JALAN

Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi
Tucson, Amerika, Mei, 1978
translasi: Abbas, 2002

Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim
Fuqara-Faqirat, Saya akan, Insha’llah, mengatakan sesuatu ttg jalan dari Allah (Tariqa), Jalan Kepada Allah. Ini dapat dibicarakan dengan berbagai cara, dan dapat dibicarakan dengan berbagai bahasa yang berbeda, dengan perbendaharaan bahasa yang berbeda. Dapat juga dibicarakan memakai bahasa Al-Quran, bahasa Allah tabaraka wa ta’ala. Dapat juga dibicarakan memakai bahasa khusus dari kumpulan suatu kaum, komunitas, di mana mereka menciptakan kumpulan istilah-istilah teknis mereka sendiri untuk menjelaskan ahwal al-maqamat mereka, (the inner-state) keberadaan dalam dan pemberhentian (station) dengan Allah; keberadaan dalam, hanya itu saja yang mereka tahu dan urusan -maqamat- derajat derajat hanya Allah saja yang mengetahuinya dan hanya para -awliya- wali Allah mengenali ini pada diri mereka. Mereka tidak mengenali maqam mereka ( khalayak umum), tapi mereka mengenali -Hal- keadaan mereka. Kamu dapat membicarakan dengan cara begini.

Kamu dapat membicarakan tentang kelebihan, thariqat-thariqat: Naqshbandiyya, Shadhiliyya, Darqawiyya, Chistiyya; tentang para Shuyukh; Shaykh ini dan Shaykh itu, tentang maqam yang ini dan tentang maqam yang itu; tentang Aqtab, Awtad dan Salihun, dengan semua cara ini kamu dapat membicarakan tentang Tassawuf. Atau kamu dapat membuat cerita sendiri dan tetap membicarakan hal itu. Tidak ada yang menyanggah kamu. Shaykh Muhammad al-Fayturi Hamuda berkata : “kami tidak tertarik pada wird-wird; kami tidak tertarik pada wazifas; shaykh ini atau shaykh itu. Para sadiqun hanya tertarik pada satu saja: ma’rifa (Pengenalan tentang Allah). Tak ada urusan yang lain!”. Salah seorang sufi di Pakistan Timur berkata : “Para Shuyukh tidak terbang; para murid-murid mereka yang seolah-olah membuat mereka terbang. Para Shuyukh tidak saling berkelahi; para murid-murid mereka yang seolah-olah membuat mereka berkelahi satu sama lainnya.” Dengan kata-kata lain ahl-Haqiqat, orang-orang ma’rifa, ada dalam persetujuan yang lengkap, dalam keseimbangan rasa yang lengkap, dan tidak ada perdebatan di antara mereka.

Jadi bagaimana kita akan membicarakan Tariq, tentang jalan ini? Di situ ada jalan, ada Sabil, Sabilillah, fi-Sabilillah, pada jalan Allah. Jalan ini, Jalan para Sufi secara baiknya dapat dikatakan Sabil. Sabil dari asal kata yang artinya hujan. Hujan datang dari sesuatu yang tidak ada, keluar dari sekumpulan awan, dan menjadi hujan. Yang awalnya adalah awan-awan, lalu menjadi hujan, dan menghilang. Benar-benar hilang, dan hanya hasilnya saja yang terlihat, seperti rumput-rumput dan bunga-bunga, dan makanan untuk lainnya. Imam al-Junayd, radiya’llahu ‘ anhu, Imamnya para kaum Arifin dan para orang-orang Jalan ini, Jalan Allah, berkata: “Para sufi seperti pupuk, tanah di bumi dan berbagai macam biji-bijian yang ditebarkan kepadanya, dan dari ini, mawar-mawar dan bunga-bunga yang indah tumbuh dan mekar”.

DURS ON THE ESSENCE

Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi

Yesterday we got to a very significant point of approaching understanding of this great central claim of the people of tasawwuf from the Qur’an al-Karim. We found it in the event of Sayyiduna Musa, ‘alayhi salam, in his quest for this ultimate knowledge of Divine reality. In unfolding this we came on uncertain things that we have to clarify in order that there should not be confusion. We also came on certain things which we might say are contrary claims which are true. But we remember that the sufis say that this knowledge cannot be proved by logic. In other words, it is a precarious path which scorns logic in the sense that it leaps over it because we are not anymore concerned with demonstration or proof, we are concerned with confirmation of experience. If someone has something that is beyond their experience, up to that point all that remains is confirmation of the experience.

We find that the people of knowledge of Allah, by the separate paths that they have come to it, all confirm the goal. The Ahl al-Haqiqat in one place will say something and other people of haqiqat without connection with these people confirm the same thing. Those who have examined the matter even more deeply in terms of the human record find confirmation of exactly the same story in the communities before Sayyiduna Muhammad, sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam. Allah has never left a people without a prophet and therefore he has never left them without access to the unitary reality.

