Abdur Rahman ibn Yusuf Mangera – Faith, Forgiveness and Patience
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AI: Transcript ©
Bismillah al Rahman al Rahim Al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen wa
salatu salam ala CL Mursaleen. While he was off be a Baraka was
seldom at the Sleeman cathedral Ilario. Medina, Amma Bharat,
the topic is a very simple topic today. It's totally non academic.
Nothing very challenging, but it's very spiritual. And it's actually
quite fundamental, very important that we deal with this topic,
especially when we are in
this period of our life, when we're studying, trying to do
something with our life. Obviously, the reason why we study
is because we're trying to acquire something, so that hopefully it
will help us with a type of career. What's very important is
that this is a time of when we're formulating ourselves, developing
ourselves, preparing ourselves, it's the time of Shabaab and
youth. And it's a very important time that we get it right. So one
is obviously make a good choice of what you study.
That is very important, because that is obviously something that
you will do, and then you won't be able to
change that very easily afterwards. So that's why it's
important to make a very good choice from the beginning. Career
Choice. Hopefully, you've made a good choice by choosing a good
university. Right? That's obviously
a very important point in this.
The three things that we're supposed to speak about today is
one is patience. Another one is, was it forgiveness.
So forgiveness, patience, forgiveness, and faith. And faith
is essentially supposed to help you with forgiveness and patience.
These three are very important things. Firstly, let's try to
understand the big distinction between the way people think life
is supposed to be and how we can actually improve our life. First
and foremost,
the life of a believer when I say a believer, what do I mean by a
believer, I mean by a believer, somebody who believes that there
is a Creator, somebody who believes that this creator is very
active, is not a passive Creator, He created humanity, created
everything in the world, created us and now continues to nurture us
continues to assist us, help us and provide for us, He gives us
everything that we do, it comes through God, it comes through
Allah subhanho wa taala, this is what I'm speaking about. This is
what I am
basing this entire discussion upon. If you don't believe in a
creator, then most of this is going to be irrelevant. So I just
want to clarify that let's give a simple example of this. Right? The
life of a believer is one of belief and faith, generally in the
unseen that is what Allah subhanaw taala says right at the beginning
of the Quran, or the fleur meme, vertical kita will already Buffy,
then he says, Allah Xena, you may know in a bill hype, these are the
people who believe in the unseen, something they can't see you can't
see a god. You can't see the angels we believe in these things.
Believe in the afterlife, which is the most important. If you look at
a number of the hadith of Rasulullah sallallahu Sallam he
says, mankind, you know Billahi, while yo mill Earth, those people
who believe in God and the Last Day, and thus everything in
between, if you believe in God, and the last day, you'd be assumed
to believe in everything else that you're supposed to believe in. So
that's all faith. So faith is primarily believe in the unseen.
However, what's most interesting thing is that if the population of
the world at this point is around 6 billion, out of that about 2
billion Christians of various different denominations,
Christians, 2 billion Muslims are approximately 1.7 to 1.8 billion.
That is already 3.7 billion. We haven't even counted people who
follow Judaism and other faiths that believe in a in a supreme
being and a God that is already two thirds of the population of
the world, for sure. Believe in a Almighty being. Now whether they
believe God is passive active, that's a whole different story,
whatever they call God, whatever they call, call him, whatever
language whatever word they use for him, that's a different issue
altogether. So this is a fundamental belief, belief in the
unseen and as much as that is increased.
That is how much better a person will be contented within this
world.
I know this, if you look at this purely from a logical perspective,
saying you want me to believe in the unseen and you're telling me
if you believe in the unseen, you'll have a better life. And
then I'll add a third claim to that as well. You'll also have a
better hereafter. In fact, prosperity in the hereafter deep
Hands on this belief. Now why should you believe that we live in
a world where
a person who doesn't believe they base their entire life on
observation, if they see an increase somewhere, if they see a
benefit somewhere, a perceived benefit, a clear open benefit,
then that is what attracts them. So for example,
you put money in a bank, with a high interest, high interest
account, you've got 100 pounds in there, and our students, you're
listening money, right? You're trying to make ends meet, if you
put 100 pound in, then if you leave that for a year, you will
end up with maybe 125 pound or something like this, or whatever,
you've seen your money increase, that makes a lot of sense.
However, as a believer, you're told there's a person in need,
those orphans are in need, people are in Syria in need. And we have
even though we may be on a shoestring budget, but we still
have more than what other people have. So this is a fundraiser,
give money, give charity give sadaqa. And you know what, God
will give you 70 times as much, God will give you 70 times as much
as that. But you don't see that 70 times do you? Right, because God
you when you give a pound, right, when you give 10 pounds in
charity, you don't suddenly get 70 in your bank account or in your
pocket or in your wallet or your purse, or whatever it may be.
