Rania Awaad – Inclusion & Support in Our Community
AI: Summary ©
The speaker discusses the importance of learning the rules of Islam to see if there is a way to change, as it interacts with the Prophet's words and behavior. They also discuss the history of Islam, including the rise of Islam in Afghanistan and the emergence of Islam in Pakistan, and the importance of finding a way to deal with people with disabilities. The speakers emphasize the need for personalization and humility in choosing the right person to pray with, as well as the importance of helping people with special needs and donating to TMC.
AI: Summary ©
So now I'm on a coma Rahmatullahi Veta Catullo
I know it's late mashallah, is this like normal Florida time people are doing Holika
Allah bless you Oh Hamza de la,
de la. It's wonderful to be here with all of you and hands it into.
And so this particular talk, I was asked to really talk about the society of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and how it is that he dealt with kind of all abilities. So we'll go ahead and start formally Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim was Allahu Allah say the name Muhammad wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa salam Etchmiadzin
Subhan Allah, this talk for me is very near and dear to my heart. As somebody who as a parent of children with different abilities, masha Allah, some of whom are what you would call normal, typical, neurotypical, and also a child who isn't SubhanAllah. And so there is really all different forms of abilities when you think about what that means. And it's not just as we talked about earlier today, limited to mental health, but also physical health, emotional health, cognitive health, there's all different kinds of aspects upon Oman.
And so I want to take a moment and first think about
the society of the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasallam. So often, so often, we talk about how we wish that we were part of that Medina in society, we think about with a lot of beautiful kind of memories and thought, what could that have been like sitting with the Prophet sallallahu, ala he was sending him his companions, the men and the woman, and what did they experience having the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam in their midst.
Now, a lot of times, modern Muslims will do what we call kind of rose color.
History, as in the sale vacant, very rose colored, or even, we might say, romanticize the history a little bit. And what's so interesting to me, when I came to this realization, and it was kind of an interesting realization, it was not an immediate realization, but it's a realization that
but if Allah subhanaw taala, think about it with me, if Allah subhanaw taala wanted to send out his message,
he could absolutely have sent down the message without a human being. Right? We have the unwashed for example, the tablets, right? He could have sent on the put it on as a book to humanity and said, Here's my message. But he gave us a living, put it on, write a human being in the flesh, the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam to live the Quran, literally. But the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is the most perfect of all humans, Clady, Hunkeler. Right, the most perfect of all human beings. And so he's not going to himself, do wrong.
And so what do you have, in addition to the book, and in addition to the Prophet, you have also companions, you have literally men and women around the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wasallam. To do what? To be human, to bring to life, all of the things that come up the good and the bad. Why?
Because think about it, you have the Prophet sallallahu wasallam was commanded to do what
commanded to do a
enjoined the good and forbid the bad, right? He has to he has to it is literally commandment, that if he sees wrong happening in front of him, what does he have to do? He has to correct it. He has to say something, he has to do something he can't just see wrong happening in front of him, he has to enjoy the good and forbid the evil. And so you have the Companions, men and women around the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi, wasallam, who are being human, right, they're going to do all of the things that humans do good and bad.
And people don't think about this, but in the Medina and society.
All human errors and all human sins.
Big and small happen in that Medina in society.
This is the part that we don't normally talk about. In Sita, we normally hear the beautiful stories. We don't necessarily hear about sometimes where there were trouble, difficulties.
And I think that's really important because at the end of the day, that's a hobby. It's a hobby to where the perfect were the best, excuse me, were the best of all humans, right? Like the Hadith says, the best of you. Right is the generation, my generation with his time SallAllahu Sallam and the generation after them and the generation after them. They are the best,
but they are still human.
And the reason that's important is because you have the profit within them, that in order for him to enjoy the good and forbid the evil. He has
to say something about if there was wrong that happens. So how are we going to learn the rules of Allah subhanaw taala unless sometimes people goof up.
And this is very important. Whatever you tell me, lying, stealing, cheating, big things, fornication, adultery,
using alcohol, using interest, whatever you say, from the Cabal, or the Salah, and from the big sins or little sins, they actually happened at the time of the Prophet sallallahu to send them in that Medina and society when people have a hard time when we say this, but it's true. And do you know why? This there's there's a purpose behind this, so that we can see the way the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam interacts with his community.
We can see when he's being strict and saying, This is not right. But also even in saying that there's a gentleness, there is an empathy. There is a way of getting down to the level of that person and helping them through this. And even when the companions are having a hard time
because again, they're human. They have their own levels of discrimination.
They're humans, they have their own level of, we don't want this person in our Masjid. We saw him drinking. We don't want him here.
Did you know that there was a companion of the prophets, Allah Sahabi. who drink
people have a hard time with us.
And yet, even though he was addicted to alcohol, he would still come to the masjid and pray in the masjid of the Prophet sallallahu. I do send them. The other companions are bothered by this. They didn't like the fact that he came, knowing that he drink sometimes seeing him drunk.
