Moutasem al-Hameedy – How to Make Sense of Unfortunate Events
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AI: Transcript ©
At times
like ours,
sometimes a Muslim wonders
if Islam is the truth,
why do the non Muslims
have the upper hand
politically, financially,
in military terms,
and almost in every aspect.
Sometimes
a Muslim wonders,
if Allah is Abu al Amin, the Lord
of the worlds
who takes care of the creation
and none of the affairs
in existence
escapes
the control
and the power of Allah.
Why do we see so much suffering?
Why do we see a lot of innocent
people
being
prosecuted,
being
abused,
being killed?
Why is there so much suffering in the
world?
And some of us verbalize this question
and seek an answer for it.
Some of us
keep it within.
It stays within them, it burns them,
it hurts them,
the doubt that grows with it
brings more agony into their heart,
but they suspect
the answer might be shocking
or they suspect
that there might not be a satisfying
answer.
So it's better to avoid it.
The reason we're having these questions
and the reason that we struggle to find
answers to those
is that we haven't read the Quran properly.
Because Allah answered these questions in the Quran.
And the second reason
why these questions go through our minds
and sometimes with our youth
and sometimes even with the older generation.
Especially as we see the genocide
that takes place where innocent people,
children, women are bombarded and targeted
without any sense of humanity,
without any level of mercy.
And then when you see the politicians of
the world, the people with the power
sugarcoating
all of these crimes
and supporting these
atrocities
and financing
them
and providing the political cover for them.
And then when on the other side when
you find
some of the extremists
among the nationalists and the far right,
brainwashed,
simple minded people in different parts of the
world
trying to justifies the justify these crimes
and provide a rationalization
for them.
The mind of the Muslim is puzzled sometimes.
How come not only atrocities are being committed
in daylight,
but they are also provided with cover,
with a rationalization,
and by who?
By the ones who seem to be the
most intelligent people in the world,
who control,
who who have power, who have control,
who control education in the world,
the ones who seem to produce technology,
and they are the ones who produced
the the
the civilization
that all of us
are now subjects and part of it.
So more mystery is added to the doubts
and we say
how come? Where is the quest where is
the answer to this question?
When Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has already dealt
with that,
Allah has clarified that. And the reason we
are we're asking these these questions,
the reason these doubts are eating at our
hearts
and are
torturing us
or torturing those who have concern for the
truth,
concern for justice,
concern for the innocent people.
The reason we have these and the is
that we instead of reading the Quran,
we are thinking
as non muslims think.
We have given up
the world view,
the mindset,
the way of thinking
that helps us process the world and navigate
it.
The infrastructure
for how we can deal with the world.
We have forsaken what Allah has given us,
and we have opted
for what the non muslims have developed and
created for their own selfish ends.
We have swallowed that.
We have sought
to learn that.
We looked up to that. We thought that
was civilization.
We thought that was the way to become
more educated,
more civilized,
and better individuals.
And we didn't see the poison
that is inherent at the heart
of this plot that was devised mainly by
shaitan Satan himself.
That's what happens to Muslims when they leave
the Quran,
or when they treat the Quran like mere
accessories in their life.
When the Quran becomes some sort of artifacts
that is good to have on the side.
But
we develop plans for our life
designed
according to the ways of the non Muslims.
We choose our future.
We choose our career,
our path in life.
Exactly using the system that exactly using the
system that was created by the non Muslims
for their own ends that don't believe in
Allah.
We process the world
in the same way, according to the same
system
that they put together
for themselves
to relate to the world. Then we say,
where is Allah?
Where is Allah's rahmah and mercy?
Why does Allah allow all of this to
happen?
Could all of those intelligent people be misguided
and we are the guided ones when our
countries are the most backward?
When most of the suffering in humanity is
taking place within our territories?
That's the confusion shaitan
brings into your heart when you opt for
the way of thinking
that He brought to you through others that
you look up to.
The Muslim doesn't think this way.
And if the Muslim happens to slip and
think in this way,
out of pain, out of extreme suffering,
Islam treats that.
We all aware of the famous incident when
Khabab ibn al-'Arat came to the Prophet sallallahu
alaihi wasallam in Makkah.
And he himself was tortured
severely.
His back was burnt
with fire. He was his back was exposed
to the flames of fire directly.
He was literally
scorched. He was literally barbecued.
Literally, that's what they did to his back.
He said, the only thing that put the
fire out was the
the fat of my back melting and my
skin melting and falling on the fire and
putting it out.
