Bilal Assad – The Law of Attraction & Manifestation
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AI: Transcript ©
In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious,
the Most Merciful, all praise is due to
Allah, and peace and blessings be upon the
Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon
you, my brothers and sisters.
Today, although I'm going through the book Riyadh
As-Saliheen, we've arrived at a wonderful hadith,
but subhanallah, it opened the door to a
very interesting topic we called the law of
attraction or manifestation.
I don't know if you've heard about that
term, but today, inshallah, we're going to talk
about it from an Islamic perspective, and you'll
find that it's deep-rooted in our, the
concept is important to learn about because it
affects our ideology, our belief system in Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala, and I think it's
a very important topic to be addressed.
So I begin with the, first of all,
the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ in Riyadh
As-Saliheen, Rawat At-Tirmidhi, and others, that
Ibn Abbas, Abdullah Ibn Abbas radiyallahu anhu, was
a young boy at that time, he was
about 12 or 11 years old, and he
is the first cousin of the Prophet ﷺ,
of course.
So one time he was with him on
his camel, and the Prophet ﷺ decided to
teach him a few important words of wisdom.
So he said to him, Ya Ghulam, Ghulam
means, oh young lad, oh young boy, a
person who's between 9 years old, 12 years
old is called a Ghulam, something like that,
he said, Oh Ghulam, I will entrust you
in some matters, I will advise you some
words, be watchful of Allah, his commandments, the
commandments of Allah, his watchfulness, be watchful of
Allah, be watchful of his commandments, and he
will preserve you.
Be watchful of the commandments of Allah, and
he will preserve you.
Safeguard his rights, and he will be ever
with you, meaning in your support.
If you beg, beg of him alone, and
if you need assistance, supplicate to Allah alone
for help.
And remember that if all the people gather
to benefit you, if all the people were
to gather to benefit you, they will not
be able to benefit you except that which
Allah had foreordained for you, what he has
written for you.
And if all of them gather to do
harm to you, they will not be able
to afflict you with anything other than which
Allah had predestined against you, what has been
written against you.
The pens had been lifted, and the ink
had dried up.
There is nothing left to destine.
Allah has written all his knowledge and everything
that will be, and has decided which direction
everything is going to go in the wisdom
that he knows based on his knowledge, eternal
knowledge, based on his justice and wisdom, and
he wrote it, he created it, it's over.
Whatever is going to happen is going to
happen.
Now, this is a core belief in our
deen, Islam.
Whoever does not believe in every part of
this hadith, every part of this point, has
disbelieved in the Qur'an and the message
that Allah has sent with Muhammad ﷺ, all
his prophets.
It is pure tawheed, monotheism, that Allah is
separate from his creation, and his creation is
separate from him.
What does it mean?
It means Allah is not in his creation,
and his creation is not in him.
He is not bound by his creation, he
is not bound by time or place, and
Allah is not dependent on his creation.
Complete separation.
Yet he knows, sees, and hears all things
right down to the subatomic objects, particles, everything.
So in Islam, everything that happens, everything that
we do, every reaction, every attraction, everything that
doesn't happen to us, everything is in whose
will and power?
Allah.
Of course we have choices, and that choice
is part of Allah's will, that he gave
us some free will, and he put consequences
to those free will, and he put physical
realities, cause and effect, that in general, if
you do certain things, there are consequences or
rewards for them in this life and in
the hereafter.
But the Muslim's belief is that not everything
we do that's supposed to have a consequence
necessarily will have a consequence unless Allah wills
it.
There are so many things we do that
normally would have consequences by cause and effect,
but Allah saves us from them.
Example, have you seen people for example online
or on YouTube or anywhere, where they escaped
getting run over by a millisecond for example.
Or somebody who fell from a high cliff
is meant to die, but somehow they fell
on certain things that by the will of
Allah they stayed alive, whereas any other person
would have died.
These phenomenons we cannot explain them, but what
we can say is this is qada and
qadr, this is the predestiny and will of
Allah.
So when we may perceive that a person
should die, if Allah has not willed for
them to die, they will not die.
And when we perceive that a person should
have lived for example, if Allah has not
willed for them to live, will they live?
No.
No matter how much we try.
There are times when we try and try.
We think, we intend, we do.
We do everything possibly that we can and
we expect an outcome, but the outcome is
not in our favour.
Isn't that true?
Whose control is that all in?
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So this is called the belief in qadr,
that Allah had pre-measured everything to be.
I've given a long talk, a three part
series about qada and qadr.
For those of you who want to go
back to it, it's on YouTube.
Inshallah maybe one day we'll do it again.
But I wanted to open up with this
introduction because of the topic which has confused
unfortunately even a lot of Muslims now, including
those who are religious and are knowledgeable even,
who have gotten confused with the concept of
this thing called law of attraction and manifestation.
Now brothers and sisters, I find that it's
affected more our sisters, women, in this idea
of law of attraction and manifestation.
In fact there are some sisters who are
now online, they make posts trying to explain
it, in favour of it.