Do you know what the prophets a little audio sent him said?
Very nice, excellent.
He's said don't remove him from the prayer lines.
His prayer will eventually stop him.
It's Panama. I asked you sisters and brothers. If we have somebody who coming today, into those doors right here. What looks a little tipsy.
What would we do?
See when we talk about the Medina and society, and we want to talk about the society that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam created, he created a society in which there was room for everybody despite their differences and deficiencies. And as long as you were a work in progress, there was a wanting to change, there was a hope for redemption and change. You were welcomed into our Muslim community.
This is a hard lesson for so many people. Because sometimes, if you look different, if you act different, if you are different in some way, you have a really hard time being part of our masajid not this one, I sorry, this is my first day here. May Allah bless this community. I don't know anything about it will bless you all, that are all speaking about this semester. I'm saying in general, in generalities. But I'm talking about comparing this to the prophets, society, where there were people who were different. Remember, every single one of those Sahaba, every single one of them was a convert.
Every single one of them until later people were born into Islam. Every single one of them converted, they had a life before Islam. And they did things before Islam. Right. And they had to repent and change and Islam also came in stages. Right? And so they changed along with that. Why am I bringing all of this up? I say this all to you. Subhanallah is because when we talk about people have this romantic idea of romanticized idea of a Medina and society I say to them, are you ready to have differences in your community? Are you ready to accept people who are a work in progress? Who don't maybe fully look like you and cover like you who don't fully pray yet, like you who maybe be
doing stuff? Who that's not quite Islamic just yet, but want to change and want to actually come to this community into Islam? Are we ready to accept people who look different than us and act different than us? And maybe there is a medical condition in place as well.
We had a whole discussion right before this right on mental health. Many of you were here Subhan Allah. And what we didn't talk about is different abilities. Right? differently abled.
Children, men and women SubhanAllah. Disability is also something that showed up in the society of the prophets.
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and people asked me this all the time they say you do mental health research, have you come across something like autism, like anything on the spectrum? And I say subhanallah I haven't come across this specifically. But knowing what we know, medically speaking, the likelihood that there were definitely people who are likely on the spectrum at the time of the Prophet Salado sentiment in the generations that follow is very high. In fact, subhanAllah it's so interesting. Sometimes you read the biographies. Remember, I was telling about the books and books I was reading, to figure out about mental health history. Sometimes in the biographies of the scholars
of the greats. You find these like amazing abilities people have.
Like it says that mmm and no will we for example, wrote more pages for wrote more pages than is humanly possible for the number of years he lived. And he said that he was ambidextrous, meaning that he could write with his right hand and his left hand and sometimes you'd be writing at the same time.
Right or that if his eye fell on a page, his right eye would see what his left eye they would read two different pages. Allahu, Allahu Allah, right. It's in the biography, who knows SubhanAllah. But the fact is what he produced and what he left behind in a very short number of years, he died very young. In the short number of years he lived, certainly you would say this is somebody who either had to cut them out somebody who had a legate blessings and Budha in his time and his efforts. Or it could be that well, we would call maybe today, and I don't know this. So I'm just saying, in general, the potential of some of the scholars some of scholars to have such an astute, astute,
high, high, high, high, high level of IQ, that you might say, this is like an Asperger's type of a condition. So Pamela, we don't know. There are other Subhanallah scholars in the biographies you read, like geniuses, like literal geniuses, and what they were able to produce, yet in their social life. They would kind of stay locked behind doors and not want to interact with other human beings and have a lot of social anxiety. And this is written about them in their biographies.
So even if we didn't have the names of diagnoses, we know that such people Subhanallah existed in Islamic societies. And not only that, but many of them. Were honored. They were honored. We were like, wow, look at this person. They're worthy of Allah subhanaw taala. Allah has given them an amazing gift. They weren't stigmatized and chastised or like, ostracized and moved aside. Does that make sense? Why am I mentioning this? Because Subhan Allah, when we look at the even if you go back to the generation of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, even if you look back in the time where he himself lived, salaam Allahu alayhi wa sallam, and you take a closer look at the Medina and
society without those rose colored glasses that I was telling you about. Subhanallah what you find with the prophesy centum in their midst, is you're going to find people Subhanallah with disabilities,
who are differently abled. And the people remember who were the people of Medina? They are Sahaba and Sahaba yet yet they're humans and we have proof that even they did not treat always all the people that look different or acted differently right? And this is where the prophets of Allah Saddam came to teach to change literally change how the entire fabric of society
loose I mean it's it's amazing. Sometimes we talk about this of like, thinking you know, they no longer would bury the girl the girl daughters, right? This concept, right? We know people talk about this often Oh, he came to a little audio send him and he changed the fact that the girls were buried alive. But you know what else he changed? He changed the way people dealt with people with disabilities. Did you know this? Let me give you some examples Subhan Allah
There's a very famous companion when I say his name, all of you are going to know who he is when I see the name Abdullah ibn mistero and what comes to mind What do you know about the Livid Mossad
good so we have a couple of things. Let me hear from the side what do we know about Abdullah bin masala
so we have to see Hadith This is quite an okay, what is he most known for? He was known for the one of the best most relied upon interpreters of the Quran.
interpreters have seen right professor of the Quran and told me Do you know what he looked like? Physically?
