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Sufi Biography: Yahya ibn Mo‘adh
Abu Zakariya’ Yahya
ibn Mo‘adh al-Razi, a disciple of Ibn Karram, left his native town of
Rayy and lived for a time in Balkh, afterwards proceeding to Nishapur
where he died in 258 (871). A certain number of poems are attributed to
him.
Yahya-e Mo‘adh-e : Razi and his debt
Yahya-e
Mo‘adh had incurred a debt of a hundred thousand dirhams. He had
borrowed all this money and expended it on gifts to holy warriors,
pilgrims, poor men, scholars and Sufis. His creditors were pressing him
for repayment, and his heart was much preoccupied thereby.
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One night he dreamed that the Prophet spoke to him.
“Yahya,
be not over-anxious, for I am pained on account of your anxiety. Arise,
go to Khorasan. There a woman has set aside three hundred thousand
dirhams to meet the hundred thousand you have borrowed.”
“Messenger of God,” cried Yahya, “which is that city, and who is that person?” ‘ |
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“Go
from city to city and preach,” said the Prophet. “Your words bring
healing to men’s hearts. Just as I have come to you in a dream, so now
I will visit that person in a dream.”
So Yahya came to Nishapur. They set up a pulpit for him before the cupola.
“Men
of Nishapur,” he cried, “I have come here at the direction of the
Prophet, on him be peace. The Prophet declared, ‘One will discharge the
debt you owe.’ I have a debt of a hundred thousand silver dirhams. Know
that always my words possessed a beauty, but now this debt has come as
a veil over that beauty.”
“I will give fifty thousand dirhams,” one man volunteered.
“I will give forty thousand,” offered another.
Yahya declined to accept their gifts.
“The Master, peace be upon him, indicated one person,” he said.
He
then began to preach. On the first day seven corpses were removed from
the gathering. Then, seeing that his debt was not discharged in
Nishapur, Yahya set out for Balkh. There he was detained for a while to
preach. He extolled riches over poverty. They gave him a hundred
thousand dirhams. But his words did not please a certain shaikh living
in those parts, seeing that he had preferred riches.
“May God not bless him!” he exclaimed.
When Yahya left Balkh he was set on by highwaymen and robbed of all the money.
“That is the result of that shaikh’s prayer,” they said.
So
he proceeded to Herat, some say by way of Merv. There he related his
dream. The daughter of the Prince of Herat was in the audience. She
sent him a message.
“Imam, cease worrying about the debt. The
night the Prophet spoke to you in a dream, he also spoke to me. I said,
‘Messenger of God, I will go to him.’ ‘No,’ the Prophet replied, ‘he
will come to you.’ I have therefore been waiting for you. When my
father gave me in marriage, the things others receive in copper and
brass he made for me of silver and gold. The silver things are worth
three hundred thousand dirhams. I bestow them on you. But I have one
requirement, that you preach here for four days more.”
Yahya
held forth for four days longer. On the first day ten corpses were
taken up, on the second twenty-five, on the third forty, and on the
fourth seventy. Then on the fifth day Yahya left Herat with seven
camels’ loads of silver. When he reached Balham, being accompanied by
his son, transporting all that wealth, his son demurred.
“When he enters the town, he must not give it all immediately to the creditors and the poor and leave me with nothing of it.”
At dawn Yahya was communing with God, his head bowed to the ground. Suddenly a rock fell on his head.
“Give the money to the creditors,” he cried. Then he expired.
The men of the Way lifted him on their shoulders and bore him to Nishapur, where they laid him in the grave.
Yahya-e Mo‘adh-e Razi and his brother
Yahya-e Mo‘adh had a brother who went to Mecca and took up residence near the Kaaba. From there he wrote a letter to Yahya.
“Three
things I desired. Two have been realized. Now one remains. Pray to God
that He may graciously grant that one desire as well. I desired that I
might pass my last years in the noblest place on earth. Now I have come
to the Sacred Territory, which is the noblest of all places. My second
desire was to have a servant to wait on me and make ready my ablution
water. God has given me a seemly servant-girl. My third desire is to
see you before I die. Pray to God that he may vouchsafe this desire.”
Yahya replied to his brother as follows.
“As
for your saying that you desired the best place on earth, be yourself
the best of men, then live in whatever place you wish. A place is noble
by reason of its inhabitants, not vice versa.
“Then as for
your saying that you desired a servant and have now got one, if you
were really a true and chivalrous man, you would never have made God’s
servant your own servant, detaining her from serving God and diverting
her to serve yourself. You should yourself be a servant. You desire to
be a master, but mastership is an attribute of God. Servanthood is an
attribute of man. God’s servant must be a servant. When God’s servant
desires a station proper to God, he makes himself a Pharaoh.
“Finally,
as to your saying that you desire to see me, if you were truly aware of
God, you would never remember me. So associate with God, that no memory
of your brother ever comes into your mind. There one must be ready to
sacrifice one’s son; how much more a brother! If you have found Him,
what am I to you? And if you have not found Him, what profit will you
gain from me?”
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