Abdur Rahman ibn Yusuf Mangera – Essentials of Islamic Spirituality- What is the Sufi Pledge
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Raheem Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen
Wa salatu wa salamu ala al-mab'uthi
rahmatan lil'alameen wa ala alihi wa sahbihi
wa baraka wa salam tasliman kathiran ila yawm
al-deen amma ba'd The Essentials of Islamic
Spirituality or the Path to Perfection by Shaykh
Masih-ud-Dalla Khan Teachings of Hakim al
-Ummah So, last time we were discussing the
various different statements of the Sufis, about Sufism
as to what it's supposed to be and
what it's not supposed to be.
Now we move on to the technical terms
of Shari'ah and Tariqah.
So these are different terms that are used
by different people regarding this subject.
So we're just gonna go through and understand
what that means.
So firstly, there's the technical terms of Shari
'ah and Tariqah.
Shari'ah, you've heard of that, right?
And Tariqah.
So the source of all Islamic teaching is
the Qur'an and the Sunnah.
The foundation of this teaching, the foundation of
these teachings was in the gatherings of Allah's
Messenger ﷺ.
And that was laid right from the beginning,
initial part of Islam, and it existed at
its main center in Madina Munawwara, Makkah Mukarramah.
Initially, there were a confined number of adherents.
Just a few followers, right?
That's how the initial followers were.
There weren't thousands at the beginning.
One of the Sahaba says, I was the
seventh person to enter into Islam.
I was the seventh of the seven people
there.
So all the branches of Islamic instruction, tafsir,
Qur'anic commentary, hadith, jurisprudence, tasawwuf, spirituality, they
were all imparted in that one venue.
The Prophet ﷺ taught everything.
And it wasn't like, okay, one class on
this, one class on that.
It was just, as it came along, the
Prophet ﷺ's teachings, everything makes up the deen,
right?
The school, that one venue was the school
of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, and separate departments
did not exist.
However, in the school of the Prophet Muhammad
ﷺ, there was a permanent group of lovers
of Allah and devotees of the Prophet ﷺ
who were at all times engaged in the
purification of the soul and the reformation of
the heart by means of practice.
They were eating less.
They were focused only on what was necessary
and useful and beneficial.
And you know these people, they're called the
people of the ledge or the Ashabus Suffah.
Now, as the teaching continue, the Prophet ﷺ
departs.
When Islam acquires universal status, not everybody could
teach all of these things at once.
You didn't get that dedicated students to do
that.
You still get that sometimes in schools and
madrasas and seminaries.
But you know, general public, they can't sit
with you for hours, can they?
It's once a week we do this, for
example.
Actually, once every two weeks.
And when there's a football match on, then
there's a huge competition, right?
So, when Islam acquired universal status, the scholars
of the religion divided the science of Islam
into separate departments, so they could each be
focused on.
Those who rendered service to the knowledge of
hadith began to be called hadith scholars, muhaddithin
or hadith masters.
Those who undertook the responsibility of Qur'anic
exegesis or tafsir were called the wafasirun or
exegetes of the Qur'an.
Those who specialized in jurisprudence, fiqh, were called
the jurists or fuqaha.
And those who took custody of or focused
on the department of purification of the heart
or islahul batin or islahul qalb became known
as the sheikhs of tasawwuf or Sufis.
That's essentially how it was.
Hence, anybody who doesn't know this history and
doesn't understand this, they just think Sufis are
just like...
because there's been some bad ones, so they
just think they're all like that.
Hence, not a single one of the great
authorities of former times ever divorced the shari
'ah from the tariqah.
This became known as tariqah, the path.
Sufism was the path to attain Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala.
On the contrary, they held tariqah in subservience
to the shari'ah.
So, the tariqah has to be governed by
the shari'ah, it can't be a separate
thing.
And for some people, it is a separate
thing.
I remember in America when I was the
imam there, I used to get calls, do
you guys have any Sufi activities in your
mosque?
They're like, yeah, five times a day.
That's not what they were intending.
Because in America, Sufism is a separate religion
to Islam.
Because Rumi is quite popular, that any mainstream
bookshop you go to, there's a section on
Sufism.
