Riyadat an-Nafs

The Qur’an tells us that when sayyidna Musa, alaa nabiyyina wa alayhi afdal assalatu wassalam, met with sayyidna al-Khadir alayhi assalam, al-Khadir said to him: “You will not be able to bear with me patiently. How could you be patient in matters beyond your knowledge?”

So Musa alayhi assalam, promises to be patient and not to question the actions of his teacher, but cannot stop himself from doing so when he sees what the man that Allah had sent him to learn from does. First he makes a hole in a ship that they were on, and removes two of its wooden planks, and then when they are back on the land, he sees a young boy playing with other boys, and decapitates him.

The Prophet Musa is shocked and appalled at these apparently evil acts, but is later told the wisdom behind them. The ship belonged to poor people who needed it for their living. But there was a King who was in quick need of ships and was seizing every good ship and adding them to his fleet. When he would find a hole in that ship, he would decide that it would not be of any help for the urgent matter. The poor people will keep the ship, which they can fix later on.

As for the young boy, his parents were pious, and the child would have grown up to be very evil, oppressing them with rebellion and disbelief. So Allah Most Wise had him killed, and gave the parents instead a better offspring: He gave them a daughter that was very merciful to them, and that married a Prophet. Her child was also a Prophet and Allah guided through him one of the nations of mankind.
(Some of the details are from the Qur’anic commentaries).
For more on al-Khadir, see: riyada.hadithuna.com/al-khidr-and-i/

So al-Khadir was , so-to-speak, the “hand of God” in doing things that on the outside appear absolutely evil or outrageous, but in reality will lead to a good outcome that is hidden from our eyes.

It is interesting that we find some rare accounts of the Mongol invasions of the Muslim world, scattered in different books of history, literature, and Sufi hagiographies, that understand that event in the same light, and even place al-Khadir there, with the same role that he played in the Qur’an.

Ibn Karbala’i, who wrote in the 16th century a compendium of hagiographies of the Sufis buried in Tabriz, has an entry on a  13th-century Sufi known as Baba Hamid, who came from a little village near Tabriz that came to be named after him.

Ibn Karbala’i says that it is widely reported that “at the time when Genghis Khan came out upon the land of Iran”, some of the awliya of that era saw al-Khadir, “who was running ahead of that band of obstinate apostates and was helping them; he was saying, “Kill, O infidel people, these evildoers!” (uqtuloo ya qawm al-kafara, haadhihi al-fajara).”

Baba Hamid, he says, was one of those who recognized al-Khadir, so he said to him: “Even you?!”

So al-Khadir replied: “Even He!”

This account is interesting because more than a century earlier, the Indian Sufi Sayyid Ashraf Jahangir Simnani wrote two letters in which he said that the wealth and luxury of the Khwarezmian dynasty made the people there forget about worship and to do wicked things. But he said, the awliya who remained devoted to Allah and His worship, began to hear voices from the unseen world, coming from all sides, saying:
“O infidels, kill the evildoers!” (Ya ayyuhal kafara, uqtulul fajara!)
These voices, he said, began to arise in those regions in the year 591 AH/1195 C.E.

Likewise in the 15th century, Dawlatshah Samarqandi, in his anthology of poetry and poets Tadhkirat al-Shu’ara, wrote of a dialogue between the Khwarizm Shah and his son Jalal al-Din that is said to have been recounted by one of Khwarizmshah’s poets. He says that the son asked his father why, being a great King who ruled Iran unchallenged for 20 years, and famous for his bravery and power, he was now fleeing from a band of infidels (the Mongols) and allowing the Muslims to fall into their hands.

The father said: “My son, you do not hear what I hear.”
The son insisted on an explanation, so the father said:

“Every time I arrange my ranks for battle, I hear a group of the men of the unseen world (rijaal al-ghayb) saying: “O infidels, kill the evildoers!” (ayyuhal kafaratu’uqtulul fajarata); fear and terror and dread overcome me. Forgive me, my son.”

