Mohammad Badawy – A Checklist the Prophet Left Us
AI: Summary ©
The importance of devoting oneself to Allah's teachings and eliminate certain actions is emphasized, along with the importance of finding oneself within the six categories and three actions that will save the person. The story of Islam is discussed, including the loss of a family and the need for a new one, as well as the importance of speaking the truth and not harming others. The importance of valuing one's actions and avoiding deluded thinking is emphasized, along with following the actions of Allah and avoiding destruction.
AI: Summary ©
We begin with the name of Allah
The exalted, the sublime, the most merciful, and
the bestower of all mercy. Whoever Allah
chooses to guide, none can lead astray.
And whoever
Allah chooses to lead astray, none can guide.
And I testify that Allah
is the one true god.
The only one deserving in all of existence
of our complete unconditional
love, obedience, and worship.
And I also testify that the prophet Muhammad
was his final prophet and messenger,
sending peace and blessings upon him
and his wives and his family members and
his companions, and all those who choose to
follow their footsteps until the day of judgment,
asking
Allah to make us amongst them.
My dear brothers and sisters in Islam,
we thank Allah
for the opportunity on this blessed day of
Jummah on Friday.
We thank him for granting us the opportunity
to come here to the Masjid, his house,
and devoting some time to worship him, to
hear his words,
his revelation, and the teachings of his messenger
is a huge blessing from Allah
And as we were speaking about in the
previous weeks, we're continuing
with the topic, the concept
of devoting oneself
to Allah
embracing
the concept
of religiosity
as they call it.
To renew
the drive in ourselves
to come close to Allah
embark and continue on this journey of coming
close to Allah
and succeeding in our lives, fulfilling the purpose
of our existence.
And
today, in these few blessed moment on
of this sermon,
this Khutba,
we want to delve into yet another hadith
that is part of this journey. And in
reality, all of our relation is about this
journey, the journey towards Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
the purpose of our existence.
And
just like any endeavor that we want to
embark on, any task that we want to
fulfill,
there are certain steps that will help us
do that
and certain steps that will hold us back.
There are certain pitfalls on this path,
failure. And there are certain
tricks or methods to ensure success.
Just like with everything, if you wanted to
pick up a new hobby
or take on a certain task, if you
search online, you'll come with lists,
plenty of lists.
And this is a
recent trend in terms of article writing or
giving advice to put into a list. Five
pitfalls when starting your own business. And you
read that so you don't fall into it.
Or 6 steps
to necessary necessary to fixing your engine or
whatever it may be.
And likewise, the best of teachers,
the most knowledgeable of men sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam. The one whose source of knowledge was
not an article or a couple of hours
or days or years of research
even, but the source of his knowledge was
direct revelation
from the all knowledgeable, the all knowing, Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
Likewise, he salallahu alaihi wa sallam gave us
a list
and this was a very common practice
of his salallahu alaihi wa sallam when teaching.
He would give us list because it's easy
to remember, easy to recall,
easy to go in front of you, to
number in your head and to recall it
when you need it.
So he gave us a list, things to
do, things not to do, things that will
save you and things that will destroy you.
So pay very close attention.
Lend me your attention for these short moments.
Memorize these 6 things.
Put them in front of you. And most
importantly, I what I want you to do
here in this khutva is to put yourself
in these 6 categories.
An event that happened in your life,
an outlook that you have, a course of
action or something that you said, put them
into these 6 categories. See what you need
to eliminate and see what you need to
acquire in terms of these traits that the
prophet is giving us. Here are the 6
qualities, the 6 actions
that he gave us, salallahu alaihi wa sallam,
6 concepts. He said, salallahu alaihi wa sallam,
3 actions that will destroy you and 3
actions that will save you.
3 acts of Salvation
and 3 acts of destruction. He said
As for the actions that will save you,
actions of salvation,
he gave us 3 of them salallahu alaihi
wa sallam.
3 in this one hadith even though there's
much more. He says the piety,
the consciousness of Allah, the fear and love
of him whether you are in public or
in private.
And to speak with the truth, to support
the truth,
to speak only the truth whether you are
content or discontent, whether you are happy or
you are angry.
