Omar Suleiman – Al-Aqsa #08 Salahuddin The Legend Who Liberated Jerusalem

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Asalaamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh, Audhu billahi
min ash-shaytani r-rajim, bismillah ar-Rahman
ar-Rahim Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen, wa la ilaha
illa a'la al-dhalimeen, wa la aqeebatu
lil-muttaqeen Allahumma salli wa sallim wa baraka
ala abdika wa rasulika Muhammadin salallahu alayhi wa
sallam wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallim
tasliman kathira I want to welcome you all
back inshaAllah to our I think 8th session
now on the history of Masjid al-Aqsa
bismillah ta'ala tonight we're going to be
speaking about the most legendary associated figure with
Masjid al-Aqsa and that is the liberator
of al-Aqsa Salahuddin al-Ayubi rahimahullah ta
'ala, the great Sultan and I'm going to
preface the lecture tonight with a few things
Number one, Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen, we actually just
recorded an extensive series on Salahuddin with Dr.
Hassan Alwan hafidahullah ta'ala and that inshaAllah
ta'ala will be released after Ramadan on
Yaqeen's YouTube channel and it is an extensive
biography with beautiful maps and relics and representations
and reflections bismillah ta'ala that truly is
gem filled and so tonight is by no
means meant to be the entire biography of
Salahuddin al-Ayubi rahimahullah ta'ala and as
I said inshaAllah ta'ala once I complete
this series my goal is to turn this
into a book and in that book we
will have a lot more of the smaller
details because many names and maps and regions
can get lost in the capacity of a
talk like this the second thing is that
I want to dig into a question before
we start with Salahuddin and it's always been
interesting to me that when we talk about
Salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala and we talk about
the regaining of Al-Quds the regaining of
Jerusalem there's a question that is often not
asked and that question is how did we
lose Jerusalem in the first place you see
subhanAllah you have the glorious entrance of Sayyidina
Umar rahimahullah ta'ala and then somehow 400
-500 years of history just disappears into thin
air and we immediately start talking about the
hero once again opening Jerusalem it was understandable
with Umar bin al-Khattab rahimahullah ta'ala
entering into Jerusalem in the glorious way that
he did that Islam had dawned with the
Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam and this was a
natural extension of the da'wah of the
Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam and a glorious prophecy
fulfilled with the best of the companions of
the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam but what about
Salahuddin and so I actually want to spend
some time just talking about the few hundred
years between Umar rahimahullah ta'ala opening Jerusalem
for the first time and then the reopening
of Jerusalem by Salahuddin al-Ayub rahimahullah ta
'ala and it's almost a perfect set of
events between 639 and 1039 and so you
talk about these four centuries where significant things
will happen that make Jerusalem that make al
-Quds open to the vulnerability that allowed the
crusaders to sack it for the first time
and so we come to the very beginning
of Umar rahimahullah ta'ala once again opening
Jerusalem he establishes the Umari pact that gives
all sorts of assurances to religious communities that
guards religious relics, the sahaba relocate to Jerusalem
many of them relocate to the areas of
Palestine, some of them will die there al
-Quds becomes a hub of Islamic learning, it
becomes a place where Muslims around the world
come as pilgrims and what makes Umar rahimahullah
ta'ala and his pact so significant is
that the system that he put into place
in the 600s remains intact all the way
until the crusaders come and rupture it which
shows you the beauty of it, the coherence
of it, the consistency of it and the
way that the Muslims for the most part
upheld what Umar rahimahullah ta'ala had set
into motion so the ihsan of Umar rahimahullah
ta'ala, the excellence of Umar rahimahullah ta
'ala still breathes through the city of Jerusalem
we come into the 700s and as Islam
is spreading throughout the world you have of
course Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan building some
of the most beautiful and prolific sites in
the area of al-Aqsa the dome of
the rock, al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik
expands some of what his father did in
the courtyard of al-Bayt al-Maqdis and
as Jerusalem, as Palestine is becoming this bustling
center of Islamic scholarship something happens politically which
is important and it's often underestimated the Umayyad
Caliphate was based in al-Sham because the
Umayyad Caliphate is based in al-Sham there
is naturally more emphasis on the architecture on
the establishment, on the infrastructure of the place
that the Caliphate is in and so when
the Abbasid Caliphate takes over the Abbasid Caliphate
moves to al-Iraq and when it moves
the center of Islamic power to al-Iraq
and by the way this isn't about right
or wrong, I'm just talking about natural consequences
of infrastructure and emphasis from a political perspective,
from an architectural perspective when the Khilafah moves
away from al-Sham there is naturally less
emphasis that's going to be placed on some
of the development of those areas you come
to the 900s and something extremely significant happens
about a thousand years before the Crusaders are
able to penetrate and to wreak the havoc
that is historically documented the Dawla of al
-Fatimiyya, the Fatimids the Dawla of al-Fatimiyya
take over Jerusalem and al-Dawla al-Fatimiyya
is an interesting establishment that many times we
kind of gloss over in the history of
Salah al-Din they are an extreme sect
that emerges out of Shi'ism but even
to mainstream Shi'as they are extreme they
are going further away than what the majority
of Shi'a would consider as orthodoxy within
their school of thought and they are the
makings of what would become the Ismaili school
in terms of their creed so if you
study the Ismaili school then you can see
the way that the creed itself is very
different from the creed of what we know
within al-Islam and with that expansion of
this Dawla so you still have the Abbasid
Khilafah but you have a split, you have
junctures with their taking over Jerusalem they start
to implement things that are foreign to the
Muslim population foreign to the people themselves and
they quickly become a hated form of governance
there in al-Bayt al-Muqtas and they
start to chip away at some of the
holy sites especially to Ahl al-Sunnah because
the idea is to direct things to a
new doctrine, to a new creed and so
they are very difficult to deal with and
Jerusalem naturally starts to feel, al-Quds starts
to feel some of the pressure of that
leadership you come into the year 1009 and
particularly you have a man by the name
of al-Hakim bi-Amrillah who becomes the
leader of that dynasty, the Fatimid dynasty and
he is known as the crazy ruler, literally
the Majnoon, a madman he was a kid
when he assumed leadership, very erratic, crazy would
gradually start to make more claims of divinity
and subhanAllah you almost start to see a
complex where he pushes the boundaries every single
year now why is he important to the
story of the crusaders?
