Dear Companion,
Praised be God, who extended His invitation to me in 2010 and gave me an amazing opportunity to visit the holy land for the first time, an experience that will remain with me forever.
Coming from a culture so immersed in rights and individualism, it’s often easily forgotten that the world is much bigger than us. Before going for my Umrah trip, I didn’t know what to expect. I had looked at pictures, Youtube videos, and heard a few lectures but nothing compared to actually being there. This was my attempt to escape, isolate myself and discover peace but I came to find, the experience of Umrah, as Imam Suhaib Webb describes, is not so much internal as it is external. As I walked towards the haram, I had a mixture of feelings. Being excited and fearful at the same time, muddled with awe, trying to imagine the spiritual high with every step and invoking the talbiah quietly as I marched with a lowered gaze, clinging behind my friend, reminding myself of the honour of following the footsteps of the holy Prophet ﷺ - and indeed honour is a gift from God: “[O God] You exalt whomever You will, and You debase whomever You will” (Quran 3:26). When I managed to get through the sea of people and find a spot to pray, I was in a state of complete admiration for the ka’ba and its surroundings. Upon the first sujood (prostration) I felt a sense of bliss and reflected on the sins that had made me neglect God’s grace – how Exalted is He! A quote of Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad comes to mind: “To purify the body from the disorders which both engender and result from sin, a system of worship is gifted in revelation, which culminates in the placing of the forehead, the symbol of human pride and of self-oriented thought, upon the earth.” As I completed the tawaf (circling of the Ka’ba), I engaged in prophetic invocations, a beggar pleading for God to open the doors of mercy, and beseeching His forgiveness. Shaykh Hamza Yusuf mentions the ritual of circulating the Ka’ba is performed in a counterclockwise fashion, with the left side facing the House i.e. the heart, which is centered slightly to the left of our bodies, inclined towards it to ‘remind us of God and His presence in the life of humanity.’
There were so many people present, providing me with a simple, yet profound realisation. No one cared about how rich or poor you were, where you were from, what post you have or how many degrees you have. Millions travel to redeem themselves, to begin a new chapter and while I didn’t know what sacrifices were made to visit the holy land, I knew that I was there in Makkah, with my insignificance apparent in the midst of the ocean of believers. I concluded that I had truely lost focus on what is beyond me and thought my problems were big, until there God, through His infinite mercy, had sent me a reminder. The second part of my trip led me to visit the blessed city of Madinah, and Masjid Al-Nabawi (the Prophet’s Mosque) where I visited the Beloved ﷺ, the one who demonstrated the true essence of magnificence, the one who’s reality cannot be perceived in this world by the inattentive and the one who surpassed all prophets in appearance and virtue – peace and blessings upon him, his family and companions. This is the same city in which it’s reported Imam Malik would never ride or mount an animal and would say, “I am too shy before Allah to trample with an animal's hoof on the earth where Allah's Messenger is buried.” (Al-Shifa, Vol 2). When the great Owais Qarani entered the mosque of Madinah, he waited at the door and at once lost consciousness. Upon my entering, I conveyed my Salams, and as Imam Ghazali says, met with him as though he was alive and I was standing before him ﷺ.
This city is contrasting from the city of Makkah. The feeling of tranquillity is unparalleled, and the raised level of sanctity is evident through the way you feel purified by one visit, hence the city’s other name Tayba, meaning pure and pleasant, for the beautiful fragrance that is found in its sacred air. During my stay there I pondered over the words of Qadi Iyaad: “For you (O Madinah) I have intense, ardent love. And a yearning which kindles the embers of my heart.” (Al-Shifa)
The Imam of the haram recited beautifully and precisely for every prayer, his deep voice resonating around the walls where the Prophet ﷺ would walk past, being heard inside and outside the grand, elegant structure. People formed their rows quickly after the call to prayer and there was a constant rush around the grave of the Messenger of God ﷺ, with pilgrims stopping at the golden carvings, some crying while trying to gain that connection, standing humbly before the graciousness of the Prophet ﷺ. “And attribute to him whatever you wish of honour, and attribute to his status whatever you wish of greatness, for the graciousness of Rasulullah has no limit, to an extent beyond what can be expressed in words” explains Imam al-Busiri. I remember an encounter I had after the evening prayer with a Mauritanian individual. He sat there with his prayer beads, concentrating in his dhikr (remembrance of God), harbouring his thoughts, diligent in his devotional act of worship, wearing the light blue Mauritanian costume which resembles the ihram in appearance. Visiting righteous people for spiritual ascendency has always been encouraged by scholars, and I had read of the vast Islamic knowledge that people from Mauritania gain from a young age. I managed to talk to this man in my broken Arabic as he smiled while asking me to sit next to him. I couldn’t help but ask him of his past studies, as his fingers continued to move one bead at a time, and he spoke little and to the point, but a normal quiet simple individual such as this would be considered a great Shaykh in the small part of London where I’m from! I also managed to gather that he had either studied with or taught Shaykh Hamza Yusuf. Although I never saw him after that it was a blessed meeting for me as I asked him to pray for me.
The Imam of the haram recited beautifully and precisely for every prayer, his deep voice resonating around the walls where the Prophet ﷺ would walk past, being heard inside and outside the grand, elegant structure. People formed their rows quickly after the call to prayer and there was a constant rush around the grave of the Messenger of God ﷺ, with pilgrims stopping at the golden carvings, some crying while trying to gain that connection, standing humbly before the graciousness of the Prophet ﷺ. “And attribute to him whatever you wish of honour, and attribute to his status whatever you wish of greatness, for the graciousness of Rasulullah has no limit, to an extent beyond what can be expressed in words” explains Imam al-Busiri. I remember an encounter I had after the evening prayer with a Mauritanian individual. He sat there with his prayer beads, concentrating in his dhikr (remembrance of God), harbouring his thoughts, diligent in his devotional act of worship, wearing the light blue Mauritanian costume which resembles the ihram in appearance. Visiting righteous people for spiritual ascendency has always been encouraged by scholars, and I had read of the vast Islamic knowledge that people from Mauritania gain from a young age. I managed to talk to this man in my broken Arabic as he smiled while asking me to sit next to him. I couldn’t help but ask him of his past studies, as his fingers continued to move one bead at a time, and he spoke little and to the point, but a normal quiet simple individual such as this would be considered a great Shaykh in the small part of London where I’m from! I also managed to gather that he had either studied with or taught Shaykh Hamza Yusuf. Although I never saw him after that it was a blessed meeting for me as I asked him to pray for me.
Praised be God and with sorrow, I departed from the great city, and the great land. I now gained a better understanding of maintaining good kinship with good people, because a spiritually high journey like Umrah can lead to a spiritual low once returning to your normal life, unless there is something there to maintain that state, which is a difficult task because of the environment that we live in. The lesson I learnt of associating myself with the right people is one that I would like to end with as Ibn Ata’illah once said, “Do not take as a companion someone whose state will not elevate you and whose speech does not direct you to God.” Purification of the heart is indeed an ongoing process and so we also must ensure we do not let our hearts become encrusted, accumulate wholesome deeds and work on consistency to adopt good conduct. I consider this journey of mine to the holy land a stepping stone for this process, God Willing.
Sincerely,
Waqaar Butt
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