And finally, to be moderate
whether you are rich or you are poor.
These three concepts will save you.
And then he said
He says, ask for the 3 actions that
will destroy you. 3 act of destruction, they
are
my dearliness
that is obeyed
and desires that are followed
and for the person to be impressed by
themselves, to be arrogant.
So again, pay attention to these 6 categories.
Find yourself within them.
See which what you can do, what approach
you can take to build the 3 that
save you, and what you can do to
eliminate the 3 that would destroy you. First,
he said salallahu alaihi wa sallam from the
things that save you acts of salvation.
The piety,
the consciousness,
the awareness, the love, obedience and fear of
Allah. Taqwa means all of these things.
And he said
whether you are in public or you are
in private.
And he mentioned this
because it's harder in private.
It's easy to put on a show. It's
easy to dress a certain way in front
of the people.
It's easy to come and pray in congregation
once or twice or a few times or
even during the week. But to uphold the
commitment even when you're in private, that's true
taqwa.
This is true piety. This is what it
means when someone is conscious of Allah.
That doesn't matter when or where
or who, they are always the same person.
They are always aware of Allah. They're always
aware of his commandments, staying away from his
prohibition.
This is the true believer. This is why
the prophet said fear
Allah, fear Allah, be obedient towards him. Be
beautiful towards him no matter when and where
you are.
It shouldn't matter
what the season is. Doesn't matter who is
around you. It doesn't matter the situation.
The rules of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala are
the most stable constant in my life.
This is our this is the standard I
hold myself to at all times, at all
places. So he said, this will save you.
This will be a salvation.
How?
How will the piety and the consciousness,
the awareness and the fear of Allah save
you?
Read every single story in the Quran and
sunnah.
That's basically what it is. That piety,
consciousness of Allah will save you.
He didn't say from what? Because Allah never
said from what? He said,
Whoever fears Allah, obeys him, Allah will cause
for him a way out. Of what? He
left it open because you fill in the
blank.
A way out of your financial
issues. A way out of your marital issues.
A way out of your business issues. Whatever
is plaguing you. Whatever is harming you. Whatever
is ailing you, holding you back.
A hurdle in your past, difficulty you wish
to overcome,
your solution is in taqwa.
Your solution is in obeying Allah to the
best of your ability. Your solution is in
fearing Allah to the best of your ability.
Your solution is in keeping your tithes with
your lord subhanahu wa ta'ala.
He said, salallahu alaihi wa sallam, it will
save you. What is his story, salallahu alaihi
wa sallam? Him and the believers that accepted
Islam with him in Mecca. What did they
need? They needed a new family. They needed
a new country. Their entire city had turned
against them. Their families were the ones torturing
them and leading the campaign of oppression against
them.
But they stick they stuck
to
the revelation.
They stuck to their belief.
They stuck to it despite the adversity and
the difficulty, the starvation, and the boycott, and
the death
that they faced
all just because they wanted to worship Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala as he revealed. And what
did Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala do? After 13
years, he opened the heart of the people
of Madinah. They told them we will be
the family that you're missing. We will be
the country that supports you that you do
not have.
Come take of the wealth and the land
that you need. Allah
giving that to you.
And what is the story of all the
prophets? Look at the story of and
Ibrahim and their family
struggling, going from land to land. When you
know the story, we abandoned them in Mecca
before it was Mecca. What did they need?
They needed food and drink
and a support system, a community. Allah
sent that.
He sent to them food and drink and
a tribe to settle there and establish the
city of Mecca, the greatest city to ever
be on the face of the earth. This
was because of the taqwa. They stuck to
their duty. She asked Ibrahim Alaihi Salam, Hajj
Alaihi Salam, she asked him, where are you
going? What are you doing? Why are you
leaving us? There's no food. There's no drink.
There's no town.
He said, he didn't answer. So she realized
and she said, is this a command from
Allah? When he said yes, she said he
will not forsake us.
The takla of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will
never lead to your demise.
It will never lead to you being left
hand hanging. It will never lead to your
needs being unfulfilled
because it is Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala who
you are obeying. It is Allah who you
are fearing. It is Allah who you're keeping
your duty towards. Why would he leave you
hanging?
