Knowledge Is Based on Evidence
Mawlana Shaykh Hisham Kabbani
19 October 2009 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
A`oodhu billahi min ash-Shaytaani ‘r-rajeem. Bismillahi ‘r-Rahmaani ‘r-Raheem.
Nawaytu ‘l-arba`een, nawaytu ‘l-`itikaaf, nawaytu ‘l-khalwah, nawaytu ‘l-`uzlah,
nawaytu ‘r-riyaadah, nawaytu ‘s-sulook, lillahi ta`ala fee haadha ‘l-masjid.
Ati`ullah wa ati`u ‘r-Rasoola wa ooli ‘l-amri minkum.
Obey Allah, obey the Prophet, and obey those in authority among you. (4:59)
So our duty is to continuously thank Allah even though it may not give Him the rights that he honored us with everything.
Recitation from Surat Ali Imraan
كُنتُمْ خَيْرَ أُمَّةٍ أُخْرِجَتْ لِلنَّاسِ تَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَتَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ وَتُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللّهِ وَلَوْ آمَنَ أَهْلُ الْكِتَابِ لَكَانَ خَيْرًا لَّهُم مِّنْهُمُ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ وَأَكْثَرُهُمُ الْفَاسِقُونَ
kuntum khayra ummatin ukhrijat li 'n-naasi taa'muruuna bil-ma`roofi wa tanhawna ‘ani 'l-munkari wa tu'minoona billaahi wa law aamana ahlu 'l-kitaabi la-kaana khayran lahum minhumu 'lmu'minoona wa-aktharuhumu 'l-faasiqoon.
You are the best of the nations raised up for (the benefit of) men; you enjoin what is right and forbid the wrong and believe in Allah; and if the followers of the Book had believed it would have been better for them; of them (some) are believers and most of them are transgressors. (3:110)
“You were the best ummah that has been sent to humanity.” If you know Arabic, I think most people here do not; if we say what is meant in Holy Qur’an, Allah (swt) didn’t say “you are”, He said “you were the best nation that has been sent to humanity.” So if we think like normal thinking, it is “you are (the best nation)” not “you were (the best nation),” because we think the Nation of Muhammad (s) as the last nation. So we think we are, but in this ayah Allah (swt) is telling us we were the best, “Somewhere before I created you, but I made Ummati 'n-Nabi (s) to be the best nation, and you were in the holy presence; I made you already, I made you the best in between everyone else.”
When you begin school they teach you the alphabet, "a", "b", "c." “A” is for a apple, “b” is for boy, etc. They don’t dump on you in the intermediary classes, they give you the basics or else what will you understand? Nothing. If they give you high school lessons, you don’t comprehend anything. If they give you a rock that contains a diamond, you will throw it away like a worthless rock. So don’t waste your energy. You have to build up people with teachings. You can’t come to them speaking about the reality of the essence of what the Creator manifested, or Allah’s secret knowledge. What is the benefit of that? They will drown in this high knowledge; they will leave and forget everything. You tell them to make 5,000 astaghfirullah, or, “You make 50,000 of that tasbeeh.” Mawlana Shaykh Nazim (q) said, “Don’t give the load of the camel to the sheep.” It is impossible.
So this is an important message for those representatives that don’t have a basis of Shari’ah, they come and throw out words that no one understands. It is better to give to people on some level that they understand what they are doing. For example, we are sitting here, what do you do every Thursday in the zawiya? (Someone answers, “dhikr.”) Where is the evidence of this in Holy Qur’an? Correct? Lost - no answer. So what is the benefit of telling about dhikr, you have to give some definitions of dhikr.
What is the benefit of having a zawiya? To teach, to give them some elementary courses. You are going to give PhD courses? You go to a scholar and say, “We are going to do dhikr,” he understands. But if you go to common people, they are saying "what is this dhikr? Where is it in Qur’an, hadith?"
So too much interference...anyone can know how to put sentences together, but there is no benefit because you come and you go, leaving without knowing anything. The Prophet (s) said, نعوذ بالله من منافق عليم اللسان جهول القلب - - n`oodhoo billahi min munaafiqin`aleemun bil-lisaan jahool al-qalb - the thing I fear most for my nation is a hypocrite he knows how to speak, but is ignorant in his heart, doesn’t know anything.” So you are forced to learn about the dhikr, to account for them.
In any scientific course, you have to prove through the labs that this evidence is correct, to prove everything, especially through physics. You can’t tell children about light, that it is traveling 300,000 km / sec, what will they understand? Nothing. You have to prove to them, go through the method. So you have to give heavenly proofs or else your work is just a loss of time.