So, people like this kind of mystical idea,
but without the rigors of the religion, without
having to conform that you better pray five
times a day, or you better abstain from
X, Y, and Z, alcohol and so on.
They just want this kind of mysticism and
everybody's interested in something.
It's built in us, I guess, but they
just don't want the strictures of it.
So, now we're gonna deal with four terms.
Shari'ah, exactly what that means, tariqah, haqiqah,
and ma'rifah.
They're very important terms.
So, the combined teachings and injunction of Islam
are known as the Shari'ah.
So, overall, everything is known as Shari'ah.
And Shari'ah actually comes from the concept
of a path as well.
Both sets of acts, both external acts like
our salat, and judicial system, marriage, divorce, all
of that, and our internal system of dealing
with people with love and compassion, and all
of that, are all included in Shari'ah.
Shari'ah is the overall term anyway.
Shari'ah is not just hand-cutting.
A lot of people, they get a bit
zealous, they wanna establish an Islamic state.
So, the first thing they wanna do to
mark themselves is start cutting hands off, without
kind of sorting anything else out.
Not to say that's not part of Islam,
but that seems to be like the first
thing to make a big bang.
In the terminology of the early authorities of
Shari'ah, called a mutaqaddimun, mutaqaddimin, the term
fiqh, literally profound understanding, fiqh just means profound
understanding, was synonymous with the word Shari'ah.
So, fiqh and Shari'ah meant the same
thing earlier on.
Thus, the great Imam Abu Hanifa, rahimahullah, defined
fiqh as, he defines fiqh as the recognition,
to recognize that which is beneficial and harmful
to the self.
If you recognize what's beneficial for you, and
what's harmful to you, you're a jurist, in
his sense, in the literal sense of that
word.
So, you know words, they did undergo change.
They meant a certain thing, then they could
start meaning something else, but related meanings.
They became more particular, they were more general
before, and so on.
Later in the terminology of the later authorities
of the Shari'ah, mutaqhirun, the word fiqh
began to be used for the specific branch
of Islam, which related to the external acts,
like your salah and fasting, and so on.
While the branch that dealt with the internal
acts became known as the sawf.
So, before everything was fiqh, but later, the
internal aspects became known as the sawf.
The ways of methods of reforming the esoteric
acts, they're also called the tariqah, because to
do that, you have to go on a
path.
The reformation, you see, if you wanna study
fiqh, you don't have to be thinking of
fiqh 24 hours a day.
Fiqh relates to salah, so you're gonna think
about it in salah time.
Fasting, you're gonna relate to it in Ramadan.
Buying and selling, so it's only when you're
dealing.
You don't have to be thinking of fiqh
24 hours a day.
But what we do have to be thinking
about all the time is, what's the condition
of my heart?
Am I thanking Allah?
Am I aware of Him?
Am I dealing with somebody correctly?
Am I getting angry?
Am I letting my desire overtake me?
That's a much more frequent part of our
life, more than fiqh is, in that sense.
So, the reformation of the internal acts brings
about spiritual radiance and light in the heart.
To this heart is then revealed certain realities
pertaining to the tangible and intangible occurrences.
Above all, virtue and vice, as well as
certain realities pertaining to the divine attributes and
acts of Allah, mainly affairs between Allah and
His servants.
That sounds a bit complicated.
But saying that once you get on to
this path, then no longer will you be
confused by what's going on in the world
as much.
We'll develop a kind of a consciousness towards
what's right and wrong.
You won't feel good about doing certain acts
even though you don't know the ruling of
it.
It just doesn't sound right.
My heart doesn't agree with it.
That's a mu'min's heart.
That's what happens when a person goes on
this path sufficiently.
They develop that inner understanding.
Because that's what Allah wants from us, is
to be molded into that kind of focus.
Sometimes you just have this in your heart.
Sometimes you might even see dreams.
Not that we're looking for that.
It'll be just the intuition.
So, these kind of unveilings, they're known as
haqiqah.
If you do get that kind of an
understanding where reality just hits you, that's called
haqiqah.
Reality.
And again, it's not like we're looking, we're
just doing our best to be servants of
Allah.
He'll do everything for us.
The process of these revelations is called ma
'rifah.
Ma'rifah just means recognition.
I've recognized Allah.
