ʿAli Bin Abi Tālib's Advice To Kamīl Bin Ziyād

ʿAbdu-Rahmān bin Jandab narrated that Kamīl bin Ziyād told him:

"ʿAli كرم الله وجهه (karrama-LLahu wajhahu) held my hand once, and he walked with me in the direction of the cemetery. When we reached the open desert, he soughed a deep breath before he said to me,

'O Kamīl son of Ziyād, hearts are like vessels, the best are exceptionally conscious and vast. Learn from what I am going to tell you. There are three types of people:

(1) A godly scholar,
(2) A student who is seeking salvation, and
(3) A ferocious follower of every howler and his own type.

The third type of people are biased, and they float with the currents. They neither seek enlightenment through knowledge, nor do they take refuge in a safe recess during a storm.

You must understand that knowledge is better than money, for knowledge will guard you, while you have to be the guard of your money. Deeds are more exalted than knowledge, while money needs someone to spent it justly in order to render it pure. To love a man of knowledge and to learn at his hand is a debt one can never repay. Knowledge earns its owner respect during his lifetime and praiseworthy remembrance after his death, while what money can do expires once it is spent. The keeper of a safe dies and what he guards and the treasures remain, however, a men of knowledge lives throughout the ages.

moske_egypt

Their distinct form may no longer be seen, but their findings are preserved in people's hearts. Although knowledge is preserved in the hearts, yet if it is acted upon, it will carry its bearer, otherwise when merely memorized, knowledge remains vulnerable. (Another) person may use his religious knowledge for worldly gains ... like that, knowledge dies away when its carrier dies.

However, the earth will never remain devoid of someone who carries the proof of God's sovereignty, and the testimony of His messenger ﷺ otherwise, God's revelations and clear signs will be abrogated. Such true human beings are the rare few, although they are the most exalted in God's sight. Through them, Almighty Allah guards His message, and He will not take them back unto Himself until they have delivered the same to their coequals. These people endeavor to plant such seeds in hearts akin to their own.

Hence, knowledge gushes forth from their hearts, and they take from it the terrain the opulent ones judge as rugged and what the ignorant ones deem as reprehensible. In fact God's people live in this world with bodies who's souls are captivated by the Supreme Observer of all. Such are God's vice-regents on earth, and such are the callers to His religion.

Ah, ah! I yearn to meet them, and I ask for God's forgiveness for me and for you. Now if you wish we may go back."

From "The Beauty of the Righteous and Ranks Of The Elite"
(Hilyat-ul Awliya Wa Tabaqāqt al-Asfiya); Philadelphia, 1995

"In any case, what Westerners call civilization, the others would call barbarity, because it is precisely lacking in the essential, that is to say, a principle of a higher order."
René Guénon, East And West, 1924

صلّى الله على سيّدنا محمّد و على آله و صحبه و سلّم

The blessings and peace of Allah on the Prophet, his Family, and his Companions, ( sallAllahu `aleihi wa sallam ) .