What is the Soul of Deeds?
Alhamdulillah, with His Grace and His Mercy, Allah subhana wa ta'ala has given us another opportunity in our life to experience the night of Jumu’ah. Who knows whether or not we will get this next week? Allah subhana wa ta'ala has given us this night, and with His Fadhl and Grace, He has given us an Amal which He likes very much, namely His Dhikr. Because this is a gathering of Dhikr, I would like to present in your service a Hadith of Nabi al Karim sallallahu alayhi wasallam on this topic; and the objective of sharing this Hadith is simply this, that we gain an understanding of the significance of this Amal of Dhikr which Allah and His Rasool sallallahu alayhi wasallam hold to be so important. In addition, this Hadith will enable us to save ourselves from negligence and laziness if we bring this action into our lives.
The Hadith on this subject that I am going to present in your service is a very unique Hadith. The one who is asking is a Companion of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, a true lover and Ghulam of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, and he posed a unique question. I am just sharing with you the meaning of the Hadith here, and the question was about Salah. And though we pray Salah also, alhamdulillah, we are not talking here about our Salah - may Allah ta’ala accept our Salah! At least we pray, alhamdulillah. So the questioner said ‘Oh Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam, we pray Salah, but what is the best Salah according to Allah?’ SubhanAllah, we need to think about this now as well. We also pray Salah, but in the Sight of Allah, which Salah is most liked? Which does He prefer? And the Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam gave a very concise response: ‘Dhikrullah!’
So the question was ‘What is the best Salah?’ and the answer was what? ‘Dhikr of Allah.’ Then another question followed: ‘Oh Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam, what is the best fast?’ And Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam again responded ‘Dhikrullah!’ And then he was asked again: ‘What is the best Jihad?’, to which Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam also replied ‘Dhikr of Allah.’ The commentators have written that the message being given by Allah’s Nabi in this Hadith is very clear. The deeds mentioned here are the greatest deeds, so this also applies to all smaller deeds, and it is established that whatever deeds we do, they become accepted through the Dhikr of Allah. Allah ta’ala accepts those deeds via Dhikr of Allah – this is how to elevate them to the rank of acceptance. So from this Hadith that has been mentioned, it has been made clear that if we establish Dhikr alongside all the A’maal that we perform in our lives and do it in the way that has been prescribed and explained, then all of our A’maal, alhamdulillah, will be accepted in the Sight of Allah, and those deeds of ours will become excellent.
Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith Moulana Zakariyya Sahib rahmatullah alayh has stated that the Dhikr of Allah is the soul of all Ibadah. This is similar to how a human being has a body, which may have powerful hands or be tall or well-built, but once his Ruh is extracted, then his body becomes useless - doesn’t it? Then it gets put into the grave, and nobody looks at how strong or tall that person was, or how rich he was or whatever. As soon as he dies, they lower him into the grave, because he is finished – there is no Ruh or soul left inside. Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith rahmatullah alayh was saying that just as the existence of every human being is linked to his Ruh, so also the A’maal are only in existence due to their Ruh, their soul, which is the Dhikr of Allah. And what a great personality he was, with a very great rank in Hadith and Qur’an, and he shared that knowledge with us so that we do not live a life of negligence.
So our A’maal cannot reach that level, can they? We are weak, for sure, and we cannot develop those depths of emotion in our deeds, but alhamdulillah, a beautiful, clear path has been explained to us in the practice of establishing Dhikr of Allah in parallel to our deeds. Do as much as you can! Hadhrat Qutb-al-Aqtab, Sheikh-ul-Masheikh, the Sheikh of his time, Hadhrat Ali Murtaza qaddasAllahu sirrah has also made a statement about this - and these are the Walis of Allah, those personalities who understand the path of Sulook, the journey of the traveller, and they established this path not through books but through practice. Yes? Through their deeds and actions, they demonstrated and established this path, and they know it best. Their statements and declarations are very valuable indeed, and if we practice upon them, then alhamdulillah, we ourselves will attain the path during this life, because they have attained that path having travelled it.
So I will also present his statement in your service. There are thousands of people who are following this path and who have the Nisbat, the connection, with this great Sheikh, and if they travel on the path with Ikhlas and Yaqeen, there is no question that such a person will not attain a successful conclusion. Thousands of people get to their destination with this path, because when a person sets out on a journey on his own, as a lone traveler, then he gets distressed. He will always worry that a thief or bandit may catch him – that is why you can see that it is hard to travel alone. But if you have a sincere partner to accompany you on the journey, then you will travel with ease. You won’t have to worry about your luggage when you go off to make Wudhu – you can go easily, taking turns to look after each other’s belongings when you need to eat or whatever. So journeys undertaken with a partner are easy, but if you go on your own, then somewhere or other you will fall into a trap or be deceived. This is the same with the path to get to Allah; you can try to get there on your own, but if a Wali of Allah is with, you, then that journey becomes very easy.
Experience this for yourselves, my brothers. The moments and seconds of this journey of life that we are travelling along are passing; this Maghrib that we have just prayed has finished and the next Maghrib will be coming soon. So whoever didn’t pray or was lazy, that Maghrib will not come again in their lives. This time that goes can never come again; you can spend millions of the currency of this world, but you cannot bring that Maghrib back in order to pray it on time or repeat it. No – once the light of the day’s sun has gone, that Maghrib has finished, and it will never come back. Understand what I am saying. We are travelling fast, and our journey will end in a ditch, in a grave. Remember this. The objective of listening and doing is that we put our lives back onto the right path. This world can delude us so quickly - and this is the definition of the world that Rasoolullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam taught us. This world is a place of deception; in every second, everything in the Dunya deceives us, and the deception and delusion that we fall into is ‘I’ll do it tomorrow – I will repent tomorrow.’ This is the biggest deception that the Dunya gives us, because that tomorrow never comes, my brothers. The person who is thinking correctly says ‘No, I will repent today, here and now. I will pray Maghrib on time from today.’ Right there and then, he attains his objective. If he says ‘I will start from tomorrow,’ then he loses today’s Maghrib. Today’s Fajr has passed, the morning gathering of Dhikr has gone; today’s Tilawat has gone. It has finished – the time has gone. You can spend all of the wealth of the world to try to reverse it, but Allah says that a cross has been placed in your Book of Deeds; end of story - the next phase has begun.
