Hosai Mojaddidi – Session 1 Purification of the Heart for Muslim Teenagers
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The spiritual heart is the same thing as humans, and the physical heart is the same thing as humans. The heart is the same thing as humans, and people have been the same way for thousands of years. The spiritual heart is the same thing as humans, and people need to be aware of the potential consequences of heart disease, including chest pains, heart-related disorders, and mental health. The heart is the same thing as humans, and people need to be mindful of their behavior and not let negative consequences of their actions affect their health.
AI: Summary ©
And then he was a descendant of the cousin of the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wasallam, who is Jaffa ibn Abi a polyp. Okay. So
that's the first part of his bio. His mother, and this is for all
the moms who are tuning in, I'm a mother. And I want you and I
wanted to, again, honor You My Mother Woods biography, but also
honor all the mothers because we sometimes don't give ourselves
enough credit. But look at you know, what we know of the mama
mode that his mother Marian bids Mohamed Mahmoud, even now, he was
also very knowledgeable, and she was her son's first teacher
SubhanAllah. Most of us are most of us are our children's very
first teachers, right. But he actually memorized the Quran
through his mother. So again, such a beautiful inspiration for all of
us to reflect on as mothers and as children, that the greatest school
is our it oftentimes, our home, and our teacher is the greatest
teacher that we have first teacher anyway, is our mother
Alhamdulillah. So he's a great scholar of his time, authored
many, many books, over 70 books, and then, you know, he passed away
in the year 1905. So not, you know, I mean, it's not that long
ago, right? Hamdulillah. But he did so much for our faith by
providing this beautiful poem that examines the diseases of the
heart. And we're going to talk about what that means in just a
moment. So now that we know a little bit about your mama
Mahmoud, let's talk about the next person that's really important to
this because he brought this text which is in classical Arabic, to
the western audience, he translated it from Arabic to
English, and then provided commentary, which is the basis
which is what we're going to talk about in this class. As we go
deep, you know, session by session, we're going to talk about
the commentary that your Hamza Yusuf provided so who is he? Well,
we should all know him especially if those of us in California and
the Bay Area because he is a Bay Area, native, masha Allah, but
he's also a Global Scholar known throughout every region of the
world, mashallah Batticaloa. And he currently serves as president
of the first accredited Muslim college in the US, which is a tuna
College, which is right here in Berkeley, California, a huge honor
for those of us again in the Bay Area, and in California in
general, and hamdulillah Hamza, as you know, we could say so many
things about him and his acumen, but mashallah he holds traditional
advanced degrees each other in Islamic law and theology, as well
as a BA in religious studies from San Jose State University and a
PhD from UC Berkeley, the graduate theological union hamdullah, he
was ranked by the Muslim 500 as the 23rd most influential Muslim
worldwide huge honor. Right of all the Muslims, billions of people in
the world Sure, Hamza was ranked as the 23rd most influential
meaning that his teachings mashallah have spread to so many
people on Hamdulillah. And most of those, the teachings are, by way
of books, articles that he's written, as well as classes that
are available for people and lectures that he's made available
online. And so the books that he's published right here in this
bottom section, are include the border purification of the heart,
which I just showed you, the Content of Character, another
amazing book for parents, again, to look into the creativity man
with the Howey and agenda agenda, change our condition, walk on
water, and the prayer of the oppressed 100 all incredible
resources for us to have. So I'm gonna please keep both of them in
your doors as we go through this class because we would not be able
to do this if it wasn't for their efforts. And it's so important to
be in a state of gratitude to our teachers and to those who again,
give us access and knowledge that enhances us and helps us on our
spiritual journey. Okay, so with that said, we're going to jump
into this topic because I want to maximize the time that we have, we
have about an hour maybe a little bit more if I take some q&a at the
end, which I want to, but let's proceed Inshallah, why do we need
to purify the heart? This hadith, which you know, we said is one of
four or five Hadith around which the entire religion of Islam is
understood, is pretty critical to understanding why we have to do
this process of purifying the heart and we're going to get into
details again about what that means. The prophesy centum said
that the Hadith the halal is clear and the Haram is clear, and
between them are matters unclear that are known to most people.
Whoever is wary of these unclear matters, has absorbed his religion
and honor and whoever indulges in them has indulged in the Haram. It
is like a shepherd who hurts his sheep to close to preserve
sanctuary, and they will eventually graze in it. Every King
has a sanctuary and the sanctuary of Allah is what he has made
haram. There lies within the body a piece of flesh, if it is sound,
the whole body is sound, and if it is corrupted, the whole body is
corrupted. Verily, this piece is the heart. So what does this mean?
The word sound right it's kind of like strange because we think of
sound we think of hearing
We think of something that we hear, but actually has multiple
meanings. In this case, it means that if it's healthy, okay, so if
the heart is healthy and you can, we're talking specifically, you
know, we can we can interpret this hadith as the physical heart as
well as the spiritual heart, right. And that's what our
scholars have done that it applies to both. And it's true it from a
medical or physiological standpoint, if you have a healthy
heart, then it'll hamdulillah everything in the body is just
seems to go smoothly. A lot of people it's one of the number one
killers is heart disease, right? A lot of people get have sick
hearts, and I actually have a picture of a sick heart coming up.
