Chapter (2) A Birth of Good News

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Shaikh Muḥammad al-Muḥammad al-Kasnazān in the Karbchna Mosque (early 1980s).

The seeker wants things, and Allah (exalted and high is He), the Messenger, and the Shaikhs also want things from the seeker. They want him to apply the Muḥammadan Shariah and then apply the states, sayings, and deeds of the Messenger to himself. If a person does not benefit himself, how could he benefit others? A seeker must apply Ṭarīqa first himself, then have his family, wife, and children to do likewise. If he can, he should also get others—such as friends, relatives, and acquaintances—to apply it.

Shaikh Muḥammad al-Muḥammad al-Kasnazān (Sermon, 5 December 2012)

Sayyida Ḥafṣa Gulanabar was chosen as Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm’s wife by divine decree. Her brother, Musṭafā, was a childhood friend of Shaikh Ḥusayn and they remained very close. The two friends also fought together against the British army in northern Iraq. Musṭafā had offered Shaikh Ḥusayn his sister, Ḥafṣa, in marriage but the Shaikh did not want to marry again.

About two years after returning to Karbchna from his emigration to Iran, Shaikh Ḥusayn spoke to Musṭafā about marrying the young woman to his brother, ʿAbd al-Karīm. Shaikh Musṭafā consented to this great honour. Sultan Ḥusayn called for his brother, who at the time was no older than thirteen. When the child heard his elder brother the Shaikh of Ṭarīqa’s decision, he began to cry and ran away, as children are wont to do. Sultan Ḥusayn told him that he had his reasons that the young boy could not yet understand for wanting this marriage to take place. He knew that the marriage of his brother, who would be the Shaikh of Ṭarīqa after him, to the young woman would produce Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm’s successor to the Masterdom of Ṭarīqa. The young woman was five years older than Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm, which was contrary to the prevalent tradition of having an older husband and younger wife. This confirms that there must have been a subtle purpose behind their marriage.

Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm married sayyida Ḥafṣa early in his youth. They had their first son, Ḥusayn, in 1927, and in 1937, the first of their four daughters, ʿĀʾishā, was born. Then, at dawn on Friday 15 April 1938, Allah gifted them with their third child and the secret behind their marriage.

Sayyida Shamsa (may Allah have mercy on her), Shaikh Ḥusayn’s daughter, related what happened on the blessed night our Shaikh was born. At the time, she was ten years old. When Shaikh Ḥusayn learned that the wife of his brother, ʿAbd al-Karīm, went into labour at night, he kept walking back and forth between the house’s entrance and patio, reciting “Yā Hū, Yā Hū”, waiting for the newborn’s delivery. He calmed down and sat only when he was told of the delivery at dawn.[1] That our Shaikh was not the first child of Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm and sayyida Ḥafṣa highlights the exceptional nature of Sultan[2] Ḥusayn’s interest in the newborn.

It was Sultan Ḥusayn who named his nephew “Muḥammad”, following the prevalent tradition of the Shaikh of Ṭarīqa naming newborns. About eighty years later, specifically in 2016, the Messenger (PBUH) blessed our Shaikh’s name with his, with him now being called “Muḥammad al-Muḥammad”.

When Sultan Ḥusayn sent for the newborn, a number of his children, some of whom were very young, were in his assembly. When he extended his hand to greet the swaddled newborn, an aged dervish told him that this would make his children jealous. The Shaikh took the child, placed him on his lap, and began praising him, saying, “This is the reviver of religion, this will benefit religion, this will live a long life”.

Shaikh Ḥusayn must have seen a future Shaikh of Ṭarīqa in his nephew, just as his father and the Master of Ṭarīqa before him had said about him a quarter of a century earlier. When Shaikh ʿAbd al-Qādir was informed of the birth of his son, ʿAbd al-Karīm, he asked that the newborn be brought to him. When the baby was placed before him, the Shaikh moved his cane above the child to and fro and said, “What Allah wills, what Allah wills. Allah (exalted and high is He) will guide many Arabs at the hands of the son of this man to the true path”. Indeed, in Shaikh Muḥammad al-Muḥammad’s time, especially after he moved the central takya to Baghdad in 1982 and he permanently moved from Kirkuk to live there, a vast number of Arabs took the Ṭarīqa’s pledge.

When Shaikh Muḥammad al-Muḥammad was two to three months old, he became so ill that his parents thought that he might not survive. They took him to his uncle, Sultan Ḥusayn, who had been in a continuous retreat, isolated from people and the world. Aware that Allah had decreed a tremendous spiritual role for the child, the Shaikh reassured them and told them not to worry about their baby for he had guardians protecting him.

One event that embodies Sultan Ḥusayn’s exceptional love for his nephew took place when the ascetic was on his deathbed, hours before his departure from this world. Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm and his wife were sitting close to him, weeping over his imminent departure from this world. When Shaikh Ḥusayn, who was lying on the bed, saw their child, who was less than a year old and in the company of a guardian, he motioned for the baby to be brought to him. He held him on his chest and began kissing him and sniffing his neck as if he could smell the pleasant fragrance of Ṭarīqa the baby was destined to take care of forty years later. Those present were further overwhelmed by emotion when they witnessed the moving scene. Shaikh ʿAbd al-Karīm lifted the child off the chest of Shaikh Ḥusayn, upon whom asceticism and seclusion over the years had taken their toll, to avoid any discomfort the baby’s weight would cause. This was the last good omen from Sultan Ḥusayn before his passing about the lofty status that the young Muḥammad al-Muḥammad would have in the future.

[1] Shaikh Muḥammad al-Muḥammad al-Kasnazān, sermon, 10 February 2016.

[2] The title “Sultan” is used for the Kasnazānī Shaikhs because they are heirs of Shaikh ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Gaylānī, who was known as the “Sultan of walīs”.

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