Dhikr Quotes

If your family are not very practicing, it is on you to create the aura of Islam around the household; revive sunnahs & increase dhikr.

Praise be to God; whose compassion is all-embracing and Whose mercy is universal; Who rewards His servants for their remembrance [dhikr] [of Him] with His remembrance [of them] - verily God (Exalted is He!) has said, 'Remember Me, and I will remember you' - Opening lines from Kitab al-Adhkar wa'l Da'awat of the Ihya ulum ad-Din

We live in the age of Noah (a.s.) in the sense that a flood of distraction accosts us. It is a slow and subtle drowning. For those who notice it, they engage in the remembrance of God. The rites of worship and devotion to God's remembrance (dhikr) are planks of the ark. When Noah (a.s.) started to build his ark, his people mocked him and considered him a fool. But he kept building. He knew what was coming. And we know too.

We seek forgiveness with dhikr so much that we forget the true meaning of Dhikr.

Your Fikr in my mind , Your Dhikr on my tongue , Your Shukr in my heart.

A potential dajjalic interruption is an excessive esoterism. All of these people on a grail quest and looking for the ultimate secret to Ibn Arabi’s 21st heaven and endlessly going into the most esoteric stuff without getting the basics right, that is also a fundamental error of our age because the nafs loves all sorts of spiritual stories without taming itself first. The tradition that was practiced in this place for instance (Turkey) was not by starting out on the unity of being or (spiritual realities). Of course not. You start of in the kitchen for a year and then you make your dhikr in your khanaqah and you’re in the degree of service. Even Shah Bahauddin Naqshband before he started who was a great scholar needed 21 years before he was ‘cooked’. But we want to find a shortcut. Everything’s a shortcut. Even on the computer there’s a shortcut for everything. Something around the hard-work and we want the same thing. Because there seems to be so little time (or so little barakah in our time) but there is no short cut unless of course Allah (SWT) opens up a door of paradise or a way for you to go very fast. But we can’t rely on that happening because it’s not common. Mostly it’s salook, constantly trudging forward and carrying the burden until it becomes something sweet and light. And that takes time, so the esoteric deviation is common in our age as well.

The Qur’ān is Allah’s greatest blessing for you. It is the fulfilment of His promise to Adam and his descendants: ‘There shall come to you guidance from Me, and whosoever follows My guidance no fear shall be on them, neither shall they sorrow’ (al-Baqarah 2: 38). It is the only weapon to help your frail existence as you struggle against the forces of evil and temptation in this-world. It is the only means to overpower your fear and anxiety. It is the only ‘light’ (nūr), as you grope in the darkness, with which to find your way to success and salvation. It is the only healing (shifā’) for your inner sicknesses, as well as the social ills that may surround you. It is the constant reminder (dhikr) of your true nature and destiny, of your station, your duties, your rewards, your perils. It was brought down by one who is powerful and trustworthy in the heavens – the angel Jibra’īl. Its first abode was that pure and sublime heart, the like of which man has never had – the heart of the Prophet Muhammad, blessings and peace be on him. More than anything, it is the only way to come nearer and closer to your Creator.

If you want to see lights, go to the laser-light show. Why do you need to do dhikr to see the lights? Walk around at Christmas time and see the Christmas lights, if that’s what you want. You don’t do dhikr because you want your hearts to tremble. If you want your heart trembling then just go on a rollercoaster.

It is said that what you think, you become. If we continually think of Allâh we become one with Allâh.

Sometimes I was too tired, other times just lazy. Now and then, I was frustrated because nothing seemed to be happening – no signs from God, no enlightenment, nothing. But that wasn’t the point, the Shaykh explained. What mattered was the inner connection with God, which builds slowly and only transforms us gradually. Another obstacle, however, was that I often found it hard to concentrate during the dhikr.