he does something that Umar radiyaAllahu ta'ala
Anhu did not do and naturally Umar radiyaAllahu
Anhu is not looked at favorably by him
in the first place he is a hated
figure and so the legacy of Umar is
all over al-Quds the legacy of Umar
radiyaAllahu Anhu is all over Jerusalem he desecrates
the holy sepulcher which Umar radiyaAllahu ta'ala
Anhu had of course maintained as a symbol
of respect and that was deeply rupturing to
the relationship between the Muslims and the Byzantines
at this time and sends shockwaves through Europe
but he doesn't just desecrate Christian sites, he
also bans Hajj because they see the Kaaba
as not so sacred, they see what is
happening in Mecca and Medina as taking away
from their creed so he also bans Hajj,
so he is desecrating holy sites, he bans
Hajj at some point he even calls himself
al-Hakim bi-Amri so instead of the
one who commands by the will of God,
he is the one who commands by his
own will signifying a deification of himself and
at some point he disappears so he disappears
from not just rule, but he disappears period
so his death and the circumstance of his
death are very mysterious he is deified by
some sects, so you'll see for example in
some strains of the Druze, he is deified
by them he is looked at as a
saintly figure, an interesting human being to say
the least the year 1039 after he disappears,
the church is reconstructed so that part of
any type of rupture between the Muslims and
the Christians or Islam and Christendom is made
peaceful for the moment at least there isn't
a desecration of the site at least the
site is maintained as Umar radiAllahu ta'ala
Anhu had guaranteed now what happens to the
crusaders or how do the crusaders start and
this is in fact one of the most
important contexts to understand as to how we
lost Jerusalem in the first place Europe is
plunging into full on economic despair so they
have massive resource deficits they have famines and
plagues they have population issues there is much
corruption with the elite class so there is
a full on corruption of the way that
wealth is distributed so Europe is falling into
all sorts of economic despair partly because of
the corruption that is present within Europe and
in suffering that famine and that drought and
the population is dwindling and resources are dwindling
and you have mass corruption and bad distribution
you needed to find a way to turn
this into a religious conflict to turn this
into some sort of holy war or righteous
war on the Muslim world to justify what
really was an attempt to rescue Europe from
its economic despair and many historians will say
the same that the true nature of the
crusades was more economic than it was religious
so it was as much about Antioch and
Edessa as it was about Jerusalem and in
fact when you read about the fourth crusade
it completely removes Jerusalem from the equation or
it focuses entirely on the richest Muslim cities
so it focuses on Constantinople, Istanbul today because
the idea is to gain as much treasure
and to gain the most accessible port in
the Muslim world possible to where you can
transfer riches back to the crusader kingdom and
so Venice and the Italian districts wanted the
ports of Asham other European states were focused
on China and India and the silk routes
and the spices and the different ways that
they could access the east and access Asia
and access pathways to Africa and they felt
cut off by the Muslim world and so
Europe needs to pillage the Muslim world under
a religious call in order to bring back
prosperity to the failing crusader kingdom everything that
you see back then has a parallel today
just read about the gas off of the
coast in Gaza there are going to be
nefarious parties, malicious motives even more malicious than
the obvious malicious motives that will push certain
parties to the table and so the drums
of war are being beaten in Europe against
the Muslim ummah to pillage the Muslim world
and it is not because tensions have boiled
to a point to where it's just become
untenable between the two between the Muslims and
the Christians and therefore we have to escalate
this war it's because Europe has economic woes
primarily secondly, the Muslim ummah is in complete
shambles we always get in our own way
and subhanallah you think of the hadith of
the prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam da'awtu rabbi
thalat I made dua to Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala for three things li thalat I
made dua that Allah would protect us from
famine this ummah would not be wiped out
by famine Allah answered that I made dua
that this ummah would not be wiped out
by an external enemy Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala guaranteed us that that as an ummah
we won't be wiped out by anything external
but the third one that there is no
misfortune or that their misfortune does not come
at their own hands due to their own
disunity Allah azawajal did not give the prophet
salallahu alayhi wasalam that because the ummah is
responsible to maintain its own unity its own
cohesion because Allah has already given us his
habal he's given us his rope that's your
covenant hold on to the rope of Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala it's been extended to
you as an ummah when you hold on
to it together you're guaranteed greatness the Muslim
world was completely fractured and as a result
of it being fractured impotence you have the
Abbasid Khilafah in one place which is becoming
a complete non-player in global Muslim politics
you have al-Fatimiyya, Daul al-Fatimiyya which
is heretical to a point that it does
not represent at all anymore what the spirit
of Islam was supposed to be you have
the Seljuks in Iraq you have so many
different places where different empires and different players
are at play and this offers an opportunity
for the crusaders to come in and to
penetrate a divided weakened Muslim world that is
busy with its internal feuds and its internal
disputes those are the two major factors that
lead to making a place like Jerusalem so
vulnerable so I'm going to give you the
names of some important figures I want you
to put yourself in Europe right now the
year is 1095 we're 400 years or so
after Omar ibn al-Khattab radiAllahu ta'ala
anhu enters into Jerusalem a man by the
name of Pope Urban II gives his famous
speech at Clermont and you can look this
speech up by the way, it's his most
famous address Pope Urban II stands to initiate
the crusades and as he initiates the crusades
against the Muslim world he describes the Muslims
as the following, he describes them as a
vile race, number one number two, a cursive
and alien to God number three, a generation
wholly given to the service of demons, number
four take arms against the barbarians, not your
brothers and so you think about like all
the marks of dehumanization that precede some of
the most disgusting genocides in history, just look
at the man's speech, this is the Pope
speaking, so you think about the religious justification
and cover that's going to be given to
the crusaders to wreak the havoc that we
know on the Muslim world they are looking
at us as a vile race a cursive,
foreign to God alien and barbarians that should
be fought instead of their brothers, on top
of that we're in the service of demons
and so a satanic, pagan race now think
about propaganda, I mean back then how many
people in Europe had interacted with Muslims in
their daily lives, like you think about now
how dehumanization becomes possible without interaction, think about
that world and the way that peoples were
separate and how when you portray a people
like that you give license to kill in
an entirely different way, on top of that
he calls on robbers to become knights meaning
we will release our prisoners and our most
brutal people and send them out into battle,
he calls on robbers to become knights he
offers full amnesty for any crime that's been
committed so long as you go to the
Muslim world and you fight against the Muslims
and you serve in these crusades he offers
debt relief in response open spoils of war,
whatever you can collect in the battlefield, collect
it, it is yours and the last thing
the icing on the cake full redemption of
sin when you kill the pagans and so
whatever sins you have committed before will be
gone when you enter into the Muslim world
and when you serve in this holy war
against the Muslim world by the way, when
I say it's relevant and this precedes what
will happen in Jerusalem just read the papers
of Donald Rumsfeld and John Ashcroft and the
Bush administration and the orders they were giving
to the military before the invasion of Iraq
it was crusader language invoking specific references from
the crusades and that's how you portray a
people and that's how you dehumanize them and
become inhumane yourself what does that lead to
and translate into?
what is the introduction of the crusaders to
the Muslim world before Jerusalem?
the most significant one is what is known
as the massacre of Ma'arrah the massacre
of Ma'arrah this takes place in December
of 1098 and it's around modern day Idlib,
subhanAllah when you think about all that Idlib
has been through may Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala see forth the entire liberation of our
brothers and sisters and completion of their victory
in Syria, Allahumma ameen, what they've been through
so the massacre of Ma'arrah is particularly
as Ibn Al-Athir says the most shocking
incident of the crusaders entering into the Muslim
world and really put on display their immorality
like it became a legend the way that
they acted in Ma'arrah became legendary in
the sense of evil it sent shockwaves that
a people could do this, now keep in
mind this precedes the Mongols right, we're not
even talking about the Tatar and what would
come from them yet, not the hands of
the Tatar so this was really really new
to see the way that a people would
behave especially while carrying crosses right, they're coming
in the name of religion plunging into the
Muslim world with the flags of crosses sanctioned
by the Pope and what do they do
in Ma'arrah Ibn Al-Athir says they
massacred 30,000 civilians in cold blood 30
,000 Muslims they put them to the sword
in cold blood if you look up there
are chapters in books called when the crusaders
became cannibals when the crusaders became cannibals because
subhanallah at this point what they unleashed of
themselves in that process, you know we look
at what the Zionists do in Gaza and
we think how crazy are these people like
how do they not see how beastly they
have become in the process of making us
into animals how crazy and beastly have they
become you have to think about what the
crusaders had in their mind about the Muslim
world that was taught to them before they
came to the Muslim world and how that
sanctioned beastly behavior that maybe was foreign to
them before and so Albert of the Franks
this is from their side he writes that
in Ma'arrah our troops boiled pagan adults
in cooking pots we boiled them in cooking
pots and we devoured grilled children on skewers
they ate the people they cooked and they
ate the people and this was supposed to
be a sign of their * over the
Muslim world but in the process they had
unlocked the evil, the true evil that was
present inside of them and what they planned
to do with the rest of the Muslim
world as for the exploitation of women as
for what was done beyond murder, our imagination
can go to the worst of places because
clearly they had no limits and what they
were willing to do to the Muslim world
as they came into Asham as they started
to pillage the area and then you come
to Jerusalem the sad thing about Jerusalem is
that when you move to July 15, 1099
July 15, 1099 it only took them 5
weeks to take Al-Quds 5 weeks, a
little over a month and that's a sign
of how weakened the Muslim world had become,
how much we had relinquished the grip of
glory that we had from the time of
Sayyidina Umar radiAllahu ta'ala and the barbarians
of Ma'arrah who were actually the crusaders
enter into Jerusalem and you can imagine what
they did and by the way it wouldn't
just be against the Muslims, the Jews this
time, whose side do you think they were
on?
