Jila’ Al-Khatir

Renunciation

 * O young man, I am not interested in my speech, you, or the goods, wealth, and presents that you keep in your houses. As long as I remain so, you will benefit from my words, Allah willing. As long as the eye of the speaker is on your turbans, clothes, and pockets, you will not derive any benefit from what he has to say. As long as he frequents the place of the smoke of your cooking and has greedy desires about you, you will not benefit from his words. His speech will be a shell that has no kernel, a bone that has no meat on it, a bitterness with no sweetness, an appearance with no essence. The speech of the covetous person is never free of flattery, and his flattery prevents him from disagreeing with you. The words of the greedy person are as empty as the Arabic word ṭama‘(covetousness) itself, because the three letters of the word ṭama‘are all empty and hollow (the way they are written in Arabic): The ṭā’, mīm, and ‘ayn.

* The ascetic has no hands with which he takes the money of people.

* The reality of renunciation is giving up this world and giving up the hereafter; giving up all lustful desires and pleasures; giving up one’s very existence; giving up seeking spiritual states, rankings, miracles, and spiritual stations, and giving up everything other than the Lord of the creatures so that no one remains other than the Creator (mighty and glorified is He). He is the final destination and He is the ultimate object of all hopes. To Him all affairs belong.

* Renunciation is a source of comfort for the hearts of the obedient ones, the ascetics. The burden of renunciation rests on the body, the burden of knowingness on the heart, and the burden of nearness on the innermost being. Practice renunciation, be content, offer thanks, be satisfied with your Lord (mighty and glorified is He), and do not be satisfied with yourself. Think well of others, give up holding a poor opinion of others, and do not hold yourself in high esteem.

* When you renounce this world and your asceticism becomes true, this world will appear to you in your dreams in the form of a woman who pays homage to you, saying: “I am a maidservant for you; I have trusts for you, so take them.” She will count for you your allotted shares, whether few or many. When your knowingness has strengthened, she will come to you in wakefulness. The first spiritual state of the prophets (prayer and peace be on them) is inspiration and the second is a visionary dream. When their spiritual states have strengthened, the angel comes to them in wakefulness and says: “The True One (mighty and glorified is He) says to you this and that.”

* When someone has genuinely renounced the creatures, they become genuinely interested in him and benefit from listening to his words and looking at him. When the heart’s renunciation of the creatures and the innermost being’s renunciation of anything other than Allah (mighty and glorified is He), apart from His nearness, have become genuine, nearness becomes his close companion in this world and his entertainer in the hereafter.

* Be sensible, I can see that you do not have hearts or knowledge of the heart. Woe to you! You claim to be an ascetic and put on clothes of ascetics, yet you go knocking at the doors of the kings and the rich, who are the sons of this world, and then return! Your lower self seeks this world and wishes for what those people have. Surely you must have known that the Prophet (Allah’s prayer and peace be on him) has said: “Whoever hovers around a prohibited area is very likely to end up encroaching on it.” Preoccupation with the affairs of this world obstructs the way of the servants of Allah (mighty and glorified is He), enchants them, and drives them out of their senses. This applies to everyone except those whom Allah (mighty and glorified is He) wills to exclude. These are a few individuals. Allah (mighty and glorified is He) looks after their hearts and deeds and protects them in both their public and private lives. He purifies their food, drink, and clothing by the hand of power. The people of Allah have put into practice what the Messenger of Allah (Allah’s prayer and peace be on him) brought with him, so the Master (mighty and glorified is He) took care of them and loved them.

* Woe to you! It is the heart that practices renunciation not the body. O you who are ascetic only outwardly, your renunciation is thrown back at you! You have hidden your turban and shirt, buried your gold in the ground, put on austere woolen clothes, and collected leftovers. May Allah cut off your skin and head if you do not repent. You have opened your shop to sell hypocrisy. May Allah demolish your shop on top of you and kill you under its ruins if you do not destroy it, repent, and cut your waistband (zunnār).¹

Woe to you! The believer has renunciation in his heart and nearness to his Lord (mighty and glorified is He) in his innermost being. This world and the hereafter have both come to his door, inside his treasury, not inside his heart. His heart is empty of anything other than his Master. How can it take in others when it is already filled with Him, His remembrance, and His nearness? His heart is empty and broken on his Master’s account, so no doubt He dwells in it. Allah (mighty and glorified is He) has said in one of His utterances: “I am with those whose hearts are broken on My account.” Their lower selves have broken by giving up this world and their hearts have broken on account of their Master. Once this break has taken place, He will come to them and set it. The Physician will come and treat them. This is the true bliss, not the bliss of this world and the hereafter.

