Riyad Nadwi – 0.6 Actionable Tafsir Dars 6
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The speakers discuss the importance of multiple words in language to enhance perception and understanding. They explain the meaning of the Surah of entrusting and giving trust, as it is the solution to time gap experiences. The Basmala language is a part of the title in the first Surah, and is linked to survival of the world. The speakers also discuss the importance of language acquisition, language acquisition, and language acquisition in learning language. They emphasize the importance of remembering to say never to eat before entering a bathroom and not to say Miss Georgia.
AI: Summary ©
Here in the Basmara, the b in the
Bismillah is also
packed full of meaning.
Tafsir series in which we are pondering
verses of the Quran with a view towards
purifying our hearts and minds
and beautifying our conduct and character.
In our last session,
we
pondered
the meanings of the 25 names of salt
and fatiha.
After discussing
the role of labels in the mind, the
role of
names, terms.
And we
reflected on fact that without terms, with our
without labels, without names,
our perception and our ability to think about
things will be impeded,
If not, it's obstructed completely, as we saw
in the examples of multiple labels,
multiple names for particular
things that,
we also talked about the importance of
multiple labels
in the ability to facilitate
deeper and more profound
mental engagement with phenomena
as
the
words words for on the color spectrum
example.
And if you happen to have multiple words
for something in your linguistic repertoire,
your cognition,
your cognitive engagement with that particular thing
will be deeper
in a variety of ways, as we said
in your perception, in the way you think
about it, in your recognition, your memory,
your even emotion and
sense of relation, your sense of connection
will be influenced by the names you have
for lang for in your language for a
particular thing.
So the more names
you have for something is the better your
ability to relate to it and think about
it.
And in that vein, we
talked about languages with multiple words for one
thing.
The example of the Eskimos,
multiple words for snow
or what's closer to home, the many words
for camel in Arabic or the many words
for
the concept of love where
14 different words emanate
to describe the,
intensity of
the concept.
We also reflected on the fact that Allah
in
his ultimate wisdom
revealed to us 99 of his names, 99
of his beautiful names,
which is, of course, in order to enhance
our ability to engage
and keep him in our thoughts and hearts
through these names.
And
with this Surah that we are studying, the
greatest Surah in the Quran,
Surah Al Fatiha,
We're
also blessed with multiple names to aid our
connection and concentration
with it.
By pondering those 25 names, we sought
to enhance our perception and appreciation of the
Surah.
Now I'll quickly just
go through the list again because we need
to reinforce these names.
The 25 names were Fatiha tul Kitab,
openings,
the opening of the book,
Saba'al Mathani, oft recited, the oft recited verses
that are repeated.
And then Ul Quran, the essence of the
Quran. And we said here is taken from
the place that children cling to. They
when when children
are startled, they run to their mother.
And
the the stay saying of the scholar in
regard to this that Surat al Fatiha is
that
it is the place where believers go when
they're they're a place of refuge.
When they're in trouble, when they need something,
they go to Surat Al Fatiha. Umul Quran.
Number 4 was Quran Al Adim, the magnificent
Quran.
Number 5, the salah. The salah, which we'll
come back to. And,
number 6 was the incantation,
rupiah,
then,
a shefa, the cure, then a shafi'ah, the
curing, then alwafi'ah, the full measure, then al
Kafir, the sufficient,
then a dua, the supplication, then al Assas,
the foundation,
then a Shukr, the thanks, then al Munajat,
the beseeching monologue,
then Suratul Kans, the treasure, then Suratul Nuh,
the light, Suratul hamdullula,
the the first hand of the Hamidat,
Suratul hamdulluswa,
the the shortest of the Hamidat, then al
lazima, Suratul lazima, the compulsory surah. Suratul suwal,
the the
the the surah of of request.
Umul Kitab, the essence of the book. Surah
Al Fatiha, the opening of the the opening
surah. Surah Tafwid, the surah of entrusting and
give giving trust.
Then Surah Al Ta'alim Al Mas'ala, the surah
of teaching supplication.
And then the 25th 1 was Surah Al
Hamd,
the Surah of Praise and Gratitude.
Now among these,
we spoke about the need to reflect on
the
name of the Surah, Salah, the Salah. Because
here, this is the one that was linked
to your action point. As we said that
this Surah this this tafsir is to teach
you actions.
And so this was your action point. Your
action was to reflect on the on the
name of all of these names plus your
action point in the sense that
salah is
refer refers to
the hadith where
Allah
is saying,
that I have
divided the salah, in other words, the the
prayer, this this Surah into 2 parts.
So to do this before every prayer because
we
we we recite this Surah 20 times a
day, sometimes 30 times a day, 36 times
a day,
several dozen times a day.
And our mind becomes, it becomes blurred in
our mind. You might find,
in spite of this reciting it so many
times, we we we have very little recollection
of reciting it.
And this is what this gives you. And
I I linked it to the
the the psychological phenomena
known as time gap experience, where you where
where drivers
find that they lose time because they they
lose their track of their time markers. You're
driving from one city to another city, and
you only wake up,
when you reach the crossroad of another city
because then you've realized, oh, what has happened?
I've passed so much,
so many miles. I have no recollection of
driving through all these places.