LOVE OF THE PROPHET

Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi
Ihsan Mosque, Norwich 19.8.81

Surat al-Ahzab: 55
Certainly Allah and His angels pray on the Prophet. Oh you who believe! Pray on him and ask for much peace on him.

We will look at this ayat that has been recited. In it is permission and in it is a command to pray on Sayyiduna Muhammad, sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam. Everything in Islam has two aspects because Allah, subhanahu wa ta’ala, is the Lord of the outward and the Lord of the inward. This is referred to in Qur’an: “We have shown you the two paths.” The Qur’an is divided into surats from Makka and surats from Madina. The surats of Makka are essentially surats of haqiqat, the Last Day and unseen matters. The surats of Makka speak about the attributes and qualities of Allah, subhanahu wa ta’ala. The surats of Madina lay down the basic principles of shari’at, the basic outward concerns of an Islamic community. This is in general but each overlaps the other. There is a Madinan element in the Makkan ayats and there is a Makkan element in the Madinan ayats. It says in Qur’an: “Huwadh-Dhahir wal-Batin”—He is the Outwardly Manifest and the Inwardly Hidden.

Shahada is double: Ash-hadu an la ilaha illallah wa ash-hadu anna Muhammad ar-Rasulullah. In the Shahada Allah has placed Sayyiduna Muhammad, sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, next to Him in this statement. He has exalted the Prophet with this high position and it is an outward exaltation because when Allah, subhanahu wa ta’ala, raises Sayyiduna Muhammad, sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, to the Maqam al-Mahmud, to the chosen station in the batin He says, “He took His slave.” He calls him by the word ‘slave’ in the Qur’an—for his batini exaltation he is called by his low name. For his outward presence he is given the exalted name of Rasulullah. It is this that takes him to this position of being part of the Shahada.

THE NAFS

Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi
Tucson Discourses

Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim
We start right at the beginning, trying to make a definition of nafs in its totality. So the first thing to understand is that inner science in the Sufic science of the self, and we must grasp Ibn ‘Arabi’s statement that nobody knows the nafs except the sufis. No one understands the nafs except the sufis – no one is able to understand and there is no way they can understand – except the sufis.

Now, it is terribly important in our technical vocabulary that we have no fixed terms. For example, one shaykh says, “There are a hundred stages to Allah,” and designates what the hundred stages are, and another shaykh says, “There are a thousand stages to Allah,” and has written down what the thousand stages are. Shaykh al-Ansari has written what the thousand stages are. Another shaykh has said there are ten thousand stages to Allah and every one of them divides into a hundred recognisable stages, depending on his insights and recognitions. All this is not poetry because they specify what they’re talking about. Having said that, you must realise that each of these is true. They are by perception different ways of seeing, but they are all true, and you can take any of these ways and you will go through it step by step and recognises everything in it. Our terms are interchangeable.

The other thing is that we are quite happy to allow one term to plane into another term in talking about the self. We can be talking about the self and you can go out of the room and come back and we have not changed the subject and it has become qalb, the heart. So we are talking about the heart and you go out of the room and come back and we are talking about the ruh and we have not changed the subject of conversation. We changed the viewpoint. We’re talking about it in another way. You go out of the room another time and we’re talking about ‘aql, intellect. We have not changed the subject of conversation each time. We are looking at the same reality from a different aspect or from a different function.

Sharh of the Diwan of Abu Madyan al-Ghawth

Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi al-Murabit ad-Darqawi
(Weimar, German, 1998)

The pleasure of life is only in the company of the fuqara. They are the sultans, the masters, the princes.
There is no higher company. As they are the least of men and make no claims, they are the elite and the two worlds are their property. With them is the Maqam al-Mahmud, for the Messenger, blessings and peace of Allah be upon him, has said, ‘Look for me among the poor, for I was only sent among you because of them,’ and ‘Poverty is all my glory,’ and “Allah loves the poor.”

Therefore keep their company and have adab in their assemblies. Leave your portion behind you whenever they send you forward.
Keep their company – in this is half the science of knowledge. Our knowledge is not informational, it is transmitted. The company of the fuqara is like a developing fluid in which the murid is soaked, until by its properties, the self emerges and is recognised. As we see later in the poem, the imprinting of the image is due to being exposed to the light of the Shaykh.

Spiritual courtesy has three levels:
1) adab to Allah
2) adab to the Shaykh
3) adab to creation

Adab to Allah has three parts:
a) Performance of the obligatory
b) Nawafil (extra) acts of ‘ubudiyya – night prayers, recitation of Qur’an, wirds, wazifas, diwan, Asma’ al-Husna.
c) Muraqaba. The invocation of the Supreme Name with deep contemplation and stillness until the falling away of the attributes and the secret is revealed. The secret of muraqaba is mushahada (That is, the secret of watching is witnessing.)