Umar radiAllahu ta'ala was the one who
brought them back after, remember the conflict that
they had with Heraclius Umar radiAllahu ta'ala
settled their communities the Jews were on the
Muslim side the Eastern Christians, historic Christian communities
that were not under the Catholic Church were
also alongside the Muslims and whatever they were
able to put up with in terms of
a fight was insignificant in the face of
these people and so for the most part
people retreated to their holy places and the
crusaders went into Al-Aqsa and they killed
up to 70,000 Muslims as they entered
into Jerusalem, they burned the Jews alive in
their synagogues and they even set fire to
the Eastern Orthodox churches, so they burned alive
people and murdered anywhere up to 100,000
people as they took Jerusalem on that dark
day of July 15th 1099, Reynald of Aguileras
so this is not the famous Reynald that
we would talk about but he's one of
the crusaders, he said, he writes about it
he says, in the temple and Solomon's porch,
men rode in blood up to their knees
and up to their horse's reins they flooded
the streets with blood they destroyed the masajid
they destroyed everything that was holy to anybody
else and they beat back the Muslims whatever
existed of the Muslims to different regions, at
that time Imaduddin Zengi, rahimahullah ta'ala of
the Seljuks he fights back in Iraq with
whatever he can but he has limited success
against the crusaders before he himself is going
to be assassinated and his second son Nuruddin
Zengi, rahimahullah ta'ala, will take command of
the Zengid dynasty, and this is where we
come to the story of Salahuddin you cannot
talk about the story of Salahuddin Al Ayyubi,
rahimahullah without talking about Nuruddin Zengi, rahimahullah ta
'ala, who was the Mujadid before the Mujadid
the warrior before the warrior the leader before
the leader the mentor of one of the
greatest human beings this Ummah has ever seen,
you cannot talk about Salahuddin without understanding Nuruddin
Zengi, rahimahullah ta'ala, Imaduddin Al Ayyubi, rahimahullah
ta'ala, says that there has not been
a man that this Ummah has seen since
Khulafa al Rashidin like Nuruddin, rahimahullah ta'ala
not a more competent and great leader that
this Ummah has seen since Khulafa al Rashidin
like Nuruddin rahimahullah ta'ala Nuruddin establishes his
rule in Halab, in Syria so his brother
takes what's left over of Iraq from his
father and Nuruddin takes Syria he establishes himself
in Syria and Nuruddin is someone who fights
back the crusaders valiantly and is able to
beat them back from major strongholds and is
able to establish multiple sneak attacks on different
crusader strongholds and quickly becomes a boogeyman of
sorts to the crusaders as he is rebuilding
his rule in Syria and beating back the
crusaders from certain regions he also establishes over
40 madaris 40 schools, scholarly hubs of learning
because he sees that the revival of ilm
the revival of the Qur'an is central
to the revival of the Ummah and so
he mandates his warriors to go through religious
training the generals in the army of Nuruddin
are all hufadh of Qur'an he mandates
that they learn once again and he also
wants to spread the sunnah in the face
of what had happened under Al-Dawla Al
-Fatimiyah, so he's taking through different routes to
beat back the crusaders and to beat back
some of the influences that had weakened the
Ummah from within so he's a righteous man
an incredible human being and SubhanAllah an entire
lecture should be and could be dedicated to
him but tonight we will not be able
to do him justice because we want to
focus on Palestine and his role in Palestine
suffice it to say as Ibn Al-Athir
Rahimahullah says Nuruddin Rahimahullah Ta'ala commissioned the
construction of the minbar that would be placed
in Masjid Al-Aqsa once Masjid Al-Aqsa
was retaken from the crusaders and it took
a couple of years and you can imagine
the psychological impact on the people that Nuruddin
the leader is already constructing the minbar of
Al-Aqsa when we take it back this
is the minbar that we will place back
in Masjid Al-Aqsa and the way that
he's trying to instigate the emotions of the
believers so that they can understand that what
has been taken from them is not going
to be considered insignificant nor will it be
forgotten amongst the ummah and this impacts Salahuddin
Rahimahullah Ta'ala growing up imagine growing up
in that shape where you know that your
predecessor has already built the minbar that one
day you know today when we hold the
keys of Palestine from the Nakba you say
one day you will open your home one
day we will return to our lands even
when it seems impossible we're taking this from
our Turah we're taking this from our tradition
you know like SubhanAllah one of my teachers
he said something very profound once he said
what dress have you prepared for the day
of Fatihah Baitul Maqdis what are you going
to wear the day that it's opened that
there are some that would put aside even
their relics that the day that Jerusalem is
opened Bi'idhnillahi Ta'ala this is what
we will enter in with Bi'idhnillahi Ta
'ala so it's part of the psychological and
spiritual growth of the believers so Nuruddin Rahimahullah
Ta'ala has this minbar built and it
would not be installed in Al-Aqsa until
two decades after he's already passed away and
that's not the point right, the point is
is that he's generating something special in the
hearts of young people around him he is
reigniting the Ummah towards something that is special
and so Nuruddin and the Zengid Empire are
embedding the idea of Baitul Maqdis in the
hearts of young people, they're putting that back
in the hearts of the Ummah and they're
right there in Al-Sham at the gates
of Jerusalem which is the most fortified city
right now that represents crusader * over the
Muslim world and there's an important lesson here
that you might say that Nuruddin failed if
you're looking particularly at or specifically at his
political endeavors that Nuruddin was never able to
take back Jerusalem in his lifetime and he
certainly tried but sometimes it's not the individual
or the group that tries to do it
the first time sometimes the credit should go
to those who didn't relinquish the idea even
if their efforts fell short because they placed
the fruit in the hearts and in the
minds of those who will come after them
and have the same sincerity as them and
will see the effort through by the permission
of Allah and Allah rewards everyone in the
process of that everyone that was a part
of that process and so if you're just
going to clip out Nuruddin's chapter and this
is extremely important right now, if you were
going to clip out Nuruddin's chapter you might
deem him a political failure without looking at
what came after him or what he put
into Salahuddin because you'll say he wasn't able
to do it the odds were against him,
he built that minbar but what did he
actually achieve when he lived and when he
died his entire life, Jerusalem was under the
crusaders, it's not the point this is an
ummah where transition and transmission comes through the
hearts that light is transmitted from generation to
generation and Allah knows what everyone has put
into that process so this is Nuruddin Zengi
rahimahullah ta'ala and we'll talk a little
bit more about him inshallah ta'ala as
we start to introduce Salahuddin in this process
and focus on some of these lessons, so
Salahuddin is born in 1137 where was he
born?
