Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Majlis Haul Imam Abdullah bin Alawi Al-Haddad 1431 Hijri/2010


Bismillah.

Alhamdulillah wa shukrulillah. The brilliant lights from the charming chandeliers at Masjid Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah appeared extraordinarily bright and beautiful last Saturday. Beneath it were honorable habaib, ulama, ahlillah, ariffeensolehin whose nur and sirr only Allah knows. They were like little stars surrounding one sparkling star we all adore and love - Habib Umar bin Hafiz.

Habib Umar said (as interpreted by Habib Ali Zainal Abidin):

Alhamdulillah, for His guidance and endless blessings...
We must understand that the reality of our relationship with Allah is fundamentally based on the heart and ruh (spirit). This fact is supported by a hadith of Rasulullah s.a.w who said: "Allah does not look at your physique nor your face, rather He looks at your heart."

I witness Lailaha illAllah that He welcomes whoever comes to Him; He mentions the name of whoever mentions His name; He is thankful to those who are thankful to Him and He comes to whoever comes to Him. I witness that Muhammad is a servant of Allah who said: 'I am one who is most fearful of God and foremost in taqwa.' Make salutations to the Prophet s.a.w, he is the door connecting us to Allah, the gateway for us to know Allah.

Make your heart present at this majlis. Your heart is being watched and monitored by the One Who knows it well. We are in a majlis in honor of Imam Al-Haddad, who is capable to make one's heart inclined towards Allah. Think about it. If not for his noble position, we will not be here paying tribute to him. If not for our faith and love for him, we will not trouble ourselves to come here to listen about him. If not for our faith and love we will not be sitting here doing zikir and reading Ratib Al Haddad. The reality of our association with this masjid, Imam Al Haddad and zikrullah reflects the reality of our relationship with Allah. Zikr is what we profess with the tongue. Imam Al Haddad is a descendant of Prophet Adam, a special creation of Allah and the masjid is a construction of bricks. All these makhluk [zikr, Imam Al-Haddad, and masjid] serve as a cause for our association with the Creator.

Allah has taught us through the Prophet s.a.w, the six tenets of iman (Rukun Iman). Is it sufficient that we only accept the first principle - the shahadah? What about the other five? As a matter of fact, four of the tenets are linked with servants of Allah [makhluk]. As stated in both the Qur'an and hadith, We are to also have faith in the angels, Rasul, kitabullah (the Qur'an), yaumul akhir (the hereafter) and qada & qadar. Whoever claims to have iman yet refuse to accept any one of the six principles be it Rasul, the Qur'an, even one huruf of it, angels and so on, he is in fact kafir and is bound for hellfire.

Once upon a time, a Jew came to see the Prophet asking him who it was who conveyed the words of Allah to him. 'Jibril', replied the Prophet. The Jew retorted saying:  "He (Jibril) is our enemy!" Allah revealed in the Qur'an that whoever denounces Jibril, Allah considers him as an enemy. And they are enemies of the Prophets too. Their iman shall not be accepted. As a result, their allegiance to Musa was of no use. The Prophet s.a.w said as recorded in Sahih Bukhari: "Whoever wages war on my friend (awliya), wages war against Me." According to one ulama whoever reproach the awliya and suffered musibah (calamities) for it, he shall not die a Muslim, in fact, he will face su'ul khatimah (a bad end to his life). How could he ever be peaceful if Allah waged a war on him?

O the Essence Who is constantly watching our hearts, fill our hearts with love for You, for Rasulullah, the prophets, angels, the pious, all muslimin and honor us with husnul khatimah.

O mukmin who is present here at this majlis, one who is faithful, who hopes to purify the heart, know that the reality of our faith may be connected through one who is close to Allah. Saidina Yaakub bin Ishak bin Ibrahim at the moment of death asked his son, 'Who do you worship after me O son?' The reply was: 'We worship your God, your father's God, the God of Ishak and the God of Ibrahim.' Why do you think it was answered in that manner? It's because Yaakub's son understood the significance of having a connection with those who are near to Allah. Our tauhid cannot be perfect if we do not keep a connection with the anbiya and solehin. Someone who does not understand sanad properly might misunderstand and fall into error. There is a distinction between a mukmin who honors someone whom Allah honors and a mushrik who honors one amongst the mushrikin. The latter worshipped and placed their hopes on idols whereas the sahabah sought barakah [tabarruk] from the Prophet s.a.w. Imam Bukhari recorded incidents where sahabah tried to catch hold of water from the Prophet's ablution. Similarly, we learned from the story of Nabi Yusuf who gave his shirt as a cure for his father's eyesight. Notice the degree of yaqin in these examples. Beware of making a mistake in one's iktikad/aqidah. It is a sin to regard a makhluk as a god. In comparison, honoring and showing reverence towards someone whom Allah has made honorable is a shi'ar and something which He orders. Those who idolized a makhluk and made him godly did so out of nafs. The mushrikin worshiped their idols and thereby committed shirik. The angels were asked to prostrate to Adam. Yaakub and his sons were asked to prostrate to Yusuf. All these are mentioned in the Qur'an. Making sujud to any but Allah is batil but it was different in the case of Adam and Yusuf because it was an order from Allah. As we know, Iblis refused to make sujud to Adam. Does that mean Iblis understood tauhid better? No! We must emulate the tauhid of anbiya and the angels, not that of Iblis.

