When you are reaching the real paradise and you are in love with Allah swt it means you dropped from your heart the love of dunya, you try to do as much as you can for what is necessary for akhira. You are not running after… you say, “I am praying my five prayers, given charity, fasting, doing hajj and say I am doing my life.” And for that it is alright you go the Paradise that is a reflection of the picture paradise. As we said before this paradise of pictures, every real paradise has a photocopy of it, which is an image and all of these images, Allah dropped one drop from the Beautiful Names and Attributes of beauty, al-Jamal and it was enough to give all these paradises their taste. But the real one is Jannat al-ridwan the one where Allah sends His servants when He is happy with them.
He said that “today people are so happy only to the image, they don’t want to bother to find the reality, the truth. Allah knows who is in love with the image and who is in love with the real one. And the example of someone who is in love with the image as to someone who is in love to reality is like someone who is in love with a beautiful lady but he says ‘I am in love with the reflection of that lady that appears in the mirror.’”
Do you like that? No, you want the real one. When someone wants to marry does he marry the mirror or the beautiful lady? What is he going to do with the mirror? Nothing.
Too many mirrors today. They invaded the world with mirrors and all these mirrors are only there for you to waste time. What are these mirrors that they have invaded the whole world with it? Plasma tv. No more thick; it is very thin, it is like a mirror. And say, “O it is enough for you, don’t marry. Marry the plasma.” They call it plasma, female gender. Whey they didn’t call it plasma. In Arabic anything female ends in a, hah. So Jamil - Jamila.
So they intentionally, shaytan knows, teaching them some sciences, to come up with plasma TV. Take the mirror you don’t need more than that.
The awliyaullah say we don’t want the mirror, we want the real one. What is the real one? It is what is found in paradises from realities. Allah swt described in paradises all kinds of rivers there: rivers from water, water from wine, river from honey, so you want the photocopy of rivers or you want the reality. The one with taste or the one which is picture.
So it is said in hadith that Allah appears to the mu’min in paradise. The only place they can see, is the paradise where … only appears in the paradise of realities, not in the paradise of images.
He said I am not in the process of speaking and cracking and bombarding the bad behavior of people, except for one wisdom I keep hitting on them and cracking down. Awliyaullah crack down, and people wonder why are you cracking down. There is fruit insides, like walnut you have to hit on shell to get the fruit. And if you don hit it is still shell and after a while worm will go in and spoil it completely.
So awliyaullah keep cracking on what the students love. The student loves the picture not their reality. They say that is enough for me.
When Allah send the trust on heavens and earth they said “we cannot take it.” But human beings, they said “we can take it.” “And they were ignorant oppressors.” They took and spoiled it, they didn’t use it.
Innama bu`ithtu li utimoo makaarim al-akhlaaq. To perfect you from what? you have bad characters and the Prophet takes these bad characters and throw them and put in you good characters. How to take out the bad characters? The awliya learned from prophet how to take it out of the followers, by bombarding the followers. Be hard. Not hard on everyone hard on the students who took initiation. they know if you are hard on them they will be disciplined.
Man allamanee harfan sirtu lahu `abdan. It is famous poetry, who taught me one letter I become slave to him.
It means to tech you this is bad characters and you accepted that this is my teacher so if he says this is bad char, that means he taught me something. He told me one thing that shaytan cannot catch me with it. That is one favor it is enough that we become slave to him. That one is enough to be servant for him or to be at his door.
The awliyaullah say to leave one forbidden manhiyyan `anh, is more rewarded than if you worship him from beginning to end, it doesnt mean you don’t have to worship but it means how much value if you leave something bad and don’t do it. How much will Allah be happy with his servant?
So the Prophet said, I have been sent to perfect the characters of human beings.
It means I am going to change your blurry vision , your astigmatism that make your vision blurry. I am going to give you very well eyeglasses. Not physical eyeglasses, but spiritual eyeglasses. Not like this one. You can see letters; there are eyeglasses you can see hearts. There are eyeglasses you can see at night. At night you cannot see with this. There are Ultraviolet eyeglasses and with them what can you see? You can see in darkness whatever is moving around. And there are spiritual eyeglasses that the prophet will put into your heart and at that time you begin to see the real paradises.
In Salat an-najaat after pray 2 rakaats, in that sajda there is sajda of vision, sajdat al-mushahada, there you are prostrating under the arsh. Jannat al-Firdaws. Jannat al-mawa. Idh yagsha al-sidrata ma yaghsha.
Idh.. yantiqa an al-hawa …fa kaana qaaba qawsayni aw adna…. Sidratil muntaha indaha jannat al-mawa.
Sidrat la-muntaha, where everything ends up. the prophet reached where everything ends up. And Allah is confirming that what he saw is real. Laqad ra’ahu min ayyatihhi al-kubra. He saw from Allah’s sign the biggest sings.
