MERCY OCEANS, Book 07 (Hidden Treasures, Shaykh Nazim, 220 pages, 4/12)
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r spiritual attributes so that they can’t appear. The ego accomplishes this by insisting, “I and my wild characteristics are your real personality.”
All Prophets came only to give people this guidance: “Oh people, you must not let yourselves be cheated by your egos — don’t believe them, but look instead to what is really good.” Therefore, Moses was given the miracle of his hand becoming sparkling white as he pulled it from his breast and showed it to the people — “See this shining hand; know that this world of purity and light is the real one and that your egos have been cheating you.” All the Prophets came just for that purpose, but so many people, being donkeys for their egos, do not accept Moses, Jesus Christ or Muhammad, Peace be Upon All of Them. All Prophets are sent as guidance to people in order to say to them: “Be careful of your egos, for they are cheating you and causing you to fall into troubles here and in the hereafter.”
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After the days of the Prophets, ending with the Seal of the Prophets, our beloved Prophet Muhammad, there have come many Awliya following the ways of the Prophets and who, like them, are guides. They know the tricks of the ego very well, and because of this, so many people are running away from them, as their egos are telling them, “That person is no good, we must escape from him.” Why does the ego want to escape from the Awliya so badly? Because they will show to that person the reality of his ego, will reveal to him its bad character and dirtiness. At that time, the ego Will be very displeased, as up until that time it was sitting on a throne and the person was saying to it, “Oh my Lord,” but after that person finds out that the ego is not his Lord, but only his donkey, he will throw it down and make it serve him. Therefore, when people are angry at us, it is not their souls that are angry but only their donkeys.
Every Grandshaykh is given a special kind of guidance. Our Grandshaykh’s special quality was that if he saw bad characteristics, he would fire upon them a heavy barrage. His batteries were always charged up for firing at the bad characteristics of anyone — be he king or workman — with great explosive shells. He did this so often, and once he said to me about it: “Oh my son, Nazim Efendi, I promised to my Lord on the Day of Promises that if I ever saw any bad characteristic in anyone that I would fire at it, and my Lord granted me that through that firing the person involved would be cleansed of that characteristic sooner or later. That firing will make that person ashamed of himself now so that on the Last Day no shame will befall him. As this is Allah’s promise to me, I always shoot at whatever bad characteristics appear, knowing that in that way it shall be removed from that person. This style of guidance was given uniquely to me and it is very difficult to carry, but I was given that guidance-power (Irshad) on the Day of
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Promises, and even if people become angry with me, it does not matter, as I am only doing, what I have been ordered to do.”
Grandshaykh went on to explain a second special guidance quality granted to him: “When I am sitting and speaking in my lectures about any ranks or virtues of the hereafter, the people who are attending my assembly must ultimately reach to those ranks.” Even if one’s worshipping was not adequate, he will eventually attain them because he was listening to and believing in Grandshaykh. Our Grandshaykh may take them to such ranks as he is invested with himself; he never spoke of any ranks until he had attained them himself. For example, he never spoke about Damascus until he had arrived in it; had he not known, he would not have spoken about it. This is a miracle (Karamah) of Grandshaykh, and he says: “You must be thankful to your Lord that you have reached this assembly.”
Then Grandshaykh told me about the most important good manner for believers, a good manner which is also the essence of what Shaykhs , and Tariqats are teaching. That good manner is: Not to say, “No, this is wrong”, or “Why is it like this.” To avoid thinking and saying these two phrases is the summit of good manners (Adab). When you see a person who has stopped saying “no” and “why”, you must know that he has adab with his Lord, and looks at everything which He decrees as being alright. Such a person is not going to say “no” and “why”, but instead will say, “nothing is wrong except me.” He looks to himself and says, “I am wrong, but everything happening outside of me is going according to laws and in its proper order — but, oh my ego, you are wrong.”
Contrarily, bad manners always make us say, “Everything is wrong, but I am right.” You may see
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everyone doing and saying this. This is an illness of our souls which is called, “Everyone-being-pleased-with- himself.”
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ALLAH’S BOUNDLESS MERCY: EVERYONE HAS HIS PLACE IN PARADISE; THE BLACK STONE: DIFFERENT LEVELS OF UNDERSTANDING; TELESCOPES
My Grandshaykh was saying that the gates of Paradise are open for all to enter; and according to the Hadith of the Holy Prophet, Allah Almighty has parcelled out Paradise, assigning to everyone his portion, and not allowing anyone to occupy the portion that has been assigned to another. What this means is that Allah Almighty has given to His servants before they ever ask for anything, has given with a generosity that is absolute, as He doesn’t wait for us to ask that then He may give us according to our requests, He gives unbesought.
Our Grandshaykh went on to say that Allah Almighty treats His people in this life with the absolute Mercy emanating from His Divine Name Ar-Rahman (The All-Beneficent). No one can fall outside of the bounds of a mercy and a beneficence that is boundless, as is the mercy implicit in the Holy Name Ar-Rahman. Don’t ever think that the mercy oceans belonging to this Divine Name have any shore — no — they are boundless and endlessly deep, and so they ever will remain. You must know that Allah is never going to take back anything which He has granted to His servants, and that even to think such a thing is unbelief (Kufr) and the worst
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thought that we can think about our Lord. Yes, our Lord gave to us all a grant never ending, and that grant is faith.
What we are listening to now of Grandshaykh’s words is not knowledge of the sort that we may be accustomed to hearing — it may seem new and strange to our ears, but nonetheless it is the truth from the secrets which are opened up day by day to the Saints (Awliya). Allah Almighty granted faith to the Sons of Adam on the Day of Promises, the day when the souls of all the descendants of Adam were brought forth from his backbone and asked by their Lord: “Am I not your Lord?” We were all present on that day — looking to our Lord, talking to Him, knowing Him — and we replied: “Yea, verily. We testify that You are our Lord.”
(Surat al-A’raf, Ayat172)
That faith was granted to everyone, but Divine Wisdom decreed that in this life some people’s faith would remain covered while that of others would appear. The Holy Prophet said in regard to this: “The hearts of the Sons of Adam contain treasures, and the keys to the hearts are in the Hand of our Lord.” Therefore, if He is not going to open the hearts, no one can — not even His Beloved Muhammad, for whose sake the whole creation was created.
