Abu Hafsat

As-Salaam alaikum, The Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, said that Surah Ikhlas (chapter 112 of the Holy Qur'an) equals one-third of the Qur'an. Four short lines, 57 letters in Arabic, yet somehow equivalent to over 200 pages of revelation. How wonderful. Most people read this Surah daily, they know it protects them; brings blessings; opens doors; but Sheikh Ibn Arabi, may Allah sanctify his secret and be Merciful to him, discovered something that scholars whisper about but rarely explain in public. The Surah is not just about Allah's Oneness; it is about the the dissolution of everything that is not Allah, including you. The Sheikh in his 'Futuhat al-Makkiyyah', notes that Surah Ikhlas begins with 'Qul'- Say. This is a Command from Allah to the Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, but Ibn Arabi saw deeper layers. The command to 'say' itself is a teaching about the nature of speech and existence. When you say something, where does the sound come from? -- from breath; from vibration in the throat; from the intention in the mind. But who gave you breath, who created the vocal cords, who placed the thought in your consciousness? Every word you speak is ultimately Allah speaking through the instrument of your body. So when the verse/ayat commands Qul (Say) it's reminding you even your act of recitation is not truly yours, it's Divine Speech manifesting through a human form. Then comes 'HUWA ALLAHU AHAD' -- He is Allah, the One. Ibn Arabi spent years meditating on the word AHAD because it's different from WAHID, another word for one. WAHID means one in number -- implying the possibility of a second. You can count 1, 2, 3 but AHAD means the Absolute One beyond all counting; beyond all comparison; beyond all conceptualization -- it's the Oneness that cannot even be thought about properly, because thinking requires a subject; an object; a thinker and a thought. But AHAD dissolves that duality. Ibn Arabi wrote that when you truly say Ahad, your mind reaches for something it cannot grasp. And in that failure to grasp, something happens; the ego which survives on categorization and separation finds nothing to hold on to. The verse continues: ALLAHU SAMAD -- Allah the Eternal Refuge. The word SAMAD has multiple meanings that Ibn Arabi carefully unpacked. On one level, it means the one who needs nothing but whom everything needs; on another level it means solid without hollowness, without internal parts. Most beings are composite made of parts dependent on those parts staying together. Your body is made of organs, your organs are cells, your cells are molecules. You are a temporary assembly that will one day disassemble, but Allah is SAMAD... Absolute, noncomposite, Eternal. He has no parts, no dependencies, no internal structure that could fail or decay. When you say 'Allahu Samad' with understanding you're acknowledging that only Allah has true self-subsisting existence; everything else including your sense of 'I' is borrowed, contingent and destined to return to the source. Then the Surah delivers the blow: LAM YALID WA LAM YULAD -- He begets not, nor is He begotten. This verse destroys the concept of origin and derivative. Everything in your experience has a beginning and an end. You were born; you will die; your thought arise and pass; your feeling come and go; the entire universe emerged from the Big Bang and will eventually end...but Allah was never born, never originated, never came from anything and He never begets, never produces offspring, never creates something that is His equal or shares His Essence. Ibn Arrabi saw that this shatters the ego's attempt to understand Allah by analogy. We understand things by comparison - this is like that; this came from that; but Allah cannot be understood that way. He is not like anything. He did not come from anything; He does not produce equals. This verse forces the mind into a corner where all its tools fail. You cannot think youur way to Allah because thinking operates through relationship; and this verse says Allah has no relationship of origin or derivation. The final blow comes with WALAM YAKUN LAHU KUFU'AN AHAD -- And there is none comparable to Him.... the word KUFU'AN means equal, comparable, similar. This is the Absolute negation of all comparison -- nothing is like Allah; not metaphorically unlike, but absolutely, categorically incomparable. Every time you think you understand something about Allah, this verse says no! you don't. Whatever you imagined is not Him, whatever concept you formed is not Him, whatever feeling you had is not Him. Ibn Arabi calle this the via negativa - the path of negation; you cannot say what Allah is, only what He is not. And this final verse negates everything.

As-Salaam alaikum, You are praying, you are fasting, you are doing everything right, yet something inside you feels dead, heavy, empty. The Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, called it the silent disease of the heart. Sheikh Ibn Arabi, may Allah sanctify his secret, described it as the hidden death that kills the soul, while the body still works. Right now, this is spreading faster than ever. The heart becomes sick when it forgets who is watching. The first silent disease of the heart is forgetfulness of the Divine Gaze; not forgetfulness of Allah's Existence. The deeper danger is forgetting that Allah is witnessing them right now. A person may say I believe in Allah, but their heart acts as though Allah is far away; they speak carelessly because they forget Allah hears; they look carelessly because they forget Allah sees; they plan sins quietly because they forget Allah knows; they delay repentance because they forget tht their next breath is not guaranteed. This is not ignorance of religion; this is absence of presence. In the path of inner knowledge, the greatest poverty is not having little money but living under the gaze of Allah while feeling unseen by Him, because when the heart truly knows it is seen by Allah, it becomes careful, it becomes softer, awake. This is why Ihsan is the medicine of the heart. To worship Allah as though you see Him, and if you do not see Him, to know that He sees you. The Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, did not teach Ihsan as decoration. He taught it as the highest state of worship, because the heart cannot remain diseased when it is truly aware of been seen by the One who created it. A man alone with his phone at night is not alone; a woman crying quietly into her pillow is not alone; a person hiding bitterness behind a smile is not alone; a businessman cheating in a transaction is not alone; a student lying to escape blame is not alone; a believer standing in prayer without focus is not alone. Allah sees the movement before it becomes an action; He sees the intention before it becomes a word; He sees the wound before it becomes anger; He sees the desire before it becomes sin; He sees the repentance before it reaches the tongue. So, the question is not whether Allah sis watching. The question is whether your heart is awake to His watching. This is where many hearts become sick. They begin to live as if people are the real witnesses and Allah is only an idea. They fear embarrassment more than sin, they fear losing reputation more than losing sincerity, they fear being exposed in front of people more than being exposed on the Day when nothing hidden remains hidden. And when the gaze of people becomes greater in your heat than the gaze of Allah Ta'ala, your worship becomes performance, your morality becomes strategy and your religion becomes a routine. This is a serious disease. We must Beware!!

As-Salaam alaikum, What if the greatest distraction in your life isn't your phone but your own self, you sit after Sallah and within moments the same thoughts return, did I pray with enough focus, why didn't I feel anything, am I getting any closer to Allah or am I only pretending? You recite the Qur'an, but your mind quietly drifts towards tomorrow's meeting, last night's conversation or version of yourself you hope other people see.... Most of us think distraction comes from social media, endless notifications, or the noise of modern life. Those things certainly distract us, but there is another distraction that follows you everywhere. It sits besides you in Sallah, it opens the Qur'an with you, it whispers during your Zikr, it even joins you when nobody else is around -- it is the endless habit of watching yourself - am I sincere enough, did I pronounce that correctly, do people think I am religious, why can't I concentrate, why don't I feel what everyone else feels. Without realizing it, many of us have become experts of observing ourselves while forgetting to observe the One who created us. And the more we watch ourselves, the more exhausted we become. The irony is painful, we long to become close to Allah while remaining trapped inside our own thoughts. Shiekh Ibn Arabi, may Allah be Merciful to him, diagnosed this illness in a way that feels astonishingly modern. He teaches in the 'Futuhat al-Makkiyyah', that the heart becomes truly alive when its attention leaves the prison of the ego and rests in awareness of the real Allah, whose perfect knowledge never leaves His servant. Muraqabah is not forcing yourself to think about Allah every second. It is learning to live as someone who finally realizes that no one breath, not one thought, not one hidden tear has ever existed outside Allah's knowledge. For Ibn Arabi, Muraqabah is not an isolated mystical exercise practiced only by spiritual elites, it is a transformation of perception, it is learning to live beneath the Divine Name al-Raqib - the Ever Watchful - not imagining Allah, not visualizing Allah, not confusing the Creator with His creation. Allah remains utterly transcendent, completely unlike His creation yet His knowledge encompasses every hidden thought, every whispered prayer, every forgotten disappointment, every sincere intention.