(Khwarizmshah then fled to an island on the Caspian Sea, where he died.)

Dawlatshah continues:

“And it is related by those to whom hidden realities are unveiled (ashaab al-kashf) and by the saints of the faith that they saw the people of God (rijaal Allah) and al-Khadir in front of the army of Genghis Khan, guiding that army. The discernment of the intelligent is struck dumb by this phenomenon, and the wisdom of the wise is rendered weak by this fact; but ‘God does what He wishes and commands what He wills’ “.

The oldest story of them all, only 50 years after the Mongol destruction of Baghdad, comes from one of the discourses of the famous Indian Sufi Nizam ud-Din Awliya. In the year 708 AH/ 1308 CE, he talked about the famous Qalandari Sufi Qutb al-Din Haydar.

He says:

“When the emergence of Genghis Khan was underway, the infidels turned toward Hindustan; and during that time, [Qutb ad-Din Haydar] one day turned to his companions and said, “Flee from the Mongols, for they will prove to be overpowering.” They asked how this would be. He said: “They are bringing a dervish along with them, and they are under the protection of that dervish. In my inmost being (sirr), I wrestled with that dervish; he threw me to the ground. Now the reality is that they will be victorious; you must flee!” After that he himself went into a cave and disappeared; and in the end it happened as he had said.”

What’s interesting is that most of these accounts (and there are a few more scattered about), are unconnected to each other, and there is no evidence that their transmitters had knowledge of each others’ works. Whether or not they are true, Allah only knows. But when we see great catastrophes that we don’t understand in life, we must remember that Allah does what He wills, and that there is always a hidden reason that we don’t understand.

As  Muhammad Iqbal said in his poem Jawab-e-Shikwa:

It is evident from the story of the Mongol invasions
that the Kaaba found new protectors in the people of the temples.

———–
Sources:

* DeWeese, Devin, “Stuck in the Throat of Chingiz Khan: Envisioning the Mongol Conquests in Some Sufi Accounts from the 14th to 17th Centuries”. History and Historiography of Post-Mongol Central Asia and the Middle East: Studies in Honor of John E. Woods, ed. Judith Pfeiffer and Sholeh A. Quinn in collaboration with Ernest Tucker (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2006), pp. 23-60.

* Muhammad Uthman al-Mirghani (al-Khatm): Taaj al-Tafaaseer li-Kalaam al-Malik al-Kabeer.

(See also Hulago Khan’s letter to the Mamluks where he claims to be sent by God against those who have incurred His anger: riyada.hadithuna.com/looking-back-at-history/ )

والحمد لله رب العالمين على نعمه كلها

اللهم صلّ وسلم وبارك على سيدنا ومولانا محمد خير البرية

وعلى آله في كل لمحة ونفس عدد ما وسعه علم الله

“خذوا حذركم من النسوان و مخالطتهن ومكالمتهن، و الذكر معهن من أكبر الفتن المهلكة”

الشيخ عبدالسلام الأسمر

“Be careful of women, of mixing with them and talking to them. And doing dhikr with them is one of the greatest of the fitnas that lead to destruction.”

- Shaykh Abdessalam al-Asmar

Salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam

There is an exhibition in a museum in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on the life of the greatest of Allah’s creations, our master, our prophet, our leader, our role model, sayyidna Muhammad, Rasool Allah, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam.

Part of this exhibition is a model of the house of the Prophet, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, that was built based on the authentic narrations about it, in order to give visitors a glimpse of the way he lived, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam.