Ah, you're saying to me skinny. What about that?
Someone said someone said like a
someone short in stature. And so this is interesting. How do we know the story? One time I'll go live in Minnesota climbed a tree. He was climbing a tree and the other companion Sahaba listened to me. They're not just people. We talked about people. No, no, these are Sahaba we just said the best of people the best of generations. He went up the tree
Some of the Sahaba loft
why were they laughing? Does anyone know?
His legs were really thin. People are going like this.
Sorry, this is like a very Arab thing
bless you. Yes, yes, his legs were very skinny or thin instant and it was short in stature. So what it means is, if physically speaking, he was not the same, proportionally, right? Something about his legs were short and different looking to where the Companions as I saw him go up the tree, they laughed. Humans, human beings do things. What did the Prophet sallallahu said? It's the Prophet witnessed this. And he said to them, what makes you laugh? Remember, the prophet has to do what he has to enjoin the good, and he has to forbid the wrong. So but look at how the way he teaches he didn't go to them. It's like, what um
what did he do?
He asked the question. He said, What makes you laugh?
And so they said to him,
I think the way his legs look, he says,
I'll deliver and Mr. Owens legs are weightier on the scale.
Then, does anyone know the rest of the Hadith, then the mountains of odd
Subhan Allah.
And this idea that not only to the prophets of the life that I'm not want people to learn from the story, not to laugh, not to mock others, but especially when it comes to a physical disability. He reminded us that men and women are not defined by their disabilities, that they are defined by their actions, their contributions to society. So he says, if you just take off the lip and Mr. Woods legs, and you put them on the scale with Allah subhanaw taala, they will weigh more than all of us.
Do you see what I'm saying? So he's literally reframing. This is what we call in psychology. We call this a cognitive reframing. You literally cognitively reframe the way you're seeing something, you see something here that maybe looks funny, but he's reframing this and saying, actually, with Allah subhanaw taala This is the reality that Allah sees, not what you're seeing.
And teaching us to be very careful. There's another companion of the Prophet sallallahu wasallam. If I say to you the name
Julie B.
Do you know this name? Oh, good. Some of you really know this name. Tell me about your lady.
Tell me about him.
So something about short and stature. What else?
Something about what is it? He was not good looking? Okay, okay. So something something about his structure was also now quite what we call proportionate to you. Okay, what else about your baby? That's physically speaking, what about him?
Poor
So, in the time of genitalia, before Islam, the people of Kadesh shunned July beep, because of the way he looked, he looked different. And again, people when they look different, or something's different about them, again, remember we talked about how with people fear the unknown. They're like, we don't know. We don't know what's going on here. So we are going to shun you. Right? ignore you, ostracize you. Yet when Islam came, the Prophet himself sallallahu alayhi wa sallam befriended to lay them. And people thought this was so interesting. And here's a friendship between this man in between the prophets, Allah, Allahu Allah, he was,
and he loved him so much. He loved him so much, that he literally said just one day, this man is for me, and I am from him. Can you imagine like how weighty it is, this is not just, you know, this is not just like the the king or the prince Allah. This is the Prophet himself SallAllahu Sallam saying this. So can you imagine the other competitors, what they're thinking? They're thinking how literally, the Prophet is saying, This man is from me, and I am from him. And that's how close he is to him.
Which means that the prophets, Eliza Anna was doing what we call a cultural change, not the culture of Arabia, not the culture of Kadesh, but a cultural change of the minds of the hearts. This is something so amazing, but even the non Muslims when they write about the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam. Even if they don't believe in his prophecy, receiving divine revelation, there are things about him that they can't
deny. The fact that he was able to change literally changed the culture of an entire society.
Think about this people in pre Islamic, generally a times they would isolate people who looked different or had any sort of disability, right? They would often not be able to have normal lives, get married, have a business right kind of interact with normal society. So if somebody had a child or a family member that looked like this, they were essentially locked away, kind of kind of closed off.
And before Islam in Medina, so now think about Medina. So the Muslims come from Mecca, they come to Medina, they emigrate there, they're going to set up, right the medina in society. And when they go there, they find that there are some people like all humans, there are some who are going to be visually impaired, others who are going to have physical disabilities, others who might have mental disabilities, you have cognitive disabilities. And here comes the Prophet sallallahu wasallam saying to them, everybody's going to be paired. Right? Everyone's going to be paired. And not only is everyone going to be paired, but these are now your brothers in faith. These are not your sisters in
the deen.
