SERMON 91 - This sermon is known as the sermon of Skeletons (Khutbatul-Ashbah) and it holds one of the highest positions among the sermons of Imam Ali ibn Aba Talib, Peace be Upon Him

Back You are here: Home

Details: Hits: 1460

Mas`adah ibn Sadaqah has related from Imam Ja`far ibn Muhammad as-Sadiq (p.b.u.h.) saying: “Imam Ali ibn Aba Talib (p.b.u.h.) delivered this sermon from the pulpit of (the mosque of) Kufah when someone asked him, ‘O Imam Ali ibn Aba Talib (p.b.u.h.)! Describe Allah for us in such a way that we may imagine that we see Him with eyes so that our love and knowledge may increase about Him.’ Imam Ali ibn Aba Talib (p.b.u.h.) became angry at this (request of the inquirer) and ordered the Muslims to gather in the mosque. So many Muslims gathered in the mosque that the place was over-crowded. Imam Ali (p.b.u.h.) ibn Aba Talib (p.b.u.h.) ascended the pulpit while he was still in a state of anger and his color was changed. Having praised and extolled Allah and sought His blessings on the Prophet (p.b.u.h.), he said the following:

About Allah:

Praise be to Allah Whom refusal to give away and stinginess do not reach and Whom munificence and generosity do not make poor, although everyone who gives away loses (to that extent) except He and every miser is blamed for his niggardliness. He obliges through beneficial bounties and plentiful gifts and grants. The whole creation is His dependents (in sustenance). He has guaranteed their livelihood and ordained their sustenance. He has prepared the way for those who turn to Him and those who seek what is with Him. He is as generous about what He is asked as He is about that for which He is not asked. He is the First for whom there was no before so that there could not be anything before Him. He is the Last for whom there is no after, so that there could not be anything after Him. Time does not change over Him, so as to admit of any change of condition about Him. He is not in any place so as to allow Him movement (from one place to another).
If He gives away all that the mines of the mountains emit of the gold, silver, pearls and cuttings of coral which the shells of the ocean vomit out, it would not affect his munificence, nor diminish the extent of what He has. (In fact) He would still have such treasures of bounty as would not decrease by the demands of the creatures because He is that generous. Being Whom the begging of beggars cannot make poor nor the pertinacity of those who beseech make miser.

Attributes of Allah as Described in the Holy Qur’an:

Then look at the inquirer, be confined to those of His attributes which the Holy Qur’an had described and seek light from the glory of its guidance. Leave to Allah that knowledge which Satan has prompted you to seek and which neither the Holy Qur’an enjoins you to seek nor is there any trace of it in the actions or sayings of the Prophet (p.b.u.h.) and other leaders (Imams) of guidance. This is the extreme limit of Allah’s claim upon you. Be informed that firm in knowledge are those who refrain from opening the curtains that lie against the unknown and their acknowledgment of ignorance about the details of the hidden unknown prevents them from further probing. Allah praises them for their admission that they are unable to get knowledge not allowed to them. They do not go deep into the discussion of what is not enjoined upon them about knowing Him and they call it firmness. Be content with this and do not limit the Greatness of Allah after the measure of your own intelligence, or else you would be among the destroyed ones.
He is Powerful, such that when the imagination shoots its arrows to comprehend the extremity of His power, the mind, making itself free of the dangers of evil thoughts tries to find Him in the depth of His realm, the hearts long to grasp realities of His attributes and the openings of intelligence penetrate beyond description in order to secure knowledge about His Being, crossing the dark pitfalls of the unknown and concentrating towards him, He would turn them back. They would return defeated admitting that the reality of His knowledge cannot be comprehended by such random efforts, nor can an iota of the sublimity of His Honor enter the understanding of thinkers.

