Muhammad West – The Ahzab Invasion
AI: Summary ©
The transcript discusses the history and significance of Islam, including the birth of Islam in the Middle East and the rise of Islam in the United States. It also touches on the significance of "by the way" and "by the way" in religion, as it relates to one's life and their religious affairs. The transcript describes a group of Muslim leaders who are marching against the arrival of the Iranian army and the Iranian government, and they formed a coalition to destroy the army and wipe out the country, while planning a retreat. They discuss the situation in the region and the potential consequences of their actions, including the desire for the ultimate news and the desire for the "by the way" and "by the way" in religion. The transcript also touches on the success of a coalition against Islam, which is expected to destroy conflict between Muslims and their own religion, and the potential consequences of their actions.], [The transcript describes a woman in the middle of nowhere in the Karoo, who turned out
AI: Summary ©
I seek refuge with Allah from the accursed
Satan, in the name of Allah, Most Gracious,
Most Merciful.
All praise is due to Allah, Lord of
the worlds.
And peace and blessings be upon the most
honored of the messengers.
Our master Muhammad and all his family and
companions.
My beloved brothers and sisters, peace and blessings
be upon you.
All praise is due to Allah, Lord of
the worlds.
We begin by praising Allah.
We testify there is none worthy of worship
besides Allah.
And we send our love and our greetings,
our salutations to beloved Nabi Muhammad ﷺ.
To his pious and his pure family, to
his companions and all those who follow his
sunnah until the end of time.
May Allah ﷻ bless us to be in
the companionship of the Nabi ﷺ in Jannatul
Firdaus.
Ameen.
We all have problems.
I'm sure you have problems.
Some more than others.
Sometimes we are in such a difficult situation,
whether it's marriage, finance, health.
Where there is no way out.
And one actually gets to the point of
being hopeless.
There is not even an alternative.
It could be that the doctors tell you
that there is nothing we can do.
You look at your finances or your job,
there is nothing you can do.
It's absolutely hopeless.
When we look at from your personal perspective,
you might feel like that.
Or when you look at the global ummah,
you might feel like the people of Gaza.
What hope do they possibly have?
How can they possibly win against such odds?
Really this khutbah, which will be probably over
2-3 weeks, should be called against all
odds.
When everything is against you, when logically, scientifically
there is no answer.
How do you still have the ability to
fight on?
And even the hope to believe that there
is a light at the end of the
tunnel.
And there is no moment in the history
of the Nabi ﷺ.
There is no event in the seerah of
the Nabi ﷺ that really shows us the
power of tawakkal, dependency on Allah.
Shows us that Allah is in control in
the battle of Ahzab, the battle of the
trench.
We all notice the battle of the trench,
the battle of Ahzab.
And as I said, it will take maybe
a couple of weeks to go through this.
But this is the one, this is the
moment.
When everything was against the Muslims.
When all hope was lost.
When even the sahaba were pushed to the
brink.
When nobody had a good answer anymore.
When they were just waiting.
They had nothing left but dua.
You get to the point where there is
nothing to even try anymore.
It's pointless to even try anything.
You just have to make dua and hope
for the best.
When Allah pushes you to that extent and
then it's only tawakkal.
And then Allah shows how He can change
a situation.
It is also the moment when, if you
look at the biography of the Nabi ﷺ
and the sahaba.
They were always on the defensive.
In Makkah for 13 years persecuted.
In Madinah, armies came to invade them time
and time again.
When did it change that this ummah became
strong?
It was this battle.
They were at their lowest, weakest, most desperate
situation.
And immediately after the ascendancy began.
After this there was no more weakness.
And this was that moment, this battle.
And so this battle, as we said, most
of us know it as the battle of
the trench.
The name though in the Qur'an is
Ahzab.
The 33rd surah of the Qur'an is
called Surah Al-Ahzab.
Trench is a khandaq in Arabic.
What is Ahzab?
An Ahzab is a coalition or confederation.
Because it wasn't the Muslims against the Quraysh.
It was the Muslims against the Quraysh.
Against the Yahud, the Jews.
Against the Bedouins.
It was everybody united against the Muslims.
Yet one tiny city, one tiny village against
all of Arabia.
And impossible odds, against all odds.
It was an army meant to exterminate and
destroy.
Very similar to what we have in our
brothers in Gaza.
One tiny strip of land.
Most densely populated place on earth.
Against all the superpowers ganging up against this
little tiny village.
Is there any way that they can possibly
succeed?
