Hamzah Wald Maqbul – Ramadn 9th Late Night Majlis Khaja Fariduddin Shakar Ganj 06042017
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AI: Transcript ©
So today, we read the
Tabakah
of the Sheikh Hajafariduddin
Shaker Ganj
His father was a sheikh Jamaluddin, the maternal
cousin of the sultan Mahmud Ghaznavi.
His name was Mas'ud and his title was
Fariduddin.
He was a descendant of Amirul Munin, Omar
ibn Khattab
He was born in 584 or 585 or
569
Hijra
in Cortwal, which is in the district of
Multan.
His grandfather,
Adi Shuraib, migrated from the homeland in Kabul,
during the era of,
Halagu or Hulegu,
the Mongol,
general and went to Lahore.
Qadiman Sur of Lahore who had acquired his
knowledge in Kabul had informed the king of
Dili Abdi,
arrival of Qadhi Shoaib. The king offered him
a post. However, he declined and went to
Multan.
The king instructed the governor of Multan to
arrange a fief
for, Qabi Shuraib.
This was arranged in court while where he
finally settled.
So there's a number of things,
Mahmoud Ghaznawi
was
the,
the the famous
Turkic king,
who conquered,
conquered large swaths of the Indian subcontinent.
He was the,
the king who conquered,
the Somnath temple.
There was
a idol of the the Hindu god Shiva
in that temple
that was so large
that,
it took them
it took it took the army
several days to destroy it completely.
Interestingly enough, the Muslims, when they used to
conquer the Hindu lands, it's not like it
was a
a common practice for them to destroy their
temples. In fact,
the the the the Amalie
and practical fatah that they used to use
is they would just,
consider them to be like Zoroastrians,
which is that they're not completely people of
the book in the sense that they gave
fatwa that haram to marry their women and
it's haram to eat their slaughter.
But, give them the benefit of the doubt
that perhaps their deen, because it's ancient, is
somehow rooted in some sort of revelation.
But the the thing that happened with
the Somnath temple is that there was so
much wealth and riches and gold,
and the idol was so precious to them
that when his army passed through that land,
the the, the people in the temple tried
to they offered him an amount of money
to spare the temple.
And because they did it, he was offended.
He said that you think you're gonna buy
my dean out for money. And so he
he he he declared to them that he's
not going
to spare it. So if they wanna defend
it, they can defend it with their army.
And there was a a a battle and
he,
entered in and destroyed the temp the the
temple and destroyed the the the idol. Imagine
if the idol was so large that it
took them,
several days to break the stone of it.
It was it was a great it was
a great, feat,
and it was not a small matter.
So he's known in in Farsi as
which, which is a Farsi expression for idol
breaker.
And that was one of his titles, and
he was very well known for that, for
sacking the the Somnath temple.
And, you know,
some modern sensibilities
may be offended by that, but, you know,
if you worship wood and stone, a, something's
wrong with you in the head, and, b,
you're going to the hellfire. So there's a
greater there's a greater, mercy,
in that being shown. It's like Sayidin Ibrahim
alaihis salam, he said to his people
that, when they asked who destroyed our idols,
they asked the big one. They say, you
know, they don't talk and they don't have
any they don't they're they're not able to
understand anything. They don't harm you. They don't
benefit you. So his,
he's a maternal cousin
of of, of,
Mahmoud Ghaznabi,
and he's a descendant of Sayidina
There are a large number of the,
both of this era and, after it and
before it that are that are from the
lineage of Saidna Umar of Nokhtab
including Shahwaulullah and his family
and including Mujaddad Alfthani,
Sheikh Ahmed Sarhandi,
who the only extent line of
the only extent line of the Naturbandi Tarika
comes through
him. And, he's from Sarhand, which is, in
in East Punjab.
And,
Kurwal is a place that that that's I
mean, it's still a modern city in in
in Punjab.
Multan is an interesting place also that he
settled in Multan
because,
Multan is a place that was first conquered
by
Muhammad bin Qasim Thaqafi. He was a nephew
of Hajjaz bin Yusuf,
and his army was dispatched by Banu Umayyah,
to free,
Hajjads who were captured by,
by,
a Hindu, pirate and a king in Sindh.
And, they conquered all the way up to
Multan. And it said that after
after,
Muhammad bin Qasem,
conquered Multan.
For 200 years, the the the native language
in that place was actually Arabic.