Why would he leave you to your own
devices? Why would he then abandon you? This
is not what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala does.
And likewise, all of the prophets
and all of the righteous.
Too many stories to mention in just one
gathering. Every single story in the Quran. Every
single prophet. A story of people who came
with taqwa, promoted it, taught it, and people
who accepted and then others who rejected. The
people who accepted were saved.
Allah
says,
We saved those who believed
and had piety and had the taqwa of
Allah.
And thus he says after the story of
Yunus alaihi sallam who was swallowed by the
whale, stuck in darkness, no way out of
his predicament.
And he realized his mistake, he made his
and he made dua so Allah
acknowledge his weakness and his own oppression of
himself.
Taqwa and Allah saved him. And then he
says, and likewise,
it is a right upon us, meaning upon
Allah, it's his duty.
Something he has to do that he wrote
upon himself that no one's forcing him to
do, but he wrote upon himself.
Likewise, it is upon us to save the
righteous,
to save the believers, to grant them salvation.
It was narrated about Muhammad ibn Al Qasim,
the Muslim commander who conquered
Southeast Southeast Asia in its entirety. Any Muslim
from Pakistan or Bangladesh or Afghanistan
or anywhere East
Iran and everywhere East of Iran is Muslim
because of his endeavors, is Muslim because of
his conquest and the army that he led.
It was narrow that he had encountered a
particularly large army of the Persian Empire.
And in it, they had 80 elephants
that were causing the the
horses of the Muslims
to panic. They're unable to keep them in
formation. They're unable to keep them in line,
and the army itself was about to crumble
facing this onslaught
of the Persian army.
So
he said it's narrated by him that he
sought mess he sent messengers seeking help from
the surrounding cities. Send us more troops. We
need more. We can't do this on our
own. And very little came.
He was not they did not respond to
him very strongly. And when they tried to
muster the forces, they realized they would not
be able to the horses were not being
controlled. The the elephants are causing the whole
army to fall apart out of fear. This
is something they've never seen. This is something
they've never heard of. So So when this
happened and he realized things are falling out
of his control, he's unable to do anything
else. He called for help and he's stuck.
He sat on the side and he began
to repeat to himself,
There is no power and there is no
might. There is no success. There's no endeavor
that can be started or undertaken
except through with and by Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala.
And after some time had passed and intense
heat came upon the land that they were
on And the elephants also come to it,
and they became utterly exhausted. They sat at
the water. They refused to move when the
Persians tried to control them. And so the
Muslim army was able to regroup now that
the elephants are just completely out of the
picture. This is what Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
did. He is able. He didn't have to
send birds to bombard them like he did
to as Habifil
once upon a time. Simple. The the heat
came and overcame the entire army and their
number one weapon was now useless
And the Muslims were granted victory by the
permission of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. And not
just the righteous, not just the prophets, not
just the ayat and the hadith.
Taq Wasayb
is your story as well.
That is your experience.
You can add to that story. You can
add to that concept. I'm sure you know
of yourself and others around you situations where
I left the Haram and Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala provided.
I turned away from this door because I
knew it was displeasing to Allah and he
opened 50 others. How often does that happen?
Because he said, salaam, he's telling us,
and the things that will save you is
having piety, having consciousness
of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala whether you're in
public or in private.
The second thing that he mentioned,
salaam,
to
speak the truth whether you are content or
discontent,
whether you are happy or angry. And he
mentioned that, salaam, because it's harder when you're
angry. You can support the truth, and the
truth is the truth, and the ayat and
the hadith, and this is the true teachings
is what Allah revealed
when it's going fine, when it's in your
favor. But what about when it cost you
something?
What about when you have to give? What
about when you have to sacrifice?
What about if it goes against your personal
preference, your desires?
Will you still be as
encouraged and enthusiastic
and devoted to the laws of Allah? This
is the question.
This is true piety. This is why he
said salallahu alaihi wasallam, the truest of faith,
the most sincere iman is for a person
to love what Allah loves and hate what
Allah hates.
