BismillahirRahmanirRahim

Remembrance Of Death Is A Heavenly Knowledge

Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alamin. Wasalatu wa salamu ala rasulina Muhammadin wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajmain nahmadulllahu ta’ala wa nastaghfiruhu wa nashadu an-lailaha ilallahu wahdahu la sharika lah wa nashadu anna sayyidina Muhammadin abduhu wa habibuhu wa rasuluhu salallahu alayhi wa ala alihi wa azwajihi wa ashabihi wa atbaihi.

Khulafail Rashidin mahdin min ba’di wuzerail immeti alal tahkik. Khususan minhum alal amidi khulafai rasulillahi ala tahqeeq. Umara il mu’mineen. Hazreti abu bakr wa umar wa uthman wa ali. Wa ala baqiyati wa sahabai wa tabieen, ridwanallahu ta’ala alayhim ajmain.Ya ayyuhal mu’minun al hadirun, ittaqullaha ta’ala wa ati’uh. Inna allaha ma allathina-ttaqaw wal-lathina hum muhsinun.

Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. Wa Salatu wa Salamu ala Ashrafil Ambiya’i wa Imam al-Mursaleen, Sayyidina wa Mawlana Muhammadin wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajmain.

All praises are due to Allah, Lord of the Universes. All praises are due to Allah Who has the Beautiful Names. All praises are due to Allah Who has created everything, the One who sustains and provides for His creation. All praises are due to Allah Who created the Universes for the sake of His Beloved Prophet, Sayyidina Muhammad (asws).

And may all peace and blessings be upon the Master of the Prophets, the Leader of the Messengers, the Rider of the Buraq, the Imam of the Two Holy Places, the Lamp of Guidance, Sayyidina Muhammad (asws), and upon his noble family and blessed companions, especially upon the Four Khulafa-e-Rashideen, Hz. Abu Bakr el-Siddiq, Hz. Umar el-Faruq, Hz. Osman el-Ghani, and Hz. Ali el-Murtaza, and all those who follow them until the Last Day.

Ya Ayyuhal Mu’minoon! O Believers. Jummah Mubarek to you on this Day of Jummah in the Month of Zul Qaida, as we are one month away from the Day of Kurban. Welcome to those who are making preparations for the Hajj. Welcome to those who are living their lives according to saying “Labbayk Allahumma Labbayk.” According to the saying, “Here I am at Your service O my Lord. Here I am.”

O Believers! The life of this dunya is temporary, and it is coming to an end. Every day that passes, we come closer to our deaths. As our Sheykh, Sheykh Abdul Kerim el-Kibrisi el-Rabbani has taught us, we are prisoners between two breaths, and we do not know what the next minute it holds. Rasulallah (asws) is saying in his Hadith Sherif: Race to good actions as fast as you can. What are you waiting for except delayed poverty, oppressive wealth, debilitating illness, the weakness of old age, a swift death or the Dajjal? Or are you waiting for an unseen evil, or the Last Hour? The Last Hour will be most bitter and terrible.

So the time to act is now. And we have to take accounting of how we are using this breath of life that has been given to us. The Great friend of Allah, Hz. Hasan al-Basri (ks) is saying to us, ‘He among mankind who will receive the least judging on the Day of Judgment, is the one who judges his own self in the life of the world for Allah’s sake.’

He who makes tafakkur about his intentions and actions; if whatever he has intended is for Allah’s sake, he continues in it, otherwise he stops from doing it. Verily, the judgment on the Day of Judgment becomes heavy for those who were rushing in this life and did not hold themselves accountable. They will find that Allah has counted their deeds, including what equals to an atom worth. So the serious advice is coming down to us that we must make tafakkur about what we are doing, we must reflect and meditate on how we are spending our lives. And the choice in front of us is very clear. Either we make tafakkur and fix ourselves now, or we face a heavy judgment on the Last Day. An intelligent man will know which road he has to walk on. And if we are making tafakkur of our actions, then the most basic question that we must ask ourselves is this: How am I spending my time? Because the time, it is the currency of our lives. And how we are spending our time, that is how we are spending our life. The Proof of Islam, Imam al-Ghazali (ks) is saying: Your time is nothing other than your life, and your life is the capital that you make use of to reach Eternal Happiness in the Nearness of Allah (swt). Each of your breaths is a priceless jewel, since each of them is irreplaceable and, once gone, can never be retrieved. Do not be like the deceived fools who are happy because each day their wealth increases while their life shortens. What good is an increase in wealth when life grows shorter and shorter? Therefore be happy only for an increase in knowledge or in good works, for they are your two companions who will stay with you in your grave when your family, wealth, children and friends stay behind.