And there are brothers also who think of
it as well.
It actually crept into the Muslim world and
now I feel there are more Muslims who
are asking me about it.
So I thought maybe it's a good time
to talk about it because it can be
the dividing line between tawheed and shirk, between
monotheism and polytheism, belief and disbelief.
So let's have a look at it inshallah
and how it relates to this hadith that
we had just read.
Focus on the part of the hadith which
says, if you ask or beg from anyone
then only ask from whom?
From Allah.
This doesn't mean that you can't go to
the doctor and ask them how they can
treat yourselves from a disease or ask your
parents for money or ask your employer to
increase your wealth.
This is not what is meant here in
the hadith.
These are causes and effects which Allah created
in life but we're talking about that you
should not rely on people and created things
at all without Allah.
You have to rely on Allah in everything
and believe that no one can do anything
if Allah doesn't will it.
But of course you seek and obviously if
something is not rational, has no logic to
it, no rationale to it, no sharia, no
teachings in Islam, the Quran and the sunnah,
then also it's forbidden for us to believe
in it and take it.
For example, if a person, a very obvious
example, you go and ask an idol to
provide you with something or you look up
into the stars and you say the stars
will give me something.
These are obviously haram and shirk and irrational
and illogical in every sense and goes against
the Quran and sunnah.
So we're going to talk more about that
inshallah.
And then focus on this hadith as well
that says that if the entire world and
everyone were together to benefit you with something
Allah had not willed for you, it will
not benefit you.
And if they all came to harm you
with something that Allah had not predestined for
you and written, it will not happen.
The pen is lifted and the ink is
dried.
Does everybody understand that part clearly?
Okay, now let's look in practice.
Unfortunately, when it comes to practice, people still
get it confused.
All of these have a connection to this
idea called the law of attraction and manifestation.
There is a beautiful book by a good
friend and very well learned expert in atheism
and scholar of ideologies, Sheikh Haytham Talat.
He wrote a book called Spiritual Atheism.
What a very smart title.
Spiritual Atheism.
It's a new age movement and thought that
is based on an ancient idea where a
person forgets about God but continues to be
spiritual but without God.
It's called Spiritual Atheism.
Keep God out of the picture and remain
spiritual.
And it stems from the ideas of Buddhism,
Hinduism and others.
And all of these, they include law of
attraction, manifestation, zodiacs, astrology, positive and negative energy.
You know somebody will say, I feel negative
energy in here.
My family is toxic.
They just give me negative vibes.
My work colleagues at work fire this person
and that person.
Why?
Negative energy.
Husband and wife, it's toxic negative energy.
Wow, when I'm around this person, it gives
out such positive energy.
Energy is not a thing by the way.
Did you know that?
Energy is nothing.
It's not really tangible in science.
It's nothing.
It's just a capacity that something can do
something.
So when I move, it's a capacity.
It's called energy.
It's not really a thing that you can
touch.
It's nothing.
So when you say energy, there's nothing really
there.
It's just a capacity.
But we'll talk about that a bit more.
I don't want to lose you.
What does Islam say about it?
Do we believe in it?
Do we not?
What about certain hadiths and ayat of the
Qur'an that says things like be optimistic
and you will reach it?
What about when the Prophet ﷺ told us
to be optimistic and not be pessimistic?
What about the saying of the Prophet ﷺ,
assume well of Allah and you will find
it.
I am the way you assume of me.
Isn't this all part of this idea of
if you do something, something will come for
you or you'll attract it?
What does Islam say about all these practices?
Yoga, astral projection, energy healing, meditation and so
on.
There's a book that was released based on
a film in 2006 called The Secret by
Rhonda Byrne claiming to reveal the great mystery
of the universe.
Obviously it's a pseudoscience book.
It has nothing to do with science but
it uses scientific language.
And it actually dares to go and use
quantum physics language because that's how it is.
When I want to bring an idea to
you, I've got to convince you.
And by the way, this is all commercialized
now.
The Law of Attraction is commercialized.
There's coaches, there's people who offer you courses
to go and do healing classes.
And it's all, may I say in the
most polite terms, it's just merely buffoonery.
You know what buffoonery is when a buffoon
talks like that?
It's got nothing to do with science whatsoever.
So let's go to the definition.
What is Law of Attraction?
Two other names commonly used, as I said,
Manifestation and Lucky Girl Syndrome.
Have you heard of that one?
Lucky Girl Syndrome.
Gosh girl, when you're around everything happens good.
You've got a lot of luck.
So Lucky Girl Syndrome Manifestation.
It is an ancient belief strongly associated with
Hinduism, Buddhism, ancient Egyptian beliefs and others, that
in this universe there are frequencies of energy
and vibrations that you give out.
And in this universe there are frequencies of
energies.
And that if your energy matches the right
frequency of this universe, you'll contract positive energy
or repel negative energy and get what you
desire, manifestation.
Or you repel what you don't desire.
In other words, your thoughts, what you think
in here and what you intend and your
goals, just by thinking very hard, your thoughts
send out vibrations to the universe and the
universe somehow decodes your thoughts and responds to
you.
