Voices of Islam (73 page)

APPEARANCE

God says in the Holy Qur’an:

O Children of Adam! wear your beautiful apparel at every time and place of prayer
...
.

Say (O Muhammad): ‘‘Who has forbidden the adoration with clothes given by God, which He has produced for His devotees?’’

(Qur’an 7:31–32)

Nafi‘ related:

‘Umar entered upon me one day as I was praying in a single garment and he said, ‘‘Don’t you have two garments in your possession?’’ I said, ‘‘Yes.’’ He said, ‘‘In your opinion, if I sent you to one of the people of Medina on an errand, would you go in a single garment?’’ I said, ‘‘No.’’ He said, ‘‘Then is God worthier of our self-beautification or people?’’

An adjunct to proper covering is proper physical appearance. The most direct method for establishing one’s identity as a traveler upon the path of self-purification is to adopt the correct outward appearance, abandoning the dress of the worldly life and putting on instead the apparel of the Hereafter. This is an outward indication of rejecting servitude to the material world (
‘abd al-dunya
) and asserting one’s true identity as a servant of the Divine (
‘abd Allah
).

The dress most conducive to spirituality is the garb of the Prophet Muhammad, the traditional clothing worn by all the Prophets and

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Messengers of God. For men, this includes wearing the turban, the cloak (
jubba
), and a ring, and using perfume and a tooth-stick (
miswak
). For women, it involves wearing loose clothing, covering the hair, arms, and legs, with white clothing being the most preferable. Such is the honored dress of the ascetics and lovers of God and His Prophet, those who reject the illusion of the material world and will settle for nothing less than the perfection and truth of reality.

Fundaments of Prayer

The first and foremost fundamental part of the ritual prayer is intention (
niyya
).

As in all Islamic worship, the worshipper intends the prayer as a fulfillment of God’s order done purely for God’s sake. The Prophet Muhammad established this as a paramount rule of worship when he said, ‘‘Verily all deeds are based on their intention.’’
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The prayer is initiated by the consecratory magnification of God (
takbir
), followed by multiple cycles, each of which follows the same series of postures and recitations: first standing, then bowing, brief standing, prostrating, a brief sitting, a second prostration, and in the even cycles, sitting after the second prostration. Each of these positions also involves specifi recitations. While standing, the fi chapter (
Surat al-Fatiha
) and other portions of the Holy Qur’an are recited, either silently or aloud, depending upon the time of prayer. In bowing, the brief standing, prostration, and the brief sitting, God is glorifi and praised in short formulas. While sitting, the testimony of faith (
tashahhud
) is recited, along with greetings to and prayers for the Prophet Muhammad, the Prophet Abraham, and their families. In addition, there are a variety of supplemental invocations and recitations that are traditionally part of the practice of most worshippers. The basic essentials of ritual prayer number about 15, depending on the school of jurisprudence followed.
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Each obligatory prayer has a prescribed number of cycles to be observed (see the following table).

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Voices of the Spirit

The Positions of Prayer

The movements of the prayer identify the one praying with all other forms of creation, for the prayer’s postures are designed to remind the worshipper of mortality and the traversal through the different stages of life. They also resemble the rising and setting of the celestial bodies, as well as the rotation of the planets upon their axes and the orbits of the moons, planets, and suns. These are signs which demonstrate the hierarchical nature of creation and its submission to Divine regulation at every level, for as the Holy Qur’an states:

Among His Signs are the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. Adore not the sun and the moon, but adore God, Who created them, if it is Him ye wish to serve.

(Qur’an 41:37)

God further draws our attention to their submissive nature, saying:

Hast thou not seen that before God prostrate whosoever is in the heavens and whosoever is on the earth, and the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the hills, and the trees, and the beasts, and many of mankind
.. .
?

