The eighth chapter of the fourth part, beginning on the five hundred and eighth page of the India-1281-hijrî-year edition, of the book Kimyâ-i-sa’âdat, the Persian original by Imâm-i Muhammad Ghazâlî, has been translated literally and written below:
Another grade which those who appoach Allâhu ta’âlâ pass through is tawakkul, and its grade is very high. Yet tawakkul is
difficult and delicate to learn. And it is even more difficult to practise it. For, if a person thinks that someone other than Allâhu ta’âlâ affects actions and deeds, his tawhîd will be defective. If he says there is no need for any causes, he will have deviated from the Sharî’at. If he says that it is unnecessary to put the causes in between, he will have been unreasonable. If he says that they are necessary, he will have put his tawakkul (trust) in the one who has prepared the causes, a case which shows a defect in tawhîd. As it is seen, tawakkul should be understood in such a manner as to agree with both mind and the Sharî’at and tawhîd. Such an understanding requires deep knowledge. Then, not everybody can understand it. We shall first
clarify the value of tawakkul, then explain what it means, and then prescribe how to obtain it.
The virtue of tawakkul: Allâhu ta’âlâ has commanded everybody to have tawakkul and declared, “Tawakkul is a requirement for îmân.” It is purported in the sűra of Mâida: “If you have îmân, put your tawakkul in Allâhu ta’âlâ.” In the sűra of ’Imrân: Certainly Allâhu ta’âlâ likes those who have tawakkul.” In the sűra of Talâq: “If a person puts his tawakkul in Allâhu ta’âlâ, Allâhu ta’âlâ is sufficient for him.” In the sűra of
Zumar: “Isn’t Allâhu ta’âlâ sufficient for His born slave?” And there is many an âyat like these.
Once Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ said, “They showed me some of my Ummat. They covered mountains and saharas. I was surprised and pleased to see that they were so many. ‘Are you pleased?’ they said, and I said, ‘Yes, I am.’ They said, ‘Only seventy thousand of these will go to Paradise without any questioning.’ ‘Which ones,’ I asked. ‘They are the ones who do not mix their deeds with sorcery, spell, incantation or augury, and who do not put their tawakkul and trust in anybody besides Allâhu ta’âlâ.” Uqâsha ‘radiyallâhu anh’, who was among the listeners, stood up and said, “O Rasűlullâh! Pray for me so that I shall be one of them.” So Rasűlullah prayed, “O my Allah! Include him
among them!” But when someone else stood up and asked for the same prayer, he stated, “Uqâsha has forestalled you.”
He stated in another hadîth, “If you put your tawakkul in Allâhu ta’âlâ thoroughly, He would send your sustenance as He sends it to the birds. Birds go out with empty, hungry stomachs in the morning and come back with their stomachs filled, satiated in the evening.” He stated in a hadîth, “If a person trusts himself to Allâhu ta’âlâ, Allâhu ta’âlâ will come to his help in his every
deed. He will send him food from places which he does not expect at all. If anyone trusts the world, He will leave him in the world.” When Hadrat Ibrâhim was put on the catapult and was about to be hurled into the fire, he said, “Hasbiyallah wa ni’mal wakîl,” which means “My Allah will suffice for me. He is a good guardian, a good helper.” As he fell into the fire Hadrat Gabriel (Jebrâil) came to him and asked, “Do you have any wish?” “Yes, I do, but not from you,” he said. Thus, he proved true to the word “Hasbiyallah.” Therefore, he was praised in the sűra of Wannajmi: “Ibrâhim, a man of his word.” Allâhu ta’âlâ declared to Hadrat Dâwűd: “If a person gives up hope of everything and puts his trust in Me only, I shall certainly rescue him even if all the beings on earth
and in heaven strive to harm and deceive him.” Sa’îd bin Jubayr narrates: “Once a scorpion stung me on the hand. My mother adjured me to hold out my hand so that they would utter an incantation, that is, lots of absurd words. I held out my other hand, so they chanted some incantatiton.” Sa’îd did not hold out his hand because Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ had stated, “A person who practises incantation or who cauterizes with fire has not put his tawakkul in Allâhu ta’âlâ.” Hadrat Ibrâhim Ad’ham ‘quddisa sirruh’ asked a priest, “How do you make a living?” The other replied, “Ask the One who sends my sustanence whence He sends it. I don’t know.” Someone was asked, “You pray everyday. What do you eat and drink?” He showed his
teeth in answer. That is, “He who makes the mill will send its water,” he meant to say. Haram bin Hayyân asked Uways Qarnî [who is also called Waysalqarânî], “Where shall I settle?” “In Damascus,” he answered. When the former asked, “I wonder how the life standard in Damascus is?” the latter said, “Shame upon those hearts who doubt about their sustenance! Advice will do them no good!”
Tawakkul is something which the heart will do, and it originates from îmân. There are various kinds of îmân. But tawakkul is based upon two of them. These are the îmân in tawhîd and the îmân in the muchness of Allah’s favour and mercy.
Tawhîd, the basis of tawakkul: It will take a long time to explain tawhîd, and the knowledge of tawhîd is the last one of all the branches of knowledge. Here, we shall describe it only as far as necessary for tawakkul. Tawhîd has four grades. That is, it has one kernel and one kernel of the kernel. And it has the shell and the shell’s shell. This means to say that it has two kernels and two shells. Tawhîd is like a fresh walnut. Everybody knows the two
shells of a walnut as well as its kernel. And the kernel of its kernel is its oil.
The first grade of tawhîd is to say “La ilâha il-lal lah” with the tongue only and not to believe it with the heart. So is the tawhîd of munâfiqs.
The second grade is the heart’s believing the meaning of this kalima-i tawhîd. This belief is either by seeing, hearing from others, e.g. the belief of us, the ignorant people, or one believes through proofs, with mind’s proving. So is the belief of the savants of dîn, of the masters of the knowledge of Kalâm.
The third grade: to see that one creator creates everything, to realize that all work is done by one agent only and that none else does anything. This seeing and understanding requires a nűr being lit in the heart. Such an îmân is unlike the îmân of the ignorant or of the savants of Kalâm. Their îmân is lîke a curtain put over the heart with the tricks of imitation and proving. But this seeing and realizing is the heart’s being opened and the curtain’s going up. For example, there are three kinds of believing that the resident of a house is in the house:
1 - To believe it by hearing someone say so. The îmân through imitation is a reminiscence of this.
2 - To believe by seeing the things used by the resident every day, such as his mount, his headgear and shoes in the house. This is an example for the îmân of the savants of Kalâm.
3 - To believe by seeing the resident in the house. This is an example for the tawhîd of ârifs. Though such tawhîd has a very high grade, its owner sees both the creatures and the Creator, and knows that they were created by the Creator. Since he sees the creatures, his tawhîd cannot be perfect.
The fourth grade: He sees one being. He does not see more than one. Men of tasawwuf call this state ‘Fanâ in tawhîd.’
Of the four grades above, the first one is the tawhîd of munâfiqs and is like the outer shell of a walnut. As the outer shell of a walnut is bitter and looks ugly from within though a lovely green from outside, and when burned it makes lots of smoke and puts the fire out and is useless except that it protects the walnut for a few days, so the munâfiq’s tawhîd has no other use than to protect him against death in the world. When the body rots away and the soul is left alone after death, it will be useless. The tawhîd of the ignorant and of the savants of Kalâm, the second grade, is like the wooden second shell of the walnut. As this wooden shell
of the walnut does not avail except to protect the walnut for a while, so this grade of tawhîd avails only in protecting one from Hell’s fire. The third grade is like the walnut’s kernel. The kernel is the useful part of the walnut, yet, when compared to the oil of the walnut, it will be seen that it only bears the sediment. What makes the third grade look like the sediment is the state of seeing creatures in this grade. The real tawhîd is in the fourth grade and nothing other than Allah is seen. One even forgets about oneself.
Question: It is difficult to attain to the fourth grade of tawhîd. How is it to see all the things as one being? We see various means and we see the earth, the sky, the creatures. Are all these the same one thing?
Answer: It is easy to understand the first, second and third grades of tawhîd. It is the fourth grade which is difficult to understand. Yet this kind of tawhîd is not necessary for tawakkul. It is difficult to describe it to someone who has not tasted it. Let me say briefly that many different things may be alike in one respect. Therefore, they may be thought of as the same one thing. Likewise, when an ârif sees all the things as the same one thing in one particular respect, he sees all of them as one thing. For example, there are such things as flesh, skin, head, feet, eyes, ears, stomach and lungs in man. But with respect to being human, they are all one body, and, when we think of a man we do not remember his different parts, but we think of thim as one body. When we are asked
what we are thinking of we say that we are thinking of nothing but one thing. When we see a man we say that we see no more than one body. There is such a grade of ma’rifat [knowledge] in tasawwuf that an ârif who reaches there sees all the things existing as related to one another in one respect. He sees various things in the world in one respect only, he finds it like the position of the man’s limbs with respect to his mind and soul. A person who does not understand the meaning of the hadîth, “Allâhu ta’âlâ created Adam in His own attributes,” cannot understand these words of ours. We have explained this hadîth a little at the beginning of the book Kimyâ-i sa’âdat. It would not be right to explain it any more. Mind could not comprehend it
and it would be misunderstood.
The third grade of tawhîd suffices for tawakkul. We have explained this grade of tawhîd at full length in our book Ihyâ-ul-’ulűm. You can read that. As we have said in the chapter about shukr (thanks) in the book Kimyâ-i sa’âdat, the sun, moon and stars, the clouds, the rain and the wind, and all the forces in
nature are under Allah’s will and command. They are like a pen in the writer’s hand. Nothing moves unless Allâhu ta’âlâ wishes it to. Then, it is not right to say that the work is done by the causes. It is like thinking that a director’s decree and command are from the paper and pencil. It is wrong to think that man has some authority in as much as he has will and option. For, Allâhu ta’âlâ, again, gives man option. Man does something with his power. And this power is dependent upon his option. But [according to the Ash’arî madhhab], his option wishes what it is created for. Since his option is not within his power, so his power, and what he does, is not within his power. For understanding this better, let us classify men’s actions in three groups:
1 - Natural [physical] movements, e.g. to sink when stepping on water.
