Some sayings of Hadhrat Bukhari Shah Naqshbandi Mujaddidi Qadri (May Allah shower His Mercy on him)

[The first part of this article ran here.  This is the second and last part of this series]

 

My heart desires to say a lot to lessen its sorrow, but this occasion doesn’t permit it.  Thus, I swallow my sorrow and write some sayings which I have heard from my master.  Among those sayings which I have heard in his assemblies are:

 

1.  If efforts are made about some affair and the result is against what was desired, then one shouldn’t give way to sorrow at all, but should sincerely repent before Allah on one’s effort.  I said:  O master!  What occasion is this for repentance?  He said:  Human beings should make efforts in permissible things, but when one sees that the whole affair has gone awry and all our efforts have been wasted, then one should believe that this is the will of Allah and that all this time we have been working against the will of the Lord Almighty and now when we understand it, we repent on it.

 

2.  Ecstasy, screaming, restlessness, etc. are totally against the precepts of the Naqshbandi Mujaddidi order.  If the state of some Mujaddidi is like this, then it ought to be dissipated.  The state of the person on whom the teachings of this order have cast their color is somewhat similar to the state of the Companions.  That person has the same calmness, the same dignity and humility and the same permanence of the sense of being present before Allah and the high degree of Ihsaan (which means to worship Allah as if one is seeing the Lord Almighty.  If this is not possible, then to at least believe that Almighty Allah is seeing us and this is acquired only after achieving a high degree of sincerity) which the Companions enjoyed.

 

That person also develops the habit of enjoining the good and forbidding the evil like the Companions.

 

3.  Follow the Sunnah and save yourself from the people of this world.  Understand it clearly that the person who goes to the lovers of this world will be debased and to the one who stays away from them, all of them will come running like dogs.

 

4.  Poverty and hunger are among the essentialities of this path.

 

5.  The person who reaches the pinnacle will be that person who has a perfect spiritual guide (Shaykh Kamil) and a room near the spiritual mentor and that person remains in that room, immersed in remembrance of Allah and spiritual practices and doesn’t ever step out of the room without a valid reason.

 

6.  That Imam Rabbani (May Allah sanctify His secret) was a denier of Unity of Being (Wahdat Ul Wujood) is just false and a rumor.  What the Imam had said was that this is among the subtleties of the heart.  Although people of this are also among the saints, but perfection lies even above this and it is that the state of the slave being the slave and the Lord being the Lord starts being revealed.  This was the Nisbah of the Companions, the successors and their successors.

 

7.  The summary of the blessed life of the Holy Prophet (Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam) is to surrender all the affairs to Almighty Allah.  One should just sit back and watch how the Omnipotent Emperor scatters and entangles the affairs and then again untangles them and sets them in order.  One should watch the happenings and events but shouldn’t say even twitch.  One should keep one’s heart strong by remembering the unseen treasures of the Lord Almighty and should strengthen one’s heart and should despair of one’s being and of the whole world.

 

8.  The sign of love is that one wholeheartedly sacrifices all of one’s desires for the sake of the Beloved.  The person who disobeys the Beloved and runs away from His summons and still claims love is a liar and is arrogant.  In spite of this false love, those who think that they are accepted by the Beloved are truly misguided and have been cast away from the Beloved.

 

9.  People say that we have to waste 5, 6 years in traversing this path (Naqshbandi Tariqa) and even then we don’t know what will happen as the ultimate outcome is unknown.  Who can say whether we will acquire something in this period or not?  For people who talk like that and think like that, it seems that this treasure has not been decreed for them at all.  They are just being miserly by spending 5, 6 years in remembrance of Almighty Allah.  Let them answer in what pursuit have they spent their whole lives and what have they gained by it?  The seeker (Salik) should never be sorrowful on seeking and should never let one’s heart become constrained.  They should bear difficulties, suffer sorrows, but should never leave this door.  They should think that if a beggar is sitting at the door of a benevolent person, that person shies from sending away that beggar empty-handed.  Then how can that Benevolent Lord, for whom giving whatever anybody asks is easier than giving away a piece of bread, send away someone from His door empty-handed?  No.  Never.  But striving and patience are imperative for the seeker.

 

10.  One will gain the Nisbah through regularity in remembrance of Allah and through the company of the Shaykh, but this is gained gradually in such a manner that the seeker himself/herself doesn’t realize it.  He/she thinks that he hasn’t gained anything.  The seeker is exactly like the man who sends his child to a calligrapher.  The calligrapher collects all the written pieces of the child from day one.  After some days, the father asks the calligrapher that my child has been writing for so many days, but he hasn’t gained anything.  The calligrapher puts before the father all the previous writing samples of the child.  The father sees these and realizes that every day, the child’s writing did improve somewhat.  The first writing is completely different from what the child writes today.  But this difference was neither understood by the father nor by the child himself.  In the same way, the state of the seeker is improved day by day, but he/she doesn’t realize it.  Now the question as to why the Nisbah is gained gradually can be understood with the illustration that if a beggar is given a large amount of money in a single day, he will surely waste it without realizing its worth.  On the contrary, if the beggar gets a large amount of money gradually, he will value it and will draw benefit from it.  In the same way, if the Nisbah is gotten all at once, the seeker will not realize its worth and will destroy it.

 

11.  The cure of the heart is through 5 things:  Reading the Holy Quran with understanding, keeping the stomach empty, worship of the night, crying before Allah just before dawn, keeping company with the pious folk.

 

12.  The degree of a person’s closeness to Almighty Allah depends on the distance between him and the populace.

 

13.  All the saints agree on it that if a person’s earnings are not through lawful means, that person can’t distinguish between a divine inspiration (Ilhaam) and a satanic whisper (Waswasa).

 

14. Dhun Noon Misri (May Allah shower His mercy on him) has said:  The condition of the people have worsened and their hearts have been rendered useless because of 6 things.  (1)  They have a weak intention for the deeds of the hereafter.  (2)  Their bodies have become used to carnal pleasures.  (3)  They have fallen prey to high hopes.  (4)  They prefer the approval of the public to the approval of the Lord Almighty.  (5)  They run behind their own desires and have cast the Sunnah of the Holy Prophet (Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam) behind their backs.  (6)  They make a small slip-up of the Pious Predecessors a precedent for themselves and bury, i.e. conceal many other excellences of theirs and don’t follow them in those regards.

 

15.  The one who desires to seek blessings from the Elders of the Naqshbandi Order should always keep in mind 3 things.  When that person performs a deed which is liked by them, he/she should never give that deed any consideration and should never think that I am also worth something and should never allow pride to raise its head.  Instead, one should be all the more humble.  If one does something which those Elders don’t like, he/she shouldn’t think that I have been rejected, shouldn’t give way to despair and should never wander here and there leaving them.  When they give a command, then one should fulfill it wholeheartedly as early as possible.  This will grant them their objective.

 

16.  If a person offers Salaat Ul Tahajjud, recites Surah Yaseen in it and after the Salaat asks for something, that supplication will be accepted.

 

This is but a sample of his teachings.

 

[Excerpted from Gulzaar-e-Auliya of Hadhrat Muhaddith-e-Deccan(May Allah shower His mercy on him)]