Well like the Ahzab, we'll see inshaAllah how
Allah's plan is above all plans.
So a little back story to the battle.
We know that the Nabi ﷺ, of course,
our Ummah originates from Makkah.
Islam does not originate from Makkah.
Islam began even before humans were created.
Islam is the religion of the universe.
The angels, all are Muslim.
But our Ummah begins in Makkah.
We know that's where the Qur'an was
revealed.
In Makkah.
And for 13 years the Nabi ﷺ struggled
and called his people to Islam.
And they rejected.
But it was a town, 500-600 kilometers
away.
Called Madinah.
A tiny tiny village.
Madinah now, subhanAllah for those of you who've
been to Madinah.
The whole of the Madinah of the Nabi
ﷺ could basically fit into what the Haram
is today.
We know that for those who've been there,
Baqi Cemetery is right next to the Masjid,
right?
The cemetery of Baqi is right next to
the Masjid.
Now who built the cemetery in the middle
of the town?
No, the cemetery was outside of town.
Baqi was taken to be outside of the
town that the people lived in.
That shows you how small the town was.
That's the entire population of Madinah.
A tiny tiny village.
And so this tiny village accepts Islam.
And the Nabi ﷺ as we know and
the Sahaba immigrate to Madinah.
And interestingly as we all should know, and
it plays so much relevance to our times
and the age that we're living in.
There were a number of Jewish tribes living
there.
And when the Prophet ﷺ came to Madinah,
he had entered into a universal constitution with
them.
He didn't say you're not Muslim, leave.
Obviously they were offered Islam, they rejected Islam.
But nonetheless if you want to live in
Madinah, we can live.
But under a common agreement, we will not
help enemies against you, and you will not
help enemies against us.
We will work collectively, but we will not
interfere with your religious affairs, and you don't
interfere with our religious affairs.
It was very much, something like that is
very unique at that time.
Freedom, the Yahud could live in freedom, so
long as they do not support the enemies
of Islam.
One by one these Jewish tribes sort of
broke the agreement.
And one of these tribes, I won't get
into the names so much, but there's a
tribe called the Banu Nadhir.
Allah speaks about him in Surah Al-Hashr
in the Quran.
If you want to understand more about him,
Surah Al-Hashr is devoted, dedicated to this
tribe.
They tried to assassinate the Prophet ﷺ.
They tried to kill him.
Now any group of people, let's just say
there's a group of foreigners living in Cape
Town.
And they plot and plan to assassinate the
President, and they're caught.
What is going to happen to these people?
There should be some punishment.
What the Nabi ﷺ said to them after
they were caught trying to assassinate him, Look,
clearly you're not able to live amongst us.
You can leave.
You take your family, your property, take whatever
you can carry and leave Medina.
Just go.
And they packed up and they left to
a city next door, another Jewish city close
by.
So the Banu Nadhir, they were expelled from
Medina.
And we have a very interesting narration.
We'll take a side note here about the
Banu Nadhir.
An interesting narration that we have that is
told to us by the princess of the
Banu Nadhir.
The chief of the Banu Nadhir, his daughter,
Safiyyah, would eventually marry the Nabi ﷺ.
That's a long story.
How does the arch enemy of the Nabi
ﷺ end up his daughter marrying the Nabi
ﷺ?
That's another love story that we will get
to in another time.
But our mother Safiyyah, Safiyyah binti Huyay, the
daughter of the chief of Banu Nadhir, she
tells the Nabi ﷺ a very interesting story
when they eventually meet.
Many, many years later they're going to meet.
And she says, Oh Muhammad, she wasn't yet
a Muslim, I remember the day you entered
Medina.
And she says, I know when you arrived
in Medina, my dad who was the chief,
he was very flustered.
Because everyone, I mean imagine some person who
calls himself a prophet arrives in Cape Town,
and all the people out there in the
parade getting to meet him.
We will say, hey what's going on?
We'll call an emergency bukkah meeting.
So she said, that's what happened.
The day you arrived in Medina, my dad
and the rabbis got together to discuss, is
this guy really a Nabi?
Because they understood what a Nabi was.
The Yahud understood anbiya and revelation, they knew
these things.
So she said, my dad and my uncle
who was a rabbi went out to meet
you.
They stayed very long, the whole day with
you.
And finally they came back and they looked
extremely exhausted.
They were like very disturbed.
So much so they didn't even take notice
of me, I was playing there.
They didn't even bother with me and I
could hear what they were talking about.
