Hamzah Wald Maqbul – Riyd alSlihn Feeding Those Fasting & I’tikf
AI: Summary ©
The importance of fasting as a way to achieve spiritual health and progress is discussed, along with the use of "IT" during massages and the potential for conflict of interests between individuals. The speakers emphasize the importance of fasting for the spiritual path and the potential for conflict of interests between individuals. The use of "IT" during massages and the "we" concept is also discussed, with the importance of protecting oneself from extreme activities and avoiding physical harm. The speakers emphasize the importance of following the command of the prophet sallali alaihi wa sallam and emphasize the reward for fasting for women.
AI: Summary ©
We almost finished the chapter regarding the virtues
of fasting last week.
And so we have a couple more ahadith.
And,
you know,
this,
is a book of the spiritual teachings of
the prophet
And,
oftentimes,
the
exercises and practices that are described therein
are individuals for an individual person
to practice in their,
journey to Allah between them and Allah.
But that doesn't mean that a person's spirituality
is disconnected with the way that they deal
with others.
In fact, it's quite the opposite. And there
are some shortcuts once a person is able
to muster a certain amount of
individual spiritualism inside of themselves. There are some
shortcuts that a person can use other people,
the service of other people in particular,
and being good to other people in particular.
They can use those things in order to
progress quickly. In fact, more quickly than they
can through their own,
efforts and their own, striving.
And so this is a chapter with regards
to that.
And it's relevant for those who can fast,
and it's also relevant for those who are
unable to fast because fasting as an act
of worship is not easy for everybody.
Depending on a person's disposition, some people, it's
very easy for them, and some people, it's
very difficult for them.
The companion of the messenger of Allah Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam from the Babila of Juhaina, which
is I'm told still
intact
and still has a great number of,
members you'll, in fact, oftentimes see, like,
in Saudi Arabia, you'll see,
the
on people's, like, name tags and things like
that.
That, from Wadi
that,
Zayd bin Khaled Juhani radiAllahu ta'ala who narrates
from the prophet
that, the person who provides for the iftar
of someone who's fasting,
that person will receive
the reward of the one who fasted without
decreasing from the reward of the one who
fasted,
at all.
And so there there's a couple of things.
One is obviously you receive the reward for
fasting even if you don't fast
yourself. And so Allah gave people the time
and the ability to fast, and some people
they don't have that. Some people have the
money, but they don't have the time or
the ability to fast. Some people have the
ability to put in the effort to cook
for others, but they don't have the ability
to fast. Some people do all of all
of the above together.
And that's the follow-up of Allah, he gives
to whoever he wills. But there's a door,
there's a there's an entry way and entry
point for everybody,
somewhere or another in the
in the equation. And this is actually one
of the reasons that
mothers
have such a high rank in the deen.
The reason mothers don't have high, that the
the reason that mothers have a high rank
in the Deen is not because of girl
power.
It's not because girls rule or feminism or
they had a protest and they, you know,
whatever.
It's precisely because of what a mother does
for her children.
That she herself fasts in Ramadan often
times, and if she doesn't, it's because she
has to feed,
like, suckle the children or she's pregnant herself
or whatever.
And people don't think about this, but our
own mothers have, like, oftentimes,
you know,
fast days that they have left to make
up for years afterward.
Because of the difficulty
of nursing children and the difficulty of taking
care of children,
and, oftentimes they'll fast through those things as
well. And so this is why this is
why they have this mapam. It's not just
some sort of like identity politics.
You know what I mean? Like, if you're
if you're, you know, not every immigrant is
the same as like, you know, whatever Cesar
Chavez, and not every black person is Martin
Luther King. Not every woman is like, you
know, it's not your identity to to a
group, and not every person who goes to
the Masjid al Anjumah is like like the
Sahaba
on him. But it's through the the the
the the the the person does that they
receive their rank. This is part of a
long
standing caution that I have for myself and
for others that we don't
raise our sons to be fathers to look
forward to being fathers, and we don't raise
our daughters to look forward to being mothers.
But think about this, that the woman who
who fast and who takes care of her
children, she does so, and she's protected from
riyat because if person sponsors the iftar and
the masjid,
that undoubtedly there'll be some sort of announcement
or dua, or someone will ask who paid
for this. And children,
you guys don't even care. Your mother will
do a 1000000 things for you, and you
don't you don't you don't even think about
it. You take it for granted. Which means
that for the mother, there's no
conflict of interest rather,
she can do the act purely for the
sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, which is
itself a great
a great vehicle
of of progress in the
spiritual path. At any rate, one of the
other things that people should think about with
this is what is it the Rasool Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam is incentivizing a civilization in which
people value fasting.
