Mufti Menk – NO SACRIFICE – NO EID
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Today is the day of the great sacrifice.
You and I hear the word sacrifice.
If you know what it means,
it is not something easy. Someone says, I
have to sacrifice.
That means I have to do something that
requires great determination.
It requires belief, conviction, and strength.
And without that you will not be able
to sacrifice.
So what you need to know is
as much as it is the greatest celebration
in the Islamic calendar,
we need to ask ourselves.
What is it that I
have sacrificed or am prepared to sacrifice
for the sake of my Lord, Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala?
Ibrahim alaihis salam, the father of the prophets,
Abraham, may peace be upon him.
He was very close to Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala
mainly because
he followed
every instruction
that Allah gave him whether he understood it
or not.
When Allah told him to leave his family
in Makkah
and proceed, he did not question.
When Allah told him to sacrifice his son,
he did not question.
When Allah told him to build the Kaaba,
he did not question.
And so on. The list is almost endless.
So many things Ibrahim alaihis salam did simply
because he knew the instruction
is coming from Allah.
The instruction is coming from Allah. When Allah
instructs,
that's it.
Allah Almighty.
Allah Almighty knows what He is saying. He
will never tell you something
that is harmful for you. In fact, anything
that Allah has prohibited
is harmful.
If you don't understand how it is harmful,
that's not Allah's fault.
It's your weakness.
And anything that Allah has made compulsory
is the only way you're going to get
closer to Allah
If you don't understand how or why, it
is your weakness.
It's not Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala's weakness at
all. When Allah tells you, you pray 5
times a day, this time, this time, the
the the other, the next time, the next
one and the following,
you listen. It's your sacrifice.
Do you know when you look at Ishmael
alaihis salam and you look at all the
other messengers, in fact look at the message
of the Quran.
Allah Almighty tells you that
bear patience.
Bear patience when it comes to
obeying the instruction of Allah.
Instruct your family to pray
and be patient
when it comes to fulfilling the command of
Allah. Do you know what that means?
Patience is divided into 3 in the Islamic
context.
Number 1, the patience that is required
or should I say the strength that is
required to fulfill the commands of Allah? It's
called sabr. It's called sabr.
That part of sabr is actually the strength
that is required
to fulfill the instruction of Allah. When Allah
tells you do this, it's not going to
be a joke. It's not going to be
a walk in the park. It's not going
to be easy. It's going to be tough.
And you require
a certain type of sabr, which is a
strength
together with determination
and belief. If you don't have belief and
conviction, you won't have sabr. If you don't
have the strength, you can't have sabr. You
need to have the willpower, the conviction.
You need to want to please Allah.
When Allah tells you do something,
Instruct your family to pray
and strengthen yourself through
in order to fulfill it correctly.
That means you're not going to be able
to fulfill salah if you're a lazy person
or you're not determined or you don't have
a connection with Allah.
So Allah says,
be strong and do it.
When Allah tells you to do something,
you need to know it is for my
benefit.
If Allah tells you you have to give
out a certain amount of your wealth that
we gave you, then you need to know
by doing that, not only are you going
to please Allah, but there is benefit for
you. It cleanses you. It purifies you. It
brings you down to earth to realize that
all the wealth that I have is not
going to actually help me the day I
die unless I have spent it in the
correct way and done the right thing. I
earn it in a proper way and I
spend it in the right way. That is
why Allah makes it compulsory for you to
give.
Imagine someone's earned.
They can say if they not If they
don't believe, this is mine. Why should I
do what you want me to do? But
we believe. We will say we earned it
how Allah wanted us to earn. We stayed
away from what Allah did not want us
to to earn.
And when we spent, we spent it how
Allah told us. The same applies
when Allah tells you fast in Ramadan from
this time to this time. If you miss
it by a few seconds, it's gone.
When Allah tells you don't eat and drink
and don't do this, you have to understand.
It.
Allah does not want me to do it.
You see in the pillars of Islam,
some of them Allah tells you to do
things. And some of them Allah tells you
to abstain from things.
For example, when it comes to Ramadan, Allah's
telling you stay away from what? Food and
drink. And when it comes to prayer, Allah
is telling you do it. It's more like
testing your plus and minus. Right? Multiplication
and division. All these tests from Allah in
order that when you go back to Allah,
you would have done the right thing and
earned His pleasure.
Similarly, when it comes to Hajj, why does
Allah love it so much? And if you
look at the first pillar of Islam which
is the Shahada,
we are saying there is no one worthy
of worship.
None worthy of worship.
Nothing worthy of worship besides Allah. Why do
we say this? Because we are
declaring
that whatever my Lord instructs me, that's my
instruction.
He is the only one worthy of telling
me.
Allah
owns
creation. He made it. Who made you?
Whoever made you, does he not have the
right to instruct you? He made you, man.
Today you you are a father and you
feel that's my son. That's my daughter. Let
me instruct them. They should listen to me
because I'm the father. What about your creator
who created you completely?
Don't you feel he has the right to
instruct you and I? He definitely does. He's
the owner and the only owner
of supreme instruction.
For him belongs the instruction.