And so my dad who was the chief,
he asked his brother who was the chief
rabbi, Sheikh, Mawlana, tell me is this man
a Nabi?
You the sheikh, is this guy a Nabi?
Is this Muhammad guy a Nabi?
And the rabbi says, he is definitely a
Nabi.
He is a Nabi.
He ticks all the boxes, in fact he
is the one we've been waiting for.
We've all been waiting for a Nabi.
Side note, why are the Jews in Medina,
in Arabia?
They don't belong in Arabia.
They are there because they know this is
the land of Nubuwwah.
And they believed, like all the anbiya from
Nabi Musa, Nabi Isa, Nabi Yahya, they're all
Bani Israel, he's going to be an Israeli.
How could Allah choose from them, these savage
people a Nabi and not from us?
So she said, my dad, when the rabbi
said to him, look chief boss, he is
a Nabi, what are we going to do
now?
Should we go and give our pledge of
allegiance?
Should we go and accept him?
The chief said, never.
I can never follow an Arab Nabi.
Never until my dying breath will I follow
an Arab Nabi.
And if Allah has chosen this man, then
I reject this man.
And so that was the position of the
Banu Nadheer.
And they kept this hatred in their hearts
for the Nabi Salaam for as long as
they could until they had an opportunity, as
I said, the Nabi Salaam came to visit
them.
And they told him to wait somewhere and
then they planned an assassination.
But Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protected the
Nabi Salaam and so they were expelled.
So the Banu Nadheer have deep hatred for
the Nabi Salaam.
Once they were expelled from Medina, they took
their wealth with them.
They emptied their bank accounts, their investments, liquidated
everything, sold everything.
And they took all of that to a
town next door.
They would not leave the matter like this.
They would do what we know happens even
in the world today.
They would form behind the scenes a coalition.
They would finance a plan, a plot to
destroy Islam.
And this man, the head of the Banu
Nadheer, his name is Huyay, Safiya's dad, Huyay.
He is the architect, the mastermind.
He is the guy who is bringing together
this coalition.
So remember the name of this battle that
Allah uses?
He calls it the Ahzab, the coalition, the
confederation.
Arabia was like the wild west.
There was no government.
There was no central authority.
Each tribe lived like a gang.
This is our turf, you don't come to
our area.
Never did they cooperate with one another.
This would be the first time that they
are cooperating and working together.
And it is this Yahud tribe, the Banu
Nadheer, that will go to different tribes around
Arabia to form this coalition.
For two years they would go around and
bring support to a grand army, a grand
coalition to destroy Medina.
The chief of the Banu Nadheer goes to
Mecca, to Abu Sufyan, the arch enemy of
the Muslims.
Mecca is obviously at war.
They fought the Muslims in Badr, they fought
the Muslims in Uhud.
So the main number one enemy of the
Muslims is Mecca, Abu Sufyan.
So we should know this context.
This delegation of Banu Nadheer comes to Abu
Sufyan and says, we want your support against
us to fight against Muhammad.
And Abu Sufyan, the people of Mecca, the
pagans, they said, we're surprised.
We're surprised that you would side with us
against the Muslims.
Because from what we understand, your religion and
Islam is very close, very similar.
We are idol worshippers, we believe that Allah
has children, Allah has sons and daughters.
Your religion seems very similar to your people
of learning.
So Abu Sufyan asks them this, whose religion
is better?
Us, idol worshipping pagans, or Muslims?
And Subhanallah, the rabbi said, no, no, your
religion is better than Islam.
And Allah reveals an ayah about this, Allah
says, Allah says, have you not seen these
people who were given the scripture, they were
given the book, but they believed in superstition
and false objects of worship.
And they say to the mushrikeen, they say
to the kuffar, هؤلاء أهدى من الذين آمنوا
سبيلا.
You pagans are even more rightly guided than
the Muslims.
Allah is telling them that if you have
an enemy, you have a beef with one
person, okay that's one thing, but to lie
about Allah like this, it's a different level,
subhanallah.
To sell your own religion like this is
something on a different level.
Allah says, I know what you are saying.
And so through this, the Banu Nadheer are
able to form this coalition.
And again, names are a bit difficult, and
it's important to know the names, it gives
a sweetness to the seerah.
So we have on the one side, the
yahood.
They are not militarily the biggest in terms
of number, but they are the financiers.
They are the wealthiest, subhanallah, how history repeats
itself.
And they are the ones funding the campaign,
buying the weapons.
And they are able to bring the Quraysh
into the fold.
