Hamzah Wald Maqbul – Riyad alSalihin Beautiful Character II.mp4
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We continue the chapter regarding
about beautiful character.
A Sahabi
although not somebody who is
not somebody who is particularly
close
Sahabi to the Prophet
in the system. He's not Abu Bakr or
Umar. He's not one of the chiefs of
these the Muhajir or the Ansar.
He met the Messenger of Allah Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam and he said, I gave him
a wild donkey as a gift.
What is a wild donkey? Zebra. A zebra.
There
was zebra in the Arabian Peninsula. There used
to be at one time lions, ostriches,
all kinds of different animals actually, all kinds
of different animals that are that are now
hunted to extinction unfortunately.
But so he said I gave a zebra
to the Messenger of Allah SAW
and so the Prophet SAW
he returned the gift
and,
but then when he
saw
in my face the
disappointment that he didn't accept my gift,
he,
very,
you know, very, very, lovingly said to me,
said that I didn't
return your gift because I didn't want to
accept it but because I'm in a state
of Ihram.
He was in a state of Ihram, he
was on on the journey of Hajj and
so one of the conditions of ihram is
that you can't hunt
and so
the to eat to eat a donkey itself,
a normal donkey is haram
and the year of Khaybar, there are 2
things that the messengers of Allah sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam the trip,
the
expedition of khaibar, there are 2 things that
he declared to be haram. 1 was the
eating of the flesh of a donkey and,
a domesticated donkey, and the other was,
or,
quote unquote temperature temp temporary marriage. And I
think there's a good isharah in it that
both of them are very distasteful,
very distasteful types of things, you know, but
the
the the wild donkey,
which is essentially a zebra as far as
I can tell. I asked the what
does a wild donkey look like? He says
it has black and white stripes.
So and if you look at a zebra,
it's essentially a donkey, but just like in
good health and like, you know, living living
fat in the jungle,
Masha'Allah.
It's
basically he caught one and he gave it
to the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam and
because when you're in ihram,
you can't kill you can't kill a wild
animal, you can't hunt. So killing a wild
animal is in the hookum of hunting and
you can't even tell another person to kill
it.
This comes in the hadith of
Abu Qatada al Ansari radiallahu ta'ala Anhu that
he went with a jamaat of, of Sahaba
on Hajj and he wasn't in a haram.
He was essentially like security.
He wasn't in a haram. So, say, nah
Anas bin Malik
he said, I saw like a wild animal
coming close to the to the
to the group, the caravan,
and it was a really nice animal.
And, it was coming dangerously close. You You
know, it didn't seem to be particularly bright
and,
you know, these are tests from Allah Ta'ala.
It's the same thing that happened with Banu
al Sala'il. The fish used to come to
them on the day of Sabd. So
but this is the difference between, you know,
them and the Sahaba radiAllahu ta'ala anhu that
the animal came very close. And so he
said, I knew that I can't kill it
in in
Iran, but I thought, should I should I
tell
that, yo, grab your spear. This thing is
like on it's like almost on our plate,
you know.
Because you can eat it. You just can't
kill it. You can't tell you know, you
can't kill it. So he then he thought
that even if I even if I wink
at him in order to get put draw
his attention to the animal, it will be
like participating in in hunting it. So he
said, I just didn't do it. And so,
you know, you know, from that and the
madahib alfukaha may be different about it from
that. The idea was there amongst the sahabah,
radiAllahu anhu. You can't even tell another person
to kill it. You just can't participate in
the death of any animal,
any wild animal like that. So he returned
it. He said, I can't can't tell someone
else to slaughter it for me. I can't
do anything. But the the point of the
hadith is that what that he had concern
for for he wasn't just like, yo, I'm
the messenger of Allah and I'm the king
of all of Arabia and this and that
and you don't know fiqh so this is
that's bogus for you, you know. But he
was concerned. He didn't wanna, you know, hurt
the guy's feelings. He's just a simple person.
He came and bought a gift. He didn't
wanna hurt his feelings. So he explained so
that so as to
not hurt his feelings, and it's obviously something
he narrates later on and he appreciated that
you had that much concern for him.
So
and I'm pretty sure we read this hadith,
here, in in the past as well. There
are some hadith that are repeated in, in
in, and
they should be repeated.
He narrates
that he said, I asked the messenger of
Allah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam about piety and
about sin. What is piety and what is
sin? And he said sallallahu alaihi wa sallam,
piety is good character to other people, dealing
well with other people, dealing nicely with other
people, dealing in a beautiful way with other
people.
And sin is that thing that is unsettled
inside of your chest, meaning that you don't
feel comfortable with.
And also that thing that, you would be
ashamed if other people found out about it.
That you'd be ashamed if other people found
out about it.
A very prominent Sahabi and a very prominent
narrator of of of Hadith, of the Hadith
of the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wa Salam. He
narrates that
the messenger of Allah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
was not Fahish nor was he
means in Arabic
to be excessive,
or to be ugly in in in in
doing something.
So there's 2 types of. There's
the which is to,
commit or to do,
shameful acts
of a sexual nature. And then there's the,
which is to use ugly and bad language
with people.
Just to be over the top with everything
you say and to curse all the time
and, you know, just to be unnecessarily harsh.
The thing you could say, like, you know,
you could be like, you know,
do you mind not doing that? But instead
he said, get lost loser or whatever and
like, you know, this and that curse words
and whatnot. There's an easy way of saying
things. The prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam used
to not be excessive in his speech. So
he wasn't neither Fahesh,
nor is a Mu'ta Fahesh nor would he
go out of his way, in in in
trying to be that way ever. He never
tried even to act like that, sallallahu alaihi
wa
sallam. He used to say, verily the best
of you are the most beautiful in their
character.
Said, there is nothing,
on the day of judgment that will be
heavier in the scale pants in favor of
a believer than good character,
showing good character to people.
And verily Allah hates
the person who is Faqish and Badi, the
person who is indecent in his conduct,
and indecent in his speech.
And so he,
Badi is is specific
to the person who is not only,
not only,
excessive in his speech, but, you know, just
ugly, just garbage. Lajah
garbage talk all the time, speaking garbage all
the time. This is an issue. This is
a problem with cursing and and constantly just
being over the top with what we say.
It's a hadith that's narrated by.
It's a longer hadith
describing Islam
and, at the end of it, Sayidamu'ad radiAllahu
anhu asked the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam. He see asked him, he says,
will people be taken account to account also
for things they say,
on top of the things that they do?
And so the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
says,
And he's a he said,
He said,
oh, may your mother grieve you? Meaning that
this is such a question.
