Ali Hammuda – Guilt – Why them and not me
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
It seems that every moment of joy that
we experience today,
particularly in the last 10 months or so,
in light of the ongoing genocide in Gaza,
the floods
in Bangladesh, and the destruction in Sudan and
other places in the Muslim world.
It seems that
any moment of joy that we experience in
our day today,
whether with family or with friends, or even
those moments you spend by yourself,
are all of a sudden and without introduction,
punctured
with an overwhelming
sense of grief
and pain
and guilt.
As you remember those images of disaster,
of bloodshed,
children with no limbs and people dying of
hunger,
Images which you remember and see so vividly,
and it drains
the joy
of any moment you may be experiencing
at any given hour of the day.
Here we say, as a footnote, how merciful
is Allah
for making the universe like this.
Volatile,
unstable,
by design.
This is the definition of the life of
man.
So that those who are comfortable,
they never become complacent
because things will change.
And so that the sinner doesn't wander off
for too long, you will have to come
back because life will change.
And so that the conqueror, the defeater,
does it become arrogant because life will change?
And so that those who are defeated and
oppressed
never despair and give up. They remember things
will change.
Nevertheless,
the scale of the carnage,
the sheer size of the monstrosity
killing machine
that has claimed tens of thousands to date
there in Palestine,
has been so dramatic
that it has clearly altered the way that
the modern man thinks.
Perhaps you've noticed just over a year ago
or so, people were complaining of their problems
rise in the cost of living covid before
that.
They were saying why me?
Complaining Why
me?
Why should I suffer like this? And they
began to doubt their faith had a crisis
in iman.
All of a sudden, after what they have
seen there in Gaza and the live minute
by minute updates that they are receiving on
their phones, the mentality has changed.
No longer is the modern man saying, why
me?
He is asking,
why not me?
Why then
and not me?
Why should I be able to enjoy a
warm meal every day?
Why should I live in security?
Why should I be at home
enjoying my time with my spouse, kissing my
children, and playing with them, when I know
that my brothers and sisters are not experiencing
this guilt? No longer are we complaining to
Allah saying, why me?
We are saying,
why not me? Why them?
This is in reference to a well documented
phenomenon described by some as survivor's guilt.
Or in Arabic, we may translate it as
Survivor's guilt is a phenomenon that says,
man will experience a sense of grief,
guilt,
even disgust at himself,
when he sees others whom he loves and
cares about suffering a trauma, death, loss of
property,
and he will feel responsible for it.
He will feel responsible for having caused that
or in some cases, it wasn't even his
fault, but this is the nature of survivor's
guilt.
You will feel a sense of blame and
hurt and guilt for having survived something that
they had not survived from.
For enjoying something that they are not enjoying.
And this experience that we describe as survivor's
guilt
is part of a bigger construct Allah has
placed inside of you and I. It is
called empathy.
And the idea of empathy
is your ability to
imagine
yourself in the situation of somebody else. That's
called empathy, and survivor's guilt is a direct
extension
of this inbuilt characteristic
called empathy that Allah Almighty has built inside
of us.
However, if we are not careful,
this guilt, this
could overflow
and could overwhelm us, and there are signs
that it has started to do that with
some of us.
And this can push us,
as they say, to substance use mis disorder,
irrational thinking,
desensitization,
social distancing,
a sense of numbness,
and even a crisis
in iman as you begin to doubt Allah
as you look at this mass tragedy unfolding.
This is why we speak about it today.
The purpose of speaking about survivor's guilt is
not to spotlight you and I
at the expense of others who are truly
suffering.
No.
The reason why I center this khutba around
us
because we have reached a juncture in our
Umma where we cannot afford to lose a
single member of the Muslims
to the paralysis and the death and the
numbness of survivor's guilt.
The global order is shifting beneath our feet
as you can see.
The world will not be the same ever
again.
So we need every Muslim to keep his
eye on the ball,
to be awake,
to be energetic,
to be optimistic,
to frame life's events correctly.
We cannot afford anyone to falter at this
time.
Energy and motivation, reliance upon Allah is what
is required.
This is why we speak about it today,
to ensure that we are not debilitated
by the constant feed of information that we
are getting through our phones.
So let us begin. First of all, we
say, brother or sister, the idea of feeling
guilt for your brother or sister who is
suffering,
that is a wholesome reality.