And they are also able to bring another
tribe, and I think you need to know
this name, the Ghatafan.
They will come up again in the story.
Name, Ghatafan.
And they are mercenaries, they are nothing more
than hired guns.
These guys have no real issue with Mecca,
Medina, they are doing their own thing.
But they are told, if you join the
army, we will give you a half, one
year supply of goods.
We will feed you for a year.
All the produce of our plantations will go
to you for one year.
It's a huge amount, but you need to
fight with us.
And all the tiny little tribes around Medina
and around Arabia, send us 5 men, 10
men, 100 men, whatever it could be, that
dozens and dozens of tribes who hated each
other, they had complete animosity with one another.
For the first time in the history of
Arabia, they are standing together, on what?
United against Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
It's also why Allah mentions in the Qur
'an that when he sends down the truth,
when you see what's happening, for example, in
Palestine, it becomes clear, truth from falsehood.
Allah sometimes puts down a definitive line, and
you're either on this side or that side.
When these times of crisis, you see who
the good guys and the bad guys are.
You make your choice.
So you have the Muslims on the one
side, and you have everybody else united, not
on ideology, on values, on beliefs.
They hate one another, but they are united
against Islam.
And they are able to form, best estimates,
well over 10,000 men.
10,000 men is a huge, huge number,
in terms of Arabia.
All of Medina, men, women, and children, donkeys,
cows, cats, everything together is probably not 10
,000.
Medina maybe has 1,000, 2,000 fighting
men.
So at best, if every man goes out
and fights, they're still outnumbered 5 to 1.
This is a extermination.
The objective of this army is to destroy
Medina, to wipe it off the face of
the earth.
To kill everybody.
This is what it's coming to do.
And so now that the Banu Nadir, with
their finances, with their trickery and strategy, successfully
were able to form this coalition.
Very good at this, subhanAllah.
Being able to bring people who hate one
another, to sit down and agree on this.
I think why us, subhanAllah, side note, we
agree on everything, but we can't stand together.
It's ajeeb.
And again, this is not something 1,000
years ago we're talking about, we see it
playing today.
Not a single Muslim country you can say
is allied.
They stand side by side.
They agree on everything, same Qibla, same Nabi,
same Quran, same Halal, everything.
But no, can't stand together, ajeeb.
So this group is able to stand together.
And when the news now, you can't move
10,000 men without eventually the news reaching
the Nabi.
He's now informed about this catastrophe on its
way.
The Quraysh are coming from the south.
The Ghatafan are coming from the north.
The tribes around Medina have all been armed
and they are marching from every direction.
We are being invaded now.
And they are arriving in basically 10 days.
The Nabi, as he would do, this is
his leadership style, for those of you in
leadership style, this is something which Allah mentions
in the Quran.
He had a philosophy of shura, consultation.
He calls an emergency meeting.
And he gives the community, he gives them
the facts they needed to know.
We've got an army, 10,000 men.
They're going to arrive in two weeks.
What should we do?
He's asking the jamaah, what do you think?
Does anyone have a good idea?
In Uhud, the previous battle, the Muslims were
very confident.
They were almost overconfident.
We go out, we fight, we meet them,
we're going to go out in a blaze
of glory, we'll wipe them off the map.
Didn't turn out so well for them in
Uhud.
So now the mood is very, very different.
Nobody is able to come up with a
good idea.
If we defend and they invade Madinah, it's
going to be a catastrophe.
Even if we go out and meet them
5 to 1, 10 to 1, we'll be
wiped out.
Abu Bakr r.a, Umar r.a, nobody
can give a suggestion of what to do.
You can imagine the mood in that meeting.
I don't know if any of you have
been in an office or in a hospital
where the facts were laid out.
And you ask, what do we do now?
And there is no answer.
We don't know what to do.
This is what is put in front of
the sahaba.
There must have been a silence for a
while.
And in the back of the masjid maybe.
It's not someone who was central of the
leadership.
Not one of the senior men puts up
his hand and he said, I have an
idea.
Who is the sahabi?
You should know.
Salman the Persian.
Salman the Persian.
Now I need to take a side note
on Salman the Persian.
You see, have you ever been to, I
don't know if you have been on a
road trip and you find these little dorpees
along the Karoo.
There is like no one there except for
a shop right or something.
And you find, I imagine you enter this
dorpee.
You go for salah, there is a jamaat
khana.
There is about 2 or 3 people.
And here you see a Japanese guy.
Or an Inuit or someone from like the
end of the world.