This is such a basic foundational question that
you, you know, that you don't have about,
that you don't have surety about. May your
mother grieve your loss. It's an expression amongst
the Arabs.
May your mother grieve your loss. Will anyone
be
dragged in, bite on their face in the
fire,
except for because of the,
the crop that their tongue harvests.
Meaning, what? The things that they the things
that they say,
those things will show up on the day
of judgment. And so it's very important that
a person be very moderate in the way
that they speak and that they not be
given to excesses
because excesses will both cause a person to
lie, it will also cause a person to
exaggerate. Some people have tendencies to exaggerate things.
You don't need to exaggerate in order to
make friends. Your mother will still love you
if you just
be more straightforward about things.
And specifically here cursing,
saying bad words, these things are really,
They're really bad. They're really, something that a
believer should stay away from.
Alhamdulillah by Allah Subhanu. When I was studying
in Madrasa, I went years without hearing any
curse words, alhamdulillah,
And when I came back here, people this,
blank this, blank that and it's like, you
know, at first it was like I felt
like I was getting stabbed with a knife.
Now it's completely forgive you. You know? It's
completely
normal.
And,
you know, one of the things is, you
know, you go to Hajj or you go
to Umrah and you get that again, and
then you you lose it. This is one
of the reasons we should just like television.
One of the things I noticed about television
just in the couple of years since I've
been gone
is that now when they they bleep out
the words originally, I used to bleep out
curse words so people wouldn't hear them. Now
they do it in such a bizarre way
that it, like, accentuates the curse word.
Right? The first part of the word, the
last part of the word is is there,
and the mind fills in what's in the
middle, and it probably does a better job
than the ears do. And, it just like
the the belief itself accentuates the,
the word,
to the point where it's it's
it's like really bad and it's something that
you carry around in your head with you
when you hear things like that and it's
funny or it's this or it's that. The
Nabi Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam it's the the
last part of the Shamal, the hadith of
the Shamal that we were reading inshallah we're
gonna read it on Monday. But one of
the things is that, I mean, he used
to joke. He used to be funny, but
he used to not do it in a
bad way.
And, that's something that that,
that we should be very careful about, not
to
use bad language when we speak.
Be the cause of the entrance of a
majority of the people in Jannah?
And he said 2 things. He said the
fear of Allah
and good good character showing good character to
other people.
And then he was asked what will be
the thing that enters the majority of the
inmates of the * fire into *? And
he says the mouth and the private parts.
Allah
ta'ala
protect us. And this
the issue is that and that's why Ramadan
is so important and so needed.
There's probably no time
in
human history that the Shahawat are
manipulated like and and and cultivated more than
this time.
Perhaps in the old days, kings used to
enjoy certain types of debauchery that people enjoy
nowadays, but now it's become so on, like,
that regular people are
are are accustomed to just eating whatever they
want to and doing whatever they want to
with their with their with their,
with their,
sexual,
shahawat and things like that. And it's something
a person really needs to be, like, careful
because the problem is that they it bends
your fitra so much day by day that
you may get to a point where it's
almost impossible for you to straighten yourself out
again. In that point, you're just going to
live the rest of your life as a
a person who is attached to a disease,
and all you can do is just, you
know, make Toba and cry about it because
there's nothing really you can do to restore
your sanity again. And I don't say that
by way of,
demotivating
people from changing their lives
or, in order to discourage people or to
be negative,
or or or worse than that to judge
other people. I mean, all of us are
in this thing together. The problem is is
that you cannot just give in to your
nafs every single time,
and it's easier to treat yourself and prevent
yourself before you go,
you know, overboard with those types of things.
And the person who cannot control himself when
he
has his,
desire to eat
and drink and when he has a sexual
desire,
that person is not gonna be able to
control himself for anything. It's very interesting. Like,
nowadays, like, food
like there's all these different types of food
and people like you know they take pictures
of what they eat and they share it
with one another and you know they're called
they call it food *.
Right? This is interesting because prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam, what is he what is he?
He's a famul farj. What do they call
it? They call it food *. It's like
it's what * is to
Zina. This is this is the same thing
to the shahua of of the baton of
of the the shahua of the stomach, the
the vain desire of the of the stomach.
And the person at some point just needs
to do a boycott, you know, just like,
you know, like, whatever Rosa Parks referred to
refused to give up her seat and because
of that, you know, they they just stopped
riding the bus and they made the the
the
the business go bankrupt.
At some point, the detox for all of
this, you just gotta boycott the system to
say I'm not gonna eat except for something
simple and very little. I'm not gonna drink
except for something very simple and very little.
I'm not gonna look at this stuff. I'm
not gonna listen to this stuff. That's the
only way you're going to make it out
of out of any of this. And then
you go back in into environments that you
are exposed to those things
as much as you need to to make
a living and as much as you need
to in order to, you know, take care
of whatever,
you know, basic Sharia
requirements that you have.
But, you know, especially people who are not
public figures and don't need to mix with
people that much, I tell you really you
have to be very careful to protect yourself
in these things.
You have to be very careful. It's okay
if you feel like this thing is starting
to get the upper hand on you, then
you have to tame the nafs. You have
to tell the nafs, okay, that's enough. You
have to starve the nafs. How do you
starve the nafs? Right? Don't eat. Don't drink.
Don't look at these shahawat and things like
that. And it's it's not something that you
have to do for your entire life.
Right? A person, when they fast, eventually, they
will have bistar. You understand?
But it's just a a way of placating
and and and and not placating of taming
the nafs. And that's one of the reasons
why
Imam Ghazali
he talks about this, that there are certain
people who actually eat more outside of Ramadan
than in Ramadan. He didn't mention that. He
says that there's people who eat the same
amount in Ramadan than they do outside of
Ramadan.
Many Many of us actually, astaghfirullah, end up
eating more, but he says he blames the
people who eat the same amount outside of
Ramadan than they do in Ramadan.
And he says, what is it?
Basically, the shahua, the desire of the stomach.
Right? What you're doing is you're you're you're
like a spring. You're winding it up so
that, bam, you that it hits even harder
when when it,
when when it's, released.
Right? You're indulging at the same amount, but
you're increasing the intensity of its indulgence.
And that's that's like that's like weightlifting. Right?
Is
Masha'Allah. He's pumped up. Masha'Allah. So he knows.
Right? If you do 3 3 sets of
10 reps, that's good for conditioning. You're not
gonna put on weight that way. Right? What
do you do? You do less less
more sets with less, repetitions
with more weight on it.