When he tells you something, that's it. It's
final.
A true believer, male or female, when Allah
or his messenger
instructs,
they do not feel that they have a
choice in that regard.
They know there is no choice in this
regard. This is the way it is and
this is the way it shall be.
And I follow and I obey. So Ibrahim
alaihis salam was instructed to sacrifice his son,
Ishmael.
And
what did he do? No questions asked.
He went to follow the instruction of Allah.
Allah replaced it with
a ram
and Allah kept the memory of it up
to the day of judgment.
More important
than the slaughter itself
is what is known as the taqwa.
Allah says the meat is not going to
get to to Allah. The blood is not
going to get to Allah But rather what
gets to Allah is the consciousness,
the development of the correct relationship as a
result of the sacrifice.
What is known as the taqwa.
When you have that correct sense of
relationship with Allah, what we would term the
consciousness, the fear of Allah in the correct
sense. That is what gets to Allah. Allah
wants that. So now
the crux of it is the following, and
listen to this very attentively.
You and I have bad habits.
Some of them are bigger than others.
Are you prepared to put a knife today
on those habits,
those sins?
There is a man who was prepared to
put a knife
where it didn't make sense to general human
beings
to slaughter and sacrifice your own son.
But if Allah instructed it, he said, well,
I'm prepared to do it.
Allah is not telling us to sacrifice our
children. No,
not at
all. It won't be and it will never
be.
But Allah is telling us
sacrifice for the sake of Allah,
Cutting out your habits. Put a knife to
your bad habit. Today is the day. Then
you have the reason to rejoice
for the sake of Allah. I cut out
something for my maker. Only for Allah I
can do this. Someone else, you may not
be able to do it for them. In
fact,
people do it because someone they love tells
them, don't do this. You know, you get
married and your spouse tells you, well, if
you do this, I'm gonna leave you. And
say, no. No. No. I won't do it.
Allah will leave you. Imagine then what will
happen? But still through his mercy, he says,
no. I give you another chance. Another chance.
You're breathing. Yes. Well, then you can always
come back to us. Make tawba, seek the
forgiveness. Come to me. I will forgive you.
Today is the day of rejoicing. If you
are prepared to cut your bad habits and
to sacrifice to fulfill your obligations unto Allah,
go and enjoy the day. Go and enjoy
it. You deserve it.
But if you're not prepared to move an
inch regarding your bad habits and you're not
prepared to move an inch regarding fulfilling the
instruction of Allah, Be it your dress code,
be it your prayer, be it your whatever
else it may be that you know you
need to get done for the sake of
Allah. In that case, do you deserve
to celebrate?
How can you say, Masha Allah, eat Mubarak
Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar Allah is
the greatest Allah is the greatest La ilaha
illallah wallahu Akbar None worthy of worship besides
Allah. Allah is the greatest. Allahu Akbar wallahi
lhamd Allah is the greatest. To Him belongs
all praise. But you're still engaged in your
bad ways, your bad habits, and you don't
even want to think about it for you.
This is just a day of food and
drink and let's go and check out the
meat and how much we're cutting and how
much we're going to eat. And the braai
we might have or the barbecue, they call
it in some countries. And, subhanallah, that's what
it's all about. Let's go and eat and
drink.
You're only supposed to rejoice when you deserve
the party, so to speak. You don't just
have a party every day for nothing. There's
a reason.
This is the biggest party that we could
ever have as believers.
It is the biggest day of rejoicing. You
and I deserve it. Look.
The hujaj who made hajj.
The day preceding the day of Eid is
the biggest day. The biggest day and the
day of Eid.
The day of Arafah precedes the day of
Eid. What are they doing? All of them
are calling out to Allah crying for forgiveness
and for their needs. Right? They are asking
Allah, forgive us and help our brothers and
sisters everywhere at the moment in Palestine. You
know what's going on. Allah knows better than
you and I. Our brothers and sisters are
being butchered. That's the word.
We ask Allah to grant them victory, to
grant them protection.
We would be failing in our duty if
we don't mention our brothers and sisters suffering
throughout the globe.
We think of them. We pray for them.
Each one should do whatever is in his
or her capacity to help, to assist, to
alleviate to the best of their ability. And
each one's on a different level. But nonetheless,
you and I know
that the day of Arafah, everyone is crying
to Allah to meet their needs, to help
them in their own personal lives, in their
families, communities, in the Ummah, in humanity at
large. And And what happens the very next
day? In fact, in the evening they go
to Muzdalifa
and thereafter they go to Mina. Why are
they going to Mina? To pelt shaitan.
Shaitan must not come in the way
between you and the instruction of Allah. Never
pelt
him.
I seek protection in Allah from shaitan, the
accursed.
And you repeat that and you say it
because Allah tells you in the Quran
that whenever the Shaitan tries to
lead you astray, seek Allah's protection and Allah
will protect you.
And then
they pelted this devil,
Jamrat al Aqaba. It is called with 7
pebbles.
More than the pebble,
shaitan physically is not there. There is only
a demarcation of where he was at one
point. More important than the devil that you
are pelting in that particular way, is to
remove the devil within within.
