18/April/2014, Friday.
“Yaqeen” — Belief! Something we say we have but really don’t. In his lecture, Shaykh Hammad highlighted the importance of Yaqeen in the life of a Believer. Yaqeen in ALLAH, , Angels, His Books, His Prophets, in Hereafter , etc.
Ever since we’re kids, our parents ans teachers feed into our mind that we’ll only be successful if we Ace our exams & tests at school, get into a top class renowned college & further into a top university & end up in a job that pays alot of money to afford a posh lifestyle, and there, we’re SUCCESSFUL! That’s the definition of success that’s fed into our minds.
If you own a Mehran or Suzuki, an Air conditioner at your home, have food & shelter; you’re among the most rich people. Yet we run after this world & money. Ever thought of what you saved up for your Akhira? How sad would it be to find yourself rich in this world but poor in the hereafter (not enough goodness to save you from the hell-fire).
We spend all of our lives, earning this world. By the time we retire, all we have is a bungalow over a couple of kanals of lands, or a farm house may be? Even more? A few more pieces of lands. And that’s it! Imagine, you spent alll your life for these few pieces of lands.
Now, imagine reciting “Subhan ALLAH” (Only ALLAH is free from all faults), how long does it take you? less than a second, right? The reward for reciting 1 Subhanallah with firm yaqeen, ALLAH (s.w.t) plants for you 1 tree in Jannah the size of this tree is such that if you travel with the fastest Arabian horse under the tree it will take you 500 years to cover the shade of the tree. Just imagine being rewarded an area equivalent to 1.5 times the area of this Dunya, and that too for an effort you made that took you not more than a second!! Isn’tthat worth it?? Now, if you recite this SubhanALLAH once in Makkah ( a place that increases the sawaab of every good deed), you get a reward of 126million times the area of this Earth. IT’S ALL A MATTER OF YAQEEN!
All our life, we keep delaying prayers, delaying zikar & ibadah. A child is born, we say we’ll make him goto masjid only when he grows up. Next, we say let him get into a good college & I’ll help him/her develop the 5 prayers habit then. Next, we say his/her life’s too hectic (university stage) , let him get married & he’ll go to masjid himself. We keep on delaying & delaying. In real, it’s Shaitan that puts us in this circle. He makes sure we dont go to Jannah!
Ask a person how many surahs from Quran has he learnt, he’d reply 1-5 surahs, or may be 10! ask him the same que after 5 years, he’d reply the same. But if you inquire about his degree or post in the office he’d reply differently both times. Today, may be he’s a Junior Accountant at a top firm. Five years down the lane and he’s a Manager now. Would he EVER agree to stay on that Jr. Accountant’s post for the rest of his life, would he? Obviously not! But its sad that we agree to remain Junior Accountants in our Deen.
HOW TO ATTAIN ‘YAQEEN’?
The way to attain this ‘Yaqeen‘ we’ve been talking about it through ‘Qurb-e-ilahi‘ (Closeness to ALLAH).
What happens when our professor is right next to us, watching us? We act very carefully infront of him, making sure we don’t upset him, right? Because we have YAQEEN that he/she IS right next to us!
Similar is the case when we’re close to ALLAH. When we have Yaqeen that He is right next to us, watching us every second of our life, we would avoid doing anything that would upset Him, isn’t that right?!
Once ‘Qurb‘ is acheived, sinning would be impossible because we’d lose raz’aa of ALLAH. And none of us would wanna lose raz’aa of ALLAH, once acheived.
8 STEPS TO ATTAIN QURB-E-ILAAHI
1. ADAB
Deen sarasar poora Adab hai. It’s been said that “be-adab insaan kabhi baa-Khuda nahin ban sakta. Adab here means adab towards ALLAH in terms of respecting & obeying him. When we sin, it means we’re not obeying Him, hence the criteria of Adab is not being fulfilled. It also means Adab towards Prophet’s (SAW) Hadith & Sunnah and following both of them as well.
Allah is bay-niaaz, He could throw us all into Hell-fire. It wont matter to Him. He would still be ALLAH, He doesn’t need us. We need Him. Even the Wali of ALLAH doesn’t care (beyond a certain point). But Prophet (SAW) always cared, he(SAW) cared for his Ummah so so much that he’d wake up for Tahajjud prayer & shed tears for us, uttering the words “My Ummah, my Ummah, my Ummah”. Prophet (SAW) was Fanaaf-il-Ummah. He cared about his Ummah more than anyone else. Thus, the sunnah of Prophet(SAW) is the real path to attain Qurb. Sunnah to this day is very powerful and iski barkat se Qurb haasil hota hai.
Another point Shaykh mentioned was that sometimes a good deed’s idea comes to our mind/heart, that is nothing but Taufeeq granted to us by ALLAH. If we fail to out it into action due to our laziness or whatever reason, it’s sad & unlucky of us to do so.
2. ILM-UN-NAAFAY (Beneficial Knowledge):
Ilm-un-naafay –> Ilm (knowledge) that benefits. And by Ilm (knowledge) we mean Ilm leading to practice. For example, most of us know that whoever uses Miswaak(which is a Sunnah) on a daily basis, would inshaa ALLAH be granted Kalima at the time of death. It’s simple knowledge that needs to be practiced, we dont need any Fatwaa or need to have learnt all the tafseer of Quran to know this piece of knowledge that could benefit us.
It is said that it took Hazrat Umar (RA) 12 years to learn Surah-al-Baqarah. And it was not because of the length of the surah or the difficulty, what it meant is that it took him 12 years to practice what he learnt in this surah.
3. AMAL-E-SAALEH :
Once a person attains (1) & (2), he gets to the third stage that is Amal-e-saaleh, where he practices all his learning in real life.