That's the idea of Law of Attraction.
And those who believe in it, its believers
claim that it is a universal law, like
it's some kind of law that is just
fact.
But in fact it's metaphysical law, meaning it's
not partisan.
You can't test it.
It dictates that like always attracts like, and
negative always attracts negative.
In other words, positive attracts positive, negative attracts
negative.
If you're positive enough, you'll attract positive things
around you.
If you're a negative type, you attract negative.
Positive energy attracts positive energy, negative energy attracts
negative energy.
Just by thinking a lot.
Some of them, they go further than that.
They say, you've got to think a lot,
you've got to intend, you've got to say
it, affirmations and write it.
Some people do that.
And then they say, it happened, man, it
happened.
Just by thinking, intending, saying and writing.
Nothing else, right?
And these same people will tell you, oh,
but look, it doesn't mean you don't do.
Come on, man, you just said it's about
thoughts and positive energy and frequencies and I
don't know what.
So if you focus on positive thoughts and
positive mindset, you will attract positive energy from
the universe, repel negative energy and give out
positive energy.
And that if you focus on negative thoughts
and negative mindset, you will attract negative energy,
repel positive energy and give out negative energy.
We have to get the definitions right, so
I'm repeating it to you in different ways.
I don't want to lose you.
Basically speaking, let's make it a bit more
basic.
Basically speaking like this, the universe, this big
cosmos of all planets and everything, this hundreds
of billion year old universe listens to our
thoughts.
Now you got it.
The universe listens to your thoughts and your
desires and your intentions and then gives us
those desires because we focused hard enough on
it in our thoughts.
If you think it hard enough, it will
come.
That's the idea of law of attraction.
Essentially, it's a belief that the universe possesses
awareness.
It has a mind of its own.
It's aware of these eight billion earthlings and
their thoughts and intentions, each and every one
of us here, our feelings and our thoughts.
And then the universe prioritizes our thoughts and
intentions to gift us with our deepest yearnings.
Does everybody understand that now?
Alright.
In Islam, there is a term for that.
It's called wahdat al-wujud.
It's an ancient belief that stems from polytheism.
It's actually not even polytheism.
It's worse than that.
It's called pantheism, wahdat al-wujud, unity of
existence.
Have you ever heard the term, we are
all in one and one in all?
We are all one and one in all.
That the cosmos, the reality and God are
all identical.
They're all one.
The universe is God, in other words.
But they just don't call it God.
Obviously, in Buddhism, this is a practice, a
very deep belief.
In Hinduism, it's there, and in other ancient
religions.
The law of attraction also means that nature
doesn't like vacuum.
What does that mean?
In this universe, there are so many atoms
and things, there's no space.
So what you've got to do is you've
got to take out bad space so that
good space can come in.
I'll tell you what it means.
It's like this.
For example, you're at home, you're clearing your
clutter and unwanted things.
Rearranging in an order and a design clears
the vacuum to attract new things.
I know a story of a woman who
got married and didn't like her husband, a
few years down the track.
Instead of looking at the causes, the reasons,
how they're communicating, trying to talk about it,
she decided to go to these people who've
got this idea about the law of attraction.
And they told her that to reorganize her
house order, her furniture, to declutter, park her
car differently, and so on, and you will
attract the right husband and get rid of
the negative husband.
So like that.
The idea is truly spiritual atheism.
Get rid of God and the universe becomes
the God.
Have you ever heard the statements, the universe
has been kind to me?
I thank the universe.
The universe gave me.
The cosmos or whatever you call it.
And you'll find that these types of people,
they love this idea because it separates you
from rules, from commands, from God, from a
hereafter.
It's comfortable.
It's nice because there's no real responsibility here.
Just you think, think, think, think and get
what you want, want, want, want.
If you can match the right frequency, what
is that frequency?
Allahu alam.
Some people among the Muslims have actually mixed
the idea of law of attraction with religion.
So some of them brought in dua and
prayer and dhikr.
And they say, if you make enough dua,
if you make enough dhikr, if you make
enough prayers, then you can manifest certain things
with the law of attraction.
And this is mixing deen with shirk.
It's the same thing.
And it's an innovation of religion.
Let me look at it scientifically.
And then I'm going to go religious.
And we'll go talking about each one of
them one by one, inshallah.
And let's talk how it affects us scientifically.
So this book, The Secret, by Rhonda Burns,
uses claims to be based on science and
borrows phrases from quantum physics.
You'll find this in Live Science website.
And the law of attraction is false in
science in four different ways.
Number one, in physical science, the law is
widely considered to be pseudoscience or religion coached
in scientific language, and there is no scientific
evidence supporting this law.
No scientist or scientific institute has ever termed
this belief as a law.
Where did they get this terminology from?
When did it become a law?
Number two, in physics, same things do not
attract.
In fact, in physics, opposites attract.
You can't get positive and attract positive.
The positive attracts negative.
That's in physics, like the magnet.