2 - Involuntary actions, such as breathing.
3 - Optional actions. Talking, walking, etc.
The natural movements are not within man’s power. Like any object which is heavier than water, man will sink in water. As the stone’s sinking in water is not of its option, so man’s sinking is beyond his option.
So are the involuntary actions such as breathing. For, we cannot help breathing even if we do not want to breathe. The will to breathe happens automatically. If we thrust a pin at a person’s eye, he will close his eyes willy-nilly. He cannot help closing his eye. For, the will to close the eye will happen automatically at that moment. For some natural reasons like in sinking in water, the eye will be closed spontaneously. This comes to mean that men are compelled in their involuntary actions.
It is difficult to observe the optional actions such as talking and walking. Man does such actions if he wants to, and he does not if the does not want to. But man’s wishing to do something requires mind’s liking it and saying that it is good. In fact, after mind’s thinking for a while if it will be good or not and then deciding that it will be good, the wish happens compulsorily and the limbs start moving. Like the moving of the eye upon seeing the pin, the limbs spring into action. The mere difference is that the pin’s harm to the eye and the use of closing the eye are known every moment and without any need to think, the will happens, and from the will originates the power. Since there is no thinking here, the closing of the eye is like sinking in water. For instance, if they run after a person with a cudgel,
and if the person is
suddenly confronted with an abyss on his way, he will prefer the one which is less harmful. That is, if he thinks that jumping down into the abyss is less harmful than being battered, he will jump down and escape. If he thinks it is dangerous to jump down, the feet will stop willy-nilly, he will not be able to go any further. As it is understood, action is dependent upon will and will depends upon mind. As a matter of fact, if a person wants to kill himself, he cannot do it though he may be holding a pistol in his hand. For, the power that will make the hand move is dependent upon will and will depends upon mind. When mind says that it is good and useful, the will starts moving. But mind is not independent, either. Mind is likened to a mirror. The vision of something good is seen on mind’s
mirror. It is not seen if it is not useful. If a person faces some trouble that he cannot endure and thinks that death will be better, then it will be seen. The reason why such actions are called optional is because (they are done after) their benefits are seen. Otherwise, if their benefits are seen spontaneously, they will be compulsory like breathing and closing the eye. The compulsion of both will be like that of sinking in water. As it is seen, the causes are connected to one another. There are many links in the chain of causes. We have explained this in detail in our book Ihyâ-ul-’ulűm. The power which has been created in man is one of the links of this chain of causes. As it is understood, it is not right for a person to boast of having done something good. What falls to
his share from a good deed is no more than acting as a means. In other words, the option and power which are the causes for doing something useful have been created in him. Since power and option were not created in a tree, we say that the tree’s swaying in the wind is an indispensable and compulsory movement. When Allâhu ta’âlâ creates everything, His divine power is not dependent upon anything but Himself, so His deeds are called ihtirâ’, that is, creation. Man is not so; his power and will are dependent upon causes that are beyond his power and his deeds are unlike Allah’s; so man’s deeds are not called creation or ihtirâ’. However, man is unlike a tree. He contains power and will, which happen in him willy-nilly, so his deeds cannot be said to be compulsory, either. In order to distinguish them from both types
of deeds, the savants looked for another name, at last calling them kasb (acquiring). This means to say that though man’s deeds are done by him optionally, his option is not within his power. Then, he can do nothing.
[The Commandments of Allâhu ta’âlâ are classified into two
groups: awâmir-i taklîfiyya, awâmir-i takwîniyya. The first group includes His commandments and prohibitions enjoined on genies and human beings. Actions contained in the first group are willed and created by Him after they have been wanted and opted by men. The second ones are created immediately with their causes. All natural events are examples of this. The ripening of a fruit over a long process of time is a collection of events (each of) which He creates instantly.]
Question: Since man can do nothing, why should he be rewarded or tormented; and why were dîns and Sharî’ats sent down?
Answer: This question is called tawhîd in the Sharî’at and the Sharî’at in tawhîd. Many people were drowned here. Escaping its danger has fallen to the lot of only those who can float on this ocean or who can at least swim in it. The majority of people escaping the danger has been due to their not going into the ocean. Because ignorant people do not know how to swim, they should be pitied and protected from being drowned by not being left near the shore. In addition, they do not think of learning how to swim. Most of them drown and annihilate themselves by saying, “We can do nothing.
Allâhu ta’âlâ makes everything. A person predestinated as a shaqî, disbeliever, cannot change it no matter how hard he may try. And a person who has been predestinated as a sa’îd, for Paradise, does not need to work.” Such words are always the results of ignorance, of wrong reasoning. Though it is not proper to explain this subject by writing in books, we will explain it a little, since our words have taken this course.
In answer to the question, “What are thawâb and torment for?” we say: Torment is not someone’s hurting you in revenge for your having committed an evil deed. Nor is thawâb (reward) his rewarding you because he likes your deed. That day there will be nobody besides Allâhu ta’âlâ to revenge. As we call it illness when there is a change in man’s body because there is something wrong with his bile or because other harmful substances in his body have increased, and as we call it health when medicine has cured him, so a sort of fire falls into the soul when anger and lust increase in man. It is this fire that brings man to ruin. It is for this reason that a hadîth declares, “Wrath is a part of the fire of Hell.” As the light of mind extinguishes the fire of lust and anger when it
gets strong, so the nűr of îmân extinguishes the fire of Hell. As a matter of fact, Hell will say to Believers, “O Believer! Pass
quickly, or else your nűr will extinguish my fire” This statement will not be through sounds, but as water extinguishes fire so Hell, not standing against the Believer’s nűr, will go out. And the fire of lust will be extinguished with the light of mind. In the next world they will not bring your torment from some other place. As a matter of fact, it is declared, “Hell is nothing but the evil deeds you have done in the world. They are returned to you.” Then, the seed of Hell’s fire is man’s lust and wrath. They are inside man. He who knows through ’ilm-yaqîn can see this. As a matter of fact,
it is purported in the sűra of Takâsur, “If you knew through ’ilm-i yaqîn you would certainly see Hell.”
Poison makes man sick. And sickness puts him into the grave. But it cannot be said that poison and sickness become angry with man and revenge themselves on him. Likewise, sinning and lust make the heart sick. This sickness becomes the heart’s fire. This fire is of a kind of Hell-fire and is unlike worldly fire. As a magnet attracts pieces of iron, so Hell-fire attracts those who bear this fire. [It is not the anger or the revenge of Hell or of the Zabânîs of Hell, that is, the angels of torment.] So is the case with those who do (actions causing) thawâb. It would take a long time to explain.
[Allâhu ta’âlâ divided the works done by men into two. He said that He liked one part of it and would appreciate those who did them, and promised that He would grant blessings, comfort and goodness in reward for every effort made. The unit of goodness promised is called ajr or thawâb. Various amounts of rewards will be given in the Hereafter in recompense for every goodness done in this world. The place where blessings will be granted is called Jannat (Paradise). Allâhu ta’âlâ declares that He does not like the second part of the works done by men and disapproves of those who do them, and that He will forgive those who repent in sorrow and attain intercession (shafâ’at), that He will very bitterly
recompense for the bad deeds of those who will not be forgiven and will burn them in Hell. Such bitter recompense is called ’azâb (torment). The unit of the severity of azâb is called ithm or ghunâh (sin). Things liked by Allâhu ta’âlâ are called khayrât or hasanât, that is, good things. Things He dislikes are called sayyiât, that is, evil things. Allâhu ta’âlâ revealed which actions were hasanât and which actions were sayyiât. He promised thawâb for those who do hasanât. Allâhu ta’âlâ is committed to His promise. He never goes back on His word. Then, on the Day of Judgement, no blessing
or torture will be taken from anywhere else, but one will meet the reward for
what one has done in the world.]
Why did the Sharî’at come? Why were prophets ‘alaihimussalawâtu wattaslîmât’ sent? As for the answer to this question, their being sent is subjugation, compulsion. It is intended to pull people to Paradise by means of the chain of compulsion. Indeed, it is purported, “Are you astonished to see people being pulled to Paradise with chains?” The Sharî’at is a lasso that nooses people lest they should go to Hell. Indeed, it is purported, “Like moths you throw yourselves into the fire. And holding by your belt I pull you back.” Another link in the chain of Allah’s attribute Jabbâr [doing whatever He likes] is the words of prophets ‘alaihimussalâm’. It is through these words that men can distinguish the right way from wrong ways. The danger
pointed out by them forms fear in man. This knowledge of distinguishing and the fear clear away the dust from the mirror of mind. Mind, being polished, realizes that it will be better to take the way to the Hereafter than being seized by the world’s pleasures. This realization forms the will to work for the Hereafter. Since man’s limbs are dependent upon his will, they then begin to work for the Hereafter. Through this chain, Allâhu ta’âlâ forces you to keep away from Hell and pulls you towards Paradise. Prophets are like shepherds of a flock of sheep. If there is a meadow on the right hand side of the flock and a cavefull of wolves on the left, the shepherd will stand on the side of the cave and sway his stick to drive the flock towards the meadow. The sending of prophets ‘alaihimussalâm’ is reminiscent of this.