That’s why I like to say in our work, we learned this fact in America, over many years meeting with non-Muslim people, that the Prophet (s) said, “Speak to people according to the capacity of their minds.” You cannot speak to people on high levels or they run away.
One famous scientist, I won’t mention his name here but will mention at the end, studied all kinds of religions, and he ended up studying about Islam. He knows about Islam, but he was finding it difficult when he asks a particular question. What was his question?
“What should I do to become a Muslim?”
He traveled to many countries to ask Muslim scholars, and everyone told him, “You must take shahadah.”
He said, “OK, I will take shahadah.”
They all told him, “But you cannot take shahadah without praying the five prayers, and you have to fast Ramadan, and you have to make the Hajj and on top of that you have to… .”
And he was 87 years old! Finally he came to Grandshaykh `AbdAllah as a last resort. And with the wisdom that Allah gave to awliyaaullah, Grandshaykh said to him, “O my son, you have to pray two raka`ats a day.”
“Is that it?” he asked.
Grandshaykh answered, “Yes.”
Because awliya have the wisdom of Prophet (s), when he was introducing Islam, he first told the people to say la ilaha illa-Llah and more came after 18 months. That was all he (s) said, that’s it!
Someone came to the "shaykh" (representative) and he said, “O, you have black magic!” To another he says, “O! You have a jinn! I have to take it away!” Correct? They come with difficulties, so why are you giving them another difficulty? Don’t give them more; they are depressed already, don’t depress them more. They need your help! Give him a break, let him come, give him a drink, let him relax, then ask him again. Some of these people like to show they know everything, that they (know how to remove) black magic (and they prescribe) “50,000 times tasbeeh and you must wake up and pray all night.” They connect Salat al-`Isha with Salat al-Fajr (staying up all night). I never saw Grandshaykh `AbdAllah staying up after ‘Isha more than one hour, and he got up 90 minutes before Fajr.
Qur’an recitation:
نِصْفَهُ أَوِ انقُصْ مِنْهُ قَلِيلًا قُمِ اللَّيْلَ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا يَا أَيُّهَا الْمُزَّمِّلُ
O you who have wrapped up in your garments! Rise to pray in the night except a little, half of it, or lessen it a little. Surat al-Muzzamil (73:1-2)
It means, “O Muhammad, the one covering himself with a cloak! Wake up most of the night,” then Allah (swt) then reduces it to one-half, then reduces it again to one hour. It began as “most of the night,” then reduced because no one can carry that. The Prophet (s) can carry, and that’s why we know from the hadith when Sayyida Ayesha (a) said to Prophet (s), “your feet are swollen,” and he (s) answered, “you don’t want me to be a thankful servant?” You have to come with the proof (textual evidence of what we are saying) or people will not understand.
You keep the people up all night for what? I never saw Mawlana Shaykh Nazim keep people up all night. He said, “come later,” and it means don’t give burdens to people, they will not be able to carry. So you cannot make a child to understand what a professor knows. A wise professor keeps to himself.
So you come to dhikrullah, and what are the evidences for dhikr? When you quote evidence, it helps people understand, like to accept theories. Is Darwin’s theory correct or is false? It is false, because he says our origin is from monkeys! According to his Theory of Evolution, if you trace all the way back to the beginning, to mammals, to fish, to one-cell creatures, from all that you become a human being from all these different cells, from a monkey? (Let’s examine this.) If everything is like that, what about apples? Apples evolved from which monkey? What about bananas? Or pineapples, did they evolve from mangoes? Why they cannot say the origin of apricots or apples or prunes? Why do they speak about the origin of human beings, but all these other things are not convincing? Because based on that theory, they can never convince.
Recitation of Holy Qur’an:
يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ اتَّقُواْ رَبَّكُمُ الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفْسٍ وَاحِدَةٍ وَخَلَقَ مِنْهَا زَوْجَهَا وَبَثَّ مِنْهُمَا رِجَالاً كَثِيرًا وَنِسَاء وَاتَّقُواْ اللّهَ الَّذِي تَسَاءلُونَ بِهِ وَالأَرْحَامَ إِنَّ اللّهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَقِيبًا
O people! be careful of (your duty to) your Lord, Who created you from a single being and created its mate of the same (kind) and spread from these two, many men and women; and be careful of (your duty to) Allah, by Whom you demand one of another (your rights), and (to) the ties of relationship; surely Allah ever watches over you. Surat an-Nisa (4:1)
Allah mentioned in Holy Qur’an 1400 years ago that He created you from one cell, then He created from that cell another cell, which was the female. So He made from one cell the male, from the other the female. Then He spread from them too many. They were reproducing quickly too many men and women. Go back little bit to Holy Qur’an. See if they are accepting, if you come against Darwin’s theory, which has no evidence. Allah ordered Sayyidina Jibreel (a) to come from Earth, to bring clay to Heaven to create Adam (a). What he brought? He brought the origin of humanity from one cell from that soil, that he brought it to Heaven, under Allah’s observation.