Why? Because the person who's themself
fasting now is no longer considered to be
a time waster,
no longer considered to be some sort of
whack job.
In fact, their
act itself becomes, like, the central point for
what is a communal,
for for what is now a communal custom,
which is what? Which is that the Istar
should be provided for and should be fed.
This is one of the most Mubarak
gatherings that a Muslim will attend in his
life, which is what is the Iftar,
the suhoor and the Iftar of those who
fast. I remember when we were in the
MSA in the University of Washington,
because many people lived on campus or were
locals,
there was not really a whole lot of
provision for Iftar.
And so what happened was myself and a
couple of brothers who lived in the dorms,
we decided that we'll just have iftar together.
Whoever wants to eat from the cafeteria can
grab their food from the cafeteria. Whoever brings
their own food or gets it from outside,
we'll just sit together and we'll eat our
iftar. We'll pray another day together in a
place in the dorms, and we'll sit together
and make our iftar. There are a couple
of pious brothers who had cars, they would
just go to the masjid, and those were
left behind.
We just have iftar
together. That started with, 3 people.
By maybe 5 or 6 days it ended
up becoming 30,
And it became such a big thing that
literally, like, for years after that, 100 of
people would gather together.
The administration actually tried to stop it. I
said, hey, look,
you know, they come. I don't force them
to we're we don't, you know, speak or
anything. It's just a bunch of people sitting
together when they eat. I go, if you
wanna stop it, go ahead. But I have
no idea on what basis you're gonna stop
and who's responsible for any of this. Right?
And so they finally made a
concession to say, okay. Fine. We won't, like,
make a big deal out of it. Just
make sure you guys clean up after yourself.
I go, we already do anyway.
And they said, yeah. We noticed that. And
so what would happen
is,
people would sit together and they would eat
every day. Somebody would bring people from outside
the community found out and they would cater
their stars. People would get together, they would,
you know, be Muslims, like, as a community,
as an ummah.
And it was all what? Through fasting which
is an individual deed.
And I don't know, I mean, I know
for years afterward that customs state. I don't
know if the students at the university still
do it or not but, many massages, this
is one of the things that boggles my
mind, completely boggles my mind, completely.
I have no idea how or why any
of this happens. But there are many masajid
that will actually,
bar iftars from having the happening in the
masjid.
And I have no idea why. And the
reasons, the excuses are different.
People people, you know,
they don't clean up after themselves or whatever
or people don't,
you know, we don't have the money to
pay for so you don't have to pay
for anything. Just tell people come bring your
star, eat together. You don't have to have
even have them eat in the you know.
In some sense, it's better not to eat
in the
But just have people who, you know, all
you need is like a box of dates
and,
like, you know,
and, like, making a meal out of something
that a person doesn't really look like look
at it like a meal. But when you
need to, you just, you know, you do
what you need to do and that's it.
And the simplest of foods, you know, we're
the ummah that, like, made Biryani a thing,
man. Like, you can see, literally one day
of briyani probably cost, like, what? In the
old, like, 2 years ago maybe $60 maybe
because inflation, $80,
You know, people are eating all kinds of
wild things like, vegetable, briyani or whatever. Just
like throw some paneer in it or whatever,
you know. And like, it's you can make
cheap a large amount of food for a
large number of people,
and there's always somebody who will do it.
I remember when I was imam in the
masjid in Chico, California.
There was an auntie, she used to work
the night shift.
What a pious woman. I sometimes
envy her reward.
She used to work the night shift in
the lab, like, people get blood test in
the day and they run them in the
lab at night.
And, and so she would also fast. She
would come
at Assar time, and she would cook, and
she had to leave the masjid, like, an
hour before Maghrib. It was in the summers.
An hour before Maghrib in order to make
it to work on time. And she would
work basically the whole night and, like, come
home after suhoor.
And,
or around suhoor time or whatever.
And the students because Chico is a a
college town.
So Chico State University is a California State
University.
So they would ask the kids and then
I'd say, what do you guys wanna eat?
And,
they would tell her, and so sometimes it's
this, sometimes it's that. She'd look up, like,
different recipes, American food, Arab food, Italian, whatever,
Mexican. But she just look it up and,
like, figure it out. There are 1 or
2 aunties that would help her. She'd bring
the entire material herself, and she would cook
it and prepare it and just leave it,
like, in dishes and trays,
and and go,
oh, we're gonna shut it down. I go,
why in the world would you shut it
down? So you know these kids, they come,
they don't even pray afterword. I'm, like, you
don't come praying maghrib, like, nobody, like, banned
you from the masjid, bro. Like, what what
what, like,
what kind of, like,
weird constraint inside of the heart does a
person have to have in order to be,
like, I don't understand. Right?
