Mustafa Umar – Islamic History 101 Lecture#9 Life of the Prophet
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
Alright.
Alright.
So before we begin,
quick,
now we'll skip a pop quiz. We'll just
start,
So today we're gonna be covering
a number of topics. We're gonna be covering
the persecution that the Muslims faced in Mecca,
how they went for asylum in Abyssinia,
some relief that they received through the,
reversion or conversion of 2 very important people,
the political tactics that were used by the
Quraysh against the Muslims,
and the boycott and the sanctions,
which was a phase that Muslims had to
go through as well. So
starting with the persecution.
Now keep in mind this scenario. This is
the situation in which we are. We're in
a scenario and we're in a situation which
the revelation has come to the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam. He began with the secret
call for a period of 3 years, and
he began to call people secretly and people
who he could trust. And then the command
came from Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala through revelation
telling him that he must proclaim his message
openly to people.
So he began and he ascended the hill
and he started calling other people, and people
began accusing him in different ways. They began
calling him a liar. They be they began
calling him insane. They began challenging him and
they had many different reasons why they were
rejecting the message of Islam.
Now remember that
it was it began with name calling,
and it began with insults,
and it began with propaganda.
And they were very concerned that at the
time of the pilgrimage,
there was going to be
a spread of Islam to all the other
tribes throughout Arabia,
and they did not want to allow that
to happen. And this is very important that
we understand how persecution begins.
Persecution never begins overnight
in any civilization or in any society.
Persecution
begins with insults. It begins with mockery.
It begins with other political tactics first, and
then it moves forward to the state of
persecution, and that's where the Muslims are coming
through at this time.
So first, the believers are openly mocked about
their beliefs. Not only the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu
alaihi wasallam was being criticized,
but
his followers started to be criticized as well.
So now you imagine a Muslim's walking down
the street, and now the Muslim is being
made fun of just for being a Muslim.
And you see that they're going to the
Kaaba to pray, and they're being made fun
of just because they're praying in the way
that Muslims are praying. So this is a
problem that's taking place, and it's a problem
that began
initially
by accusing Islam,
and now it's accusing all people who follow
the religion of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam. So the believers are being openly mocked
by people. Now imagine the scenario.
Imagine the situation where you're walking down the
street
and somebody starts
throwing something at you, not hurting you, but
just making fun of you, spitting in your
direction while you're walking down the street. They're
doing something mocking you or making fun of
you. Very very difficult. This is psychological
trauma that Muslims were having to go through
at this time. It's not easy.
Now
that's where it started in the beginning.
Then what happened?
The next phase and the next thing that
happened was the Quraysh began to torture
the people who were slaves, the Muslims who
were slaves, and the Muslims who were poor.
Now the question is, why would they start
with these people?
Right? Why not just start persecuting Muslims immediately?
Well, the thing is they wanted to make
sure that they would persecute Muslims
who would not be able to fight back,
and no non Muslims
would be able to kind of defend them
because they don't have any clout, because they
don't have any people to back them up.
And if the Muslims,
who had that honor or had that reputation,
they would also not be able to back
them up because their tribe
would be willing to support them but they
would not be willing to support some foreigner
who has no status or no position. And
their tribe is still not a Muslim not
Muslim yet. So this is the way it
works and this is the way it began.
And it's very interesting if you just look
at all the parallels. I hope some people
are already making the connections in terms of
how persecution begins, how Islamophobia
begins to take place in a society, for
example. The same thing's happening.
And you start with the people who are
not who are who are not able to
do something about it. The people who no
one's gonna miss if you kind of, you
know, kidnap them and put them in some
kind of, you know,
prison or torture chamber or whatever it is.
So the same kind of tactics have been
used throughout history, and the same tactics were
being used in Makkah at that time.
So you have some examples now. You have
a few examples that we're gonna mention of
some of the slaves or some of the
weak people
and what kind of persecution they went through.
Bilal
ibn Raba,
one of the early Muslims.
Bilal was a slave.
K. He was a slave, and he was
a slave from Africa,
from, you know, Ethiopia, that kind of region.
And he had come into Mecca. Don't know
his exact details of his story, but he
is a black slave living inside Mecca. Now,
by the way, slavery
in Arabia
was not like slavery in America.
Slavery was equal opportunity.
So whether you're black or whether you're Arab
or whether you're Roman or whether you're Persian,
you could still be made a slave. It
was not only race based. So Bilal just
happened to be black though. He happened to
be an African slave who is sitting in
Mecca, and he's he's owned. He's been purchased
by someone and the the person who owns
him, not a very nice guy.
Bilal finds out about Islam.
And when he finds out about Islam, he
accepts it and he says, you know what?
This is the truth. Now because of his
Islam, what happens to him? In the beginning,
we we know how he was living, maybe
he had to work hard, maybe he had
to do something. Now that he's Muslim, he
has a major problem because his quote unquote
master, his owner,
hates the Islam that Bilal has. First of
all, why does he hate Islam so much?
Because
slave owners at that time thought that they
don't only own the body of the person,
they own the soul of the person as
well. That's how arrogant the people became at
that time. So Bilal became Muslim and now
he's going to be tortured. Here are some
of the methods of torture that they applied
on him. Number 1,
they dragged him in the burning sand.
Now how would they drag him? Right. The
Quraysh, you know, the people who are torturing,
you know, Muslims, they're not gonna unnecessarily
waste their own energy if they don't have
to. So they would not drag him just
by themselves. They would either get a bunch
of other people to drag him or they
would tie him to an animal and drag
him through the burning sand. Now,
if you've ever been to Makkah or if
you've ever been a very hot desert climate
and you feel the sand at noontime,
you know what it does to your body.
Even if you just even people who prey
on the sand in a 115 degrees or
120 degrees heat during noontime, it starts burning
your body because it's really really hot. So
he's being dragged through the burning hot sand.
Right? While his flesh is probably, you know,
messing up and, you know, being, you know,
whatever type of degree burn he's getting. The
second way they tortured him
was they took
a boulder, a giant rock. I imagine a
giant boulder and they would place it on
top of his chest
just enough
that his chest, his bones, his rib cage
would not break.
But they would be at the point where
he can't take it anymore. He can barely
breathe, and a giant rock is being placed
on him. So while this while this torture
was taking place, not only the rock, while
he's being dragged around in the sand And
sometimes he was dragged by his hair. There
were people would be pulling him by his
hair. While he's being dragged around,
all they're asking him to do is just
do one thing. Just leave Islam.
That's it. Just leave Islam and renounce Islam
and renounce the Prophet, and everything is gonna
be fine for you. And he did not
have to say anything. He could have simply
remained quiet. But his faith,
his belief was so strong that he started
saying,
ahad, ahad. 1, 1. Meaning that Allah is
1. I'm not gonna worship these idols. I'm
not gonna take these idols for worship. Now
I want you to think about Bilal's situation.
And if you were in his in his
status,
imagine you were in the same position.
Would you have
the confidence?
Forget the confidence.
Would you have
the ability
to speak up
in that
aspect? Now see, remember what he's doing. What
he's doing is he's being defiant.
