Yusuf 108: (Oh My Messenger!) Say; “This is my path. I am calling to Allah; and me and the ones who follow me are upon an enlightened path. I exalt Allah (from all associations) and I am not among those who associate partners.”

Yes. Say, O My Messenger: this is my path. The path of the religion of Islam. That is our path. That is, this path is the path of the Sharia ruling our Lord has commanded us. If you live it, your eyes fill with tears; if you live this, this path, our Lord's words in this way, makes a person weep. Say: this is my path. Yes, why did we come into the world? To know our Lord. So that those who know and those who do not are separated. So that those who know worship Allah. And to take our place in our Lord's (?), to do what He says, we came into the world. We came to prove what kind of person we are in this world.

In this case, surely our path is the path of the commands of our Lord who created us. I call to Allah, says the Prophet (peace be upon him). I call to Allah. That is, I call you to the One who created us, to our Owner. I and those who follow me are on a bright path. Because I and those who follow me: I am of Islam, he says. Say what you will, I will not leave Islam and turn my back on my Lord. And those who follow me, he says, we are on a bright path. Because the Owner of the worlds who created us promises: Whoever does what I say, We will make him honored in this world and the Hereafter, He says.

I will give him My Paradise, I will cleanse him of every hardship. Yes, in this case Allah Almighty addresses us in the most beautiful way. And after that, in many of His verses, He says: who is more true to his word than Allah? No created being can be as true to its word as Allah. No created being. In this case, surely whoever does what Allah says, and since Allah's word is truth, surely Allah will both give him peace in this world, light his way, and make him a sultan of the Hereafter. I declare Allah free of partners, he says. Yes, we too declare Allah free of partners. He, He, in His essence One, existing by His essence alone, the absolute owner and ruler of all these worlds; Allah we declare free of every deficiency, of deficient attributes.

And I am not one of those who associate partners. Yes. We, the Muslims, are not among those who associate partners.

To people who in this way associate partners with Allah, say: this is my path. Yes. That is, it is the safe and bright path shown to us by Allah, who created us from nothing.

I call you to Allah, to Him who created you. It shows you your benefit, I propose that you attain life. I and those who follow me are on a bright path. Because Allah created people so that His essence would be known. If a person thinks with a sound mind, leaves the feelings of hatred and loathing in his heart, frees himself from the feelings of the nafs and reflects, he sees that the religion of Islam is the truth. That there is no other religion but it, and no other god besides the one Allah, that all created things other than Allah were created by Allah, and that the Owner of all created things is Allah, he sees and grasps.

Yes. Beliefs other than this are not faith. Yes.

Beliefs are not faith. Faith is this. Everything has a meaning.

Having faith in Allah Almighty's existence, that there is no god other than Him, that other than Him there is no god at all; in Allah, who is the Owner and Creator, from the atom to the globe, the seven heavens and the Throne of Allah, of all these beings encircled by the Throne of Allah, having faith. Believing that there is no other god but Him; in His prophets, His books, in resurrection after death, His angels, sir, believing: that is faith. It is faith. Beliefs other than this are faithlessness. So believing in something does not mean having faith in it. For example, someone invented something.

What did he do? Edison, for example, invented the lamp. He invented electricity. We believed it. Because he did it. But we cannot have faith in him. Having faith belongs to that Lord alone. It means obeying Him. It means submitting to Him. It means prostrating to Him. That is faith. Just as we call unbelievers faithless, so we cannot say of someone who invented something: we believed, we had faith. But we can say we believed. We believed. Now, that person did this. But we cannot say "had faith". Having faith belongs only to Islam. (?) Islam has faith. How does one have faith? Eşhedü en lâ ilâhe illallah ve eşhedü enne Muhammeden abdühü ve resulühü.

I bear witness that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger. So that is faith. It is the Kelime-i şehadet, the testimony of faith. In this case you could ask me a question like this: Hodja, I bear witness that there is no god but Allah, but I have not seen Allah, so is He making me bear false witness? If you say so, no. He does not make you bear false witness. In fact we all saw Allah Almighty, but because Allah Almighty sent us into an unseen world, He commanded us to have faith in the unseen. Have faith in the unseen, I said now. Sir, it is His command. Where did we see Allah, Hodja?

At the address "Elestü bi Rabbiküm". When He created us in the world of Lahut, when He said "I am your Lord", we saw. And there we had faith in Him, we obeyed. We said: You are our Lord. There people were divided into three groups. Those of the right, those of the left, and the class of the mukarrebin. Ve küntüm ezvâcen selâseh. All the kinds, three classes coming from one another. Ve ashâbü'l-meymeneti mâ ashâbü'l-meymeneh: O you of the right, woe to you. Ve ashâbü'l-meş'emeti mâ ashâbü'l-meş'emeh: O you of the left, woe to you. Ve's-sâbikûne's-sâbikûn, ülâike'l-mukarrebûn, fî cennâti'n-naîm. A third group, the group of the foremost, is in the Garden of Naim, He says.

So we saw our Lord there and had faith in Allah. Then, having come here in faith, to our Lord whom we saw in the true world, Eşhedü en lâ ilâhe illallah: and I bear witness that there is no god but You. Ve eşhedü enne Muhammeden abdühü ve resulühü: and again I bear witness that Muhammad is Your servant and Messenger, we say. We affirm with our tongue and confirm with our heart. Yes. Beliefs other than this are not faith. The things Allah created appeal to people's own nafs, and they worship them. They attach their hearts to created things. Forgetting Allah, they (?) to live by their nafs. Thinking they will be deprived of the pleasures they would take in the evils they would commit, and because Allah's commands weigh heavily on their nafs, they do not want to turn to Allah.

They keep lingering in the swamps they have sunk into. Meanwhile, they cannot escape unrest either. Because, although they too know that there is no god but Allah, since the feelings of the nafs and of Satan please them, they leave Allah's bright path and sink into dead ends and swamps. They carry on their lives on dark paths. So these people, because they long for brightness, deeming themselves enlightened, and declaring themselves progressive with the feelings of the nafs, try to ease their longing for bright paths, for the paths. So such people are in dead ends. The Prophet (peace be upon him): I declare Allah free of partners.

Allah can never have a partner. He is far above deficient attributes. By saying "I am not one of those who associate partners", he gave voice to his surrender to the one Allah. Yes.