You will get it but it comes from behind the veil, God uses people
to provide us there are means that he provides. But this has to be
taken on belief. But if you're living in a very, if you're living
in a world where you just observe, have to observe things to believe
in them, then this makes no sense whatsoever. You'd rather put your
money in a bank and get the interest, which in our faith is
considered to be wrong. Can you see the dichotomy we're dealing
with the problem we're dealing with, there's a world of
observation, there's a world of belief in the unseen. Now, we're
not to say that we dismiss everything based on observation
that's completely wrong as well. Much of the science that Western
Islam has never had a problem with science. Islam has never had a
problem with science, other faiths may have had because it challenged
some of the fundamental premises on certain aspects, whereas in
Islam, there's nothing like that, that is being challenged and
science is changing every day anyway. But we have many Muslims
who have been scientists in the past, but at the same time, their
entire theory of empiricism and observation, everything else was
what is tempered with this inside belief in the, in the God in
beyond were beyond which they could not see there was there was
a barrier in the heavens, beyond the heavens and the earth, which
we they could not see, which they could not get to. And we still
have not been able to get to.
I mean, we are just living in this world, which is literally just a
speck in this is not even a speck in this entire universe. Once you
get into astronomy, you will see this. So
the scientists within Islam, they've always balanced it out
with a with a faith with belief. And that is what's important. So
if I'm walking through a bunch of really influential people, all
suited and booted people, and I am a persecuted individual, I am a
person. You know, there's so many people like this in the world.
There are so many people like this in the world. There are people who
feel they have been oppressed, whether that be by the politicians
in their country, whether that means the authorities around them,
whatever that may be.
There's a hadith in Sahih al Bukhari, which I just read
yesterday. It says that, again, this is based on the unseen, but
it says paradise and hellfire had a little debate. Paradise said.
Jana said, I am the one in which God puts all the alpha on us. The
weaklings was supposed to him and the downtrodden ones. Hellfire
responds and says, I am the one in which God punishes all the
motorcar balloon. All of the arrogant ones, the proud and
conceited once the tyrants so that's an argument they were both
saying that God uses so paradise is saying, God uses me for a very
important purpose hellfire, saying, God uses me for a very
particular purpose, right? So it's a nice exchange is a nice dialogue
like that. Now, what's very interesting here is that this
hadith in Sahih, Al Bukhari from the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam is saying that paradise is going to be it says
it's the description is that it's filled with the weak and the
downtrodden, the oppressed. Now, if you think over that for a
while, what does that mean?
You can only use that as a description of weak and
downtrodden if they form a majority
So where the powerful going to be, we're not making any judgments
here. But it's only if the majority are going to be the
downtrodden, and the oppressed and the weak.
In paradise,
that statement is true.
So then I got me thinking, because we do not think we are weak in
general, in our little circles. However,
my understanding of this is that we are weak, we do have, we cannot
do what we want. We don't have control in our hands, majority of
people Muslim or non Muslim, they are generally weak, they have to
live under others, they live under certain systems that you don't
like. I mean, look at the problem in America, literally, my friends,
they are telling me because I stayed in America for eight years,
my friends that telling me that
so many people cried when Trump came into, you know, when Trump
was voted, so many people started crying.
So you can imagine what their fear factor is Hamdulillah we haven't
had it so bad, right? We haven't had it so bad, God knows best,
what's good and what's bad for us, at the end of the day, there's
only so much we can do at the end of the day, but we are in a state
of weakness in that sense. So in that sense, Paradise Hamdulillah,
maybe we qualified for Paradise insha Allah as long as we do the
right thing. So now you're going through is a person who is
oppressed, and he's walking through all of these people who
are influential, they literally run the country or wherever it may
be take any country, whether that be in in Burma, whether that be in
Syria, wherever that may be, can you imagine what kind of
depression this person will feel, when he sees all of these free
people in power, a lot of influence doing and having what
they want? And he or she is suffering? He or she is suffering?
Can you just imagine how what kind of depression This will take you
what kind of despondency it will create? What has this individual
gods that will give him any kind of support? Any kind of hope? Tell
me this week person in front of all of these influential
individuals, what do you think can keep him going?
Because in the world in terms of materialism, he's got nothing.
He or she has absolutely nothing. They they literally are hand to
mouth. And yet they see all of these people, what would their
perspective be? If this person doesn't have faith? What else has
he got? Or she got to be able to sustain them? The Day of Judgment
is the day when it's called the Day of Judgment Yom with Deen.
It's the day of judgment when everything will be put back in its
right place. It's a day when lie of the Lima Rob Booker shahada,
you will or will not oppress, even in the slightest. That's where he
mentions in again, in a hadith in Sahih al Bukhari it mentions that
your Lord, in fact it's in the Quran. But it's part of a hadith
here inside Bukhari, which was just read recently, there on the
Day of Judgment, the person who had just a small iota of faith
left and he didn't do anything else whatsoever, even that person
will eventually get paradise, because God does not discredit and
God is not negligent of even the slightest amount of good deed,
even if that be infinitesimally small, as much as a Dustin is
explain verdura as much as a Valera whatsoever in Arabic, you
know, when you have shaft of light coming through the window, on a
nice sunny day and you see the small specks of dust which are
everywhere. We just can't see him right now, except when we have a
shaft of light like that, you know, that speck of dust. If you
just have that much faith, eventually you will go to
Paradise, because God will not waste anybody's accounts.
