Suhbah and Khatm
Allahumma salli `alaa Sayyidina Muhammad hatta yardaa Sayyidina Muhammad (s)!
A`oodhu billahi min ash-Shaytaani 'r-rajeem. Bismillahi 'r-Rahmaani 'r-Raheem. Madad yaa Sayyidee. Nawaytu 'l-arba`een, nawaytu 'l-`itikaaf, nawaytu 'l-khalwah, nawaytu 'l-`uzlah, nawaytu 'r-riyaadah, nawaytu 's-sulook, lillahi ta`alaa fee haadha 'l-masjid.
We will repeat one thing that we mentioned last time about Sayyidina Abayazid al-Bastami (q). Look at the adab of awliyaullah, which is not imitational, like our discipline. Instead of saying, “We have no discipline,” at least give a little candy and say, “It is imitational discipline,” but in reality it’s not a discipline, it’s an ego discipline, the desire of self. Sayyidina Shah Naqshband (q) said, “Laa takhtar, don’t be happy with yourself or think you are something by calling yourself ‘mureed’.” A mureed is the one being dressed with the different dresses of what Allah (swt) and His Prophet (s) dress his Shaykh. Every Shaykh has a (unique) dress, which is why you cannot say, “My Shaykh is better than yours;” that is haraam and not accepted in Islam because that is no adab. Adab is to say, “All Shaykhs are taking from Prophet (s).” I prefer to drink from a cup, but then someone might say, “I prefer to drink from a bottle, it’s easier for me,” although the drink is the same, it is water!
So awliyaullah are different containers, if we can say that, and one is big, one is medium, one is small, but all are containers for manifestations of Allah's Beautiful Names and Attributes, so we can’t say one is better than the other. But to say, “This one is small,” and “This one is big, it contains more,” we cannot describe awliyaullah that way. However, Allah has described them in Holy Qur’an, and Prophet (s) described them (in hadith). It is not our job to define or differentiate between awliyaullah because this is not politics here, to say this president is better than that president, like in dunya issues. In Akhirah issues, in the eyes of Prophet (s) all Sahaabah (r) are the same. In the time of the Prophet (s), if they saw him once and believed in him, they became a Sahaabi, and someone might have seen Prophet (s) day and night and still he is a Sahaabi; there is no change in their title. But this one, Allah may dress him differently: this one is black, this one is blue, this is red, everyone has a different color, so Allah (swt) gave them a different dress but they all have a heavenly dress. That's is why between awliyaullah there are connections and you cannot see a genuine wali demean or put down another wali. But we do that; we put one down, then another, and make whom we love as the best, but (adab is that) even if he is the best, keep it to yourself.
Prophet (s) said:
االناس سواسيه كااسنان المشط
An-naasu sawaasiyatan ka-asnaani' l-masht.
People are equal like the teeth of a comb.
Shah Naqshband (q) said, “Don’t call yourself a mureed (as you are only a lover).” Where is the level of mureed and where is our level? All of us are at the beginner’s level, like children trying to learn how to walk, and this is our description in the eyes of awliyaullah. So what takleef will they put on you? What responsibility will they put on a child that tries to walk then falls down again and again? They put no responsibility, but if you are put under responsibility then you are always under a slap. When they want to prepare you, when they see you can be prepared and carry the responsibility, they give you a hard time, like we mentioned in the story of Sayyidina Shah Naqshband (q).
In his time, Sayyidina Shah Naqshband (q) was famous in Bukhara. At the beginning he was not just a normal person studying Tasawwuf, he was very advanced in Shari`ah, in Fiqh, Hadith and Tafseer. Once he was taking a walk around his home and it came to him to go out for a journey. Awliyaullah like to journey and he felt guided while in a state of trance, hadhir “present” and ghaaib “absent” at the same time, walking to a place he didn't know. He passed by a small alley where his teacher lived and that Shaykh was carrying the secret of the Naqshbandi Golden Chain. Your (mureed) origin goes back to Sayyid Amir Kulal (q).