His own personal preferences and desires have no
say in what he says or does. It's
only based upon the revelation of Allah. He
becomes a vessel of the will of Allah
like we said last week. The hadith where
he said salallahu alaihi wa sallam where Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala says, when he loves a
servant, he becomes their eyes and their ears
and their hands and their feet. Meaning these
things don't perform in any way except that's
pleasing to Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So do we speak the truth? Do we
teach our children to speak the truth, to
live by the truth
irrespective of consequences,
irrespective of how I feel, of what I
have to gain or lose. The truth is
the truth.
I live and speak and act and die
accordingly.
Do we teach our children that?
Does the Muslim ummah know that? It doesn't.
And the proof of that is every single
Muslim country. The proof of that is the
Muslim community.
Because if this was truly in place,
the truth is the truth no matter what,
there would be no there would be no
oppression. There would be no taking the rights
of others. There wouldn't be no shortchanging your
brother or sister or backbiting them or harming
them. And the Muslim Ummah would be in
an entirely different situation.
So he said, salallahu alaihi wa sallam, it
will save you to speak the truth no
matter what.
It may not save you here physically. You
may be tormented and oppressed and killed.
But speaking the truth will save you. It
will be the salvation
for you in the hereafter.
Perhaps for others in this dunya as well.
So speak the truth regardless of the consequences.
It was narrated
that the prophet
had sent Abdullah
to collect
the dues from the people of.
And as you know, the people of Khaybar,
the Jewish tribe
outside
of Madinah,
they had contract after contract with the messenger
of Allah that they broke.
Contract to be
allied with al Madinah and the Muslims, and
they broke countless contracts and they supported assassination
attempts against the prophet
trying to destabilize
the Madinah society every opportunity that they got.
And they went to war with him, salallahu
alaihi wasalam, as well. So after all of
that,
he organized a campaign against them
and Khaybar was besieged. And at the end
of the siege, they said, let us go.
We're sorry.
And because they had constantly broken their oath,
he told them, you will be allowed to
remain. You will not be exiled or harmed,
but on the condition that you give some
of the produce and percentage of it to
the Muslims every single year. So this was
the deal that they had. So he said,
salallahu alaihi wa sallam, Abdullah, to collect the
dud every year. So when he came to
them
and he's inspecting the crops and seeing what
they have yielded for the year,
they present him with a small
box
of women's jewelry from their woman.
And they told them, this is simply a
gift for you,
so take it easy. Take it easy and
count in the crops. You're supposed to take
20%, maybe take 18 or 17.
Or you could tell the prophet
he's not here. Right? This year, there wasn't
as much crops so the percentage is lower.
Just hook us up. Help us out here.
And this is for you. So we serve
them and he spoke to them very strongly.
He said, lord, knows
that you are the most despised people on
the face of the earth to me.
And
Allah knows there's no one I hate more
than you people. Because of their treachery and
everything that we mentioned, the warfare that they
waged against the Muslims,
the alliances that they made with other people
trying to starve the Muslims and kill the
Muslims, them themselves going to war against the
Muslims.
After all of that, he says, Allah knows
I hate you more than anyone.
But my hatred of you doesn't cause me
to oppress you,
doesn't cause me to harm you. What's he
telling them? Basically, I hate you so much,
I should be taking more. I should be
forcing you to pay even higher attack because
of the animosity between us, because of what
you've done. I should be punishing you for
that. That's how I personally feel, but that's
not what the message of Allah commanded.
He told me, come, take a certain percentage.
That's all I'm doing. I won't hook you
up, and I won't harm you, even though
that's what I want to do. I would
like to take more, to punish you more
for what you've done, but the prophet
told me, take this much. I will not
take a penny more or a penny less.
And they said,
Thus, the heavens and the earth were established
based on this justice and this truth. The
rights going to where they belong. Standing up
for them regardless of how you feel, what
you stand to gain, or what you stand
to lose.
He said, this will save you, to speak
the truth no matter what the condition. And
finally, he said,
the third action of salvation
is
to be moderate when you spend,
to be moderate whether you have or don't
have. Because most people, they either have, they're
rich, they're wealthy, and so they're extravagant.
