Title: The Spiritual Teachings of the Prophet ﷺ: Hadith with Commentaries by Saints & Sages of Islam
Author: Tayeb Chouiref (Author)/Edin Q. Lohja (translator)/Fatima Casewit (editor )
ISBN: 9781891785856
Publisher: Fons Vitae
This present work is the first in a European language to collect over two hundred of the most spiritual hadith, drawn from canonical collections and other authorative traditional sources, published in both the original Arabic and in English to which illuminating commentaries, drawn from the writings of Sufis from Hasan al-Basri, al-Ghazali, Junayd, and Shaykh al-‘Alawi and his spiritual progeny have been added.
This work will surely be of great value both to those in search of authentic esoteric knowledge and to those who seek in all honesty a more complete picture of the inward as well as outward reality of the Prophet of Islam.
The traditions (ahadith) of the Prophet of Islam are, after the Quran, the most important source for every aspect of Islamic life and thought, and include subjects ranging from prayer to economic activity, hygiene to politics, ethics to aesthetics, and law to metaphysics.
Moreover, beyond concern for all the domains of man’s terrestrial life, they include a number of hadith that are, properly speaking, initiatic and esoteric and are meant for those who wish to follow, while still in this world, the spiritual path beyond the world of impermanence and becoming, and leading to the abiding Presence of the Divine (al-tariqah ila’Llah).
I was sent a copy of this book by computer in Madinah. I happened to be sick and unable to leave my room. I could not stop reading it. By the time I was finished, I was well again. It is a wonderful book, with beautiful insights into the spiritual secrets of our Beloved’s words. Imam al-Haddad said that the reason Imam al-Ghazali ended his life reading only the Quran and Hadith is that his station was so high and his state so elevated that by then only direct revelation could nourish his soul. This book is a feast with wonderful explanations ingredients of the soul nourishing Hadiths and their benefits to one’s spiritual health.
-Shaykh Hamza Yusuf Hanson
Tayeb Chouiref is a French scholar, translator and teacher. He has translated from Arabic into French and commented upon the books Letters on the Prophet and other Letters on the Spiritual Path by Shaykh al-'Arabi al-Darqawi, The Book of Science and The Book of Patience by al-Ghazali, and The Mahdi and his Advisors by Ibn 'Arabi. Tayeb Chouiref also teaches Arabic.
Edin Q. Lohja has studied theoretical physics before turning to the study of traditional thought. He has translated and edited over 60 volumes in the field of metaphysics, spirituality, and Islamic intellectual tradition, in Albanian, English, and Bosnian. His latest translations in English include Patrick Laude's Louis Massignon: The Vow and the Oath (London: Matheson Trust Monographs, 2011).
Jane Fatima Casewit is a writer, translator, and educator who lives in Morocco. She has a background in linguistics and education and completed her undergraduate and graduate work in France and the United Kingdom. Her interests focus on comparative religion and traditionalist studies, particularly in the area of West African Islam and Sufism.