The the main language that was spoken there
was Arabic. And to this day, you'll see
the southern part of part of Punjab, which
was cut conquered by the armies of the
Salaf Banu Umayyah.
They're culturally different than the other part of
Punjab. In the sense that the the language
is is is a little bit different, but
the cultures and customs are more in line
with Muslim cultures and customs. So for example,
in the southern part of Punjab,
the mahar is given from the boys' side
of the family
to the girl side, which is a, which
is a custom of the Muslims. Whereas in
the rest of the subcontinent, at least until
relatively recently, the the the girl side used
to give a huge dowry to the boys'
side as is a custom of the Hindus,
and they would give some token amount as
the actual itself.
There are a number of customs like that.
You'll see that there are actually, you'll see
more camels in those places, and you'll see
people eat dates and, like, the the the
kind of the way they they they carry
themselves or is it's culturally closer to that,
the customs of the Arabs than than than
in,
than in in the the the part the
part of Punjab where the army of the
Salaf never reached.
And
you'll see also that, a number of great
come from from that that place, both from
the ulama,
of all different, of all different
schools of thought and also from the Sufia
of the different.
And the last thing I wanted to point
out from this paragraph is that,
what happened.
The of Lahore
who was a classmate he studied in Kabul
and he was a classmate of
of the Kadi Shoaib. So the Kadi Mansur
of Lahore was a classmate of Kadi Shoaib,
who is a grandfather
of Sheikh Fariduddin.
He wrote to the king that this is
my classmate and he's a very accomplished scholar.
So what did the king do?
He,
he
wrote
to the,
to the to the the the his,
the secretary that he should be given a
fief.
A fief is what? He should be given,
like, lands,
the produce of which will be written the
income of which is written to for for
his income,
which is
a sensibility they had in the old days
because that's how the are going to be
independent.
Now, instead, we just buy tickets to go
to conferences and, like,
I don't know, YouTube hits and, like,
you know, stuff like that. But as long
as Lamar constantly day to day, like,
dependent
on dependent on a source of income,
from
from the,
then the Awam are going to direct the
direction in which the go and not the
other way around.
And this is very important because I think
a lot of people have a very corporatized
mindset. They're like, oh, we have to have
accountability. There has to be committee overseas, just
that and the other thing. The person who
spent his life studying the dean, the only
person who oversee them is the other olema.
It's not going to be the olam. If
the olam have the risk in one hand
and,
then how are they going to take their
in the other? It doesn't really work like
that.
So the reason he was in Courtois was
that the, the the the the king of
Delhi,
gave him wrote for him a fief in,
in,
he wrote for him a fief over there.
The question might come up, by the way,
is why why why do always,
certain imams always gripe about the money?
Hajj's
grandfather was a Qadi.
The got paid.
Hajj himself was a Sufi. The Sufis didn't
take anything from anyone.
They didn't take a dime from anybody.
And they're both different types of but they
never took a dime from anyone. This is
why the the the were respected universally,
but the Sufis were were were were venerated
as the because
the person who,
takes is not like the person who doesn't
take. The person who doesn't take, there's a
sort of transcendence about that person that cloaks
them in a type of nobility that, that
the people who take, even though they are
worth worthy of respect and command respect according
to the deen, that they're not the same.
And that person has a a level of
of of resemblance to the
that's higher than than other people. But, you
know, the the system has to work practically.
We have to think about practical
things as well. There are certain people as
a gift from Allah to Allah, he'll allow
them to get through without taking from people.
And that's the father of Allah he gives
to whoever he wishes.
Sheikh Fariduddin acquired part of his academic knowledge
in the Masjid of Qadim Hajuddeen.
It was here that he became,
that he gave his hand in bayah to
the Sheikh Khutbuddin Bakhtiar,
of whom we spoke yesterday.
He completed his academic career in Kabul.
The sheikh Nizamuddin who is, another, who who
is a disciple of the sheikh Fariduddin Ganshaker,
Sheikh Nizamuddin Olia.
I'm told to this day that if you
want to go to his Mufti knife in
Detroit told me if you wanna go to
his mazar, even a Hindu cab driver, if
you say take me to Nizamuddin,
he'll correct you and
say.
Yeah. They they they consider disrespectful to not
say
Hazrat with it even though there's no za
in the Hindi language. So there's a Hajar
Nizamuddin instead of if you if you say
Nizamuddin to them. The sheikh Nizamuddin said once
while Hazrat Sheikh Fariduddin's mother was performing salat,
the thief entered.