Out of this suffering and pain,
and he was a believer
and he came to the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wasallam when the messenger sallallahu alaihi wasallam
was lying on his side
in the shade of Al Kaaba.
Cause the Prophet was was protected by his
family.
Allah vowed to protect him through different means.
One of them was his tribe.
And he said, You Rasulullah,
Oh messenger of Allah,
aren't you going to make dua
to Allah to relieve us? Aren't you going
to ask for victory for us? Don't you
see what we're going through?
The Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam sits up.
And the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam even in
those most extreme moments, difficult moments
with the extreme suffering, and the Prophet sallam
is not denying it, and he's not being
insensitive. On the contrary, Allah
describes him as mercy to the Az Rahma
to the world,
as the greatest blessing to the world.
The prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam wants to teach
Khabab and the Muslims
how to process these extreme conditions
so that you don't fall to the way
of thinking that the disbelievers have developed.
Islam is not mere accessory that it's nice
to have on the side. Islam changes how
you live life, how you process life.
Islam changes how you plan for your life,
What your priorities are, what your decisions are,
what your choices are, what your morality is,
what your lifestyle is. Everything is decided by
Islam, and it is substantially
superior
to any other alternative.
But sometimes it takes patience,
and it takes courage,
and only the patient ones are courageous.
So the prophet salawasalam wants to
clear what is more serious
than this physical suffering.
The calamity would be for the moo for
the Muslims
to fail to process the world and even
the most difficult conditions
through their faith,
and rather
have any kind of contamination
from misguided people and how they process the
world.
Because that would be a fatal error. That
would mean you would never stand on your
feet.
You will always be subjugated.
You will be neutralized.
You'll be marginalized.
You are defeated from within when you process
the world by the same criteria
that is designed and that is used by
those who are misguided.
So the prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam wanted
He had a clear sense of priority, and
the prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam wanted to
address the most important priority now.
And the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam describes
to him what happened to the nations that
came before.
That a person from among the believers would
be brought and they would dig out
a pit for him and lay made him
lay down in it.
And then they would bring a saw
and start sawing at his forehead
through his whole body cutting him into 2
halves,
slowly slow death
in order
to convince him,
even just to publicly
renounce faith.
And then they would bring
combs of iron,
prongs of iron, and run them through the
flesh
and the organs of that person to pull
out,
to pull out the flesh and the nerves
from the bones.
None of that makes that person
renounce their faith or give up on it.
Why? Because there is faith behind that.
It's not normal human capacity that allows humans
to put to put up with that level
of suffering.
If you process the world
through the work through the the path or
the thinking of the non believe of the
non believers,
you can't put up with pain
for the sake of Allah. You'll put up
with pain for the sake of your dunya.
You'll put up with pain for the sake
of wealth, for the sake of fame, for
the sake of low desire.
Yes. And you will call it sacrifice,
and you'll be proud of it.
And social media is full of those fools
that we take as role models now.
Raway Bilah.
Foolish people
that are misguided
but just because they have financial success everyone
worships them.
One day they take you right, one day
they take you left.
And instead of busying ourselves with Allah, we're
just busy with so and so and so
and so.
He said this, he said that, in this
podcast, in this interview, in this video, in
this tweet, they said this, they said that.
You worship them.
You worship them and they're rejoining it.
So the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam says
none of that makes the person renounce their
faith.
Allah addressed that already in the Quran. Allah
says,
Allah says humans,
when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
blesses them with wealth, with ease, with what
they love, with a pleasant life, an easy
life, or an abundant life,
they say, Allah is pleased with me, Allah
has honored me. I'm so precious to Allah.
But when Allah limits their provision,
and provision is in the hands of Allah,
you can try but it's Allah who decides.
But when Allah limits their provision and Allah
tries them,
they say, oh Allah has forsaken me, Allah
has given up on me.
Allah says, no.
No. That's not the way you think. That's
how the misguided people think.
That's not the story that Allah put together
for this world that He created.
Allah designed the world and Allah had a
story for it, prescribed the meaning for it.
And Allah said,
I
have created the jinn and mankind
only to worship me, that's why you're here.
That's why we're here.
And Allah said in the Quran,
We shall test you.
And he mentions different types of test.
And then Allah says,
You think you're gonna make it to paradise
when you have not been tested, when we
haven't tested you,
as we tested the nations that came before
you?
