Faraz Rabbani – The Rawha #075 The Polishing of Hearts Occupying Ones Time With Knowledge
AI: Summary ©
The speaker discusses the importance of the brochure of missed hadiths of Islam, which provides insight into the teachings of Islam. The heart is designed to reflect light and create pure faith. Rem-downing the concept of the heart's ability to create pure faith is a powerful way to achieve this. The importance of remembering Allah's words and actions is emphasized, as it is crucial for personal success and personal growth. The importance of maximizing discretionary time for the student's satisfaction with their busy schedule is emphasized, along with the importance of practicing harm and giving light to one's actions for benefit. The importance of writing and the importance of knowing the nature of human actions is also emphasized.
AI: Summary ©
You're listening to the Roha, daily guidance for
seekers with Sheikh Farazrabani,
who will be covering Imam Yusuf and Abiheni's
beautiful collection of 40 sets of 40 hadith
of the prophet, peace and blessings be upon
him, as well as Imam Zarnouji's guidance for
seekers of knowledge regarding the ways of seeking
knowledge.
In our sessions
on
looking at the Hadith of our beloved messenger
We have reached
hadith number 21
in
40 hadith on the merits of the remembrance
of Allah, mighty and majestic.
And
we have seen in previous sessions
how the remembrance of Allah is the greatest
of matters.
Because
one,
any action that is praiseworthy
is praiseworthy
insofar as you
seek Allah
thereby.
And the reality of seeking Allah in the
action is to be conscious of Allah
at time of intention, to be conscious of
Allah in the action
and to attain
greater consciousness of Allah through the action, and
that's
remembrance of Allah.
So any action
that is accompanied by remembrance of Allah
is greater
than
the same action,
bereft of or lacking in remembrance
of Allah
What is intention,
but
remembrance of Allah?
What is presence of heart,
but remembrance of Allah.
Right?
And
so we saw the preeminence of that
that that is the the that is what
one of the key
qualities
of
fruitful
action, sincerity
and
remembrance of Allah
and
excellence. They say there you know, the 3,
you know, there's 4 key components to
accepted action.
Sincerity,
soundness,
excellence,
and remembrance of Allah.
Right? These are 4 key components
of
accepted
action.
Sincerity
soundness
that you do the perform the action in
accordance with the the the command of Allah,
the guidance of the messenger.
Right? So
sincerity,
soundness.
Thirdly,
excellence,
which is to make your action correspond
to
prophetic guidance
to what the prophet
encouraged
as soundly understood.
And 4th is remembrance of Allah, to be
conscious of Allah
before,
during, and after
the action.
What
facilitates
consciousness of Allah
in
worship,
action,
and life, it is the remembrance of Allah.
Right?
Even more so,
the prophet
as we'll see in today's hadith make
clear
that remembrance of Allah
is one of the keys
to rectifying one state with Allah.
And that's the hadith that we're going to
begin with.
And this is an amazing
hadith.
It is related by Abdullah ibn Umar. May
Allah be well pleased with both father and
son.
Then the prophet, peace and blessings be upon
him, used to say. Right? So this is
something that was frequently mentioned by the prophet
sallallahu alaihi
wa
sallam.
The messenger of Allah sallahu alaihi wa sallam
would say, meaning would frequently say,
truly everything
has a polishing,
and the polishing of hearts
is the remembrance of Allah.
Everything has a polishing.
A polishing. Why?
We see
the in the Quran and in the sunnah,
the heart being referred to as being like
a mirror.
Right? Like a mirror.
But the mirror of the the mirrors at
that time were typically
from metal.
And, and
and a metallic mirror
only reflects when polished.
Right? You have to keep rubbing it.
So you have to rub it intensely
for it to begin
reflecting.
But you have to keep rubbing it for
it to keep
reflecting.
So say, and that really is a metaphor
for the spiritual path.
That there is an aspect of intensity
in the spiritual path, which is the transformative
change.
Right? You have to exert the effort
so that
you can have transformative
change in your life.
So you go from heedlessness
to consciousness.
Right? That's from having a heart that does
not reflect light to having a heart that
reflects light.