I just want to put that out there in case anybody's a little
squeamish. I'll give you an alert before I posted. But I want you to
see what happens when our hearts become diseased. And then try to
understand that the same thing can happen to the spiritual heart.
Okay, so this is why we purify the heart. Now another really
important thing to understand is that there are different types of
hearts. Okay? So what we mean by that is here, here are the eight
types of hearts. And we're going to go through these, the
description of each one to understand that where people
different people throughout the world are some people have
different you know, they don't have a sound heart, they don't
have a healthy spiritual heart or physical heart. But we're, again
speaking about the spiritual heart here. So these are there's eight
different types of hearts, that we learn through Hadith, or learn
through commentary or learn through eyes of the Quran. And
we're going to now describe each one, okay, here's the first one,
the dead heart. In the Quran and chapter 50, verse 37, Allah
subhanaw taala says that verily in this is a message for any that has
a heart, or who gives ear and earnestly witnessed the truth. So
he's talking about the Quran itself, that for people who have a
heart, and obviously this does not apply to the physical heart,
because if you don't have a physical heart, you're not alive,
right? We're specifically talking about the spiritual heart, that
for those people who have a spiritual heart that's working,
that's functioning, and who actually listen and earnestly or
sincerely are trying to learn the truth, the message of the Quran is
going to touch their hearts. So what that means, or the opposite,
or what this ayah tells us is that there are people that their hearts
aren't working, that somehow something's gone wrong, that the
spiritual heart is dead. Right? And these are the people who do
not know Allah subhanaw taala the way they should they don't worship
Him the way He commands in the way that he likes. And the way that
he's that pleases Him, instead of worshipping Allah subhanaw taala.
They just do whatever they want to do, it doesn't matter. It's like,
oh, I want to, you know, not pray because I'd rather go and, you
know, have some ice cream, or I'd rather go watch a movie, or I want
to go on my bike and take a ride bike, you know, right around the
court. So whenever there's something that has to be done as a
form of worship to Allah, they don't do it. And even though they
know that this might cause Allah's displeasure, and wrath, they still
go and do whatever they want. So these types of people are what we
would say there's something wrong with their actual spiritual heart,
in that it's not functioning and it's probably dead. Now, can it
come back to life? Yes, that's the good news. Alhamdulillah how they
have to humble themselves make Toba to Allah. And then they have
to be willing to listen and take the message. Right, whatever, like
to listen to the message of the Quran and to listen to the words
of the prophets. I send them with sincerity. This is how this kind
of a heart can come back to life. So the hardened heart, okay, now I
want you again, I'm using this imagery because I want you guys to
think about what happens to the spiritual heart, okay? When a
person stops remembering ALLAH SubhanA wa Tada the way that they
should, and they stop, you know, doing what they should be doing in
terms of fulfilling their you know, EBA the heart starts to
harden. Okay, the spiritual heart. And so to prevent this from
happening, the answer that what we should be doing is always being in
a state of remembrance as much as possible thanking Allah subhana wa
Tada. feeling grateful for the blessing of existence, for all of
the blessings that Allah has given us, our families, for example, our
parents, our homes, the food that we eat, the drink that we have,
the drinks that we get to have, the clothes that we wear, all of
the things that we have in life, our gifts that almost pocket has
showered on us, he's blessed us with so we have to be in
remembrance and gratitude to Allah and when we do that enough, it
prevents the heart from getting hardened Okay, so that's why
saying mashallah Alhamdulillah Allah Subhana Allah insha Allah is
so important to have as a practice of stuff for Allah right? A lot of
things we could say, but as long as we're remembering Allah
subhanho data. The third heart is the Darkened Heart. And if you
know
Notice in this picture, there's light, but it's not going through
this heart. Why? Because this heart is darkened. And, you know,
we talked about the dead heart, right, those who basically are
just in disobedience, they know that almost Panthera, you know, is
may or may be upset with them, but they continue to follow their own
desires. And those people, yes, their hearts can come alive,
through being attentive and actually witnessing the truth. But
the people who still remain in darkness, right, that maybe
they've heard the truth. They hear the message and they're just not
willing to accept it, that those people they remain heedless. They
just are, you know, they don't want to do what they're supposed
to do, their hearts become darkened, right. And that darkness
is because they are heedless, which means they're not fulfilling
their obligations to Allah. And then that what that does, it
actually makes them suffer in many ways. They start to have problems
with their life in their life, they may have mental health
problems or other spiritual problems like anxiety, depression,
fear, they might start getting a lot of stuff. And that's again,
sorry. The reason for that is because a person who has peace in
their heart, they have peace and they have light in their heart
because they're remembering a lost part that so when you don't
remember ALLAH, this is the consequences that it starts to
darken. Okay, so what about the difference? So what's the
difference between a Darkened Heart and a blackened heart? Well,
