Rebuking of Unjust Rulers

W e owe this next report to Shaikh Abu ‘l-‘Abbas al-Khadir al-Husain al-Mawsili, who said:

“One night, we were in the schoolhouse of our Shaikh, Shaikh Muhyi ‘d-Din ‘Abd al-Qadir (may Allah be well pleased with him), in Baghdad. While we were there, along came Imam al-Mustanjid-bi’llah Abu ‘l-Muzaffar Yusuf, the son of Imam al-Muqtafi-li-Amri’llah Abu ‘Abdi’llah Muhammad al-‘Abbasi. He saluted the Shaikh with the greeting of peace, and told him that he had come to seek his wise advice. He then set down before him a large sum of money, contained in ten vessels, borne by ten of his personal servants. ‘I have no need of this,’ said the Shaikh (may Allah be well pleased with him), but the visitor insisted that he must accept it, and pressed the matter with great urgency.

“The Shaikh (may Allah be well pleased with him) then grasped one vessel in his right hand, and another in his left. They were the best and finest of vessels, by the way. He squeezed them extremely tightly, till they began to drip with blood. Then the Shaikh said to his visitor: ‘O Abu ‘l-Muzaffar, do you not feel any sense of shame before Allah (Exalted is He), that you should take wealth from the people and offer it to me?’ He fainted when he heard this, and the Shaikh (may Allah be well pleased with him) went on to say: ‘By all that is due to Allah, were it not for the sanctity of his ancestral connection with Allah’s Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace), I would have let the blood go on flowing all the way to his house!'”

–Shaikh Muhammad Ibn Yahya at-Tadifi, Necklaces of Gems [Qala’id al-Jawahir], trans. Muhtar Holland (Ft. Lauderdale: Al-Baz Publishing, Inc., 1998), 124-125.