Kamal El-Mekki – The Three Rivers
AI: Summary ©
The importance of showing complete justice of Allah's deeds in front of people is emphasized in Islam. The Prophet's weight of small deeds in the sense of good deeds and the importance of forgiveness and mercy is emphasized. The use of words like "good deeds" and "goods," in understanding deeds is emphasized, as well as the need for deeds to be viewed as a whole and not just a set of them. The importance of forgiveness and denying labels from one's wrongdoings is emphasized, as well as the need for deeds to be viewed as a whole.
AI: Summary ©
Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen, wassalatu wassalamu ala rasoolihi al
-ameen, wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajma'een.
Amma ba'd, brothers and sisters in Islam, the
title of our khutbah today is Three Rivers.
And we begin with this hadith that is
narrated in Sahih Muslim.
And the narrator is Abu Dharr al-Ghifari,
the companion, radiallahu anhu.
He said, the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam
said, And Nabi
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, Indeed, I know
the last of the people of Al-Jannah
to enter Al-Jannah.
And the last of the people of the
Hellfire to leave the Hellfire.
And of course he's talking about the same
person.
The last one to leave the Hellfire and
the last one to enter Al-Jannah is
the same individual.
So the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said,
Then it will be said, meaning Allah will
say, Present him, this man after he's taken
out of the Hellfire.
Allah azza wa jalla will tell the angels,
Present him with the minor sins, all his
minor sins.
And do not display his major sins.
So then it will be said to him,
You did on the day of such and
such, this and that.
And you did on the day of such
and such, this and that.
And he will say yes.
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is saying, He's
not able to deny any of the deeds
that he's presented with.
Because his major concern is that he doesn't
want his major sins to be displayed.
These are the minor sins, so he's agreeing
to everything.
His major concern is that they will bring
his major sins to display in front of
him.
Before we continue, the question is, Why are
the deeds presented?
And the scholars say, To show the complete
and the perfect justice of Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala.
And we see this in other hadith.
In Surah Al-Tirmidhi and also narrated by
Ibn Hibban.
The famous hadith known as Hadith Al-Bitaqa,
The Hadith of the Parchment.
And the point we want from that hadith
is that, At one point, when the deeds
are displayed, Allah azza wa jalla will ask
the servant, Did my servants, meaning the angels
who write down the deeds, Did they do
any injustice to you?
He will say, No my lord.
Meaning, he will see the complete justice.
Everything is written and he will not feel
injustice whatsoever.
And that's why whatever you do of big
or small, It will be written and recorded
and brought forth on the day of judgment.
As Allah azza wa jalla says in Surah
Al-Zalzala, Whoever does the weight of a
small ant, So whoever does the weight of
a small ant, Of good, he will see
good.
And whoever does the weight of a small
ant in bad, he will see bad.
So it's the perfect justice of Allah azza
wa jalla, That he presents the deeds in
front of us.
And likewise, it is also the mercy of
Allah azza wa jalla.
The scholars say, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
will display thousands of your bad deeds, And
then pardon them right in front of you.
So you see the mercy and the justice.
So, in our hadith, the man is worried
that his major sins will be presented.
It will be said to him, You will
have in the place of every sin you
see here, a good deed.
So he will say, my lord, I did
other bad deeds that I don't see here.
Why is he saying that?
All the deeds that were presented were switched
and changed into good deeds.
So now he wants to see the rest
of his bad deeds.
And then our narrator, Abu Dharr al-Ghaffari
radiallahu anhu says, Then he says, I saw
the Prophet ﷺ laugh until his rear teeth
showed.
Why is the Prophet ﷺ laughing?
The man didn't want his deeds to be
displayed, But when they were switched into good
deeds, Now he's saying, but I did other
things that I don't see up here.
Because he wants his reward.
The question also in this hadith, Is what
happened to the major sins?
And why weren't they presented?
Ibn al-Qayyim rahimahullah, the great scholar, Explains
in his famous book, Madaraj al-Salikeen, He
says, for the sinners are three rivers in
this dunya, That they use to purify themselves.
