Der er egentlig ikke behov for en diskurs. Dette har været en aften med det, der kaldes samaa’ – som ikke er musik, men at lytte. Hele denne aften har været en undervisning. Allah talte til os i Surah Ya Sin, og store ‘ulama’ og shaykh’er talte til os i de qasidahs vi sang og tekster vi hørte læst op. Men der kan være en fordel ved at komme med et par pointer. Ledsageren Hassan ibn Thabit, må Allah være tilfreds med ham, skrev i sin berømte qasidah:
Muhammed er et menneske, men alligevel ikke som nogen anden;
nej, han er en fejlfri rubin, mens andre mennesker bare er sten.
Og al-Busayri sagde i sin qasidah al-Burdah:
Lad være med, hvad de kristne har påstået for deres profet –
Så ros ham som du vil, men gør det klogt.
Disse to vers sætter parametrene for at nærme sig Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred. Et menneske ja, men langt større end modernister siger.
Profeterne og sendebudene, fred være med dem, sendes til folk i deres tid og deres lande for at demonstrere, hvad et menneske er, og vejlede dem til at blive virkeligt mennesker. Profeten, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, blev sendt for hele menneskeheden af ??enhver race og farve, ethvert sprog og kultur, fra hans tid til tidens ende. Hans måde ophæver alle de tidligere religioner og måder. Vi er arten, der skal vise os, hvordan vi kan være, hvad vi er ved åbenbaring. Så hvis Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, er vores model for, hvad et menneske er, hvordan forener vi det så med humanismens tidsalder, som på en eller anden måde forestiller sig, at den allerede ved dette?
På arabisk har insan – menneske, som flertal både nas og ins. Disse leder os til to forskellige rødder. Først, nasiya – han glemte. Det siges, at summiya al-insana li-annahu nasiya – [mand] blev kaldt insan, fordi han glemte det.
Men Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, glemte ikke, som vi glemmer. En gang da han bad to rak’ah for en af de fire rak’ah salah’er, og ledsageren Dhu’sh-Shimalayn mindede ham om det og spurgte, om salah var blevet ændret, eller om han havde glemt det, og andre bekræftede, hvad der var sket, han, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, sagde: “Jeg glemmer, eller jeg er foranlediget til at glemme, for at jeg kan etablere sunnaen.” Engang spurgte ‘A’ishah: “Allahs sendebud, sover du, før du gør Witr?” Han sagde: “‘A’ishah, mine øjne sover, men mit hjerte sover ikke.”
Men glemsomhed har et andet aspekt: ??at glemme fejl begået mod en, skader og fornærmelser. Mænd og kvinder husker disse nogle gange gennem hele deres liv. Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, glemte de uretfærdigheder begået mod ham, og de skader og fornærmelser han modtog og meget mere. Han bar aldrig nag. Hvis han blev vred, var det kun for Allahs skyld. Da Allah gav ham åbningen af Makka til islam, tilgav han Quraysh for alt, og det inkluderede alle de frygtelige strabadser, han og hans ledsagere havde udstået i Makka, og de mænd som blev dræbt af dem i kampene. Dette er en høj og velsignet forglemmelse. Det er kun en af de mange karakteregenskaber, som er det egentlige formål med at blive sendt. Han, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, sagde: “Jeg er kun blevet sendt for at fuldende karakterens ædle kvaliteter.” Han fuldkomnede dem i sig selv, men også han i sin rolle som murabbi der fremmede vækst hos andre, perfektionerede dem i sine ledsagere. Allah sagde, det der betyder, “Og du er på en enorm karakterform”. Disse karakteregenskaber kaldes futuwwa, et begreb der er dårligt/sløjt oversat som ridderlighed.
Den anden rod til ordet insan er anisa, som betyder at være elskværdig og omgængelig. Af vores natur er vi socialt omgængelige skabninger, og vi er familiære. Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, demonstrerede perfekt, hvordan man bliver gift og får børn. Beretningerne hans hustruer, børn og tjenere fortæller om ham er lysende. Men mennesket har altid levet socialt i bredere forstand end familie, og de sjældne undtagelser som eneboere prøver reglen. At samfundslivet normalt blev eksemplificeret i byerne, men fra historiens begyndelse har byen også været problematisk. Byerne i Mesopotamien som de sumeriske og babyloniske var baseret på korn, men så kommer åger ind i historien, og slaveri af de gældsatte. Grækerne forsøgte, at danne deres byer, kaldet polis, på grundlag af indsamlingen af ??frie mænd og deres beslutning om ting sammen, ikke på en monarks beslutning, og dette kaldte de demokrati. Romerne dannede en republik, hvor alle samfundets klasser undtagen slaver og kvinder var repræsenteret. Men det blev til et imperium, og imperiet er baseret på kommando fra centrum. Verden ventede på, at Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, for at komme og lave hijrah til hans Mad?nah, hvor han under åbenbaringens vejledning formede en modelby for menneskeheden. Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi kaldte bogen, der registrerer det mest detaljeret, Muwatta’en af Imam Malik, ‘planen for en oplyst by’. En af vidensfolkene sagde, at Maliks hadith er som at se direkte på Allahs sendebud blandt hans ledsagere. Og så for at konkretisere billedet, er der levende optegnelser om de næste to generationer i Madina, fordi det var et samfund i bevægelse og udvikling. Som et samfund i udvikling har det fungeret som en dynamisk model for samfund lige siden og vil igen insha’Allah.