That is a sign that you have brimming
iman, healthy connection to Allah
It's not wrong.
Because how cold, how dead,
how burdened
with sin must a heart be to roam
around in life unaffected, unbothered, as if nothing
is happening across the other side of the
globe.
No. The fact that you are feeling this
guilt and this pain, the fact that you
stay up at night, the fact that you
shed tears,
the fact that you sometimes feel helpless,
conceptually as an idea by default, this is
a sign of iman because you care about
your siblings in iman.
And that is why
our prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam, he said
to
he asked him the question,
do you love to go to Jannah?
And he said yes, oh, messenger of Allah.
He said to
him,
so love for your brother what you love
for yourself.
And the hadith that all of us have
memorized as children,
we learned in the masjid
None of you
will attain the high level of full iman
until
you learn how to love for your brother
what you love for yourself.
You've memorized this hadith yet. Do you know
how the scholars of Islam have commented on
this one narration?
Abu Dawood as Sijistani, he said about this
hadith.
That is one of the narrations which the
whole religion of Islam revolves around.
No iman
until you love for your brother what you
love for yourself.
We can recite Quran as much as we
want and learn our
todweed. You can push yourself to the limit
of salah and siyam, fasting. Excellent. You may
fill your calendar with all sorts of islamic
lectures, talks and conferences. Brilliant. And we may
convince ourselves that we are righteous people
but the reality remains
that our iman is deficient.
It is weak. It is lacking. It is
critically out of low until
we learn how to truly feel the pain
of our brothers and sisters locally or worldwide.
So the fact that you're feeling this,
say,
The fact that you are experiencing this idea
of survivor's guilt or whether we call it
whatever you would like to label it, say
that your heart is throbbing with pain at
the sight of a Muslim who is suffering.
Here allow me to share with you a
few examples
of the finest generation to walk the earth,
the companions of our prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam,
and how they felt the sense of guilt
and pain
if they enjoyed a luxury, even if it
was simply a warm meal
that was not enjoyed by
people they loved.
Abu Hurair who
walks through the streets and he sees a
group of men who have a cooked sheep
in front of them. They invite, Abu Hurayrah,
come eat with us.
And then he remembers something, and so he
declines the invitation. He said,
He said, the prophet
died.
He left this world,
and he never ate to his fill with
respect to even barley bread.
It hurt him.
There was some consequence on his actions
because of the guilt that he felt.
Likewise, our mother Aisha
she said
She said anytime that I eat my fill,
I'm able to cry if I want.
They said to her, masruq. He asked her,
how come?
She said,
She said, because I remember the way in
which the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam died. I
remember his state.
She said,
Because not once in his life did he
eat meat and bread to his fill twice
in one day.
The guilt never left them
because their hearts were filled with iman.
And likewise,
Abdul Rahman, Ibn Nahu alayhiallahu alayhiallahu, food was
presented to him after a long day's worth
of siyam, fasting.
He comes to break his fast, and then
he stops. He remembers something. The image arrives.
And he said,
Mosheb
ibn
Umayr
was killed, and he is a much better
man than me.
He said. And when he died,
we couldn't find anything to shroud him with
except a single piece of cloth. If we
covered his head, his feet would show. If
we pulled it down to his feet, his
head would show.
Was the most spoiled young man in Mecca,
one of the finest,
one of the most fragrant.
He became a Muslim. He gave it all
up for the sake of Allah, and he
died as a martyr with nothing even to
shroud him. Abdur Rahman remembered it as he
was having his iftar, breaking his riyam.
And then he said
Then life has just unfolded its riches to
us.
And we fear that Allah is giving us
our dunya
so that he gives us nothing.
He cried so much, and he left the
food.
So they felt this pain that you are
experiencing.
Whether we called it survivor's guilt or anything
else, they experienced it,
when those who are either better than them
or people whom they loved, didn't experience the
luxuries that they were experiencing.
But here is the difference.
Their survivors guilt as righteous men and women
of the past, didn't cause any of the
negative outcomes that we quoted earlier.
Their survivors guilt
never caused them to doubt Allah Almighty, never
caused them numbness in inside of their hearts,
never caused them social distancing, never caused them
irrational thinking, never caused them a crisis of
iman, never cause them to question Allah and
his hikmah.
But sometimes with us it does.
The only thing they questioned was themselves, not
Allah.