Literally, the bonds of sisterhood and brotherhood even with those who have disability, you following me?
And then Allah subhanaw taala says,
and tells us in the put on,
lay silent. Mahajan, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah and Maria, the Raj.
Here in this verse, it says, There is no restriction on the blind, or on the disabled, nor on the sick. Does anyone know what this verse is talking about?
What is it referring to? What is the context suburb in New Zealand? What is the reason it's revealed?
There is nothing stopping people from living the life they need to live in order to worship Allah like, a lot of not stopping them from letting them worship.
You just giving them something that he's testing them with, because you might be beautiful. This particular verse is in the context, someone said it earlier.
Yes, yes. What is this? Told me?
Yes, say it louder.
You got it.
To eat from the homes of
those who look different than yourself. This is so interesting. In Premiere in Premiere in pre Islamic society, the people who looked different, like I said, people were essentially like disgusted from them, they wouldn't sit with them, they wouldn't eat with them, they wouldn't marry from them, they wouldn't have business with them. And here comes the Prophet sallallahu Sallam making them brothers and sisters. And in addition, you have put an antic revelation, that's literally saying, it is not in their hands, that they have a disability. It's not their fault that they are blind, it is not on them, that they have a physical disability, it is not on them that they
are sick. And then it says that they can eat from what you eat, and you can eat from what they eat.
In the verses of the Quran.
So when we talk about a complete change of a society, here you have from the seven heavens message for from God himself saying, This is not in their hands, and
you are going to share meals with everybody who was part of this Muslim society.
Because you could say, Okay, fine, they're part of our society. They can have a house over here and my house is over here. But I don't need to interact. No, no, no, no, you're going to not just be brothers and sisters, you're going to share me. You can and we'll be able to eat with each other. Do you see what I'm saying? Breaking bread is a completely different thing than just having a neighbor, let's say,
what is this cultural change in the time of war? Someone said earlier, more happened? And you're absolutely right. This is the general context in which this is happening. When they would go off to the battles they have to leave behind their homes. Their homes have inside of them, what? Their wealth, their goods, their stuff, yes.
Who can't go to war?
Who is it not? The is saying it's not on them that are blind, that they're sick, that they're disabled. Right, somebody that has an excuse essentially not to go to war.
So guess what?
You know what the Prophet SAW I sent him instituted that the keys to the houses of the people that would go to war, who would they leave the keys with?
Subhan Allah literally a cultural shift and change. So now this is what sorry the minimal say upset it says. What says that the when the Muslims will go on there
expeditions, anybody who is considered exempt to not go because of chronic illness of some sort, that literally when Allah says Allah subhanaw taala says, the keys to the doors, it's talking about,
they would be entrusted with the keys to the houses of the others who are going and the food inside of it. The wealth inside of it also became entrusted with them as well. So you went from people who are locked behind closed doors, nobody wants to interact with them. Nobody's talking to them, wanting to marry them wanting to have business with them anything, literally to become the people you trust with your very wealth. Can you imagine talk about a complete shift of not only a cognitive change, but a cultural change completely sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and so what do you think about this? One of my favorite Hadith soprano one of my absolute favorite, we were going in the drama
foundation Holic I was telling you on Friday nights, we go through different books over time, and one of them that we went through like last year, we cover the entire Shema and in mohammedia, the Shemitah and mohammedia is a book by them. It's a movie it's a collection of a hadith 400 and some Hadith by the mammoth timidity, he collected them, and they're all descriptions of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam physical descriptions, but also the way he interacts the way he lived his life and so on and so forth. Beautiful book, you should definitely have a copy and shall if you don't, you learn so much about the Prophet sallallahu wasallam. And for the sisters, here we have
the whole I think I did this in like 40 sessions or something, the whole thing is recorded in sha Allah, you're welcome to listen if you'd like in sha Allah kind of going through each of the Hadith. Anyhow, the one of the Hadith that I absolutely love is a Hadith in which the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa send them the Hadith it goes like this. One day, the Prophet sallallahu wasallam was walking, and a woman came to him and asked him a question, which if I just stop there, that's pretty amazing.
Because people say, what was it like for women during the time of the Prophet sallallahu audio sunnah? And from what we know from the narrations,
the woman came to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and they asked their questions. Now this particular woman, this is so beautiful in the Hashi, which is basically the explanations. It's not in the body of the Hadith itself, but it's in the explanations about the Hadith. In the margins, basically, it says more details about this particular person. And it says this lady who came to the Prophet sallallahu wasallam, she says to him,
that she has a need, she has a question, she has something she needs to ask the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Now the wording of the hadith is very simple. And if you don't know the backstory, it's beautiful in itself that that a woman from the time of the Prophet is that I was able to walk right up to him and say, I have a question I have something to ask you. And his responses. Find any road? Right in Medina, right, but any road and I will meet you there.