So he began to feel the presence of Shaykh Amir Kulal (q) in that alley where he was walking and he realized his house was there. So within him there came a desire, `ashq, “yearning” to enter with to see his teacher whom he had never seen but had heard and with whom he had taken baya`, and it was not like our baya` these days. At that time, to be given baya` you had to be very highly qualified, because it was given under the responsibility of not breaking it and that was the Shaykh's responsibility. The Shaykh will be scolded in a nice way by Prophet (s) when he is asked, “Why you gave him baya` when you knew he was going to break it?” Baya` cannot be given that easily, but as there is too much darkness between human beings now, they give it easily these days for rahmah.
So Shah Naqshband (q) was passing by and began to feel the presence of his teacher more and more, until he reached his door. With Bismillahi 'r-Rahmani 'r-Raheem, he put his foot inside his house, where the Shaykh was sitting with his mureeds, and he heard Shaykh Amir Kulal (q) ask,
“Who is that one?”
They said, “Yaa Sayyidee! This is Baha’uddin Naqshband from Bukhara.”
The Shaykh said, “Throw him out! He is not part of us and we cannot have a stranger here and!”
He didn’t say, “Welcome my son! How are you? You are very good, you are a prince, you are a president,” rather he said, “Throw him, we don’t need him!”
Shah Naqshband (q) was rich, looking after thousands, of homeless people and those who attended his suhbahs. The mureeds of the Shaykh took him, saying, “You have no luck here, you can go,” and they told him to go out. He left, but there was a struggle in his heart, and he thought, “I am not going to see him anymore! What kind of teaching is this? What type of respect is that for me? All Bukhara knows me and I am being thrown like that?” (Sayyid Amir Kulal lived outside Bukhara.) “How could I be thrown out like that?”
People think, “I am doctor, a professor, an engineer.” Today, if you tell a professor or an engineer to go out, we can’t say ‘doctor’ as there are too many doctors here (laughter), or ask a doctor to go out, if there is a small test you will lose them. But Allah (swt) said in Holy Qur’an:
فَأَلْهَمَهَا فُجُورَهَا وَتَقْوَاهَا
Fa alhamahaa fujoorahaa wa taqwaahaa.
He inspired the self of its good and its bad. (Surat ash-Shams, 91:8)
Allah inspired the self, fujoor, “to rebel” and to have taqwa, piety. He inspires everything bad that makes you rebel and everything that makes you do good. Look into the verse, “fa alhamahaa fujoorahaa,” which goes back to the nafs:
وَنَفْسٍ وَمَا سَوَّاهَا
Wa nafsin wa maa sawwaahaa.
By the Soul, and the proportion and order given to it. (Surat ash-Shams, 91:7)
It mentions, “He inspired the bad,” and immediately after that comes the good, so what does it mean? It means the good always overcomes the bad, and if you remove the bad then the good will appear in your self.
Grandshaykh, may Allah (swt) bless his soul, said there are many verses of Holy Qur’an that first mention adhaab, punishment or Hellfire, then at the end of the verse it mentions Jannah/Paradise, and always the emphasis is on the goal you will reach.
Shah Naqshband’s good side was saying, “No, I have to stay! Why should I listen to my desires?” as Allah (swt) said in Holy Qur’an:
فَلَا تُزَكُّوا أَنفُسَكُمْ
Fa laa tuzakoo anfusakum.
Don’t praise yourself. (Surat an-Najm, 53:32)
“So I am going for my Shaykh, not for a normal person, but my Shaykh kicked me out. Am I going to make myself an enemy to him? No way! I am not going to be jealous like Iblees was of Adam and he came against Allah (swt), no I am not!”
As he struggled, while still in the state of being absent and present, he found himself outside at the threshold of the masjid in sajda, and it began to snow. He only had a thin jacket made of animal skin, there was nothing else on him. In those countries in winter you feel the cold; it is very dry and chills all the way to the bone! He put his head on the doorstep and was in that trance fighting with himself and the snow began to cover him. That was Shah Naqshband (q); if we compare ourselves with him where would we be? If there are seven Earths, we will be under all of them!