So this is a big deception of the Dunya for us, because we can never bring back what has gone. Someone is fifty years old, another person is sixty, one person has two children, someone else is twenty-five and another is thirty years old. Tell me – have we wasted our time or not? Forty or fifty years have gone into the ditch, haven’t they? They have been wasted. Every moment or second that we spend in this Dunya is extremely precious for us, for in any one second, we can earn mansions in the Gardens of Paradise just by saying the Name of Allah once in the heart. Remember this – I am telling you the meaning of the Hadith here. If a person recites the name of Allah once in his heart, then the gap between the heavens and the earth fills with Noor, so imagine if we carry on doing this action of remembering Allah in the heart for seventy years, or if we have done this for forty years! I saw that the tongue of my Hadhrat Sheikh rahmatullah alayh was always moist with Allah’s Dhikr – I am telling you the truth here. He did not waste even one second, because he understood the facts. Look at the life of Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith rahmatullah alayh – read and study an account of his life. He was such a Dhakir that he was annihilated in Dhikr all the time – read his books. These great personalities understood the objective of life and showed us how to make life valuable by performing the great deeds that Allah ta’ala has given us.
So Dhikrullah is the soul of deeds - and is it hard to do Dhikr? No! My Hadhrat Sahib rahmatullah alayh said this, and he had attained this path and had achieved. I got a lot of satisfaction and contentment on hearing this statement made by this great Wali of Allah – and what a unique statement it was, backed up entirely by Hadith. He said ‘There is a cure for everything by means of the Dhikr of Allah. It provides a cure for every issue.’ Think about the greatness of this statement. Alhamdulillah, it would take a lot of time to explain this fully, but for every issue, the Dhikr of Allah provides a solution. These were not people who live lives of make-believe; rather, they had experienced this for themselves, having travelled on this path and arrived during the journey of their lives. Indeed, they not only succeeded themselves, but they also took others on this journey to Allah.
So he said ‘Dhikr of Allah provides a cure for everything - all issues can be solved thereby.’ And he went on to make another beautiful point, saying ‘Do not worry, for even if you do just five minutes of Dhikrullah every day, then I promise that you will get massive benefit from that.’ SubhanAllah – the benefit is massive. You cannot do this without getting benefit – he said this would be impossible. How much Dhikr do you have to do for this? Five minutes of Dhikrullah. You will get so much benefit from this that you cannot calculate the amount. If you are stuck in a problem, do Dhikr of Allah; if you need a cure, do Dhikr of Allah; if you have a very serious sickness, do Dhikr of Allah; if some issue of yours is hard to resolve, do Dhikr of Allah. Every issue in this Dunya has a cure by means of Dhikr of Allah. Allah announces in the Qur’an {وَلَذِكۡرُ ٱللَّهِ أَڪۡبَرُۗ} – it is such a great action that Allah ta’ala has said that it is ‘Akbar.’
Now obviously, in our case, we are not dealing with minor opposition, for we have got Nafs and shaytan working against us, because they don’t want us to travel on the right path. That is why Allah ta’ala, through His Fadhl and Grace and Mercy, has bestowed these gatherings upon us. We sit in such gatherings and listen to a few words in order to understand, so that our batteries can get recharged. We should be grateful to Allah when, by the Tawfeeq from Allah, these words reach us, and we should dispel any negligence within us and in our lives. We should think ‘Why am I so lazy and ignorant when five minutes of Dhikr of Allah can benefit a human being so much?’ Allah says ‘When you sit down to recite My Name with any Niyyah, then I will bestow upon you that very thing for which you have the Niyyah.’ SubhanAllah.
SubhanAllah, the Grace and Fadhl of Allah on this town is such that due to the Dua of a Wali of Allah – not due to me, for I am no use – you pious people get the Majlis of Dhikrullah every morning and evening in the Masjid! We hold this Majlis on a regular basis after Fajr, and we learn the greatest point from Hadith that Rasoolullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam himself would remain seated after Fajr engaged in Dhikr of Allah in the same way. Pick up the books of Hadith and read them - study them. This was the blessed Tariqa of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam - and the noble Companions. Hadhrat Ali radhiAllahu anh would do this – indeed if you look at the lives of any of the Companions, they used to say that the most valuable time to be immersed in the remembrance of Allah was from Fajr until Ishraq. So don’t turn around and look at other things, because it is said that you should be immersed to the extent that you shouldn’t even move from the spot where you prayed Fajr. Sit in that same spot, as mentioned in Hadith, and do Dhikr of Allah.
What a great reward Allah bestows upon those human beings who do this. Allah is so happy with that human being who sits there doing Dhikr immediately after Salah, so happy that He will not let that person leave empty-handed. Rather, Allah accepts Sadaqah from all three hundred and sixty of the joints of his body due to that Dhikr. SubhanAllah – imagine how many sicknesses are removed from those who sit and do Dhikr in the morning in this way. Yes, we should go to hospitals and take the prescribed tablets and medications, but also consume this spiritual cure that Allah ta’ala has given. There are many, many benefits of Dhikrullah, my friends, including cures and countless mercies and Barakaat. Even five minutes of Dhikr will never leave you without benefit – never. It cannot be that Dhikr of Allah will not give benefit to a human being.