in Tikrit, in Iraq and he wasn't an
Arab, he was a Kurd Nuruddin also was
not an Arab which shows you subhanAllah that
the connection to Al-Aqsa has to transcend
Arabism has to transcend that it has to
be a cause of the ummah Imaduddin was
not an Arab, Nuruddin was not an Arab,
Salahuddin was not an Arab and subhanAllah there
are some who even tried to connect Salahuddin
to an Arab ancestor to make him Arab
it didn't matter and it doesn't matter what
you can find in his lineage or if
you can try to connect him to an
Arab ancestor this is a cause that's greater
than the Arab, this is the cause of
Islam and the Muslims, this is the cause
of every single person and the one who
connects their hearts and efforts to it is
just as connected to it as anyone else
because Allah subhanAllah makes sacred links through what
physical links cannot make and so there are
different claims that are made to Salahuddin by
the way, funny enough even after the glorious
chapter of Salahuddin will close some of the
Europeans will try to justify in their minds
how such a great man rose amongst the
Muslims who they had portrayed as barbarians and
as lowly people all this time, how did
the greatest general of their time arise from
them and their conclusion in some of their
books was that he had a European mother
and so he had to come from something
else because it doesn't make sense otherwise for
him to be this person and I want
to say about Salahuddin before we continue that
this is a man who subhanAllah, when you
talk about acceptance in the hearts of the
believers has been given a status in the
Ummah that is unparalleled I want you to
think about the amount of time that has
passed from his time to our time and
the way that his name has been invoked
generation after generation generation after generation that is
enough to tell you what a special person
he is in the sight of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala that he has been in
the hearts of believers for over an entire
millennium it's unprecedented it's unheard of for someone
that comes that far after the sahaba to
have that type of a status amongst the
believers and when you read about him, he
deserves it he deserves every bit of that
praise that he receives in the Ummah he
deserves every bit of that acceptance because this
was a man who was born and bred
and who lived and died with the Ummah
in his heart a selfless human being subhanAllah
who had vision who had sincerity that is
unparalleled in his time and I also want
you to appreciate the circumstances that he was
born in and how close he actually was
to the time of the Prophet salallahu alayhi
wasalam I was trying to reflect on this
context, the time between us and Salahuddin is
a thousand years the time between the context
of Salahuddin, not necessarily the birth of Salahuddin,
the context of Salahuddin and the death of
the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam is 400 years
that means that the effect of that generation
of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam and the
generation that immediately followed and immediately followed is
very much so still present like I think
about this in an American context they talk
about slavery being 400 years old the effects
are still very present, there are easy ways
to trace your lineage, you know who your
great great great grandfather was if you look
hard enough, you can trace the development of
villages and cities, you can see the same
structures, that's how close it is to the
Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam and so that should
help you appreciate that there is something very
special that's still in the air to be
salvaged and that makes the destruction of a
place like Jerusalem and the pillaging of the
Muslim world that much sadder in his time
and so you have this man rahimahullah ta
'ala, that's a Khalid ibn al-warid like
figure the greatest general in this ummah after
Khalid radiallahu ta'ala anhu, who we would
have the great victories on his hand what
is his actual name?
what is his actual name?
does anyone know?
his actual name is Yusuf his actual name
is Yusuf and Salahuddin is the honorific that
is given to him rahimahullah ta'ala and
this is deeply profound because it will factor
into the way that he lives his life
rahimahullah ta'ala his father was a general
under Imaduddin whose name was Najmuddin his father
Najmuddin was a general under Imaduddin remember Imaduddin
is the father in Iraq and when he
dies his son Nuruddin his second son assumes
the rulership of the dynasty based out of
Syria based primarily out of Syria so he's
a general under Imaduddin al-Zengi rahimahullah ta
'ala and before Salahuddin was born his mother
had an interesting dream about him that she
went to the dream interpreters she said I
saw a dream that in my stomach was
a sword and so subhanallah you talk about
a ru'ya and a prophecy that Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala will bring out of
this man his mother saw him as a
sword in her stomach before she actually gave
birth to him rahimahullah ta'ala and subhanallah
what happens on the very day that he's
born is that his father his mother who
just gives birth to him have to flee
from Tikrit because of an attack so you
can imagine the day of his birth he's
a refugee, he's on the move on the
day of his birth his father is expelled
the day of his birth and as they
are on the run one of the generals
says to his father Najmuddin that this baby
of yours must be bad luck it's gotta
be bad fortune the day of his birth
you're expelled and you're on the run from
Tikrit to Mosul in Iraq both in Iraq,
so this baby must be of bad fortune
and he responded and he said rather it
may be that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
has planned through him a good fortune that
we can't comprehend there might be something in
his qadr that is way beyond anything that
we can perceive and so I think about
those children that are born in Gaza that
were born while their parents were on the
run and perhaps babies that were born subhanallah
that will never know their parents, babies that
showed up in the makeshift hospitals and their
parents had been killed in the same bombing
Allah azawajal knows what may come out of
this generation of genocide may Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala give izzah to this generation Allahumma
ameen and so they're fleeing to Mosul where
Imaduddin, the father is Imaduddin Zangi rahimahullah ta
'ala and he takes in the soldiers who
fled including his general Najmuddin Al-Ayubi, the
father of Salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala eventually as
we said Imaduddin will pass away and Nuruddin
assumes the rule in Syria, so Salahuddin rahimahullah
ta'ala is going to grow up in
which city?
In Damascus in Damascus and as he grows
up, to give you the context of Salahuddin
rahimahullah ta'ala the sentiments around him, everything
was anti crusader everything is anti crusader everything
from the culture to the poetry to the
stories and so that's one very important context
to have that he's born in the devastation
of the crusaders and the crusaders have Jerusalem
and he's born in the shadow of Nuruddin
Zangi rahimahullah ta'ala who will become his
greatest mentor, that's number one, number two there's
a defeatist atmosphere that the muslims will not
be able to fight back this monster of
the crusaders and I think about our day
and age, you know you think about the
climates and the different poetry and the different
songs that children are nurtured with and it's
important for them to not just have those
songs and to have that poetry and to
have that connection but to also believe that
that connection will eventually manifest in victory, that
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has promised us
that these songs will not stay in our
ears alone that this poetry will not merely
be recited on our tongues as we are
distant that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will
see us through, so he grows up in
an anti crusader climate but a defeatist climate
as well he also grows up in the
masjid that became a focal point subhanallah in
the last few weeks the umawi masjid, he
grows up in that masjid, that's the masjid
that he memorized the quran in, that's the
masjid that he learned the fiqh of the
imam al-shafi'i in and became a
master of the shafi'i madhab, that is
the masjid that he grew up playing in,
that he grew up practicing his military arts
in salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala grows up as
a student of knowledge, simultaneously he grows up
as a warrior he learns everything from religion
to astronomy, to greek philosophy to diplomacy to
the arts, to everything about military skill and
subhanallah he takes a deep interest to the
legend of nuruddin rahimahullah ta'ala even more
so than his immediate relatives to the legend
of nuruddin as well as the scholars that
are around him, so he loves the ulama
and he grows up in the shade of
the scholars and he praises the scholars, so
he could grow up to either be a
scholar or a warrior or both but he
looks at nuruddin rahimahullah ta'ala as an
absolute hero and nuruddin rahimahullah ta'ala sees
in salahuddin a very special kid and spends
time investing in salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala and
mentoring him as well and so it's only
at the age of 14 that he becomes
an official soldier in the Zengi dynasty directly
under the command of his uncle Asaduddin you'll
notice a lot of uddins, uddins, uddins I'm
sorry, inshallah ta'ala you'll be able to
capture that, so his father is Najmuddin, his
uncle is Asaduddin, his mentor and the leader
is nuruddin, there we go hopefully you all
memorized it by now inshallah ta'ala I
won't take you further than that so he
becomes a commissioned soldier in the Zengi dynasty
under his uncle Asaduddin who in western literature