And you say, how did you end up
here in the middle of the Karoo, in
the middle of nowhere?
For the Muslims to find a Persian man
in Medina, a tiny village from the most
advanced civilization.
You are here in the middle of the
Arabian desert.
How did you get here?
Salman the Persian, how are you here?
But Salman, what does your story?
And it's such a beautiful story of how
Salman as if Allah had chosen him to
be there for that moment in time to
come up with this suggestion.
Salman, we take a side note.
How is this man in Medina?
Salman radiyallahu anhu, he tells the Nabi salam
the same story.
I was a Persian.
My dad was a governor.
I used to, we were Zoroastrians who worshipped
fire.
That's their religion.
In fact, I was the little boy that
would go and make sure the fire is
always lit in the temple.
Like he's a little Bilal, a miniature Bilal.
And one day he loved his religion.
One day he managed to find himself as
a teenager in a church.
He listened to the bayan of the priest.
And he said, this is so much better
than my religion.
And he converted to Christianity.
When his dad found out, they tried to
stop him.
And he fled.
He left his home.
He ran and he became a Christian.
And now as a refugee, running from his
parents, leaving his country, cancelling his nationality.
He goes from monastery to monastery trying to
learn Christianity.
Giving up everything to learn the truth.
And he meets different priests along the way.
Number of priests along the way.
Some good, some bad, some ugly.
He meets along the way.
Eventually he finds an old sheikh, Maulana, who
teaches him a lot.
But then this sheikh Maulana is about to
die.
And he says, Salman, where do I go
after you die?
Who must I go as a mentor, as
a teacher?
And the sheikh says, there is no other
priest that I know of that is preaching
the true Christianity.
Everyone else has corrupted the true teachings of
Nabi Isa.
So, the only hope I have for you
is, look for the final Nabi.
We are all waiting for final prophet, look
for him.
He will be in Arabia.
What I can tell you is, we know
he is going to be in Arabia.
And he is going to be in a
city.
We don't know the name of the city.
But I can tell you what it looks
like.
It is between two volcanic, extinct volcanoes.
And in the city there are date trees.
Look for a city like that in Arabia.
InshaAllah you will find a Nabi.
So Salman says, okay great.
He leaves Syria, takes whatever he has.
He finds a group of Arab Bedouins.
They said, are you guys Arabian?
Are you going through the desert?
He said, yes.
He said, can I go with you on
the journey so I can see a city
like this?
They said, no problem, come with us.
And he said, the minute we left the
village, the town, we left Syria, these people
wronged me.
They cheated me.
They took my money, they took my property.
They chained me and they made me a
slave.
They enslaved me.
Now I think at that moment in time,
if it was you or me we would
have thought, SubhanAllah, he is not the god
of the Persians punishing me.
I turned away from him and look what
he has taken everything from me.
I am being punished now like this.
And so now he is taken as a
slave from being the governor's son.
Being dragged through Arabia.
And he gets bought and sold until he
is sold to a Jew in Medina.
And he walks into Medina in chains and
he says, This place has got two volcanic,
extinct volcanoes.
There is a lot of date trees.
This kind of looks like the place I
am supposed to be.
And when he gets there he asks, where
is the prophet?
And the boss hits him across his head,
The only prophet you must worry about is
the prophet in my pants.
That's not your business, there is no prophet
here, what are you talking about?
Salman arrives in Medina before Nabi Salam.
So he comes, this is the place, but
there is no Nabi here.
And here he is working as a laborer,
working as a slave.
And one day he says, I was in
the tree cutting down dates when the whole
Medina was up in arms.
A Nabi has arrived from Makkah.
A man claiming to be a prophet has
been from Makkah.
He says, I almost fell off the tree
trying to meet this man.
Who is this man?
And InshaAllah we continue next week.
Ibnillah, about Salman Al-Farisi and the Battle
of the Trench.
Time is up.
Just a few announcements.
We make dua for everybody that is about
to write their exams.
Our matriculants in particular.
May Allah grant you success and tawfiq.
Dua, InshaAllah, is your weapon, is your success.
And anyone else going through a hardship, whether
it is financial, marriage, medical.
May Allah grant you success.
May Allah grant you dua as I accepted.
And we ask Allah to grant Jannatul Firdaus
for those who have passed away.
A relative of mine, a second cousin, 28
year old, passed away of heart attack yesterday.
May Allah grant Jannatul Firdaus and make it
easy for her parents and her family.
Ameen.
JazakAllah Khair.
Assalamualaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.