4. HIKMAH (Wisdom):
(1), (2) & (3) are at the person’s end, his efforts towards Qurb-e-Ilaahi. Hikmaah(wisdom) is what ALLAH grants us for our efforts that we put in the earlier three stages. And the person gets to know the reality (asliyat) of this world. There have been many many well-educated people but they lack Wisdom. True Wisdom can only be granted by ALLAH to those who put in efforts towards Him.
5. ZUHUD:
At this stage insaan ko dunya ki asliyat samaj ajati hai k dunya ki koi asliyat nahi. The person’s heart, at this stage, does not have dunya or it’s love. His/her heart is for Qurb of ALLAH. Their hearts are not fascinated by the luxuries of this world. To them sitting in a luxurious lounge is not different than sitting on barren land. These are the Wali of Allah.
It is to be noted that a Wali’s profile will exactly be the same as any other normal person, he may own a bungalow, a fancy car, etc. But the only difference would be that his heart & life are disconnected with this dunya. His heart yearns for ALLAH only. A Wali tastes the love of ALLAH & Aakhira. Nothing (of this dunya) effects him anymore.
6. INA’BIT-ALLAH:
A person’s heart has only two states; either it’s filled with the Darkness of this world’s love or filled up with the noor of Love of ALLAH. It can’t be both at the same time. Today, we’re filled up with this world’s love, we need to vacuum our hearts. We need to repent to ALLAH to fillour hearts with His love. Only then can we attain His Qurb.
“Koi ALLAH ko mananey wala toy banay“
At this stage, these people miss ALLAH. They wait to pray & do more & more amal-e-saaleh.
7. TRUE IBADAH:
The person wakes up to every tahajjud every prayer w/o anyone(his parents/friends) asking him to wake up. He prays with all his heart. He knows the Reality. It’s all about “ibadah, ibadah & ibadah“. Here, he reaches his real Maqsad i.e to worship ALLAH. The very purpose of his existence.
8. MAARFAT-ALLAH:
This is the ultimate stage that a human attains. The Wali craves for ALLAH. “Wo chalta phirta Jannati banjata hai.” He begins to understand what ALLAH feels & looks like. He feels ALLAH to be right beside him every second & minute of his life.
We used to have Khaanqahein i.e Institutes for Qurb-e-ilahi where one would learn to attain Yaqeen & Qurb. These were the ishq ki dukaanen (khaankahein of Love of ALLAH) and the special things about them was that they were all available for free. Today we pay high amounts of fee to the institutes where we study, but these institutes we all for free.
Today, we have a shortage of people who attain Qurb & Maarfat of ALLAH. When there’s a shortage of something in the market, it’s price(return that we get) increases. Hence we find that reward of reviving a Sunnah in times of fitnaa is equivalent to the sawaab of 100 shaheeds. Thus, the return we get is way more when there’s a shortage of it (in this case it’s the shortage of Sunnah being practiced)
3 SHORTCUT WAYS TO ATTAIN QURB-E-ILAAHI & THUS YAQEEN
“One moment is enough to change a sinner into a Wali of ALLAH”
1. Special Places; Makkah & Madina:
If we ask a person if he’s been to UK, US, etc. He’d proudly say YES. Ask about Makkah & Madina(for Hajj, Umrah) , you’ll hear a NO.
What we overlook is that even today, the barakaat(blessings) these two places are as strong & powerful as they were 1400 years ago.These are special places. All we need to do is have true niyyat (intention) to visit these places, confess our sins & repent.
Make a niyyat for taubah saying, Ya’ALLAH people come to you with tons of good deeds, sadaqah etc. All I have are mountains of sins. You are the only one who could forgive me. I want to live a life where I dont disobey you.
Similarly in Madina, make duaa saying “Ya’ALLAH apne humen jismaani qurb to ataa farmaya. Prophet(SAW) ki tarah baatani qurb bhi ataa farma”
Agar ap dil se sacchi taubah karna chahtay ho tou ALLAH zarur apko change kar k bhejega.
A wali once said “Emaan ki halat me jo Makkah na gaya, he earned NOTHING”
2. Special Times; Months of Shaaban & Ramazan:
The two very special months that bring us closer to ALLAH, especially Ramazan, it takes us very very close to ALLAH. As the month of Rajab approached, Prophet(SAW) would start praying to ALLAH that “humen Ramazan tak puhuncha“. THAT is the importance of this month near Prophet(SAW).
There was a time when, inquiring about the numbers of times one achieved to have this Moth of Ramazan in his life, was enough to determine his Qurb-e-ilaahi. (because these people utilized this month to grow closer to ALLAH, unlike us).
The thing is k Asal maanon mein koi Qurb haasil karne wala banay tou sahi!! One moment is enough to change a sinner into a Wali of ALLAH.
3. Taubah:
Allah verily says:
إن الله يحب التوابين
“Surely, Allah loves those people who constantly repent to Him (do Tawbah to Him).” [2:222]
Notice Allah did not say: “Allah loves the Taa’ibeen (those who repent)”, but he said: تَوَّابِيْن, which means “those who constantly, over and over, repent to Allah.”
All we need to do is have a true Niyyat (intention) & dil mein nadaamat k ainda main achi zindagi guzarna chahta hun, gunahon se door.
Through sincere repentance ALLAH forgives sins no matter how big they are and no matter how many they are, ALLAH says:
“Say: O My slaves who have transgressed against themselves (because of sins), do not despair from the mercy of Allah. Verily, Allah forgives all sins. Verily, He is All-Forgiving, Most Merciful.”
Concluding this piece of knowledge, I’d say, it’s never too late to return to Him. All we need is a pure heart. May ALLAH cure all our spiritual diseases that are fixed in our hearts & include us in His Muhibbeen.
Ameen!
Purifying Our Hearts 