Thursday, June 11, 2015

Purification of the heart

(Shaykh Kamaluddin Ahmed)

Adab for Allah swt
The one who succeeds is the one who brings to Allah a sound heart. (Quran)
Succeeded is he who has purified it, failed is he who has not. (Quran)

Purification of the heart is absolutely farz. The method you use is optional, but the actual purification is mandatory.

You should leave all the sins that you do outwardly and internally. (Quran)
Zahir and batin.

As haram it is to have one morsel of pork, as haram it is to have a feeling of envy, unlawful desire, unlawful anger, etc. Batin sins are crippling.

It is imperative that we leave all the sins that we do.

To adorn your heart with the siffaat of the mumineen. Zikr tawakkul sabr shukr khauf rijaa muhabba khashiya.

Text written by medieval Muslim scholar, poetry: Imam Mawlud.
There are many entry points, there is no one way to begin the process of purification. One person may begin with love for Allah, other with fear for Allah.
The Imam says that the highest and noblest of beginnings is to have adab with Allah swt. To be courteous with Allah swt, the high and the majestic.

What does adab with Allah swt mean?
By practising modesty (haya) and humility (ijz). One aspect of haya is that you will not do something that is vulgar in front of a person you respect. For example, someone won’t smoke cigarettes in front of their father.
Haya is a branch of iman. It is a gift from Allah, it is part of our fitrah.
It is very unfortunate that West teaches us that haya is something wrong.
The first time you did a sin there is hesitation, that was your haya calling out to you.
If you don’t give in to your haya you end up subduing it.
There comes a stage when your qalb is screaming to you to feel remorse, but you suppress it.
What a person does is that they literally shut off their haya.
If you can turn off your haya, you can also turn it on or increase it.
The more you think about Allah, the more your haya will come back.
Humility: to realise that Allah is the Malik and we are the abd. I am aajiz: I will do with my day what you want me to do. O Allah I want to do that, but it is my ijz that I will hold myself back.
In exchange for that Allah grants a person barakah in their married life, wealth, life in general.
Our desires and wishes become tempered (iffat: ability of self control) by haya and ijz.
You shouldn’t have greed for others. How does this relate to adab? Allah is the bestower of nemat. When we are envious of people, we are criticising Allah’s takseem. To think that somebody shouldn’t have something, to have covetousness, to want someone to be deprived of something and to have it yourself, or just wanting for him or her to be deprived, that is going against the ikhtiyaar of Allah.
By hastening to fulfill His command. When you respect your parents, you immediately get them a glass of water, immediately respond to their call. The purpose of haste is not speed, the purpose of haste is showing that we are happy, we are happily being a servant.
By being wary of the subtle encroachment of bad manners. Bad adab doesn’t come glaring in the face, it can encroach upon a person. Part of humility is to watch yourself against being arrogant. Part of adab is to watch yourself against being disrespectful. Mostly this disrespect is in hope of Allah’s Mercy. We go back to sleep after waking up at fajr time without praying fajr, thinking that Allah is Merciful, we can pray later. They negate His siffat of being Malik by focusing on Him being Raheem.
Allah is the eternally besought. There is no being who has been as sought as Him. We have to make ourselves seekers of Allah. Muneeb: to have inabat, yearning.
As much as Allah is intrinsically Rahman, Rahim, Malik, insan is designed for ibadat. When you become the servant of Allah you actually become a proper human being.
The names and attributes of Allah swt. “You should adorn yourself with the attributes of Allah”. Allah is Raheem, Kareem, we should also be merciful and generous. The scale on which Allah is merciful and generous cannot be matched by us, but we say I am going to be merciful to someone, as Abdur Raheem it befits me that I should be merciful, so You may be merciful to me.
If we subdue our lower attributes we will be given such noble attributes that they are the attributes which Allah has given to himself.
Arabic word: fakar. O Humanity you are fukarah, you are needy you are mohtaj, you are fakeer. A lot of us think we are independent of Allah. Anyone who says that I don’t need worship, I don’t need halal haram, is saying that I don’t need Allah.
The Abd-Rab relationship is the asal.
Part of adab is to realise your role in the relationship.
You will gain dignity and wealth from Allah.
There is no salvation like the heart’s salvation, there is no freedom like the heart’s freedom.
The qalb is the control room.
If you have love of dunya in your heart, it will steer your nafs and your aqal. In our heart we have started to fall in love with the material world.
A person will always be thinking, plotting, scheming how to get more in this world, gets locked in this vicious cycle. The purification of the heart enables you to break out of this vicious cycle. Everything else will fall into place.

