Our Lady of Hungary Parish
As-salaamu `alaykum wa rahmatullaahi wa barakaatuh. Alhamdulillahi Rabbi 'l-`Alameen, wa ‘s-salaatu wa ’s-salaamu `alaa ashrafi 'l-mursaleena Sayyidina wa Nabiyyina Muhammadin wa `alaa aalihi wa sahbihi ajma`een. Alhamdulillahil-ladhee hadaana li ’l-Islami wa maa kunna li-nahtadeea law laa an hadaana ’Llah, alhamdulillahi `alaa ni`amihi zhahiran wa baatina.
I don’t deserve to be sitting here, my place is on the floor, my place is at the shoes; that is what I must tell my ego, my self, because Allah (swt) said in the Holy Qur’an:
فَلَا تُزَكُّوا أَنفُسَكُمْ
Don’t praise yourself. (Surat an-Najm, 53:32)
Don’t praise yourself, don’t be proud of yourself.
أنا سيد ولد آدم ولا فخر
The Prophet (s) said: I am the Master (leader) of the Children of Adam and I say this with no arrogance. (Ahmad, Musnad)
And with that I say without pride, but I am proud to be a Morrocan! [Laughter.] Shaykh Anwar, what he recites and sings, and the music of the group [Burdah Ensemble], it will make the heart melt. The way that this is presented, I did not hear it this way in the Middle East or in the Far East, I only heard it in Morocco. So from this time, I am a Moroccan! [Allahu Akbar!]
وَلِلَّـهِ الْعِزَّةُ وَلِرَسُولِهِ وَلِلْمُؤْمِنِينَ
To Allah belongs all Glory and to His Messenger and to the Believers. (Surat al-Munafiqun, 63:8)
Whatever we try to do in this life let it be good because it is not worth it to do badly, because Allah (swt) has sent the Prophet (s) and all prophets to perfect human behavior and human character . That is why the Prophet (s) said:
انما بعثت لاتمم مكارم الاخلاق
I have been sent to perfect the best of conduct (your behavior and character). (Bazzaar)
“I have been sent to complete and perfect all bad manners.” The Prophet's (s) Message is to perfect human beings. Allah gave him that perfection to distribute to all human beings. So let us do good, because dunya is moving forward, people are coming, living, dying and then being judged. Let us be judged in a good way by Allah, not by punishment, although we believe that Allah is Ghafoorun Raheem, but let Him be happy with us.
Awliya have lots of power, they can move mountains. Let us dedicate our purpose for Allah and Akhirah. The main trunk or main crane-lift works on the strength of love within the person. That is why for curing, if someone is ill or sick and you show him love, he will feel confidence in himself, he will be cured. There are too many cases of cancer that have been cured because the mureed came to the shaykh and the shaykh showed him love and his body was rejuvenated.
I will tell you what happened between Sayyidina Jibreel (a) and the Buraaq that carried Sayyidina Muhammad (s) to the Divine Presence. I will tell you a story that happened frequently in our travels with our shaykh, may Allah bless his soul now. Just now when they were showing his pictures, my tears were streaming non-stop from my eyes for the work that he did around the world and raised the name of Muslims high. I will relate a story that happens a lot to me.
We were in England and a man came to me asking for a prayer. He said, “Shaykh please pray for me. I am working in London, my wife is alone and the child is going to school. We need another child and for a long time, we are not able to have a one.”
I put my hand in my pocket and found a Kit Kat chocolate bar and said, “Alright, take this. You eat half and let your wife eat the other half and inshaa-Allah you will have a child.”
He said, “I will do it right away.” I did not see him for a year.
The next year I saw him and I asked, “Did you have a child yet?”
He said, “No shaykh, I left that Kit Kat in the drawer.”
I said, “Alright, eat it now.”
Look what love can do. If you have love you believe and if you believe, miracles happen. What about the Sahaabah (r) of the Prophet (s)? They loved the Prophet (s).
So I left. The next year I came and he said that he wants to surprise me. “Shaykh, I invite you for dinner.” At dinner he brought a child and said to me, “I named him Kit Kat.” As soon as he said that, about fifteen ladies came from the other rooms wanting Kit Kat chocolate bars! I did not have any at the time, I said, “Next time bring your Kit Kat and come!”