When you put positive on positive, it repels,
correct?
When you put positive to negative, it attracts.
But that doesn't mean that that's how we
work in our life.
We're talking physical.
Like they're saying science and science, there's nothing
like that.
Number three, the electric charge of a human
body as a whole is electrically neutral.
We have in our body electrons, protons, neutrons.
All of that is neutral, our entire body.
There's nothing more positive about our body or
more negative.
So when I touch you or you touch
me, I'm not increasing your positivity, nor am
I increasing your negativity.
Our bodies remain neutral, positive and negative are
neutral in the body, electrons, protons and neutrons.
Therefore, the body can neither attract anything nor
repel anything.
But they say, no, the body and how
you think can attract and repel and increase
and decrease, buffoonery.
Number four, those who support this law claim
that energy is tangible, meaning it's a physical
thing that you can touch.
In physical science, this is of course false.
Energy is not a thing you can touch.
It's just a capacity.
And so they think they can get energy,
harness it, make it big, make it small,
attract, give, take.
There's nothing like that.
So it's just the object's ability to move
or do work.
If energy was an object and this law
was true, then the success rate for anybody
who believes in law and traction will be
100%.
You can attract things that are real energy.
But according to one of the experts featured
in the film, The Book, The Secret, his
name is John Asaroff, the success rate of
manifestation and the law of attraction is 0
.1%. Example.
According to this law of attraction, if I
want to win the lottery, I merely have
to go there and think really hard and
I can win the lottery.
If I think of being thin, the universe
will respond and make me thin.
If I want a new car, I'll think
about it really hard and the universe will
respond and facilitate that for me.
I'll have a new car.
In the book, The Secret, if you have
a plane crash or you die of a
disease or a child dies of a disease,
it's their fault.
It's their fault.
So it's because I didn't match the right
frequency.
And of course, neither frequency nor vibrations can
attract anything, nor does the human body have
the characteristics of attraction.
The human body has a whole neutral charge.
It cannot attract or repel anything.
This is all from a scientific perspective.
Not only that, it creates mental illnesses.
How?
The law of attraction makes the person blame
themselves.
I didn't think hard enough.
I didn't intend well enough.
That's why it didn't happen.
Not only that, the law of attraction goes
into families and can separate families and disunite
family ties.
How?
If they believe in the law of attraction,
then the people who are around them that
they are stuck with, their family, their wife,
their husband, their children, if they believe that
they're not meeting the right frequency and they're
on a different frequency, they've got to move
away from them.
That's why the idea of toxicity and moving
away from family and cutting them off, individualistic
societies, it's a new age type of movement.
Your frequency doesn't match my frequency.
I don't know what that means.
Let's say somebody has a mental issue.
What they're supposed to do, what they're advised
to do is get a support group, but
the law of attraction will tell them, no,
don't go to that support group because that
support group doesn't match your frequency, so you
shouldn't be around them.
Again, empathy and compassion towards others is also
low with the law of attraction because they're
not on the same frequency as you.
And they say the universe acts.
You don't act, the universe acts.
So my brothers and sisters, instead of that,
we say inside of us, Allah has given
us willpower.
If you have a good intention and you
have a positive mindset and you are optimistic
and you rely on Allah, then it comes
with action.
Plan, act, do, rely on Allah and the
outcome is for Allah.
And the idea of being optimistic as a
Muslim means, oh Allah, whatever outcome comes out
of this, I know that you know better
than me and I will accept it and
assume well of Allah.
The law of attraction is the opposite.
You have to get what you want.
It's about you, what you want.
And that by fixating on the universe, the
universe is the objective and you will get
it definitely.
So it defies the belief of qadr, that
everything is in the control of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala.
We come back to opposing this entire teaching
of deen.
By the way, Christianity and Judaism also, they
reject the law of attraction and manifestation.
So there's no such thing as if you
do something, the energy goes out and it
hits a frequency and the universe gives you
something back.
If a person's in a plane crash and
then you've got 200 people in the plane,
they say if it had a crash, it's
your fault because you didn't match the right
energy.
All 200 people in the airplane, the universe
just blames everybody and it's again a complete
fallacy.
My brothers and sisters, in Islam, if you
do positive things, there is a possibility that
Allah rewards you with something positive but not
necessarily.
Or it may be positive but you don't
see it as positive.
You may not like it.
So what happens in our world now is
unfortunately a lot of people tend to think
negatively about Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So if something doesn't go their way, majority
of people, Ibn Qayyim speaks in his book
about this.
He says if you looked at the majority
of people of the world, when it comes
to assuming of their Lord, what do they
assume?
If things don't go the way that they
wanted them to go, they start thinking that
Allah has betrayed them.
It's not fair.
Why me?
That shouldn't be.
So when Allah says think well of Allah,
it means no matter what the outcome, be
patient and think well of him.
Even if you don't see a good right
now, it will be good for you somewhere
else.
But if you're going to take that attitude,
Allah is bad, why didn't things go for
me, why, why, why, this is what starts
the shaitan comes and leads you towards these
buffoonery type of ideologies.