That is but then you have to keep
polishing it so that it
continues
to reflect
light, but so that and so that it
becomes
more reflective
of light.
But the prophet
did not so the heart has a polishing,
but there's but the prophet said everything has
a polish.
Meaning everything has something that makes it radiant.
And
so the ulama
here at looking at this hadith said
because this is the part that's ignored. Everything
has a polishing. And what if something is
polished,
it is beautified,
it is perfected,
and it makes it radiant.
Right?
It makes it radiant.
It's beautified, perfected, and it becomes radiant. It
reflects
divine light.
So some of the said
that remembrance of Allah
purifies hearts, but the heart
is your reality.
The heart is your reality.
As Imam Shafei said. You are by your
soul, not by your mere body,
a human.
So in that sense,
right, why did the prophet say everything has
a polish and the polish of hearts is
remembrance of Allah.
And because of your heart is polished,
your entirety will will be polished as we
know from other hadith of the prophet
and the hadith
of the
Allah is pure and accepts only the pure.
What does it say at the end?
Truly in the body
is
a morsel,
which
If sound, the entire body is sound.
And if corrupted, the entire body is corrupted.
So some of the said
that the reason only the polish of the
heart is mentioned, because
what polishes the heart, polishes you. Because you
are your heart.
Other olema said that that may be true,
but they also because you you look in
the hadiths and
this is something beautifully pointed out by Sheikh
Hamza Yusuf. May Allah protect and preserve him,
in his wonderful series,
purification
of the heart. If you look at listen
to the audio series, he quotes there from
one of the great scholars that they talked
about
and you see this thing.
The prophet mentioned
keys
to certain things.
There's
that if you the key to
such and such thing is such and such
matter. The prophet
said deal with people
by good character.
So the key to making good all your
dealings
is good character. That's.
The key to all good relations is good
character.
K?
Similarly,
there's other things
that have been described as keys. Right?
So this is something to pay attention to.
The key to the the polishing of the
heart is remembrance of Allah.
And but why
why is the remembrance of Allah a polishing
of the heart? Because what is the heart
supposed to do?
The heart, if it's a mirror, a mirror
reflects.
What is it meant to reflect?
It is meant to reflect
the light of Allah
It is meant to reflect the light of
Allah
We said Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala said, Allah's
Messenger salallahu alaihi wa sallam says,
in the hadith related by Imam Muslim and
others, Allah
does not look at your bodies or your
forms.
Rather, he looks
to your hearts.
Right. He he looks to your hearts. Right.
Allah
is the light of the heavens and the
earth. And he's the one who gives it
the light of existence.
And the light of sustaining.
What is the whole purpose of creation?
Right? It's for Allah to be known.
Right?
He chose to make himself known.
Right?
I have not created
humans in in jinn except that they may
worship me.
But Liabudun
ibn Abbas
whom the prophet prayed
for him having deep understanding of the of
the Quran. He
said that they may worship me, meaning that
they may know me. So the purpose of
worship is to know.
Worship expresses
recognition
of the one worthy of worship.
Worship to worship is to recognize
and to seek and to strive to attain.
Right?
So
and Allah looks only at the hearts. What
does he want to see reflected in it?
Pure faith.
And a heart in which there is none
other than us.
So
this is so how does remembrance of Allah
polish the heart?
Remembrance of Allah polishes the heart because each
statement of remembrance
is a statement of a reality of faith.
When you say,
this is a statement of faith.
When you say it,
is not that which is done
with the tongue.
The reality of is a meaning expressed by
the heart.
Right?
The tongue is simply the translator of that.
K?
So
every time you make any dhikr,
you are your heart is expressing
a meaning of faith.
Right? Your heart is expressing that.
And that expression of the meaning of faith
expels
that which negates pure faith. True dhikr. We
we we
we go from dhikr of the tongue
to dhikr
of the heart
at the levels of what it means to
remember Allah with one's heart.
Right? And the scholars talk about the levels
of dhikr.
But true dhikr is dhikr of the heart.
The tongue is the facilitative
means to the dhikr of the tongue of
the heart.
But every dhikr,
the heart, the spiritual heart
is expressing
faith,
and it's
dispelling that the meanings that go against faith.
