Perfect People In Perfect Unity: Part 1

"My love to the children. May God, the unfathomable ruler of grace who is limitless love, give you His grace and the wealth of His Grace. May He give this to all of us. May His qualities and His actions come to exist within us. Just as God conducts His kingdom and just as He regards all lives, may we have those same qualities. May we do His duties and services in the same way that He does. May we do this with His grace.

Precious children, jeweled lights of my eyes, my own born created beings, who are as the body within my body, may all of us join together as one and focus on our Father. May we live as one family in the world. May we worship the One God. May we bow down to Him, and may we disappear into His intention. God must give us His grace.

Precious children, jeweled lights within my eyes, all of us must join together as one. Not only must we come to meetings, but we must join together in our hearts as well. We must live together and become one in our qalbs (inner hearts), and we must join together in what we see, in our thoughts, in our dreams, and in our intentions. We must exist without any differences at all. We must never see any separations in our actions or in our thoughts. We must reach this perfection.

Even in hunger, illness, and old age, may we live as one body and as one life. We must have the certitude to be aware of this unity. In the same way that God comforts all of creation, let us all establish this state within ourselves. This is the unity of the one family, one community, one heart, and one compassion. This is the love of God. May we establish this state.

We must establish this unity and make our hearts perfect. Unity is not the way we commonly speak of it. It is not the way that we look at it. It is not the way we claim it to be. It is not the way we do it. Our conduct, our thoughts, our speech, our hearts, our lives, and our bodies must be made one. In this way, we must reach the fullness in performing duty, and God's action must manifest. We must bring about that kind of heart within ourselves. Only if we develop that can we reach the state, the happiness, and the life of one family, the unity of brothers and sisters, and peace in each heart. Only then can we see tranquility. That will be the perfection for us and the completion for our hearts. That will be completion for the qalb and completion of God's grace. If we make that completion of grace perfect and full, then we will see peace in the life of man. We will see the completeness of the one family, and we can know prayer to the One God. That will be perfect prayer. We will be a perfect family, perfect brothers and sisters. As we progress, we will realize the perfection found in such a life. Until this state comes, we will never see perfection.

To worship God inside, we must see that God has formed the four religions as four steps. There is shari'at, tariqat, harqiqat, and ma'rifat. We are born, we drank milk, we at for our hunger and our illnesses, and we went to school. A few more years passed, we got married, and later we became old. All the while, we experienced desires and cravings, and we searched for materials and possessions. Everything we see in life is shari'at. It is all shari'at. Our whole life exists as shari'at. What we think of, what we search for, what we eat, what we imbibe, our searching for halaal and haraam (what is permissible and what is not permissible)—all that is shari'at.

In this life of shari'at, we must know what is right (shari), what is wrong (pilai), what is halaal, what is haraam, what is sifat (the manifestation of creation), what is Zat (the essence of grace), what is sharr (evil), and what is khair (good). All this must be understood. When we understand all this, we must accept only what is good, and we must avoid what is evil. We must avoid the sifat and accept the Zat. We must avoid what is haraam and take only what is halaal. We must exist in such a state.

After we take what is right, and once we have determination and certitude of faith in God, then our state becomes tariqat, which means we have our Iman firm, and we place God in our hearts. The first step is shari'at. After we have seen what is right and what is wrong, we must take what is right, have faith in God, and then build the proper (inner) mosque. First we must realize the shari'at of life. Next in the second step we must realize the One to whom worship belongs, and we must build the mosque in which He is accepted. We must build that mosque and perform the prayer of iman. There is not one to whom worship is due other than Allahu ta' ala. For creation, for questioning, for the day of resurrection, for the prophets, for the lights of God, for this world and the next world, God is the one who judges. No one else can give that judgment. This is what we must accept with determination, and then we must build the mosque accordingly. That is tariqat.

In tariqat, we have shakur (contentment) saying, Al-hamdu lillah (All praise belongs only to God). If we receive food we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If we receive no food, we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If we receive a beating, we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If we do not get beaten, we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If sadness comes to us, we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If sadness does not come, we say, Al-hamdu lillah. If we get a delicious rice dish or if we get only water, we say, Al-hamdu lillah.

Patience, sabur (inner patience), shakur (contentment), tawakkal-Allah (absolute trust in God), and Al-hamdu lillah—these are the prerequisites of iman. The second level tariqat, the state in which the certitude of iman exists within you, is the prerequisite to Īman-Islam. As soon as iman becomes perfectly pure, as soon as your determination is correct, then the state of Islam, or light, will exist. You will become the light. 'Lam' is light, the light of perfect purity. Light is pure. For that purity, patience, sabur, shakur, tawakkal-Allah, and Al-hamdu lillah are the pure food. They are the wage and the food given by God. At all times one must have sabur. If he gets food, he has sabur. If he gets less food, he has shakur; he is still satisfied and contented. If he gets even less, he has tawakkal-Allah, and if he gets even less then that, he says, 'Al-hamdu lillah.' This is Īman-Islam.

The first step is shari'at and the second is tariqat. First of all you must see what is right and what is wrong; only then can you transcend shari'at. In shari'at, you see the shadow forms within, and wherever you look outside you see the physical forms. That is the worship of idols. Inside, all the thoughts and intentions are shadow worship. What you see on the outside, everything, all of it, is idol worship, animal worship, monkey worship, donkey worship. Secondly, to see that only God is right, to have the determination of faith, and to accept only God, is the mosque built in the second step, the second mosque of tariqat. Your iman must be made firm, and you must build that mosque.

In the second step (which is also the religion of fire worship), the fire of hell says, 'Bring this, bring that. Bring me this, bring me that.' It demands things.

But you may say to the fire, 'Al-hamdu lillah, you must have shakur. Do not talk to me!'

'Aiyo!' it will cry. 'I don't have this! I'm hungry! Please give me this, please give me that!'

Again you must say, 'Have shakur, do not talk to me. I do not have time to talk to you.'

It will cry, 'Give me meat, give me fish!'

But you must say,....

Continued in Part 2

Copyright: Four Steps to Pure Iman
Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship Family Newsletter July – August 1997