They buy everything they desire they desire, they
constantly spoil themselves and their families and their
children,
and they have no ability to be patient
or to put things off or to not
indulge and say let's train our nafs to
be calmer, to be more
satisfied you know, to to be more satisfied
with what Allah gave us. They never do
that. They just let it all go. Buy
as much as you can, eat as much
as you can, enjoy as much as possible,
and that's harmful to the self. It ruins
patients. It eliminates the ability to persevere through
adversity.
Or they don't have
and so they're stingy. They hold back.
They say, I do not know
where my next meal is coming from. I
don't know where my next income is coming
from. I can't give for the sake of
Allah. I have to be miserly with myself
and my family.
Or they're in between,
and they're just constantly distracted
with getting more.
They're a middle class. They're not overly rich.
They're not poor either, and they're just constantly
occupied,
consumed
by the concept of amassing more and gathering
more.
So regardless of their situation, they're not moderate,
they're not focused and they're completely
deluded by the state of their finances.
He said salallahu alaihi wa sallam,
salvation is in being being moderate no matter
what whether you have or don't have.
And moderation means intelligence,
means to be economical,
means not to be extravagant on yourself, means
to give for the sake of Allah give
for the Masjid, give for your children, it
needs it's a whole system. And he said
when you're like that,
it will save you. It will save you
from making many mistakes. It will save you
from performing a lot of sins in your
wealth. It will save you from oppressing others
being with yourself and your family.
So he told the three actions that will
save you.
Of Allah. Fear and obedience of him regardless
of how you feel.
Speaking the truth regardless of how you feel,
and being moderate in your wealth regardless of
whether you have or not. Then he said,
now as for the actions of destruction,
the actions that will destroy you. He said
the first of them is
that
is obeyed.
Because you can have
inside of you, cheapness.
Right?
Is like being cheap but more extreme. You
can have that inside of you as a
natural trait Allah created you with. You have
in different degrees, he's cheaper than him and
that's normal.
But it makes a big difference if you
choose to obey it or not.
If you choose to make that that characteristic
that you have a deciding factor in your
actions or not, that's up to you.
That's why he said,
my dearliness, that is obeyed because if it's
ignored and fought against, there's no blame on
you. But if you obey it,
if you make it a defining characteristic, it
will destroy you. He said,
who destroyed the previous nations.
What has destroyed people that came before you?
It commanded them to cut the ties of
kinship, so they cut it.
It commanded them to oppress one another, so
they did so. And so they were destroyed
because they were too keen
on keeping things,
too keen on having,
too keen on amassing and having others witness
that. That became a defining factor of their
characteristics.
He said,
the worst characteristics you could find in a
man.
For him to have alarming
miserliness.
He's constantly being alarmed. He's constantly panicking about
his wealth.
Anytime it dips $1 less, he's in a
state of panic.
He gets more and he's still in a
state of panic. It's not enough.
So the most evil characteristic
in a man would be this kind of
panicky
cheapness
and cowardly cowardice that is not controlled, unrestrained,
allowed to, again, prevent the person from their
duties for from striving and struggling for the
sake of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. It was
married that Hasan Wa Ta'ala he entered upon
a man in on his deathbed.
And when he entered upon him, the man
kept staring into the corner of his home
where he had
a
chest
of
love.
And
he
said,
Oh, Abu Sahid is talking to Al Hasan,
what do you say? What is your opinion
about 100,000
coins in this chest?
With which I never spent a penny on
Zakah
and I never spent a penny to keep
tithes of kinship.
Meaning it was not used in any good.
I didn't pay zakat on it ever and
I never used it to keep tithes between
my family. What is your opinion? So he
told him,
may your mother lose you. What was the
purpose then of gathering it?
And this is a message to all of
us. If you have wealth, it's not going
for the sake of Allah.
It's not keeping tithes in your family. It's
not making things better for your family. Why
are you gathering it?
This is the asking the man, why then
do you have it? What other purpose can
there be to earn as wealth if not
for this good?