is also shirkuh and as he grows and
flourishes under him he's quickly ascending ascending the
ranks of the military now by the way,
this is an important point salahuddin rahimahullah ta
'ala in terms of physical stature actually was
not very big he actually didn't have a
dominant physical stature and so it was easy
to overlook him in the ranks of the
military but his haybah his awe inspiring presence
in what he was able to do pushed
him through in ways that he was gaining
the attention of everyone within the ranks of
the military, nuruddin is receiving the reports of
this growth of his his father until he
passes away is seeing salahuddin, his uncle is
seeing him and so eventually the year 1164
comes and salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala is appointed
as a commander of a battalion to engage
egypt egypt is under al-dawla al-fatimiyya
is under the fatimid dynasty, which at that
point is the largest super power in the
muslim world the abbasi khilafah is really a
small khilafah, it's more symbolic than anything else
at that point, so it's the most dominant
force in the muslim world and this is
where subhanallah you start to see the wit
of salahuddin rahimahullah ta'ala salahuddin is a
sunni scholar and warrior, he represents a sunni
dynasty, right and we're talking about a dynasty
that again is further than even mainstream shiaism,
so we're talking about ideologically two different powers
but he's patient salahuddin rahimahullah sees an opportunity
to build from within egypt and so he
goes into egypt and through negotiations, his uncle
becomes a wazir initially, his uncle becomes a
minister under the fatimid dynasty under al-dawla
al-fatimiyya, despite everything that is happening there
and eventually his uncle passes away and salahuddin
rahimahullah ta'ala is appointed as a wazir,
appointed as a minister under the fatimid dynasty
in egypt so there he not only trains
battalions and develops an army he consolidates all
sorts of power, for one he builds universities
and madaris all throughout egypt in the same
mold that nuruddin did in syria so he
starts to build madaris throughout, madaris of hifadh
quran and learning creed and learning jurisprudence and
to grow the scholars he increases, this is
really interesting, but he saw that it was
important to increase the wage of the teachers,
if you want to look at how a
society values education, look at the way that
it pays its teachers and so it tells
you a lot about how islamic scholars can
be valued and how imams can be valued
and how teachers, those that teach your children
can be valued, it's important for a society
to be uplifted in that way and to
have education prioritized and so he increases the
office of the educators, if you will, he
builds these glorious madaris all across, and in
the process he also becomes a noted orator,
so he's giving khutbah in egypt, he's a
general in egypt he's building madaris in egypt
his popularity is growing he survives multiple assassination
attempts subhanallah it's remarkable how many times this
man was almost killed now one time in
egypt he's literally stabbed in his helmet, in
his head and he doesn't die rahimahullah ta
'ala, so he survives multiple assassination attempts because
some people are wary of his power he
slowly starts to change things the adhan was
altered to hayy ala khayr al anam come
to the best of deeds, so he slowly
starts to bring things back to hayy ala
salah hayy ala filah, bringing them back to
the deen, growing with the people, and then
he finds an opportunity, he's still technically paying
allegiance to the fatimid leader within the dynasty
as he gives his khutbah, he makes dua
for him but he finds an opportunity to
suddenly push the boundaries and he omits the
name of the ruler of the fatimids in
his khutbah the leader of the fatimids passes
away salah ad-din rahimahullah ta'ala assumes
a greater role of power as a natural
leader amongst the people he changes the allegiance
in the official sense symbolically to ad-daulah
al-abbasiya to the abbasid khilafah and he
continues to now consolidate his power and I'm
omitting a lot of details because of time
he continues to grow and consolidate his power
throughout the region so the madaris that he
built are systematically upon what he has put
as well as older madaris like al-azhar
is changed to fit a coordinated curriculum that
grows the people in the deen across the
board and again fits the mold of what
nur ad-din rahimahullah put into motion and
so subhanallah you can imagine the religious transformation
of Egypt the psychological transformation of Egypt under
salah ad-din rahimahullah ta'ala he then
secures the hajj routes because remember the crusaders
would attack the hajj routes and even the
fatimids at least under al-hakim they banned
the hajj so he secures the hajj routes
from Egypt and Sudan and this makes him
extremely popular with the people and so he
becomes known as the defender of the hajj
because he secures the route of the pilgrims
he then captures Yemen so if you think
of a mind map of what salah ad
-din is doing he takes Egypt and then
he captures Yemen and by capturing Yemen he
gains control over the ports over the red
sea and by having control over the red
sea he's able to import and export using
the ports and enrich the economy under his
rule in Egypt as well as Yemen and
so his power is quickly growing and by
the way this is all happening within a
matter of three years this isn't taking decades
this is unfolding rapidly now what happens and
subhanallah this is the case of fitna always
that there are efforts to pit salah ad
-din now in Egypt and Yemen against nur
ad-din his teacher in Syria and so
the suspicion is growing, the fitna is growing
and of course the crusaders could want nothing
more than to see these colossal leaders go
at it, nur ad-din and salah ad
-din and just as that fitna is starting
to grow nur ad-din dies a natural
death in the year 1174 by the mercy
of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala without them
ever having actually fought which is an incredible
mercy from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala because
the forces were being put into motion to
pit these two powers against each other and
to have the familiar internal turmoil within the
Muslim world but Allah azawajal spared nur ad
-din from that and spared salah ad-din
of that as well and spared the ummah
as a whole of that as well, in
the process salah ad-din rahim Allah ta
'ala wants to continue to unify the ranks
and so he now takes the Zengid empire
and he absorbs it into the Ayyubid dynasty
if you're looking at it from historical terms
but under his power he now starts to
bring Syria under his power as well, he
takes Damascus he takes Halab and subhanAllah he
does things in a very diplomatic way, at
the end of the day he's trying to
soften the hearts too, so wherever he can
spare bloodshed and consolidating power in the Muslim
world, he does so and so the son
of nur ad-din rahim Allah ta'ala
was too young and quickly passes on and
the widow of nur ad-din is now
technically in charge of the throne and salah
ad-din marries the widow of nur ad
-din and this helps consolidate power as well
so he marries the widow of his teacher
and this helps bring power as well into
his ranks and so he becomes the first
sultan of Egypt and Syria over time subhanAllah
he will gain Syria, Egypt Yemen, the Hijaz
parts of Libya and beyond, so he consolidates
beyond and Iraq as well he's given legitimacy,
in Baghdad he's given legitimacy as well, so
this is a man subhanAllah who consolidates power
and who sees the importance of unifying the
Muslim ummah before you can take on a
monster like the crusaders and that is perhaps
one of the most important lessons in studying
salah ad-din, that even a man as
brilliant and remarkable as him knew that it
was important to solidify everything around as well
that Jerusalem has to be the central focus
but Jerusalem cannot be the exclusive focus of
reformation of restoration of the ummah that it
was important to unify the ranks and solidify
the ranks as he gained focus and he
started to focus the Muslim world on what
was happening in Jerusalem and subhanAllah of his
greatest qualities, this is a remarkably patient man
it took him one decade to do this,
for two years he was operating in Egypt
under a dawla that was completely foreign to
him and within ten years he survives over
twenty assassination attempts and you know when Ibn
Abbas says about the ayah لما صبروا وكانوا
بآياتنا يوقنون that Allah made them imams when
they were patient and when they had certainty
in our ways subhanAllah look at the man's
patience he's always optimistic he's always determined, he's
always resilient, he operates at a pace of
his own where he's not hasty he's very
wise about everything he's doing he's very calculated
about everything he's doing but at the same
time he always sees that important moment where
he can take that next step now you
have to think about the crusader perspective the
Muslims are coming together therefore Jerusalem is at
risk of falling to the Muslims once again,
Nur ad-Din's protege is growing in power
we suddenly can't keep them fractured and you
have to understand that our enemies always want
to weaken us from within through the tactic
of division, the Romans were thrilled with the
wars amongst the sahaba because that gave them
a chance to breathe with everything that was
happening prior to that and here they are
thrilled, the crusaders were thrilled with all the
internal turmoil and dynasties that were at competition
in the Muslim world so that they could
continue to just take more and more and
more and exploit it without finding any real
competition so Amalric Amalric of the crusaders tries
to exploit the division but he dies then
from the crusader side, Baldwin IV who is
