Risalah

<p><strong>RISALAH: The Discipline of Love and Longing</strong> is not a manual for escape but a map for those who burn.</p><p>Risalah is a meditation at the frontier where philosophy becomes devotion and devotion knowledge. It begins not with theory but with ache: What is the nature of love that annihilates the self yet preserves distinction? It asks the oldest of questions and answers not through abstraction but through fire.</p><p>Authored by Asaad N. Riaz a <em>fakeer</em> who writes from the ash of his own endurance this treatise unfolds as a mirror for the soul already walking the path. Composed in Madinah at the threshold of the Prophet's ﷺ Rawdah it is not theology but unveiling; not speculation but remembrance. Each reflection reconciles intellect and love as twin movements of the same Light. It is for the seeker who feels the fire of <em>Ishq</em> (Love) yet searches for <em>Mizan</em> (Proportion) within that fire.</p><p>The book rests on one principle: The Prophet (ﷺ) is the geometry of reflection the only mirror in which Divine Light is seen without distortion.</p><p>Here fana (annihilation) is not negation but purification-the clearing of distortion until only the Beloved's pattern remains. The self is not destroyed but sanctified. In the Prophetic path love reaches perfection as servanthood: the highest station is not the lover but the slave. Glory be to Him who took His slave by night. In that verse lies the secret of ascension-nearness belongs to surrender.</p><p>Drawing upon Ghazali Iqbal Attar Rumi and Hallaj it weaves reason and revelation into one rhythm until obedience becomes intimacy and the self made transparent becomes a perfect reflection of the Light. The intellect when disciplined by love becomes luminous; love when guided by law becomes eternal. Between them lies the <em>Sirat</em>-the middle path where thought bows without losing clarity and love burns without consuming proportion.</p><p>It speaks of <em>Wahdat al-Wujud</em> and <em>Wahdat al-Shuhud</em>-of the cosmos as infinite expressions within the unity of One. Multiplicity it shows is not a fracture of <em>tawhid</em> but its radiance.</p><p>This work is not for the curious but for the called: for those who have tasted nearness and awoken to its withdrawal for whom prayer has become endurance. It teaches that the dryness of faith is not absence but refinement: when worship persists without reward and love stands free of transaction.</p><p>It charts the path from longing to alignment.</p><ul><li><strong>THE FIRE AND THE FRAME: </strong>Why Divine Law (<em>Shari'ah</em>) is not a cage for love but the frame of reality-the sacred physics that converts the heat of ecstasy into the coherence of light.</li><li><strong>FROM LOVE TO SERVANTHOOD:</strong> The journey from <em>fana</em> (annihilation) to <em>baqa</em> (subsistence). It argues that the highest station is not lover but abd (slave) for proximity is granted to surrender.</li><li><strong>THE SOBER AND THE ECSTATIC:</strong> The narrow path between the safety of Junayd and the perilous unveiling of Hallaj both contained within the balanced model of the Prophet (ﷺ).</li><li><strong>THE VALLEY OF DRYNESS:</strong> When sweetness departs and prayer becomes endurance-this is not absence but purification the polishing of the mirror that reflects the Real.</li><li><strong>THE FINAL PERIL:</strong> Beware the subtle pride that mistakes borrowed light for its own.</li></ul><p>At its core it is both confession and invocation: a philosopher's logic tempered by a lover's flame. It invites the reader to walk the razor's edge of proportion-to unite <em>aql</em> and <em>ishq</em> reflection and remembrance <em>shari'ah</em> and <em>haqiqah</em>. For every atom remembers every law is mercy and every path if rightly walked ends at the feet of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ-the still point where all multiplicity returns to Light.</p>