Muhammad West – Asabiyyah
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AI: Transcript ©
A'udhu Billahi Minash Shaitanir Rajeem, Bismillahir Rahmanir
Raheem, Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen, wasalatu wasalamu ala ashrafil
mursaleen, Sayyidina Muhammadin wa ala alihi wa sahbihi
ajma'een, my beloved brothers and sisters, assalamu
alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu.
Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen, always forever begin by praising
Allah, and I share with you la ilaha
illallah, we testify there is none worthy of
worship besides Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, and
we send our loving greetings, salutations to our
beloved Nabi Muhammad salallahu alayhi wa sallam, to
his pious and his pure family, to his
companions and all those who follow his sunnah
until the end of time.
May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala bless the
ummah of Nabi Muhammad salallahu alayhi wa sallam,
may Allah make it easy for us, grant
us success, ameen, ameen walhamdulillah.
Today inshallah we're gonna talk about something called
Asabiyah, have you heard about this before?
Do you know what Asabiyah is?
So inshallah it's something we learn, something new.
30 years ago, it's not an easy topic,
30 years ago, there was a genocide in
Rwanda, so we are living through a genocide
now, we are watching live what's happening in
Palestine.
One group of people is trying to completely
destroy another group.
Now 30 years ago, we had a genocide
in a tiny country called Rwanda.
Small population, few million people.
And within the span of 100 days, 3
months, 1 million people were hacked to death.
This isn't like an army going in and
bombing, if you drop bombs, you can kill
a large amount of people.
But these are people going in door to
door, hacking their neighbors, their co-workers, their
colleagues to death.
These people they lived with for hundreds of
years.
People who share the same culture, the same
language, the same religion.
They've been living together side by side.
But a few hundred years before, the colonial
powers came in and said, this group they're
called Houthis, and this group they're called Tutsis.
They put this one in the box, and
that one in the box.
And you couldn't tell the difference between the
two.
There were no differences really.
But because a mindset of them versus us.
And this one hating that one.
This division built up and built up.
Eventually, it got to the point where people
who you lived with side by side for
hundreds of years, you went in, you took
a knife, you killed the children, the women,
everybody.
And you moved on.
1 million people in 100 days.
Now subhanallah, we don't make comparisons.
We look at Gaza, subhanallah, it's like 40
,000 people, 42,000, 50,000 people.
The march that we had was over 50
,000.
That's 50,000 people plus in your mind
that has died in Gaza.
Times that by 20, that's a million people.
And so we ask scientists, professors, thinkers, what
makes ordinary normal people who go to work,
who take their kids to school, become mass
murderers overnight?
How is it possible?
Because this was a mobilization of an entire
country.
Hundreds of thousands of Hutus killed millions of
Tutsis.
How did normal people go from just going
to the shop, going to work, end up
murdering whole families of people?
How do we do this?
And one of the things that comes out
is this sectarian, tribal mindset.
Us versus you.
We are right, you are wrong.
It's our people versus your people.
You are not even people.
And I had a conversation with a Zionist
at work, at varsity, a student.
And I was trying to limit my political
stuff in class.
It's accounting, it's only political.
But somehow it led to the Middle East.
It led to petrol prices.
And this young man said, well it's all
Hezbollah's fault.
It's all Hamas' fault.
Before I could just get, let's just finish
the accounting, let's balance this balance sheet.
We'll talk about this afterwards.
And getting to understand, I genuinely said I
want to understand your perspective.
Because we are all intelligent people.
I think, I believe we are all civil,
decent people.
We all love humanity.
We see the same facts but we come
to totally different conclusions.
Some way there's a miscommunication here.
And really the bottom line of this conversation
is, well those are my people.
Those are the good guys.
And these people are the bad guys.
And I will stand with my people to
the better end.
You see this with parents.
The principal brings two kids, they had a
fight.
The one stabs the other one.
He said, why?
Your son stabbed another student.
He said, yeah but he called my son
a name.
Just because it's my son, I need to
stand with it to the better end.
No matter how much oppression and aggression we
cause.
And this is what is Asabiyyah.
The Nabi salallahu alayhi wa sallam spoke about
against this.
