Imam Abdallah al-Haddad was one of Islam’s major scholars, he lived in the twelfth Islamic century, was renowned and deservedly so, for the breadth of his knowledge and his manifest sanctity. The profundity of his influence on Muslims is reflected by the fact that his books are still in print throughout the Islamic world.
He was born in Tarim, in the hills of Hadramaut, one of the southerly regions of the Arabian peninsula, and grew up in an environment where the accent was upon piety, frugality, erudition, and an uncompromising thirst for gnosis [ma'rifa]. His lineage is traced back to the Prophet, may blessings and peace be upon him, and his family, through Imam al-Husayn. His illustrious ancestors, the 'Alawi sadat, had for centuries produced generation after generation of great scholars, gnostics, and callers to the Straight Path.
Imam al-Haddad's writings are mostly concerned with establishing within his readers the firmest possible foundations for faith and certainty. He recognized the signs of his times, and of the times to come, and observed how people were drawing away from religion, exhibiting a reluctance to study and a diminishing inclination to seek spiritual growth. He therefore endeavored to produce concise, clear, and un-controversial texts. His concern for brevity is manifest throughout his books, many of which are abbreviated adaptations of Imam al-ghazali's monumental work "The Revival of the Religious Sciences" [Ihya Ulum al-Din]. Imam Ghazali had himself been the [Mujadid] renewer of the sixth century.
The present translation is one of the works which he designed as guides for Muslims who 'earnestly desire to tread the path of the Afterlife, and seriously follow the Sunna of the Prophet, may blessings and peace be upon him and his family.
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