Bismillahir Rahmaanir Raheem
So many people nowadays take up yoga, or some other type of meditation. There are many forms of meditation out there, some of them quiet scientific, like binaural meditation. Islam also has its form of Meditation - its called Zhikr. My appologies to the brethren in advanced for the simplistic explanation below. There are numerous books available on the subject in case anyone actually reads this and wants to know more. Drop me a line and I will refer these books on.
Meditation:
Zhikr (Dhikr)
Catholics have their own form of "prayerful meditation". They use a rosary which dictates that they are supposed to read a predetermined number of one prayer and another. The rosary does not appear in the bible but there you have it. And yes, I do know what those prayers are, having been raised catholic. I choose not to place them here. Some are proportedly given to them by Jesus - whom we call Essa (as) - and others proported to be given by Mary - whom we call Miriam (as) - after she "left this earth" (in catholic speak), and others were written by the nicene council - a one-man led council - as a statement of belief in various things. In my days as a catholic and then as a "reborn christian" (I continued to seek God until I found him in Islam) this is one thing that really impressed me about Islam - if it isn't in the holy book (Quran - the direct spoken word of Allah) or RELIABLY recorded (this is actually a science in its own, how the records are kept!) as being said by the prophet Muhammad (pbuh) who is the direct messenger of of Allah, then it is usually considered human innovation (Biddah) and thus should not be done by muslims.
At this juncture, let me just say in case I ever have any readers that are non-muslim readers- you get christians and you get christians. Similarly you get muslims and you get muslims. You get christians who try to walk what they believe (however hard that is with 28000 versions of one bible) and you those who don't really bother but carry the name of christian or of their particular branch of "christianity". You can't judge what the original bible should've been by the christians of today because no two christian denominations will agree on a particular version of the bible even tho the "slight changes" they claim can actually impact greatly on things ranging from polygamy "yes" to polygamy "no", from saints "yes "to saints "no", from Jesus was crucified on a cross to well maybe it was a pole, to "Mary yes we pray to her" and "Mary no we don't pray to her". Some wont agree on consubstantiation of the host given at church, others believe the bible should only be taught about by men and others have female preachers/teachers/leaders much to the chagrin of yet another bunch of groups. There is little consensus.
The key difference for me, is that the original book (the Quran) remains unchanged from its beginning, even if you still get "muslims and muslims" if you get my meaning. And the Quran was not "inspired" by angels, God, etc. The Quran is written in the first person - it is Allah himself addressing Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him).
That said, in the Quran and in the books of teachings of our Nabi Muhammad (saw) we are told NOT to pray to anyone but the ONE Creator. That means that we do not, in pure Islam, bow before a saint, a teacher, an Imam (someone who leads prayer) or a Mufti (one who is an expert in the matters of Islamic Law). We do not pray to any of these, either or offer them sacrifices. The Nabi (prophet peace be upon him) himself did not wish anyone to turn his own grave into an altar of prayer to HIM,and so it has become a place of prayer to ALLAH, in honour of his wishes, alhamdolilah!
Muslims should pray only and always to the ONE true and living and self-subsisting Creator, the ONE who Was, Is, and Evermore Shall be!
To be fair to what I said above about saints in the christian faith - where do saints come in for us? In very, VERY brief terms, we may ask Allah, in our prayers not to look upon our sins but to look to the goodness and sinlessness of his prophet (pbuh) and because of that purity of that prophet to forgive us our sins and hear our prayer, etc. Why? Because as brethren, we are a body. What affects one affects all, good and bad. But we do not pray to the prophet (pbuh) directly, or to a saint, living or dead, ONLY to Allah. So if you should encounter a brother or sister in Islam engaging in prayer out of desperation to some saint or pious person, kindly correct him or her lovingly, as we are instructed to do by Allah the Almighty, Living Creator..
In some christian sects, there are "names of god". (interalia Jehova Jira, etc) These describe attributes of G*d- like the "ONE who provides", the "One who protects", etc (if you're christian, note the word ONE)...
In Islam, there are 99 aspects or attributes of ALLAH (and we do recognise those of the christians although we do not use them) - I will list them in a subsequent post. In Islam we may call upon Allah by any of His many aspects. When in trouble, we may call out upon "OH ALLAH MY RELIEVER" , relieve my pain. The reliever, in arabic is tranlated as "Al Basit". In brief, we say therefore that there are 99 names of Allah. If someone offends, we may say "Oh Allah, you are the one who is just.." in other words, "Al Adl". We use the arabic because it is the language used by our prophet (pbuh) and because of his purity, and because we seek purity, and because of the purity lent by the arabic language to the name, we use the arabic words. NOTE: THIS DOES NOT mean that muslims pray to many gods - astaghfirullah (allah protect us). That's a whole different religion - Hinduism.
When in a panicked state, you may run around like a chicken with its head lopped off going "oh my, oh my, oh my, oh my. Does anyone seen what's been done?!" erm, might I ask "oh my what?" A muslim in panick who's seen something may think "oh my Divine Witness," (refering to the attribute of Allah Ash-Shahid - The Witness) in which case he may be repeating "Ash-Shahid, Ash-Shahid" or even "Ya Shahido" meaning "OH (Allah that is my..) My Witness!!"
The repitition of a statement of faith "LA ilaha il Allah" (There is no god but THE ONE LIVING GOD WHO HAS NO PARALLEL OR PARTNER) over and over and over again is also called Zhikr. In english an inefficient word might be "worship" and a more accurate one would be "Meditation of LIGHT". The repitition of an attribute (name) of Allah increases light in the body, generates heat, and since we are made up of energy, you want to generate the right type of energy to direct at a specific problem. (A simplistic explanation if my brethren will forgive me). When you are cut, you need a stitch, not a purgative, so too depending on the situation you face, a muslim will call upon ALLAH and remind ALLAH with great love of the attribute within ALLAH that will bring relief/aid/solace etc.
Zhikr may then be used for a specific purpose, or it may be used simply to praise Allah. Zhikr made for a purpose is usually termed a Wazifa (method of healing) but it is repetitiv in nature as with Zhikr, which refers more to the WORSHIP for worship's sake. There is an absolute art to Zhikr, which is also termed "rememberance of Allah".
A muslim is taught to remember Allah wether sitting, laying or standing. The entire body is used to praise the Creator. An advanced example of Zhikr is that performed by the Whirling Dervishes, in Turkey.
So going back to where this post started - MEDITATION - Zhikr is meditating - rememberance of Allah, meditating on Allah, on his attributes, His goodness, His ability to meet a need. It is the art of giving ones'elf entirely to the act of worship & opening one's heart to Allah.. We get Zhikr from the example of our prophet (peace be upon him)
Simple Zhikr (also spelt Dhikr):
1. After every Fard salaat, recite Subhannallah 33times, Alhamdolilah 33 times and Allahuakbar 34 times (total 100) this was taught by our Nabi (saw)
2. Repeat "La ilaha Il Allah" 100 times (you may use a counter of any time, including your fingers, a tasbih, etc etc)
End with Durood Sharief (as per 1)
3. Begin with Durood Sharief (ask Allah to bless the prophet pbuh with peace and blessings, because without him there would be no Islam and no Zhikr)..
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