Audhu billahi
min ash-Shaytan ir-rajeem. Bismillah ir-rahman ir-raheem. Dastoor ya
sayyidi madad. Nawaytul arba`een, nawaytul ‘itikaf, nawaytul khalwa,
nawaytul `uzla, nawatul riyaada, nawaytus suluk, fee hadhal masjid lillahi
ta`ala al-`adheem.
By Mawlana Shaykh Hisham
Al-Kabbani
I will now
narrate one of the stories of Sayyidina Shah Naqshband
{q},
who is the imam of the Naqshbandi Sufi Order and a great
`alim
in his time.
He was a rare scholar of
`ilm
ash-shari’ah,
and in
`ilm
al-Haqiqat
.
He was known as
dhu-janahayn,
possessor of two wings, keeping two sorts of knowledge: one he shares with
all, and one he keeps for his followers.
He was also known as
Sultan al-`Arifeen,
King of the Gnostics.
Sayyidina
ShaykhSharafuddin
relates the hadith
inda dhikr as-sulaha tanzal ar-rahma.
It means, whenever the
awliyaare mentioned the mercy of Allah descends on that group, because they are
mentioning His saints. Where that mercy descends is one of the secrets
revealed by Sayyidina Grandshaykh Sharafuddin and Grandshaykh AbdAllah al-Faiz
during their seclusions, when they received secrets from their
shaykhs
and from the Prophet .
Grandshaykh
Sharafuddin ad-Daghestani
said, “When the stories of the saints and details of their lives are
mentioned, the sins of the listeners will be shattered away as the
shattering of glass.”
Being a great scholar in his time, he mentioned that
Ibn Hajar al-Haytami often traveled one or two days (then they measured
distance in time or days), to hear the stories narrated by Naqshbandi
shaykhs. One such story is
regarding Muhammad Bahauddin an-Naqshband (Shah Naqshband) of Bukhara,
presently known as Uzbekistan.
When he
reached the age of seven years, Shah Naqshband was brought to meet with
all spirits of
anbiya-ullahand messengers, in
the presence of Sayyidina Muhammad {s}.
In the presence of the Prophet
age is not significant, only the spirit is significant.
Thus Shah
Naqshband arrived in that holy presence at age seven: he was unique, for
no one could match his level among all Naqshbandis of that time.
There in the
presence of the Prophet ,
Sayyidina Musa
asked Shah Naqshband, Ya fard al-`alam,
“When were you chosen as a guide for humanity?”
Shah Naqshband
{q} replied, “I was a
Murshid
when
Awliya
were in complete non-existence.”
(Meaning, “I was
Murshid before
Allah created the
Awliya.”)
He was not speaking about himself, but
rather of the secret of the Prophet which was passed to him, at that
level, in that unique state of ecstasy.
Then Sayyidina
Musa said, “Explain; we want to know.”
Sayyidina Shah
Naqshband {q} receives from the line of Sayyidina Abu Bakr as-Siddiq ,
so out of
adab
for Sayyidina Musa,
Abu Bakr as-Siddiq answered, “O Musa! When
Shah Naqshband spoke to you, it was from the level he inherited from
Prophet Muhammad
{s},
and from that level it is one of forty-nine parts of
nubuwwat.
From the secret of that level, he answered you.” Then Abu Bakr looked at
Sayyidina Shah Naqshband, indicating permission to respond to the
questions.
Shah Naqshband
{q} replied,
“I was a
murshid
when there were no
Awliya,
before granting the
Awliya
their position in
yawma alastu birabbikum.
Even then I was a
Murshid,
and Allah allowed me to look after my followers and their sustenance, and
guide them when the
awliya
were yet in void.”
Sayyidina Musa
repeated, “Explain.”
Sayyidina
Naqshband continued,
“I was given my station of sainthood before every
wali
was given his station of sainthood from the Naqshbandi Order.
And I
received that when I was still in the world of atoms.
Allah created me before He had yet created the Naqshbandi
awliya
by twenty-thousand years, and I was under the
tarbiyya
and
inayat
of the Prophet .
Allah then created all other
awliya
and they appeared after 17,000 years.
There is a difference of 10,000 years
between my reality’s appearance and theirs. That is what I meant.”
