Maryam Amir – When Ramadan is a battle

Smell him Alhamdulillah here up with the alamin in Ramadan. We

often feel like we should be able to focus fully on worship. And for

us, oftentimes, worship means ritual, worship, Salah and Quran,

terawiya, suyam, vikir, dua, all of these beautiful, heart,

touching, soul, nourishing acts. Many times we think of Ramadan as

an opportunity to isolate ourselves religiously, not

religiously, but spiritually, and the sense of we should be able to

just remove all barriers of concentration and only focus on

bringing our dua to Allah and whispering to him and weeping to

him and building that intimate connection with him. And all of

that is completely true, of course, for anyone who has become

a parent

after maybe having spent their college years in the masjid, or

having spent some time being able to give this full focus, and then

becoming parents and realizing that Subhanallah, you have

absolutely no control over your time if you get five minutes to

make A private dua with focus. It's probably because they

shockingly went to bed early and you actually have the energy to do

it. You want to read more Quran, but every time you try, they're

calling you, or you want to be able to focus on teh jut, but

you're exhausted and you may not even be able to pray. Pray more

than the obligation if they're young children, particular, so

that shift of experiencing Ramadan in that very sweet, personal,

vulnerable, intimate way, really changes. Having had this

expectation that Ramadan is going to be about one on one focus, and

having experienced that to then shift and having Ramadan be all

about a different type of worship. That's the worship of caring for

others. That's the worship of removing the burden from someone

else. Your children, when you change their diaper or take them

to, you know, play at the park or whatever it is, the Allah rewards

you in different ways, and that those different ways don't always

feel as sweet. And so this idea, and of course, it tastes sweet in

the sense of you're building relationships with your children,

but it may not taste as sweet in terms of you building your faith,

but this concept of isolating oneself in Ramadan, of making

Ramadan a time of just focused worship, we need to also ask

ourselves, have we seen that in the life of the prophet sallallahu

alayhi wa sallam in every moment of Ramadan? Because Absolutely, we

learn from the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and the

Companions, that there were times that they just focused in the art

tikkaf, that they just focused in the masjid, that they had this

focused worship. But there were other times that Allah made this

month a month of extreme difficulty, a month of trial, a

month of triumph, yes, but also a month of loss. When the battle of

Badr took place, it was in the month of Ramadan, the Prophet

sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam left, and he knew that his daughter,

rakay, or the Allahu anha, was sick. Athman ruled the Allahu Anhu

did not participate in bedr because he was left with his wife,

Rudi Allahu anha, nursing her and taking care of her. The Prophet

sallallahu, alayhi wa sallam went for Badr with the companions. And

of course, the circumstances of Badr in the way that it happened

wasn't the same as another

battle in which there were these huge preparations and everyone

knew they were going into this huge battle. They faced those who

were against the Muslims and felt their numbers were so small, their

their provision, their tools, were not equipped for this enormous

battle. And this is something that we really can take away in

Ramadan, that even though they were not prepared for a battle of

this magnitude, they faced it anyway. They faced it with trust

in Allah. They faced it with intense that the Prophet

sallallahu alayhi, he was, said that made intense, intense,

intense before bedr, they faced it knowing that they were fighting

for the sake of the truth. Now today, we may have trials and

tests, and sometimes we wonder why we are given them, but there are

circumstances in which we may not feel prepared, but Allah wills

that they have.

It in a particular time of our lives, and in that particular

time, our biggest worship is not to walk away from the battlefield

and say, I'd rather just go to the masjid, because Allah, Allah to

love me more in the masjid. Of course, Allah loves when you go to

the masjid. But what if you have someone who you love, who is sick

and they are hospitalized. Should you leave them because it's

Ramadan when you know that your presence brings them peace and

comfort, when you know that your presence as an advocate for their

medical rights is critical, when you know that they need to see

you,

is this not your own type of struggle, your own type of fight

in the month in which better bed took place.