To leave God all alone and just rely
on the universe which really is an imaginary
thing.
My brothers and sisters, the universe doesn't know
anything about you.
The universe can't read anybody.
So who is the creator of the universe?
Allah.
In Islam, we believe in Qadar.
Religiously, believing in the law of attraction and
manifestation that the universe will give you if
you take positive energy, positive energy and universe
will give you back, this is open shirk.
This is open shirk.
If I believe that the universe has power
to respond to my thoughts, then what is
there a greater shirk than that?
I've left nothing in creation except that I've
made into a God instead of Allah.
That's the meaning of shirk.
Do you get it?
Every atom, every subatomic matter, the sun, the
moon, right to the end of the universe,
all of it can know the unseen about
every person.
And who's the only one who knows the
unseen?
Allah.
And the universe has no power to do
that.
So that is shirk akbar, major shirk.
Now a person might say, what if I
believe that Allah has created laws of attraction,
that Allah is the one that's doing it
and I'm asking Allah and then he facilitates
the laws of attraction for me.
Then I say to you, this is not
shirk in Allah, but there's another type of
shirk called shirk in cause.
You make shirk with Allah in cause and
effect.
You're still putting trust in created things when
nobody told you that Allah, Allah never told
you that.
There's nothing in Islam, past or present, in
the whole Qur'an about the law of
attraction.
Nothing.
So where did they get it from?
Hindus, Buddhists and some people's ideas who are
commercializing off you.
For people who already are over thinkers, for
people who already probably are on the verge
of some mental illness, for people who are
having a rough time in their life, they
commercialize off you and lead you astray.
Islam came to make you free of all
of that.
It is only you and Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala.
In surah 2 verse 22 Allah says, It
is He who has made the earth a
resting place for you and the sky as
a canopy and sent down water from above
wherewith He brought forth fruits for your sustenance.
Do not then set up rivals to Allah
when you know the truth.
The rivals here is the universe and created
things giving them the same power or similar
power to the creator.
Allah also says, Allah
says in surah 27 verse 47, They said
to the prophet Salih, We regard you as
an evil omen to us and those who
are with you.
Salih replied, Your omen is with Allah.
The truth is that you are a people
who are being tried.
The same thing was said by the pharaohs
people about prophet Moses.
Whenever a good time came they would say
this is but our due and when there
was a bad time they would ascribe their
calamities to Moses and his companions.
Your bad energy.
You Moses and your people are negative energy.
Our idols are the positive energy.
So this has always been there.
Now Salih said to them, you're a bad
omen meaning bad energy.
And then he says your omen is with
Allah meaning what is an omen?
It is when someone has a belief of
something that is negative or positive.
The only belief that we have of who
has the power to bring about positive and
negative is who?
It is Allah.
That's why I said to them your omen
is with Allah.
Leave your belief of this future of what's
good and bad with Allah and you do
what you have to do.
And Allah also says in the Quran surah
39 verse 3, Religion is exclusively devoted to
Allah.
Your religion is entirely consecrated to him.
As for those who have taken others than
Allah for their guardians, they say we worship
them only that they may bring us nearer
to Allah.
We worship them only that they bring us
nearer to Allah.
Allah will judge between them concerning what they
differ about.
Verily Allah does not guide anyone who is
given to sheer lying is an utter unbeliever.
This verse came down about the people of
Quraysh.
At the time of the Prophet ﷺ, the
disbelievers disbelieved in Muhammad ﷺ.
What did they worship instead?
Idols.
Remember?
Quraysh people had idols and this is what
they're saying.
When they were told don't worship the idols,
they said we worship them only that they
may bring us nearer to Allah.
We worship them only that they may bring
us nearer to Allah.
The idolaters didn't really worship the idols in
that sense.
They worshipped Allah but they said the idols
are intermediaries.
They bring us closer to Allah.
So now when someone says he is idols,
you forget that energy is also an idol
now.
Planets are idols.
Beliefs in an amulet is an idol.
Omens are an idol.
Negative and positive energy that brings about things
is also an idol.
All of these are idols.
And for the Muslims who say no, no,
no, no, these are things Allah created and
I'm just getting closer to Allah through them.
They're just like these people who said no,
no, no, we don't worship the idols.
The idols, we just worship the form of
the spirit that's within them and they get
us closer to Allah.
Because we can't reach Allah, we reach His
saints.
And His saints are in the form of
these idols.
It's all the same concept.
Whether they say the universe, energy, law of
attraction, manifestation, yoga, energy healing, idols, the sun,
the moon, it's all the same concept.
Astrology, the sun and celestial planets and how
the constellations align.
All of this is the same concept.
All of these are idols.
Some people will say, so what does it
mean when I'm positive and I see that
positive things happen?
We say to you, listen, there are two
things which Allah taught us.
Number one, things can happen to you through
two ways.
Number one, through laws and things which Allah
created in this life that help you.
And through the shari'a, shari'a ways
of worship.
