The Remembrance of Allah
“O you who believe! Let not your
riches or your children divert you from the remembrance of Allah. If any act
thus, the loss is their own.”
(Al-Munafiqun, 63: 10).
“So veer away from those who turn back from Our
Remembrance and desire nothing but the life of this world.
That is what they could reach of knowledge. Surely your Lord is He Who knows best the ones who have erred away from His way, and He knows best the ones who are guided.” (An-Najm, 53: 30-31).
The Remembrance (Zikr)
of Allah is certainly food for our soul. The soul is such an entity that is
associated with his Creator and thus to preserve the relationship between the
soul and the Creator, man must strive to praise Allah (God Almighty) and
remember Him, His Omnipotence and His Love and Mercy upon him in all aspects of
his life so that he remains connected with Him (Allah).
Abu Musa
Ash’ari (ra) narrated that the Prophet of Allah Hazrat Muhammad (pbuh)
said: “He/ She who does Zikr of Allah
(practice the remembrance of Allah) and he/ she who doesn’t, their example is
of like an alive and a dead.” (Bukhari)
Remember often Allah,
and Allah will remember you in return. Thus Allah as stated in the first verse
that I recited to you, Allah wants His servants to remember Him, and to illuminate
their lives with the recitation of His attributes and His praises, meditating
on His Greatness, His Uniqueness and His Omnipotence so that he remains under
the protection of Allah, and that Allah grants him His favours and His love so
that he can live a full and fulfilling life; in other words, so that he fulfils
the duty he owes to God, that is to say, to worship Him without associating
anything to Him in His worship and to worship Him by remaining always connected
to Him.
Abandon Materialism
That is why Allah addresses
Him primarily to the believers and warns them not to let anything or anyone
divert them from the remembrance of Allah, from His memory, His Zikr. We must
not let our wealth and our children make us forget our worship of Allah. The
verse in question mentions “your riches”
before “your children” and this for
the simple reason that people are much more concerned with the pursuit of worldly
goods and children represent only a secondary interest to them.
The love of money is
unfortunately prevalent in the world we live in. In the other verses which I
quoted (Surah An-Najm), Allah draws
our attention to these people who despite possessing knowledge but they use it only
as a means to acquire the material goods of this temporary world. In examining
this world, you will find that people are using their knowledge just to acquire
worldly goods. They are invaded by the need to enrich themselves materially and
forget their spiritual duty. Thus, they let themselves be fooled by the
unreality of this material world and forget the beauty of the spiritual world.
The Holy Quran teaches us to avoid those people whose objective of their knowledge
is only get richer and richer materially and it also explains why one must remain
aloof from them.
As for the children,
although they remain in the background for some people, but nevertheless there
are people who really care for their children, and the love and the hours they
devote to these children are much larger than the hours they spend in the
remembrance of Allah. We live in this century such a time where both women and
men work. I understand that it is sometimes necessary for some couples to work
given the financial situation in which they find themselves – they have to honour
(repay) debts and make ends meet. Therefore, I do not point finger towards those
who are really in a precarious financial situation, but only towards those who
are financially prospered and do not really need to work.
In their zest to go in
the quest of worldly riches, these people entrust their children to nurses or
baby-sitters to monitor and care for them. This is really an unfortunate
situation because while not being forced to work, especially mothers of
affluent families, these women are leaving their homes to go in search of
material wealth, and thus having no guide, the children let themselves get
trapped by others and they therefore abandon the religion of Allah to grip materialism
and an irreligious life.
The repercussions of
these situations worldwide are serious. These people are cut off from our
Creator and they only live for the material goods of this world.
As these aforementioned
verses and Hadith teach us, we must move away from those people who prefer to
forget Allah, lest we meet with the same situation. We must not think that we
are entertaining some spirit of revenge or boycott against anyone. We must not confuse
in any way between the boycotting which the enemies of the Messengers of Allah
and their followers suffer for the love of Allah, and the distance that true
believers should take from those who are immersed in the ocean of materialism
to the point that they forget Allah. And it certainly does not mean also that
if these people salute you, you turn your back and reject their greetings! No, no and no!
These verses teach us
that if these people are immersed in materialism so much so as to forget the
remembrance of Allah, then we believers must not follow their example, that is
to say, we must not imitate them in their pursuit of worldly wealth, in order
to protect ourselves from this contamination, this thirst for money and power.
And so, to protect our connection with our Creator, we must avoid frequenting too
much these people imbued with this material world, those people who forget God.
My attention is drawn
to those people who only frequent people who live in opulence. They have in
fact no bond of affection with those rich people. They do this just to give
themselves a status in society and to flatter their egos. There are also very
wealthy families whose way of thinking, their bad taste and their quest for personal
interests are so deficient that it would be a punishment, an unbearable moment
just to remain a few minutes in their company. It is these kinds of people which
are spoken of in the verses of the Holy Quran which I mentioned and whom Allah
asks us to avoid. Their interest is not the same as ours, for unlike them, we
want the pleasure of Allah whereas they languish for worldly pleasures.
The person who thinks
only of his Creator wherever he is will receive from Him many blessings. This
makes me remember an anecdote in the time of Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal (Rahimullah Alayh). One day the Imam was to go to a place, and at nightfall decided to take refuge in a mosque. Not recognizing the Imam, the guardian of the mosque refused him entry into the mosque. Despite this, Imam Ahmad did not reveal his identity to him, and then he decided to sleep outside in the courtyard of mosque, but the keeper was furious and dragged him off the property of the mosque. A baker whose bakery was close by took pity on Imam Ahmad without recognizing him, and invited him to spend the night with him in his bakery.
By spending time with
the baker, Imam Ahmad noticed that he spent the night working (i.e. baking
bread), but what surprised strongly is that the man in question did not cease
to praise Allah while working, until sunrise.
The Imam was very amazed by what he saw and he asked the baker if he had ever received from Allah some (special) favours for all the praise that he dedicates to Him (Allah). The baker replied that Allah has always fulfilled his prayers, wishes, requests, all except one. The Imam, surprised asked him what that exception (that unfulfilled request) was. So the baker said he wanted to meet for a long time the famous Imam Ahmad (ibn Hanbal) but this request was not granted.
Then, the voice filled with emotion, Imam Ahmad revealed his identity to the baker and told him it was not in vain as he was dragged out of the mosque to reach the baker, because Allah certainly wanted to grant the wish of his servant (the baker) by (literally) dragging the Imam Ahmad to his door!
The Imam was very amazed by what he saw and he asked the baker if he had ever received from Allah some (special) favours for all the praise that he dedicates to Him (Allah). The baker replied that Allah has always fulfilled his prayers, wishes, requests, all except one. The Imam, surprised asked him what that exception (that unfulfilled request) was. So the baker said he wanted to meet for a long time the famous Imam Ahmad (ibn Hanbal) but this request was not granted.
Then, the voice filled with emotion, Imam Ahmad revealed his identity to the baker and told him it was not in vain as he was dragged out of the mosque to reach the baker, because Allah certainly wanted to grant the wish of his servant (the baker) by (literally) dragging the Imam Ahmad to his door!
In addition, this story
of the past, among others makes us understand that it is certainly not only the
mosque which is the only place wherein the believer can reach Allah; the mosque
is not the only place where we receive the immeasurable blessings of Allah. It
is also necessary that you know that the Zikr-e-Ilaahi
has a great relationship with Istighfar
(forgiveness) and both propel the believer to a much higher status if he is
constant and sincere in his pursuit of the pleasure and proximity of Allah.
Allah loves those who love Him, He cherishes those who cherish Him and responds
to their prayers by fulfilling them. In the story I just told you, Imam Ahmad,
though a beloved servant of Allah had to bear abuse for the chance to meet another
beloved servant of Allah, such a servant who had carved his whole life, till
even in his workplace on the Remembrance of Allah (Zikrullah). And Allah decreed to grant him his request and made
him meet the Imam Ahmad by thereby literally dragging Imam Ahmad to him!
In this regard (on the subject of Zikr-e-Ilaahi) the Promised Messiah Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (as)
said: The person who sees Allah in front of him all the time [the Khalifatullah Hazrat Munir (atba) then cited the examples of seeing the name of Allah in the sky, on trees etc. as witnessed in this era] would not even dare to make mistakes. He will always think he has before him a Watcher – a Being more powerful than him and who has the power to punish. It is truly our alienation from God which draws us into sin. If this distance is temporary, our sins will be too. But if it becomes permanent then we are sinners forever. Allah watches over us and monitors (each of our movement) every time, at every moment. How dare we then commit sins?
Zikr-e-Ilaahi has the advantage that it makes us live in the sight
of Allah and drifts us away from the evils of this world. Business affairs or
money affairs should not distract us from our worship of God. Whatever the
affairs that concern us in the world here, be them commercial transactions,
agricultural or other, Zikr-e-Ilaahi
must find its place. Follow the example of the baker, who seemingly ordinary
has been awarded a place high in the esteem of Allah to such a degree that
Allah fulfils all his requests (supplications)! This example I have quoted
gives us an idea that the mundane work which we do to support ourselves is in
no way an excuse to forget Allah (It can become a fragrant field by the Zikr of
Allah). Rather, the more you remember Allah, the more Allah will come near to
you.
Zikr-e-Ilaahi brings benefits that are well beyond our
expectations. We have to remember Allah in all that we do, and that is how we
hope to reform the world. Invite people to Allah, to His Remembrance. Talk to
them about Allah, talk about His greatness, His beauty, His favours and
meditate on Him yourself also. It is then that a genuine connection and a deep
love will be weaved between Him and you, and this union will be eternal.
Then let us enrich our
daily prayers, our Salaat, by Zikr-e-Ilaahi (the Remembrance of
Allah). Our prayers should be filled with Zikrullah
or they shall resemble arid and infertile land. May Allah grant you my dear
Muslim brothers, sisters and children the steadfastness and sincerity in your
quest to have the ability to maintain that strong connection with Him through
the Zikrullah. Ameen.
--- Friday Sermon of 18 March 2016 ~(08
Jamad’ul Aakhir 1437 Hijri) delivered by Khalifatullah Hadhrat Munir Ahmad Azim Saheb (atba) of Mauritius.