How, how honored would you feel if that's how the Prophet answered you? You had a sort of I have a question. He says, Fine, pick a place and I'll meet you. beautiful, how beautiful Subhanallah if you if that's all you read, it's a beautiful as it is. But in the hasha in the margins in the description. It says this woman in particular, was known to have some sort of neurological condition,
either a mental health or a neurological condition. Some of the books said it's like she has epilepsy. She had seizures or fits, epileptic fits. Or maybe it's something more mental health related. We don't know for sure. But something cognitively neurologically neuro psychiatrically was not right Jani in place.
Now notice, now listen to the Hadith again.
This woman with a clear disability, comes up to the Prophet sallallahu wasallam and says, I have a need to ask you.
Notice, he doesn't say to her, I'm busy. He doesn't say to her, here's Sahaba. So and So talk to him. He doesn't say to her, go through my wife. And she'll talk to
I'm gonna get myself in trouble.
And then notice at the beautiful words that he teaches her, but he says to her, literally pick any street of Medina and I will meet you there. And then the rest of the Hadith says and he stayed with her. And he stayed with her until her need was met. Someone Allahu Allah who was.
Now this isn't just the ordinary person. This is a person who has a lot of responsibility a lot on his plate, not just when you think about not just the Medina and society but the OMA. Right? And yet he's making time for his community and he
Not saying and treating one person with ability differently than a person with a disability. Do you see the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam? Can you see him more? Clearly? No. Can you see why the medina society was what it was? Subhan Allah.
And there's another woman also in the Hadith literature, this one you might know where she comes to the Prophet sallallahu wasallam and says, Please make dua to Allah for me. Because I have epilepsy, I have seizures. And when I have my epilepsy, right, my body becomes uncovered, right? Because it she can't control her seizures. And so in that one that happens, right? She wants the props have to make dua that this goes away from her. So he says to herself, Allah, what to send them, if you will be patient, and Paradise will be your reward. And if you will, I will make dua for you for a lot to cure you. And you know what she said?
She said, I chose patience. But just make dua that Allah doesn't allow me to become uncovered when I have my seizures. Subhan Allah,
that whole interaction, we could talk about the answer itself, but it's the interaction that I want you to pay attention to the fact that he's interacting with people that have chronic disabilities that have that look different, that act different that have issues that may happen. And it's clear from the Quran, that this is not on them. So pilots on a fault, because the people of genitalia would say, maybe they did wrong, or people that have some ideas might say, Well, maybe it's because you sinned. You know, I one day Subhan Allah was counseling and therapy a woman Subhan Allah, her she has a she has she's a mother of a special needs child.
And when this child was born, she has a pretty rare genetic abnormality. And so when this daughter was born, you know what all of her
any forgive me, but it was her inlaw family that kind of gave her a very hard time about this. And you know what they said?
They said, Allah
is punishing you because of your previous sins with this child.
In fact, they said to her Vic, she said before this I wasn't. When I met her, she was wearing hijab, but she said, You know, when I first met my husband and such I was anywhere hijab, I wear shorts, I whatever this and that. And she might My in law said it's because I did all those things that I have this child, I sit down with the villa,
or we do we know or
do we know the unseen, to be able to say that one plus one equals two Subhan? Allah, Allah, who I don't know my state. This is so humble. And when you want to stand in a place of humility, you say, I don't know. Yet Allah, I don't know what hair or what shutter I have, or was prevented from what I did or didn't do for me to judge someone else's Subhanallah you know, and I know that there are many cultures and many people who don't have a good proper understanding of Islam, and they will literally say, it is because as though they have their eyeballs, it's because of this, that such and such disability came to your child. This is not the way at all were taught by the prophets, Allah
said and this was not the medina in society. In fact, the verse says it's not on them, especially Subhan Allah something like a genetic abnormality. Subhan Allah. Anyhow, the prophets of Allah do send them was really, really keen on making sure that the people who from the society were were integrated, and not just that we treat them nice, and we talk to them nice, and we give them our time, no, no, integrated into the society. Let me give you an example. You have the example of someone Do you know this five say, to add to Ben Ben Malik. Does anyone know who this is?
Maybe a lesser known
on Saudi, you know? Yeah. It's kind of in Malik was somebody who was from the unsought and he was visually impaired.
And the Prophet sallallahu wasallam.