If you understand that faith is present in all of mankind, you must be very respectful towards each one of them and you must understand that only with Allah Almighty’s permission are you believing and showing your faith, while someone else is not showing faith only because his Lord has not opened it up for him. You must understand the matter like this, and never say about
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anyone, ‘He is an unbeliever’, — who can know what will be the state of any person at the end of his life? The key to the hearts is in the Hand of the Almighty, and what will become of each person in the end is a secret known in its entirety only to Allah Himself; even the Prophet can only know something about this matter within defined limits. On the Day of Promises, Allah Almighty granted faith to His servants, and He is not going to take it away from them — perhaps they will declare their faith upon breathing their last breath — such is Allah’s mercy. Allah Almighty is keeping and hiding so many mercy oceans which are destined for His servants.
* * * (A question was asked): “Mawlana, it is easy enough for me to understand how someone who dies a slow death from a long and torturous disease may have time to reflect on his life, and realizing his helplessness, believe and turn to Allah in repentance (Taubah) even though he was the most stubborn unbeliever and evildoer up until that time; but what I can’t comprehend is how someone who is, for example, shot and killed while in the act of committing a heinous crime, may attain repentance despite the suddenness of his death.”
(Sheikh Nazim replied): Allah may create time within time. The time that it takes that bullet to kill him may seem very short to us, but for that person Allah may make it a very long instant indeed, long enough for him to reflect upon his whole life and repent unto his Lord. Isn’t Allah Almighty capable of extracting a confession from His slave? — He most certainly is.
(Question): “But, Mawlana, how shall we understand all the verses of Qur’an which speak about eternal Hell with no exit?”
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(Answer): Allah Almighty says in one verse of the Qur’an:
“And we don’t send our verses (Ayat) except to frighten (Takhweefah).’’
(Surat al-Isra, Ayat 59)
In other words, to scare the hell out of people. For example, you may say to your son, “If you don’t stop doing that I will kill you!” In reality, you are never going to do any such thing, but that warning may just be sufficient to make him listen to what you are saying and to desist from that disliked action.
(Question): “Mawlana, why is it that the meanings we derive when we read the Qur’an seem to contradict the hidden meanings which you are uncovering?”
(Answer): Here I have some salt: it is a white powder that we use in most of our foods. Who could guess that it consists of two poisons that would kill whoever consumed them? Also, here we have some water — who could guess that it consists of two gases — two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen? He who knows, knows, and he who doesn’t know sees only the obvious and apparent. The latter may deny, but his denial won’t make him right.
Similarly, people read the Holy Qur’an and understand it on their respective levels; they may deny anything beyond their level of understanding, but their denial doesn’t decrease in the least the validity of the deeper truth, truth which cannot be gained merely through outward study, but is given as a grant from the Divine Presence.
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For example, Sayyidina ‘Umar said to the black stone which is part of the Holy House (Ka’bah) in Makkah: “Oh Black Stone, you are only a stone, and I would never kiss you except for the fact that I saw the Prophet kiss you; therefore, I follow his example.” That was Sayyidina ‘Umar’s level of understanding, and in following the Prophet, despite his not understanding all the Prophet’s actions, lay ‘Umar’s obedience and goodness. But the level of Abu Bakr’s understanding was deeper. We know through our Naqshbandi transmission that Abu Bakr said about the black stone that it is not just an ordinary stone, but rather a ‘stone of trusts’ (Sakhrat-ul-Amana) which contains a record of the promises that all the Sons of Adam made to their Lord on the Day of Promises, and also registers the names of all who circumambulate the Ka’bah (As one passes the stone, one may either kiss it or hold up one’s two hands and say: “In the Name of Allah, Allah is Greatest and to Allah Belongs All Praise”); it is a stone which has ears, eyes and a heart.
Different people can understand the Qur’an’s meanings according to their particular levels of faith-power: the more faith-light we have, the more understanding will be sent to us. Now, for example, astronomers examine the heavens with such gigantic telescopes that if you put your eye to them you would be knocked over. The distances that these telescopes cover are measured in light-years; I read in a magazine that a certain telescope in North America penetrates to a distance of ten-thousand million light-years — even the thought of these distances makes the mind spin. Now you are reading Qur’an just like one who looks to the skies with the naked eye and sees lots of stars there — that is your view, your knowledge — but can you imagine what kind of knowledge that gigantic telescope brings us!
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Everyone is looking at the Qur’an and seeing something, but it is not what we are seeing. By means of that telescope a gigantic galaxy has been seen, and they have named it “Andromeda”; its diameter is one hundred and eighty thousand light-years and it contains three hundred billion stars, whereas our galaxy is only one hundred and twenty thousand light-years in diameter and contains only two hundred billion stars. Our gigantic sun, in comparison to some of those stars, is only like a football in comparison to the Earth. But with our eyes, that immense galaxy appears to be no more than a very small dot, a faint star which can only be seen on the darkest moonless nights by only the very keenest eyes. However, the telescopic view tells us that it is very, very big, while our eyes inform us that it is tiny: do you believe the telescope? — You must believe it. So, oceans of Allah Almighty’s Knowledges are in the Qur’an and you must not try to put it in limits by saying, “This much, no more.” The more faith-light you possess, the more you can take in of these knowledges; but a blind person cannot see anything at all in the skies.
We believe that the Holy Qur’an contains endless knowledge — every letter of it contains at least twenty- four thousand meanings, just as that tiny star in reality contains billions of stars. The total range of that telescope covers one-hundred billion galaxies; each of them contains billions of stars, and what lies beyond this Allah Almighty knows. The words that have come to us in the Holy Qur’an are from none other than the Creator of all this — Glory be to Him; and He holds every Son of Adam to be more precious to Him than all of those galaxies.
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CONCERNING JUDGEMENT AND THE SIXTH PILLAR; QUDRAT ALLAH
There are two ways of understanding the Holy Qur’an: one way is within the capacity of our minds, and the other way only the heart can fathom, and it is endless understanding. Up until now, we are still not speaking on the level of hearts, but only on the level of minds, so that you may become prepared for understanding more and more according to the Qur’an ayat, “And Allah is endlessly Expansive and Knowing.”