Allah’s Creation:

He originated the creation without any example which He could follow and without any specimen prepared by any known creator that was before Him. He showed us the realm of His Might and such wonders which speak of His Wisdom. The confession of the created things that their existence owes itself to Him made us realize that argument has been furnished about knowing Him (so that there is no excuse against it). The signs of His creative power and standard of His wisdom are fixed in the wonderful things He has created. Whatever He has created is an argument in His favor and a guide towards Him. Even a silent thing is a guide towards Him as though it speaks and its guidance towards the Creator is clear. (O Allah!) I testify that he who likens You with the separateness of the limbs or with the joining of the extremities of his body did not acquaint his inner self with knowledge about You and his heart did not secure conviction to the effect that there is no partner for You. It is as though he has not heard the (wrongful) followers declaiming their false gods by saying, “By Allah! We are certainly in manifest error when we equaled you with the master of the worlds” (Holy Qur’an, 26: 97-98). They are wrong who liken You to their idols and outfit You with apparel of the creatures by their imagination, attribute to You parts of body by their own thinking and consider You after the creatures of various types, through the working of their intelligence. I testify that whoever equated You with anything out of Your creation took a match for You and whoever takes a match for You is an unbeliever, according to what is stated in thy unambiguous verses and indicated by the testimony of Your clear arguments. (I also testify that) You are that Allah Who cannot be confined in (the fetters of) intelligence so as to admit change of condition by entering its imagination nor in the shackles of mind so as to become limited and an object of alterations.

Part of the Same Sermon
About the Greatest Perfection in Allah’s Creation:

He has fixed limits for everything He has created and has made the limits firm and He has fixed its working and has made the working delicate. He has fixed its direction and it does not transgress the limits of its status nor fall short of reaching the end of its aim. It did not disobey when it was commanded to move at His will. How could it do so when all matters are governed by His will. He is the Producer of a variety of things without exercise of imagination, without the urge of an impulse hidden in Him, without (the benefit of) any experiment taken from the vicissitudes of time and without any partner who might have assisted Him in creating wonderful things.
Thus, the creation was completed by His order and it bowed to His obedience and responded to His call. The laziness of any slug or the inertness of any excuse-finder did not prevent it from doing so. So He straightened the curves of the things and fixed their limits. With His power He created coherence in their contradictory parts and joined together the factors of similarity. Then He separated them in varieties which differ in limits, quantities, properties and shapes. All this is new creation. He made them firm and shaped them according as He wished and invented them.

Part of the same sermon
Description of the Sky:

He has arranged the depressions and elevations of the openings of the sky. He has joined the breadths of its breaches and has joined them with one another. He has made easy the approach to its heights for those (angels) who come down with His commands and those (angels) who go up with the deeds of the creatures. He called it when it was yet (in the form of) vapor. At once the links of its joints joined up. Then Allah opened up its closed door and put the sentinels of meteors at its holes and held them with His hands (i.e. power) from falling into the vastness of air.
He commanded it to remain stationary in obedience to His commands. He made its sun the bright indication for its day and its moon the gloomy indication for its night. He then put them in motion in their orbits and ordained their (pace of) movement in the stages of their paths in order to distinguish with their help between night and day and in order that the reckoning of years and calculations may be known by their fixed movements. Then He hung in its vastness its sky and put the rein its decoration consisting of small bright pearls and lamp-like stars. He shot at the over-hearers arrows of bright meteors. He put them in motion on their appointed routine and made them into fixed stars, moving stars, descending stars, ascending stars, ominous stars and lucky stars.

Part of the same sermon
Describing the Angels:

Then Allah, the Glorified One, created for inhabiting of His skies and populating the higher strata of his realm new (a variety of) creatures namely the angels. With them He filled the openings of its cavities and populated them with the vastness of its circumference. In between the openings of these cavities there resounds the voices of angels glorifying Him in the enclosures of sublimity, (behind) curtains of concealment and in veils of His Greatness. And behind this resounding which deafens the ears there is the glory of light which defies the approach of sight to it and consequently the sight stands, disappointed at its limitation.
He created them in different shapes and with diverse characteristics. They have wings. They glorify the sublimity of His Honor. They do not appropriate to themselves His skill that shows itself in creation. Nor do they claim they create anything in which He is unparalleled. “But they are rather honored creatures who do not take precedence over Him in uttering anything and they act according to His command” (Holy Qur’an, 21: 26-27). He has made them the trustees of His revelation and sent them to prophets as holders of His injunctions and prohibitions. He has immunized them against the waviness of doubts. Consequently no one among them goes astray from the path of His will. He has helped them with the benefits of succor and has covered their hearts with humility and peace. He has opened for them doors of Submission to His Glories. He has fixed for them bright minarets as signs of His Oneness. The weights of sins do not burden them and the rotation of nights and days does not make them move. Doubts do not attack with arrows the firmness of their faith. Misgivings do not assault the bases of their beliefs. The spark of malice does not ignite among them. Amazement does not tarnish what knowledge of Him their hearts possess, or His greatness and awe of His glory that resides in their bosoms. Evil thoughts do not lean towards them to affect their imagination with their own rust.
Among them are those who are in the frame of heavy clouds, or in the height of lofty mountains, or in the gloom of over-powering darkness. And there are those whose feet have pierced the lowest boundaries of the earth. These feet are like white ensigns which have gone forth into the vast expanse of wind. Under them blows the light wind which retains them until its last end.
Occupation in His worship has made them carefree and realities of Faith have served as a link between them and His knowledge. Their belief in Him has made them concentrate on Him. They long for Him not for others. They have tasted the sweetness of His knowledge and have drunk from the satiating cup of His love. The roots of His fear have been implanted in the depth of their hearts. Consequently they have bent their straight backs through His worship. The length of the humility and extreme nearness has not removed from them the rope of their fear.
They do not entertain pride so as to make much of their acts. Their humility before the glory of Allah does not allow them to esteem their own virtues. Languor does not affect them despite their long affliction. Their longings (for Him) do not lessen so that they might turn away from hope in (Allah) their Sustainer. The tips of their tongues do not get dry by constant prayers (to Allah). Engagements (in other matters) do not betake them so as to turn their (loud) voices for Him into faint ones. Their shoulders do not get displaced in the postures of worship. They do not move their necks (this and that way) for comfort in disobedience of His command. Follies of negligence do not act against their determination to strive and the deceptions of desires do not overcome their courage.
They regard the master of the Throne (Allah) as the store for the day of their need. Because of their love (for Him) they turn to Him even when others turn to the creatures. They do not reach the ending limit of His worship. Their passionate fondness for His worship does not turn them except to the springs of their own hearts, springs which are never devoid of His hope and His fear. Fear of (Allah) never leaves them so that they might slacken in their efforts, nor have temptations entrapped them so that they might prefer this light search over their (serious) effort.
They do not consider their past (virtuous) deeds as big, for if they had considered them big then fear would have wiped away hopes from their hearts. They did not differ (among themselves) about their Sustainer as a result of Satan’s control over them. The vice of separation from one another did not disperse them. Rancor and mutual malice did not overpower them. Ways of wavering did not divide them. Differences of degree of courage did not render them into divisions. Thus they are devotees of faith. Neither crookedness (of mind), nor excess, nor lethargy nor languor breaks them from its rope. There is not the thinnest point in the skies but there is an angel over it in prostration (before Allah) or (busy) in quick performance (of His commands). By long worship of their Sustainer they increase their knowledge and the honor of their Sustainer increases in their hearts.

Part of the Same Sermon
Description of the Earth and its Expansion over Water:

Allah spread the earth on stormy and tumultuous waves and the depths of swollen seas, where waves clashed with each other and high surges leapt over one another. They emitted foam like the he-camel at the time of sexual excitement. So the tumult of the stormy water was subdued by the weight of the earth, when the earth pressed it with its chest its shooting agitation eased and when the earth rolled on it with its shoulder bones the water meekly submitted. Thus, after tumult of its surges it became tame and overpowered and an obedient prisoner of the shackles of disgrace, while the earth spread itself and became solid in the stormy depth of this water. (In this way) the earth put an end to the pride, self conceit, high status and superiority of the water and muzzled the intrepidity of its flow. Consequently, it stopped after its stormy flow, settling down after its tumult.
When the excitement of water subsided under the earth’s sides and under the weight of the high and lofty mountains placed on its shoulders, Allah flowed springs of water from its high tops and distributed them through plains and low places and moderated their movement by fixed rocks and high mountain tops. Then its trembling came to a standstill because of the penetration of mountains in (various) parts of its surface and their being fixed in its deep areas and their standing on its plains. Then Allah created the vastness between the earth and firmament and provided the blowing wind for its inhabitants. Then He directed its inhabitants to spread all over its convenient places. Thereafter He did not leave the barren tracts of the earth alone where high portions lacked in water-springs and where rivers could not find their way, but created floating clouds which enliven the unproductive areas and grow vegetation.
He made a big cloud by collecting together small clouds and when water collected in it and lightning began to flash on its sides and the flash continued under the white clouds as well as the heavy ones He sent it heavily raining. The cloud was hanging towards the earth and southerly winds were squeezing it into shedding its water like a she-camel bending down for milking. When the cloud prostrated itself on the ground and delivered all the water it carried on itself Allah grew vegetation on the plain earth and herbage on dry mountains. As a result, the earth felt pleased at being decorated with its gardens and wondered at her outfit of soft vegetation and the ornaments of its blossoms. Allah made all this the means of sustenance for the people and feed for the beasts. He has opened up highways in its expanse and has established minarets (of guidance) for those who tread on its highways.