Sometimes you may not feel ready for

the tests. None of us are ready for tests.

But sometimes Allah spinal Tada knows that this

has to happen in this time of your life for a reason, and sometimes

we can't know the reason. And I don't mean to imply that this has

anything to do with abuse. It's not about abuse. It's not about

someone else harming someone else's rights. But I'm talking

about the type of test or trial that someone sometimes goes

through, and then maybe 10 to 15 years later, they look back and

they say, subhanAllah, I had to go through that at that time in my

life to be able to get to this point in my life and in my

relationship with Allah. There was a sister who was talking about how

she had gotten really difficult news about the home that she had

been renting and they had to leave immediately, And subhanAllah Allah

facilitated for them, not only to move to a better place,

Alhamdulillah, that they wouldn't have even imagined before, but

also to have neighbors, neighbors who were so caring and who made

them feel safe and made them feel Welcome, and that was something

they had never experienced previously in their neighborhood.

So sometimes these notices come at a time that is unexpected and with

immense difficulty, but we never know what Allah, Spano to Allah,

has stored for us in the long run. That being said, the Battle of

bedr was a time in which the Companions actually got the glad

tidings of victory. The angels supported the companions. And did

you know that the angels support you? I talk about the angels a

lot, so perhaps you've heard me here speak about this, but the

angels are beings of light the heaven order to do certain acts,

and one of those acts is to protect you. It's to make dua for

you. It's to roam the Earth, looking for you, reciting the

Quran and the angels were ordered to go to the Prophet sallallahu

alayhi wa sallam, companions to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa

sallam, and defend them and fight on their behalf. In better Did you

know that you can have angels fighting on your behalf?

Subhanallah, angels making dua for you, angels who are invested in

you in your protection, that this is a command from Allah, and when

we look at bedr, it was victory, Alhamdulillah, clear victory for

the Muslims, that joy and that celebration in Ramadan is

incredible.

The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam came back to Medina to find

that his daughter, rokaya rodi Allahu anha, had not just passed

away, but she had already been buried. He didn't get to see her

body. Rodeo Aloha anha to say goodbye to her physical form. The

Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa salam went back to find she was already

back into the ground,

and the joy and the excitement of a victory like bed is tempered

Subhanallah tempered

with the immense loss and trial and tribulation and pain of losing

his daughter, Rodeo laho A sallallahu alayhi wa sallam lost

every child in his lifetime, and that faulty model the anha was

told that she would pass away by him, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam,

this was a prophecy that came true, that she was the next To

pass away of his kin, salua, they he was salam. He wasn't spared the

pain of her loss, even as he was passing away, sallAllahu, alayhi

wa sallam. But the news of Raqqa, urodiloha and his passing was in

Ramadan.

He lost his daughter in Ramadan, sallAllahu, alayhi wa sallam,

and I want to share that with you, because if you are going through

pain and loss, if you are struggling with Ramadan and mental

health, if you are navigating Ramadan and isolation or

depression, if you feel like you can't connect in this month

because emotionally, you just have so many other responsibilities, it

doesn't make you a.

Any less blessed. It doesn't mean that yo Ramadan is not one in

which Allah has not counted as so beloved to him. It means that

you're having yo Ramadan

like the Ramadan in which the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa

sallam lost his daughter, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, that

didn't make it any less of a Ramadan for the companions the

community of the Prophet. Peace be upon him. It didn't make it any

less of a Ramadan for the Prophet himself, sallAllahu, alayhi

wasallam, have hope in Allah, complete yur Ramadan with hope in

Him. It is worship to be optimistic in Allah, and being

optimistic looks like accepting that part of life is loss, and

that part of loss is a form of connection with him, with

vulnerability and pain and closest to him, in a way that sometimes

we may not ever, ever be able to understand, but we can take it to

Doha.

We can take all of that to Doha and the Allah loves to hear our

voices.

But.