The value of the baatin

There is body and soul and when the soul leaves the body, no one keeps it for this is the value of a baatini (unseen)The importance of spiritual purification  thing. O honorable ones! There is a baatini life and baatini deeds and in absence of these, the physical body remains futile. Just like a body is worthless without the soul, the physical deeds remain worthless without baatini purification. Say a person is praying zuhr salah in a very beautiful manner but there is riyaa (show off) inside him and this will make his act worthless. A man is spending lakhs and millions of rupees in constructing Masjid, hospitals and so on but this zaahiri (outer) deed has no value because of the baatini disease. That is why I am saying just as a physical body has no value without soul even if it is very beautiful, the zaahiri aamaal (deeds that are apparent) are worthless until the baatin is purified. The words sufi, tasawwuf has become like the word siyaasi (politician). Call anyone a politician, he takes it offensive. The word sufi is to do with a purified man and it comes from the word “saaf” meaning pure. The moment one hears the word politician, he thinks about him to be a corrupt and a liar immediately and so has become the word sufi for he thinks of a person with a long tasbih (rosary) with big beads in his hand, wearing amulet and a long jubbah (toga) who knows amaliyaat and wazeefahs. No, this is not correct.

The importance of purification of heart

A sufi used to be the one whose baatin is pure. Similarly the real meaning of siyaasi is the one who takes responsibility for the reformation of a certain thing and this can be a house, an organization or a whole region. And the Prophet ﷺ gave the meaning of siyaasi to be the one who doesn’t deceive or is deceived. So is the word tasawwuf, the real meaning of which is purification of baatin. A pious person is not necessarily the knower of baatin and someone has to tell him if he has pride, vanity, jealousy etc. Sometimes he may not know the condition of these diseases in his heart and he has to consult a spiritual doctor to check if he has any of these spiritual diseases. A patient may not know what sort of disease he has, its level and its severity and the only thing he knows is he is not doing well. The doctor then takes an X-ray scan and says he has such and such problem and this is the cure. O honorable ones! Sometimes a person might be performing salah and fasting for 40 years but he might not feels its effect as it is not getting accepted because of the disease inside him which he would have never speculated like malice in his heart. He might have completed his farz salah but he is not getting its fruits and barakah. As mentioned in the previous sermon, squandering is a sin but no one repents for it. Once our beloved Prophet ﷺ told Anas bin Malik  with so much of love, “O my dear son, if you are able to pass day and night without finding any faults in others then definitely do so for this is my sunnah and whoever gives life to my sunnah has loved me. And whoever loved me will be with me in jannah”

The evil consequence of rancor

Definitely it is very difficult to keep the heart clean and to tell the truth offering nafil salah throughout the night is easier than keeping the heart clean but we do not strive enough and if we strive, there is a hope in Allah ﷻ. The purity of baatin is the real thing because of which one gets progress in zaahiri amals (deeds) and its acceptance. Allah ﷻ commands us to adopt the forgiving nature, enjoin good speech and to turn away from the ignorant. Our Prophet ﷺ said, “Do not have rancor for each other”. In anger if one doesn’t have enough strength to take revenge on someone, a feeling of resentment occurs towards that person, which is called as vindictiveness or rancor. And the source of this is anger is pride and vanity. Rancor is not just the result of anger, a sin in itself but also the origin of many diseases and the heart yearns that the person finds loss in some way, gets humiliated and disgraced. As the rancor is the origin of many evils, one gets these sorts of thoughts and he doesn’t leave any opportunity to backbite him. When anger doesn’t leave one’s heart, it keeps developing into hatred and rancor is to earnestly wish for one’s detriment and to be a malevolent. By chance, if one has evil and baleful thoughts for someone in his heart and also strives not to act on that and if one doesn’t wish to meet a person from whom he hears words causing grief, this is not necessarily rancor. These are those things that should be consulted with a skilled spiritual reformer about his heart condition to know if he has rancor or not.