In Arabic Asab is to hold together.
It's about holding something together, a social cohesion.
A force that keeps people together in a
group but in a negative sense.
It's like a negative unity.
In Arabic mashallah there's positive unity which is
like making the ummah jamaah.
You have Asabiyyah which is a collective built
on some negative cohesion.
And the Nabi salallahu alayhi wa sallam spoke
about this in many ahadith.
And he said this type of Asabiyyah where
communities stand up for their tribe.
Or their culture, Malay, Indian.
Or their sectarian group, Tablighi, Sufi, Salafi.
Or they stand up with their political party,
ANC, Hezbollah, whatever.
They stand up for no just purpose.
This is Asabiyyah.
And a Sahabi asked, Ya Rasulullah, is loving
your tribe or loving your people Asabiyyah?
If I love my people, I'm proud of
my South African people, I'm proud of my
Malay culture, we are the Malays.
Is this Asabiyyah?
The Nabi said no.
Asabiyyah is to support your people in an
unjust cause.
Where you stand with your people even when
they are wrong.
Why?
Because we are the Memons.
That's it.
This board is only for the Cockneys.
Now I pick on everybody today inshallah.
Either all of you are going to take
me to the Human Rights Commission.
But that is Asabiyyah.
And the Nabi salallahu alayhi wa sallam spoke
against this very clearly.
And titles.
We put titles and we box people into
little boxes.
So that we can see that's a them
or you're one of us.
And automatically we decide how we're going to
treat you based on that.
Based on your title, based on the box
that you tick.
Before I even know you, before I even
understand what it is that you want.
I already want to box you and categorize
you.
I look at your address, now I know
what kind of service I'm going to give
you.
I look at your cultural background and now
automatically how this conversation is going to go.
And titles.
Titles are a dangerous thing.
A title can be something which is good
and praiseworthy.
And that same title can be used to
demean, put someone down, to cause division.
And this is a beautiful example from the
seerah.
One of the titles which Allah gives to
the sahaba is muhajireen and ansar.
Beautiful title.
Those who made hijrah and those who helped.
We all want to be muhajireen, we all
want to be ansar.
Allah says, the best of people, asabikun awwalun.
Allah loves the early Muslims of the muhajireen
and then the ansar.
So Allah mentions these titles as groups that
He loves.
It's a good title.
Now look at this from the seerah.
The sahaba, they were on their way back
from a battle.
On their way home.
The army consists of muhajireen, people from Mecca,
and ansar, the people from Medina.
And on their way home, two young people.
One from the muhajireen, one from the ansar.
Two young men.
They got into an argument, a shoving match
over.
Allah, we don't even know what it was
that they got into a scuffle over.
And then they first started to fight.
This one grabbed him and chest to chest.
And while they're in the fight, the sahaba
from Mecca said, O muhajireen, help me.
And then the people of Medina, O ansar,
help me.
Now they're calling each other by their...
These are titles Allah had given them.
This is not even Meccans and Madinis.
This was muhajireen, O ansar, help me.
The nabi is about this, the ansar and
the muhajireen are calling each other by these
titles.
He is red in his face.
He is angry.
The vein is throbbing.
And he says, what are these titles of
jahiliyyah?
You're calling each other.
These are titles Allah had given.
But he said, this is a type of
jahiliyyah.
You're using titles of jahiliyyah.
And he says, I'm still with you.
I'm still here and you're already fighting over
my tribe versus your tribe.
You're using names.
Now what?
Now you're muhajireen and us, we are the
muhajireen.
And we're not of you.
We are the ansar.
The same title now was meant to break
the jamaah.
Was meant to demean.
And subhanallah, how often do we do this?
Particularly in religion.
What madhab are you from?
Now we know, oh, it's khanafis.
They're different.
They're different to us.
Or shafis.
Oh, no madhab.
It's even worse.
You don't tick any of the boxes.
That's a bigger problem.
And this is how we divide and break
ourselves up into smaller and smaller groups and
factions.
Each one has their own title.
Each group has a sub-sub-sub-group.
Within the salafis, there's what type of salafi?
Madkhali?
And it gets on in each group.
It's a tariqah.
This is a problem.
