Numan Attique – Is Anger A Sign Of Weakness
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The Sun. The Sun.
AI: Summary ©
السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته It's a very
wintry night, yet it feels like fall with
the rain.
We were told there'd be snow, but there's
no snow.
Let's say for instance, picture with me if
there was a bit of snow.
And, لا قدر الله, you started finding people
on the road that weren't so amicable.
They're causing you problems.
Somebody randomly cutting in front of you, braking
too fast, too hard for no reason, honking
at you.
This is happening back to back.
I think the most obvious feeling that most
of us would have is anger, road rage.
And, it's easy to fall into.
And it's not just road rage that I'm
speaking of here, I'm speaking of anger in
general.
It's something that some of us are more
prone to naturally than others.
And you can't blame yourself for that.
You can't say that, oh, X person or
Y person is an angry person because naturally
they can get upset quicker.
What you can blame yourself for or blame
others for is not working on it.
Not trying to control it.
That's where you can hold yourself accountable.
Some people, literally, Wallahi, you could do anything
to them and they'll just be very mellow,
easy going.
You'd be like, Subhanallah, how is this person
like that?
We have people in this community that are
very easy going.
You could say anything to them and they'll
be pretty chilled out.
Another person, you just look at them the
wrong way and they'll be ready to kill
you.
Every community has that.
So, it's not that you, oh, don't say
that, oh, this person has less akhlaaq than
the other person.
Even the sahaba, their taba' and their natures
differ.
We know Abu Bakr radiallahu anhu was generally
a more, generally speaking, much more cool and
level headed in most situations.
While Umar radiallahu anhu was more emotional in
the sense that it was easier for him
to get riled up.
The amount of times Umar radiallahu anhu has
said in authentic narrations, Ya Rasulallah, let me
cut his head off.
It's quite a lot.
In different scenarios.
Rightful, it's not wrong.
It's not incorrect, it's in the anger that
he has.
But it's the way he went about it
afterwards.
When he said to the Prophet, he walked
up to the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam.
And he said to him, are we not
on the truth?
When it came to the sulh hudaybiyyah and
them making this compromise, even though all the
sahaba felt like we've come all this way
for Umrah, to do Umrah, and now we're
saying we're going to just turn back?
Are we not on the truth?
So Umar radiallahu anhu went up to the
Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam and said this.
And he said, of course, we are.
And he went to Abu Bakr radiallahu anhu.
And he said, after that, I made penance
for this by doing more actions of goodness.
Constantly, I did more actions of goodness to
make up for this.
Me going to the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam
and saying what I said, the way I
said it.
Again, not wrong.
His nature was of a certain way.
And he had to deal with it a
certain way.
So this is why when a man came
up to the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam, he
said, Ya Rasulallah, also you need to give
me advice.
He said, do not be angry.
The man was kind of waiting for something
more.
So he's like, okay, I'll see.
This is kind of like a beginning.
I'm sure there's something more to this.
He said, don't be angry.
He kept asking, come on, like, give me
more.
Don't be angry.
If there's anything this should tell us, it's
that everybody in their life is facing their
own challenges, and has their own struggles.
And no two situations will be the same.
You could be brothers, twins, born together.
But in life you will have very different
paths, and very different issues.
That doesn't make one set of issues worse,
or more difficult than another, or more challenging.
It just means you have your own struggles.
And for some people it's anger.
And managing that anger.
This is why the Prophet ﷺ said, whoever
leaves an argument, in the anger that he
could have had justly in that situation, where
he was right, when he leaves it for
the sake of Allah, Allah promises him a
house in Jannah.
So just in the morning we had a
hadith about Jannah.
Whoever builds a house of Allah, even if
it's the size of a bird's nest, Allah
will make a house for him in Jannah.
Because it's a great act to build a
house of Allah.
Imagine then, how great of an act it
is to control anger.
It's that virtuous.
Because if it was easy, it wouldn't get
you houses in Jannah.
You think real estate is cheap?
The most expensive is of a Jannah?
Jannah has been surrounded with things we dislike.
When people say, you've got to grind, you've
got to become principled, your mindset should be
of growth and this and that, to achieve
something in life.
Monetarily, they're talking about financial, materialistic growth.
What about Jannah?
The mindset, the growth that's needed.
If it was easy, houses in Jannah would
not be promised.
If it was easy, Allah wouldn't use it
as a specific trait of the people of
excellence.
Of Ihsan, which is the highest level of
faith.
As if to worship Allah, as if you
can see Him.
And if not, then as if you can
see Him.
That's the highest level of faith.
And for that highest level, from the attributes
that God has told us that enables you
to get there, is, And those who control
their anger, is to cover up.
If there's something that's appearing, you cover it
up.
Like if there's a fire, you smit it
out.
Like that.
Take the fire that's burning within you, and
cover it.
Don't give it the oxygen it requires to
breathe, to grow.
And they pardon people.
They pardon people.
Allah loves those who do Ihsan.
Then Allah says, In another ayah, He says,
Those who avoid major sins.
And when they get angered, they forgive.
This is for the people of true Iman.
This is for the people of Jannah.
If it was easy, it wouldn't be getting
you to Jannah.
Just like how when we say things like,
Marriage is half of your faith.
This is a slogan, even for apps.
Marriage is half of your deen, half of
your faith.
That's cool.
Do you know why it's half of your
faith?
Because half of your faith ain't easy.
Marriage isn't easy.
It can be a very big challenge.
It has so many ups and downs.
It's like Iman, it goes up and it
goes down.
It's not like this.
And so the same applies to Ghazal.
The same applies to anger.
It requires a lot of work and practice.
You're not going to wake up tomorrow and
be a different person.
And some of you, if your natural disposition
is to be quick to anger, you will
always be facing holding yourself back.
It will always be like you're just putting
a cap on it and you're keeping it
back.
And yeah, InshaAllah, maybe later downwards in the
line, you see people who get older, they
change.
But initially, that's how it's going to feel.
And the best place to practice it is
at home.
The best place where character is seen is
at home.
This is why the Prophet ﷺ said, خيركم
خيركم لأهله وأنا خيركم لأهله That the best
of you are those who are good to
their families.
And I'm the best to my family.
Because it's easy to put up a front
outside, but when you go home, when you're
dealing with your parents, you're dealing with your
siblings, you're dealing with your wife, your children,
that's where the rubber hits the road.
And you've got to really see if you
can hold up to your principles.
Because it's easy, it's actually not that hard
to put on a face.
Like everybody might know you, MashaAllah, this person
is so easy going, so nice and patient,
but at home, he's a tyrant.
At home, all that needs to happen is
a small thing falls and he just goes
off the rails.
That's where it requires, so a good place
to test anger is at home.
I'll say personally, before I got married, like
17 years ago, I thought, I'm not too
bad when it comes to anger.
I'm not too bad when it comes to
these things.
After marriage, where you start to develop this
characteristic a lot more, and then after kids
even more, up to how to control and
mitigate this emotion.
And it can make or break your life.
Dhaba is something that breaks people, it breaks
families.
In a moment of anger, you might divorce
your wife, and ruin your family.
In a moment of anger, you might lose
your job or your business partner.
In a moment of anger, you might alienate
yourself from a good friend.
All because you couldn't keep your anger in
check.
And so the outcomes of anger is that
Shaytan loves anger.
And he loves to get you to anger.
If you look at the definitions of anger
in the books of Arabic, the ma'ajim,
the dictionaries, you'll see that it's described as
an anatomical or physiological state.
غَلَيَانُ الْقَدْ Or sorry, غَلَيَانُ الدَّم The heating
up and the speeding up of your blood.
Which is actually quite accurate with what actually
happens.
Adrenaline starts pumping, your heart gets faster, your
blood flow increases when you get angry.
And the same is what the Prophet ﷺ
describes Shaytan as.
That he runs in your veins.
He runs in your veins and the easiest
way for him to get to you is
via anger.
Anger, it has other social repercussions.
Such as, it will never allow you to
be right.
Even if you are right.
So the hadith where the Prophet ﷺ is
saying the person who leaves an argument and
doesn't argue and get angry and upset, I
will give him a house in Jannah.
I think this has lots of merit even
in the sense of if you were to
fight and get upset at that moment, for
yourself here, then what's going to happen?
People are going to take you seriously.
This is why if you look at things,
if somebody at work place is yelling, screaming
or in the masjid somebody is just yelling,
screaming and going off, even if they are
right or they have a point, that point
becomes useless.