Det ville have været nok, men Allahs sendebud, fred være med ham, tog det videre: han lagde grundlaget for umma. Så på trods af orientalistiske historikere har vi aldrig haft et imperium, hverken et islamisk, eller et abbasidisk eller et osmannisk imperium. Vores model er umma – et fællesskab, hvis folk både eksemplificerer deres egne traditioner og kulturer samt tilpasser sig den velkendte oversigt over, hvad det er at være muslim, hvor den afrikanske muslim er autentisk afrikansk, ligesom kineseren er fuldt ud kinesisk. Dette er i modstrid med den modernistiske bevægelse, som reducerer folk til at være dårlige efterligninger af arabere. Og hvis man ikke skal blive araber for at være muslim, så behøver man bestemt ikke at blive pakistaner eller tyrkisk. Profeten var fuld af bekymring for sin umma i en sådan grad, at han under sin natrejse og opstigning, som var hans nåede det højeste punkt af åndelig viden, kom direkte ind i Allahs nærvær, så ‘han var en afstand på to buer længde eller endnu nærmere’, hans bekymring for sin umma forlod ham aldrig, og han har gemt sin bøn til at være for hans umma på den sidste dag.
Endelig er der selve ordet insan. Mand. Husk, at oprindeligt havde det engelske ord Man intet køn. Det indikerede mennesket. ‘Isa, fred være med ham, blev rapporteret som at have sagt i evangelierne: “Mennesket skal ikke leve af brød alene.” Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi, må Allah forbarme sig over ham, sagde: “Insan betyder ‘mand’, og det betyder også ‘øjets pupil’. Denne særlige fælles sætning er af afgørende betydning for den måde at tale på, som er brugt af Shaykh al-Akbar, fordi han ser en meget vigtig betydning i, at insan repræsenterer mennesket, og det repræsenterer også øjets pupil. Så den delte sætning har to betydninger på samme tid.” (The Book of Tawhid)
I Muhammeds vej siger Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi: “Ordet for mennesket har en rod NAS, der betyder: ‘at blive rystet frem og tilbage’, ‘at hænge suspenderet’: INSAN har en parallel betydning, som er: ‘øjets pupil’. Mennesket selv er en vibrerende hvirvlende aktivitet af energi i uendelig bevægelse – han hænger suspenderet i kosmos på sin lille planet, og i det usete hænger han suspenderet mellem de enorme formudsving, der udgør Ilden og Haven. Samtidig er han universets øje, hvormed hans Skaber betragter hans skabelse.”
Allahs sendebud, må Allah velsigne ham og give ham fred, var al-insan al-kamil – den fuldstændige perfekte mand, som blev sendt for at fuldende menneskeheden.
Properly there is no need for a discourse. This has been a night of what is called samaa‘ – which is not music but listening. All of this night has been a teaching. Allah spoke to us in S?rah Y? S?n, and great ‘ulam?’ and shaykhs spoke to us in the qasidahs we sang and texts we heard read out. But there might be some benefit in making a few points. The Companion Hassan ibn Thabit, may Allah be pleased with him, wrote in his famous qasidah:
Muhammad is a human being, yet not like anyone else;
no, he is a flawless ruby while other people are just stones.
And al-Busayri said in his qasidah al-Burdah:
Leave aside what the Christians have claimed for their prophet –
Then praise him as you like, but do so wisely.
These two verses set the parameters for approaching the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. A human being yes, but far greater than modernists say.
The Prophets and Messengers, peace be upon them, are sent to the people of their times and their lands to demonstrate what a human being is and guide them to becoming truly human. The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was sent for all of mankind of every race and colour, every language and culture, from his time until the end of time. His way abrogates all the previous religions and ways. We are the species who need to be shown how to be what we are by revelation. So if the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, is our model for what a human being is, how do we reconcile that with the age of humanism that somehow imagines that it already knows this?
In Arabic insan – human being, has as plural both nas and ins. These lead us to two different roots. First, nasiya he forgot. It is said that summiya al-insana liannahu nasiya – [man] was called insan because he forgot.
But the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, did not forget as we forget. Once when he prayed two rak‘ahs for one of the four rak‘ah salahs and the Companion Dhu’sh-Shimalayn reminded him and asked if the salah had been changed or if he had forgotten, and others confirmed what had happened, he, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, “I forget, or I am made to forget, in order that I may establish the sunna.” Once ‘A’ishah asked: “Messenger of Allah, do you sleep before you do the witr?” He said, “‘A’ishah, my eyes sleep but my heart does not sleep.”