Look at this one (a mureed) who, like me, doesn’t know computers, and one day I needed him and asked him, “What are you doing?”
He said, “I am fighting with the computer, it’s a challenge. Who is going to win, me or it?” That was six or seven years ago and until today he could not complete that challenge and he still does not know; this is his IT level. Can we compare ourselves to Shah Naqshband (q)? He was still in the Level of Mureediyyah and had not yet reached the maqaam of Shaykhhood, although he was a Shaykh since birth, but in the explanation here he was not yet a Shaykh. He was in that struggle until Fajr, when he heard the calling of adhaan. In the old times there were no bathrooms in the homes, everything was outside. The Shaykh (q) wanted to make wudu to pray, so he passed through the house to the outside door and suddenly stepped on Shah Naqshband’s head (as if unnoticed). Shah Naqshband didn’t even say “Aah,” with Shaykh Amir Kulal’s full body weight on his head! Imagine what happened to his forehead, but he didn’t move.
The Shaykh said, “You are here?
Shah Naqshband (q) said, “Can someone be away from your garden of Paradise? Even if you step on my head until it is crushed, I will never move my head from here!”
Look at the greatness of awliyaullah! We get upset with what they do and we say many things and still they say, “Come, welcome.” They don’t throw anyone out!
The Shaykh said, "Yaa waladee, come," because when Shah Naqshband (q) was walking through the alley there were a lot of thorny bushes and both his legs were full of wounds and thorns. So Sayyidina Amir Kulal (q) took him in and the mureeds washed him and they took away all the thorns and the Shaykh dressed him in white and prayed Fajr with him and took him to his private room. Shah Naqshband (q) said everything changed there, and the Shaykh dressed him with Libaas al-Ma`arif, the different dresses of Gnosticism, about which he said, “As he was putting his head over my head and dressing me, I saw these different dresses from different colors, heavenly dresses coming from above me, and as they were coming the doors of my heart were opened for ma`arifatullah, which I would never have been able to learn through studying.”
To learn that knowledge by studying books is impossible. It came to him by tajalliyaat.
Shaykh Amir Kulal (q) said, “Yaa waladee! I dressed you with the secret of this tariqah and now you are a Shaykh.”
So that is a sample of one of the stories of Shah Naqshband (q) which sheds light on the story of Sayyidina Abayazid al-Bistami (q), who said that he saw Allah (swt) in a dream. Can Allah be seen in a dream? Yes. Can Prophet (s) be seen in a dream? Yes. Imam al-Ghazali (q) also wrote in his Ihya `Uloom ad-Deen that he saw Allah coming to him in a dream. Sayyidina Abayazid al-Bistami (q) saw Allah in the dream, not as a physical body or shape, but as a manifestation of Divine Light, and he said, “Yaa Rabbee! Kayf al-wusoolu ilayk! How can You be reached?”
This story is for everyone to see where he and his brothers in the same way stand, and where their teacher stands. It is like a formula used in Chemistry, Physics, Economics, and in the Stock Market it is like a security measure, whether or not to buy the stock, and it is an answer to all of us.
Sayyidina Abayazid al-Bistami (q) said, "O Allah! How can You be reached?" He did not say, “How can I reach You?” because he needed more work, but in general, “How to reach You?”
Did it ever come to our mind to ask a question like that? No, we don’t think like that. We think, “Oh, we are reading our juz of Holy Qur’an and our juz of Dalaa’il al-Khayraat, using a new miswaak and new beads....”
One of our Grandshaykh's students would never be seen carrying a tasbeeh. Why was that? It’s not because he wasn’t using them, but because he woke up after midnight, around one o’clock, and stayed awakeuntil Ishraaq (to complete his entire awraad). We sleep one hour before Fajr, in order not to pray Fajr. (laughter) In Ramadan, people are in the restaurant all night eating and drinking, then an hour before Fajr they sleep, so they do not have to pray Fajr. So you would never see that person carry beads because he was up for Qiyaam al-Layl for four or five hours until Ishraaq, and would do his awraad--reading Dalaa’il al-Khayraat, tasbeeh--and finished everything by Ishraaq, nothing was left. Then during the day he did not want to show people he was busy with beads because that would be considered showing off, so he wanted to show people that he was just like them, that he was nothing special or different. Some are different, as everyone has his own way. So I never saw him doing awraad, but in reality he was doing it at night when everyone was sleeping.
