By Rachid Halim
Translated by Yassine Hicham

The Imam of Renewal, Abdessalam Yassine—may God enfold him in mercy—penned in his book Islam Tomorrow: “It is God’s eternal law that divine guidance is passed down through spiritual inheritance, just as physical traits are transmitted through the lineage of flesh and blood. A luminous essence [Nūrāniya] most surely flows from the departed spiritual guide to his disciple, yet it never ascends to the height of granting him a true spiritual birth. For such a birth can only take place in a realm where one is not begotten save by a spiritual father, and only when the vigor of that fatherhood sows the seed of life deep within the soil of the soul.”[1]

This Prophetic legacy—handed down through the people of God from one generation to the next—has been faithfully transmitted to those who come after, just as it was received: through an unbroken chain that reaches back to the Messenger of God (may God bless him and grant him peace). The Imam of Renewal was a blessed tree of this noble, far-reaching grove. He revived the inheritance, cleansing it of the stains that had clung to it through long centuries of tyranny and coercion. Then he entrusted it once more—pure, steadfast, and enduring—to the sons and daughters of Justice and Spirituality Movement, planting within their hearts the seed of knowledge and love from which true life springs. “Time and again, he urged that this sacred trust be conveyed, that its conditions be fulfilled, and that we rise from the level of mere words to the reality of lived embodiment.”[2]

The Sacred Duty of Preservation

When Imam Yassine was once asked, in the midst of one of his gatherings, how this sacred legacy should be passed on, he replied: “First, we must preserve it.” Then, to bring the matter nearer to the heart, he offered a parable: “Among the heedless of this world, there may be a man of great wealth who has amassed riches and stored them away. But when death overtakes him, his fortune becomes an inheritance. And if his heirs are foolish, they will squander it without thought-each one scrambling to claim the greater portion for himself.”[3]

The transmission of this sacred heritage is inseparable from its preservation; its loss and fragmentation arise from corrupt rivalry and the devilish love of self. For this noble Cause of ours is, at its heart, spiritual companionship within community—and nothing undermines that bond more than unhealthy rivalry and egoism. Whoever lays claim to exclusive mastery of knowledge, dismissing all others as mere idle talk and falsehood, has only wrought his own ruin. It is through such arrogance that countless generations of Muslims have been led astray, veering off the path and falling from the grace of Islam. Imam Yassine stated: “If we wish to plant the seeds of this Cause and convey it to our contemporaries and to those who shall come after, we must not act in haste, nor rush forward seeking to claim the lion’s share for ourselves. There are those who claim a monopoly over knowledge-but it is this very conceit that caused generations before us to deviate and abandon the path of Islam.”[4]

To illustrate this, he offered an example: “There was a sect known as the Bābīs, whose leader claimed Prophethood. He brought them a scripture and left behind a legacy. He commanded the people to listen to none but him, for he claimed to be the ‘gate’ [Bāb] to the Prophet. Whoever did not enter through his gate, he declared, could never attain true knowledge. In so doing, he fashioned himself a prophet—and thus opened the door to misguidance.”

The Attributes of the Faithful Conveyor

Imam Yassine laid down a condition: whoever is entrusted with the preservation and transmission of this sacred legacy must honor his brethren, love them with sincerity, and seek their good. His heart must be pure, for a heart clouded by impurity can neither carry nor convey light. He offered a striking analogy: “Consider a wire through which the current flows—if it is rusted, can it conduct power? It cannot. Only a clean wire transmits the charge. So it is with the heart: if it is tainted by the love of status and recognition, it will convey nothing.”

A pure heart is one emptied of pride, free from the craving for control, and adorned with the virtues of justice and spiritual excellence [iḥsān]. The key to such a heart is the frequent remembrance of God. As the Imam warned: “If God’s remembrance is absent from our midst, then we stand upon nothing.”

He went on to illuminate the qualities with which every member of the Movement of Justice and Spirituality must be adorned: “To convey this sacred trust, we must embody the character of the Movement of Justice and Spirituality. We must remember God in abundance, that our hearts might be purified.” He then recalled a sacred exchange: “When Abū Dharr heard the ḥadīth, ‘Follow a misdeed with a good deed, and it will erase it,’ he asked the Prophet, ‘Is Lā ilāha illā Allāh [There is no god but God] among the good deeds?’ The Prophet replied, ‘It is the best of them.’” Likewise, the Prophet said: “Īmān consists of over seventy—or over sixty—affluents, the highest of them is the utterance: Lā ilāha illā Allāh.”

Therefore, let us increase our utterance of it, with hearts fully present, as much as we are able. Let us be reverent in ritual prayer, conscious of every word we speak, for God is present therein. Let us honor those whom God has honored, those whose Path He has commanded us to follow, and let us increase our prayers upon the Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace).