we know from the Hadith, the prophesy centum said, Verily, when
the servant commits a sin, a black mark appears upon the heart. So
you want to look exactly like this picture, okay? Every time we sin,
every time we lie, every time we don't do our prayers on time, or
we do something that our parents told us not to do. And we make our
parents upset. Or we do something that again is forbidden in Islam,
whatever that is, that it's a sin and it creates a black mark upon
our heart. Now the hadith is hopeful because the prophets and
said if he abandons the sin, so if you say have suffered a lot, you
recognize your mistake, and then you seek forgiveness and you make
your Toba then Alhamdulillah, The Black Spot gets removed, it's like
it wasn't even there, and it's polished again. But if you keep
going back to the sin, then that sin or that dark blackness will
increase, and it just starts to take over the heart. It's like the
whole heart starts to get spotted with these black spots. And then
it looks like something like this, right? And I was surprised that it
has an ayah in the Quran also that talks about a covering, right? So
this is what we mean that when a sins start to cover our hearts,
it's because of what we've done it to our own sins, right? And this
is why it's so important to make stuff for all every day, the
processor will make us suffer a lot every single day and he didn't
even sin. But why is he teaching us to do that? Because he knows
that we will fall into mistakes and sins, but if we always go back
to Allah, Inshallah, we'll be okay. Okay, so the next Heart is
called the sealed heart, okay. And this is our spine that says, Thus
does Allah seal the hearts of those who do not know. So there's
the word in our Arabic is Tobiah, which means to stamp or seal. And
I was proud that talks about how he seals the hearts of the
disbelievers and those who transgress those who go against
Allah subhanaw taala who are disobedient to Allah subhanaw
taala Allah puts a seal on their heart. And so there are people out
there who, again, they may hear the message of Islam but they
don't they're Allah is not guiding them because he's put a seal on
their heart. Okay?
A locked heart. This is another heart and there's two more Okay,
so the locked heart this is Allah spy that says, do they not then
earnestly seek to understand the Quran? Or are their hearts locked?
So this is really interesting, right? Because there are people
who they have the truth and hamdulillah they may you know,
they're Muslim, they, they may have learned a lot of things, but
for some reason, they've put a heart lock on their own heart. And
so this is the person is doing this to themselves, right? And
that prevents them from reciting the Quran, reading the Quran,
learning about the Prophet sallallahu wasallam seeking
knowledge, doing their prayers on time, for whatever reason, they're
just maybe, again, their knifes is too strong and they want to just
do what they want to do. But these are people who put a lock on their
own heart. Okay. And the last part that I was asking, you know, those
people like think about what you're doing right? That this is
you're the one that's putting that lock on your heart. And then we
have the blind heart, okay? This is also important. There's a lot
of people who are just blind. So the Allah's father says here Do
they not travel through the land so that their hearts
Made us learn wisdom and their ears made us learn to hear. Truly
it is not their eyes that are blind, but their hearts which are
in their chests. So there are a lot of people who don't seem to
see, you know, the importance of worshipping Allah subhanaw taala,
of doing what they're supposed to be doing, because they're
forgetting, they're forgetting that they were created for a
purpose. And so this is a versus a challenge that says, basically, go
out and look right, observe with your own eye, how beautiful this
world is, look at the stars, and the heavens and the universe and
the sun and the moon. Look at the waterfalls and the mountains and
all of the beautiful things in creation, the beautiful animals
that almost PanDa has created. Some of them can camouflage and
change their color. Some of them, you know, can, can do so many
incredible things. So think about all of these miracles are in a way
that we're witnessing when we look out into the world and reflected
who How did this all come about? If you're blind, you're not seeing
these things. So that's why it's very important to be in touch with
nature, and to try to always go out and maybe take a hike or go
somewhere where that it connects you back with nature, right? I
know a lot of children, one of the things I love I love many things
about children. But one of the things I love about children is
that you have a natural love most children do of nature, you love
to, you know, be out and about, you know, whether it's you know,
just being outside and playing in your backyard or going on a hike
or going mountain I mean to the mountains, going to the beach, you
just like to be out and look at the creation of Allah subhanaw
taala so that's why children are always in this beautiful state of
joy and happiness because they're in awe, they love to see all of
the great things that last part has made and created right so your
hearts are mashallah fully, you have great sight right? A lot of
other people we need to learn from you because you mashallah have
this this natural ability to see things that sometimes adults don't
always see. Okay, so hamdulillah So may Allah protect us again,
from all of these hearts, and then the heart that we all want? This
is the one Okay, so we covered seven so far, there's eight. This
is the heart that Allah subhanaw taala wants all of us to have, and
that we should all want to have. A last part of it says, the day on
which neither wealth nor children will be of any benefit, except for
whoever brings to Allah sound heart. What does he mean by that?
