Graduation and Teaching

When Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi was twenty years old, Ebu Fadl Ali, who was the Shaykh of Vasit province and his teacher, awarded him a sehadetname (teaching certificate) encompassing the sciences of canon law and permission to initiate a dervish order, gave him the name “father of external and interior sciences,” and dressed him with his own dervish’s cloak. His teachers and his shaykhs agreed about the greatness of his rank and the superiority of his worth.

Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi remained in Nehr-i Dikla for a short time and after that went back to his father's guest house for travelers in Hasen. He then became very well known. When he was twenty-eight, his uncle Shaykh Mansur requested that he lead the dervish lodge and Caliphs after him. He also instructed him to live in the dervish lodge of Shaykh Yahya en-Neccari, who was his grandfather from his mother’s side. Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi took up his post (shaykhship) there as an enlightened master and began teaching in this dervish lodge. His uncle died in the same year. By the time Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi reached the age of thirty-five, his murids (disciples) numbered over seven hundred thousand.

Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi taught the Sunnah (the way of the Prophet Muhammad (saw)) and the details of the Qur’an to the public, and he always said that the trade of a wise man is to show the way that leads to Allah and to direct hearts towards Allah.

He held courses on hadith, Islamic canon law, religious precepts, and commentary on the Qur’an on all days of the week except Mondays and Thursdays. He sat in his pulpit on Monday and Thursday afternoons and preached to intellectuals and the general public. Because of the depth and the influence of his words, the people were captivated, their intelligence was stupefied, and their hearts submitted to him. Apart from the Prophet Muhammad (saw), the companions and disciples of the Prophet and twelve Imams, there was no other person who spoke as well as Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi did.

Whenever he sat in his pulpit to give a lecture, crowds–including advanced scientists, preachers, spiritual teachers and the general public–gathered. When he began to speak, knowledge gushed out with his words like the gushing sea. Wise men were enraptured when they heard his beautiful and influential words and listened to his extensive knowledge. The denying and obstinate were tongue-tied in the presence of the power of the evidence. Literary men profited from his outstanding expression, scientists from his skills and talents and philosophers from his deep and wise manner of speaking.

In his book Sevad ul-Ayneyn, the writer Imam Rafii narrates, “Shaykh Salih Yusuf Ebu Zekeriya el-Askalani, who was a great expert in the canon law of Islam, told me: ‘I had gone to Ummi Abide to visit Hadrat Shaykh Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi . There were more than one hundred thousand people around the guest house; some were managers, scientists and shaykhs, and the others were the normal public. He gave dinner to all of them and was very friendly to everyone. He started to preach in the afternoon of a Thursday. In the audience were preachers from the province of Vasit, as well as a religious community of doctors of Muslim theology of Iraq and the important people of the province. One group asked questions about the science of commentary on the Qur’an, another asked about subjects dealing with the recorded sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (saw), another asked about Muslim canon jurisprudence, another asked about the disagreements between the different religious opinions, and yet another group asked many questions about different areas of science. Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi answered more than two hundred questions, and he did not get angry when he was answering the questions. I became embarrassed because of the insensitivity of people asking the questions, and I stood up and said, “Is this not enough for you? He can answer every question about the written sciences, without facing any difficulty, with the permission of Allah!” Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi smiled at my words and said, “Ebu Zekeriya, allow them to ask before I pass away. Certainly the world is a house from which we will all depart. Allah changes all situations, all of the time.” All the public cried at this answer. The crowd was perplexed and anxious exclamations were heard. Forty thousand people became his students because of the spiritual effect of his talk.’”

Hadrat Sayyid Ahmad ar- Rifâi ’s talks, his actions, his behavior and his every breath were for Allah. He always had a smiling face, was modest and good-tempered, endured suffering, and was very patient. He did not get personally cross with anyone, and did not want any help for his own person. On the contrary, he loved for Allah, and even his anger was from Allah and for Allah. He did not rebuke anybody who behaved in a manner that he did not like. He considered neither his family nor himself superior to other people. Speaking about this he said, “According to our opinion of Allah, everybody is equal to everybody else: it doesn’t matter if they are close relatives or if they are strangers to us.”