a young man with leprosy and who's very
ill, takes charge and because of that, they're
a weakened empire as Baldwin IV assumes charge
Salah ad-Din Rahim Allah Ta'ala sees
that they are weakening and he tries to
take advantage of a moment and subhanallah this
is so important because just as much as
you cover his victory, you have to also
cover the times that he fell short in
the year 1177 Salah ad-Din Rahim Allah
Ta'ala makes an attempt on Jerusalem, he
thinks that he has a pathway to Al
-Quds he takes his path he tries to
stage an attack on Al-Quds to retake
Jerusalem not only is his army defeated but
they're cut off from the back and Salah
ad-Din Rahim Allah Ta'ala is almost
killed in that process and it is just
as important to cover that defeat as it
is to cover the fath that will come
later because even though he was quote unquote
defeated he wasn't deterred and that's actually part
of the point as well, you know when
you think of Salah ad-Din, you think
of alright, guy is born he's just a
master of everything, just goes to the gates
of Jerusalem, says I'm here, read some Quran
and then takes it there's a process here
that's unfolding where he's defeated but he's not
deterred, he's not demoralized, so he goes back
and he rearranges himself continues to try to
consolidate power, and subhanAllah there's a narration that's
even said to him because he's a sultan
and they're thinking about power and territory, look
you have Egypt, you have Syria, you have
Yemen you have the Hijaz how come you're
not smiling, why aren't you content and he
said how could I smile when Bayt al
-Maqdis is under crusader occupation all of this
is irrelevant to me if it doesn't manifest
in the retaking of Jerusalem I'm not doing
this for power I'm doing this so that
we can retake Al-Quds, so that we
can retake Jerusalem and it's even narrated that
some said to him that we saw in
astrology that the astrologers have said that if
you try to retake Jerusalem you'll lose an
eye, he said I'll lose both of my
eyes, I don't care that doesn't matter to
me he's focused on Al-Quds he goes
back, he regroups and he thinks about how
to retake it once again, two years later
April of 1179 Salah ad-Din Rahim Allah
Ta'ala meets one of the largest armies
of the crusaders at the Golan Heights and
he has up to 40,000 men with
him and he defeats the crusaders in the
area of the Golan Heights, the Druze in
the area actually pledge allegiance to him and
so he consolidates power in that area as
well Baldwin, from the crusaders secures a truce
with Salah ad-Din so they go into,
they enter into a two year truce why
would Salah ad-Din enter into a truce
with the crusaders?
because he sees that it's an opportunity to
consolidate more strength and power from the Muslim
world when the time comes again so Salah
ad-Din takes the truce as an opportunity
to continue to unify and bring the Muslim
world under a singular power structure the year
1183 comes, Salah ad-Din Rahim Allah Ta
'ala has everything from Halab to the Hijaz,
Mosul is still an issue for him and
the truce is violated by a man by
the name of Raynald de Chatillon Raynald de
Chatillon this man, subhanallah is one of the
greatest enemies that Islam has ever seen in
its history, the Firaun of his time, truly
if there was to be one is Raynald,
also known as Reginald Raynald de Chatillon if
you look at a map right now and
you were to draw from Damascus all the
way down to Mecca to Al Hajj, you'll
see right in between there is Karak in
Jordan, I'm not talking about the T the
famous city and you have the palace, Raynald
is a crusader general who is situated right
there, and it's right on the route from
Syria to Hajj and despite claims by Baldwin
that he has instructions not to attack the
Muslims on the way to Hajj, he just
can't help himself the man constantly attacks the
Hijaz and attacks the Muslims on their way
from Syria to Al Hijaz, he cannot restrain
himself, he captures them, he kills them, he
steals from them, he does everything the truce
entails that he's not supposed to do, Baldwin
claims that this is Raynald acting on his
own but this causes a disruption in the
truce and then eventually Baldwin seeks another truce
this time with Salahuddin Rahimullah Ta'ala for
four years for four years a four year
truce SubhanAllah how these things start to sound
so relevant to our times Salahuddin Rahimullah Ta
'ala agrees to it, they even have discussions
about how Muslims will be able to visit
Jerusalem and to at least rebuild what has
been destroyed and some security guarantees of Christians
that come into the territories of the Muslims
at that point so there are negotiations that
are ongoing during that time as that happens
Baldwin IV dies Baldwin V his son takes
over as a child ruler, doesn't last long
because he's also a very sickly child his
sister takes the throne and then appoints her
husband Guy of Lusinian as the king of
Jerusalem if you read in the English literature
by the way it's spelled as Guy, his
name is not Guy Guy of Lusinian is
appointed as the king of Jerusalem so there's
a new ruler to deal with a new
power structure to deal with from the Crusaders,
so Salahuddin Rahimullah Ta'ala is upholding the
truce but as we said this man is
an incredibly evil human being and I want
to give you a little bit of context
of this man Reynald de Chatillon and what
he tried to do and how they tried
to psychologically demoralize the Muslims and if you
were a Muslim living at that time what
type of shaking and what type of doubt
could be instilled in your faith?
Al-Aqsa is taken, Reynald says I am
going to take the Kaaba and destroy it
and then I'm going to go and pull
the body and he uses a derogatory word
about our prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam which I
will not repeat but I'll go pull his
body out from Medina and crucify his body
to make a display out of him so
his goal was we took Jerusalem, I also
want to demolish the Kaaba and I want
to steal the body of the prophet Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam Nooruddin Zengi Rahim Allah Ta'ala
when he was still alive he had a
dream of the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam in
Medina looking disturbed and the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam pointed to two men when Nooruddin woke
up he immediately sent to Al-Medina and
he identified the exact looks of those two
men and he said find these two men
and Subhanallah these two same men were crusader
agents that had penetrated into Medina they posed
to be tullab ilm, they posed to be
students of knowledge and they were digging a
tunnel in Al-Medina to the body of
the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam to try to
confiscate the body of the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam and Nooruddin Rahim Allah foiled their plot
this was at the commissioning of Raynal Deshatian,
so Raynal tried to steal the body of
the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam used to regularly
attack the hajjaj wants to flatten the Kaaba
in his own expression, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam hates
this man so within this four year truce
because he can't help himself here they are
again passing through Qara and Raynal attacks the
hajjaj again he kills some of them, he
takes some of them as hostages, he steals
all of their belongings Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam Rahim
Allah Ta'ala in upholding the covenant he
offers an opportunity to distance themselves from what
Raynal has done, give the hostages back, compensate
for all the harm that you've done, Raynal
insists that he's not going to do it,
he insists that this is his right and
he's going to continue to attack the hajjaj
anytime they cross through Qara Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
swears by Allah that he will kill Raynal
by his own hand that Raynal Deshatian will
be killed by his own hand and Subhanallah
go back to the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
Hudaybiyyah was supposed to be a 10 year
truce the Meccans violated Hudaybiyyah which led to
Fath Mecca here Raynal in historical Christian sources
is blamed as the guy that gave up
Jerusalem because it was because of his actions
that Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam basically acted upon the
broken truce and decided to carry forth with
his offense against the crusaders and to retake
Jerusalem, so they they accredit him for the
fall of Jerusalem as Salahuddin Rahim Allah Ta
'ala now had an opening to go into
Jerusalem and to take it back and to
continue the war against the crusaders so Salahuddin
Rahim Allah Ta'ala intercepts Raynal's troops with
a fleet that he sends under Husamuddin and
as this happens this will lead up to
the famous battle of Hattin which is the
gate of Al-Quds, the famous battle of
Al-Hattin Raynal had taken Nablus he'd taken
Beirut he'd taken all sorts of other towns
around and they were basically guarding Jerusalem from
different fronts and so the fights between the
Muslims and the crusaders are in full effect
and as he's entrenching or as the crusaders
are entrenching themselves to guard Jerusalem Salahuddin Rahim
Allah Ta'ala takes a different strategy just
as he patiently unified the Muslim world under
a central power, Salahuddin Rahim Allah Ta'ala
made it a point to capture all the
unsuspecting forts and so he starts to clean
up around Jerusalem so he takes back Haifa
he takes back Beirut he takes back Nablus,
he takes Akka he takes all of these
different places he captures the forts and then
he patiently surrounds the main army the main
fort of the crusaders and in the process
he uses his military genius so like Khalid
Ibn Walid if you read about Khalid his
main tactic was deflection so he creates these
bogeymen these deflections in different places that take
the army by surprise and then he's able
to move in deeper.