Grandshaykh was saying that because Allah has granted to the Sons of Adam from His boundless mercy, if Allah Almighty asks you on the Judgement Day: “What did you do with your life?” You must say: “Oh my Lord, You left us to choose our way, You told us, ‘Do as you like; if you like to believe, you may believe, and if you don’t like, don’t believe — you are free in every matter.’ When You gave us this free choice, we did as we liked — as You said, we did — now here we are in front of You.” What Grandshaykh is saying is that when Allah Almighty makes an account of everyone’s actions on the Last Day, He will take into account all that He Himself pre-disposed His servants for doing and allowed them to pursue.
Everyone has a body and a soul inside of that body. Without a soul, this body belongs to the Earth, and nothing is going to emerge in the way of actions from a body without a soul. The body says, “Oh my Lord, I cannot do anything without a soul; when You send me a soul, only then may I perform actions, so in reality it is the soul that acted, not me.” Then the soul will be asked to account for its actions, and it will say, “Oh my Lord, You know that I was in the Spiritual World worshipping You without ever opposing You, worshipping You before
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I ever came to this body. How can I be a sinner when I am but an emanation from Your Divine Light Rays? How can there be sin or darkness for me when I am all light?”
Grandshaykh is explaining that this baffling interaction of earthen body and pure soul can be understood as a manifestation of Divine Power (Qudrat Allah). To illustrate this point, we may look at how the striking together of flint and iron produces a spark of fire: is the fire in the flint or in the iron? Where is it? When you strike the two together you get fire, but you can’t say that the fire is hidden either in the flint or in the iron. What you can say is that the fire is coming from Qudrat Allah. The same Divine Power that causes the spark to appear from the striking together of those two materials also causes our actions to appear from the marriage of body and soul, as Allah says in the Holy Qur’an: “And Allah created you and that which you do.”
(Surat as-Saffat, Ayat 96)
This means that He created you and created your actions as well — those actions appear through the Lord’s Divine Power.
The sixth pillar of faith (Iman) is the belief that Allah has already determined all that will happen in this world in the way of goodness and badness alike. Perhaps someone will say, “If this pillar is true, what real responsibility do I have for my actions that would cause Allah to put me in Hell?” The answer is that Allah gives power to His people to do good and bad actions — some He chose for virtue and some for evil. He created Paradise and Hell, and the people of each are acting;
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they must see the results of those works on the Day of Judgement. You must not be in doubt concerning your Lord’s justice, thinking that He will put you in Hell. His justice is Absolute Justice, and you must know that evil- doing people are already staggering under the weight of the heavy burdens of their badness, and you must thank Allah Almighty that they are carrying those burdens, for otherwise you would be carrying them. We must be intercessors on the Day of Judgement for those people; Allah will grant authority to so many people on that day to intercede for those who carried heavy burdens of sin.
‘Abdul-Wahhab Ash-Sha’rani, a famous Scholar and Sufi of Egypt, was praying to Allah to have mercy on prostitutes, saying: “Most Merciful Lord, those prostitutes are like a huge wall, a great barrier that keeps the honour of ladies. They put themselves forward as a buffer in front of honourable ladies, keeping animal- men away from them; if not for those prostitutes, bad men, like big donkeys, would rush upon honourable ladies also; but those women make themselves available, putting themselves forward, so that those men come to them, and thus honour is protected — so please grant Your mercy to those women.”
So many people are carrying such heavy burdens, and we must look at their situations with the eye of wisdom, or else we will be in the stable with donkeys; if we aren’t satisfied being in that stable, we may climb up, up, up. This is only one drop from the secrets of the Holy Qur’an, one ray coming from the Sun of Divine Predestination (Qadr).
* * *
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THE MURID’S TOTAL SUBMISSION TO HIS GUIDE WILL TRAIN HIM TO KEEP HIS FAITH IN SEVERE TRIALS
Our Grandshaykh’s advice to everyone is that they must look for a holy person who may guide them to their Lord’s Way. He stresses, furthermore, that this is an obligation for every believer, and that once the seeker has found his guide, the most important point for him as a follower is always to firmly believe that his guide is absolutely right and correct in his actions. You must believe in your guide, must believe that he knows at least fifty times more than you; your having this attitude is a necessary condition for his being able to guide you. If you think that he knows, feels or looks at things the way that you do, then you will never be able to derive any benefit nor receive any guidance from that person.
Real spiritual guides are inheritors of the Prophets and in spiritual contact with them. It is a well-known fact about Prophets that they had extraordinary powers and characteristics that enabled them to serve as guides for people to their Lord’s Divine Presence. You must know that whatever is the number of people in a Prophet’s Nation, and be it millions or billions, that Prophet must know at least that number of times more than any of his people may know. You can only know for yourself, but a Prophet must know for his whole Nation, so that he can complete his Prophethood by means of them. Because of the spiritual connection that real guides have with the Prophet, and by virtue of their being his inheritors, they also have such extraordinary powers and characteristics which enable them to know at least fifty times more than we know.
The most important thing for a seeker (Murid) who follows a guide (Murshid) in order to move toward the
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Divine Presence, is to understand that his guide is going to try him time and again. The Murshid has been ordered by the Prophet to try his murids, and everyone knows that a trial is not an easy thing — or else it isn’t a trial. When a Murshid tries his murid, he sends toward him some trial in which that murid can see no Divine Wisdom at all. Perhaps he orders something which the mind of that murid cannot accept and protests against loudly to itself: “It is not right to do this; why does he order me to do such a thing?” If the murid should openly express such rebelliousness to his Shaykh, or if it just comes to his heart without him even letting anyone know about it, the Divine Power between him and his Shaykh is cut — like a blown fuse; he is then stuck at that level and unable to progress.
Grandshaykh says: “For a murid to rebel, either openly or secretly, against his Shaykh is as terrible as someone cursing the Prophets; it is abominable to think bad thoughts about one’s own guide. One’s changing of heart in relation to his Shaykh is like cursing the Prophets, for if not for your guide you are never going to reach to knowledge of the Prophet’s realities.” Therefore, a follower must have utmost respect for his Murshid, not only in what he expresses, but also in What he conceals in his heart.
This is a training for believers so that they may learn to always keep respect in their hearts for the Prophet, and never to object in any way to anything that the Prophet did in the way of actions and judgements. If someone says, regarding the Prophet, “This action of his was totally correct, but that one not so much,” then immediately the power is cut between the Prophet and that person, and the connection is in need of being re- established.