He is God is a very grateful Lord. He is a shirker Shaku. So that is
the that is the challenge of our life. We need to be the best of
what we can do in our sciences and in our studies and everything
else. But at the same time, there must be an inside, there must be a
spirit, there must be a rule, there must be a connection with
the Divine. Because we didn't come into this world,
just like that. There's an entire design that God for example, I've
been thinking for a while that
if I have four children, and we've had the same kind of food that
we've been cooking, every one of our children has come up with the
same kind of cuisine, eating the same kind of thing. But we have a
child who I'm sure all parents will see this. One child doesn't
like tomatoes. He doesn't like fish. I mean, there's people
You're probably sitting here who never liked those things. And yet
another child loves this fish,
tuna, he will gobble it up. And this other child doesn't even want
to touch it.
How does that happen? You've got two individuals, two brothers, two
sisters, one has all of these great ideas, you got three
brothers and sisters, one has all of these great ideas. And God has
also given them the aspiration and the him to put those ideas into
action. With that means either make a lot of money with them,
right? So he's got good
business sense, right? Or whether that means good is, you know, very
good with his hands. She's very good at cooking, whatever it may
be, or she's very good at Sciences, or whatever it may be,
right? You've got all of this. So you've got one who's got good
ideas, who also puts them into action is not lazy whatsoever.
You've got another individual has great ideas, but too lazy, just
sitting, very lazy, doesn't do anything with them. But great
ideas talks a lot though, right? And you got a third person who
doesn't even have any ideas. Right? Now among them, you'd have
a person who's very Lazy, Lazy as well. But yet you have other
people who are very hard working, but they don't have great ideas,
they generally follow us and work for somebody else. Why is it
that all of these different people? Why is it though, these
different people, though, they may be from the same background, maybe
even from the same family? We're talking about siblings, maybe?
Right?
Grown up in the same area, same kind of food, same kind of
schools, but yet you get all of this diversity? Where does that
come from?
Who is giving these guys this guy all of these ideas, giving them
the inspiration, giving them the actual get up and go?
Would you call it
to go and do what they have to do? And yet the other person is lazy?
Where does one of this come from? Now that we will say it comes from
God, this is design. This is complete design of how Allah
subhanho wa Taala puts all of these things in place.
This is what our faith needs to be based on by thinking of these
things, not just the facts, not just the superficial facts that we
see around us. Now while we're on the subject, if we do have an
individual who mashallah, you know, these four individuals that
I spoke about, what are their responsibilities? So the one who
has no ideas, he can pray to God, to give him some ideas to make it
easy in their life. And that's why you've had people who seem to be
when they were young, growing up, or even at youth, they seem to be
the basically the bluntest pencil in the box. As such, you know, for
lack of better word, right? That's what they seemed like. But then
suddenly, they became the, you know, the Bill Gates or the
whatever it may be. God, somebody gave them a breakthrough.
So that kind of a person must ask God for something. Because God
always answers God always gives, He will never reject somebody who
wants something sincerely. But you must find God and ask Him first.
The person who obviously is, has ideas, but doesn't put them into
action is very lazy, then, clearly, you need to remove that
laziness, you need to remove that procrastination. And you need to
get inspired to do something with it. And the way to do that is to
look at other people who've done something and find a mentor, find
somebody who can encourage you find a good circle of friends, not
not not some lazy, but not some lazy guys, that you just hang
around with all the time. Anyway, and the first person we spoke
about, who puts things in action, has great ideas and so on. What is
his responsibility? You think he shouldn't do anything? He's
already got it all. No, he also has a responsibility. He or she
must thank Allah subhanaw taala. And you know what the wonderful
thing is, as Allah says, In the Quran, Allah insha Allah as even
if you thank Allah, if you thank me, I'll give you more, I will
increase you. So this person, this person, who has got ideas, puts
them into action,
develops himself by it. He also needs the spirits. Just because he
seems to be successful, doesn't mean that it's all done for him.
That's a god's gift. God will test you with that gift. God will test
this other person.
God test everybody. This person's responsibility is to be thankful
to God and to try to use what God has given him for the betterment
of humanity in general, for the betterment of others and not be
selfish. Now, as I mentioned, if he thanks god he will get more
if this second person
He asks God and tries to do something with his ideas.
Hopefully he will pick that up.
The third person we already discussed, which was the person
who didn't have any ideas, but ask God and suddenly he got a
breakthrough.
So you can see how God is dealing with all three of these
individuals, right? There's three, four or five, meaning get very,
very different types in there. But that's the general three people
that we're speaking about. Now, somebody might say, that is first
person, right, the one who has the ideas, puts them into action, very
successful. Also, thanks Allah. And thus, God just gives him more,
he's always going to be better off than the others, it seems, because
he already has here, he's already had a headstart.