You can see it in panorama view here:

fieldofview.com/flickr/?page=photos%2Fbahimashat%2F3372829764%2Fin%2Fset-72157603538368056%2F

والحمد لله رب العالمين على نعمه كلها

اللهم صلّ وسلم وبارك على سيدنا ومولانا محمد خير البرية

وعلى آله في كل لمحة ونفس عدد ما وسعه علم الله

When I went to Morocco, I wanted to buy a good large commentary on the Burda of Imam al-Busiri, radi Allahu anhu, especially having in mind the commentary of Imam Ibn Hajar. In the famous Bennani bookstore, I found the commentary of Imam al-Bayjuri, a previous Shaykh of the Azhar, as I mentioned previously. It’s not big though, quite small, but really good. One special thing about it is that it includes the special benefits of each verse or group of verses. Some are meant to heal the sick, others to help you defeat your ego, others to make you able to worship for longer, others to see the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam in your dreams, etc. InshaAllah I might post some of them later. But I got busy lately and haven’t had a chance to continue reading it.

He also told me that there’s another book called “something Shadhili”, a large commentary, but he couldn’t find it for me. But a couple days ago, I somehow came across it online.

It was written by shaykh Hasan al-’Adawi al-Hamzawi, and he was a great hadith scholar at the Azhar. One of his closest students was shaykh as-sayyid Muhammad Ibrahim as-Samaluti al-Maliki, who also became a great hadith scholar, and was one of the teachers of shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari.

The book is called An-Nafahat ash-Shadhiliyya fee Sharh al-Burda al-Busiriyya, and it’s in three volumes. The first volume is a seera of the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, and the second volume is about tasawwuf, and the third volume is the actual commentary on the Burda. Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyya, Beirut, has published it all in one volume, and my father happened to be in Lebanon when I discovered the book so alhamdulillah he bought it for me.

I’m going to copy something I wrote earlier about shaykh al-Hamzawi, but first, a brief interesting note about shaykh as-Samaluti.

Shaykh Muhammad Ibrahim as-Samaluti spent the last part of his life teaching hadith and tafseer in the Mosque of Imam al-Husayn in Cairo, and every time he finished a book of hadith, he would have a huge celebration with his students, attended by scholars, reciters, orators and poets, who would compete in their arts, and they would make duas of khatm. As there are many written khatm al-Qur’an du’as, the shaykh wrote a poem as a khatm for Sahih al-Bukhari.

Now back to Shaykh al-Hamzawi.

Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari says:

—————–

“After he memorized the Noble Qur’an, seekers of ilm took him with them from his home town to the Azhar. He had no money, and became really hungry and was severely distressed, when he heard a man calling: “O people of generosity!”, so he said to him, “Where are these people of generosity that you are calling?” So the man took him by the hand to the dome of mawlana al-Husayn at night, where he found those who offered him bread and food. He stayed doing this until he finished his studies and obtained the diploma from the Azhar.

And then there happened a fitna between the ulama of the Azhar- some of them said: The head of mawlana al-Husayn is here in Egypt, and others said: No.

The shaykh al-Hamzawi was of those who said that the head is in Egypt. He then saw mawlana al-Husayn in a dream vision saying to him: “How do you say that what is here is my head? Have you been taking your share of bread and meat from the head without the body?” So the next morning the shaykh al-Hamzawi went and stood among the ulama of the Azhar at the Husayn Mosque and said, “I swear by Allah, I swear by Allah, I swear by Allah: sayyidna al-Husayn is here in his head, his body, and his soul.” From that day the shaykh al-Hamzawi began writing about himself, “the servant of the Husaynid Doorsteps”, and then the inner knowledges exploded in his heart until he became the shaykh of the Malikis (in Egypt). And (my) shaykh Muhammad Ibrahim al-Samaluti was one of his closest students.”

————

May Allah be pleased with the great scholars, the living and the dead, and raise their ranks, and increase our love and appreciation and respect for them.

Tafsir Surat Najm Part 1

SubhanAllah, shaykh Dr. Abdalla Yassin does an amazing job with this tafseer. Especially when he compares the word “dalla” (from dalaal) in this sura to the “daallan” in Surat Duha. I wrote an explanation of the word daallan in Surat Duha in a previous post, with all its different meanings as explained by commentators.

( riyada.hadithuna.com/and-he-found-you-in-love/ )

However Dr. Yassin does something great by showing proof from the life of the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, and the way he breastfed as a child, to prove that he could never be astray in any way or form, since his birth.

