Today is the 27th of the sacred month of Rajab, and according to the majority view, that is the day when Rasool Allah, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, traveled on his Night Journey (Israa) to Jerusalem, and then ascended from there to the Heavens (the Mi’raaj). Here are some important lessons and rulings for the seeker, that ulamaa have gained through study of the hadiths of the Israa:

The Life of Prophets:

The Prophet, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, said that during his Israa, he passed over the Prophet Moses standing in his grave, praying (1). Then when he arrived at Jerusalem, all the Prophets came there in their bodies and clothes, and he led them in Salaat (2). Then when he ascended into the Heavens, he saw some of the Prophets there once more, as is well known.

From this we can take the following:

1) Proof that the Prophets are alive after their death, and that their bodies are still intact. The Prophet salla Allah alayhi wa sallam, told his companions that he will hear the salaat and salaam that the people of future generations will say to him, and they asked him how that is possible, when his body has decomposed, and he said, “Allah has forbidden the Earth to eat the bodies of the Prophets” (3).

2) Evidence that the Prophets can be seen after their death, by those who are awake. It also shows that it is not impossible for the Prophet Muhammad, salla Allah alayhi wa sallam, to go to, and appear to, Muslims in different parts of the world, just as the Prophets went to Jerusalem on that night.

3) Evidence that after their death, Prophets can appear in more than one place at once, or travel miraculously from one place to another. For example, our Prophet saw sayyidna Musa praying in his grave, then in Jerusalem, then in the sixth heaven, all in the same night. (4)

Honoring the Places of the Prophets and Righteous Servants

During the Israa’ journey to Jerusalem, the angel Gabriel said to the Prophet, “Descend and pray in this spot”, so the Prophet prayed there, and then Gabriel said, “Do you know where you prayed?”, and when he answered in the negative, the angel explained that he prayed in the place where Moses rested under a tree, in the city of Madyan (See the Holy Qur’an, verse 24 of surat Al-Qasas). (5)

The Angel Gabriel made the Prophet perform the Salaat in another spot during the Israa, and after the Prophet prayed there, Gabriel explained that it was Bethlehem, where sayyidna Isa was born (6). Then they did the same on Mt. Sinai were God spoke to sayyidna Musa (7), and also in Yathrib (8).

The great shaykh Ahmad Al-Dardir wrote, “From this we take the permissibility of seeking blessings from the traces of the Prophets and the Righteous.”

The Imam of the Azhar, shaykh Saleh al- Jaafari al-Husayni, explained that this was because the Prophet descended while on his journey, and got off the Buraq, for the sake of the piece of land on which Moses sat, thus honoring Moses and showing respect to him, and giving thanks to Allah Most High.

The other ruling that we can take from that is the permissibility to visit the grave of Prophet Muhammad and pray next to him.

Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari wrote that the above hadiths showed how Allah Most High honored the places of Moses, and the Prophet was instructed to pray there by the angel Gabriel. And likewise, the Qur’an honored the place of Abraham, and instructed us to pray there. The Qur’an says, “And make the Maqam Ibrahim a place of Salaat” (Surat al-Baqara, verse 125), and in a variant reading it says, “And they took from the Maqam Ibrahim a place of Salaat“. Thus the Qur’an is telling us that previous nations prayed in this maqam, which is where the Prophet Abraham stood while building the Kaaba, and that we should also pray there.

Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari writes, “So how could we not then go to the Prophet - salla Allah alayhi wa sallam- when he is alive in Medina, in a garden from the gardens of Paradise(9) ? And how could we not respect his place, when Allah Most High glorified the place of Abraham and Moses, alayhim assalam?” (10)

Furthermore, it is important to note that neither Madyan, Mt. Sinai, or Bethlehem are on the way from Mecca to Jerusalem, which means that Gabriel made the Prophet travel to them only for the sake of visiting them and honoring them. This is clear refutation of those who say it is not permissible to travel solely to visit the Prophet Muhammad in Medina.

