Al-Salawat al-Jaʿfariyya

“And my salawat shower down like rain,
Never ending, fully quenching
I personally serve him who recites them,
Like a mother concerned with her child”

It is not hidden to anyone the significance, value and rank of the prayer on the Prophet (ﷺ) (salawat). It would have been enough, the words of our Lord (ﷻ), when He said,

“Allah and His angels send blessings on the Prophet: O ye that believe! Send ye blessings on him, and salute him with all respect.” (Qurʼān 33:56)

And the words of our beloved Prophet (ﷺ) when he gave us the glad tidings,

“The Companions said: “O Messenger of Allah, today you are in good spirits and joy can be seen on your face.”

“Yes,” said the Prophet (ﷺ), “A visitor came from my Lord and said: ‘When a member of your nation bestows one prayer upon you, Allah records for that person ten good deeds, erases ten of his bad deeds, raises him ten degrees and bestows upon him a prayer like the prayer he bestowed.’” (Ahmad and al-Nasāʼī)

But we are not confined to these powerful exhortations and reminders, there are manifold hadith and counsels of our scholars[i] in delineating the need, value and reward for sending prayers on him (ﷺ).

As a result many of our pious scholars compiled collections of salawat. Many of them have become famous, and perhaps the most famous of them is the collection known as Dalāʼil al-Khayrāt of Imam al-Jazūlī (raḥimahu Llāh). Likewise our master and shaykh, Sayyidī Shaykh Salih al-Jaʿfari composed a masterful compilation of daily salawat, entitled, The Jaʿfarī Salutations regarding the Prayer on the Best of Creation (الصَّلَوَاتُ الجَعْفَرِيَّةُ فِى الصَّلَاةِ عَلَى خَيْرِ البَرِيَّةِ). Similar to Imām al-Jazūlī’s collection, Shaykh Salih’s salawat are broken out into seven sections for each day of the week.

As the prayer on the Prophet (ﷺ) is in one context an obligation and thereafter a perpetual recommendation an ijāza or permission, is generally not needed to perform any salawat. However people on the spiritual path recognize the baraka and blessings of the idhn (permission). As such we will share the famous story (abridged) of the ijāza of Shaykh Salih to all the believers to read the ṣalawāt.

The universal Ijāza:

The shaykh says([ii]):

“And he (ﷺ) had already given me a general ijāza for all the ṣalawāt. And that is what I saw in my dream, that I was doing ṣalāt on the Prophet (ﷺ) with salawat other than the ones from our Idrīsī ṭarīqa. But when I began with the ʿAẓīmiyya (of shaykh Ahmad ibn Idris), he (ﷺ) appeared to me sitting on a chair. So I got up and kissed his noble hand and said:

“Shall I do salat on you, o Messenger, with this formula?”

So he said: “With it and with other than it.” And he pointed with his noble head from top to bottom, and from bottom to up (ﷺ).

And I give ijāza to all the brothers from the Idrīsī ṭarīqa and from others, from the East to the West of the world, in this Salat ʿAẓīmiyya, in which the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) gave me ijāza. And likewise I give them ijāza in the First Salat, which the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) heard from me, and likewise I give them ijāza with the rest of the ṣalawāt, which the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) gave me ijāza in by saying: “With it and with other than it.” And I make my sanad in that the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ).

And I have great hope that everyone who hears these words of mine, and turns with his heart and body toward these salawat, and recites them regularly with love and belief, that he will see him (ﷺ) in sleep and in the waking. And nothing stands between me and the doubters except trying.”

As for the compilation of Sayyidī Shaykh Salih, his son and inheritor, the Resplendant Moon of the Age, Shaykh ʿAbd al-Ghani al-Jaʿfari has said[iii],

“Therefore adopt them, o murīd, and reflect upon their meanings and secrets and inhale their scent and aroma and enter into the realm of their sanctity and lights. Indeed Allah the Exalted, has made for you, through them, an opening from every deprivation, a way out from every worry. And by reading them, by the permission of Allah, the Exalted, the reader has a relief from difficulties, forgiveness from sins, increase in reward and elevation to the highest ranks.”

We will end with one of the greatest ḥadīth about the reward of sending copious salawat on the Beloved (ﷺ):

Ubayy ibn Kaʿb said: I said: O Messenger of Allah, I send a great deal of blessings upon you; how much of my duʿāʼ should be sending blessings upon you? He said: “Whatever you wish.” I said: One quarter? He said: “Whatever you wish, and if you do more, that will be better.” I said: One half? He said: “Whatever you wish and if you do more, that will be better.” I said: Two thirds? He said: “Whatever you wish and if you do more, that will be better.” I said: I will make all of my duʿāʼ for you. He said: “Then your concerns will be taken care of and your sins will be forgiven.”

Purchase physical copies: Light of the Azhar Publications

PDF Arabic: Salawat

[i] https://www.meccabooks.com/1029-sending-prayers-upon-the-prophet-9789079294206.html

[ii] https://strayreflections.wordpress.com/2010/01/31/the-ijaza-of-shaykh-saleh-al-jafari-ra/

[iii] Miftāḥ al-Dukhūl li-Ṭarīqa al-Jaʿfarīyya pgs. 59-60.