Signs on the Horizons

by Michael Sugich

  Several of the younger men were assigned to take care of us. One of these men was a deaf-mute, a lovely young man, very innocent, with the awkwardness and dislocation of the hearing impaired. He performed the hadra with incredible focus and skill, which I thought extraordinary given that he couldn’t hear anything. We took walks up in the foothills above the village. Sidi Saleh had founded the community as a refuge for his disciples from the depredations and depravities of modern life. Living was primitive and civilized at the same time. Connections with the outside world were tenuous. The views across the plains were breathtaking. I’m not sure the experiment was altogether successful. The pull of the world was very strong and many of the younger men left the community for the seductions of the city.

  I became friendly with their Imam, Sidi Abdul Rahman, a robust man of about 40 years of age. He invited me into his home, which was among a cluster of small buildings set at a distance from the central zawiya hall and the lodgings of Sidi Saleh. His home was a simple rectangular room divided by a sheet. He had two wives. One wife lived on one side of the sheet and the other lived on the other side of the sheet. From all appearances they lived in domestic harmony.

  We stayed three days as guests of Sidi Saleh, in accordance with the rules of travel. When I announced that we would be leaving on the third day, Sidi Saleh came out and insisted that we stay on for at least three more weeks! He had plans for us. He wanted us to travel with him. He had already worked out the itinerary. I thanked him and told him that we really did have to make our way back to Meknes. Sidi Saleh looked stricken, as if he really needed us to stay with him. I have to say I wavered, genuinely tempted to abandon our schedule and take to the road with this wonderful man. But I was responsible for getting our group back to base at the right time. I had to decline. When it became clear that there was no way he could convince us to travel with him, Sidi Saleh handed me a fist full of dirhams and sent us with his blessing on our way down the hill.

  May God bless his memory and have mercy on him and all those who followed him.

  “Renunciation is to look at the world,

  keeping in mind that it is passing,

  in order that it be diminished in your eyes,

  thus making it easy for you to turn away from it.”

  Ibn Jalaa*

  THE UNSEEN

  Bashir Othman lived in Al-Madinah Al-Munawwara and was among the sacred city’s greatest men of God. He was from Eritrea and was a disciple of the great Eritrean Shaykh Mohamed Abu Bakr. He guided many on the Sufi way. I didn't know him well, although several of my friends were his students. He knew the sciences of the unseen and healed those afflicted with possession and illnesses resulting from black magic.

  One day he honored me with a visit to my home in Makkah. At that time I was writing a newspaper column on film and spending rather more time than I should have looking at movies. I was concerned about this and asked him how dangerous it was to watch movies, which more conservative Muslims considered to be completely forbidden. His answer surprised me. He said, "What you hear has more impact on the spirit than what you see. The auditory is more powerful than the visual. Beware of what you listen to.”

  He then initiated me into the invocation Ya Latif, which he prescribed to be repeated many thousands of times every night. He said, "If you recite this invocation, the unseen will be unveiled for you.”

  I mentioned this to my shaykh Sayyid Omar Abdullah, may God be well pleased with him. He laughed, shook his head and said, "Don't do it."

  I said, "I had a feeling you'd say this. I have enough trouble with the seen world. I don't think I'm ready for the unseen, right?"

  Sayyid Omar laughed again, nodded this time, and said, "Right."

  “The perfect meaning of Al-Latif combines gentleness in action with delicacy of perception.”

  Imam Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali*

  THE ILLUMINATED

  “The religion of God is light.

  His Book is light.

  His Messenger is light.

  The abode which He has prepared

  for His intimate friends glows with light.

  God is the light of the heavens and the earth;

  one of His Names is Light.”

  Ibn Qayyim Al Jawziyya*

  FIRST LIGHT

  He was one of the most beautiful men I have ever laid eyes on, physically and spiritually. I first met Moulay Abu'l Qasim in Meknes in 1973 during the Moussem of Shaykh Mohamed ibn Al-Habib. We had arrived in a caravan from England and settled in to a small courtyard house in the valley below the zawiya of the Shaykh. When we entered the zawiya for the first time, we proceeded straight to the circle of Sufis in the corner of the room, all sitting silently invoking God. I joined my companions who were more experienced than I, moving round the circle of men counter-clockwise, kissing each man’s hand. Most of the fuqara were over 60 years of age. All greeted us warmly.