(Qur’an 22:18)

The postures of prayer, then, are symbolic of humanity’s relationship to the Divine, moving as they do from standing in assertion of existence and strength, to the bowing of humility and servitude, to prostration in the face of God’s overwhelming Magnifi ence and Power and the corresponding realization of one’s utter nonexistence. From this station of utter abasement, the worshipper returns to the intermediate position, between annihilation and independence, to sit between the hands of the Prophet Muhammad, greeting the one who is the intermediary between the Divinity and His creation. The Prophet stands at the station of Perfect Servanthood and is the ultimate exemplar of the condition of servanthood to God. Unlike all other creations, the Prophet Muhammad was divested of all selfhood, dissolved in the Presence of God.

Whithersoever ye turn, there is the presence of God. For God is all-Pervading, all-Knowing.

(Qur’an 2:115)

THE PEAK OF PRAYER IS PROSTRATION

The Prophet said, ‘‘Nothing brings the servant of God nearer to the Divine Presence than through his secret prostration (
al-khafi
).’’ The Prophet

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also said, ‘‘Any believer who prostrates himself, will be raised one degree by God.’’ As for what that degree consists of, know that it is not something small, for each heaven might consist of one degree.

For these reasons, many among the pious observe extra voluntary prostra- tions to God after completing their obligatory prayers. Whenever they encounter a difficulty, whether spiritual or worldly, they seek refuge in their Lord through prostration to Him.

One must cut down self-pride and make the inner self prostrate, for one who truly submits to his or her Lord can no longer submit to his or her self. Once that state is reached, prayer is purely for God. That is why the Prophet said, ‘‘What I fear most for my Community is hidden polytheism.’’
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He feared for his community not the outward polytheism of idol worship, for he was informed by God that his community was protected from that forever,
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but the secret polytheism, which is to do something for the sake of showing off.

A man came and asked the Prophet, ‘‘O Prophet of God, pray for me to be under your intercession on Judgment Day and grant me to be in your company in Paradise.’’ The Prophet replied, ‘‘I will do so, but assist me in that.’’ The man asked, ‘‘How so?’’ The Prophet said, ‘‘By frequent pros- tration [before God].’’

The Prophet related that, on the Day of Judgment, as the believers emerge from their graves, angels will come to them to brush the dust from their foreheads. However, despite the best efforts of the angels, some of that dust will remain. Both the resurrected believers and their angelic helpers will be surprised that this dust cannot be removed. Then a voice will call out, ‘‘Leave that dust and do not try to remove it, for that is the dust of their prayer-niches, thus will it be known in Paradise that they are My [devout] servants.’’

This Prophetic Tradition indicates the spiritual value of the prostration of the believers, making as it does even the dust touched by their foreheads hallowed. The power of prayer has a similar effect on the place of prayer itself, as exemplifi in the story of the Virgin Mary, as mentioned in the Holy Qur’an:

Whenever Zachariah went into the prayer-niche where she was, he found that she had food. He said: O Mary! Whence cometh unto thee this (food)? She answered: It is from God. God giveth without stint to whom He will.

(Qur’an 3:37)

It was there, in the Virgin Mary’s hallowed sanctuary, where she used to find her daily provision in the form of fruits out of season, that the Prophet Zachariah went to prostrate himself before God and beseech Him for a child, and it was there that God granted his request.

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Voices of the Spirit

The places where a Muslim prostrates will bear witness to his or her devotion on the Day of Judgment. It is for this reason that one often sees Muslims changing the location of their prayers, praying the obligatory cycles in one spot and then moving to another area to observe the voluntary cycles (
sunan
).

Ibn ‘Abbas, a cousin of the Prophet and the greatest early exegete of the Qur’an, said, ‘‘When God commanded Adam to descend to Earth, as soon as he arrived, he went into prostration, asking God’s forgiveness for the sin he had made. God sent the archangel Gabriel to him after forty years had passed, and Gabriel found Adam still in prostration.’’ He had not raised his head for 40 years in sincere and heartfelt repentance before God.

