How does one know what is a ‘good sign’ or ‘bad sign’?

BismillahirRahmanirRahim

Question: How do one know if a sign is to be taken as a ‘good sign’ or a ‘bad sign’?

BismillahirRahmanirRahim. That’s a very good question. It’s pretty simple, if you have someone to teach you what is good and what is bad, you will be able to know. You don’t try to learn yourself. Even if you think that you know, it may not be what it is. You are following a guide, you are following a Sheykh, then you must ask. You are following a Sheykh, then you must follow. You are following a Sheykh, then you must obey, for you to be able to know what is ahead of you, how to read that sign. Because the sheytans may change the sign just like that too. Your ego may look at something else also, causing you to be tricked.

The signs, they need to be, first, taught by a Friend of Allah. And more than that sign that you are going to see, you are going to check what is in your heart. You are going to check what is in your intentions. You are going to check what are your actions. You are going to check what is in your past. You are going to check what you want from the future. You are going to check whether this is according to the will of Allah or not. You are doing that and you have a Sheykh that is going to knock you wall-to-wall. It is now not going to be very difficult for you to read the signs that is in front of you. You may come to the point where you say ‘I’m not even going to look so much for these signs,’ because the one who is bigger than these signs, it is who? Your guide. You know, when they have racing, is it only one driver? It’s like, I think Formula 1. They have two people, no? One drives and the other one does, what? He gives him the guidance, everything. That one can just go, this one is saying ‘it’s like this, it’s like this, it’s like this,’ reading everything and informing him. So that one who is driving, that one who is walking, he doesn’t even need to rely on himself. Someone is telling him what it is.

The problem with today’s knowledge is you think the knowledge comes from you. The problem with today’s spirituality is you think you get spirituality from yourself. And when we say that Prophet has blessed you and the Evliya have blessed you, they say ‘no, I did it to myself.’ It is the biggest shirik that you can make, because Allah has a protocol. And everything that He is sending down it is through those ones that He has appointed. There’s something that is general blessing for everyone. Everybody knows, in this world, there is always a cause and effect. Not even the light of the sun goes directly to us. Does it? It looks as if. Sun is shining, and it is bright. But are you understanding how many, let’s say, thousands of layers of atmosphere that it has to go through? So it is a matter of belief of what the Prophet has taught to his Sahabi e-Kiram and the inheritors, for over fourteen hundred years, something that is lost in these days because of the arrogance of man.

So learn to read the signs, then once you learn, you may or may not even be there physically, you already know. And you are not going to be able to read the signs, you are not read the signs with these (physical) eyes, you are going to read with these eyes (of the heart). But these eyes (of the heart) are not yours. You are going to say, ‘I’m going to put my eyes aside, away, I’m going to use my Sheykh’s eyes. I’m not going to look at it the way that I want to, I’m going to see it according to the Prophet. I’m not going to look the way that my ego or what I want to, it has to be how Allah is seeing.’ And Allah SWT is openly saying in a Hadith e-Qudsi, ‘My servant becomes Beloved to Me when he performs the obligations. When he performs the actions that are not obligation, he comes close to Me. And he comes closer and closer and closer until I become his eyes that he sees with.’ This is what we should aim for. To lose ourselves more and more, to come into our own reality more and more. If you are not learning how to lose yourself and how to die, if you are not learning how to submit to that Prophet, how are you going to submit to Allah? And the Evliyaullah they are training us how to submit to that Prophet, as the Sahabi e-Kiram did. Selam Aleykum wa Rahmatullah.

Sheykh Lokman Efendi Hz  
Khalifah of SahibulSaif Shaykh Abdulkerim el Kibrisi (qs),
Osmanli Dergahi New York
10 Rabiul Ahir 1440 
14 February, 2019