Questions on dhikr

[1]Truthfulness should not be confused with sincerity, since it is possible to act with sincerity but not to reach truthfulness, as Nawawi explained in his commentary to the second of his “forty hadiths” (hadith about islam, iman, ihsan). Ibn al-Jawzi relates in “Sifat al-Safwa” (4:98): “Mansur said: I heard Musa ibn ‘Isa say: I heard my uncle say: I heard Aba Yazid (al-Bistami) say: “If one time I could utter purely LA ILAHA ILLALLAH (there is no god except Allah alone), I would not care about anything after that’ (law safat li tahlilatun ma balaytu ba‘daha bi shay’).”

[2]Abd al-Hakim Murad: Ahmad ibn ‘Isa Abu Sa‘id al-Kharraz (d. 277/890-1) was an important Sufi who, according to Huwjiri, was “the first to explain the doctrine of annihilation (fana’) and subsistence (baqa’).” He was the close companion of Dhul-Nun, Bishr al-Hafi, and al-Sari al-Saqati, and was renowned for the emphasis he placed on ‘ishq, the passionate love of Allah, and upon the scrupulous observance of the Law. Sources: Sulami, Tabaqat al-Sufiyya 223-228; Qushayri, al-Risala 1:161-162; Brockelmann, 1:646.

[3]‘Abd al-Hakim Murad: I. ibn Yazid al-Nakha‘i (d. c96/714-5) was a devout and learned scholar of Kufa who opposed the writing of hadith as an unjustified innovation. He studied under al-Hasan al-Basri and Anas ibn Malik, and taught Abu Hanifa, who may have been influenced by his extensive use of personal judgment (ra’y) in matters of jurisprudence. Sources: Ibn Hibban, Mashahir ‘ulama al-amsar 101; M.M. Azami, Studies in Early Hadith Literature 65-66; Ibn al-Jazari, Ghayat al-nihaya 1:29.

[4]”Destroying all things by commandment of its Lord. And morning found them so that naught could be seen save their dwellings. Thus do we reward the guilty folk.” (46:25)

[5]Mawlana Shaykh Nazim al-Haqqani said that Mawlana Shaykh Abd Allah al-Daghistani said that even when removing an obstacle from the road such as a stone according to the saying of the Prophet “Belief has seventy-odd branches, the lowest of which is to remove something harmful from the road,” the God-wary one does not indifferently kick the stone away but picks it up and displaces it by hand out of respect for its glorification of Allah.

[6](Nuh Keller, Victor Danner:) Abu al-Fadl Ibn ‘Ata’ Allah (d. 709/1309) of Alexandria, Egypt: One of the great sufi imams and a Maliki jurist, author of the Hikam (Aphorisms), Miftah al-falah (The Key to Success), al-Qasd al-mujarrad fi ma‘rifat al-ism al-mufrad (The Pure Goal Concerning Knowledge of the Unique Name), Taj al-‘arus al-hawi li tadhhib al-nufus (The Bride’s Crown Containing the Discipline of Souls), ‘Unwan al-tawfiq fi adab al-tariq (The Sign of Success Concerning the Discipline of the Path), the biographical al-Lata’if fi manaqib Abi al-‘Abbas al-Mursi wa shaykhihi Abi al-Hassan (The Subtle Blessings in the Saintly Lives of Abu al-‘Abbas al-Mursi and His Master Abu al-Hasan), and others, five of which were transmitted with their chains by the hadith master and historian al-Sakhawi (d. 902/1497) to the Shadhili commentator Ahmad Zarruq (d. 899/1493). Ibn ‘Ata Allah was the student of Abu al-‘Abbas al-Mursi (d. 686/1288), the second successor of Imam Abu al-Hasan al-Shadhili, and the shaykh of the Shafi‘i imam Taqi al-Din al-Subki. He related from al-Shadhili the following saying: “This path is not monasticism, eating barley and bran, or the garrulousness of affectation, but rather perseverance in the divine commands and certainty in the divine guidance.” Some sources: al-Zirikly, al-A‘lam 1:221; ‘Asqalani, al-Durar al-kamina 1:273; Subki, Tabaqat al-shafi‘iyya 9:23.

[7](A.Hakim Murad:) Muhammad ibn Musa al-Wasiti (d. 320/932): A Sufi who associated with al-Junayd and al-Nuri in Baghdad and who later moved to Merv where he died. He was also an authority on fiqh. Sources: Qushayri, Risala 1:174; Sulami, Tabaqat 302-307.

