hold a listening session and have me attend with them. I declined, so they set aside a separate place for me, where I sat. When they began listening and experienced ecstasy and spiritual states, the senior shaykh began calling out to me in his ecstasy, saying, “So-and-so! A great share has come your way. Come and take your share!”

I said to myself—and later told them when we gathered—“You are under no obligation to give me this share. Any share that does not come through the way of Muhammad ibn ‘Abd Allāh, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, I will not partake of at all.” Some among them who possessed knowledge and understanding came to realize that devils had been present with them, and that someone among them was drunk on wine.

What I meant was that this share, this gift, this bestowal, and this spiritual state arose from a cause not sanctioned by the revealed law. It was neither an act of obedience to Allah and His Messenger nor something the Messenger had prescribed. It is like someone saying, “Come and drink wine with us, and we will give you this money,” or, “Venerate this idol, and we will appoint you to this office,” and the like.

Its cause may also be a vow made to someone other than Allah, glorified and exalted is He: for example, making a vow to an idol, a church, a grave, a star, a shaykh, or the like—vows that involve associating partners with Allah. If someone associates partners with Allah through such a vow, Satan may fulfill some of his needs, as discussed earlier concerning sorcery.

This is unlike making a vow to Allah Most High. It is established in the two Sahīh collections that Ibn ‘Umar reported: “The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, forbade making vows and said, ‘It does not bring