And the nabisim says, Unfortunately, four qualities will
remain in this ummah until the day of
qiyamah.
Four things of jahiliyya will not get rid
of.
Four types of ignorances of jahiliyya will not
get rid of unless Allah SWT has blessed
you as a person.
Number one is that you will be boasting
over your status.
You want to put other people down based
on whatever blessing Allah has given you.
And boasting over your lineage.
My forefathers, my...
Your forefathers don't even know who you are.
You have no...
You know, subhanAllah, what is there?
In what your great-great-great-great-grand
uncle who did this.
But you want to boast and put another
man down based on your forefathers.
There's nothing wrong with being proud or honored
of your people.
And your lineage and your tradition.
But to use it as a means to
put someone else down, this is a problem.
Or to make it a means why I
am superior to you.
This is a problem.
And it's this superiority which has led to
the world's biggest genocides.
The Nazis killed millions and millions of Jews.
Why?
Because we are superior as a human race
than you.
What you see in India, it's all this
national...
And that's exactly like Zionism.
This is what Asabiya leads to.
This is not just a little petty thing
we have in our community.
It leads to genocide.
It leads to whole communities killing one another.
So bragging about your lineage.
Posting about your status.
And the Nabi says, talking about looking at
the stars.
Checking your horoscopes.
Audhu Billah, we shouldn't be doing this.
And wailing, grieving over the dead beyond what
is permissible.
And so as I mentioned, we all have
this mindset.
We want to put labels on people.
And put you in a box.
And decide from there what kind of person
you are.
I want to ask, what madhab do you
follow?
What sect do you identify with?
I'd say I put up my hand, I'm
a tablighi for example.
And I ask now, what do you think
of the Sufis?
What do you think of this group?
And automatically you'd find if you're outside of
the group, well we think negatively of that
group.
Just without even knowing.
Without even having a sense of why.
This them versus us is something which the
Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam warned us against.
And the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says, Let
people stop boasting about their forefathers and their
lineage.
And their ancestors who have died.
Many of whom are basically in Jahannam even.
Subhanallah, this is the Arabs.
Remember the sahaba, their forefathers were idol worshippers.
You want to be proud about your forefathers.
They did this, they won that battle.
They're in Jahannam.
Who merely are fire for Jahannam.
Or they will be, and in the sight
of Allah, this is more insignificant than the
cockroaches on the floor.
You know, the dung beetle.
So the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says, O
Muslims, Allah has removed the sense of partisan.
A sectarian, Allah has removed this from you
from the days of Jahiliyyah, the sahaba.
You have come beyond that.
You are now out of that ignorant mindset.
You see a person for his principles, for
what he stands for.
I don't see Abu Bakr who is a
Qurayshi.
And Salman Al-Farisi, he is a Persian.
No, I see what you stand.
What is the measure of the man based
on his actions, his deeds and his principles.
The Prophet says, you have come out of
that now, O my sahaba.
You are beyond that now.
Of the days of Jahiliyyah and boasting about
your forefathers.
Indeed a person, the only thing that matters,
you are either a pious believer or a
rich sinner.
That is the only thing that matters.
And all of mankind came from Adam, and
Adam is from clay.
Ultimately, if you really want to go all
the way back, you all go back to
mud.
If you want to be smart, remember you
go back to mud.
And in fact, asabiya one could say, is
the original sin.
This is the same reason shaitan declares war
on insan.
I am made of fire, he is made
of clay.
Simple, them versus us.
No logic, reason.
That's why when I sat with a Zionist
student, I wanted to find some profound deep
reason to justify in my heart, how it's
okay for someone to kill a whole hospital
of babies and children, and not feel anything.
There must be something that gives me a
sense of, it makes sense.
And really, wallahi, as pathetic, as stupid, as
Jahiliyyah, these are my people, it's us versus
them.
We are the good guys, you are the
bad guys.
Whatever we do, I support.
I don't even need to look.
If my people did it, I give the
green light.
I don't need to listen to anything you
say.
It's you, it's wrong.
This is Jahiliyyah, asabiyyah.
And we don't have to look outside.
Before we criticize those on the outside, the
ummah is in the ICU because of this.
