Islamic law and sufism
Advice
“My dear son, your words and deeds should be according to the shari’ah since knowledge and action without observance of the shari’ah is nothing but deviation. Do not be deceived by ecstatic utterances and vehement cries of the Sufis because this path can be traversed by fighting one’s whims and selfish desires through spiritual exercises not through falsity and wrong practices. You should know that a fluent and quick tongue and a closed heart full of heedlessness and lust are signs of unhappiness. Until you annihilate your selfish, lower self of desires and lusts through strict and sincere mujahada, self disciplinary exercises, your heart will never become illuminated with the light of knowledge.”
The principle of shari’ah, the law: implementing the law and the science of tasawwuf
Imam Al Ghazali, may Allah allow us to benefit from him, in this lesson wants to establish a principle for all of us, for all believers, and this principle must be implemented from the very beginning of your journey to Allah subhan wa tala’a. It is the principle of shari’ah, adopting and implementing the law of Allah subhana wa ta’ala and Rasulu Allah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam, on the earth. This is the foundation for all of us.
1 – The one who implements the fiqh, the outward duties and obligations of a believer without implementation of the science of tasawwuf is on a path to deviate somehow and he will sin inevitably because he doesn’t have the meat behind the rules because he is concentrating on trying to implement the rules but the spirit is not there, and surely he will lead himself to destruction.
2 – The one who implements tasawwuf without the fiqh is on a path to become a person who all of a sudden he feels that he doesn’t need to implement the shari’ah and the fiqh, so therefore he is on a path of deviation away from Allah subhana wa ta’ala and Rasul Allah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. However, the combination of the two – fiqh and tasawwuf – is the the haqq, this is the truth of what we are trying to establish. It is the truth that all the ‘ulama of the past are trying to establish and that this was the catch-cry, the hallmark of Abu Haamid al Ghazali rahim Allahu ‘alayh.
The three areas of ‘ilm, knowledge1) The Shari’ah
So when we refer to the shari’ah, it encompasses the laws of Islam, the pillars of Islam. The five pillars and those which emanate and stem from the five pillars of Islam.
2) The Tariqah
When we talk about the tariqah, that is the path of suluk, we usually are referring to iman, It is being taught that the person who is steadfast on the tariqah then his thirst will be quenched from above, and Allah subhana wa ta’ala has mentioned this in the Holy Quran.
3) The Haqiqah
The knowledge of ihsan is attributed to the haqiqah which is the divine truth.
Our words indeed should be according to the shari’ah. Everything that we say and everything that we do should fall in line with the laws, rules, and regulations of the rules of the law of Islam (fiqh). And this can only occur if you have studied, if you have acquired the divine knowledge. For you to know the difference between haram and halal and sunnah and makruh, etc., With this, you begin your journey towards Allah subhana wa tala’a.
The stages of the human being’s life:
1 - The first phase is that of talb طلب
The student phase of learning. If a person has a strong foundation at the beginning of his life, then inshaAllah this will keep him safe throughout the rest of his life and he will have, inshaAllah, a good ending. If not, if a person’s foundation was a little bit shaky at the beginning, this person will tend to stumble along the way and he can be deviated. Someone can take him off the path, and he comes back on, and he stumbles and trips and makes mistakes. However, if at the beginning of his life he managed to capture some of the blessings of the divine ‘ilm, then something will happen towards the end of his life which will straighten him up, inshaAllah, and help him have a good ending.
This age of building the foundation: the age of tamyiz تمييز
The age of seven years “tamayyuz” is the ability of a child to distinguish between male and female. This is where the role of the parents come in by taking the child by the hand and filling his heart and mind with the correct thoughts and the correct beliefs :
a) The belief of tawhid
Building this tawhid in the child’s heart and soul is all for Allah subhana wa tala’a, and Allah constantly watches you. So you teach the child “Allah is always with you. Allah is always watching you. Allah subhana wa ta’ala loves you. Allah is the One who gives. Allah is the One who raises you. Allah is the One who gave you birth. Allah is the One that gives you death.” All of these constant lessons should continuously be given to the child even if the child does not understand what it is that you are trying to pass onto him. The child at this tender age absorbs what it is you tell him.
b) The haqiqah
- Teaching the children the truth.