So love made that person to come and ask me, because he loves me and knows that I am not going to cheat him. When they were showing the picture of Mawlana Shaykh Nazim (q), I was remembering the first time I made Hajj with him in 1967. We made Tawaaf al-Qudoom and we began to circumambulate. We made the first tawaaf, then the second and after the third, Mawlana stopped at Baab al-Multazam and recited this du`a, “Yaa Rabbee, we came here a long way for the sake of Your Prophet (s) and we are thirsty. we want to drink from the hand of your Prophet (s). Shower us now for the sake of your Prophet (s) and Your Holy House!”
I was looking, the temperature was 40 degrees and the sky was blue. I wondered how is it going to shower us, but I believe in my shaykh so I kept quiet. As I was looking up at the Door of the Ka`bah, where you have to put your whole body and touch it, in five minutes the sky became dark and very cloudy! There was no sun and it began to shower. The rain kept coming and coming and the water was filled in the Ka`bah. There was no way for the water to be taken away, so the water was rising and rising until it reached our chst! No one could drive in all of Mecca due the city being full of rain. Then he said, “Yaa Rabbee, I said shower us, not drown us”, because drowning from Rahmah is okay, in a hot temperature of 40 degrees Celsius, it is okay. So people were happy to stay by the Ka`bah in the rain. How did this happen? Because Allah loves His servants:
أَلا إِنَّ أَوْلِيَاء اللّهِ لاَ خَوْفٌ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلاَ هُمْ يَحْزَنُونَ
Behold! Verily on the Friends of Allah there is no fear, nor shall they grieve. (Surah Yunus, 10:62)
That is Allah’s Love on them. The Prophet (s) said in a Holy Hadith Qudsee:
وما يزال عبدي يتقرب إلي بالنوافل حتى أحبه فإذا أحببته كنت سمعه الذي يسمع به وبصره الذي يبصر به ويده التي يبطش بها ورجله التي يمشي بها وإن سألني لأعطينه ولئن استعاذني لأعيذنه وما ترددت عن شيء أنا فاعله ترددي عن نفس المؤمن يكره الموت وأنا أكره مساءته ولا يزال عبدي يتقرب إلي بالنوافل حتى أحبه، فإذا أحببته كنت سمعه الذي يسمع به وبصره الذي يبصر به، ويده التي يبطش بها ورجله التي يمشي بها،
My servant does not cease to approach Me through voluntary worship until I will love him. When I love him, I will become the ears with which he hears, the eyes with which he sees, the hand with which he acts, and the legs with which he walks (and other versions include, “and the tongue with which he speaks.”). (Hadith Qudsi, Bukhari)
“As long as My servant approaches Me, I will love him.” So when Allah loves, miracles happen. “When My servant approaches Me through voluntary worship, I will love him and when I love him, I will be the ears he hears with, I will be the eyes he sees with, I will be the hand he acts with and I will be the feet he walks with,” in the way of Allah. So these awliyaullah do more than anyone else for the benefit of Ummat an-Nabi (s). That Hadith continues, Sayyidina Muhammad (s) then said that Allah (swt) says, “Until that servant will become Lordly, rabbaaniyyan yaqoolu li shay’in kun fa yakoon, he says to a thing ‘be!’ and it will be.”
Allah (swt) said:
عبدي اطعني أجعلك ربانيا تقول لشيئ كن فيكون
My slave! Obey Me and I will make you Rabbaani, Lordly, so you say to something “Be!” and it will be (exist). (Hadith Qudsi)
But we obey our husbands and our wives, and then at the end we end up fighting. Allah said, “If you obey Me, I will make you Lordly: you will say to something ‘be!’ and it will be.”
You [Shaykh Anwar] are from the country of Sayyidina Muhiyuddin ibn `Arabi (q), that is why I am Moroccan. It is an honor for us to be Maghaariba, because they are the ones that showed the high level of architecture and they are the ones, Allahu Akbar, who showed the writing that they wrote and took Islam all the way to Spain. If that is honor for us to say we want to be with them and from them, because they have a king, we love kings, we love the kings that bring peace on Earth, inshaa-Allah.
So Sayyidina Muhiyuddin ibn `Arabi (q) related a story in his Futoohaat. That is why someone said that tonight’s topic is “Pearls and Wisdom.” When I was entering I asked him, what is the topic? And he said that the topic is “Pearls and Wisdom.” And I said, “Take the wisdom and give me the pearls,” because there is a story of pearls and wisdom that Ibn `Arabi narrated in his book. He said that when Allah (swt) wanted to invite His Beloved One to Qaaba Qawsayni aw Adnaa, and this can happen only out of love, Allah (swt) took him in a journey that is impossible for anyone to have, because it is against the laws of Quantum Physics or physics, to penetrate not only Earth’s galaxies, but to go beyond the galaxies, beyond anything that is created, because the Divine Presence is not in a created place; it belongs to Allah (swt) and no one knows about it except Him.
When Allah (swt) decided to bring His Prophet (s), He sent Jibreel (a) to the Heaven of Buraaqs, as Sayyidina Muhiyuddin Ibn Arabi (q) said, where there are countless Buraaq, no one can count them. What are they doing? They are making salawaat on the Prophet (s). Jibreel (a) was surprised to see the infinite numbers of Buraaq there. He was asked to bring one of them in order to convey him to the Station of Qaaba Qawsayni aw Adnaa. He looked and saw one Buraaq crying. He was surprised to see that Buraaq crying, tears streaming from his eyes. Sayyidina Muhiyuddin ibn `Arabi (q) said that from every tear that came from his eyes, Allah (swt) made it a pearl! The origin of pearls is not from the sea, but from Heavens. In Sufi tradition we call pearls the purity. So from every tear that he shed, Allah created a pearl bigger than the Earth, bigger than anything you can imagine that has a mass. And every pearl that is bigger than the Earth, Allah is creating a palace for those who recite salawaat on the Prophet (s). The meaning of a “palace” is a heavenly palace that cannot be described, but in order for you to understand we say ‘palace,’ as a palace is huge like Alhambra. Allah knows how big a heavenly palace is and what is in it.
So Sayyidina Muhiyuddin ibn `Arabi (q) said that Jibreel (s) approached that one and saw that river of pearls going into the Paradise of Buraaqs.
He said to that one, “My dear angel,” because he is an angel, “why are you crying?”
That Buraaq said, “Yaa Jibreel, leave me alone. I am crying since the day Allah created me.”
“But all your friends, all the other angels are not crying like you,” said Jibreel (a).
He said, “Yaa Jibreel, it is their wazeefah; they have something and mine is something else. When Allah created us all and He mentioned that one of you is going to carry My Beloved One to the Divine Presence, from that moment kuntu abkee min `ishq al-mustafa rasoolillah, I was crying from that moment for the one that is the Beloved of Allah, that I be the one to carry the Prophet (s) to the Divine Presence!”
He was crying out of love since the day Allah created him, and so he was the one chosen to be honored by the Prophet (s) sitting on him. So do you see how much love is important in the life of the Prophet (s) and the life of Awliyaullah and in your life? Everything in this life is based on love; there is nothing else worthy but love.
I will end with this story that will make everyone see the love between two people and I want you to think of who those two people are. I know that it will be difficult to continue without mentioning them; it is Sayyidina Muhammad (s) and one lady.
When the Prophet (s) `alaa firaashi 'l-mawt, was on his deathbed, he was continuously sweating. Before he was on the deathbed, that lady was always looking after him. Whenever he travelled, she looked after him and when he would come back, she would do everything for him. If he wanted food, she prepared it for him and when he prayed, she prayed with him. When he was preparing to leave dunya, she was crying and the Prophet (s) said to her, “Yaa Fatima! Why are you crying? It was his daughter, Fatima az-Zahra (a). He hugged her and said something in her ear, and when he spoke she was so happy with what he whispered in her ear.
What did he say to her? Sayyida `Ayesha (a), the Prophet's wife, asked Fatima (a), “What has the Prophet (s) whispered in your ear?”
She said, “I will not say anything. I promised my father that I would not say anything until 40 days has passed.”
After 40 days passed, Sayyida `Ayesha (a) wanted to know, so she asked another time, “What did he whisper in your ear?”
Look at the love here between two, the Prophet (s) and his daughter. He said, “Yaa Fatima! After six months you are going to follow me. We will meet there in Paradise.”
After six months Sayyida Fatima az-Zahra (a) died. Look, for them dunya is nothing. Before he died, the father gave her the good tidings that in six months she was going to die. For them there is no death, they are alive, and Akhirah is full of love of the Prophet (s)!
May Allah forgive us and may Allah bless us. Thank you very much.
As-salaamu `alaykum wa rahmatullaahi wa barakaatuh.
[Bay`a.]
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