Abdal Hakim Murad – Uthman bin Affan Paradigms of Leadership
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Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala Rasulillah Ali he was
Akbar he woman well that Robbia sera I near Kareem of the middle
Hockley in Khalifa tattle Aleem.
So we're resuming our consideration of what has already
turned out to be a very extensive palette, in our search for
paradigms of leadership, having deconstructed and dissected this
idea of leadership and tried to, as it were discard from our
scalpel all of those ego residues that go with the idea of being a
leader being upfront. A kind of management guru,
mentality or the heaven help us.
electoral contest syndromes, various
ego,
manifestations of leadership, we saw have no place in the context
of religion, which in many ways, turns the world and its paradigms,
exactly upside down what happens when you value those who are not
valued. When you're actually listening with the poor or being
amongst the poor, when you do not like being upon the throne, or the
minbar or some other position of responsibility and plead with God
and with your associates to be taken away from these
hazardous roles. Because the Hadith says, called La Cumbre, and
are called Local mess all on camera at
each one of you as a shepherd. And each one of you is accountable for
his flock.
If the wolf comes along, or the sheep is sick, and you don't
notice or the lamb is not looked after, in the middle of the night
of shepherds fault, don't go blaming
the government or a Zionist conspiracy or some other thing
that you want to reduce your status as mess, all responsible
notes, it's up to you it could look on Raw, Holy Prophet says
every one of you as a shepherd, even if it just means keeping an
eye on the toddler or feeding your cat or whatever it might be.
There's always somebody for whose well being you are responsible,
and mess all responsible in the literal sense of the word. In
other words, having to give a response to give an account to
explain how you discharge that responsibility. And sometimes it
is just feeding the cat or looking after mum. Sometimes it's dealing
with affairs of millions of people spiritually or temporarily. But in
every case, this Shepherd Hadith applies. And we've seen how
characteristically Islamic is the way in which the human response to
this weighty burden of responsibility has fluctuated in
different times, and places in the steeply magnificent ever
diversifying. But nonetheless, universal progress of the OMA in
space and time.
One of the things that we've been trying to get our heads around is
this famous principle of what diversity means in the context of
a religion that is so emphatic on to SC in other words, following
the prophetic wasswa, or example, seems to be a specifically Islamic
characteristic.
In other religions, you don't quite get this idea of the
painstaking, almost forensic Emmitt RTO.
You don't really try to be like, how Jesus kept his beard and when
he, how often he trimmed his fingernails and those sorts of
things in the context of Christianity. Similarly, Judaism
is not really about trying to be like Moses, the law is not that
it's something else. But in our
all embracing final hatom religion, we have this idea of
excellent being specifically articulated in terms of the
personal emulation of an ideal human being.
There's something very Islamic about this idea of sunnah and
Sunnah doesn't translate terribly well into other linguistic
cultural spiritual frames, it's hard to see how you would use the
word sadhana, how you would find an English dictionary equivalent,
it's something specifically Islamic. So on one hand, we have
this Islamic specificity of emulation.
But on the other hand, we have the fact of a religion that is
palpably embracing of all
kinds of difference in diversity.
And one of the ways in which we've reflected on this is by looking at
the principle of prophetic emulation as precedent and
boundary setter and expression of love, rather than as it were as
the founding of an ideology
for them to remember that Islam calls itself Dean, and doesn't
call itself ideology. That's a kind of 20th century aberration
has been Korea and so forth. Jump up and down, I say as long as an
ideology.
That word is not to be found in the Quranic dictionaries, beware
what you're doing if you try and reinvent the whole definition of
what God's religion is, according to some 20th, on this case, 18th
century understanding of what a worldview might be, it comes from
to Tassie in the 18th century, this idea of ideology. And lo and
behold, he says, This is what we have, when we don't have religion.
We no longer believe in the church and the priests. Instead, we
believe in humanity as a version of Zoology.
We're just part of matter. Very positivistic. And yet you get
these Muslims nowadays jumping up and down and making them feel
cells feel very modern and very political by saying aye, as long
as an ideology, the ideology of Islam.
Why do they do that? Well, it's a sad insight into the apologetic
inferiority complex. It sounds very modern and relevant, if we
call it an ideology. So let's go with that. But no, we use our own
internal definitions, which presumably, are the correct ones.
And we say, Dean to ideology, partakes in sciences, tendency to
reduce everything to a single pattern of explanations and
outcomes. It's mathematical, there's only one proper answer to
the quadratic equation.
Dean, as opposed to this scientistic ideology, historically
opens up humanity. Why? Because it's not really ultimately about
the collisions of atoms and the forces that determine them and
then ultimately, human behavior, dialectical materialism. ideology
is a big word for Marx is the German ideology is one of the
founding texts of Marxism. But in said, Dean, which is about the
spiritual connection of human beings to transcendence, partakes
in the indefinite nature of the human spirit, the roof.
So if we're in ideology, and we're interested in natural causation,
that's going to make us very anxious if things seem to be going
wrong in the world.
We are essentially reducing Dean to the level of the materialistic
ideology and that's why a lot of modern Muslims go wrong because
they think, Oh, you've got a socialist republic. And you've got
an Islamic Republic. And they've got different ideologies, but
Islam is more radical, different deep than that, because it's
ultimately about that which touches the most indefinable,
unscientific part of us, which is the roof participates in the
divine freedom, and hence, is not reducible to a single mathematical
calculus, of course, affect outcomes, but is imponderable
different. And therefore, Dean becomes the cornucopia of
incredible diversity and necessary indeterminacy in all, but the most
essential practices and, and doctrines. And this
approximate tivity of the film is one of the things that divides
classical Islam from modernistic or Islamist forms of Islam, that
that pre modern scholars were happy with fit because being the
latest stage of the evolution of a discussion, and there's FTF and
we'll move on to something else. It's approximative. Whereas the
ideologists want it to be like Dutch capital, an absolute fixed
and determinately valid statement of class
and money and human relations and how we should behave and how the
government should be fixed. That's one of the interesting paradoxes
of the Enlightenment. Science is to be the measure of all things.
We're just thinking animals, but it's also that freedom, liberty,
equality, fraternity. However, science is just about matter.
There's nothing about it that automatically is going to deliver
freedom or humanism. It might, but there's nothing intrinsically in
it that's going to do that. In fact, it tends to limit everything
in terms of laws cause and effect
Dean that we just sort of the Spirit can transcend that. And the
Quran is all about telling us stories about the limitations of
human expectations about cause and effect in the world. Look at all
those stories who could predict materially the outcome of any of
them, what really is going to happen to Satan, the use of what
really is going to be outcome of Morses encounter with Pharaoh on
what is really going to happen to it's an island harder in the
desert, there's always a strange, on anticipated outcome. So that's
Dean,
not ideology. And we need to be really clear about this, because
those who are redefining the whole worldview of our civilization are
reducing it to something that cannot but be totalitarian. And
the results is the same unhappy result, as we see with every other
totalitarianism it cannot deal with a flux of the depths of the
human condition, and certainly has nothing to say to the possibility
that prayer might be answered, for instance. So
that's one way of beginning this journey towards trying to figure
out how we can resolve the paradox of on one hand, sunnah, so this is
how we should live surely true. And on the other hand, Islam has
historic capacity, to embrace and to color and to transform, and to
purify an indefinite range of different human cultures,
presumably, including our own. And this is where this might take us
too far afield to discuss it things like Alderfer and adire are
important. Pick up any pre modern book of Islamic jurisprudence. And
you'll see how important and authoritative is people's own
local custom
and narrow for orphan Kelmarsh. Row a Sharon is one of the
principles of the Sharia. That which is known by custom is like
that, which is revealed by revelation. The ideologists can't
figure that out and freaks out. So it's not the Sunnah, brother.
But it's in all of our texts of classical fit when all of them
adapts, and it's part of how our civilization dealt with this idea
of sunlight, which turns out to be infinitely deeper than most of us
have imagined.
So maybe that's a useful,
problematic to try and resolve as we move through these different
expressions of Islamic excellence in these different times and
places that we've looked at. And the the particular is all of this,
as it were, is the spectrum that comes out of the prophetic prism.
The closer we get to the origins of it all, the clearer will be
Islam's vision of the accommodation rather than
suppression of the natural diversity of human beings.
And much many of the questions that we have about God's law
cannot be resolved ideologically
and cannot be resolved through what you might call a
fundamentalist understanding of what the early Muslims took the
sunnah to be.
So for instance, just consider
if the Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam had only married
Khadija in Kuwait, or just one woman in his life, and a lot of
Muslims nowadays get fidgety about this, what would have been the
operative consequences? sated married a woman 30 have a
particular height and build and education.