But forgetfulness has another aspect: forgetting wrongs done to one, injuries and insults. Men and women remember these sometimes throughout their lives. The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, forgot the wrongs done him and the injuries and insults he received and much more. He never bore a grudge. If he became angry it was only for the sake of Allah. When Allah gave him the Opening of Makka to Islam, he forgave Quraysh for everything, and that included all the terrible hardships he and his Companions had endured in Makka, and the men killed by them in the battles. This is a high and blessed forgetting. It is only one of the many qualities of character which are the actual purpose of his being sent. He, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, “I have only been sent to perfect the noble qualities of character.” He perfected them in himself, but also he, in his role as a murabbi who fostered growth in others, perfected them in his Companions. Allah said, that which means, “And you are on a tremendous character form”. These qualities of character are named futuwwa, a term which is poorly translated as chivalry.
The other root of the word insan is anisa, which means to be amiable, companionable, and sociable. By our nature we are societal sociable creatures and we are familial. The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, demonstrated perfectly how to be married and have children. The accounts his wives, children and servants narrate about him are luminous. The human being has always lived socially in a wider sense than family, and the rare exceptions such as hermits prove the rule. That societal living was usually exemplified in cities. But from the beginning of history, the city has also been problematic. The cities of Mesopotamia such as the Sumerian and Babylonian ones were based on grain, but then usury comes into the story, and the enslavement of the indebted. The Greeks tried to form their cities, called polis, on the gathering of free men and their deciding on things together, not on the decision of a monarch, and this they called democracy. The Romans formed a Republic, in which all classes of the society except for slaves and women were represented. But that turned into an empire, and empire is based on command from the centre. The world waited for the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, to come and make hijrah to his Mad?nah where under the guidance of revelation, he shaped a model city for humanity. Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi called the book that records that in the most detail, the Muwatta’ of Im?m M?lik, the ‘blueprint for an illuminated city’. One of the people of knowledge said that the hadith of Malik are like looking straight at the Messenger of Allah among his Companions. And then to flesh out the picture there are vivid records of the next two generations in Madinah because it was a society in movement and development. As a society in development it has served as a dynamic model for societies ever since and will again insha’Allah.
That would have been enough, but the Messenger of Allah, peace be upon him, took it further: he laid the foundations of umma. So in spite of orientalist historians, we never had an empire, neither an Islamic one, nor an Abbasid one, nor an Ottoman Empire. Our model is umma – a community whose people both exemplify their own traditions and cultures as well as conforming to the well-known outline of what it is to be Muslim, where the African Muslim is authentically African, just as the Chinese is fully Chinese. This is contrary to the modernist movement which reduces peoples to being poor imitations of Arabs. And if one doesn’t have to become an Arab to be a Muslim, then one certainly doesn’t have to become Pakistani or Turkish. The Prophet was full of concern for his umma, to such an extent that during his night journey and ascent, which was his reaching the highest point of spiritual knowledge coming directly into the presence of Allah so that ‘he was a distance of two bows length or even closer’, his concern for his umma never left him.
Finally, there is the word insan itself. Man. Remember that originally the English word Man had no gender. It indicated the human being. ‘Isa, peace be upon him, was reported as having said in the Gospels, “Man shall not live by bread alone.” Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi, may Allah have mercy on him, said: “Insan means ‘man’ and it also means the ‘pupil of the eye.’ This particular shared phrase is of vital importance to the way of speaking which is used by Shaykh al-Akbar because he sees a very important meaning in the fact that insan represents man and it also represents the pupil of the eye. So the shared phrase has two meanings at the same time.” (The Book of Tawhid)
In The Way of Muhammad, Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi says: “The word for man has a root NAS, meaning: ‘to be shaken to and fro’, ‘to hang suspended’: INSAN has a parallel meaning which is: ‘the pupil of the eye’. Man himself is a vibrating whirling activity of energy in endless movement – he hangs suspended in the cosmos on his small planet, and in the Unseen he hangs suspended between the tremendous efflorations of form that make up the Fire and the Garden. At the same time he is the eye of the universe with which his Creator contemplates His creation. He is a gathering-together of all the forms, a resumé of the whole creational process from the basic matrices up through the elements and plants to the highest complexification of aspects. And so he is also a small universe, just as the universe from what the Qutb said above, is nothing else but Al-Insanu’l-Kabir, the Big Man. We are of course speaking here in the language of the Sufis and not in the language of ignorance and literalism. This does not lessen the veracity of the assigning to the cosmos the name of the Big Man, it is simply that literalist thinking is too primitive a method of reflection to grasp these matters. The Perfect Man is utterly aware and awake, permeated by all the Names and all the perfections of the Divine Attributes.”
The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was al-insan al-kamil – the complete perfect man.