He's saying that on that day, the most important thing that you can
come to Allah subhanaw taala with is you can't you know by Allah
subhanaw taala does happiness with you, you can't bargain with Allah
subhanaw taala it the most important thing that you can do is
make sure that your heart is shining, bright, and healthy. And
sound, there's that word again sound right? Which really means
healthy, vibrant, alive, right? And the prophesy. centum said,
Verily, Allah does not look to your faces and your wealth, but he
looks to your spiritual heart and to your deeds. So this is again,
another reminder that Allah doesn't care how tall we are, how
small we are, how much what color our hair is, what color our eyes,
you know, our or what, you know, other things that we have in terms
of our physical appearance. None of that matters. He doesn't care
about how much money we have. None of it, the most important thing
that I was proud that he wants from us, is a really sound
healthy, beautiful, sparkling, shiny spiritual heart. So how can
we get that? Well, that's what we're doing. This is what the
whole class is about. The whole class is to teach all of us how we
can try to keep our hearts from getting diseased. Okay, so this
heart that I just described is called Bone saline. That word
sound in Arabic, it's Saleem, and here is an ayah. Again in the
Quran, from Chapter 26, verse 89, the says what it meant at Allah
the Calvin's selling so when the only one who will be saved is the
one who comes before God with a heart devoted to him. Write a
heart that's devoted to almost pantalla. If Jeff Rob Google
Calvin Salim again, he came to his Lord with a devoted heart, right,
very important that our hearts are clean for for Allah subhanho wa
taala. So ooh, oh, sorry, I forgot to give you guys the warning.
Okay, if you can't look at things that are kind of, you know what
the human body, I'm gonna put a picture up, but I want you to see
it. I hope that you guys are okay with looking at it. I know we have
some kids that are 11. We have other teens that are much older.
So I'm going to put it out there and let your parents hopefully
decide whether or not you can look at this. It's not too bad, but I
think it's an important visual. Okay. So how do we achieve a
devoted heart a clean heart? Well, look at this picture on the right.
You see that healthy heart
Right, that's what we all start off with every single person
that's born it, you know, healthy, all infants, were given this
beautiful fresh piece of, you know, flesh in our body that just
does what it's supposed to do really well, it pumps blood, and
it brings us, you know, full health throughout the rest of our
body, right. But over time, because of things that we do,
there's people who eat really bad food. But then there's other
people who do things like drink alcohol, which is haram in Islam,
right? Or they smoke cigarettes, or they smoke other things, or
they do other, you know, type of just wrong things, those things
have an effect on their heart, and it starts to do this, what we see
in the damaged heart, it starts to cover the heart with disease,
right, the heart is no longer working, right. And that's why
those people sometimes have a hard time breathing, they have a hard
time doing anything, walking, a few steps can for some people be
really difficult. And it's likely because their hearts have just
been damaged for so many years. And, you know, it just prevents
them from living a normal, healthy life. So the spiritual heart is
the same way. Over time. If you don't, if you're not aware of the
diseases of the heart, what can happen is it starts to take over
the spiritual heart, just the same way, like the damage that you see
in this physical heart. Okay. So that's why it's so important that
we first identify what the diseases are. Because if you go to
a doctor, right, and you say, Doctor, I'm experiencing some
chest pains, and I think my heart hurts, he, he or she will send you
for, you know, some testing, they'll look into your heart. And
they'll then tell you, these are the changes that you need to make.
If you want to get your heart to be healthy again, they'll tell you
to stop eating this, stop doing this exercise more. That's all
advice to get your heart to be healthy again. But you have to
first identify where the problems are. So for the spiritual heart,
it's the same exact thing. You cannot fix the heart if you don't
know what the diseases are that affect the heart. So that's what
we are going to talk about in this class. So let's go ahead and look.
