Lecture by MSH June 2009

Allah…

Shaykh Hisham Kabbani made an eye opener sppech on Sufism, Tasawwuf at the expo last Tuesday; that was what my friend told me, and I readily second that. His booklet on SUFISM also suffices as an excellent introduction to what Sufism is all about, its roots in the Traditions, despite not having the particular term Tasawwuf being used, how it was developed over the years and what it entails.

I attended the lecture with my brother and two of my friends, Alhamdulillah, God works in ways very subtle.

I shall not do injustice to Shaykh Hisham’s speech by attempting to summarise; he spoke from the heart, not any prepared material. Themes touched included how Loving the Prophet s.a.w. is an integral part of spirituality in Islam, in order to get to Allah, we need to Love the Prophet s.a.w.

Shaykh Hisham mentioned a very interesting topic towards the end of his lecture; about Mawlana Jalaludin Rumi’s Whirling. Today, not much about the whirling is studied systematically, Westerners and Orientalists marvel at it as a form of graceful art, whereas muslims in parts of the world other than Turkey perhaps make no mention about it at all.

Yet, and yet a big YET, the understanding and appreciation of the Whirling goes very deep. To begin, it is almost as if God has made it a Divine decree that to circumambulate is one of the main ways of worship. We see this in the constellations; where planets circle the sun, in the atomic world, where electrons circle the nucleus, the syariah where pilgrims do the tawaf, the angels who circumambulate the Kaabah etc.

Movement, or harakah, as Shaykh Hisyam explained, is a manifestation of worship; everything worships God in more ways than we can imagine.

And that everything really encompasses everything:

I quote the THIRD LAW of THERMODYNAMICS:

Third law of thermodynamics, about the absolute zero of temperature:
As a system asymptotically approaches absolute zero of temperature all processes virtually cease and the entropy of the system asymptotically approaches a minimum value; also stated as: "the entropy of all systems and of all states of a system is zero at absolute zero" or equivalently "it is impossible to reach the absolute zero of temperature by any finite number of processes".

The closest scientists got to Absolute Zero (-273.15 deg cel) was -270 deg cel, using liquid helium if I’m not mistaken.

That means, no matter how cold we force the temperature to be, particles will still vibrate and move. Perhaps this is divine decree.

And, we shouldn’t be surprised. Because the Quran says hearts tremble upon the mention of Allah and also, hearts find peace in the remembrance of Allah. This so-called mix of opposite reactions is what gets people to experience jazbah or zouk while in Zikr under the lead of a mursyid. Sidi Abdul Rasyid, some of the old-timers told me, used to use his rosary to tap on those who are, *you know, while in zikir. You tend to see this a lot in TAI, because our way is Loud, Expressive Zikir (Jahr). Sidi does not like it when in zikir, dia sorang yang bace ;p

Zikir is like divine light/energy, the more of it we have, the more energetic we become, and may even lead to being more ‘unstable’, as the culmination in the story of Moses demonstrates;

‘O My Lord allow me to see You’, implored Moses to his Lord Most High.
Thereupon God told Moses, “You will not be able to see Me”

‘Look at the mountain as I shine My Light on it’
Guess what? Moses FAINTED.

This is so in line with the concept of Entropy, the positive measure of disorderliness in a system.

Having more energy only makes a system more unstable. Which is why, when bonds are formed in chemistry, producing more stable compounds, energy is given out. At least the same amount of energy is needed to break the bonds in the stable compounds.

E = mc^2 is dealing with vast amounts of energy, thanks to c^2, by its SI unit, carrying a huge value of 3x10^8 squared. That figure, even in joules is very huge. Which is why when even a small mass is lost in nuclear reactions, the energy given out is huge, making the product very stable as an equivalent amount of energy is needed to reverse the reaction. Light Upon Light….

Gibbs free energy; a reaction is only feasible when G = H – TS is negative; unless conditions are altered.
S is the positive measure of entropy, disorderliness. The tendency is such that reactions leading to more disorder tends to happen more than those leading to more orderliness. Is this the reality of Qiamat? Heat Death? Perhaps.

Diamond and graphite have a peculiar relationship in enthalpy; graphite is more stable than diamond; despite the uber strong covalent bonds in diamond that give rise to its famous hardness quality; that being the greatest of any known material.

So yeah, lesson to take home, do not criticize those who have harakah in zikr. Sometimes, it is not done for show-offs.


*words cannot describe the state they are in ;P