Because the way you came off was in
anger and anger never looks right.
Generally speaking.
And so in a climate now where we
are more than a year into the war
in Gaza and with the new elections and
a new party coming in which is more
might Allah will be more clear in its
anti-Palestinian stances potentially.
What do you do?
Do you allow your anger to control you?
Or do you use it for other things
that are better?
Do you allow it to become something that
steers you towards goodness?
Steals your resolve and makes you greater?
Does it make you focus?
Or does it break you?
Because again remember these are natural dispensations.
These are natural orientations, attitudes that you have.
Do you let it run loose?
Say whatever you want, do whatever you want,
threaten people and then what happens?
Oh well then the hammer of anti-Islamism
and bigotry comes down on us and they
say Muslims are like this, Muslims are like
that or you use it to do systemic
organizational change where you set up different things
to lobby for political representation for other things
and you work towards betterment.
So you take that natural emotion, that raw
emotion you use dua and you use the
proper means to do that.
So today we will take four basic methods
in which one can practically control their anger
and these are from the Sunnah of the
Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam The first is
when you feel really angry you seek refuge
in Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
It is narrated in the Bukhari Muslim upon
Suleiman that a person came there was two
people in front of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam who started fighting and one started cussing
he started cursing and the next person his
face went red.
He was ready to blow and the Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said I will teach
you words that if he was to say
them the state of his would go away
the state that he is in if he
was to say I seek refuge in Allah
from Shaitan and when the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam said this the Sahaba who were standing
around these two people they said did you
not hear what the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
said and he was so upset he said
like am I crazy am I insane that
you are telling me to say this because
the general idea is that the only time
you say this is if you are possessed
or something or if you are crazy but
he is saying am I crazy I am
not crazy but this is what happens Shaitan
does not even want you to say I
seek refuge in Allah from Shaitan something else
very beautiful that you will see in certain
cultures like Arab cultures and this was very
widespread and I have seen this quite a
lot between like youth when they are angry
and upset growing up in Saudi you see
that if they are getting really upset they
are taking off their Iqas to fight and
stuff like that and then somebody comes and
says send Salawat upon the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam and everybody stops and says now this
does not necessarily mean they will stop fighting
because some people read the Salawat and go
right back to fighting like this one time
I saw two of the youth fighting in
the area and then somebody comes in between
and says send Salawat upon the Prophet Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam and they stop they say send
Salawat upon the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and
they go right back into fighting physically so
it needs to serve its purpose which is
you become cognizant you actually become aware of
the fact that I am mentioning Allah I
am mentioning His Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
and it should bring me back to a
place of stability so the Dhikr of Allah,
the mentioning of Allah should remind you what
you live for and bring you back to
a balanced position the second is to
change your state if the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam said that if you find yourself if
you are standing then sit when you are
angry and if you are angry while you
are sitting then lie down so what that
means is change your state if you are
in a place and you feel like you
are about to lose it leave do something
different and this will help you calm down
because change of place and state allow you
to change your mental state so physical states
address mental states and both of these go
hand in hand this is why if you
see two people fighting and somebody is trying
to break them up one will take one
of them outside why will they take them
outside?
because it is changing changing the states let's
walk, let's sit down in another hadith Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam mentions drink water drink water
and it will help you because you went
from being really angry to drinking water another
way in which it is helpful is to
remain silent if you find yourself very angry
don't speak Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam is narrated
to say that if you are angry stay
quiet and he said this three times if
you are angry stay quiet because it is
better to be quiet and not say something
wrong that you don't mean how many times
have you said things that you don't actually
mean but it was in a place of
anger that you said it but when those
words leave your mouth they can't come back
you've said them and somebody has heard them
and this has now either ruined somebody and
things might not ever go back to the
same where they used to be so to
stay quiet is actually essential and if you
do them together stay quiet, change your state
stay quiet go lie down putting these together
is essential from the sunnah of the Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam to control your anger the
fourth advice that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
says or gives is to do wudu or
to do ghusl in one of the hadith
that is narrated again in the musnad of
Imam Ahmad the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said
غضر is from shaytan anger is from shaytan
وإن الشيطان خلق من النار and shaytan was
made from fire وإنما تطفئ النار بالماء and
fire is extinguished by water
فإذا غضب أحدكم فليتوضع and so if one
of you feels angry then do wudu because
what?