And not only that, he explains that it is not enough to believe that the Prophet, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, was protected from error by Allah, but that Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala created him in a way that his nature would always go towards the truth, and never towards error. It was his nature, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, to always take the right, just, truthful path, ever since he was a baby.

Interestingly as well, he interprets verse 5, about who taught the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, as being Allah, whereas most mufassireen, sufi or otherwise, said that it is Jibreel alayhi assalam. So I did some quick research and found that this interpretation is that of al-Hasan al-Basri, radi Allahu anhu. And Dr. Abdalla does a very good job of proving this interpretation. ُThen the following two aayaat become about the Prophet, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, not about Jibreel alayhi assalam.

Great stuff, subhanAllah!

When you read about the lives of ancient scholars, like the four imams, and the generations preceeding them and succeeding them, you always hear about the marvels that come out of their mouths. You read how they can write volumes and volumes of gems about any topic, and how everyone listening to them is in complete awe. You hear about daqa’iq (minute points) and lata’if (subtelties), and asraar (secrets), and you wonder: is it really like what they say? Can they write volumes of this stuff? Where does this knowledge come from?

It is reported that sayyidna Ali ibn Abi Talib, radi Allahu anhu, said,

“I can write an explanation of the Fatiha that would take 70 camels to carry”.

Meaning: to carry all the books that are needed to contain this explanation.

Sayyidi Shaykh Saleh al-Jaafari writes:

“And I have asked him, radi Allahu anhu, once (in a vision): Did you really say: ‘I can write an explanation of the Fatiha that would take 70 camels to carry’ ?

So he raised his voice- and I found him to be of a loud, orotund voice- and he said: “Yes, for we are the household of prophecy (ahl bayt an-nubuwwa)!”, radi Allahu anhu“.

And shaykh Saleh himself was like that. In his book on aqeeda, Fath wa Fayd wa Fadl min Allah fee Sharh Kalimat Laa ilaaha illa Allah, Muhamamdun Rasool Allah, he devoted several long pages on explaining the secrets of “Muhammadun Rasool Allah” and the significance of its letters and their numbers.

Then he says:

“I had written by the grace of Allah Most High something of the meanings of its letters, and began to think about these meanings, and how did they come (to me). And on the day of the 16th of Safar, year 1393 Hijri, I came across the following hadith, and I knew that it was because of the blessing of my ancestor, sayyidi Ali ibn Abi Talib, radi Allahu anhu wa karrama wajhahu, by way of inheritance. And here is the hadith:

That sayyidna Ali, radi Allahu anhu wa karrama wajhahu, called unto him Ibn Abbas, radi Allahu anhuma, after the Isha prayer. Ibn Abbas says: He asked me about the tafseer of the (first letter) alif in the word alhamdu lillah, so I said: I don’t know. So he spent a long time (lit: an hour) talking about its explanation, and so on with every letter. ”

So as you can see, Shaykh Saleh inherited something of this from his ancestor, radi Allahu anh. And Shaykh Saleh’s shaykhs were like this as well. One of the famous and well known karamaat about sayyidi Ahmad ibn Idris was that seventy notebooks were filled from his tafseer of one ayah in the sura of al-Ahzab, and it is the saying of God Most High, “the Muslim men and the Muslim women”.  And likewise that he kept explaining “walladhee qaddara fa hadaa” (87:03) for three days from after the Asr prayer until sunset. And when they were astonished by that he said to them: If I stayed with you as long as Noah stayed with his people (950 years) I would have given you a new explanation of it every day.

And likewise was sayyidi Ahmad ibn Idris’ son as-sayyid Abd al-Aali, who used to explain the Qur’an in the Sudanese town of Dunqula, in the manner of the people of the maghreb. Meaning: a shaykh would recite to him an aya, and the sayyid would then proceed to explain it.  Once he was explaining God Most High’s saying: “Blessed is He Who made the constellations in the heavens and made therein a lamp and a shining moon”. (25:61), and when the shaykh read it to the sayyid, the sayyid explained it. Then one of the scholars came to shaykh and said: Tomorrow, don’t recite the next ayah, but read this same ayah that the sayyid explained today so we can see if he can give us a new tafsir of it.