Right?
And that polishes the heart by removing
from one's consciousness
all those meanings that go against
pure faith.
That's why it is such an amazing reality
and such an amazing gift.
Previous peoples were not given the permission to
remember Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
We take it for granted. It's a you
know, we're the Ummah of,
you know,
of facilitation. We can just do whatever we're
doing besides where it's obviously wrong like in
the toilet
or naked. You can be cooking, cleaning, walking,
in a conversation
and remembering Allah.
But if you think about the reality, you
are mentioning
the one who's sustaining all of reality.
And you can you have permission you have
permission and encouragement to do so.
Right?
So it is a tremendous
opportunity.
And the prophet sallallahu
alaihi
wa
sallam
continued,
And the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam said,
there's nothing
that saves one more truly
from the punishment of Allah than the remembrance
of Allah.
They said not even striving in the way
of
Says, unless
one struck with one sword until one sword
even broke. Meaning,
unless one exerted oneself to the utmost.
This is related by Ibn Abid Dunia and
Al Beihaki and it's similarly related,
especially the first part in the major works
of Hadith as well.
The
the prophet
said, the messenger of
Allah said
that if there's a person
who has in their possession,
you know, many dirhams,
much wealth
that that they divide
up in charity, that they give keep giving
out in charity.
And the other remembers Allah, then the one
who remembers Allah will be better.
It's related by the sound chain of transmission.
The way the ulama explained this,
because it would appear to be problematic.
Because the general principle established in the d
from the Quran and the Sunnah is
That benefit that benefits others is greater in
reward than benefit limited to oneself.
So how would we understand this hadith? It's
saying that someone who regularly gives in charity,
one person regularly gives in charity, the other
remembers Allah,
reg you know, much, consistently.
The one who remembers Allah will be better.
How? They say this is not in terms
of the intrinsic reward of re of the
2 good deeds.
Intrinsically, which one is better greater in reward?
Charity is intrinsically greater in reward than remembrance
of Allah. And there's something important for activists
to keep in mind.
Is activism greater in reward
than you're spending time in?
Yes. The same thing applies to charity. However,
the nature of charity
is what's what direct spiritual impact does the
charity have?
Similarly, you could say with activism,
it's limited.
Right? Giving money to someone is not
you know, how does it directly affect your
relationship with Allah? It doesn't. There's reward in
it and there's indirect indirectly, it'll benefit you.
However, will it make you more sincere,
more true?
Will it nurture good qualities in you? Directly,
it will to some extent. But remembrance of
Allah,
which is the counsel of the messenger
remain constant in the remembrance of Allah. The
merit of remembrance of Allah is not just
the intrinsic reward
and intrinsic benefit of it, but it's also
the extrinsic
benefit of it in what in the transformational
impact it has.
Right? Because someone just gives in charity, there
are dangers to giving in charity. It can
become,
I gave charity.
Right? There's dangers in that. Right? And you
see some people
who can who fall into that. They only
give if you put their name on the
project.
And we don't question sincerity,
but yeah. That's
what's in it for you to remember Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala? There's a element of sincerity.
The meaning expressed by remembrance is transformative.
So it's not saying it's not a it's
not a it's not a false dichotomy. Don't
give in charity, but rather remembrance of Allah,
then yes,
charity and other acts of good
have great reward,
but the religion is also about transformation.
And it's clear in the sunnah
that without remembrance of Allah,
spiritual transformation is not possible.
Charity,
even given regularly without
active effort in remembering Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala,
will not have
the transformative
impact that charity should have. How are you
going to have that consciousness to give,
to feed the poor rather than just do
it for some bland dead intention?
What what are you doing on Saturdays? I
work at a soup kitchen. Why? Well,
because
and then what you find at the end
of it, you you've been working at the
soup kitchen for a whole year. Do you
feel closer to Allah? No. You has it
transformed how you are? Not just spiritually, but
as a human being?
Maybe a little bit. But after a while,
this becomes a habit. And then, you know,
you show up because your friend shows up.
And you show up because
it looks good. Because you can put it
on your resume.
You show up because
you guys go
for, to the burger factory afterwards. Right? All
kinds of things come up.
