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“None of you believes until he loves me more than he loves his children, his parents, and all people.” Sahih Bukhari

“None of you believes until he loves me more than he loves himself.” Sahih Bukhari

As we approach the time when the whole Muslim world joins together for Maulid, I sit and reflect.

Our beloved Prophet (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam) seemed so unapproachable to me for years. I would attend conferences and sit and hear lecturerers speak about his qualities, some would even be moved to tears by mere descriptions. Others sat dry-faced, looking awkardly at the unusual sight of public male emotion.

“MashaAllah” I would say, I wish I could feel something like that. This was a matter of no light importance, since it was clear that while I was externally a believer through Shahadat, I was internally a disbeliever for not having loved the Prophet (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam) truly at the level I was supposed to.

This made me work harder on ‘generic islamic activism’. I worked hard on such things in the vain hope that I could, through some mighty conference or enough reading, open up my heart to the same feeling that those people experienced. After all it was clear to me that we were to love the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) immensely, more than our parents, our families! But how could that be accomplished?

It’s so immensely hard to love a theory.

The answer of the community of that time was that to love the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) you have to ‘know him’. Hmm.

MashaAllah, how do I get to know him (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam)? From reading or hearing about his life? His struggles? His sacrifices? (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam)

While knowing every detail of the reports of his life made a deep impression on me, it was an impression one might as well have of any great historical figure. I could say he (sallalahu’alaiheewassalam) was an amazing one, yes. Great one, yes. Loved? Not even close.

I wonder what reaction you would get if you tell these people to fall in love with their wives or husbands through reading about their life (it doesn’t seem to work on matrimonial ads). The reaction would be ridicule, most likely.

But somehow for the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) it’s a possibility?

Most of us love our parents without knowing much about the first 40 years of their life at all. And the love we give them is unconditional and without a basis in ‘knowledge’. We couldn’t even feed ourselves before we loved them, much less ask about personal details of their life. Shouldn’t the love for our Prophet be unconditional, not even needing the requirement of literacy?

Developing a love, one much stronger than one for my family through reading about a person in a book? I’m not even close. My family is real, tangible. Their need for me great, my need for them immense. Anyone who suggests that they have achieved that station through books is by far a Wali in my opinion, since it was far out of reach for me.

I would also think about the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) and the community of people today, many of who are poor and ummi (illiterate) as the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam). Is loving the Prophet(Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) out of reach for them, since they cannot read a Seerah text before going to bed or listen to a Seerah CD set?

Is this really the path which the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam) intended for us?

No, for me the answer became clearer much later, especially when I read:

“Verily the men of knowledge are the inheritors of the prophets” (Hadith)

Knowledge of what? When the Prophet (Sallalhu’alaiheewassalam) spoke this there were no hadith isnads, the Quran was not completely revealed until over years of his prophethood. The knowledge here is not of science, or knowledge of cooking, or knowledge of writing. It was direct knowledge and awareness of Allah and His Messenger (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam) which must be being addressed here. The type Imam Ghazali (R) addressed in “Deliverance from Error”:

“Thus it became clear to me that their (sufis) most distinctive characteristic is something that can be attained, not by study, but rather by fruitional experience and the state of ecstasy and “the exchange of qualities”. How great a difference there is between your knowing the definitions and causes of health and satiety and your being healthy and sated! And how great a difference there is between your knowing the definition of drunkenness - and your actually being drunk! Indeed a drunken man, while he is drunk does not know the definition and concept of drunkenness and has no knowledge of it. But a physician knows the definition and elements of drunkenness, though he is experiencing no actual drunkenness….

Generally speaking, anyone who is granted nothing of that through fruitional experience grasps, of the reality of prophecy, only the name.

So we have the inheritors of the Prophet (Sallalhu’alaiheewassalam), and even when we put aside hadith, isnads, tafsir, or Imam Ghazali (R), they are still there, doing their work.

When I see the love they present for the Prophet (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam), it is not one of exaggerated tears but of humbleness, direct knowledge and awareness. It is as if they are in conversation with him. If I developed a relationship with someone who knows the Prophet (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam), I may be introduced to develop my own relationship.

Within them we see the prophetic example personified. When I gazed upon the true inheritors of the Prophet (Sallahu’alaiheewassalam), such things became very clear to me. I could love that one, and Allah has sent so many to earth for every generation and community. Everything they do is through the filter of the Sunnat. Through them I feel the inkling of what it was like for the Sahabi, what it was like to sit in the companionship of the Prophet (Sallalahu’laiheewassalam).

Through their respect and love for the Prophet (Sallalahu’alaiheewassalam), I grew my own, and it continues to grow.

A theory is becoming a reality.