Now there are 25 diseases of the heart. Okay, this is a long list,
but we're going to go over all of them by the end of the class. And
this is just the first 13 Here's the rest. So I'm going to go over
each one of them and kind of give you again, some commentary so that
you understand what they all mean, and how human beings can develop
them. Like how can someone get a diseased spiritual hearts? Well,
we're going to talk about that. So let's go ahead and jump into the
very first five or six, we're likely because of time, we had to
do an introduction that we might not get to all of these, I think
we're probably only going to be able to do the first three, but I
still wanted you to see them. So let's just quickly look at this
list. The first one that we're going to talk about is called
miserliness or stinginess, okay? Again, the the English words are
on the right column, the middle column has the Arabic words, and
then the definition is in the right column. So the Arabic word
for being stingy or miserly is bihon. Okay. And this is the
definition is someone who is holding on to their wealth and not
spending it when it's necessary. And they're being stingy or
greedy. They don't want to let go of their wealth for whatever
reason, okay? So this is a disease of the heart for many reasons,
because which we'll get to okay. But if you can imagine, again, in
Islam, the prophesy seller, when you study his life, you know, one
of the things that he was very well known for was how generous he
was, he was always helping people, he helped everybody. He even
helped animals. So his generosity wasn't just for, you know, his
family or friends, he helped complete strangers. He helped
people from all different backgrounds, and he even helped,
as I said, animals, so to not be a helpful person or a generous
person or a charitable person, is to go against the way of the
Prophet sallallahu wasallam. That right in and of itself, makes
being stingy a very big problem, right. And again, we'll get into
that in just a moment. The next disease of the heart is called
wantonness, which is butter and this is being way too exuberant,
joyful, but that leads you to be reckless and your extravagance and
I know those are probably big words for some of you I'll explain
what that means is that you Allah may have given you a certain
lifestyle right? Maybe you have a lot of money like maybe during all
these years, you've gathered some money from family from you know,
your
have grandparents, uncles, aunts, before your birthday for eat and
you have a lot of money. And then you take all that money and you
just want to spend it without really thinking about where would
be best to spend, you're just like, You know what, I'm going to
go buy, like, you know, 10 pounds of candy, and then go and buy all
these toys. And even though you have a lot of toys, and you
probably don't need all that candy, it's just because you have
so much that you can do with all this money that you just let
yourself go. Now for a child, that's you know, to a certain
degree, okay, but when you have an adult that has that problem, it
can really be become a big issue, right. And I'm going to again,
talk more in detail once we get to that. The third disease that we're
going to cover for today is called hatred. And this is both in
Arabic. And this is when you hate someone for really no reason, no
justifiable reason. And it's definitely it's not for the sake
of Allah because there's some times you know, if you hate
something, anything it has to be for the sake of Allah, you can't
just hate for no reason, right? And so we're going to talk about
how that disease can also really affect a person's overall
spiritual state. Okay, so those are the three that we're going to
cover today. And then I'm going to leave it open for some questions,
hopefully. But let's go ahead and get to the first one. So
miserliness, okay? This is again, Boho in Arabic. So I want you to
add home with your parents if you're there to repeat the words
because you should know how they sound. miserliness and borehole,
okay ha with a hub borehole. Now what is that? Here we have
reminders from the Quran and Hadith ALLAH SubhanA wa Taala
said, that those who are miserly and enjoined miserliness on other
men and hide what Allah has bestowed upon them of His
bounties, and we have prepared for the disbelievers a disgraceful
torment. So Allah is warning us very clearly, that if you're a
miserly person, and you hide, you're hoarding to hoard
something, is where you basically are just collecting, right? You're
gathering things for yourself, right. And I don't know how many
of you are paying attention. But when this whole pandemic started,
a lot of people were running to the stores to get what piles and
piles of toilet paper piles and piles of hand sanitizer. And there
were a specific people who got so much that they cleared out the
stores. So all the local stores in their cities, they didn't even
have any of these things available, because one or two
people took all of it for themselves. This is completely
wrong. In Islam, you can't do things like that, because there
were so many people who needed that stuff. Right? They needed it
to keep their families healthy and safe. But the miser doesn't care
about other people. They're selfish, they're only thinking
about themselves. And then they hoard things, maybe even more than
they need. There was actually you know, even shows, I remember
watching a few of them, that go through people who have this
disease of the heart. And they go there, you know, the second
documentary, kind of which is where it's like a little news
story where of camera crew will go into the house of a person and
then kind of, you know, just show what, how they live. A lot of
people have a disease called hoarding, okay? And hoarding is
where you just can't help yourself. You just want to gather
as many things as possible. Some of these people, if you go into
their homes, you know what happens? You can't even walk
through the front door, you have to go through a window or a side
door, because the things that they have gathered or accumulated over
time are so much that they go all the way to the roof of the house.
So can you imagine and some of these people like they have one
specific thing, like I remember watching one woman, you know what
she loved to buy. She loved to buy dolls. So she would buy she was
like an older woman. So she's not like a little girl who just loves
dolls. She likes to collect dolls. So what she did is she bought so
many dolls that they were taking over every room of her house. So
this is what happens with people who hoard right? They just keep
taking and taking and taking, not realizing this is wrong, you're
not letting other people also have their share. And so it's a disease
right of the heart, the prophesy. centum also said spend in charity
and do not count it, lest Allah count it against you. Do not hoard
it right Do not be miserly, lest Allah withhold it from you. So
this is a clear warning that Allah subhanaw taala if you are a
hoarder, someone who hoards or miserly that
Allah will withhold things from you to write. So you do that to
other people, you're going to have it done to you, this is really
important to understand. Now, this is an interesting fact. Some of
you may know this, some of you may not. Did you know that in Arabic,
the Arabic language the word for miserly or miserliness is compared
to something really unpleasant, that all human beings experience
even you? Pretty much all of us, we have all at some point in our
lives experiences because it's just natural thing, but it's not
very pleasant. Okay. And I'm going to tell you what it is. So check
this out.
The Miser ardently clings to what his wealth right, and he hoards it
up. The word for cling in Arabic is Masek. Can everybody say Masek?
