Sayyid Omar travelled back home to Comoros. President Mwinyi invited him to accompany the presidential delegation for the annual pilgrimage. I knew he was coming but wasn’t sure when. I waited to hear from him once he arrived. No news came. I became concerned and called his son-in-law Dr. Omar Saleh. He informed me that Sayyid Omar had arrived with the Tanzanian delegation, but had been detained at the Hajj Terminal because he was carrying a Comorean, rather than a Tanzanian, passport. He had been left sitting in the terminal for nearly twenty-four hours and had gone into diabetic shock and had to be admitted to hospital. Dr. Omar told me that he had suffered renal failure and had to have a part of his foot amputated. I was beside myself with anxiety. I wanted to see him. Dr. Omar said that Habib didn’t want me to see him in his condition. I had to wait.
When he finally left hospital, I rushed to the apartment of his daughter and son-in-law to wait for him. He arrived from the hospital, smiling weakly. He had become emaciated. We helped him in to the apartment and to bed. I sat with him for a while but he was very weak. I came back to see him. He was still wan and fragile but in good humor. It was the last time I saw him.
He returned home to Comoros. A few months later I learned that Sayyid Omar Abdullah had passed away. I went to see his daughter, who was still in Jeddah. We wept together. I was devastated.
Thousands attended his funeral in Moroni. He was deeply loved. Within a few months his daughter also passed away, from a severe asthma attack. She was so like her father; another trace of him lost.
One year later I was in London and visited the home of one of Sayyid Omar’s disciples, Habib Abu Bakr Ba Shuaib, to celebrate a memorial for our shaykh. A long time had passed. I had become accustomed to his loss, or so I thought. We recited the Qur'an. Abu Bakr spoke about Sayyid Omar. While he spoke, without warning, the floodgates opened. I missed him too much. I couldn’t contain my grief and loss. I broke down and wept uncontrollably. I couldn’t stop. I consumed boxes of tissues. I was overwhelmed by sorrow and the memory of my beloved master.
After Sayyid Omar died I was sitting in the company of Habib Ahmed Mashhur Al-Haddad and his disciples. We were remembering Sayyid Omar and one of the elders said, "Habib Omar, he was a great teacher, a great da’i (one who calls people to Islam)." Another gestured to me and said, "Haroon was his close companion.” Habib Al-Haddad, who was my Shaykh, turned to me and said, "You know, he was your Shaykh." I nodded. Another looked at me and said with conviction, "You have something from him." I hope so.
A quarter century has passed. I have never recovered. He was the love of my life.
“Live as long as you want, but you must die;
love whatever you want,
but you will become separated from i t;
and do what you want,
but you will be repaid for it!”
Imam Abu Hamid Mohamed Al-Ghazali*
SONG AND DANCE
“What happens in the Circle of Remembrance is not dancing”
Sheikh Muzaffer Ozak Al-Jerrahi*
“Those who call it ‘dancing’ are utterly wrong. It is a state that cannot be explained in words: ‘without experience or knowledge.’”
‘Ali ‘Uthman Al-Hujwiri**
“When souls tremble, desirous of reunion, Even phantoms dance, oh uncomprehending one!”
Shaykh Abu Madyan Shu’ayb***
TO DANCE OR NOT TO DANCE
We were invited into the bourgeois home of a wealthy Saudi industrialist who was a dogmatic Salafi that constantly condemned Sufism but who loved my teacher Sayyid Omar Abdullah. The industrialist was denouncing the practice of the sacred dance (hadra) as a forbidden innovation (bid’ah) in Islam. When the industrialist left the salon where we were sitting Sayyid Omar jumped up mischievously and said to us sotto voce, "Now, if I stand here before you and declare God's Name, "Allah!"; is this forbidden?" We looked at him, shrugged and shook our heads. He then moved casually from one foot to another and said, "If I do this and say "Allah!" am I doing something forbidden?" Of course not. He then moved from one foot to another with more rhythm and said, "If I do this and say "Allah! Allah!" is this forbidden?" We shook our heads. Then he started to swirl around the floor with an imaginary partner and said, "But if I do this" and he began singing, 'Everybody loves Saturday Night! Everybody loves Saturday Night!' "Well, that is forbidden.” What he was telling us is that what differentiates what is forbidden from what is permissible is the purpose and this is the classical Sufi approach to remembrance in all its various forms. When the industrialist returned Sayyid Omar sat down w it h an impish smile and continued to charm his unwitting host. And Sayyid Omar never practiced the hadra - except once.