I've recognized what's good and bad.
I've recognized the evils of myself.
I've recognized that I have to be careful.
That's why I read the dua, اللهم لا
تكلني إلى نفسي طرفة عين.
O Allah, do not let me be submissive
to my nafs even for a second.
Because it'll get me into trouble.
But You stay in control of it.
So that You're constantly guiding me.
Because the nafs is greedy.
Meaning our lower self, ego is greedy, desirous
of multiple things which may not be beneficial
for us.
So, that becomes ma'rifah of Allah and
the workings of the universe.
The workings of Allah with the world.
While the one experiencing the unveiling is known
as an a'rif or muhaqqik.
That comes after a long time when a
person is muhaqqik, means a person who's developed
reality.
There's so many cases where the Prophet shallallahu
alaihi wa sallam say, don't do this.
And then it came out that there was
a good reason why that was said.
So many times religious people, righteous people, awliya
Allah say, I don't feel good about this.
And exactly turns out like that.
One scholar, one big shaykh passed away recently,
about three years ago.
Somebody brought some money to him, wanted to
give him a gift of a huge sum.
I mean, he would accept gifts from people.
In this particular occasion, he's like, I don't
want it.
I'm not accepting it.
The guy was unhappy, obviously.
But two, three days later, I think everybody
understood why he didn't accept it.
Because there was something dodgy about it.
But it wasn't known in that time.
He just didn't feel right about it.
In fact, regarding Izzuddin ibn Abdussalam, one of
the great scholars who was in Egypt, Sultan
al-Ulema, they call him, the king of
scholars, they call him.
He's a big wali of Allah.
So he used to be in the city,
and there was a person outside the city,
a friend of his would send him stuff,
gifts, you know, from the village.
So once he sent him some cheese, some,
you know, homemade cheese.
Now, the guy who was taking it and
who was bringing it for him, somewhere he
stumbled and the cheese fell, and it became
all dirty.
Now, he felt a bit upset.
So what he did was, there was a
Christian cheese seller that he found.
So he bought some more cheese from there,
and took it to the Sheikh, along with
some of the other stuff.
The Sheikh accepted everything except the cheese.
He said, I don't, I smell something from
there.
I don't want it.
And then later upon inquiries, he just found
out that it was actually not from his
friend.
It was actually from someone else.
Not to say you're not allowed to eat
cheese from Christians, but it was just that
he figured it out.
Now, you could say that maybe he saw
the cheese, and he knew the other person's
cheese.
I mean, you could have all of these
rational ideas there, right?
Which is fine if you want to.
It's not a problem.
But ultimately, a lot of the awliya are
given a discernment.
It's not like they never make a mistake,
though.
They're not prophets, right?
Even prophets can slip up in some of
these things, right?
But never in religious matters.
So, usually you're prone to less mistakes.
You're more divinely guided.
May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make us
like that.
That's why Allah promises this all the time.
That you just focus on our path, and
make that effort, and we'll show you our
ways.
لَنَهْدِيَنَّهُمْ سُبُولَنَا That's what this is talking about.
All the aforementioned relates to the sharia.
Everything we've just spoken about, it is all
sharia anyway.
The notion of the sharia and tariqa as
entities apart, that has gained prominence among the
public, is totally baseless.
Now the nature and reality of tasawwuf and
suluk.
Tasawwuf, purification of the heart department, and suluk
just means being on that path, have become
clear.
It will be understood that unveilings, you know,
what you hear that righteous people get understanding
of things, and unveilings, and miracles, they're not
necessary.
They're just things that might happen.
For some people it never happens at all.
If tasawwuf does not promise success in worldly
affairs, sorry, tasawwuf does not promise you success
in worldly affairs.
If you become a Sufi, it doesn't mean
you're gonna become successful in the world.
All of your deals are gonna come right
now.
No.
You're gonna start making a lot of money.
You're gonna get a better job.
No.
Right?
Nor does it assert that one's work will
be accomplished by means of ta'weez, and
amulets, and potions.
Now you're gonna be given all of these
spells, that things will just get done for
you.
You just have to say abracadabra, or whatever
the equivalent is.
Nothing like that.
It's just pure steadfastness on the sharia.
That's what tasawwuf is really.