What will you then gain from it? It'll
only be evidence against you. So the man
says, I gathered it
I gathered it so I can submit my
authority. I can't have authority in the land
without wealth.
And I gathered it so I can have
a good time to enjoy myself, to live
luxuriously,
to live pleasantly,
and so that I can have many children.
He didn't keep the size of kinship. He
wanted to offer his own kids. So So
this was his reasoning and then he died.
This was the final moment of his life.
So Al Hasan, he prayed his and
they took him to the graveyard where they
buried him. And then he told them
he told the people present at the burial,
Look at this poor, poor man.
He he's just was talking about the 100,000
that he has. He's still poor. He's poorer
than anyone else. He's poor in his heart.
He's poor in his understanding.
He's poor in his misguidance and in
the way that he duped himself
into ending his life in this fashion.
So look at this poor man and he
continued at length
telling them, don't let this happen to you.
Telling the inheritors, the family members are bearing
this man. This wealth is coming to you
freely. You didn't sweat in it. You didn't
tire in it. It just came to you
from Allah as inheritance.
So for you, you take it,
but don't let the same ending happen to
you. He gathered it for his family, for
his authority. Where is that now? What will
it do for him now? My journeyliness drove
him to this end. Don't let it be
the same for you.
Because the day of judgment, he said, is
a day of regret.
The day of judgment is a day of
regret. Everyone will be regretting. And of the
worst regrets, he said he's telling the inheritors
now is that you see your wealth in
the scale of someone else. They inherited it.
They did it right. They gave for the
sake of Allah. They were not overly attached.
They didn't spend on haram,
so they will be rewarded. But who worked
for that wealth? You did. You produced it.
You saved it, but you didn't use it
correctly. So the inheritors,
it will be in their scales and of
the greatest regrets he's telling them is to
see your wealth that you toiled and sweat
and fought for in the scale of others.
Finally, he said the 3 acts of destruction
now. They are the miserliness that is obeyed
that we touched on in speaking about moderation
and wealth and the
desires that are followed
and for the person to be impressed by
themselves. So first, he said, mightily,
we already touched on that with the story
of the man who held back his wealth
and the hadith where he warned us against
mightily and how to destroy the people before
us. So it's connected to the moderation.
And
the the Allah
also says,
whoever overcomes their own miserliness,
Whoever overcomes it, then they are of the
successful. And it was narrated that the one
of the righteous seen on the scholars made
a on the Kaaba, and every time that
he'd run into him, as he would say,
oh, Allah protect me from the within me,
the my dearliness,
the cheapness that is within me. So he
told him, how come this is the only
dua you're making?
Why are you constantly making dua? And he
told him,
if I'm protected
from I'm protected from oppressing others.
And cutting off the ties of kinship as
well, and then is included in there. So
I'm asking Allah to protect me from that
because they'll protect me from so much more.
The second act that will destroy the person,
he said
desire that is followed.
So my dearliness that is obeyed and desire
that is followed. Once again, everyone has desires.
You don't have to follow it. You have
to fight against it. You can strive to
tame it. You can strive to control it.
But if you follow it, he's telling that,
dear sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, it will destroy
you.
And,
he says the example of your nafs, your
soul that you're created with, that has the
base needs of food and drink and procreation.
This is like a steed, an animal that
you are riding towards the hereafter.
You're riding towards your meeting with Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala.
The reigns with which you control this animal
are the revelation.
The Quran, the sunnah, the teachings of the
prophet shalallahu alaihi wa sallam. The teachings of
the ta'ba. That is what will control this
beast to the destination that you're going to.
But if you do not have any reins
on it, you leave your desire
to be followed, to be obeyed,
then it will misguide you. It'll take you
where it pleases or it will buck you
and you'll go flying. You do not know,
but you will not get to the destination
as you intended.
So this is the reality that all of
us have a desire. All of us have
desires within us. We have to choose not
to follow them. Following in following them is
destruction.
And finally, he said
for the person to be impressed by themselves.
Some people are impressed by how they look.
Some people are impressed by their finances.
Some people are impressed by their wealth or
their home or their car or their family.