When he gazed at her, he immediately became
blind.
The thief cried out, I came with the
intention of stealing and have become blind. I
pledge never to steal again.
At this time, Azza Sheikh's age was approximately
6 years old. He himself made dua and
the man's sight was restored.
In the morning, he came with his entire
family and accepted Islam.
So next time we go on a Twitter
storm talking garbage about Islamophobes or whatever,
these people dealt with it
according to prophetic methodology.
In the morning, he came with his entire
family and accepted Islam. His name was then
Abdullah, and he remained in Hazrat's service till
the end.
There are several views for him becoming known
famous by the title
of Ganj Shakar.
When he decided on the path of Mujahada
or struggling against his own soul, his sheikh
advised him,
to maintain hunger. He therefore became he began
fasting.
After 3 days, a man came and presented
some bread. Thinking this to be by divine
direction, he accepted and ate the bread.
Within a few moments, he became nauseous and
vomited out whatever he ate it whatever he
ate.
He reported this incident to his sheikh who
said, after 3 days, you ate the food
of a drunkard. Shook her to Allah ta'ala.
Thanks to Allah ta'ala, the food did not
remain in your stomach. Now remain hungry for
another 3 days and eat what comes to
you from the ghib.
After 3 days, nothing came. He was overcome
by weakness.
On account of the extreme hunger he felt,
he put some pebbles into his mouth and
the pebbles turned into sugar.
Fearing this may be some deception, he spat
it out. A short while again, he felt
extreme hunger once more,
and he put the pebbles into his mouth.
These 2 became sugar which he again spat
out.
This happened a third time in the morning.
He reported to a sheikh who said it
would have been good had you eaten it.
Since that day, he was called shakarganj.
Shakara is the the the Persian word for,
sukhar for sugar, andganj means,
treasure.
According to another version on the 7th day
of hunger, he came tottering to his sheikh
sand on his mouth had be sand in
his mouth, which had then become sugar.
Another explanation is that once he asked a
trader for some sugar and the trader falsely
said that he only had salt,
Hazrat said to him it must be salt.
When the trader looked, the sugar had become
salt. The trader apologized and salt again became
sugar.
Hazar Sheykh Fariduddin
resorted to extreme methods of Mujahada initially.
Hazar Sultan al Masha'i said, a hair came
from out of Hazar Sheykh's beard. I requested
permission to use the hair in a tawid
in an amulet.
He granted me permission. I wrapped it in
a cloth. When someone gave became ill, I
would give him the taweez.
When the
sick person was cured, I cured, I retrieved
it. I observed many benefits of this taweeb.
Once when a friend became ill, he asked
for it for a taweeb.
Although I searched much, I could not find
it. The friend then died. On another occasion,
when I searched for it in order to
give it to another person, I found it
on the shelf where I had left it.
I then realized that since the mote of
the friend the death of the friend had
been ordained at that time, I could not
locate
the
Now
stories like this, for example, a person may
ask, okay, isn't this horrible? Blah blah blah.
These are all the karamat of the oliya.
When a person is a person of deen
and is a person of scrupulous and steadfast
in observing the Sharia when these things happen,
This is a karama Allah ta'ala, vouchsafes at
the hands of his in order to what?
In order to,
prove the correctness of their their their their
dawah and their claim. Because it's a part
of our atida also that the karamat of
the, the miracles of the saints
are, all of them one collectively. They form
one of the miracles of the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam.
And so these things do happen.
Specifically, do you have to believe this story
as a matter of aqidah? No. You may
say, okay, maybe that didn't happen. But in
general, the karamat of the aliyah person who
doesn't believe them believe in them, it's as
if they have neglected a a part of
the belief in Islam and the belief in
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
Obviously, people entered into Islam in the in
into the thousands at the hands of such
people. So this is this is, hikmah why
Allah to have vouchsafed these miracles to be,
shown at their hands.
Sheikh Fariduddin's
spiritual grandfather, Yanihi's sheikh Sheikh Haja Muinuddin spoke
in glowing praise of him. Once he said,
Qutbuddin has imprisoned a great royal falcon.
It's a metaphor that Qutbuddin, his his,
his,
successor.
He looked at his his, disciple,
Fariduddin and said Khutbuddin has imprisoned a great
royal falcon.
On another occasion, he said, this is a
candle which will brighten the homes of the
Darish's.
He will be the and the of his
time. Both Hoth and Khutub are are are
names for,
the the the highest ranks of the Aliyah.
Hoth being the highest rank of the Aliyah
and Khutub,
being the one
below
it. When Hazar Sheikh Khaja Khutbuddin was on
his deathbed, when Khaja Khutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki was
on his deathbed,
he called Hazrat Fariiduddin and appointed him his
representative.
Hunger was a dominant feature in his life.
Many a time, even his wife and children
had to experience hunger.
His famous statement is when you don the
mantle, you know that when you don the
mantle, you know that you've donned the kafan.
The mantle of what? The mantle is the
the the,
majaz or the the metaphor for
the, being sheikh.
Because this was the the old practice of
the Sufis that the the the way that
they used to show their khilafa, their ijazah
is that the the the patched
cloak of the the sheikh, he would give
it to one of
the one of the successors, and that successor
would then wear it and then he carry
the authority of his sheikh and that that
that that that was passed through generation after
generation. It said that
wore
the
kirkah
of.
And it's a claim that he himself makes,
I think, in his fatawa.
And so he says whoever wears the, they
should know that the is that your nafs
is dead at that time.
It's not
unfortunately,
now like our,
you know, goofy friends do that that this
has become like an opportunity to become a
big shot and have people make a and
blah blah blah.
The true hack of it is that your
your nafs dies that day. No no more
are you.
And it probably should have died far before
that. No more do you your does your
nafs have a a part in in what
you do in the day and and and
in in the night.
Once Hajar Muinuddin
was the guest of Hajar Qutbuddin.
So the grand sheikh is the guest of
the sheikh.
The beds of both host and guest were
in the same room.
Hajjar Fariduddin, according to his normal routine,
went at night into the room to press
the feet of his sheikh.
Haja Qutbuddin
signaled for him to press the, feet of
his sheikh,
Haja Muinuddin.
After pressing his feet for a few minutes,
Khadijah Fariduddin came to his own sheikh and
said, my heart is here. Where else can
I go?
Commented,
at least give him something.
Meaning what?
There's a couple of things people will find
strange here. I don't think I've ever seen
this before in America, but it's a custom
of the students of knowledge and it's a
custom of the the
the the disciples in Tisauuf that they make
service for their.
Here it's,
I mean, you see that a little bit,
but one of the things that they do
is that they'll actually put put a hand
on the Sheikh and they'll they'll, like, massage
their back or their neck or their feet.
Why? Because oftentimes when you go when you
do these things properly, like when you're traveling
and you won't speak at, like, different places
or whatever, you're quite exhausted by the end
of it. So it's a way of token
by which the the student, you know, shows
appreciation for the sheikh and does some sort
of service for him. Really, people who are
not dunya y people,
there's very little you can do for them
anyway. So it's like one of the few
things that you can do for them in
the first place.
One of our,
I actually told him he would forbid any
of the students from from doing his kidma
ever. And I said, look, you know, it's
not
it's not necessarily that you're doing it for
your own nafs, but there's a great deal
of there's a great deal of Barakah and
benefit that the student receives through doing service
of their Sheikh, which has nothing to do
with who the sheikh is, but has to
do with the and it has to do
with rewarding
a person for doing something good.
And he actually came to me later on
and said, you're right, you know, because
when we don't allow the students to do
these things, they don't learn any better. They
don't learn adab or or or anything like
that.
And,
so the story is what is that Khaja
Muinuddin and Khaja Qutbuddin, they're they're in their
bed, about to go to sleep in the
same room.
And,
for who's
the the of
of.
He enters to press his sheikh's feet
as his his
habit.
And so he signals to him to go,
no. You go to my sheikh and do
his instead today.
And so he did it for some time,
and he went back to his sheikh. And
this is, he went back to his sheikh
and and he said what? He said that
my heart is here. What can I do?
And so the sheikh,
says to him, he says, give him something.
You should give him something. Why? Meaning what?
That you should give him from your attention
and from your duas and from whatever Allah
gave you spiritually, you should give it to
him as well because look how much love
he has for you. How attached you are.
He he is to you. And this is
also another part of this is also another
concept or precept in the so of is
that one of the reasons there's there there
there is the institution of taking a sheikh
is that if you take from every single
sheikh, I like this thing from Salman, I
like this thing from Humayun, I like this
thing from Rafay, I like this thing from
Basit, I like this thing
from Mahina, I like this thing from Imran.
What will happen, you're picking and choosing
Your nafs has a a a hisa in
it. Right? And the fact of the matter
is there may be, like, 20 different shayefs.
All of them are good people.
All of them will if you follow their
instructions, you'll benefit and you'll you'll achieve what
your goal is.
But,
if you pick and choose, the naf still
has a part in it.
Whereas if you go to one of them
and say, I know this person to be
a good person. Obviously, if someone tells you
to do something halaam or whatever, this is
a calamity that comes afterward that a person's
shaykh is a charlatan or whatever. But assuming
that the the person is actually a pious
man of Allah ta'ala, which nobody knows for
sure, but the signs are there in in
in people.
Going to one sheikh, the the the benefit
in it is what? Is that your nafs
has no no part in it at all.
And
that gets difficult after some time.
There's some people who do like doing, like,
kinda like the shaky tourism and, like, going
from one place to the other and then
get bored with someone or like when the
person actually starts you expecting you to be
serious as a student hot from one place
to the other.
And the the pastor pastor pastor is always
greener on the other side.
There are a lot of people like that.
And the sign of a person who's a
very serious student or a talib or or
or or murid in in
both in knowledge and in the soul of
is that they stick to someone until they
get whatever they're able to get
from that person. And that's not something you
decide. That's something that the shift tells you
they'll give Ijazah at one point or at
one point that you've mastered whatever I have
to offer, then you can go and and
benefit from someone else or benefit other people.
So the the
the the story is beautiful in the sense
that it shows what,
even our own from,
Darulun Deoban,
they,
you know,
I believe it's reported from them that they
said,
even if,
Junaid Bafdadi was alive in this time, we
would not have left our Sheikh in order
to,
go to him because the benefit we get
from from him, we our our feeling is
that that's that benefit is more than we
would have gotten from somebody else. Junaid Baghdadi
is
the tawus of tariqa. He's like the peacock
of the of the tariqa. He is himself
his name has become a
a,
a metaphor for everything that's beautiful and wonderful
about the soul. So they said, what? They
said maybe that even if he was alive
today, we wouldn't have gone to him. We
wouldn't have gotten the benefit from him that
we got from our Sheikh. This is part
of a person's risk and the benefit of
staying with somebody. So the the grand Sheikh
was so touched that look, you know, this
this kid is not, like, looking a bit.
Oh, like, this is the big sheikh. I'm
gonna go and, like, benefit from him now.
And we have this, by the way. This
is so bad. We have this, like, in
this locality, in many localities. You'll have somebody
who is a person of the utmost amount
of accomplishment both in their knowledge and in
their spirituality and their
and their struggles, everything.
But the person, you know, they're they're like,
you know, they're taken for granted.
So somebody comes from out of town and
the whole message fills up to listen to
those people
and, the people that you have
that you've actually benefited from, like, on a
day to day basis that are right there,
right next to you. People don't,
you know, people, they they don't really, appreciate
what they're getting from there. And the fact
of the matter is if you dig a
little bit here, you dig a little bit
there, you're not gonna get anything. But if
you keep digging in the same place again
and again, even if it's a very little
bit, eventually you're gonna strike water.
And so the sheikh was the grand sheikh
was impressed that this kid is not a
groupie. He's not a
sheikh groupie. He's not a Twitter follower or
a Facebook follower. He's actually like somebody who
actually
wishes to take the how from you,
which goes back in a sunnah to the
prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. So give him
give him something.
Give him something. Don't don't don't hold back
from him.
The sheikh's death, father alaihi wa sallam
passed away on the 5th of Muharram in
the year,
664
or 668
on a Monday.
Another version gives the year at 6 60.
Rasulullah
also passed away on a Monday.
His,
grave is in Pakpatan in the district of
Multan.
This place is between Lahore and Multan.
He has an innumerable
number of Khalifa.
The number is said to be as high
as 70,
1,000.
In
Jawahir Farid, the names of 584
of his khalifa are enumerated.
The most famous amongst them is,
Hazrat Sheikh Sheikul Masai Khaja Aladdin,
Sabir,
whose discussion will be will be, will follow.
So
the the the
of the Sheikh Fariduddin,
some of them will be mentioned in the
the,
the the
regarding,
Al Mullakab Bissabir, the one whose nickname was
Asabir, the patient one.
Because he is the nephew
he's the nephew of Hajjafariduddin
Ganshakar. It's also worth mentioning,
a couple of, other things before closing out.
One of which is that
from amongst the sheiks,
Khalafa that are famous also is the Sheikh
Nizamuddin Olia, who we mentioned from before.
The of
of Deoband from which our belong,
they they are from the Sabiri line, not
from the Nizami line. Their their their their
comes
from the Sheikh Aladin Sabir, not from the
Sheikh Nizamuddin.
Sheikh Nizamuddin is a very well known famous
celebrated
Sheikh of
of Tasawwuf of the in in,
in the subcontinent.
My sheikh,
Anwarul Hussein Shah
He
himself was a lineal descendant of the Sheikh
Nizamuddin.
And, he his father was also a master,
scribe,
Khattat. He's a master katib. So he he
one of the that the Taj company the
Taj company who's a who's a publisher of
books, one of the that are in circulated
in circulation in Pakistan was actually written by
him. And they also have the tariqa that
they passed down from their forefathers as well.
The from
which he he had his as well.
The shayr Nizamuddin was
also
a student of knowledge.
And once the Qadi of Delhi passed by
him
and he asked him,
make dua for me to become Qadi.
Because if you become Qadi, being Qadi is
a very big mansib in the dunya. After
after the governor, the most important political,
individual in the land was the Qadi, who's
the judge.
And
people didn't like the governor because the governor
was a politician. People respected the Qadi because
he was an alim.
Because, it took a great immense amount of
study. The most genius of the genius, like,
type people would would become the Qadi. Not
every alim would had a shot at becoming
Qadi. So the Qadi of Dili was passing
by when he was a student of knowledge.
So he asked him, make that I become
and so the said to him said why
why do you wanna spend this this this
this knowledge for the duniya? Don't you wanna
seek a greater treasure with Allah instead?
And so after that, he made a a
a a as a child, he made a
firmer's resolution in himself that I'm not going
to seek dunya from this. I'm going to
only seek Allah
And so, Hajjafariduddin
Gan Shaker
who was a sheikh sent him to Delhi,
which was at that time
a city that was not
it wasn't it wasn't the capital yet.
Its political glory was ascending.
And so he went to the city, say,
how am I gonna find a place?
And he couldn't find a place for himself
in the city. Obviously, if all you're doing
is teaching people Allah Allah in solving their
problems and giving money to the poor, you're
not gonna be able to, you know, do
a fundraiser and buy buy a building downtown.
Right?
So
he,
he set up shop in the place that
he was in, the area that he was
in. Now Nizamuddin is, like, considered part of
the city.
But in those days, he set up at
the outskirts.
He became he was such a pious and
agreeable and righteous person
that all the people of Dili loved him
and he used to come to his majlis,
from the courtiers of the king
all the way down to,
all the way down to the,
you know, the common masses. And it said
that his his majlis, when he would hold
it, there are more people that would attend
the majlis than than would, would go to
the royal court,
to the point where the king,
sultan, Aladdin Khilji,
it upset him.
And the sultan actually,
asked
for,
he actually asked for
Nizamuddin to visit him, Sheikh Nizamuddin to visit
him.
And the sheikh said, no. I'm not going
to the I'm not gonna go visit the
king. And the king said, well, if he
doesn't visit me,
I'll execute him.
And,
the sheikh Musamadin said, will I I'm never
gonna go visit him. So the sheikh says
he has this many days. If he doesn't
show up at court, I'm going to have
him have him killed.
And the days went by, and,
Khaja Amir Khosro, who was a very interesting,
individual in the history of the Indian subcontinent,
a person who's
universally respected by Muslims and Hindus alike,
as a literary and cultural figure,
but he also was a very close disciple
of the Sheikh Nizamuddin.
And there's a whole number of stories,
regarding regarding him as well,
in in connection with the tariqa.
He,
he pleaded with the Sheikh. He said, if
the king kills you, it's gonna cause complete
upheaval in the kingdom.
People are going to, like, riot essentially,
and people will lose their lives other than
you. Please just go visit him. And so
he said, no. I swore an oath that
I I I I I I won't go
and go and visit him. And so as
fajr was about to break before the fajr
broke, assassins
snuck into the palace
and,
had him killed. They assassinated the king and
a new,
a a new,
general essentially seized power and seized the throne
from him.
And this is this is
a
a this is a story that that reminds
me the hadith of the messenger of Allah
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
That how many a person who is disheveled
and, dusty,
meaning somebody nobody thinks that this person's a
beggar that has no importance at all in
front of Allah ta'ala. That person is
so high that if he swears an oath
by Allah ta'ala, Allah ta'ala takes it upon
himself
to make that oath come true. That he
swore an oath that, well, I am never
gonna go and visit him.
And it said that
in his majlis,
nobody,
there's no food or drink. Right? Nowadays until
you have, like, a potluck or a dinner
at the masjal, nobody shows up. There's no
food or drink in his majlis.
And it said that that
there
there used to be basically at the end
of the majlis, a bowl of water was
sent around.
And they say in the majlis
of because is out in the a Jordan,
the ancient name of where he his was
out in the middle of nowhere. Right? You
see that the
and
were in Delhi. Khaja Muinuddin was in in
Ajmer.
Jordan where where Khaja Fariduddin was, it's in
the middle of nowhere,
you know. And oftentimes there's some Hanqas in
the city. Some of the best ones are
the ones out in the middle of nowhere,
because people it helps them to to focus
on on on non
things.
And so,
there used to be a wild fruit that
would grow in the forest,
and so he would send some of the
the disciples go pick that and then you
can feed it to the,
people. But it was not good to eat,
so at least to put salt on it.
And so the only expense for feeding the
people at the Hanqa, this, like, weird, like,
wild wild fruit thing,
was that they had to buy the salt.
So so one of the attendees in the
champa once, went to buy the salt
and,
he he realized when he was transacting that
he didn't have any money. And Peter said
it's okay. Just take it. You can pay
me back later.
And so this is one of the the
miracles in the books that was ascribed to
the sheikh that,
the people of the the people of, the,
they disliked
consuming things based on bought on, purchased on,
purchased on loan or credit.
So when he was about to eat, he
said, there's something wrong with it. I said,
no. It's the same thing that we always
eat. No. There's something wrong in it. How
did you purchase it? He says, then he
admitted that he purchased it, and he forgot
that he didn't have the money, so he
purchased it on on on credit. And so
the says don't do that again, and he
refused to eat from it.
And that's the type of austerity people were
paying payments on their houses and on their
on their cars,
you know, you could take take heed of
because buying things on credit is something which
is like a step away from slavery. And
when you owe somebody money, you compromise your
deen. Rasool Allah also, he didn't make it
haram out of mercy, but he greatly discouraged
people from buying things on on on credit
and on loan.
However, the sheikh Nizamuddin,
his
was so huge and there were so many
such a huge number of differing types of
people that used to attend
it. That they say that the the food
that was served there and the food that
was cooked for it and that was served
on a daily basis, the number of animals
that were slaughtered on a daily basis, it
was greater than the royal court itself.
It was greater on the royal court itself.
And,
once the sultan Alauddin Khalji who eventually
ended up
ended up,
being assassinated.
In his jealousy of the sheikh,
he he once ordered his courtiers that they
said that the sheikh is wasting money on
so much food,
since he so so he ordered them not
to not to to to send food, cook
food or send it or to give anymore.
And so the court the the attendance in
the Chanka brought the sheikh the news to
the sheikh, and he said what? You know,
they said he said that all the courtiers
are no longer allowed to send food to
your anymore to feed the,
to feed the the the people who come
to
visit.
So maybe we should reduce our amount of,
you know, expenditure on on feeding people. And
the chef said, no. Don't worry about it.
From this day on, double it.
So he doubled it. The money still kept
coming in.
And so there's a time there's a time
to be, frugal about things. There's a time
to be open handed about things depending on
your circumstances or whatever. So it was something
that our our sheikh mentioned to us that
the different hankas run differently.
Allah make us people who are ourselves austere,
but when it comes to other people that
we have a chance to feed everybody,
Muslim, non Muslim, pious, impious, people who agree
with us, people who don't agree with us,
that we'd be people that that Allah gives
us the that we feed them constantly. You'll
see in the Indian subcontinent before
the,
before the,
the the British colonized,
every masjid used to have a kitchen with
it. That was open 24 hours a day
and whoever wanted to eat could eat for
free. The only places that still have kitchens
in them are the khanqas
because the kitchens ran on on,
on government funding. So obviously, when the government
is sacked by the Farangi,
there's no no more funding for them. But
the Hanqas still have kitchens where people come
and eat for free.
And it's a really beautiful custom.
I wish that Allah gave us a tofic
of of continuing it as well.