So what we need to do is to be regular in this and approach it with love. Make Dua that ‘Oh Allah, You have assembled and gathered us, and we have sat down due to Your Fadhl and Grace to remember You now.’ And alhamdulillah, tomorrow is Jumu’ah, which is the Sayyid-ul-Ayyam, the greatest of days – Allah ta’ala has selected the days, has He not? And Allah ta’ala has instilled such great moments into the night of Jumu’ah also, just as He instils greatness into certain the nights of the year, like the great nights of Ramadhan and the ten days of Dhul Hijjah. In addition to these, Allah has arranged that every week He seals all the virtues into one specific day. Indeed, some Mufassireen have said that the night of Jumu’ah is equivalent in Barakaat to Laylat-ul-Qadr– yes! So we should be so happy to sit together to remember Allah Name on such a blessed night, and we should make a commitment to be regular at least on this one day of the week. Promise ‘Oh Allah, even if I have to travel in order to attend, I will definitely attend this Majlis once a week.’
So listen to this fact with coolness, ease and comfort in your heart: I am not calling you to myself. When somebody gives a Da’wah invitation when doing Tableegh, he is not calling you in a personal capacity. So I am not thinking ‘My team will grow, and my group will grow, and I will have Mureeds.’ Wa’llah, bi’llah – I have no interest in that whatsoever. I swear by Allah, and I can promise you this as I sit in the Masjid, that I have no connection with any such thought process. Whether a thousand or two thousand people come, or whether just two people come, there is no benefit or loss to me either way. I am not interested in counting how many Mureeds I have got – this is not a game. This is just Da’wah li’llah, and I am the most grateful of all that I am here. More than anything, I am grateful, thinking ‘Oh Allah, You have given me the Tawfeeq.’ This is Da’wah that I am giving, so don’t come and sit here thinking that I am collecting people and making a group. I have no connection with that thought process at all – I don’t even know people’s names or who they are or where they come from. Some people I do know, but I forget the names of many as I don’t know them personally.
I have no connection with that. Rather, I am just worried about myself. I am surrounded by my own grief, thinking ‘Ya Allah, allow me to attend the Dhikr in the morning and evening. Oh Allah, send good people so that I can sit with them and do Dhikr of Allah and remember You.’ Why? Because this is a Sunnah of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, who was passing by one day and saw a Jamah of people doing Dhikr of Allah. So Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam went over to them, and he said a weird and wonderful thing to them, which was ‘Allah ta’ala sent me to you! Allah ta’ala revealed {وَٱصۡبِرۡ نَفۡسَكَ}, telling me that I should also go and sit with you myself.’ So from this we realise what the Mufassireen have said, which is that the Dhikr of Allah contains the great virtue and benefit that you will receive Thawab as if the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam himself was attending the gathering with you! That is how much Thawab comes to such a gathering. Is that nothing? We get the reward of being in the presence of the Imam-ul-Ambiya sallallahu alayhi wasallam. This is how much benefit there is in the gatherings of Dhikr of Allah, such as the one in which we are sitting.
We pray to Allah ta’ala that He gives us all the Tawfeeq to do this. We should be so grateful for this - and there is a way to be grateful for this. When you hear the virtues of any Amal, such as when you hear the virtues of praying Salah, you should be grateful for the Salah that you have prayed and make the intention ‘Oh Allah, inshaAllah I will pray every Salah properly from now on.’ When you hear about a good deed and Allah ta’ala sends you somewhere to do a good deed, such as if you get the ability to spend time in Ta’leem or Tableegh or some other work of the Deen, then be grateful to Allah and show your gratitude with this intention: ‘Oh Allah, You have bestowed this work upon me, and with Your Tawfeeq, inshaAllah I will try to come back and repeat this action again.’ Allah then becomes happy with that servant, for it shows that he has liked this work of Allah’s Deen and has performed it in a nice way. So we too should make this intention, and say ‘Oh Allah, we are grateful to You, and we make intention tonight that we will also come to Dhikr in the morning.’ It only means leaving a little sleep, and since Fajr is Fardh anyway, we have to be here to pray it. Whoever does not pray it has lost out and has broken the link, but for those who come to implement the Fardh, then SubhanAllah, Allah ta’ala will give an extra hour of Ni’mah if we sit and do His Dhikr. What a great gift of Allah this is, for it enables us to make our lives precious.
So understand that there is no question of us coming here to do Da’wah for the sake of expanding the group and increasing the number of Mureeds – no one has this intention. What a waste of time to even think such a thing. My brethren, I request that you think about the Hadith that we have just heard, because elevation for everything is attained by what means? By doing Dhikr of Allah! So come and join after we have prayed Fajr Salah, and also in the evenings when we hold the Majlis after Isha every day for fifteen or twenty minutes. In the morning alhamdulillah, we also do Dhikr after Fajr, and if you take hold of these two times, your life will be made, alhamdulillah.
Read the Fadhail about this that have been mentioned by Rasoolullah in the books of Hadith. He said that there is a cure for everything, whether sicknesses, distress, problems, difficulties, unemployment, Jinn – for all these problems, the cure is to take hold of Dhikr of Allah! That’s it. Allah ta’ala says ‘Leave the rest to Me. {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓ أَذۡكُرۡكُمۡ} If you remember Me, then you will see what I do with you.’ This is the Tafseer of this verse. Allah says ‘Just remember Me! {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓۡ} – then see how I will treat you and what Ni’mahs and rewards I will bestow upon you. What do you know? I will remove difficulties that were about to overcome you, whether small or big. It was in your destiny that you were going to die without Iman, but you took hold of Dhikr so I exchanged that outcome and in its place, I will send you a small sickness.’