Idh yagsha as-sidrata ma yaghsha. What is yagsha. At that sidra, the highest point that prophet reached, there Idh yagsha as-sidrata ma yaghsha. Yaghsha - fainted. [yagsha, overcome] yaghsha is fainting because something huge appeared. But the prophet did not faint Allah is saying he saw that huge light and what is in that light he was able to see and we don’t know what he saw there, but Allah mentioned what he saw there, that he saw from Allah’s huge signs, al-kubra, there is no limit. Idh yaghsha as-sidrata ma yaghsa, that light that he was seeing is real and he was seeing it with his eyes.
Afatoomaaroonahu ala ma yara – “Are you questioning him about what he saw? He saw from the biggest signs of what Allah wants him to see.” `Ind as-sidrat al-muntaha…at the highest level Allah wants him to reach there is Jannat al-mawa, the sheltering paradise and It is called Jannat al-khuld the highest of paradise and they call it Jannat al-Firdaws, the abode tree they translate. That is what Allah wanted him to see.
That is the meaning of hadith innama bu`ithtu li utimu makaarim al-akhlaq- I have been sent to perfect the best of conduct; I came to build back the perfect character.” Of all human beings, not just one. I want to bring to paradise of realities, not paradise of pictures. Take them back to paradise of origin. That is only for special people. So when your shaykh teaches you one letter it is said you have to be servant to him. what then you have to think if he brings you to that knowledge.
That is why it is said you must submit to your shaykh because he has the knowledge to take you through difficult tunnels in order to bring you to realities. He is trying to correct your vision in order to make you in love with the source and reality and not with the picture. But because of our bad characters we are still with the picture and leaving the origin.
And he said, that from the bad characters that is found in us it takes pictures of wild animals.
That is why one wali one time was looking for Khidr in Makkah in kabah. “Ya rabbee send me Khidr. Ya rabbee send me Khidr!” One day Allah accepted and that wali found Khidr beside him. Then Allah answered him and Khidr was beside him and said to him “what do you want with Khidr?” He said, “Khidr is the one who can point to the mountain and move it will move.” So he said, “ok where can I find him?”
So Khidr didnt say anything as that man was so connected to prophet, he was lost in that.
So he kept praying, “ya Rabbee send me Khidr.” Ok, Allah accepted and he appeared again and said, “what do you want with Khidr?” He said, “I want to make all people rich. All the people here I want to distribute the gold to them.” Then he said, “Khidr is the one who can point to the mountain and say ‘move’ and it will move.” Then the mountain moved. And the wali realized it [was Khidr].
So he said “on one condition I will do it, you put my turban on your head and I will give you the gold.” And he said, “why not take baraka?” Then he took khidr’s turban on his head and then all the people going around ka`aba disappeared. He only saw animals. Wild animals and domestic animals. Then he didn’t see any men anymore. Then on top of it he saw another ka`ba above it and there were men there circumambulating it and their hearts were with Allah. And the ones down are animals. So how can he give them gold and the ones above are turning they have no concern for gold.
So he said, “ya Khidr these are animals.” He said, “yes, they came here to be purified but as they go they come, they don’t clean their bad characters.”
So Grandshaykh said, “it is like that I am cracking on them but they are not taking it.
So what do I do with the gold? It is there, I dont take it back, do what you want.”
Then he took his turban. And the animals disappeared and the gold disappeared and Sayyidina Khidr disappeared.
And awliyaullah are cracking on us in order to take us away from bad characters and to seek the real original paradise not to take the picture alone.
He said anbiyaullah and awliyaullah tried their best to change our bad characters to good characters. He asked what is important of religion. He said, “the importance is not to pray too much but it is important to follow way of the Prophet. You know the way they took you follow that way as it is the shortest way to Allah.”
Ittiba` means to follow the way of others. Today people are so arrogant they dont want to follow the way of others; they want to follow their own way. And the awliyaullah are trying to show the shortest way. And the ego says, follow your own self, you know everything. The bad characters are your guide and in everyone of us we have bad characters. We ask Allah swt to take them away.
Allah asked Bayazid al-Bistami, how you came to me o Bayazid. He said, “ya rabbee I left everything and came to me with your zuhd.” He asked him “what have you dropped in your life to become ascetic?” He said “I dropped dunya.” He said “ya Bayazid haven’t you heard that the dunya has no value to Me more than the wing of a mosquito. That is not real zuhd, but real zuhd is to leave what I don’t like, the forbiddens. Then you can reach My real zuhd, and My eternal life and then you reach My paradise, the Sidratul-muntaha and Jannat al-mawa.”
May Allah forgive us and ma Allah bless us bi hurmatil Fatiha.