As for the question, “What use it is for a person who is to go to Hell to strive,” this word is right in one respect, while it is wrong in another respect. It is right because it brings ruination to the person who says it. For, the sign of having been predestined for Hell in the eternal past is the occurrence of this question in mind and consequently one’s not working and sowing one’s seeds. He who does not sow the seeds in the world cannot harvest in the Hereafter. What signifies that it has been predestined in the eternal past that a person will die of hunger is the coming of the thought, “It will do me no good to eat and drink if it has been written on my forehead that I shall die of hunger,” to his heart. Because he thinks so he does not eat or drink and then dies of hunger. Likewise, a person who says, “If
poverty is my fate what use is it to work?” does not work and certainly becomes poor. But a person whose fate is happiness and wealth thinks and says, “Those who are predestined as rich will work.” This thought of
his drives him to work. Then, these thoughts are not meaningless. They occur to the heart on account of the predestination in the eternal past. They cause the predestination to manifest. The cause of whatever a person is created for will be brought before him. It is not without reason that he is given the work. For this reason it has been purported, “Work! Whatever a person is created for will be made easy for him!” Then everyone, from the situations and actions into which he has been driven, can make a guess about his predestination and what will become of him in the Hereafter. A student who studies his lessons and who does his duty should deem this state of his as glad tidings, a symptom signifying that he will pass his course and that he will occupy
a ranking position in the future. But if the thought, “If my destiny is ignorance, it will be of no use no matter how hard I study,” is brought to his heart, and he does not study but wastes his time; it should be inferred that ignorance is his destiny. So should the qadâ and qadar be known pertaining to the situation in the Hereafter. As a matter of fact, it is purported in the sűra of Loqmân, “The creation of you all in the world and your resurrection in the Hereafter are like the creation and resurrection of one person.” And it is purported in the sűra of Jâsiyya, “Their states in the Hereafter are like their states in this world.”
He who understands this writing of ours well will have tawhîd. He will realize that the Sharî’at, mind and tawhîd agree with one another.
The second îmân, which is the basis of tawakkul, is to believe that Allâhu ta’âlâ is Rahîm (merciful, compassionate), Hakîm (judicious, wise) and Latîf (gracious). His grace and mercy reach every creature from the ant to man. His mercy, goodness upon His slaves is more than a mother’s mercy upon her child. A hadîth also has stated that this is so. His grace, His mercy are so much so that He has created the world and everything in the world in the best manner. Anything better than that is impossible. He has not deprived any creature of His compassion and grace. Even if all the sages on the earth came together and made researches, they could not find a more suitable, a better form of anything He has created. They would realize that everything has been created as it should be. The most suitable, the most perfect form
of something which has been created ugly is its being ugly. Were it not ugly, it would be defective, out of place. For, if it were not for ugliness, for instance, none would appreciate beauty, nor would there be any taste in beauty. If it were not for the defective, the perfect things would not be appreciated, nor would perfection be sweet.
For, perfection and defectiveness are recognized by a comparison with each other. For example, if the father is not, the child is not either; nor can anyone be a father without a child. Existence of one of such pairs is known by the existence of the other. Measurement can be done between two things. If there are not two things, measuring gives no result. Men may not realize the value of Allah’s deeds. But it is necessary to believe that the most useful, the best form is the one created by Him. In short, all the things in the world, illness, weakness, even sins and disbelief, nonexistence, defects, cares and sorrows are not without ultimate divine causes or benefits, nor out of place. All of them have been created in the most suitable, the most useful manner. The most suitable thing for a person
whom He has created poor is to be poor. If the person were rich, he would end up in perdition. The case is the same with a person whom He has created rich. This, like the tawhîd section, is like an open sea. Many people have been drowned in this ocean. This, like the matter of qadar, cannot be explained; nor is there permission to explain it. If we dive into this ocean, we will have to go into long details. But it will be sufficient to believe it as far as we have explained.
What does tawakkul mean? Tawakkul is a state that takes place in the heart. It takes place by believing in tawhîd and in the fact that Allâhu ta’âlâ has boundless goodness and grace. This state is the heart’s trusting, depending on and believing the Deputy and its feeling safe with Him. Such a person does not set his heart on worldly property. He does not feel sorry for his worldly failures. He feels sure that Allâhu ta’âlâ will send his sustenance. Let’s give an example of this. If they defame a person and bring a law-suit against him, he will hire an advocate. If he trusts the advocate in three respects his heart will feel at rest. Firstly, the advocate’s knowing the defamation, the trick well. Secondly, his not hesitating to tell the truth and his ability to talk well and explicitly so that he can express himself
well. Thirdly, the advocate’s pitying him and doing his best to save his right. If he believes and trusts his advocate so, he will not have to do anything additional on his part. A person who understands well the âyat, “Allâhu ta’âlâ is sufficient for us. He is the best deputy,” in the sűra of Âl-i ’Imrân, who says that Allâhu ta’âlâ makes everything and that none other than He can do anything, and who believes that there is no deficiency in His knowledge or power and that His compassion, His goodness are endless, will not reckon on anybody other than Allâhu ta’âlâ as the source of
goodness, nor will he depend on precautions or means. He will say, “My sustenance has been allotted and reserved. It will reach me when the time comes.” He will say, “Allâhu ta’âlâ will treat me as it becomes His greatness and mercy.” Some people believe this. However, they have an inner feeling of fear, hopelessness. There are many people who believe in something but whose natures do not agree with their belief, so they follow illusions and fancies. In fact, though they know that these fancies are wrong, they still give heed to them. An example of this is the person who stops eating something sweet and cannot eat it any more because somebody has likened it to something foul. Though he knows that the comparison is wrong and it is unlike anything foul, he still cannot eat it. Another example
is the person who cannot sleep in a room alone where there is a dead man. Though he knows that a dead man is like a stone and cannot move, he cannot sleep there. As it is seen, tawakkul requires both a strong îmân and a strong heart. Thus, there will be no doubt left in one’s heart. Unless the feeling of trust and ease are complete, tawakkul will not be complete. For, tawakkul means the heart’s believing and trusting Allâhu ta’âlâ in everything. Hadrat Ibrâhîm’s îmân, conviction was complete. But, in order that his heart would feel easy, he said, “O my Allah? Show me how You resurrect the dead!” When he was asked, “Do you not believe?” as purported in the sűra of Baqara, he said, “I
do believe. But I want it so that my heart will feel calm.” There was conviction in his heart. But he wanted his heart to feel satisfied and become peaceful. For, the heart’s comfort is first dependent upon feeling and imagining; later, however, the heart also will depend on conviction and will no longer need to see clear evidence.
There are three grades of tawakkul.
He who is in the first grade is like a person who trusts in a zealous, above-board, bold and compassionate advocate.
The person who is in the second grade is like a child. A child thinks that everything given to it is sent by its mother. When hungry it looks for its mother. When in fear it takes refuge with its mother. This state of the child is from itself, it is not taught by someone else, nor is it through force. Nor is it within the child’s will. A person who is in this grade is not aware of his tawakkul. For, he does not deem his deputy separate from himself. Yet the one in the first grade knows of his tawakkul and has tawakkul through the force of his will.
The person who is in the third grade is like a dead man in the hands of the person who washes him. He sees himself as a dead man who moves with Allah’s power. If he faces trouble and pain he does not even pray so that he will be saved from them. Whereas the baby calls to its mother when it suffers any pain, this one is such a child as will not call to its mother. For, it knows that its mother is looking at it all the time and is ready to run to its rescue.
The options of those who are in this third grade are not within their wills, either. Only, those in the second grade run to the attorney and beg him. There is option in the first grade, and he holds fast to the habits and means recommended by the deputy. For instance, if it is the attorney’s habit not to go to the law court unless his client is present there and the file is ready, he prepares these means and then leaves the job to the attorney. From then on he expects eveything from the attorney. He also knows that his preparing the file is from the attorney. For he has prepared it with the attorney’s habit and indication. Then, those who are in the first grade do trade, farming. They learn a craft. They hold fast to the means that are Allah’s habits, laws. But they do not give up tawakkul.
They trust not in their work, but in Allah’s superiority, fadl and favouring. They expect Him only to make them reach their goal through the means they have resorted to. As a matter of fact, they say that He sent the means of trade and farming, too. Holding fast to the means, they know that what they obtain is from Allâhu ta’âlâ. And this is the meaning of the âyat, “Allâhu ta’âlâ, alone, gives strength to everything,” which is in the sűra of Kahf. For, hawl (in Arabic) means action. And strength means power, energy. If a person knows that his strength is not from himself but from Allah’s creation, he expects everything from Him only. In short, a person who forgets about causes acting as intermediaries in the formation of actions expects nothing
from anybody besides Allâhu ta’âlâ, and, thus, he has had tawakkul.
The highest grade of tawakkul is defined by Bâyazîd-i Bestâmî, the sultan of ârifs, as follows: Abű Műsâ Dinawârî said: “I asked Bâyazîd what tawakkul meant. He asked what my opinion was. I said that the savants said, ‘It is tawakkul when nothing would come to your heart if there were lots of snakes and scorpions on your right, on your left, all around you.’ He said: ‘In my opinion tawakkul is to see all disbelievers being tormented in Hell and all Believers being blessed with favours and gifts in Paradise and still not to see any difference between the two
cases.’ ” What Abű Műsâ describes is the high grade of tawakkul. But this does not mean that you should not beware of danger. Hadrat Abű Bakr ‘radiyallâhu anh’, when he was in the cave (with the Prophet), defended (the Prophet and himself) against the snake by putting his blessed foot on its hole, though his tawakkul was higher. It was not the snake that he was afraid of. He was afraid of the snake’s Creator, that He might give the snake strength and motion. He saw that only Allâhu ta’âlâ gives strength and motion to everybody. Bâyazîd’s word reveals the îmân which is the basis for tawakkul, which is the îmân, the belief in Allah’s justice, hikmat, compassion and favour. It is the belief in that everything He makes is in its proper place. A Believer with such îmân sees no
difference between torment and blessing.
Every grade in Islam is based upon three fundamentals: ’ilm (knowledge), hâl (state), and ’amal (deed). We have defined what tawakkul is and explained its state. Now we shall explain its deed, i.e., how to do tawakkul. Many people think that tawakkul is to leave things to take their own course; not to do anything with one’s option; not to work to earn money; not to save; not to avoid snakes, lions or poisons; not to take medicine when sick; not to learn Islam, the Sharî’at; and not to keep away from the enemies of Islam. [Also, the enemies of Islam, by giving tawakkul and contentment such a meaning, say that Islam is laziness, that the dîn is opium. They attack Islam. They strive to deceive youngsters and to make them disbelievers, nonbelievers. They basely slander Islam.] It is wrong to think
of tawakkul as such. It is incompatible with the Sharî’at. Tawakkul is something commanded by the Sharî’at. How can those things unsuitable with the Sharî’at ever be tawakkul?