And then bad qualities can start creeping in.
Can you how do you attain the state
where?
We feed you only
seeking Allah thereby.
Right? That is through the remembrance of Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala. So it's absolutely vital for
anyone sincere in seeking Allah
and anyone striving to make their acts of
good
transformative
to be rooted in remembrance of Allah
That's critical
for anyone doing any good, whether you're an
activist, you're a teacher, you're a mother, you're
a
father. You are trying to be the person
who brings family together.
Family time is not particularly spiritual.
Right? Sometimes it can be the opposite of
spiritual.
But how can you make
Birlul Waliday being dutiful to one's parents a
spiritual act?
Remembrance of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
So that how do you nurture good intentions
in powerful things you do. A lot of
parents struggle
when they have a child
because the experience of childbirth
in itself
is not a very spiritual experience.
But you you've just this is one of
the this is
basically this is how
human beings remain in existence. This is how
the light of guidance,
it's is transmitted
in humanity.
Right. You have given birth to a believer.
For Allah to guide one soul through you
is better for you than the world and
all it contains. That's not a particularly spiritual
act. Changing diapers is not particularly spiritual. At
least not in my limited
experience.
Right. But what makes all of that full
of meaning?
Remembrance of Allah.
Right?
So that's
a really
important
fundamental
concept. So we looked at 2 hadiths today.
We'll continue
from hadith number 23.
We're also going to look briefly
at,
some of the counsel related to the path
of seeking knowledge from
instruction of the student
regarding the ways of learning, and this is
a wonderful work by Imam Azirnuji.
We're covering this on Saturdays here at Seekers
Hub Toronto at 10 AM, and we also
broadcast it online.
And
you can also access this daily RoHA podcast,
Mondays to Thursday, that's between 7 and 7:30.
And you can access it also on on
the seekershub.org/podcast
page or by looking for seekershub,
in Itunes under podcasts.
So Imam Zarnooji says,
It befits the seeker of knowledge not to
busy themselves with something other than knowledge.
And not to turn away from So there's
2 councils. 1 is, don't busy yourself with
something other than knowledge, meaning
that don't make
your prime
primary concern other than filk
other than knowledge.
Have a focus on knowledge.
K? Because without without focus, attainment
is not possible.
And then there's some things that one needs
to do or where there's benefit in doing.
But one really has to ask, is the
benefit of this greater than the benefit of
what I'm doing?
Both in its immediate benefit and in its
long term
benefit.
And if it's not, then you leave it.
Right? Right?
One of the great hadith scholars of the
20th century,
Sheikh Zakari al Kandaharawi,
who authored
the the great 20 volume commentary
on the motto of I Amalek.
It was called,
the shortest of paths to the motto of
I Amalek
and who
taught
Sahih al Bukhari, taught with full commentary
over 40 times.
It was a great, great scholar
and very recently, one of his last
senior surviving students,
Sheikh Abdul Hafid Al Meqi,
just passed away a couple of days ago.
He's a great great scholar of hadith and
of the spiritual path.
Sheikh Zakir al Kindahaloi,
was once asked what you know, a few
just a few years before he passed away
and he was physically very weak
and probably on a, you know, on a
wheelchair. I asked to say some words
to the students at a and
he had physically very weak. It's very hard
for him to speak much. So he just
said to them
that,
oh, people of knowledge,
know your worth.
That's all he said.
And know the greatness
the know the significance of what you're engaged
in and give it its due.
And give it its due. That this as
Emmanuel Junaid said about the spiritual path, that
if I knew that there is anything
under the sky more important than what I'm
engaged in, I would abandon what I'm engaged
in and busy myself with that.
Right?
So that's in general. Right? And even if
someone,
you know, and most of us have careers,
have
worldly responsibilities,
but certainly in your discretionary
time, ask yourself, how much discretionary time do
I have in the week? Right? The prophet
said, the smart person is the one who
takes themselves to account.
How much discretionary time do I have, and
how do I allocate it?
So you try to maximize that, and maximizing
that
is only possible by minimizing
the things that are useless drains of your
time.
Right? A lot of people say they're really
busy, but they, you know, suddenly they put
a you know, they say, oh, I'm really
busy. I've not been able to take a
course. You just post, so any recommendations for
for some series I can watch on Netflix?
But they didn't even want to watch something.
They're looking
for
for something that's not of
benefit. There's something to pass the time.
Right? And that's
and that's
and that is loss.
And unless there's some clear benefit, right, and
there's clear purpose behind it.
And not to turn away from fiqh.
Right?
The knowledge of and here he he actually
means very deliberately for the student knowledge,
knowledge of Islamic law. Because ultimately,
what is your responsibility as a servant of
God is to obey Allah
and to do what is pleasing to Allah
and to avoid the opposite of that. To
avoid what Allah has prohibited
and what is displeasing to Allah. That's your
that's your duty as a servant.
And how is that known? That is known
by
fiqh.
And every element of excellence
only arises
from being in a state of obedience to
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. Which is why the
knowledge of fiqh
is fundamental. What do you need most day
and night?
Practically, it's fiqh. And once that's in place,
that you're in a state of obedience to
Allah and doing what is pleasing to Allah,
then you take
that only then is it possible to say,
okay, how do I do this
soundly
and with excellence? How do I do what
is pleasing to Allah with excellence?
And excellence is a quality
only found
in the context of being in a in
a state in states of obedience to Allah.
That's why is so important and that's what
people need the most as well. Like, as
much as one busies oneself with many other
things,
right, ultimately they need
and all harm.
Right?
Practical harm that arises
in relationships,
in human conduct arises from
lack of observance of the limits of Allah
and these are known by fiqh. All other
aspects
of relations
and actions
arise through that.
And these are the vessels.
The vessel the containers of meaning
are human actions. But if the container is
broken,
no mean you know, no sustainable meaning can
be found
therein, which is why
of particular benefit to the person themselves,
rightly pursued, and
to be able to benefit others.
Muhammad Al Hassan, the great student of Abu
Hanifa,
and one of the great
one of the most influential
teachers and writers
of law in human history.
He is the transmitter
of the teachings of both Abu Hanifa and
of Abu Yusuf,
this the main student of Abu Hanifa.
He said, this
this craft of ours,
right, this craft of ours mean the science
of is
from the cradle to the grave.
So whoever
wishes to leave this knowledge of ours even
for a moment, let them leave it at
this very moment.
And then it requires focus. You cannot master
something unless you keep
keep training.
Right? No one can say, okay, I've learned
now how to do such and such, and
I don't need to to do it anymore.
So you'll get rusty.
And that's even with a simple skill.
The nature of human actions is that they
are vast.
And fiqh relates to human actions.
And unlike lawyers, for example, lawyers are disappointing
bunch of creatures with all love and respect.
Yes. Most lawyers
say, oh, I'm a corporate lawyer. I don't
know about personal law.
So ask them something in corp corporate law.
So well, I'm specialized in this. You ask
them something in their specialty. Let's say, well,
I only handle
litigation,
not such and such.
Right?
But I kinda you just have a general
sense. I can look it up for you.
I can look it up too.
Right? Whereas,
you know, the nature of of knowledge,
the personal knowledge is the one who knows.
Okay? And to be able to benefit oneself
in your actions,
you have to be able to have to
have
shine the light of knowledge
on all that you do or all that
you may do.
And you have to be able to give
that light of clarity
for others with respect to their actions.
Right? Which you and there's a lot to
it. There's worship
and matters of worship, matters of marriage, matters
of commercial law, matters of halal and haram,
matters of relationships.
Right? Let alone then matters of the heart,
etcetera. There's a fiqh of the inward, the
fiqh of the heart as well. There's a
lot to it, which is why Imam Abu
Hanifa
said
that
no
faqih,
no scholar fiqh should be a judge
for more than 4 years. Because if you
serve for more than 4 years, you'll be
cut off from
from your review and critically your teaching
of the law of and
you begin to forget.
They say
The problem of knowledge is forgetting it.
And the only way of retaining it is
by
focus,
review,
and
group study of it,
what's called
and teaching it.
Right?
And we'll we'll just take the story of
Imam
Abu Yusuf, the senior most student of Imam
Abu Hanifa, one of the greatest
judges of Islamic history of human history.
Said,
a scholar
visited Abu Yusuf
in his
final illness.
And he was
about to
to give his last breath.
So Abu Yusuf asked this jurist,
Ramyul Jimari, Raqib an Avdul Amrajilan.
So Abu Yusuf asked him,
you're
throwing the the stones of the Jamarat. Is
it better to do
riding
or
walking?
And, of course, there's a history to this
question. This is the question that Abu Hanifa
asked Abu Yusuf
when Abu Yusuf started teaching
without Abu Yusuf Abu Hanifa's permission.
So Abu Abu Hanifa had given permission, had
told Abu Yusuf to start teaching people.
But
but a permission is to the extent of
the permission.
Right?
And the other is
that one doesn't just go off
on one's own,
which if people do it all the time
and then they justify it, but that's not
anything.
And then they say, I'm a student of
so and so, but that's
you're a student, you should have asked.
Right? Until they tell told you to stop
asking.
So, you know,
Abu Hanifa sent him
a questioner, even though daily Abu Yusuf was
attending
Abu Hanifa's gathering. And he'd be sitting right
in the front
when Abu Hanifa delivered and, he was a
tough man.
Very kind and caring, but very tough.
He sent the questioner to his gathering and
was sort of on the other side of
the city
asking him a question in writing.
So Abu Yusuf was embarrassed, but he sent
the answer. He said, it's wrong. So he
answered the other way, said it's
wrong. Then Abu Yusuf came and said, you
asked me the question, is throw throwing the
the the stones at Hajj
better riding
or,
walking
or, you know, standing.
And I said one way and you said
it's wrong. I said the other way, it's
it's wrong.
What's the answer? I said the answer is
that it depends.
And
he went into so so that's when he
was still relatively young. Many years later,
on his deathbed, he's like about to take
his final breath. He asks
a scholar who came to visit him this
question.
And this scholar didn't know the answer, so
Abu Yusuf answered him.
Right? But it's not just about concern for
an all because you wanted to benefit him
with something
that was subtle.
He
says This is how it befits
the the the person of, the person who's
concerned with the science of of Islamic law,
which is the
central
Islamic science.
Right? The science of how you
how one is in a state of obedience
to Allah,
to be busied with it in all one's
times.
And that's how one finds a tremendous enjoyment
in that.
Right?
And
and we'll we'll begin
by someone who had a vision of Mohammed
bin Hassan,
who's
asked, how were you what what did you
experience
when you breathe your last? So actually we'll
just read that.
It said that Muhammad meaning Muhammad Al Hassan
was seen
in by one of the righteous in their
sleep
after he died.
So he asked how are you when you're
breathing when your soul is being taken out
of you,
which is a time of pain and torment
and
distress and difficulty.
Since I was reflecting
on an issue from the issues of the
in of the indentured
slave, a slave with whom the the agreements
been made that if you pay this much,
you you will be freed.
So I did not realize that my soul
was departing my body.
Right?
And then
he and we'll read that because that's the
fine. And he said at the end of
his life that I was busied with the
rulings related
to the indentured slave from being prepared for
this day.
Right? Of course, why? But it's also because,
you know, it's a great concern
in Islam
to free slaves
and how slaves will be freed.
Right? So not just any random thing, this
is an important thing. It's one of the
goals. But of course, there's outward slavery and
there's
real slavery. Right? And there's a lot of
economic slavery in our times.
Right?
But also tells, you know, that this is
what he was, you know, he was busy
doing.
It said also, of course, he only said
that out of humility.
Right? Out of humility.
And then in the next chapter,
so we reached the end of a chapter
on
trust in Allah and striving.
He talks about what are the best times
to seek knowledge.
And that's what we look at next. And
after that, he talks about some of the
the the akhlaq of the talib al al,
some of the key qualities of the seeker
of knowledge.
Thank you for listening to the Raoha, daily
guidance for seekers with Sheikh Farazrabani.
Help SeekersHub
give light to 1,000,000 around the world by
supporting us through monthly donations by going to
seekershub.org/donate.
Your donations are tax deductible in the US
and Canada.