Adopt Taqwa

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ 

The following is an adapted extract of Imam Abu Hamid Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Ghazali’s (r.a.) Ayyuha al-Walad.  When Shaykh Abu ‘Ali Shaqiq ibn Ibrahim al-Azdi al-Balkhi (q.s.) asked his student, Shaykh Hatim Ism (q.s.), who became a great spiritual master, about the benefits of associating with him, he named eight. 

Of the fourth, he said, “O my teacher!  The fourth benefit is that I looked at the people of the world and saw that some of them think that grandeur and honour belong to the nation or tribe that is big and powerful; that is why they express pride in their tribe.  Some of them are such that they think that the grandeur is obtained through abundance of wealth, possessions, family, and relatives; that's why people express their pride in their wealth and children.  Some are such that they think that their grandeur and honour is in displaying anger, beating, killing, murder and pillage and they express their pride in that.  Some are such that they think that their grandeur is in wasteful spending that is why they consider their wasteful spending a source of honour and express their pride in that.  But I deliberated on this verse in which Allah (s.w.t.) Says: 

سُوۡرَةُ الحُجرَات

... إِنَّ أَڪۡرَمَكُمۡ عِندَ ٱللَّهِ أَتۡقَٮٰكُمۡ‌ۚ ... (١٣) 

… Lo!  The noblest of you, in the Sight of Allah, is the best in conduct ... (Surah al-Hujraat:13) 

Therefore, this is correct and is the truth and the Creations’ thoughts are false conjectures.  That's why I adopted taqwa so that I would be counted as the one with the highest rank in the Sight of Allah (s.w.t.).”