So if you gets some small illness in your life, you should be grateful and think that Allah ta’ala has removed a very big illness from you and has replaced it with this small one. Those who think like this say ‘I am not worried about this illness, because the main thing is that I have got Iman. My Iman is increasing and my A’maal are increasing, and I am getting the Tawfeeq to do good deeds, so I have no worry about this illness. I have understood that Allah ta’ala has taken a big disease away from me and has averted a big storm that would have removed my Iman from me and perhaps would have caused me to pass away without Iman, but Dhikr of Allah has saved me. In place of that, Allah ta’ala has given me this small sickness to remind me of the precious treasure that changed the big sickness to this small sickness. So I will always remember Allah, for this is the least that a servant should do in order to be grateful for this reward that Allah ta’ala has given to me. By doing Dhikr of Allah I have been saved, for otherwise I would have passed away without Iman.’ Say SubhanAllah!
So reflect on these points and facts. There was an announcement yesterday that Iqbal Sahib had gone into hospital because he was very sick, but today he is sat here with us! Say SubhanAllah – these are Allah ta’ala’s rewards and gifts. Why am I saying this? Because he is a Dhakir. Someone said ‘Make Dua because he is in hospital and it looks like he is going to pass away.’ So I said ‘Who told you that?’ Everyone is going to go and come, but Allah ta’ala has made Dhikr a cure, and now he is back and is sitting here in front of us. So you should become a person like this who does Mujahidah - what a great testament to him. He was supposed to have some big heart issue, and the doctors would have said ‘Rest – you mustn’t go anywhere.’ Even his family members would have said this, but no, he has come because in the action of Dhikr of Allah, there is a cure for everything! Say SubhanAllah. So become a man like this – become a true man.
Who is a true man? Who does Allah say is a man? When people call someone a man, it is a big title, but who does Allah ta’ala define as a true man? Those who do not leave the Dhikr of Allah! Imagine the Hal of those people, the Dhakireen, on the Day of Judgement. You know how people of the world say ‘Oh, he’s a man.’ On the Day of Judgement, Allah will say ‘Come – I will show you the true man. He is the true man. He always remembered Me - in any form or circumstance, he remembered Me. He is the true man.’ This is what you call a powerful man, a person who fights Nafs and shaytan and leaves all the attractions, and instead comes and sits down to do the Dhikr of Allah. May Allah ta’ala give us all the Tawfeeq that we too can get a soul as powerful as this and acquire this spiritual energy so that we keep doing Dhikr of Allah in the face of the small Wasawasahs that come, saying ‘Don’t do this; don’t do that.’ We should say ‘Run away, you silly thoughts! Allah’s Name is the greatest Name, and at least I am reciting Allah’s Name. I have no concern about anything else. The biggest danger I have is when I stop remembering Allah’s Name.’
The worst and most dangerous day for a human being is when he is trapped by shaytan’s games and thoughts and Waswasah, and so he leaves Dhikr of Allah, saying ‘Oh no, we don’t need to do Dhikr. What’s the point of doing Dhikr? I have other actions to do.’ If, through such Wasawis and shaytan’s tricks and games, a person leaves the Dhikr of Allah, then Allahu Akbar, he earns extreme destruction in his life. Such a person has accrued massive loss in his life. Don’t think about anything else in life – until you get the Tawfeeq to recite Allah’s Name, you will remain sick, upset, distressed and will be in a very bad state in life. But if Allah ta’ala has given a person the Tawfeeq to recite His Name, then he should not worry; he is the greatest human being in the sight of Allah – the greatest. All the other factors in life are just a test for him, so don’t say ‘Oh, he does Dhikr of Allah but he still has problems in life; he does Dhikr but he has still got issues; he does Dhikr but all his worldly issues are not being solved and he is sick and lying in bed.’ The Dhakir will reply ‘It doesn’t matter what else is happening in my life; as long as I am doing Dhikr, I am Allah’s Mehboob. Allah loves me, and I love Allah, because I am doing Dhikr of Allah. {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓ أَذۡكُرۡكُمۡ} I am reciting Allah’s Name, and Allah calls out to me as well out of His Mercy.’
So do we believe in the Qur’an or do we listen to shaytan? Yes? If someone asks why you are sick, say ‘I am sick because this is the Hikmah of Allah, and I cannot see it any other way.’ If you have problems, it is because this is the Hikmah of Allah. Why has Allah stopped your worldly issues? It doesn’t matter why – it’s Allah’s choice. I just need one measurement to assess my life: am I reciting Allah’s Name or not? That’s it. A person may be a millionaire with so many worldly possessions and assets and in good health as well – like Firawn. Did Firawn get sick during his life? He did not have sickness or such problems and difficulties to deal with – Allah didn’t give him any of that, did He? Why? Allah says ‘I didn’t want to give him difficulties in case he turned to Me.’ That’s why that most disobedient of people, Firawn, did not have any difficulties or problems.
When we are looking at someone who is rich with shops and businesses and other assets, we need to remember this fact and look to whether he has the Tawfeeq to recite Allah’s Name. If he doesn’t come to the Majlis on a Thursday night, and never sits in the Majalis of Dhikr, and has no connection with a Wali of Allah and has no Dhikr in his life, then despite all his worldly and material advantages, what does the Kitab of Allah say about such a person? That he is the biggest loser – he is dead! He is spiritually deceased as the Hadith makes clear: those who Dhikr are alive and those who do not are spiritually dead. Don’t think that they are alive. Their physical bodies walk around, just as the animals do, eating and drinking, but Allah is saying ‘The basis of My assessment of people’s lives is whether they do My Dhikr or not.’ That’s it - end of story.