When they saw a tragedy,
not Allah Almighty who was the subject of
their questioning, they questioned themselves. Have I discharged
my responsibilities
towards Allah?
And so their survivors guilt allowed them to
grow in iman.
And it made them people of shukr to
Allah Ar Rahman. Gratitude.
And it redoubled their commitment to the Ummah.
It energized them. It didn't paralyze them.
So here we ask the question,
how can you and I
ensure that our survivors' guilt, in light of
what we see in the Gaza
or Sudan or elsewhere, how can we ensure
that our pangs of guilt do not debilitate
us,
deactivate us, and destroy us from being activists?
How can we ensure that we grow because
of it? I will suggest 3 items. Take
note of them in your mind, please.
Number 1,
manage your consumption
of tragic content online.
It is completely natural
to search for information
because we find safety and comfort in knowledge,
especially during times of hardship.
We look for more information, it allows us
in a rest.
However, be careful, beware of crossing over into
what they call doom scrolling.
Doom scrolling. Doom scrolling is a term that
has been recently added into the Oxford dictionary,
and it refers to the idea of endlessly
scrolling through bad
news
online.
And this has a negative effect on the
human brain where it is no longer able
to receive any more distressful input.
It overwhelms the the nervous system, and you
reach your threshold of fatigue, and this is
when desensitization
occurs in paralysis
because you have consumed more than the point
of necessity.
I understand we want to stay up to
date and we have a duty to stay
up to date,
But you will know that and you will
remember back in the days when we used
to receive the news once in the day.
It was just the 11 o'clock broadcast, and
that was it.
Now you have a minute by minute update
on the most tragic and harrowing scenes coming
live to your phone any hour of the
day.
The human brain is not designed to receive
this type of content around the clock.
And that is why when the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wasallam, he saw Sophia,
the sister of Hamza,
coming to the battlefield.
And her brother Hamza was martyred and his
torso was opened. He was mutilated and martyred.
She was rushing through to see her brother.
Her son, Az Zubayyah, tried to stop her,
and she punched him in his chest. She
was a strong woman. Get out of my
way.
The prophet
saw her coming. He said,
The woman, the woman.
Meaning what?
Don't allow her to come and see this.
Stop her in her tracks. She can't see
her brother in this state.
There's only so much that you can bear
as a human being.
Now I understand this will seem selfish.
Some of us will say, what are you
talking about? You're telling me to withdraw and
to manage my consumption of media
and to not see what is happening in
Gaza? Is this about me and my feelings?
They are living the trauma.
Am I not allowed to see the trauma?
I should be strong enough. I'm a man.
I will see it. I will share it.
Every video, every post, the world needs to
see the truth. I've got a manna,
even though it may be hurting me. I'm
not suggesting that you withdraw from your activism
for Palestine at all.
I am simply suggesting that you take strategic
breaks from the consumption of tragic content
so that you see the world for what
it is.
So that you think well of Allah
So that there is a balance that you
maintain, an equilibrium
in emotional state, spiritual state, and mental state.
This is required.
And here I will suggest a distribution.
How you can distribute your time when managing
your information and content that you receive about
Palestine or elsewhere.
I suggest
10%
of your time
to finding out the news that is happening
on the ground, the live updates. Give that
10% or so of your time.
Perhaps another 10%
for the political analysis,
for what is happening on the ground by
trusted and credible sources.
And the remainder of your 80% of your
day and the time you've allocated for this
Dedicated
to consuming beneficial Islamic talks and lectures by
trusted
and reliable
and relevant
scholars of Islam who are talking about what
is happening on the ground,
and who will help you frame the events
on the ground in an Islamic frame.
So the majority of what you consume is
Islamic,
is ideological.
It's it's
that. Why?
So that you don't think bad of Allah
Almighty.
You understand that there is meaning behind the
tragedy that is happening, and it's not limited
to those raw
footage that you are watching every day. This
is required.
This distribution of 10%, 10%, 80%, 80%. I
understand it is not solid.
It is not absolute,
but I claim that it is inspired by
the Quran.
Because when you look at how the Quran
addresses tragedy,
it will dedicate a minority of ayaat to
describe the event. A minority.
And then the majority of the verses will
deal with what?
To how to frame the event and understand
it in light of dunya and akhirah and
Allah and his wisdom.