That's how you build Balkan muscle. So that's
basically what a person is doing if if
they fast, and then afterward, they're going to
eat, you know, pakoras and samosas and, you
know, all this other stuff, you know, until
they explode or whatever, and they're belching during
tawih and all of these things.
Essentially, what you're doing is you're giving weight
training to the nafs. You're like making you're
pumping it up so that it has more
khabab and rage next time it's indulged.
And that's always dangerous. That's not a good
thing. So it's okay, you know. I realized
this at some point in my life
that, okay, every iftar, I don't have to
gorge until, like, I feel like passing out.
I can just eat like a normal amount
and, like, life will go on.
In fact, a person should you know, we
should make a culture of this. We should
make a culture of this that the masjid
is a space that a person can retreat
from the dunya
and, like, we should we should do that.
I mean, obviously, there's the,
not everybody in the community is here right
now. Right? There's a set of people that
are here. Not everyone in the community is
here right now. Not everyone in the community
if we tell this message to will they
find it palatable.
And so if we're going to go in
and, like, next time time there's, like, a
community of Thar, you'd be like, you people
are disgusting. You're just gonna belch and you're
gonna this and you're gonna that and you're
eating as much as you did and you're
horrible and, like, I have knowledge and, like,
you guys are
horrible. That's not matlub because everybody is not
at the same level. For some people, just
for them to not eat and drink
during their fast is a very big achievement.
May Allah keep us amongst those people as
well that that that that at least can
observe the minimum requirement of the law. But
we should have a culture. I mean, if
you're going to if you're gonna be, there
should be, you know, if somebody is, like,
eating simply, drinking simply, eating less, instead of,
like, forcing them to, like, yo, just here
to have this other falafel, you know, whatever.
To be like, okay, this guy is working
on his own, he's working on his own
spiritual howl and his own state, and so
let you leave a person alone. If there
are people who are in the masjid who
are like that, they don't talk a lot.
You don't have to go over there and
talk to them.
The the food of the of
of the spirituality of a person is hunger
and silence,
and vigor and all of these. You don't
have to bust someone's chops if they're lucky.
You could be like, yeah, this guy is
just working on himself. I respect that. You
know, your kids will be like, oh, baba,
how come this guy is not, you know,
is doing this? He said, because he's working
on himself. Maybe I'll take you one day
to the Masjid also, and, we can do
that as well. And we should be on
top of ourselves and have a little bit
of that. We can have a little bit
of that. We don't have to have a
itikaf because there is 2 types of itikaf.
There's the itikaf that I see, which is,
like, very social.
You make friends that you keep for the
rest of your life. You talk, you learn
about the community, you share food and it's
just this is like great wonderful experience. Then
there's the itikaf of the sunnah which is,
well,
do Ibadah, make dua, read Quran, read salat,
make dhikr, and everything else you do like
like,
just like you when you go to the
bathroom, a normal person, although nowadays people make
bathrooms also that are confusing to people now.
Some bathrooms I walk in, it looks like
I'm, like, on the Starship Enterprise. But, you
know, like a normal person, at least what
we used to consider a normal person, he
goes to the bathroom and then when he's
done, he leaves.
Right? We don't have, like, this, like, western
thing where, like, newspapers
and phones and all this stuff in the
valley. Does Makrudah do any of that stuff?
If the writing on the newspaper is of
a sacred nature, then it becomes haram to
read while using the restroom. Yeah? That's not
our tradition. You go in and do what
you, you know, you make a dua when
you go in. You do what you need
to do. You make your dua on your
way out, and you don't spend more time
there than you need.
Just like that,
everything other than those four things,
are
things that a person by the sunnah, by
the consensus of the fuqaha.
Everything other than those four things is makru.
That's okay. We should do that. You don't
even have to do it only during Ramadan.
You can do that for the rest of
the year as well, if you feel like.
I mean, obviously, the Masjid has rules and
regulations, and these these gentlemen are here. You
can talk to them about whatever that is.
But, you know, the mustard space should be
open. If you feel like you're having a
especially spiritually troubling time at work or at
school
or, whatever,
you know, you should be able to do
that. You should say, I'm gonna spend 3
days in the Masjid. I'm gonna spend 2
days in the Masjid,
fast during the day, and I'm not gonna
talk to people, you know, other than what
is necessary.
And we should we should have a culture
of that. We should cultivate a culture of
that and respect that in other people and
instead of
trying to, like, you know, bust their chops
about, you know, doing these things, we should
support them and not not give them,
such a hard time. But this, shahutulfarjulfam,
the shahua of of the mouth and of
the the private parts,
it's a big danger. It will take it
will take it will take us over if
we don't,
keep them in check. It will eat us
alive if we don't keep them in check.
What we consider to be sin is nothing.
Right? What is our what did we used
to consider to be sin? Someone commits zina.
Right? Somebody will be a glutton. Right? These
things are nothing. There's gateways to, like, all
kinds of other bizarre types of perversions people
go. In the end, shaitan will keep making
a person dance,
his tune until a person does just reaches,
like, the last end of depravity,
and, they destroy their own humanity. And, we
just can't leave that that that door open
for ourselves. We need to check ourselves for
our own benefit. It's something to understand.
The difference between a human being and difference
between, say, another animal. Why isn't that dolphins
haven't made civilization
and taken taken everything over? Or why is
the gorillas haven't been able to do that?
The brain can do
a lot.
Their brains can do a lot,
but what is it? There's a certain type
of, control you have over yourself.
The more you have the the power to
put the shahawat aside,
and think rationally,
the more you'll progress forward. The less you
have the power to put the shahawat aside
and,
and and think rationally,
the less you'll have power. What we have
here in America
is a civilization
that was built on the sacrifices of other
people,
on the sacrifices of other people. If you
look at the Salaf As Salah have this
nation, there are people who did things like
their great generals, presidents, politicians.
They worked hard for the country. They died
broke.
Many they say William Tecumseh Sherman, his father
was a a senator in the Ohio State
legislature. I was just reading this this morning,
and,
he died
and, he he had no money whatsoever.
And,
his children were divided up amongst the neighbors
and raised by the neighbors because he had
no money whatsoever.
And he himself was a person who,
steadfastly, despite being a very successful general and
politically very popular, he steadfastly refused to participate
in politics because that was his notion of
giving khidmatul dukkum. Okay. People like that made
America what it is.
Right? People that are around nowadays that are
like, oh, marry your boyfriend and eat this,
do that, no one can tell you what
to do. What these people are are they
are leaching off of the
the sacrifices of the people before.
It's the same thing if you look in
the Muslim world. There's a large group of
people, they're just leaching off at the sacrifices
of previous generations of ulama and masha'if and
the Sahaba radiAllahu and whom all these institutions
that they built and then one day someone's
like, well, I don't need to be limited
by this, that and the other thing and
their dawah is just a call towards shahawat
and they're chipping away at civilization chipping away
at civilization. Tell me if everybody marries their
boyfriend what will happen to the poem in
in in 50 years?
It will disappear.
If everybody is busy,
chasing their shahawat, everybody is addicted to drugs
and medical marijuana and alcohol and all of
these. What will happen to the Qom? The
Qom will collapse.
Literally, if you read the history of China,
what happened? The entire Qom became addicted to
opium. The British flooded them with opium. That's
how they broke their trade monopoly.
And, what happened is the only way that
the the their country was resurrected from that
is they just said, khalas, anyone who gets
caught with any narcotic narcotics will just kill
him on the spot. That's it. Not even
really a trial.
The the the you know that's that's what
happens because there are certain certain habits that
build a civilization and there are certain habits
that destroy a civilization.
And these these hadiths of the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam, they're not just something that
will give you pie in the sky somewhere
down the line, you you know, will die,
and if it's over, it's over. And if
there's an akhirah, alhamdulillah, I'm Pakistani, I'll go
to Jannah. Right? It doesn't work that way.
It doesn't work that way at all.
And it's not just for that time that
you save it up for. It actually helps
you in the dunya as well. As a
civilization, it helps you in the dunya. If
you cannot,
overcome your shahawat, you're not going to be
able to contribute to civilization.
And if you can overcome your shahawat, you
will be boss. You will be you will
be, somebody who will make it in this
side as well as the next side.
By the tawfiq of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
And the best of you are the best
of you to your women.
And and the the meaning of this
literally is the best of you to your
women. Idiomatically
can also be,
translated as the best of you to your
wives.
And and both both meanings are sound.
But, what's the point? The point is that
when you're at home and you deal with
stuff that happens at home, it happens to
everybody. Nobody's household is perfect.
When you're in a position of control and
no one else is watching you, if you
can keep good character at that time,
you could forgive at that time, if you
can be patient at that time,
then then the person has great scope for,
you know, has great scope for having good
character with other people. And the the head
there's another hadith of the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam. He said, the best of you are
the best of you to your wives and
I'm the best of you to your wife
to to his wife
wives. And so this is not something that
Nabi
just preached. It's something he practiced as well.
That verily the believer can,
through,
his beautiful character,
reach the rank of those people who constantly
fast and those people who constantly pray.
And in fact, there are other hadith which
indicate a person who fasts
excessively and prays not excessively fast
plentifully and prays plentifully, but his, character is
ugly, he's not good character,
that person is actually not just less good,
that person is actually bad, that person is
actually somebody that the prophet
has bara'a from that that he disassociates himself
with. May Allah be our protection.
And a person with your good character. What
is your good character?
Not busting people's chops over like every last
cent. Buying lunch for your relatives and for
your friends.
You know, when someone does something wrong to
you just to look the other way and
give them an excuse even though you may
know better.
You know, things like that. Forgiving people,
you know, forgiving people for things,
and that doesn't negate that doesn't negate, like,
the legal process.
Do you you understand what I'm saying? If
a man rapes a woman,
right,
good character doesn't mean that, like, oh, okay.
I forgive you. I won't tell anybody.
You can get your rights and things like
that. But at the end of the at
the end of the day,
not carrying a grudge in your heart and
not being excessive. Every
situation has a,
has an appropriate
response to it.
Is every situation as a pro sometimes forgiving
a person is not an appropriate response. Very
rarely, but sometimes it's not an appropriate response.
But that doesn't mean, you know so every
situation has an appropriate response and the hussun
al Khulab are
connected with what that appropriate response is.
It doesn't mean that, a person should just
give away all of his money and then
not be able to pay the rent next
month. It's just, making sure that everybody, you
know, you do your business, you take care
of yourself as you're able to.
And,
whatever slack you're able to cut people, you
cut slack to them. I mean, this is
something very important. When people get angry with
each other or they get into fights with
one another,
very rarely do people get into fights just
because they're, like, horrible people.
One of the reasons people get into fights
is when they feel threatened
and we often then step on each other's
toes and threaten one another
like unknowingly. We say something that makes a
person feel threatened and they'll back off. Very
few people are so evil that I have
like, masha'Allah, I have 2 pizzas in front
of me and you're starving to death and
I'll say get lost. I don't I wanna
feed you because I don't have to.
What is it? It's like, you know, if
I give this to this person, then the
other beggars will come. I won't have anything
for my children. There's a fear that's there.
You understand what I'm saying?
And in as much as a believer cannot
be a coward, a believer should be a
brave person, they keep the fear at bay.
And in addition to that,
you know, whatever reasonably they're able to accommodate
other people, that's where the Husnu Khulab are.
Husnu Khulab is not killing yourself in order
to make people happy
nor is it compromising on,
nor is it compromising
on absolute values in order to keep people
happy. Rather, it's
being able to pay your bills at the
end of the month and keeping the sacred
sharia,
in the way that Allah and his Rasool
command you to. But whatever room there is,
in Slack in in that,
giving people the Slack that that you're able
to. And Allah sees who's, you know, who's
in what situation.
1 person,
what may be for
them is not for another person. 1 person
may buy another person lunch and go to
Jannah for it. For another person, it's not
I mean, it's not that big of a
deal for them because of the position that
they're in. Allah sees everybody and everyone should
give out, you know, in accordance to what
they're able to.
That the the the the
say, no. Say, no. Say, Abu Ma'am al
Bahili narrates that the messenger of Allah sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam said, I guarantee I'm
the guarantor
of a house on the outskirts of Jannah
for the person who gives up an argument.
And So Mira, there are different types of
argument, right? There are different darajahs, right? The
highest darajah of an argument is what they
call Munadhara.
Munadhara is 2 people
who have an opinion about something, who who
have some knowledge about something
that they exchange their their views with one
another in an orderly fashion
in order to perhaps learn something from the
other. You call in with a open mind.
This is something usually only the ulemaq can
do or are accustomed to doing, and, it's
not something that, like, you know,
usually, a lot of people do,
or nor are they really required to because
they're not required to have such a subtle
and nuanced understanding of things,
but that's what it is. Basically, the the
the
the point of Munadwala
is what? Is in order to learn the
haqq, and it's predicated
on the supposition that a person might be
wrong. They or they may learn something from
from seeing the organization
the organized fashion of another person's thought. This
happens very rarely. Almost nowadays, it happens very
almost never. In fact, most of what people
refer to as Munawala
is what they
refer to in the technical
vocabulary, the mustala as mukabara.
Mukabara is what? Mukabara is 2 people that
that have a debate with one another in
order to show how much knowledge they have
and how stupid the other person is. And
they're not willing to from the beginning to
they're not willing to accept the fact that
there's the possibility that they may be wrong.
And,
Mira is that type of vain argument.
Mira and Jidal are 2,
are 2 words
for that type of argument. The type of
argument that you just do for the sake
of proving that you're right and that you
don't have any intention of learning anything or
benefiting
or even of teaching a person.
You're just you're just trying to bust another
person's chops. That's completely haram.
That's completely haram. Even if you're you're you're
doing it on behalf of Islam and someone
else is a kafir or your aqeedah is
correct and the other person is a muqtadir
and their is wrong. You are allowed to
tell your point of view if asked.
If you need to clarify, you can clarify.
If you need to expound, you can expound,
but there's a point in every argument where
you said what you had to say and
the other person said what they had to
say, and you're just basically laying into one
another. Once you get to that point, or
if you know that talking to a person
will be completely that, you are you are
not allowed to,
get into it with them about anything, especially
about Din.
And this is not a point that is
a fiqh issue. This is actually an Aqidah
issue
In the sense that all of the agree
about that that you're not allowed to do
it, and it's part of the deen. This
is why they,
ibn Abi Zaid mentions it in his,
in his aqayd. Imam Taha'i mentions it in
his aqayd. It's like basic books of aqayd
that they mentioned this, that it is it
is not permissible to get into this type
of argument with another person about matters of
deen, and in fact, it's the Messenger of
Allah
he he he said
that this is a sign of, you know,
people getting into getting into it with one
another in this way is a sign of
guidance being lifted away from a people. So
just don't do it. So just don't do
it. He came to the masjid one time
saw people,
arguing like this, and he looked at them
and said, antum harb, you people are war.
This is, like, meaning completely
disapproved of what they were doing.
And and this is the the tarbia that
the messenger of Allah
gave to his companions
So Abu Muhammadan Bahili,
he says that the messenger of Allah sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam said, I guarantee
a house on the outskirts of Jannah to
the person who leaves such an argument
even if he's right.
For a person who leaves such an argument
even if he's right. Because the person who's
right,
that person,
it seems that the sin of that person
is less. Why? Because at least they're they're
they're they're
arguing, but that's the extent of it. The
person who's wrong is not only arguing, but
they're advancing batin,
which is another issue.
So there is a type of mindset which
is like, well, I'm right.
You know, like, I don't know, like, why
peep you know, why I have to be
quiet. I'm right. I'm telling the truth. There's
a lot of truth that people abuse.
Uh-uh. Saidna Ali radiAllahu who says this to
somebody, he said so and so said such
and such thing. He said that he said
something that's true, but he's trying to use
it in order to prove.
Right?
Allah
Muhammad.
Anyway
So there's a Ayah of Surah
Surah
Surah Surah Al Kahf, but it's so difficult
if you know the second half to remember
what the first half is.
Right?
Right? It's
a sifa of the people of
Kufr
that they,
that they they,
argue
using,
Ba'atil in order to repel the Haqq. Right?
That's bad enough.
But it's still bad if you're arguing in
a bad way
using the haqq, then that's particularly unfortunate that
you're disobeying
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala with a piece of
knowledge that should be used for guidance but
it's being used for this guidance is a
particularly
unfortunate
unfortunate circumstance.
Yeah.
Yeah. The the the the the people of
disbelief
that they should they should make this type
of mira, jidal, this type
of this type of, like, pointless argument,
using batil in order to to repel and,
like, discredit the Haqq,
and those are the people who took,
Allah Ta'ala says, those are the people who
took my,
signs
and and and and,
my warnings
as a joke.
And so it's it's it's bad enough if
a person does it with Baatil, but it's
still a sin if a person does that
type of argument with
with with Haqq. Again, doesn't mean that every
time 2 people are talking back and forth,
having discussion or debate with one another, it's
wrong.
Right? If you're learning from me, I'm learning
from you, or at least I'm teaching you,
and you're you have some desire to hear
what I have to say. That's another thing.
But once you send your piece and it
just goes in this circular, like, back and
forth and people are just trying to shank
one another with their words, that's where that's
where, you you know, it's you know that
there's there's, all the khairas gone from that
kalam. And you should once you once a
person realized that happening, they should desist. And
what's the reward for desisting?
The Nabi Salam said,
I'm I'm the guarantor. I guarantee you if
you do that,
Allah will, you know, that Allah will give
you a a, a house,
on the,
on the,
edge of Jannah. Right?
It's
a
That, it's
the the places that are just on the
outskirts of the fortification of a city right
outside of the fortification of the city, but
they're still considered part of the city,
in some way. So that's the prophet promise.
If you can give up arguing like that,
even if you're right,
if you're wrong, you should it's should be
easier to give it up because you're wrong.
But if you give up an argument like
that, even if you're right,
Allah Ta'ala, he promises Allah Ta'ala will give
you a house in this outskirts of Jannah.
And I also am the guarantor of a
house in the middle of Jannah,
or sorry, in the middle of Jannah for
the one who, leaves lying
even in jokes
even in jokes.
That, you know,
there's jokes that a person tells that that
requires a little bit of lying or bending
the truth or whatever just to get a
laugh out of a person.
But Allah Ta'ala from from his Asma'al Husna
is Al Haqq. From his Sifatul Ullah is
Al Haqq. That Allah is the truth. He
is Al Haqq.
Haqq. And the messenger of Allah Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam,
he
was the embodiment of siddiq
siddiq
and he said
that truthfulness will always
save you
and and lying will always destroy you. It
will always destroy you. So the person who
gives up untruth
with such steadfastness to the point that they
don't even invoke it when joking.
Because in that in that case, there's no,
you know, you know, there's no
deception involved. People know, but you're just saying
something that's not true just to get a
laugh out of somebody.
Even you're so steadfast in in in in
in in in sticking to the Haak and
staying away from a lie that you can,
you can give up telling untruths even in
joking.
The messenger of Allah guarantees Allah will give
you a house in the middle of Jannah.
And the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam guarantees a house in the highest part
of Jannah for the one who beautifies his
akhlaq, for the one who beautifies his character
and his conduct.
1
the messenger
of Allah said, from verily, from the most
beloved of you to me
and the ones that will sit closest to
me on the day of, on the day
of judgment
are those who are the most beautiful in
your character.
And verily, the most hateful to me,
and the furthest from me on the day
of judgment,
are the fardharun, and the fardharun
are,
the the ones who are defined as being,
who just speaks too much. They just go
out of their way to just say too
much
in that
they're
in affectation.
They're not even sincere in what they say.
Of Tashaduk.
When Muhtashaduk
is a person who
speaks a lot
and
he
fills his mouth with speech
and eloquence,
but only in order to aggrandize himself.
This happens with a lot of people.
They purposely talk over other people's heads in
order to show how wonderful they are, and
they use, like, terminology that other people may
not understand.
This is something you may, like, recognize that,
like, in Khutulbat and things like that, sometimes
they'll make fun of certain there's like buzzwords
that if you're cool, you'll say, you know,
everything paradigm and narrative and discourse and God
knows, like, there's like just these types of
words that people use as buzzwords and like,
oh, this guy knows what he's talking about.
He's all intellectual and whatnot.
This is one of the things that happens
in the western world.
After the,
industrial revolution,
the material and physical sciences, which used to
be in the university on par with the
humanities,
they completely take off because you make a
lot more money if you know,
if you know how to manipulate the physical
world around you, you'll make money. Whereas if
you're
a genius when it comes to drama or
art or literature, you're not gonna make a
lot of money probably.
So what ends up happening
is you have upper campus, lower campus. Upper
campus is the, the original faculties of every
university, which include the humanities,
and then the lower campus is where the
university expands into. University expansions are almost always,
are almost always in the physical sciences and
engineering and and and and things that make
you money essentially.
Right? The medical school, things like that.
And so what happens is that this is
a crisis in in academia
in the west
because people
stop,
stop
reviewing
and and and respecting the physical sciences. If
you have a degree in drama, people snicker
at you and laugh at you. You have
a degree in literature and philosophy, people snicker
at you and laugh at you. They'll give
condolences and nadilahi wa nadilahi wa ji and
your parents,
you know. And you know, people do that
also like to my father. They're like they're
like, Oh,
How many brothers do you have? And then
like, I'll be like, I'm the only son.
Oh.
And then they'll go to my father and
say, chalisaab,
chalisaab, mashaAllah, you're going straight to Jannah, you
know, like as like as if like you're
someone just like ripped your liver out and
like like
crashed it against the wall because you studied
Deen instead of, like, you know, doing something
that makes money. And,
you know, like, that's all they'll say. So
people very warmly congratulate my fathers,
My father, about my having studied, and I
tell a boy, I said, this guy, this
kalam, is all vanity. I know if his
son were to say, hey. I wanna become
an alib. He would probably disown him or
he might, you know, like, hit him with
a baseball bat or something like that.
So
so this is an issue that happens. We're
not the only ones who went through it
or who are going through it, all those
particularly pronounced and certain, like, immigrant communities,
but this is an issue that happens over
here in academia as well. So one of
the defense mechanisms
that the humanities
and that,
what they call the social sciences or the
soft sciences,
one of the defense mechanisms that they they
invoke,
in order to justify their presence is they
start to cocoon their knowledge
in bizarre and difficult
terminology.
So somebody can get up and talk about
the discourses and ethos and paradigm and narrative
and, you know, and all of these things,
and you're like, wow. What does that mean?
Well, you have to come study with us
in order to understand what it means. It's
like a secret language that they have between
each between each other that makes their knowledge
inaccessible to the general public
and and
helps to justify their their existence in order
to, you know, allow them to have takkabur,
that they can talk in front of an
engineer in such a way that the engineer
has all these technical words he can use
because it's a technical field. Well, they can
also have technical words that they can use.
The engineer won't know what what they're talking
about, so they have to respect the fact
that this is also a science, this is
also a science. Or this is also
a field of knowledge, and that's also a
field of knowledge.
This is exactly
not what the
prophet does, and exactly not what the hadith
is, exactly not what the Quran is, and
not what Ilm is. In some ways, Ilm
does morph into this as well
at some point, but part of the the
the part of the the charm of the
prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam's speech is that
he took these, like, really deep concepts and
he was able to put them in very
simple words. And part of the charm of
the Arabic language as well is you can
say stuff straightforward.
You say things very straightforward.
If you translate it literally, there's very few
languages in which you can say stuff like
that that
that straightforward, you know. But Arabic, not the
Arabic of nowadays where people, yeah, I see
the tafabal marhaban and a khadimuka
al mutawadah.
It's not the way that the sahaba radiAllahu
alaihi wa'am used to talk. Right? That's not
the way that the original
Arab of the Kaaba'il
they used to talk like that. They used
to be very direct and straightforward, and that's
one of the the the part of the
umni nature of the message of the Messenger
of Allah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, and it's
part of the universality of Islam
that things are said very straightforward and they're
they're they're in a way that they could
be understood.
And this is a miracle of the Ummah.
One of our masha'ikh, Sayyid
Ahmad Shaheed
He was one of the great masha'ikh of
the Indian subcontinent.
He was ummi. He was a,
he was illiterate,
but he probably headed,
the largest movement of ulama in the Indian
subcontinent's
history.
And what would happen, they say that the
people would people would,
the Muftis and the ulama would come to
him with masala, complex masala.
He would just listen to what they have
to say and return a response to them
in such a simple way that it would
boggle people's minds, and so people used to.
People used to hold him in great respect.
He's one of the great anti colonialist,
leaders
in the history of the Indian subcontinent,
and somebody who almost every person of ilm
from the Indian subcontinent has some sort of
nisbah toward,
some sort of nisbah toward. He's a disciple
of Shawla as he is one of the,
one of the the sons of Shawwalhi
Allah
and in that sense, they're people with bonafide
ili credentials. So Shauliullah's is
isnaat for hadith
is probably the not probably, it's hands down
the most widespread isnad living chain of narration
for the books of Hadith in the in
the in in the world by a long
shot by a long shot. Probably the next
3 or 4 contenders, forget about it. He's
like a majority. All of the other contenders,
for this slot
combined don't don't,
don't touch the number of, narrations that are
alive in the world to this day,
for the chain of narration of the hadith.
But one of his one of his,
companions,
Shah Ismail Shahid, who was
a
a a an alim of the both of
them were Shuhada. Both of them were fought,
the both of them were murdered on the,
at the battle of Balakot, which is in
a place in
Kashmir,
fighting against
the the the 6 who had sacked,
the western part of the Mughal Empire.
Okay.
It's okay. Well, it's part of Hazrat Kesheer
politically though
to this day, but it's part of the
Hazara area that's a point taken.
