Gifts for the Seeker

Description

Gifts for the Seeker Ithaf is sail Revised addition - Translated from the Arabic by Mostafa Al-Badawi This book answers many of the questions often asked by seekers of inward illumination. What are the real implications of the doctrine of divine unity? How can proper concentration be achieved during spiritual exercises? When should one avoid participating in Sufi gatherings? What is the relationship between the tongue, the mind, and the heart? How is one to understand visions received in sleep? The work also includes the author’s commentary on a poem on inner wayfaring which speaks of the most exalted stations of the path and goes on to explain a number of paradoxes of the Way, such as the reason as why the saints usually refuse to deploy their miraculous powers, preferring to concentrate on self-scrutiny and the compassionate guidance of others. These points are illustrated with references to the famous mystical poems of Ibn al-Farid and Abu Madyan. The author Imam Abdallah Ibn-Alawi Al-Haddad (d. 1720), lived at Tarim in the Hadramaut valley between Yemen and Oman, and is widely held to have been the ‘renewer’ of the twelfth Islamic century. A direct descendant of the Prophet, his sanctity and direct experience of God are clearly reflected in his writings, which include several books, a collection of Sufi letters, and a volume of mystical poetry. He spent most of his life in Kenya and Saudi Arabia where he taught Islamic jurisprudence and classical Sufism according to the order (tariqa) of the BaAlawi sayids.