All of the Muslims who love to follow the Sunnah. And they should
love the Sunnah. would think I really want a woman like that.
Who looks this way? Who is of this height? Who is of that age who has
been married who hasn't been married at home that will be an
understandable form of devotion like those Deobandi mo learners
who spend long periods of time and even books discussing what kind of
buttons the Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam had on
his commies, and that's valid in its way. It's an expression of
love.
But what would be the operative consequences if they also thought
about who they should marry in those terms? problematic,
especially for the women. I'm 31 the religious guy is going to
marry me and finished I'll get married at 30 Because that's what
all the guys with beards think that they should have. It would
have very significant consequences, but he marries on
Allahu Allah who is 11 also women, and a really different. Each one
is really different. The first one is older than him, and then our
issue is much younger than him and then there's on selama and then
there's um, Habiba and they're all really different. Some of them are
of Jewish origin even and there's Rihanna and some of them high
background some of slave origin
But
that diversity has been a sign that the idea of sunnah is not
meant in a restrictive sense.
And there are so many other dimensions of this and one of
them, it seems to me
is this idea.
And we hear it in the hospice, at least if you're in a Sunni mosque
alikhan B Sana T was so Nikhil qualifier, Rafi Dinham embody.
And the Imam towards the end of the hotpot always mentions their
names at Bucher and Omar, n off man and Ali and gives a little
formulaic expression of the form of perfection represented by each
of them, not which places he conquered, or whatever, but what
kind of person he represented. And you can see four different people.
And then Sunday is binding. Each one represents a color kind of
pushed out from the original prophetic brightness. But each one
of them really different personalities, if you think about
it, what could be more different or heterogeneous than those for
men.
So already in the time of the sell off, and under current
circumstances, it's important to recognize this is not something
that happened with moguls or something. But it's in the time of
the seller, human diversity, big human diversity for women and for
men in that early sainted generation, so he says, alayhi
salatu salam, as hobby can no job, be at him looked at data after
data. My Companions are like the stars, by which soever of them,
you guide yourself, you will be guided
nicely image. If you know your night sky, there isn't a single
star and you can identify that can't actually help you to figure
out where is north and where you should be going. Feel on your mule
at night or something that that's how you do it before GPS, Gods
GPS, and it'll be around for long after the satellites have
exploded.
It's permanent. And so the two are our permanent, permanent
firmament. And this is not intention with the idea of
prophetic emulation. We don't say I could follow this hobby but no,
I prefer to follow the Sunnah. That's just the early version of
people nowadays who are saying Oh, you're following the
A che Barney I follow the Sunnah.
This kind of things that people have in their mind what you could
just as well say that about people who are following the ways of Abu
Bakr or updraft man band Alpha Salman referring to one of the
early great ones. So this idea of human diversity as part of the
universality and inclusivity of Islam is right there right at the
beginning of the Islamic package, all of those different
personalities, not by their love of the Sunnah of the Holy Prophet
and their knowledge of the necessity of conforming to his
perfection. homogenized ideologically as socialist man.
Now, you see those Russian statues from the Stalinist ego era. And
every single one of them looks the same. You know, there's images
sort of in usually bronze things out some some tedious party
headquarters, and the guy is kind of standing like this with a
torch. And then there's the dawn and then the woman is holding a
hammer, and it's always the same. Socialist man is the same kind of
thing is scientific. With the Chinese now doing the same thing
they call it harmonization a procrustean bed if ever there was
one. But no, we don't do that. In Islam, we have this idea of the
Sahaba, all 100,000 or whatever, whichever one of them. Okay, you
might say it's a little bit strange. If you're stuck in the
desert at night, and you say I'm going to look for a particular
star alcaide or whatever it is. They're just about see, I'm going
to steer my donkey by that. So maybe that's a slightly odd thing
to do. But it'll still get you to your destination. And that's why
we say at the Sunnah, well GEMA then are all the same that is
impossible in terms of the eminence, acerbic, ordinal. A well
on assalamu Bashara. These great ones are not the same as somebody
who converts three days before the Holy Prophets death and doesn't
do much obviously, it's not ideological, it recognizes human
diversity, but in a way that does not ever compromise all important,
suddenly principle of the Sunnah. And we really need to understand
this because a lot of our mutual blaming and anxiety amongst
Muslims is based on the fact that we differ.
And you have a lot of Pakistanis don't understand Islam
Under the Saudis like this
difference, diversity is the way Allah has made us if delighful LC
netic como el Juanico is of his signs, the difference of your
languages and colors. And ideology is not into that, to scientific.
There has to be one proper Chinese citizen. But Dean doesn't do that.
And that's one reason why ideologies always crash, and
humiliation. Dean keeps going.
So the fourth one, I felt we could say that's one example, you could
talk about the wives of the Holy Prophet, and the different types
of female perfection. And each of them is an incredible woman, but
they're different.
But we're going to talk today about one of the Hola.
Just to indicate something that, again, makes us think about
what we're doing when we think of paradigms of leadership is not one
paradigm of leadership. Just be like the Holy Prophet, be
identical to that no, you know, the Greek story of the
procrastination bread bed, that ancient king of Greece who had a
bed, and he invited his guests to stay on it every night. And if
they were too long, he cut off their feet, if they were too
short, and have them stretched. So it's become a English kind of
proverb, the procrastinator read that which tries to fit everything
into a single template, which is what the Marxists tried to do. But
with the diversity of difficulty of humankind didn't really work.
People still wanted to have their businesses and do their own thing.
And it didn't fit the reality of humanity. But Islam says, Athens,
and welcome and you can be as long or short as you like, and
you're still welcome. And it's important for us in our anxious
and defensive age, not to retreat into ideology, but to continue
this generous affirmation of difference, which is that in a
whole of Russia, Dean and Medina Minh body, that's part of the
summer. So the one I want to talk about
is actually off man been a fan radula, who may be the one that we
think about and hear about least.
So I'm going to do a bit of bio data.
Some of it will be familiar anyway.
But also a bit of analysis, sort of model of sunnah perfection. So
you follow Him and emulate him, according to the Holy Prophet
himself that's following the sun. Because a big thing is not
prophecy. But that's kind of in the shape of prophecy.
Well, to go through the bio data first, always essential to see
people as consequences of their time in place, as well as people
who suddenly in his case, shook and change the world in their time
and place. Here's the almost exact precise
contemporary of the Holy Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam.
What does that mean? Exactly? I mean, just last Thursday happened
to be the 40th anniversary of my taking shahada
should have a party.
But it's something to think about. So he is born five days after the
Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, which is of course,
our Millfield the,
the year of the elephant. So a close contemporary and is also of
course, all the Reishi and his aristocratic, blue blooded Uthman
Ibn are Fern Ibn ABIL asked if an Omega ibn Abd shrimps ibn Abd
Manaf
mother, Ottawa, an aristocrat of Quraysh, her mother on Hakeem bint
Abdul Muttalib Ibn Hashem, the twin sister of the Holy Prophets,
Father, so really kind of close
in kinship.
He's one of the first converts to Islam and the scholar same may be
the fifth is converting during Abu Bakr it's very secret, early Dawa
when things are really ominous, it's like talking about something
other than state ideology and Albania.
Leila
still places like that today.
And that's how it was in the days of the secret persecution so even
his heart says that first of the mail convert Abu Bakr, then Ali,
then Zayed bin Haritha. And then Offerman been our fan and most of
the earliest zero books book ad must have
later historians say yeah, so that's really Subak precedents in
Islam, which is one of the ways in which we kind of rank the Sahaba
that people have Bader and the people who are the mohajir on and
then the answer is different gradations of the sahaba.
Although, of course, it's not always an immediate indication of
who should do what, because again, we're not looking at ideology.
Remember those?
I think it was
Himmler or somebody who had party number number, party member number
eight or something, they had little badge saying this for them
to be one of the first Nazis was a big deal, but that was just kind
of ego didn't mean anything. But the longer with God's Messenger
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and the more of his tribulations that
you share with him, obviously, is a sign that you are trustworthy.
So he is a big name convert. And of course, this throws the cat
amongst the pigeons and his uncle, Al Hakim had been I've been asked
kind of goes up to him and physically grabs him, starts
shaking him and shouting at him, and then takes them off and ties
him to a post in a public place and saying, Are you going to leave
the religion of your ancestors, the deen of your ancestors, you
should have said ideology, I guess because they weren't to comply or
else.
