Paradise One

Bismillahir-Rahmanir-Raheem,

I recently stumbled upon a video which attempted to recreate the historic battle of Al-Yarmouk in which the great Sahaba, Khalid Bin Waleed (radhiAllahu anhu) lost his helmet, which always contained a few strands of the Prophet’s blessed hair (salAllahu alaihi wasalam).

Instead of continuing on with the fight and reclaiming the helmet after the battle had ended, he dropped everything and ran to secure his helmet and lift the noble hair off the ground, leaving himself completely defenseless to enemy attack.

Despite the fact that the battle took place over a thousand years ago, this love for the Prophet (salAllahu alaihi wasalam), and all those items attached to his blessed presence has not been completely lost. Although few and far apart, there are still great individuals among us whose hearts and minds are illuminated with love for the beloved of Allah, salAllahu alaihi wasalam.

I experienced this immense love first hand this past March while attending a Mawlid (a celebration of the Prophet’s birth. salAllahu alaihi wasalam) at the Osmanli Naksibendi Dergah in the Catskill Mountain, New York.

After we had finished the Khatm Khwajagan I went outside to get some air. While reflecting on my past few days at the Dergah and refreshing my wu’du I heard a faint voice reciting a beautiful salawat. The voice grew louder and as the seconds passed; all the while I just stood where I was trying to figure out what was about to happen.. Suddenly, I heard the voice reach the outside door so I rushed over to open it and saw one of the resident mureeds, Mustafa, walk in carrying a huge bundle of cloth over his head. I immediately understood that the wrappings contained the hair of the Noble Prophet (salAllahu alaihi wasalam) within them, so I quickly stepped aside to let him pass. I followed him into the prayer room where the dhikr was held and saw as he, with the help of a few more mureeds, carefully placed the bundle of cloth on an elevated platform.

From there everyone began to recite that same salawat in unison and, with the instruction of Shaykh Effindi, Mustafa and Sultan began the unraveling of the cloth.

The unraveling process itself took well over 20 minutes as there were countless, beautifully decorated clothes protecting the mubarak hair, and the mureeds removed each cloth in a slow, respectful manner.

Finally, we reached the last cloth and the box containing the blessed hair was carefully opened by Shaykh Effindi.

Inside the box was a small, glass casing, which he lifted up with both hands, kissed, and held close to his heart.

The guests and mureeds then formed a circle along the walls of the dergah and continued with their recitation of prayers upon the Prophet (salAllahu alaihi wasalam).

We were then each individually blessed with the opportunity to walk up and kiss the mubarak hair and fill out hearts with its light and barakah.

After the last person kissed the hair it was placed back in the box, and the wrapping procession began.

When all the clothes were placed back around the box, two more were added, increasing the overall size of the bundle, which was then lifted up over the head of another mureed and carried back to the house of Shaykh Effindi.

—

It was truly a remarkable night, and I have yet to come across a gathering similar to the one that was present there, or meet an individual with more love and respect for our beloved Prophet (salAllahu alaihi wasalam) than the beautiful Shaykh Abdul Kerim al-Kibrisi.

It was this immense display of love and respect for our master Muhammad (salAllahu alaihi wasalam) that helped me finally reach my decision to take initiation into the Naksibendi Hakkani tarikat and take Shaykh Abdul Kerim as my spiritual guide through this life.

Elhamdulilah, I thank Allah (swt) every day for blessing me with such an Incredible guide.

Ameen!

by Shaykh Gibril F Haddad

ALLAHUMMA salli ‘ala sahibi al-taj, goes a famous Yemeni prayer _ “Our
Lord, bless the Owner of the Crown!” The “crown” is the turban, and its
owner is the Holy Prophet Muhammad, upon him blessings and peace.

‘Imama, the turban, has been the most distinctive vestimentary sunnah _
“way of life” _ of Islam since the beginnings of the Religion. ‘Abd
Allah ibn ‘Umar said: “The Prophet used to wind the turban around his
head and tuck it in behind him, letting its extremity hang down between
his shoulders.”

Turbans were worn even before Islam and signified a man’s honour. An
Arab saying goes, “Turbans are the crowns of the Arabs”. This was
explained to mean that although the pristine Arabs were too proud to
accept a king’s rule over them, and therefore had no crowns other than
their turbans.

The early Muslim way of wearing the turban consisted in two pieces of
headdress: the qalansuwa or borderless hat of varying thickness, and the
‘imama, the actual turban cloth wound around the qalansuwa. Abu Dawud
mentioned in his Sunan that the Prophet is related to have said, “The
difference between us and the pagans is that we wear the ‘imama on top
of the qalansuwa.” Thus, wearing either exclusively of the other was
originally a foreign practice.

The material of the turban is ideally white muslin, a very fine cotton.
The colours and length of the turban vary. In the chapters on the
Prophet’s turban in the books of the “Prophetic Characteristics” known
as Shama’il, the authorities have mentioned seven and 10 yard lengths as
the two standards. However, as long as one can at least wind the turban
around once, its length suffices, while great Shaykhs of the past have
been known to wear large and heavy turbans exceeding 10 yard-lengths by
far.

All of the founding Imams of the four schools of Ahl al-Sunnah
wal-Jama’ah wore the turban. In their biographies of the founder of the
Hanafi School, Imam Abu Hanifah _ famous for his awesome analytical mind
_ al-Suyuti and al-Haytami relate that he owned seven turbans, perhaps
one for each day of the week.