- Teaching them about Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
- You help them to memorize the Holy Quran
- You teach them of the mutun, these are texts or couplets. It could be hadith. It could be poems which are based on fiqh principles.
- Exposing your children to mashayikh, ahl al ‘ilm, those who are close to Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
So you introduce your child, “This is Shaykh such-and-such. This is Shaykh such-and-such. Look at him, gaze at his face, shake his hand, kiss his hand, kiss his head.” So the child respects the shaykh and loves the shaykh not because of the fact that he is anything except for he is one who is carrying the divine knowledge and he is carrying something sacred and he is an inheritor of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam.
The نظرات nazharat, the gazes which the mashayikh are giving to your children. Being in the constant company of the mashayikh and the mashayikh looking at the child has an impact on the child’s heart. And don’t take these words lightly because these words are translated to us from generation to generation to people who have tried and tested this. These nazharaat, and Allahu ‘alem, Allah knows what these gazes are filled with. It’s not just the look. Don’t look just at the physical. Allah knows what is being sent from the shaykh to the child. And why? Because the shaykh is an inheritor of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam. You understand the concept of the blue tooth and you accept the blue tooth where files are transferred from phone to telephone without seeing anything happen. If this is something which is capable, which is created by human beings, then what about from human being to human being? Allah subhana wa ta’ala created the human being and the ability for the human being to send anwaar (lights), to send nur and secrets from Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
Habib mentioned a story of one of the mashayikh in Hadramawt, and he said “My father took me to a place in the company of all these great people, all these mashayikh, and there was one of the haba’ib passing through, one of the ‘aarifeen billah, one of these people who were connected and had this qurb with Allah subhana wa tal’ala, and this shaykh gazed at me.” This is the child explaining. He said, “this gaze which I received from the shaykh came back to me at the age of 40.” And Allahu ‘alem, maybe he got this sir, this asraar, or the secrets of this gaze at the age of 40 wa Allahu ‘alem.
When we are talking about the نظرات nazharaat, the divine gazes, we are not talking about the divine gazes to the faces. We are not talking about looking from face to face, but it is nazharaat, it is divine gazes which is sent from Allah subhana wa tal’ala from one heart to another heart. So you need to switch on your heart inshaAllah. Usually these nazharaat, or these gazes, come without you even realizing it. It comes from that which you did not even expect, and a lot of the time these nazharaat are hidden, and sometimes you may say to yourself, “Oh, he never looked at me. He never gives me nazharaat. Why doesn’t he look towards me?” Well, like we just said, it may come from somewhere where you least expected it. Or it may be happening, or a nazharaat may be occurring, and you’re not even realizing it. So the idea is to purify yourself inshaAllah. Prepare yourself. Prepare your intention. We purify our intentions so that we receive the divine gazes which inshaAllah revives our hearts.
So the child grows up with reverence to the mashayikh. And you do this until they reach the age of puberty, the age of responsibility where now their books are opened up and everything they do is recorded for them or against them.
- Teaching them the adaab of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salim, the character of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam.
Building the foundation.
This foundation building requires that we implement three points:
1) Tahfiz تحفيظ – Memorization
Is rote memorization, committing to memory, memorizing by heart – that being memorization of the Quran or memorization of ahadith or memorization of other mutun, other texts, which the child will benefit from later as they grow up, inshaAllah.
2) Talqin تلقين – Repetition, so you speak and they repeat after you
We mean here is that you should sit with your children repeat principles of the deen. Teach them concepts of Islam, arkaan ad deen, and they repeat after you, “What did I just teach you?” “What did I just say?” and they repeat after you, and also talqin al-dhikr تلقين الذكر which is saying phrases of dhikr and they repeat after you.