By Allah, I will not leave you until we give this up. But Othman
says Paula he Murdock toma and FE Abba that often takes an oath and
swears by Allah, I will never leave this ever. And eventually,
after a lot more shaking, the uncle kind of gives up and
converts have this experience that, oh, you become a terrorist,
or you're going to hang up with weird people, oh, you're going to
be sold into slavery in Sudan or something, and usually kind of
parental freak out, that convert parents sometimes experienced, but
eventually, when you're strong, they kind of kind of reconfigure
it and you give them some flowers and chocolates and remember their
birthdays for change, and it kind of settles down. This is constant.
It's a constant with human nature. People don't want to be isolated
from their own flesh and blood.
Acerbi according to a well known Quranic phrase, the preed, the
first predecessors in Islam, some would identify with these who were
Muslim, at the time of the first migration to haberdasher Ethiopia
who actually participated in it. So he goes, and already he has the
Holy Prophet, daughter Rakaia as his spouse. And together they go
to the publisher. And so the Holy Prophets, one of the first prayers
that is recorded with him that he makes it off man, off man or a
woman or man, her Jerry Lee, off man is the first to have made
hijra with his family.
And it said that he was the first to have done this since the time
of Satan a lot, Ali salaam, this is recorded in the Hadith
collection. So he's taking his family with him. And in Ethiopia,
they kind of they're sort of sensation, because one of the
things that is narrated of him is that he has a very extreme
physical beauty, this time, kind of his early 40s in his prime,
magnificent, and also Rakaia, his wife is stunningly beautiful. And
this is one of the reasons it seems like the magician and his
entourage kind of melted and from that time, it's actually been a
principle of Shadi
that you should never appoint as an ambassador, anybody who really
isn't good to look at I don't know if the Foreign Office has the same
principle but I don't know maybe they'll appoint somebody who's
lost an eye and kind of has no teeth to be
a Majesty's representative to Apple zombie or Gambia or
somewhere but it's it's just good psychology that if you're pleading
a case, you kind of look
at look magnificent because human beings naturally are inclined to
beauty so they were kind of radiant and luminous and one of
the Sahaba says right to automatic been a fern or Mara Ito Roger Lin
Wella Mara atan edge melanin who watch
I saw is reminiscing of man been a fan and never in my life have I
seen a man or even a woman whose face was more beautiful than his,
but he was really hurt.
sensation and this is one of the things that is recalled of him.
Osama bin Zayed narrates the message he wants to meet off man's
house with a plate of food so I go in what either Bureau kya Radi
Allahu anha jelly, sir, for shout out to Andrew Elachi Roca, yatta
yatta and what ILA what you have man, I went in and there was
rakia, Allah be pleased with her sitting down, and then I couldn't
stop looking at off man and it hurt and man added her. And when I
returned, the messenger said, Have you ever seen a more beautiful
couple than they? And I said, Let us all Allah never so pretty
dazzling.
But there's also a range of Hadith in which the Holy Prophet comments
on the resemblance between Othman and hazard Ibrahim alayhi salam
was comes up in a number of Hadith and what are we to make of this?
Is it a physical resemblance or some kind of spiritual
resemblance. But he often says that he found this, this to share,
but this this resemblance, and it may well be that this has
something to do with what is off man's most famous quality or
characteristic. The hottie bit on the minbar and he's finishing his
cookbook. And he says, Well, I'll stop at home here and off man.
And all of the people who can't understand Arabic Say amen. I
mean, I mean, all that the diet has finished, but it's just
breezing off man. But nevermind. It's a prayer that's already come
about. And the one who's most sincere in modesty is off man.
That's what we say, of the third of the four philosophers and
what is what are we to understand by this? Modesty, and this is
maybe the heart of what we want to get up today, if we're looking at
the very earliest Muslims, those who are sunnah themselves, still
illuminated by the memory of the Sahaba rissalah alayhi salatu
salam, each of them having a different form of human perfection
that is to do with inheritance, DNA, upbringing, whatever will
different
ideology tries to squeeze us onto that procrustean bed. Dean says,
let's see what Allah has made of you and see how you can be perfect
and represent the Sunnah in a perfect form, according to what,
what what you are made to be.
So are stuck or home higher and often.
This idea of high yet
seems to conflict completely with our conventional view of what
leadership might be
higher is kind of like being modest.
The sound Hadith in which it was reported that off man, even when
in the kind of shower cubicle, be like that wouldn't stand up. It
could naturally hate
a modest person.
What kind of leader is that? There's not like
Prince Andrew or Boris or Trump or these people who are now seen as
symbols of immodesty.
The darkest secrets of what you wants, did you kind of blab about
it in front of a camera? This is not the Islamic way. And the Holy
Prophet says so know who Allah who was salam.
But equally, Dean in Holyoke, will hold local Islam, I'll hire.
Every religion has a particular virtue that characterizes it, the
spiritual type that it favors and that of Islam is here yet.
So that's the essence of the Islamic modality of being, but how
do we even translate it? It's so specific to Islam. It's another of
those kind of untranslatable things like sunlight so Islamic
that we don't have a word in English precedent. Wouldn't know
someone who's just sunnah. Hey,
sometimes we translated as humility or modesty or shyness.
That's kind of a bit of it. But how does that become a paradigm of
leadership?
How do you do that and still be a shepherd responsible for all of
the Muslims and these armies that by this time we're in Central Asia
and North Africa.
That's another
A very characteristic Islamic paradox, but it's again part of
the prophetic. So now the prophetic perfection. Can the
Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, a shed to a higher and
middle degree field rehab.
The Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam was more modest, more
shy than a virgin in her tent.
Whoa, this is a man with a red turban and a senator who's
unifying his people, the hero, the warrior, but more modest, more shy
than the Virgin in her tent, which is kind of the Arabs essence.
That, again, is something that you have to work out if you're going
to understand what Islam means by a specific form of virtue. It's
not the chest beating warrior from Game of Thrones with whatever,
it's not that it's some other model of warrior excellence. That
to us seems very strange. Who is the person who is at the forefront
of things? Who is the shyest of people?
This in our age of democratic politics, when everybody is there,
because they want to be there. And modesty, hate wouldn't get you
very far on the slippery pole of politics nowadays, because it's
all about, you know, our CVs can't get a job unless you boast and
tell half truths. And a very dynamic outgoing person and a team
player and I've done
as long as it's cross it all out.
It's a problem for us.
But this is, you know, the whole Islam, the Holy Prophet says it
and it's a sound Hadith, and how can we be shyer than the Virgin in
her tent,
and get anything done, even argue with the plumber.
Shy, it's
one of these interesting paradoxes. But it's a prophetic
quality.
And it's characteristic of so much of Muslim social existence,
modesty, with the religion of hijab, the religion of niqab, the
religion of no seclusion to all of that, other religions recognize
the virtue of modesty, obviously, in modesty is not appreciated by
anybody if they're serious.
But we rarely do these things.
It's a whole local Islam characteristic, if you look at any
group of Muslims and see who sits next to whom, and you know, an
Abbas in Turkey now, if there's any one place on the bus, and the
woman gets on, and there's a man who would have sat next to her, he
gets up sitting next to a man and the woman who has that goes, and
it's his wife, and they rearrange it so that she doesn't have to sit
next to a strange man and muscle while these things are understood.
And this is important, because we're often kind of
dismissed for this as if we're inhibited or buttoned up, or
puritanical. And that's not the Muslim way either, or hey, yet
coexists with a naturalness about every aspect of humanity,
including marriage. So it's a modesty that is not an inhibition.
And this in the context of recent news is kind of important.
Because what is the only thing that Donati can say about the male
female relation that equal equality? liberation is equality.
The man and woman are equal.
Now, when some 20 year old aspiring actress goes to see
Harvey Weinstein in his suite, or the outdoors, or the Waldorf
Astoria in New York, and she's alone at his there, you can say
they're equal? Yes. Okay, we can say that equal, of course created
to be equal. But that is not an adequate account of that
situation. It doesn't, it's not enough just to say they're equal,
which is what the feminists will kind of want to do, some will say,
No Halawa, no illicit seclusion. The hadith says the shaytaan is
the third of them.
And it will also say where's her Muslim?
Brothers should be there kind of obvious or her father.
But the feminist thing doesn't like that. Equality courts she can
be though. The reality of our messy world excludes any kind of
idealistic image of what equality might mean there are certain
realities, where modesty is usually in the woman's interest.
Usually a society where modesty is respected is one that protects
women better than one where people are just predators. Because
something in the male temperament, man is either a prey
editor or a protector. With raptors, basically, it's not
necessarily something to be proud of, particularly but machete as as
early as boundaries, don't go to his hotel room, don't go to the
island in the Caribbean on the private jet and all of these
things.