Nor does it claim that one will necessarily
be successful in court cases by means of
du'as.
If you got a court case, you go
to a shaykh and say, I wanna be
a mureed, so that I can be successful
in the court cases.
Not necessary.
Yes, you'll feel stronger.
You'll feel more confident.
You'll feel able to deal with the matters.
Number of cases of, especially women who are
going through some seriously bad marriage issues, and
they're totally stressed out, and really have a
great amount of difficulty in living their life.
Give them some adhkar, get them on this
path, and suddenly they're strong.
It might not change the situation.
Their husband is still a zalim.
Right?
Their in-laws are still persecuting them.
Right?
But at least they know what to do.
They're not helpless now.
The reason they were helpless in the first
place is because they have no connection to
Allah.
They didn't...
Essentially they were not leaning on a strong
pillar, as they say.
So now at least they know Allah is
on their side.
So you're just able to deal with matters
better.
So that will happen.
What else?
Nor does it promise you cure from your
physical ailments.
Your cancer is not necessarily going to get
better.
It does not promise increase in your earnings.
It does not foretell future events.
You're not going to become a clairvoyant, or
a fortune teller.
It does not contend that the seeker's reformation
will be achieved by the spiritual focus of
the shaykh.
Some people say this.
Actually some Sufis say this.
You get into this tariqah, and then the
shaykh does everything for you.
You don't have to do much.
The amount of focus the shaykh gives and
everything, you just sort yourself out.
It's not a conveyor belt.
It helps, but it's not a conveyor belt.
You don't just get to Jannah like that.
It helps though, because you get a prompting,
you get du'as, and you get instruction.
And just the fact that you're supervised by
somebody, that feels good, that helps.
But ultimately you have to then fill in
the gap.
So none of that is tasawwuf.
Okay, what else does he say?
Extraordinary feats are not organic to tasawwuf.
Basically, just because you become Sufi, you're not
going to do extraordinary feats.
Lots of other people can check online.
Lots of magicians, they can do extraordinary things.
They're not Sufis.
Lots of Hindu yogis can do lots of
crazy stuff.
That doesn't make them Sufis.
It does not contend that the one who
treads this path will not be afflicted by
the thought of sin.
You'll still struggle with sin, but you'll just
be stronger, more immune.
But you're not prophets, so you can still
do a sin.
But it's just going to be easier to
deal with.
Yes, the shaitan will attack first though, and
make it much worse.
You have to get over that initial period.
When somebody is lazing around, not doing anything,
distracted, and then suddenly starts practicing, there's an
initial bout of time when the shaitan just
goes after them, gives them doubts and all
sorts of things.
And he'll come and say, I never used
to have these doubts before.
I never used to have these problems before.
Brother, just carry on, just carry on.
Give it a few months, and the shaitan
will realize you're on it.
You're not going to get off.
You're not an easy task.
So keep asking Allah for assistance and carry
on.
Nor does it claim that the seeker will
automatically, without effort, engage in worship.
It's still going to be an effort.
It does not promise total self-annihilation, so
that one is now not aware of even
one's presence.
Just because you're going to the path of
the soul doesn't mean that you're going to
lose yourself.
You're just completely madly in love with Allah
now.
You don't even know what's going on.
You don't care about anything anymore.
That's not necessarily going to be the case.
It does not promise experience of states of
ecstasy, spiritual effulgences, through spiritual exercises.
Nor does it claim that one will see
beautiful dreams and wonderful visions.
You are going to go to Makkah and
Madinah Munawwarah every night in your sleep now.
No.
If anybody promises you that, I don't know
what they're doing.
Right.
None of the above are the aims of
tasawwuf.
What is the aim of tasawwuf then?
The good pleasure, ridwan of Allah Most High
is the aim of tasawwuf.
That you just achieve the good pleasure of
Allah.
This then should be kept in sight, he
says.
So, that was that section.
Now, this can be done through multiple ways.
And one of the most effective ways is
to get somebody to help you.
So, to have a shaykh to help you
who has done it already so that they
can help.
Because always in anything in this world we
help by becoming an apprentice, by becoming a
disciple.
Right.
You do law studies and then suddenly you
have to go and find pupillage.
You have to become a pupil.
