Nadia Uddin

Sufi Samrat Hazrat Shah Dewanbagi (Mza) Hujur Qibla is the Greatest Reformer and Revivor of Mohammadi Islam. He teaches us the process of how a man can communicate with Almighty Allah and how we can rectify and control our Nafs in order to gain the closeness and satisfaction of Allah.

Allah has sent us to the world with the sole purpose of worshipping Him and gaining His satisfaction. However, upon arrival to this world, we engage ourselves with the affections of worldly matters. Examples include: love for family, social, cultural, financial concerns etc.  We keep ourselves so busy with these aspects that we forget why we were created and sent by Allah (Swt). Whereas in reality we should be concerned on how we can attain the satisfaction of Allah.

Since the beginning of this world, Allah has been sending His representatives to guide mankind into the right path. It is when every time a nation/tribe had gone astray Allah had sent His representatives to save them from great destruction and guided them to Almighty Allah’s way. This includes Prophets in the age of Nabuwat and afterwards Awlia (friends of Allah) in the era of Belayat. In continuation to this process, Allah has sent Sufi Samrat Hazrat Shah Dewanbagi (Mza) Hujur Qibla.

Till today, at the age of 70, Sufi Samrat spent his entire life inviting people into the right path (Siratal Mustakim) and teaching them how to communicate with Almighty Allah. Among his many philosophies, one of the most important philosophies is how a person can communicate with Allah with the process of meditation. Meditation has been practiced since the beginning of creation. When we look back into history, we can see that in the age of Nabuwat, Prophets starting from Hazrat Adam (As) to Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) used the process of meditation to communicate with Allah. Similarly, in the age of Belayat, Awlia-e-keram also used meditation as the platform to communicate with Allah.

When we look closely into the society, we can see that people are performing ibadah, but the root and most important thing- Meditation is missing among us. Neither we meditate nor do we believe in the concept on meditations. We forget that even Prophets and Awlia used to meditate in order to communicate with Allah (Swt).

Islam means ‘to surrender’ or ‘to submit’ and Muslim is ‘one who surrenders’ or ‘submits’ to Allah. Sufi Samrat teaches us how we can surrender properly towards Allah, through meditation. In order to submit we need to be able to control our Nafs. According to Sufi Samrat Nafs can be classified into 5 different types. They are briefly discussed below:

• Nafs-e-Ammara (the soul which commands): In the holy Quran- Allah says, “The (human) soul is certainly prone to evil.” (Surah Yusuf 12: Verse 53) Nafs-e-Ammara commands or takes control over a person. There are 6 characteristics within an individual which can lead them to commit various sins.
• Lust can cause many problems in the society. Due to lust, a person will be attracted to other women and to meet his feeling of lust he/she will cross all his limits. This often results in sexual harassment rapes etc in the society.

(ii) Anger often leads to destruction among each other which can take the form of physical abuse and even wars between each other. When a person is angry, anger will take over him and make him commit sins such as swearing, saying foul language etc.

(iii) Greed can make a person lie, commit fraud and deceive other people. A person might also engage himself in various sins due to greed.

(iv) Jealousy occurs when we cannot accept the betterment of others. A person will feel jealous when we cannot see the other person doing better than him.

(v) Vanity refers to ‘self-concentration’. This is when a person is only busy about himself. He only thinks about his self-pride, self-obsession, self-ego, self-centered overall. He believes he is superior to everyone.

(vi) Illusion is when a person is overly attracted towards something or someone. Being overly attracted, he can start to make wrong decisions in life. The only thing in his mind would be his obsession, so he would not pay attention to whether his decision is right or not, as his only intension would be to achieve his obsession.

Sufi Samrat teaches us how we can control all those 6 characteristics within an individual. These teachings help us to be purified and attain the closeness of me Almighty Allah and gain His satisfaction

• Nafs-e-Lawwamma (the soul that blames):  Allah refers to this Nafs: “And I do call to witness the Nafs that blames.” (Surah Qiyamah 75 : Verse 2) This Nafs feel blame, shame, pain while doing the sin. When committing the sin, they feel as if they were criminals in the act.
• Nafs-e-Mutmainnah (the soul at peace): Allah (Swt) states in the holy Quran : “O Self, in complete rest and satisfaction.” (Surah Fazr 89 : Verses 27 and 28) Mutmain means to be happy. Happy with whatever Allah has allowed us. The Nafs performs and obeys the commands of Allah in alignment with what Allah expressed is Shariah. Such a Nafs dislikes what Allah dislikes and also abides strictly by Allah’s rules and commands.
• Nafs-e-Mulhima (Ilham): After Nafs-e-Mutmainnah, when a person has purified himself and he obeys Allah’s commands, he will hear the voice of Allah also known as Ilham and continues to lead his life in accordance to those Ilhams.
• Nafs-e-Rahmania (Nafs of Wali-Allah): This is considered to be the most precious Nafs which is carried by Wali-Allah. Through this Nafs, a two way communication between Allah and Wali-Allah is established.

Sufi Samrat Hazrat Shah Dewanbagi (Mza) Hujur Qibla teaches us how we can rectify and control our Nafs and purify ourselves. Purification of the soul comes with the incentive of communication with Allah (Swt). On the other hand, in terms of meditation Sufi Samrat teaches that there are 37 levels within spiritual meditation. He teaches us how we can accomplish each of these levels successfully and gain the satisfaction of Almighty Allah. Out of his many great philosophies have only highlighted two of them.

I pray to Almighty Allah for my Morshed’s long life and good health.

[Writer: Spouse of Mejo Shahebjada Imam Dr. ARSAFM Qudrat E Khoda (Mza)]