And, as, you know, as long as I
was there, I I was like, okay, well,
if you ban this, I'm leaving. And, but,
you know, people have their kind of weird
excuses. Finish those weird excuses. Go back to
the sunnah of the prophet What is the
sunnah of the prophet This is something that
the rasulullah
mandated. It's part of the deen.
Some people, honest to God, fine, if you're
a good Muslim, you're a bad Muslim, whatever,
you know, things are how it is, life
is life, Not everybody's perfect. People who act
perfect are oftentimes more imperfect than the people
who know that they're not perfect.
That's fine. You know, people's individual accounts,
you know, whatever. It is what it is.
What I don't understand and what completely boggles
my mind is what is the,
in particular, the
desire for people to
sit in positions of authority within the Muslim
community
while being so starkly against anything having to
do with Islam.
The Rasul he
gave a mandate that this is something that
should
happen. Why fight it? You should actually be
facilitating it. Why fight it?
And, this is one of the reasons why
these duroos, oftentimes, they're very necessary, and the
people who's most necessary for them to sit
in, they're they're the ones who are the
most frequently absent, and we ask Allah for
help.
But, you know, feeding feeding the one who's
fasting is like it's a big deal. It's
not a small thing.
There's some discussion amongst the Muhadithun
as to,
who exactly what the name of Umamara is.
And
the Khulasa is that some of the Muhadef
when they said it was 2 different there
are 2 different women with from the Ansar
with this, Kunya.
But,
Hafiz ibn Abdul Bara and Hafiz,
ibn Hajar. They say that the both of
them, they're the same person.
And,
she is the grandmother of Habib bin Zayd,
and,
her name is Nusayba.
She,
from her fa'vail is that
she was there as a,
to aid the Muslim army in the battle
of Uhud.
And,
hers and, she,
was
present at the
second bay'atul Aqaba, the bay'a of 70.
So it's a maqam, the the original Ansara
that
accepted Islam before the prophet
came to, Makkum Karama.
She was one of them.
And,
she also,
was there at the Bay'atul Ridwan, which is
the
oath of allegiance to follow the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam when they went for the
Umrah Al Qadah,
when they were blocked from making umrah by
the
mushrikun
and had to return the next year, which
is immortalized
in the book of Allah in the. Suratul
Fathrah
She was from those people from that bayah,
that under that tree, they took the oath
of allegiance with the messenger
bore witness to him being pleased with them.
And she also
went out,
and
she also went out in the battle of
Yamama. The battle of Yamama was
the battle in which
the,
Rasul
his his companions went to fight the after
shortly after the
passing, his companions went to fight,
and
Musaylum
Kathab,
the the false prophets of,
Rabia
that
gave battle in a place called Yamama,
which is the fort fortification of Banu Hanifa.
First, they fought the battle in front of
the fortress, and then when they got beaten,
they had to go inside the fortress and
then the
and whom,
brought them out.
So, she treated,
11
or tended to 11 wounded,
companions
in that, in that time.
And she lost a hand in that in
that battle.
She herself was wounded and injured and she
lost a hand. May
Allah, give her, Jannah and a in
this world and the hereafter and like that
everybody who
sacrifices something for the sake
of Allah. And so she's a person of
great virtue from amongst the companions
It's interesting,
as a tangential note
that, today was 12th of Rabi'ul Awwal, the
battle cry in the,
in the battle of Yamama was.
But the companions
were so
offended by the false claim of prophethood of
and and Musailema
that,
that their battle cry on that day was,
wah Muhammadah,
that, oh, Allah help us.
Give us madad and give us victory through
the haq of the Nabooah and the khatun
Nabooah of Sayidna Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
The idea being that the expression of love
of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam takes
many
forms. The highest form is that of a
struggle and sacrifice,
in serving his deen and in following his,
following his sunnah. And there are other forms
as well and we, we,
you know, we we honor those forms as
well.
So she,
it's narrated,
in
that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam entered,
her house,
and he, meaning he was invited over and
so he he he when he entered her
house, she put forth, something for him to
eat.
And she says,
she she put forth something for him to
eat, and he also said to her, why
don't you eat from it as well?
And,
she said, I'm fasting.
And the messenger of Allah, sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam,
he said that
the person who's fasting,
the angels will recite a particular benediction on
on that person,
if
they have to be patient with others eating
around them until the people who are eating
are done. And so this salatul malaika
is described,
as
the invocation of blessings and in particular
the du'at, Allah ta'ala, that Allah forgives such
a person their sins.