As-Salaam alaikum, The Noble Messenger of Allah, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, said: ''I smile because of 2 men from my Nation, who shall knell in the Presence of the Lord of Power. One of them says: 'O my Lord, grant me retaliation for the wrong which my brother did to me.' And Allah says: 'Give your brother that in which he was wronged.' 'O Lord, he says, 'none of my righteous works remain.' Then Allah Ta'ala [the Exalted] says to the man who made the demand: 'What shall you do with your brother, seeing that none of his righteous works remain?' And he replies: 'O my Lord, let him bear some of my burdens in my stead.' And Allah's Messenger wept, as he said: 'Truly, that shall be a fearsome Day, a Day when men have need of others to bear their burdens.' Then he said: 'Allah shall say to one who made the request: 'Lift up your head and look to the Gardens.' This he does, and he says: 'O my Lord, I see high cities of silver, and golden palaces wreathed about with pearls. For which Prophet shall they be, or which Saint or martyr?' And He said: 'They belong to whomsoever pays Me their Price.' 'O my Lord, he says, 'And who possesses such a price?' You possess it', He replies. 'And what might it be?' he asks, and He says: 'Your forgiveness of your brother.' 'O my Lord, he says, 'I have forgiven him!' Then Allah the Exalted says: 'Take your brother's hand and bring him into Heaven.' Then Allah's Messenger recited part of 1st verse in Surat Anfal of the Holy Qur'an: ''...Fear Allah, and make reconciliation among yourselves'' (8:1) (Al-Hakim al-Nisaburi: al-Mustadrak ala al-Sahihayn) IV, 576.

As-Salaam alaikum, Our Teachers, the 'Ulama of the Islamic tradition teach that the true homeland of peace is the Heart (qalb) when it is polished by dhikr (Zikr), Imaan (faith) and surrenders to Almighty Allah. External threats, insults or hardships can shake our body, but not the heart that has been anchored in the Divine. Says our Lord in the Holy Qur'an: -- ''Indeed, in the Remembrance of Allah [Zikr] do hearts find peace.'' (13:28) The peace referred to in this verse/ayat is not fragile; it is not given by people, and so it cannot be taken away by them. When faith flowers in the heart, the inner garden becomes a paradise before Paradise. Here, if you like you may recall that Hadith in which the Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, said: - ''Paradise is closer to you than your shoelace, and so is Hellfire''. (Musnad Ahmad). And Sheikh Abu Madyan al-Ghawth, may Allah be Merciful to him, said: ''The true faqir is the one who is at peace in the storm, for his heart is with Allah while his body is among creation.'' So, no matter what others say or do, if your heart is with Allah [rooted] in Tawheed, you carry a sanctuary with you. This is what the Sufis call Sakina .... the tranquility Almighty Allah sends into the hearts of believers.

As-Salaam alaikum, The complete one (Kamil) does not worship Allah for any motive, except one or, if necessary two. The first is that one worships Allah, the Exalted so that Allah, the Exalted will love him for his following His commands and adhering to what he was created for. For, if Allah Ta'ala loves him, He will subject all of the universe to him and everything will obey him. If he says to it, "Be", then it is, by the indication of His saying, (When I love him, I am his hearing by which he hears....)/ Hadith-Qudsi. However, he does not say to anything "Be", out of courtesy with his Lord, and in light of the station of slave-hood (al-Ubudiyya). Because, verily, the slave does not exceed his degree by giving orders. And his station is only to receive orders, unless his Lord gives him permission, so that he speaks with the tongue of his Lord, not with the tongue of his self (nafsihi). And the second purpose is that one worships Allah Ta'ala, for the sake of (seeing) His Honored Face in the place of eternal bliss (Dar al-na'im al-muqim).