when you're bringing water to your body essentially
cool water it will help you in calming
you down even today many research papers have
to say cold showers help you a lot
in all sorts of things they make your
mood better you might feel miserable in the
moment but they'll make you feel better in
the long term if you're angry I definitely
think that if you were to get have
wudu or shower with cold water that will
definitely cool you down mentally cool you down
and so wudu or ghusl is something that
takes the fire of shaytan away from you
and so if we try to apply these
pieces of advice and I'll repeat them again
remember Allah the second was what guys?
change move change, move, do something different and
the third was?
silence to be silent and the fourth was?
wudu or ghusl and these will help you
control your anger and the last point I'd
like to make before we end up is
there is a place in time for anger
there is justified anger and non justified anger
justified anger is anger for the sake of
Allah for the sake of the Prophet Muhammad
this is justified it's valid it's how you
go about doing it afterwards that's a different
story but this is justified anger the Prophet
Muhammad never got angry the only time he
got angry was when it came to the
right of Allah in the well known hadith
where he said I would like that somebody
else does the iqama and leads prayer and
I go and burn the houses of those
who don't come and pray fajr this is
anger he's showing anger in another point why?
it's the right of Allah in another where
a man once talked on the Prophet's door
the Prophet didn't open up and he started
peeking through a hole in the house the
Prophet said I would have liked to throw
a knife into your face into your eye
because you were peeking into the privacy of
a Muslim's house and so over here he's
showing he's expressing anger for what?
for the sanctity and the rights of a
Muslim so there are places to be upset
and to show anger and the only time
it's justified is when it's for the sake
of Allah but then how do you go
about dealing with it is also important over
here did the Prophet physically take this person's
ayah no, he said it to him to
be like whoa, this is the Prophet saying
this to me there's clearly something wrong that
I've done that I need to fix to
kind of give him a shock factor wake
up a little bit, this isn't okay at
all how could you possibly think it was
okay other times in community where this might
be beneficial is like when certain sins that
are not normal in society where somebody might
try to come do them publicly in front
of you over there, the need for ordering
the good and forbidding the evil should be
strong and you say you're shocked you can
say I'm so shocked that you were able
to do this in front of us or
you thought this was okay especially if this
person knows so it's context based, I'm not
saying you apply it across the board if
this poor man doesn't even know how to
pray then what do you do, you do
what the Prophet did let him be, let
him finish peeing in the corner of the
masjid the man did not know any better
and the Prophet ﷺ cleaned his urine afterwards
and then taught him to not do this
and then he said Allah forgive me and
Muhammad and nobody else because the others wanted
to hurt him because he's peeing in the
masjid doesn't know any better, he's a Bedouin
and so it's context based if you know
a good person who is regular at the
masjid, you know him well enough and then
he does something of his nature then at
that point you can show a level of
shock or a level of disbelief and honestly
a bit of expression of being unhappy or
upset, how could you of all people do
this and that allows them to be introspective
like wait hold on, you're right, how could
I because when you normalize sins or you
normalize certain states in the community then there's
no such thing as being upset about it
anymore so things like this can be also
done so should you be upset if your
children don't wake up for fajr yeah, you
should be validly upset how do you express
that?
you express that by talking to them by
showing them that you're actually very concerned for
them and this isn't okay and it's upsetting
to Allah so it's upsetting to me and
the one thing that matters is our salvation
in the hereafter I don't care whether you
make a million dollars over here I don't
care whether you can buy a house here
what I care is that you get to
Jannah so if I'm trying to wake up
what makes you think you don't need to
wake up so it's that type of vision
that type of thinking that you want to
be able to instill it's da'wah and
this is a tool and I'm not saying
it's the tool that you need all the
time sometimes it's needed, sometimes it's not it's
context based and so the only time where
you can be justified in anger is when
it comes to the sake of Allah we
ask Allah to make us from those who
are those who control their anger those who
pardon others make us from the muhsinin, from
those who have excellence and have the highest
level of ihsan may Allah forgive us for
our sins, elevate our status make us from
the rightly guided and righteous and from the
dua'ats, from those who call to the
way of Allah in private and in public
who are aware of Him in private and
in public and those who will unite together
in our forever homes in Jannah Ameen