Now,
you know, what does it mean that an
angel makes du'a for you? Generally, if you
ask someone for help, they say, can I
have $5? I said, no, but I'll make
du'a for you. Thanks a lot, buddy. You
know? But that that we shouldn't, if we
shouldn't have that attitude. 2nd of all,
the dua of the angels in particular,
the expression means what? Is that Allah Ta'
created them without sin. Allah Ta' created out
them without blame and without fault.
And so the idea that they're making du'a
for you
intertwined with that in order to understand what
it is. The idea is that what their
du'a will be answered.
That Allah ta'ala will accept their dua.
And, and so this is this is
a way of saying, it's a elegant
way of saying
that,
the person who is patient with those eating
around them while they're fasting, that this is
a reason for Allah forgiving them.
And lucky us
in America that, you know, people don't fast
generally
and, you know, they eat
left and right around us all the time,
and, we get so much,
reward. And this is the father of Allah
Ta'ala that had it not been on us,
you know, we could have been the ones
eating and not fasting.
But this is an honor Allah gave us,
between,
between the backs of other people who are
Mahrul who are deprived. May Allah
give it to them as well,
Sayidna Anas bin Malik
narrates that the prophet,
went to visit Sa'ed bin Urbadah
who was,
the the the the one of the chiefs
and one of the leading peep men of
Khazraj,
the 2,
one of the 2 great
tribes
of the Ansar.
1 being Os and 1 being Khazraj. The
2 were related to each other by
by by their ancestors, the eponymous ancestors and
Khazraj were brothers from the same mother, but
they had different fathers.
Their their their ancestor, her name was Qayla,
so they're the Olad Qayla,
Qayla too. And so they were they were
brothers, but from different fathers, same mother, but
different fathers.
At any rate, so the, Khazraj, which was
numerically the larger of the 2,
Sa'd
ibn Oghadda Afan
was
the was a chieftain of the Khazraj.
And he was a wealthy man and he
was known to be a very generous man.
The Rasul Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam came to him
once, and the Rasul Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam did
he give them to eat? He gave them
bread and oil.
Now bread and oil is not
like the biggest feast in the world. Even
in those days, you know, they used to
slaughter animals, they used to, you know, cook,
you know, big feasts and things like that.
And so one of the things that the
early Monday mentioned
is that that
if someone comes and visits to give them
whatever is ready, whatever is prepared, and whatever
you can give easily. There's nothing wrong with
that. As a guest, you should not see
anything wrong with that, and as a host,
you should also not see anything wrong with
that. What's the benefit of it?
The benefit is is that if we make
visiting one another easy, then we'll visit each
other more often.
Whereas if we make the kaloft that somebody
came, you have to do this, and then
you have to do that, and you have
to spend all this money, etcetera, etcetera, and
until that happens, you know, like, I don't
feel
honored as a guest, and until that happens,
I don't feel,
as a host that I've done my duty
and I'm apologizing 50 times and this and
that. Then what will happen? It makes it
very painful and annoying to visit one another,
and people just stop visiting one another, sicknesses
of the age, that we live in, that
people are very disconnected with one another, and
it's one of the reasons also mentally we're
ill,
That we don't visit with one another, we
don't see one another, we don't,
go to those,
occasions where,
we can talk to one another, that we
can, you know, exchange
ideas and
lighten our grief, etcetera, etcetera.
It's spiritually also a reason that people are
ill. Why?
Because things like going to the masjid, things
like going to visit your brother when he's
sick, or to console people when they're down
or, you know, to help somebody or to
seek advice from somebody or visit 1 of
the or
visit 1 of your elders, visit 1 of
the people of and virtue from these are
all reasons mentioned in the hadith of the
prophet
for a person to be forgiven.
And when your sins are forgiven, it's not
just something like a nondescript thing that will
happen on the day of judgment
that a person will,
will will benefit from on on the day
of judgment. And until then, it's just like,
you know,
you don't see it, taste it, smell it,
touch it. Rather, it's a feeling you have
inside of your heart as well that you
feel clean inside of your heart. Whereas people
who are not forgiven,
the and
the
the the kind of dirty state of that
being, which catches up with everybody, Muslim and
otherwise,
if you don't have a chance to clean
yourself from it, you feel disturbed.
You just feel disturbed and perturbed from it.
It doesn't let you sleep at night. It
doesn't make you let you be happy. It
doesn't let you meet people with happiness, etcetera,
etcetera.
And so,
this is something that the commentators mentioned, that
that bread and oil to dip
the bread in. Although, you know, the oil
they had was real
olive oil. It wasn't the kind of fake
Italian mafia stuff that we have nowadays. It's
like a whole scam in America. It's very
difficult to find, like, real olive oil. Most
of what's, like, labeled as olive oil is
something else that they put, like, smell in
or whatever, and they take take it to
the lab. It's
it's much of it is just fake. So
that was actually more nutritious and better, so
don't just, like, you know, say, hey. It
looks like Sunai put out, like, wonder bread
and crisp you know, like,
canola oil or whatever in front of a
person. You probably shouldn't eat that stuff yourself
anyway. Neither the wonder bread nor the canola
oil. Have you ever seen a canola before?
Right? Because it doesn't exist. It's like something
fake. It's not, like, actually something you should
be eating. But the point is is that
they had you know, it's still it's not
it's not like a a big or anything.
And so he put it out, and the
rusul was happy with it, and he was
also happy to put it out as well.
He says that he put it out for
them for them to eat, for him to
eat
And the prophet
made dua for him. I mean, he was
pleased with him and he made dua for
him. He says,
may
the people who fast come and open their
fast with you. This is a dua for
somebody. Right?
Not like, oh, damn it. All these, like,
fasting hobos came, and they expect somebody to
eat. No. It's a honor. It's a honor.
It's a shut off of, of,
of the nobility of, that this is how
how their honor is increased
is what is that? How many how many
people who fasted did he feed?
How many poor people did they feed? How
many people did they help out? How many
people did they teach? How many people did
they give good advice to? Etcetera, etcetera.
This is as opposed to nowadays where we
think of somebody as being a big shot
if they have, like, a a ridiculous house,
or if they have a ridiculous overpriced car,
or whatever. It's all buckwheat. It's all nonsense.
First of all, it's something that they theoretically
enjoy.
Not you. So why should you look up
to another person,
for something like that? But it's part of
the deception of,
of the stupidity nowadays.
That the Rasool
was the most powerful man in Madinah Manawwara,
and he was one of the poorest,
not because of a lack of opportunity,
the poorest, again, not because of lack of
opportunity, but because he spent on people. After
him said,
again, not because of lack of opportunity, but
because he used to give.
He used to he was honored by people
because he gave in such a way that
nobody everyone else knew were not able to
give like that.
And he honored giving more than receiving.
Interestingly enough, Sayidna Uthman
who was
a a a wealthy man, but at the
same time, he gave more than anybody else
gave.
He gave so much. He gave more than
anybody else gave. To the point where where
the Rasool Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam informed him before
his death that one day, the people are
gonna assassinate you in.
And everybody was, like, surprised, like, how how
could this even happen?
How could this even happen? And the assassins
have said, now, I
just read yesterday from the tail end of
the Irshad of,
Imam Haramain Joanne Bu Ghazali's sheikh. He has
a section at the end about imama,
about the,
and things like that. And so, he had
very not good things to say about those.
He named them. He said these people were,
like, nobody's, like, their riffraff. He goes
that that that that it's
there's no difference of opinion that they they
had no right to do what they did,
and that they themselves deserve to be killed
for, like, such a horrible thing that they
did.
But the point is, is what? He spent
more than anybody else did,
in the path of Allah.
And that was why people
honor them and love them.
And this is a disease, a sickness to
look up to people because of how much
money they spend on themselves,
and it just it doesn't really make sense.
And to be honest with you, we should
despise such people.
We should despise such people.
Of course,
there's a limit to how much you despise
a person, because people, a lot of outputs
them in fitna and things like that. Some
people fail tests. We also fail tests in
our life. Right?
But in as much as that particular lifestyle
way of living,
spending more and more money on stupid things
that you don't need,
on yourself. It's not something to look up
to.
And, you know, it's like, for example, if
you see somebody on the street that has
no arms and no legs, you don't despise
the person in the sense that, okay. Like,
you know, they're a human being at the
end of the day. Right?
But you also
it would be silly for someone to say,
hey. Would you like to be like that?
No. Of course not. If you said yes,
you'd be an idiot.
Allah
chose to test that person in a certain
way,
and there are certain choices, they only are
good when Allah makes them.
If anybody else made them, that person would
be like out of their mind,
and we wouldn't accept it from anybody else
except for from Allah Ta'ala because of Allah
Ta'ala being unlike his creation.
Otherwise,
nobody nobody wants to be that way.
Nobody should want to be that way.