With hardship,
with lack, with illness, with stress, with fear,
they were shaken,
they were petrified.
So why now when the promise of Allah
is being fulfilled,
instead of that increasing as an iman and
saying that's exactly what Allah promised?
We are saying where is Allah
because we are thinking
like this believers,
and we are treating Islam as
the accessories.
Imagine a car. You buy a car, everything
about it is functional, but you think, you
know, I'll just have
some more accessories here and there. They're nice
to have,
but they are not
fundamental.
They are not
important for the function functionality
of the car. That's how we treat Islam
and Allah.
Allah for us is more like cosmetics now.
Allah is for us more like decoration we
put on the wall. It's nice to have,
but he's not into our life.
Words So what do we fill our life
with?
What we have been taught.
How to worship the dunya?
How to plan for the dunya,
how to fall in love with the dunya,
and we give it good names.
Being ambitious, being successful,
being famous,
being an influencer,
having a great career. There's nothing wrong with
any of those things, these are things that
Allah put as means. If you put them
where they are as accessories of life, then
perfect.
But we have invest, we have reversed
the whole equation
and then we're saying why
people are dying.
Well that's exactly what Allah said is gonna
be.
That's exactly what Allah said. When you treat
Islam, when you put the Quran on the
side of your life, and you live like
those who don't believe in Allah live according
to their ways,
although you have some
artifacts, you have some appearance,
you have some external, again, things, cosmetics
that make you look slightly culturally different.
But essentially, you're thinking the same way. You're
processing the world the same way. Your priorities
are pretty much the same.
Let's say 80% the same.
What's gonna happen?
You become a tool.
You become a tool that is used by
Shaitan
and by the forces of disbelief, who are
going to bring destruction,
evil,
and
complete ruin on humanity.
You're just gonna feed into their system.
You're gonna reinforce your sister their system because
in this world,
in this world,
if you are not a force for good,
you are a force for evil by default.
There's no middle ground.
There's no middle ground.
Unknowingly, you'll be used
as a pawn
for the forces of evil.
So we as Muslims should take our life
seriously. And again, this is not an invitation
against success
or against
any kind of good that Allah made halal
and a useful means, but I'm against.
And this is an invitation, this is what
Islam is against, the worship of the dunya.
Have
you seen the person who has taken their
desires, their whims, their dreams, their plans, what
however you want to put it?
Their ambitions, they have taken that as what?
As their god. Meaning that's what they pursue,
this is what they live for.
How are you going to control these people?
You don't have control. People are responsible for
their own
doings.
So what can we do?
What can we do
in order to free ourselves
from the predicament that we have
willingly,
you know, allowed ourselves to be part of.
1st wake up.
Wake up as a Muslim and as a
believer, you have a responsibility
to save yourself,
to educate yourself,
and to to
to devote yourself for Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
People worship their gods
proudly. They worship wealth, they worship status, they
worship power
openly, and they're proud of it.
They're proud of it. They they're allowing it
to to shape their life and their decisions,
and not only their decisions,
they allow it to even shape the destiny
and the future of populations,
of millions of people and generations to come
for their own personal gain,
for their own personal gain.
And they know how to beautify that, they
know how to sugarcoat that.
As a Muslim, Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has
freed us from that.
We worship Allah. There's no way to freedom
except by worshiping Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
and being true to Allah. So
any position you are in, if you are
the father in the house,
fulfill your obligation
and better yourself, improve yourself.
The more you develop yourself, the more you
become a better influence
on your wife and your children.
The mothers in the house,
embrace the role that Allah gave you.
Take Allah's plan for you. Don't take the
plan of all of the lies that they
tell you as promises
with which they waste your life and they
waste your children,
and they destroy their future
by taking you out of the most precious
and noble
role that a human being could ever play.
The most crucial.
Embrace that role that Allah chose for you
and, Allah, you will never regret it. You
will never regret it.
Our children, our youth wake up. You're not
here for video games, you're not here for
dating, you're not here for social media, you're
here for something greater.
Don't let these things
devour you and ruin your future.
You can't achieve heroism,
you know, at the keyboard as you're playing
video games.
That's a lie. That's deception. Don't waste your
life. There is real heroism
that is more exhilarating than any video game
that you are fond of,
where you bring real change into the world.
At least play your role, be some be
a positive change, be something for the sake
of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Lead a better life.
Don't let them mess with your mind. Don't
let them waste your life.
Take the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam and
his companions as the example. That's the way
for us to go.