Location: Birkatul Haj – after al-Marg
He is Borhanudeen Ibraheem bin Ali bin Umar al-Ansari al-Matbuly. He is a great saint and his origin is from Matbul, a village in the province of Gharbiya.
He (may God be pleased with him) was raised an orphan and used to sell boiled chickpeas near by the Mosque al-Amir Sharaf al-Deen in the area called Al Husayniya in Cairo to provide his and his mother’s daily needs. Since his childhood days he exhibited piety praying all his five daily prayers in the Amir Sharaf al-Deen mosque. He would often doze off in this mosque after the Isha prayer until his mother would come and wake him up to bring him back home. Often he saw the Prophetﷺ in his dreams as he slept in the mosque. After relaying his dreams to his mother she would say to him “my boy the true man is the one who sees himﷺ in a waking state.” When God blessed him with that experience she affirmed to him “now you have been initiated into the station of rujula (spiritual manhood).
He built (may God be pleased with him) a great Zawiya in Birkat al-Haj as an abode for those whose loved ones were away on pilgrimage. That is how the Zawiya got its name. He planted a date palm tree beside this Zawiya that still stands today.
He has a book called “al-Akhlaq al-Matbuliya” (The Character of Matbul). His path is built on the foundations of sincerity and purification of the heart. He once said (may God be pleased with him) “if you purify your heart from the love of the world you will find the tributaries of faith flowing through your heart.”