....they say that we used to be apes and the first man was coming fr ape and ok, if the man came from ape, from where the woman came? from a male ape she came or a female ape? they come together? statistics, probability, if you study chance of 10 billion that something happened, that at this one time both came, evolution cannot say that, is impossible. so they have to be in different time. then they say that 'al hasra tajalli'? in stone age, they say they were talking w/ sounds, they give sounds (Mawlana Shaykh makes ape sounds) you go study origins, anthropology, they cannot speak.
وَعَلَّمَ آدَمَ الأَسْمَاء كُلَّهَا ثُمَّ عَرَضَهُمْ عَلَى الْمَلاَئِكَةِ فَقَالَ أَنبِئُونِي بِأَسْمَاء هَـؤُلاء إِن كُنتُمْ صَادِقِينَ
wa `allama aadama al-asmaa'a kullahaa thumma `aradhahum `alaa al-malaa'ikati fa-qaala anbi-oonii bi-asmaa-i haa'ulaa-i in kuntum saadiqeena
And He taught Adam all the names, then presented them to the angels; then He said: Tell me the names of those if you are right. [Surat al-Baqara, 2:31]
He taught Adam all the names, means everything that He created, He taught him all names. astaghfirullah, but you have to study, you are in kindergarten, a child you have to show this is a cup, you have to show him, this is not ordinary water, this is Perrier water. It is different from ordinary water, it is mineral water. now Adam knows, this is mineral water, this is river water. Then he told the angels, and they said 'we don't know, you have to teach us.' So Allah teaches (Mawlana Shaykh makes apes sounds) How do they say this? In movies they make a club from stone. This is Adam (a)? Adam goes like that? (walking like ape) crippled Adam? This is their level of understanding, scientists and professors, even Muslim and non-Muslim. Allah said 'you were the best nation.' you have to think, sorry to say, or you are illiterate or dumb. I didn't say stupid.
According to that theory, they say we used to be apes and the first man was coming from an ape. OK, if the first man came from an ape, from where the first woman came? From a male ape she came or from a female ape? Did they both appear together? If you study statistics, what is the probability of that happening? Is it a 1-in-10 billion chance that both a man and a woman together evolved from an ape at the same time? The Theory of Evolution cannot claim that, because it is impossible! The evolution of the original man and original woman have to be at different times. Then anthropologists claim there was a Stone Age in which humans communicated with sounds but no speech or language (ape sounds).
Recitation of Holy Qur’an
wa’allama aadama al-asmaa-a kullahaa tsumma ‘aradhahum ‘alaa almalaa-ikati faqaala anbi-uunii bi-asmaa-i haaulaa-i in kuntum shaadiqiina.
And He taught Adam all the names, then presented them to the angels; then He said: Tell me the names of those if you are right. Surat al-Baqara (2:31)
“He taught Adam all the names,” means Allah (swt) taught Sayyidina Adam (a) the names of all Creation! You have to study (your religion)! In Kindergarten, you show a child this is a cup and this is not ordinary water, it is Perrier sparking water, it is different from ordinary water. Allah taught Sayyidina Adam and he knows this is mineral water and that is river water.
Then Allah (swt) told the angels, and they answered, “We don’t know, You have to teach us.” So did Allah (swt) teach apes? In movies they make a club from stone,and the caveman walks hunched over. Did Allah cripple Adam (a)? This is their level of understanding, scientists and professors, even Muslim and non-Muslim. Allah (swt) said, “You were the best nation.” You have to think, sorry to say, or else you are illiterate. What is dhikr then?
Recitation of Holy Qur’an:
ذَلِكَ مَبْلَغُهُم مِّنَ الْعِلْمِ إِنَّ رَبَّكَ هُوَ أَعْلَمُ بِمَن ضَلَّ عَن سَبِيلِهِ وَهُوَ أَعْلَمُ بِمَنِ اهْتَدَى
dhaalika mablaghuhum mina al-`ilmi inna rabbaka huwa a`lamu bi-man dalla ‘an sabeelihi wa huwa a`lamu bi-mani 'htadaa.