May Allah a’ala give us all the Tawfeeq. Ameen
Recite Durood Sharif
Alhamdulillah, with His Grace and His Mercy, Allah subhana wa ta'ala has given us another opportunity in our life to experience the night of Jumu’ah. Who knows whether or not we will get this next week? Allah subhana wa ta'ala has given us this night, and with His Fadhl and Grace, He has given us an Amal which He likes very much, namely His Dhikr. Because this is a gathering of Dhikr, I would like to present in your service a Hadith of Nabi al Karim sallallahu alayhi wasallam on this topic; and the objective of sharing this Hadith is simply this, that we gain an understanding of the significance of this Amal of Dhikr which Allah and His Rasool sallallahu alayhi wasallam hold to be so important. In addition, this Hadith will enable us to save ourselves from negligence and laziness if we bring this action into our lives.
The Hadith on this subject that I am going to present in your service is a very unique Hadith. The one who is asking is a Companion of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, a true lover and Ghulam of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, and he posed a unique question. I am just sharing with you the meaning of the Hadith here, and the question was about Salah. And though we pray Salah also, alhamdulillah, we are not talking here about our Salah - may Allah ta’ala accept our Salah! At least we pray, alhamdulillah. So the questioner said ‘Oh Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam, we pray Salah, but what is the best Salah according to Allah?’ SubhanAllah, we need to think about this now as well. We also pray Salah, but in the Sight of Allah, which Salah is most liked? Which does He prefer? And the Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam gave a very concise response: ‘Dhikrullah!’
So the question was ‘What is the best Salah?’ and the answer was what? ‘Dhikr of Allah.’ Then another question followed: ‘Oh Prophet of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam, what is the best fast?’ And Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam again responded ‘Dhikrullah!’ And then he was asked again: ‘What is the best Jihad?’, to which Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam also replied ‘Dhikr of Allah.’ The commentators have written that the message being given by Allah’s Nabi in this Hadith is very clear. The deeds mentioned here are the greatest deeds, so this also applies to all smaller deeds, and it is established that whatever deeds we do, they become accepted through the Dhikr of Allah. Allah ta’ala accepts those deeds via Dhikr of Allah – this is how to elevate them to the rank of acceptance. So from this Hadith that has been mentioned, it has been made clear that if we establish Dhikr alongside all the A’maal that we perform in our lives and do it in the way that has been prescribed and explained, then all of our A’maal, alhamdulillah, will be accepted in the Sight of Allah, and those deeds of ours will become excellent.
Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith Moulana Zakariyya Sahib rahmatullah alayh has stated that the Dhikr of Allah is the soul of all Ibadah. This is similar to how a human being has a body, which may have powerful hands or be tall or well-built, but once his Ruh is extracted, then his body becomes useless - doesn’t it? Then it gets put into the grave, and nobody looks at how strong or tall that person was, or how rich he was or whatever. As soon as he dies, they lower him into the grave, because he is finished – there is no Ruh or soul left inside. Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith rahmatullah alayh was saying that just as the existence of every human being is linked to his Ruh, so also the A’maal are only in existence due to their Ruh, their soul, which is the Dhikr of Allah. And what a great personality he was, with a very great rank in Hadith and Qur’an, and he shared that knowledge with us so that we do not live a life of negligence.
So our A’maal cannot reach that level, can they? We are weak, for sure, and we cannot develop those depths of emotion in our deeds, but alhamdulillah, a beautiful, clear path has been explained to us in the practice of establishing Dhikr of Allah in parallel to our deeds. Do as much as you can! Hadhrat Qutb-al-Aqtab, Sheikh-ul-Masheikh, the Sheikh of his time, Hadhrat Ali Murtaza qaddasAllahu sirrah has also made a statement about this - and these are the Walis of Allah, those personalities who understand the path of Sulook, the journey of the traveller, and they established this path not through books but through practice. Yes? Through their deeds and actions, they demonstrated and established this path, and they know it best. Their statements and declarations are very valuable indeed, and if we practice upon them, then alhamdulillah, we ourselves will attain the path during this life, because they have attained that path having travelled it.
So I will also present his statement in your service. There are thousands of people who are following this path and who have the Nisbat, the connection, with this great Sheikh, and if they travel on the path with Ikhlas and Yaqeen, there is no question that such a person will not attain a successful conclusion. Thousands of people get to their destination with this path, because when a person sets out on a journey on his own, as a lone traveler, then he gets distressed. He will always worry that a thief or bandit may catch him – that is why you can see that it is hard to travel alone. But if you have a sincere partner to accompany you on the journey, then you will travel with ease. You won’t have to worry about your luggage when you go off to make Wudhu – you can go easily, taking turns to look after each other’s belongings when you need to eat or whatever. So journeys undertaken with a partner are easy, but if you go on your own, then somewhere or other you will fall into a trap or be deceived. This is the same with the path to get to Allah; you can try to get there on your own, but if a Wali of Allah is with, you, then that journey becomes very easy.
Experience this for yourselves, my brothers. The moments and seconds of this journey of life that we are travelling along are passing; this Maghrib that we have just prayed has finished and the next Maghrib will be coming soon. So whoever didn’t pray or was lazy, that Maghrib will not come again in their lives. This time that goes can never come again; you can spend millions of the currency of this world, but you cannot bring that Maghrib back in order to pray it on time or repeat it. No – once the light of the day’s sun has gone, that Maghrib has finished, and it will never come back. Understand what I am saying. We are travelling fast, and our journey will end in a ditch, in a grave. Remember this. The objective of listening and doing is that we put our lives back onto the right path. This world can delude us so quickly - and this is the definition of the world that Rasoolullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam taught us. This world is a place of deception; in every second, everything in the Dunya deceives us, and the deception and delusion that we fall into is ‘I’ll do it tomorrow – I will repent tomorrow.’ This is the biggest deception that the Dunya gives us, because that tomorrow never comes, my brothers. The person who is thinking correctly says ‘No, I will repent today, here and now. I will pray Maghrib on time from today.’ Right there and then, he attains his objective. If he says ‘I will start from tomorrow,’ then he loses today’s Maghrib. Today’s Fajr has passed, the morning gathering of Dhikr has gone; today’s Tilawat has gone. It has finished – the time has gone. You can spend all of the wealth of the world to try to reverse it, but Allah says that a cross has been placed in your Book of Deeds; end of story - the next phase has begun.