That is known as time gap experience. The
point here is that, we can have time
gap experiences
within our Salah. We start our Salah, say,
and
we have no recollection of reciting it. And
you might think about, okay, the next surah
that we're reciting, but because Surah Subhata
is such a routine, is such,
where where the familiarity with it is such
is so high, we lose we lose. So
in this hadith, we have
a a solution to that problem,
which is that the Surah will aid aid
concentration
as the action point where where we supposed
to try to put it into practice by
act actually rethinking
about the hadith when that Allah is saying,
that that I have divided the salah so
that when bring to mind this fact that
when we say,
Alhamdulillah,
when you say Alhamdulillah,
that this by saying this will Allah
will respond, and he will tell the angels.
He will point to the angel. He will
point to you. He will say that, look,
Hamidani Abdi. Oh, he just said, Alhamdulillah. Oh,
she just said, Alhamdulillah.
And look. Look. Look what he's doing. Look.
Look what she's doing. She's saying, Hamidani.
Oh, he's my my lord. My my my
servant is praising me. And when we say,
Arrahman al Rahim,
then he'll say,
Allah will say,
He will say, oh, look. Look. My servant
is,
is, extolling me. She's she's exalting me. And
when he say,
he again, he will say,
That, no. He my servant has glorified me.
And when we say,
Allah is going to say, this is between
me and my servant. That. This is between
between us. And when I say,
Allah will say that, liabdi masala'an, that that
for my servant is what he asked, and
that that and Allah will give. Allah will
give you that. So
having that conversation in the mind
prior to starting Salat, thinking about this Hadith
will aid your
recollection of what you're reciting during the prayer.
And that's your action point. That was your
action point for last week. Now, today,
I want to move on to the Basmala.
Now do you know what Basmala means?
Basmala
is
in in Arabic, Basmala means,
but, this is in Arabic, sentences can be
condensed into words. This is, one of the,
beautiful things about the beautiful features of Arabic
is that you can bring new words into
it, yeah, and, and and place it into
all,
molds, and then it functions like native, like
native language. So you so the condensed condensation
of bismillah,
rahman, rahim is known as basmalah. And then
you put that into the morphological
mold, the old mold, and and then it
becomes basmali basmali. You you a person can
say basmaltu.
Oh, I have just said mister Muhammadu Raheem.
And the same thing with.
You can condense it all to. There's there's
a word so you can bring it into.
And so this is why, the the
the the ability of the language to
absorb and then still keep
its foundation is an amazing thing. I mean,
even modern words, a word like, take,
television,
in Arabic.
The the word for modern Arabic word for
television is
but you can say
So then it goes into the form. It
goes into the mold, the old mold, and
then it becomes native. So that's what happens
to, language,
words that come into the into Arabic.
So
in this sense, Basmala, there's Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim.
Now to come back to our first sentence,
if you notice
that one of the first things our attention
is drawn towards in this, in the first
sentence of the Quran
is what?
Is
You're you're drawn towards the name.
Now put that in the light of all
we have discussed in the past 5 lessons
where we introduced,
about
the importance of names, of namings, and
and a number of names.
Here you're being introduced
to
the most important name
in your life.
The first name that you're being taught, the
name of the creator, the name of your
creator, Allah,
the mention of the name that you're being
given the ability to mention. And the mentioning
of this name is linked to the survival
of the entire universe.
Yes.
The dimension of this name is linked to
the entire
survival of the world. As long as this
name is being mentioned,
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala will not bring the
world to an end. And as we are
told in Sahih Muslim
In other words, as long as people are
doing the zikr of Allahu Allah,
the final hour will not come. Before the
final hour, these people will disappear from the
off. People who will use the word, who
will say the word of Allah. This is
hadith in Sahih Muslim.
So
if you see people saying Allah or Allah,
then no, it is because of them that
Allah is keeping the world
going,
keeping
the keeping this world function when they disappear
from the world, then then the world will
come to an end.
Now language acquisition.
When a child is learning language,
when you are learning to speak as an
infant
in infant language acquisition, the first words you
learn
are the names of things. Do you remember
what the first word you learned?
I don't think you would, but your parents
would.
It'll be baba or mama or it or
bowl or truck or something like that or
scarf or bowl.
Now
in in,
if a child learns that look, this is
scarf that
the
mama takes her scarf off and
the the little child holds the scarf and
says, oh, this is this is scarf scarf.
So then if the if the mother then
has 5 or 6 scarfs on the floor
and tells the the child
to
bring scarf.
That child will crawl over all the other
scarf and go to the one with which
the name is connected. Only that one is
scarf for the baby for the child.
That it takes a while
for them to then
extrapolate that this thing that looks like this
and similar things, the similarities
creates a category of scarf.
Right? The the the the the development. So
the child learns
Tawhidil Maina, the oneness of
meaning for for a name
at the first. So naturally, we are designed
to learn this, that it's one name. There's
no other name for this. This comes,
in the sentence. And here here instinctively,
you your your your learn you learn,
as a child, and that becomes the basis
for the category where you learn that this
everything else is,
extends from it. So the key here is
similarity. The similarity of the scarf, the contours
of it, the way the roundness of a
ball,
will then all run things are balls and
then that category is created in the mind.
Now when it comes to the word Allah,
Allah
is making us
remember very clearly in the Quran. What does
he say? He reminds us, he says,
There is nothing like unto him. So once
you learn this name, then the next thing
you have to learn is that there's nothing
like unto Allah, that Allah is Allah alone.
And there's no other. There's no one else
like him. No one. There's no similitude. No
similitude can be found. There can be only
1 Allah.
And he is a Rahman, a Rahim.
He is the merciful, the compassionate.
Now, before we dive into the meanings,
there are a few points you should bear
in mind about the Basmala.