The Hanafis, such as Subcontinent and other Asian Muslims from the
Chinese to the Turks, are particularly strict about never praying
bareheaded. A famous manual of law according to the four Sunni Schools
states, “According to the Hanafi school it is abominable to pray
bareheaded out of laziness. But praying bareheaded out of humbleness and
a feeling of submission is permitted.”

The founder of the Maliki School _ which dominates most of Africa today
_ Imam Malik ibn Anas always wore beautiful clothes, especially white,
and he “passed the turban under his chin (a style known as tahannuk),
letting its extremity hang behind his back, and he wore musk and other
scents,” said one of his students.

Malik stressed the wearing of the turban, particularly for the learned.
“The turbans should not be neglected,” he said. “I wore the turban with
nary a hair on my face. When I asked permission from my mother to pursue
the scholarly life she said: ‘First, wear the garb of the scholars’; she
took me and dressed me in short-hemmed (mushammara) garments, placed a
tall headcover on my head and tied a turban around it then she said,
‘Now go and write the Science’.

“I saw over 30 men wearing the turban in my teacher Rabi’a’s circle. He
would not put it down before the Pleiades rose (late at night) and he
used to say: ‘I swear it strengthens wit!”‘

Baring the head in Islam was the sign of a man of low condition and is
listed in many a manual among the “acts which betray lack of
self-respect” (khawarim al-muru’a). A scholar relates that as a young
man, one day, he entered the mosque in Madinah without anything on his
head whereupon his father scolded him to no end. “How dare you enter the
mosque bare-headed?”

It was a different matter, however, if the same was done out of
humility, as revealed by the wording of a question that was put to one
of the eight-century authorities in Syria: “Is it all right if people
gather in the mosque, making zikir and reading al-Qur’an, praying to
Allah and taking their turbans off their heads, weeping, as long as
their intention is not pride nor self-display but seeking to draw closer
to Him?” he replied yes.

The illiterate Shaykh ‘Ali al-Hajjar was described as “the Bare-Headed,
the saintly man” but another Egyptian, the stern Ibn Daqiq al-’Id, said:
“What is carried on top of the head should not be put down” _ at least,
not on the floor.

Imam Muhammad ibn Idris al-Shafi’i, founder of the School which bears
his name and dominates large parts of the middle East and the totality
of Southeast Asia, “was thrifty in his dress and wore thin clothes of
linen and Baghdadi cotton. He sometimes wore a headcover that was not
very tall but he wore the turban very often”, said one of his students.
“I counted three hundred turbans in his circle save those I could not
see.”

Another said: “Al-Shafi’i used to wear a large turban, as if he were a
desert Arab.” Both he and his student, the Imam of the Hanbali School,
Ahmad ibn Hanbal, passed it under his chin the way the North African
Touareg and many Sudanese do to this day.

Such is the high nobility of the turban that we are told even the angels
wore it. Of the Qur’anic verse, “Your Lord shall help you with five
thousand angels bearing marks” (Surat Ali ‘Imran, verse 125), Ibn
‘Abbas, the greatest of the early exegetes, said: “The signs are that
they wore turbans.”

[Source: qa.sunnipath.com ]

Asalamu Alaikum,

Amazing quote I came across on brother Yursil’s blog:

“And when, as a result of this soul searching you begin to read from books of Sufi knowledge, of the Prophet (S), of Abu Bakr (R) and Ali (R), of Rumi, of Attar, you only feel your longing more strongly and feel that you are even thirstier. Through all this reading you have tasted only a trickle, just enough to know how sweet a spring this is. By now you must realize that books are not the best vessel for wisdom of the heart, for the heart itself is the vessel, and the precious draught is passed from heart to heart. Where may such heart springs be found in a time that has turned verdant fields into desert wastes? Wandering through huge desert wastes, how many of us may just happen to stumble upon an oasis? First you may stumble upon one hundred mirages! But you must keep on, don’t turn back saying, “I have found only illusions.” No, no one said you have embarked on an easy journey, so you must be perseverant.”
- Shaykh Maulana Nazim al-Hakkani

SubhanAllah.

nothing I can say will even begin to do justice to the power and beauty of this speech.

May Allah (swt) bless Habib Jifri a thousand times over. AMEEN.

Heres an interesting story related to us by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani:

(So an Egyptian grad. student is sitting at the da’wah table at the University of Toronto, when a fellow student walks up to him..)

Atheist: “I don’t believe in god”

Egyptian grad. student: “I do not believe in the god that you don’t believe in, but I believe in a God that you do not know about”

..SubhanAllah, this is definitely something to ponder over.

“If a wolf asks a dog why he is chained up…
…the dog says: That’s how it is.

I prefer to be free, says the wolf and he walks away.

That’s what it’s like for us.
And even if it is difficult…
…we are very satisfied with our life.
Praise God.

If only for a day, for a year…

You can better die like a cockerel
than a chicken.”

…and imagine the peace and blessings of Allah (swt) pouring into your heart.

Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani, SunniPath Academy Teacher

what is the latest view on coke and its products?

Walaikum assalam wa rahmatullah,

I pray this finds you in the best of health and spirits.

There is nothing intrinsically haram about Coca Cola or its products. However, one should be careful about how much sugar one consumes–because one’s body is a trust from Allah.

And Allah alone gives success.

Faraz Rabbani

:)