The Guiding Imam linked the first virtue—companionship and community—to the second, declaring: “These cannot endure without dhikr. For Dhikr comprises a multitude of devotional acts, detailed in the ‘Affluents of Īmān’ within the book The Prophetic Method. Let us begin with Lā ilāha illā Allāh. The more we repeat this goodly phrase, the more our hearts shall be refined, and our īmān purified.”

The Steadfastness of the Community

Having spoken of the virtues of steadfastness, trustworthiness, and the transmission of the trust at the level of the individual-what then of the Community as a whole?

The Imam said: “Days pass, nights fade, and lifetimes draw to a close. After every generation, another shall arise—God willing, better than the one before—until the Day of Resurrection. But this will be so only if the successors hold fast to what their forebears established. This requires true following—and to follow rightly, we must first understand.”[5]

May the All-Bestowing King preserve the banquet of Justice and Iḥsān until the end of time. Yet the condition remains: that each generation cling faithfully to the foundation laid by those before—and that they grasp its meaning with clarity and reverence.

The meaning of his words is that we ought not to be swayed by the organizational frameworks that preoccupy worldly politicians, for such models hold no obligation over us. He said: “If our Cause were political in nature, then indeed, it would be fitting to replace the head of leadership every so often.” Knowing that the selection of senior figures—men and women alike—within the Movement is conducted through free and open elections at every level, all the way to the highest legislative and decision-making body: the Shura Council. All of this took place during the Imam’s own lifetime, under his direct guidance and supervision.

The sole exception is the Guidance Council of the Movement. “For our matter,” he said, “is, first and last—before all else and beyond all else—a matter of spiritual education. Such education cannot be improvised, nor are its qualities— both seen and unseen—acquired overnight. Rather, the divinely-guided emerge through long years of trial, shaped in the crucible of hardship and tested through time. Without a steadfast pillar within the Movement, its principles risk slow erosion—generation after generation, council after council—until nothing remains but a hollow shell. And so, we return to the Holy Qur^›ān, where God, the Mighty and Majestic, says: ‘And the Foremost, the Foremost’ (56:10), and ‘And the first forerunners among the Emigrants and the Helpers, and those who followed them with excellence’ (9:100). The foremost in our Movement are those who today form the Council of Guidance. I repeat always: this council must stand firm—unshaken by every wind of novelty and change.”[6]

These words are not an accolade, nor are they honors to be pinned on the chest, but burdens of trust, laid upon the shoulders, meant to lodge in the roots of the heart. The Imam impressed this upon the Council, saying: “The Movement is a sacred trust in your hands.” In his book, The Prophetic Method, he described its members as: “The leadership alongside the Amir, and they are the witnessing guardians of the Truth.”[7]

He concluded with a solemn reminder: “The matter hereafter is a constant test—night and day—against the lower self, the subtlest and most deceitful of foes. There is no victory save through humility toward the believers, sincere reverence, and drawing upon God’s help. The just testimony of believers over one another—offered in sincerity and truth—is the surest safeguard. So too the unity of hearts, joined in the love of God and His Messenger, in love for God’s sake alone, in brotherhood for His sake, and in the bond of spiritual companionship. This is what preserves.”[8]

And the matter remains one of mutual consultation—both in public and private affairs. “This council is no sealed chamber,” he affirmed. “It stands open to every institution and body within the Movement, just as those institutions and bodies remain open to it—as was the manner between them and the Imam.”[9]

In his final testament, the Imam wrote: “I urge you to righteous action—beginning with the individual believer’s closeness to God through both obligatory and supererogatory acts of worship, and extending to far-sighted, tireless effort to reunite the scattered umma, brick by brick, until the Caliphate upon the Prophetic Method is raised high. That Day of Islam, promised by the One who speaks not from desire, is as certain as the Hour, the Resurrection, the Gathering, Paradise, and the Fire: truths beyond all doubt.”[10]

May God show mercy to the Imam of Renewal, and keep us true to the covenant until we join those who went before us in faith—unbending and unwavering.

All praise is due to God, Lord of all the worlds.

[1] Abdessalam Yassine, Islam Tomorrow, Iqdam Publishing, 2^nd Edition, 2023, p. 512.
[2] Abd El-Karim El-Alami, Wayfaring to God in the Teachings of Imam Abdessalam Yassine, Afrique Orient, 1^st Edition, 2022, p. 145.
[3] Ibid., p. 145.
[4] Ibid., p. 145.
[5] Ibid., p. 239.
[6] Ibid., pp. 240–241.
[7] Abdessalam Yassine, The Prophetic Method, Istanbul: Iqdam Publishing, 5^th Edition, 2022, p. 74.
[8] Abd al-Karim al-’Alami, Wayfaring to God in the Teachings of Imam Abdessalam Yassine, Afrique Orient, 1^st Edition, 2022, p. 242.
[9] Ibid., p. 246.
[10] Abdessalam Yassine, My Testament, 1^st Edition, 2013, p. 21.