* You have to practice pious restraint so that the hand of your heart is never without it. If you give it up then you will be disappointed. When someone gives up the practice of pious restraint, his heart darkens with legally dubious things and impurities. Woe to you! You claim that you are pious yet you do not practice pious restraint! The practicing person abandons many things in fear of falling in prohibited and dubious things, and Allah punishes him on the basis of the lowest allowed concessions.

One day I passed through a village surrounded by fields of corn. I stretched out my hand and picked a corn cane to suck. At that point, two men from the village, each of them holding a stick, came and beat me up until I collapsed to the ground. So I gave a pledge to Allah (mighty and glorified is He) at that moment not to take advantage again of the allowed concessions or avail myself of what is not mine. The Law has allowed the person who passes by fields of cereals and fruit trees to eat as much as he needs without paying anything in return, but it prohibited him from taking away anything. This is a general concession. However, I was not allowed to take advantage of this concession and I was ordered to adhere to the strictest laws. As the person increasingly remembers death, his pious restraint increases, the concessions that are allowed to him decrease, and his adherence to the strictest laws increases.

* Open the eye of your lower self and say to it: “Look at your Lord (mighty and glorified is He) and see how He looks at you. Look how He has destroyed the kings and the rich who lived before you. Remember the deaths of those of bygone times who owned the world and enjoyed its pleasures before it was snatched away from their hands and they were snatched away from it. They are now imprisoned in the jail of torment. Their palaces are deserted, their houses are in ruins, their property is gone, and their deeds have stayed. The lustful desires have gone and their bad consequences have remained.”

Do not rejoice, for this is not the time of rejoicing. Do not be impressed by the beauty of your wife’s face, by your son, by your house, and by the size of your wealth. Do not rejoice in what the preceding prophets, the messengers, and the righteous (Allah’s prayer and peace be on all of them) did not rejoice in. Allah (mighty and glorified is He) has said: “Allah does not love those who are recklessly happy” (from 28.76) with this world and its people and with other than Him. He loves those who rejoice in Him (mighty and glorified is He) and in His nearness.

The thinking and the reflection of the people of Allah are focused on the affairs of the hereafter not on lustful desires, pleasures, and entertainments. O you who are under an illusion, you have not done what He wants you to do! O forgetful ones, in the hereafter there is a severe torment for those who do not obey Allah (mighty and glorified is He)!

Footnotes

¹ A belt that Christians used to wear.

Fear

 * There is no one on the face of the earth whom I fear or pin my hopes on, be it one of the jinn, human beings, animals, insects, or any other creature. I am not afraid of anyone other than Allah (mighty and glorified is He). The more that He allays my fear the more it grows, for He is “One who certainly works His will” (from 11.107) and “He shall not be questioned as to what He does, but they shall be questioned” (21.23).

* The believer remains in fear until his innermost being is granted the book of safety. He conceals it from his heart and never reveals it to it. This happens to a few individuals only.

* The pious are those who are pious to Allah (mighty and glorified is He) in their public and private lives and watch Him under all circumstances. Their hearts shiver in fear of Him by night and day. They are afraid that tribulations might attack them during the night and cut them off from Him and, with them failing to be patient, they would turn to disbelief. They are afraid that the Angel of Death (prayer and peace be on our Prophet and on him) might come to them while they are doing evil deeds. “They do what they do while their hearts are full of fear” (from 23.60), afraid of being rejected, afraid of the foreknowledge of Allah (mighty and glorified is He) about them.

