1:7 The path of those whom Thou hast blessed, not of those who incur wrath, nor of the misguided.
It has been said that this is the road and traveling of the Companions of the Cave. The faithful want to say, “O Lord, complete for us our road without us, just as You were bountiful toward the Companions of the Cave and placed Your caress upon them. You placed them on the cushion of intimacy and You Yourself undertook to pull them. You said, 'Go into this cave and sleep well, for We have taken your sleep to be as the worship of the world's folk.' O Lord, give us a portion of that blessing and caress! Just as You with Your bounty completed their work without them, so also with Your bounty complete our work without us. For, whatever we do is to our loss, and whatever You do is the foundation of exaltedness in the two worlds.”
The Pir of the Tariqah said, “O God, we cannot complete this work without You, nor do we have the gall to complete it away from You. Whenever we fancy we have arrived, we fall back in the bewilderment of our account. O Lord, where will we find again that day when You belonged to us and we were not? Until we reach that day again, we will be in the midst fire and smoke. If we find that day again in the two worlds, we will profit. If we find Your being for ourselves, we will be pleased with our own nonbeing.”
It has also been said, “Those whom Thou hast blessed with the submission and the Sunnah.” He tied the submission and the Sunnah together because, as long as the two are not joined, the servant will not have the straightness of the religion. It is mentioned in the traditions that Shāfiʿī said, “I saw the Real in a dream. He said to me, 'Ask a favor of me, O son of Idrīs!' I said, 'Make me die in the submission.' God said, 'Say, “And in the Sunnah.” Ask for both from Me.'”
This is because there is no submission without the Sunnah, and whatever is with the Sunnah is the true religion. Hence Muṣ?afā said, “There are no words without deeds, no words and deeds without intention, and no words, deeds, and intention without hitting the mark in the Sunnah.”
It has been said that the submission is like a spring of water. Trees have no escape from a spring of water, and in the same way the submission has no escape from the Sunnah. Every breast that comes to be adorned with the exaltedness of the submission has become a place where the light of the Sunnah has appeared to the submission. This is why the Lord of the Worlds says, “Is he whose breast God has expanded for the submission, so he is upon a light from his Lord…” [39:22]. It has been said that this is the light of the Sunnah.
It has come in the reports that tomorrow at the gathering place of the resurrection and the assembly of harshness, when the folk of the seven heavens and the seven earths are mustered, everyone's feet will be stuck in his own deeds, his head thrown down, helpless in his own work, confounded and bewildered, falling and getting up, thirsty and naked. All at once a fragrant and perfumed person will stroll out from the hiding places of the Unseen and disclose himself. The breeze of that fragrance will reach the nostrils of the folk of felicity. Everyone will become sweet smelling and will rejoice. They will say, “Lord God, what fragrance and comfort is this? What beauty and perfection is this?” The address will come, “This is the face of the beauty of Our Messenger's Sunnah. Whoever was a follower of the Sunnah in the house of the decree, I give him permission to set the foot of security in the pavilion of his exaltedness. Whoever was a stranger to the Sunnah in that house-I will send him down to the Fire. I will give him over to hell, for today also he is stranger and rejected.”
Become a Sunni and keep to the religion so that you may live,
for everything but the religion is death, all but the Sunnah is grief.
[DS 489]
Not of those who incur wrath, nor of the misguided. O Lord, do not make us be among those whom You have turned over to themselves so that they have been wounded by the sword of separation and fastened by the nail of rejection.
Indeed, what burden can be pulled by a broken rope? What use is the striving of an unworthy servant, living in estrangement? Today he has fallen from the road and fancied the crooked road to be straight. Tomorrow the tree of despair will give fruit and disowned individuals will appear. The crier of justice will let out the call of disowning: “Their effort was misguided in the life of this world, and they were reckoning that they were doing beautiful deeds” [18:104].
I said, “My luck has gone beyond the highest summit,
my kingdom's throne is like that of Solomon.”
When I measured myself in the scale of intelligence,
my bags were emptier than the storehouses of the lowly.
Let us now conclude the Surah of Praise with one of the subtle points of the religion. Know that this surah is called “the key to the Garden.” It is the key to paradise because the gates of paradise are eight, and the opening of each door is specific to one sort of knowledge from the Qur'an. Unless you learn these eight sorts and unless you believe in them, the doors will not be opened to you. The Surah of Praise comprises those eight sorts that are the keys of paradise.
First is the mention of the Lord's Essence: Praise belongs to God, Lord of the Worlds. Second is the mention of the attributes: the All-Merciful, the Ever-Merciful. Third is the mention of the acts: Thee alone we worship. Fourth is the mention of the Return: And from Thee alone we ask for help. Fifth the mention of the purification of the soul from blights: Guide us on the Straight Path; and sixth the adornment of the soul with good deeds. Both this adornment and that purification are clarifications of the Straight Path. Seventh is the mention of the states of the friends and God's approval of them: The path of those whom Thou hast blessed. Eighth is the mention of the states of the estranged and the Lord's wrath toward them: Not of those who incur wrath, nor of the misguided.
Each of these eight sorts of knowledge, by reason of the reports and traditions, is one of the doors of paradise, and all are found in this surah. Hence, if someone recites this surah with self-purification, the doors of the eight paradises will be opened to him-today the paradise of recognition, and tomorrow the paradise of Approval in the neighborhood of the All-Merciful. “There will be nothing between them and gazing upon their Lord except the mantle of magnificence on His face in the Garden of Eden.” This is a sound report from the Prophet.