Not really a very complicated concept to understand that it's
always the women who get hurt in these situations because they end
up with the baby or feeling psychologically damaged or
trafficked, or whatever. If you just say, equality, you're not
dealing with the reality of the fact that it's stronger. He's a
bully. She's the one who's going to get pregnant, he won't. It's
equality doesn't quite do it. So this idea of hijab and of reserved
between the genders is it's not really what the feminists like,
but it certainly nine times out of 10 will serve the interests of the
female rather than the male.
She's on long distance bus in Turkey, does she really want to go
to sleep when there's a guy she doesn't know, next to her? Nope.
So equality fine, has to be something else as well. And this
higher this modesty, which is very much the Islamic ethos is is is
important.
And all of these modernist Muslims who want to be
accepted or feel embarrassed by these kinds of old customs and
say, well, we don't, doesn't really matter. And we can just
mingle freely, and it's cool to socialize. Well, when they become
victims, or when the girls become victims, which is the more usual
case, and the cruelly inequalities of the real world, then they might
think, well, didn't work too well, that time did it, but then they
end up this is
half of our headlines are about what happens when you don't have
modesty. So
this is the quality of Satan off men. And we have to get our heads
around the fact that he's when he becomes Khalifa.
That Muslim thing is already enormous. It's the big new
superpower in the world. And this man who is so huggy modest, is in
charge of it. So that indicates the radicalness of the human
person generated by absence of ego.
And we've seen this many times on this journey with these paradigms
of leadership that somebody who really doesn't have egos really
different and strange, doesn't care.
Clean the toilet for somebody, and it doesn't matter. Doesn't even
think about it afterwards. And that's, that's different, not just
to be committed to the poor, like Karl Marx, but to live with the
poor.
He kind of lived a relatively comfortable life and hamster door
ever it was even though his wife said, after he died, I wish Carl
had spent less time writing about capital and more time earning some
but yes, see human nature. But the Holy Prophet alayhi salatu salam
prays to be resurrected amongst them so keen.
That's where he'll be not with us kind of fortunate, centrally
heated Westerners with our nice cars, but with the kind of
barefoot Rohingya or whoever is there, that's where to find him.
That's a different kind of leadership. It's, it's some
moving, troubling, guilt inducing, but that religion turns everything
upside down, not through some kind of class war, but through into
something much deeper, which is inverting people's priorities.
Be with the poor love the poor, Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam wouldn't go to sleep at night of the coin in his house,
that's not that radical, that's nowadays that's an empty bank
balance. That's the letter from the bailiffs. That's that world
that precariat
that's where the divine favor is likely to be. So
all of these figures represent the real revolution, which is the
revolution in the human heart, which is what a new religion
brings. So
we find his wealthy his aristocratic he doesn't care.
It's like Emanuel Junaid statement that Zod asceticism doing without
is for the heart to be empty of what the hand is empty of.
If you're poor that you really wish you had stuff. That's not the
hood,
the hood, the quality of the all of the profits is really not to
care.
Any profits on another value is those food it eat it if they
wasn't to go to sleep hungry and it wasn't what he was thinking
about.
doesn't become an issue. So that again is kind of radical when you
think about it, not just not to mind being poor and putting up
with it but kind of not noticing it not being an issue.
So until has no color at all Earthman and now Iman if you miss
GDP Mel have a team Lisa how Allahu Ahad wa Ameerul Momineen
al Hassan, this is one of Imam Ali's son said I want so off man
sleeping alone in the mosque with a rough blanket over him. And he
was Ameerul Momineen.
Wow, if you've dealt with
rich visitors on CMC tours, for instance, is really not acceptable
air conditioning and my room last night it was so noisy and what is
this CMC and why did you put me into this hotel was the noisy air
conditioner.
Really sorry. Please don't stop giving us your 1000 pounds a year
or whatever really sorry about the air conditioner.
off man is not even thinking about how he should be. He's one of the
most powerful people in the world already leading these unstoppable
armies. He's just crashes out in the mosque with a blanket doesn't
isn't even the beginning of an issue for him. So that's part of
what we are looking at.
And in his own environment. He's well wealthy continues to be
wealthy. He's one of the richest of the Sahaba
unsure off a bill call in North man Acana youth m&s Muhammad Imara
weird Hello beta HuFa Colin Hello was eight
of man used to feed people, the way a prince feeds people. And
then he'd go to his house and there would be vinegar and olives.
That's just how he was. And again, you probably wouldn't even think
about that. That was just not his concern.
used to ride around Medina but not on a kind of smart white horse but
on a mule. And if you had his servant or Secretary who'd be kind
of riding behind him on the meal, and it might not look so regal,
but it's not exactly the coronation coach going down the
mall as it did back and all of the trumpets, the fanfares, that stuff
is fine, but these people are different. He's happy with the
Muller Secretary behind him.
Different one aspect of his higher of his modesty which is why
modesty is not really a very good translation
is he was very soft hearted.
can either work with Allah convert in Dhaka? If he stood to pray at a
grave he would weep until his beard became wet, kind of soft
hearted remembering,
mortality
right to automatically been a fern Jambul jumbo Island Minbari Allah
He is our own attorney on the valleys terminal who are about to
draw him out comes to throw him worried that on who fear to him
mama Chaka
somebody said I want so off man been a fan on Friday, he was on
the minbar giving the Hotbot
now we and there are legitimate arguments for this. Say. Quran
says hello Xena commander called the masjid be beautiful in every
masjid. And that's part of respect for the mosque and further
what's going on there.
But off man radula Juan wasn't part of the world of the huge
turban and a caftan. And
the performance that we have, even though that becomes how it should
be because people naturally are going to respect the dignity of
the person up there. You can see the majesty of our civilization
that if he's just in jeans and a T shirt and kind of standing any old
power on his phone is going off and he's just an ordinary bloke.
You don't respect the word so much. And this is recognized you
want to see the solar the majesty of the ALA Matt, this is
appropriate.
But back in those days, I want sawed off man on Friday on the
minbar and he had a rough
loincloth from Aden, which might have been worth four or five coin
And then a tone kind of shirt which was on him.
That also this is part of diversity. This is also part of
prophetic perfection, poverty and being clean but not extravagant.
And this is what religion brings that is new because it's not the
Byzantium Emperor. And it's not the king of Persia. And it's not
the
king, the emperor of China, where everything is kind of operatic and
its magnificence and he was not even thinking about whether he
should do that or not, but he just got up to give the hotbar and it
was probably so amazing that people were in tears and
the paraphernalia
wouldn't matter. Another aspect of his show is his aristocratic
virtues is his generosity, as is one of the things that is most
remembered for. And this again, is an aspect of prophetic perfection.
Well, let us all lie, he says Allahu alayhi wa sallam, ASTRA or
Bill Haley, Monterrey l mo Salah, the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam was quicker in giving and giving, then the winds which has
come and go that imaginary being that kind of unpredictable and
spontaneous, it's just like a force of nature, we just give you
don't think, maybe next March, I will give sadaqa. And I think I
can afford 120 pounds and such and such a charity and download it in
my diary and I'll get an
email reminder. It's not like that it's seeing the need, and
immediately, here you are. It's like the wind, it's a nice image.
And that was the prophetic way.
I said northmen radula, who was the same
and was famous for a number of key benefactions in the history of the
OMA in Medina when they came, and some of the tribes were not
allowing them access to water.
And so he paid for a well to be dug, which is the famous bitter
Roma, which is still there. And I've been there and it's actually
still, I don't know if somebody hasn't noticed it in Riyadh. But
this is a beautiful place with the palm trees and the water and it's
delicious water, each of the wells of Medina is traditionally
believed to have a different taste. And the Ottoman elite, one
of the things they would do would be to have a kind of water
evening. And they would sample water from different parts of the
world. And it was like wine tasting or something, but probably
ended rather better.
And a bit Roma was was famous and it's still my kids. It's a very,
very sacred place. He was the one who dug it, which was a big
operation in those days before the yellow machines knowing where to
do it and how to. So that was one of the things for which the Holy
Prophet
asked for Allah's blessings that He spent for that and the other
was the Battle of Tabuk, or the expedition of Tabuk. And the whole
Jehovah J shell, or surah is called the army of difficulty,
because the army had to go in the summer.
And people had just suffered the siege and the campaigns and they
were
impoverished, they found it difficult. And often that often
made it possible by equipping 1000
Cavalry so let's let's listen to this and see if we can find a
contemporary resonance for this expression of leadership.