Okay. What is Masek? This is derived from another Arabic word
which means constipation. O M G right? I see your smiling faces
are laughing faces. I knew this was gonna get you guys to giggle a
little bit. But just think about it for just a second. That the
person right? Who is constipated is what they are holding on to
something that's actually harmful for them to hold on to. Because
you need to go right when it's time to go. You need to go but if
you can't go because your body has a problem. What happens is it
causes you problems right? So Miserly people are compared to a
person who is in that state because they're clinging on to
something that actually poisons them. Right? What do we mean by
that? When you have wealth and all spiders given us abundance of
something in Islam, we have to give part of our wealth away,
right? We give the cat we give charity. Why? Because that is a
cat and sadaqa that we give cleans, are purifies all of the
other wealth that we have. So it's kind of like a detox, right?
Because we don't know if all of the money that we have is halal.
So we give it part of it away so that Allah cleanses the rest of it
for us. But if you're a miser, what you do is you don't give
sadaqa you don't give zakat, you're holding on to your money
for whatever reason. And so your they compare you to a person who's
in that constipated state. That's why it's something so odious
something so repulsive, right? We don't want to be misers just like
we don't ever want to be in that physically very, very
uncomfortable state, right. So remember that word, the word Masek
remember what it means. Okay, so another also just for those of you
who might again want to quicker definition, miser. A miser is
someone who's also cheap. Okay, so cheap people, Stingy people,
miserly. Those are all the words that you need to know to
understand this disease of the heart. Now, how do you get rid of
it? Okay, so important because as we talk about the diseases, we
also have to talk about the cures, right? We can't just identify the
diseases without figuring out well, how do I make sure I don't
ever ever, ever ever become a miser? Well, let's look at what
our scholars have told us. They've said first number one thing is to
remember death. Okay? Remember that wealth is accumulated over
time. And a lot of people work hard. If you look at your parents,
they work really hard every single day to give you the life that you
have, right? They go to work early, they sometimes deal with
really difficult people. They're not always in the best state. But
why do they do it because they have to, they have to provide for
their families. So when you accumulate wealth, it takes time.
But also one of the things that we know about this world is that
death can come at any time, right? And so you have to be grateful for
what Allah gives you and use it in its appropriate time without
thinking that you have time to spend. Because we don't know we
have no idea how much life we have in this world, right? We always
have hope and we should always have the best hope with Allah
subhanho wa Taala but remembrance of death will humble us to know
you know, what, what am I holding on to this for? And then we also
have to learn how to balance our spending, because it's perfectly
fine to spend your wealth if Allah has given you wealth to spend it,
you shouldn't, you know, hold on to it for no reason, but you also
shouldn't waste it. Okay. Wasting your wealth is just splurging
buying things for no reason. Just kind of being careless okay about
your wealth, we should not do that. And we should learn how to
spend it for the sake of Allah's path. That's a balanced view, just
doing both right? And then this is a really important point. So I
want you to pay
Attention, okay. The Miser is considered the ultimate loser.
Why? Because they don't use their wealth in this world because
they're holding on to it right? They don't want to spend, they're
holding on to their wealth. And then in the next life, Allah
subhanaw taala holds them to account, which means he's going to
ask them about it, right? He's gonna say, why didn't you use that
wealth that I gave you to help the orphans or to help the refugees or
to help the family that was struggling after their house went
on fire, you know, or to help this person or that person? Alas, Panda
is going to ask every single one of us how we where we got our
wealth from and how we used it. So the miser is going to be in a lot
of trouble on the Day of Judgment. But then if you think about their
life on in this world, well how sad because Allah has given you
all this wealth, but you don't want to spend it. That means
you're not even enjoying your wealth, you're just holding on to
it for no reason. So this is why the miser is considered again, a
double loser, okay? Important to know May Allah protect us all from
miserliness. So insha Allah say me and Okay, we have to make dua to
Allah subhanaw taala that he cleanse our hearts so that we
don't ever get these diseases, right? So, so important to make
that dua to Allah, please protect me from miserliness. I don't want
to be ever in this category of people, right. And also, another
thing that the scholars say is that the miser is usually someone
that nobody really likes, not even other Miserly people. So kind of
funny, but not really just idea that they're so you know, like,
disliked that even other people like them don't like them. So
think about that. We never want to be like that. Right? So the next
disease is wantonness, okay? This is called butter, or butter in
Arabic. Okay. And what is this, this was part that again, verse,
chapter eight, verse 4046, to 47, he says, do and do not be like
those who leave their homes filled with excessive pride, about their
state about that, all right, showing off before people and
preventing others from the way of God, and God encompasses what they
do. And then he also tells us, he reminds us how many cities have We
destroyed, that exalted in their livelihood? Here are their homes
now uninhabited after them, except for a few? What is that he's
warning us that there were people throughout history that had a lot
of wealth. And they were very, they're big show offs, they like
to show off, and they had all this pride. But they didn't do anything
really good with their welfare, they instead used it excessively,
they spent on things they didn't need. Right. And that is something
that now the only thing that remains about them are the big
homes that they used to go around and, you know, show off about
because they themselves were destroyed. So Allah reminds us
that, you know, this world is something that's not going to last
forever. And so don't think that, again, you just having the wealth
that you have, and spending it on whatever you want, that you're not
going to be asked about that, right, it's important that we know
there's a, it's going to end at a certain point, and we're going to
be held accountable. So let's look at this. wanting, wanting this the
definition that, again, is being so full of oneself and proud of
one's lifestyle and standard of living, that it becomes difficult
to show restraint and control one's desires. Okay. So a person
afflicted with this disease wants more and more and more of
something, even if they don't need it, just because they can have it.