So
what happens is that,
this,
companion of his who is a person who
is well versed in the formal sciences and
left is definitely not Umi. He leaves behind
a number of very important works of 'aqida
and Afit.
Shai Ismail Shahid.
One of his books, Taqwiyatul
Iman, is actually,
It was translated into Arabic. You can find
it in most of the bookstores of the
Arab world as well.
He says this about the sheikh. He says
from the Kamal, from the perfections of how
Allah Ta'ala
created,
this,
Sayyid Ahmad,
is that He made him
Ummi like the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
so that his fitra is not disturbed by
the affectation
of
of academic learning.
This is not as a he himself is
a great scholar, so he's not saying this
in order to
trash scholarship,
but he he does recognize that sometimes
too many buzzwords and terminologies
and and and, you know,
these types of things, they detract from a
person's ability to think clearly and think,
based on usool. They clutter a person's mind
up. And so this hadith is essentially trying
to say the same thing. Don't go down
that route. Okay? The western
public has its hang ups with their whole
like academic history, that's not your problem, it's
not my problem,
right? What did the messenger of Allah sallallahu
alaihi wasallam say? He said, verily from thee,
most hateful of you to me and the
furthest from me in on the day of
judgment
are the people who speak too much and
have too much affectation in their speech and
the people who
use their,
who speak too much and they use their
eloquence, their command over language in order to
make themselves
look and sound big and in order to
show how awesome and wonderful they are, to
to to to show their takabr to people.
And and the third group is the mutafayhikun.
And so the messenger of Allah
says, we understand what the
the say. We understand who the first two
groups are.
But who are the mutafayhi boom? And the
messenger of Allah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, replies
on Mutakabbirun,
the people of arrogance.
The people of arrogance. It's a hadith narrated
by Imam Tilmidi,
and he said that it's a hadith Hasan.
And,
he then explains what the linguistic meaning of
the word mutafahir is is that its
origin is from the word alfaq,
and faq means,
to fill something up.
And it is a, an expression meaning the
person who fills his mouth with speech
and, is expansive in his speech
and speaks in such a way that it
confuses other people. People don't understand what he's
trying to say,
but he's doing so in order to show
his own takabbur, to show how great and
wonderful he is and his own how
high he is, how much higher he is
than other people, and make his own, the
of his own fabila show how much better
he is than other people, how much merit
he has over other people.
And,
it's a hadith narrated by Imam Tirmidhi.
Imam Nawawi then brings up another brings another,
small piece of knowledge. He says that, Abdullah
bin Mubarak
and just a great alim of this.
He was one of the companions of Imam
Abu Hanifa,
When he was writing his fiqh down,
he had a assembled a council of 40
experts in all sorts of different,
all sorts of different
fields. See, if I was Hanafi and I
said that Sheikh Aqif said, you're just pumping
up your own madhah, but I'm not even
Hanafi, but I'm telling you, it's really amazing.
A council of 40 experts in different fields
of of knowledge,
and they would they would they discuss the
masal, the issues of the sharia 1 by
1.
And if for example the would have a
difference of opinion, this verse actually means this,
this verse actually means that, the people
experts of tafsir, they'd ask them or they
would have a difference of opinion, this happened
or, you know, this is a hadith of
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, no it's
weak, no it's sahih,
Then they'd ask the the muhaddifun that are
present in that panel of experts, what is
your opinion? And then once they come to
a a a a conclusion, then they'll return
the ball to the court of the fukaha,
so they'll continue with their discussion. And this
happened over decades,
and that's how the Hanafi madhab is developed.
So you may agree with it or not
agree with it, but it's based on solid
scholarship.
If, you know, one of the accusations that
that people make, which for the life of
me, I can under I cannot understand why,
but one of the accusations that detractors make
against the Hanafi school is that it's it's
based on weak hadith and Abu Hanifa didn't
know hadith and so that's why it's weak
in hadith. And,
I'm Hanifa heard hadith directly from the Sahaba
alaihi wa'am on whom I'm not concerned about
that discussion. We can have it if someone
wants to later on. But, you know, the
council of 40 experts,
amongst them is Abdullah bin Mubarak who sits
there in that council.
Abdullah bin Mubarak is a person who is
narrated in all Sihasidda.
Okay? What does that mean? Imam Ahmed bin
Hambl, you heard of him before?
Is he an important Muhadith? Yeah. He's a
miral mumineen for the hadith fiasri. He's like
the the chief of the Muhadithin in his
age. Right? He has a he has a
student, one of his students is who? Imam
Bukhari.
Bukhari doesn't even narrate one hadith from him
because he finds shorter chains of narration from
other people. That's how cutthroat
like, the field of hadith is not like,
oh, like you're my shaykh so I'm gonna
put your no. It doesn't work that way.
If you find a shorter chain, you bypass
your own teachers even. Right?
So the fact that Abdul Abin Mubarak is
in all 6 books of hadith means that
there are certain hadith that he has, that
he carries, that you're not gonna find reliably
transmitted from anyone else. Otherwise, they wouldn't have
gone to him. They would have gone to
somebody else. So he's a he's a big
name in in Ilm. Right? He's a very
big name in 'ilm. And the fact that
he was, you know, one of the companions
of Abu Hanifa and his knowledge was at
the disposal of,
of this council
that that was this origin, the source of
the original,
Hanafi madham. Right? And it's very sad actually.
The Mongols when they sacked Baghdad, they actually
have the original books that were written that
that other books will because it's a very
long work. Other books will actually quote that
book that they actually wrote, the original tuduen,
the original attestation of the fiqh Abu Hanifa.
They'll quote it, so that's why we know
it it exists.
But the Mongols, when they sacked Baghdad, they
say there's a contingent of Armenians.
Right? The Armenians had a beef with the
Muslims for some time. Obviously, not army all
Armenians have beef with all Muslims, but those
particular ones seem to have a beef with
the Muslims. And so while the Mongols were
busy sacking, looting, killing people,
that Armenian contingent said, where's the library? And
they threw all the books into the into
the river. And so those books were unfortunately
lost.
The original books of the companions of Imam
al Hanifa in which the original madhab is
is written. But there are other books that
were written that are abridgments of that long
book that do make it out of Baghdad
and are still preserved, and there are other
books in which that book is quoted.
Many of the books of
in the Hanafi Madhub will will will will
quote that in.