The Holy Qur’an tells us that, after God created Adam, He ordered the angels to prostrate before the first man.

When We said to the angels, ‘‘prostrate yourselves to Adam,’’ they prostrated themselves, but not Iblis [Satan]: he refused.

(Qur’an 20:116)

Imam Qurtubi, one of the great commentators on the Holy Qur’an, writes in his exegesis that one of the four Archangels, Rafael, had the entire Qur’an written on his forehead. God had given Rafael knowledge of the Holy Qur’an and wrote all of it between his eyes, and he is the angel who inscribed the destinies of all things in the Preserved Tablets before they were created.
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Rafael’s name in Arabic, which differs from his Syriac name Israfi , is ‘Abd al-Rahman, Servant of The Merciful. This theme of mercy pervades Islamic thought, for it was through God’s Mercy that the Holy Qur’an was sent down to the Prophet, about whom The Merciful said:

We sent thee not but as a Mercy for all creatures.

(Qur’an 21:107)

When God ordered the angels to make prostration to Adam, Rafael was the fi to obey, making prostration and placing his forehead, containing the entire Qur’an, on the earth, out of respect and honor for Adam, for he perceived the whole of Qur’an written on Adam’s forehead.
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Other com- mentators say the angels fell prostrate before Adam for they perceived the Light of the Prophet Muhammad shining from his form. There is in reality no discrepancy here, for God said in the Holy Qur’an:

Yasin. By the Qur’an, full of Wisdom.

(Qur’an 36:1–2)
˙

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The Prophet Muhammad said that Yasin, the 36th chapter of the Holy Qur’an as well as one of his own blessed names, is the heart of the Holy Qur’an, the very Qur’an that the Prophet was carrying in his breast. Thus, the light that shone forth from Adam was the Light of the Prophet within him, who in turn was blazing with God’s Holy Word.

The Inner Meanings of the Different Positions of Prayer

Shah Waliullah al-Dihlawi said:

Know that one is sometimes transported, quick as lightning, to the Holy Precincts (of the Divine Presence), and finds oneself attached, with the greatest possible adherence, to the Threshold of God. There descend on this person the Divine transfi ons (
tajalli
) which dominate his soul. He sees and feels things which the human tongue is incapable of describing. Once this state of light passes away, he returns to his previous condition, and fi ds himself tor- mented by the loss of such an ecstasy. Thereupon he tries to rejoin that which has escaped him, and adopts the condition of this lowly world which would be nearest to a state of absorption in the knowledge of the Creator. This is a posture of respect, of devotion, and of an almost direct conversation with God, which posture is accompanied by appropriate acts and words
...
. Worship consists essentially of three elements: (1) humility of heart (spirit) consequent on a feel- ing of the Presence of the Majesty and Grandeur of God, (2) recognition of this superiority (of God) and humbleness (of man) by means of appropriate words, and (3) adoption by the organs of the body of postures of necessary reverence
...

Still greater respect is displayed by laying down the face, which reflects in the highest degree one’s ego and self-consciousness, so low that it touches the ground in front of the object of reverence.
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Jili says:

The secrets and inner-meanings of prayer are uncountable so what is mentioned here is limited for the sake of brevity. Prayer is a symbol of the uniqueness of the Divine Reality (
al-Haqq
), and the [position of] standing in it is a symbol of the establishment of the uniqueness of mankind in possessing something from the Divine Names and Attributes, for as the Prophet said, ‘‘Verily God created Adam in His Image.’’
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Then the standing towards the Qibla is an indication of the universal direction in the quest of the Divine Reality. The intention therein is an indica- tion of the connection of the heart in this direction. The opening magnification of God’s Greatness (
takbir
) is an indication that the Divine Proximity is larger and more expansive than what may manifest to him because nothing can limit its perspective. Even so, it is vaster still than every perspective or vision that manifests to the servant for it is without end.