One of the important teachings of Islam is that when we make our ibadat we must always try our best, as I’ve said on so many occasions, to make it لِلّٰهِ تَعَالٰى (lillahi ta’ala: for the sake of Allah).  Because we are human beings and as the Qur’an says we have been created weak, we sometimes do things so that other people can hear us, other people can see us and other people can know what we are doing.  They call that riya’ in Islam.  There is a hadith (Prophetic Tradition) of Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ) in which he mentions that even if there is an atom weight of riya’ in one’s ibadat, those ibadat are rejected by Allah Almighty.  Now this shows that the line between riya’ and ikhlas is very narrow, extremely narrow.  One can go from the one state to the other so fast.  One might be doing

It does not matter what we do as Muslims, whether we are praying, whether we are fasting, whether we are making du’a, whether we are making dhikr, whatever the case might be, whatever our behaviour might be as Muslims, there’s always just one law that applies and that is the Divine Law, the Law that Allah has sent through the Qur’an and through the Sunnah. This combined law that we call the Divine Law and that comes through the Qur’an and the Sunnah of Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ), we refer to as the Shari’ah. Now there are some people that refer to the word Shari’ah as those laws applicable to our ibadat and our person to person and social relationships. There is one scholar who says that the Shari’ah is everything that Allah has revealed to Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ), everything with regard to all matters. We should memorize that definition because

   I first want to tell you a little story before I come to what I want to speak to you about.  About two years ago [2004] there was a big meeting in the Railway Institute in Salt River.  It was an anti-drug meeting.  One of the drug-lords from Salt River was there.  And at the end of the meeting he went onto the stage and he told the people that he sells drugs but he doesn’t tell people to come and buy them from him.  He insisted that the people could not blame him for the fact that there is a drug problem in Salt River.  This story is very important for our understanding of what I’m going to speak about.    Let me first of all take you back, right back to the time when Allah created the cosmos, the whole universe.  He created the cosmos with the

I have been thinking since last night what I must speak to you about this morning.  I am going to say a very strange thing to you.  I will explain it to you as I go along.  It came to me that I should speak to you about the “I phenomenon”.  I will explain that as I go along. The letter “I” is a first person pronoun.  I don’t know if you remember your English from high school.  It is perhaps the word that is used the most by many of us and it is one of the most destructive things for our spiritual development.  We say: I did that, I achieved this, I entered tariqah, I worked hard, I obtained that, we speak like that all the time.  Most of the time the way we speak has to do with what “I” have done: I have received that. I

There are so many things!  In Suratul Fatihah Allah Almighty invites us to a major spiritual feast, a major spiritual banquet. But He says we must ask Him for that. We cannot just assume that it would be given. It says in the Qur’an: “Ask Me,” and in Suratul Fatihah Allah Almighty tells us to ask Him the greatest possible grant that He can give to any human being. This is part of the importance of this surah because in this surah Allah Almighty tells us: “I have set for you as my servant, as of the Nation of Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ), the highest possible goal for spiritual achievement. This is not a low goal, not an ordinary goal. This is the highest possible aspiration because I have placed you in this ummah and I have granted to you Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ), My most beloved and My most honoured Prophet,

   Allah Almighty says that all strength and power belong to Him.  What we think are our strengths and power is nothing.  We have imagination with regard to ourselves.  We think that we have power and strength and the nation thinks that it has power and strength.  Muslims say no!  Muslims say: لاَ حَوْلَ وَ لاَ قُوَّةَ إِلاَّ بِاللهِ العَلِيِّ الْعَظِيْمِ (La hawla wa la quwwata illa billahil aliyyil azim: There is no power or strength except with Allah, the Most High, the Most Powerful).  This verse, this statement, is one of the treasures of the Jannah, according to a hadith from Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ).     But that is not what I wanted to speak about to you today.  We must appeal very passionately to Allah Almighty and ask Him to make us pious people.  Piety is the only thing that has any real meaning here and in the Hereafter. 

All of us or most of us must have heard the word karamat.  We here in Cape Town usually use the word kramat to refer to the grave of a Wali or the Wali himself but I am talking about something else.  I am talking about miracles that are performed by very, very pious people.  Many people say that this is nonsense, and that people hallucinate or imagine that those things have happened. Well, they may have their views. We know of course of the miracles performed by the Prophets (a.s.) and Messengers (a.s.) and we refer to those as mu’jizat.  These were not things that were always deliberately performed. Many times they were performed as a matter of course.  I do not want to talk about the miracles of the Prophets (a.s.) and Messengers (a.s.).  I want to come to something else, about very pious people who can perform

O My Lord! I declare to Thee, O My Lord!  I declare to Thee that there is no god other than Thee, and I declare to Thee, O Allah, that Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ) is Thy Messenger.  He is the most honoured, most beloved by Allah. That is what the Shahadah means. I don’t want to talk about that. I want to talk about something else.  In the time of Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ) there was a Sahabah, Sayyiduna Abu Dhar (r.a.). He was very well-known, a very pious man. Once he had a quarrel with Sayyiduna Bilal (r.a.). He was also very well known, very pious. During the quarrel he remarked to Sayyiduna Bilal (r.a.) about his blackness. Sayyiduna Bilal (r.a.) was very upset with Sayyiduna Abu Dhar (r.a.).  He went to Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ) and complained to him: “Ya Rasullallah, Assalamu alayka. Abu Dhar (r.a.) remarked to me about my

After the demise of Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ), Sayyiduna Abu Bakr (r.a.) took over as the ruler of the Muslims.  He was called Khalifatu Rasulillah.  When he passed away, he was succeeded by Sayyiduna Umar (r.a.).  He was the first one to receive the title Amirul mu’minin.  Nabi Muhammad (ﷺ) when speaking about Sayyiduna Umar (r.a.) said that if there had to be any Prophet after him, it would have been Sayyiduna Umar (r.a.).  He was such an intensely pious person with major leadership qualities.  In any case, one day he was standing on the minbar in Madinah delivering the Jumu’ah khutbah when he stopped suddenly and called out: “Ya Sariyah! Ya Sariyah! Al-jabal! Al-jabal” (O Sariyah! O Sariyah!  The mountain, the mountain).  Sariyah, the general of the Muslim army was in Persia (Iran) at that time, thousands of kilometers away.  Sayyiduna Umar (r.a.) called him.  The voice of Sayyiduna Umar

As you know that about 30 of us were in Lefke (in 2005), and most of us had just arrived back a few days ago.  And I think that all of us will say again that we had an unusual, wonderful experience to be with one of the most pious people on earth.  Mawlana Shaykh Nazim is considered by other Awliya’ as the Sultanul Awliya’, as perhaps the greatest Wali in the world today.  And to be able to sit with him and talk to him and greet him and kiss his hand, and eat with him, was one of the rare privileges we had when we went over there.  I don’t want to go into detail with all the things that happened but there were some very good things that occurred. I want to mention some of these things to you. First of all, of course, every night we