1st, although the scholars are in agreement that
the Bas Mada is part of the Quran,
there is a difference of opinion among among
them as to whether the Bas Mada is
an integral part of Surat Al Fatihah
or not? Some scholars, in Imam Hanifa and
Imam Malik and others are of the opinion
that it is
it is at the beginning of the surahs
as an independent verse used to as a
demarcation between the surahs,
while Imam Shafiya and others consider it an
integral part of the Surah. And they all
have their own,
proofs for the for their position.
And as a result of that, you have
differences in the fiqh.
But, I can't go into the details of
that here because this is beyond the scope
of this, of this, series here that we
are doing. Well, what you need to know
is that the Basmara
is a verse in the Quran, that much
is
confirmed.
The second point is that,
it is found at the beginning of every
Surah except one. That is the 9th Surah
Surah Tawah Al Bara'ah.
And there are several explanations for this. The
easiest one is to remember that this is
how it is written in the official Uthmani
script.
There is
an official script that it was written in.
And Inshallah, we'll talk more about the history
of the compilation later on in the series.
And then the third point is that the
Basmala
is part of the text
in,
in the, the the 30th verse of Surah
Al Nami.
It is it this is the 27th Surah
where Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says,
that it is from Solomon. It is indeed,
it is the name of God, most gracious,
most merciful.
Now and then the 4th point is that
although from the way Bissom,
if you look at Bissomillah is written,
Bissom is written,
it may seem like one word. It is
an amalgamation of 2 distinct units of meaning.
Bism is not one word. It's even though
it's written as one word, it is amalgamation.
It's 2 words.
The word it's a the the preposition b
and the noun ism.
Now the letter alif
in the in the word ism is dropped,
and this is also because of the, how
it is written in the Uthmani, the official
Uthmani manuscript
here at the beginning of the Quran. And
the reason
is, the first word is ism, Ismallah.
Now grammatically,
one would normally
say, aqarao
bismillah. You don't start. You start here. So
you have there's a supposition that there's a
verb. There's a verb that is not read
here that that is not written, but it's
it's supposed to. It it it it is
a supposition of its presence. So it is
aqarao bismillah that I recite in the name
of Allah.
But
if this if I recite in the name
of Allah is shifted around
in in that, it it says, in the
name of Allah do I begin,
then you will literally begin with the name
of Allah. If you say, if you say
I read in the name of Allah, then
you're not literally beginning with the name of
Allah. But if you say in the name
of Allah, I begin, then you're literally beginning
in the with the name of Allah, with
name of Allah that,
so these are, final details that the scholars
have
highlighted
in this discourse.
Then the same construct
is found.
This ism,
is found in the first verse
that was revealed to the prophet
What was the first verse?
Iqara
Bism
Iqara
Bismirab Bikar.
Read in the name of your Lord. So
the idea of name is coming again over
and over here. And in at the beginning,
you're being told.
From the start,
both in the revelation
and in the written text, our attention is
being called towards
name, towards Islam,
which is derived from
samu,
meaning elevation,
sam samu
to to elevate the because when you name
something, in the naming rises the profile
of the name and facilitates mentioning and remembering.
So some in that sense. So they say,
it it it it gives us facilitates mentioning
mentioning and and raising a profile.
Of course, there's another
opinion in this regard. There's a difference between
the Kufi, the the people of Kufa and
the people of Basra.
But,
they some who say that it's from Sima.
The word ism comes from Sima.
But,
we prefer this one, the the one that
said the Asung, which is Sima meaning sign.
But here, the first one appears to be
more sound, and it's preferred
by many scholars.
So as his creatures, as Allah, as the
creatures of Allah, we must first know his
name and proclaim it. His name, Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala,
he is Ar Rahman and Rahim, the most
merciful, the most compassionate.
And who is Ar Rahman?
We're told Ar Rahman Alam Al Qur'an. Ar
Rahman
is the one who is teaching you Quran,
the one who taught Quran.
Ar Rahman is the one. So if you're
learning Quran, you're with Quran. Ar Rahman is
the one who was who who taught Quran
and the one who create you. So
Ar Rahman
He
the your Rahman is the one who taught
Quran,
created you,
and who created the human being, created you,
and
taught him speech.
So
taught you speech.
Taught us language. The languages we speak is
from Allah He
taught us language.
Now the native language each of us speak,
where did we get it from?
How did we learn to speak?
From our parents, of course.
And they where did they learn to speak?
How did they learn to speak? From their
parents. Right?
And them and those from and our great
grandparents from our great grandparents, and if you
follow this, so on, go on and on,
you follow that all the way upwards,
where do you end up?
Now we do have 7,000
languages in the world,
but half of the world speaks only
how many languages?
Of of the 7,000,
half of the world speaks
23 languages.
That's all.
Yeah. Now
linguists have created a language tree, family, a
family of trees of various languages to show,
how they branch off from one another. And
this is an area of
many controversies,
many, many controversies.
What was
the first proto
human language? You know,
this is a hot topic that was debated
throughout history
until it was banned. More on that later.
But language acquisition is highly dependent
on the process of hearing it's being spoken.
You language acquisition, you have to you. And
there's a crucial period in which you have
to hear it in order to to learn
it, to learn the language,
and mostly from your parents. And we know
this for certain because when children are deprived
of it, they do not develop language skills
at all.
There are numerous
well documented cases
of feral children.
These are children who are found to be,
who were raised by animals, lost and raised
by animals,
or severely isolated children in homes locked away.