But why is he being defiant?
He's being defiant because of the conviction that
he holds inside.
His conviction is leading him to say that
not only am I gonna be willing to
get tortured for the sake of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala, I'm going to even tell you
that you're wrong in what you're believing and
I'm right in what I'm believing.
This is very important
because usually what ends up happening is people
are able to deliver a message to another
person when they're in a state
that's when they're in a state of superiority
over them. If you look at the way
propaganda works in society, for example, if you
look at the way people who own, you
know, radio stations or those talking heads on
radio talking about their analysis of world events
and spewing all of their hate speech or
whatever it is, that happens when they are
in a position of power. And when people
are not in a position of power, they're
not willing to speak because they feel that
there's gonna be repercussions against them. Bilal is
flipping the the the you know, the everything
around. He's saying that no, I may be
in a state of weakness,
extreme weakness in this case, but I'm still
the one who's gonna be calling you to
Islam. I'm still the one who's gonna manifest
for myself. So imagine what Bilal is doing.
He's
easing his own pain
by
reiterating
his own conviction and his own belief in
Islam. So number 1, he's saying, I had,
I had to himself.
So that it's very clear in himself that
I am 100%
sure that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is 1,
Islam is the truth, and I'm gonna remind
myself so that this torture doesn't take any
effect on my iman, on my belief. Number
2, he's calling them
and in a way he's persecuting them. And
this is something that people the subtle point
people don't realize. He's being physically tortured
but they hate Islam so much
that they're actually being psychologically tortured by Bilal.
This is what's happening. He's actually getting them
back as well. That's how much of a
hatred they have against Islam. So this was
a this was something that Bilal was going
through. Now Abu Bakr
may Allah be pleased with all of these
people. Abu Bakr, we already talked about him,
he was a philanthropist. He was a businessman.
He was a genealogist. All the other stuff
we talked about.
He was quite wealthy.
So when he found out that Bilal and
other slaves among the Muslims were being tortured
like this, some of them were being beaten,
some of them were having to go through
all of these things, He started purchasing these
slaves
and setting them free. So he came by,
and he bought Bilal,
and he bought 6 other slaves as well
that we know of for sure,
and perhaps even more than that. So Abu
Bakr
didn't go through the same torture but what
did he do? He eased the torture of
other people and he spent his money for
the sake of Allah by purchasing these slaves.
So many lessons to learn that if you're
not in that position, you may be in
another position where you can help somebody in
that case.
If you're not being tortured yourself, then you
can utilize
your wealth or utilize your time or utilize
your efforts to help somebody who is undergoing
that type of torture. So Abu Bakr's father
comes to him. He was not a believer.
Being a, you know, kind of materialistic person,
he says, you
know, you could use all that money that
you have
to at least you know, if you're gonna
believe in Islam, fine. You have money, you
wanna spend it for the sake, you know,
for the sake of Islam, fine.
If you're gonna free some slaves, can't you
at least free some strong slaves
so that they could at least work for
you? This is this what he's saying. Because
Bilal was not one of the really strong
people. He was not one of the big,
you know, you know, those big slaves who
could, like, do some lot of work or
something. So at least free some of the
big slaves so that they could work for
you.
And Abu Bakr said, we're not I'm not
doing this
so that they can benefit me. I'm doing
this completely for the sake of Allah. See
sometimes your intention
will be that, you know what, you can
do this for the sake of Allah, but
you can also get this other great thing.
And then everyone's thinking, oh that's great, you
know. If that other incentive is there, alhamdulillah.
You know, but if the other incentive is
not there, maybe I won't do this thing
purely for the sake of Allah. But Abu
Bakr had this sincerity in him. So he
began to free these slaves for the sake
of
Allah and he would free them completely.
Another example of persecution
was Khabab ibn Ararat.
Khabab was
another slave
and Khabab was a blacksmith.
So a blacksmith is somebody who, you know,
works in the, you know, metal industry and
they're, you know, hitting, you know, hitting the
swords and they're shaping the metal and everything
around the fire. So Khabab, what did they
make him do? They made him, His torture
was number 1, he would lie on burning
hot coals
because he would have coals in the place
where he works. So they would make him
lie on burning hot coals and he would
he would be burnt. And in fact it's
reported that he was burnt so badly that
sometimes the fat from his body
was dripping off because he was being, burned
and the fat would drip off and go
on the coal and extinguish the coal. That's
how bad he was actually being tortured. And
then another way they tortured him was people
would come and stand on top of him.
So they would, like, stand on him like
he's a human carpet. So they would step
on him. They would stand on him. And
there's another report as well that
they would take the sword that, you know,
that was being burnt in the fire, and
they would brand him with that.
Imagine burning hot metal, and they would come
and they would brand him with that. And
later on, few years later, when they moved
to Madinah and all of that, he goes
and he starts showing the scars
to the other Muslims. He's changing his shirt
one day, and people look at him and
say, what in the world happened to you?
They say, oh, you never seen this before.
This was during the time in Makkah when
I was being tortured.
All of these scars on my back are
from that torture, And that's when people started
respecting Khabab more. So he didn't go and
show it off in the beginning, but when
somebody saw it one time, they started, respecting
him even more.
So now the interesting thing about this, though,
Khabab is being tortured like this. So he
goes
to the prophet
who's sitting in front of the Kaaba one
day, and he goes up to him and
he says, You Rasulullah,
you know, why don't you pray for us?
Why don't you, you know, ask Allah for
victory for us? No. We can get out
of this. We're being tortured. It's so difficult
for us. Now you would Imagine what the
answer would be. I mean this this is
not,
Given the circumstances, it seems like this is
this is not a unfair request. It's very
difficult, right? Instead of being tortured,
what does the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
answer?
He said: Oh Khabab,
that people in the past
would have their flesh torn apart with iron
rakes.
Now just think about that. You have a
rake, imagine, and your flesh is being torn
apart
with iron rakes
but they never abandoned their religion. Meaning they
never abandoned their belief in Allah. We're talking
about a generation of Muslims that lived in
the past
and this is how they were being tortured
but they never left their faith. So then
the prophet says, don't worry.
Allah will establish this religion
and make peace in the land, but you
people are too hasty.
Can you imagine?
He's telling habab,
you people are too hasty.
Because habab came in a state of desperation.
What does it mean?
It means
that there has to be
certain tests in life.
And there has to be certain trials and
certain difficulties that the Muslim ummah, that the
Muslim community has to go through
in order to get through that other stage.
And the prophet is telling them at a
stage where they're being tortured and they're persecuted.
He's not saying that nothing's gonna happen. It's
gonna happen. But this is a stage that
we must pass. You must be patient in
this stage. Huge lesson.
Huge huge lesson to be
learned.
Ammar ibn Yasser
and his parents were among the earliest believers
as well. So Ammar
and his parents, they are not from Mecca.
So remember, if you're not from Mecca some
some, sources say that they were slaves. Some
say that, no, they were not really slaves.
They were just foreigners. So they were not
from Mecca, meaning they didn't have their roots
rooted in Mecca. Therefore, they're weak.