Example, the shari'a ways of worship is
through dua.
Who are you asking?
You're asking Allah.
Salat, who are you praying to?
Allah.
Through dhikr, who are you making dhikr to?
Allah.
Quran, whose words are you reading?
Allah's.
Doing good deeds, who are you doing the
good deeds for?
Allah.
When you connect your family ties, why are
you doing it?
For Allah.
All these are connected between you and Allah.
These can bring about a positive change to
your life by the will of Allah.
By the will of Allah.
Allah says in Surah Al-Kahf, وَلَا تَقُولَنَّ
لِشَيْءٍ إِنِّي فَاعِلٌ ذَلِكَ غَدًّا إِلَّا إِيَّا شَاءَ
اللَّهِ Do not say that I am about
to do such and such a thing tomorrow,
except if Allah wills.
And another verse, وَمَا تَشَاءُونَ إِلَّا إِيَّا شَاءَ
اللَّهُ رَبُّ الْعَالَمِينَ You cannot will for anything
unless Allah wills it.
Now these Quraysh people, they made the idols
as intermediary.
So if I come up and I say
Allah created this energy so I can make
an intermediary between me and him, then this
is shirk, this is exactly like the people
worship idols.
As for rational, physical things which Allah created
as a means, it's like medicine.
Medication.
Medication is a means.
Working is a means.
Knowledge of mechanics and processes, scientific methods, these
are all means.
This is not like saying some energy or
supernatural thing is helping you.
Some people they say, what about optimism?
If I'm optimistic, good things can happen.
The Prophet ﷺ, they use the hadith, the
Prophet ﷺ said, تَفَاعَلُوا بِالْخَيْرِ تَجِيدُوا Be optimistic
and you will find it.
The answer to that is number one, this
is not a hadith.
It is not from the Prophet ﷺ or
any companion.
We don't know where this came from.
Someone in the past said, if you're optimistic
you will find what you're optimistic about.
Some person said it, I don't know where
the idea came from.
But being optimistic is a good thing in
Islam.
Being pessimistic is not a good thing.
Pessimism is like bad omens.
And being optimistic, however, is just a natural
mindset.
It's not attached to the universe and to
energy outside of you and frequencies and vibrations
and thoughts that you let out and it
comes back.
It's inside you already.
That when Allah ﷻ helps you with these
hormones and with willpower, with the intention, sometimes
you feel energetic.
But it doesn't mean the universe gave you
this energy.
Some people they say, oh man, he's giving
me negative vibes.
It's just you.
Another person will come and say, he gives
me positive vibes.
The same person, same time, same thing.
It's just you in here, your experiences, your
thoughts.
It's got nothing to do with some energy
coming to you and frequencies that you happen
to find and sort of get there like
luck.
The Prophet ﷺ told us contagion and pessimism
contagion when diseases are contagious and pessimism a
Muslim does not believe in them.
What does this mean?
It doesn't mean that diseases are not contagious.
They can be contagious.
It doesn't mean that bad things don't happen.
Bad things can happen.
What it means is don't believe that there
is a force called contagion that has a
mind of its own and can bring diseases
to you.
In the past they used to believe that
adwa, contagion, is a force.
It's an energy force that has its own
abilities and it goes and chooses people.
No, contagion in Islam that we believe in
is a natural contagion.
If I sneeze in your face and I've
got a disease, you're going to get the
disease most likely.
But there's no such thing as a contagion
that lurks around like a holy ghost or
an energy thing that comes and chooses people
because that is shirk.
Pessimism.
What they used to do in the past
was they used to bring a bird.
If they want to go somewhere and they
think, should I take the right road or
the left road, they would get a bird
like a pigeon.
They would place it on the floor and
they would wait which direction it will fly.
If it flew right, then that's a good
omen.
If it flew left, it's a bad omen.
Sometimes they would say if it flew right,
it means they've got to take the right
path.
If it flew left, they've got to take
the left path.
If it flew forward, they've got to get
another bird.
So the idea of putting their trust in
created things and what they do is all
part of this same concept.
So Prophet ﷺ says we don't have any
of that.
And when he was asked, oh messenger of
Allah, what does it mean to be optimistic?
He answered it.
He said with an optimistic word.
Meaning when you go and visit, for example,
someone who is sick.
And Rasul ﷺ used to visit sick people
and one time he went and visited a
sick Bedouin and he said to him, no
harm, no harm.
This is a purification inshallah.
These are words of optimism.
But they're more abstract.
It doesn't mean definitely you're going to get
healed.
But whatever happens to you, put your trust
in Allah that it is a purification.
It's either purification from your sickness, purification from
your sins.
It's either to humble you or maybe there's
good that's going to come out of it.
Something good, but not necessarily a healing.
One day he entered into Bedouin who had
a bad fever and he was old.
The hadith is in Sahih Muslim.
And he said to him, tahoor inshallah.
It's a purification inshallah.
And then the man said, what did you
say tahoor?
Purification?
So he took it as healing.
Get well soon.