What you find is that,
they're all they all are found to have
insurmountable
trouble learning human language.
Even years years after you bring them back
into society,
they all they they are able to do
is to learn the rudimentary,
in a very low rudimentary
way to to communicate with hissing and grunting
like animals,
lower level communication.
If you leave a child isolated without exposure
to language in the early years, then they
will not develop language on their own. In
fact,
several cruel people have conducted this experiment,
experiments to find out what was the original
Adamic language. There is a there's research about
looking for the Adamic language. What what language
did Adam, alaihis salam, spoke to? We can
find
so,
they,
the Jewish exegetes of of the Midrash, the
Jewish scholars, the Tafsir scholars of their text,
had claimed that,
the the language was Hebrew
because
the name
of Hawa, alaihis salam, the Eve, the name
of Eve, our
mother Eve, that that can only be translated
meaningfully
in Hebrew.
In Hebrew, it only makes sense in Hebrew,
which was Shaba, Isha and Shaba
in in Hebrew,
and that means life and living.
So,
so so because of that, now people people
are trying to find trying to justify that.
So they carried out these experiments like,
the the Roman emperor Frederick the second,
put 2 babies,
locked them away and put people to, not
to speak to them so that they can
see what they will come up with. But
it didn't. It didn't it didn't,
produce anything. And then later on, the,
King James of,
James the 5th of Scotland,
he also did the same.
Because the first in in the early experiments,
they thought that the women did speak to
the child, and that's why they they said
some words. So they they chose mute nurses,
people who couldn't speak to take care and
lock them away to see if the child
would speak.
But they didn't learn any language because there
was no input.
And according to one report, even Akbar, the,
you know, the multi emperor in in India,
he also conducted this experiment.
Anyway, come back to the claim. The claim
was that
this has the language has,
Hebrew.
It makes sense.
It's the only language in which
the naming of Eve,
Shava, Shawa
and Isha, it makes sense because it means
life and living.
Now when you bring this logic into Arabic
and look at the meaning of the word
Hawwa,
which is the Arabic for Eve,
what you find is that the meaning in
Arabic is far more precise and profound.
It includes both the meaning of something in
that capsulates multitudes in it,
and it also
captured it it also,
gives the meaning of someone who recoils in
in shyness.
Hawwa,
as a carrier of the eggs of the
eggs of the eggs of humanity with the
shyness of a female, that's the meaning that
you can derive from this Hawwa in
Arabic. It's not like life and living in
Hebrew. It's very specific.
In Hawwa,
the place where a gathering, the
the place where there's a gathering, and
it
means in Arabic, in in
in in.
The, you know, the
to coil away, to recoil, and which is
a female trait to to be shy. That
is very clear,
in the meaning. So in if the name
of Eve is the only proof we can
find,
then Arabic wins
this argument by miles.
Now, this sort of speculation was an area
of fascination for linguist in the early modern
period.
They were building massive family trees.
But then suddenly in 18/66,
the Linguistic
Society in Paris
decided
to ban all research into the origin of
language.
Yes. Rather strangely,
it's a very strange thing to have to
do, especially in the era of enlightenment with
the latter part of the enlightenment, you know,
people are coming up and you're gonna decide
to ban research into this.
So,
people were encouraged in the enlightenment to study
everything, to investigate everything, look into everything, you
know, study. And yet here in 18/66,
issuing a ban. Now, Allah knows the best
reason.
Allah knows best the reason why they did
it, but we can make educated guesses here.
Anyway, in the last 40 years, there's been
a resurgence in the interest in this matter.
But, of course, with no solid breakthrough yet,
and I'm going to read to you an
excerpt of an abstract
so that you can see where the science
is on this matter.
Inquiry into the origins of language was banned
by the Societe du Linguistique,
du Parais,
which is the sirens,
in in 1866.
Within the past 40 years or so,
within the past 40 years,
however, writings on the subject have exploded.
Liberman, Bickerton,
Pink Pinker, Bloom, Jack and Iff, Fitch, and
Horford,
implying that hard evidence
had outpaced speculation.
Now we argue, you know, this is a
group of,
linguists, major linguists, including Noam Chomsky. 8 there
are 8 of them that's written wrote this
paper. And they are saying that we argue
instead
that the richness of ideas is accompanied by
poverty of evidence.
The richness of ideas is accompanied by poverty
of evidence
with essentially no explanation on how and why
our linguistic computations
and representations
evolve.
We show that to date, studies of nonhuman
animals provide virtually no relevant parallel
parallels to human linguistic communication,
and none to the underlying biological capacity.
The fossil the fossil and archaeological evidence do
not inform our understanding of the computations
and miss and representations of our earliest and
ancestors,
leaving details of the origins and selective pressures
unresolved.
Our understanding of genetics of the language of
language is so impoverished
that there is little hope of connecting genes
to linguistics.
All modeling attempts have made unfounded assumptions.
All modeling of attempts
have made unfounded unfounded
some assumptions
and have provided no empirical test,
thus leaving any insight into language into languages
origin
unverifiable.
Based on the current state of evidence, we
submit that the most fundamental questions about the
origin and evolution of our linguistic capacity
remain
as mysterious
as ever.
With considerable uncertainty about the discovery of either
relevant or conclusive evidence
that can adjudicate among the main among the
many open hypotheses.
Title of the, of this paper, which is
published in 22,
2014,
the mystery of language evolution,
including, as I said, Chomsky and others.
So the point is that science
has no real answer to the question of
the origin of language.
