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Shaykh Abdul Qadir Jilani Attained The Spiritual
Station of Siddiqin
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The Holy Prophet Muhammad Mustafa Sallallahu ?alayhi
wa Sallam is the last Prophet and there is no prophet after him. But
people can still aspire to spiritual progress, acquire taqwa (piety)
and saintliness and become awliya Allah (friends of Allah). And the
highest spiritual state after the anbiya (prophets), belongs to the
siddiqin (the truthful). That is why the Holy Prophet Muhammad taught
us to make the supplication: Allahummaj 'alnaa min-as-siddiqin (O Allah
make us among the truthful). Well, Shaykh ?Abdul Qadir Jilani Rady Allahu
?Anhu manifested to the world that he ranked among the siddiqin at the
ripe age of 18. At that age, his thirst for knowledge and eagerness
for the company of the awliya Allah (friends of Allah) took him to the
city of Baghdad.
It is related that as he was about to leave home on this momentous journey, his widowed mother sewed forty gold coins inside his coat as part of his inheritance, and as parting advice told him to be forever truthful. The caravan with which he was travelling had gone as far as Hamadan when it was attacked by a gang of robbers. In the course of their loot, one of the robbers asked him whether he had anything with him and he truthfully replied that he had forty gold coins sewn in his coat. The robber obviously thought he was joking and narrated this incident to his chief who decided to see this young man. When his coat was torn open, sure enough there were forty gold coins. The gang leader was astounded. He asked Shaykh ?Abdul Qadir Jilani as to why he revealed this when he could have kept it secret. Shaykh ?Abdul Qadir Jilani told him that his mother had advised him not to lie and he was duty bound to obey his mother, Hearing this, the gang leader was overtaken with remorse, repented, accepted Shaykh ?Abdul Qadir Jilani as his Shaykh and so did all his followers and they went on to acquire wilayah (sainthood) themselves. This is how Shaykh ?Abdul Qadir Jilani came to be ranked among the Siddiqin. Allahummaj 'alnaa min-as-Siddiqin, Aameen Yaa Rabbal 'Aalamin. This incident has been narrated in almost all the biographies of the Shaykh, among them being Qalaid al-Jawahir (Necklaces of Gems, p. 33), one of the earliest and major biographies, by Shaykh Muhammad ibn Yahya at-Tadifi, Rahmatullahi ?alayh (passed away 963 A.H, 1556 C.E) Sayyid ?Abdur Rahim ibn Muhammad Isma?il Shirazi Rahmatullahi ?alayh has captured the essence of this incident most beautifully in the following verse of his Urdu poem on the Ghawth al A'zam: Choron pay tum nay kar kay tawajjoh Focusing your spiritual glance at the thieves (Gulzare Tayyiba, The Pleasant Garden, vol. 3, p. 18) Yaa Hayyu Yaa Hayyu Yaa Qayyum |
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