Omar Suleiman – Why Me #17 I Didn’t Mean To Hurt You
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss the importance of protecting oneself from anger and envy and forgiveness in the here after. They stress the benefits of not letting anyone dominate one's life and the reward of forgiveness. The speakers also emphasize the importance of hesitation and self-help in addressing past mistakes and future mistakes, and suggest that forgiveness is a key factor in avoiding harmed memories.
AI: Summary ©
What if you were the one who wronged
them?
Perspective helps you grow and realize how you
could have been better.
When you begin to reflect on yourself,
you might see you were the one wronging
where you once thought you were being wronged.
Or that you were the oppressor where you
once thought you were oppressed.
In all those moments where you thought you
were the victim,
you may find that you were in fact
the aggressor.
These flashes of insight are a gift from
Allah who guided you to realize your wrongs.
There's a powerful hadith of the prophet Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam where he mentions 3 men that
get stuck in a cave.
And at the entrance of that cave, there's
this huge boulder.
And all 3 of them say to each
other, let's make dua to Allah with the
deed that we did sincerely for his sake
in hopes that he'll remove the boulder.
Now I want you to pay attention
to the second man who makes dua and
what exactly he says.
He says, Allahumma
inna kanatili
bintuaman ahababtuhakaashaddimayuhibburrijalunisa.
Oh Allah, I had a cousin of mine
that I fell in love with and I
loved her
deeper than any man could love any woman.
Fatalabtuminha
fa'abat.
And then I asked her to be with
me and she refused.
And then she goes into deep debt
and he says I manipulated her taking advantage
of her desperation and telling her, look I'll
give you a 100 dinars if you do
what I want you to do.
So she agreed in her desperation.
So he says, Falama waqa'tubayna
rajlaihaqalatyaabdullahittakillah
wala taftahilqhatama
illa bihaqqihi.
Just as I was about to commit that
deed and I had her exactly where I
wanted her, at that moment she shouts out
and says, O slave of Allah, fear
Allah and do not break a seal that
he hasn't given you permission to.
So he says, I got up and I
ran away.
And he says, oh Allah
if I did that for your sake alone,
please remove this boulder.
And Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala allowed it to
move further.
Now
SubhanAllah compare how trapped he felt in that
moment in the cave
to how trapped she felt that night by
him.
But he woke up and that changed the
course of his divine decree and it definitely
altered hers as well. But we just don't
know how.
We often don't see life through the other
person's eyes,
and we definitely don't see how our significant
encounters may have significantly changed the course of
their lives.
Just like people are a test for us,
we too can be a test for people.
And as our lives unfold, we worry so
much about the harm that comes to us
through other people's spiritual diseases.
How do I protect myself from someone else's
anger, someone else's envy, someone else's hypocrisy?
But the companions were far more worried about
their own anger and envy and potential hypocrisy.
Because to harm someone here is to harm
yourself in the hereafter,
Whereas to endure someone's harm here is reward
in the hereafter.
And I'd rather the physical cost of bearing
someone else's issues
than the spiritual cost of causing someone pain.
That's why the prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said,
Be the slave of Allah that is murdered,
not the one who murders.
In essence, be the slave of Allah who
is wronged, not the one that wrongs others.
And this is part of what Imam Hasan
al Basri Rahimahullah meant when he said that
the eye of the hypocrite always looks outwards,
whereas the eye of the believer always looks
inwards.
Allah describes the hypocrites with a trait.
Yasaboonakullasayhatan
alayhim. They feel like every shout is against
them, meaning they're insecure. And if anyone says
anything, even if it has nothing to do
with them, they take it as a personal
shot and then use that to justify their
own aggression against others.
The believers on the other hand, not only
do they excuse
people who are obviously offending
them, they watch even the tone of their
own voice to make sure that they're not
being offensive. Inna'ankaral
aswati lasaltulhamid
The worst voice is the one that is
like the brain of a donkey.
At the end of the day, every relationship
is going to show up on the day
of judgment.
And if we're accustomed to always making ourselves
out to be the victim,
we may become blind to the harm that
we have caused.
And it takes deep introspection to look at
yourself and what you have done out of
fear of that showing up on the day
of judgment.
Otherwise, you're always just the Musa of your
own story.
But is the other person really the fir'awn
that you made them out to be? You
see rarely in a conflict is either side
a 100%
right. And if they were 70% wrong and
you were 30% wrong,
own the 30 and seek the reward for
the 70 because Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says,
famanaafa wa aslaha fa'adruhu a'All Allah. So whoever
forgives and pardons then his ajr is on
Allah. Meaning on the day of judgment, Allah
has a heavy reward for him. But for
the one who used to not see their
own wrongdoings towards the people,
they might end up bankrupt on the day
of judgment because all of those small transgressions
add up and they become a a heavy
burden at the
scale.
While few people are gifted to realize they
were in the wrong,
even fewer people are gifted with the ability
to put their head down and admit that
they were wrong,
especially if it's towards the people who they
think provoked them or instigated their conflict in
the first place.
But wahbibnu munabbir Rahimohullah says the righteous inclined
towards 3 qualities.
Number 1, sakha'utun
nafs, having a generous soul.
Number 2, asabraalal
adha, to be patient despite being harmed.
Number 3, having fa'yibal kalam, pleasant speech.
And when you do that, you don't just
get the reward in the hereafter.
Allah says that sometimes you get the reward
in this world as well.
Itfaabilatihaaasam
faidalaladi bayna kawabeinahu a'drawatun kAnahuwaliyunhamim.
Respond to that which is evil
with that which is better.
Then the one you previously had animosity with
may end up becoming a loving front.
And if you've harmed people in the past
that have now passed away
let your redemption be in the people that
Allah will continue to put in your way.
How many enemies of the prophet SallAllahu Alaihi
Wasallam repented after literally killing companions?
But they took that regret and turned it
into legacies of redemption.
Wahshi who killed Hamzah radiAllahu ta'ala Anhu with
a spear could never bring Hamzah back. But
he used that spear against the enemy of
Allah Musalima.
Sa'id bin aam radiAllahu Anhu who was present
at the crucifixion of Khubayb radiAllahu Anhu. He
couldn't take back being present in that great
injustice
but he established justice in entire nations based
upon the guilt that he carried for the
death of that one individual in Khubaib.
And at every moment where we become heedless
with ourselves
we risk still doing things that hurt others.
Whether it's something as small as a rude
gesture
batanal
them. Tashawwufuq
ilaama batanafiqaminalayyobi
khairun min tashawwufuq
ilaama khujiba'ankaminal
ghayyub.
Your being on the lookout for the vices
hidden within you
is far better than your being on the
lookout for the invisible realities that have been
veiled from you.
Self accountability breeds healthy regret over the way
we may have treated people in our past,
and humility with how we treat people in
the future.
Humility keeps you from oppressing others and yourself,
and raises your rank in the sight of
Allah.
Allah tested you through people, and He tested
people through you.
But the more you seek to be the
blessing that He sends to others,
the more he starts to send you people
to be a blessing to you.
You might even be the one you've been
so desperately waiting for.