I have bad habits. I'm going to cut
them out. I'm going to take them out.
I'm not going to allow shaitan to come
and attack me. And one after the other
to bog me down, to make me continue
in my bad ways, to make me lazy
regarding
the obligation unto Allah. To get up for
salatul fajr requires
great determination.
It requires belief, strength and determination.
Without those 3, you're not going to get
up for salatul fajr.
Are you determined?
Do you really want to prepare for the
day you are going to meet with Allah,
which could be today? May Allah take us
in a way that He's pleased with us.
If you want to,
just tell Allah right now, oh, Allah, help
me to sacrifice for your sake. Help me
to understand the truth of this particular day.
The sacrifice, the greatest sacrifice, the sacrifice of
Ibrahim alaihi salam.
The reward of it is so great. Allah
says it's the biggest day. The best thing
you could do is to sacrifice,
to sacrifice your animals. What's the point of
eating the meat? Every time you have some
meat or you see those animals, tell yourself,
do I really deserve this? Have I really
sacrificed anything for Allah? And here I am
celebrating
a sacrifice
for Allah.
So this is it. This is the message
that I have, and this is exactly where
we stand as believers. The day of sacrifice
is a great day.
Mend your relationships with your family members
because that is an instruction of Allah in
the Quran.
You have issues in your circles.
Mend the relationships
or try your best to mend them for
the sake of Allah.
Remember, it's not easy to get on with
people, different temperaments.
Everyone on earth has a different method, a
different style. Even brothers, they have a different
way of thinking. Sometimes it could be similar
to a degree, but it's not the same.
Why did Allah make you that way? To
reward you when you navigate through that bearing
Allah in mind.
That's why Allah has made it that way.
Learn to love each other for the sake
of Allah. The ummah needs you and I.
This is the day of sacrifice. We are
going to enjoy. We're going to rejoice. Look
at the takbir. We say the extra takbir.
Right?
That day of the hujaj, the day of
Eid, they go and pelt
for the sake of Allah.
Thereafter they slaughter animals for the sake of
Allah. Thereafter they shave their hair or they
cut their hair for the sake of Allah.
Thereafter they go back to Makkah and do
tawaf known as tawafulifada
or tawafulziyarah
with sai between safa and marwa for the
sake of Allah. Why does Allah want you
to do all of this? In order for
you to realize
you
are in need of Allah.
You and I
are in need of Allah.
Allah does not need us. We need Him.
Listen
to
this
verse.
Allahu
Walgani
Oh people,
you are in desperate need of Allah.
You are in need of Allah and Allah
is totally
independent.
Allah is totally independent.
Allah is full of praise, the owner of
praise. Whether you praise Him or you don't
praise Him. Whether you worship Him or you
don't worship Him. Whether you follow Him or
you don't follow Him. It does not decrease
His value at all. He is
the creator.
Then Allah says, if He wants,
He can delete
you. He can do away with you. He
can remove you. He can destroy all of
you and replace you
with a different creation altogether.
And then he says,
and that is not difficult for Allah.
He can do that. May Allah Almighty not
replace us. May we be the ones who
worship Allah. Yes. You and I are human
beings. We have human weaknesses.
Sometimes we have a tendency to like certain
things.
Allah says, regulate it. You want something?
Make sure you get it in a way
that is pleasing to Allah, not in a
haram way. And if there is no way
to get it except through the displeasure
of Allah, then you leave it.
Someone involved in homosexual
acts, for example,
there is no way that you're going to
regularize that. You have to cut it for
the sake of Allah. If you'd like to
earn the pleasure of Allah, you're going to
have to cut certain things. Someone can't say,
well, how can I regularize this? If you
want to steal someone else's property, you can't
do that. If you want
to get something that's not yours, for example,
or that Allah does not allow
someone who is addicted to alcohol, addicted to
adultery and they say,
how can I make this alcohol permissible? There
is no way to make it permissible. You
will have to abstain. That's what it is.
May Allah Almighty grant us all goodness and
ease.
This was just a short message in order
to remind us, and once again I end
with it as well. Let's sacrifice for the
sake of Allah. Beautiful sacrifice, and we'll enjoy
the day. Don't do that which is displeasing
to Allah. The days are numbered of all
of ours. And remember something,
people are suffering across the globe.
They need us, they need you and I.
And one of the best ways is for
us to change ourselves.
That's the beginning, and then everything else will
happen. How do we change ourselves?
Sacrifice for the sake of Allah. This day
of Eid comes every year.
Why? Because Allah wants to remind you again
and again. A year has passed. What did
you do?
Another year has passed. What did you do?
A 3rd year has passed. 30 years have
passed. 50 years have passed. You're about to
go into your grave. What did you do?
Seek the forgiveness of Allah. Allah is the
most forgiving, the most merciful. Something that brings
me so much of joy is when you
know that your Lord is the most kind,
the most compassionate, the most forgiving, the most
amazing,
the most unique, the greatest,
the one who is absolutely magnificent. That's my
Lord and yours. Don't lose hope in his
mercy. Seek his forgiveness. No matter what you've
done, he will forgive you.