Speech in the Al Isra’ wal Mi’raj Asy Syarif Cel­e­bra­tions 1438H /​2017: The Sen­si­ble Approach to Irt­ibat with Al Habib

My speech for you today is enti­tled, “The Sen­si­ble Approach to Irt­ibat with Al Habib.”

When we look around us, we wit­ness many coun­tries in civil and ter­ri­to­r­ial wars. How­ever, as soon as the wars ended, restora­tion and recon­struc­tion started. It takes only sev­eral years for peo­ple in these coun­tries to walk on the streets and in the mar­kets again. There are no more signs of war or destruc­tion except in people’s mem­o­ries and in pictures.

Mean­while, we also find peo­ple who are not affected in such wars but their human Tak­win are trem­bled by the impacts of chal­lenges in life. The ele­ments of their self-​formation are wrecked and the visual pro­jec­tions of their per­son­al­i­ties are in dis­or­der. A per­son may even take his entire life­time to restore and recon­struct his destruc­ted self. By say­ing this, we do not mean to mea­sure or under­rate the amount of chal­lenges in life, espe­cially for the gen­er­a­tion of youths. Rather, we empha­tize them for the great dif­fi­cul­ties in life such as unem­ploy­ment, inabil­ity to find a suit­able job, eco­nomic cri­sis, infla­tion, social and fam­ily prob­lems, mar­riage dif­fi­cul­ties, strug­gles between ease and dif­fi­culty, and many oth­ers. In fact, any one of these prob­lems by itself can be enough to trem­ble a human.

Due to that, we feel that we must cau­tion peo­ple not to sur­ren­der to self-​destruction, anx­i­ety, hope­less­ness, neg­a­tive thoughts, depres­sion towards life, fear of every­thing, and the feel­ing that life has no value or mean­ing. To these peo­ple, we shall say, “If you want to improve your sit­u­a­tion and con­di­tion in life, or to rise from the chal­lenges of life and soci­ety, then you have to begin by build­ing and improv­ing yourself.”

From the Dan­darawi Per­spec­tive, the build­ing of an Insan Mus­lim refers to the build­ing of one’s self with stur­di­ness, coher­ence, effec­tive­ness and inter­ac­tiv­ity. This will ensure good­ness for his self, his fam­ily, his life, his sit­u­a­tion and his rela­tions with oth­ers, as a result of his Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. From here, we divide our speech into five sec­tions to explain about Al Irt­ibat; its mean­ing and neces­sity, its method, its prin­ci­ples, its steps and its effects.

The first sec­tion: Why do we have to Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawatullah?

This ques­tion has tens of answers. Most of these answers are due to the pos­i­tive effects of Al Irt­ibat to the Murtabit [per­son who Irt­ibat], his life and the lives of those around him. How­ever, we want to go even fur­ther to the ori­gin and foun­da­tion of Al Irt­ibat. Due to that, we would like to pose a more pre­cise ques­tion, “Why is it nec­es­sary for us and for every Mus­lim to Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawatullah?”

Here, I have two answers which I find are suf­fi­cient to prove that a Mus­lim can­not com­plete his reli­gion and can­not be near to Allah Jalla wa ‘Ala except if he Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Al Musthafa Al Mujtaba Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih.

The first answer: Although the word “Al Irt­ibat” is not men­tioned as a term in Al Quran Al Karim or in Al Hadith An Nabawi Asy Syarif, its mean­ing is clearly men­tioned. Its mean­ing is that if I Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah, I have to per­form two simul­ta­ne­ous actions:

The first action is to have Iman [faith] that the Prophetic self is unique, thus I emu­late him when form­ing the ele­ments of my self-​formation; Badan, Ruh, Nafs and ‘Aql. With that, I shall attain effectiveness.