So this is a big deception of the Dunya for us, because we can never bring back what has gone. Someone is fifty years old, another person is sixty, one person has two children, someone else is twenty-five and another is thirty years old. Tell me – have we wasted our time or not? Forty or fifty years have gone into the ditch, haven’t they? They have been wasted. Every moment or second that we spend in this Dunya is extremely precious for us, for in any one second, we can earn mansions in the Gardens of Paradise just by saying the Name of Allah once in the heart. Remember this – I am telling you the meaning of the Hadith here. If a person recites the name of Allah once in his heart, then the gap between the heavens and the earth fills with Noor, so imagine if we carry on doing this action of remembering Allah in the heart for seventy years, or if we have done this for forty years! I saw that the tongue of my Hadhrat Sheikh rahmatullah alayh was always moist with Allah’s Dhikr – I am telling you the truth here. He did not waste even one second, because he understood the facts. Look at the life of Hadhrat Sheikh-ul-Hadith rahmatullah alayh – read and study an account of his life. He was such a Dhakir that he was annihilated in Dhikr all the time – read his books. These great personalities understood the objective of life and showed us how to make life valuable by performing the great deeds that Allah ta’ala has given us.
So Dhikrullah is the soul of deeds - and is it hard to do Dhikr? No! My Hadhrat Sahib rahmatullah alayh said this, and he had attained this path and had achieved. I got a lot of satisfaction and contentment on hearing this statement made by this great Wali of Allah – and what a unique statement it was, backed up entirely by Hadith. He said ‘There is a cure for everything by means of the Dhikr of Allah. It provides a cure for every issue.’ Think about the greatness of this statement. Alhamdulillah, it would take a lot of time to explain this fully, but for every issue, the Dhikr of Allah provides a solution. These were not people who live lives of make-believe; rather, they had experienced this for themselves, having travelled on this path and arrived during the journey of their lives. Indeed, they not only succeeded themselves, but they also took others on this journey to Allah.
So he said ‘Dhikr of Allah provides a cure for everything - all issues can be solved thereby.’ And he went on to make another beautiful point, saying ‘Do not worry, for even if you do just five minutes of Dhikrullah every day, then I promise that you will get massive benefit from that.’ SubhanAllah – the benefit is massive. You cannot do this without getting benefit – he said this would be impossible. How much Dhikr do you have to do for this? Five minutes of Dhikrullah. You will get so much benefit from this that you cannot calculate the amount. If you are stuck in a problem, do Dhikr of Allah; if you need a cure, do Dhikr of Allah; if you have a very serious sickness, do Dhikr of Allah; if some issue of yours is hard to resolve, do Dhikr of Allah. Every issue in this Dunya has a cure by means of Dhikr of Allah. Allah announces in the Qur’an {وَلَذِكۡرُ ٱللَّهِ أَڪۡبَرُۗ} – it is such a great action that Allah ta’ala has said that it is ‘Akbar.’
Now obviously, in our case, we are not dealing with minor opposition, for we have got Nafs and shaytan working against us, because they don’t want us to travel on the right path. That is why Allah ta’ala, through His Fadhl and Grace and Mercy, has bestowed these gatherings upon us. We sit in such gatherings and listen to a few words in order to understand, so that our batteries can get recharged. We should be grateful to Allah when, by the Tawfeeq from Allah, these words reach us, and we should dispel any negligence within us and in our lives. We should think ‘Why am I so lazy and ignorant when five minutes of Dhikr of Allah can benefit a human being so much?’ Allah says ‘When you sit down to recite My Name with any Niyyah, then I will bestow upon you that very thing for which you have the Niyyah.’ SubhanAllah.
SubhanAllah, the Grace and Fadhl of Allah on this town is such that due to the Dua of a Wali of Allah – not due to me, for I am no use – you pious people get the Majlis of Dhikrullah every morning and evening in the Masjid! We hold this Majlis on a regular basis after Fajr, and we learn the greatest point from Hadith that Rasoolullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam himself would remain seated after Fajr engaged in Dhikr of Allah in the same way. Pick up the books of Hadith and read them - study them. This was the blessed Tariqa of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam - and the noble Companions. Hadhrat Ali radhiAllahu anh would do this – indeed if you look at the lives of any of the Companions, they used to say that the most valuable time to be immersed in the remembrance of Allah was from Fajr until Ishraq. So don’t turn around and look at other things, because it is said that you should be immersed to the extent that you shouldn’t even move from the spot where you prayed Fajr. Sit in that same spot, as mentioned in Hadith, and do Dhikr of Allah.
What a great reward Allah bestows upon those human beings who do this. Allah is so happy with that human being who sits there doing Dhikr immediately after Salah, so happy that He will not let that person leave empty-handed. Rather, Allah accepts Sadaqah from all three hundred and sixty of the joints of his body due to that Dhikr. SubhanAllah – imagine how many sicknesses are removed from those who sit and do Dhikr in the morning in this way. Yes, we should go to hospitals and take the prescribed tablets and medications, but also consume this spiritual cure that Allah ta’ala has given. There are many, many benefits of Dhikrullah, my friends, including cures and countless mercies and Barakaat. Even five minutes of Dhikr will never leave you without benefit – never. It cannot be that Dhikr of Allah will not give benefit to a human being.