The baatini reformation doesn’t happen just like that

If one doesn’t like to meet a person but doesn’t have any animosity towards him or wishes for his detriment, this is not rancor. Sometimes one may not like to meet a person thinking talking to him might result in backbiting or he thinks his own evils might affect the other person, and again this is not rancor. The rancor has its own realism and if one is doubtful of his state, he has to check with a spiritual doctor if he has this disease or not. A person worries about his islaah only when he realizes the severity of rancor or any spiritual disease in his heart and finds its burden. When a person feels some uneasiness in his heart, knowing its severity, he runs to the doctor immediately irrespective of the fact he has some serious heart problem or not and when the doctor says he has just some gastric problem, he finds relief. Here one knows the severity of heart related diseases which make him restless. So when one realizes how dangerous is the disease of rancor, only then he will worry if he has this disease or not. I really wish Allah ﷻ makes us realize the severity of baatini diseases like those of physical diseases. The main thing is the elimination of baatini diseases. As far as physical change like wearing topi or growing beard, one will accomplish it by a single bayaan (sermon) or when one finds a pious company while these inner characteristics get changed as we keep on changing ourselves and the inner diseases goes away as we keep on progressing. Outwardly we might appear religious but when people get close to us thinking us to be pious, they start thinking it is better for them to move away from us and this is because of our inner diseases which results in no deeni attraction in us. So one gets a zaahiri change promptly but this baatin takes time as we keep striving and striving to purify our hearts from malice, wishing bad for others and so on.

The difference between having rancor for deen and dunya

Our beloved Prophet ﷺ said that our deeds are presented before Allah ﷻ on Mondays and Thursdays and Allah ﷻ forgives all those who seek His ﷻ forgiveness but the people of rancor do not attain salvation even in these days. You can realize the severity of this sin. In fact a person keeps praying during blessed times in the morning and evening, in the month of Ramadhaan and during laylatul qadr but his duaas are sent back as they reach the heavens because of rancor and malice in his heart. Now think how severe is this disease. Sometimes a person goes for hajj, does umrah and even remains wakeful during night in prayers but his duaas are not accepted because of having rancor in his heart. How worst is this disease! It is said that two men are not forgiven until there is animosity and rancor between them provided the reason for animosity is worldly affairs. If there is rancor towards a munaafiq or a kafir because of deen, he becomes my brother as he accepts deen and abandons innovations and keeping shirk with Allah ﷻ. athillatin Alalmumineena a’izzatin Alalkafireena. (They are)humble towards the believers, stern towards the disbelievers-Al Quran 5:54.Being stern towardsdisbelievers is the sign of eemaan and having rancor because of kufr or innovation is desirable but it is wrong to have rancor for worldly things which is the case with majority of us, sometimes related to business or family’s customs or traditions or related to gift items. We are of attitude that we will behave just like the other behaved with us. Let Allah ﷻ keep our hearts pure.

O honorable ones! We work really hard praying nafil salah, reciting Quran, doing zikr, giving charity and making duas but if we have filth along with it, there is no enjoyment and all our hard work gets ruined. One does so much of deeds that he gets exhausted but he is still heading towards the hell fire because of the evil of baatin. Let our hearts become pure. If one has animosity towards anyone because of deen instead of worldly things, this is undoubtedly an admirable rewarding act. Loving and hating for sake of Allah ﷻ, giving and buying for sake of Allah ﷻ are the signs of perfection of eemaan. Today our attitude is like if anyone says something to us, there is no sign of good left for him and we keep rancor in the heart and when Allah’s ﷻ laws are violated, we do not bother, there is no kink on our foreheads and no reaction can be seen from us. His own self is bigger for him but not the true One ﷻwho is the deserving. Loving and hating someone for sake of Allah ﷻ is a praiseworthy characteristic and it comes in a hadith that on the Day of resurrection Allah ﷻ will say, “Where are my slaves who loved each other purely for My sake; today I will shade them under my arsh”.

The two levels of love of Allah ﷻ

Keep this is in mind, after eemaan there are two levels of love of Allah ﷻ. The first level is you love someone from whom you achieved something which is very beneficial in the akhirat. This love is also for Allah ﷻ. For example, one is loving his teacher, a spiritual guide, a religious scholar because of whom he got that which is beneficial for his akhirat like a student obtaining religious knowledge from his teacher and thus loving him, a disciple finding ways of his spiritual reformation from his sheikh and thus loving him and also the love of a teacher for his student because he is the land cultivating good deeds for him in the akhirat and the love of sheikh for those having islaahi talluq (having contact for spiritual reformation) with him by the blessings of whom he gets more rewards in the akhirat. The ilm becomes a sadaqah-e-jaariya (continuous charity) because one gets reward in association of this ilm for a very long time when people keep benefitting from it and thus becoming very beneficial in the akhirat. When these are all for the sake of Allah ﷻ without the world being purported then inshaaAllah one will be fortunate enough to get the shade of arsh in the akhirat.

The other level which is greater than this level is to love someone just because he is the beloved of Allah ﷻ without seeking even the deeni benefits. He gets benefited from him or not, he loves him just because he is the beloved of Allah ﷻ. This level is superior to the first one. Slowly and slowly this talluq based on love of Allah ﷻ becomes so strong that it not just tames their nafs but they start preferring the people of Allah ﷻ over themselves like just how one gets worried with something, he gets worried when the people of Allah ﷻ become worried, he gets hurt when they get hurt, he wishes good and peace for them just like he wishes for himself. Depending on the preference over oneself and its strength, he will get progression in perfection. Similar is the case of rancor and one should have animosity towards those who are disobedient to Allah ﷻ and those who are fortunate to get this level of Allah ﷻ, their state so becomes that they abandon even sitting and talking with the disobedient ones and when they get to see their faces, they close their eyes.  Our beloved Prophet ﷺ prayed to Allah ﷻ, “O Allah! Don’t let any faasiq to have favor on me so I don’t get love for him in my heart for his favor”. Even if one contacts such a person, it is merely because he comes towards deen, abandons sins and gets the tawfeeq for repentance. This is desirable and has its own space to the extent even the Prophet ﷺ went to the house of a jew and preached his child but there is no love. For deeni and daawat (invitation to Islam) purpose there is a room but there is no love. Some say my so and so friend, my qaadiani friend when he is not even a Muslim. How come he is your friend when only a Muslim can be your friend? This very sentence is wrong.

The sign of weak eemaan

Yes we are having good relation with someone so he comes close to deen, gets affected by our akhlaaq, accepts Islam, abandons sins and repents to Allah ﷺ for this is what it matters for us. This sort of treatment can be with anyone be a hindu or a sikh or a christian. There was a pious elder who had so much hatred for English people and he also spent around 13 years in jail for rebelling against them. He had a hindu servant who used to clean his house and bathroom. Sometimes Hazrat makes him sit with him for meal and feeds him morsel with his own hands. He did this because he is weak and subdued and if he does him good, he might accept Islam which was the objective. So our beloved Prophet ﷺ prayed, “O Allah! Don’t let any faasiq to have favor on me so I don’t get love for him in my heart for his favor”. The one who doesn’t have this quality in him should know that he has a weak eemaan.

If one’s enemy or opponent meets some loss through someone and if he finds enjoyment in his heart because of this and rejoices this is defendable. Make duaa to Allah ﷻ to ward off this pleasure.  Now what is the cure for rancor? Whenever your enemy or opponent meets loss, think that the emerging thought of happiness can be eliminated and mindfully ward off that thought and make duaa for him and for yourself and inshaaAllah slowly the rancor and vindictiveness will come to an end. Sometimes instead of being revengeful when you get hurt by someone, it is better you say straight to him finding an appropriate time that you are hurt by his words because of which the heart will stay clean. People keep building words in heart and this gets burst out all of a sudden. So tell the person in an appropriate time that had he said in some other manner it would have been better because you were hurt by his words. Forgive the person for whom you have rancor and have communication with him even if you are inconvenient because inshaaAllah in few days the rancor will be removed from the heart. If you realize the severity of the disease, the cure is easy. The difficult patient is one who doesn’t have enough realization of the disease. inshaaAllah one will get a definite cure who has the realization of the disease and moreover as it is spiritually related, one will get more help from Allah ﷻ. Let Allah ﷻ purify our hearts from these diseases and keep it clean. Let Allah ﷻ help us all to act on what we hear, write and read. Ameen