  I proceeded around the circle until I came to a man swathed in white with his head lowered in meditation, sitting against the qibla wall. He was simply one man in a circle of many but when he raised his head to return my greeting I was dazzled by the extreme beauty of his face. His smile was like a sun. His features were sharp, his nose wide and hawk-like. He was about 70 years old at the time I met him but looked ageless. He could have been 40. I almost swooned at the sight of him. His presence was overpowering. His whole being was effulgent. I didn’t know anything about him at the time but I immediately recognized his holiness. He was the first Sufi saint I recognized. I became very attached to this man and thought of him frequently.

  During my visits to Morocco I would try to sit beside him. I did not, however, feel worthy of his company and was far too intimidated by his presence to do more than seek physical proximity to him. His voice was as beautiful as his face – soft, broken and ethereal – permeated with intimacy. He spoke very little and when he did, he spoke only of Paradise and God’s love of His creatures. On one occasion, he addressed us, saying with quiet, emphatic certainty, "This gathering is in Paradise". I am, by nature, skeptical of theatrics or theatrical statements like this, but the atmosphere was so transfigured by his presence, infused as it was with remembrance of the Divine, that he seemed to be stating the obvious. I remember he once said, "There is nothing on earth that God loves more than His slave, hands raised helplessly in supplication, weeping, and pleading.”

  On certain occasions he would sing qasa’id, sometimes while leading a hadra. His voice was unearthly, the most celestial voice I have ever heard, as if the song he sang was emanating from the ethers; he seemed never to take a breath. In the center of a hadra he had the grace of a leopard. At the end of a hadra his eyes brimmed with tears, his heart heaved, as if he had been sucked into a vortex of luminous divinity and returned absorbed in an indescribable passion. He was the first human being that gave me certainty of the Path. He was a proof of the vibrant reality of Islam for me and his memory has kept me within the Way for 40 years. He combined all the aspects of a Man of God – sobriety, intoxication, serenity, compassion, subtlety, love, knowledge, wisdom, humility and strength.

  For all his gentleness and he was one of the gentlest men I have ever encountered, he could be fierce. One afternoon during a meal, I watched him closely. He ate very little – three balls of couscous – during a meal. However, it was almost impossible to recognize this. Had I not been following his every move, I would have assumed he was eating as heartily as the rest of those at the table. There was nothing ostentatious about his abstinence. I had observed that he always passed food to whoever sat to his right. This was a practice of the Prophet Mohamed, may God bless him and give him peace. The adab, or spiritual courtesy, in response to such an action is to accept any food offered, particularly by an elder. Whenever I was able to sit to his right hand side during a meal, I eagerly took the bread he passed to me. On this occasion, toward the end of the meal, he passed some bread to the faqir on his right hand. This faqir was dominating the table talk. In the a
ftermath of the hadra, an intoxicating lightness pervades the atmosphere and it is very easy to allow levity to overtake the sobriety of the act of remembrance. The man on his right hand was a little carried away and talking too much. When the bread was passed to him, he pushed it back to Moulay Abu'l Qasim, pointing to his stomach, saying something to the effect that he had eaten enough and couldn’t possibly have more. He was being polite but he was, in the context of the gathering, behaving with a lack of adab. I paid close attention to Moulay Abu'l Qassim. He looked at the bread and moved it back in front of his neighbor. The man continued his conversation, smiled and insisted that he really couldn’t take the bread. He pushed it back. Moulay Abu'l Qasim looked silently at the bread for a moment and in one powerful motion, grabbed his neighbor’s wrist, lifted his arm, put the bread in the man's hand and closed his fingers over it, staring fiercely into his eyes. He then quietly resumed eating, leaving the fellow stunned and with a powerful lesson in the small spiritual courtesies of Sufism, which lie at the core of the practice.