This enables you to plug into the sir, the secret of passing on the knowledge through a connected chain which goes all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. And this is the secret of our deen which is not present in any other way of life, if you like, in that we have a connection that goes all the way back to the Prophet Muhammd salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam which also goes all the way back to our father, Adam (‘alayhi assalaam) where Allah subhana wa ta’ala says in the holy Quran,
وَعَلَّمَ آدَمَ الْأَسْمَاءَ كُلَّهَا (Al Baqara, Ayah 31) “And He taught Adam the names of all things” - the names, the nouns, what is life, what is the universe. Allah subhana wa ta’ala taught Adam ‘alayhi assalaam and the knowledge continued generation after generation until it reached us. This is talqin.
3) Mujaalisa مجالسة – Being in the company of people which we will mention now
This is the method of the ‘arifeen billah, those who have this experiential knowledge of Allah subhana wa ta’ala, those who are close to Allah subhana wa ta’ala. These are methods that are tried and tested. They are not experiments. They are proven to work. So why change something if it is not broken. So we are continuing in that tradition in that you should take your children to sit in the company of ahl al ma’arifa, sit in the company of ‘ulama, sit in the company of the mashayikh. We are talking about sitting in the company of those who have this connection with Allah subhana wa ta’ala, not sitting in the company of a university professor. We are talking about sitting in the company of Allah subhana wa ta’ala even if the head of the family, even if you yourself were an ‘aalim, a shaykh, you yourself have this connection going all the way back to RasulAllah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. It is recommended even for you to take your child and to sit him in the company of other ahl al ma’arifa. In this way, the child also receives from them. He receives from them, not just you as a father, but he also receives from them and he makes his acquiring of the divine knowledge strong and built on sanad. It is an unbroken chain going all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbih wa salam. Unfortunately, many of Muslim households of today have lost these ingredients, so what you see today is not an accurate representation of what it is to be a true Muslim.
Unfortunately many Muslims, they don’t care. They are not worried about how their children are raised or what their children are exposed to and just put them in any school. They are not worried about the quality of the school or any kindergarten for that matter. They are not worried about what their children are exposed to, so that the child grows up with all these social diseases and social problems that the parent cannot work out or understand why the child is befallen with such ills. All this is because you did not take advantage of the foundational years.
Habib Umar bin Hafiz
Advice
“....Your words and deeds should be according to the shari’ah.”
Allah subhana wa ta’ala does not accept anything from a person except that his words and deeds are in line with the shari’ah.
So a person whose outside actions are not in line with the shari’ah is a person who is in a loss. This person has not fulfilled his duty in having his word and deed in line with the shari’ah.
We have learned from Junayd bin Muhammad some of the wisdoms. He is of the people whose heart has been purified and has been given the correct understanding. And none of what you do is accepted except that which falls in line with two things :
- That is the kitaab, which is the Quran
- The sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. So if anything comes or emanates from you which is not in accordance with the kitab or with the sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam, this is a point against you.
So this is like something which has possessed you, has come upon you that you have no acquired the truth.
Contrast this, these are words from those who come with the correct understanding which is being given to them by Allah subhana wa ta’ala.... Compare this to somebody who has just acquired some knowledge and just derived some wisdoms from this and is saying this is the truth yet he has not been connected to Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
The haqiqah of the deen is given to those people who are using that which is on the earth to help others understand what Allah subhana wa ta’ala is intending.
The person who has come up with these theories of understanding and are thinking they are helping the deen, if you like, by taking into consideration different thoughts and different opinions which are not connected to the truth, the reality is that these people are jaahil, these people are ignorant, so how can they actually be helping the deen?