Now when you look at many aspects of
ancient languages like Old Persian
or Sanskrit
or isolated language like the Basque language in
the north of the Iberian Peninsula,
What you find
is that you can trace
Arabic to these languages.
And there's some very interesting research happening now.
InshaAllah, we will dive more into this topic
later on. But the point here,
that we need to focus on is that
as Muslims,
we believe what the Quran says. We believe
in the Quran and believe in what the
Quran says and that the genesis of language
starts with names, with very specific names, and
those names names were taught to Adam
in the Quran.
That Allah taught Adam the names. This this
is the point we're making here. Now the
first and most important name we need to
know, as we said, is the name of
our creator,
Ismullah,
Ismuljadara,
the name of Allah.
Imagine,
how lost would we have been if we
did not know his name?
Who would we call on? Who do we
call out to when we needed to call
on Allah, when we needed to call on
our creator? How would we call him if
we did not know his name?
This name
is reserved exclusively for Allah, Him alone and
no one else. You will not find in
any
language in anywhere
on the face of the planet, in any
language, anyone with the name of Allah.
As the scholars say that he that he's,
what Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
has come on Allah Al Al Al Al
Alsul that he he has locked the towns
from naming with this name.
This is this is the power of Allah's
control over his name.
That that, Imam Khutibi says that, look, this
is Labdul Jadarah. It is the word of
majesty.
Allah
That this name is the most righteous and
the most comprehensive
of Allah's name. That through it you have
and Allah asked in the Quran, he said,
You know anyone that named this name with
this name? The only one that has such
name. This is Allah
Now take a moment to think about it.
How fortunate
we are
in knowing this name.
Our keys to remembering
Allah.
Excuse
me. Our keys to remembering him
are linked to this name.
Our or
are
with this name. We say, SubhanAllah.
We say, Alhamdulillah.
We say, Allahu Akbar.
La ilaha illallah.
Hasbud
Allah.
Wadi amalwakil,
insha Allah,
jazak Allah,
masha Allah.
This
is the principal name by which we know
and recognize our Lord and creator,
And we must be eternally grateful
for this honor because this is an honor.
This is an honor to be able to
utter
Allah's pure name with our sinful tongues.
Allah is allowing us to do that. Think
about the honor
and the
mercy in the fact that he has given
us this ability.
These tongues with which we commit sins,
so many sins come from the tongue,
but yet he's allowing us.
Allah is allowing us to mention his pure
and blessed name with that same tongue.
His name that is described by other beautiful
names. We have wallahu ghafururururraheem.
It's it's the the name is described by
other names. You wouldn't find
Allah being Allah describing other names. This is
the prince this is name, but you will
find Allahu Qafur Rahim. Allahu,
Azizun Hakim, that Allah is most merciful. Allah,
Allah is forgiving.
Allah, Allahu Azizun Hakim, that Allah is mighty
and wise. So
according to some scholars,
it is the greatest name. It is the
Ismul A'adhah, which is the great name that
carries a blessing that if you if you
ask Allah using that name, it would be
it would be immediately
accepted. And reports obviously differ on what the
great name is.
But Allah is
a strong candidate for that. This is the
name that penetrates the heart
when it is uttered with sincerity.
You would find when you say Allah
sincerely,
it enters the heart and touches the strings,
the deepest part of the strings of your
heart, the depths of your heart when you
say Allah.
And there's a beautiful story
of person that walked the face of this
earth, Rasool Allah sallallahu alaihi wasallam,
was traveling once and they were
in the,
in the desert. You stop
during the midday
sun to take with the taiula, you know,
your siesta.
And there were
trees were sparse. So all all these companions
that that he was traveling with,
dispersed to find the tree just where there
were there were 30 trees, a lots of
thorns around. So he
he he found one with some shade, and
they all dispersed and and
went to sleep. He took his sword off
and hang it on the on the tree
and went to sleep.
And in that interim,
a an enemy of the prophet, an enemy
of Islam,
walked by and saw them all sleeping. And
here here is the prophet,
So he recognized him and went over to
him and
saw the sword on the tree. He's lying
on the ground, and he pulled the sword
out. When he unsheathed the sword, the sound
of that woke the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wasallam,
up. And the man with the sword, the
prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam is on the ground.
He's over him. And he says to him,
many of them now come in need. And
who will save you now from me? You're
on the ground. I have my sword. This
is it. You're finished.
Ma'i amnaoka, who will who will save you
now?
Because you're on the ground, and I'm I've
got the sword above you. I all I
have to do is strike you.
And Rasulullah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam said, in
all calmness,
Amlah.
Just the utterance of that word to say
Allah
was sufficient
to
penetrate and startle that man.
This is an this is an enemy of
Islam,
but it penetrates his heart and startled him
such
that he
is is completely
frozen. He went into shock,
froze,
stuck the sword back in and sat down
and couldn't move.
Yes, Rasool Allah sallam, just by saying this
word Allah.
When that happened, the other Sahaba, they were
around. I heard this,
commotion, so they all came over and said,
oh, what's going on here? And they see
this man sitting in front of the Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. The sword is back in
the sheath.
And then
said to them that, you know, this man,
he came and he said this, and I
said this to him,
then he sat. This is
and then when he said that,
the man said,
and
and then he,
the Hadith could confirm that Rasulullah SAW Salam
didn't punish him. He didn't kill him. He
didn't he didn't hit him. He didn't turn.
He just sent him away.