To be on course in our bid to reach our Lord and Creator with Imaan (faith), we need to be mindful of four things, as follows :-- "Zikr, the basis of which is righteous works, and the fruit of which is illumination. Meditation, the basis of which is perseverance, and the fruit of which is knowledge. Poverty, the basis of which is thankfulness, and the fruit of which is an increase of it. Love, the basis of which is dislike of the world and its people, and the fruit of which is Union with the beloved. " Abu Hasan Shadhili. " There are 3 (people) who will enter Paradise without accounting : a man who, when he is washing his garment, has no other one, a man who has no more than one pot on his fireplace, and a man who, when he asks for a drink, is not asked 'what kind of drink do you want'? " - - Abu Najib

As-Salaam alaikum, Abu Huraira, may Allah be pleased with him, narrated that the Messenger of Allah, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam told me:- "O Abu Huraira, be scrupulous and you will be the most devoted of people, be content and you will be the most grateful of people, love for people what you love for yourself and you will be a believer, be a good companion to those in your company and you will be a Muslim, and decrease laughter, for truly, a lot of laughter kills the heart. "(Ibn Majah).

As-Salaam alaikum, "I DID NOT CREATE THE JINN AND MANKIND EXCEPT TO WORSHIP ME" (51:56) The final purpose of the world is nothing but Divine Worship. Devotion or worship, ultimately, is in 3 stages:- (1) Devotion of ordinary people: obedience to God's Commands. (2) Devotion of the elect on the mystical path: Increasing of intention and will and cultivation of sincerity. (3) Devotion of the elect of the elect (akhassu l-khassa) : Serving God with love. In all these 3 forms/stages, Devotion should/must be seen as the presence of the heart, whereby one gets immersed in the ocean of love and connecting to the Divine in his/her acts of worship.

As-Salaam alaikum, In addressing him, the Holy Qur'an says about Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam:- "Truly, though art of an exalted (azim) character" (68:4) And it was lost on no one that the Qur'an uses the same adjective to refer to itself - 'the Mighty (azim) Qur'an' (15:87). The Exaltedness of the Prophet's character derives precisely from the fact that he had assimilated the Qur'an into his very being. This is how Sufis have understood the saying of the Prophet's wife Sayyada A'isha, may Allah be pleased with her, when she was asked about his character after his death. She replied : "Have you not read the Qur'an? His character was the Qur'an". (Sunan Ahmad 10, No. 25,240). Indeed, among all of Allah's servants, the one who had the most exalted character was/is Muhammad, literally 'the praised one', also called Ahmad, 'the most praiseworthy' (61:6). The Qur'an speaks of Allah as "the Praiseworthy" (al-Hamid), the implication being that no one else is truly worthy of praise. If the Qur'an calls the Prophet both "Muhammad" and "Ahmad", that is because his character conforms to Allah's "character", which is to say that "his character was the Qur'an", Allah's Speech and Self-Expression.

"This world is the prison, and we are the prisoners: dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out! What is this world? To be forgetful of God, it is not merchandise and silver and weighing scales and women. As regards the wealth that you carry for religious sake, "How good is righteous wealth (for the righteous man)"! as the Prophet recited. Since he cast out from his heart (the desire for) wealth and possessions, on that account Soloman did not call himself (by any name) but "poor". Although the whole of this world is his Kingdom, in the eye of his heart the Kingdom is nothing. " After Jalaluddin Rumi in his 'Mathnawi, Trans. by Prof R. A Nicholson.

As-Salaam alaikum, "Wherever you turn, there is the face of God" (2:115) Such knowledge comes by way of Zikr, which is al-hudur ma'al-mazkur.. "presence of the One Remembered". We should see the world for what it is - - a reminder of God, a mention of God, a remembrance of God. And the place where God becomes truly present and man becomes truly blessed, is the heart. Says Sheikh al-Akbar, or the Greatest Master, Sheikh Muhiyiddin Ibn Arabi:- "The greatest sin is what brings about the death of the heart. It dies only by not knowing God. This is what is named " ignoramce". For the heart is the house that God has chosen for Himself in this human configuration. But such a person has misappropriated the house, coming between it and its Owner ". (Futuhat Makkiyyah, 179:6), Cairo, 1911.