So these people that use their own mind or their own ‘aql if you like to the best of their understanding and the science and the modern-day methods to try to impart an opinion or a side or a solution to the modern-day problems just for the sake of trying to appeal to the masses, if you like, but they are not actually given the truth and they are cut off from the deen The true cure for all our issues as human beings is a connection to the divine light from Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
Obviously the source of this is the beautiful advices and words come from Allah subhana wa ta’ala, the Most Merciful, and His most beloved the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam. And this is also what is required. With this is also using good character and mercy and trying to bring about the understanding of those who are acquiring this knowledge.
Some of the mashayikh of the Shaam, of Syria, would cure the darkness of the heart through dhikr. So many people would go to these mashayikh and they would be given dhikr from the mashayikh and their hearts would be cure. Even to the extent that one of the missionaries of the Christians went to them. So he said to him, “Write down your beliefs, your creed as you understand and as you believe right now, even the trinity, everything, write it down right now.” And so he wrote down the beliefs of the Christians, the deviant beliefs of the Christians at the time. So he said to him, “leave this now aside and go” and he put him in khalwa, in isolation where you only busy yourself with Allah, Allah, Allah and nothing else. After his isolation was complete for a number of days, the shaykh gave back to him what he had written down before he went into isolation. The man said, “I am innocent of what has been written, this is incorrect.” So he said, “What’s the truth?” He said, “Allah is One, there are no partners with Allah subhana wa ta’ala, and the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam is His last Prophet and Messenger.” So he became Muslim and his Islam was perfect.
However, if he had gone to the shaykh with this idea that he is a missionary and he going to try to convert the shaykh using his mentality, days would have passed and he would have not come into Islam.
How many gatherings where the righteous people speak words of Allah and it moves the hearts, even of the kuffaar.
When Imam Al Haddad is explaining the path of the saliheen (the righteous), he said listen carefully. He said, put aside the speech of those people that experiment, they try this and they try that, and instead stay with the book of Allah and the sunnah. Putting into action which is not in line with the shariah is deviation.
Imam Abdurrahman As Saqqaf said, “Every knowledge without action is worthless, and every knowledge without intentions is false, and all knowledge, actions, and intentions without the following of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam is rejected. And every knowledge, action, intention, and implementation of the sunnah without sincerity is also rejected.” Whoever combines all of this it is very difficult to find deviation in such a person.
In the ayah “And those people that do whatever they do, in their hearts tremble,” Aishah asked the Prophet salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salaam “What is the meaning of such an ayah? Is this a person who commits a sin and his heart trembles?” And the Prophet salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam said, “No these are the people who when they fast and pray and do all the righteous deeds, their hearts tremble.”
You look at many a servant where the beginning of their night and the ending of their night is so different where in the middle of the night they engage in the remembrance of Allah, recitation of the Quran, or standing up in prayer. In the end of the night they stand making istigfaar, it is as if they’ve done nothing (i.e. no sin). Look at that person and the person commits sins and engages in sin in the night and doesn’t even make istigfaar with Allah. This person is not forgiven.
In a hadith it is said that a believer is one who combines excellence in his servanthood and fear of Allah, whereas the hypocrite does bad deeds on the earth and at the same time he feels safe from what he has done. The combination of excellence and fear, this is the true servanthood with Allah. This is why we hear of the mala-ikah who are protected by Allah and are in the divine protection of Allah.
The fear of Allah is according to one’s knowledge of Allah. So as they are close to Allah, their fear increases. Whoever’s fear is pure, then his hope is also true. If you understand the greatness of Allah, you will fear. And if you fear Allah properly, then you expose yourself to the mercy of Allah.
You are like the one - using a hikmah - is like planting a seed and once he plants the seed, he nurtures the seed, and he waits for the harvest, and this is the true servant of Allah. If a person does not fear Allah and that same person says we want Allah, he is like a person who plants a seedling and does not nurture it and still waits for the fruits to come. This is a futile hope.