Kata Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam for Hatha Isla Zhi SHAN
Or surah. For call of min Allah me at Byron be afraid to see her
Oktibbeha the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam gave an address
and urged people to participate in the army of difficulty. Cut off
man said I will contribute 100 camels with all of their saddles
and accoutrements and rains call for Mahathir
and the Holy Prophet again urged people for call off men. Allah me
at okra be Athleta see her off man stand up again is it another 100
with its equipment, but for Mahathir for Carlos man, I'll
admit at the okra B Alessi how Oktibbeha and so it goes on for
our Aiton Nebia sallallahu alayhi wa sallam II are called ma Allah
off man and man ma mi la ba their hair.
And then the narrator said, after all of this, I saw the Holy
Prophets saying moving his hand in some way.
Whatever off man does after this, it's going to be kind of covered
by this kind of this is an amazing sadaqa that is given
It is interesting that what we see here is a little bit similar to
what we get sometimes with Muslim fundraising today. And we think,
Oh, dear, this is like some kind of, I don't know, the voice or
something. There's a presenter and he's getting us worked up. And
this has nothing to do with Islam. But this is what is happening.
It's a kind of ancient thing the Holy Prophet is urging them. I
pledged 100, Campbell's aerosol, Allah, but he does it three times.
And the result is that the army is is equipped in that world where
the empires and the tribes were out to annihilate
early Muslims in the city of, of Medina, so yeah, he's making of
pledges. As long as course as you fulfill the pledges, rather than
as has happened to the new mosque project, having to deal with
checks that balance and that kind of thing.
If you actually do it with silk,
it's a prophetic emulation.
Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam often early beneath a fern
yomo yomo J Shil Austro. Jia Ian with their HIPAA for call a lot of
mk 30 auth men up below the bar for what I learned on a subtle
level.
Only Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam saw off man coming and
going and rushing about trying to equip this army. And he prayed, Oh
ALLAH forgive off man, that which he has turned to and turned away
from that which he hides and what he has announced that which He has
not spoken about and that which He has spoken about.
So
we have this combination of this kind of physical beauty,
aristocratic, graciousness, novelists of leash,
a complete indifference to how comfortable he was himself.
The traditional hospitality and generosity of the well trained
nobleman, and also this kind of modesty, this high up. I said to
Almighty hire and of men, even
the one in my Alma who has the most hair is often been our firm.
But there's other things.
One of the things that kind of made the biggest difference
historically was his relationship to the Quran.
He is said to have been an all of Islamic history one of only two
Khalifa is who was half is memorized the whole court and the
other was on that more than that bursted, Kenneth who was half his.
So he was somebody who preserved Allah's book
by heart, and was
involved during his endeavor, with making sure that the text that was
known by the Sahaba, who heard the Holy Prophet recite it fully, they
knew the text was preserved in some kind of written form that
could then be sent out in order to be compared against various
variations that were inevitably happening in faraway places. So he
assembles committee, in order to make sure that those kind of
authorized version if you like, which is off manic reception.
And there's books now which claimed to be that Quran and it's
really hard to determine their exact age because they've been
through obviously 1400 years of historic vicissitudes. But if you
go to Tashkent, ancient sheshe, capital of Uzbekistan, and you go
to the volume or the Mobarak madrasa, which is another site
which has a hair from the beard of the Holy Prophet, it's called
Mauryan. Mubarak. Next to it, they have a kind of museum of the Quran
where they have what they say is the original Quran that Hazaragi
of Nan was reciting during his martyrdom, so they'll point out
the stains on the page that they see his blood. There's other
copies of this they say there's one in Egypt, Allahu Allah, but
his relationship to the Quran is something that the former has
certainly preserved in its in its memory.
His titles, also indicative of the kind of leader that he was,
he's often known as don't know rain.
The man of the two lights maybe this is the most common of his his
epithets and all and no rain. Sometimes if you see in some
ceremonial mosques and parts of the Islamic world, very self
consciously Sunday
they'll have the names of the four calibers and they might have in
smaller characters, the particular quality of that
Khalifa. So he's done Lorraine,
the one with the two lights.
What are the two lights? Well, there's one, that text that
indicates that this has to do with two particular forms of divine
proximity that he will be granted in paradise. There'll be two
flashes of light that accompany him in the garden. And there's
early texts that indicate that but the more usual interpretation in
the OMA is that it he was the only person who ever married two of the
daughters of the Holy Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam, as we saw,
who dies more or less during the Battle of better although she's in
Medina
and then uncle form later on. So the one who has two prophetic
spouses, the man of two lights, and according to a narration from
Imam Ali, it was the Holy Prophet to give him this title,
specifically.
So Roca is the mother of his son, Abdullah ibn off man.
So he has his Konya, his patronymic, Abu Abdullah is his
kind of informal name.
And he is in because his daughter is kind of dying. So he has
permission not to go and join the battle of better, obviously, and
he buries her as the news reaches Medina of the victory of Bader,
and because he received some of the finat emsam Booty of
batteries, sometimes it's some of the lists included, as one of
those who were of the people of Bader and then humorous uncle form
also leaves him bereaved because she dies in the year nine of the
Hijra. And the Holy Prophet says in the Hadith, if I had a third
unmarried daughter, I would give her to Osman as well. And I
married my daughters only with what he was revelation.
And this is another indication of an aspect of prophetic emulation,
which is that you
make sure that you marry your daughters to somebody who will
honor them.
All of man certainly honored the daughters of the Holy Prophet
salallahu alayhi wa sallam.
And in this perhaps we can again, go back to the idea of modesty.
And the idea also of respect, and how we deal with these endless
human sort of train crashes, is now afflicted the royal family and
Boris Johnson with his girlfriend in Downing Street, but he's still
got his wife somewhere else. And it's
at a event arranged by some Muslims recently to which Boris
Johnson was invited. The idea was that he would be sitting sat next
to a woman in niqab because he makes his comments about
letterboxes, that would be interesting. And then during the
event, he would suddenly realize it's actually his wife.
So that's one way of getting onto the front page of The Daily Mail.
But it didn't happen that way. But the point is, you know, this is
Eros, the Greek said was the God that never is defeated. You defeat
him one way you get to some other way. And that's one reason why in
our time, where everything is kind of immodest, and the internet is
full of freakish, outrageous immodesty. The religion that's
been given for this time is the religion of really strict modesty
and correct comportment and people being very careful about what they
say because the ultimate say that impropriety in that area of human
life is more destructive than anything else. It really does very
deep damage.
So the Holy Prophet alayhi salam is obviously choosing men for his
daughter's huge responsibility. This is part of being a shepherd
and gives his daughter not to somebody who's going to have a
kind of luxury lifestyle, because he certainly doesn't, but as a
person who is profoundly decent, and that's a major responsibility
for Muslim parents, always, nevermind, status, prestige, etc.
But somebody decent and
a footnote to this is that so much of the language about Islam and
modernity focuses on Sharia disparities.
Let's get rid of polygamy and it's changed his inheritance laws,
blah, blah, until everything is gone. Really, that isn't just what
the West wants. There's a lot of that chitchat in the Muslim world
as in the West, but actually the real issue, as we see with these
people is not really
Sharia disparities, but rather, how decently people
teach each other,
you can have a system that's perfectly egalitarian and irons
out any wrinkles, that if people are still unrefined and they're
still predators, and they're still not compassionate, and they still
don't have respect, it's going to be a disaster and relationships
won't last.
Look at the divorce rate and relationships breaking up in
modern England, even though they've ironed out any kind of
disparity between husband and wife decades ago, but still, it's not
working.
So if we want to set our communities right, which is
evidently what we should, because we're dysfunctional very often in
this area, sometimes our relationships at work, just
saying, oh, let's have a new HD had about inheritance law or
something isn't, isn't really the most useful place to look. But
instead, how can we get people to behave better to each other and
with more respect. So it's a kind of inward o'clock a Sufi thing
rather than a filthy thing. You can't actually change people's
behavior, to act of parliament. You can punish them for being bad,
but making them not bad in the first place is more interesting,
and is really the essence of religion. So the idea of the, the
spouse as Shahid, Sufi, rather than 50 category, cutter, Ramona,
Benny Adam, we have enabled the descendants of Adam.