So when the next day came, the shaykh read the same ayah and so the sayyid explained it with a new explanation different than the first and he excelled in it greatly. And when the third day came, it was the sayyid himself who read the same ayah and then gave a new tafsir and excelled at it wonderfully (abda’a feeha ghayat al-ibdaa’). So the shaykh kissed his hand and started crying. So the sayyid said to him “what makes you cry, our brother shaykh Abdallah?” so he said: “Ya sidi, I cry because you came to our town when I was already old, and I used to wish that I was still a strong young man that I can receive this knowledge.” So the sayyid said to him, “If I stayed with you as long as Noah stayed with his people I would have given you a new explanation of it every day.”

(see: riyada.blogspot.com/2007/02/abd-al-aali-and-western-branch-of.html)

SubhanAllah!

Alhamdulillah I have seen something  of this nature with my own eyes with one scholar, and that is shaykh Ibrahim Osi-Efa, may Allah preserve and protect him. He has been giving a seera lesson once a month, and I have been to three of the past four, only missing one during my trip to Morocco. What can I say, except subhanAllah, a million times subhanAllah. Shaykh Ibrahim makes you realize that just as the Qur’an, as a book, is a miracle in which oceans and oceans of secrets are hidden, so is the seera of Allah’s beloved, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam. Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala has weaved the story of the life of His beloved, in such a miraculous way, that every little detail hides a secret. Just as the Qur’an has hidden meanings, it seems that EVERYTHING in the seera has a deeper hidden meaning.

On his second lesson especially, Shaykh Ibrahim spoke of a science of the seera that I never knew existed, and I’m pretty sure that thousands of the greatest scholars that lived on this Earth have lived their whole lives studying ilm and never even heard that such a science existed.

He talked about the names of all the women who breastfed the Messenger of Allah, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam, and the secrets we can learn from the meaning of their names, in relation to the duration of the breastfeeding, and what that tells us about that characteristics that Allah put in the Messenger as a child, salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam. He then completely shocked me when he looked at the names of the other children who were suckled by the same women at the same time, and the duration that they did so, and what that tells us about the Prophet salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam’s greatness, specifically: how much we knew about him in the outward (zahir), in relation to much how we don’t know about his greatness in the inward (batin). My jaws simply dropped to the floor.

Tonight, the shaykh similarly revealed secret after secret in the hadiths and the events of the seera. It made me just stare at his face and think: I want to learn EVERYTHING from this man. I want to inherit all his knowledge. I want to kiss his feet. I want to wake up with him, stay with him all day, and sleep on the same bed as him, so that nothing he ever says escapes me. This man is a wonder among wonders in the field of seera.

Where did he get this knowledge, I don’t know. Was it from his shaykhs? He studied with some remarkable shuyukh: al-Habib Umar ibn Hafidh, Murabit al-Hajj, and 6 years in Tarim learning from Habib Ali, Habib Kazim, and others.  But if it was from scholars, then how does he know it so well? How does he know it so deeply? Did he inherit all they knew about the subject? Can there be more? Or could it be from books? Are there possibly books that reveal all these secrets? Is there a super-seera book out there that I’ve never heard of? Or are there rays of light hitting upon each other in his mind, creating sparks of wisdom, and an endless stream of pearls coming out of his mouth?

I don’t know. All I know is: I thank Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala that there are such scholars, and that He Most Generous has allowed me to see them and benefit from them, and I ask Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala to protect this shaykh and all those like him, and increase them in blessings and knowledge with ever glance and every breath. Ameen Ameen Ameen.

والحمد لله رب العالمين على نعمه كلها

اللهم صلّ وسلم وبارك على سيدنا ومولانا محمد خير البرية

وعلى آله في كل لمحة ونفس عدد ما وسعه علم الله