As reported in Sahih Bukhari, upon the Prophet's demise, his jubah (cloak) was given to one of his wives Maimunah and the water from cleaning the jubah had been used for healing. We must be aware of the sacredness of one who has absolute tauhid on the kalimah shahadah [the Prophet].

We must not busy ourselves in judging others or calling them kafir. Instead, we should busy ourselves with acquiring knowledge from a genuine source and purify our hearts from illness. We must be grateful and thankful to Allah that he has protected us from committing shirik jalli (apparent polytheism). We, therefore, need to guard ourselves against shirik khafi (subtle polytheism). One example of shirik khafi is riya' which is showing off our ibadah to people. Let us all strengthen our hearts and iman to Allah. Let us purify our hearts. It is meaningless to perform plenty of good deeds when the heart is not pure and sincere.

Sahabah used to sing praises for one man for his excellent conduct and piety. One day the man entered the room where the Prophet and sahabah were sitting. His beard was visibly wet from his wuduk. "That is the man we were talking about," said the sahabah. Seeing the man approaching him, the Prophet remarked: 'I saw a sign of shaytan on your face. Tell me, when you came into the room did you not feel that you were better than everyone else?' And the man admitted.

******
Imam Al-Haddad was a man of excellent character. His adab was evident in his mu'amalah (dealings) with the public. One day a little boy brought a knife to him thinking that he was a blacksmith. Instead of feeling angry about it Imam Al-Haddad treated the boy kindly. When the boy's father found out of his son's mistake, he went to apologize to the imam toward whom he had a deep respect. Imam Al-Haddad said to the man: "If you truly love me, please do not scold your son for his innocence. I don't take to heart that the boy has mistaken me for the al-haddad (one who works with metal) in the market." O people, imagine if that were to happen to us, surely, we would be angry and humiliated, but Imam Al-Haddad was a man of commendable adab.

Being a man of his stature, people were fond of greeting him and stopping him to ask questions and seek counsel. He found that disturbing everytime he walked to the masjid. So he politely asked people not to stop him. He said, 'When I go to the masjid I would be engrossed in my ta'zim for Allah. Please do not bother me or you would be disturbing my ta'zim.'

Imam Al-Haddad was said to cause a mihrab (prayer niche) cracked upon saying Allahu Akbar. The cracks remained visible even after the mihrab was repaired and I saw that with my own eyes.

Imam Al-Haddad was one who's very committed to sunnah Rasulullah s.a.w. There was not a sunnah that he did not do and for that he was blessed with meeting Rasulullah both in his dreams and in yaqazah (waking state). Several ulama who happened to be nearby the raudhah at Masjid Nabawi used to hear the Prophet answering Imam Al-Haddad's salam when he visited the Prophet's maqam.

Imam Al-Haddad was passionate about writing qasidah. So much that he thought when he died he should have one favorite qasidah of his - Ya Alimal Hal written on his palm. He said: 'But then I realized it's not my way. I must come to Him without bringing anything except for hoping for His help.' That shows the degree of Imam Al-Haddad's relation with Allah.

There was a true story that took place after Imam Al-Haddad passed away. One family known as Bafodal wanted to visit the Prophet's maqam but couldn't. They felt frustrated about it. As they were sailing on a boat, one of them dreamed of the Prophet who said: "Are you feeling sad that you could not come visit me? Don't you know that by visiting the maqam of Imam Al Haddad, seventy of your hajat will get fulfilled?"

O people, whoever reads Imam Al-Haddad's kitab would receive a bountiful light and ma'rifah. So please make an effort to study his writings especially Risalatul Mu'awanah that was written when he was 25 years old. Read Nasa'id Diniyah and the ratib which we have read just now (Ratib Al-Haddad).

If you wished to get close to someone who is loved by Allah and Rasul, read his work. With that I wish to present you a gift - ijazah on Ratib Al-Haddad with the shortest sanad that I have got. I know several versions of sanad but I will give you one with the shortest sanad. I hereby grant you ijazah 'amiyah for Ratib Al-Haddad which I had learned from my guru, Habib Umar Alawi Al Kaf who had received it from his guru Habib Umar Abdullah [Bashasi] who received it from Habib Umar bin Hamid who received it from Imam Abdullah bin Alawi Al-Haddad. There are three people between me and Imam Al-Haddad. You are the fourth person in the sanad despite the fact that Imam Al-Haddad had left us 300 years ago.

May Allah gather us with the man we are honoring today. May Allah keep us together in akhirah with much goodness. May Allah unite our hearts with faith, certitude and love. We are asking Allah for some great bounties but we know He is the Most Rich and Most High and is able to answer our du'a...
Ameen Ya Rabbal Alameen.

 






Partial transcript of Habib Umar bin Hafiz's lecture in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.
Wallahu a'lam. I seek refuge in Allah for any mistakes in my notes.
Credit: Amanah Hawi Al Khairat http://www.alhawi.net/ 

No comments:

Post a Comment