He said to the Prophet sallallahu sallam, I wish that you or messenger of Allah would come and perform Salah in my house, so that I can make my house a place of prayer. Because as someone who's visually impaired, it was hard for him to consistently go to the masjid. So what are the processes on the lives and um, do you tell me what do you think he did? He went to his house and made a Jovana a congregation in his house and into from that day forward his house because the Prophet prayed there in Jamal who literally became one of the massages that are known today till today it's place in Medina Subhan Allah and so he said, The so what happened is that one day the Prophet SAW I sent
him an herbal bucket cases, and the man is telling the story, came in the morning to his house, and they asked permission to enter. And of course, let's the problem. So I sent him in, and he says, what part of this house do you want me to pray in? And even a dub of asking Where would you like me to pray in lieu sounds right? And so he pointed to I said, he said, I pointed to a sir
in place in the house, and we started praying in turn, and we stood, and he lined us up in a row and he performed to tacos. And you find this hadith still in Bukhari and Muslim Subhan Allah, that this is known that this is upon Allah is something that prophesy centum did. Cultural change doesn't come easy. And so if any of you right now are listening to this and saying, Well, that's the prophets of Allah wa salam, and that's Medina in society. And you know, it's um, maybe you feel like I haven't been so good myself of working with or seeing someone in the masjid or in our community who looks different or acts differently. Maybe I haven't been so good. I want you to remember something.
The Prophet himself, the Prophet, himself, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
Subhanallah every time I think about this, it's so
do you know the verses in the Quran?
Allah Azza wa Taala
Are you familiar with us? Some of you know some of you don't what is the story behind the ABA with our law?
What is this verse even mean? Yes, something about
there was a visually impaired man. What about him?
So the prophets is of the backstory. Let's explain the story. The con feel that the student you might say you might read this verse, you might come across it in the plan and you're hunting in Ramadan, maybe you read this right? So with Allah and Jeff will Amma right? You may have already come across this. But maybe we don't know the context behind the verses. The context behind the verses is the prophets of the lives and him is doing Dawa, where he's trying to talk to, especially the important people of the society. So here he is Pamela, talking to some of the people who he's trying to explain to us about Islam and trying to kind of leverage and get them to come. And here
comes who does anyone know who?
What was his name?
Who, yes, in sha Allah, Allah vitae, Kiki. And so he comes literally,
Abdullah ibn
Maktoum, he comes to the Prophet salallahu Salam and he is visually impaired, so he can't actually tell who he's talking to. He doesn't know that these are kind of leaders and important people. And he himself has something to ask the Prophet sallallahu wasallam he wants an audience with the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So what happens remember, the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is highly Hulka love the best and most perfect of all humans,
but as human nevertheless so what happens?
He what is the verse say, the RSL what's our law? What happens? He frowns and he turns away from him. Right? And so the verses go on and on and on a woman a unique Allah Allahu USEK. Actually, we actually even just break down the verses, it's so beautiful, literally says he found and turns his attention away, simply because the blind man came to him interrupting, you never know profit, perhaps he may be purified, or that you may or that he may be mindful, benefiting from the reminder. Now as for the person know, ALLAH is talking about the other individuals that the prophet is talking to. As for him who thinks himself self sufficient, you give him your undivided attention, even
though you're not to blame if he's not purified. But as for the one came to you eager to learn being an all of a law of him you're neglectful and divert your attention.
Now law, here is a law as of agenne chastise chastising the Prophet sallallahu said I'm teaching him teaching him as in to say, This man who's visually impaired didn't see what was happening. Yet he was so passionate about Islam and wants a connection with Allah. And you turned from him paying attention to this other individual
who's not interested in us a bit of the province doing Dawa. That's, that's his job, right?
In this story, Subhan Allah talk about humility, when Allah subhanaw taala himself kind of humbles you, right teaches you Do you know what happens to this individual?
For all of the rest of the time, that he was that the Prophet sallallahu sallam was alive? Whenever he would meet in Macedon? He would say, he'd say to him well, even though he can't see him, he would come with a smiling face the process and would have this big, smiling face. And he would say to him, welcome, welcome to the man for whom my Lord has chastised me.
Salallahu audio so no.
Isn't that humility? It's a change, literally a cultural change. Subhan Allah and someone said it here what happened after the death of the Prophet sallallahu sallam, what happened? He became what he became the person who was the successor in Medina to lead the prayer Subhan Allah Now think about
This twice, twice when the prophesy centum was still alive, he would leave him in his place to leave the prayer that has anyone studied filk the rules of double salah, for example, the rules of prayer, yes.
What time what happens in the rules related to the email when there is a list of criteria of who's more rightful to be the email them. And they give certain criteria, of course that you have to have the basic knowledge of how to pray and basic the hot alright, and everything in place. And then they have this list of priorities where they say, you know, does anyone know what's actually an interesting list?
How do you choose if everybody's equal in knowledge and everybody's equal and back forever? How do you choose who's the mmm
beautiful invoice? It's beautiful. Even they look nice.
Yes, I follow home the one was the most recitation.
And subhanAllah.
Yes. And in this list, if everything else is equal, you would choose the one who could see over the one who is visually impaired why for the simple reason of why that he tells what time the prayer if the prayer time is in or not. Right? Listen to this. You have now think about here's the promise of instead of himself raising this entire generation of Sahabi as a hobby, who are what, who are learned in their Deen learned or their Islam learned in the Quran, right. And so you have people who are pretty much on par with each other. And he a twice in our Sita, the prophet Salatu was Salam. When he in his absence, he literally puts
in a Maktoum, to lead the prayer, when the Prophet can't himself leader, he's off doing something else to lead the prayer, someone who's visually impaired,
that is a big deal. It is a big deal because it brings up the status of somebody who has a disability, it is a big deal because it can it communicates to everyone else. This is not a reason why you would prevent someone who otherwise is qualified from being your Imam.