And therefore, it's very easy to persecute them
as well. So
what happened?
Amar
is being tortured
and his family is being tortured as well.
K. His father, Yasser,
and his mother, Sumayyah, are both being tortured.
Now while they're being tortured, the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam walked by one day. And
what did he said? He said what did
he say? He said, have patience,
oh family of Yasser, and you will have
paradise.
Have patience,
oh family of Yasir, and you will have
paradise.
A very important question arises.
What was the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
doing?
Why didn't he just, you know,
run-in there and try to attack somebody?
Why didn't he throw a rock at some
you know, the first people this is a
fellow Muslim
who's being tortured.
Right? What should what should have been done
in this state? Why is the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam simply walking by and he's
not doing anything about it? And all he's
saying, the thing that he's doing, it's not
he's doing nothing.
He's telling them have patience and if you
have patience you will have paradise.
Who can who can answer this question?
It's a very very legitimate question. Right?
Why not just just charge in there and
just do something about it?
Okay. Might have eased some other suffering. It
was not a strategic move, and you have
to go through,
strategic moves. Yes. He knew it was a
test from Allah. He knew it was a
test from Allah. That's right. Okay. That's that's
it's a test from Allah, but then strategy
is very very important as well. Yeah.
He wasn't commanded yet by Allah. These are
all correct answers. He wasn't yet commanded by
Allah. It's a test for that person from
Allah and the strategy was not theirs. Allah
had not revealed to them yet to fight
back. What else?
So if they would've fought, the Quraysh might
have actually gotten more aggressive and the entire
thing would be messed up. Now, even more
people, even the middle class people would start
being tortured maybe. Maybe something else would happen.
So it was it was a point in
time where this was not the time to
fight back.
Meaning,
that there are times
where you don't necessarily fight back. And that's
why the ulema say that if you're on
the battlefield and you know that you can
inflict no harm or no damage upon the
enemy or virtually no damage damage upon the
enemy, what do you do? You're allowed to
leave. You're allowed to flee. Even though the
Quran says clearly that if you turn your
backs on the enemy, if you're in the
battlefield, it's one of the greatest sins
except
in certain circumstances.
Meaning there are exceptions to the rule.
Now how do you determine all of that?
You have to make a very important judgment
call. But understand
that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam was
teaching. Not only was he doing something, had
he charged in and done something, everyone else
would follow his example and they would do
the exact same thing. And what would happen?
There could be disastrous consequences.
So this is very very important to understand
that there is a a time and a
place for everything. And that's why wisdom
is defined as doing the right thing and
saying the right thing
at the right time and in the right
place.
Not saying the thing, it's not saying a
nice thing in the wrong time or in
the wrong place. So the prophet passed
by and he told him, have patience,
oh family of Yasser. Now, Sumayya,
his, Yasser's mother,
she
was being tortured as well. And these were
all believers. And these were this was a
very old woman, and Yasir was an old
man as well. So they were all being
tortured. And Abu Jahl, one of we're gonna
talk about him soon. He became one of
the worst
worst,
enemies and opponents of Islam against Islam.
He grabbed He was torturing her and he
was saying, you know, leave Islam.
Worship these idols and putting the idols in
front of her.
And what did he do? He got really
upset when she refused. And she refused in
a very firm and solid way, and she
even insulted him. So he got so upset
that he grabbed a spear, and he stabbed
it through her *.
And she died.
She died bleeding.
So this is the first
martyr in Islam.
The first martyr in Islam
was a woman
who died for the sake of Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala.
And the prophet said she's going to be
guaranteed paradise.
So we have so far, if we take
Khadija as being the first believer in Islam
is a woman. Well, the first martyr in
Islam is a woman. And we're gonna talk
about some other interesting thing about different woman
going through. So Abu Jahl stabbed her and
she died. Now, Ammar,
he saw this.
He saw his parents being tortured. He just
saw his mom being killed.
And he's, you know, kind of young and
everything.
He couldn't take it anymore.
He couldn't take it anymore, and they're saying,
we're gonna stop all of this torture.
Because they were what they were doing, they
were racking him.
Racking is a type of torture that was
used where they tie your arms and legs,
and they stretch you in both directions.
Extremely, extremely painful. Excruciating pain. So they were
racking him, and basically, that's when he gave
in. And he said, okay. What what do
you want me to do? And they started
telling him, we we want you to say
that you don't believe in Islam. He said,
okay. I don't believe in Islam. And we
want you to say you worship this idol.
He said, okay I worship this idol. And
then they started making fun of him so
much and then a little bug was passing
by and we want you to say that
this little bug is your god. And he
said, okay okay this little bug is my
god. And they started torturing him in this
way even psychological torture. But they said, Okay.
Well, stop if you give in.
So Ammar, he gave in.
He gave him he gave in
and after he gave in, he was let
go. So he survived the ordeal.
His mother is dead. What happened to his
father exactly?
Not a 100% sure.
So Ammar comes out
and now he's feeling horrible
because he realizes that he just renounced Islam.
He just gave up his Islam.
Bilal is being tortured. Bilal didn't give in.
Khabab is being tortured. Khabab didn't give in.
His mom and dad are being tortured. They
didn't give in,
but he gave in.
So now he's thinking I'm outside the fold
of Islam. I've left Islam. I've betrayed the
Muslim. I've betrayed the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam. There's nothing I can do.
So he's feeling extremely bad. Finally,
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam finds out
that this is what happened.
He sends somebody to tell Chabbal to tell,
Ammar, just bring him over here.
He said, Ammar, did you actually
believe
what you said when you said it? And
he said, no, You Rasoolullah.
Of course not. I did. I didn't believe
that. I mean, I was just saying that
to get myself
out of being tortured. I did not
I did not meet it. I still believe
in Allah, and I still believe in in
you as a prophet and all of that.
So the prophet he told him, he said
that
it's what's in your heart that matters most.
And he said, if they torture you again,
you go ahead and you say the same
thing
to avoid the torture.
Showing you two different examples. And then the
verses of the Quran were revealed
where it says, With the exception of those
who are forced to say that they do
not believe,
although their hearts remain firm in faith. So
it's talking about people who disbelieve.
And it says, The exception to the rule
is those who are forced to say
with their tongues that they don't believe,
but their hearts remain firm in faith.
So what do you have here?
You have two examples.
You have the example of the one that's
being tortured
and is maintaining their Islam proudly
despite all of those difficulties.
And then you have
the one person who's being tortured, and they
can't take it anymore.
And they say verbally, I'm gonna give in,
but in my heart, I'm going to remain.
I want you to ask yourself this question.
Which one
would you do?
You don't have to answer.
Just think about it. Which one would you
do?
And then the next question is
which one
should you do?
Islamically, according to Islamic law, according to Sharia,
which one should you do?
And the reality is
that the scholars have differed.
Scholars have a difference of opinion.
And one of the schools of thought says
that you get much more reward
if you go ahead and you take the
pain and you take the torture. And the
other one says, no.
You should after this verse was revealed,
that was a time for them. And now
if you're being tortured to a point where
you can't take it anymore,
you you're supposed to. You should go ahead
and just stop the torture if you can.