“My dear son, your words and deeds should be according to the shari’ah since knowledge and action without observance of the shari’ah is nothing but deviation. Do not be deceived by ecstatic utterances and vehement cries of the Sufis because this path can be traversed by fighting one’s whims and selfish desires through spiritual exercises not through falsity and wrong practices. You should know that a fluent and quick tongue and a closed heart full of heedlessness and lust are signs of unhappiness. Until you annihilate your selfish, lower self of desires and lusts through strict and sincere mujahada, self disciplinary exercises, your heart will never become illuminated with the light of knowledge.”
The principle of shari’ah, the law: implementing the law and the science of tasawwuf
Imam Al Ghazali, may Allah allow us to benefit from him, in this lesson wants to establish a principle for all of us, for all believers, and this principle must be implemented from the very beginning of your journey to Allah subhan wa tala’a. It is the principle of shari’ah, adopting and implementing the law of Allah subhana wa ta’ala and Rasulu Allah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam, on the earth. This is the foundation for all of us.
1 – The one who implements the fiqh, the outward duties and obligations of a believer without implementation of the science of tasawwuf is on a path to deviate somehow and he will sin inevitably because he doesn’t have the meat behind the rules because he is concentrating on trying to implement the rules but the spirit is not there, and surely he will lead himself to destruction.
2 – The one who implements tasawwuf without the fiqh is on a path to become a person who all of a sudden he feels that he doesn’t need to implement the shari’ah and the fiqh, so therefore he is on a path of deviation away from Allah subhana wa ta’ala and Rasul Allah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. However, the combination of the two – fiqh and tasawwuf – is the the haqq, this is the truth of what we are trying to establish. It is the truth that all the ‘ulama of the past are trying to establish and that this was the catch-cry, the hallmark of Abu Haamid al Ghazali rahim Allahu ‘alayh.
The three areas of ‘ilm, knowledge1) The Shari’ah
So when we refer to the shari’ah, it encompasses the laws of Islam, the pillars of Islam. The five pillars and those which emanate and stem from the five pillars of Islam.
2) The Tariqah
When we talk about the tariqah, that is the path of suluk, we usually are referring to iman, It is being taught that the person who is steadfast on the tariqah then his thirst will be quenched from above, and Allah subhana wa ta’ala has mentioned this in the Holy Quran.
3) The Haqiqah
The knowledge of ihsan is attributed to the haqiqah which is the divine truth.
Our words indeed should be according to the shari’ah. Everything that we say and everything that we do should fall in line with the laws, rules, and regulations of the rules of the law of Islam (fiqh). And this can only occur if you have studied, if you have acquired the divine knowledge. For you to know the difference between haram and halal and sunnah and makruh, etc., With this, you begin your journey towards Allah subhana wa tala’a.
The stages of the human being’s life:
1 - The first phase is that of talb طلب
The student phase of learning. If a person has a strong foundation at the beginning of his life, then inshaAllah this will keep him safe throughout the rest of his life and he will have, inshaAllah, a good ending. If not, if a person’s foundation was a little bit shaky at the beginning, this person will tend to stumble along the way and he can be deviated. Someone can take him off the path, and he comes back on, and he stumbles and trips and makes mistakes. However, if at the beginning of his life he managed to capture some of the blessings of the divine ‘ilm, then something will happen towards the end of his life which will straighten him up, inshaAllah, and help him have a good ending.
This age of building the foundation: the age of tamyiz تمييز
The age of seven years “tamayyuz” is the ability of a child to distinguish between male and female. This is where the role of the parents come in by taking the child by the hand and filling his heart and mind with the correct thoughts and the correct beliefs :
a) The belief of tawhid
Building this tawhid in the child’s heart and soul is all for Allah subhana wa tala’a, and Allah constantly watches you. So you teach the child “Allah is always with you. Allah is always watching you. Allah subhana wa ta’ala loves you. Allah is the One who gives. Allah is the One who raises you. Allah is the One who gave you birth. Allah is the One that gives you death.” All of these constant lessons should continuously be given to the child even if the child does not understand what it is that you are trying to pass onto him. The child at this tender age absorbs what it is you tell him.
b) The haqiqah
- Teaching the children the truth.
- Teaching them about Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
- You help them to memorize the Holy Quran
- You teach them of the mutun, these are texts or couplets. It could be hadith. It could be poems which are based on fiqh principles.
- Exposing your children to mashayikh, ahl al ‘ilm, those who are close to Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
So you introduce your child, “This is Shaykh such-and-such. This is Shaykh such-and-such. Look at him, gaze at his face, shake his hand, kiss his hand, kiss his head.” So the child respects the shaykh and loves the shaykh not because of the fact that he is anything except for he is one who is carrying the divine knowledge and he is carrying something sacred and he is an inheritor of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam.
The نظرات nazharat, the gazes which the mashayikh are giving to your children. Being in the constant company of the mashayikh and the mashayikh looking at the child has an impact on the child’s heart. And don’t take these words lightly because these words are translated to us from generation to generation to people who have tried and tested this. These nazharaat, and Allahu ‘alem, Allah knows what these gazes are filled with. It’s not just the look. Don’t look just at the physical. Allah knows what is being sent from the shaykh to the child. And why? Because the shaykh is an inheritor of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam. You understand the concept of the blue tooth and you accept the blue tooth where files are transferred from phone to telephone without seeing anything happen. If this is something which is capable, which is created by human beings, then what about from human being to human being? Allah subhana wa ta’ala created the human being and the ability for the human being to send anwaar (lights), to send nur and secrets from Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
Habib mentioned a story of one of the mashayikh in Hadramawt, and he said “My father took me to a place in the company of all these great people, all these mashayikh, and there was one of the haba’ib passing through, one of the ‘aarifeen billah, one of these people who were connected and had this qurb with Allah subhana wa tal’ala, and this shaykh gazed at me.” This is the child explaining. He said, “this gaze which I received from the shaykh came back to me at the age of 40.” And Allahu ‘alem, maybe he got this sir, this asraar, or the secrets of this gaze at the age of 40 wa Allahu ‘alem.
When we are talking about the نظرات nazharaat, the divine gazes, we are not talking about the divine gazes to the faces. We are not talking about looking from face to face, but it is nazharaat, it is divine gazes which is sent from Allah subhana wa tal’ala from one heart to another heart. So you need to switch on your heart inshaAllah. Usually these nazharaat, or these gazes, come without you even realizing it. It comes from that which you did not even expect, and a lot of the time these nazharaat are hidden, and sometimes you may say to yourself, “Oh, he never looked at me. He never gives me nazharaat. Why doesn’t he look towards me?” Well, like we just said, it may come from somewhere where you least expected it. Or it may be happening, or a nazharaat may be occurring, and you’re not even realizing it. So the idea is to purify yourself inshaAllah. Prepare yourself. Prepare your intention. We purify our intentions so that we receive the divine gazes which inshaAllah revives our hearts.
So the child grows up with reverence to the mashayikh. And you do this until they reach the age of puberty, the age of responsibility where now their books are opened up and everything they do is recorded for them or against them.
- Teaching them the adaab of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salim, the character of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam.
Building the foundation.
This foundation building requires that we implement three points:
1) Tahfiz تحفيظ – Memorization
Is rote memorization, committing to memory, memorizing by heart – that being memorization of the Quran or memorization of ahadith or memorization of other mutun, other texts, which the child will benefit from later as they grow up, inshaAllah.
2) Talqin تلقين – Repetition, so you speak and they repeat after you
We mean here is that you should sit with your children repeat principles of the deen. Teach them concepts of Islam, arkaan ad deen, and they repeat after you, “What did I just teach you?” “What did I just say?” and they repeat after you, and also talqin al-dhikr تلقين الذكر which is saying phrases of dhikr and they repeat after you.
This enables you to plug into the sir, the secret of passing on the knowledge through a connected chain which goes all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. And this is the secret of our deen which is not present in any other way of life, if you like, in that we have a connection that goes all the way back to the Prophet Muhammd salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam which also goes all the way back to our father, Adam (‘alayhi assalaam) where Allah subhana wa ta’ala says in the holy Quran,
وَعَلَّمَ آدَمَ الْأَسْمَاءَ كُلَّهَا (Al Baqara, Ayah 31) “And He taught Adam the names of all things” - the names, the nouns, what is life, what is the universe. Allah subhana wa ta’ala taught Adam ‘alayhi assalaam and the knowledge continued generation after generation until it reached us. This is talqin.
3) Mujaalisa مجالسة – Being in the company of people which we will mention now
This is the method of the ‘arifeen billah, those who have this experiential knowledge of Allah subhana wa ta’ala, those who are close to Allah subhana wa ta’ala. These are methods that are tried and tested. They are not experiments. They are proven to work. So why change something if it is not broken. So we are continuing in that tradition in that you should take your children to sit in the company of ahl al ma’arifa, sit in the company of ‘ulama, sit in the company of the mashayikh. We are talking about sitting in the company of those who have this connection with Allah subhana wa ta’ala, not sitting in the company of a university professor. We are talking about sitting in the company of Allah subhana wa ta’ala even if the head of the family, even if you yourself were an ‘aalim, a shaykh, you yourself have this connection going all the way back to RasulAllah salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. It is recommended even for you to take your child and to sit him in the company of other ahl al ma’arifa. In this way, the child also receives from them. He receives from them, not just you as a father, but he also receives from them and he makes his acquiring of the divine knowledge strong and built on sanad. It is an unbroken chain going all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbih wa salam. Unfortunately, many of Muslim households of today have lost these ingredients, so what you see today is not an accurate representation of what it is to be a true Muslim.
Unfortunately many Muslims, they don’t care. They are not worried about how their children are raised or what their children are exposed to and just put them in any school. They are not worried about the quality of the school or any kindergarten for that matter. They are not worried about what their children are exposed to, so that the child grows up with all these social diseases and social problems that the parent cannot work out or understand why the child is befallen with such ills. All this is because you did not take advantage of the foundational years.
Habib Umar bin Hafiz
Advice
“....Your words and deeds should be according to the shari’ah.”
Allah subhana wa ta’ala does not accept anything from a person except that his words and deeds are in line with the shari’ah.
So a person whose outside actions are not in line with the shari’ah is a person who is in a loss. This person has not fulfilled his duty in having his word and deed in line with the shari’ah.
We have learned from Junayd bin Muhammad some of the wisdoms. He is of the people whose heart has been purified and has been given the correct understanding. And none of what you do is accepted except that which falls in line with two things :
- That is the kitaab, which is the Quran
- The sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam. So if anything comes or emanates from you which is not in accordance with the kitab or with the sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam, this is a point against you.
So this is like something which has possessed you, has come upon you that you have no acquired the truth.
Contrast this, these are words from those who come with the correct understanding which is being given to them by Allah subhana wa ta’ala.... Compare this to somebody who has just acquired some knowledge and just derived some wisdoms from this and is saying this is the truth yet he has not been connected to Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
The haqiqah of the deen is given to those people who are using that which is on the earth to help others understand what Allah subhana wa ta’ala is intending.
The person who has come up with these theories of understanding and are thinking they are helping the deen, if you like, by taking into consideration different thoughts and different opinions which are not connected to the truth, the reality is that these people are jaahil, these people are ignorant, so how can they actually be helping the deen?
So these people that use their own mind or their own ‘aql if you like to the best of their understanding and the science and the modern-day methods to try to impart an opinion or a side or a solution to the modern-day problems just for the sake of trying to appeal to the masses, if you like, but they are not actually given the truth and they are cut off from the deen The true cure for all our issues as human beings is a connection to the divine light from Allah subhana wa ta’ala.
Obviously the source of this is the beautiful advices and words come from Allah subhana wa ta’ala, the Most Merciful, and His most beloved the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa aalihi wa sahbihi wa salam. And this is also what is required. With this is also using good character and mercy and trying to bring about the understanding of those who are acquiring this knowledge.
Some of the mashayikh of the Shaam, of Syria, would cure the darkness of the heart through dhikr. So many people would go to these mashayikh and they would be given dhikr from the mashayikh and their hearts would be cure. Even to the extent that one of the missionaries of the Christians went to them. So he said to him, “Write down your beliefs, your creed as you understand and as you believe right now, even the trinity, everything, write it down right now.” And so he wrote down the beliefs of the Christians, the deviant beliefs of the Christians at the time. So he said to him, “leave this now aside and go” and he put him in khalwa, in isolation where you only busy yourself with Allah, Allah, Allah and nothing else. After his isolation was complete for a number of days, the shaykh gave back to him what he had written down before he went into isolation. The man said, “I am innocent of what has been written, this is incorrect.” So he said, “What’s the truth?” He said, “Allah is One, there are no partners with Allah subhana wa ta’ala, and the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam is His last Prophet and Messenger.” So he became Muslim and his Islam was perfect.
However, if he had gone to the shaykh with this idea that he is a missionary and he going to try to convert the shaykh using his mentality, days would have passed and he would have not come into Islam.
How many gatherings where the righteous people speak words of Allah and it moves the hearts, even of the kuffaar.
When Imam Al Haddad is explaining the path of the saliheen (the righteous), he said listen carefully. He said, put aside the speech of those people that experiment, they try this and they try that, and instead stay with the book of Allah and the sunnah. Putting into action which is not in line with the shariah is deviation.
Imam Abdurrahman As Saqqaf said, “Every knowledge without action is worthless, and every knowledge without intentions is false, and all knowledge, actions, and intentions without the following of the Prophet Muhammad salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam is rejected. And every knowledge, action, intention, and implementation of the sunnah without sincerity is also rejected.” Whoever combines all of this it is very difficult to find deviation in such a person.
In the ayah “And those people that do whatever they do, in their hearts tremble,” Aishah asked the Prophet salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salaam “What is the meaning of such an ayah? Is this a person who commits a sin and his heart trembles?” And the Prophet salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa salam said, “No these are the people who when they fast and pray and do all the righteous deeds, their hearts tremble.”
You look at many a servant where the beginning of their night and the ending of their night is so different where in the middle of the night they engage in the remembrance of Allah, recitation of the Quran, or standing up in prayer. In the end of the night they stand making istigfaar, it is as if they’ve done nothing (i.e. no sin). Look at that person and the person commits sins and engages in sin in the night and doesn’t even make istigfaar with Allah. This person is not forgiven.
In a hadith it is said that a believer is one who combines excellence in his servanthood and fear of Allah, whereas the hypocrite does bad deeds on the earth and at the same time he feels safe from what he has done. The combination of excellence and fear, this is the true servanthood with Allah. This is why we hear of the mala-ikah who are protected by Allah and are in the divine protection of Allah.
The fear of Allah is according to one’s knowledge of Allah. So as they are close to Allah, their fear increases. Whoever’s fear is pure, then his hope is also true. If you understand the greatness of Allah, you will fear. And if you fear Allah properly, then you expose yourself to the mercy of Allah.
You are like the one - using a hikmah - is like planting a seed and once he plants the seed, he nurtures the seed, and he waits for the harvest, and this is the true servant of Allah. If a person does not fear Allah and that same person says we want Allah, he is like a person who plants a seedling and does not nurture it and still waits for the fruits to come. This is a futile hope.