Ya'ni to cleanse themselves of their sins.
So if they don't purify them, these three
rivers in this dunya, If they don't purify
your sins, They are purified, They are purified
with the hellfire.
And he says they are, number one, The
good tawbah.
And then, good deeds.
And then the trials or calamities that expiate
sins.
And then he continues, And if Allah wants
good for his servants, He enters them or
him into one of these rivers.
And if he enters one of them, Then
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala saves him from
the fourth.
Ya'ni, if Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
guides you to one of these three rivers,
Tawbah, good deeds, and calamities that expiate your
sins, And if they don't expiate, And if
they don't expiate, Then Allah will purify them
with the hellfire.
So it is from the mercy of Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala, That he has given
us many avenues through which our sins are
erased.
We have a tawbah, And we have spoken
about a tawbah from this minbar before, And
we've all heard lectures, And we know so
many examples, And so many things that invite
you to return to Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala.
In Surah Al-Imran, Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala says, Except for those who repent, Tawbah,
make tawbah, repent, After that, And they do
righteous deeds or they become righteous, Indeed Allah
is forgiving and merciful.
In Surah Hud, And ask forgiveness from your
Lord, And then repent to Him, Indeed my
Lord is merciful and wadood.
Why this ending?
Wadood means loving.
If your God is angry or hateful or
vengeful, Would that encourage you to repent to
Him?
Or a God that is loving?
And the scholars also say, That Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala is ending it in this
way, And in other verses also like in
Surah Al-Buruj, To tell you that, That
He will forgive you, But keep loving you.
Because on this dunya we might forgive one
another, I forgive someone but I don't like
them anymore, Or I even hate them, But
I've forgiven them.
But Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will forgive
you, But He will keep loving you.
So, what if we fall short in tawbah
and repenting to Allah azza wa jal, Then
we have the second river, good deeds.
And we have much evidence in Islam to
support this, That the good deeds erase the
bad deeds.
And one of the strongest verses in Surah
Hud, Allah azza wa jal says, Allah
azza wa jal says, And establish the prayer
in the two ends of the day, Fajr
prayer and Maghrib prayer.
And in the night, meaning the Isha prayer,
Indeed, the good deeds push away, erase the
bad deeds.
This verse was revealed, Regarding an incident that
was narrated in Sahih Muslim, A man came
to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, And
he said that he had kissed a woman.
So the first thing is, In this narration
in Sahih Muslim, Umar ibn Khattab was there.
And so the first thing Umar radiallahu anhu
tells him is that, Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala concealed you, Why would you expose yourself?
Because it is not for us in Islam
to expose our bad deeds in front of
others.
So the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam does
not answer this man, Until he left.
And when he left, he had someone go
out and call him, Because this verse was
revealed, So in Sahih
Muslim, A man says, A man said, O
Prophet of Allah, Is this just for him
specifically this verse?
That the prayer and the good deeds erase
the bad deeds?
He said, rather it is for everyone.
In Sahih Bukhari, the man himself, He said,
is it just for me?
It is for my entire ummah.
And in the hadith, just as examples, That
the good deeds erase the bad deeds.
As just one example, And the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam said, And the sadaqah
extinguishes, Puts out the bad deed, the sin,
The same way the water puts out the
fire.
And this is an excellent example, And a
strong analogy, Because the fire here represents sins.
It's heat and it's flame, And it's ability
to cause destruction.
And then when water extinguishes fire, There's not
even a spark left.
It's completely gone.
So the good deeds erase the bad deeds.
And there's a lot of evidence.
And we know from other examples, The companions
themselves understood this concept.
After the treaty of Hudaybiyah, He was not
happy with the terms of the treaty, As
were the other Muslims.
So he started to question the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam, And question Abu Bakr.
And he didn't really do anything haram, But
he felt guilty later, For questioning the Prophet
of Allah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, In that
way.