And her work
at Adam was this summit of creation, and that which was given
to Adam was nothing short of the perfection that everything in the
garden partook of that hemisphere, has to be seen as a sign of divine
creativity and greatness and needs to be treated with respect, not
just with equal rights, respect and honoring and amazement and
gratitude has to be the basis of the relationship the male female
relationship in any culture, law is you have to have good laws,
that's not really going to reach far enough into the human heart to
make relationships really work. So there has to be high yet modesty,
that lord it over him or her, or just press for this or that, but
just be grateful and respectful and amazed. And the blessings will
come. And this is kind of obvious, but nowadays, we're so keen on box
ticking and we often have swanky weddings a few years later, it all
kind of comes to nothing and people tend not to recover fully
from that. The hadith says a palapa doula. Whoa, Asha Rockman.
Divorce shakes the throne of the rock man.
Avocado halal, the most detested of all permissible things. So we
need to go into those relationships which should be easy
for two hemispheres. It's the fitrah what could be more obvious
on the basis of respect for Allah's creation and the
Indicative ality of gender rather than just what's in it for me? And
is this an acquisition? And does she go along with me and agree
with me and all of that kind of nafse talk? So the decline of the
inner a Clarkie Sufi dimension of Islam has actually made the book
much harder work, because we're always looking at these books of
Pollock and things, counseling and relationships. That's just kind of
an emergency escape hatch a very occasional thing rather than
something that half of the population should
be looking towards. So, Holy Prophet alayhi salatu salam looks
carefully to where he places his his family members, his DNA This
is vitally important and chooses somebody who's not going to worry
about the noisy air conditioner,
but is a fundamentally decent, respectful human being.
He's also known for as one of the Sahaba who were most
kind of emphatic in a beta
so if you look at that
tafsir works where it says a man who Arnet on Anna laelia surgery
then walk on Iman Ja Rule akhira or Jada drew rock meta Rob,
is he who is humbly standing for the stretches of the night
prostate, prostrate and upright, fearing the next world and hoping
for, for the mercy of his Lord. The Tafseer authors say on the
authority of Ibn Ahmad, who are often even off is often even
often.
And elsewhere in the books of Tafseer where it says Alladhina
ermine, what AMILO Solly heard he thought Matakohe n n o thornleigh
Taco.
Central wala who you have not seen in those who have Eman and do
beautiful works and then fear Allah and then have Eman and then
fear Allah and then have F San. Allah loves those who have SN
interesting verse. And it says that's also related specifically
in connection with often been a fan. So kinda off men are Radi
Allahu Anhu yes so muda y como Lane Illa hedge attornment Awali
of learn, used to fast continuously and pray every night
except for a small rest that it takes at the beginning of the
night and it's recorded by the historians that somebody wants to
watch him in the mosque in Medina to see what is he doing exactly.
And it turned out that he was reciting the entire Quran in two
rackets.
Today, you hear stories of people doing that recited clearly but
rapidly new can do that it might take seven or eight hours. It's
possible
that this is one of the things that he was known to have done.
During the sad story of his martyrdom, when the streets were
full of uncouth rioters trying to break down his door his wife leant
over from the parapet and said, in touch to law, who outta to call
for in the volcano, you're here, Leila Kula who Fiera cotton you
huge mouthfeel or en
his wife is saying whether you kill him or let him live, he'll
still be the man who recited the entire Quran. In one Rucker. She
knew she lived with him. He said, That's my husband. So what are you
doing?
Famous for FIP because well, particularly some of the Hadith
that have come down to us and the early sayings and positions of the
tabby ain about the Hajj. Underrated specifically on the
authority of man Ibn are fun. So, again, there's a lot to be said.
About him, he was perhaps the closest counselor to Abu Bakr,
Siddiq radula. One during his two years he left which are two very
turbulent years. Also, according to some of the historians like the
lottery, the closest counselor to hazard Omar or the law one during
his Khilafah very involved. So for instance, one of the issues that
arose, these places are being conquered.
What do you do with the lands?
So the big Byzantines feudal system and the Byzantines Empire
and the deckhands, the big landowners of Persia, they kind of
fled
or were slain on the field of battle, what do you do with the
lands and some of the conquerors are saying we want them
and Ahmad consults with Othman, who says, no, they should be
returned to the original owners. That causes a very big sort of
impact on the demography and the balance of wealth in the earliest
amik empire and it's irrespective of whether they're Muslim or not.
So the Greek owners, the Armenians and so forth, the cops if they're
still there, they they get their estates back. So Omar accepts this
view.
Another of that, so much that can be said on this. Things that when
we think about leadership in Islam, remind us that it is a
plural form diverse. And again, a reminder that that is necessary if
the Sunnah is not to turn into ideology
is the fact that these holidays are Asha Deen, methine, Rightly
Guided caliphs. The process by which each of them becomes Caleb
is very different,
as important for us as an ummah.
If there was a verse in the Quran saying, a ruler must come to power
through X, Y, Zed
inheritance is the eldest son, or he takes power or whoever's in
charge, or whatever that would be binding upon Us.
Now, you'd have ideology. But in fact, by divine providence, the
process by which each of these four Early Care lifts comes to the
Amira mini in is quite different.
So it's by acclamation, the complex difficult times. Some
people have Benissa either, and eventually a kind of consensus and
a very rowdy gathering of the Sofie for the venue side. Abu Bakr
becomes Khalifa and then he designates his successor by NUS.
It's going to be online. And that's accepted.
And then Omar dies because suddenly assassinated
things are not, it's not expected. What's going to happen now.
Now in the context of the ancient world, there was really only one
way in which you could get to be ruler, which was
being born into it. That was the Egyptian model, all of those
dynasties that was the Byzantium model.
That was the Persian model China. Bill had dinner stairs, the word
Dola. That originally meant dynasty, it was the eldest son,
and of course in Europe and in England, it's the same it's
by primogeniture.
Now, in earliest Nam, there were lots of people who thought well,
that has to be this case for us. But Makana Mohammed on ABA, a HUD
in Monterey Jellicle.
Mohammed, as the Quran says, is not the father of any of your men.
And his daughters apart from Hazaragi Fatima, who's already ill
of predeceased him.
So, kind of Imperial idea of primogeniture,
it's not going to be easily applied. But in any case, there's
nothing in the Quran or the Sunnah, that indicates that that's
how it should be the same Quran and Sunnah that's so detailed
about so many other aspects of life and the book of Waldo is this
big. How you get to be Amira money is something that's worked out
consensually through disputation, and trial and error in subsequent
generations and centuries of discussion, but it's not really
part of the original thing. So ideology, which is very
politically obsessed, can't really get a handle on this, because it's
diverse. Each of these four rulers is coming to power through a
different process. So how does off man expressed this? How does he
begin his temporal leadership?
Omar before he dies,
appoints a committee of six men who are going to have this
discussion,
in consultation short are with the rest of the Muslims.
Now, of course, you can't consult people who are in Iran and Kufa
and places because it takes three months to get there and it's not
not going to work. So it's Medina and Medina, as we saw with our
Imam Malik lecture has a particular parodic Matic
representative value. It's the kind of oma in
microcosm. So these six men who are chosen by Omar Ali ibn Abi
Taalib, of man bun are Fern and Abdul Rahman bin Alf, who is
somebody who ends up unwillingly really chairing this committee
committee who again is one of the sagip on a well on, they say he
was the eighth convert to Islam, and was the one who rallied the
troops at 100 when it looked as if all was lost, and he's the one who
shouted, ended up defending the Holy Prophet with a small band of
faithful warriors. A person of immense distinction, sad ibn Abi
walk us Zubayr tal Heibon Obaidullah these are the kinds of
inner core have been around from earliest times and Omar knows they
have only the interests of Islam at heart. So off man is on that
committee.
And they have three days and the decision has to be on the fourth
day.
It's not like choosing the pope where you get all of these old
guys from Bolivia or whatever and they sit together supposedly they
have their discussions in Latin but I don't know if it's quite
like that. And they're not allowed out until they've chosen a pope
and there's camp beds and they bring in pizzas and things and
they have to decide who is the Pope and the white you know, the
whole drama the operatic aspect of that
these people are given three days despite the trauma see Norma are
sorted this out but he's been stabbed.
M Rahman been ALF shares the committee but says he will not
stand. He will he will not become the Khalifa.
Less to be lady on a fee SOCOM. Allah had a more he says I'm not
going to compete with you in this matter. But he presides. He asks
each of them in turn, would you do it? Starting with Imam Ali who's
only prophets, cousin son in law. Ali does not speak.
As Zubayr says it has to be either Ali or Othman. Have
Man says it should be Ali. Saad says off man majority kind of in
favor of off man because remember he's been the kind of prime
minister or the deputy for Abu Bakr and for Omar and was trusted
with two of the daughters of the Holy Prophet didn't ordain etc.