You have to become a disciple.
That's how it used to work before.
And that's how it works now in many
cases.
You get experience.
So, the way that usually happens is that
you agree.
So, you take a pledge.
You do what they call the bay'ah.
So, this is what the bay'ah is
all about.
The sahaba took bay'ah with the Prophet
ﷺ.
So, then later scholars said, let's do that
so that we can have our students to
be committed.
You want to study fiqh with somebody, you
might have to sign a contract for the
course that I'm gonna pay you this much
and it's gonna be this many.
But it's not gonna be any bay'ah
system, is there?
If you go to study tafsir with somebody,
they don't make you do bay'ah.
If you go to study hadith with somebody,
there again, they don't do that.
It's an ijazah system, right?
But when it comes to tasawwuf specifically, they
do bay'ah.
It's not necessary, but it's very beneficial because
it's like because it's a spiritual realm.
It's like you're getting connected through that bay
'ah, through the shaykh, through his shaykh, all
the way up to the Prophet ﷺ.
So, the benefit we believe is that our
ilm that comes to us today, our knowledge
that comes to us today is not coming
from the teacher.
It's coming from through a whole series through
Allah, through the Prophet ﷺ, down the generations
from heart to heart because we believe in
that chain.
And it's coming through like that.
So, you're getting connected officially to that by
giving the pledge.
You could be unofficially taking, no problem.
But you're becoming officially now linked to that.
So, inshaAllah, the blessings that are coming and
we expect that Allah, if there's a good,
if there's been a good, you can say,
order, a good number of people who've done
this, then we believe that Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala, His shower of mercy comes on
these people.
So, we get benefit from that.
I'd rather be with those kind of people.
So, that's the benefit of doing that.
So, here, this is how he explains it.
He says, bay'ah or the pledge is
a mutual pledge related to the striving for,
adherence to, arrangement, and executing of the laws
of external actions and internal actions.
That's the purpose of the bay'ah.
I undertake to do this, and to not
lie, and to not steal, and not to
commit haram, and to do my prayers on
time, and to make up anything that I
miss, and so on and so forth.
There's bay'ah mentioned in the Quran, where
the Prophet shallallahu alaihi wasallam said that, when
those women from Makkah come, then you need
to test them and take the bay'ah.
That they will, They won't steal, they won't
commit zina, they will, and they will not
kill their children, and so on.
Whatever is relevant in that particular position, any
of that can be said.
So, the pledge is known as, meaning the
pledge for the path, which has been in
practice through authoritative transmission from generation to generation.
You know, pretty much from the earlier generation
of Islam, there have been some cases where
there was no bay'ah, in between two
shaykhs, and it was just a more casual
relationship, there was no need for a bay
'ah.
That is definitely the case, that has been
the case.
The Messenger of Allah shallallahu alaihi wasallam took
pledges, bay'ah from the companions, not only
on jihad, that was the famous one, right?
But on Islam, and adherence to the rulings
of the Islamic law in general, as well
as on practical deeds and a'mal.
When Amr ibn Aas shallallahu alaihi wasallam came
to become Muslim, he said, I want to
take the bay'ah.
So, the Prophet extended his hand.
So, Amr ibn Aas pulled his hand back,
and he said, why are you pulling his
hand back for?
So, he said, oh, I want to take
the pledge, but I want to make some
conditions.
He said, what condition do you want to
make?
Condition I want to make is that all
my previous sins are forgiven.
He said, well, that's what's going to happen
through proper Islam anyway.
So, he took the pledge.
Actually, when new Muslims become now, we don't
really take pledges from them, do we?
We should take pledge with the imam maybe.
Be a good idea.
I don't think anybody does that.
They just make him say, la ilaha illa
Allah, and then they send them.
But the Prophet shallallahu alaihi wasallam, that's what
he used to do.
Right.
So, numerous hadith established this.
The following is one such hadith, Awf ibn
Malik al-Asja'i, may Allah be pleased
with him, said that we were with the
Messenger of Allah shallallahu alaihi wasallam, seven, eight,
or nine of us.
When he said, will you not give a
pledge to the Messenger of Allah?
We extended our hands and asked, on what
shall we make the pledge to you, O
Messenger of Allah?