Ultimately, this training is essential in enabling
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us to keep our faith and to become real slaves of the Almighty, as in the course of our lives so many strange, terrible and unthinkable events may occur causing people’s hearts to be disturbed, and many will say, “What is this, is this justice?’’ So many people are asking this question nowadays, when, according to the understanding of their minds, there is no justice and no mercy in certain events — this is unbelief. If a person believes in his Lord, he must believe that his Lord is always guiding events in the most excellent of ways, and that in everything that happens you may find the Lord’s absolute Mercy and Justice.
If you do not accept training at the hands of a Murshid, you won’t be able to tolerate many events, which are happening all around you in this life, but over which you can exercise no control whatsoever. If you are going to object to the occurrence of these events, you are, in effect, accusing Allah of wrong judgement and injustice. Therefore, every believer must first be trained at the hands of a Murshid; then, when he has stopped saying, ‘No’, and ‘Why’, in relation to his Shaykh, the perfume of good actions will begin to issue forth from that murid. What this means is that you will not find any objection in a real believer to what his Lord decrees, nor can you witness any breach of manners toward the Lord. He says: “Oh my Lord, You are right, I am wrong; oh my Prophet, you are right, I am wrong; oh my Grandshaykh, you are right, I am wrong.” This is the peak and the perfume of good manners and actions; whoever obtains these characteristics will improve more rapidly than anyone else.
* * * The trials that come to us from our Shaykh will be much lighter trials than those coming from the Prophet, and the trials that the Prophet sends will, in turn, be
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much easier trials than the ones sent by Allah Almighty —and you must be ready for your Lord’s trial, then you will be alright — not before. When you can say, “What my Lord decrees is right, and what I might desire contrary to that is wrong,” you have attained the highest degree of good manners with your Lord (Adab). All Prophets have been sent in order to teach this point.
How can a person really believe in his Lord when he sometimes objects, saying that his Lord is not performing the best of possible actions? A person has really overcome this pitfall and attained to real faith when he can wholeheartedly say, “Allah knows best what is good for His creatures, the Prophet knows what is best for his Nation and the Murshid for his followers —we can be wrong, but they can’t.” When he can always accuse himself in this manner, it means that he has attained the first station of faith (Iman).
The basic and common level for man is to be at all times one with his ego, and when man is one with his ego, he is in the darkness of unbelief (Kufr). People on that level may be heard saying, “I am just fine, but the problem is with the others — they are all wrong.” As long as a person is on that level, he will never accept a guide or believe in a Prophet; how should he, when he thinks that he knows everything better than anyone else? He is under the control of the commanding-self, the lower self that commands one to do evil (An-nafs ul-ammara bis-suu), and as long as he is under its command he will remain on the level of unbelief.
When one climbs from that level to the second level, he improves to the awakening of the self-accusing self (An-nafs ul-lawwamah); once awakened, that self always makes the person see himself as being blameworthy, and accuse himself by saying, “You are wrong, oh my ego.” At that stage he will seek some guide to show him what is
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right, as he has recognized that his ego is always wrong; its praying is wrong, its fasting wrong, its almsgiving wrong and its pilgrimage is wrong — nothing is right because he is not right, not yet purified from the tyranny of his lower self. Once he has accepted the fact that his ego is preventing him from doing any goodness, he is ready to accept a guide to lead him to real goodness, and at that point he is prepared to be a follower; even if his guide tries him severely, he will say, “I am wrong, he is right.” When a person has reached this point, he has attained the first level of real faith (Haqiqi Iman).
All different kinds of situations may befall a person during his life. One may encounter both goodness and badness, and indeed it may be one’s lot to have to suffer the most troublesome and harmful events. Whenever such events befall one, the sign of real faith is one’s being able to put up with them — for example, to eat an unliked food (unliked by the ego, not by the Divine Law); to see, hear or come in contact with something one detests. In all these cases, one must be able to keep hold of oneself without flinching, without undergoing any change within oneself and without saying, “This is wrong and I am right.” This is steadfastness, a sign of real faith.
* * * (A question was asked): “Mawlana, so many of our brothers in Islam can understand, and will readily agree that everything Allah Almighty and His Prophet ordered in the way of Divine Laws (Shariah) is perfect, totally acceptable and applicable to all times; but what they have a very difficult time understanding is that even the bad things which people do against the Shariah are also taking place in accordance with Divine Will and Order.”
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(Answer): That is because they are struggling with their minds’ understanding, but still have not understood that they must look at the final outcome of those disliked events — that bitterness is only the initial taste, while sweetness is the lasting taste. Therefore we can’t judge events, but must be patient for their fruits which will appear in the end.
An important point is that Allah left His people free to do anything but ordered them to do good actions and to desist from bad actions and unbelief. They may either obey or disobey, and the Lord says: “I don’t approve of your bad actions.” We, as servants of Allah, believe that everything happens only through His Will, and although He may try His people severely, we shall never raise any objections; but we shall never approve of either our own ego’s or anyone else’s bad actions. When we are looking at bad actions, we must look first at those of our own ego, before regarding those of others, as, according to the Prophet’s order, everyone must be occupied with his own faults, and only when he has eliminated all of them may he look to other people in order to help them eliminate their faults and incompleteness’s. * * *
THE POWER OF REAL FAITH: WHEN NO ONE BUT ALLAH IS WATCHING…
Our Grandshaykh is explaining to us what the power of real faith is and how strong it may be. He said that the power of real faith is such a power that would enable a man to be stranded alone on a desert island for forty days with a very beautiful girl without any indecent thought entering his heart in relation to that girl — the power of real faith would bar him from even considering a forbidden act with her. The presence or
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absence of purity of heart will become evident in such a trial. One may ask if such purity is within the capacity of the human being — purity that would prevent the normal animal urges from even entering the mind of a man alone with an attractive woman for such a long period of time. The answer to this question is, of course, yes: what if that girl was your daughter or sister, would it not then be natural for even any normal man to be free of lustful intentions concerning that girl? For a man of real faith, that female stranger is no different than his daughter or sister — his heart is spotlessly clean.
You may ask yourself how you would stand up to the following trial: You are walking down the street of your hometown, along a dark alley in the middle of the night, when suddenly a door opens and a very beautiful lady calls you to come inside; it is twelve o’clock midnight, and nobody is watching what you will do. What is your ego going to lead you into? Will you fear Allah and leave her, or will you be pushed by your ego into doing a dirty action? If you can keep yourself in such a moment as this, then you may know that you are a real believer in your Lord; for in such a situation you would believe that no one is looking excep
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r spiritual attributes so that they can’t appear. The ego accomplishes this by insisting, “I and my wild characteristics are your real personality.”
