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The Transformative Nature of Islam

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Murabit View Drop Down
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    Posted: 05 January 2007 at 4:15am

The Transformative Nature of Islam

By Hajj Abdal Haqq Bewley

As for him who overstepped the bounds and preferred the life of the dunya, the Blazing Fire will be his refuge. But as for him who feared the Station of his Lord and forbade the lower self its appetites, the Garden will be his refuge. (79:37-40)

That is because Allah would never change a blessing He has conferred on a people until they had changed what was in themselves. Allah is All-Hearing, All-Knowing. (8:54)

The second ayat is repeated twice in the Qur'an and is usually quoted in the context of improvement, in other words: Allah will not make things better for us until we better ourselves. But in fact, although it clearly can mean this, the meaning both times it is used appears to be the opposite: that Allah will not make things worse for us unless we change for the worse. The change can be in both directions. The important thing to grasp from the ayat is that everything in existence is in a state of constant change and that this also applies to Muslims both as individuals and communities. Islam is a dynamic, it is a process, it is an organic patterning. It is not a fixed, solid structure, a rigid legal framework which you somehow get hold of and fit yourself into. It is vital to understand this if we want Islam to spread and become fully established and implemented in the world again.

Islam is all about change, about growth, about transformation on the one hand or, and we seek refuge with Allah from it happening, the opposite of this, about stasis, shrinkage and deterioration. When someone becomes Muslim, they change. The change can be seen in their faces. Their lives are transformed. This is absolutely inevitable and if it does not happen, it means that they have not really become Muslim, their Islam has not "taken". The transformation is the result of the heart's exposure to the Muhammadan light and when we speak of the heart it must be understood that we are not speaking in any way figuratively. There is in the breast of every human being an organ of perception which is our access point to the subtle worlds of meaning, angelic energy and Divine power which interpenetrate with this world of physical appearances which we inhabit.

The root meaning of the Arabic word for heart, qalb, is turn over, change, transform, convert, transmute. Becoming Muslim entails turning one's heart upside down, so that instead of facing downwards towards the opaque density of the dunya, it faces upwards towards the subtle worlds of the spiritual realities, towards the potential of your own perfectibility as a human being whose highest possibility is the Muhammadan light itself.

Although we commonly talk about inward and outward it must be understood that there is no hard and fast line between them; they are interpenetrating realms. Therefore so-called inward transformation inevitably manifests itself outwardly, so that being Muslim involves our lives in inexorable and irreversible change. What happens is that we begin to take on the Muhammadan form. This connects with the ayat in Sura Ali 'Imran: Say, 'If you love Allah, then follow me and Allah will love you�' (3:31)

Being Muslim means being drawn to all those things that the Prophet, salla'Llahu 'alayhi wa sallam, did and taught his Companions to do. First the basic practices of the deen and gradually those qualities of character, such as taqwa, generosity, fortitude, courtesy and other virtues, which found their perfection in the Messenger of Allah, salla'Llahu 'alayhi wa sallam, and inseparable from this is the desire to share the invaluable gift of Islam we have been given with as many other people as possible.

A word of warning here for the many Muslims who do treat their deen as a rigid structure, as a series of outward actions they impose on themselves and others without true inward acquiescence and submission. Doing this inevitably leads to a split in their being which almost always results in periodic acts of self-gratification of the most repugnant kind and in extreme cases to madness. And warning also for those who say that they are Muslims inwardly while refusing to take on the obligations of the Shari'a. Their lack of outward transformation shows that they are deluding themselves in a most dangerous way and putting their ultimate fate in the gravest jeopardy.

There is never any room for complacency. Being a Muslim means being willing to undergo a never ending process of self-transformation. The transformation process is endless because perfection belongs to Allah alone and is a goal which can always be approached but never attained, but we can never give up trying. There can be no such thing as sitting back and saying to yourself, 'That's it. That's as far as I can go. I've done as much as I can do.' If you settle for the status quo it means you are losing your deen. As we have said Islam is a dynamic; there is no such thing as stasis. If you are not going forwards, you are going backwards. If you are not gaining ground, you are losing ground. You are in fact giving the lie to Allah's great blessing to you by not taking it on to the full. He himself says of such a state: We will lead them, step by step, into destruction from where they do not know. (7:182)

We seek refuge with our Lord from that and ask Him to give us success in drawing closer to Him and in following His Messenger inwardly and outwardly and in establishing His deen and the sunna of His Messenger within ourselves and round about us.