Al‑Fudhayl bin ‘Iyādh (may Allah show mercy to him) used to say to Sufyān Ath‑Thawrī (may Allah show mercy to him) whenever he met him: “Let’s weep over the foreknowledge of Allah (mighty and glorified is He) about us.” How excellent these words are! They are the words of someone who is a knower of Allah (mighty and glorified is He) and who is knowledgeable of Him and of His management. As for the “foreknowledge of Allah (mighty and glorified is He)” that bin ‘Iyādh referred to when saying “weep over the foreknowledge of Allah (mighty and glorified is He) about us,” it is His following saying: “These are to go to Paradise and I do not care, and these are to go to the Fire and I do not care.” He mixed them all in one place so one cannot know to which of the two groups he belongs. They did not become conceited because of what became visible of their deeds, because all deeds are assessed according to their final outcome.

The pious are those who give up the acts of disobedience and sins, both the apparent and hidden ones, dissimulation, hypocrisy, and working for the sake of the creatures and worldly purposes. Therefore, today they are in the paradise of obedience and tomorrow they will be in the midst of gardens and springs, sitting among trees that never fade, fruits that never run out, and rivers that never run dry. How could the water dry up when it springs from beneath the Throne? For everyone of them there is a river of water, a river of yogurt, a river of honey, and a river of wine. These rivers will be with them wherever they go, without a cleft in the ground. Everything in this world has an equivalent in the hereafter and more. Everything in Paradise has its prototype in this world. “They receive what their Lord gives them” (from 51.16) (mighty and glorified is He) of bliss that no eye has ever seen, no ear has ever heard, and has never occurred to any human being. “Whose fruits are nigh to cull” (69.23). When one of them reclines on his couch, the fruits come to his mouth and he eats them while resting. The roots of the trees are upward whereas their fruits are downward. Their roots are silver and their branches are gold. When it occurs to one of them to eat some of the fruits, they advance to his mouth, so he picks what he likes and then they return to their places. Everything in Paradise sings for the people of Paradise and entertains them. Their speech is lovely and in the finest sound. This is true even of its rivers, trees, and everything there.

O seekers of this world, this world is ephemeral and tiring! Seek the everlasting Paradise, which is the place of comfort, the place of bliss, and the place of thankfulness. In Paradise there is no ablution, no prayer, no pilgrimage, no obligatory alms‑giving, no tribulations to be endured with patience, no illnesses, no chronic diseases, no poverty, and no fear of departure. O people, soon death will call on you and snatch you away! You will be as if you had not been created or seen! Turn your hearts away from your families, children, and property. Renounce all the creatures of your Lord (mighty and glorified is He) and do not rely on anyone of them in trivial or important matters. O Allah, grant us trust in You under all circumstances and awareness of the powerlessness of anyone other than You, and “give us good in this world and good in the hereafter and protect us from the torment of the Fire.”

* Give up your wish in favor of His, your preference in favor of His, your decision in favor of His, and your will in favor of His. He is “One who certainly works His will” (from 11.107). “He shall not be questioned as to what He does, but they shall be questioned” (21.23). His company is like the company of lions and snakes, which is why the people of Allah are standing in His presence on the feet of fearfulness and caution. Neither their night is an ordinary night nor is their day an ordinary day. Their eating is like that of the ill, their sleep is like the sleep of those who are drowning, and their speech is out of necessity. The patient feels satisfied with very little of food. He eats while being afraid of his food, unable to tell whether it is good for him or not. The drowning person slumbers only when sleep is irresistible, just to be awakened by the waves of the sea of power, the sea of “One who certainly works His will” not what they will. They are scared of being drowned by the waves and Him sending some animals to eat them. They wish that the waves would throw them ashore and allow them into the palace of His nearness, private conversation, and sightings.

* O young man, the people of Allah have given up everything other than working [for Him], saying that everything else is mere nonsense and a shell. They have sought the kernel, clenched to it, and renounced the shell. They have sought the help of Allah (mighty and glorified is He) in their quest for what is indispensable. The True One (mighty and glorified is He) is indispensable, whereas everything else can be dispensed with. So when He saw and recognized their truthfulness in their quest, He granted them amnesty, well‑being, and His nearness: “There, authority is Allah’s, the True One” (from 18.44).

Every heart that has no fear is like a town without trees or sheep without a shepherd. Such a town is nothing but ruins and such sheep are doomed to become food for the wolves. When a person is afraid, he keeps wandering throughout the night. He cannot settle in one place so he is always on the move. The destination of the travel of the people of Allah is the abode of the True One (mighty and glorified is He).