That is their goal of knowledge; surely your Lord knows best him who goes astray from His path and He knows best he who follows the right direction. (53:30)
This is a book; I didn’t write it. Who wrote it? Ibn Taymiyyah. Who is ibn Taymiyyah? The head teacher of Wahabis. You have to give proof from their own book. (Mawlana reads in Arabic.) He says in the book by Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyah, “The gathering of dhikr is the gathering of angels.” Wahabis ask, “Why you do dhikr?” and this is evidence from their teachings! (Mawlana quotes from their book) “Angels don’t have a gathering in dunya, because they don’t belong to dunya, except the gathering in which Allah’s Name is mentioned.”
... أخرج البخاري ح : عن أبي هريرة قال قال رسول الله
إن لله ملائكة يطوفون في الطرق يلتمسون أهل الذكر فإذا وجدوا قوماً يذكرون الله تنادوا هلموا إلى حاجتكم
And it is mentioned in Sahih al-Bukhari and Muslim (6407), from the hadith of Abu Hurayra, “Allah has a special kind of angels; they move around, they roam.” Tawaaf is circumambulating. It means they go through every district, they go through Earth, to every house. Can that happen? Can angels can move around? (Yes.) You cannot give to someone this information; to a believer, yes, but otherwise, how you can convince him? They will say, “Give me scientific evidence.”
(Mawlana speaks to the mureed next to him and takes a cell phone from his pocket.) You want evidence? (From the signal in this cell phone) they know where you are, always roaming; you go on a street, right and left, a navigation system tracks where you are. Angels also have a navigation system! At least believe they have the ability to be like a telephone, like GPS, roaming. The GPS tracks your car and instructs you, “Turn left! Turn left!” andnd we say, “No, I want to turn right.” Sometimes they don’t like the GPS voice of a lady and they change it to the voice of a man! (laughter)
Angels know wherever you are, and they are roaming in streets, looking for the circles of dhikr, like intelligence or Secret Service.
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إن لله ملائكة يطوفون في الطرق يلتمسون أهل الذكر ، فإذا وجدوا قوما يذكرون الله تنادوا : هلموا إلى حاجتكم . قال : فيحفونهم بأجنحتهم إلى السماء الدنيا ، قال : فيسألهم ربهم ، وهو أعلم منهم ، ما يقول عبادي ؟ قال : تقول : يسبحونك ويكبرونك ويحمدونك ويمجدونك ، قال : فيقول : هل رأوني ؟ قال : فيقولون : لا والله ما رأوك ، قال : فيقول : وكيف لو رأوني ؟ قال : يقولون : لو رأوك كانوا أشد لك عبادة ، وأشد لك تمجيدا وأكثر لك تسبيحا ، قال : يقول : فما يسألونني ؟ قال : يسألونك الجنة ، قال : يقول : وهل رأوها ؟ قال : يقولون : لا والله يا رب ما رأوها ، قال : يقول : فكيف لو أنهم رأوها ؟ قال : يقولون : لو أنهم رأوها كانوا أشد عليها حرصا ، وأشد لها طلبا ، وأعظم فيها رغبة ، قال : فمم يتعوذون ؟ قال : يقولون : من النار ، قال : يقول : وهل رأوها ؟ قال : يقولون : لا والله يا رب ما رأوها ، قال : يقول : فكيف لو رأوها ؟ قال : يقولون : لو رأوها كانوا أشد منها فرارا ، وأشد لها مخافة ، قال : فيقول : فأشهدكم أني قد غفرت لهم . قال : يقول ملك من الملائكة : فيهم فلان ليس منهم ، إنما جاء لحاجة . قال : هم الجلساء لا يشقى بهم جليسهم الراوي: أبو هريرة المحدث: البخاري - المصدر: الجامع الصحيح - الصفحة أو الرقم: 6408 خلاصة الدرجة: أورده في صحيحه وقال : رواه شعبة عن الأعمش ولم يرفعه ورواه سهيل عن أبيه عن أبي هريرة عن النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم
Angels find a group of people remembering Allah. So what you do at the zawiyah? You remember Allah. So this is the answer. What they do there? They do the dhikr (remember Allah). So is there any problem with this? There is loud dhikr, silent dhikr; it is mentioned in hadiths. They say (in Arabic), “Come to your needs, we are here to help you. They will rub them with their wings.” Angels touch those who remember Allah (swt). When you are touched by a heavenly angel, do you think that place will go to Hellfire? The entire place is purified! Like today you are sick, they say you need an IV (intravenous treatment), and they deliver medicine in your arm (one place) and it goes through the whole system and you feel better. Angels rub you in one place and the affects go through the whole body.