"I am a slave. I eat as a slave eats and I sit as a slave sits.", Beloved, sallallahu alyhi wa-sallam.
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seekshidayath View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote seekshidayath Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07 January 2007 at 4:19am

As'salamualaikum,

May Allah reward you.  Superb article that really stirs our hearts. I wish all the members go thru this article. Jazakallah again.

Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: �All the descendants of Adam are sinners, and the best of sinners are those who repent."
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote ummziba Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07 January 2007 at 4:50am

Assalamu alaikum,

Masha'allah!  Very nice article!  Thanks for posting it Murabit.

Peace, ummziba.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but your words...they break my soul ~
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USA-NIQAABI View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote USA-NIQAABI Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21 January 2007 at 5:52pm

Assalamu'Alaikum,

JazakAllahKhair......Thank You for posting this article very nice.

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senekerk View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote senekerk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 January 2007 at 4:47pm
a good summation of our life's journey. A phrase I like is the reward is in the journey (I would add after reading this article) of Islam. yet how often we seem to resist this transformation.  Fear is a big factor in my life, as well as letting go.  In order for change to take place in me I have to be willing to step forward in unknown territory and trust that Allah will be with me. 

Edited by senekerk
Kay
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Alwardah View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Alwardah Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 January 2007 at 3:38am

As Salamu Alaikum

 

Masha Allah a very beneficial article.

 

I especially loved this part as many of us forget (including myself) that learning is an on going process.

 

There is never any room for complacency. Being a Muslim means being willing to undergo a never ending process of self-transformation. The transformation process is endless because perfection belongs to Allah alone and is a goal which can always be approached but never attained, but we can never give up trying.

 

Jazakallahu Khairan for sharing this article with us.

 

May Allah reward you Ameen!

 

Wa Alaikum Salam

�Verily your Lord is quick in punishment; yet He is indeed Oft-Forgiving Most Merciful (Surah Al-An�am 6:165)
"Indeed, we belong to Allah and to Him is our return" (Surah Baqarah 2: 155)
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abuzuhri View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote abuzuhri Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07 March 2007 at 7:57pm

Allahu akbar ! Would to shed some ray of lights on the journey and background of Hajj Abdal Haqq Bewley from my past diggings.  He is a wonderful man, sacrificed and travelled a lot for islam and knowledge of Allah. Islam found and take him in Morocco sometime in 1968 near Fez, where with an old trusty companion they met and study under the great Darqawi Shaykh Muhammad Ibn al-Habib(d.1971). After several trips to and fro England and da'wa to USA, another seeker Haj Abdal Aziz Redpath joined their small circle in London.

Hajj Abdal Haqq bewley then spent sometime study islam, arabic and other ilms at al-Azhar with help of late rector Dr.Abdal Halim Mahmud. somewhere here and on the endless travels, he married the renown translator Hajjah Aishah Abdar Rahman Bewley. She translated many sufic texts, Quran tafsirs, Maliki fiqh, Muwatta, Sirah/Shifa of qadi Iyad, The Darqawi Way, Meaning of Man, Fusus al-Hikam and wrote several small books herself like Sub atomic World in The Quran. They also published a new english translation of Quran, pristine,clear and illuminating, be cleaned and purified from the many old editions filled with biased christianised/latinize terms.

To know more and deeper about these two fine scholars and selfless propagators, pease read the excellent and their vast writings at the homepage at http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ABewley

Recently his eldest son Hajj Habib Bewley was appointed and served as Imam of Norwich Ihsan mosque where the past Imams listed were like stars eg. Haj Dr.Yassin Dutton, Hj.Issa Bryce, Hajj Abdas Samad Clarke, Haj Dr.Asadullah Yates and Dr.Umar Abdullah of Commoros. In a sense, they contribute partly the light of Islam that shining forth from the West in the last 30 years.

May Allah increase us in wisdom and gather us in the company of Salihin-Righteous and put us serving on His Way. amin.

abuzuhri shin
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