[8]Ibn Majah narrates from Abu ‘Anbasa, and Tabarani from Abu ‘Utba that the Prophet said: “Allah has vessels from among the people of the earth (lillahi aniyatun min ahli al-ard), and the vessels of your Lord are the hearts of His righteous servants, and the most beloved of those to Him are the softest and the most sensitive.” al-Jarrahi said in “Kashf al-khafa” that this was the basis of the saying attributed to the Prophet: “The heart of the believer is the house of Allah.” al-Qari said that the latter, though not a saying of the Prophet, was correct in meaning. Imam Ahmad narrates in his Kitab al-zuhd from Wahb ibn Munabbih: Allah opened the heavens to Ezekiel until he beheld the very Throne, whereupon he said: “Glory to Thee, what greatness is Thine, O my Lord!” Allah said: “Verily the heavens and the earth are unable to encompass Me, and the devoted, soft heart of My faithful servant is able to encompass Me.” Imam Ghazali mentioned it in his Ihya’ ‘Ulum al-din.

[9]Abu al-Qasim Muhammad ibn ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib (c15 H- 73), named ibn al-Hanafiyya: A saintly son of sayyidina ‘Ali. He took hadith from him and from several other Companions including Jabir ibn ‘Abd Allah, the last of the Companions who died in Madina. Sources: Ibn ‘Adi, al-Kamil 2:113b; Ibn Hajar, Tahdhib al-tahdhib 9:354 (M.M. Azami). The Prophet gave sayyidina ‘Ali special permission to name him both Abu al-Qasim and Muhammad, which he otherwise forbade: Tirmidhi (#2846) and Abu Dawud (Adab #4967).

[10]Abu al-Fadl ‘Iyad ibn Musa al-Yahsubi al-Maliki (d. 544 H) of Andalusia and Fes, Morocco. The imam of his time in the sciences of hadith, and a scholar of tafsir, fiqh, Arabic grammar and language, and Arab genealogy. He wrote many books including a commentary on the Sahih of Muslim which Nawawi used in his own great commentary. Ibn Farhun in Dibaj al-dhahab says of his book al-Shifa: “No-one disputes the fact that it is totally unique nor denies him the honor of being the first to compose such a book. Everyone relies on it and writes about its usefulness and encourages others to read and study it. Copies of it have spread East and West.” (Qadi ‘Iyad, Muhammad Messenger of Allah: Al-shifa’ of Qadi ‘Iyad, trans. Aisha Abdarrahman Bewley, Granada, Spain: Madinah Press, 1991, p. 511).

[11]Author of a massive commentary on Bukhari’s “Sahih” entitled ‘Umdat al-Qari.

[12]A saying by Wahb ibn Munabbih reported by Bukhari in the title of the first chapter of the Book of Funeral Prayers (Jana’iz).

[13](Cf. 6:99, 6:141, 18:32, 19:23, 19:25, 20:71, 26:148, 54:20, 55:11, 55:68, 69:7, 80:29).

[14]The various names of the date corresponding to its different stages are: tal‘, khalal, balah, busr, rutab, and tamr or suyyab.

[15]‘Abd al-Rahman ibn Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, Fath al-majid sharh kitab al-tawhid, 7^th ed., ed. Muhammad al-Fiqi (Cairo: maktabat al-sunna al-muhammadiyya, 1377/1957) p. 35.

[16]M. Nasir al-Din al-Albani, Talkhis ahkam al-jana’iz (s.n.: Jam‘iyyat ihya’ al-turath al-islami, n.d. [reprint of the 1^st edition, Amman : al-Maktabat al-Islamiyah, 1982]) p. 48.

[17]Ibid. p. 44, 47.

[18]Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Zad al-ma‘ad (ed.? 1:205-206).

[19]Ibn Qudama, al-Mughni (Beirut, 1414/1994 ed.) 2:323.

[20]Ibn al-Jawzi, al-Tahqiq (Beirut, 1414/1994 ed.) 2:14.

[21]Sayyid Sabiq, Fiqh al-Sunna (Cairo, 1408/1987 ed.) 1:352.

[22]Nawawi, Sharh Sahih Muslim (al-Mays ed.) 7/8:25-28.

[23]Ibn Qudama, al-Mughni (Beirut, 1414/1994 ed.) 2:323.