THE WAY OF SHADHILLI

The Shaykh Abu-l-‘Abbas al-Jami related to me that a certain man asked Sidi Abu-l-Hasan, “Who is your spiritual guide Sidi?” He said to him, “In the beginning it was Sidi Shaykh Abu Muhammad ‘Abd as-Salam Ibn Mashish. At present I draw from ten seas, five of the sons of ‘Adam and five of spiritual origin. The five ‘Adamic are Sayyidina Muhammad and his companions, Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthman and ‘Ali. The five of spiritual origin are Jibril, Mika’il, Israfil, ‘Izra’il and ar-Ruh {the Holy Spirit}.”

Thus the Way of the Shadhdhuliyyah, though traceable back through Sidi ‘Abd as-Salam Ibn Mashish as well as Sidi Muhammad bin Harazim and Sidi Abu-l-Fath al-Wasiti, really has its beginning with our Shaykh, Sidi Ali Abu-l-Hasan.

Sidi Ibn ‘Ata ‘illah reported on the authority of Sidi Shihab ad-Din Ahmad, the son of our Shaykh, that at the time of his death his father said, “I have brought to this Way {Tariqah} what no one has before me.”

Thus the Way of the Shadhdhuliyyah, though it has many areas in common with the various Turuq, may Allah be pleased with them all, is a unique Way unlike any other.

The Shaykh, may Allah preserve his secret, said, “Of all the Ways there are two: the way of travelling {suluk} and the way of attraction {jadhb}. Our Way is the Way of Jadhb. Our beginning is their end. Their beginning is our completion ” Shaykh Ibn ‘Ata’ illah, whose books greatly aided in the diffusion of the teachings of our Shaykh, says in the Kiatb al Hikm, “He who is illumined in the beginning is illumined in the end.” Thus the Way of the Shadhdhuliyyah is firmly based on the reality {haqlqah} that Enlightenment or Illumination {-ishrdq} is both in our beginning mid at our end with the certain knowledge that both our beginning and end are in His Presence and by His Grace.” {see 7:172}

FIRST LETTER FROM SHAYKH AHMAD AL-BADAWI

(Shaykh Ahmad al-Badawi was the student of Shaykh Moulay al-‘Arabi al-Darqawi)

In the Name of Allah, the All-Merciful, Most-Merciful

There is no power nor strength except by Allah, the High, the Immense, and may Allah bless our master and Prophet Muhammad and his family and Companions and grant them peace abundantly until the Day of Rising

Allah. Allah. Allah.

To all the slaves of our Lord who follow us, wherever they are, especially our lords and masters of Ayt an-Nubu’a, and our lords and masters the scholars, and our lords and masters the descendants of the salihun whose ancestors were salihun, and our lords and masters who are the esteemed muqaddams and esteemed muqaddimat* (*Women with the position of muqaddam), since they are our representatives who represent us and are our support and the pillars supporting our brothers. They are the dogs of the fuqara’, barking at their heels and guarding them, bearing their loads and urging them on and never being irresolute. That is the reality of the muqaddims, so how great is their happiness and what good news for them because of that since as is reported, “The servant of the people is their master.”

If you do not busy the nafs with the truth, you will busy it with the false. And anyone who does not serve the elite will be tried by having to serve thieves. May Allah make us people whose goal is Him alone since that is what is necessary for attaining the three stations of the deen: Islam, Iman and Ihsan. “So worship Allah making the deen sincerely His.” The people of the station of Islam are distinguished by what goes from them to Allah. The people of the station of Iman are distinguished by what comes from Allah to them. And the people of the station of Ihsan are distinguished by what goes from Allah to Allah.

SHAYKH MUHAMMAD IBN AL-HABIB AL-FILALIl

(1295/1876-1391/1971)

His lineage:
He is the Sufi sharif, teacher, guide to Allah and shaykh of the Darqawi tariqa, Sayyidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib ibn as-Siddiq al-Amghari al-Idrisi al-Hasani.

His ancestors were based in Marrakech, and he is related to Moulay ‘Abdullah Amghar*, who is buried at Tamsloht , near Marrakech, a descendant of a line which goes back to ‘Ali and Hasan. This branch of the family emigrated to Tafilalat and settled there. His father emigrated to Fes, settled there and his descendants still live there. *I’ve been informed that this should be Sidi Husayn.