Now what does torture mean by the way?
Torture doesn't mean that you're getting a few
punches over here, right? Or somebody comes and
says, Well, you know, I'm gonna, you know,
fine you $5,000
or something like that. That's not torture. We're
talking about real torture where you can't bear
it anymore. Because some people may take this
verse and say, Well, you know, we should
just, you know, sit inside our house because
Islamophobia is on the rise. We shouldn't speak
about Islam at all. Just keep our mouth
shut completely and we can't do anything about
That's not torture. Torture meaning to the point
where it's really really unbearable.
Okay.
So this is,
amar.
Another person who's being tortured is Abu Zar.
Abu Zar al Ghifari
is another person
actually, so we're not talking about torture yet.
So Abu Zar al Ghifari
is a person who lives outside of Mecca.
So he lives among a tribe known as
the Ghifar,
and
he hears about the Prophet SAW.
He hears
from a source because, remember,
tribes were going and they made that pilgrimage.
And even though, all the propaganda, you know,
the Quraysh had sent people to spread propaganda
around the city of Mecca, obviously, some of
them still got the information about Islam and
what's going on. So Abu Azar,
he had heard from a secondary source. He
didn't go to Mecca yet. He heard from
somebody from his tribe who came back saying,
you know what? The new news in Mecca
is that there's a person who's saying that
he's a prophet. And he had these verses
of the Quran, and he's claiming this, and
he's making this claim.
So Abu Zar was inclined because he was
one of those people who had naturally stopped
worshiping idols.
And he had an inclination against idol worship.
And he used to try and, you know,
pray in his own way or whatever. We
don't know too much about the details. So
Abu Zar, what does he do? He goes
and he sends this person from the tribe
and he says, I want you to go
and find out more information about this. The
guy goes to Makkah, finds out the information,
brings it back, and he tells him this
and this is what happened. Abu Zar is,
like, just waiting to find out more. And
he said, this is not sufficient.
I'm going myself.
I I I have to investigate this matter
myself.
Very interesting. His character and his personality is
very interesting because sometimes people, when they're told
about Islam,
they say: Well, you know,
if somebody comes and talks to me about
Islam, then that'll be nice. But I'm not
willing to go to attend a class. And
you say: Oh, well, I'm gonna send somebody
else on my behalf to go and
attend the class and learn a little bit
about it, but I'm not gonna go and
travel all the way over there to go
and find out something about it. There are
people in this world who are kind of
waiting for the truth to come to them.
And then there are people like Abu Zar,
where they send somebody else and then they
come back and they bring some of the
message and they say, No, no, no. I
need more. I'm thirsty for more. I need
to go. So Abu Zar, he goes and
he sets out on a journey and he
goes to Makkah himself. When he arrives in
Makkah,
he goes and he starts searching around for
the Prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam.
So he's in Makkah.
He stays at the Kaaba. Now think about
this. He's not a very wealthy man. He
goes to Makkah and he just he's just
sleeping at the Kaaba.
He doesn't need anything else. He's living off
of Zamzam water. He's just drinking water and
just you know what? I have to find
the prophet. I don't care. Food is not
important.
He's not interested in going to the local
restaurants or the local gatherings or something like
that. He's only searching for one thing and
one thing only, and that is the truth
about Islam.
So he's waiting there waiting there, and then
Ali,
right, who is a Muslim, right, he comes
and he finds this man, and he's a
foreigner, and he's just lying there. He says,
what are you doing here? And he says,
I'm looking for that man, the prophet. I'm
looking for Muhammad. Can you can you guide
me to him? Can you can you tell
me? And he said, you came to the
right person.
You stumble across the right person. Because if
he stumble across the wrong person
and he's not from Makkah, he would get
beat up, he would get persecuted, he would
get the propaganda.
So he encountered the right person, which is
very interesting
because the thing is this,
who's the first person he encountered? Ali.
Why did he encounter Ali?
Because Ali, as a Muslim, his generosity
inclined him to ask, what are you doing
here? Can I take care of you?
What can I take care In fact, the
actual story goes that he took,
Abu Zar into his house, not knowing why
he's in Mecca in the first place? He
took him into his house for hospitality.
And after a while, he started asking him,
you know, by the way, you know, you've
been here with me for a while. What
are you doing here anyways? And he said,
this is what I'm doing here. He said,
you came to the right spot.
Which means what? As a Muslim,
if you are
reaching out to me, doing good deeds and
helping people,
naturally somehow you'll stumble across some opportunities
to be able to convey the message
of Islam to other people. So Ali goes
and Ali says, I'm gonna show you where
the Prophet is. You follow me.
And he says, while you're following me, you
follow me from behind.
Right? So I'm gonna be walking, and you
follow me from the back. And if you
see me, that I stop and I walk
up to a corner or I stop to
bend down or something,
just it'll it'll I'll make it look like
I'm going to the bathroom or I'm tying
my shoes or whatever. I'm I'm gonna make
it look like I'm doing something else.
That means we're being followed,
and you stop following me and you go
the opposite direction. Now this in this conversation
tells you a lot about what the situation
was like at that point in Makkah.
It was so dangerous that they couldn't even
walk side by side. They had to walk
separately. He had to be following him from
the back and he even gave him a
signal. Very smart. Right? Rather than just saying,
you know, Insha'Allah Allah will protect us. Everything's
gonna be fine. Let's go. No. Intelligence. They
were using they were using the things that
the prophet taught them. So they're walking
to where the prophet was going to be.
So Ali radiAllahu an, he covertly
led him to the prophet
As soon as he entered, he learned about
Islam, he immediately accepted.
Immediately accepted Islam. Islam had entered into his
heart. He heard the Quran
extremely convinced this is exactly what he had
been searching for. It's exactly what he had
been waiting for for years. So now that
he's Muslim,
the prophet
tells him now imagine all the things that
the prophet could tell him. He could tell
him, look, we're very few right here. We
need you.
We need you to stay with us. We
need you to help strengthen us. We need
you to work for us. We need you
to do something. He didn't say that.
At this point in time, in the mission
of Islam,
he said, What you need to do, you
keep your Islam a secret.
You go back home to your people,
and when we contact you again, when I
contact you, then you start, you know, you
come, basically.
But now is not the time. We don't
need you here. You don't stay in Makkah.
You stay quiet
with your Islam, go back home,
tell your people,
but don't come back to Makkah until we
tell you.
Strategy. He knows. The prophet knows what's going
on. But Abu Zar was the type of
person
who can't who can't keep it inside. You
know, when you're excited about something, it shows
you his love for Islam. When you're excited
about something and you know, many many new
Muslims for example, they come and they tell
me they say, you know what? They just
accepted Islam and I said, look,
one of my advices to you is,
you know, test your family a little bit.
Okay? Ask them, you know, what do they
think about Islam? Or, you know, just tell
them, you know,
you know, mom, dad, I have a friend
of mine who accepted Islam. What do you
think?
Oh, I hate that religion and know this
and that. I don't want you to be
his friend anymore. Maybe you shouldn't be telling
them that you've accepted Islam just yet until
you're independent yourself.