He said, and in in other reports, he
said that you will not be with people
who who will I will not be I
promised him, he said, I will not ever
be with people who will will fight you.
And he went away saying that I came
from,
I I I've just met the best of
people.
But anyway, the point I'm making here is
that the power of this word, the power
of this of this name to recognize
the honor of it and the power of
it. That's important.
Now we will talk more about those about
the meanings of these of Allah, UHman, Al
Rahim. But we have to start at the
beginning. This was just an introduction,
that I want to talk about language, so
I gave you I went into that. But,
we're gonna start at the beginning. And the
beginning is with what?
The first unit of meaning
is the preposition b.
Right?
Bismillah has
3 words in it. The preposition b, the
noun ism, and the name Allah.
The phrase has 3 possible this phrase has
3 possible,
connotations in in in in the in the
preposition. 1 is that
begin with the name of Allah, with the
name of Allah, with the help of the
name of Allah or with the blessing of
the name of Allah. Those are the 3.
Now the complete meaning of the sentence there
for it to be complete, you need clarification
of what is intended
with the help and the blessing. Now the
rules of Arabic grammar, when you were applied
to this, remember what we said about our
scheme first,
Our scheme included in the scheme of interpretation,
scheme of exegesis
includes
the grammar it includes Arabic grammar. So Arabic
grammar necessitates the meaning of an unwritten verb
here. It means which will have to be
added in the sense that Abda'u
I begin. Abda'u
in the name of I begin. Abda'u Bismillah.
I begin with the name of Allah.
But for decorum, the verb is understood
the verb understood here in the phrase the
meaning must be I begin in the name
of Allah,
but it must be at the beginning, so
I I switch it around, which is the
point I made earlier.
And then
so you will say it it it the
meaning will be with the name of Allah
do I begin.
Now the other subtle point is mentioned earlier
is that the Alif in the word is
dropped resulting from the word being used at
Bismillah.
Now the letter at at this beginning, at
beginning of the Bismillah, this letter Ba
is also
the first unit of meaning, as we said.
But
remember in our second lesson, we spoke about
the richness of the language.
Remember I still told you about a word
can be you will get meaning depending on
where a letter is in the
in in the sequence of of of the
letters.
So in this case,
richness
is, in in some cases, you're gonna have
meanings embedded in a single syllable,
in individual letters depending on its position in
the root form. And so here in the
Basmara,
the B in the Bismillah is also
packed full of meaning.
And just as
the one letter,
just that one letter, the first letter of
the Quran, which is known as Hafizal Jabr,
degenerative.
It it's known as the generative,
heartfelt jar, that bear with a cast around
in it, b.
Now for our purposes, which is to enhance
our cognitive engagement with the text in a
way that would help bridge,
as we said, the chasm of time and
language
that separates us from the 1st generation of
interpreters, which is the prophet
and the Sahaba.
For that,
in a sense, we are attempting to
remold our
English
speaking brain. We we,
and to to appreciate the nuances of Arabic
in a more profound manner than mere just
gathering information.
And and for that, you need to take
in all the facets, all all the nuances
of the language in order to restructure your
your perception of it. And in Arabic is
obviously
not native to most of us, and the
cultural context we live in is radically different.
So
it it it it it does not naturally
lend itself to the semantics of the words
of the Quran.
English translations will, as you as I said,
will take you only take you so far.
Therefore, we, as we did with the names
of the Surah, what what did we do?
We went through all the names in order,
using each name to grow our perceptive capacity
of the Surah. Here again, with this first
letter of the Quran,
the first letter of the first sentence, we
will do the same.
Now following, of course, the principle of the
scheme of interpretation that we said in the
beginning, the scheme of Usul Al Tafsir, which
was that we will look for interpretation of
the Quran
by the Quran, from the Quran. That's the
first point of call.
Now this letter, this preposition
b in the Janzif construct
in Arabic
has
13 different meanings,
and each
has its own flavor of meaning in different
verses of the Quran.
And that is what we are going to
look at.
An example of each of the 13.
Hope you can finish in time. Okay.
So
the first,
the first example and we're when I say
be,
we're talking about be as in the genitive
construct, not not when it is part of
a word like bidah. We're not talking about
that. We're talking about the the preposition be.
Talking about the preposition be, not when it
is bidah,
like in
in, when it's part of the
when it's part of the actual word.
So and
the scholars say were,
That,
it it has a core meaning, and then
all the other meanings will revert to it.
They're they're linked.
So
now the first meaning,
it has this b at the first meaning
is known as Il Saq, which is contiguity
and attachment.
And the verse the verse for that where
we were, it has this meaning is in
Surat Al Maeda verse 6,
wipe with your head.
You can say that in natural speech, you
will say,
just wipe your head. But here, it has
Watch your head. Or or wipe your head.
And there are difference of opinion among scholars
about b, whether here it is Ilsek or
not or whether it it it it means,
the whole head,
which we'll come to later on. But once
a whole, this is Ilsek in the meaning
of Ilsek, in the meaning of attachment and
contiguity.
Right? And then the second meaning is
baoukagia,
which is the transitive, the transition.
So we have,
moving from one place to another. You have
transitioned. This gives the meaning of transition. So
the the example of that in Surat Al
Baqarah verse 17, Allah
says,
that Allah went went to that Allah
went with their nur, with their light. What
that means is that he took away their
light. So it moving it from one place
to another. So this is transition transmitting, moving
big here again.
That's the second meaning.
The third meaning is,
in in the meaning of istiana.
Istiana means assistance. That with the assistance.