He says, oh no, it is a fever
which is igniting and it is getting worse
on an old man which is about to
put him in his grave.
Very pessimistic the man was.
So the Prophet ﷺ then said to him,
fa naam idhan.
Okay, then that's what it is.
A person may look at this hadith and
say, huh, there you go.
Negative attracts negative.
He was positive.
If he was positive, he could have attracted
positive.
No, no, no.
It has nothing to do with that.
The Prophet ﷺ is bringing some happiness to
this person to change his mindset.
So inside of him, inside of him, he
can ease his stress.
Not that by saying that he will.
And then when he told him, then it
is, mean that not only are you going
to die of this sickness, you're going to
die miserable and stressed out on top of
what you're going through.
And you could have at least assumed of
Allah well that even if you died from
it, it would be an expiation for your
sins.
Allah will give you mercy.
Something good will happen out of it.
But the fact that you didn't even want
anything good, well, maybe then, that's what's going
to happen.
So the idea is that the idea is
connected to Allah.
It's not connected to energy or positive or
negative.
And you know what?
There is now a scientific, a medical therapy
that is science.
They say that if doctors, when they see
a sick patient, they talk positive to them.
They are optimistic.
And what happens is it's got nothing to
do with energies.
It's got to do with the healing process.
The sick person, when they think positive, something
about the body changes inside of them.
And it says, therefore we understand.
Now I want to talk quickly about the
following.
Some people use istikhara.
They say if I want to get into
a relationship, I do this dua called istikhara.
Unfortunately, they forget that they're also mixing this
energy thing around the world with the dua.
Why?
They say if I make istikhara, they're expecting
an outcome that they want.
If she likes him or he likes her,
they expect the istikhara to make them together.
But that's not the case.
The istikhara is, oh Allah, if you see
that it is good for us, let it
happen.
If you see that it's bad for us,
then keep it away from us or from
me and bring about the good wherever it
is for me and make me accept it.
So the whole idea is again, oh Allah,
whatever outcome comes out of this, I trust
in you and I know that you will
guide me.
And some people, they sit there, they're waiting
for a particular sign, they're waiting for something
to happen in the universe, they're saying there's
something the sun to do, they're waiting for
a dream.
It's not necessarily the case, brothers and sisters.
Again, means that whatever the outcome is, you
do your best and the outcome happens that
way.
There's a brick wall in front of you
or it goes ahead.
That's okay.
Keep going and rely on Allah and don't
lose trust in him because some people, they
resort to yoga.
What is yoga?
Yoga means union.
Union of what?
Union of man with the spirit.
That's what yoga means.
Some people think it's just exercises.
Well, the exercise is called known in English
as the sun salutation.
Sun salutation.
Sanskrit.
Prostration to the sun on eight parts of
the body.
If you go and look, people who take
yoga seriously, that's what they do.
It's preferred to be naked when you're doing
yoga.
Especially the back, the thighs and the chest.
You've got to face the sun with your
eyes.
You've got to look at the sun.
That's why it's good at sunrise and sunset,
they say.
If you have a concern about your religion,
they say don't worry, just draw an object
if you go and do it with the
professionals.
They say look at the object and focus
on it.
It's a humanitarian.
You can see where it's going.
And it's good to repeat words called mantras,
such as om.
I don't know what om means.
For me it means what am I doing?
Not to, I'm not trying to disrespect anyone.
Just the word om, I don't know what
it means.
And then you've got to repeat certain words
of the sun, like different names of the
sun.
Rafa nama, which means I bow my head
to you, oh one whom everyone praises.
The sun, the sun.
And then other words, which mean I bow
my head to you, oh guide of all,
the sun.
Another one is called bahana fi nama, which
means I bow my head to you, oh
bestower of beauty, the sun, the sun.
Another one is called safitar nama, which means
I bow my head to you, oh bestower
of life.
Sun worship, in every sense of the word.
So what is a Muslim supposed to do?
My advice, do you stay away from yoga?
Why?
Because of all these doubts, and what it
could lead to.
And I even heard about people who go
overseas to the Tibetan, they're the Tibetan monks,
and they do this extreme type of yoga,
I don't know what they call it, yoga
something, where you go into a trance and
somehow you go into this astral projection where
your conscious and subconscious minds separate and your
body, you know that movie Doctor Strange?
Like that.
And there's like eight different bodies outside of
your body.
And our scholars tell us that this is
like jinn possession and sorcery and I don't
know what.
Terrible things.
The point is this has nothing to do
with deen and Islam.
And I've heard of stories of people who
tried that and something happened mentally to them.
There's this energy to go into your body.
Again, in Islam there's no such thing.
Astral projection.
It's like when you go into a trance
through some kind of hypnosis, your body goes
into a state of sleeping or unconsciousness, and
there's this other body inside your body that
goes out.
Like Doctor Strange thing.
And from this came the idea of psychic
people.
You know the future.
And if the body roams around and you
can see things and you come back and
you tell people things.
Like if somebody stole, where is it?
If somebody did something, that person killed them.