Our ummah is crippled because of this.
Within our tiny 2-3% Muslim population
in South Africa, every single one of us
here can list, I'm not just a Muslim,
but I belong to this madhab, and this
aqeedah, and this tariqah, I'm of this cultural
background, subhanallah.
We put all that there.
Not as titles of praise, but as titles
to make me different to them.
And perhaps religious asabiyyah is of the worst.
Religious asabiyyah is of the most despicable.
Because in our attempt to get closer to
Allah, we belittle, we undermine, we insult others
who try to get closer to Allah.
There's asabiyyah between the brothers in the masjid.
No one cares about those people in the
disco, who are not even worshipping Allah.
We don't care about them.
We discuss how you worship versus how I
worship.
Yes, doesn't mean we're all the same kumbaya,
everything goes.
There are certain principles which are right and
wrong.
We must discuss those things.
But to negate someone's iman, his islam, his
sincerity, his connection with Allah, because of a
title, this is what destroys the ummah.
In a beautiful hadith, it's actually a long
hadith, and perhaps with time.
The nabi says, the anbiya of the past,
they were given sort of instructions by Allah
to give.
And in the hadith it begins where Allah
instructs Nabi Yahya, tell your people five things.
And Nabi Yahya is a bit late, and
so then Nabi Isa is instructed, tell your
people five things.
To worship Allah alone, and to make salah,
and to fast.
That fasting is your shield, and to make
dhikr of Allah protects you from calamities, and
to give sadaqah will remove you from calamities.
So these are the five things.
Then Nabi Isa says, Allah commanded me with
also five to tell you.
These are the five things I need to
tell you.
He commanded, the hadith continues, and I command
you, Allah is commanding you with five.
So Nabi Isa says, I'm commanding you, O
my ummah, with the five things which I
was commanded.
Number one, listen to the authority.
Listen to the leadership.
If we lived in an Islamic state, in
a Muslim country, there's a khalifa, whether he's
good, bad, so long as he's not commanding
you to do sin, we need to respect
him and listen to him.
Allah has given that manzilah.
Others, we have chaos.
And we see that now.
We see the chaos without a khalifa.
Okay, so we don't have that.
We still have some, alhamdulillah, some sort of
leadership in our tiny community.
We have committees, we have chairpersons, we have
imams, we have ulema bodies.
Love them, hate them, whatever you have the
ulema bodies.
We are better off having a weak, impotent
maybe ulema body than none at all.
Fix it.
Help it.
Restore it.
Then break it down.
Listen to the authority.
Don't work against and obey the authority.
If they command you with good, follow them
and respect them.
Listen and obey two things.
Then to fight jihad against those who harm
this ummah.
To stand up against oppression.
And to make hijrah when you can't fight
in this.
You find yourself in a situation of some
hijrah.
Doesn't only mean you immigrate to some islamic
state.
It means you're in a company where my
morals are being tested all along.
I can't practice my islam here.
Rather leave that paycheck and go to a
job where you can practice your islam freely.
Rather leave that community where there is no
islam, no masjid, to the southern suburbs or
wherever the cape flats, where the masjid is
there and you can practice.
Make hijrah from something which is bad for
your imam to something which is better.
Leave that group of friends that diminishes your
imam to something which is better for your
imam.
And then he said, Allah commanded me with
the jama'ah.
The jama'ah, the community.
For indeed, whoever parts ways against the jama
'ah.
Very serious words here.
Whoever walks away from the jama'ah, you
break the unity of the muslims.
You cause a fitna in our community.
Then he has cast off, he's out of
the fold of islam.
I'm not saying this, the professor is saying
this.
Whoever breaks the jama'ah of the ummah.
You break the jama'ah of the masjid.
We go this way, now you wanna go
that way.
The community is going on one side and
you wanna cause mischief and corruption.
Yes, if the jama'ah, if the community
majority is wrong in a way that doesn't
break the unity, we can talk about things.
But to break down the unity of the
muslims and to divide us further and make
us fight one another.
Then he has thrown off the yoke of
islam.
Unless he comes back.
And whoever calls by names, whoever calls by
titles of jahiliyyah.
