Bismillahi rahmani raheem assalamu alaikum.
I received the following Question:
Salaamu Alayka ya shaykh. Briefly read your “Answers to Questions by the Shuyukh of Tasawwuf”. I wanted to ask, if it’s not to bold to do so, when did you recognise that your training was through the method you described, events happening in your life, and how did you recognise that? I believe this answer could assist me in understanding myself further, however it is Allah SWT who deems whether I should receive this knowledge or not. (End of Quote)
Allah made it very clear from the start, the first 20 years of my life Allah tested me through trials, when my heart withstood those at the age of 20 in a dream He took me on a miraj accompanied by two Mala’ikat al Kursi to see Rasul Allah (saws) at the place of the resurrection, there He placed knowledge in my heart and then I was asked to stand in a silsila of Naqshbandi Shuyukh, which was both my initiation into the Tariqah and elevation to that rank of shaykh in it. (End Quote)
I am going to quote something from the Naqshbandi Tariqah that will help you see what I saw after 15 years of further training at the hands of Allah:
The aspirant may feel himself to be flying towards the heavenly goals, beholding the wonders of the mysterious and hidden aspects of creation.
If your eyes have been thus opened, and if you are greatly enamored of the wide vistas you have beheld, then be warned. Should you embark upon the Naqshbandi path, your colorful plumage will be clipped and replaced with the humble cloak of obscurity. For the main difference between the Naqshbandi Way and others is that while they are giving, we are taking away. Everything must go, even your separate existence. First you will be without anything, then you will be nothing. Only those who are prepared to take such a step can be real Naqshbandi murids. As long as a drop is falling from the heavens, it may be called a drop. When it falls into the ocean, it is no longer a drop, it is the ocean.
If anyone is interested in spiritual stations and powers, he may attain them through following any of the forty Sufi paths, as these ways are quite efficacious. Through the recitation of the most beautiful names of Allah everyone receives bountifully in accordance with his intention. In the end, however, the sincere seeker will be struck with remorse if he becomes fixated at the stage of stations and states. One day he will perceive how he has fallen victim to distraction and say: “Oh my Lord, I have been wasting myself and my efforts on something other than you.”
Should a seeker’s life end while he is in those states, he will regret that they distracted him from seeking the Divine Countenance of His Lord. Therefore, GrandShaykhs have been ordered to strip their followers of their spiritual adornments, so that they may be presented to their Lord in perfect lowliness: “This is your servant, oh our Lord; accept him. He is lost to himself and exists only for You.” This is their top priority, and helping their followers attain such a reality is their duty.
It is understood by all orders that the strange and enchanting experiences are the scenery of the journey, not the goal. The goal is to reach his Divine Presence by the attraction of the Beloved Himself. The Holy Prophet Muhammad (s) is the Guide and Example. On His miraculous Night Journey, in which He was conducted by the Angel Gabriel (s) first from Makkah to Jerusalem and then up to the Seven Heavens and into the Divine Presence, he passed trough the whole universe. Allah Almighty informs us in the Holy Qur’an that the Prophet’s vision “neither swerved nor wavered” [53:2]. In other words, he looked and beheld but never let those sights distract him from ascending towards his most Exalted Destination. The Holy Prophet was able to behold those sights without being distracted because His Heart was only for His Lord. He was the Beloved of Allah. As for ourselves, we are vulnerable and weak-willed. Those experiences and attainments may accord with our ego’s desires, whereas annihilation is never an attractive proposition for the ego.
Therefore, in order to provide maximum protection, the Naqshbandi Masters take a different approach to the unveiling of the heart’s eye. There are 70,000 veils between us and the Station of the Prophet (s). A Naqshbandi Master rends these veils in descending order, starting with those closest to the Divine Presence and then successively downwards towards the level of the murid. This process continues throughout the training of the murid, until there is but one veil, the Veil of Humanity (hijab al-bashariyya), restraining the murid‘s vision from contemplation of the Divine Reality. In order to protect the murid from attraction to something other than his Lord, however, the GrandShaykh does not rend that last veil until the murid reaches the highest state of perfection, or until his final seven breaths on his deathbed.
If the veils are removed from the bottom up by means of mystical practices, the murid beholds a succession of new panoramas. That very vision may keep him from progressing.
http://naqshbandi.org/practices/dhikr/the-naqshbandi-way-of-dhikr/
This work is an outline of life in the tariqah, when you read that you recognized your own life in it at the hands of Allah, as I did. People often need others to help them be responsible but a few are responsible by their own account, the later can follow the ways of Allah more easily.
“And (as for) those who strive hard for Us, We will most certainly guide them in Our ways; and Allah is most surely with the perfectionists (Muhsinun).” (29:69)
Al Khaidr was one such person, Allah mentions his story in the Quran, people who receive the Tariqah like myself are trained in such a way.
People often think Allah mentioned the story to teach people about Musa (as) but the point was to tell people Allah has servants like al Khidr (as) who He trains himself, the last of such people will be Imam Mahdi (as) who Allah will elevate in a single night, that means Allah will make the openings of his heart so he can see properly in one night.
If you ask a blind man to describe the ocean from what he has read and another person from what he has seen, whose description will be more accurate? this is how uneducated companions who have never seen a university can know Islam at every level better than a Mujtahid Imam who has memorized every work ever written.
What was the education of al Khidr (as) to be more knowledgeable than Musa (as) who was educated by the Pharaoh of Egypt and Gabriel (as), Maarifah and Kashf from Allah directly, Allah speaking to a persons heart is better than an Angel speaking to you because that knowledge is being placed directly in your soul.
Shaykh Rami Al Rifai.