I wrote with the pen. I wrote with
the assistance of the pen.
In in Surat Infatiha, this is the example
of
Bi meaning Istia'aar,
b meaning assistance.
Then the 4th meaning is
Ba'us Sabid Sababiyya,
which is reason or cause for something to
happen.
So,
you would say,
that
so we seized and this was, in Surat
Al Ankabut verse 40.
It says, Kulan,
and so we seize each one for his
sins
with it. So the reason we seize them
is for the sins. So that's another meaning.
It is in comfort, the meaning of Sabbath.
And then
the 5th meaning
is
Musahabah,
accompanying.
It it it it shows that,
that all all people,
saying to Nuh alaihi salaam, oh,
descend. Come come down with,
come down with in in pay in in
peace.
So,
enter with so accompanying
salaam, accompanying peace,
accompanied with peace. So that's another meaning of
of b.
The 6th meaning is known as a Darfia,
which is
temporal.
In in other words, denoting time and space.
So,
an example of the time with in
Surah Al Imran verse
123,
Allah says
that
Allah
helped you. He he the aid. He his
his help came in in Badar. So, in
in that is at the time in the
place of Badar. So that's it. And then,
that we we save the family of Luth
Alaihi Salam.
Bisahar means in the morning. So it's a
morning time. So it it's giving you time
there. So it's temporal meaning that is known
as dafir, in in something, in daf.
And then
the 7th meaning is
which is exchange, compensation,
comparison, all of that it means. So so
so
you'll
say as in
178 verse 178,
where Allah
is telling us that you there's comparison. So
you have,
that a a free a free a free
person with a free person is a an
equal exchange.
The servant of, a slave with a slave
and a and a female with a female.
So that is known as mukabala.
And another another
flavor of meaning, another nuance.
And then the 8th meaning is
Al Muja'awza.
And this is Al Muja'awza means
where we would use in the meaning of
an, about about something.
Ar Rahman Ufas Albihi Khabira.
The gracious one, ask any
informed person about him. So it comes in
the meaning of about.
And so, Allah
is saying, Arrahmanu Fass Al Biih Kabira.
The Gracious One, ask anyone, any informed person
about him. So this is, known as Muja'uza.
Al Muja'uza 2.
And then the 9th meaning is Babool Isti'uilah.
This
is, al Baool Isti'uilah.
The
Ba in the meaning of control
or dominance or hold or something. So,
you you you say,
in in Surat Al Imran verse 75,
Allah
says, among the people of the book, there
are there are there are some who, if
you entrust them with a heap of gold,
they will return it. They will return it
to you. So with
a heap of gold. So this is you
give them control over something. So giving control
is as well here.
Yeah. So that was number
9.
The 10th meaning is
alziah with where it is purpose
and goal.
Is. So Yusuf verse 100,
where,
he's saying that he was kind to me
when he let me out of prison. So,
that b there is the reason why he
has taken me out of prison because he
was kind to me. So there's there's reasoning.
There's goal. There's the goal of it.
That is number 10,
the 10th meaning.
And the 11th meaning is
atabarid.
Atabarid
with dog, atabarid,
which means segmentation
part of something as in partial,
where
you're meaning you're meaning part of it, not
the whole thing.
And here is
the difference of opinion
among the scholars is clear about,
in in branches,
it gush forth in branches. So,
that they are drinking from the well doesn't
mean they're drinking all the well. They're drinking
they're drinking
from a part of the well. So that's
segmenting of it. That's a segment of it.
And
this is the difference between Imam Hanifa and
Imam, Imam Shafi'i in regard to wiping of
the head. He'd think, Imam Shafi'i is of
the opinion that this is taggreed,
that the meaning
of wiping your head, that the meaning of
the bad air is Tabireed. It is segmented.
So you can so a third of the
head, if you wipe that, that's sufficient for
in in Shafi'i fit. But the Hanafi'i fit,
it's not. It's the the full head, And
that's the difference. But the point here is
that this ba also has that meaning in
it.
And then we have the 10th meaning, which
is Qasam.
Qasam, oath oath.
You know? So,
the
this is in,
in Surat Al Araf or verse 134,
where it says, pray to your lord for
us,
by the virtue of promise he has made
to us. So that virtue, that oath be
in in there will
be with the oath which he makes. So
you can use it with an oath as
well in in the meaning of oath.
And then the fine and,
so so that was,
Sanyashok,
the 12th.
Did we do it to 11th? Yeah. That
was the 12th. And then finally, the 13th
one is for emphasis.
It's called tawkid.
The the meaning of tawkid. And
you you use this, in a, in in
an example of this in Surat Al Nisar
verse 6. Allah
said,
That kafaa that kafaa Allah is not you
can say Allah is sufficient, but kafaa billahi,
that sufficient is Allah. Sufficient Allah is that,
and that, that
your Lord will be will will be there,
all sufficient a guardian.
That Allah is sufficient all, as a
guardian. And here, it is for emphasis. The
be there,
that Allah is yours.
All sufficient your guardian. He's
walatulku bi idikum. Walatulku
idikum
is makes
the meaning comes through, but when you add
ba there, that is ba zaydah that's it's
ba for tawkeed. It is for emphasis.
So,
and
it's it it gives you the meaning of
so this is the, summary of the meanings
of the preposition
of bi in the Quran.
Now
this,
as we said, is the first unit of
meaning in the Quran, the Ba'h with the
Kasra under it and which is known as
Haful Jar, the genitive with with the meaning
of mess the,
and the take home message from from all
of this is not to run away with
the idea
that it means
with or when we say,
oh, this means with or or in in
the name of Allah.
