The Journey of Faith

The Makkah night had a silent nature, like a suppressed breath.

Near the Kaaba, the Prophet Muhammadbased on the Haq use of the prophet Muhammad heart was busy resting after years of misunderstanding and suffering.

He was deprived of the love of his life, Khadijah (RA) who was his first patroness, his source of consolation.

and his uncle, Abu Talib, who had sheltered him out of danger, had passed, also.

The Makkah people had made fun of him, stoned and labeled his message as a lie.

But out of the gloom of grief Allah was training him to light.

The angel Jibreel (Gabriel) came that night--with his wings overflung across the horizon, delivering with him a gift which should not only give strength to the heart of the Prophet, but to all who should thereafter in faith be.

"Come," said Jibreel softly.

And in front of the Prophet {Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam) was a white animal not a horse nor a donkey).--that was called Al-Buraq.

Its eyes were shiners, and its distance length of the horizon.

And the Prophet shouldered it, and in a beat of his heart they were pearched up in the wind by it, and the sands of Arabia became smaller, and the stars became bigger.

They had a place to visit in Jerusalem first and that was the Farthest Mosque Al-Masjid al-Aqsa.

there all the prophets that ever walked the earth awaited him:

Peace be upon them all Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and many others.

They all rose in a row behind the Prophet {Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam} when he came in and the Prophet proceeded to lead them in the prayer.

It was time in quiet, the last of the messengers a head of the column of all those who preceded him.

This is followed by the Mi'raj -the Ascension.

Jibreel held Prophet {Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam} by the hand and they both soared higher than the heavens.

They were presented to prophets at every heaven, smiling and greeting him and honorable.

There was Adam (AS), in the first heaven, receiving his son with love.

In the latter Isa (Jesus) and Yahya (John) were smiling together.

In the third Yusuf (Joseph) was very beautiful.

In the fourth Idris (Enoch) was surrounded by angels.

In the fifth the greeting of Haroun (Aaron) was cordial.

In the sixth, was Musa (Moses), wept.

And in the seventh heaven, above a light which was inconceptible, was Ibrahim (Abraham)-- supporting himself upon Al-Bayt al-Ma'mur, the sacred House of Worship in which angels seventy thousand came to upon a daily basis.

Hazl he gazed upon the Prophet [Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam,] and said,

Hail, thou just son, O great Prophet.

At that, Jibreel brought him to a certain place further where no creation was able to move.

It was the border of Godly proximity- Sidrat al-Muntaha or the Lote Tree of the Farthermost Unreaching.

It had its roots in paradise and branches in infinity, and leaves which shone with colors of which no man can see.

Jibreel stopped.

This is where I have to be, he told himself. "If I go further, I would burn."

But the Prophet, continued by himself alone,-- rising in light, and his soul made to move closer to the presence of Allah Almighty.

And there, above time and place, Allah talked to his beloved -

not by angels, not by signs but directly by them.

The gifts of that night included the command of Salah (Prayer), five daily prayers, which was an agreement between man and heaven.

Initially, fifty were to be prescribed. However, when the Prophet, {Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam} was coming down, Musa (AS) urged him to go back and request him to ease his Ummah.

This he returned to again and again, till Allah, in his good grace, caused them to be five, but vowed them fifty.

Sure, they are, said Allah, fifty in reward, but five in action.

The stars remained in the sky when Prophet returned to Makkah.

It was a second-long expedition across the heavens.

When he narrated to people of Quraysh, they chuckled and laughed at him.

And how can you go to Jerusalem and come back in one night? they jeered.

But Abu Bakr (RA), the best friend of Prophet, only said:

When Muhammad says it, then it is true.

And henceforth called he AS-Siddique -The Truthful One.

The Isra journey and Miraji were not just a miracle journey -

it was a message.

that though the world may get as dark as it wants there is always a way to light.

and that religion is a process-- now by woe, now by stars--

but always toward Allah.

the Prophet {Silla Llahu Alayhi WaSallam} did not come back to the earth with a golden horn and the staff.

but with prayer - the communion between man and his Creator.

And every time a faithful man is drawing his salath, and elevates his hands and declares Allahu Akbar,

at he too, up doth rise,-- not space way.

but by the natures of his heart.