Take Suratul Buruj as an example.
22 ayaat
that deal
with the genocide of a community who were
killed
by fire.
Only 4 ayaat are dedicated to describing the
event.
Minority
And 18 or so a'at, about 80%,
is dedicated to connecting the meanings of iman
into the event, to understand it.
Describing the event for a'at, kutila'ashabuluhdud,
the people of the trench were
killed.
The fire that was filled with fuel.
When they were sat upon
the fire.
And they were witness to what they did
to the believers. 4 ayaat describing the event,
and that's it.
Then the majority now of the ayaat do
what?
Raise the morale of the believer to see
the deeper meanings at play.
They only resented them because they believed in
Allah, the most mighty worthy of praise.
He who controls, has dominion of the heavens
and
And Allah is witness over all things.
Those who punish the believing men and women
with fire, and then they did not repent.
We will send them to the hellfire, and
they will burn in *.
Those who believe and they do good, we
will give them gardens beneath which rivers flow.
That is the supreme success. Look at how
Allah is framing the event.
The grip of your Lord is severe.
He begins and he repeats,
He is the forgiving and the loving,
owner of the glorious throne.
He does whatever he wills.
So on and so on and so on.
So this is where a suggestion of how
you could consume
the tragic content. Manage it so that you
think well of Allah,
and you understand your role in it. That's
number 1. Number 2,
keep moving.
Keep active.
Keep contributing.
Less talking
and more activism
for the cause of Philistine and the other
causes of justice.
I have found in my short experience that
those who are most calm, collected, composed at
peace,
even in the face of tragedy and pain,
happen to be those same people who are
living by meanings bigger than themselves.
Those who are alleviating the struggles of others,
Allah Almighty alleviates their struggles when they are
in pain. They are most at peace.
And Allah promised this in the Quran
when he said,
Oh, you who believe, if you are told
to make space for people in the gatherings,
make space, and I, Allah, will make space
for you.
Something as small as making space for your
brother in a gathering, Allah promises to make
space for you in your life and in
your hereafter.
So those men and women who stay active
during times of tragedy,
they have the most space in their hearts
because they're busy making space in the lives
of others. That's number 2. And number 3,
and I will leave you with this.
You can ensure that your survivor's guilt doesn't
bring you down by building your imani core.
Building your Islamic core. They tell us in
the gym that we need to take care
of the core exercises. Everything else is pointless
if you don't take care of your core.
I suggest here take care of your core
iman,
your imani core.
And another observation I will share with you
before I sit down and that is,
and this may offend some,
I understand that doubts
can happen
at a time of mass trauma. I get
it.
I also come to discover in my short
life
that those men and women who have an
intimate connection with the Quran over many years,
Inhaling from its air
and growing under its shade
and drinking from its fountains
and shaping their minds around its meanings, they
are the people who are least bothered,
least affected by the storms of doubt when
they arrive.
The same doubts that may claim you and
I, they are anchored. Why? Because they have
a lifelong connection with the Quran. Not just
a connection of recitation, not just a connection
of tawhid and recitation
and memorization.
A connection of tadaq or contemplation and study.
They are anchored when others are drowning.
Strengthen your imani core and rediscover the Quran,
my brother, my sister.
In conclusion,
the events in Gaza
must have some consequence on our lives.
Something has to change.
I remember a sister
who said that
as thankful as I am to Allah
that he has guided me back to my
religion and repentance,
after so many years of sleep,
I am thankful.
But I am guilty inside that it took
so many children in Gaza to die for
me to find my Islamic awakening.
Our guilt
is not just because we're unable to change
their circumstance.
Our guilt
is also because we are unwilling to change
our circumstance.
You have seen so many lives that have
come to an end there in Palestine and
elsewhere.
Why is my Islamic life yet to begin?
So many homes were shattered. Is it not
time now that I build my home in
Jannah because of it?
Our guilt comes that we are unable and
still unwilling to change our lives
despite what is happening there.
So if you are weeping, my brother, with
due respect, you are crying because of what
you are seeing, but the tears are not
going to change your life, then with all
due respect, please spare this spare us of
your tears. The ummah doesn't need them today.
But if these tears are going to have
some change on your life,
some change on your dress, my sister, some
change in your business,
your trade,
your relationships,
your public and private appearance,
then allow those tears to flow because how
welcome and how righteous are those tears?