Nadim Ali – Spiritual Iceberg

Indeed, our praise belongs to Allah. We thank

him and seek his aid, and we seek

forgiveness, and we seek refuge with him from

the evil of ourselves and from our bad

actions.

Whoever Allah guides, then there's no one who

can mislead him. And whoever Allah causes to

go astray, then there's no one who can

guide him. And I bear witness that there

is no deity except Allah who is unique

and without partners, and I bear witness that

Muhammad is his worshiper and his messenger. May

the peace and blessings of Allah be upon

him and his family and his companions

and those who follow them with good intentions

until the day of judgment.

All you who believe fear Allah as they

should be feared, and do not die except

as Muslims and all mankind.

Be careful of your duty to your Rabb

who created you from a single soul and

from it created its mate, and from the

2 of them scattered forth many men and

many women. Be careful of your duty to

Allah, whom you demand your mutual rights, and

be careful

of the wounds that bore you.

And indeed Allah is our Raqib over you.

All you who believe, fear Allah and always

speak the truth. He will cause your deeds

to be beneficial, and he will forgive for

you your sins. And whoever obeys Allah and

his messenger, then indeed, yes, indeed, he has

truly achieved a tremendous accomplishment.

Let there arise from you a nation inviting

to good and enjoying what is right and

forbidding what is wrong, and those will be

the successful. And the law also says, you

are the best nation produced for mankind. You're

enjoying what is right, and you forbid what

is wrong, and you believe in Allah.

And Allah

talks about the believing men and the believing

women are allies of one another.

They enjoin what is right and forbid what

is wrong, and they establish prayer, and they

give charity, and obey Allah and his messenger.

Allah will have mercy upon them. Verily, Allah

is almighty and wise.

And when we look

at these particular verses, it gives a description

of who the believers are who the believers

are.

It's just like,

the whole concept of the iceberg.

The iceberg when we look at the iceberg,

we see something that is mountainous.

But what we see is just 1 tenth

of the actual iceberg. It's just 1 tenth

of the iceberg.

Similarly, when we see another person,

what we see is just on the surface,

just on the surface of the composition of

the whole person.

What are the underlying traits of the person,

specifically the Muslim?

What

is under? What is the other 9 tenths

if we look at the similitude of an

iceberg?

What

are we composed of

within the other 9 tenths?

You know, the majority

of us, you know, we

all we see is what's on the surface.

You know, but who are we on the

inside?

Who are we on the inside? Because we

have to

continuously grow. We have to be of those

who

are striving to purify our hearts, to clean

our hearts.

Abu Dhar reported that the Messenger of Allah

sallallahu alaihi wa sallam said that wealth

is in the heart and poverty is in

the heart. Whoever is wealthy is in his

heart

and will not be harmed no matter what

happens in the world. Whoever is impoverished

in his heart will not be satisfied

no matter how much he has in the

world. Verily,

he will only be harmed by greed of

his own soul. And so it's not about

material wealth.

It's not about what you have

basically,

you know, in wealth.

Because

the Prophet

said, it's poverty and wealth is in the

heart. So you can be a multimillionaire,

multi billionaire,

and have an impoverished heart. And you can

be a person sleeping under the bridge and

be very rich.

Because again, the old saying that richness is

not having diamonds and gold, but richness is

having contentment

in your soul.

And so we have to look at our

spiritual icebergs. What does that 9 tenths consist

of? What is the composition

of our spiritual icebergs?

Is it something that is solid or is

it something that is shallow?

You know, we have to get away from

the surface Islam.

You know, we have to learn to grow.

We have to develop a level of taqwa.

We have to develop the concept of being

deferential to Allah.

Taqwa is being

conscious and cognizant of Allah. It's about having

piety. It's about establishing a level of truth.

And some say it's just fearing Allah. Fearing

Allah, that healthy fear. You know, we grow

in taqwa by showing

patience during hard times, my brothers and sisters.

You know, and we,

as the law says, we shall surely test

you with something of fear and hunger and

loss of wealth and lives and fruits, but

give glad tidings to the patient. Give glad

tidings to the patient,

who when disaster strikes them, they say,

Indeed, we belong to Allah, and indeed to

Him is our return. And this is what

Allah tells us in the Quran.

We have to understand

that the insistence

on the oneness of Allah was one of

the first messages that the Prophet

taught his people.

He taught them tawheed. He taught them this

message, the concept of the oneness of the

Creator, that the Creator is one solid entity,

and again not composed of various parts. And

the denunciation

of polytheism.

You know, belief in the last day and

also

establishing justice.

Economic justice as well as social justice. This

is what the prophet, peace be upon him,

spent

his time in the early days in Mecca,

what he taught the people. He had to

get them away from the polytheism

so that he can help to change and

effectuate a change in their behaviors. This is

what he did. And we have to basically

do this with the people of today, to

get them away from the idols that they're

worshiping. The idols of intoxicants.

The idols of collecting material things. The idols

of engaging in promiscuity.

We have to get them away from them,

get away from all of these things,

by first of all, establishing the fact

that Allah is 1.

Allah creates, and Allah communicates, and He has

communicated

to us through the Quran, and we have

to accept this. You know, we can't basically

take old behaviors

into the Islam.

You know, we have to basically

be of those who are searching for a

way to clean ourselves up.

As Allah says in the Quran,

is there any reward for good? Any reward

for good? Anything but good? Is there any

reward for good? Anything

but good, as the law says in Surah

Rahman. So which of the favors of your

lord do you deny?

Change must be complete and then not be

superficial.

Our change must be complete.

The composition of our spiritual iceberg

must be of solid Islam.

And it takes time.

It takes time

to grow in this deen. But we have

to be traveling

forward towards

our ultimate goal

of being the best Muslims that we could

possibly be.

Solid Islam

needs to

be what our composition of a spiritual iceberg.

You know, just as the composition of a

physical iceberg is solid ice. You know, we

can't be superficial brothers and sisters. So let

us assess who we are at this time

and work to be congruent Muslims and not

superficial Muslims, because Allah says, indeed, He will

not change the condition of a people until

they change what is inside themselves.

And when Allah intends for ill for a

people, there is no repelling it. And there

is not for them,

besides him, any patriot.

You know, in other words, you don't have

a helper except the law. And so you

have to call on the law. We all

have to call on the law to change

what is inside of us. That change can

be immediate or that change can be gradual.

Just like Allah says, he is Al Latif.

He is the subtle and he helps us

to to subtly change.

But we have to have that willingness to

change and not try to bring

old habits into Islam.

These are some of the things that we

have to establish

if we are to basically establish the strong

community

that, as Muslims, that we're striving for.

The change can't be superficial. The change cannot

be something that is weak. You know, we

have to build a solid foundation.

We have to basically establish

strong

and a spiritual

iceberg that's solid.

You know, as I stated in the beginning,

what you see is only 1 tenth

of what is actually there. And so as

Muslims, we have to work to establish a

strong,

solid 9 tenths. If I've said anything that's

inconsistent with what Allah has given us and

the prophet

has taught us, I take full responsibility for

that. And if I've said anything in which

you have gained some new knowledge, as always,

all praise belongs to Allah.

Our Lord, take us not to task if

we forget or fall into error. Our Lord,

lay not on us a burden such as

you did lay on those who have gone

before us. Our Lord, lay not on us

a burden which we do not have the

power to bear and overlook our faults and

forgive us and have mercy on us. You

are our guardian, so grant us a victory

against the disbelieving

folks.