So what we need to do is to be regular in this and approach it with love. Make Dua that ‘Oh Allah, You have assembled and gathered us, and we have sat down due to Your Fadhl and Grace to remember You now.’ And alhamdulillah, tomorrow is Jumu’ah, which is the Sayyid-ul-Ayyam, the greatest of days – Allah ta’ala has selected the days, has He not? And Allah ta’ala has instilled such great moments into the night of Jumu’ah also, just as He instils greatness into certain the nights of the year, like the great nights of Ramadhan and the ten days of Dhul Hijjah. In addition to these, Allah has arranged that every week He seals all the virtues into one specific day. Indeed, some Mufassireen have said that the night of Jumu’ah is equivalent in Barakaat to Laylat-ul-Qadr– yes! So we should be so happy to sit together to remember Allah Name on such a blessed night, and we should make a commitment to be regular at least on this one day of the week. Promise ‘Oh Allah, even if I have to travel in order to attend, I will definitely attend this Majlis once a week.’
So listen to this fact with coolness, ease and comfort in your heart: I am not calling you to myself. When somebody gives a Da’wah invitation when doing Tableegh, he is not calling you in a personal capacity. So I am not thinking ‘My team will grow, and my group will grow, and I will have Mureeds.’ Wa’llah, bi’llah – I have no interest in that whatsoever. I swear by Allah, and I can promise you this as I sit in the Masjid, that I have no connection with any such thought process. Whether a thousand or two thousand people come, or whether just two people come, there is no benefit or loss to me either way. I am not interested in counting how many Mureeds I have got – this is not a game. This is just Da’wah li’llah, and I am the most grateful of all that I am here. More than anything, I am grateful, thinking ‘Oh Allah, You have given me the Tawfeeq.’ This is Da’wah that I am giving, so don’t come and sit here thinking that I am collecting people and making a group. I have no connection with that thought process at all – I don’t even know people’s names or who they are or where they come from. Some people I do know, but I forget the names of many as I don’t know them personally.
I have no connection with that. Rather, I am just worried about myself. I am surrounded by my own grief, thinking ‘Ya Allah, allow me to attend the Dhikr in the morning and evening. Oh Allah, send good people so that I can sit with them and do Dhikr of Allah and remember You.’ Why? Because this is a Sunnah of the gracious Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, who was passing by one day and saw a Jamah of people doing Dhikr of Allah. So Allah’s Nabi sallallahu alayhi wasallam went over to them, and he said a weird and wonderful thing to them, which was ‘Allah ta’ala sent me to you! Allah ta’ala revealed {وَٱصۡبِرۡ نَفۡسَكَ}, telling me that I should also go and sit with you myself.’ So from this we realise what the Mufassireen have said, which is that the Dhikr of Allah contains the great virtue and benefit that you will receive Thawab as if the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam himself was attending the gathering with you! That is how much Thawab comes to such a gathering. Is that nothing? We get the reward of being in the presence of the Imam-ul-Ambiya sallallahu alayhi wasallam. This is how much benefit there is in the gatherings of Dhikr of Allah, such as the one in which we are sitting.
We pray to Allah ta’ala that He gives us all the Tawfeeq to do this. We should be so grateful for this - and there is a way to be grateful for this. When you hear the virtues of any Amal, such as when you hear the virtues of praying Salah, you should be grateful for the Salah that you have prayed and make the intention ‘Oh Allah, inshaAllah I will pray every Salah properly from now on.’ When you hear about a good deed and Allah ta’ala sends you somewhere to do a good deed, such as if you get the ability to spend time in Ta’leem or Tableegh or some other work of the Deen, then be grateful to Allah and show your gratitude with this intention: ‘Oh Allah, You have bestowed this work upon me, and with Your Tawfeeq, inshaAllah I will try to come back and repeat this action again.’ Allah then becomes happy with that servant, for it shows that he has liked this work of Allah’s Deen and has performed it in a nice way. So we too should make this intention, and say ‘Oh Allah, we are grateful to You, and we make intention tonight that we will also come to Dhikr in the morning.’ It only means leaving a little sleep, and since Fajr is Fardh anyway, we have to be here to pray it. Whoever does not pray it has lost out and has broken the link, but for those who come to implement the Fardh, then SubhanAllah, Allah ta’ala will give an extra hour of Ni’mah if we sit and do His Dhikr. What a great gift of Allah this is, for it enables us to make our lives precious.
So understand that there is no question of us coming here to do Da’wah for the sake of expanding the group and increasing the number of Mureeds – no one has this intention. What a waste of time to even think such a thing. My brethren, I request that you think about the Hadith that we have just heard, because elevation for everything is attained by what means? By doing Dhikr of Allah! So come and join after we have prayed Fajr Salah, and also in the evenings when we hold the Majlis after Isha every day for fifteen or twenty minutes. In the morning alhamdulillah, we also do Dhikr after Fajr, and if you take hold of these two times, your life will be made, alhamdulillah.
Read the Fadhail about this that have been mentioned by Rasoolullah in the books of Hadith. He said that there is a cure for everything, whether sicknesses, distress, problems, difficulties, unemployment, Jinn – for all these problems, the cure is to take hold of Dhikr of Allah! That’s it. Allah ta’ala says ‘Leave the rest to Me. {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓ أَذۡكُرۡكُمۡ} If you remember Me, then you will see what I do with you.’ This is the Tafseer of this verse. Allah says ‘Just remember Me! {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓۡ} – then see how I will treat you and what Ni’mahs and rewards I will bestow upon you. What do you know? I will remove difficulties that were about to overcome you, whether small or big. It was in your destiny that you were going to die without Iman, but you took hold of Dhikr so I exchanged that outcome and in its place, I will send you a small sickness.’