The sec­ond action is to have Intima’ [adher­ence] to the unique Prophetic self of the per­son who did not say, “Nafsi, Nafsi [myself, myself]” but, “Ummati, Ummati [my Ummah, my Ummah]”. I have to be part of his Ummah by reflect­ing the visual pro­jec­tions of my per­son­al­ity in any human inter­ac­tion; ide­o­log­i­cal, social, racial or regional, in accor­dance to the meth­ods formed by the Owner of Al Ummah, Az Za’im Al Jami’ Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih.

There are many clear evi­dences in Al Quran Al Karim and Al Hadith Asy Syarif that Irt­ibat Al Iman and Al Intima’ is the only way to build a human and to unite the Ummah. There are also count­less evi­dences of this Irt­ibat in the lives of the hon­ourable Sahabah. As such, Al Irt­ibat with Ar Rasul Al Musthafa Waz Za’im Al Mujtaba is nec­es­sary to com­plete the religion.

As for the sec­ond answer: We are peo­ple who have faith in Allah Jalla wa ‘Ala, thus we lis­ten to Al Quran Al Majid which informs us about Allah Sub­hanah and His Asma’ul Husna [beau­ti­ful names], hence we love Him. Here, we learn from Al Quran Al Karim that Allah Sub­hanah loves those with qual­i­ties which are in-​built in them such as At Tawwabin [those who repent] and Al Mutathah­hirin [those who purify them­selves]. We also learn from Al Quran Al Karim that Allah Sub­hanah also loves those who attain their Tak­win Muham­madi by fol­low­ing Al Habib Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih with­out hav­ing those spe­cific qual­i­ties in-​built in them. Allah Ta’ala says in Surah Ali ‘Imran (verse 31):

قُلْ إِن كُنتُمْ تُحِبُّونَ اللَّـهَ فَاتَّبِعُونِي يُحْبِبْكُمُ اللَّـهُ وَيَغْفِرْ لَكُمْ ذُنُوبَكُمْ وَاللَّـهُ غَفُورٌ رَّحِيمٌ

[Say (oh Rasu­l­ul­lah), “If you love Allah, thus fol­low me. Allah will love you and for­give you your sins, and Allah is All-​Forgiving and All-​Merciful.”]

Indeed, our Rasul Al Karim Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih is Habibul­lah. No mat­ter how much we strive to fol­low him, we can never be like him because no human can ever be like him Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. How­ever, we can attain the por­trayal of the char­ac­ter­is­tics of the one whom Allah loves and be the peo­ple who attain Tak­win Muham­madi who are promised with the love from Allah Jalla wa ‘Ala. There­fore, Al Irt­ibat with the self of Habibul­lah is the way to gain love from Allah.

The sec­ond sec­tion: The Method of Al Irt­ibat (How to Irtibat?)

Indeed Al Ana [ego] exists in each one of us. It sets our focus to look within us inter­nally and to the soci­ety exter­nally. Through­out the time when ego con­trols a human’s focus, he acts within the inter­ests of his self, his fam­ily and his assem­bly by stay­ing within his fear for him­self. In short, if a human is to be left with his desires, his ego will not be bet­ter and will not be con­cerned towards oth­ers because he only pre­serves the inter­ests of his self, his group and his des­tiny. This per­son whose ego con­trols the capac­ity of his Wij­dan [heart] and the dis­tance of his Wujud [exis­tence] is one who Irt­ibat with his own ego.

How­ever, when he becomes con­vinced that Al Irt­ibat with the self of Ar Rasul Al Musthafa Waz Za’im Al Mujtaba Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih is nec­es­sary to com­plete the reli­gion and the way to gain love from Allah the God of the uni­verse, he will leave his ego and his desires. He will then sub­mit his focus and turn towards the right­ful owner of As Siyadah within him inter­nally and the right­ful owner of Az Za’amah to his soci­ety exter­nally, Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih.