  When I returned to the West I began to dream of Moulay Abu’l Qasim. These dreams were all slightly strange. In one dream I was in a cinema, watching a film and he entered and sat down behind me. In another I was in a gymnasium and he walked through the locker room, nodding to me. I puzzled over these strange appearances until I learned that he had been ordered by the Shaykh to watch over those of us from the West. It occurred to me that his appearances in unlikely settings may have been a reminder to remember God in every time and place.

  One from among our group contracted a virulent case of dysentery while in Morocco. He became emaciated and was extremely ill for many days. Moulay Abu'l Qasim turned up at the door of the small courtyard house where we were staying unannounced and asked to see the man who was ill. He sat beside him and asked for a glass of water. He put his right forefinger into the glass and recited from the Qur'an. He gave the man the water to drink. Then he took his leave. Before he departed he told us, "He will have one more attack and then he will be all right.” And this is what happened.

  I always tried to sit as close to Moulay Abu'l Qasim as I possibly could. From a distance he was a dazzling figure, wreathed in light, which was enhanced by his white burnoose, green turban and spotless white haik (head-cover). His carriage, his appearance, was that of a prince, and indeed he was. Yet at close quarters I noticed that his garments had been patched and mended in dozens of places – holes that had been meticulously stitched. When he entered the zawiya and slipped out of his shoes, I noticed that they were completely worn out, falling apart. Yet, there was no indication at all that he was poor. He was truly the wealthiest man I have ever encountered.

  “Roam around these tents for evermore,

  Drink the cups that hold the wine of love;

  Cast off all others, have courtesy,

  At this station, where there’s none above.

  In Contemplation’s Presence there’s a wine

  Which strips all lovers of the joy of sleep.

  In Contemplation’s Presence there’s a wine

  Which leads a thirsty passion ocean deep.”

  Al-Habib al-Imam Ali ibn Muhammad Al-Habshi*

  BLACK LIGHT

  He was a rugged one-eyed black man who looked a little like a buccaneer. He wore the dark green turban of the Darqawiyya and a ragged coarse wool djellaba. He had large calloused hands, a virile, commanding presence and he walked with a swagger. His gestures were abrupt and powerful. He had a radiant grin. His rough appearance belied a profound spirituality. He was utterly devoted to the act of remembrance and had the Name of God on his lips at all times, even when he slept. One of us came upon him when he was fast asleep. With every exhalation of breath he sighed, "Allllaaaah”. When he was awake, he worked his prayer beads ceaselessly. He was meticulous in his observance of the prayers and the times of dhikr. To keep time he carried around a large alarm clock in his djellaba, which he would pull out and squint at as if it were a pocket watch.

  He lived in the most impoverished slum outside the walls of Meknes, a sprawling shantytown called the Borj. The Borj was a vast dilapidated exurb of wooden hovels covered by corrugated iron and t in roofing. The mosque was a rickety wooden hall with a makeshift minaret formed of old t in scraps riveted together.

  From here he presided over the dhikr of the Habibiyya Order as the muqaddam, or deputy, of the Shaykh. I never knew his name. We always knew him as the Muqaddam of the Borj. In honor of the poor, the Shaykh, may God be well pleased with him, always held his Moussem (annual spiritual celebration) in the Borj. The Muqaddam of the Borj hosted hundreds of fuqara congregating in his ramshackle zawiya to remember God and praise the Prophet Mohamed, peace and blessings be upon him. He moved through the gathering with great authority. His fuqara were among the most impressive in the order. It was the greatest night in the year for these men. The zawiya pulsated with invocation. The hadra was always overpowering.

  In 1986 I visited Morocco as a guest of the Moroccan tourism authority. Once my work was done I made my way to Meknes and the zawiya. The fuqara were very polite and pleased that I could recite the entire wird of the Ibn Al-Habib from memory, but there was a reserve I wasn’t accustomed to. One afternoon, as we were sitting around a tray of food eating lunch, the Muqaddam of the Borj casually asked me about a disciple who had claimed to be a spiritual master. He asked me point blank what I thought of him. All the fuqara looked at me intently. Surprised, I paused and then said carefully, "I believe that he is very far from the Path.” Suddenly, the ice was broken, the group relaxed and burst out laughing. The Muqaddam of the Borj slapped me on the knee, patted my back and, beamed, nodding vigorously. They had accepted me as one of their own and we launched into a round of invocation to seal the moment. This was the last occasion I saw this magnificent illuminated guardian of the poorest of the poor.