There is no way to neutralize causes because the source-forms necessitate them. They only appear in existence by the form on which they are based at the source since "there is no changing the words of Allah." (10:64) The words of Allah are not other than the sources of existent things. Timelessness is ascribed to Him in respect to their permanence, and in-time ness is ascribed to them in respect of their existence and appearance. Thus we say, a certain man or guest happened (26) to be with us today." That does not mean that he did not have any existence before this event. For that reason, Allah says about His Mighty Word which is timeless, "No reminder (dhikr) from their Lord comes to them lately renewed (27) without their listening to it as if it were a game," (21:2) and "but no fresh (28) reminder reaches them from the All- Merciful, without their turning away from it." (26:5) The Merciful only brings mercy, and whoever turns away from mercy advances the punishment which is the absence of mercy.

According to a hadith, the tongue is the “interpreter of the heart.” Hypocrisy is wretched because the hypocrite says with his tongue what is not in his heart. He wrongs his tongue and oppresses his heart. But if the heart is sound, the condition of the tongue follows suit. We are commanded to be upright in our speech, which is a gauge of the heart’s state. According to a prophetic tradition, each morning, when the limbs and organs awaken in the spiritual world, they shudder and say to the tongue, “Fear God concerning us! For if you are upright, then we are upright; and if you deviate, we too deviate.” Engaging in the regular remembrance of God (dhikr) safeguards the tongue and replaces idle talk with words and phrases that raise one in honor. The tongue is essential in developing courtesy with God, which is the whole point of existence.

Arguments amongst Muslim organisations in the West, for the most part, tend to be on the level of form of religion, a level of Islam with a small ‚i‛, as it were. Sometimes of iman, almost never does one hear serious discussions of ihsan. So the religion is imbalanced in favour of the divisive possibilities of its outward forms, because the heart unifies and the law creates, not disunity, diversity. There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of fiqh dalils, each of which can be variously interpreted and provide scope for disagreement. But there is only one heart, and its argument, its dalil, is only ever one – it’s the argument that clamours for serenity, for dhikr, for remembrance of Allah (s.w.t.). That’s the only dalil that the heart has in religion.

« J’imagine que vous avez déjà appris, par les journaux ou la radio, la nouvelle douloureuse de la mort de René Guénon, survenue dans la nuit du 7 au 8 janvier. J’ai reçu votre lettre le 8 janvier en même temps que la nouvelle de son agonie. Le jour suivant j’apprenais qu’il était décédé. Il souffrait depuis plusieurs mois et avait cessé toutes ses correspondances vers la fin novembre. Il souffrait d’un œdème à une jambe, causé par des rhumatismes. En décembre le danger semblait complètement écarté, mais l’empoisonnement de son sang lui causa un abcès à la gorge et il semble que cela ait accéléré sa fin, si cela n’en fut pas la cause. Il y a eu des moments durant ses derniers mois où, comme je vous le disais, il était clair que je le dérangeais et que je le fatiguais ; sa résistance avait bien diminué. Mais il était lucide jusqu’à ses derniers instants. « Voici quelques détails bien touchants : durant ses derniers jours, il semble qu’il savait qu’il allait mourir, et dans l’après-midi du 7 janvier il performa un dhikr très intense, soutenu de chaque côté par son épouse et un membre de sa famille. Les femmes étaient fatiguées et s’épuisèrent avant lui. Elles racontent que ce jour là, sa sueur avait l’odeur du parfum de fleurs. Finalement, il leur demanda avec insistance la permission de mourir, ce qui montre bien qu’il pouvait choisir le moment de sa mort. Les femmes le supplièrent de rester en vie plus longtemps. Finalement, il demanda à son épouse : « Ne puis-je mourir maintenant ? J’ai tellement souffert ! » Elle lui répondit en acquiesçant : « Avec la protection de Dieu ! » Il mourut alors presque immédiatement, après qu’il fit une ou deux invocations de plus ! « Quelques détails de plus : son chat, qui semblait en parfaite santé, a commencé à gémir et mourut quelques heures plus tard. Le jour de sa mort, René Guénon avait rendu son épouse perplexe en lui disant qu’après son décès elle devait laisser sa chambre inchangée. Personne ne devait toucher ses livres ou ses papiers. Il souligna qu’autrement il ne serait pas capable de la voir, elle et leurs enfants, mais dans cette chambre non perturbée il demeurerait assis à son bureau et il pourrait continuer à les voir, même si eux ne pourraient le voir ! » – Michel Vâlsan, lettre à Vasile Lovinescu, 18 juin 1951.

