Yahya Rhodus – Becoming Beloved To Allah And His Messenger
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In the name of Allah and peace and
blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah and
upon his family and his companions and upon
him and upon Allah.
Alhamdulillah, we thank Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta
-A'la for the blessing of this month,
for the light of this month, for the
happiness of this month, for the joy of
this blessed month, this blessed month in which
the best of creation ﷺ emerged from the
blessed womb of his blessed mother into this
world.
And he honored this world and graced it
ﷺ.
And once he was born, everything would change
and would never ever be the same after
the blessed Prophet ﷺ came into this world.
And Alhamdulillah, one of the greatest blessings of
all is that we have sarawat upon Sayyidina
Muhammad ﷺ, that you and I can take
part in the most important thing in existence,
which is the relationship that our Prophet has
with the Lord of the heavens and the
earth, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la.
All that really matters is Allah.
And Allah Ta'ala made His greatest Beloved,
none other than Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ.
This is the source of creation.
This is why it is that everything else
was brought into existence.
And this is the highest thing that anyone
can possibly ever reach, is to become Beloved
to Allah and His Messenger and then to
love Allah and His Messenger.
And this is life in its entirety.
This is the khulasa and the essence in
an abridged form of what it is that
we should be doing and what it is
that we should be aiming for.
And every time that we say Allahumma salli
ala Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ, we are not calling
upon with the words Allahumma, all of the
names and attributes of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa
Ta-A'la, but we are asking the
Lord of the heavens and the earth to
pray.
And the scholars teach us about what that
means, to pray upon the best of creation
ﷺ.
The Prophet is not in need of our
prayers upon him.
Whether we do it or not, he is
already with his Lord ﷺ.
We are the ones that get to benefit.
We are the ones whose hearts then become
filled with mercy, become filled with light, become
filled with goodness, and they become open to
be able to receive divine guidance.
And one of these blessed salawat that was
sent upon the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ by one
of the great inheritors, Habib Ali ibn Muhammad
al-Habshi ﷺ.
And this is a salawat that has very
profound and deep meanings.
Allahumma salli ala Sayyidina Muhammadin salatan tur deeka
wa tur dee wa tan tawi biha a'mali
wa niyati wa harkati wa sakinati thee wa
ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallim So this
begins by saying that O Allah, that pray
upon Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ.
We are asking the Lord of the heavens
and the earth to pray upon Sayyidina Muhammad
ﷺ.
And in general, the ulama say that it
is rahmah, that it is mercy.
But what is the reality of what our
Prophet ﷺ experiences when the Lord of the
heavens and the earth is praying upon him
incessantly, constantly, forever and ever and ever.
And this is indicated when Allah Ta'ala
says, Innallahumma la'ikatuhu yusalloon Outwardly all you
see is a verb in the present tense.
But you know rhetorically that this points to
a reality that Allah Ta'ala yufidat istamara
is constantly and will forever be praying upon
our Prophet Muhammad ﷺ.
What does that mean in terms of what
our Prophet ﷺ experiences in every moment where
he is receiving the prayer of Allah ﷻ
upon him.
And what is emanating to creation then as
a result.
And how is he enriching everyone and everything
around him as a result.
They've always said that, If you don't have
something, that you can't give something.
If you don't have knowledge, you can't give
knowledge.
If you do not have mercy, that you
cannot give mercy.
And so forth and so on.
If you don't have something, that you can't
give it.
But then think about our Prophet ﷺ who
has more than what he has.
And all of the most sublime meanings of
what it is that human beings can attain.
It is for this reason that he gave
so much ﷺ.
So we say that, O Allah!
Pray upon Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ.
Salatun.
A prayer that what?
Salatun turdika wa turdi.
That makes you content and makes him content.
Imagine if Allah Ta'ala accepts that salawat
from you.
Is that if you're asking Allah Ta'ala
to pray upon Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ.
And when you do so, you're opening up
the door for your du'as to be
accepted.