  “Let me live among the poor,

  die among the poor

  and be raised up among the poor.”

  The Messenger of God*

  THE BEACON

  I was with a group trudging up one of the long steep cobbled streets of the ancient city of Fes. The streets were teeming at that time of day. Crowds of pedestrians were walking down the hill in our direction. Far away up the hill in the distance I saw a shining light, from a face in the crowd, like a beacon. I couldn’t make out the features, the distance was too great, but I became transfixed by this dazzling light moving down the hill through the crowds. My heart was pounding. I had never seen anyone so radiant. I watched this slow-approaching figure bathed in supernal light with anticipation and rising excitement. When he came closer I was stunned. The illuminated figure I had been watching was a man I already knew, someone who I always associated with severity and scholarship. His formal knowledge veiled his hidden illumination. He knew us. He beamed and shook my hand with a powerful grip before moving on down the hill.

  The first time I saw Si Fudul Al-Hawari Al-Sufi was shortly after I had entered the Path. I attended a gathering of fuqara in the city of Meknes at the elegant home of Moulay Hashem Balghiti, who has since become the Shaykh of the Habibiyya Order. The hadra was held in the open courtyard of the large house. The fuqara sang from the Diwan of Shaykh Mohamed ibn Al-Habib and, as evening moved into night the recitation of the Diwan gave way to the sacred dance. The hadra was powerful and induced intense concentration in the gathering. Upon its completion, an austere and unassuming scholar began to give a discourse. At the time I didn’t speak a word of Arabic but a companion whispered what it was about. The discourse was on the most prosaic of subjects, the act of wudhu, or ritual ablution. The scholar’s presentation was soft spoken, simple and matter-of-fact. He began by going through the process of wudhu, step by step, explaining the deeper meaning of each action. There was no hint of emotion in his voice. No histrionics. Yet, as his discourse progressed, I watched as the man sitting beside me bowed his head into his open hands and, overwhelmed, began to weep. Another man directly behind me shriek
ed the Name of God – "Allah!" – in ecstasy. In front of me another fainted dead away. I looked around me and the entire assembly was overcome, weeping unashamedly, shaking their heads at the power of the knowledge quietly articulated by this austere man of God.

  He was one of the greatest living interpreters of Sufism in Morocco, whose commentaries and qasa’id were subtle, powerful and ecstatic, yet he personified sobriety on the Path. His discourses were delivered with scholarly gravitas but induced ecstasy and awe in his listeners. He lived a life without a trace of pretense. He was the proprietor of a small bolt-hole shop that sold household items near Bab Boujloud in Fes and, when he wasn’t engaged in teaching or spiritual practice he could be found standing in front of his shop, like any other small trader. He had a pleasant, unpretentious house behind the Bab Boujloud Mosque where he delivered the Friday sermon. He was a family man who lived a sober, self-effacing life. He was, by all appearances and notwithstanding his ecstasy-inducing discourses, a restrained, conservative man of learning. But, of course, appearances can be misleading.

  When Shaykh Mohamed ibn Al-Habib died in 1971 all his disciples turned to Si Fudul for guidance. The Shaykh had appointed Si Fudul as his Khalifa before he died and there were many who assumed he would inherit the Shaykh’s mantle. Yet Si Fudul refused, even though he would have been accepted by acclamation. The great Saharan saint Sidi Mohammed Bil Kurshi had also refused the role, leaving a vacuum that was not filled for decades.

  It is hard for an outsider to understand how deeply troubling the loss of a living Shaykh is for the disciple and there is a natural human tendency to fill the immense gap left by the death of one's guide with a comforting placeholder. Many Sufi orders become hereditary in this way, with the son of the shaykh taking the mantle by acclamation to sustain the way. The great awliya within the Darqawiyya-Habibiyya Order had the profound integrity not to settle for what might have been reassuring and the Habibiyya carried on for decades, surviving on the extraordinarily powerful practice and legacy of the great 20th century shaykh. During this period, numerous people tried to declare themselves as Shaykh of the Order, but Si Fudul and others quashed these false claims.