Isn't that unfair?
Because he's already had a headstart.
Know, Allah subhanaw. Taala says in the Quran, 30 Godfather, Allah,
He ut him and Yeshua,
that is the grace of God that he gives to whom He wishes. Having
more in this world, what you have to remember is that him having
more great ideas, successful accomplishments, and other people
having to work a bit harder for it. Now, have you seen some
people, they'll be quite relaxed, but they always get top grades in
class, they find business opportunities to opportunities
when we look at them, and we just walk past right by like a blind
person, right? certain individuals like that, at the end of the day,
all of this is restricted to the dunya. And the world, this person
will be more successful in the world, this person will be less
successful in the world. But what's gonna really matter is that
at the end of the day, this world is limited. 60 years, 70 years,
maybe 80 years, if you're really lucky, maybe nine to 100 years,
but that's it, then it's all done and dusted, then we've got a life
of eternity, what's going to happen, there is going to be a
reflection of what we did, what we pursued and what we sent forth for
that life.
That is what's important. This is a very simple worldview of how you
look at these things. What really matters is at the end of the day,
if this person's efforts, this third person who didn't have a
very good mind, who didn't really see opportunities, tried to make
things work, was maybe even oppressed, was maybe subjugated
was a weak person, and
never in a privileged position. But if he was patient,
if he was patient, persevered, believed in God, and believe that
one day God will give him because what are we supposed to do? There
was a again, a hadith in Sahih Bukhari, the Prophet sallallahu
sallam was there with a number of his Sahaba obey, you have niqab
and others, and one of his daughters sent a messenger to him
saying, Please come quickly, my child is towards is nearly about
today, his child was lost last few breaths or whatever it may have
been. So the Prophet sallallahu sallam said, that, for God is what
he gives them for God is what he takes. And he gave her basically,
just some kind of the philosophy behind losing people in this
world. And he sent that message. She sent the messenger back
saying, I swear you must come here, or you She insisted that you
must come. So then eventually, the prophets, Allah Larson went there
with a few of his companions. When he got there.
The baby eventually passed, eventually passed away in his
hand, and then he had he, he had a few tears. So the Companions asked
him, How come you're crying because they had understood that
you shouldn't be crying in this kind of situation. It actually is
a bit of a misunderstanding, because they used to wail in this
situation. They used to actually have professional whalers that
used to come, these women actors who could cry and they used to
come they used to tear their garments, pull out their hair, and
just cry just to
that was a ceremony for the deceased. So that had been
prohibited. But compassionate, crying is fine compression or
weaking is fine. It's very important, actually. It's very
important to do that. So
the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is saying it's whatever
Allah subhanaw taala has given whatever Allah subhanaw taala,
whatever Allah takes, he takes it. So that's, that's the way that's
the way he taught that. So at the end of the day, what really
matters is what's going to happen in the hereafter.
That's what really matters what we can send forward. And we can
become very easily misguided in this world to forget and become
heedless,
to forget and become heedless. So
when there's a difficulty on a person, how are we supposed to
deal with that? Hamdulillah we are in very privileged positions in
where we live. We get food on our table, we get
the clothes that we want to wear, right? We don't have to suffer. We
don't have to worry about sonic booms, we don't have to worry
about bombs dropping, running from one place to the other. We have a
peaceful night, unless we've got a medical problem, right? At the end
of the day, when somebody is going through difficulty, when somebody
is going through a difficulty, What should their perspective be?
Their perspective should be that
this is what God is putting me through.
I hope to be relieved of this. But I'm going to bear with patience
and I'm not going to complain to God.
And that will give them the reward. All of that is being
rewarded in the hereafter. Every bit of patience, on any difficulty
is being rewarded. That's why the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, he was in the graveyard. And he walked past and there was a
woman at a grave just crying her eyes out, and was in a real
hysterical situation, it seemed. So the professor Larson said to
her take it easy, right? And she turned around to him not realizing
who he was or what he was. And she said that you don't understand
what I've been through. Right, you don't understand what's going on.
So she's justifying her her act
and her behavior. Later somebody told her you know, that was the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam. So then she came to his
house to seek forgiveness for it. And the Prophet saw some said one
word to her. One sentence he said in the Mossad or in the submitted
Hola. Patience is to be practiced at the first level, which means
that when you are struck, you should be your Eman should make
you persevere.
Not that I've cried myself out. I've tried everything to sort this
matter out. And then on the third day, after nothing has happened, I
say, Oh, let me ask Allah. Let me be patient. Now let me not
complain anymore. But I'm complaining for three days. That
doesn't work like that. It's about training ourselves. So the first
time a calamity hits us, we may complain, that's fine. But let us
know that that's wrong. And we need to persevere because Allah
says in the Quran, that Allah subhanaw taala says in the Quran,
that anything that has been written for you will never miss
you.