And how many memorizers of the Quran who follow the Quran today are visually impaired? How many people have been able to master the Quran, despite their disability Subhan Allah, and they find fulfillment in their life, right through the Quran. And we honor them as a society. This would not be the case, if you didn't have the people like even on Macedon, Subhan. Allah, it's amazing. And then think about this. Following this course of the Prophet sallallahu wasallam, you have seen the Ahmed Ibn Abdul Aziz, right? May Allah be pleased with him, who then this is so interesting, too, when he was the Khalifa, he asks the rulers of the provinces, all the different places that he's
essentially responsible for. And he says to them, give me the names of everybody in your province, who's visually impaired, everybody that has a physical disability, everybody that has a chronic illness,
give me all of their names. And so because the Halifa has asked, they all literally send names of all the individuals in their province that have a disability, and you're thinking why, like, what, why, what does he want with all these names?
When they send the names in, guess what he does?
It's the most amazing and beautiful thing. He literally finds, he says, every single person that has a visual disability, he needs to have, I'm going to employ somebody as a guide, as a guide, to help that person to look after them. Everybody that has every two chronically ill people, they're going to be given an employee, I'm going to employ them to basically take care of their needs. Everybody who has an illness of a condition that's chronic, it's not going away. We're going to literally take from bits and men and employ with it this person who's going to be a guide or a helper to the people.
Think about that. How do we use our data today?
How do we use our stuff our charity today? In good ways and Hamdulillah? We send it to the orphans we send it to you know crises that are happening Subhanallah throughout the world, we give it to our massages, but have you ever thought about putting your aceca towards the stability?
You know me because I talk about mental health all the time. I tell people have you ever thought about putting years ago towards mental health? People are like what? It is true. Our clinic that we run in Madison's called betta Stan mill surprise. We call it Dr. Lutz autoship, as you know, but I was talking about in the first hour. Our clinic in California, that's the mental health clinic for the Muslims. One of the things that we do is we collect tickets, because we know that in our community there are those who are eligible, who don't have insurance, who don't have finances to be able to get therapy and care. So we literally collect the cat and use that to fund their mental
health session.
So
Allah subhanaw taala says in the Quran,
er marks different forms of sick out, right? And one of them is the needy and the needy person, whatever their needs are. Some of it is water, food, clothing, shelter, yes. But some of it's also mental health. So Pamela, because the more you give food and the more you get closer to somebody that has something like a trauma, or someone who has a mental inability, disability, guess what?
It's just going to repeat the cycle until you can get to the root of the problem. And then what you give them they'll be able to really use it and sustain it. Do you understand what I'm trying to say? So I ask people all the time, we invest our wealth in all kinds of different things we put ourselves at corners get in kind of the typical known categories. Right? But Allah subhanaw taala says, Yeah, team and what I see it and right, he talks about even even the seed at Subhanallah you know this I'm going to talk about this because of the type of foundation that was here yesterday and coming tomorrow. Subhan Allah prisoners I see it literally in the pan literally the SE it is listed, but
have you ever thought to give your cat or sofa to a prisoner
but it's a category in the Quran.
What I mean by this is the way Islam came at reshaped our society reshaped the way we saw people, the way we understood them, even the way we give charity to people. What we do what we do with it, not the typical same things, think about diversifying your Salah and your charity, and you never know Subhanallah where exactly, it'll hit one time. And we know Subhan Allah, we don't know we don't. After the Prophet SAW I said and why revelation is cut off. So we don't know for sure. But Subhanallah one time there was somebody in our family. I won't say exactly who but somebody in our family passed away.
And the next night, or a couple nights later, somebody else saw a dream about that person. And subhanAllah. Again, we can't tell Revelation we don't know exactly. But sometimes when you see dreams, there are such things as true dreams. Allahu Anam. But in that dream, the person saw the family member who had just passed away. And in the dream that the family member was being asked
how did you do? How did they go?
And they said had him didn't like there was like a, you know, positive news, Michelle la Charley out of vincelli out of it's right out. And then they said in the dream, there are two things that helped. And they listed and it's a panel, the family didn't know this, it was a secret sadaqa. Right. Like they kept it as a secret. They didn't tell anybody. But apparently, there was an orphan that they were helping support. And they said the thing that helped me the most. And they listed two things, and one of which was this orphan. And the family didn't even know that this person was funding this orphan. And so they were digging around trying to figure out where you know, and they
actually came across truly, there really was, you know, until they realized that they kept on sending then trying to help the orphan. And in the dream, they the person said, This is what helped me subpanel let me be real. It may be truly out I mean, and so when you think about it, you don't know we say when we give charity, you don't know which which of the categories which of the things is going to be the most pleasing to Allah subhanaw taala. So it encourages us what to literally diversify, given every category you can give hopefully, something or many things work out for us inshallah. Tada. So, as I close here, I wanted to share this kind of concept with you
Subhan Allah, Dr. Ahmed, Nanda Aziz and how how SubhanAllah. He,
he was He instituted, now we have in Islamic societies, the concept of not only treating the disabled well, are differently abled well, but also providing for them assistance.