When I went to Umra, I saw that the place where sayyidna Muhammad - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam- was born, is now a library, and pilgrims are barred from entering it, and a large sign outside tells us that the Prophet never commanded us to visit the place of his birth and that praying there is shirk! However the Prophet himself prayed where the Prophet Isa was born, and if the Salaat is done to Allah alone, then how could it be shirk?!?! They are keeping the Muslims from imitating the Prophet! The place of his birth is more deserving of honor by Muslims than that of sayyidna Isa, and more deserving of performing Salaat there in praise of Allah, thanking him for sending us His Mercy unto mankind.

Should You Fast on the 27th of Rajab?

First of all, no one knows for sure if the 27th of Rajab is really the day of the Israa’ and Mi’raj.

Shaykh Yusef al-Qaradawi says, “Among the prohibited types of fasting is any kind of fasting people initiate on their own without any Shari’ah text or evidence. An example of this is the fasting on the 27th of Rajab thinking that it is the day that followed the night of Al-Israa’ and Al-Mi`raj.” (11)

But there are in fact some reports and traditions about the benefit of fasting that day, and staying up that night. However these traditions make no connection between this day and the Israa and Miraj.

Shaykhul Islam, the imam Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani, writes in his Ghunya that scholars have counted 14 nights in which it is recommended to stay up for worship, and among those are the first night of Rajab, the night of the 15th of Rajab, and the night of the 27th of Rajab.

He also relates with his isnad to Abu Hurayra, that the Prophet salla Allah alayhi wa sallam said, “For him who fasts the 27th of Rajab, the reward of sixty months of fasting will be written down for him.”

He says that it is the first day that Gabriel told the Prophet to announce his message to the people, thus it is the first day of the Prophet as a Messenger. Remember that the Prophet fasted on Mondays because it was the day he was born and the day he received the first revelation (12), and fasting on the day he was given the first message to mankind is similar to that, and might explain the merit described in the hadith above.

Al-Jilani also relates with his isnad to Hasan al-Basri the special practice of Ibn Abbas (of seclusion and Salaat from Fajr until Asr) on that day, which he said is what the Prophet did on that day, which shows that this is a special day that should be honored. (13)

And may Allah guide us to honoring His special times, places, and servants.

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1. Sahih Muslim

2. Sahih Muslim

3. In the hadith collections of Al-Nasa’i, Abu Dawood, Ibn Majah, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, and Al-Bayhaqi.

4. For a more in-depth discussion, see the article Waking Vision of the Prophet: (riyada.hadithuna.com/waking-vision-of-the-prophet/)

5. In the hadith collections of Al-Tirmidhi and Al-Bayhaqi.

6. In the hadith collections of Al-Tirmidhi and Al-Bayhaqi and Al-Nasa’i.

7. In Sunan Al-Nasa’i.

8. The Prophet changed its name to Teeba, and is now known as Al-Madina al-Munawwara. This was in the hadith collections of Al-Tirmidhi and Al-Bayhaqi and Al-Nasa’i.

9. Referring to the hadith in Sahih Bukhari: “Between my house and my pulpit is a garden from the gardens of Paradise” and the hadith in Tirmidhi: “The grave is a garden from the gardens of Paradise, or one of the pits of Hell”.

10. Al-Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari, Al-Siraj al-Wahhaj fee Qissat al-Israa’ wal-Mi’raj, Cairo: Dar Jawami’ al-Kalim.

11. Quoted in a fatwa on Islam Online.net

12. Sahih Muslim.

13. See the chapter called “Majlis: Fee Fada’il Shahr Rajab” in Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani’s Al-Ghunya li-Talibi Tariq al-Haqq.

In his book Hilyat al-Abdaal, Ibn Arabi mentions that there are four cornerstones to the spiritual path: Seclusion, Silence, Hunger, and Wakefulness.

In his book Asraar al-Siyam (The Secrets of Fasting), the Azhari imam, Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari, writes:

“They have mentioned that the Abdaal have four characteristics: Silence, Hunger, Seclusion, and Wakefulness. Now Silence is brought about by Hunger, and so is Wakefulness. And what remains is Seclusion, which is its fruit, because it is brought about by the lights of dhikr, for they cause one to find intimacy and comfort in the company of Allah (al-uns billah) and alienation in the company of all other than Him (al-wahsha ‘an siwah).

So Hunger is the basis for the (other) three, and it happens while Fasting.”

“One! One!” is all sayyidna Bilal ibn Rabah repeated as he was being tortured by his owners for proclaiming Islam. With a heavy rock crushing his chest, and pushing his bare back into the scorching sand, every inch of his body must have been burning in flames of heat. The midday sun of Mecca torturing the top of his body, and the burning sand torturing his back, there was no escape for Bilal except into the world of the spirit, to which he turned all his attention, until he drowned in the ocean of the witnessing of Allah’s oneness. His body was on fire, but his soul was drinking from the ocean of witnessing: One! One! That was the station of sayyidna Bilal, at the beginning of Islam, so just imagine what stations he reached after being Rasool Allah’s personal assistant.

He become such a lover of the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam that he could no longer say the adhaan after his death: his tears always stopping him from finishing “I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.” That is why Bilal was happy on the day of his death, saying that he would soon be reunited with sayyidna Muhammad. Allahumma Salli alaa sayyidna Muhammad wa alaa aalihi wa sahbihi wa sallem. Perhaps it was because of his great love for the Prophet that Paradise itself loved him, for it is related that the Prophet said, “Paradise longs for three: Ali, Ammar, and Bilal.”

After sayyidna Umar opened Jerusalem to Islam, Bilal moved to Bilad al-Sham, and among the places in which he settled was a place in modern day Jordan, in an area of Amman. That area is now known as Al-Rabahiyya, because Bilal ibn Rabah lived in it, and a mashhad is built there to honor his memory, which I visited.

But during his stay in Bilad al-Sham, Bilal saw the Prophet (salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) in a dream, saying, “Is it not time for you to come visit me?” Bilal woke up sad and scared, and rode to Medina. He went to the Prophet’s grave, crying there and rubbing his face on it. Al-Hasan and al-Husayn heard of his arrival so they went to him, whereupon he hugged them and kissed them, so they said, “We desire to hear your adhaan that you did for Rasool Allah salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam in the mosque.” So he climbed to the top of the mosque and when he said, “Allahu Akbar“, the city shook. When he said, “Ashhadu an laa ilaaha illa Allah“, it shook even more. And when he said, “Ashhadu anna Muhammadan Rasool Allah”, even the women that stayed secluded in their homes came out and shouted, “Rasool Allah has been raised!” After the day on which the Prophet died, there wasn’t seen as many women and men crying on any day than on that day.

Bilal headed back to Bilad al-Sham after that, dying in Damascus in his sixties. Al hamdu lillah, I found his tomb there and visited it on my last trip, and buried next to him was Abdallah son of Jaafar al-Tayyar. I had visited Sayyida Zainab bint Ali b. Abi Talib in Cairo, who was Abdallah’s wife,  and his father Sayyidna Jaafar in Jordan. Abdallah is famous for his generosity.

“I wonder how the Umayyads would have felt had they known that people would one day climb up to the top of their palaces to watch airplanes landing,” I said to Amar. It was sunset, and the both of us were standing on top of the Throne Hall of Mushatta palace, as a plane landed slowly and gracefully. Of course when you’re inside the plane you know it’s not slow, and not particularly graceful, but from on top of those ancient ruins, that’s how it looked.

The palace was supposed to be the most magnificent in the Middle East, but its founder, Walid II, was assassinated before its completion. There was no one else on the ruin premises, but you can see the military Humvee, with machine gun on top, guarding the little path to Queen Alia Airport just outside the ruins. The only time I saw people there, they were Yemeni workers at the Mushatta Industrial City surrounding the ruins. They had a day off and were enjoying it by listening to the radio, eating, and taking pictures from on top of the Throne Hall, where the Caliph would be seated. This morning I had shown Amar the Citadel in Amman, which was built in a similar manner: At the beginning, there is a large mosque. Then there is a long hallway that travels in a straight line in between all the structures in the palace, leading to a Throne Hall at the very end.

I brought Amar with me from Syria, as I was there the past two days. Amar had emailed me while I was in Fas, saying that he discovered the Umayyad tombs in Damascus, and since it’s only 2.5 hrs away, including the time at the borders, AND I was getting a free ride both ways, I couldn’t pass that up. Inshalla I will be able to talk about the new things I discovered on this short trip to Syria, before I get back to writing about Fas.

Someone visited a shaykh and found him crying. “What makes you weep?”
The shaykh replied, “I am hungry.”
“And someone like you cries out of hunger?!”
“Be silent! Don’t you know that what He wants from my hunger is that I cry?”

- Al-Qushayri’s Risala, the chapter on Hunger and the Abandonment of Lust

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The shaykh was not crying out of hunger. Rather, it is because of his hunger that he was able to cry.

“What is this copious sleep? As if you were created for food and sleep? If you do not fast, then who is it that fasts? And if you do not stay up at night, then who is it that stays up? … Is it the highway robbers that stay up at night? And the people in night clubs?”

- Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari (r.a.)

As I mentioned in my previous post on Fas, I met a group of top scholars and researchers on my first night in Fas, who gave me two of their best students (and teachers) to teach me. These teachers had acquired degrees in the Ta’leem al-Ateeq (or the Ancient Teaching system of study in the Qarawiyyin Mosque and other mosques and institutes all over Morocco). They had actually lived for about 8 years each in the ancient Saffarin Madrasa that I had visited, and saw the very simple life of its students, who live in very small rooms, shared with one or two more people, and receive less than 50 or 60 dollars to live on, each month. It was exam season in the time that I went, and I got to see my teachers grading exams of young students in this ancient system, and I once went to meet one of my teachers in the Qarawiyyin Mosque, and found that its doors were closed to the public while students took their exams inside! One of my teachers was absolutely brilliant, and he acquired Bachelors and Masters degrees in both the Ancient Teaching system and the modern public university system simultaneously. He also got his PhD in the Ancient System and is now working on his PhD thesis in university, in Law. Fas gets really hot in summer, and a lot of its inhabitants, who originally come from other cities or villages, leave to their cities of origin in summer to escape the heat. This teacher was from Essaouira (home of the famous Gnaoua Festival), and he would go there every summer and memorize the entire books that he would be studying the following semester! He still knows Ibn al-Subki’s Jam’ al-Jawami’ in Usul al-Fiqh by heart, ma shaa’ Allah, la quwwata illa billah!

On my last (full) day in Fas, these teachers took me to meet shaykh Muhammad al-Taaweel, who they said is THE alim of Morocco today, recognized by all as a mujtahid in the madhhab, and is according to their estimation the most knowledgeable scholar in the entire Muslim world. So we went to his house to visit him, and he told me that these teachers of mine come from a unique generation. This is because, as he explained, the system of Ta’leem Ateeq had previously been gutted and weakened, but he didn’t explain when this happened, maybe it was during the French colonization period. Then it was restored to how it used to be, and my teachers were products of this generation, but now new programs have been introduced to completely weaken it again. He said instead of 10 hours of fiqh a week, they have now been reduced to almost one hour a week for certain levels, and complained that you can’t create a faqih from studying it one hour a week. He said what “they” want these days is to create people that carry the label of “Islamist” but have no brains or proper education, so that they provide no intellectual match for other parties, etc. May Allah protect Islam and put baraka in its ever-decreasing number of proper scholars. The shaykh gave me three of his small books to take with me to Jordan.

And so one teacher was assigned to teach me Ibn Abi Zayd’s Risala in Maliki Fiqh. I had taken with me the commentary of Shaykh Zarruq but he preferred we read that of Abul Hassan al-Maliki because it is what they teach at the Qarawiyyin. We read the first quarter of the book with commentary then decided that at this pace we wouldn’t finish in time, so for the rest of the book we only read commentary where we thought it necessary or important.

The other teacher was to teach me the Usul, and he brought showed me some books that we could study. There was no time to study Ibn al-Subki’s Jam’ al-Jawami’ with commentary, so I picked another book, mostly because I liked its cover! It was the Luma’ of al-Shirazi and turned out to be a perfect choice. It’s a book from the 5th century A.H., the century in which the science of Usul al-Fiqh was fully worked out, and in which some of the most important books on the subject were written. The book is short and explains all the important concepts, giving all views on the subject and then arguing for his view. My teacher pointed out to me whenever his view was different than what became the dominant view later on, and gave me the terms that were later put down for concepts that al-Shirazi discussed that still had no name.

We finished just in time, with a couple days to spare, in which we finished a tiny book called Isal al-Salek fi Usul al-Imam Malik, which is quite recent in authorship and simply lists and briefly discusses the Usul that are accepted in the Maliki Madhhab.

Usul al-Fiqh is possibly the most important science in religion, because it teaches you how to understand the Quran and Sunna, and how to derive laws: this it is the source and basis for fiqh.

Finally if you’re wondering why I picked the Maliki madhhab if I come from a country that is either Hanafi or Shafii, it is because the Maliki Madhhab is unique in one of its usul, and that is the Amal of the People of Medina. What I read about it in Yasin Dutton’s The Origins of Islamic Law convinced me that the practice of the people of Medina in the earliest generations is the best gauge of the Prophetic Sunna. Aisha Bewley has an article about it here: ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/aBewley/Page1.html but I definitely recommend you read the chapter on it in Dutton’s book.

The second reason is that my shaykh is a Maliki, and the more that a murid becomes like his shaykh, the closer will their souls be to each other, and the more that his soul will take from the soul of his shaykh. Thus I hope this will bring me closer to my shaykh, rahimahullah wa radiya ‘anh. This is most important reason for my choice.

I also read on my own the first half of Ibn Taymiyya’s fatwa on the Maliki Madhhab, in which he discusses its superiority to the other Madhhabs. While known as a Hanbali jurist, Ibn Taymiyya later became a mujtahid mutlaq, not restricting himself to any madhhab and ruling according to what he sees is correct. It has been published as a small book called The Favoring of the Madhhab of Imam Malik and the People of Medina, and Aisha Bewley translated it and published it as The Madinan Way: The Soundness of the Basic Premises of the School of the People of Madina. I read the first half because it discusses the soundness of the usul of the madhhab, while the other half gives examples from particular fiqhi questions by comparing the maliki ruling to the other madhaahib.

Now I’m reading Shaykh Muhammad Abu Zahra’s Malik, which also studies the Maliki usul.

Finally, I plan to read, inshaAllah, a book recommended to me by my teacher, called Usul al-Fiqh by Al-Arabi al-Loh. He said that it basically summarizes what is in all the different commentaries on Ibn al-Subki’s Jam’ al-Jawami and that reading it is like reading all these commentaries. He said that if I read it and understood it, the entire science of the Usul al-Fiqh will be in my grasp, and made me promise him to read it at least twice.

The sacred month of Rajab began a couple days ago. The word Rajab comes from the word “tarjeeb“, which means glorification, so this is a month that people glorify. It’s one of the four sacred months, and it is followed by Sha’ban then Ramadan.

The Light of the Worlds, Sayyidna Muhammad, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam said,

“Rajab is Allah’s month, Sha’ban is my month, and Ramadan is the month of my Ummah.”

That is why, according to Abu Hurayra, the Prophet didn’t fast entire months beside Ramadan except Rajab and Sha’ban.

It is said,

* Rajab is the month for those who race ahead, Sha’ban is the month for those who do some extra good deeds, and Ramadan is the month for the sinners.

* Rajab is the month of sanctity, Sha’ban is the month of service, and Ramadan the month of blessings.

* Rajab is for leaving our forgetfulness and coldness, Sha’ban is for work and devotion, and Ramadan is for sincerity and purity.

* Rajab for  Allah’s forgiveness, Sha’ban for intercession of the Messenger, and Ramadan for the amplification of reward, the descent of mercy, and the Night of Power.

And the in words of Dhul Nun al-Misri:

“Rajab is for leaving wrongdoing, Sha’ban for obedience and good works, and Ramadan for waiting for blessings and gifts from Allah.”

He also said, “Rajab is the month of planting, Sha’ban is the month of watering, and Ramadan is the month of harvest.”

There are many hadiths on the benefits of fasting at least one day in Rajab, and preferably three, for each good deed is rewarded as ten, and so it is as if you have fasted the entire month.

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The above information comes from Al-Ghunya of Shaykh al-Islam Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani (r.a.).

Assalamu Alaykum,

I just returned from a 5-week trip to Morocco, a month of which i spent in Fas. Founded by Idriss II, who is considered to be a saintly descendant of the Prophet (pbuh), Fas (aka Fes or Fez), is considered one of the holiest cities of Islam. As one Arab chronicler wrote,

When he was about to begin construction, he lifted up his hands and prayed for it and its inhabitants in the following words: “Almighty God, make of it a house of knowledge and of legal science, so that in it Thy Book may always be read and Thy laws always observed. Let its inhabitants hold fast to the Book and the Sunna, as long as Thou shalt preserve it.” And so this city never ceased to be a centre of science and of law… Many and varied are the benefits, blessings and graces which Fez received thanks to the prayer which its founder offered on its behalf, thus echoing the Prophet’s intercession for Medina and our lord Abraham’s intercession for Mecca…

Another scholar wrote,

I know of no other Islamic city that is so ancient and so filled with religion and science, that was founded by a true descendant of the family of the Prophet; and the resulting blessing from this has never failed. (These two quotes were taken from Titus Burckhardt’s FEZ: City of Islam)

The year of its foundation was 808 C.E., making it exactly 12 centuries old this year, and I will speak more about this later. Fez became a center of knowledge not only for Muslims, but also for its large Jewish population. One century after its foundation, a Jewish scholar described it as,

“…the great ancient city of Fez, the seat of the Law, the threshing-floor of wisdom, the winepress of the testimony, which drives away sleep to study the Law of the Lord, which breathes divine learning even in its sleep…”

Now in the year 2008, Morocco is celebrating Fas’ 1200th birthday, with year-long celebrations, and on each month focusing on a different theme. I don’t remember them right now, except that May’s theme was a celebration of the contributions of women. You could argue that the greatest contribution ever made to the city of Fas was that of a woman, Fatima al-Fihriya, who in 859, founded the Qarawiyyin Mosque-University, the oldest continuously operating institution of higher learning in the world. The Qarawiyyin became one of the greatest centers of knowledge in the Islamic World and of the world in general, as even Christian and Jewish scholars would visit it and study in it. Her sister made another great contribution by building the Mosque of al-Andalus, so named because it was built by the Andalusi refugees who had come to Fas. This mosque was also an important center of knowledge but not so much anymore.

So not only was I fortunate enough to go to Fas on this special year, I also discovered when I got there that the annual Fes Festival of World Sacred Music would run for two weeks while I was there! Perfect timing, al hamdu lillah!

My father called his friend in Morocco, who called his (important) friend in Fas, who invited six of the top scholars of Fas in their fields for dinner. So on my first night in Fas, I find myself sitting in a room with all these scholars, asking me how they can help me! I told them I went to learn two things: Maliki Fiqh, and Usul al-Fiqh. They recommended two of their best students, who have been teaching at the Qarawiyyin for the past 4 years, and called them for me, in order to start the next day!

If you’re wondering why I picked the Maliki madhhab, coming from a country that is Hanafi and Shafi’i, you can read my next post about my studies in Fas.