And they tell them actions of the future.
All of this is buffoonery as we said.
Then there is, it's connected also to astrology.
You know the zodiac signs?
And I was surprised to see that some
Muslims, they quote certain scholars of the past
that believed in astrology.
What is astrology?
It's the planets or the stars or the
solar system or the galaxies.
And when they align in a certain way,
it means certain things.
And it tells you about yourself and it
tells you things about the world.
All of this came from the Zoroastrians and
it came from the Babylonians at the time
of Ibrahim A.S. They're the people who
Allah sent Ibrahim A.S. against.
They're the ones that threw him in the
fire.
Don't you remember in the Quran where Allah
says that Ibrahim A.S. went into their
monstery, their place of worship and there were
idols there and he said when they ran
away from him, it was like negative energy
by looking up at the stars.
He was mimicking them and then he goes
and breaks all their idols and says come
on, speak.
And then they found that he was just
bluffing and was trying to teach him a
lesson and they learned from it.
Then they got angry and they said kill
him, burn him, get rid of him, get
rid of the truth.
So all of this came from there.
Some of them quote Ibn Sina.
Ibn Sina was a great scholar.
He said and in that book he attacks
astrology in which he cites passages from the
Quran to dispute the power of astrology to
foretell the future.
The Prophet A.S. he said whoever goes
to a fortune teller and he believes what
that fortune teller says then he has disbelieved
in what Allah has sent down on Muhammad
A.S. And whoever goes to a fortune
teller and does not believe what they say
just go for fun 40 days of their
prayers will not be accepted will not be
accepted even though they still have to pray
it.
Now in some of our countries especially in
the eastern world people do magic and sorcery
they write things, they do voodoo in order
to make people love each other or to
separate from each other or all sorts of
things.
And this is all related to this type
of philosophy.
Some of them also use intermediaries like they
say go and pray to a saint in
his grave in order for God to give
you this or that.
This is called Tawassul to make an intermediary
between you and Allah.
And in Islam Tawassul is only allowed in
three ways intermediaries.
Number one is when you use your acts
of worship Oh Allah, Dua, Salat this is
an intermediary Allah A.S. says seek Allah
through these means what means?
It means of worship.
Worshipping who?
Worshipping Allah.
It's just you and Allah.
We don't have this idea of I think
it's Catholicism where you go and confess your
sins to the priest and then he says
I forgive you son.
We ask Allah directly and we turn to
Allah directly.
The second way is if you want to
ask someone to make Dua for you for
example somebody is going to Hajj or Umrah
and you say don't forget us in your
Dua Rasul A.S. said that to Abdullah
Ibn Umar and he said Don't forget us
in your Dua.
This is a living person who is making
Dua to who?
To Allah.
You're not making Dua to the person.
That's number two.
Right?
And the third way is to make Dua
to Allah by past good deeds that you
have done.
And this Hadith is in Sahih Bukhari about
the three men who got stuck inside of
a cave and when they woke up there's
a big rock that stopped their way from
getting out and each one sat aside and
made a Dua and one of them made
a Dua about a good deed of the
past long Hadith another one made another Dua
and Allah S.W.T. saved them.
So they sought this Halal way of intermediary
with their good deeds which they have done
in the past.
These are the only three allowed things.
So for me to call upon a saint
or a dead person or an angel or
a jinn or energy or the sun or
the moon or the planets or the earth
or nature or the universe all of this
is polytheism making partners with Allah if not
major one.
Some people ask me what about amulets what
about talismans what about charms that we wear
the answer to that is either it is
Shirk or it is not Shirk but better
not to do it.
When is it Shirk?
It's polytheism when I wear an amulet let's
say it's a blue eye let's say it's
a horseshoe let's say it's a rabbit's foot
let's say it's a charm of some sort
and I attach a belief to that object
and I say I believe this has powers
to repel the evil eye from me or
this has powers to repel jealousy and negativity
from me or some people they wear energy
what is it bracelets again if you believe
in the energy that it has powers then
this is minor Shirk but if you just
believe because there's some signs to it it's
not Shirk but again you should avoid it
now if I don't believe in the blue
eye and the rabbit foot and I don't
know what but I still wear it because
I say I just like the way it
looks it's a trend then you haven't done
Shirk but you are but it's better to
avoid it because you're getting you're promoting something
like that and you're showing something like that
when you know that the belief is still
there and I've seen people they go from
that to Shirk to paranoia to starting to
believe in these fallacies my brothers sisters I've
spoken a lot and I ask Allah to
guide us to the right path and to
save our hearts and our Iman and our
belief from all harm and to keep our
guidance and our direction in the way that
pleases him subhanahu wa ta'ala and to
save us from all false ideologies pain harm
and all things which lead us to *
fire and to guide us to everything that
leads us to paradise may Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala lift the oppression of our brothers
and sisters in Palestine everywhere around the world
may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala return us
to his Deen a good return and unite
this Ummah ameen wa sallallahu ala Nabina Muhammad
wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajma'in