And so I tell us, and I ask us, when we think of a beautiful community, like you guys are in here, my question always is this. What services are being set up? And maybe you have that already? Maybe you have something set up? There's a really great organization. I'm not directly affiliated with them, but I think that they're great. And they're a Muslim organization for those with special needs and differently abled. Are you familiar with Lawson, muhs? En? Yes, excellent. Are you here for masa?
Yes, excellent. Lachlan, Allah bless you. Well, let's see the Muslim facilitator for Tansa How beautiful is that?
Excellent. I hope I hope our message is literally in turn become certified. The reason for this is when I think about all metagenome devisees. And he went when he created and I think about how he was sure to take from the silica and from the charities of the Muslims and to make sure that this was something that was available to all those who needed. Think about our communities here. Subhan Allah, we do very good in some aspects, and then we're kind of deficient in other aspects, right? And so this is our opportunity to really become more like those who are from our predecessors. If you want to be more like, not just the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam whose ultimate example
but you
have also the examples of people like Ahmed have the disease and the many generations who followed and continued to make sure that not only are we saying yes, we want to treat people differently abled better than us.
But also you're going to put your money where your mouth is essentially right and actually make sure that this happens. And so with that, I'm going to close in sha Allah and say this.
That the the
yeah, there's a number of number of things I wanted to say. But I'm going to close with this in sha Allah did it just for time
that Allah subhanaw taala it that says in the Hadith, that Allah subhanaw taala does not look at our appearances. Nor does he look at our forms. Nor does he look at our wealth. Rather, he looks at our hearts and our deeds. Right?
In a lolium little Illa. So welcome. I'm Anika, right. But what does he look at
it a polo be como El Malecon. And so when you think about this, Subhan Allah, to have that Medina in society, that is our aim, if we really want to revive this and revive the institution revive this mercy that the Prophet sallallahu wasallam came with, then the understanding is it's not what what you see in front of you, but rather understanding what's coming through. And that the next person over from you may not look the part that you will, but absolutely may be like, the very first Hadith we mentioned today, where the weight literally just the legs, just the legs, right Subhanallah is what weightier than the mountains of hurt. So I ask us, and I hope Inshallah, to honor that our
mustard here, this group here, this group of you here, and I know you come from different massage in different places. But I hope what you take with you Inshallah, as you go back, is to say to yourself, how could I bring this to my community from the first talk and the second talk, maybe you go back and you say, I need to be able to have kind of that mental health unit in my masjid and figure out how exactly to do that. And from there, we have the blueprints, because we've created this to have the data. You say, you have the data, you have the button up here, folks, come and talk, right, mashallah, how to bring this to your massage to make sure that it's friendly, and
available and accessible, but also supportive. And even the support groups and family networks that happen, because so many families that have children with special needs, and like I said, at the very beginning, I'm one of them. They sometimes feel ostracized from the rest of the community, they feel like it's really difficult to find playdates, or when they sit together in social gatherings, they're not invited, they can't be invited because of their childhood because of that family member to the weddings and to the If thought is, and to the gatherings and to this, so they feel kind of left out. And that becomes really problematic. And then you see the trickle down effect in the
community, and eventually that wears down on that person. And then they feel that what's the point of being part of a Muslim community, and then eventually, we see some bad news later and we don't want that. So the upstream of all of this is to make sure that we have the kind of societies if you truly want that Medina in society, then like we talked about, prompted on this entire hour is you make room for all those who may be different, look different, or are a work in progress and sha Allah may Allah Subhana Allah bless you honor this community, uplift us in sha Allah make us people who really understand this message of the Prophet sallallahu wasallam and those connected to him.
And will Allah monad had him or marijuana early, he was so happy to send them BarakAllahu phaco Shama
you see you sir Dr. Rania. You want to come down more often.
Just like Lochhead for another very beneficial talk. I think that's something we need to hear and hopefully can open up more conversations. Again, want to thank Dr. Lonnie I want for her time and the beautiful talks that we had. I want to thank TMC for hosting us. And a kind suggestion if you guys would like to donate to TMC for offering programs like this, and to allow them to do more of this in the in the future in sha Allah. Does that go ahead, brother hasn't, and I want to give a very special shout out to sister Silva, who is I know she does so much behind the scenes and really making this happen. So please make a special dua for her and her family and every