Mastering the heart’s infirmities is the second stage of purification of the heart. If we try to tackle the illness of the heart directly it becomes difficult. Adab should be established first.
What exactly are the illnesses of the heart?
What causes them and what can remove them?
This knowledge is farz on everyone.
Allah has revealed to Prophet s.a.w that nobody will enter Jannah who will have an atom’s weight of takabbur in their heart. Therefore it becomes incumbent on us to free ourselves from takabbur.
If you’re in danger of getting the illness, of being exposed to it, then this knowledge is wajib.
Is human being inherently pure or inherently a mixture of good and evil? Is human being inherently humble? Ijz is his asal? Even if you don’t have takabbur, you have the potential to have takabbur, then you must learn how to protect yourself against takabbur (Al Ghazali).
Either way me and you have to learn this.
Inner sins incinerate our inner self. Our life becomes empty of barakah, itmenaan and sukoon. We have allowed our heart to become sick.

Bukhl (stinginess/miserliness)
Why is it the very first thing being talked about after adab is miserliness? The word “Zakat” is related to “tazkiyah” and means purification. One way that halal rizq becomes tayyab (pure) is by giving zakat. The system of zakat can bring about poverty eradication.
Supporting dependents means supporting them in the lifestyle they are used to.
Rights due to others: raising wages of domestic staff with increase in inflation.
Relieving the distressed: khairat. Voluntary charity. Maybe there is an earthquake, person is not eligible for zakat, but needs financial relief.
Rights of neighbours: not just financial stinginess, can be generosity in other ways as well.
When hosting guests: being generous. Shouldn’t get worried if someone comes over to visit.
Bukhl in purchasing a burial shroud or sacrificial animal. Tipping the gravedigger.
Purchasing something to give to the needy.
“I want to have money for the sake of money, I want to have money for the sake of enjoying life to the maximum.”
Inability to spend, love for wealth, are two illnesses of the heart.
Batr: wantonness. Being lackadaisacal, carefree approach to life. Irresponsible. Excessive mirth, exuberance. Treat it with hunger and the remembrance of the akhirah. Allah does not love the excessively joyful (those who have batr).

Hatred (bughuz)

Hatred for someone for other than the sake of Allah. Its cure is to pray for the one who is despised.
The only person who seeks a cure is one who recognises that they are sick.
The first step is to stop justifying one’s anger.
Harming a fellow creature without right.
Getting clothing or car should not be the basis of your happiness and sadness.
The rat race.
Consumerism: people want to live beyond their ability. It is caused by desiring other than Allah.
Hasd: you want the other person to lose their ni’mah.
One thing is not to act on envy, other thing is not to feel the envy in the first place. The cure is to act contrary to one’s desire.
When you find fault in someone, you should seek out their virtues and praise them to other people.
Envy never benefits the envier nor does it ever succeed.

Blameworthy Modesty
Blameworthy modesty is that which stops a person from stopping what is condemnable.

Ghazab (anger)
Be humble.
To adorn ourselves with the attributes of Allah. Allah is Al Haleem. I am justifiably angry. I remember Allah’s Hilm (ability to do something but hold myself back out of hikmat), and become Haleem.

Relying on other than Allah (Tawakkul)
Fear of and desire for other than Allah is against tawkkul. (fear=khawf and hope=rijaa).
The only Being Whose Love you fear losing is Allah’s.
Hope: absolute yakeen: the only hope you have is from Allah.

Reliance of ghair Allah that leads to leaving something that is mustahab is makruh.

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