And I didn't mention the other title still Qibla tiny praise
towards the to cableless doll heater attain he participates in
the two hedgerows, he has a lot of these kind of dual titles.
So a person of real distinction and then they go out to sound out
the people in Medina and the consensus seems to be in favor of
man. The fourth day comes they have to have a decision under
commandment of goes out for Fajr praise in the mosque and it must
have been a pretty intense prayer for Lamar sunless Subha each tema
all what else an odd Salah Abdul Rahman LM and Hadera minimal hedge
arena well Ansari will O'Meara engineered Thor Mercato. So after
the prayer
members have asked people to stay and then he sends out messages to
the heads of the tribes and then we'll hygiene and the unsavoury
and the military leaders and then he stands up and speaks to them.
To Hamid Allah, we're escena i Li thermocol am about the Indian
Azhar to be Emery nurse Iwasawa to home felon aged homea DeLuna be
off man Samak all year off man. No by year orca Allah Sana T
Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam well Khalifa tiny embody.
So he stands up to give the speech he praises Allah. And then he
says, To proceed, I have looked into
the public affair and I have sought their counsel and I have
found that they will not choose anyone other than off man. And
then he says, Oh off man. I pledge allegiance to you according to the
Sunnah of Allah's Messenger and that of the two Khalifa 's who
came after him while
he accepts the bear yeah who have the rough man whereby yeah, I've
also heard you don't know well, I'm sorry, we're all morale edge
nerdy, well, Muslim all Weatherly calahorra. Till Mohan bother
Daphne Omar radula, one with a letter D a year.
And then Abdurrahman pledges allegiance and the Moorhead you
don't know the answer, do the same. And the leaders of the
armies and the Muslims in general. And this is the beginning of
Muharram, immediately after the barrier of Omar. So this is in the
year 24.
So
it is interesting that the royal principle which was so universal
at the time, doesn't really manifest in any of this.
Now, in certain forms of early Shiite Islam, the idea of
primogeniture seems to be evident. Even though Ali is not the Son of
the Holy Prophet, this is kind of cousin, son in law, married to
Fatima. So according to the royal understanding of things, is the
heir apparent.
The next of kin, so that should be he so even though many of those
who became the what academics called the proto Shia, those who
thought it should be Ali, were focusing on his spiritual and
historical eminence. There were some also who in the background
thought, well, it has to be succession. This is what everybody
does. And sometimes some of the theorizing about the El beit, when
it gets larger than its do proportion and is no longer
imbalanced tends to adopt some ideas of primogeniture as some
kind of divine right of kings idea, which is clearly not what
what these people are doing and clearly has no basis in the text
of the Quran. So we can talk a little bit about some of his
innovations when he actually was a leader.
He continues to conquest and it's always worth bearing in mind
that these conquests were done actively with the cooperation of
local populations. So he is involved in the throwing out of
the Greek elite from Armenia.
But most of the fighting, it seems, was actually done by the
Armenians themselves from an office sites and not die for sites
that accept the
theology of the great church in Constantinople. And it's the same
with the conquest of Egypt under Omar that there's a lot of
resentment in religious minorities in the very cosmopolitan, complex,
ancient world that is used by the
li Muslim conquerors and finds the conquerors as being people who
offer a much better deal than the Greek emperors edited. The Jews in
particular who are more or less subject to systematic persecution,
pogrom and annihilation, suddenly found you can go live in Jerusalem
again, what are you the Messiah, not a very interesting early
Jewish texts from that period and monastic texts, which also
indicate how the early Hadith that would make
donations benefactions, to the monasteries as a chronicle by
somebody called pseudo CBS that talks a lot about this. And it's
an interesting aspect. It's conquest, but it's kind of people
are rather appreciative. That said that it was the Jewish community
of Spain who invited the Muslims to invade even though the Khalifa
hadn't got a clue what was happening until news reached him,
took a long time to get news from Gibraltar to Baghdad in those
days, and that it was
a kind of conquest through collaboration. But that takes us a
little bit outside the story today. But this is the liberty of
dimension of these early conquests that are being done. Remember, not
in the name of somebody who's wearing a gigantic crown, that the
English coronation crown is so heavy, that the one who wears it
has to be taught exactly how to sit, because if you move your head
the wrong way, it'll actually break your neck because it's just
such a heavy thing. It's weighs a ton.
These people are not wearing crowns. That's not their style.
They're sleeping under a blanket in the masjid and not even giving
it a second thought. So that's a different kind of Imperial but not
imperial expansion. But in any case, one of the things that he
does is that he creates the first Muslim Navy
because the one of the things that Muslim conquests is achieving is
creating a unified, unified Near East. The Romans had tried to
conquer Persia, but they always failed us with the Emperor Julian
and his ill fated battles in Iraq. Empires always come to grief in
Iraq, it seems he actually dies on those campaigns. But the Muslims
unite the eastern and the western world. The only bit that they
don't take is to the north kind of Europe. Partly because Byzantines
is getting in the way. What are we have procedures Constantinople for
a year, but it has walls. And there's also since there's not an
awful lot. Once you get past Constantinople.
You just got forest and in England, you'd have kind of naked
people painted in blue, who would appear from the forest and kind of
angrily Shakespeares at you and why, why bother? The Romans went
as far as Scotland, obviously, nobody wants Scotland. So
Hadrian's Wall. That's really what have they got porridge or
something that would rather stay in Italy. But even England, there
wasn't a strong, it wasn't like being in Syria, or Spain or some
of those amazing places.
Though,
it's, again, a little bit outside our compass. But there weren't 90%
of the distance from Medina to Cambridge. That's not bad.
But Europe was kind of invented by these conquests, because they've
not been to Europe before.
Those places were just part of the Roman Empire, which is basically a
Mediterranean Empire rather than a European thing. So
it's Islam that invented Europe, that's just a matter of historical
fact. And no doubt, they're really grateful.
So this incredible thing is happening while he's reciting the
whole Quran in two Rackers, and
helping the poor and sleeping in the mosque and so forth a very
extraordinary episode in human history and his creating the first
Muslim,
navy
seal. So
this is still the Sahaba who were engaging in this. So
he appoints more Alia, to be in charge of the campaign against
Byzantines, Cyprus, because they're more aware of buffer,
Mahabharata, even Assam it. Well, I'm going to hold on Karen
Fermat, it would have been a twin Erica,
one of the permanent consequences of those conquests was that maybe
the generals, nobody really knows what became of them. But the
Sahaba and the tabby ain
still buried in those places and define as it were the subterranean
deep roots of those places in Islamic terms. So what are we is
invasion of Cyprus
With or bad it had been a sonnet who again is one of the
10 promised paradise, his wife on her arm, who had been the witness
of the Holy Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam is on the campaign
and dies in Cyprus. And if you've been to Cyprus and EasyJet goes to
Larnaca, that's the cheapest flight to land at London, I could
look out the window of this plane while everybody is doing their
scratchcards and thinking about their duty for you look out of the
window. And there is this salt lake
and a dome. And that's the tomb of on her arm, one of the sahaba. And
it's if you actually get together, very close to the airport,
wonderful kind of peaceful place, very simple. And somehow still,
maybe it's imagination, maybe it's something deeper, has something of
the the determination and sincerity and the humility of
primal Islam. Definitely a poor place to
place to visit. So these people who've not really been outside,
their tribal hunting grounds before are now everywhere and are
becoming spiritual hubs for everywhere. So that's a hairless
Altantic, near La NACA and until Ataturk put an end to such things,
Muslim ships and the Ottoman Navy whenever they went near Cyprus
would always fire a salute, in order to respect on her arm and
fly their flags at half mast out of respect for her.
So there's a Muslim Navy, Rhodes has captured the Byzantines
counter attack the famous battle of the masts, cosmos that is the
worry, which is one of the great sea battles of of history.
And a lot of other strategic important decisions. So the port
city for Maccha is now no longer Schreiber but will be Judah. So
the city of Jeddah and Saudi Arabia kind of become significant
as a result of this geographical decision, he sends embassies
everywhere so the first Muslims who go to Ceylon Sri Lanka are his
ambassador to the king of southern deep and there's a shrine for them
there. To this day, he sends the first Muslim embassy to China,
apparently under Saudi bin Abi Waqqas. They go by sea, which must
have been quite a journey. And the hui Muslims to this day consider
that to be the beginning of Islam in China, Sadie said to have met
the time the emperor of the Tang Dynasty, and called him to Islam.
And he gave them permission to spread Islam. In China.
He strikes the first Muslim coins, and we've already mentioned his or
an policy, that automatic reception. So
really busy, and I should try and wind up now there's a lot to be
said about his
leadership qualities. But let's just fast forward a little bit and
talk about his demise because there's something interesting here
as well.
out external threats were more or less neutralized.