All Prophets came only to give people this guidance: “Oh people, you must not let yourselves be cheated by your egos — don’t believe them, but look instead to what is really good.” Therefore, Moses was given the miracle of his hand becoming sparkling white as he pulled it from his breast and showed it to the people — “See this shining hand; know that this world of purity and light is the real one and that your egos have been cheating you.” All the Prophets came just for that purpose, but so many people, being donkeys for their egos, do not accept Moses, Jesus Christ or Muhammad, Peace be Upon All of Them. All Prophets are sent as guidance to people in order to say to them: “Be careful of your egos, for they are cheating you and causing you to fall into troubles here and in the hereafter.”
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After the days of the Prophets, ending with the Seal of the Prophets, our beloved Prophet Muhammad, there have come many Awliya following the ways of the Prophets and who, like them, are guides. They know the tricks of the ego very well, and because of this, so many people are running away from them, as their egos are telling them, “That person is no good, we must escape from him.” Why does the ego want to escape from the Awliya so badly? Because they will show to that person the reality of his ego, will reveal to him its bad character and dirtiness. At that time, the ego Will be very displeased, as up until that time it was sitting on a throne and the person was saying to it, “Oh my Lord,” but after that person finds out that the ego is not his Lord, but only his donkey, he will throw it down and make it serve him. Therefore, when people are angry at us, it is not their souls that are angry but only their donkeys.
Every Grandshaykh is given a special kind of guidance. Our Grandshaykh’s special quality was that if he saw bad characteristics, he would fire upon them a heavy barrage. His batteries were always charged up for firing at the bad characteristics of anyone — be he king or workman — with great explosive shells. He did this so often, and once he said to me about it: “Oh my son, Nazim Efendi, I promised to my Lord on the Day of Promises that if I ever saw any bad characteristic in anyone that I would fire at it, and my Lord granted me that through that firing the person involved would be cleansed of that characteristic sooner or later. That firing will make that person ashamed of himself now so that on the Last Day no shame will befall him. As this is Allah’s promise to me, I always shoot at whatever bad characteristics appear, knowing that in that way it shall be removed from that person. This style of guidance was given uniquely to me and it is very difficult to carry, but I was given that guidance-power (Irshad) on the Day of
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Promises, and even if people become angry with me, it does not matter, as I am only doing, what I have been ordered to do.”
Grandshaykh went on to explain a second special guidance quality granted to him: “When I am sitting and speaking in my lectures about any ranks or virtues of the hereafter, the people who are attending my assembly must ultimately reach to those ranks.” Even if one’s worshipping was not adequate, he will eventually attain them because he was listening to and believing in Grandshaykh. Our Grandshaykh may take them to such ranks as he is invested with himself; he never spoke of any ranks until he had attained them himself. For example, he never spoke about Damascus until he had arrived in it; had he not known, he would not have spoken about it. This is a miracle (Karamah) of Grandshaykh, and he says: “You must be thankful to your Lord that you have reached this assembly.”
Then Grandshaykh told me about the most important good manner for believers, a good manner which is also the essence of what Shaykhs , and Tariqats are teaching. That good manner is: Not to say, “No, this is wrong”, or “Why is it like this.” To avoid thinking and saying these two phrases is the summit of good manners (Adab). When you see a person who has stopped saying “no” and “why”, you must know that he has adab with his Lord, and looks at everything which He decrees as being alright. Such a person is not going to say “no” and “why”, but instead will say, “nothing is wrong except me.” He looks to himself and says, “I am wrong, but everything happening outside of me is going according to laws and in its proper order — but, oh my ego, you are wrong.”
Contrarily, bad manners always make us say, “Everything is wrong, but I am right.” You may see
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everyone doing and saying this. This is an illness of our souls which is called, “Everyone-being-pleased-with- himself.”
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ALLAH’S BOUNDLESS MERCY: EVERYONE HAS HIS PLACE IN PARADISE; THE BLACK STONE: DIFFERENT LEVELS OF UNDERSTANDING; TELESCOPES
My Grandshaykh was saying that the gates of Paradise are open for all to enter; and according to the Hadith of the Holy Prophet, Allah Almighty has parcelled out Paradise, assigning to everyone his portion, and not allowing anyone to occupy the portion that has been assigned to another. What this means is that Allah Almighty has given to His servants before they ever ask for anything, has given with a generosity that is absolute, as He doesn’t wait for us to ask that then He may give us according to our requests, He gives unbesought.
Our Grandshaykh went on to say that Allah Almighty treats His people in this life with the absolute Mercy emanating from His Divine Name Ar-Rahman (The All-Beneficent). No one can fall outside of the bounds of a mercy and a beneficence that is boundless, as is the mercy implicit in the Holy Name Ar-Rahman. Don’t ever think that the mercy oceans belonging to this Divine Name have any shore — no — they are boundless and endlessly deep, and so they ever will remain. You must know that Allah is never going to take back anything which He has granted to His servants, and that even to think such a thing is unbelief (Kufr) and the worst
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thought that we can think about our Lord. Yes, our Lord gave to us all a grant never ending, and that grant is faith.
What we are listening to now of Grandshaykh’s words is not knowledge of the sort that we may be accustomed to hearing — it may seem new and strange to our ears, but nonetheless it is the truth from the secrets which are opened up day by day to the Saints (Awliya). Allah Almighty granted faith to the Sons of Adam on the Day of Promises, the day when the souls of all the descendants of Adam were brought forth from his backbone and asked by their Lord: “Am I not your Lord?” We were all present on that day — looking to our Lord, talking to Him, knowing Him — and we replied: “Yea, verily. We testify that You are our Lord.”
(Surat al-A’raf, Ayat172)
That faith was granted to everyone, but Divine Wisdom decreed that in this life some people’s faith would remain covered while that of others would appear. The Holy Prophet said in regard to this: “The hearts of the Sons of Adam contain treasures, and the keys to the hearts are in the Hand of our Lord.” Therefore, if He is not going to open the hearts, no one can — not even His Beloved Muhammad, for whose sake the whole creation was created.