As-Salaam alaikum, Sayyadi Ali ibn Abi Talib, may Allah be pleased with him, quotes the Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, as having said: "There is none whose final abode is not known to Allah from beforehand - whether it is going to be Hell or Heaven". The audience said, "Should we not then hang on to the scroll of destiny and suspend action?". The Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, said:- "No, do your part for what is pre-ordained for one has been made easy for him. If he is fortunate, the path of goodness has been smoothened for him but if he is doomed, evil deeds are equally facile to him". He then recited the ayat/verse, "But as for him who gives (in charity) and fears (Allah), and accepts whatever is good, We surely will smoothen the path of happiness". (Bukhari and Muslim).

As-Salaam alaikum, The most revolutionary statement on earth, LA ILAHA ILLALLAHU, MUHAMMADUR-RASULULLAH, discerns between the Real and the Unreal, or between the Absolute and the Relative, or between ALLAH and everything other than Allah, which is the universe. The Kalimat-Shahada is divided into 2 halves, the negation (LA-ILAHA) and the affirmation (ILLALLAHU). The first half denies the inherent reality of the world and the self, while the second half affirms the ultimacy of the Divine Reality. The Shahada means there is no creator but Allah, none Merciful but Allah, none Knowing but Allah. In sum, it means that there is no reality but Allah Ta'ala... and that all the so-called realities of our experience are secondary and derivative. Says the Holy Qur'an: "Everything is perishing but His face" (28:88). Here, Allah Ta'ala did not say, "will perish", for He wanted it known that the existence of all things is pershing in His Being today. Only those veiled from the reality of things post pone the observance of this until tomorrow. Allah's Reality is such that nothing can stand up to it, His Unique possession of all that is real and all that provides reality to others means that the others are in fact non existent. This is how our teachers interprete the saying of the Messenger of Allah, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, "Allah was, and nothing was with Him". And by saying/affirming "MUHAMMAD RASULULLAH"... we say and believe that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah... he is a clear, designated manifestation of the One Real. In other words, he represents Allah Ta'ala more directly than other creatures. He and the Qur'an for which he is the vehicle are guiding lights in the darkness of unreal things.

As-Salaam alaikum, Just as when a piece of iron when exposed and immersed in tremendous heat of fire annihilated its own identity and become lost in the color and quality of fire, similarly the Messenger of Allah, Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, lost his own self-hood in the fire of Divine love, and attained to his highest degree of Khilafat. And thus through him, the Attributes of Allah Ta'ala were/are made manifest. The Prophet's seeing, hearing, doing and speaking are that of the Divine's. That is why Allah says about the Prophet:- "You did not slay them, but Allah slayed them, and in no way did you throw when you threw, but Allah threw" (8:17) "The Prophet doesn't speak out of his own volition, his speech is but revelation (Allah's Speech)" /53:3 Through the Prophet, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, Allah's Beautiful Names and Attributes were manifested fully, that is why following the Prophet is made equivalent of following Allah, where the Qur'an declares:- " He who obeys the Messenger has obeyed Allah" (4:80) And,also, by the bestowel of Almighty Allah, the Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alaihi Wasallam, had within himself manifest the Divine Attributes which are supernatural from ordinary human standard... for example, he said :- "Allah has folded the entire earth in front of me. So I can simultaneously observe everything from its east to its west" (Sahih Muslim) and "Allah has placed this worldly manifestation in such a mysterious way in front of my eyes that whatever will be created until the Day of Judgement, I can see them as if they are right on top of my palm" (Tabrani). From this, we deduce that from the subtlety of his haqiqat, space and time boundaries are made null and void... everything is made present simultaneously Allah's mystical manifestation (Tajalli) to his Prophet was in his power of hearing and seeing. That is why he said : "I can see what you cannot see, I can hear what you cannot hear". (Ahmad and Tirmidhi).