It doesn't make sense for anybody to wanna
be that way. And, you know, this is
the same thing that a person who's given
wealth, and a person who's given,
you know,
power, and a person who's given fame, and
all of these things, they don't use it
except for to ingratiate themselves.
This is like basically, like, the human version
of a pig. It's not a good thing
it's not a good place to be. And
so sure, that person may make toba on
later on, and then they'll go make Hajj
and whatever, and Allah forgive them. We ask
Allah to forgive everybody who dies on the
of the prophet even bad people,
you know, from the
If not for any other reason, then if
Allah forgives them, then Insha'Allah, he'll forgive us
as well, right?
There's some interest self interest in it. But
the point is is that when looked at
looked in a
vacuum, that
how it's not a good how to be
in. A person should despise it. A person
should ask for protection that I should become
like a pig like that. That You just
keep eating, keep consuming, keep consuming, keep spending,
keep spending, keep spending, and you don't have
any care or concern for anybody else. Such
people are like a cancer, on society. Right?
What is a cancer?
A cancer is a tissue, serves no beneficial
function to the body, but it keeps consuming
its,
its, resources
and getting bigger and bigger. And,
you know, one day it will cause the
death of the entire body altogether.
There's so many like weird,
you know, parallels
in our society nowadays.
The whole, like, the the alphabet, you know,
community.
QRS, TUV community.
Right? It's, like, fine. Do you think that,
like, being gay is, like, invented, like,
20 years ago or 60 years ago in
America.
Muslim countries,
trust me, they've been doing it for a
long time and it's they're actually
far more advanced, if you can call it
that, in in some of these things. They
have a culture of centuries and millennia from
before Islam even that they practice these things.
These countries we come from, subcontinent, Central Asia,
etcetera, they're infamous for these things.
But at the end of the day,
it's not an identity that people advocate for.
Why? Because even the people doing it understand
how if everybody were to do this, you
know, society is gonna collapse.
Right? In America, when a man and woman
get married and get tax breaks, it's because
it's hard to raise a family. What's the
problem when you don't have if you don't
raise a family, you don't have children. Right?
Within a 100 years, your entire nation state
collapses.
It becomes vulnerable to its enemies.
This is a problem. This is one reason
China is not really all that big of
a threat to the world. Although
they're doing horrible things right now, but they're
not all that big of a threat because
nobody wants to have children anymore. They're they're
already suffering from demographic collapse.
They're already suffering from demographic collapse in Japan.
They're already suffering from demographic collapse in Korea.
They're already suffering from democrat
the demographic collapse in Europe. That's why everybody's
so afraid of Muslims. Not because Muslims are
strong, organized,
smart,
you know, they haven't been those things as
a society for a very long time, to
be honest with you in any way that
could threaten any of those countries.
But what is it? Something very simple, right?
That the rest of the soul said the
will get married. Muslim
Muslims sometimes are not really all that smart
or articulate
or, like, hardworking or any of these things.
Some are many are, but some of us
aren't.
So at least we can get married. Right?
At least we have, like, a couple of
children.
That in and of itself, it protects us.
Whereas on the flip side, what are we
doing? A man marries a man.
Who has the wali, who gives the mahar
to who? God knows, you know, what does
that even mean? Doesn't even mean anything.
And on top of that, we're gonna give
them tax breaks for it.
That a per you know, a husband and
wife save money in order to buy a
house so they can raise a family. It's
efficient. You have, like, 5 people consuming, like,
in one address and consuming, you know, food
on one bill, and it's efficiency, actually, and
it provides something for the next generation. Now
you have 2 people, you know, basically consuming,
like, as much as, like, 3 people consume
normally.
It's gonna cause everyone to
it's gonna cause the society basically to rot
from the inside out. Right?
But the problem is if you don't look
at these things from the correct lens,
you won't understand that because people will be,
well, it's my choice. So at some point
or another, that's fine. First of all,
put that issue aside, it's my choice. At
some point, our choices for ourselves, they impact
other people.
If a man is a father, ahead of
a household. A woman is a mother, she's
ahead of a household versus somebody who's, like,
lives alone in the forest.
Okay? Lives alone in the forest. They say,
oh, look at this mushroom. Let me, like,
you know, take it and see what happens.
Right? You're alone in the forest. Worst case
scenario, you know, you'll trip out and then
some animal will eat you and it's like,
you know, it's a dumb move, but it's
over.
You're a mother of, like, 7 children, what's
gonna happen? You made the choice, 7 people
die with you.
If you're the president of a country,
your choices are different than if you're just
a private citizen. They impact other people differently.