So now, we have to ask ourselves the question: How should we be spending our time. And if we look for this answer in the world, from Muslims to non-Muslims, from eastern people to western people, we are going to find so many theories, so many answers, how to spend our time. But one thing that 21st century people are all saying is, we have to be busy with education. We have to be busy with going to school. We have to be busy with getting bachelors, masters, phD, this diploma, that diploma. And they take the Hadiths of the Holy Prophet (asws) where he is saying, ‘Seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave, and Seek knowledge even if you have to go to China.’ They use these Hadith they tell the Muslims, go and study to become doctors. Go and study to become engineers. Go and study to become bankers. Go and study to become lawyers. Go and learn every dunya knowledge. Run, it is a religious obligation, they say, become expert in that knowledge, and spend your breath of life in it until you die.

But is this what the Holy Prophet (asws) is speaking about? Was the Holy Prophet (asws) speaking about every kind of knowledge in this Hadith? Was he speaking about the dunya knowledge in this Hadith? Or was he speaking about a very specific kind of knowledge? The enemies of Islam, they tricked the 21st century Muslims by using the words of the Holy Prophet (asws) against to us. They know the Love that the believers have for the word of their Rasul, so they said, knowledge means every knowledge. Knowledge means dunya knowledge. You see, the reason you are backward is because you don’t have dunya knowledge. So now, learn our language. Learn our culture. Learn our science. Learn from our educational system that teaches you there is no Creator, that man comes from monkeys. Learn from our universities that are going to teach you that your Prophet is, hasha Astagfirullah, that he is a fake one. Learn from our colleges that are going to take your faith away and turn you into our slaves because of the debt you owe us. And they fooled us into thinking that is the knowledge Rasulallah (asws) commanded us to seek.

Of course, we must seek the dunya knowledge. We must seek knowledge, but not useless knowledge that doesn’t give us benefit. Especially not knowledge that is going to harm us, or that is going to destroy this world, destroy the people and destroy our faith. Yes, there are many knowledges out there that destroy our faith. There are many knowledges out there that destroy this world. The Holy Prophet (asws) is saying in a Hadith Sherif: The sign that Allah does not love a person is that he is busy with Malayani, knowledge that does not concern him. And he is saying in another Hadith, knowledge from which no benefit is derived is like a treasure out of which nothing is spent in the cause of Allah.

Are we saying that medicine, engineering, and all these knowledges are not important? Only an ignorant person will say that we come to that conclusion. What we are saying is that being busy only with an educational system that is constructed by the enemies of Allah to make us lose our faith, that is going to harm us and our children and this world, that is going to harm our faith. Of course we need the dunya knowledges. And 21st century Muslims all forgot that Islam for thirteen hundred years it has been the one who is most advance in dunya knowledge. We need dunya knowledge but we have to remember that kind of knowledge it is only for this dunya. They are for a temporary world that is going to end. There is another kind of knowledge that is going to benefit us in this life and the Hereafter. No, this is not just to read all the Hadith, to read all the books of Fiqh, and to carry them on our backs like donkeys, no. Even religious knowledge, it can become a veil between us and Allah (swt) if it is colored by arrogance, if it is corrupted by dunya, if it is corrupted by our nafs. So there is a knowledge beyond that which is learned in books and classrooms, and that is the Heavenly Knowledge, which is fresh and alive.