So this is a form of greed, right? It's a form of greed to be a to
have this disease of the heart. And a lot of people like
especially adults, what happens to them. And this is, by the way,
happening everywhere. A lot of adults, they end up falling into
debt. And what does that mean? If you fall into debt, it means that
you are spending more than you have, and how do people do that?
They usually go and get credit cards and you know, get loans from
other people, they borrow money from other people. And they do
things that are just not right, because they're trying to live a
certain standard of living like a lifestyle. So they'll buy like
really expensive cars, but guess what, it's not with their own
money. They're borrowing money, whether from a bank or their
father or their mother or their brother. So they basically can't
control this desire to just spend, spend, spend, and it ends up
harming them and their families because if you can't control that,
then it's going to you know, affect everybody it's in a lot of
people they have, you know, their their families fall apart because
they can't control this disease of the heart. So very serious
disease. Now, how do we protect ourselves from it?
It became important to know that the treatment is similar to what
we're doing right now. Okay? We are all experiencing hunger,
right? When you deprive yourself, you go through that process of
saying, I'm not going to eat, I'm not going to drink. What does it
do, it just instantly reminds you right of, of all the things that
maybe you went a little overboard with, it humbles you, you start to
appreciate what you have more you've because usually when you
just keep wanting things, you lose the value of it. But once it's
taken away, you remember the value of it, right. And so another
important thing to do, which relates to that picture that I
showed you of the heart, is that a lot of different religions, not
just Islam, have what we call shared, like universal beliefs,
that we share the same idea about things. And so among them is that
too much food actually harms the spiritual heart, okay, and in
fact, could kill it. So this is connected to wantonness because a
lot of people who have wantonness are excessive in everything they
do, not just spending on wealth and material things, but also on
eating too much. And what happens is, their spiritual heart becomes
hard, hard hearted, okay? That picture that I showed you of that
heart that looks like a rock, that's what happens to people who
eat too much, or who drink too much, or who do anything in
excess, spend too much. If you don't have restraint, that's
what's gonna happen to you. You're slowly basically killing your
spiritual heart. And the interesting thing, the parallel,
is that the same thing happens with the physical heart. When
people eat really rich foods are an eat too much of it. Like if
you're eating a lot of fried foods and sugar, and just things that
are not good for you. They're, you know, they're not healthy foods
that would promote health, but they're actually dangerous foods,
what happens is, your heart actually becomes hard hearted with
something called arteriosclerosis. And this means that the arteries
in your heart are hardened, they start to get really, really hard.
Right? And so similarly, when you eat too much food, your spiritual
heart starts to also become hard. So fasting is one of the ways to
actually prevent yourself from getting this disease of the heart.
Inshallah, another one is to also seriously reflect on death and the
hereafter. And this includes, you know, the various scenes and
states of death because death is a process right? And then to think
about the grave walking on the Surat right so if your parents or
your Islamic school teachers have ever taught you that there's, you
know, a life after this life, we have different things that occur,
right, we have the soul travels, the soul was somewhere with Allah
subhanaw taala, then it came to the womb of our mothers, and then
we're born into this world. And then we're in the bottom left,
which is the stage between this world and the next life. And then
we have the next life. So it's important to know those steps
because then it reminds you that you know what, you have to be
better and you have to stop being too greedy and wanting too much
and showing more more control of yourself. Right. And so then the
last disease that we're going to cover is bullet. This is hatred,
very important, because it's so common, a lot of people
unfortunately, they have too much hate in their hearts. So let's
look at what Allah subhanaw taala and the prophesy said and taught
us. First Allah's father says, Oh, you who believe stand out firmly
for a lot and be just witnesses, right witnesses who are just,
there are people of justice. And let not the enmity and hatred of
others make you avoid justice. Be just that is nearer to piety and
fear Allah verily, Allah is well acquainted with what you do. So
Allah is telling us right away that if you are a hateful person,
you're not going to be just full right? You're not going to be a
just person. So we need to know that what's closer to Allah and
what's going to please him more as being just so we cannot let hatred
take over our hearts. The prophesy said I'm also said, by the wind
and whose hand is my soul, you will not enter paradise until you
submit to Allah. And you will not submit until you love one another.