But many of them,
they don't take that advice. They go ahead
and do it anyways,
and then sometimes they get kicked out of
their house. Sometimes they're encountering the most difficult
circumstances and situation. This is something to learn
from. The prophet is telling them what? He's
telling him, keep your Islam secret at this
point in time,
and just go back home and we're gonna
contact you. We'll let you know what to
do next. Insha'Allah. This is sufficient for you
now. And he says, no. No. I have
to announce this publicly.
So he goes
straight to the Kaaba, and the Kaaba is
the place where everyone is gonna be. So
he goes straight to the Kaaba and he
gets up and he announces in front of
everyone, Oh Quraysh and all the people, I
have accepted Islam. And immediately they jump on
him and they start beating him up and
everything
and you think, okay man, this guy got
beat up. Somebody intervened
and you know, got him off and they
say, woah woah woah. Do you know who
this guy is? This guy is from the
tribe of Ghifar.
Okay. Now why is the tribe of Ghifar
important? The tribe of Ghifar were the gangsters
of the time. Right?
They they were the guys who
stay on the paths, and when a caravan
goes through, they would loot the caravan.
Right. So you have to, you know, you
have to if you're going through their territory,
you either pay them or you're gonna get
robbed. So they go, do you know this
guy's from the tribe of Jafar? You continue
to if he dies
your merchandise is gone, right. You guys are
gonna be in trouble. So they stopped beating
him up. So now you would think right
that the prophet told him not to do
this. Now he just got beat up. So
you think, okay this guy is gonna go
back home. He's he's taking a beating. It's
it's gonna be sufficient. So what does he
do instead? The next day he goes to
the Kaaba again and he says, I'm gonna
announce again. And he announces publicly again, I've
accepted Islam and I'm a Muslim. So I
mean imagine what kind of faith he has.
He's not making the right decision
but he's doing it out of love, right?
So
the another group of people who weren't there
yesterday, they jumped him and they started beating
him up and everything. And finally,
the the guys come and they get they
get him off. This guy is from Ghifar,
man. You don't want to get messed up.
And they said, No. Can you please stop
doing this because we may not be able
to save you if you do it again
tomorrow.
So 2 times after a beating, he decides,
okay, fine. I've I've I've got it out
of my system a little bit, you know.
I'm feeling good now. So he decides, okay,
I'm gonna go back home now. So he
goes back home and alhamdulillah.
Now at this point in time, many people
are entering into Islam.
Now many Muslims
were keeping their Islam a secret
because of the situation
in Makkah at that time. And this was
not only something that it was allowed, it
was something that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam
recommended
for especially the people who were in a
weaker position.
Why? Because there were spies all around Makkah.
So even if you try to keep your
Islam a secret,
how can somebody find about out about your
Islam? What's the best way for somebody to
figure out that you're a Muslim?
I heard it.
Prayer. Right? They see you praying, and you're
praying differently than everyone else is gonna be
praying at the Kaaba or whatever they were
doing. So they can tell if they catch
you praying somewhere,
they know, okay, this guy is a Muslim.
So this is why it was very very
difficult for a lot of people, and people
were getting caught. A lot of people were
getting exposed because they were caught praying. And
when they were caught praying, they they said
this person has accepted Islam, and they were
being tortured.
Okay?
Any questions?
Any questions? Absolutely. Yes. A very good question.
So how did they get to this point
where they're accepting Islam and they're ready to
die for it, whereas other people are taking
Islam for granted? First of all, keep in
mind, given these circumstances,
everyone here, everyone at this time is a
convert.
So no one is born into the the
religion just because their parents are that way
or they think that it's inherited or something.
So no one's gonna take it for granted,
number 1, because every single person is choosing
Islam, number 1. Number 2, they're choosing Islam
in an atmosphere
where everything is anti Islam.
So the people who are coming into Islam,
right, they're only gonna be the people who
are extremely, extremely dedicated already in the first
place. Otherwise, they would not have come out
with Islam. Most other people who are not
accepting Islam and they're not fighting against Islam,
they're kind of taking, like, a wait and
see attitude.
Right? Like, let's see what happens. You know,
if this if this becomes a really big
thing, then maybe we'll jump in. And if
not, then this happens all the time. Like,
for example, like our college. Right? Hamdulillah. A
lot of people join. A lot of people
ask them, say, why didn't you join our
college? Well, you know, it's new, and I'm
waiting to see if it's gonna be really
successful or good or so. Lot of people
waiting on the sidelines. I'm not I'm not
committed to jump in just yet. So a
lot of people are kind of waiting. So
that's that's These are some of the reasons.
And the other reasons are that they would
take the verses from the Quran,
and remember we talked about the type of
verses from the Quran that were coming. They
were the hard hitting verses, right, that were
really telling them to wake up, to change
their life, to adjust themselves to Allah. You
know, the all of these things played a
major factor.
So that's why these are not the people
who are taking it for granted. You will
find
near the end of Islam when Islam was
becoming very popular and Muslims had amassed, you
know, larger armies and everything, you will find
people coming into Islam who are taking it
for granted.
But at this point in time,
anyone who planned on taking it for granted
would not have come into Islam in the
first place because of the dangers that were
involved, which shows you that when people go
and accept Islam against all odds and against
everything, against their family, against their society,
against every circumstance,
generally, they tend to be at a higher
level of dedication
than someone who just everything's easy. Like, you're
born in the court, you know, a royal
court or something, and everything is just served
to you, like, on a golden platter. It's
very different. It's very different. Alright. Very good
question.
Yes.
That also helped? Yes. We could say the
prophet was in front of them as well.
That helped. But the reason why I don't
like to answer that way is because people
say, oh,
because the prophet was in front of them.
So it's okay for us to be like
this because the prophet was not in front
of us. That's not the way to think.
That's that's not that's not the best way
to think.
Okay. So you're saying, let's say,
you're
you're being harmed, but you're not being tortured.
And you want to get out of it
by, let's say, verbally renouncing Islam because your
mother
would be sad if you were hurt in
any way.
Or or sad. Like your arm gets broken
or something and you can't work anymore. Sure.
Okay.
Right. But let's okay.
What do you the thing is, if someone
else is gonna be directly affected, right,
then yes, you can take it into consideration.
But the thing is, if someone is,
if if let's say if your mom is
saying that, you know what? I don't want
any harm to come to you. And they're
coming and they're saying, you know, we're gonna
inflict, you know, paper cut wounds on you.
Right? And you say, my mom my mom
would be really, really upset if she found
out about this, therefore, I'm gonna renounce my
Islam, you know, in front of them. This
is not a legitimate reason because
because, yes, your mother will be, you know,
sad about that, but at the same time,
a bruise,
you can handle a bruise. Right? You can
handle, a cut or something like that. But
if it gets to a point where it's
really gonna be unbearable, then it's something else.
When it comes to a point where they're
gonna break your arm or something, and you
need that arm because, let's say, you're a
computer programmer and you're not gonna be able
to, you know, continue your job, and then
your family will be affected.