You have to use science (think scientifically). If you say to people, “O, my shaykh comes to me directly,” it might be Shaytan; you think it is so easy to receive directly? You are cheating people (saying such things)! Don’t cheat people; say, “I am like you. I know nothing. I hear them and I speak.” To make other murids like your slaves (ordering them to do things for you), things you ask from them, that is not accepted.
So Abu Hurayra (r) is saying, “They come to them, they rub them and build up layer-upon-layer until they reach first the first heaven, sama ad-dunya. Allah will ask them and he knows about them. “They glorify You, they say Allahu akbar, they thank You.” How does a group of people together glorify their Lord? This is how they do it. How angels hearing them? Must be in a loud voice, they glorify you.”
You don’t say Allahu akbar? We are 100 people here! Why people are coming here? Because they want Paradise. So the hadith says,
(Allah asks His angles) “Did they see Me?”
(The angels answer) “No our Lord, they didn’t see You.”
“What would happen if they see My Paradise?”
“If they see Your paradise, they will ask more strongly for it.”
“From what are they afraid? Did they see the Hellfire?”
“No our Lord, they didn’t see it.”
“How they would be if they see My Hellfire?”
“They would run away if they see it!”
“I make you witness, I have forgiven them.”
So in this majlis Allah (swt) forgave our sins for sure, because we came here to remember Allah!
(Continuing with the translation of the hadith)
And one angel calls out: "fayaquloo malakun min al-malaaikat feehim fulaanun laysa minhum - Wait, wait! This one is not from them! This one just came for something here to finish and go. This one standing by the door is not from them.”
And Allah swt answers "hum al-julasa la yashqaa bihim jaleesahum - They are the ones that anyone sit with them, he will never find except happiness. I am forgiving him. I forgave that person, also!”
So this is one of the ahadith, of which too many in Sahihs Muslim and Bukhari about majaalis adh-dhikr, associations of dhikrullah. But you have to... Don’t think you are lowering yourself when you bring a book with you. Or don't think you are humiilating yourself, O Mr. representative, and for Mawlana Shaykh’s representatives all around the world, because they are hearing us on the internet. Any Mr. Representative, don’t think that if you bring a notebook from Grandshaykh `AbdAllah or from Mawlana Shaykh that will humiliate you if you speak from Grandshaykh's words or Mawlana Shaykh's words. Don't sit like a peacock and say "Oh! I am receiving knowledge and I am passing to you. I am speaking to you." (mimics low voice) "You have black magic on you; You have jinn on you. You have to slaughter 20 roosters. You! You have to bring me two lambs to eat them tonight for dinner!"
Do they do that or not? You don't you see them around the world?
So no problem. Bring a book. Say, "I am learning like you. We are all learning together." One speaks and the others listen. "You have a question, ask your question."
So when you try to give your evidence, and not only ahadith, because these days even Muslims are becoming strictly with sciences with what they have learned. They have become so dunya-oriented, they cannot understand akhira-oriented. So you have to give them evidences from science itself in order to convince them and then they can accept.
And that is why in associations in Europe and America we try - with Mawlana's baraka - to give evidences from science: from chemistry, from physics, from geography, from astronomy, and so on, in order that people can be convinced. Or else you are giving them something that is a theory without a proof. Although for us that is ok, because we believe. In Islam we have to have faith, we believe in the unseen. We believe. But we are not speaking only to believers. You might have Muslims who are not believers. They are by name Muslims, who come but they do not have belief. They are Muslims and they come one time, two times, and thy are already outside Islamic belief, and you have to give them something they can understand easily. You cannot make it difficult for them.
Like these people made it difficult for that professor, "You have to get circumcized." Someone who wants to come to Islam, you want to make it easy for them you cannot make it difficult for them. Like that professor, I am 70 years old, I might die tomorrow. you tell him "you have to go and circumcize." He is Western. Western are all against circumcision. You don't see all these newspapers they go against in Africa and Egypt? They leave all sunnahs and come to this one only. So Mawlana made it easy. He said, "Just pray two raka`ts." He said, "Is this Islam?" "Yes, this is Islam. That is enough." If there is a scholar he would say, "What are you doing ya Shaykh?"
He is western. He said, "then I accept." Later he came and said, "O my shaykh I am thirsty. I feel I need more." "Ok, do the five prayers." Agains he came, "I feel I need more." "Ok, fast Ramadan."
Slowly slowly. You give over time. Prophet gave Islam over 23 years. You cannot in this time of ignorance and give it all. You cannot come and give to a person in one shot, some people they can, but mostly you cannot.
Wa min Allah at-tawfeeq. Taqabal-Allah.
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