SUPERIORITY OF THE SAHABA Hadrat [1] Imam-i Rabbani says in the 96th letter of the second volume of his

Ma ktubat: May Allahu taala increase your understanding. May He bless you with t he lot of walking on the right way! If those who strive to denigrate the three K halifas (caliphates) and the other Sahabis [2] by bringing forward such doubts b ecome reasonable and realize the honour and value of the sohbat of the Best of M ankind and if they know that the Sahaba alaihimurridwan had gotten rid of the desi res of their nafs [3] completely and had been purified from such bad habits as g rudge and enmity by benefiting from this sohbat; that they were all great men of the din and Islams eye-apples; that they strove with their utmost to strengthen the din and to help the Best of Mankind, that they sacrificed all their property to exalt Islam; that they left and sacrificed their clans and tribes, their chi ldren and wives, their homes and homelands, their waterways, fields, trees and r ivers, for their excessive love of Rasulullah alaihissalam, that they loved Rasulu llah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam more than their own lives; that they were honoure d with seeing the wahy, the angel; that they saw miracles and wonders; that they realized by seeing what should be believed without seeing; that what is knowled ge for others was experience for them; and that they are praised and lauded by A llahu taala in the Quran, they will realize that these doubts are sheer fibs, and they will pay no heed to them. They will not even consider it necessary to find out the unsound places in these fibs or to eliminate the wrong points in them. A ll the Sahaba have this superiority. How could we ever describe the superiority of the Khulafa-i rashidin, the four Khalifas, who are the most superior among th em? GLOSSARY [1] Hadrat: title of respect used before the names of great people like and Isla mic scholars. [2] Sahabi: (pl.as-Sahabat al-kiram;) a Muslim who saw the Prophet (alaihi s-salam ) at least once; one of the companions. [3] nafs: a force in man which wants him to harm himself religiously; an-nafs al -ammara. A negative force within man prompting him to do evil. (Nafs-i ammara). Nafs is ammara by creation, that is, it always wishes evil and harmful deeds to be done. It is reluctant to obey the Shariat. The nafs of a man who obeys the Sha riat and makes progress in the way of tasawwuf becomes mutmainna. It wishes to ob ey the Shariat.