But, of course, there were internal dissensions. This is the
case with any Muslim community or perhaps any human community,
inevitably, there's going to be people who are dissatisfied, and
people who complain. And there are some particularly in Egypt who
don't like the governance that often is appointing.
Now off man is confident that the old experience Meccan elites are
now serious enough in their Islam to be as it were rehabilitated.
This is again, a different kind of revolution. It's not that Russian
revolution, we just kill the entire aristocracy, and get the
proletarians to do the just thing. All of these guys are still able
Sophia and is still there more hours in charge of the Navy, and
they have generations of experience in running things. So
he has no hesitation in appointing some of them to significant
positions. There's some people who think this isn't right. These are
the people who persecuted the Holy Prophet and killed x y Zed
sahabas. And now they're
up there again. So this is the main essence of the rumblings
against off man that come particularly from some of the
soldiers who are in Egypt, but also in southern Iraq. And even
though he sends ambassadors to try and restrain it, and he calls a
council in Medina of 12 of the Sahaba who are in the provinces to
try and identify the problem. He sends us other than his aid to
Basara Abdullah bin Omar to Syria and so forth.
The complaints are continuing off man asked everybody to join him
for the hudge so that they can present their complaints. But they
come to the hedge but they weren't saying anything.
because they can see the Sahaba here and they're not on side,
these rebels start to take over in Egypt call for Basara, which looks
really serious. off man doesn't have enough troops in Medina to
reestablish kala full control there. And he also really doesn't
like the idea of Muslims fighting against other Muslims since any
time has been a kind of No, no, that just hasn't happened. You
fight against by Santana aristocracy or some Persian knight
or whatever, but
the Muslims people saying let ilaha illallah on both sides and
this is part of his hair is kind of modesty, his humility, he
doesn't want to be the one who will do that. So that's a crisis
of leadership, if you like should he have sent armies to suppress
them with his charisma, the Sahaba behind him would have won
presumably a second wave of conquest. He doesn't. And so they
kind of start infiltrating towards the city of Medina. And they come
to Medina and they come into the city and still he will not order
them to be fought the wandering around the city of Medina,
boulders brass with their swords unsheathed and everything riding
their horses. This is the city of the Holy Prophet sallallahu alayhi
wa sallam, he doesn't want there to be bloodshed.
So he orders people to just let them come. And they encircle his
house. He issues is at the local population of Medina saying can we
get this is Ruffins out can we push them out? And he says no,
there will be no fighting no shedding of blood in the Holy
Prophets city.
The rebels then
can to use force to prevent him from going out to the mosque and
they won't allow any food to enter his house and around his house.
Protesting
there are some small skirmishes al Hassan bin Ali who was there at
the door is wounded defending the house from the skirmishes. And
then you have these famous exchanges between off man and
sometimes his wife on the roof of the house trying to reason with
these people he's doing it directly.
Side off men this is an Buhari signed off men, Yeoman. Allah says
hi for Sammy about the Nursia call me Tahoe Illa caught Lee sebelah
off man goes up to the roof and he hears some of these people saying
we were going to kill him find some way of getting him
for call wala Hema Hello Allahu Allah so Luca, Li and his by Allah
neither Allah nor His Messenger have made my killing. Hello
symetra Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam they are all lay
a hill Ludum mummery in Muslim in Ellerbee
ko from bada Islam, I will Zina about Islam, I will cut Lunasin
Venus. I heard the Holy Prophet himself saying the blood of a
Muslim man is not halal, unless three things have happened. coffer
after Islam or Zina adultery without any excuse, or murder.
This is what the Holy Prophet has said we're Mirtha Alto in the
Ricochet I've done none of those things done my call.
Lastly, for Rasul Allah He sallallahu alayhi wa sallam if He
Almighty Hebei rock image, I mean mean them in the car.
I will not go against the Holy Prophets wishes for his ummah by
shedding a single drop of Muslim blood until I meet Allah.
He says what do you want and they said, resign so that we can choose
whoever we want.
And he said I will not take off a garment which Allah has caused me
to wear
or ima and up to Loony, for Allahu Allah in Qatar to Mooney that led
to have bone about the Avada wala to call to Luna body or do one
Jamia? So he makes this prediction, which is still
absolutely upon us today. He says,
If you kill me,
you will never love one another
ever again.
And you will never be together again, against any enemy. He's
kind of talking to the whole ummah. If you kill me that's the
end of the unity of the ummah.
You won't have this mutual love ever again.
Muslims will not be completely united Allah Colby Rosalyn
Whitehead, with the heart of a single man, and you will never
again be united in confronting an enemy
and then start shooting arrows. Some of them climb the back wall.
It's just a house
Hello hola Osman Radi Allahu an Wahaca I don't want Mustafa Wolfie
Hijri or MA who imra to who want to focus.
And then he burst in on off man while he was sitting in the Quran
on his lap and his wife beside him, and there were people on the
roof
and then somebody called Ibn or Ahmed attacked him. His wife
Nicola throws herself over her husband to protect him, and her
fingers are cut off, off man is killed. So mahalo draw had he been
mean, he thought that Hello. And then they run away fleeing
in the direction from which they'd entered.
So his wife nathula, even though she's wounded goes out to give the
news for the Medaka know what to do off man and Mother boy hunts
and kibou la he up Quan, and when the people came in, they found
often man had been stabbed to death, and they kind of were
weeping unto themselves upon upon him. And the news came to ally
Tulsa and Zubayr have occurred at okolo. Home tells her holy eyes
Amil hubba and they almost lost their mind. So immense was this
this news?
Call Ali Ali said Kaithal kotula Ameerul Momineen our Entomb
entoma, Allah Al Bab, all Lemna Allah. So it says the sons Hassan
Hossein, according to most of the historians, at the door defending
the house, how could you allow the Ameerul Momineen to be killed when
you're at the door and they said we didn't know
the rebels are pursued, most of them are killed off man buried
three days later after he left for 12 years.
As a Shaheed, that doesn't need to be a vassal wash washing of his
body.
And some other accounts of his last minute, it was kind of just
an act of kind of mad vengefulness mob rule, the kind of wild
mentality that takes over a group like the G liaison in Paris kind
of crowd mentality that is quite animalistic. And, of course, the
mortified many of them what has been done, and
it's only Imam Ali Khan, Allahu Wacha, who comes afterwards, even
though he's traumatized by this event, and
had no part in it, who manages to bring Muslims together again, but
from that time, where he says you'll never love each other all
together, again.
Alma has had these fitness within it.
Different groups and tribes and now nations and the Sunnah, and
the Shia, and the idea and the Ismailia, and about the Salah,
fear and everything that's been the Ummah, whereas at the
beginning, it was just
a single
garment,
on rent by any hand. So it's a climacteric moment, but we live in
dunya. And unity of a huge human collectivity and dunya is rarely
to be sought. This is just how things are.
But that is not the key memory that we have of him. Instead, we
have the memory of the man who was the man of modesty, but the man
who built this great navy and the man who sent the army against
Constantinople and the man who said that the Byzantines can have
their lands back once it's been conquered, and the man who slept
under a blanket in the mosque and the man who married two of the
daughters of the best of creations of Allahu Allah usli
extraordinary. So the take home really is leadership is not about
kind of standing up straight beating your chest and being the
alpha male Tarzan. Yeah, there's a certain magnificence to
masculinity that has its Hawk that everybody recognizes. The Warrior
is a hero.
But the warrior without ego.
That's a more interesting personality, the one who's not
Tarzan, roaring and beating his chest saying Look at me, but the
one who is dignified because of lack of ego rather than because of
self regard. That's the Islamic ideal to prophetic idea, which is
why these people also represent sunnah by any of these stars.
You'll be guided try and be like off man, you'll be amazing.
So yes, diversity is not offended by the principle of sunlight but
is in fact purified and released to be itself. All of those all of
that were really different people. How they came to power was really
different in each case, but they will represent extensions of the
same prophetic light in the same sunnah. So in our diverse times,
we need to
Remember that and be less than freaked out by differences amongst
ourselves the Bangladeshi and Pakistani and a Sunday and a
Salafi? Well, there is a place for heterogeneity in this ummah, it's
an alma of the spectrum of the colors that are beautifully
unfurled. It's not ideology is Dean. And this ft laughs is how
things are divinely decreed to burn. balaclava Phu Kham will form
income As salam o alaikum, Rafi
Cambridge Muslim College, training the next generation of Muslim
thinkers