He poisons wells along the way he attacks
with small groups of archers these crusader bases
and so imagine when you're trying to sleep
at night but then from far away a
few arrows rain down on you and so
what that does is it creates a paranoia
amongst the crusaders wherever they are that at
any point these archers might rain down upon
us and so they have sleep deprivation they
have all sorts of paranoia and panic amongst
them.
They never know as they're in those areas
where Salahuddin has commissioned some of his men
so he's using small battalions to demoralize and
deprive them of any type of morale that
they're building around Jerusalem, that they're building around
Palestine and then comes the battle of Hattin
now Subhanallah as Salahuddin arrives as we know
the story Subhanallah that Salahuddin is checking the
tents of the Muslims to make sure what?
Not that they are militarily equipped to make
sure that their tents are lit up at
night and that they're praying Qiyam al-layn
and Ibn Shaddad who will talk about his
biographer he mentions that Salahuddin would not miss
a night of tahajjud that this was a
man no matter how busy, no matter how
tired, no matter how engulfed he was in
the battle always found his time to turn
on the lights in his tent and to
pray to Allah at night for victory and
this was one of the most crucial ingredients
of his success so Salahuddin is making sure
that his soldiers are praying and that his
soldiers are ready under the king of Jerusalem
you have 1,300 of the most skilled
knights that will come out to fight the
Muslims their headquarters had been Masjid al-Aqsa
the destroyed Masjid al-Aqsa had been the
headquarters of the knights of the crusaders he
sends his most skilled knights and he sends
15,000 troops Salahuddin amasses an army of
about 20,000 people and they meet for
the battle of Hattin just like the battle
of Badr the use of archery gives the
Muslims a strategic advantage and so as the
battle begins the Muslims rain down so many
arrows that the army cannot advance in any
way to the point that they say that
even an ant would be hit precise with
their arrows striking them and beating them back
as they seek to come forth and they
rain arrows throughout the day and the night
as that's happening Salahuddin is gathering intelligence from
within as to what their weaknesses are.
He comes to find out that they're short
on water they're short on water so what
does he do?
He sees the direction that the wind is
blowing and he sets the grass on fire
and the wind blows the fire onto them
and they don't have water amongst themselves to
put that fire out and so their army
is demoralized on top of that remember the
true cross that the Persians had stolen from
the Christians and that Haraqib had hoisted on
his back and put back in the sepulcher
and was guaranteed safety by Umar al-Khattab
radiAllahu ta'ala anhu they came carrying that
true cross because they thought that if they
carried the true cross they could not lose
Salahuddin rahim Allah ta'ala was able to
acquire the true cross from them and this
completely psychologically demoralized the Crusaders because they knew
that they were done at this point and
so the Muslims would come back to Salahuddin
rahim Allah ta'ala and they would say
al-Nasr we won he would say not
yet and he would say until you've captured
every single battalion and until you've struck at
the tent we've won we've won we've won
and he made sure that they had complete
victory and then he came down and he
did sajda to shukr rahim Allah ta'ala
and it was at this point by the
way that Raynald the Shatian Salahuddin rahim Allah
ta'ala would kill him with his own
hands as he had promised as he intercepted
him before the fall of Jerusalem and as
I said I'm skipping a lot because I
want to focus on the lessons the 20th
of Rajab and you can look at the
date right now on your phone by the
way the 20th of Rajab which correlates to
the 2nd of October 1187 Salahuddin rahim Allah
ta'ala begins his front on Jerusalem and
he lays siege for 6 days and then
it would be on the 27th of Rajab
that he would enter into Al-Quds and
if you remember when we covered al-Isra'
ul-Mi'raj that is the date that
many scholars hold would have been the night
of al-Isra' ul-Mi'raj the night
that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam led all
of the Prophets the Anbiya in prayer on
that miraculous journey and as Salahuddin rahim Allah
ta'ala enters into Jerusalem you can imagine
the emotions of the Muslims that have been
subjected to all sorts of horrific crimes before
that point, you can imagine the spirit of
rightful vengeance these people beat our children against
walls, grilled them and ate them off of
skewers these people exploited and violated our women
in the worst of ways these people burnt
down Masjid Al-Aqsa desecrated everything that was
holy to us in Jerusalem and we've been
banned, there was no Adhan in Al-Aqsa
for almost 90 years can you imagine almost
an entire century so when you tell me
Palestine is over the Qadiyah is over, it's
not over almost 90 years not an Adhan
in Masjid Al-Aqsa but Salahuddin rahim Allah
ta'ala lives up to his legendary name
Yusuf and he offers terms to the Crusaders,
he offers safe passage women shaved their heads
and desecrated themselves because they were afraid that
the Muslims would do to them what the
Crusaders did to the women of the Muslims,
we're not like them, we can't be like
them, people protected their wealth that they thought
would be looted Salahuddin rahim Allah ta'ala
offers safe passage and safety and on top
of that as they desecrated our sites, he
restored their sites and guaranteed their places of
worship just as Umar rahim Allah ta'ala
when he entered into Jerusalem now as the
time goes on, I want you to imagine
the emotion then when he brings forth the
Minbar that was built by Nuruddin rahim Allah
ta'ala and installs that Minbar in Masjid
Al-Aqsa, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
protect it, Allahumma ameen and I also want
you to appreciate that this war did not
stop Salahuddin showed every form of Ihsan that
you could possibly show, but you know what
the Crusaders launched the third Crusade and they
came back and Salahuddin rahim Allah ta'ala
stayed the course and he kept on protecting
it and this is important that you don't
get caught up in a moment of euphoria
and victory and think that it's all over
because it's often then when you put your
guard down that you're struck Salahuddin rahim Allah
ta'ala guarded the fort, the Crusaders gathered
some of the largest armies up to 600
,000 some historians even say under Frederick up
to a million soldiers to come and fight
and to retake Jerusalem Frederick drowned Salahuddin rahim
Allah ta'ala rose and he continued to
protect and yes at times he lost some
of the towns around Al-Aqsa he lost
some of the towns around Jerusalem but he
continued to guard the forts of the Muslims
and it was Richard who said that as
long as Salahuddin is in Jerusalem it will
never be taken and indeed it was not
taken while Salahuddin rahim Allah ta'ala was
amongst us as we come to his death
I want to mention the man the name
of the man who chronicled his life up
close and personal you keep hearing me say
Ibn Shaddad and this man his name was
Bahauddin Ibn Tamim from Mosul in Iraq, he
was a scholar he was a wise man,
he was a poet a qadi and the
reason why he's called Ibn Shaddad is because
his maternal uncles are from Banu Shaddad and
he was raised amongst them so his famous
nickname is Ibn Shaddad and there are other
Ibn Shaddad's in history and he gained such
prominence chronicling the Muslim world that Salahuddin rahim
Allah summoned him from Hajj to come to
him and then Salahuddin rahim Allah took him
as a close confidant and a close friend
and ultimately he became one of Salahuddin's closest
generals and field commanders but also his biographer
writing about some of the things that were