There are different kinds of tawakkul in optional actions, that is, in actions done willingly, in earning money and property, in using one’s existing money and property, in avoiding danger and in curing illnesses and the sick. We will explain these four kinds of tawakkul in their right order:
Here the tawakkul of bachelors, of those who live alone, and the tawakkul of the married, of those who have others to support, are unlike each other.
For those who have nobody else to support, in their earning
property, in their satisfying their needs, there are three kinds of tawakkul with regard to causes:
I - First kind of causes are the means which it is Allah’s divine habit (’âdat) to make means for His creating something. [To create means to make from nothing, or to turn existing things into things with other properties through laws of physics, chemistry, physiology or metaphysics.] These causes are learned with experience. It is not tawakkul, but it would be madness, idiocy, not to hold fast to such causes. For example, it would be idiocy, not tawakkul, not to eat anything when you are hungry and to say that Allah will feed you if He likes without eating or that He will send the food to your mouth without you touching it with your hand or to say that Allah will give you children without your performing nikâh and marrying. In actions dependent upon causes that are learned by experience, it
is not tawakkul to give up causes. But it is to have tawakkul on the level of knowledge and state. To have tawakkul on the level of knowledge is to know the fact that Allâhu ta’âlâ created all the means for satisfying hunger, namely, the hand, the mouth, the teeth, the stomach, the means of digestion, the food, the bread and the physiological movements. To have tawakkul on the level of state is the heart’s trusting in Allah’s goodness, its not trusting in eating, in the hand, in the mouth or in the health. The hand can be paralysed at any moment. One can catch an alimentary disease some day, and eating could be of no value. Then in the creation of the food and in its coming to us and in its being digested, we should trust not in our own actions or strength but in Allah’s favouring and goodness.
II - Second kind of causes are those that are not a hundred per cent effective but which are necessary most of the time. It is not tawakkul to give up such causes, either. For example, though it is mostly useful to get food and drink when setting out for a journey, sometimes there is no need for such means. It was our Prophet’s sunnat and our savants’ habit to hold fast to such means. Tawakkul is not to depend upon such means, which are not useful sometimes. One should depend on the One who creates and sends the means. It is not a sin to give up such means. It is because one’s tawakkul is strong. This means to say that it is a sin not to eat and drink. But it is not a sin for a traveller not to carry food. But there are two conditions for its not being a sin; one has to be strong enough to
endure hunger for several days and must be used to eating what one finds on one’s way. Ibrâhîm
Hawwâs ‘quddisa sirruh’ had tawakkul. On a long journey he would not take food with him, but he would take a needle, a pocket-knife, a rope and a bucket. For, these are things that are a hundred percent effective and always useful. Water cannot be drawn up without a rope and a bucket from a well in the desert. When one’s clothes are torn nothing else can serve like a needle. We say again that it is not tawakkul to give up the means whose effect is not for sure. It is tawakkul to hold fast to the means and yet to rely not upon the means but upon Allâhu ta’âlâ. This means to say that it is harâm to live in a cave far from any city and to say that one is having tawakkul. It means to throw oneself into death. It means to stand against Allah’s law and habit. The state of such
a person is like the state of a person who hires a lawyer but does not give the file to the lawyer though he knows that it is the lawyer’s habit not to go to the law court without reading the papers in the file, and he still relies on the lawyer. Once upon a time a person wanted to become a zâhid and cease from the world. He entered a cave in the mountains, did tawakkul and waited for sustenance. Days passed but nothing came to him. He was about to die of hunger, when Allâhu ta’âlâ commanded the prophet of that time, “Go and tell that idiot! If he does not go into the city and live among the people, I will kill him with hunger. Does he want to violate My ’âdat?” After the prophet informed him of this, he went into the city, where something was brought to him from each part of the city. Allâhu ta’âlâ declares:
“I like to send My slaves their food not directly but through My other slaves.” Likewise, it is harâm for a person to hide himself somewhere in the city or to shut himself up in his house and do tawakkul by not opening the door to anybody. It is not permissible to give up causes that are certain. If he does not shut the door of the house in the city and opens it for those who will come by, he will have done tawakkul, on condition that his mind will not be busy with the door, nor will he wonder if there is somebody bringing something. His heart should be with Allâhu ta’âlâ only. He should be busy with worshipping. Even if there are no means in sight, he should still know for certain that his sustenance will not be cut off. It has been said that if you run away from your sustenance,
your sustenance will run after you, and it is true. If a person invokes Allâhu ta’âlâ, “O Allah! Don’t give me sustenance!” Allâhu ta’âlâ will declare, “O you ignoramus! I have created you. Why shouldn’t I give your sustanence?” Then, to have tawakkul means to hold fast to causes
and to depend not upon causes but upon the Creator of causes. Everybody is eating Allah’s sustenance. But some eat it by putting up with the disgrace of begging, some [e.g. tradesmen, merchants] by suffering the boredom of waiting, some [e.g. artists, workers] by getting tired, and some [e.g. men of knowledge] in dignity and comfort without expecting from anybody but Allâhu ta’âlâ.
III - Third group of causes are those whose effect is not for certain, nor are they always necessary but are obtained by thinking and searching. Earning money through such causes is like curing the sick by means of augury and incantation, about which our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’, while explaining tawakkul, stated, ‘Those who have tawakkul do not cure the sick by augury and incantation.” He did not say, “Those who have tawakkul do not work or live in cities, but they go to the mountains.”
There are three grades of tawakkul while holding to causes:
a) A single person who is in a high grade of tawakkul lives far away from the city lest he will commit sins and in order that he will not trespass against anybody. He does not take anything with him. When he becomes hungry he eats whatever he finds. If he cannot find anything to eat he does not fear that he will die of hunger. If he suffers hunger, even if he is about to die of hunger, he deems it good for himself. For, a traveller who takes something to eat with him may be robbed, even killed on the way, which has happened many times. But it is not wâjib to avoid such an event.
b) A person in the second grade does not earn money, but he does not leave town, either. He worships in mosques. He does not expect anything from anybody. He expects from Allâhu ta’âlâ.
c) A person who is in the third grade works to earn money. But he observes the Sharî’at, the sunnat in his every action. He avoids playing tricks, looking for subtle means or dealing with commercial information. A person who does not avoid these has dived into the third group of causes and does not have tawakkul.
To have tawakkul does not mean not to work. For, Hadrat Abű Bakr had perfect tawakkul in everything he did. After he was elected the Khalîfa, he went on selling tissues at a market-place. When he was told, “O you, the Khalîfa! Is it appropriate to trade while presiding over the state?” he stated, “How can I support the people if I don’t support my household?” Upon this, they decided it would be de rigueur to pay the Khalîfa a stipend from the Bayt-ul-mâl. From then on, he always kept busy with
matters of the public. He was the highest of those who had tawakkul, yet he did trade. But he did not think of earning money. He deemed his earnings not from his capital or work but from Allâhu ta’âlâ. Nor did he like his own property more than the property of his Muslim brothers.
Having tawakkul requires zuhd. And being zâhid, in its turn, does not require tawakkul. Abű Ja’far-i Haddâd was Junayd-i Baghdâdî’s master. [Haddâd means blacksmith.] He had very much tawakkul. For twenty years he did not let anybody know of his tawakkul. Every day he earned one dinâr at the market place. [A dinâr is equal to one mithqâl of gold. One mithqâl is four grams and eighty centigrams.] He gave all of it as alms to the poor. When he was present Junayd would not talk of tawakkul. “I would feel shame to talk in his presence about things which exist in him,” he would say.
It signifies weak tawakkul for men of tasawwuf to walk about at market-places, in bazaars, among the common people. They should stay in their homes and expect things from Allâhu ta’âlâ only. As well, their sitting at a well-known place, at tekkes, is like sitting at a market-place, in which there is the danger that the security in their hearts may originate from their fame. But if they do not remember their fame, they will have had tawakkul like any working man.
In short, the basis of tawakkul is not to expect anything from people, not to rely on causes, and to expect all from Allâhu ta’âlâ only. Ibrâhîm-i Hawwâs says, “I saw Hadrat Khidir. He wanted to make friends with me. But I did not want it. For, I was afraid that my heart would feel calm because of the security given by him and thus my tawakkul would lessen.” Ahmad ibni Hanbal hired a worker. He asked one of his disciples to give the worker something plus his daily wage. The worker did not accept it. Later when the worker was gone, “Catch up with him and give it to him. He will accept it now,” he said to his disciple. When the disciple wanted to know the reason why, he said, “First his heart had been expecting that we would give him something. So he did not take it. But now, as he is going,
he has no such hope left, so it won’t harm his tawakkul.”
This means to say that the tawakkul of a person who works is not to depend on his capital. And its symptom is that when he loses his capital his heart does not feel worried, or give up hope of his sustenance. For, a person who relies on Allâhu ta’âlâ knows that He will send his sustenance from places he does not expect at
all. If He does not send him sustenance, he will think that this is better for him.
It is not easy to acquire such tawakkul. All your property has been stolen, or you have undergone a great catastrophe, and your heart still does not change; this is not something everybody can do. Those who have such tawakkul are very few, but they are not nonexistent. Attaining such tawakkul requires the heart’s complete and positive belief in the endlessness of Allah’s blessing, compassion and favouring, and in that His power is in the greatest perfection. One must think that He sends sustenance to many people though they do not have any capital, while, on the other hand, many fortunes cause perdition. One must as well know that it is good for oneself if one loses one’s own capital. Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ stated, “A person spends the night thinking
of the thing he is going to do the next day. But that thing will bring calamity upon him. Allâhu ta’âlâ, pitying this slave of His, does not let him do it. And he, in his turn, becomes sorry because he is not able to do it. Thinking, ‘Why hasn’t this business of mine been accomplished? Who doesn’t let me do it? Who on earth is imposing this enmity upon me?’ and he begins to think ill of his friends. However, Allâhu ta’âlâ, having mercy upon him, has protected him against calamity.” For this reason Hadrat ’Umar ‘radiyallâhu anh’ said, “If I become poor, needy tomorrow, I will never feel sorry. I will never think of getting rich, for I do not know which is better for me.”
What has to be known secondly is that such things as fearing poverty and belief in ill omen are casued by the Devil. As a matter of fact, it is stated in the sűra of Baqara, “Satan promises you that you will fall into a needy situation.” It is a high ma’rifat to trust in Allah’s compassion. It has always been seen that He sends plenty of sustenance from unexpected places through means that could not be thought of. But one should not depend on the secret means, either; one should trust in the Creator of the means. Once there was a man of tawakkul who spent his time worshipping in a mosque every day. The imâm of the mosque said to him, “You are poor. You’d better find a job,” to which the man
answered, “One of my neighbors, who is a Jew, sends me what I need every day.” Then, the imâm said, “Then, you have secured your position. It will do you no harm not to work.” Upon this he said to the îmâm, “Then, you better quit your job of being an imâm for the people, for a person who holds a Jew’s word superior to Allah’s word is not worthy of being an imâm.” The
imâm of another mosque said to one of the assembly, “How do you make a living?” Upon this the man said, “Wait a minute! I will repeat the namâz which I have performed behind you.” That is, he meant to say, “You don’t believe the fact that Allâhu ta’âlâ will send the sustenance. Your namâz will not be accepted.” Those who have had such complete tawakkul have always been sent their sustenance from unexpected places, and this has consolidated their îmân in the statement, “Allâhu ta’âlâ will certainly send the sustenance of every living creature on the earth,” which is declared in the sűra of Hűd. Huzayfa-i Mar’âshî used to serve Ibrâhîm-i Ad’ham. When he was asked the reason why, he said, “We were
on our way to Mekka, and we became quite hungry. By the time we arrived in Qűfa, I could not walk from hunger. ‘Are you exhausted of hunger!’ he said. ‘Yes’ was my answer. He asked for an inkpot, a pen and paper, which I fetched. He wrote the Basmala and the prayer, ‘O my Allah, who is relied on in everything, in every case! It is Thou who giveth everything. To Thee do I pay my hamd and my thanks every moment. Not any moment do I ever forget about Thee. I am now hungry, thirsty and naked. The first three are my duty. Surely I will do them. And Thou hast promised the final three. From Thee shall I expect them,’ and he gave me the paper. ‘Go out, do not expect anything from anybody but Allâhu ta’âlâ, and give this paper to the first man that you will meet,’ he said. I went out. I met a man riding a camel first. I gave
him the paper. Upon reading it, he began to weep. ‘Who wrote this?’ he asked. ‘Someone in the mosque,’ I replied. He gave me a purse full of gold, in which were sixty dinârs. Later, I asked those who were around who the man was. ‘He is a Nasrânî (Christian),’ they said. I told Ibrâhîm Ad’ham all of this. ‘Don’t touch the purse. Its owner will come here now,’ he said. After a while the Christian came. He sprang down to Ibrâhîm’s feet and became a Muslim.” Abu Ya’qűb-i Basrî says, “I suffered hunger for days in the blessed city of Mekka; I couldn’t endure it any more, when I saw a turnip thrown out into the street. I wanted to take it. But some voice inside me seemed to say: ‘You have been patient for ten days. And now you are going to eat that rotten turnip?’ I gave up. I went into Masjîd-i harâm and sat there. Someone
came and put some newly fried bread, sugar and some almonds in front of me and said, ‘I was out in the sea. A storm broke out and I vowed that I would give these to a poor man that I would run into if I should be rescued.’ I took a handful of each and gave the rest to
the man as a present. Realising that Allâhu ta’âlâ created a storm in the sea in order to help me and then rescued the person for his vow and sent him to me, I thanked Allâhu ta’âlâ. And I repented of having looked for sustenance on the streets.” To consolidate îmân it is necessary to read such rare incidents.
If a bachelor’s îmân is strong and he abstains from earning money lest he will commit sins, the means for sustenance will come before him. A child is unable to work in its mother’s womb, so He sends its sustenance through its navel. After it is born, He sends its food through its mother’s breast. When it reaches the age of eating, He creates its teeth. If its parents die and it becomes an orphan, He gives others kindness similar to that which He gave to its parents and fills others’ hearts with mercy for the orphan. Formerly it was pitied by its mother only and no one else would look after it. But now, its mother being dead, He makes thousands of people watch it with affection. When it grows up a little older, He gives it the strength to work, plus the desire to earn money. He now places in
it mercy upon itself. If the person gives up that desire, chooses the way of taqwâ and makes an orphan of himself, He fills others’ hearts with mercy for him again. Everyone says that the person is on the way of Allah and so he must be given the best of everything. As he was earning money, he alone would pity himself. But now everybody pities him. But if he abandons the way of taqwâ, follows his nafs, does not work and earn money, He does not create mercy for him in others’ hearts. It is never permissible for such people not to work and sit idly in the name of tawakkul. A person who thinks of himself has to think of getting what he needs by working, too. This means to say that Allah creates in everyone’s heart mercy and compassion for a person who is on His way and is like an orphan. For this reason, a person’s dying
of hunger while being on the way of Allah has never happened. If a person sees and understands in what a great order and perfection the owner of all beings has created everything, he very easily sees the âyat, “There is not even one creature on earth whom Allâhu ta’âlâ does not give food.” He gets to know that He rules over the âlam very well and does not leave anybody hungry. There have been very few people whom He has killed with hunger, and then He has killed them because it would be better for them, not because they did not work. For, sometimes He also kills those who have earned much property with hunger by taking away their property. Hasan-i Basrî, seeing this subtlety clearly, said, “If all the inhabitants of Basra were my
children and if one seed of wheat cost a dinâr, I’d never feel worried.” Wahab bin Werd says, “Supposing the sky became iron and the earth turned into bronze, I would not deem myself a Muslim if I felt worried about my sustenance.” Allâhu ta’âlâ sends the sustenance from the sky.
[This is communicated clearly in âyats and hadîths. Today scientists have begun to realise this fact. In rainy weather, owing to lightnings, the nitrogen gas in the air chemically combines with oxygen gas, forming a colourless gas called nitrogen monoxide. This gas cannot remain stable in the air. Combining with oxygen again, it turns into nitrogen dioxide. And this gas, which is orange-colored and suffocating, combines with the moisture of the air and turns into nitric acid. On the other hand, the hydrogen gas, which has become free from the air’s moisture as a result of its disintegration with the effect of lightning, combines with the air’s nitrogen and turns into amonia gas, which, combining with the nitric acid, which has also been formed meanwhile and with the carbon dioxide gas, which
already exists in the air, makes the salts called amonium nitrate and amonium carbonate. These two salts, soluble like the salts of all other alcaline metals, descend on the earth with rain. The earth turns these substances into calcium nitrate and gives them to plants. Plants change these salts into albumens (proteins). Proteins pass into grazing animals and men from plants. Men take them from plants and from animals that eat grass. These substances are the building stones of men and animals. Dry proteins contain 14% nitroen gas. Now, it has been calculated today that by means of rains more than four hundred million tons of the air’s nitrogen falls on the earth and turns into food each year. The amount that falls on seas is certainly much more than this. We can understand through science today that the sustenance
descends from the sky in this manner. It must be descending in many other ways. Maybe in the future science will be able to discover some of them.]
By informing that He sends everyone’s sustance down from the sky, Allâhu ta’âlâ declares that no one’s sustenance can be intercepted. When they said to Junayd-i Baghdâdî, “We are looking for our sustenance,” he said, “Look for it where you know it is, if you ever know where it is.” When they said, “We ask for it from Allâhu ta’âlâ,” he said, “If you think He has forgotten about you, remind Him!” When they said, “We are having tawakkul. We will see where he will send it from,” he said, “Having tawakkul and testing and trying at the same time shows
that there is doubt in one’s îmân!” When they said, “What should we do, then?” “You should work as He has commanded, you should not worry about your sustenance, nor run after means.” We should trust in Allah’s promise about sustenance. He makes the person who works in obedience to His command attain his sustenance.
Tawakkul for the married: It is not right for a married person to go away from town in order to perform tawakkul. He has to work and hold fast to causes. In other words, the tawakkul of the married must be in the third grade. That is, they have to do tawakkul by working. As a matter of fact, Abu Bakr Siddîq ‘radiyallâhu anh’ performed tawakkul by working. For, there are two parts of tawakkul. The first one is to endure hunger patiently and eat what one happens to find. The second one is to believe that if the death of hunger is one’s destiny it will be good for one. No one is permitted to command these two parts of tawakkul to his household. In fact, a person who is not patient enough is not permitted to have tawakkul without working. If one’s wife and children also consent to being patient, then
it will be permissible to have tawakkul without working. In short, it is permissible to force oneself to endure inconvenience patiently, but it is not permissible to force one’s family.
Here, too, the tawakkul of bachelors who have no one else to support is different from the tawakkul of those who have a family to support.
If those who have no one else to support stock their one year’s needs, this will spoil their tawakkul. For, in this case they will have trusted in causes. A single person who keeps as much food as to feed himself and as many clothes as to get dressed has had tawakkul. It is said that it would not spoil tawakkul to preserve one’s forty days’ needs. Sahl bin Abdullah-i Tusturî said, “A single person’s preserving his food, no matter for how long, spoils his tawakkul.” Abű Tâlib-i Makkî, one of the great men of tasawwuf, said, “If he does not depend on what he preserves, it does not spoil his tawakkul even if he preserves it more than forty days.” Bishr-i Hâfî was one of the great men of tasawwuf. One day a guest went up to his presence. He gave a handful of silver to one of his disciples and said,
“Go and buy some good and sweet food.” Up to that time he had not been seen buying so much. He ate with the guest. The guest, when leaving the house, took the rest of the food with him. Seeing his disciple’s astonishment, he
said, “This guest was Fat’h-i Műsulî. He came from Műsul in order to teach us a lesson. He has showed us that a person whose tawakkul is strong will not be harmed by preserving food.” This means to say that tawakkul means not to busy one’s mind about the future. For this reason, one should not stock for the future and, if one stocks something, one should not deem it as something in one’s own hand but as something which Allâhu ta’âlâ will give in the future; that is, one should not depend on it.
Tawakkul for the married: It does not spoil tawakkul for one who has a wife and children to preserve goods for a year. If it is for more than a year, it spoils tawakkul. Our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ used to preserve a year’s need for his household because their hearts were weak. Yet for himself he would not keep even a day’s need. If he had kept it, it would not have harmed his tawakkul. For, it was equal for him if he had or not. But he used to do so in order to teach his Ummat. Once, when one of his Sahâba ‘alaihimurridvân’ passed away, two gold coins were found in his pocket. Our Prophet stated, “This is a sign of two torments.” This torment must be the sorrow caused by not reaching a higher grade in Paradise. As a matter of fact, when someone
else died, he stated, “On the Day of Resurrection his face will shine like the full moon. If he had not prepared his summer clothes in winter and his winter clothes in summer it would shine like the sun.” At some other time he declared, “What you have been given least is yaqîn and patience.” In other words, preparing one’s clothes a year before is caused by one’s having little yaqîn. However, as agreed by all our superiors, it is permissible and necessary and does not spoil tawakkul to preserve those things that are always necessary in the house, such as water containers, water installation, table services, means of sewing and cleaning. For, Allâhu ta’âlâ has created this world in such an order that food and clothes supply come out freshly
every year. It is not permissible to disobey Allah’s law. But house gadgets may not be available whenever they are needed.
NOTE: If a person’s heart does not feel calm when he does not preserve his food and clothing and if in this case he expects others will bring them to him, it is better for him to preserve them. In fact, if a person cannot worship and pay his dhikr to Allâhu ta’âlâ without any worries when he does not have a field, a workshop or any other means of income, it is better for him to get a means of income. For, the real purpose is the heart’s thinking of Allâhu ta’âlâ sedately without worries. Some people are busied
with property. They cannot worship comfortably while estimating their property. When they have no property any more, they have no worries, no doubts any more. It is better for such people not to have property. Others become comfortable only when they have as much property as to get along. So it is better for them to acquire a means of income enough for them to get along. Yet those hearts who are not content with as much property as to get along but who run after more and who think of their luxury, comfort and pleasure are not among those hearts who are attached to Islam. We will not take them into consideration.
Also, among the means to protect oneself against danger, it is not one of the principles of tawakkul to give up those means whose effect is certain or most probable. It does not spoil tawakkul to close and lock the door of the house lest a thief will go in. Nor does it not harm one’s tawakkul to carry arms in dangerous places or to avoid one’s enemies. It does not spoil tawakkul, either, to wear thick clothes lest one should get cold. But it spoils tawakkul to be too meticulous by having recourse to such means as eating much so that the body will be heated by getting more calories and one will not be cold in winter. So is the case with cauterizing [a healthy person lest he will get sick] and incantation. [A doctor is permitted to cauterize a sick person.] To have tawakkul, it is not necessary
to give up those means that have positive effects and which are known by everybody. One day a villager came to Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’, who stated to him, “What did you do with your camel?” When the man answered, “I left it by itself and had tawakkul in Allâhu ta’âlâ,” “Tie it and then have tawakkul!” he stated.
It is tawakkul and is good not to prevent an injury caused by a person and to endure it patiently. As a matter of fact, it is purported in the sűra of Ahzâb, “Do not respond to the injury and torments of disbelievers and munâfiqs! I shall punish them. For protection against them and to rescue yourself from them, trust yourself to Allâhu ta’âlâ!” And it is purported in the sűra of Ibrâhîm, “We patiently endure their tortures. Those who have tawakkul should have tawakkul only in Allâhu ta’âlâ.”
It is necessary to prevent such animals as scorpions, snakes and wild animals from doing harm. It does not spoil tawakkul. [We should not be patient with the germs that spread disease, and we should do our best to prevent them. In case we catch an infectious disease, we should use antiseptics and antibiotics
If a person who carries a weapon in order to protect himself against the enemy does not depend on his strength or weapon, he will have had tawakkul. We should lock the door. But we should not rely on the lock. As a matter of fact thieves have broken many a lock. The symptom of a person’s having tawakkul is that when he comes home and sees that his possessions have been stolen he does not feel sorry. Saying that Allâhu ta’âlâ has willed it be so, he becomes contented with destiny. When putting the lock on the door we should pass through our heart the prayer, “O my Allah! I put this lock not to change Thine destiny but to follow Thine command and law. O my Allah! If Thou shouldst make someone attack my property, I am contented with Thine decree! I do not know if Thou created this property for
me, or for someone else and gave it to me as a deposit.” If a person locks his door and goes away and then, upon seeing that his possessions have been stolen when he comes back, feels sorry, he should realize that he does not have tawakkul. But if he does not cry, wail or cause alarm or confusion, he at least gets the grade of patience. If he complains and investigates the thief, he falls down from the grade of patience, too. If he, finding out that he does not have tawakkul and is not patient, gives up having a high opinion of himself, this is his benefit and advantage casued by the thief.
Question: If he did not need his possessions he would not hide them by locking the door. Can a person help becoming sorry when something is stolen which he has been keeping in order to satisfy his needs?
Answer: When Allâhu ta’âlâ gives these possessions to him he should deem their coming to him beneficial for himself. “There are benefits in everything given by Allâhu ta’âlâ,” he should say. By the same token, he has to deem the loss of his possessions as beneficial for himself. “Allah’s taking away something is as good as His giving it. As it is useful to have something when He gives it to me, so it is useful not to have it when He takes it back,” he should say. We should be pleased with things that are beneficial. Men cannot know well which is good and useful for themselves. Allâhu ta’âlâ knows it better. For example, if a sick person’s father is a specialized doctor, when he gives him meat and sweets to eat, he becomes pleased and says, “He would not give these to me if I had
not recovered my health.” If his father does not prescribe him diets containing meat and sweets, he becomes pleased again and says, “His keeping me away from these things
is intended to cure my illness.” Likewise, unless there is full faith in Allah’s not giving as well as His giving, tawakkul will not be complete.
1) He should lock the door. But no more precautions should he try to take. He should not lock the rooms or the windows, nor should he make his neighbors take care of it. It does not spoil the tawakkul to hire guards and doorkeepers for offices. Mâlik bin Dînâr would fasten his door with a piece of string. “If I knew that beasts would not enter the house, I would not tie this either,” he would say.
2) He should not keep valuable things, those things which will allure thieves in the house. He should not cause a Muslim brother of his to commit the sin of stealing. Once, Mughayra sent his zakât to Mâlik bin Dînâr, who took it and then sent it back, saying. “Satan brought anxiety into my heart that it might be stolen by thieves. I don’t want to have anxiety or to cause a Muslim to steal.” Upon hearing this, Abű Suleymân-i Dârânî said, “He returned the money because a sofi’s heart is weak. He is zâhid; the world has no place in his heart. What harm would it give him if thieves stole it?” This statement of Abű Suleymân’s shows that he has a keen insight.
3) When leaving home, he should have the intention, “If a thief steals any of my belongings, let it be his, may it be his lawful property! The thief may be poor and will meet one of his needs with that thing. If he is rich, he will become contented with that thing and will not steal others’ possessions. Thus, my property will prevent the hurting of a Muslim brother of mine.” By having this intention he will have pitied both the thief and all Muslims. Indeed Islam consists in pitying creatures. This intention does not change Allah’s qadâ and qadar. But, whether his belongings are stolen or not, for each dollar he has, he will be given as much thawâb as if he gave seven hundred dollars as alms. This intention is like the case stated in the hadîth: “If a person, during
intercourse with his wife, does not retract, that is, if he does not prevent the formation of a child, he will be given as much thawâb as is given to a hero who fights until being martyred, whether the child is born or not.” For, the person has done his best. If the child were born dead, he would be given thawâb for what he did.
4) If his property is stolen, he should not feel sorry, but should know that the loss of his property is beneficial for him. If he says,
“May it be halâl,” he should not look for his property, nor should he take it back if they should give it back. But if he takes it back, it is his property. Intention does not cause it to cease to be his property. Only, it must not be taken back, so that tawakkul will be complete. Abdullah Ibni ’Umar’s ‘radiyallâhu anhumâ’ camel was stolen. He looked for it far and near, but could not find it. He said, “May it be halâl for the person who took it away!” He went into a mosque and performed namâz. Someone came and said, “Your camel is at such and such a place.” He put on his clogs and left for the place, but then gave up and said, “I have said, ‘May it be halâl!’ I won’t take it back.” One of the great dreamt of his brother, who was sorry although he was in Paradise. When he
asked him why he was sorry, he answered: “I will remain sorry until the Resurrection. For, they showed me my high-ranking post in Paradise. No other grade was so beautiful as it was. I wanted to go there, but I heard a voice saying: ‘Don’t let him go there! The place is for those who have given up for Allah’s sake.’ I asked how to give up for Allah’s sake. They said, ‘One day you said, ‘May this property of mine be halâl for Allah’s sake!’ But then you did not abide by your word. If you had kept your promise well, the entire place would be yours now.’ ” Someone slept in the blessed city of Mekka. When he woke up he did not see his purse. One of the great was there, to whom he said, “You took my money!” Then the great person took the owner of the money to his house and asked him how much money he had and gave him as
much gold as was equal to the value of the money which the man claimed to have owned. After going out, the man found out that a friend of his had taken away his purse only as a joke. So he went back to return the gold, yet the owner refused to take them back: “I gave you this gold with the intention of alms,” he said and added that they be distributed to the poor. Likewise, of old, when they, for example, took bread to a poor man and did not find him in his place, they would not take the bread back home but give it to another poor person.
5) He should not curse a cruel person or a thief. When he curses them he spoils both his tawakkul and his zuhd. For, a person who becomes sorry when he loses something cannot be zâhid. Once Rabî bin Haysam’s horse was stolen, and it was worth several thousand dirhams. “I saw it being stolen,” he said. When he was asked, “Why did you keep silent though you saw it,” he said, “I was together with Someone whom I love much more than it. I couldn’t part from Him.” It was found out afterwards that he
had been in namâz. They cursed the thief. “Don’t curse him. I have made my horse halâl for him,” he said. One of the great was oppressed by a cruel man. When he was told to curse him, “He is doing enmity not to me but to himself. The harm which he causes to himself is enough for him. I cannot add any more harm,” he said. A hadîth states, “A person curses someone who torments him, and thus he takes his right back in the world. Maybe he even trespasses upon the cruel one’s right, too.”
6) He should pity the thief and have compassion for him instead of he himself committing a sin and torturing himself. He should thank Allah that he himself is not the cruel one but is the one who is oppressed. He should be pleased because he has suffered a loss of property and not a loss of faith. If he does not feel sorry because a Muslim brother of his has committed a sin, he will have not advised and pitied Muslims. Once, something was stolen from Bishr-i Hafî; he began to weep. When he was told, “Does one simply weep for property?” he said, “I am weeping not for property but out of the thought that the thief has committed a sin and will be tormented for this in the next world.”
There are three kinds of medicine. The effect and use of those medicines of the first kind are for certain, obvious, as in bread’s allaying hunger and water’s quenching thirst. [So is the case with the effect of quinine compounds for fevers, of the salicylates for rheumatism, and of the vaccinations, serums and antibiotics and sulfonamides for bacteria. Inoculation for smallpox was discovered in 1197 [1782 A.D.]. Ibni Âbidîn ‘rahmatullâhi ’aleyh’ says on the 215th page of the fifth volume, “It is fard to eat and drink as much as the amount needed to perform salât standing and not to die of hunger. It is a grave sin not to eat as much as that limit. If a person does not take medicine (although he is ill) and then dies, he will not be sinful (for not taking medicine). For medicine will not certainly
work a cure.” This comes to mean that it is fard to take medicine with a definite curing effect. It is written in the 182nd letter by Muhammad Ma’thűm Farűqî ‘rahmatullâhi ’aleyh’, and also in detail in the 343rd page of the book Hadîqa that it is wajib to hold to means with a definite effect, and it is sinful to expose oneself to sheer harm by not using them.] And so is the case with extinguishing a fire with water. It is not tawakkul but it is idiocy and harâm not to use these medicines and the like, the effect of which is for certain.
The effect of medicines of the second kind is not for certain, nor predictable. Only, they may be useful. Examples of these are incantation, that is, using substances that have not been experimented scientifically and meaningless pieces of writing that are not from the Qur’ân, cautery and using things that are supposed to be useful. Having tawakkul requires not using these. As it is stated in a hadîth, using them is a sign of too much trust in causes. Of these three, the one with the most probable use is cauterizing [a healthy person]. [There is detailed information about fortune-telling at the end of the booklet Bey’ wa Shirâ.].
Medicines of the third kind are between the first and the second kinds. Their use is not for certain, but strongly predictable. Examples of these are bleeding, cupping, taking purgatives, and using medicines [which are selling in the hundreds today], effects of which are doubtful. It is not harâm not to use them. But, it is not one of the conditions of tawakkul, either. For many people it is better to use them. Yet sometimes it is better not to use them. We have said that having tawakkul does not require giving up these things. For, our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ stated, “O you who are Allah’s slaves! Use medicine!” And he declared at some other time, “Each disease has its medicine. Death, only, is an end with no
way out.” When he was asked if medicine would change qadâ and qadar, he stated, “Qadâ and qadar will make you use medicine.” Another hadîth states, “I heard from all angels: ‘Tell your Ummat that they should apply cupping, that is, bleeding,’ they said.” Another hadîth states, “Apply cupping on the seventeenth, nineteenth and twenty-first days of Arabic month; otherwise, if blood increases [blood tension goes up], it may cause death.” Another hadîth states, “One of the diseases which Allâhu ta’âlâ has made a cause of death is the increase of blood.” Bleeding or using tension-reducing medicines when blood tension
goes up, using antibiotics, sulfonamides or other antiseptics against infectious diseases, or applying disinfection is no different from killing the scorpion or the snake in one’s clothes or bed or extinguishing a fire. For, these are all causes of death for man. Having tawakkul does not require giving these up. Our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ commanded Sa’d bin Mu’âz ‘radiyallâhu anh’ to be cupped, that is, to draw blood from his vein. When Hadrat Alî’s blessed eye ached, he told him not to eat fresh dates and to eat beet leaves, yoghurt and cooked barley. Suhayb-i Rűmî’s ‘radiyallâhu anh’ eye was aching. When Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ saw him eating dates he
declared, “You eat dates though your eye is aching.” “I am chewing it on the side of the eye which does not ache,” he answered, which made Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ laugh. Rasűlullah would put kohl on his eyes every night. He would apply cupping every month. He would drink medicine every year. Whenever the wahy came upon him his blessed head would ache. So he would apply henna on his blessed head. When any of his limbs was wounded he would put henna on the wound. If he did not find anything else he would put the dust of clean soil on it. He used many other medicines, which are written in the books titled Tibbinnabî. [One of those books was written by Imâm-i Jalâladdîn-i Suyűtî.
This is explained in detail in the second volume of Mawâhib-i ladunniyya.]
Once Hadrat Műsâ ‘alaihissalâm’ became ill. They told him its medicine. “I don’t want medicine. Allâhu ta’âlâ will cure it,” he said. The illness lingered, getting even worse. “The medicine of this illness is well-known and has been tried. You will recover soon,” they said, but he replied, “No. I don’t want medicine,” and his illness became even worse. Then the wahy came down to him, declaring: “If you do not take medicine, I shall not bless you with healing.” Upon this he took the medicine and recovered health, but something occured to his heart. Then the wahy came in which Allâhu ta’âlâ declared: “In order to have tawakkul you want to change My hikmat, My law. Who gave useful effects
to medicines? Of course, I created them.”
A prophet ‘alaihimussalâm’ complained about weakness. The wahy came down to him and he was commanded, “Eat meat and drink milk!” Believers of an ancient time complained to their prophet that their children were born ugly. The wahy came down and the prophet was commanded, “Tell your ummat: ‘Those women who are to bear children should eat quinces!’ ” So they ate quinces during pregnancy and dates after birth.
As it is understood from all these examples, Allâhu ta’âlâ has made medicines means for healing. As He has made bread and water means for feeding, so He has made medicines means for removing illnesses. Allâhu ta’âlâ alone creates all means and gives them effective power. A hadîth states, “Hadrat Műsâ ‘alaihissalâm’ asked, ‘O my Allah! Who makes diseases, and who cures diseases?’ Allâhu ta’âlâ declared, ‘I make both of them.’ When he asked, ‘Why should we need doctors, then?’ ‘They know the means which I created for healing and give them to My slaves. And I give them sustenance and thawâb through this way,’
As it is seen, we should go to doctors and use medicines. Yet we should not depend on doctors or medicines and we should ask for healing from Allâhu ta’âlâ. Those who did not recover health though they took medicine and those who exhaled their last breath on operating tables are not few.
NOTE: Cautery has become a custom in some places. But cautery spoils tawakkul. In fact, it has been prohibited by the Sharî’at. For, it may cause dangerous wounds. And its use is not certain. The benefit of cautery can be provided through other medicines as well. Imrân bin Hasîn ‘radiyallâhu anh’ became ill. They told him to cauterize. But he would not. They begged him to do so, so he cauterized and then recovered health. Afterwards he said, “Before, I used to see nűrs, hear voices. Angels used to greet me. After cautery none of these has happened.” He repented and said istighfâr so many times that later Allâhu ta’âlâ, as he said to Mutrif bin Abdullah, granted these blessings to him again.
Sometimes it is better not to use medicine, which does not mean to disobey our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’. Most of our superiors did not use medicine.
Question: If it were perfection not to use medicine, our Prophet ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ would not have used it, which he did.
Answer: There are six reasons for not using medicine:
1) A person may have a vigilant heart and may be an owner of kashf. He may realize that he is about to die. So he does not use medicine. As a matter of fact, doctors do not prescribe medicine or diet for a person whom they see will die soon. When the Khalîfa of Muslims, Abű Bakr ‘radiyallâhu anh’, became ill, they said, “Let’s fetch a doctor.” But he said, “The Doctor saw me and said ‘I will do as I will.’ ”
2) The ill person may be in fear of the next world. He does not think of or ask for medicine. Abu Dardâ ‘radiyallâhu anh’ moaned when he became sick. They asked him what was the matter with him. “I moan with the thought of my sins,” he said. They said, “Do you want anything!” “I want Allah’s compassion,” he said. They said, “Shall we call a doctor?” “The Doctor made me sick,” he said. Abű Zar-i Ghifârî ‘radiyallâhu anh’ had an eye sore. When he was asked if he would not like to use medicine, “I have something more important to do now,” he said. Their state is like that of a person who, while being taken towards the gallows,
is asked if he wants something to eat; I wonder if he would ever remember eating though he may be hungry? When Sahl bin Abdullah-i Tusturî was asked what his food was, he said, “Dhikr of the One who is Hayy and Qayyűm.” Upon this they asked, “We ask you where you get your strength from,” to which he replied, “From knowledge.” They asked, “What is your food?” “Contemplation and dhikr,” he said. Then they said that they were asking about the substance of nourishment that fed the body. This time he answered, “Not to think of the body but to think of the One who sends the food.”
3) He may catch a chronic disease of which the causes are not known; the sick person, in this case, does not want to use the medicines with a placebo effect. Those who have no medical knowledge think that many medicines are so.
4) Craving for thawâb only, some do not want to recover health lest they would be deprived of the thawâb. Being patient, they do not use medicine. A hadîth states, “As they examine the doubtful gold by means of fire, so Allâhu ta’âlâ tests people by means of anxiety and hardships. Some go out of the fire of hardships as true. Others go out as false.” Sahl bin Abdullah Tusturî would give medicine to the sick, but he himself would not use it. “The namâz which is performed sitting and enduring the sickness patiently is more valuable than the namâz performed standing by a healthy person,” he would say.
5) His sins may be many. He wants to have his sins pardoned by suffering illness. A hadîth states, “Malaria purifies you of all your sins. As there is no dust on a hail-stone, so there will be no sins left on a malarial person.” Îsâ ‘alaihissalâm’ stated, “A person who becomes sick or gets into trouble and yet is not happy because his sins will be pardoned is not learned.” When Műsâ ‘alaihissalâm’ saw a sick man and prayed, “O my Allah! Have mercy upon that slave of Yours?” Allâhu ta’âlâ declared: “How else should I have mercy upon a slave of Mine who is by now with the means which I sent to him so that he would attain My compassion. For, I shall forgive his sins by means of this illness. Through this I shall promote his rank
in Paradise.”
6) Apprehending that continuous health may cause one to forget Allâhu ta’âlâ, to disobey Him, and to commit harâm, he may prefer to remain ill. Through hardships and illnesses Allâhu ta’âlâ wakes those slaves of His whom He pities from unawareness. As a matter of fact, a hadîth states, “One of the following three things exists in Believers: qillat (poverty), illat
(illness), zillat (lack of esteem).” Another hadîth states, “Allâhu ta’âlâ declared: ‘Illness is My lasso, trap, and poverty is My dungeon. I put those whom I love into these.’ ” Health causes sinning. Real health exists in illness. Alî ‘radiyallâhu anh’ saw a crowd of people making merry and asked what it was for. When they said that it was their day of merry he said, “And our days of merry are those on which we don’t sin.” One of the great asked a person he ran into how he was. When the man said that he was quite well, he said, “The day on which you are quite well is when you don’t sin. There is not a disease more dangerous than sinning.” The reason why Pharaoh wanted everybody to worship him
was because he lived for four hundred years, during which he never had a headache or fever. If his head had ached only once, he would not have even thought of that impudence. If a person becomes sick and does not beg Allah for forgiveness Azrâîl ‘alaihissalâm’ says to him, “O you unwary! I have sent you messengers so many times. But you won’t pull yourself together.” Our superiors say that within forty days a Believer should have some trouble, some illness or some fear, or some damage should come upon his property. Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ was about to marry a woman with nikâh, when they said to him praisingly that the woman had never become ill. Then he gave up marrying her. One day he ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ was talking about a headache, a villager said, “How is a headache? I have never had
a headache.” Upon this he stated, “Keep away from me! Anyone who wants to see a man for Hell must look at him.” When ’Âisha ‘radiyallâhu anhâ’ asked him if anyone could reach the grade of martyrdom, he stated, “A person who remembers death twenty times each day attains to the grade of martyrs.” No doubt, the ill remember death very often. It is for these six reasons that some never used medicine.
Rasűlullah ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ used medicine because he did not need these reasons.
It is written as follows in Durr-ul-Mukhtâr and also in the section about kinds of water in Radd-ul-Muhtâr, which explains the former:
“It is permissible to use something harâm as a healer, provided it will be known that it will cure the ill person and when no halâl medicine is available. A hadîth in Bukhârî states, ‘Allâhu ta’âlâ has not created healing for you in things that are harâm.’ Its meaning is: ‘Substances that are harâm but which are, as it has been experimented, good for healing, are halâl for medicine.’ As
a matter of fact, it is halâl for a person who is about to die of thirst to drink as much wine as to save him from death. The existence of a curing effect in something harâm will be understood only if a specialized Muslim doctor says so. Only, pork and its fat cannot be used as medicine even if they are curatives.” In the eighth chapter of his annotation to Mawâhib-i ladunniyya, Muhammad Zarkânî ‘rahmatullâhi ta’âlâ ’aleyh’ says, “It is stated in a hadîth-i sherîf, ‘Receive medical treatment.’ According to this hadîth-i sherîf, treatment is fard when it is indispensable against death or when it will prevent one from omitting an action which is fard or when it is done for
curing a cardiac. The treatment for other diseases is sunna.”
It is written in Tatârhâniyya, “When there is no other remedy, it is permissible to have a surgical operation in order to save oneself from death.”
In conclusion, we say that avoiding the causes of illness is not an obstacle against tawakkul. The Khalîfa ’Umar ‘radiyallâhu anh’ was on his way to Damascus, when he heard that there was a plague in Damascus. Some of those who were with him suggested that they should not enter Damascus. Others protested that they should not run away from Allah’s destiny. Upon this the Khalîfa said, “Let us run away from Allah’s destiny to the destiny which is His, too. Let us not enter the city. Suppose someone among you has a pasture and a bare rocky area. To whichever he drives his flock, he will have done it with Allah’s decrees.” Then he summoned Abdurrahmân bin Awf ‘radiyallâhu anh’ and asked, “What is your opinion?” He said, “I heard Rasűlullah state, ‘Do not enter a place
where there is plague, and never flee from a plagued place or move to some other place!” Upon this, the Khalîfa saying, “Alhamdulillah, my statement concurs with the hadîth,” they did not enter Damascus. The reason why it is prohibited to leave a place where there is plague is because when the healthy ones leave the place there will be none left to look after the sick, and thus they will die. Moreover, at a place of plague the dirty air [which is full of microbes, bacilli, of plague] infects everybody, so those who escape will not escape the disease [but they will take the discease with themselves and will infect others with it]. A hadîth states, “Fleeing from a place where there is the disease of a plague is a grave sin, like running away from the enemy in a combat.”
[Muhyiddin-i Arabî ‘quddisa sirruh’ says in his book Futűhât-ul-makkiyya, in the chapter about ‘qadâ and balâ,’ “Avoid disasters and dangers as well as you can. For, it is a
habit of prophets to keep away from things that are unbearable and unendurable.”]
It is written at the end of the fifth volume of Radd-ul-muhtâr and in the book of fatwâ titled Bezzâziyya, “If an earthquake breaks out when you are at a closed place, it is mustahab to run away from there to an open place.”
NOTE: Having tawakkul requires that you will not tell people around you about your illness. It is makrűh to tell others or to complain about it. But it is not makrűh and does not spoil tawakkul to tell those who will be useful [like telling a doctor] or to tell in order to show how incapable, poor you are. As a matter of fact, when Alî ‘radiyallâhu anh’ became sick he was asked how he was. “Not well,” was his answer, which made others look at one another with surprise. “I am showing my incapability to Allâhu ta’âlâ,” he added. This statement was worthy of his state. He knew his incapability, despite his bravery, strength and courage, and would say, “O my Allah! Bless me with patience!”
Our Prophet ‘sallallâhu aleyhi wa sallam’ stated, “Ask for health from Allâhu ta’âlâ. Don’t ask for trouble!” It is harâm to complain about one’s illness by telling everybody about it! It is not harâm if one does not do it in order to complain. But it is better not to mention it. For, otherwise it may turn into a complaint because one mentions it often.
Hadrat Muhammad Bâqîbillah, a murshid-i kâmil and one of the great members of Tarîqat-i aliyya-i Naqshibandiyya, says, “It is not tawakkul not to hold fast to causes, nor is it to sit lazily. For, being so is impertinence against Allâhu ta’âlâ. A Muslim should hold fast to causes that are lawful [in Islam]. After holding to causes and beginning to work, he places his tawakkul. In other words, something which is wanted will not be expected from the thing which acts as a cause for its happening. For, Allâhu ta’âlâ has created the cause as a gateway through which to get to the thing wanted. To expect something to come to you directly without any causes in between instead of doing what will serve as its cause is like closing the gate and expecting it to be thrown in through the window, which is
impertinence. In order that we might get what we need, Allâhu ta’âlâ has created the gate and left it open. It is not right to close it. Our duty is to go to the gate and wait. The rest is up to Him. He often sends it through the gate. And He gives it by throwing it out through the window whenever He wishes.” This word of Hadrat Bâqîbillah’s is written in the book titled Barakât. As it is seen, it is not permissible to sit
idly and then say that you are having tawakkul. Great men of tasawwuf said that one should first begin working and holding to causes and then have tawakkul.
In his 13th letter, Mazhar-i Jân-i Jânan ‘quddisa sirruh’, one of the great scholars in India, says that even though our scholars wrote so often about the matter of optional and obligatory actions, some doubts come to the human mind automatically. This is because of the fact that the human mind is not able to comprehend some religious knowledge. If it were able to comprehend, there would be no need or necessity to make revelations to prophets so that men’s deeds could be good and useful. Claiming that man has full will, that is, saying that man can do whatever he wants, or vice versa, i.e., claiming that man has nothing so he only has to do the thing in destiny (qadâ and qader), means denying the Book and the Sunna. For, men’s deeds, corpses, that is, their material beings, actions, and movements
are all created by Allâhu ta’âlâ, too. So, is it possible to claim existence of full will in man? It will be injustice to call someone to account for something he did involuntarily. Allâhu ta’âlâ never acts unjustly. So, how can it be a true word to claim that man has to do by compulsion? It is obvious that men’s actions are not done involuntarily like tremulous motions. These actions are done using our knowledge, our will and our power. Men’s optional actions come out through these three things. However, men cannot have these three things by willing them. They are sent to them by Allâhu ta’âlâ when He wills. It is only to this extent that the compulsion of man may be said to be the case. Since men do not have full will and since they are not fully compelled, either, their actions come into existence between these
two extremes. This effectuation of actions is called kesb (acquisition). The existence of such a paltry amount of option in man’s acquisitive actions has caused Allâhu ta’âlâ’s injunctions [commands and prohibitions]. And since our option is weak, the injunctions have been moderate. Allâhu ta’âlâ’s attribute of Rahmat (Compassion) for Believers has surpassed His attribute of Ghadâb (Wrath) against the disobedient ones among them. None of His other attributes has surpassed any of the others. On the other hand, since Allâhu ta’âlâ’s deeds happen by His knowledge, will and power, they are dissimilar to the slaves’ (men’s) deeds. Therefore, His calling men to account on account of these deeds of theirs cannot be said to be incompatible with justice.