And anything that has not been written for you, sorry, anything,
yes, anything that has been written for you, it will never
miss you. And if something has not been written for you, you will
never get it. Right, you will never get it. Then Allah subhanaw
taala says in one verse Lika, Allah so Allah TOCOM, Wallah,
tafro Hobbema taco.
The reason why you must believe in Allah,
for what you have, or for what you don't get, is because
so you do not feel despondent when you miss something when you don't
get something.
You realize that maybe God, maybe God doesn't want to give me this
because it's bad for me. It's not healthy for me, it's not
beneficial for me.
I mean, maybe you wanted to be at another university, but poor guys
ended up in Cambridge. Right? Maybe you wanted to be somewhere
else. But then you had your you had to be in Cambridge. So maybe
that wasn't good for you. And that's why this is better for you.
Jerry the other way around, but
so then Allah says,
when you are given something, you then don't exalt.
If you believe in God, it will give you humility. You won't think
that oh, this is all my doing. This is what the Quran talks about
karoun. Right, in a time of Musa Musa alayhis salam, he would, he'd
been given so much, Rich's had been given a great amount of
riches. And he used to exalt with that, to such a degree that it
made him negligent of his faith. Musa alayhis, Salam and others
were trying to encourage him, but he kept thinking, because he had a
false sense of security, a false sense of superiority because of
what he had.
That's not how Allah wants us to be, believe in the unseen, having
the faith and Iman helps us to manage our successes and our
failures. That's what's important. So patience, through difficulties,
and increased amount of faith. And finally, the other point, which is
seeking forgiveness for the wrongs that we do.
What is the benefit of that? See, on a day to day basis, we do
things that we're not supposed to do. And God understands that.
You know, what's very important what is very interesting is that
it there's a hadith which mentions that when Allah created humanity,
He saw that he had created them. I mean, he obviously knew. But this
is the way it's explained, he saw that he had created them very
weak, and very prone to doing wrongs, very easily misled, very
easily falling into sin. He saw that weakness within the human
being in son is dying, if he's mentioned that in the Quran. So
then what God said is that if I'm going to treat, if I'm going to
have a system in the world of reward and punishment based on
good and bad deeds, right, that's the system you have, right? If
it's going to be just a very, very straightforward little system of
being rewarded for every good act that you do, and being punished
for every evil act that you do, and there's no forgiveness,
there's no mercy, there's no compassion, then these people are
going to suffer, they're never going to be successful. Right?
Because our nature is that we falter once in a while. You get
that so far, right? So then he wrote, In the divine tablets, in
Rama de Saba called hobby, My Mercy has dominated my anger.
My Mercy has dominated my anger. And he said, The reason for this
is so that humanity can be successful.
No university in the world, no school, no college in the world,
generally,
is built
or founded to fail people. You know, I'm going to develop, I'm
going to found a university, I'm going to set up a school, I just
want to fail because I like to see the miserable. They don't do that.
They do it for success. Some succeed and others don't.
Unfortunately, people do fail, people do mess around, they fail,
right? But what Allah wants is he wants to give us as much chance as
possible. And that's why he said that my dealing with people is
going to be based on mercy.
As much as I can.
My anger is there as well. And that's why within Islam, it's very
different from Christianity. When it comes to Christianity, you've
had, you know, the Archbishop of Canterbury, saying that his faith
shakes when he sees so much misery in the world. Now, yes, we do feel
perturbed about it. But it doesn't shake our faith in God. Because we
know that God just as he is the Merciful One. And he's the
gracious one. And he's the loving one that will do the Rama and
Rahim and he reminds us all day long, you know, Al hamdu, lillahi,
rabbil, Alameen Rahmani Raheem, that he is the merciful one. But
he's also the Taha, the mighty one. He is also the Moontak him
the one who Avengers and takes revenge. So we our God is a very
comprehensive God. So when these things happen, we understand God
is behind that as well. It doesn't shake our faith. It's not supposed
to shake our faith, because God has many manifestations in the
world. And that's what's very important for us to understand not
to lose our faith. However, the fact that God knows that we are
very weak, he, his entire his entire interaction with the human
being is based on compassion, mercy, and he reminds us of this.
He never wants us to be despondent, otherwise. shaytaan
the devil will make us despondent, you do something wrong and make
you feel you are finished. You have no option. You have no choice
now, you have no way back. That is shaytans job to create
despondency. And God says, Oh, my servants who have transgressed
against themselves. Yeah, yeah. What is it? Yeah, a buddy
AlLadhina asstra for Allah and forsake
those servants of mine my servants who have transgressed against
themselves, law takuna to me Rahmatullah do not become
despondent, in Allah's mercy.
In New York fear your fear of Uber, Jamia? He forgives all sins.