Because the scholars have also always said this.
If you want your prayers to be answered,
begin with salawat upon the Prophet ﷺ.
Then make du'a, supplicate and then end
with salawat.
Why?
Because Allah Ta'ala is too generous.
We know that he accepts salawat upon the
Prophet ﷺ.
That is one of the actions that we
know Allah will accept even if we have
weak intention.
Even if we have mixed intentions.
Because of how much he loves the Prophet
ﷺ.
So that if you mention any other supplication
in between that, Allah is too generous to
answer the two tail ends of your du
'a and then not to answer what is
in the middle.
So just imagine if Allah accepted that.
We are praying upon the Prophet a prayer
that hopefully will lead to the contentment of
Allah.
صلات ترضيك وترضي That makes you content and
makes him content.
But then look what he asked for.
The awliya of Allah know how to do
a talab.
They know what to ask for.
They know what it is that we should
be seeking.
And this is why that we have to
follow them and listen very carefully to what
they say and the words that they use
because they do not use them haphazardly.
Rather is that there are deep meanings in
everything that they say.
وَتَنْطَوِي بِهَا A prayer through which تَنْطَوِي بِهَا
This Arabic word تَنْطَوِي Is that it comes
from طَوَا يَطْوِي Which is to fold something
up.
And the idea there is that if you
put something in the middle of a piece
of paper and you fold it up that
you can no longer see it.
It is now contained inside of that paper.
So تَنْطَوَا is to be folded up or
to be folded in something.
In other words, to be absorbed into it.
And the scholars of the sciences that they
mention that there are three degrees.
There is what is called تَنْطِوَا And this
is the first degree of a سِيل الحاص
of a special connection.
It is what is called تَنْطِوَا Then there
is what is called اِمْتِزَاج Then there is
what is called المُحَكَى And انطِوَا is the
first degree because it relates to our افعال
the things that it is that we do.
اِمْتِزَاج is higher than that because it relates
to our traits.
And then المُحَكَى is even higher than that
because it relates to our essence.
But this is the goal.
To absorb, to be absorbed completely in the
best of creation صلى الله عليه وسلم And
so when we say صلى الله عليه وسلم
وَتَنْطَوِي بِهَا What?
اَعْمَالِ وَالنِّيَاتِ My actions, my intentions وَحَرَكَاتِ وَسَكَنَاتِ
My times of movement and my times of
stillness So we want all of our اَعْمَال
everything that it is that we do and
تَنْطَوِي We want those to be absorbed in
the Messenger of Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم
Because the reality of اَمْتِوَى is مُشَابَهَةَ الْأَفْعَالِ
الْأَفْعَالِ Is that where your acts start to
resemble the one that you are following And
this is how we begin And this should
be our intention And no doubt we fall
short everyday We might talk about this right
now and fall short in five minutes after
it is that we speak We might fall
short tonight and tomorrow morning But this is
why we come together to remind ourselves This
is what we want and this is what
we should be searching for How can you
and I resemble the best of creation صلى
الله عليه وسلم in everything that it is
that we do And from the bounty of
Allah we have a complete description Everything that
it is that we need From head to
toe with all of our limbs Outwardly and
inwardly Everything that it is that we need
to perfectly resemble the best of creation صلى
الله عليه وسلم You can just imagine If
you have a generation of people that grow
up and that start to resemble the Prophet
صلى الله عليه وسلم Look during the time
of the Sahaba There were so many people
that resembled the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم
Is that when he was sitting amongst them
and people would come from outside of Madina
Munawwara They actually wouldn't know who the Messenger
of Allah was Now outwardly they would explain
that this points to his humility that he
wasn't sitting on that some big chair where
everybody else was sitting around him صلى الله
عليه وسلم But he was sitting among them
So yes it does point to his humility
but there are much deeper explanations of that
as well Is that the light of the
Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم had that penetrated