When he deeply sub­mits the own­er­ship of his focus to the self of Rasu­l­ul­lah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih, firstly, he will sub­mit his desires in accor­dance to the teach­ings and con­tent­ment of Rasu­l­ul­lah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. At the same time, when he inter­acts with the soci­ety exter­nally, all the visual pro­jec­tions of his per­son­al­ity will con­tribute to rais­ing the com­mu­nity and to the unity of the human struc­ture, play­ing an active part in the com­mu­nity and the Ummah. With that, he will under­stand the impor­tance of both his own inter­est and the inter­est of oth­ers. In fact, each time he is being active in the inter­est of the soci­ety exter­nally, he is gain­ing more results for his own inter­est as well.

The third sec­tion: The Prin­ci­ples of Al Irtibat

Indeed, to leave ego is not a sim­ple mat­ter. It may not be ful­filled instantly in one attempt. Even when a per­son has decided to Irt­ibat and per­form it, ego may qui­etly con­vince him to regard his clashes or even sev­er­ing of ties with oth­ers as a kind of praise­wor­thy and legit­i­mate dig­nity. Instead, it is in fact a despi­ca­ble pride which destroys human relationships.

Due to that, it is impor­tant for a human to have clear prin­ci­ples that bal­ance between the ele­ments of his self-​formation within him inter­nally and the visual pro­jec­tions of his per­son­al­ity within his soci­ety exter­nally. It is impor­tant for him not to fear of what he dis­likes, but to be reg­u­lated by the prin­ci­ples of Irt­ibat so that he may straighten his Masirah Zatiyah and Jama’iyah.

We begin with the prin­ci­ple for a person’s inter­nal self within the capac­ity of his Wij­dan. Thus we find that this prin­ci­ple is As Siyadah Al Muham­madiyah Asy Syami­lah [the Uni­ver­sal Muham­madi Mas­ter­ship]. It is the ref­er­ence for us to bal­ance every­thing within our­selves, includ­ing our think­ing, thoughts, assump­tions, feel­ings, fears and reac­tions. We bal­ance every­thing before they appear to the human world and before they are being trans­lated into words and actions. Through this bal­ance, we will not allow our inter­nal self to show that it is being shielded with ego and that the Nafs is fol­low­ing its desires by com­mit­ting injus­tice and offences.

This is because our heart is con­vinced that it can­not con­tra­dict the objec­tives of Asy Syari’ah and the objec­tives of Sayyidul Muwah­hidin Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. Each of us should be focused that among the ini­tial objec­tives of As Siyadah Al Muham­madiyah Asy Syami­lah in the human’s Wij­dan is to form the ele­ments of his self-​formation in a man­ner that results in him being clean, trans­par­ent, of good morals, enlight­ened, strong, active and influ­en­tial to peo­ple around him.

He will not be inclined to take advan­tage of the legal rights of his son or rel­a­tive. He will also not be in fear of any unjust sit­u­a­tion caused by his man­ager at work or any­one who has author­ity over him. Instead, he con­sid­ers this sit­u­a­tion as a test from Allah Sub­hanah and accepts it with trust in Him. He will not stop from want­ing to change, and he will not have any neg­a­tive think­ing or thoughts which may devi­ate the effec­tive­ness of his self and obstruct his strife to seek a bet­ter life under the shel­ter of As Siyadah Al Muham­madiyah Asy Syami­lah within his Wijdan.

As for the sec­ond prin­ci­ple for the soci­ety exter­nally within the dis­tance of a person’s Wujud, we find that this prin­ci­ple is Az Za’amah Al Muham­madiyah Al Jami’ah [the Uni­fy­ing Muham­madi Guar­an­tee]. It is the ref­er­ence for us to set our inter­ac­tiv­ity in our inter­ac­tions with our diverse human soci­ety, and also with the entire world con­sist­ing of humans, ani­mals, land and nat­ural envi­ron­ment. With this prin­ci­ple, we will not Redha that our inter­ac­tions to be devi­ated through the visual pro­jec­tions of our per­son­al­i­ties even if we can jus­tify our actions with numer­ous evi­dences and proofs. This is because we have observed that this way of inter­ac­tion opposes the objec­tives of Asy Syari’ah and the objec­tives of Za’imul Mus­limin Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. From these objec­tives, we under­stand that one of its pleas­ant out­comes is hav­ing good rela­tions with oth­ers. It is sim­i­lar to how a Muj­tahid will act in the arena of Fiqh whereby he builds his Ijti­had upon the ori­gins by being reg­u­lated by the objec­tives of Asy Syari’ah. There­fore, we find that this inter­ac­tion should be reg­u­lated under the objec­tives of Az Za’amah Al Muham­madiyah Al Jami’ah to safe­guard the inter­est of the assem­bly and to pre­serve the unity of the Ummah, not to dis­in­te­grate the unity.