If you understand that faith is present in all of mankind, you must be very respectful towards each one of them and you must understand that only with Allah Almighty’s permission are you believing and showing your faith, while someone else is not showing faith only because his Lord has not opened it up for him. You must understand the matter like this, and never say about
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anyone, ‘He is an unbeliever’, — who can know what will be the state of any person at the end of his life? The key to the hearts is in the Hand of the Almighty, and what will become of each person in the end is a secret known in its entirety only to Allah Himself; even the Prophet can only know something about this matter within defined limits. On the Day of Promises, Allah Almighty granted faith to His servants, and He is not going to take it away from them — perhaps they will declare their faith upon breathing their last breath — such is Allah’s mercy. Allah Almighty is keeping and hiding so many mercy oceans which are destined for His servants.
* * * (A question was asked): “Mawlana, it is easy enough for me to understand how someone who dies a slow death from a long and torturous disease may have time to reflect on his life, and realizing his helplessness, believe and turn to Allah in repentance (Taubah) even though he was the most stubborn unbeliever and evildoer up until that time; but what I can’t comprehend is how someone who is, for example, shot and killed while in the act of committing a heinous crime, may attain repentance despite the suddenness of his death.”
(Sheikh Nazim replied): Allah may create time within time. The time that it takes that bullet to kill him may seem very short to us, but for that person Allah may make it a very long instant indeed, long enough for him to reflect upon his whole life and repent unto his Lord. Isn’t Allah Almighty capable of extracting a confession from His slave? — He most certainly is.
(Question): “But, Mawlana, how shall we understand all the verses of Qur’an which speak about eternal Hell with no exit?”
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(Answer): Allah Almighty says in one verse of the Qur’an:
“And we don’t send our verses (Ayat) except to frighten (Takhweefah).’’
(Surat al-Isra, Ayat 59)
In other words, to scare the hell out of people. For example, you may say to your son, “If you don’t stop doing that I will kill you!” In reality, you are never going to do any such thing, but that warning may just be sufficient to make him listen to what you are saying and to desist from that disliked action.
(Question): “Mawlana, why is it that the meanings we derive when we read the Qur’an seem to contradict the hidden meanings which you are uncovering?”
(Answer): Here I have some salt: it is a white powder that we use in most of our foods. Who could guess that it consists of two poisons that would kill whoever consumed them? Also, here we have some water — who could guess that it consists of two gases — two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen? He who knows, knows, and he who doesn’t know sees only the obvious and apparent. The latter may deny, but his denial won’t make him right.
Similarly, people read the Holy Qur’an and understand it on their respective levels; they may deny anything beyond their level of understanding, but their denial doesn’t decrease in the least the validity of the deeper truth, truth which cannot be gained merely through outward study, but is given as a grant from the Divine Presence.
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For example, Sayyidina ‘Umar said to the black stone which is part of the Holy House (Ka’bah) in Makkah: “Oh Black Stone, you are only a stone, and I would never kiss you except for the fact that I saw the Prophet kiss you; therefore, I follow his example.” That was Sayyidina ‘Umar’s level of understanding, and in following the Prophet, despite his not understanding all the Prophet’s actions, lay ‘Umar’s obedience and goodness. But the level of Abu Bakr’s understanding was deeper. We know through our Naqshbandi transmission that Abu Bakr said about the black stone that it is not just an ordinary stone, but rather a ‘stone of trusts’ (Sakhrat-ul-Amana) which contains a record of the promises that all the Sons of Adam made to their Lord on the Day of Promises, and also registers the names of all who circumambulate the Ka’bah (As one passes the stone, one may either kiss it or hold up one’s two hands and say: “In the Name of Allah, Allah is Greatest and to Allah Belongs All Praise”); it is a stone which has ears, eyes and a heart.
Different people can understand the Qur’an’s meanings according to their particular levels of faith-power: the more faith-light we have, the more understanding will be sent to us. Now, for example, astronomers examine the heavens with such gigantic telescopes that if you put your eye to them you would be knocked over. The distances that these telescopes cover are measured in light-years; I read in a magazine that a certain telescope in North America penetrates to a distance of ten-thousand million light-years — even the thought of these distances makes the mind spin. Now you are reading Qur’an just like one who looks to the skies with the naked eye and sees lots of stars there — that is your view, your knowledge — but can you imagine what kind of knowledge that gigantic telescope brings us!
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Everyone is looking at the Qur’an and seeing something, but it is not what we are seeing. By means of that telescope a gigantic galaxy has been seen, and they have named it “Andromeda”; its diameter is one hundred and eighty thousand light-years and it contains three hundred billion stars, whereas our galaxy is only one hundred and twenty thousand light-years in diameter and contains only two hundred billion stars. Our gigantic sun, in comparison to some of those stars, is only like a football in comparison to the Earth. But with our eyes, that immense galaxy appears to be no more than a very small dot, a faint star which can only be seen on the darkest moonless nights by only the very keenest eyes. However, the telescopic view tells us that it is very, very big, while our eyes inform us that it is tiny: do you believe the telescope? — You must believe it. So, oceans of Allah Almighty’s Knowledges are in the Qur’an and you must not try to put it in limits by saying, “This much, no more.” The more faith-light you possess, the more you can take in of these knowledges; but a blind person cannot see anything at all in the skies.
We believe that the Holy Qur’an contains endless knowledge — every letter of it contains at least twenty- four thousand meanings, just as that tiny star in reality contains billions of stars. The total range of that telescope covers one-hundred billion galaxies; each of them contains billions of stars, and what lies beyond this Allah Almighty knows. The words that have come to us in the Holy Qur’an are from none other than the Creator of all this — Glory be to Him; and He holds every Son of Adam to be more precious to Him than all of those galaxies.
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CONCERNING JUDGEMENT AND THE SIXTH PILLAR; QUDRAT ALLAH
There are two ways of understanding the Holy Qur’an: one way is within the capacity of our minds, and the other way only the heart can fathom, and it is endless understanding. Up until now, we are still not speaking on the level of hearts, but only on the level of minds, so that you may become prepared for understanding more and more according to the Qur’an ayat, “And Allah is endlessly Expansive and Knowing.”
Grandshaykh was saying that because Allah has granted to the Sons of Adam from His boundless mercy, if Allah Almighty asks you on the Judgement Day: “What did you do with your life?” You must say: “Oh my Lord, You left us to choose our way, You told us, ‘Do as you like; if you like to believe, you may believe, and if you don’t like, don’t believe — you are free in every matter.’ When You gave us this free choice, we did as we liked — as You said, we did — now here we are in front of You.” What Grandshaykh is saying is that when Allah Almighty makes an account of everyone’s actions on the Last Day, He will take into account all that He Himself pre-disposed His servants for doing and allowed them to pursue.
Everyone has a body and a soul inside of that body. Without a soul, this body belongs to the Earth, and nothing is going to emerge in the way of actions from a body without a soul. The body says, “Oh my Lord, I cannot do anything without a soul; when You send me a soul, only then may I perform actions, so in reality it is the soul that acted, not me.” Then the soul will be asked to account for its actions, and it will say, “Oh my Lord, You know that I was in the Spiritual World worshipping You without ever opposing You, worshipping You before
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I ever came to this body. How can I be a sinner when I am but an emanation from Your Divine Light Rays? How can there be sin or darkness for me when I am all light?”
Grandshaykh is explaining that this baffling interaction of earthen body and pure soul can be understood as a manifestation of Divine Power (Qudrat Allah). To illustrate this point, we may look at how the striking together of flint and iron produces a spark of fire: is the fire in the flint or in the iron? Where is it? When you strike the two together you get fire, but you can’t say that the fire is hidden either in the flint or in the iron. What you can say is that the fire is coming from Qudrat Allah. The same Divine Power that causes the spark to appear from the striking together of those two materials also causes our actions to appear from the marriage of body and soul, as Allah says in the Holy Qur’an: “And Allah created you and that which you do.”
(Surat as-Saffat, Ayat 96)
This means that He created you and created your actions as well — those actions appear through the Lord’s Divine Power.
The sixth pillar of faith (Iman) is the belief that Allah has already determined all that will happen in this world in the way of goodness and badness alike. Perhaps someone will say, “If this pillar is true, what real responsibility do I have for my actions that would cause Allah to put me in Hell?” The answer is that Allah gives power to His people to do good and bad actions — some He chose for virtue and some for evil. He created Paradise and Hell, and the people of each are acting;
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they must see the results of those works on the Day of Judgement. You must not be in doubt concerning your Lord’s justice, thinking that He will put you in Hell. His justice is Absolute Justice, and you must know that evil- doing people are already staggering under the weight of the heavy burdens of their badness, and you must thank Allah Almighty that they are carrying those burdens, for otherwise you would be carrying them. We must be intercessors on the Day of Judgement for those people; Allah will grant authority to so many people on that day to intercede for those who carried heavy burdens of sin.
‘Abdul-Wahhab Ash-Sha’rani, a famous Scholar and Sufi of Egypt, was praying to Allah to have mercy on prostitutes, saying: “Most Merciful Lord, those prostitutes are like a huge wall, a great barrier that keeps the honour of ladies. They put themselves forward as a buffer in front of honourable ladies, keeping animal- men away from them; if not for those prostitutes, bad men, like big donkeys, would rush upon honourable ladies also; but those women make themselves available, putting themselves forward, so that those men come to them, and thus honour is protected — so please grant Your mercy to those women.”
So many people are carrying such heavy burdens, and we must look at their situations with the eye of wisdom, or else we will be in the stable with donkeys; if we aren’t satisfied being in that stable, we may climb up, up, up. This is only one drop from the secrets of the Holy Qur’an, one ray coming from the Sun of Divine Predestination (Qadr).
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THE MURID’S TOTAL SUBMISSION TO HIS GUIDE WILL TRAIN HIM TO KEEP HIS FAITH IN SEVERE TRIALS
Our Grandshaykh’s advice to everyone is that they must look for a holy person who may guide them to their Lord’s Way. He stresses, furthermore, that this is an obligation for every believer, and that once the seeker has found his guide, the most important point for him as a follower is always to firmly believe that his guide is absolutely right and correct in his actions. You must believe in your guide, must believe that he knows at least fifty times more than you; your having this attitude is a necessary condition for his being able to guide you. If you think that he knows, feels or looks at things the way that you do, then you will never be able to derive any benefit nor receive any guidance from that person.
Real spiritual guides are inheritors of the Prophets and in spiritual contact with them. It is a well-known fact about Prophets that they had extraordinary powers and characteristics that enabled them to serve as guides for people to their Lord’s Divine Presence. You must know that whatever is the number of people in a Prophet’s Nation, and be it millions or billions, that Prophet must know at least that number of times more than any of his people may know. You can only know for yourself, but a Prophet must know for his whole Nation, so that he can complete his Prophethood by means of them. Because of the spiritual connection that real guides have with the Prophet, and by virtue of their being his inheritors, they also have such extraordinary powers and characteristics which enable them to know at least fifty times more than we know.
The most important thing for a seeker (Murid) who follows a guide (Murshid) in order to move toward the
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Divine Presence, is to understand that his guide is going to try him time and again. The Murshid has been ordered by the Prophet to try his murids, and everyone knows that a trial is not an easy thing — or else it isn’t a trial. When a Murshid tries his murid, he sends toward him some trial in which that murid can see no Divine Wisdom at all. Perhaps he orders something which the mind of that murid cannot accept and protests against loudly to itself: “It is not right to do this; why does he order me to do such a thing?” If the murid should openly express such rebelliousness to his Shaykh, or if it just comes to his heart without him even letting anyone know about it, the Divine Power between him and his Shaykh is cut — like a blown fuse; he is then stuck at that level and unable to progress.
Grandshaykh says: “For a murid to rebel, either openly or secretly, against his Shaykh is as terrible as someone cursing the Prophets; it is abominable to think bad thoughts about one’s own guide. One’s changing of heart in relation to his Shaykh is like cursing the Prophets, for if not for your guide you are never going to reach to knowledge of the Prophet’s realities.” Therefore, a follower must have utmost respect for his Murshid, not only in what he expresses, but also in What he conceals in his heart.
This is a training for believers so that they may learn to always keep respect in their hearts for the Prophet, and never to object in any way to anything that the Prophet did in the way of actions and judgements. If someone says, regarding the Prophet, “This action of his was totally correct, but that one not so much,” then immediately the power is cut between the Prophet and that person, and the connection is in need of being re- established.
Ultimately, this training is essential in enabling
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us to keep our faith and to become real slaves of the Almighty, as in the course of our lives so many strange, terrible and unthinkable events may occur causing people’s hearts to be disturbed, and many will say, “What is this, is this justice?’’ So many people are asking this question nowadays, when, according to the understanding of their minds, there is no justice and no mercy in certain events — this is unbelief. If a person believes in his Lord, he must believe that his Lord is always guiding events in the most excellent of ways, and that in everything that happens you may find the Lord’s absolute Mercy and Justice.
If you do not accept training at the hands of a Murshid, you won’t be able to tolerate many events, which are happening all around you in this life, but over which you can exercise no control whatsoever. If you are going to object to the occurrence of these events, you are, in effect, accusing Allah of wrong judgement and injustice. Therefore, every believer must first be trained at the hands of a Murshid; then, when he has stopped saying, ‘No’, and ‘Why’, in relation to his Shaykh, the perfume of good actions will begin to issue forth from that murid. What this means is that you will not find any objection in a real believer to what his Lord decrees, nor can you witness any breach of manners toward the Lord. He says: “Oh my Lord, You are right, I am wrong; oh my Prophet, you are right, I am wrong; oh my Grandshaykh, you are right, I am wrong.” This is the peak and the perfume of good manners and actions; whoever obtains these characteristics will improve more rapidly than anyone else.
* * * The trials that come to us from our Shaykh will be much lighter trials than those coming from the Prophet, and the trials that the Prophet sends will, in turn, be
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much easier trials than the ones sent by Allah Almighty —and you must be ready for your Lord’s trial, then you will be alright — not before. When you can say, “What my Lord decrees is right, and what I might desire contrary to that is wrong,” you have attained the highest degree of good manners with your Lord (Adab). All Prophets have been sent in order to teach this point.
How can a person really believe in his Lord when he sometimes objects, saying that his Lord is not performing the best of possible actions? A person has really overcome this pitfall and attained to real faith when he can wholeheartedly say, “Allah knows best what is good for His creatures, the Prophet knows what is best for his Nation and the Murshid for his followers —we can be wrong, but they can’t.” When he can always accuse himself in this manner, it means that he has attained the first station of faith (Iman).
The basic and common level for man is to be at all times one with his ego, and when man is one with his ego, he is in the darkness of unbelief (Kufr). People on that level may be heard saying, “I am just fine, but the problem is with the others — they are all wrong.” As long as a person is on that level, he will never accept a guide or believe in a Prophet; how should he, when he thinks that he knows everything better than anyone else? He is under the control of the commanding-self, the lower self that commands one to do evil (An-nafs ul-ammara bis-suu), and as long as he is under its command he will remain on the level of unbelief.
When one climbs from that level to the second level, he improves to the awakening of the self-accusing self (An-nafs ul-lawwamah); once awakened, that self always makes the person see himself as being blameworthy, and accuse himself by saying, “You are wrong, oh my ego.” At that stage he will seek some guide to show him what is
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right, as he has recognized that his ego is always wrong; its praying is wrong, its fasting wrong, its almsgiving wrong and its pilgrimage is wrong — nothing is right because he is not right, not yet purified from the tyranny of his lower self. Once he has accepted the fact that his ego is preventing him from doing any goodness, he is ready to accept a guide to lead him to real goodness, and at that point he is prepared to be a follower; even if his guide tries him severely, he will say, “I am wrong, he is right.” When a person has reached this point, he has attained the first level of real faith (Haqiqi Iman).
All different kinds of situations may befall a person during his life. One may encounter both goodness and badness, and indeed it may be one’s lot to have to suffer the most troublesome and harmful events. Whenever such events befall one, the sign of real faith is one’s being able to put up with them — for example, to eat an unliked food (unliked by the ego, not by the Divine Law); to see, hear or come in contact with something one detests. In all these cases, one must be able to keep hold of oneself without flinching, without undergoing any change within oneself and without saying, “This is wrong and I am right.” This is steadfastness, a sign of real faith.
* * * (A question was asked): “Mawlana, so many of our brothers in Islam can understand, and will readily agree that everything Allah Almighty and His Prophet ordered in the way of Divine Laws (Shariah) is perfect, totally acceptable and applicable to all times; but what they have a very difficult time understanding is that even the bad things which people do against the Shariah are also taking place in accordance with Divine Will and Order.”
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(Answer): That is because they are struggling with their minds’ understanding, but still have not understood that they must look at the final outcome of those disliked events — that bitterness is only the initial taste, while sweetness is the lasting taste. Therefore we can’t judge events, but must be patient for their fruits which will appear in the end.
An important point is that Allah left His people free to do anything but ordered them to do good actions and to desist from bad actions and unbelief. They may either obey or disobey, and the Lord says: “I don’t approve of your bad actions.” We, as servants of Allah, believe that everything happens only through His Will, and although He may try His people severely, we shall never raise any objections; but we shall never approve of either our own ego’s or anyone else’s bad actions. When we are looking at bad actions, we must look first at those of our own ego, before regarding those of others, as, according to the Prophet’s order, everyone must be occupied with his own faults, and only when he has eliminated all of them may he look to other people in order to help them eliminate their faults and incompleteness’s. * * *
THE POWER OF REAL FAITH: WHEN NO ONE BUT ALLAH IS WATCHING…
Our Grandshaykh is explaining to us what the power of real faith is and how strong it may be. He said that the power of real faith is such a power that would enable a man to be stranded alone on a desert island for forty days with a very beautiful girl without any indecent thought entering his heart in relation to that girl — the power of real faith would bar him from even considering a forbidden act with her. The presence or
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absence of purity of heart will become evident in such a trial. One may ask if such purity is within the capacity of the human being — purity that would prevent the normal animal urges from even entering the mind of a man alone with an attractive woman for such a long period of time. The answer to this question is, of course, yes: what if that girl was your daughter or sister, would it not then be natural for even any normal man to be free of lustful intentions concerning that girl? For a man of real faith, that female stranger is no different than his daughter or sister — his heart is spotlessly clean.
You may ask yourself how you would stand up to the following trial: You are walking down the street of your hometown, along a dark alley in the middle of the night, when suddenly a door opens and a very beautiful lady calls you to come inside; it is twelve o’clock midnight, and nobody is watching what you will do. What is your ego going to lead you into? Will you fear Allah and leave her, or will you be pushed by your ego into doing a dirty action? If you can keep yourself in such a moment as this, then you may know that you are a real believer in your Lord; for in such a situation you would believe that no one is looking excep
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