He is more merciful than a mother. I don't know if you've ever
experienced this, but if we've misbehaved, right, and the father
comes home from work, and the mother, you know, the mother's
love for their child, it's that it's a parable. It's, it's a
proverbial, you know, idea. I mean, nobody. There's nobody else
who shows more mercy than mothers with their children, not even
fathers, that same mother, if we've been a bit mischievous, then
when the father comes home, that mother is going to say, your child
did this. You're not even a child anymore on that day. Right? But
Allah He addresses us and saying, Oh, my servants who have
transgressed against themselves. Yeah, EBA de in Arabic. That's
what it means. Oh, my servants, not Oh, those guys who's trying to
transgress themselves, know myself and you're still my servants. So
his whole ethos in dealing with us is based on mercy. He reminds us
of this in the solid that we do. He reminds me of this whenever we
do anything, say Bismillah R. Rahman Rahim. Merci. Merci. Merci.
The angels are all based on mercy. The Prophet he
sent is our hammer is the rock motto Lila mean is the Most
Merciful. For is the is a mercy for the entire mankind? Can you
see what kind of Mercy he's trying? He's trying to cause to
proliferate around the world he deals with. He deals with people
with mercy. He reminds us of His mercy. His motto is of mercy, his
entire mission statement, you can say, I mean, I hate to say that
word and reduce it to a business, right? But in the rahmati subaqua
hobby, it says that so clearly, the angels are based on mercy. The
profit is based on merci sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Now I
know that we have aggression in this world in the name of Islam,
unfortunately, and they're being very merciless, right.
SubhanAllah.
Just Just on that point.
It's all you know, whenever you think about Sharia, what comes to
mind first, let's establish it here. What does that mean? What
does that tell us? What does that evoke, in our mind, cut off some
hands. Right stone somebody to death. Unfortunately, this has
become like a synonym, because this is what some of our brethren
have propagated. And then the media picks it up and uses it to
create more Islamophobia. But do you know that
out of all of the Sharia laws, which incorporates Salatin, Zakat,
and hedge, marriage, trade, business, and so on, it's less
than a percent of the laws of Sharia.
It's a small percentage cutting of hands. But you get these brothers
of ours, you get these people in the world, right? call themselves
Muslim. And when they take over a little area, the first thing they
want to do is cut off people's hands and start whipping the
women. So what's your problem? You know, start teaching people soap,
you know, try to give people food that they've been looking for,
give them some prosperity and safety. Now, the first thing they
do is they just set out these these laws. It's just crazy.
Completely against the Mercy of Allah in the way Allah deals with
people. He forgives, forgives, forgives. Otherwise, if God was
to, if God was to take us to task for every little deed that we did,
we'd be we'd be in big trouble. But he forgives so many times I
remember once I was in class, and there was no teacher there.
There were no teacher there, the teacher was absent. And one of the
guys was messing around a lot. So the teacher then came in, and he
caught him.
And he caught him and this will probably about 14 1516 around
that. He said, No, this is the first time I've done this. And the
Sheikh is a Hadith teacher, he is a more facile, you know what he
said to him, that those words are very, you know, very strong at
that time for me, he said, That's impossible. Even God overlooks and
pardon so many times before he gets you. Right. So there you must
be doing this all the time. That's why I caught you today. And it was
actually right because everybody knew this guy was always messing
around.
That's Allah subhanaw taala with us. Now, what is our
responsibility is not just to try to
is not just to depend on that mercy. Because the the Hadith of
the Prophet sallallahu Sallam says that
the
the Arkin is the one who
is careful about these things. But the stupid one, the muck, right is
the one who
allows men at bar and NAFSA, who Hawa Waterman, Allah Allah, which
means he allows his self to go in pursuance of whatever desire that
comes about whatever he wants, or she wants to do. Somebody gives
them an idea, go and do this and it's wrong. It's haram. It's
impermissible. They go let's go on you know, let's go and have this
night out. You know, like you get some brothers sitting in the
canteen talking to sisters, like what are you doing? I'm giving
dower
right.
The you know, all of these kinds of things. What Domina Allah Allah
wa termina Allah Allah, which means vain hopes in Allah subhanaw
taala Oh, God is merciful. God is we don't want those kinds of
people to be thinking about God's mercy, although God's mercy is for
them as well. But God's mercy is for everybody
to think about, but we need to seek forgiveness. Because
forgiveness is a major part of our life. We are going to be wrong but
let's seek forgiveness. So now not to take too much of your time. I
just want to mention a few things which
I've suggested to a number of others, especially students.
And it's worked a lot and this is scientific.
This is not based on the unseen.
I guarantee you if you do this, empirically, you will find a
result in three weeks. Right? Which is what is that? You have to
do five things.
That's it, it probably take about half an hour of your day, but half
an hour in your 24 hours of your day,
to persevere to connect with God give you more contentment and
satisfaction and in sha Allah more baraka and blessing in your time,
that you will get more out of it.
When I was a student
in the madrasa, which means in the seminary, studying Quran, sunnah
Hadith, and so on, I was always on my books, I had no time for
football. That's why I'm very unfit. Right? I had no time for
sports. I was just on my books, that's that's what I would do. And
thus, I felt anything else was a waste of time. So while they would
be a vicar gathering, a gathering of remembrance of Allah for half
an hour, 20 minutes in, you know, that other shoots, some other
students would go to, I would say, No, it's wasting my time. I knew
the benefit of it, but I hadn't really
sunk in.