So if you gets some small illness in your life, you should be grateful and think that Allah ta’ala has removed a very big illness from you and has replaced it with this small one. Those who think like this say ‘I am not worried about this illness, because the main thing is that I have got Iman. My Iman is increasing and my A’maal are increasing, and I am getting the Tawfeeq to do good deeds, so I have no worry about this illness. I have understood that Allah ta’ala has taken a big disease away from me and has averted a big storm that would have removed my Iman from me and perhaps would have caused me to pass away without Iman, but Dhikr of Allah has saved me. In place of that, Allah ta’ala has given me this small sickness to remind me of the precious treasure that changed the big sickness to this small sickness. So I will always remember Allah, for this is the least that a servant should do in order to be grateful for this reward that Allah ta’ala has given to me. By doing Dhikr of Allah I have been saved, for otherwise I would have passed away without Iman.’ Say SubhanAllah!
So reflect on these points and facts. There was an announcement yesterday that Iqbal Sahib had gone into hospital because he was very sick, but today he is sat here with us! Say SubhanAllah – these are Allah ta’ala’s rewards and gifts. Why am I saying this? Because he is a Dhakir. Someone said ‘Make Dua because he is in hospital and it looks like he is going to pass away.’ So I said ‘Who told you that?’ Everyone is going to go and come, but Allah ta’ala has made Dhikr a cure, and now he is back and is sitting here in front of us. So you should become a person like this who does Mujahidah - what a great testament to him. He was supposed to have some big heart issue, and the doctors would have said ‘Rest – you mustn’t go anywhere.’ Even his family members would have said this, but no, he has come because in the action of Dhikr of Allah, there is a cure for everything! Say SubhanAllah. So become a man like this – become a true man.
Who is a true man? Who does Allah say is a man? When people call someone a man, it is a big title, but who does Allah ta’ala define as a true man? Those who do not leave the Dhikr of Allah! Imagine the Hal of those people, the Dhakireen, on the Day of Judgement. You know how people of the world say ‘Oh, he’s a man.’ On the Day of Judgement, Allah will say ‘Come – I will show you the true man. He is the true man. He always remembered Me - in any form or circumstance, he remembered Me. He is the true man.’ This is what you call a powerful man, a person who fights Nafs and shaytan and leaves all the attractions, and instead comes and sits down to do the Dhikr of Allah. May Allah ta’ala give us all the Tawfeeq that we too can get a soul as powerful as this and acquire this spiritual energy so that we keep doing Dhikr of Allah in the face of the small Wasawasahs that come, saying ‘Don’t do this; don’t do that.’ We should say ‘Run away, you silly thoughts! Allah’s Name is the greatest Name, and at least I am reciting Allah’s Name. I have no concern about anything else. The biggest danger I have is when I stop remembering Allah’s Name.’
The worst and most dangerous day for a human being is when he is trapped by shaytan’s games and thoughts and Waswasah, and so he leaves Dhikr of Allah, saying ‘Oh no, we don’t need to do Dhikr. What’s the point of doing Dhikr? I have other actions to do.’ If, through such Wasawis and shaytan’s tricks and games, a person leaves the Dhikr of Allah, then Allahu Akbar, he earns extreme destruction in his life. Such a person has accrued massive loss in his life. Don’t think about anything else in life – until you get the Tawfeeq to recite Allah’s Name, you will remain sick, upset, distressed and will be in a very bad state in life. But if Allah ta’ala has given a person the Tawfeeq to recite His Name, then he should not worry; he is the greatest human being in the sight of Allah – the greatest. All the other factors in life are just a test for him, so don’t say ‘Oh, he does Dhikr of Allah but he still has problems in life; he does Dhikr but he has still got issues; he does Dhikr but all his worldly issues are not being solved and he is sick and lying in bed.’ The Dhakir will reply ‘It doesn’t matter what else is happening in my life; as long as I am doing Dhikr, I am Allah’s Mehboob. Allah loves me, and I love Allah, because I am doing Dhikr of Allah. {فَٱذۡكُرُونِىٓ أَذۡكُرۡكُمۡ} I am reciting Allah’s Name, and Allah calls out to me as well out of His Mercy.’
So do we believe in the Qur’an or do we listen to shaytan? Yes? If someone asks why you are sick, say ‘I am sick because this is the Hikmah of Allah, and I cannot see it any other way.’ If you have problems, it is because this is the Hikmah of Allah. Why has Allah stopped your worldly issues? It doesn’t matter why – it’s Allah’s choice. I just need one measurement to assess my life: am I reciting Allah’s Name or not? That’s it. A person may be a millionaire with so many worldly possessions and assets and in good health as well – like Firawn. Did Firawn get sick during his life? He did not have sickness or such problems and difficulties to deal with – Allah didn’t give him any of that, did He? Why? Allah says ‘I didn’t want to give him difficulties in case he turned to Me.’ That’s why that most disobedient of people, Firawn, did not have any difficulties or problems.
When we are looking at someone who is rich with shops and businesses and other assets, we need to remember this fact and look to whether he has the Tawfeeq to recite Allah’s Name. If he doesn’t come to the Majlis on a Thursday night, and never sits in the Majalis of Dhikr, and has no connection with a Wali of Allah and has no Dhikr in his life, then despite all his worldly and material advantages, what does the Kitab of Allah say about such a person? That he is the biggest loser – he is dead! He is spiritually deceased as the Hadith makes clear: those who Dhikr are alive and those who do not are spiritually dead. Don’t think that they are alive. Their physical bodies walk around, just as the animals do, eating and drinking, but Allah is saying ‘The basis of My assessment of people’s lives is whether they do My Dhikr or not.’ That’s it - end of story.
May Allah a’ala give us all the Tawfeeq. Ameen
Recite Durood Sharif