That occurred
when Shah Naqshband was seven years old, and it was his first
irshad
in the presence of
anbiya,
the
awliya-ullah and
sahaba.
Allah granted Shah Naqshband 12,000
specialties.
One of these specialties, in order to give
you an idea of the others (and this is one of the ordinary ones) is the
power to focus his vision around this universe 363 times in twenty-four
hours, encompassing the entire universe.
He is able to look at 363 times each day at
every creation, upon human beings, observing what they are doing,
including the state of their sustenance, their affairs, their problems and
difficulties.
Not only that, he is able to look after
every baby in the womb of its mother.
This is one of his basic specialties.
On that
occasion of his first visit he asked, “O my Lord, don’t let any one who
takes me as a guide and those who came after me or before me exist without
support from You.”
All the angels of the skiessaid, “Ameen.”
Grandshaykh
said the
baraka
of that
du`a
appears four times a year, and its protection is sent to the followers of
Shah Naqshband four times a year.
One is the fourteenth of Muharram,
Shah Naqshband’s birthday;
on the first day of
Ramadan,
the fifteenth of
Ramadan and
Laylat al-Qadr.
On these special days of the year, Allah sends that special protection to
the followers of Shah Naqshband. Whoever entered the Naqshbandi
tariqat
will be protected from all sides.
When Allah
I
created the
Awliya after
17,000 years (10,000 years after Shah Naqshband’s creation),
they came to the World of Essence, spoke to
the essence of Shah Naqshband, and asked him for the sake of Prophet
Muhammad
{s}
to be accepted in the Naqshbandi Way.
He accepted 7007 of them to be
saints, and each of them were granted 12,000 knowledge's from every letter
of Qur`an they read.
Shah Naqshband
sought this distinction for the sake of Prophet Muhammad, and when he
requested it the Prophet
looked at him and raised him for every letter of Qur`an multiplied by the
12,000 knowledges given on each letter to these
awliya.
For each of those 7007
awliya Shah
Naqshband was raised that many levels.
We say there
are 70,000 veils of darkness between us and the presence of the Prophet.
As much as you become nearer to the Prophet ,
the last veil makes you feel you are very far from the Prophet’s reality.
For to be near to the presence of the Prophet, your
ishqwill make you feel even farther
away from him.
From that
station of knowledge Shah Naqshband {q}revealed,
“When
awliya-ullah
destroy those veils and approach the presence of the Prophet, there are
700,000 more veils to overcome to reach the essence of the Presence of the
Prophet.
I crossed
where no one reached before.”
That is
similar to the story of Sayyidina Bayazid al-Bistami.
When he was stoned
and tortured by his tribe he went onboard a ship and prayed, “O My Lord!
Take me to a place where I will feel happy.”
Thereafter, the ship began to
toss about on the high waves.
The ship’s captain said, “There must be a
great sinner on board who is causing this calamity!” Sayyidina Bayazid al-Bistami
said, “I am that sinner; throw me in the ocean.”
He said to
himself, “I am going into that ocean and I am going to seek the Presence
of Allah.” As soon as he was thrown in, the water stopped tossing about,
and Sayyidina Bayazid, without thinking of any other purpose and using his
utmost spiritual power, began to plunge into that Ocean
of (realities)
at a speed greater
than the speed of light, until he reached a place of ultimate darkness and
void. There he heard a voice which Grandshaykh described as, “Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu.”
Sayyidina
Bayazid was granted extraordinary spiritual powers, similar to those of
Shah Naqshband, powers which he tried to use to count the number of all
the people at that location saying “Huuuu…”
Despite using all his power, he could not count them. Grandshaykh says
Sayyidina Bayazid then realized this was a presence he could not reach,
and he knew it was Shah Naqshband and his followers reciting “Huuuu…”
Although Shah
Naqshband came many centuries after Sayyidina Bayazid al-Bistami, still he
reached Shah Naqshband’s spiritual presence and that of his murids.
And Sayyidina Bayazid al-Bistami was worried, anticipating that Shah
Naqshband would ask him, “Why are you here?” and then send him away, for
awliya guard their
followers and don’t want another wali
in their territory. «
Bihurmat al
habeeb wa bi hurmat al-Fatiha.For the sake of the
Beloved, for his sake we recite the Opening Chapter of Qur`an.
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