And then one day, maybe I was going through something and I
decided to go, and thus I went for several days only was exam time.
Now during exam time, your time becomes even more valuable. Even
for those people who don't want to study at all the time, suddenly,
an exam time is very valuable. And you know, what I found? I found a
marked difference in the way my day went in what I was able to
accomplish, basically blessing in time, blessing in time.
All time is in the hands of God, we have 24 hours, right? Every
day, you will have 24 hours. That doesn't change, okay? If you want
to go into you know, the leap years and the minute minute here
and there, right? That's a different issue. We have 24 hours
a day. But tell me something, have you not experienced that some
days, your 24 hours goes much faster than some other days, some
days in your 24 hours, you can accomplish a lot more, and you get
a lot more done. You feel very satisfied, and other days that the
date is the day and days go past the week goes past. Have you not
noticed that? What is the difference in that? Why do some
days go faster than others?
Why is it that some people can accomplish so much in short spans
of life? We've all heard of Imam Shafi. He died at the age of 53.
Yet he leaves this massive legacy behind him today we invoke Him
because daddy died at 55 Omar Abdullah Abdullah z is the second
great no the second homage to the great Salif of dominions, right,
well respected dies before the age of 40.
And yet, look at the legacy he leaves behind. And there's so many
other examples like this short lives, but you do a lot more in
that time. Wouldn't that be wonderful? We're not always
playing catch up with everything. But again, this is not
an observable phenomena until you try it. I'm telling you take half
an hour of your time out to do these things I'm going to tell
you, and you will get more blessing in your time, you'll just
think no man. And these things, though, they're so easy to do,
they're very difficult because
they're not as exciting unless you get used to them. So what what are
the five things that we must do? Number one, every day, we want you
to do 100 is still far, which means seeking forgiveness in the
morning, and 100 in the evening. That means you could say something
as simple as just a strong federal law. I seek forgiveness in Allah.
And just think of your sense, right 100 times in the morning,
the better one, as the federal law have been in equilibrium been to
LA, which incorporates Toba in it as well. I seek forgiveness in
Allah from all sins, and I returned to him.
Right? So that's, if you can do that. Just get a test be used
whatever you want 100 times in the morning sometimes and you know the
benefit of this is we are cleaning our inbox out. We are defragging
our system. Because in the morning when you do it overnight,
whatever's happened since the evening, any miss any word that
we've said, that's not been right, anything we've seen that's wrong,
whatever it may be any wrong that we've done, inshallah it's
forgiven.
In the evening, we do it again, anytime after us. You can do it.
Whatever is convenient for you.
What do we get forgiveness for the day so we again, clean sheets. So
literally, we are cleaning out our inboxes every day, twice a day.
Imagine how streamlined there'll be. We're cleaning out our house
every day. We're having two showers a day, think of it that
way, how clean a person was going to be. Now once we've done that
we've gained some purification. Now we need to embellish ourselves
and adorn ourselves How do you do that? We want some blessing. We
want some
bounty from Allah, the way we do that is we
SECOND POINT 100 Salawat on Rasulullah sallallahu Samina
morning and 100 in the evening Allahumma salli ala Sayyidina
Muhammad wa ala Sayidina Muhammad roboticle. Selim 100 times,
morning and evening, you if you don't want to do the big one
sallallahu alayhi wasallam Allahumma Salli, ala Mohammed,
something as simple as that. Oh god send your blessings on
Mohammed salah, what's the big deal? The Prophet sallallahu
sallam said, Whoever sends one blessing on me, God sends 10
blessings on him. We owe it to the Prophet awesome anyway. But when
we've sought forgiveness, we're clean and pure. Now we want to
embellish ourselves so that we have some blessing and Baraka.
Right? These are very important things for us. Now we've done
those two things. The third thing is our responsibility to the
Quran, which is our book, it's our Savior, it's so important for us,
if you can just read even one page a day.
Like forget a juice of the Quran, if you can't do a juice, if
easily, you can just read half a page a day, just to half a page.
If that is when you're going when you're on the bus or whatever it
may be, right, commuting. Use that time usefully. I know we are a
distracted, distracted generation with all of the Notifications we
get on our phone. And while we may put our phone on to read the
Quran, but we'll see a whatsapp notification or a Facebook
notification will say let me just check that out. And that is just
endless. So it just needs discipline. Right? Read half a
page of the Quran a day, preferably with its meaning if you
can, that's number three. The Quran is a light for the hearts.
The Quran is a removal of cares, the Quran is a blessing. The Quran
invokes the Mercy of Allah subhanaw taala believes believe me
do these three things. So the first one was
seeking forgiveness cystic for number two was Salawat on the
Prophet sallallahu Sallam number three a bit of Quran.
Number four then is something more specific.
This is some kind of meditation.
What I mean is private time with Allah.
