Faraz Rabbani – The Rawha #019 Good Opinion of God and Drawing Near Loving For God Intentions of Seeking Knowledge

AI: Summary ©
The importance of sound understanding of Allah's actions and attributes is crucial for achieving desired divine benefits. The speaker discusses the importance of love for oneself, intentions, and the potential harm of doing things by oneself. The speaker provides practical advice for students to write out their own WhatsApp messages.
AI: Summary ©
The messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be
upon him, encouraged us to strive for uprightness
by seeking assistance in the early mornings, late
afternoons at and something of the depths of
the night. From this tradition, the scholars made
it a habit to briefly read text of
religious guidance in the late afternoon and often
term such readings the daily.
The term refers to the late afternoon, but
also to a time of rest from worldly
toils and reinvigoration of one's spirit.
In this day, Sheikh Horazrabani will be covering
2 texts, imam Zarnouji's primer on the etiquette
of seeking knowledge,
and imam Youssef Anabahani's beautiful collection of 40
sets of 40 prophetic hadith.
In our daily raha, we've been looking at
the 40 Hadith Qudsi.
That's the first collection
in
the
Irvine, 40 sets of 40 hadiths
from
the Messenger Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
And we've we're also looking at Talim Al
Mutalim by Imam Azar Nuezhi.
And Talim al Mutalim,
we
paused
in the last session
to look
at some of the key verses and some
of the key hadiths
that highlight
some of the virtues
of knowledge, and all the hadiths on the
virtues of knowledge,
all have within them
clear expression
or indication
or
implicit within them
the key conditions for
gaining and benefiting
from that knowledge.
So we stopped,
we in our look at
the 40 Hadith Qudsi,
I believe
with Hadith number 28.
Correct?
That honor is my
cloak
and and
haughtiness is my garment.
So whoever buys with me for them, I
will punish them.
And in and one narration of it mentioned
by the author, it says,
I will
cut them off.
I'll destroy them.
So Hadith number 29
and
So the messenger,
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, relates
that Allah most high says,
Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala says, I
am
as my servant
thinks of me.
If they think
good of me,
they shall have it. And if they think
ill of me, they shall have it.
Right?
And this is and there's a number of
such hadiths and they're in the one. Right?
And this refer I am as my
servant.
Yeah. Is how one thinks of someone.
Right?
But,
you could also you know, literally,
literally
is
refers to tangible,
I am
with
the servants thinking of Me. Right?
So if you think of Allah,
He's there with you.
Because the reality is He is with you
wherever you may be.
But if you think of Him in good
quality,
you think of His
mercy and favor,
and you think about
him in a good way, that's what you
will find.
But if you think that he will forget
you and not give you, and or you
object to him,
right? So it's either thinking about Allah himself,
or his attributes,
or his actions.
I am as my servant thinks of me,
of Allah himself,
of his attributes,
and of his actions.
Right?
And of course and the thinking is not
just the imagining with the mind, but how
you conduct yourself.
Right?
Right?
I am as my servant thinks of me.
Both,
like, if what you think about Allah, but
then how you do it, because what your
actions
are expressions of how you truly think about
something.
And this is related by Imam Ahmed and
Muslim.
And in Hadith number
so that's Hadith 29. Hadith number 30
and
So in this hadith related by Bureira from
the Messenger of Allah SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, Allah
Most High says,
I am as my servant
thinks of me.
And I am with them
when they remember me.
Right?
Or,
because I am with them when they remember
me, or I am
and I am with them as they remember
me.
This is both the remembrance of the tongue
and the remembrance of your state and actions.
And then Allah Subhana Wa Ta'la explains,
if they remember me in the you know,
within themselves,
I remember
them
to myself.
And if they remember me
in a gathering,
I remember them in a gathering
that is better than that.
Of course, this is of the numerous hadiths
of the merit of remembering Allah with other
people.
And we've had other
hadiths that have come on this of the
hadith,
and more are to come.
And then
if
they draw close to me by a hand
span,
Shibran,
I draw close to them by an arm's
length, zira.
And if they draw close to me, by
an arm's length, takarab to min Huban, which
is 2 arms' lengths.
When
and if they come to me
walking,
I rush
to them.
It's related by Ibn Abi Sheba. Now this
narration of Ibn Abi Sheba is also mentioned
separately,
the 2 parts of it,
in
the Sahih works.
Right? But he mentions this narration because it
puts the 2 together.
Right?
There's a question.
I mentioned them in a gathering better than
that, which is in the company of the
angels, by Allah mentioning
those people, which
is a greater honor,
which is a which ultimately indicates greater divine
good pleasure.
And that and this is from Allah's mercy
that if they draw close to me
by by a hand span but it also
affirms these two key meanings. Right? 1 is
all the actions that one does, what is
the purpose underlying them?