That's that's a legitimate thing. But if you're
just gonna, you know,
let's not go into waterboarding examples and all
of that. You know? But
it's it's it's it's tough. It's torture, but
it just depends how many times you're gonna
be waterboarded. Right? Because it's not gonna kill
it's it's not gonna kill you. Right? So,
I mean, it's it's it's torture. There's no
doubt about it. But how many times? Like,
if it's, like, you know, Guantanamo, they do,
like, 650 times a year. That's that's a
lot of waterboarding, you know. But, it just
depends. Right?
I mean, in your case, just call contact
care. I would recommend
that. Contact care and they'll give you advice
and they'll also follow-up
with why, you know, your students are not
allowed to do that. So
they'll give you good advice, inshallah. Okay. Alright.
Let's continue, inshallah. So
asylum and Abyssinia. So now
we're talking about the 5th year. It's very
important to keep your time line in in
your time line in date. So the first
three years of the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam, call, secret call.
4th
year, public call.
What else took place?
Persecution,
ridicule,
propaganda
had begun already.
Right? Now we're into the 5th year.
So in the 5th year of the call,
the prophet saw that persecution is taking place.
Muslims, the weaker ones are being persecuted.
People are rejecting Islam. People are making fun
of Islam. Very difficult situation. So the prophet
recommended
that Muslims,
a lot of the Muslims,
migrate
to a place called Abyssinia.
Now Abyssinia
is around modern day Ethiopia.
Why? Because
there was a person by the name of
Negus or An Najashi.
Right? That was not his name, but that
was his title, and he was a just
king.
He was a just ruler. And he was
a Christian. And he was ruling over that
land. And we talked about Abyssinia a little
bit when we talked about the history. Remember
Abyssinia
teamed up with the Roman Empire
to remove who from power?
The Jews from?
From Yemen. From Yemen. Very good. From Yemen.
Alright. So we talked about them a little
bit. They're also a smaller kind of
small empire. But they're Christian, therefore they have
a lot of cooperation with the Romans who
happen to be Christian as well. And they're
next to Egypt because the Romans had conquered
Egypt
and Ethiopia is just below that a little
bit. So they had
a kingdom over there. And this king, the
prophet, salallahu alaihi wasallam, had heard about him.
He had he knew about him,
which means what?
Which means
that this you know, whether this was revelation
or not, we don't exactly know. But the
prophet recommended
that whoever would like to migrate should migrate.
It means that he was keeping in touch
with what's going around
on around in the world. He was not
just sitting in Makkah himself not caring what's
going on. He understood what's going on around
the world. He understood that there's a person
here. And he said, look. This is a
Christian, and he's a king, and he's known
to be a just king, and he's known
to be someone who, you know, doesn't wrong
people. And he has a very very good
reputation.
So he gives advice
to the Muslims and he says, whoever would
like to migrate,
you don't have to be
one of the people who are being tortured.
You can still go ahead and migrate. So
whoever would like to migrate can migrate.
First migration,
over a dozen Muslims migrated.
Even the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, daughter,
Ruqayhi,
which tells you what?
Which tells you that the situation was pretty
bad.
Situation was pretty bad if his own daughter
would even be migrating. Now his daughter Ruqayyah
was married to who? Does anyone know?
As Osman. Right? So Osman ibn Affan
was actually
a very wealthy person,
and not very powerful but quite wealthy and
quite well off. Now the fact that he's
migrating as well means
that the situation even for him was quite
difficult. And even he was undergoing
some form of persecution.
Not from the political
angle, not from the top people, but from
his own clan,
from his own family. So what end up
happening is that the people who are in
power in Makkah, they're the ones who are
persecuting and torturing the weakest people.
But does that mean that the people who
are in a good position are off the
hook? No. Their own family can go ahead
and torture them. So they can go ahead
and mess with them or do whatever they
want and cause them as many problems as
they want. So over a dozen Muslims they
migrated to Abyssinia. Now when they migrated to
Abyssinia,
they reached there.
2 envoys from the Quraysh
were sent to go and follow them
and sent sent to bring them back.
Actually, before that, an entire army was sent.
A small, like, call it battalion or whatever,
a brigade was sent to go and bring
the Muslims back. What does that tell you?
It tells you that the Quraysh
are not just upset now anymore that Islam
is in Makkah.
They have a problem with Islam,
period, wherever it is. So the Muslims should
not be going anywhere. Even though they're leaving,
the Quran shouldn't have a problem. If the
problem is we want power in Makkah, we
don't want you here. Just get out of
here. Now they're leaving. A a group of
Muslims is leaving,
and they don't even want them to leave
so they pursue them. But they make it
to the Red Sea, and they cross over,
and they make it to Abyssinia before they
could get caught.
Now that they're there, you would think that
everything you know, they're there.
They're living under this Christian king. There's a
lot of Christian you know, it is a
Christian land.
They're,
you know,
not really they're not enjoying themselves in the
sense that, you know, they they took all
their money with them or something. No. It's
a difficult life but at least they can
practice Islam.
So no one is persecuting them. No one's
ridiculing them because no one knows too much
about them. So they weren't doing much. At
this point in time, they're not going and
telling everyone, But the people were leaving them
alone.
But the Quraysh are not gonna leave them
alone. So they send 2 envoys to go
and extradite them and bring them back to
Makkah so that they can be tortured.
So what do they do? Very very smart
politicians.
Alright.
Before they even arrive in Abyssinia,
they know that a lot of merchandise goes
through Arabia. It comes from Yemen, comes from
Syria, comes from different places. So And they
know what kind of merchandise
every group of people likes. People in Syria
like certain type of items. People over here
like certain type of items. People at Abyssinia,
they liked like leather.
Certain type of leather that was being made
that was going through, and they like certain
type of items that you can't get over
there. So what did they do? They came
with all those nice gifts.
And before they even went and met with
the king, because who makes the final decision,
they met with his advisory committee. Right? So
he he has he has a bunch of
advisors. He has like a little council.
So the best way to The best thing
to do is kind of bribe the council.
Right? And you say, you know, I've come
from Arabia and we're friends. And they were
allies as well in a sense,
not because Mecca is not a big player
in world history at this time, but they
still had decent relations, amicable relations. So they
brought all of these gifts to the advisors.
Very smart move. And they said, you know
what?
We just came for a visit and, you
know, just seeing how things are. We we
love you so much and here's all these
gifts.
So you know that the advisors had been
kind of, you know, bought out in a
sense without even realizing it. Now they go
and they meet the king.
Very good political tactic. And this is the
speech
that was given
by one of them, right, who later on
later on,
accepted Islam. He said, some young fools have
sought refuge in your kingdom.
If you analyze just the wording,
it's it's beautiful. Right?
Some young fools have sought refuge in your
kingdom. Okay. So first they're being called fools
in the beginning.
They left the religion of their people,
but they didn't enter your religion either. So
they're not from us and they're not from
you either. Very, very smart. Says they have
come with a fabricated
religion. Now at that time, tradition was a
very, very important thing. It's not like today's
society where everything new is good. This oldest
goal at that time. Right? So they have
come with a fabricated religion which neither of
us recognizes. We have so much in common.
You know, they left our religion. They didn't
even enter your religion. None of us none
of us knows about this new religion that
they're coming with. The noble men among their
people have sent
us sent us to you to return them
home.
So meaning the, you know, the really They're
the fools,
and the noble people, the nice good citizens
of Makkah
have sent sent us to you so that
you can return them home.
Who are these noble people? The parents,
the uncles, the family members. They know. They
just want them back and they're gonna, you
know, handle them. They're gonna deal with them.
Really really intelligent speech. This is what you
call beautiful,
you know, beautiful propaganda here, beautiful way of
convincing somebody.
So what happened here? The,
the advisors
are there and they're already bribed.
So the advisors,
they're looking at this and Yes, absolutely. You
know, it's their family.
You know, it's the uncles
are sending them. And these people, what's wrong?
I mean they're fools. They've they've they've messed
up and send them back. And you know,
we we don't want to deal with these
people. Why why do you want to have
these kind of people sitting in your kingdom?
They're just gonna cause problems and their family's
missing them and have some mercy on the,
you know, the family.
So then,
Najashi was a just king and he was
a very smart king as well. So he
got upset.
Why did he get upset?
Because he did not ask
his counsel
for their advice.
They're supposed to wait, but they've been bought
out and they're like, yeah. Yeah. This is
a good idea. This is a good idea.
So Najashi is upset and he says, I'm
not going to simply make a decision
without hearing these people first.
So what do they do?
Ja'far
who was Ali's,
who was Ali's brother, he spoke. Remember Ali
was adopted
or taken into the house of the prophet
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. Ja'far was taken into
the house of one of the other uncles.
Okay. Abbas.
And he was the son of Abu Talib
as well. So Ja'far,
very eloquent,
knowledgeable about the Quran, he spoke.
And this is the long lecture that he
gave. Okay?
We can analyze it.
We have a little bit time to analyze
it. So he says, dear king,
we were an ignorant people.
We worshiped idols
and ate the meat of dead animals. Now
the reason why we're gonna analyze this, by
the way, is this is a beautiful way
to present Islam to other people.
And I want you to understand the lessons
just from this speech on how you can
present Islam, especially when somebody is coming and
just gave a beautiful speech against you. Right?
This is really beautiful if you analyze. He
said, dear king,
first of all,
addressing the king with respect.
Even though he's not a Muslim,
even though they don't believe in the same
thing, he's still giving him the respect of
his status. Meaning that when a Muslim is
addressing someone, we don't say, you know, in
the sight of Allah, you're just a servant.
You're we're all servants of Allah. So I'm
gonna call you Abd. Right? I'm gonna call
you slave of Allah, you know, and I'm
gonna address you that way instead of mister
president or whatever it is. He used the
he he used the language that, you know,
would would show him some respect. He said,
dear king,
we were an ignorant people.
We're not the foolish one. This is what
we were. So he's gonna describe what their
history was. Say, We were an ignorant people.
We worshiped idols.
Okay? The King can relate to that because
in Christianity,
worshiping of idols outside of, you know,
you know, outside of that is not allowed.
It's also something that they have. Say, we
worship idols. We ate the meat of dead
animals,
meaning the animals that had not been slaughtered
or anything.
We were used to lewd behavior,
breaking family ties,
and
harming neighbors.
The strong among us oppress the weak. Explaining
what their life was before Islam. Really beautiful.
This is how we lived
until God sent a messenger to us whose
nobility and honesty we had been fully aware
of.
So now he's ex he's explained the past.
This is what we came from. Imagine what's
going on in the king's mind.
This is sick, man. What kind of savage
existence are they coming from? These are messed
up people. And then he's saying, until,
then till God sent now he can relate
to God to Allah. Until Allah sent a
messenger to us whose nobility and honesty we
we were aware of. So nobody can mess
with this nobility. Nobody can mess with this
honesty. The other 2 envoys are there, and
they're sitting there, and they're listening. They can't
question these two things because they also acknowledge
them. And then he says,
we are fully aware of. He called us
to worship the only god and give up
our inherited worship of statues and idols. Something
that he he's just
conveyed the message of Islam
while at the same time
saying something that the king would actually not
disagree with either.
He told us to speak the truth, to
fulfill promises, to keep family relations, and to
be kind to neighbors. Now who can mess
with that? I mean, explaining the aqaq of
Islam.
This is really important because sometimes when we
come and we explain the message of Islam
to someone, say, well, you know, Muslims, what
do we believe in? Well, we believe in
angels.
First thing, we believe in angels
and we believe in the Qadr of Allah.
We believe that Allah is in charge of
everything,
and don't try to understand it. Okay. It's
the decree of Allah, and I know it
doesn't make sense to some people, but that's
what we believe in, and we believe in,
you know, we don't eat, you know, this
type of thing, we don't eat pork, and
why not use wisdom and start with something
that someone can relate to and someone can
appreciate? This is this is very intelligent.
That he told us to speak the truth
and fulfill commandments of the earth. He he
forbade us from evil, from bloodshed, from shamelessness,
from lies, and from deceit.
I mean, the so he's saying this is
the society we lived in. Look how we've
changed. This is what he's telling us.
You can't say anything against this. He told
us to stop the misappropriation
of the property of orphans and to avoid
false accusations.
You can't mess with it. He told us
to pray. Now it comes to a little
bit more of the worship type things. He
told us to pray, and they can relate
to it. To give charity and to fast.
Right? So these things are there.
We believed in him, and we acted on
his teachings. So we worshiped only God and
no one else. We forbade what was forbidden
to us, and we made lawful what was
made lawful to us.
He didn't even go into the other details.
We forbade whatever he so they've already established
a reputation. We forbade whatever he said, and
we did whatever he told us to do.
And this is the reason
this is the reason why our people turned
against us. They tortured us. They tried to
make us return to worshiping idols instead of
god and consider lawful the indecencies that we
used to do. So when they oppressed us
and we couldn't take it anymore, we sought
protection in your land.
We chose you over others hoping that we
would be safe here and we would not
be oppressed. Beautiful way to end it. I
mean, this is really, really clever. Ja'far is
very, very intelligent.
So he made this speech.
Now what happens?
K.
The king
is really impressed, and he says
he he told them more stuff, and he
says, I wanna know about this Quran of
yours.
You know, tell me a little bit more
about this Quran. I wanna hear something from
the Quran.
Okay.
Now
what did Ja'far do? Ja'far knows the Quran
as well. Ja'far could have said, you know,
let's recite
Surat Al Fatiha. You know. Let's just start
with one of those, you know. Or let's
go ahead and let's let's just go with
the easy one so it's not long for
him or something. Let's go with like Surat,
you know, Ikhlas or Surat Nas or something
like that. No. He specifically
chose
the verses
about something that he would be able to
relate to, and he's giving them an explanation
of Islam at the same time. So he
recited verses from Surah Maryam about Mary. He
said the verses say
in translation
mentioned in the Quran the story of Mary.
She withdrew her from her family
to a place in the east and secluded
herself away.
Anyways, without going without reading all of it,
you can read it on your own. He
began to
talk about Mary.
