/hail

the server is back up and running again discord.gg/MAVeRxfrsJ

يَقُولُونَ لَيْلَى بِالْعِرَاقِ مَرِيضَةٌ فَأَقْبَلْتُ مِنْ مِصْرٍ إِلَيْهَا أَعُودُهَا فَوَاللَّهِ مَا أَدْرِي إِذَا أَنَا جِئْتُهَا أَأُبْرِئُهَا مِنْ دَائِهَا أَمْ أَزِيدُهَا

He says: “I saw Shaykh al-Muwaffaq at the edge of the river, east of the school, on its southern side, performing ablution (wuḍūʾ). I stood beside the school and said to myself: ‘I shall not go down to perform ablution until he has finished.’ When he had completed his ablution, he took his wooden clogs (qabqāb), walked across the water to the other bank, then put his clogs back on and ascended to the school. Then he swore to me by Allah that he had indeed seen this, and that he had no need to lie. I kept this matter secret during his lifetime. I asked: ‘Did he see you?’ He replied: ‘No, and there was no one else there. This was at the time of the noon prayer (ẓuhr).’ I then asked: ‘Did his feet sink into the water?’ He replied: ‘No. Rather, it was as though he were walking upon a padded surface’

omg my shaykh al-islam. he walked on water by the way.

They said: "May God have mercy upon you! What is your position concerning Abu Bakr and Umar?" Zayd replied: "May God have mercy upon them both and forgive them. I have never heard anyone from my household repudiate them, nor have I heard anyone say anything about them except good." They said: "Then why, in that case, do you seek vengeance for the blood of the members of this Household? Is it not because they seized your authority and wrested it from your hands?" Zayd then said to them: "The strongest thing I can say concerning what you have mentioned is that we were more entitled than all other people to the authority of the Messenger of God, may God bless him and his family and grant them peace. Yet those people appropriated it exclusively for themselves, to our exclusion, and pushed us away from it. But that did not bring them, in our estimation, to the point of disbelief. They assumed authority, acted justly among the people, and acted according to the Book and the Sunnah." They said: "Then why have these people wronged you, if those [earlier ones] did not wrong you? Why, then, do you call [people] to fight against a people who are not wrongdoers towards you?" He replied: "These people, however, are not like those people. These people are wrongdoers towards me, towards you, and towards themselves. We are only calling you to the Book of God and the Sunnah of His Prophet, may God bless him and his family and grant them peace; to the Prophetic traditions being revived, and to the religious innovations being extinguished. If you respond to us, you will attain felicity; but if you refuse, I am not your wakīl [one responsible for you]." They then separated from him and broke their pledge of allegiance to him, saying: "The Imam has preceded us!" They used to maintain that Abu Ja'far Muhammad ibn Ali, the brother of Zayd ibn Ali, was the Imam, although he had already died by that time. His son, Ja'far ibn Muhammad, was still alive. They therefore said: "Ja'far is our Imam today, after his father. He has a greater right to the affair after his father, and we shall not follow Zayd ibn Ali, for he is not an Imam." Zayd consequently called them al-Rāfiḍah (the Rejecters). Today, however, they claim that the person who named them al-Rāfiḍah was al-Mughīrah, because they had separated from him. A group among them had, before Zayd's uprising, gone to Ja'far ibn Muhammad ibn Ali and said to him: "Zayd ibn Ali is receiving pledges of allegiance from us. Do you consider it appropriate for us to pledge allegiance to him?" He replied: "Yes, pledge allegiance to him. For, by God, he is the best of us, our master, and the finest of us." They then returned but concealed what he had instructed them to do. — al-Ṭabarī, Tārīkh 7.180-181

genuinely laughed.

i restrain myself, while in my heart there is, from love, a burning anguish; and one who abstains from love is not necessarily one who is free of longing. whenever inclinations draw me towards the beloved, i refuse; and humiliation has passed beyond the one who refuses. others inhale the winds of passionate love, and compose rhymes through the prolongation of their love. and i endure from my beloved things which, were i to encounter them from other people, i would set the sharp edges of swords and the elevated spear-points against them. — al-sharīf al-raḍī [d. 1015]

إنى أغار فليت الناس ما خلقوا أو ليتهم خلقوا من غير أجفان إن لم يروك فصوت منك يسحرهم يا ليتهم خلقوا من غير آذان

Zayd ibn ʿAlī [d. 740]: No indeed! I swear by the One who sent the messengers: this is not the description of the Wisest of judges. Rather, He created them morally responsible, capable, with the proof established against them, subject to commands and prohibitions. He commanded us to do good and did not prevent us from doing so; He prohibited evil and did not incite us to commit it. He showed them the two paths—the path of good and the path of evil—and then said, “Act!” Thus, each person is facilitated toward that for which he was created: performing acts of obedience and refraining from acts of disobedience. The Exalted says: “He created him and proportioned him; then He made the way easy for him.” (Qur’an 80:19–20) The Exalted also says: “As for the one who transgressed and preferred the life of this world, then indeed, Hell shall be his abode. But as for the one who feared standing before his Lord and restrained his soul from its desires, then indeed, Paradise shall be his abode.” (Qur’an 79:37–41) And the Exalted says: “As for the one who gives, fears God, and affirms the best [promise], We shall facilitate for him the way of ease. But as for the one who is miserly, considers himself self-sufficient, and denies the best [promise], We shall facilitate for him the way of hardship.” (Qur’an 92:5–10) And the Exalted says: “None shall enter it except the most wretched, who denied the truth and turned away. But the most God-fearing shall be kept far from it: the one who gives his wealth to purify himself.” (Qur’an 92:15–18) And the Exalted says: “We did not wrong them; rather, they were themselves the wrongdoers.” (Qur’an 43:76) And: “How evil was what they used to do!” (Qur’an 5:79) And: “As a recompense for what they used to do.” (Qur’an 56:24) And: “God would not lead a people astray after having guided them until He had made clear to them what they must guard against.” (Qur’an 9:115) Thus, the proponents of compulsion and the anthropomorphists absolved themselves of every blameworthy quality, injustice, wrongful oppression, and foolishness, while attributing all of these to God, exalted is He, in every respect. They said: “God created us wretched, then punished us with the Fire, yet He did not wrong us.” What mockery could be greater than this? What injustice could be clearer, or what wrongdoing more manifest than that which they have attributed to God? No indeed! By the Master of the Day of Judgement, this is not the description of the Most Merciful of those who show mercy, who commands justice and excellence and forbids indecency and wrongdoing. As He, glorified is He, says: “God does not burden any soul beyond its capacity.” (Qur’an 2:286) And its capacity (wusʿuhā) means its ability. Rather, He imposed upon them less than they are capable of bearing, and granted them more than they deserve. He did not seek from them any pretext, nor seize upon any slip of theirs. He did not contradict His decree by His decree, His determination by His determination, or His judgement by His judgement. Exalted is He far above what the proponents of compulsion and the anthropomorphists say—high above it indeed! For they likened God, glorified is He, to jinn and human beings, since injustice, ignorance, wickedness, depravity, disbelief, and foolishness can only originate from jinn and human beings. Then, in addition to the fabrications and falsehoods they uttered about God, they compounded their wrongdoing by displaying hostility toward His friends and devoted servants: those who affirm His justice and His oneness, who are certain of His promise and His threat, who faithfully fulfil the covenant He made with them, and who cling firmly to the unbreakable handhold. They attributed disbelief to these people and accused them of fabricating falsehoods. How beautiful is the effect of God's friends and devoted servants—blessed and exalted is He—upon people, and how ugly is the effect of people upon them! Indeed, they suffer severe hardship at the hands of these people. If they remain silent in their presence, they call them resentful; if they debate them, they call them dissenters; and if they oppose them, they call them unbelievers. Such has been their characteristic among the earliest generations and the later ones. Thus, He says: “If they see the path of right guidance, they do not adopt it as a path; but if they see the path of error, they adopt it as a path.” (Qur’an 7:146) And He, majestic is His mention, said: “They rejected them, although their souls were convinced of them, out of injustice and arrogance. So behold what was the end of the corrupters!” (Qur’an 27:14) And all praise belongs to God, Lord of the worlds. May God bless Muhammad, the trustworthy, and those messengers who preceded him, and the rightly guided imams who came after him. The final outcome belongs to the God-fearing, and you shall surely come to know its tidings after a time.

may god forgive layla, even if she has spilled my blood; for even if she does not grieve for me, i bear her no reproach. i shall neither blame her nor voice any complaint against layla, though one who suffers may indeed complain to every friend. they say to me, “repent of mentioning layla and of loving her!” yet my heart shall never repent of its love for layla. — qays ibn al-mulawwah [d. 688]