Five to seven minutes a day, a private moment with Allah. Look,
we make solid right? But we are solid is very challenged. We make
solid. Those of us who do solid, our solid, unfortunately is not
what it should be. We do solid and then what happens. We start off
we're going to autopilot. As Salam aleikum wa rahmatullah you have
landed, right? What happened in between, we're so professional in
our solids,
or were completely negligent of our solids. To be able to get some
concentration and connect with Allah, we need to spend five to 10
minutes of some kind, five to 710 minutes if you're lucky, right?
Have some kind of meditation and interaction, intimate discourse
with Allah Now, what are you going to do in that time? Many things
you can do? You sit down and you just just think, where am i
Where's my life going? How much God has given me. He sent me to
Cambridge, he's given me this wonderful parents in sha Allah has
given me a good mind, good grades, I've got good prospects.
Think of all of the great things Allah has given you. And then
think, how much have we given back in return?
That's one minute. Just think about if I'm to die tomorrow, the
next minute, what's going to happen? There's one very, very
powerful one, right, which I found to be very useful is you know, to
think about different things, you might get a bit bored or whatever.
So this way, I'll tell you what to do. You sit down, you close your
eyes, lower your head, it's useful to lower your head because this is
about the heart. So you want to lower your head so that it's close
to your heart. It's just easier to connect with your heart like that.
Right.
You imagine that Allah's Mercy imagine a ray of light, whatever
you want to think a Merton Allah's Mercy is descending on your heart,
left hand side and purifying your heart. Because Allah's Mercy is
everywhere. Right? Our heart becomes darkened with our sins. So
we Allah, Allah has mercy is coming down and purifying our
heart. This is just to set us up. We're not going to think of this
for too long. We just set us up like this. Then for the rest of
the minutes, we just, once we've got that focus, then we just say
Allah, Allah, Allah with our heart. You're not saying anything
with your tongue. You're just doing it with your heart. You
mean? Basically you're saying that you are imagining that my heart is
saying Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah just calling out to Allah.
You do that five, seven minutes.
Very difficult. We are just, we can't focus. Believe me. If you
get seven minutes to 10 minutes every day. And we do it. It's not
going to happen overnight, meaning you're going to get distracted,
but don't
Give up shaytani is going to distract you. But this is a very
intimate moment with Allah. What this will benefit you is will show
you how to focus on Allah so that the next time you're praying
Quran, you're making solid, you will be able to focus in on on
salads, your mind won't be all over the place. And it will help
you focus it will help you in your studies, they'll help you with
everything because we learn to focus. Do you know that today the
people, there's only one thing that people focus on?
And where they can just be mesmerized? Does anybody know what
that is?
There's only one thing.
No, I mean, like for, you know, something grabbed you for an hour.
Sorry, the TV, the TV, it can carry you. And the reason for that
is it's the way the whole video, visual and sound and everything.
What it does is that it beams directly into your, the center of
your brain. And the thinking parts of your brain shut down. Because
you don't have to do any thinking. And anybody who's so used to that,
especially growing up, they're not going to be able to they're not
going to be able to get the lectures because they can't
concentrate. They keep drifting away, they have to check their
phones in between, like even in your lectures, do you check, do
you check your phone? Right? I supposed to be concentrating, we
check our phone, so distracted, addicted, whatever you want to
call it, this would be really, really useful. Right? So it's time
for Salawat Quran, if even half a page, believe me, is still
beneficial. Make it very easy. And number four was seven minutes five
to seven minutes of this meditation, it's very powerful.
And number five
is was number five. Number five is that once a week, you must somehow
somewhere, attend a gathering that reminds you of Allah.
Otherwise, what's going to happen is, you will do this for a few
days and then you'll get caught up with something else even forget,
we need constant reminders and inspiration. Now I know that
sometimes if you're in a certain place, you can't get a gathering
where that just remind you of Allah whether that be a vicar
gathering a Tafseer gathering, right? Not just an MSA not just an
Isaac meeting, right? Not something else join while those
are good things. They're not conducive for just remembering
Allah, their management things do you understand the difference?
Something that reminds you of Allah, something that makes you
feel connected, something that makes you reflect? If you can't
find a physical gathering, find something online, find some
YouTube lectures, that really make you think about Allah, not
entertaining lectures, not comedic lectures, right? While they have
their benefits, we need to move beyond them to something that will
be spiritually rejuvenating. That really makes you think if you do
this, within three weeks you will see a difference in yourself. You
will be a calmer person, you will have more trust in God you will
deal with the pitfalls and the setbacks in your life inshallah
much better. And above all, when you feel connected to Allah, that
feeling no riches can give you
you will see a difference inshallah. So with that, I ask
Allah subhanaw taala for assistance and help for all of us,
because we all have our various different challenges wherever we
may be. But may Allah subhanaw taala give us the ability to do
these things, and to grant us His love, and grant a security and
safety grant is the ability to have well being and to be
successful in our endeavors in this world but above all
successful insha Allah in the Hereafter. And with that I close
in sha Allah could adapt well not only hamdulillahi rabbil aalameen