To draw closer to Allah.
Right?
But that Allah is
does not
he's testing us in drawing close,
it's he wants us
to come close to him.
Right? And he magnifies that. Right? So our
the basis of Allah's dealing with servants is
mercy.
If they draw close to me by even
a little, I magnify it.
Right?
And that's how we view tests.
Right? These are opportunities of takharub, and Allah,
we we have the surety that Allah will
magnify its consequence.
But that the more that one strives, the
greater the transformative consequence.
But the greatest thing one can do to
draw close to Allah is consistency in the
acts of drawing close. When,
if they come to me walking,
that is when the acts of takar rub,
of drawing close, become consistent.
I come to them.
Right?
I, Allah, comes to them comes to the
servant
rushing.
Right? And
this was explained by Imam Nawawi because the
hadith is in Muslim this part of the
hadith is in Sahih Muslim as well,
that it is Allah's
is the the
constant divine favor upon such a person.
But Allah comes to them. Right? Because
The foremost the foremost, they are the ones
who've been drawn close.
Okay.
So this hadith contains a clear call, right,
to remember Allah's to have a good opinion
of Allah.
Right? But of course to have a good
opinion of Allah, you must know Allah.
Right? You must know
Allah,
who He is,
in His entity,
and who He is in His attributes.
And to under and who he is in
his actions.
Right?
So one must have this is why the
study, the sound study of Aptida is so
critical, to have clear understanding of what we
believe about Allah himself
and his attributes and his actions.
Right?
And this is the only way to understand
reality because as im Imam Al Ghazali says,
For nothing
is in existence except Allah himself
and his attributes
and his actions
And his dominion
and his servants are from his actions. He,
Allah.
Allah has created you. Right? So they're all
from
so this is so having
a good opinion of Allah
requires
sound understanding of Islamic beliefs and then
sound
that's the seed of having a good opinion
of Allah, but it must be watered with
the water of remembrance, which is why remembrance
of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is mentioned.
And
it's and
it is cultivated
by?
Mhmm. Mhmm.
It's cultivated by gatherings of.
Right? That's very clear.
And
the purpose
of the true servant of Allah is is
to draw close,
and to
take the little steps,
you know, the hand span. That's a small
step. That's not even a step.
You just imagine it if everyone just takes
a moment. I don't know how to look
at you. Just take a moment. Just stand
up.
K.
Okay,
and
estimate. You don't have to, like, measure it.
Estimate,
drawing you know, taking a step, that's a
shibr.
That's just like a hand span. How is
it would you call that a step? Don't
trip over your hand back, please.
Is that a step?
You wouldn't even call that a step. You
know, it's on take a step towards Allah.
Right? Take even, like,
like, a little nudge
towards Allah.
Right? Right? That's a shibr.
A zira
is closer to a step. Right? A zira
is about half a meter. Right? And we
just estimate. You don't have to, like, we're
not don't step on your laptop, please.
Okay. They take a
right?
Right? That's closer to being a full step,
but probably a little less.
Right? But then
right, is a meter.
That's a big step.
Let's take a big step.
Okay?
That's that's a
jump.
So
a ba, like, you know, that's a meter.
2 zirah's,
right? That's a big step, like a step
and a half.
How much is one step? The fukaat, to
define you guys can all sit down. Right?
The
like, is one step a khutwa?
And there's different types of steps, of course.
People,
god bless the Arabs, they love to swear
by things, and to me that wallahi this,
if this,
that to define everything. How much is a
step?
And then there's different types of steps.
Right?
And the hutwa,
actually, it's a big step. Right? Because if
you walk normally, but if you take a
big
step, it's like could be, like, could could
be up to a ba, right, so, like,
take a big step. So you take a
little it's a the
the little thing, then a small step,
then a big step,
the ba,
Right? That those are big steps, like someone
who's
gained momentum now.
Well, it's an EM sheet, but then they
make it consistent. But also the big steps,
some of the other I must say, it's
like
there's
if you think about it,
initially when you take a step, what are
you going to do?
It'll be it would be tiny.
But then you take a small step, and
it's probably less than a complete step.
But then you may be excessive, because
take a big step like that.
Right? I almost laughed. I say the big
step. Right?
Right? Which is like a meter step.
It's kinda you take that as your step,
it's kind of big,
right? And that's sort of the
struggle of beginning. In beginning, you can only
take a tiny step, then it may be
an incomplete step. Then you may kind of
go overboard a little bit for a while,
but don't worry about that. And the same
thing happened in studies. You find yourself you
slack a little bit,
then you feel that you're not making progress,
then it's not quite
complete,
then you go overboard,
and, like, your mom gets mad at you
because you never visited her,
and you never made a meal at home,
and you didn't throw out the garbage.
Right? But then it comes back to a
balance. And what is the balance? It's MESHI.
And MESHI, of course, is not necessarily the
ba,
but it has continuity.
But it
but it's all under divine favor.
It's all
under divine favor.
But also to think about
the reality
of Allah coming to you.
Right? But, of course, the reality, of course,
as we know from the Quran,
he is always with
you. Wherever
you
may
be,
however you may be.
It is you who are absent from him.
No. Him drawing closer to you is his
It is His
facilitating
for you,
right,
consciousness of Him. His
it's His
divine favor
of increase in faith
so that you are more conscious of him
and of his
facilitating for you
the degrees of closeness
to him.
Right?
But it is all
what what what is it? What is all
of it?
It's all.
It is lifting ignorance.
Right?
Because
the most basic meaning
in existence is that
he is.
Right? He is.
Right?
But we are not
conscious of that. Okay?
Hadith number 31,
It's related by Sayid Nawad bin Jabal,
I love you all, pleased with him that
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam
relates from his lord mighty and majestic
that
those
that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says,
those who love one another
by my majesty
or for my majesty.
Right?
For my sake.
For my sake.
But Bijalali,
recognizing that it is
from
recognition
of
the jalal, of the majesty of Allah,
having a deep sense
of responsibility
in doing those things that are pleasing to
Allah.
Because you would think love you think it'd
be kind why why why doesn't it say
why didn't Allah why doesn't Allah
say those who love one another for my
beauty,
because love is like an attribute of beauty.
K?
Those who seek my mercy and love one
another for my mercy.
That those who love one another
for my majesty. 1 for my sake,
but the other for my majesty,
that those who recognize my greatness,
the greatness of who I am, so they
have a sense of great responsibility
to keep,
to love others,
and the expressions of loving one another
that are called upon.
If you recognize the majesty of Allah, you
have a sense of responsibility, and that responsibility
includes,
you know, that
you love for others what you love for
yourself.
And then the ways
the subsequent hadith will tell us some of
the ways of loving one another, which are
the rights of a of a of a
believer upon a believer. All of those out
of a sense
of the majesty of Allah and tell us
that's the responsibility.
But then there's also the sense,
you know, and this is also it's out
of faith. The
is a facet.
It's either for
right? For,
but
in my majesty,
like, or you know, by my majesty, meaning
that if you if you have consciousness of
faith, it would entail that you love other
people.
As other texts make clear. Right? So those
who love one another
for my majesty,
seeking Allah's majesty,
or
out of consciousness
of Allah's majesty,
but also in consciousness
by my majesty,
in consciousness
of who Allah is,
in
consciousness of Allah,
and in consciousness of what is pleasing to
Him.
How do you gain the love of Allah?
By loving
by all the expressions of love that are
beloved to
And those who believe are more intense in
their love for Allah.
So you love others
out of love for Allah. And this is
why the expression
is
as it is.
They
shall
right? They have
minbars.
They have
Minbars
of light,
like raised stations
of light
that they sit upon.
That the prophets
and the martyrs
would envy them for.
And this is that
were even prophets
and martyrs
not to consider what they are already
rewarded
by Allah.
The reward of those who love one another
for their sake is so great
that prophets
and martyrs would think
that I wish we had that.
The
tremendousness
of the reward.
So that's related by
Imam
So here, of course, it's a strong call
to
love
one another for the sake of Allah, but
that love for the sake of Allah
has
expressions.
It has expressions
as
hadiths amongst them, the hadith of sayna Anas,
the hadith of sayna Mu'ad that will be
coming later.
That
those who
visit one another
for the sake of Allah, those who spend
on each other for the sake of Allah.
Right?
Those who you know, and the other expressions
of the rights, what are what's the sign
of loving others for the sake of Allah?
It is those are the Muslim.
Those are the duties
a believer the rights a believer has over
a believer. Those are the duties of brotherhood,
right, and which are so rarely,
if ever, considered or fulfilled. And those are
duties
towards any believer, right, let alone the duties
owed
to
someone one has a tie
of
friendship with
or has any other
relationship
wherein
rights
arise.
So so we're going to stop there.
Next class, we're going to look from Hadith
number 32
onwards.
And
after having looked
in the previous session at some of the
virtues
of knowledge, we're going to look today
briefly
as we do
at.
And
we've in Talim Al Mutalim
where have we reached?
We reached
we we we looked at the virtues of
knowledge because we reached this the sec we
looked at the
the
we reached did did we not reach the
end of the section?
Yeah.
Yeah. So we reached.
Correct?
The section
or chapter
on intention
in
one's
seeking knowledge.
So
we stopped at that there's many virtues of
knowledge that have been mentioned and we looked
at some of them that Allah raises
those who believe and have been granted knowledge
many
great ranks and some of the hadiths on
the great virtue
of knowledge.
Then he says,
He says
It is absolutely necessary
for the student for for him, meaning for
them, for the student of knowledge, to have
intention
during
the time
of their seeking knowledge. And he said,
he doesn't just say
in seeking knowledge, because I made an intention.
But
in the time of seeking knowledge. Why? Because
intention is not
there there's
having and making an intention,
but the sunnah of the intention is to
make it
and to sustain it.
Right.
It's
making or keeping the intention present.
Why? He explains
because the intention
is
the
basis, the foundation
in all one's
states.
Because of his saying, peace and blessings be
upon him.
Actions
are only
by
intentions.
And each person shall only have what they
intended.
Hadith from Sahiha at Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Salam.
It's it's an authentic Hadith from the messenger
sallallahu alaihi
It's related from him
that Hamid an action
takes the form of the actions
of this world,
but it becomes
it becomes
through its good intention
from the actions of the hereafter.
And it becomes
so Haman action has a form of the
actions of the next life, but it becomes
of the actions of this world
by the ill intent behind it.
So that's the end of the Hadith.
So what intention does this new knowledge make?
He'll explain that.
He'll explain that.
And we'll look in the next session
at some of the intentions that he acknowledge.
The important thing is Al Aslufiniya
Alikhlas.
The the basis of the
good intention is sincerity.
And in that sense, the intention is only
1.
For Allah
mighty and majestic.
But
the intention also answers the question
how How
would you seek Allah through this? So make
multiple intentions. Right? And
the reality that we have a nafs,
right,
one of the most detrimental
things the nafs does,
that it drags
our intentions.
So we do something,
because someone tells us to do something, we
do it because they told us.
Any action
is by its intention. So if you did
it because
someone said, could you make me some coffee?
So okay. Why do you make coffee? Because
he told me to.
That's a missed opportunity, because you should have
done it for
Allah.
Right.
So and the nature of the nafs,
that
and that's what that's the harm of being
by yourself,
by your by yourself
towards.
Right?
That
and then things don't make sense,
and that's one of the problems in any
type of service.
You're doing it. I was forced to do
this.
Well, no. Firstly, legally, no one forced you.
Number 2,
why did they tell you to do it?
Because there's benefit in it. So why do
you do it? Because they told me to.
So you neither did it for the benefit,
but even the benefit is not why you
do it, you do it for Allah,
seeking the benefit thereby.
Right?
But people say, oh,
I was asked to sweet to
to to clean up this
the the classroom.
So why do you do it? Because I
was told.
Please do it. I'm held clean and the
glass for the sake of Allah. Why?
Then you consider
actually, it facilitates
good opinion of others. They just say, oh,
sister Yasmin made me clean the zahala room.
Right? If if that's how I viewed it,
I'd be mad at sister Yasmin, because I
don't like doing anything.
Right? But you say, okay. She told me
to do I don't like that. I was
okay. Let me do it for the sake
of Allah.
Why
but then why do I do it for
the sake of Allah?
Because if the room is clean, people
you know, and you think of the benefits.
If you think of the benefits, then you
understand why the per person told you to
to do it, and
you won't
have the inevitable thinking ill of other people.
Okay? Actions that are done without
sincere intention
are inevitably
coupled with ill opinion
of people,
because we care more about people than Allah,
and latently,
and sometimes explicitly, with ill opinion of Allah.
Right. So actions without intentions,
without sincere
intentions,
typically come with ill
opinion of people.
And typically it is latent within them to
have ill opinion of Allah.
So he'll tell us about what the intentions
are in seeking knowledge, and this is a
beautiful
section.
And we'll look at that
next. And we'll also touch upon
the intentions for seeking knowledge of Imam Al
Haddad.
We have those on the Seekers Hub website.
If you go intentions,
intention seeking knowledge,
with 2 d's,
h a d d a d,
you you'll find the dua.
Right?
And you can make it as a statement,
and you can make it into a dua.
As you say
that, oh, Allah, I ask you for, and
you to also make it as a dua.
And that's that's a good dua.
Just a practical thing to do is just
to write out that dua in your own
handwriting
and recite it every time
you begin to study. So when you begin
to study,
anything, whether it's before a class,
before
reading a book,
before doing anything knowledge related,
and also any service that's related to knowledge.
Anything that is facilitating knowledge,
whether in terms of or
calling to Allah,
etcetera, then any of those things
are also from
these are means to that.
So if you're if you're
if you think about it, anything that you
do that's a means,
means take the rulings of their ends. So
whatever you're doing,
you intend that,
and to facilitate in that,
and to facilitate in that. Because they're all
all the means of service of the path
of knowledge are from
are from
beneficial knowledge.
Thank you for listening to the Roha, daily
guidance for seekers with Sheikhar Azrabbani.
Help us continue to give light to millions
around the world by becoming a monthly donor
at seekershub.org/donate.
Your donations are tax deductible in the US.