[…] il y aurait beaucoup de choses à dire sur le symbolisme de la langue arabe qui connait les trois formes de flexion pour les noms et pour les verbes. Par ses propriétés symboliques d’une façon générale la langue arabe est particulièrement susceptible d’être un instrument initiatique. La révélation du Coran dans cette langue s’explique d’ailleurs par ces vertus symboliques […] Comme suite à ce que nous avons dit dans une note précédente au sujet de l’arabe comme instrument initiatique, nous préciserons ici que certaines formules incantatoires du dhikr sont plus particulièrement basées sur l’emploi de sons correspondants aux trois voyelles. Le ‘repos vocaliques’ (sukûn) qui marque un ‘arrêt’ et une sortie hors du temporel a dans le même ordre d’applications une signification absolument transcendante et inconditionnée » . « Le Livre du Nom de Majesté : ALLÂH », E.T. n° 268 Juin 1948,

In dieser vorherrschenden Atmosphäre der Gottesleugnung nimmt es wunder, daß immer noch in einer verschwiegenen Tekke die Derwische des Rufai-Ordens zu ihren mystischen Dhikr-Übungen und bizarren Kulthandlungen zusammenfinden.

Dhikr must not only be felt by the heart and uttered with the tongue, but must also effect amal salih or good deeds. Significantly, Ibn al-Qayyim suggests that dhikr encompasses ‘any and every particular moment when you are thinking, saying or doing things which Allah likes’. Hence,

What distinguishes us above all from Muslim-born or converted individuals—“psychologically”, one could say—is that our mind is a priori centered on universal metaphysics (Advaita Vedānta, Shahādah, Risālat al-Ahadiyah) and the universal path of the divine Name (japa-yoga, nembutsu, dhikr, prayer of the heart); it is because of these two factors that we are in a traditional form, which in fact—though not in principle—is Islam. The universal orthodoxy emanating from these two sources of authority determines our interpretation of the sharī'ah and Islam in general, somewhat as the moon influences the oceans without being located on the terrestrial globe; in the absence of the moon, the motions of the sea would be inconceivable and “illegitimate”, so to speak. What universal metaphysics says has decisive authority for us, as does the “onomatological” science connected to it, a fact that once earned us the reproach of “de-Islamicizing Islam”; it is not so much a matter of the conscious application of principles formulated outside of Islamism by metaphysical traditions from Asia as of inspirations in conformity with these principles; in a situation such as ours, the spiritual authority—or the soul that is its vehicle—becomes like a point of intersection for all the rays of truth, whatever their origin. One must always take account of the following: in principle the universal authority of the metaphysical and initiatic traditions of Asia, whose point of view reflects the nature of things more or less directly, takes precedence—when such an alternative exists—over the generally more “theological” authority of the monotheistic religions; I say “when such an alternative exists”, for obviously it sometimes happens, in esoterism as in essential symbolism, that there is no such alternative; no one can deny, however, that in Semitic doctrines the formulations and rules are usually determined by considerations of dogmatic, moral, and social opportuneness. But this cannot apply to pure Islam, that is, to the authority of its essential doctrine and fundamental symbolism; the Shahādah cannot but mean that “the world is false and Brahma is true” and that “you are That” (tat tvam asi), or that “I am Brahma” (aham Brahmāsmi); it is a pure expression of both the unreality of the world and the supreme identity; in the same way, the other “pillars of Islam” (arqān al-Dīn), as well as such fundamental rules as dietary and artistic prohibitions, obviously constitute supports of intellection and realization, which universal metaphysics—or the “Unanimous Tradition”—can illuminate but not abolish, as far as we are concerned. When universal wisdom states that the invocation contains and replaces all other rites, this is of decisive authority against those who would make the sharī'ah or sunnah into a kind of exclusive karma-yoga, and it even allows us to draw conclusions by analogy (qiyās, ijtihād) that most Shariites would find illicit; or again, should a given Muslim master require us to introduce every dhikr with an ablution and two raka'āt, the universal—and “antiformalist”—authority of japa-yoga would take precedence over the authority of this master, at least in our case. On the other hand, should a Hindu or Buddhist master give the order to practice japa before an image, it goes without saying that it is the authority of Islamic symbolism that would take precedence for us quite apart from any question of universality, because forms are forms, and some of them are essential and thereby rejoin the universality of the spirit. (28 January 1956)