So Sayyidina Abayazid al-Bistami (q) asked, “How to reach You?” Many people do not think about this; rather, they come and say, “I have a jinn, black magic, this problem or that.” Read Surat al-Fatihah and you will see your problem is solved! Read Surat al-Fatihah one-hundred times and read istighfaar daily and Allah will take away problems from you!
Allah (swt) said, “Yaa Abayazid! If you want to come to Me, come with only one thing, not two or three. Itrak nafsak wa ta’al, leave yourself and come. You cannot come as two, you have to choose. If you leave your self it means you leave Shaytan and come to Me. You cannot be with Shaytan and come to Me!”
The self is Shaytan and the biggest enemy to you. Prophet (s) said:
روى البخاري في صحيحه عن سهل بن سعد رضي الله عنه أن النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم قال: من يضمن لي ما بين لحييه وما بين فخذيه، أضمن له الجنة
Man yadman lee maa bayna lahyatayhi wa maa bayna fakhdhayi adman lahu ’l-jannah.
Anyone who is able to control what is between his jaws and what is between his legs, I will guarantee for him Paradise. (Bukhari & Muslim)
It means this tongue takes us to punishment, I don’t want to say to Hellfire because it is too much, and may Allah (swt) forgive us. Allah will forgive punishment. And what is between your legs, if you keep it safe Prophet (s) will guarantee you Paradise.
Allah (swt) said, “How you can come to Me when your tongue is sharper than a knife?” Are some people like that? Allahu Akbar! They have a tongue sharper than a knife or razor; sharper than anything is the tongue of human beings! “So if you want to come to Me, come without your self and My door is open.”
Sayyidina Abayazid said, “Yaa Rabbee! How can I leave my self?” It’s within you. How to do that? He said, “Yaa Rabbee! I am ready, then how can I leave my self?”
Allah (swt) answered, "Yaa Bayazid! ijal nafsak maa lee abadee, Make yourself a dump for My Servants.” It means to carry whatever hardships people give to you and accept it; carry their difficulties and check if your ego: is still up, or down? Because when hardship comes, we immediately jump to reply back (argue) and, of course, we get angry. If someone calls us a donkey even once, we are angered, but when someone calls us a lion we are happy, although both are animals: there is no difference, one eats you raw and one is grazing! So it’s better to be a donkey than a lion.
It means Allah (swt) asked him to carry the burden of His Servants. So what would Sayyidina Abayazid (q) do to carry their burdens? He thought of instigating a problem so that they would come against him, and he would then carry their insults and be a dump for them.
We will leave that until tomorrow, to know out what he did from one village to another, and how when they didn’t agree to what he instigated the people began to stone him! He didn’t do other things, such as commit adultery, but he did things that people didn’t like so they sent children to throw anything at him. How did he respond, in a good way or a bad way? If his response was bad he would not have benefitted, as he was not carrying their burdens. So if they did anything bad to him, he had to respond with goodness. If they did good, alhamdulillah.
May Allah (swt) forgive us. May Allah (swt) bless us. We have to be very careful among awliyaullah, as it is not our position to say, “This one is better than that one.” Allah (swt) is giving everyone according to what he can carry. In your eyes, make your Shaykh whatever you want of goodness, then alhamdulillah, that is no problem, but don’t say to someone else, “My Shaykh is better,” or, “Your Shaykh is less.” It’s not our mission to do that: our mission is to meet everyone and take barakah from everyone. What is the big issue? We will become like a rainbow with many colors, which is better than being only one color! However, usually you prefer one color, so keep that and add more to it, like you said, this (Mawlana’s robe) has many colors. He (a mureed) has many colors.
May Allah (swt) forgive us.
Wa min Allahi 't-tawfeeq, bi hurmati 'l-habeeb, bi hurmati 'l-Fatihah.
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