On the Creation of Man and the
Sending of the Prophet, Peace be Upon Him:

Once He had spread out the earth and enforced His commands, He chose Adam (p.b.u.h.) as the best of His creation, making him the first [human being] to create. He made him to reside in Paradise and arranged for his eating in it and also indicated from what He had prohibited him. He told him that proceeding towards it meant His disobedience and endangering his own status. But Adam did what he had been refrained from, just as Allah already knew beforehand. Consequently, Allah sent him down after (accepting) his repentance, to populate His earth with his progeny and to serve as a proof and plea for Him among his creatures.
Even when He made Adam die He did not leave them without one who would serve among them as proof and plea for His Godhead and serve as the link between them and His knowledge. But He provided to them the proofs through His chosen Messengers and bearers of the trust of His Message, age after age till the process came to end with Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h.) and His pleas and warnings reached finality.
He ordained livelihoods with plenty and with paucity. He distributed them narrowly as well as profusely. He did it with justice to test whomever He desired, with prosperity or with destitution and to test through it the gratefulness or endurance of the rich and the poor. Then He coupled plenty with the misfortune of destitution, safety with the distresses of calamities and pleasures of enjoyment with pangs of grief. He created fixed ages and made them long or short and earlier or later, ending them with death. He had made death capable of pulling up the ropes of ages and cutting them asunder.
He knows the secrets of those who conceal them, the secret conversation of those who engage in it, the inner feelings of those who indulge in guesses, the established certainties, the inklings of the eyes, the inner contents of hearts and the depths of the unknown. He also knows what can be heard only by bending the holes of the ears, the summer resorts of ants and winter abodes of the insects, resounding of the cries of wailing women and the sound of steps. He also knows the spots in the inner sheaths of leaves where fruits grow, the hiding places of beasts namely caves in mountains and valleys, the hiding holes of mosquitoes on the trunks of trees and their herbage, the sprouting points of leaves in the branches, the dripping points of semen passing through passages of loins, small rising clouds and the big giant ones, the drops of rain in the thick clouds, the particles of dust scattered by whirlwinds through their skirts, the lines erased by rain floods, the movements of insects on sand-dunes, the nests of winged creatures on the cliffs of mountains and the singing of chattering birds in the gloom of their brooding places.
And He knows whatever has been treasured by the mother-of-pearls and covered under ocean waves, all that which is concealed under the darkness of night and all that on which the light of day is shining, as well as all that on which sometimes darkness prevails and sometimes light shines, the trace of every footstep, the feel of every movement, the echo for every sound, the motion of every lip, the abode of every living being, the weight of every particle, the sobs of every sobbing heart and whatever is on the earth like fruits of trees or falling leaf, or settling place of semen, or the congealing of blood or clot and the developing of life and embryo.
On all this, He suffers no trouble and no impediment hampers Him in the preservation of what he created nor any languor or grief hinders Him from the enforcement of commands and management of the creatures, His knowledge penetrates through them and they are within His counting. His justice extends to all of them and His bounty encompasses them despite their falling short of what is due to Him.

Supplication

O Lord! You deserve handsome description and the highest esteem. If wish is directed towards You, You are the best to be wished for. If hope is reposed in You, You are the most Honored to be hoped for. O Lord! You hast bestowed on me such power that I do not praise any one other than You and I do not eulogize any one save You. I do not direct my praise towards others who are sources of disappointment and centers of misgivings. You hast kept away my tongue from the praises of human beings and eulogies of the created and the sustained. O Lord! Every who praises has on whom he praises the right of reward and recompense. Certainly, I have turned to You with my eye at the treasures of Your Mercy and stores of forgiveness.
O Lord! Here stands one who has singled You with Oneness that is Your due and has not regarded any one deserving of these praises and eulogies except You. My want towards You is such that nothing except Your generosity can cure its destitution, nor provide for its need except Your obligation and Your generosity. So do grant us in this place Your will and make us free from stretching hands to anyone other than You. “Certainly, You are powerful over everything” (Holy Qur’an, 66: 8).