Akif can tell you better. He knows more
than I,
on this and many other topics. But,
you know, those things were all destroyed during
that time. Coming back to the issue,
Abdul ibn Mubarak is very important person,
and he's, again, amongst these things is he's
a great Fatiha. He's a great 'alim. He's
a great,
Muhaddith. Above all else, that's what he's recognized
for. He's a companion of Imam Abu Hanifa.
So he's from the Salaf. He's a Tabatabiri.
They say that he was such a pious
man that he used to divide the year
into 3, 4 month,
3, 4 month periods, so you don't have
to, like, you know, knock the Tabli wasn't
the first one who did it. Right? So
4 months, he would,
he would,
teach and learn,
and then or sorry. He would do trade,
and then 4 months he would teach and
learn, and then 4 months he would go
out, jihaj.
And the cycle would start every year with
hajj, start and end with hajj, and so
he'd go on hajj every year. So imagine
like a person who does that and also
he has like a bunch of knowledge and
also he goes on Hajj every year. He's
someone obviously, umma is gonna love him and
the umma does love him. It's very difficult
to find anyone who doesn't love Abdul Abin
Mubarak who has a sound head on his
shoulders. And anyway, Imam Nawawi quotes Abdul Abin
Mubarak in the khatim of this chapter.
That Abdul Abin Mubarak said regarding the the
explanation of what good characters are.
It means meeting people with a with a
smile.
It's free.
So smile.
Abdul Rahman smile. Look at that.
Right? So it's free and,
it does a lot to, you know, change
the, you know, change the the, the mood
of people.
Right?
Smile. Even when you're going to visit the
sick,
right, don't go in like, you know, you're
going to someone's funeral. Go smile even if
they are dying.
There's no point in bumming them out for
the last couple of, you know, days in
this world.
Smile, it makes a difference. Don't go there
and say, oh, you're gonna die. What's gonna
happen to your children? People do stuff like
that. People are over dramatic.
You know, smile inshaAllah. Even if they are
gonna die, they're going to Allah Ta'ala. InshaAllah,
we'll join them soon as well. There's no
excuse not to be happy. Happy. So he
says, good beautiful character is what? It's to
smile.
And it is to
It means to spend from yourself,
in the pursuit of good things.
Meaning to tell a person a good word,
or to,
spend on,
good things or to do good work,
or to manufacture something good or to say
a good word to somebody.
All of these things,
to give good advice to people. So all
of these things, suspend of yourself in pursuit
of the good.
And to do whatever you can to stop
harming other people. Meaning, don't physically harm anyone.
You know, if throwing your garbage in a
certain way annoys your neighbor, if
doing something annoys your neighbor, whether it be
the neighbor in your house or the person
next to you, if you're like scratching like
crazy and like
I do the stuff like this, I fidget
and things like that in the salat.
You know, if it's annoying the guy next
to you, right, maybe go in the back
stuff and
don't bother the person. Maybe Allah will write
for you the reward of being the first
stuff and the reward of good character on
top of that. If you know you're doing
something to annoy a person. And
you can say, well, hi, Sheikh. I have
eczema. It's not my fault. It's not about
your fault or my fault. It's what? Is
that know that whatever you whatever you do
whatever you do, if it's harming another person,
you'll reward. If it even from the harm,
meaning from the point of
killing someone all the way down to just
mere irritation
or distraction even.
If you can stop yourself from doing that,
then then you'll receive reward. And there's some
people, honest to god, like, that's they can't
really do anything good for other people, but
they can, like, stop from annoying or harming
other people or irritating other people. If that's
all you can do, then use
removing yourself from situations that you're just gonna
bother people and bust their chops, that's your
ibadah.
That's something you'll go to Jannah for.
And that's okay to, like, recognize that. You
you understand what I'm saying? Obviously, very few
people are as thoroughly irritating or harmful,
that, you know, they'll have to actually, like,
leave civilization in order to fulfill that. But
everybody has a little bit something that they
do that's
kind of annoying or kind of harmful or
kind of irritating or kind of
something or another, you know.
And we have to be very careful about
that as well in our consumption habits because
the thing is that the stuff we buy
and the stuff we eat and drink,
a a lot of it is manufactured,
is
harvested, is,
somehow brought from another part of the world
or from another part of the country that
we don't think about.
And so be careful, like, the clothes you
wear, the food you eat. You know, was
it gained by ethical means? The businesses that
got them were was it gained by ethical
means? Was it by someone who's paid a
fair wage,
and, you know,
somebody who was, you know,
working out of their own volition, or was
it from a child somewhere who's like chained
to his workstation and has quotas that they
have to meet and that they're, you know,
they're not even paid in money and that,
you know, other weird stuff like that. Right?
You have to be careful. So that's also
kafal ada. Sometimes, you know, someone might say,
oh, Sheikh, man, you're that's a bummer. Like,
maybe, like like, all the stuff at the
store is like that. Right? Well, the fact
of the matter is fair trade things, you
can buy them. They're just more expensive,
and they may not be the brand you
like. But, there there are there are ways
to get those things if If you're in
such a situation that you have no choice
except for to shop at Walmart or something
like that, then buy less
than you have to. All of these things
are on a sliding scale. But what are
the 3 things? 1, smile when you meet
people or, like, if you're not smiling, you
know, that's one thing in the old days,
they used to think someone smiles too much
as an idiot,
because maybe they have some sort of problems
because everybody, you know, they have some sort
of mental imbalance. So we find but at
least we have a positive attitude, you know,
is what what
the the the summary is. The second thing
is what? To spend from yourself in order
to do good things, and the third thing
is to restrain yourself from harming another person.
So, you know, spend less, turn your lights
off a little bit more, use less water,
somebody else will use it. You know, do
just take less from this dunya,
in order to to help. If you can't
help any other way than just doing that,
that's also a great thing because the nam
of Allah ta'ala on the people of this
land is great, and like that, there will
be great questioning about it. So, you know,
we're in the situation we're in. We don't
feel guilty about all the good things Allah
gave us. Rather, we thank him for it.
But there's an a style and a sloop
that you should have,
you know, for the situation you're in. If
you're poor, there's a style of being poor
with good character. If you're rich, there's a
style of being rich with good character.
Right? So the Ni'am Allah Ta'ala gave us,
there's a style of of how you should
have show good character with those things and
style is that just don't take more than
you absolutely need. And, prefer other people,
their consumption and their needs and their rights
over your own. May Allah
give us all tawfiq and may Allah,
forgive our sins and give us good character
so that we can be close to the
messenger of Allah salallahu alaihi wa sallam in
this world and in the year after and
that Allah may,
make heavy our scale pans on the day
of judgment,
with good deeds and and and and and
use it as a means to,
push away from our faces the fire.