Impressed by some kind of success that they
produce or impressed by some quality that Allah
gave them where they came from, the color
of their skin, whatever it may be,
you should never be impressed with yourself.
You should be humble.
You should lower your status. Don't be impressed
with your worship.
Don't be impressed that you come to the
masjid. The credit belongs to Allah alone.
You becoming impressed with these things is a
guarantee
that you'll either lose them or that they'll
be a source of regret instead of a
source of blessing. This is the reality. Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala is the source of all
good. We owe him that to be humble
and to recognize.
One of the righteous, he narrates that I
had
engaged in zik to the extent that I
was impressed with myself.
He's happy that he sat for an extent
of time making zik,
crying over the remembrance of Allah coming closer.
There's nothing wrong with being happy about it,
with enjoying it, but he became impressed with
it, meaning I'm the man. I'm doing a
lot.
I'm presenting something notable and impressive and good.
That's the level where we have to be
careful. These are the thoughts we cannot entertain.
You can enjoy doing it and be happy
that you're doing good, that's great.
But also be humble and recognize the blessing
of Allah. Do not be deluded into thinking
that you're greater than you are. So he
says, I reached that state unintentionally.
It can creep up on you. It is
hidden, as the prophet taught us, like the
black ant on a black rice, on a
black rock, on a black night. Un
undetectable,
unnoticeable.
It sneaks into your heart to be impressed
with yourselves, to be insincere, to show off.
So he says that that state afflicted me,
and I went to a public bath to
take a bath to take a bath as
they would back in the day.
And when I finished, I exited and I've
taken a few steps and then the guard
of the bathroom, the guard of the public
bath came running out and he said,
you took the the shirt of the man
inside.
So he says, I looked down and I
realized I wore the wrong soap, so I
went back to replace it, to take mine
and to give back the man who was
waiting.
And he says, I had barely left the
public bath
the second time until I found myself surrounded
by the children of the neighborhood,
All of them chanting, here's the thief, here's
the thief.
They're kids, they don't know better. Right? They're
just making fun of someone. But they said
they they surrounded me chanting the thief of
the bathroom.
And he says, I was so embarrassed and
I realized
that I wasn't humble when I should have
been so Allah sent me this to humble
me.
He didn't steal. Right? He's innocent, but the
situation was embarrassing. It was humbling and this
is what he realized. It brought him back
to the fact that earlier I was impressed
by my worship and now I'm being humble.
And it also narrates that
one of the righteous says, I was making
tawaf around the Kaaba, and I seen a
man surrounded by men who were preventing other
people from coming close.
Whenever someone come too close to him, they'd
shove him. This man is VIP. You're not
allowed to come close.
Until he says sometime later, I was in
Baghdad now, in Iraq, and I've seen this
man
in the slums of Baghdad leaning against the
wall begging for charity.
So I told him, weren't you that same
man I saw a while back around the
Kaaba that no one was allowed to touch?
Weren't you that same VIP? And he said,
yes, I was.
That was me.
So he told him, what happened? Why are
you here now? What's the story? And he
simply told him, I was in
a high position
through which some people
used to come close to Allah and be
humble.
You hear stories of the righteous like Umar
like
the righteous leaders, when they got leadership, when
they got authority,
it made them more humble because they said,
oh Allah, I don't deserve this. Oh, Allah,
I know this is a test. Allow me
to succeed. Do not allow it to come
to my head. Do not allow it to
come to my heart, and then I ruin
myself. This is the attitude that they had.
So he says, I had a high position
through which some people used to come closer
to Allah and be more humble,
but I didn't.
I used it to be arrogant, to raise
myself, to be impressed by my accomplishments.
So because of that, Allah set me down
to a lower position
through which some people used to come higher.
Some people when Allah lowers them, they lose
some wealth, they lose some authority, they get
humble, they get embarrassed. Like the first story
we mentioned was the guy at the bathroom.
He took that situation and said, oh, I
shouldn't have been arrogant. Let me come closer
so Allah be humble, make his tafar.
But this man said, Allah forced this humble
situation upon me and I can't I can't
ride through it because it's too late. The
test is over. The test has been failed.