At any rate, coming back to this,
you know, this issue, the issue is that
being a generous person and giving to other
people,
it's something it's a civilizational value that we
have. And you can very clearly say that
if somebody doesn't
for one aspect of it is feeding the
people who fast,
which also makes fasting now in demand as
a civilization of value. But in general, if
you see somebody who's living a life or
you see yourself living a life
that you're no longer able to give to
people, then you have to wonder what's the
point of this. Is this now become cancer?
Is it good growth? Are you, like, going
to the gym working out and getting stronger
that I can,
you know, lift more weight this week than
I could last week? Is it that type
of growth, or is it type of growth
that, like, is gonna send you into the
ground, like, you know, in a couple of
months?
And sadly,
people have lost the ability to differentiate between
the 2 of them, and that's why our
our society is unraveling at a rate that
I think many of us are in denial
about,
but, it doesn't mean that it's gonna happen
any less fast or,
with with any less
dramatic and traumatic of effects.
And Allah knows best.
So the chapter on
is connected
to the chapter on
fasting.
Why?
Because
it's connected to Ramadan. Ramadan is the month
of fasting.
Not necessarily because you cannot do a Tikaf
in other days of the year. You can
do a Tikaf in every day, that it's
lawful to fast.
So there's no on
or on 3 days after it.
But
but
because it's connected to fasting according to the
Malachy position, which is the hardest or the
harshest position out of all of them that
the is not valid if you're not there
for a minimum 24 hours.
And you have to fast in the masjid.
Otherwise, it's not valid.
Whereas in the Hanafi school,
the the sunnah mode of is to
is to do it that way. That's the
optimal mode of doing it, but a person
can do for less than that and also
not fast if they're
for a fraction of time that the fast
is not contained. And the other schools, I
believe,
are like that, more lenient. But all of
them agree that the sunnah, the Masnun way,
the Rasul,
the only way that he made a tikaf
or the prime way he made a tikaf
at any rate
is, is what? Is that a person should
be fasting, and he would make it in
the month of Ramadan. He said, now Abdul
Abin Umar, may Allah be pleased with both
of them, said that the messenger
of Allah would make a tikaf in the
last 10 days of Ramadan,
narrated both by Bukhari and Muslim, and also
narrated by both,
Sayda Aisha
She said that the messenger of Allah salallahu
alaihi wa sallam would make a tikaf in
the last 10 days of Ramadan until Allah
took him.
And then after his passing,
his
wives, the mothers of the believers, they used
to make after
him as well.
And,
He said that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam,
he used to make iatikaf
every Ramadan,
for 10 days, meaning the last 10 days
of Ramadan.
And when it was the last year of
his life, the year that, Allah, his soul
was taken by Allah,
he made
for 20 days,
and it's also narrated,
it's also narrated by Bukhari.
And so there's a couple of things that
are that I wanted to mention,
in the bundling of these 3 hadith, which
compromise the in or that comprise the entire
book on,
Ira Tikaf and Real al Salihim.
One has to do with why did why
did the Rasool
do atikaf for 20 days
in the last year of his life. And
it's a confluence of a number of things.
One is that it was the last year
of his life he wanted to
increases,
his devotions,
in it because of the nearing of the
end of his,
term, which he knew of from before.
The second is this is that
there was an incident that occurred in one
of the years of his,
Mubarak,
life in Madinah Munawara,
where he
set
he he had, like, a small tent pitched
in the masjid, basically, for his,
for his like they do in many massages.
They put up, like, screens and things like
that, so a person can have some isolation.
And,
when one of the
one of the mothers of the believers saw.
She
pitched her she pitched a tent in the
masjid as well to make it.
And then the other saw and said, like,
you know, like, we should you know, like,
there are some competition there. You know? I
don't wanna attribute motives to people who are
better people than us. But at the same
time, they were human beings, and the Rasool
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam himself noticed what's going on.
And it's a famous hadith, Al Biraturuddin
Abihaa,
he said to all of them, he says,
all of you really was it because of
your piety that you you wanted to be
pious that you all did this? Meaning that
he sensed also there was some competition in
them amongst them for his time,
in all pitching their tents. So he took
his tent down and he went, and they
also took theirs down and they went. Now
the Rasool, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, one of
the one of the
things about him is that when he did
a a deed
continuously,
it became Farbhan him.
So what's mentioned is that one of the
one of the opinions of the ulama is
that in the last year of his life,
the reason he did 20 days of
was what?
Was in order to make up those 10
days that he he left, in order to
make zajal, in order to,
deter the wives of the prophet
for making for this reason.
And this comes to another point. There's a
discussion about a woman's
how does it happen?
So in the Hanafi school, they say a
woman makes etikaf in her own home.