He said, that you worship Allah, associate nothing
with Him, perform the five prayers, and that
you hear and obey.
Hadith of Muslim Abu Dawud al-Nasa'i.
On this occasion, the pledge of the Messenger
of Allah shallallahu alaihi wasallam, that he took
from his companions, was neither the pledge of
faith, they were already Muslims, nor the pledge
to a jihad.
This hadith is categorical evidence for the validity
of the system of pledge-taking put in
practice by the sheikhs of Tasawwuf.
As there are four schools in jurisprudence, Hanafi,
Shafi'i, Maliki, and Hanbali, so too there
are schools in Tasawwuf.
He says there's four, but I think he's
just relating to the subcontinent, because in the
subcontinent there were primarily four.
But around the world is more than that.
He says the Chishti, the Qadili, the Naqshbandi,
and the Suhrawardi.
These were the four famous ones of the
subcontinent.
Just as the Hanafi school is dominant in
this area of subcontinent, the Chishti school is
also dominant there.
Primarily is Chishti, though there are others as
well.
Our elders in Tasawwuf gave pledge in all
the four orders though, so that the respect
of the four is maintained, although the Chishti
way is dominant.
What does that mean?
For example, one of the sheikhs that I
have ijazah from, his main way of teaching
is the Chishti way, certain way of adhkar
and so on.
However, he has ijazah, and the chains of
the Naqshbandi and other tariqs as well.
But each of the tariqs have a slightly
different way of giving you dhikr, and what
to focus on, and the methodology.
That might be confusing to give you all
of it.
So that's why they focus on one, but
you get the blessing of all of them
because the objective of each one is the
same, which is to get the pleasure of
Allah.
The objective is the same.
Of any of the pure schools of jurisprudence
that have not been adulterated and polluted, the
maqsad is the same.
There is one sheikh that I know, when
somebody comes to him to take the pledge,
he gives him dhikrs from all four types.
And the student, the seeker, is supposed to
do that for a few months, and then
he explains how he feels in each of
these, and then he says, okay, you focus
on this one because that's more appropriate for
you.
Different sheikhs will do different things.
What we do here usually is we do
chishti and Naqshbandi, the two ways.
We do a bit of both of those.
But different sheikhs do some exclusively Naqshbandi, some
are exclusively chishti, although they might have all
four chains and more.
Just to give you an understanding of that.
The founder of the chishti order is our
master Mu'inuddin Chishti Ajmeri.
Chishti is, I think it's in Afghanistan.
That's where he originally came from.
Settled in India in Ajmer, which is in
south of Delhi, north of Gujarat.
It is a massive place there that unfortunately
they do a lot of crazy stuff there
right now as well.
But that's where he's buried.
And you could say that he would be
responsible for so many conversions to Islam.
Many of the people sitting here, their forefathers
may have converted because of him.
Aside from sin, Islam came into sin much
earlier, but the rest of Indian subcontinent, Mu
'inuddin Chishti is responsible for a lot of
the Islam there.
Then he says that the founder of the
Qadiri order is our master Shaykh Abdul Qadir
al-Jilani, who was in Baghdad.
Amazing story.
Read about him in the Saviors of Islamic
Spirit.
I think we might have a lecture on
him.
The founder of the Naqshbandi order is our
master Shaykh Bahauddin al-Naqshbandi, who's from, he's
buried now in Bukhara in Uzbekistan.
So his teachings have gone all over the
world as well.
And the founder of the Suhrawardi order is
our master Shaykh Shihabuddin al-Suhrawardi, may Allah
have mercy on him.
The nature of the pledge, the meaning of
bay'ah, this word bay'ah, comes from
the concept of bay', which means to sell
something.
So what's that got to do with anything?
It almost implies that the seeker, the mureed,
sells himself to the Shaykh.
In other words, he has sold himself to
the Shaykh in preparation for the outward rulings
and the inward rulings, and to learn to
give practical expression to the law of Allah
Most High.
This is like the Shaykh is becoming responsible
for you.
There's no money in this sale, right?
The nature of this sale envisages that the
seeker of truth will have implicit trust and
faith in a Shaykh.
He will understand and accept that the advices,
prescriptions, admonitions and prohibitions of the Shaykh are
all designed and motivated for his spiritual well
-being.
Should take all of it with that kind
of understanding.
The seeker shall not interfere with or impede
the diagnosis and prescription of the Shaykh.
Usually that should not be the case, otherwise
you're telling the doctor, no, no, no, I
want to take that.
Yes, you can have a discussion, you know,
you can ask questions, that's fine.
He should have faith to such an extent
that he should believe that in his knowledge,
I mean, this is a bit extreme, but
if you really want to benefit from your
Shaykh's saying, then you must believe that in
his knowledge there is none among creation who
can benefit him more at that point than
his Shaykh.
Otherwise, why would you be going to him?
If you don't have that and you say,
oh, but that Shaykh might be better, then
you already lost it, because your focus will
be wrong.
Psychologically, you won't be focused.
In the terminology of Tasawwuf, this concept of
implicit faith in the Shaykh is known as
unity of purpose.
وحدة المطلب Without this conception, the ceremony of
pledge taking is meaningless and of no benefit.
Because congeniality with the Shaykh is an essential
condition for reformation of the heart.
Just make sure you get the right Shaykh.
Because if you're gonna give yourself like this
and trust so much this Shaykh, then you
better be a right one.
Otherwise, you're dead.
Right?
Allah Ta'ala protects.
So, he's saying congeniality and this trust is
very important.
So, he says that the sign of the
existence of congeniality between the seeker and his
Shaykh is that the heart of the seeker
does not object to the position, the statements
and acts of the Shaykh.
Should any objection arise in the heart regarding
the Shaykh, the seeker should feel grief and
distress.
This is probably from the Shaytan.
Shaytan probably wants me to be off.
The Shaytan will create a lot of problems.
Right?
To try to get you in doubt.
There's people who take a pledge with somebody,
and then they find a friend who's got
somebody else and then they jump to them.
And that doesn't work out and they jump
to somebody else.
And ultimately, they just end up wasting a
lot of time and they don't get nothing.
The external form of the pledge is beneficial
to the lay people.
What's the benefit of this?
I've already explained it, but he's now explaining
it.
Since it induces reverence and respect in them
for the Shaykh and the path, as a
result, they readily accept the Shaykh's statements and
are constrained to act accordingly.
However, for the Khawas or the scholars, the
pledge proves beneficial after a period has been
spent in association with the Shaykh.
Maybe not straight away, because they analyze things
differently.
By virtue of the pledge, a bond of
sincerity and association is generated between the seeker
and the Shaykh.
The Shaykh considers the seeker to belong to
him now.
It's a responsibility.
Not to say, I've got thousands of murids.
Right?
In fact, anybody who becomes a...
I usually tell them, don't even tell anybody
you're a beggar.
Because, what is it?
You've just joined a club, so you're telling
everybody, I've joined that club.
I'm a member now.
What benefit are you gonna get from that?
That's what some people do.
They think they get something special because they've
connected.
They do no effort, they just tell everybody.
Yes, if you want to share it, somebody
who needs help, go ahead, that's fine.
But don't make this a cultish thing or
a membership idea or something like that.
It's a very personal journey for the sake
of Allah.
The Shaykh considers the seeker to belong to
him and the seeker considers the Shaykh to
belong to him.
There does not remain any tension between them.
But the Shaykh does not become your personal
advisor on every little thing.
Some Shaykhs are like that.
They want you to ask them everything.
So there was a guy who came, he'd
come from another group that were very possessive.
So this guy, if he got you on
the phone, he wouldn't let you go for
an hour.
He wanted to ask where he should invest
his money.
And I'm like, that's not a responsibility I
take.
I can't tell you where to invest your
money.
That's very, very dangerous.
Because if something goes wrong, that's gonna be
a big responsibility.
So I don't have anything for you.
He's like, what kind of Shaykh are you?
He didn't exactly say in those words, but
because he came from that kind of background,
he expected that I had to make it
very clear to him, look, this is not
how we function here.
Something to do with religion and so on.
If you're gonna ask me that this is
the investment, is it halal or haram, I
can give you a fiqh-y response.
If you ask me whether it's good for
your heart or not, and I can understand
your motivation, I can give you that answer.
But I can't tell you where to invest,
unless I know it personally.
So one has to be very careful how
this happens and what the Shaykh is.
So it's good to know how much your
Shaykh wants from you, and wants control, right?
And wants you to be in touch.
In the
name
of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
Ya Allah, have mercy on us.
Ya Allah, have mercy on this ummah.
Ya Allah, have mercy on us with all
of these elections that have taken place.
Ya Allah, give tawfiq to those who you
have chosen above us.
O Allah, O Allah, grant them good understanding.
Grant them compassion.
O Allah, grant them kindness.
O Allah, grant them concern.
O Allah, grant them the right understanding.
O Allah, O Allah, we pray that you
protect all of us and you guide us
aright.
You make us of those who thank you,
who stay on your path, who are there
to seek your pleasure.
Ya Allah, grant us your pleasure.
Be satisfied with us.
Make us the way that you will be
satisfied with us.
Make us the way you would like us
to be, Ya Allah.
O Allah, remove from us all of our
bad traits, our bad habits.
O Allah, our vices, our sins, and protect
us and forgive us.
Ya Allah, purify us.
Ya Allah, protect us and our children.
O Allah, allow us to be on the
path of your sunnah, of your messenger Muhammad,
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
O Allah, allow us to go again and
again to Mecca, those who have been for
Hajj, O Allah, accept it from them.
O Allah, those who haven't been, O Allah,
allow them to go.
O Allah, take us back as often as
possible, Ya Allah.
O Allah, we ask that you protect our
sacred spaces, Ya Allah, sanctuaries.
O Allah, our masjid project that we have,
O Allah, allow it to be done, completed.
It's on its way, O Allah, remove any
obstacles in its path.
Remove any hindrances from it, Ya Allah.
Ya Allah, remove any hindrances.
Make it easy, Ya Allah.
O Allah, grant us resources from your ghayb,
O Allah, from we would never expect, Ya
Allah.
Make it easy for us, O Allah.
Make it for your sake, Ya Allah.
Make it sincerely for your sake.
O Allah, allow us all to serve your
faith in some way or the other.
Accept us all to be of some service,
Ya Allah.
Do not allow us to waste this life
in just personal abandon and luxury and personal
pursuits of fulfilling our desires, but O Allah,
allow us to do it for your sake
and make us truly your servants, Ya Allah.
O Allah, O Allah, you have given us
so much more than so many others in
this world, but O Allah, we are still
ungrateful, Ya Allah.
O Allah, make us of those who have
gratitude, who thank you, who abundantly thank you,
who constantly have gratitude in their heart, O
Allah, who truly understand what you have given
us and see your bounties, Ya Allah.
O Allah, allow us to be on this
path, O Allah, on the path of the
righteous people.
Bless them all who have delivered this and
conveyed this to us, all the way up
to the Messenger Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
Those who told us to make dua for
them, O Allah, bless them and grant them
their permissible needs.
Those who we should be making dua for,
O Allah, bless them too.
O Allah, O Allah, accept from all of
us, Subhana, Rabbika, Rabbil Izzati anna, Yausifuna, wa
salamun al mursaleen, wa alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen.
O Allah, give shifa to the sick ones,
especially Muhammad Mushtaq's baby and other friends and
their children who are sick, O Allah, protect
all of our children and protect all of
us and grant us all good health, Subhana,
Rabbika, Rabbil Izzati anna, Yausifuna, wa salamun al
mursaleen.
The point of a lecture is to encourage
people to act, to get further, an inspiration,
an encouragement, persuasion.
The next step is to actually start learning
seriously, to read books, to take on a
subject of Islam and to understand all the
subjects of Islam, at least at their basic
level, so that we can become more aware
of what our Deen wants from us.
And that's why we started Rayyan courses, so
that you can actually take organized lectures on
demand whenever you have free time, especially, for
example, the Islamic Essentials course that we have
on there, the Islamic Essentials Certificate, which you
take 20 short modules.
And at the end of that, inshaAllah, you
will have gotten the basics of most of
the most important topics in Islam and you'll
feel a lot more confident.
You don't have to leave lectures behind, you
can continue to listen to lectures, but you
need to have this more sustained study as
well.
JazakAllah Khair.
Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.