Know that your worst enemy is the ego that lies between your two flanks. It has been created a tyrant
commanding to evil, always pushing you towards it, and you have been ordered to straighten it, cleanse it
(tazkiyat), wean it from what it feeds on, and drag it in chains, subdued, to the worship of its Lord.(1)
(1) Ibn Qudama, Mukhtasar minhaj al-qasidin li Ibn al-Jawzi, ed.
M. Ahmad Hamdan and ‘Abd al-Qadir Arna’ut, 2nd. ed. (Damascus:
maktab al-shabab al-muslim wa al-maktab al-islami, 1380/1961) p. 426.
Reproduced with permission from Shaykh M. Hisham Kabbani’s
The Repudiation of “Salafi” Innovations (Kazi, 1996) p. 340-344.
[19] ON TASAWWUF
Abu al-Hasan al-Shadhili (d. 656)
One of the great saints of the Community, he
said about tasawwuf:
He who dies without having entered into this knowledge of ours dies insisting upon his grave sins (kaba’ir) without realizing it.(1)
(1) In Ibn ‘Ajiba, Iqaz al-himam p. 8.
Reproduced with permission from Shaykh M. Hisham Kabbani’s
The Repudiation of “Salafi” Innovations (Kazi, 1996) p. 345.
Bismillah al-Rahman al-Raheem
was-salaat was-salaam ‘alaa Rasul-illah wa ‘alaa alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam
[20] ON TASAWWUF
Sultan al-‘ulama’ al-‘Izz ibn ‘Abd al-Salam al-Sulami (d. 660)
His nickname is “Sultan of the Scholars.” The Shaykh al-Islam of his time, he took hadith from the hafiz al-Qasim ibn ‘Ali ibn ‘Asakir al-
Dimashqi, and tasawwuf from the Shafi‘i Shaykh al-Islam Shihab al-Din al-Suhrawardi (539-632), whom al-Dhahabi calls: “The shaykh, the imam, the
scholar, the zahid, the knower, the Muhaddith, Shaykh al-Islam, the Peerless One of the
Sufis...”(1) He also studied under Abu al-Hasan al-Shadhili (d. 656) and his disciple al-Mursi.
The author of Miftah al-sa‘ada and al-Subki in his Tabaqat relate that al-‘Izz would say, upon hearing al-Shadhili and al-Mursi speaking: “This is a kind of speech that is fresh from Allah.”(2)
In his two-volume Qawa‘id al-ahkam fi masalih al-anam on usul al-fiqh he mentions that the Sufis are those meant by Allah’s saying:
“Allah’s party” (5:56, 58:22), and he defines tasawwuf as “the betterment of hearts, through whose health bodies are healthy, and through whose disease bodies are diseased.” He considers the knowledge of external legal rulings a
knowledge of the Law in its generalities, while the knowledge of internal matters is a knowledge of the Law in its subtle details.(3)
Among his books on tasawwuf are:
• Shajarat al-ma‘arif wa al-ahwal wa salih al- aqwal wa al-a‘mal (The tree of the gnostic sciences and states and pious sayings and deeds) in twenty chapters, the last seven of which are devoted to the various branches of ihsan in one’s religion;
• Mukhtasar ri‘ayat al-Muhasibi, an abridgment of al-Muhasibi’s book on the Observance of the rights of Allah;
• Masa’il al-tariqa fi ‘ilm al-haqiqa (Questions of the Sufi path concerning the knowledge of Reality) in which al-‘Izz answers sixty questions regarding tasawwuf;
• Risala fi al-qutb wa al-abdal al-arba‘in (Treatise on the Pole of saints and the forty substitute-saints);
• Fawa’id al-balwa wa al-mihan (The benefits of trials and afflictions);
• Nihayat al-rughba fi adab al-suhba (The obtainment of wishes in the etiquette of companionship).
In view of his strictness in every matter, he is famous for his fatwa allowing sama‘ or poetry recitals, and the swaying of the body and dancing associated with trances and other states of ecstasy during dhikr. Imam Ahmad related in his Musnad:
‘Ali said: I visited the Prophet with
Ja‘far (ibn Abi Talib and Zayd (ibn Haritha). The Prophet said to Zayd: “You are my freedman” (anta mawlay), whereupon Zayd began to hop on one leg around the prophet (hajala). The Prophet then said to Ja‘far: “You resemble me in my creation and my manners” (anta ashbahta khalqi wa khuluqi), whereupon Ja‘far began to hop behind Zayd. The Prophet then said to me:
“You pertain to me and I pertain to you”
(anta minni wa ana minka) whereupon I began to hop behind Ja‘far.(4)
Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Hajar al-Haytami mentions that some scholars have seen in this evidence for the permissibility of dancing (al- raqs) upon hearing a recital (sama‘) that lifts the spirit.(5) al-Yafi‘i concurs with him in Mir’at al-jinan.(6) Both of them mention al-‘Izz ibn ‘Abd al-Salam as the chief example of such scholars, since it is authentically reported that he himself “attended the sama‘ and danced in states of ecstasy” (kana yahduru al-sama‘ wa yarqusu wa yatawajadu), as stated by Ibn al-‘Imad on the authority of al-Dhahabi, Ibn Shakir al- Kutabi, al-Yafi‘i, al-Nabahani, and Abu al- Sa‘adat.(7)
This permissibility of a type of dancing on the part of the Imams and hadith masters precludes the prohibition of sama‘ on a general basis, and that of the dancing that accompanies
sama‘ as well, regardless of the reservations of Ibn Taymiyya concerning it which, in the mouths of today’s “Salafis,” do become cut-and-dry prohibitions.
As for particular cases where the dancing may be prohibited, it regards the worldly kind of effeminate dancing which has nothing to do with the ecstasy of of sama‘ and dhikr. al-‘Izz ibn
‘Abd al-Salam differentiated the two in his Fatwas:
Dancing is a bid‘a or innovation which is not countenanced except by one deficient in his mind. It is unfitting for other than women. As for the audition of poetry (sama‘) which stirs one towards states of purity (ahwal saniyya) which remind one of the hereafter: there is nothing wrong with it, nay, it is recommended (bal yundabu ilayh) for lukewarm and dry hearts.
However, the one who harbors wrong desires in his heart is not allowed to attend the sama‘, for the sama‘ stirs up whatever desire is already in the heart, both the detestable and the desirable.(8)
He also said in his Qawa‘id al-ahkam:
Dancing and clapping are a bad display resembling the display of women, which no
one indulges except frivolous men or affected liars... whoever apprehends the greatness of Allah, it cannot be imagined that he will start dancing and clapping as these are not performed except by the crassly ignorant, not those who have merit and intelligence, and the proof of their ignorance is that the Shari‘a has not cited any evidence for their action in the Qur’an and the Sunna, and none of the Prophets or their notable followers ever did it.(9)
al-‘Izz on the Superiority of the Rank of the