So what is the Heavenly Knowledge that Holy Prophet (asws) wants us to be busy with? Hz. Ibn Umar (ra) once asked the Holy Prophet (asws), Ya Rasulallah, who is the wisest of people? And he replied (asws), ‘The one who mentions and remembers death the most, and the one who prepares for his death the most; these are the wise ones; they gain the glory of this life and the honor of the Hereafter.’ So it is knowledge of death. Because the knowledge of death will make us to think what kind of life we are living. Because the knowledge of death will make us to think what kind of life we want to continue after this world. But who is teaching that kind of knowledge now? Who is making people to remember their death?

If we go to the so-called circles of knowledge today, whether they are from the Wahhabis, to the “Sufis,” to the Shia, to any group, we find that nobody is mentioning death. In fact, they get upset if you remember death. They say, ‘oh that is so depressing, that is so morbid. That is too dark. That is so negative. Talk about nice things. Talk about the gardens of paradise. Talk about High Stations. Talk about the secrets of numbers. Talk about unconditional love.’ That is what they are busy with. But the one certainty that is in front of all of us, Muslims or non-Muslim, believers or unbeliever, that one certainty is death.

The friends of Allah are saying, don’t sit in gatherings that make you feel so nice and comfortable and safe. Hz. Hasan al-Basri (ra) says, ‘By Allah! If you associate with someone who makes you afraid, so that you earn safety, it is better than associating with someone who makes you feel safe, because in this situation, disaster might touch you.’ These are not our words. They are the words of the one who was authorized to speak by Shah-i-Mardan Hz. Ali (kw).

And Elhamdulillah, we are following the Inheritor of that Tradition who is reminding us of death and making us to be worried about our Ahiret. We are following our Sheykh, Sahib el-Sayf Sheykh Abdul Kerim el-Kibrisi el-Rabbani (ks). What are his sohbets? What are his sohbets other than a reminder that this dunya is a prison, that death is coming, and that we must prepare for Ahiret. What are his Sohbets except telling us to run to please Allah and His Prophet? He is giving us the same words and the same advice that was given by the Holy Prophet (asws), by the Sahaba-e-Kiram, by the Evliyaullah, because he is their Inheritor, and he is one of the most rare inheritor that has ever come to this world especially in this ahir zaman. He is saying (ks): We have to think and we have to look at ourselves. We entered through one door in this world and we’re going to go out through another door. Everyday that is passing, everyday that is approaching is not bringing a new day to us but it’s bringing us one more step closer to our grave, to our death. It’s taking one more day away from our lives.

We have to look at yesterday. How did we live yesterday? What did we do yesterday? Did we live for Allah’s sake or we ran only for ourselves, for our ego? If we lived for Allah’s sake then definitely today has to be better than yesterday. Has to be! If you’re living today for Allah’s sake then tomorrow must be better than today. It cannot be any other way because Allah (swt) is saying, `Your Akhir is better than what’s before when you’re holding tightly to the orders of Allah.’ Later what it’s bringing to you is even better. And the Holy Prophet (asws) is saying, `The believer who’s keeping the orders of Allah and His Prophet (asws), his today is better than yesterday and tomorrow must be better than today.’ We must check. Check yourselves, what you do and why you do? Is it better? If it’s better then be happy. You have to be happy anyway. Nobody has to tell you. You are happy. If it’s not better then be sad to yourself. Nobody did it. You did it to yourself because it’s there and the Holy Prophet (asws) is ordering, `If you keep this way it’s going to be better. If you don’t then it’s going to be worse. Everyday is going to become worse to you.’

O Believers! That choice is right in front of us. Either we can live like Believers, or we can live like animals. And the way of being a Believer, it is the way of running after that knowledge that will be benefiting us in this life and the next. That Knowledge, it is the Heavenly Knowledge, and it is a treasure in the hands of the Friends of Allah. O Believers! Run to be in their Companionship- it is safety in this life and the next.

Jumma Khutba by Sheykh Lokman Efendi Hz,
Khalifah of SahibulSaif Shaykh Abdulkerim el Kibrisi (qs),
OSMANLI DERGAHI- New York
9 Zul Qaida 1437
August 12, 2016.