How­ever, if we were to find that our inter­ac­tion oppresses our own wife or child, causes strain­ing of ties with our brother or fam­ily, or sep­a­rates Mus­lim assem­blies with dif­fer­ent ide­olo­gies and causes enmity between them, we should re-​examine the authen­tic­ity of our Intima’ to the unique Prophetic self. This is because Al Irt­ibat with the self of Rasu­l­ul­lah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih has to be true with­out any doubt because a Murtabit sub­mits his focus only to Sayyidul Wij­dan who is con­cerned for the human self and Za’imul Wujud who is con­cerned for the unity of the Ummah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih.

The fourth sec­tion: The Steps of Al Irtibat

There are four steps to Irt­ibat with its sequence in line with logic in any mat­ter. How­ever, some peo­ple may believe and say that Al Irt­ibat is one sin­gle step that occurs when a per­son leaves his ego, pre­vents it from con­trol­ling the capac­ity of his Wij­dan and the dis­tance of his Wujud, and sub­mits his focus towards Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih. Hence to them, this may ful­fill Al Irt­ibat in one sin­gle step. To us, this may be right. How­ever, if that Murtabit stum­bles or is devi­ated from his Irt­ibat, he does not have a roadmap which enables him to iden­tify his weak points and work to over­come them.

The four steps are as follows:

The 1^st step: The under­stand­ing of the ‘Aql about Irtibat

We sum­ma­rize this step by say­ing that the human ‘Aql should under­stand the neces­sity for him to Irt­ibat with the self of Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘Alaihi Solawat­ul­lah, the mean­ing of Al Irt­ibat that it is indeed two Irt­ibat (Irt­ibat Al Iman and Irt­ibat Al Intima’) and the method of Irt­ibat. Indeed this step is a step of infor­ma­tion to pre­serve his will to be deter­mined in Irtibat.

The 2^nd step: Instill­ing the will to Irtibat

When a person’s ‘Aql is con­vinced about the neces­sity to Irt­ibat, he will instill the will to exe­cute it. When he regains his will to leave ego, he is totally pre­pared to offer his ‘Ahdan wa Mit­saqan [pledge and oath] to walk on the path of Al Ma’iyyah Al Muham­madiyah Al Mani’ah, under the shel­ter of the ban­ner of Az Za’amah Al Muham­madiyah Al Jami’ah.

The 3^rd step: For­mu­la­tion of the ele­ments of one’s self-​formation

When the Murtabit sub­mits his focus to Al Musthafa Al Mujtaba Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih, he firstly turns towards his self inter­nally to for­mu­late the ele­ments of his self-​formation based on the por­trayal of the char­ac­ter­is­tics of Saiyidul Muwahhidin.

Firstly, he begins by improv­ing the prac­tices of his body by pre­serv­ing it with the clean­li­ness of the human self of Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih and with the pure­ness of his prayers, thus his body is ener­getic with ‘Afiah [vigour].

Sec­ondly, he improves the prac­tices of his Ruh by puri­fy­ing it with the abun­dant Dzikr of Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih and with his plen­ti­ful Salawat, thus his Ruh is pure with Syafafiyah [transparency].

Thirdly, he improves the prac­tices of his Nafs by refin­ing it with the beau­ti­ful move­ments of Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih and his per­fect still­ness, thus his Nafs is emi­nent with Sya­mailiyah [selflessness].