So then what does he do for the
rest of his life?
He said, He did many deeds to cover
up for that sin.
In his eyes it was a sin.
But he did so many, Which shows the
understanding and the concept, That you do good
deeds to cover up for your bad deeds.
So brothers and sisters in Islam, Let us
drown our sins in the rivers of tawbah,
And in the rivers of good deeds.
As salamu alayhi wa sallam.
So Ibn Qayyim rahimahullah said, We have three
rivers to cleanse ourselves, From bad deeds here
in this dunya.
And the first we said was tawbah, And
the second was good deeds, And the third
was calamities.
The calamities, the trials, the difficulties, That befall
us in this world, They expiate from our
sins.
And that's why Imam Ahmad rahimahullah, He used
to say, لولا المصائب لقدمنا يوم القيامة مفاليس
Had it not been for the calamities, We
would have come forth bankrupt on the day
of judgment.
But it's Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala expiating
our sins, With difficult trials and tests and
calamities, That remove from our sins.
Otherwise we would have nothing on the day
of judgment.
And in Sahih Bukhari and Muslim, The Prophet
ﷺ explains to what extent, Anything, any difficulty
you encounter in this world, Removes from your
sins.
That he said, حَتَّ الشَوْكَ يُشَاكُهَا Even the
thorn pricks your finger, Removes from your sins.
Every difficulty you go through, Removes and expiates
from your sins.
But the scholars do make an important point,
They said, When do calamities and difficulties expiate
sins?
They said, إِذَا صَبَرُ If the person is
patient.
If the person is patient through the difficulties
and calamities, Then they will remove and expiate
from their sins.
And one of the beautiful points they mentioned,
Is that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala might
expiate sins, With calamities.
Sins that you don't even remember.
Because you don't remember them, You are not
going to make tawbah from them.
You're not going to repent and ask Allah
to forgive these sins, Because you've forgotten them.
And so here comes the calamities and the
trials and tests, And they will remove and
expiate the sins that you've forgotten about, And
you've forgotten to make tawbah about as well.
So the third river takes care of them.
فَهَلْ مِن مُنزَجِرِ وَهَلْ مِن مُعْتَبِرِ With that,
We ask Allah azza wa jalla to make
us of those who recognize the truth as
clear truth and follow the best of it.
And to make us of those who recognize
falsehood as clear falsehood and abstain from it.
اللهم اغفر لنا اجمعين اللهم اتوب علينا اجمعين
اغفر خطائنا وعمدنا وجدنا وكل ذلك عندنا اللهم
اغفر ذنوبنا واسرافنا في أمرنا اللهم اغفر لنا
ما قدمنا وأخرنا وأسررنا وأعلننا وما أنت أعلم
به منا اللهم إنا نؤمن أنك سميع وأنك
قريب وأنك تسمع سرنا ونجوانا وتعلم السر وأخفى
اللهم لا تصرفنا من هذا الجمع إلا بذنب
مغفور اغفر لنا اجمعين وتوب علينا اجمعين وهب
المسيئين منا للمحسنين يا الله ما كان بيننا
وبينك فاغفره وتجاوز عنه وما كان بيننا وبين
أحد من خلقك فتحمله عننا اللهم اغفر لكل
من أسئنا إليه ولكل من أذنبنا في حقه
اللهم اغفر لكل من ظلمنا ولكل من أغتبنا
اللهم احللنا من الظلمات اللهم احللنا من الظلمات
التي بيننا وبين العباد وحللنا من الظلم التي
بيننا وبينك يا أرحم الراحمين اللهم أبرم لأمة
الإسلام أمرا رشدا يعز فيه أهل طاعتك ويهدى
فيه أهل معصيتك ويؤمر فيه بالمعروف وينهى فيه
عن المنكر يا سميع الدعاء وصلى اللهم وبارك
عنه وابعث رحمة للعالمين وعلى آله وصحبه أجمعين
وقوموا إلى صلاتكم ورحمكم الله