The first in historical order is that represented by S̱ẖaqīq Balḵẖī, Ibrāhim Adham, Rābi‘a, and others. This school conceives the ultimate reality as "Will", and the Universe a finite activity of that will. It is essentially monotheistic and consequently more semitic in character. It is not the desire of Knowledge which dominates the ideal of the Ṣūfīs of this school, but the characteristic features of their life are piety, unworldliness, and an intense longing for God due to the consciousness of sin. Their object is not to philosophise, but principally to work out a certain ideal of life. From our standpoint, therefore, they are not of much importance. B. _Reality as Beauty._ In the beginning of the 9{th} century Ma‘rūf Karḵẖī defined Ṣūfīism as "Apprehension of Divine realities"[113:1]--a definition which marks the movement from Faith to Knowledge. But the method of apprehending the ultimate reality was formally stated by Al-Qus̱ẖairī about the end of the 10{th} century. The teachers of this school adopted the Neo-Platonic idea of creation by intermediary agencies; and though this idea lingered in the minds of Ṣūfī writers for a long time, yet their Pantheism led them to abandon the Emanation theory altogether. Like Avicenna they looked upon the ultimate Reality as "Eternal Beauty" whose very nature consists in seeing its own "face" reflected in the Universe-mirror. The Universe, therefore, became to them a reflected image of the "Eternal Beauty", and not an emanation as the Neo-Platonists had taught. The cause of creation, says Mīr Sayyid S̱ẖarīf, is the manifestation of Beauty, and the first creation is Love. The realisation of this Beauty, is brought about by universal love, which the innate Zoroastrian instinct of the Persian Ṣūfī loved to define as "the Sacred Fire which burns up everything other than God." Says Rūmī:-- "O thou pleasant madness, Love! Thou Physician of all our ills! Thou healer of pride, Thou Plato and Galen of our souls!"[114:1] [113:1] Mr. Nicholson has collected the various definitions of Ṣūfīism. See J. R. A. S. April, 1906. [114:1] Maṯẖnawī, Jalāl al Dīn Rūmī, with Baḥral ‘ulūm's Commentary. Lucknow (India), 1877, p. 9. As a direct consequence of such a view of the Universe, we have the idea of impersonal absorption which first appears in Bāyazīd of Bistām, and which constitutes the characteristic feature of the later development of this school. The growth of this idea may have been influenced by Hindu pilgrims travelling through Persia to the Buddhistic temple still existing at Bāku.[114:2] The school became wildly pantheistic in Ḥusain Manṣūr who, in the true spirit of the Indian Vedantist, cried out, "I am God"--Aham Brahma asmi.