Fourthly, he improves the prac­tices of his ‘Aql by edu­cat­ing it with the knowl­edge of the Quran of Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih and the teach­ings of his say­ings, thus his ‘Aql is enlight­ened with Nuraniyah [enlightenment].

The 4^th step: For­mu­la­tion of the visual pro­jec­tions of one’s personality

After the Murtabit has for­mu­lated the ele­ments of his self-​formation, he turns towards the visual pro­jec­tions of his per­son­al­ity that con­trol his rela­tion­ships with his soci­ety. Then, he strives to make his visual pro­jec­tions be tinted with the por­trayal of the char­ac­ter­is­tics of the human self of Za’imul Mus­limin Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih.

Firstly, he begins by con­trol­ling the visual pro­jec­tion of his ‘Aql to com­pre­hend the ben­e­fits of the var­i­ous ide­o­log­i­cal sects with­out being extreme towards his ide­o­log­i­cal sect or con­demn­ing other sects, such that he par­tic­i­pates in each ide­o­log­i­cal sect in their events, fes­ti­vals and celebrations.

Sec­ondly, he con­trols the visual pro­jec­tion of his Nafs to feel the fair­ness of the var­i­ous social sta­tuses, such that he inte­grates with them with­out iso­lat­ing within his social sta­tus or shun­ning away from the other statuses.

Thirdly, he con­trols the visual pro­jec­tion of his Ruh to be accus­tomed to the spe­cialty of the dif­fer­ent racial eth­nic­i­ties, such that he unites with their groups with­out being fanatic with his racial eth­nic­ity or boast­ing over other ethnicities.

Fourthly, he con­trols the visual pro­jec­tion of his body to endure the spe­cial­ness of the dif­fer­ent geo­graph­i­cal regions, such that he moves about to all their direc­tions with­out seclud­ing him­self within his coun­try or dis­unit­ing with other regions.

The fifth and last sec­tion: The Effects of Al Irtibat

Indeed, the effects of good­ness of Al Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih is not delayed. Rather, it has imme­di­ate good­ness in Dunia in a man­ner in which the pos­i­tive effects of Irt­ibat with the self of Sayyidul Basyar Muham­mad Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih are count­less in its good­ness. Here, it is suf­fi­cient for me to men­tion the effects of Irt­ibat in three situations.

First: The effect of Irt­ibat on the life of a person

When a per­son for­mu­lates the ele­ments of his self-​formation through his Irt­ibat with Sayyidul Muwah­hidin Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih, he is capa­ble, effec­tive and pre­pared to face the chal­lenges in life. This is because:

•His body is far away from any­thing that does not please Allah and His Rasul

•His Ruh is puri­fied through abun­dant Dzikr to Allah and con­tin­u­ous Salawat upon Rasu­l­ul­lah Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih

•His Nafs is emi­nent from any type of despicability

•His ‘Aql is enlight­ened through the knowl­edge of Al Quran and the teach­ings of Al Hadith An Nabawi Asy Syarif

These char­ac­ter­is­tics and qual­i­ties can­not be missed from anyone’s eyes no mat­ter how much it is being cov­ered. If this per­son with Tak­win Muham­madi per­forms trade, his Nafs avoids profit from Haram because he under­stands that Haram tar­nishes Halal and that Haram will flow in the blood of his chil­dren. Thus, other peo­ple and traders rec­og­nize the dif­fer­ence between him and oth­ers such that they pre­fer to trade with him. If he wishes to marry a lady, he will seek accep­tance from her fam­ily because every­one who lives with him or inter­acts with him will bear wit­ness that he inter­acts pos­i­tively and has good behav­iours. If he works in a posi­tion where his man­ager or direc­tor has no choice but to reduce the work­force, he will secure his posi­tion dur­ing the time of eco­nomic depres­sion due to his behav­iours and trust­wor­thi­ness at work.

In short, indeed Al Irt­ibat is reflected in all aspects of a person’s life and enables him to sur­vive, as well as to main­tain and pre­serve his inter­est with­out harm­ing the inter­est of others.

Sec­ond: The effect of Irt­ibat on human relations

When a per­son for­mu­lates the visual pro­jec­tions of his per­son­al­ity through his Irt­ibat with Za’imul Mus­limin Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih, he is pre­pared to live in a diverse soci­ety and is capa­ble to pre­serve the unity of his Ummah. This is the per­son with Tak­win Muham­madi who accepts oth­ers regard­less of diver­si­ties, and inter­acts with oth­ers through par­tic­i­pa­tion, under­stand­ing, being accus­tomed and being con­cerned to be accepted in all con­di­tions even in times of con­flict. This accep­tance from every­one enables him to play an effec­tive role in his soci­ety and cre­ate a dif­fer­ence in his com­mu­nity because peo­ple in con­flict will seek help in him to become the third party to rec­on­cile between two par­ties, whether two indi­vid­u­als or two groups.

In short, indeed this per­son with Tak­win Muham­madi is of social stature and is the ref­er­ence to con­nect the net­work of human rela­tions in his society.

Third: The effect of Irt­ibat in times of chal­lenges and crisis

Indeed, chal­lenges are faced by every­one and can­not be avoided in life. Here, in times of chal­lenges, the effect of Irt­ibat and a strong and sturdy Tak­win enables him to face the cri­sis in a good man­ner. As an exam­ple, we observe a per­son with Tak­win Muham­madi to see what he will do if he is being opposed by his man­ager at work:

Firstly, he will begin by study­ing and ana­lyz­ing the issue to find the causes of the oppo­si­tion. He will also be fair and respon­si­ble to exam­ine his own mis­takes which could have caused his man­ager to oppose him.

Sec­ondly, he will con­trol his words so that he does not express him­self in a pur­pose­less man­ner. He will not appear to be com­plain­ing about being unfairly treated and he will refrain from being con­trolled by his thoughts and emotions.

Thirdly, he will con­tinue to work with ded­i­ca­tion and sin­cer­ity. He will not cease his good works to show dis­plea­sure or anger.

Through this respon­si­ble and con­trolled inter­ac­tion in such a sit­u­a­tion, he will show that Tak­win Muham­madi has no defects because a Murtabit with the self of Solawat­ul­lahi ‘Alaih under­stands with con­vic­tion that Rasu­l­ul­lah Sol­lal­lahu ‘Alaihi Wasal­lam is pro­tect­ing him with his Wilayah Al Kami­lah [Com­plete Gov­er­nance] and that Allah Sub­hanah will choose a bet­ter out­come for him, thus he waits with a firm belief that it will come in the near future.

To con­clude, some peo­ple say that the Ni’mah from Allah Jalla ‘Ulah for a per­son can­not be com­plete in Dunia. How can this be while Allah Sub­hanah is Al Karim Ar Rahim [the All-​Generous and the All-​Merciful] whose Ni’mah are count­less. Indeed, one of the great­est Ni’mah is Ridha [con­tent­ment]. If a per­son faces chal­lenges in his life and strug­gles between fear and hope, he will seek for improve­ment and bet­ter­ment in every­thing with courage and per­se­ver­ance. How­ever, when he is dis­trib­uted with gifts in any­thing and when he receives the results of these gifts, it is nec­es­sary for him to seek from Allah to grant him Ridha in which Ridha is the Ni’mah that com­pletes all Ni’mah. With that, he is con­tented with him­self, his con­di­tion, his fam­ily and his wealth.

This speech was addressed by Al-​Amir Hashem ibn Al-​Fadl ibn Al-​Abbas El Dan­darawy, Sumuwwul Amir of the Tribes and Familes of Al Usrah Al Dan­daraweyah and Head of the Inter­na­tional Dan­dara Cul­tural Cen­tres. To under­stand more about the two roles of Rasu­l­ul­lah ‘alaihi Solawat­ul­lah, Al Irt­ibat and Al Usrah Al Dan­daraweyah, please click here to read Trans­la­tion of Al Wat­siqah Al Baidha’ For­ma­tion and Model © 2013

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