His birth and primary education:
He was born in Fes, the cradle of knowledges and fount of gnoses, in 1295 AH. At the proper age, he went to the Qur’anic kuttab at Qantara Abu’r-Ru’us in the Sharabiliyyin quarter where he studied with the faqih and righteous wali, Sidi al-Hashimi as-Sanhaji, learning the basics of reading and writing and recitation of the Noble Qur’an. He also studied that with the faqih Sidi Ahmad al-Filali in the school of Qasba an-Nawwar and memorised the Qur’an under him.

His secondary education and instruction:
After he completed his goal in the Qur’an school, he left it and began to imbibe the finest nectar of dependable education and beneficial knowledge from its pure springs. That was around 1312. In the Abu’l-Junud Mosque in Fes he studied with the renowed faqih with pure recitation, Sidi Mahmad al-Irari, concentrating on the Ajrummiyya, the Alfiyya and as-Sullam by Bannani and the Qualities of Muhammad by at-Tirmidhi.

SHAYKH ABU Al-HASAN ASH-SHADHDHILI

This now is something of the story of the life and sayings of the Shaykh and Master Abu al-Hasan ash-Shadhdhili, whose full name was `Ali ibn `Abdullah ibn `Abdu ‘l-Jabbar, who, on his father’s side, descended from the Fatimid-Hasanid line, and on his mother’s side from the Fatimid-Husaynid line.

He was born in the year 593 A.H./1196 C.E., in the mountain village of Ghumara in the Rif area of the northern Atlas mountains of the Maghrib. The Berber tribe to which he belonged had virtually separated itself from the rest of the Maghrib by refusing to accept the Religion of Islam, which was otherwise universally followed in this region. Sidi Abu Madyan had tried to teach and guide this tribe to the Truth, but they had preferred to live in their state of spiritual ignorance, relying mostly upon witchcraft, magic and idols for their form of worship.

There is little recorded about the very early life of `Ali ibn `Abdu ‘l-Jabbar, but it is assumed that whilst he was still very young he would have been taught the basic rites of the Religion because he and his family were of the shurafa, that is, people who are related in the body to the Prophet Muhammad, prayers and peace be upon him. These are people who are untouched by the desire for worldly power and office or for material gains. Therefore, it could be expected that he would have studied, first of all, at the famous madrasa of Qurrawiyyin in Fez (Fas) which had been founded by the great grandson of Sayyidina al-Hasan, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, prayers and peace be upon him.

His first Shaykh and Master was Sidi `Abdullah ibn Harazim, a follower of Sidi Abu Madyan, may Allah have mercy on them both, through whose guidance he entered the Path of Allah, the Way of Tasawwuf. It was also through him that he was later moved to find the Qutb of his time.

SHAYKH ABDU ‘S-SALAM IBN MASHISH

*sources: ribat-jakarta

This now is some account of the life and wisdom of the Master, the mawlay, Shaykh Muhammad `Abdu ‘s-Salam ibn Mashish whose full name was ibn Mansur ibn Ibrahim al-Hasani al-Idrisi, ash-sharif of the Bani `Arus of the Jabal `Alam, to the south-east of Tetuan in the Maghrib.

Very little is recorded of the early life of Ibn Mashish except that it is said that he entered the Path of the People of Allah while he was still a child, and that his first teacher was the Shaykh `Abdu ‘r-Rahman al-Madani az-Zayyat who, in his presence, lived in al-Madina al-Munawwarah, the City of the Prophet, may prayers and peace be upon him, but who would travel to instruct his follower in a matter of but one hour, returning then to his dwelling-place in al-Madina.

It was said that while `Abdu ’s-Salam, may Allah be pleased with him, was being instructed on the Path that he would be in frequent prayer, above the number required for religious observance, and at times, when he had finished his praying, he would find his food prepared and laid out for him to eat. One night, however, when he felt distrust towards this food, his Master Sidi `Abdu ’r-Rahman al-Madani appeared before him and said, “Eat of this food without fear, for you are always under the Protection of Allah.” From the very beginning of his entering onto the Path of Allah until his last moment, Sidi `Abdu’s-Salam had deep humility, and no one visited him without becoming aware of this.Then after some years he took the hand of Sidi Abu Madyan Shu`ayb ibn al-Husayn al-Ghawth, receiving all the holy knowledge from this great Master.

After leaving his Master Abu Madyan, he, may Allah be pleased with him, returned to his own country where he lived amongst his people as a member of the shurafa, those who are dedicated and devoted to upholding the Religion of Islam, untouched by connection to worldly positions. He was said to be a strict follower of the Qur’an and the Sunna and was deeply rooted in the Law of Islam (ash-shari`a), and once, on being asked to recommend spiritual practices for a seeker, said, “Am I a Prophet? Perform the obligations of the Law and avoid sin. Keep your heart aloof from all temporal attachments. Accept, and be content with, everything that Allah sends to you and above everything else put the Love of Allah.”