9. EVERYTHING REMINDS THE AWAKENED ONE OF ALLAH
Those who are awake may recite or hear a line of poetry and benefit from an insinuation that he finds in it.
Al-Junayd said, Sari [al-Saqtl] handed me a piece of paper with the following written on it, ‘While I am on my way to Makkah, which Allah honoured and glorified, I heard a camel-chanter recite:
I cry, and you know not what is causing me to cry,
I cry out of fear that you might leave me,
and that you cut mv rope and abandon me.
It is worthy that you, may Allah bestows His Mercy and success upon you, to see how these lines effected Sari so much so that he wanted to share it with Al-Junayd, and indeed only a person like Al-Junayd is suitable to be shown such lines of poetry [as he will reflect on it with respect to his own relationship with Allah],
Some people’s nature is rigid and sense of understanding is slow, so when they hear this poetry they object and comment what do these words refer to? If it was meant to refer to Allah, Most High, then no feminine nouns must be used to refer to Him, and if it was meant to refer to a woman, then what kind of austere attitude is that!
Indeed, this is the understanding of the heedless who would misapprehend this kind of words! This is why people are not permitted to listen to poetry and words of singers because in most cases, people tend to understand such words in reference to self-desires and whims. It is rare to find today people like Al-Junayd and Sari who were aware (and took heed) of the nuance meanings that can be found in words.
The objection of those whose nature is rigid and thus can neither relate to nor reflect on what they hear or see in this life, is responded to by saying, ‘Neither did Sari reflect because of his taking the face value of these words nor attempted to use the exact words in reference to Allah!
Rather, the meaning of such words is what triggered his reflection and made him think of his own relation with Allah.
It is as if he wanted to say— after hearing the lines talking about the anxiety of a man who fears to be departed from the one he loves— ‘O Allah, I cry lest You turn away from me!’
He did not think of the masculine and feminine nouns used in the words he heard since such words only reminded him to reflect his relationship with Allah, so do take heed to this!
Whoever has his heart and mind awakened will always continue to benefit from such poems and folk tales.
I read a story written by Ibn ‘Aqil in which he narrates a story about one of his primary teachers who once heard a woman reciting the following lines of poetry:
I spent all night washing his clothes,
I spent all day scrubbing his clothes,
He left the house and stared at another woman,
He slipped and fell in the mud.
Upon hearing these words, he reflected on this poetry and applied the concept in these words to the relationship between Allah and humans; he came to think as if Allah is saying to mankind, ‘O my slaves! 1 have created you in good form, mended your affairs and structured you delicately, yet you have turned to other than me; hence observe the result of your disobedience!’
Ibn ‘Aqll also said, 1 heard a woman recites the following lines, which made me stay in distress for a while:
I have always told you that slackness shall have a consequence
The vile has yeast that will manifest afterwards
Truly, we will be shamed on the Day of Judgement for what we have been slack about in this life as such slackness will manifest on that Day before Allah, Most High.
(Source: al-Hafiz Abu’l-Faraj ibn al-jawzl [d. 597AH] “CAPTURED THOUGHTS being” a translation of his masterpiece ‘Sayd al-K hatir)
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