into the hearts of those that were around
them where they actually did start to resemble
them There were times where people would come
into the masjid and think that Sayyidina Abu
Bakr as-Siddiq was the Messenger of Allah
and he said, no, that's the Messenger of
Allah that no, that is the Messenger of
Allah Even in the Hijr we had this
that when they saw them coming they didn't
know who was the Prophet and who was
Sayyidina Abu Bakr until they saw Sayyidina Abu
Bakr holding some garment to shade the best
of creation صلى الله عليه وسلم That when
our Prophet said about Sayyidina Ja'far Yes,
he was from his family but deeper than
that he resembled لَقَدْ أَشْبَهْتَنِي خَلْقًا وَخُلُقًا Our
Prophet said about him is that you have
resembled me in your physical stature and in
your character in the Battle of Uhud when
Sayyidina Mus'ab bin Umar was martyred is
that part of the reason that it started
to spread that the Messenger of Allah had
passed away is because Sayyidina Mus'ab resembled
Rasulullah from his that intiwa in his imtizaaj
in his muhaka because he was fully absorbed
in relation to his actions his attributes and
his essence in the best of creation صلى
الله عليه وسلم This is where it's at
you could go on story after story story
after story let alone the two blessed grandsons
of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم but
the greatest of them all was the daughter
of Rasulullah Sayyidina Fatima al-Batur al-Zahra
Sayyidina Aisha said مَا كَانَتْ مَشَّةَ فَاطِمَةٌ تُخْتِئْ
مَشَّةَ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ that she was the perfect
example of our Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم
in woman form no one resembled the Prophet
صلى الله عليه وسلم outwardly in terms of
her physical stature and in terms of her
character and in terms of the reality of
her light she was known as Umm Abiha
the mother of her father and one of
the things that the scholars say about this
is is that her spiritual light was so
strong that you might think that she was
the source but in reality the source is
none other than Rasulullah but she was the
Umm Abiha she was the mother of her
father Sayyidina Fatima al-Batur al-Zahra because
the Sahaba understood these meanings but Alhamdulillah the
great inheritors of the Prophet صلى الله عليه
وسلم give us means for you and I
to say things and do things so that
this also becomes a reality Sayyidina Muhammad صلاة
ترديك وتردي so we say that Oh Allah
pray upon Sayyidina Muhammad a prayer that makes
you content and makes him content وَتَنطَوِّ بِهَ
عَمَالِ وَنِيَاتِ وَحَرَكَاتِ وَسَكِنَاتِ فِيهِ and so that
all of my actions my intentions my moments
of movement and stillness are completely absorbed in
him صلى الله عليه وسلم وعلى آله وصحبه
وسلم and upon his family and companions those
great people that set the bar as high
as it could be set in following the
best of creation صلى الله عليه وسلم and
then they transmitted these meanings to the تابعين
who transmitted these meanings to the تابعين who
transmitted these meanings to those that came after
them until this day and age that we
have these meanings preserved so that anybody that
wants them has to go to the right
place to be able to receive them the
great inheritors of رسول الله this month is
a month where we want these meanings to
be renewed in our heart and every month
and in every week and in every day
but especially in this month because we are
not to be for the emergence of the
physical body of our Prophet صلى الله عليه
وسلم you and I would not be here
today 1400 plus years later to speak about
these meanings the doors will be closed for
human beings to arrive to the knowledge of
Allah سبحانه وتعالى but الحمد لله Allah has
preserved it and may Allah تعالى give us
توفيق and bless us to be from the
elected those who reach this level of انتواة
where our actions are absorbed in his actions
and they move up in degrees where we
at very least love and hopefully experience something
of what it means to have امتزاج where
our attributes are absorbed in his attributes صلى
الله عليه وسلم and then may Allah تعالى
bless us to be with those whose their
essence is absorbed in his يا ارحم المراحمين
وصلى الله رسول محمد وعلى آله وصحبه وسلم
والحمد لله رب العالمين