spread peace and you will love one another. Beware of hatred for it
is the razor so he's using this word razor sharp thing object
right? And he says now he clarifies, I do not say that it
shaves hair, but rather it's
shaves away the religion. So hatred is something that will chip
away at our faith and our hearts that our spiritual hearts, we
cannot let it enter our heart. Right. And so, again, just to
expand on this a little bit, one of the consequences of allowing
this disease of the heart to grow is that it inevitably, it makes
someone unjust that when you're if you can't let the hatred enter
your heart for people for no reason, oh, I don't like this
person, because I don't like the way they talk, or I don't like the
way they walk, or why do they have to, you know, have this kind of
shirt on sometimes people can get really silly, but they'll find
really ridiculous reasons right? To, to not like someone and then
they let that dislike turn into hatred. And you see this happening
a lot, not just you know, with adults, but sometimes even
children, right? So children can bully, and they can be really mean
to each other for no real reason. But it's because again, they've
allowed this to enter their heart. And so one of the things we have
to understand is also what how this takes effect? Well, what
hateful people do is they tend to focus on one specific thing,
right? So you what you focus on one thing you don't like about
someone or someone, and then that fuels the hatred, it just starts
to make you feel more and more bad towards them. And then what that
does is you can't even see all their good qualities anymore, you
don't see anything but that hatred. Now we have a word for
this, this is called and it's a little bit sophisticated. But I
trust that you guys can learn this. It's called confirmation
bias. This is when you think have an idea of something, and then you
convince yourself of it. And then that's all you ever see about a
person or anything, then you just think that that that's your that's
the truth for you. But the truth is, it's not reality at all,
you've convinced yourself of something, and then you keep
looking for that thing. And then you think that that's all there is
in that person. So that's why it's so wrong. Because we're very, you
know, most people have goodness in them, right? Most people are good.
It's just that maybe they had a bad day. Maybe if someone said
something to you that there was a very nice, maybe they were just
having a bad day and you have to be more forgiving, instead of what
getting straight to this feeling of hatred, right, which is why,
you know, making excuses for people, which we're gonna get to
soon. What that means is a way to remedy and to remove this disease
from the heart, right? And so that point about again, that you can't
be hateful and also be a fair person at the same time is
important to remember. So how do we treat this disease of the
heart? First and foremost, we have to acknowledge that one of the
attributes of Allah subhanaw taala is Allah dude, which is the loving
one, Allah subhanaw taala is full of love, right? And there's so
many beautiful Hadith where he talks about his love and His
mercy. One of my favorite Hadith I was just telling, I think my kids
yesterday or the day before, was about how many parts of love Allah
subhana wa Tada has, right? He has, he says, there's 100 parts of
his love, only one part of that love Allah subhanaw taala has put
on the earth. So that means that every type of love that you see
all the animals all the you know, forms of love between human
beings, mother, child, sister, brother, uncle, grandmother, you
know, husband, wife, all that love is what only from that one tiny
part of Allah subhanaw taala is love the other 99 parts, he is
saving for us, the believers on the Day of Judgment. So love is
such a big part of our deen and we have to be loving people, right.
And we also have to remember that hate is the absence of love. So if
you can have a hateful heart, then that means that there's a problem
because in your heart Love is removed, and we have to help put
some more love into your heart. Right? And so that's why we ask
Allah subhanaw taala always to protect us from this disease by by
giving us love in our life and increasing his love for us. And
Shala we can hopefully overcome it. We also want to be active
proactive, right? So if you ever have bad feelings towards someone,
it could be a classmate, it could be anybody a stranger. What you
want to do is stop it and think about what's going on in your
heart, listen to your thoughts, or you know, pay attention to what
your thoughts are, and then say, Hmm, you know what, I don't really
know everything about that person. Is it really fair of me to think
all of these bad things about them? That's not right. I
shouldn't do that stuff. But Allah, Allah forgive me, you know,
I want to actually be better. So I'm going to do something even
more more than just say a stuff for law. I'm going to do something
better, which is what to make dua
for that person. So that's one of the ways that you can remove
hatred from your heart is that you go the next step, you take it, you
know, to the next extra step and you say, I'm gonna make dua by
their name. So you actually if you know their name, if it's a
stranger, you don't know their name, that's okay. You can just
say that person right? Allah knows who they are and you say, Oh
Allah, give that person guidance always that's the first thing you
should ask right that they're guided because we want everybody
to have guidance and we want everybody to to know Allah
subhanaw taala and for him to be pleased with them, and then you
can make other doors that you want for them Okay, so very important
to do that. And to deal with sincerity. And then to remember
the Hadith, right? The prophesy certain Titus that none of you has
achieved faith until he loves for his brother or sister what he
loves for himself. So this means that if you really want to be a
good Muslim, you have to love other people the same way that you
love yourself right? And you should want for them what you want
for yourself. This is how we become the best Muslims that we
can become. And Imam No, we, by the way, said that this hadith is
universal brotherhood, right? It's not just for your family if you
have a brother in your family or your Muslim family, but it's for
all humanity that we want all people to have to be better and to
be in a better state. So that's how we inshallah grow in our love
for other people and that love will remove the hatred from our
hearts inshallah Tada. So I'm going to stop here you guys
because we are just a little bit over time or almost at the end