And,
in the other schools I shouldn't say in
the other schools, in the Maliki school, and
the rest of the the
in the Hanabi, you can go ask their
what their opinions are. But in the Maliki
school, the itikaf only happens in a Masjid.
It doesn't happen at
home, for lack of really any precedent for
it because it's a legal,
it's a legal,
in the sense, it has like a legal
definition,
which is there in the Quran.
The the of a person making itikaf in
the masjid is there in the Quran.
And,
so you have to be in the masjid
for it. And so one of the reasons
the messenger of Allah
wished to deter the women from making a
itikaf is that women really shouldn't make itikaf
if theirs
not a necessity, and to have women been
thronged the masjid if
the all the were making a tikka from
the masjid, then all the women of Medina
Manawara make it a tikka from the masjid.
There's some issues there. There's some problems,
in terms of safety and security, etcetera. And
so for that reason, we say it's not
for a woman to make.
However, if she makes a vow of,
it has to be fulfilled in the masjid.
Like a person imagine somebody makes another, says
that, Yeah Allah, if I get this job,
I swear I'll make Hajj 40 times. Right?
And then you get the job. Nobody now
you have go make Hajj 40 times. What
can I sacrifice,
like, goat or fat? No. Now go make
Hajj 40 times. Who told you to do
that in the first
place?
So if a person makes another, then they
have to fulfill it,
and it's becomes farther on them even though
it's not farther on anybody else. So a
person should be careful before making another,
before making a vow.
But if they made it, it's done binding.
So if a woman makes another, she makes
a vow to make a tikah, then,
you know, that vow has to be fulfilled
then.
And that can only be in the masjid,
and there will be some
difficulty in actually fulfilling its conditions, so she
has to find a masjid that's safe and
secure, and a way of being able to
fulfill its conditions. Otherwise, otherwise, there are other
acts of piety that are for a woman
for her to sit in her home even
if the Malekis don't consider technically to be
for her to sit in her home and
pray and, you know, isolate herself and make
devotion and set that time for a devotion
is more reward than
going to the masjid and making itikaf, why?
Because this is a it's a rule in
the Sharia
that
following
following the
the command of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam, an active obedience always will receive more
reward than
doing the contrary, no matter what the other
indicators are.
So for example, the Rasool Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
said that the reward of a woman fasting
at, or, sorry, praying at home is more
than,
is the most virtuous of prayers.
So one might say, well, what about all
of these rewards that are mentioned for going
to Jumuah for the men?
And you can assume that for the woman,
because her
prayer is
explicitly mentioned as being superior at home, that
whatever reward the men are getting, she's getting
at least that much at home if not
more.
And that's, that's what that is, even though
we might say it's permissible for a woman
to go and pay jamaat the masjid.
There's nothing wrong with that. Maybe there's a
benefit, maybe she wants to hear the khutba
and learn something, or maybe she needs to
get out of the house, maybe she wants
to visit the masjid because of some other
reason or whatever. You know, that that's different.
But the point is is that for her
to make Iltizam to the the sunnah,
to stick with the sunnah
and pray at home, it will receive more
reward even if that reward isn't explicitly mentioned
like the reward of the men for,
praying, Joanna Masjid, for example, is mentioned.
And so,
you know, that's that's the second thing. The
third thing is this is that the one
of the functions in Ramadan that that, were
carried out by him
is that this angel, Jibril alaihi sallam, said
in the Jibril alaihi sallam would come to
him and review the Quran that was
revealed thus far with him.
And so it being the last year of
his life, he reviewed it with him twice.
Why? Because
the time to go was
near, and the Quran is from the is
the greatest Amana, the greatest trust Allah gave
the Rasulullah
So in order to do that,
that second review,
perhaps there's a connection between that and spending
more time in the mustard and cut away
cut off and away from
the affairs of of daily life. And it's
possible that all of those things happen at
the same time for a reason. Perhaps the
double
revision is because the was
gonna be there anyway in some part or
whatever. The point is it works out. This
is an explanation of
this, seemingly
anomalous
practice in the last year of the prophet
and why it is that we don't consider
for 20 days to be a sunnah. That's
not the regular practice of the rasul If
a person wants, they can make it for
the whole
ramadan, that's fine. Some people do that as
well. There's nothing wrong with it, but the
sunnah, the most reward is what? Is in
those,
9 to 10 days at the
end of Ramadan.
We with that, we finished the
as well and then
the next
chapter has to do with Hajj. I think
it's better rather than starting
a complete new topic. We should all end
a couple of minutes early And in case
anybody has any questions,
you can ask.