نٓ وَۚٱلْقَلَمِ وَمَا يَسْطُرُونَ

Nūn Wa Al-Qalami Wa Mā Yasţurūna

نٓ. And the writing instrument, and all that they ink on a line.

The pen

In the beginning, Allāh created the qalam. It was instructed to record creation.

ن. The twenty-fifth letter of the Arabic alphabet,

carries within it the mysteries of the Qur’ān.

ن, like other opening verses that would come,

marks the incompleteness of human comprehension of the divine.

Sufi mystics often sought deeper meaning by deconstructing words into their letters and letters into their strokes.

The dot

In the beginning of the Qur’ān is بسمالله and in its beginning is ب

Hovering underneath the ب is the nuqtā.

A dot from which all strokes and curves are extruded.

It translates the width of the qalam into the length of the stroke

According to the Sufi tradition, the nuqtā underneath the bowl of the ب contains all divine creation and wisdom

Or as Baba Bulleh Shah points out, from the nuqtā between ع and غ, the noise emerges, and

from the singularity of the ا, all forms emerge.

The body

In the beginning, Allāh created Ādam from the earth

آدم

Alif. Dāl. Mīm.

Five times a day, everyday, the faithful observe Salaah.

A sequence of body postures and gestures.

ا is the Qiyām. Standing in observation

د is the Jalsa. Kneeling in testimony

م is the Sajdah. Prostrating in praise

Forehead to the earth, heart above the mind.

How many nuqtās tall is an Alif?

How many nuqtās tall is a man?

The breath

In the beginning, Allāh sculpted Ādam in his proportions

And breathed of His spirit into him.

To connect to the divine, Sufis perform Zikr

A ritual of remembrance using voice, movement and breath.

Scripting the light of Allāh into the heart.

الله

هو

Allāh in. Hu out.

الله in. هو out.

Arabic calligraphers save the wood shavings from their qalams

To kindle the fires that warm their own funerary baths.

Can one exist inside of the letters of an alphabet?

Can one exist outside of the letters of an alphabet?