Ali Ataie – Fasting is a Shield
AI: Summary ©
The importance of fasting for achieving healthy spiritual health and breakthroughs in one's health is discussed, including the need for individuals to practice self-awareness during fasting to avoid becoming annoying during the day. The importance of guarding Allah's injunctions and protecting the heart from potential damage is emphasized, along with the need for individuals to practice self-awareness to avoid becoming annoying during the day and to use the moment of discomfort as a gl Presentation. The importance of learning to be in a healthy relationship with Allah and not just trying to be in a healthy relationship is also emphasized.
AI: Summary ©
At the end of the last session, I
said that the rationale behind fasting is given
in the Quran.
Verse 183.
Allah
tells us to
fast
in order for you to attain taqwa.
In pre Islamic times, the word taqwa was
used by the Arabs as a fencing term.
It meant to, you know, parry the attack
of an incoming sword.
When we practice taqwa in Islam, we are
protecting ourselves
from anything that might harm the state of
our spiritual hearts
and thus might harm our relationship
with Allah
And our relationship with Allah
is everything.
No other relationship is as important. I guarantee
you.
The prophet, he
said on the difficult day of Ta'if,
right, after he was insulted and abused by
the Bani Fatif,
he said, if this is happening to me
and you are not angry with me, right,
so this is his supplication,
his words to Allah
If this is happening to me and you're
not angry with me,
then I am fine with it.
You see, his only concern
was the state of his relationship with Allah.
Therefore, the Muqtakhi,
okay, is the one who guards his spiritual
heart
by practicing self discipline. He has control over
his impulses
with the goal of mastering the self. He's
not a slave to his impulses and desires,
which is a very common form
of idolatry. It's called egolatry,
worship of the ego. Right? From ego, meaning
the self and the latveo.
These are both Greek words meaning to offer
cultic worship.
Right? That the true Muqtati
is only a slave to Allah
It is not permissible to be enslaved
to anything or to anyone other than Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. And everyone is enslaved to
something.
Right? The Quran says,
have you seen the one who
The one who has taken as his god
his own Hawa, his own desires,
his own caprice.
The Quran doesn't buy atheism.
Everybody is enslaved to something and worship something.
When the Hawa of the atheist or the
anti theist
says to him,
oh my slave, let's eat this or drink
that. Let's commit this act or that act.
He responds, labayk at your service, yarab, oh
my lord.
Most modern satanists
don't actually believe in Satan, by the way,
as an actual person.
For them to worship Satan to worship Satan
is to worship your desires.
This is what they say.
Just yesterday, unfortunately, I saw a commercial
for a hair removal product
whose tagline was quote, worship
yourself
and the rest will follow.
You know? So the you know, these ad
agencies, they're smart. They know what appeals to
people
in 2021.
It's not smart to alien alienate yourself
from people when you're trying to sell them
a product. They know this will sell.
People have this people are locked in this
type of egolatry, this worship of the nafs,
of the ego.
In Islam, we are taught to discipline the
nafs and to worship God. In this culture,
young people are taught to worship the nafs
and make themselves God.
The prophet
he said,
fasting is a shield.
So the words
and
all come from a root word meaning something
hidden
or concealed.
Okay? The fast acts like a hidden shield.
So when we fast, we pay special attention,
special vigilance
to the state of our hearts
and there are 7 inroads to the heart
that must be guarded according to the scholars.
The hands, the feet,
the eyes, the ears, the tongue, the *,
and the stomach.
So when we fast, we train ourselves not
to abuse creation
with our hands.
We do not we do not allow our
feet to take us to places
that are displeasing to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
We do not allow our ears to gaze
at the impermissible. We do not allow our
ears to listen to the impermissible.
We do not we do not allow our
our tongues to speak the impermissible, and we
learn to have control
over our sexual organs and appetite for food.
The prophet
said, guard
Allah,
and Allah will guard you.
Meaning guard his injunctions,
his his
and he will protect you and preserve you.
Imam Al Jafar as Sadhak, he said taqwa
is that Allah never misses you where he's
commanded you to be and he never finds
you where he has prohibited you to be.
So when we practice this heightened state of
self vigilance,
this heightened state of muraqabah during Ramadan,
we are metaphorically setting up these security checkpoints
upon the inroads to the heart, thus protecting
the heart
from potential attackers.
And this this leads to a heart that
is a state of being that is spiritually
healthy and pleasing to our lord. And again,
that's everything. It's all about relationship with Allah
Right? Ibrahim alaihi salam is is praised in
the Quran because he was the quintessential
monotheist
and because he brought to his Lord a
sound, healthy,
spiritual heart.
In other words, he was a person of
taqwa in the most perfect sense.
But there's a certain methodology we have to
follow,
right, in order to be in this healthy
relationship. We can't just make up a method.
We can't just place our hopes in somebody
else to do the work for us.
Those are different religions. We have to do
the work. The word Muslim is an active
participle.
It's not passive. We have to get busy
doing this work.
Now when we abstain from food and drinks
during the daylight hours,
we're going to feel these twinges of hunger
and thirst throughout the day. I'm sure all
of you have experienced this. We're coming down
to the end of the month now. This
is unavoidable,
but what we tend to do when this
happens is that we tend to look at
our watches and phones
and begin asking ourselves, how many more hours
until Maghrib? How many more hours do I
have to do this? How many more days
do I have to do this? If this
happens to you, catch yourself
then ask yourself why am I fasting?
Of course, there's,
of course, there's going to be hunger and
thirst for long hours. You already knew that.
So why are you doing this? So remind
yourself that the purpose of fasting is not
to simply feel,
you know, the discomfort of hunger and thirst
and then to try to get this over
with as quickly and as painlessly as possible.
There's gonna be pain. There's gonna be discomfort.
Get comfortable being uncomfortable.
The prophet, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, he said,
How many people are there that fast, that
get nothing from their fast except hunger and
thirst?
The purpose of fasting is to grow in
taqwa.
You see, the 30 days of Ramadan, they'll
come and go. They come and go. They
come quickly. They go quickly.
They are
as the Quran says. Just a few days
when you really consider it.
Take advantage of it. It's going to be
here. Take advantage. One of my teachers said
that when you feel those uncomfortable pangs
of hunger and thirst while fasting, feed yourself,
he said.
Feed yourself the spiritual sustenance
of the dhikr of Allah.
Spend the time that you would normally spend
eating breakfast or lunch
and read some Quran or better yet memorize
the Quran
or just say
The prophet
said said
Just say this over and over. He said
Right? He said that
fills the scales. He says
fill what is between the heaven and the
earth. These are weighty.
We don't see the weight in this world.
They don't weigh what does what does speech
weigh? It doesn't weigh anything. But in the
speech has weight.
Has weight on the
The scales are calibrated differently.
On
the meditate upon the names of Allah. Satiate
yourself
with spiritual sustenance. The of Allah is
according to Abu Talib Al Makki.
Literally, the food of the hearts.
With this type of food, you can be
gluttonous,
eat as much as you want, and eat
copious
copious amounts of,
during Ramadan.
We will continue with our reflections, our final
reflection
in the next session
inshallah. Until then,