That he could have chosen the verses
which talk about Isa,
about prophet Jesus. Right? But whenever the Quran
is talking about the prophet Jesus, what is
he talking about when he's talking about prophet
Isa?
Usually somewhere along there, and it says, and
why are you taking him from worship? Or
why are you doing why are you doing
that? He chose Maryam. He chose Mary because
this is something they can unite on. The
message of Islam has already been given in
the beginning.
Now is the time where, you know what,
let's see something that we can just relate
to. So now he's not watering it down
or anything. The message of Islam has been
delivered albeit indirectly, but at the same time,
he's going and quoting some verses which the
person's gonna be able to relate to. He
recites these verses from the Quran
and
he
begins to cry.
He begins to cry. And he's getting the
translation of this, by the way. He's just
hearing the translate while hearing the Arabic and
then he hears the translation that he begins
to cry. And all of his advisers, they
were bishops. They were, like, religious people as
well. They all started crying as well, which
tells you what?
It tells you that these people were very
sincere and dedicated. These were not the majority
of them were not hypocrite. Najashi, for sure,
is not someone who had no feeling, you
know. He was someone who really believed and
who's someone who really really believed in Allah
and someone who believed in, you know, Prophet
Isa and all of that. And what did
he say? He commented and he said, these
verses and what was given to Jesus
are 2 rays emanating from the same light.
2 rays eman so he's seeing he sees
the connection. He says, they're coming from the
same light and then
and then what happens? So this is it.
It's done.
Okay. I know some of you saw the
message. They didn't see it, like, the second
day.
This the it's done.
He's saying, you guys are allowed to stay.
We're not extraditing you. We're not gonna give
them up.
Now imagine the 2 envoys who came,
they're very upset.
They said, you know, we came all the
way here. We we gave our gifts.
We bribed them. We did all of this,
and now we failed. It didn't work.
But they're not gonna leave without a fight.
You can give a good speech. They can
give a good speech, but there's always gonna
be another plan. The enemy will have more
plans. You don't just go home and rest
and say we're done. So now they come
up with another plan.
Very smart plan. The next day,
they go
and they tell Najashi, they say, you know
what? Something that they didn't tell you, by
the way. Say, what is that?
Do you know what they say about Jesus?
About your your your person who you, you
know, worship,
say that he's a slave.
Right? He's a slave. That's an insult.
Right? So Dajashi the way they put it,
Dajashi is really shocked.
I can't believe they hid this from me.
You know, they recited the verses and everything.
They kept this from me. This is a
problem. So he calls them again.
He calls them again,
and he says,
you know, explain this. Are they telling the
truth?
Ja'far speaks again. And Ja'far is very smart.
The way he explains it, he says,
we're only gonna tell you what our Prophet
teaches us and what our Quran teaches us.
That
that Isa is a servant.
He's a mess He's a servant of Allah.
He's a messenger of Allah. He's a word
from Allah because he was the way he
was he was created without a father, and
he's a spirit
from Allah. This is all the things that
are mentioned about Isa in the Quran.
What does this tell you about Ja'far?
It tells you that this person has a
deep understanding of the Quran even though the
entire thing has not been revealed yet.
It means that he is not he was
not just sitting at the session listening to
how nicely the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
recites the Quran.
And he was not just memorizing it.
He was not just he knew Arabic obviously.
He's reflecting upon the meanings and he's thinking,
you know what? What is the best way
to use everything I know about prophet Isa
in the Quran right now in this situation
of mine?
Very very important lesson. How do you take
the other verses from the Quran and how
do you apply them to your circumstances?
This is exactly what he did. So Najashi
came and he looked on the floor and
there was a twig. And he picked up
the small twig and he said, the difference
between us and you is no different is
what what you said and what we're saying
is no difference than this little twig.
First, he was saying that
the the the messages are 2, you know,
2 rays emanating from the same light,
meaning that it's the same source.
Alright. Kind of like a perennial type of,
you know, philosophy.
Now he realizes that, yes, there is a
little bit different. He said but but at
the same time, he's saying what you said,
right, and what prophet Isa said according to
us is no difference. There's no difference between
then this little tiny twig. There's a few
different ways we're expressing it. Yes. But at
the same time, it's the same. So he
said
he said that,
you know, I'm not I'm not gonna give
these people up. You guys have to go
back. And he returned all the gifts as
well. All the people, give them all your
their gifts back and tell them to go
ahead. These people can stay here.
Now that they can stay here, what happened?
A second migration to Abyssinia.
Now another group of Muslims, in fact, much
more,
you know, many many Muslims
migrated to Abyssinia. It's said that this type
first time was like a dozen.
2nd time was, like, 80, 90 Muslims
migrated afterwards. Why? Because now it's clear. It's
open open. It's very clear. He said no
problem. Anyone who wants to come from Mecca
here, they can go ahead and stay here.
What
effect did this have on the Quraysh?
Huge humiliation. This was a big defeat for
the Quraysh and a giant success for Islam.
This was a big success for Islam and
a defeat for Quraysh.
Any questions?
They had a translator.
They had a translator, number 1. Number 2,
it's very very likely, in fact many historical
books say, that Najashi knew at least some
Arabic.
If not,
because
he you know,
the fact that he was trading and he
had been around he had been in Arabia
as well with armies and all of that.
So it's very, very likely that he knew
quite a bit of Arabic.
Okay.
That's something that we're we can't get into
the details of. Right? In terms of can
this incident be used to live in a
non Muslim country? Right? The whole the whole
debate is is not about living in a
Muslim or non Muslim country or you can
live in a Muslim country but not be
allowed to practice Islam. Right? The thing is
if you're allowed to practice Islam,
for the most part, freely in a country,
then you're allowed to live there. Right? There's
other lessons you can learn from this, but
in terms of all the details and all,
we could go into a long long discussion.
We don't wanna go into that. But it's
a very important
event. Yeah.
It's it's not really about what differentiates Islam
or what makes it the same. The point
was not to make it the same. The
point is to mention beautiful things about Islam.
Alright. That someone's gonna
understand that, you know what, this is something
really nice and amazing. Right? So if you
go and you go into, like, a environment
where everyone's kind of cutthroat and all of
that, and you say, Well, you know what?
Islam teaches us to smile to our brothers
and sisters. And they're not seeing many smiles,
for example. And this is something, Oh, wow.
You have to smile? That's an act of
worship? That's that's really interesting. And then you
mentioned something about, like, taking care of family,
and this guy's from a broken family.
You said, wow. That's part of Islam? I
see. You know, that's
you know, I was abused when I was
a kid or something like that. This is
they're gonna be able to relate to it.
So the point is to relate to the
people that you're speaking to. It all depends.
It's not to just appease them or have
something in common with it. It's to explain
to them something that will, you know, get
through to them that,
oh, that's awesome about Islam. Rather than just
giving them something very generic
and talking about something, like, up there that
they can't really they're, like, oh, okay. That's
that's nice to know or that's interesting. Something
something a little bit more powerful.
How about how about we take, we'll take
a 5 minute break. Sound good?