During the post-colonial period in the 1960s when African states achieved their independence, Muslims across the continent were being marginalized because they had fallen behind Christians, Marxists and nationalists by rejecting secular education in favor of the traditional Islamic schools (kuttab madaris), which focused on memorizing the Qur'an and religious teaching. Delegations had been sent around Africa to try to convince Muslim parents to allow their children to have a more rounded secular education with little success.
One of the Muslim communities most resistant to change was in what was then the Belgian Congo. As one of Africa’s pre-eminent educators, Sayyid Omar was sent on a tour to make yet another plea for secular education. In the Congo his presentation was to take place in the grand mosque after the Friday prayers. Sayyid Omar was the honored guest of the day. When the prayers were completed, he expected to stand up and make his speech. Instead, the whole congregation stood up and started a huge African-style hadra, which was absolutely wild. Although Sayyid Omar was a scholar and his Sufi practice did not include performance of the hadra, he joined the dance. He became so involved in the invocation that he was pushed into the center of the huge circle. He threw himself into this unfamiliar ritual heart and soul and led the community in the sacred dance. Then he was called on to give his talk. Up to that point none of the educators who had advocated secular education had any credibility, but now, as a leader of their hadra, Sayyid Omar was one of them. The whole community agreed to enter their children into the secular school system.
The hadra, which literally means "presence", is a galvanic practice among the Sufis of North Africa and the Levant, particularly those from the Qadiriyya-Shadhiliyya-Darqawiyya tradition, but also the Helveti of Turkey and other Sufi orders. It induces intense concentration, which is its purpose, and can, in the right circumstance, propel individuals into transcendent states (ahwal) and spiritual ecstasies (jadhb or wajd). In all authentic traditions there is a strict adab, or spiritual courtesy, demanded of those who perform hadra. It is almost always preceded by a long interval during which Sufi qasa’id are sung. Qasa’id are teaching odes on the sacred sciences, which encourage reflection and can lead to contemplation and deep spiritual states. The singing of the diwans of the saints prepares the heart for the intensity of the dance itself, which is accompanied by soaring voices singing qasa’id. When the hadra is completed, participants sit and listen to the recitation of the Qur'an, which is obligatory. The Qur'an returns the assembly to the Words of God, the supreme form of invocation. The recitation of Qur'an is followed by a discourse delivered by a man of knowledge. The hadra cleans and empties the hearts of the assembly and the discourse fills the empty vessels with knowledge, grounding those who may have been transported beyond the physical world, or, at times, triggering transcendent reflective states.
The 18th century Moroccan Shaykh Ahmed Ibn Ajiba, may God be well pleased with him, wrote:
"The category of dancing which is recommended is the dancing of the Sufis, the people of taste and state, whether they are in ecstasy or seeking ecstasy, whether that is in the presence of the dhikr, or in sama' (literally "hearing"). There is no doubt that the cure of the heart of forgetfulness and gathering with Allah is sought by whatever means there are…”
I had always been ambivalent about the hadra. On
the one hand, I found the practice incredibly powerful, invigorating and at times intoxicating. On the other hand, it seemed to me to be a kind of crutch or shortcut that could easily be abused. I observed that those who focused on hadra over knowledge fell away from the true Path. As a novice I was exposed to hadra in its purest and most rigorous form, as part of a comprehensive process of purification that included study, contemplation, purification and spiritual companionship (suhba). From this vantage point there were other Sufi orders that focused their practice almost exclusively on the hadra, which seemed debased to me and I avoided their gatherings.
Although the Darqawi Sufi Order celebrated the hadra, and I enjoyed taking part to a certain extent, often as a singer, I was never altogether comfortable and always wondered whether it was essential. Si Fudul Al-Hawari Al-Sufi, the great Fesi scholar, was an active participant in the hadra and yet he was one of the most sober and grounded men I have ever met. So I asked him, point blank, if hadra was a necessary practice on the Path. To my surprise, he said that it was not.
Many of the great awliya I have met refrained from openly commenting on the practice and authenticity of other contemporary Sufis, but Si Fudul demanded the highest standards of practice among those claiming spiritual transmission. I visited him once with a young Fesi disciple of a popular but unorthodox shaykh who attracted many disciples by promoting the spontaneous and uncontrolled practice of the hadra, which was dramatic, exciting and seductive to young people but which breached traditional adab. When the young man introduced himself as the disciple of this shaykh, Si Fudul shook his head and warned him sternly that his shaykh’s practice was wrong and dangerous. The young man protested, obviously thinking of Si Fudul as old school. This exchange gave rise to palpable tension in the room. Neither man backed down. It was the only time I have ever seen this kind of encounter.
Although the hadra is not an essential practice in Sufism, it has become in some orders one of the most effective ways of keeping acolytes on the path.
Thursday Night Fever
In Egypt, my close friend Abdallah Schleifer dragged me to a weekly gathering led by an illustrious shaykh of the Burhaniyya Sufi Order. Shaykh Gamal ministered to thousands of Egyptians, Nubians and Sudanese and led a weekly hadra at his zawiya across from the Mosque of Sayyidina Husayn in the Azhar District of Cairo. Abdallah loved these gatherings but I avoided them. One night he insisted that I accompany him and I’m glad he did for I had something of a revelation. We arrived late, after the dhikr had begun. Hundreds of men were crushed together in the zawiyya, singing with gusto from the diwans. Shaykh Gamal spotted Abdallah, who was a regular, and made a place for us beside him. The room was ringing with the sound of dhikr. The invocation was loud and raucous, like the streets of Egypt. The hadra began. It was wild, a little scary and not at all to my taste. It was a little like Saturday Night Fever…on Thursday. I wanted to get out but I was trapped in the horde of nailing bodies. Yet, slowly it dawned on me that these were men who might otherwise be playing trictrac and smoking shisha (hubbly bubbly) in some neighborhood qahwa (coffee house), or watching a soap opera, or worse. Instead they were remembering God. The hadra was a catalyst to keep them in remembrance, to seek Allah "by whatever means there are…”
“Movement during remembrance
is a good thing because
it brings energy to the body
for the act of worship.”
Shaykh Abdul Qadir Isa*
SERENADE
When I was young the most arresting Sufi singers were from Algeria. The Algerians brought with them a distinctive pulsating rhythm to the Andalusian tradition of song that never failed to electrify their listeners. A delegation of Algerians would come to Morocco to celebrate the Moussem of Ibn Al-Habib. This was before the borders were closed between the two countries with the onset of the Polisario War between Morocco and Algeria.
The lead singer of the Algerian fuqara was a stout, cherubic gentleman with shining eyes behind thick spectacles. Hajj Omar hailed from the town of Boufarik, inland and south of Algiers. I first met him in Morocco at the Moussem of Ibn Al-Habib and then later in England when he came to visit.
Years later he came to Makkah and we spent time together. As I recall he was staying near Masjid Jinn, about two kilometers from the Holy Mosque. I picked him and his companion up from their hotel to take them into Jeddah. His friend had to mail a letter at the post office so we let him off and waited for him. Hajj Omar was sitting beside me. We waited silently. Suddenly, he turned toward me, leaned into my ear and began to sing. He sang intoxicating verses in a lilting rhythmic flow. His eyes glowed. He could make the heart dance with his voice. It was a moment of pure felicity.
“All men are sure that I am in love,
But they know not whom I love.
There is in Man no beauty
That is not surpassed in beauty by a beautiful voice.”
A verse chanted to Ibrahim Khawwas
sending him into ecstasy*
THE HEART SHATTERER
He pierced the heart. When he sang, believers would weep. His voice was almost operatic in its power. I never knew his name. He was called "The Heart Shatterer” for his preternatural gift. He was an otherwise unremarkable man who lived in the city of Meknes. He was silenced suddenly; murdered in his sleep, his throat slit. A celestial gate slammed shut with brute force. God bless him.
“Cry, lover-nightengale. This is the place for it.”
Khwaja Shems ud-Din Mohamed Hafiz-i Shirazi*
THE LIVING
“The likeness of he who remembers God and he who does not remember God is like that of the living and the dead.”
The Prophet Mohamed*
“Think ye I am this corpse ye are to bury? I swear by God, this dead one is not I. I in the Spirit am, and this my body My dwelling was, my garment for a time. I am a treasure: hidden I was beneath This talisman of dust, wherein I suffered. I am a pearl; a shell imprisoned me, But leaving it , all trials I have left. I am a bird, and this was once my cage; But I have flown, leaving it as a token. I praise God who hath set me free, and made For me a dwelling in the heavenly heights. Ere now I was a dead man in your midst, But I have come to life, and doffed my shroud.”
Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali**
DIRECT FROM PARADISE
When Shaykh Mohamed ibn Al-Habib lay on his deathbed, Si Hamid, his disciple, sat in an adjoining room, beside himself with grief. He was a gifted qari (one who recites the Qur'an) with a celestial voice and had been raised by the Shaykh from the time he was a small boy. He silently wept at the loss of his spiritual father, who was 100 years old. In his grief, he said to himself, "He is going to die. What will I do when he dies? I can't live without him." The moment this thought passed through his heart, the voice of his Shaykh rang out. "Si Hamid, come here!" Si Hamid rushed to the bedside of his Shaykh. Ibn Al-Habib sat up and admonished the young man. "Si Hamid, you must never think that! We do not die. The people of remembrance (dhikr) do not die. And the people of forgetfulness (ghaflah) are already dead!"
I never met Shaykh Mohamed ibn Al-Habib during his life but I met him in three vivid dreams. During my first visit to Meknes, the year after his passing, I was in a state of profound shock. I had never encountered men who had no interest in the ego, or, for that matter, in the world. Over an intense three-week period my hair began to turn gray. I was only 23 at the time. I was overwhelmed with the intensity of the practice of remembrance. My self-esteem plummeted. My heart became turbulent. In reaction I retreated into sleep. My friend Peter Sanders gave a slide show of the visit a month or two later. As a joke, almost every other shot in the sequence was a photo of me sleeping, much to the mirth of his audience.
Although I was embarrassed at the time, later on I discovered that retreating into sleep was the right thing to do, when I read the words of Moulay Al-Arabi ad-Darqawi:
"Have no fear of psychic suggestions when they assail you and flood your heart in waves ceaselessly renewed, but inwardly ab
andon all will to God and remain calm; do not be agitated, relax and do not be tense; and sleep, if you can, until you have your fill of it, for sleep is beneficial in times of distress; it brings marvelous benefits, for it is in itself abandonment to the divine will."
The author in an escapist slumber circa 1973
During one of these escapist slumbers, I had a dream that I was in the zawiya of Ibn Al-Habib at the far side of the large room, near the passageway leading to the apartments of the Shaykh’s widows. The atmosphere was suffused with golden light and everything in the zawiya seemed to be made of gold. From the tomb, the Shaykh emerged and walked toward me. He was young and erect, not aged. Years later I saw a photo of Ibn Al-Habib as a young man and this was exactly the figure that walked toward me. His disciples were scattered along his path, prostrate before him. The atmosphere was majestic and powerful.
Many months later in England I had a second dream, one of the most vivid of my life. I had been feeling spiritually inadequate and, in spite of my conversion to Islam, felt that I remained in many respects an unbeliever. In the dream I was in Paradise, sitting in a room rich with carpets (zarabiy mabthutha) before Ibn Al-Habib. He was extremely beautiful, his skin light and luminous, his presence emanating tranquility. He spoke to me in a beautiful voice, in rhymed couplets in ravishing classical Arabic. I didn’t speak a word of Arabic at the time, but clearly understood every word he said. I can’t remember the exact words but the gist of his poem was, "Do not worry. Even I was afflicted with kufr (unbelief)."
This was a puzzling, not to say troubling, statement. I shared the dream with another, more experienced faqir who was disturbed. He said, "No this is wrong. This can't be a true dream." I only understood the meaning of the dream years later upon reading a statement by Ibn Al-Arabi referring to kufr in its etymological sense as the act of covering or hiding something, meaning that only the Gnostics (Arifin) were completely free from unbelief when the veils had been lifted, their hearts uncovered and the illumination of Truth revealed. Much later I came across an extraordinary passage from the Maqalat of Shems-i Tabrizi, the spiritual master of Maulana Jalalud'din Rumi:
Signs on the Horizons Page 14