happening behind the scenes with Salahuddin he says
I swear by Allah that Salahuddin did not
miss Salah in congregation even in the battlefield
in his tent that he established his Salah
in congregation and that when the nights would
become darkest and the people would retreat to
their beds, Salahuddin rahim Allah would retreat to
his Qiyam even in the fiercest of battles
this is a man who lived in the
battlefield who never had a moment of respite
and always turned back to Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala and I want you to think
about this he never actually reaches the threshold
of Zakah because he would spend what came
to him and so he doesn't steal the
money of the Muslims which was common as
leaders would enrich themselves on the backs of
the Muslims Salahuddin's goodwill to the Muslims was
evident in the way that he carried out
his life and one of the most shocking
things that I always think about the man
never made Hajj Salahuddin never had the opportunity
to do Hajj his whole life was spent
in battle he never got a break to
even go and to do Hajj but look
at the status that Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala has given to him amongst the Muslims
he says that I remember times that it
would be three days and he wouldn't have
a morsel of food in his body a
true warrior in the battlefield with his people
three days he wouldn't have a morsel of
food in his body and he would often
bemoan the lack of response from the rest
of the Muslims and he would wonder when
would the Ummah wake up and meet the
challenge, rise to the great challenge that they
had and he didn't want to be seen
as the singular saviour of the Muslim world
but he wanted to see the Muslim world
as saving itself by attaching itself to Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala and what Allah azawajal
had made sacred Ibn Shaddad recounts these moments
sitting with Salahuddin in Asqalan the shores of
Gaza and Salahuddin looking out at the water
and talking about his desire to spread Islam
throughout the world and hoping that the Muslims
would continue on his legacy and hoping that
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala would give him
the ability to spread Islam far beyond what
he had done in those moments that he
had and then Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
tested him with a fever he's back in
Syria in Damascus and for two weeks this
intense fever takes him over and he's only
55 or 56 years old but it becomes
clear that the greatest general perhaps in the
history of Islam after Khalid Ibn Walid was
going to die in his bed the same
way that Khalid Ibn Walid died in his
bed despite surviving 20 assassination attempts despite living
in the battlefield like Khalid radiallahu anhu pulled
up his sleeves and showed his body to
his companions and said every single part of
me is struck how is it that I'm
dying in a bed Salahuddin mahimullah ta'ala
would die in his bed and the Qur
'an reciter would continue to recite by him
and he would as he started to phase
into an unconscious state he would react to
certain ayat of the Qur'an as the
reciter came to that there has come
a messenger amongst you that there has come
a messenger amongst you he cares so deeply
about you it greatly pains him what pains
you he is compassionate over you Salahuddin mahimullah
ta'ala would nod he would say you've
told the truth and then when we came
to Salahuddin mahimullah ta'ala suddenly started to
engage intensely with those ayat repeating after the
reciter his face
beamed as he took his last breaths affirming
that Allah azawajal is the king of all
kings and affirming his tawheed and he breathes
his last at the age of 56 years
old in his bed in Damascus to be
buried right next to the masjid that he
grew up in masjid al umawi when he
passes away people could not believe that he
passed away there is a mythology that was
developing around him how could Salahuddin die rahimahullah
ta'ala as often happens with great men
and the reciters had to remind the people
in the streets of Damascus that were wailing
in tears and in disbelief and wanted to
see his body for themselves the same ayah
that was recited when the prophet salallahu alayhi
wa sallam died that Muhammad salallahu alayhi wa
sallam is but a messenger and messengers have
come and gone before him and when he
passes away they look into his estate and
they found that he only possessed 47 dirhams
of silver one dinar of gold which wasn't
enough to even pay for his janazah greatest
leader of the Muslim world that we know
couldn't even pay for his own janazah at
the time of his death and it had
to be taken from his family the streets
flooded as they came out for the janazah
of Salahuddin rahimuhullah ta'ala and it's narrated
that the people said at his grave site,
oh Allah as his final victory as you
opened for him the doors of Jerusalem opened
for him the doors of Jannah Allahumma kama
fatahta lahu abwaba bayt al maqdis faftah lahu
abwaba al jannah oh Allah as you opened
for him the doors of Jerusalem opened for
him the gates of Jannah something along the
effect to say that he was granted victory
here and he did his job here so
grant him oh Allah what you have promised
him there and they buried next to him
in his grave what?
his sword and they said to him you
will lean on this into Jannah use this
as you enter into Jannah born in his
mother's tummy as a sword and buried with
the sword right next to him where he
was the great defender of the Muslims and
he was buried next to who?
Nooruddin Zengi rahimuhullah ta'ala I want to
end with this thought my father was sharing
this with me subhanAllah and I looked it
up that the French colonialist Henri Gouraud Henri
Gouraud in the French mandate of Syria in
the year 1920 famously walks up to the
grave of Salahuddin rahimuhullah and he kicks it
and he says wake up Salahuddin I'm here
wake up Salahuddin I'm here the taunting of
the Muslim world the taunting of our heroes
it's not the first and the last time
that we will see it and they will
seek to provoke and incite and awaken the
sentiments of the ummah and in the poetry
of my mother may Allah have mercy on
her with the addition and with the consultation
of my father may Allah Subh'anaHu Wa
Ta-A'la preserve him that as the
Bosnians were being genocided by the Serbs Oh
Salahuddin stand up because the journey is not
over the Serbs and in this case the
Zionists have filled the earth with corruption and
so who will stand and avenge their crimes
the invoking of the name of Salahuddin is
not the invoking of a god, it's not
the invoking of a saint, it's not calling
upon a mere mortal to stand up it's
the invoking of our own generations to say
that who exists amongst us that will take
up that call with the same passion that
he had rahimuhullah Ta-A'la and through
that passion and sincerity be granted incredible tawfiq
from Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la
incredible success miraculous victory from Allah Subh'anaHu
Wa Ta-A'la and miraculous victory does
not come except through sincere exertion Salahuddin is
not someone who woke up and had Jerusalem
handed to him, he's not someone who woke
up and had greatness handed to him work's
work and so as we celebrate these moments
of respite for the people of Gaza and
the people of Palestine we ask Allah Subh
'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la that just as
he rose from this Ummah Salahuddin that he
rise from amongst us the likes of Salahuddin
and that he include us amongst the likes
of Nuruddin and Salahuddin the righteous mothers that
carried the Salahuddins the righteous men and women
on the front lines the righteous scholars that
taught in the Masajid the righteous Hufadh of
Quran that passed on the torch of this
Deen, may Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A
'la count us amongst them, Allahumma Ameen BarakAllahu
Fikum, Assalamu Alaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh