On the Prohibition of Visiting Living and Deceased Saints in the Tijani Path and in All Sufi Paths

Some people who are ignorant of the conditions of the Tijani Path hold the view that visiting saints—whose visitation was prohibited by our master Shaykh Ahmad al-Tijani (Allah be pleased with him) for those in his path, as it was prohibited among the masters besides him—is permissible. They argue by analogy with the permissibility of visiting graves in the Sunna after its initial prohibition.

Reply: Shaykh Sidi Ahmad al-Tijani (Allah be pleased with him) was unmatched in his time in knowledge of the Sunna, and all the great scholars of the Muhammadan community bore witness to his mastery of the Sunna. Whoever wishes to know this should examine his writings, his Prophetic sciences, his lofty allusions, and his solutions to difficult questions expressed in divinely inspired language in Jawahir al-Ma‘ani.

Moreover, some of the brethren have become confused regarding the distinction between the prohibition and permission of visiting graves in the Sunna, and the technical prohibition of visiting saints in the terminology of the spiritual masters. To clarify, Sidi Ahmad al-Tijani (Allah be pleased with him) did not prohibit visiting graves, and that the Sunna speaks only about visiting graves, in prohibition and permission, and does not address visiting saints in the technical spiritual sense at all.

What follows is a body of evidence prohibiting the general, technical visitation of saints, which is sought for the worldly benefit well-known among the people, namely: that whoever devotes himself exclusively to a single matter and limits himself to it perfects it. The prohibition is absolute among the spiritual masters and agreed upon. Sidi Ahmad al-Tijani (Allah be pleased with him) adopted this, as did his companions after him, in accordance with his final, abrogating command. Practice continued upon it, and his companions were united upon it, except for the rare one who preferred worldly benefit over other concerns, whose ruling is known among the people of the path.

The Prohibition of Visitation in al-Fath al-Rabbani

It is stated in al-Fath al-Rabbani of Shaykh Muhammad b. ‘Abdillah b. Hasanayn al-Shafi’i al-Tijani:

As for the personal conditions that are binding, they are three: the first is that he must not visit any of the saints, living or dead, except the Prophets, the Companions, and the brethren of the Path.”

And in al-Ifada al-Ahmadiyya, Sidi al-Tayyib al-Sufyani quotes Shaykh Ahmad al-Tijani as saying, “The Prophet ﷺ said to me [in a wakeful vision]: ‘There is a matter the shaykhs have neglected: whoever takes from a shaykh and visits another does not benefit from the first or the second.’”

And in it he also said ﷺ: “If your companions pass by my companions, let them visit them; but as for other saints, let them not.”

This condition is the foundation of the Tijani Path, and it is obligatory upon the aspirant to act upon it and not to be swayed by the words of ignorant deniers.

The Shaykh (Allah be pleased with him) was exceedingly strict in this matter. One of the companions asked him: “If I pass by Mawlay Idris II (Allah be pleased with him), should I greet him or not?” He replied: “Do not greet him.”

The reason for prohibiting even greeting him is that the saint is alive in his grave and responds to the greeting. The response of the saint to the one who greets him is itself a form of spiritual succor (madad), and it was for the sake of preventing that influx that visiting was prohibited among the people of the path, because greeting and responding, in their technical meaning, carry the implication of supplication, and in their technical usage this is forbidden.

The Shaykh (Allah be pleased with him) said: “The people are in one valley, and I and my companions are in another valley.” And he said: “All people are in one direction, and I and my companions are in another direction.”

This was transmitted by the author of al-Durra al-Kharida from Abu ‘Abd Allah Akansus (Allah be pleased with him).

Beware of relying upon what is found in Jawahir al-Ma‘ani that the aspirant may visit deceased saints, for the Shaykh (Allah be pleased with him) later withdrew that permission in the final period of his life and issued an absolute prohibition. This prohibition was not mentioned in the first recension of Jawahir al-Ma‘ani, because its author completed it sixteen years before the passing of the Shaykh, and thus his companions acted upon the later prohibition.

It is stated in Raf‘ al-‘Itab: “I saw in the handwriting of the Muqaddam Bal-Qasim, from a copy of Jawahir al-Ma‘ani, that the Shaykh (Allah be pleased with him) withdrew the permission to visit deceased saints and issued an absolute prohibition.”

And in al-Ifada al-Ahmadiyya the Shaykh is reported to have said: “The Messenger of Allah ﷺ commanded me to withdraw permission [for the litany] from two men who had visited Mawlana ‘Abd al-Salam ibn Mashish.” And that is because abandoning the visitation of saints is a condition of validity (shart sihha) in his Path, and when a condition is absent, the conditioned matter is absent.