Even as we said, titles of jahiliyyah doesn't
even only mean my forefathers.
If you're using titles, tablighi, shafi'i, kokni,
malay, whatever it is.
To cause a division.
Without unjust, that means these are titles of
jahiliyyah.
Then you are the cause of jahannam.
The sahaba said, even if we perform salah,
you say, ya rasulullah, if I use this.
Even if I fast and I make salah
but I do these things, I'm still a
part of jahannam.
Even if he is fasting and praying.
If you're gonna call someone, the hadith continues,
this is so profound.
When you call people by their names, when
you call them by titles, when you wanna
put them in a box.
When you wanna put someone in a box,
put them in the box Allah has given.
Allah has called them muslimeen, mu'mineen, wa ibadullah.
Allah has called you muslims, and He's called
you believers, and He's called you worshippers of
Allah.
If someone is a muslim, and he worships
Allah, and he believes in your Qur'an,
he follows your qiblah.
Don't break that title over something smaller.
Don't break the jama'ah.
We conclude with this hadith.
As I mentioned, yes, it's not kumbaya that
everyone believes whatever you believe and it's okay,
it's all the same.
There is a right and a wrong.
There is a permissible and impermissible.
There is a halal and a haram.
And we can discuss that.
We can discuss, what do the shias believe
versus ahlus sunnah.
There are certain things which are incompatible.
What does this madhab follow, it might be
a mistake in the madhab.
We do it not to divide, or to
cause harm, or to insult.
We do it to stand on principle.
But ultimately, irrespective of what madhab he follows,
even irrespective of what sect he follows.
People ask, and I'm getting more problems here.
The head of Hezbollah was killed, Nasrullah.
We didn't see statements, we didn't see, and
because he's a controversial figure within our community.
On the one side, we love the resistance
against the oppressor.
We love that they stand up, standing up
and fighting for humanity.
On the same side, there were problems in
terms of aqeedah that we don't subscribe to,
and other historical events.
Nonetheless, anyone that says the kalima, as the
hadith says, whoever prays like us, he makes
salah.
And he faces our qiblah.
And he eats our halal food.
Basically he identifies as a Muslim, and that
person is a Muslim.
And that person is under Allah, the protection
of Allah, and the protection of the Rasul.
So do not, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, so
don't betray the protection of Allah.
Don't you go and fight those who Allah
has protected.
Anyone who says I identify as a Muslim,
look at how he lives his life.
You are in the club.
And we give you the honor of a
Muslim.
We can talk about everything else, but you
have the title of Islam.
You're part of the jama'a insha'Allah.
And so we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala to remove the sense of asabiyyah, as
them and us.
When the enemy looks, he doesn't look at
a bunch of, he looks at one enemy.
Now if the enemy sees you all as
one, yet we want to divide ourselves into
groups and pieces, and this is the problem.
Insha'Allah save us from the sickness and
this disease, and grant us to be an
ummah that is strong, and grant us success.
Ameen.
One announcement, in the spirit of making the
ummah strong, begins with nikah.
Bringing people together.
There's bad cohesion, there's good cohesion.
Love, and rahma, and nikah, it's the good
kind.
And we need rijal, we need men.
If you're not going to fight in jihad
brothers, then you must make nikah.
You must make nikah.
We're looking for men.
Those of us who are married, we don't
want to be called upon, we're doing our
service.
So those who are not married, you need
to serve.
And so insha'Allah, there are many masha
'Allah lovely sisters, who are looking to make
their life halal, who are looking for a
partner and a companion.
Even if you are eligible insha'Allah, and
you are in two minds, just sign up.
At the very least you're going to go,
you're going to eat some savories, you're going
to meet some people.
Alhamdulillah you don't know what Allah has put
out there for you.
Just go, you don't have to do anything.
You're not signing up for anything.
So if you are single insha'Allah, over
the age of 20, and you are single,
as a male, please sign up for the
sisters.
I'm sure we already filled up.
But if you still want to sign up,
you can sign up as well insha'Allah.
JazakAllah khair.
Wasalamu ala sayyidina Muhammad wa ala sahbihi as
-salamu ala mursaleen.
Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen.
Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu.