Hazrat Shaykh Wahid Bakhsh Rabbani r.a.
It must be remembered that in the Quran and Hadith we are told that there are two kinds of world, Alam-i-Zahir and Alam-i-Batin, the outer world and the inner-world. God, angels, paradise, hell and souls belong to the inner world (Alam-i-Batin); and this physical universe belongs to outer world (Alam-i-Zahir). It is also mentioned frequently in the Quran and Hadith that things of Alam-i-Batin are often revealed to the prophets and saints. The Quran has also been revealed to the Noble Prophet through Jibril by Batini means. All the Hadith-al-Qudsi are also the result of Batini talk or communication between Allah Almighty and the Noble Prophet.
The Quran and Hadith are also full of the accounts of miracles performed by the Prophet and karamaat performed by the Auliya Allah. It is a part of faith in Islam to believe in miracles and Karamaat. Then there is another kind of revelation called Ilham or Ilqa by which Allah s.w.t. reveals certain things to His chosen people personally through Batini (inner) relationship. The Prophet has said in a Hadith that:
“The Quran has an external (Zahiri) and internal meaning. That internal meaning has another internal meaning till seven internal meanings.”
The Prophets and Auliya Allah know these inner meanings of the Quran. Hazrat Ali has said:
“If I wrote the Batini (inner) meanings of Surah Fatiha (half a page) it would be the load of seventy camels.”
Once Abdullah bin Abbas went to Hazrat Ali and asked him to explain the inner meanings of Surah Fatiha. He went on explaining the whole night and when the Azan of the next morning prayer was recited, he was still explaining the meanings of the first letter “B” of Bismillah. This shows that the mysteries of creation (Haqqaiq and Maarif) are revealed by Allah s.w.t. to the prophets and saints (Auliya) and nobody can deny it. Revelation (Kashf) is of many degrees. Revelations to the prophets are known as Wahy, to the saints (Auliya) as Karamaat, and ordinary pious persons as Ilham and Ilqa. There are several examples of these revelations in the Quran and Hadith.”