Engaging in the regular remembrance of God (dhikr) safeguards the tongue and replaces idle talk with words and phrases that raise one in honor. The tongue is essential in developing courtesy with God, which is the whole point of existence.

Anyone seeking to draw closer to God needs to curb the horizontal and ascend to God vertically,’ he said. ‘And this means giving oneself fully to God – with all one’s heart, body, mind and soul. There mustn’t be any dark corners.’ Skimming the surface wasn’t an option, he stressed. ‘People often tend to merely skate around the edges of religion, but what they really need is to plunge into its depths like deep-sea divers looking for treasures. Too many people nowadays make selective choices from various faiths – the New Age approach, but never embrace any one of them fully,’ said Nasr. It was true, so many people didn’t believe in organised religion but liked to take the best from every religion or spiritual teaching. ‘The most direct means of communication with God,’ he concluded, ‘are prayer and dhikr.

Religion is also a process of healing, I discovered – a healing of the soul. Even our language points to this relation. The words ‘holy’, ‘wholesome’ and ‘healing’ all have the same root. (In German, this is even more striking: heilig, heil and heilen.) Muslims believe that all humans are born in a state of purity, our fitra, and it is only in the course of our lives that we tarnish our soul through bad habits and wrong behaviour. Through spiritual practices such as prayer, recitation of Quran and dhikr we can cleanse these acquired ‘black spots’ in our soul and return towards our original primordial nature. More so, dhikr is said to enliven the heart.

When you make Zikr and contemplate on a Name of the One Living Reality, focus on your heart. Become aware that this One Living Reality exists within your heart. However, before you begin, pray to this One Living Reality beseeching forgiveness for your actions and thoughts of duality (what the traditional teachings call 'sin'). As you contemplate on the Name, allow your heart to fill with this Attribute of the One Living Reality. That is all. Do not walk around thinking 'God is inside me,' for that is pride and dualistic behavior. You are privileged even to say the Name. Do not think you are special, for believing in a 'you' is to set up partners with the One Living Reality.

All praise is due to Allah. Allah is the One Reality, and that Reality is Love. We humans are love returning to Love. Sufis have taught great wisdom to humanity regarding the clearest ways to make that “return.” The finest way is through remembering (dhikr) Allah at all times, and knowing that Allah alone exists.

Prayer and other forms of worship all have their own status and importance but the true sense of worship is that a person can become a 'proper human being' and that he or she adopts Akhlaaq-e-Hameeda (laudable manners). The reason for doing Dhikr and sitting in the company of the Awliyaa (friends of Allah) is solely to become better human beings, to diminish our bad habits and to learn from their excellent conduct. One of the biggest problems which we are facing is that we have forgotten those manners that should have been befitting of the Umma (followers of Muhammad).

En même temps, des rites de la voie initiatique[s] [de la voie] diminuaient d'importance ou disparaissaient: le "wird" quotidien est effectué en "raccourci"; les séances de "dhikr en commun" cessèrent depuis 1945[6?] en Suisse et par analogie ailleurs. En même temps vous établissiez les réunions du Vendredi (à la place de celles du Samedi) avec des programmes improvisés comprenant la récitation des Noms divins, la récitation d'un verset Qorânique quelconque, la récitation du "Muhammadun rasûl-Llâh", etc., programmes qui, par leur manque de consistance technique et d'intérêt réel, tombaient vite en désuétude, en Suisse même tout d'abord ... Cependant un important accent était mis sur l'incantation individuelle, et il y avait dans cet accent une chose très positive. Mais malheureusement lorsque la forme psycho-spirituelle [sic] de l'invocation n'est pas suffisamment nourrie et soutenue par les ressources d'une mentalité et d'une discipline islamiques et initiatiques adéquates, pour beaucoup la vertu de l'invocation faiblit et finalement la lassitude et le manque de goût et d'intérêt s'en suivent. (Lettre de M.Vâlsan à F.Schuon, novembre 1950)