That's what he's realizing now. So he's saying,
Allah gave me a high position that some
people used to come closer, I didn't. So
he gave me a low position that some
people also used to come closer, but now
I'm stuck here. So the the the point
of the story is
humble yourself before before Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
humbles you. Show him that you are not
impressed with your worship. You're not impressed with
your accomplishments. You're not impressed with your creation.
You recognize that all good is only from
him
and whatever favors he bestows upon us are
completely undeserved
and a pure blessing from him We ask
him to continue these blessings for us to
allow us to recognize the actions that save
us and to give us the to do
them and to grant us the
to recognize the actions that destroy us and
to grant us the strength to avoid them.
Another
point of benefit from the Hadith
is that the
prophet did not mention 6 random thing.
He's not just shooting off a random list.
He's teaching us a very important lesson about
this 6 thing. And like I said earlier,
I want all of us to place ourselves
in these 6 concepts, these 6 categories.
Find a situation where I had the taqwa
of Allah or I tried to and it
benefited me, and you will find many.
Or that I tried to speak the truth
even when I was not happy, even when
it was not in my favor.
Or another time where perhaps I didn't speak
the truth because it wasn't in my favor.
And then this is the point of this
kind of hadith, evaluate yourself.
Evaluate your life.
See the actions that save you,
do you do them? And the actions that
destroy you, do you do them? And analyze
your life. So like we were saying, he
did not randomly mention and list these things.
There are actually 3 cures
for 3 diseases,
3 solutions for 3 problems.
So the first that he mentions
the piety and the consciousness of Allah whether
in public or private that is in
that holds against
desire that is followed. How do you save
yourself from this destructive act? With this act
of salvation. You will be saved from following
your desire if you have the taqwa of
Allah. And this is what Allah
said. As for the one who fears the
standing in front of his lord
and so he prevents himself from following the
desires,
then
will be there abode.
Whoever so fearing Allah
comes with preventing oneself from desire. And the
second thing that he mentioned,
speaking the truth whether you are happy or
angry, that is in that is posed against,
the the person being impressed with themselves.
Because the person will only become arrogant,
will only
give themselves too much rights
when they shortchange the rights of others.
Because that that's what is.
So you're impressed with yourself to be arrogant.
You're giving yourself too much right. You're pumping
yourself up to a level higher than you
deserve, higher than you belong. And that will
only come by lowering others beyond what they
deserve, harming them. So you will not speak
the truth.
You will be emotional. You will not give
the rights as they are due because you're
giving yourself too many rights. You're being impressed
with yourself. You're being arrogant. And lastly, he
mentioned,
moderation in poverty and wealth that is posed
against us posed
against. Miserliness that is followed. You're only were
miserly when you weren't moderate.
Right? This one is obvious. You're only able
to take more than you deserve and look
at what others had
when you weren't moderate in spending and giving
and taking and withholding.
So all of our lives,
if you notice, there's another theme of the
hadith. All of our lives, what I say
and what I do, how I feel and
how I act and how I react. All
of it has to be in conjunction with
what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala revealed.
This is the journey that I want to
take. This is the path I want to
embark on.
And these actions that he said salallahu alaihi
wa sallam is haditha like highlights. They're like
road maps,
markers on the road that show me I'm
going in the right direction or heading in
the wrong direction. So
So he said, so I was told to
close and summarize, 3 actions that will save
you and 3 actions that will destroy you.
So Ahmed
asked for the actions that will save you,
the acts of salvation, he said,
Just fear Allah and obey him as he
deserves
in public and in private.
And to speak the truth whether you are
happy or you are angry. And to be
moderate in your spending whether you are rich
or you are poor.
As for the actions, I will destroy you.
He said
for a person to follow their miserliness
and to follow their desires, to obey their
minderiness and follow their desires and for the
person to be impressed by himself. We ask
Allah
to instill in ourselves and in our hearts
the righteous qualities that will lead us to
salvation and to give us to perform them
purely for his sake. And may he instill
in our hearts the hatred
and the avoidance
of the act of destruction, and he may
give us the awareness and in our lives
to see them when they appear before us
and to avoid them pure purely for a
sake.