Dans la technique islamique, la méditation méthodique est régulièrement liée à l'incantation par sa forme même. Qu'il s'agisse de la récitation réfléchie du Qorân, ou de l'oraison discursive, ou surtout de formules à répéter, ou des noms à invoquer (continuellement ou un certain nombre de fois), -ce qui est le mode le plus caractéristique de l'incantation initiatique- les "adhkar" sont d'une façon naturelle, également des supports et même des thèmes de méditation et de concentration. Le sens du terme "dhikr" exprime bien cette double fonction: "rappel" et "incantation". Ces formules portent en elles-mêmes les idées qui peuvent et doivent être actualisée pendant l'invocation, elles possèdent aussi, en raison de leur appartenance à la révélation sacrée, les vertus secrètes qui permettent de développer ces idées d'une façon organique à partir de leur forme verbale et de leur sens littéral. Le travail spirituel se développe aussi simultanément et harmoniquement sous les deux rapports de la "forme" et du "fond" et s'accomplit sous les deux modes "sensible" et "intelligible"; aucune discordance n'intervient entre ce couple de facteurs complémentaires. (Lettre de M.Vâlsan à F.Schuon, novembre 1950)

La méthode introduite par vos thèmes de méditation n'a pas un tel caractère traditionnel. Vous proposez des formules rédigées par vous et se rapportant à des attitudes spirituelles et à des vérités intellectuelles. Elles doivent servir comme moyen, non pas d'incantation, mais d'une certaine actualisation d'idées spirituelles concomitante à l'incantation du Nom, et au moyen d'une répétition mentale d'arguments ou d'énonciations inclus dans les thèmes. cette concomitance est prescrite surtout dans la première partie de la séance individuelle d'invocation; ultérieurement le thème est ramené dans la conscience en cas de distraction. A l'égard de cette méthode je fais tout d'abord la remarque que contrairement aux méthodes connues, la méditation et la contemplation ne découlent pas de la formule de dhikr, le Nom, mais est proposée de l'extérieur par un support d'une autre forme mentale. Il ne s'agit pas de nier que les exhortations à la pensée active que portent ces thèmes ne soient d'une certaine utilité, mais la façon dont ils interviennent dans le travail incantatoire et l'importance qu'ils veulent y prendre présentent des difficultés techniques. (Lettre de M.Vâlsan à F.Schuon, novembre 1950)

In today’s world, many do not see the Prophet as a mercy. They see in him (perhaps as Ka‘b first did) only a sword. Some of these claim Islam as their religion and seek to make themselves into martyrs when what the Qur’an actually calls for is witnesses. Contemporary “jihadist” ideologies falsify the past, caricature the Prophet, and mock the Qur’an. They seem to forget that the Book names God as the Merciful, the Compassionate. But the Qur’an also makes it clear that God’s mercy is all-encompassing: My Mercy encompasses all things (Q 7:156). The name, al-Rahman, the Merciful, is more frequently used than any other as proxy for God’s personal name, Allah, in the Qur’an. For these (and other) reasons, classical Islamic theology sometimes refers to “the Merciful” as God’s comprehensive name (ism jam‘)—in contradistinction to the name of His Essence (ism dhat). The idea, in a manner of speaking, is that God’s mercy encompasses even God Himself. So-called “jihadists” deny with their deeds that the Prophet was a merciful man sent by a merciful God. It is no coincidence that all such groups are vehemently anti-Sufi. They condemn virtually all the doctrines and practices outlined in this essay, thoughts and deeds that have made life meaningful for millions of West Africans. Curiously, most so-called “fundamentalists” even condemn the routine recitation of God’s names, dhikr—like al-Rahman, a staple of many litanies. One wonders whether these “fundamentalists” even read the Qur’an! For it contains stern warnings for those who abandon dhikr, thereby forgetting that God is Merciful, and thus becoming merciless devils themselves: And whoever is blind to remembrance of the Merciful, We appoint for him a devil as a constant companion. And indeed the devils avert them from the path while they think themselves guided (Q 43:36–37).

Remembrance in its most elementary, tangible form is to chant the names of God. Remembrance is everything. Our destination as spiritually developing human beings is to live our lives in such a way that we are completely within that continual remembrance. That is the world and universe we live in. It surrounds and informs us. It illuminates our perception and softens our hearts. It should also bring us joy and happiness. That is our reality, because looking at life through the distorting eyes of the ego is, at best, a secondhand reality. The word for „remembrance“ in Arabic literally means „to mention,“ yet we translate it as „remembrance.“ When you mention someone, in a way, you‘re remembering the one you are calling to mind. We are remembering our Origin, remembering that we come from God and to God we will return. People sometimes talk about how children have an open channel to the Divine because they just came from God relatively recently. Remembering our Origin is a fundamental truth that we need to call to mind. This is expressed in the hadith „Whoever belongs to God, God will belong to him or her.“ In that sense, if remembrance is deep enough, complete enough, it is the Divine remembering in you. In the state of belonging to God, what you want is not different than what the Divine wants. And „God“ wants what you want; there is then no separate „you“ wanting. There is no duality or personal will pulling in the opposite direction. Rumi calls that being under „the compulsion of love.“(p. 6)

Spiritual life means learning to become one-pointed, to focus all our energy in one direction, towards Him. Through continually repeating His name we alter the grooves of our mental conditioning, the grooves which like those on a record play the same tune over and over again, repeat the same patterns which bind us in our mental habits. The dhikr gradually replaces these old grooves with the single groove of His name. The automatic thinking process is redirected towards Him. Like a computer we are reprogrammed for God. It is said that what you think, you become. If we continually think of Allâh we become one with Allâh. But the effect of the dhikr is both more subtle and more powerful than solely an act of mental focusing. One of the secrets of a dhikr (or mantra) is that it is a sacred word which conveys the essence of that which it names. This (“In is “the mystery of the identity of God and His Name” the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God”). In our common everyday language there is not this identity. The word “chair” does not contain the essence of a chair. It merely signifies a chair. But the sacred language of a dhikr is different; the vibrations of the word resonate with that which it names, linking the two together. Thus it is able to directly connect the individual with that which it names. (p. 121)

Spiritual life means learning to become one-pointed, to focus all our energy in one direction, towards Him. Through continually repeating His name we alter the grooves of our mental conditioning, the grooves which like those on a record play the same tune over and over again, repeat the same patterns which bind us in our mental habits. The dhikr gradually replaces these old grooves with the single groove of His name. The automatic thinking process is redirected towards Him. Like a computer we are reprogrammed for God. It is said that what you think, you become. If we continually think of Allâh we become one with Allâh. But the effect of the dhikr is both more subtle and more powerful than solely an act of mental focusing. One of the secrets of a dhikr (or mantra) is that it is a sacred word which conveys the essence of that which it names. This is the mystery of the identity of God and His Name („in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God”). In our common everyday language there is not this identity. The word “chair” does not contain the essence of a chair. It merely signifies a chair. But the sacred language of a dhikr is different; the vibrations of the word resonate with that which it names, linking the two together. Thus it is able to directly connect the individual with that which it names. (p. 121)

Once we see the world for what it is, we see that it is nothing but dhikr Allâh—a reminder of God, a mention of God, a remembrance of God. Our response to the world can only be to follow its lead—to mention and to remember God. “Everything is accursed,” says the hadîth, “except dhikr Allâh.” But everything is dhikr Allâh, so nothing is accursed. The alchemy of dhikr transmutes the accursed into the blessed. The place of that dhikr, where God becomes truly present and man becomes truly blessed, is the heart. – William C. Chittick (On the Cosmology of Dhikr, p. 63)

You are in my thought, You are my thought, You are thought, You thought, Thought!

dhikr.