And that's it. Don't allow that to happen.
But look, this is much more. This is
deeper. This is richer. So when I'm saying
Bismillah, I'm I'm not just saying this. I'm
saying from this list in the mind, we
can begin to appreciate the richness of the
language and the way meanings and messages,
unfold in layer upon layer in an amazing
semantic flourish.
You can also see from this the depths
to which the scholars have pondered and debated
the meanings of each letter of the Quran.
They looked at every instance of the occur
of the occurrence of this, occurrence of these
letters in the Quran. You know, there's over
11,000
times
this Ba' appears in the Quran, and they
have studied them. They've come up and
give us beautiful explanations.
Now for your action point,
we all know that we should be saying
Bismillah when Bismillah
or Bismillah raman Rahim
whenever you do something significant.
If you are born Muslim, then
your parents would have told you over and
over. Say Bismillah. Say Bismillah.
You would remember that.
And we do. You know, say mitzvilla before
you eat. Say mitzvilla before you drink. Say
mitzvilla for wudu. And, of course, we,
and before entering the bathroom, you say, say
mitzvilla.
But we say it sometimes and we forget
it most times. Why is that?
What's the reason? Why do we forget?
The reason is that we have not fully
internalized the value of it and that's the
point.
If we if something is valuable, then we
will, we will take care of it. You
know, we we very careful when we go
in the toilet or go in the bathroom
where we've put our mobile phones because that
the value of that is very important. So
you will either take it with you or
leave it in a place where you know
where it is.
So
now the value for Bismillah
the reason you need to know, Bismillah, that
when you say that when by saying
Bismillah
inniyahoodubu
awwubu bika min alkhobuthi wal kabaisti before going
into the bathroom, when you say that,
a veil is erected
to cover you from the eyes of shaitan
and their evil.
You're shielded from your enemies, both male and
female,
shayateen. You're shielded
when you are uncovered
and
vulnerable.
So this has to be in your mind
that when I say before going into the
bathroom, I I say this, this is the
this is the perfection I'm going to get.
Now take the issue of food.
Everyone nowadays complains about the negative effects of
food, you know, while people in one part
of the world are starving, there are people
in other parts of the world who are
paying others
to convince them not to eat.
You know, that's what I'm talking about. You
know, about weight watchers programs.
People go and they pay them. They tell
to pay them to convince them not to
eat. Yeah. That's that's as far as it's
gone. While in the other part of the
world, people have no food to eat.
So now and what we say is that
why? Oh,
the the food, I'm I'm eating too much
or it's not benefiting me. Saying Bismillah sincerely
from your heart
before eating will not only increase the barka
in your food, but it will bless you
with strength
to use the energy
earned in the actions
to please Allah.
The energy you earn in actions to please
Allah instead of strength to disobey Allah.
You know,
That's when Shaitan when when a person enters
their home, and if they mention Allah, they
say before
they before entering their house and before eating
their food, then Shaitan announces
to his people, to his,
his descendants, his his the devils,
male and female around that look
that you have nowhere to dwell tonight and
there is no dinner tonight.
Yes. There's nothing.
There's but if he enters his house without
saying miss Mila, without mentioning Allah, then Shaitan
said,
oh, we found place to to dwell here.
We found dwelling tonight.
Yes.
And
if he does not say miss Mila in
the beginning,
if he does not say it, he
says to his
children, his descendants, he said,
And now you found dwelling, you found place
to stay tonight. And we have also got
dinner.
Yes. That's what Shaitan says. So he joins
you in the food. In another in another
regard, you know, Shaitan was eating with the
Saabi. And then in the end, he says,
Bismillahi,
he he brought it all up. He was
eating with him. The Shaitan was eating with
him. So the point is that we have
to recognize these realities beyond what we can
see. That we we do not we were
people who believe in realities beyond the physical.
We we believe that we have a soul
which is nonphysical, and we believe there are
other creatures that we cannot see that are
around us.
Now
these were the words
through which Allah
saved
Nuh alaihi salam
in the great storm. We live in great
storms now. Now imagine Nuh alaihi salam, what
did he say?
What did he say? What did he say?
That he said,
embark on it. This is when he put
the ark in the massive in the massive
storm. This is the words he used. This
is the power of that. Bismillahi
majileahiha.
In the name of Allah, in the name
of Allah, it shall sail. It shall set
sail. In the name of Allah, it will
set sail. And in the name of Allah,
it will cast anchor.
This in other words, it will be safe.
Bismillahi majileahiha. So this is the mercy. This
is the plan. This is the, blessing of
and there are many more. But to recognize
this, your action point is to everything of
significance.
Make sure you remember to say to say
Bismillah because this has immense benefit.
I want to end tonight with a beautiful
story of the great scholar,
Ibrahim ibn Adham.
Ibrahim ibn Adham was a
a king in Bak in which is modern
day Afghanistan.
And he was,
one night, he was in his private chamber,
and he heard someone walking on the roof.
And he says, who are they? Who are
you doing there? And he said, I'm looking
for my camel. And he said, you're looking
for a camel on my roof. What is
this?
He said, are you mad? Why are you
looking? And and and the person responded, said
to him that
if you think I'm crazy, what about you
who are looking for Allah among silk and
golden chambers?
That shook him. And there are other,
this is not the actual story I want
to tell. I want to tell another story
about him, but just to give you a
background before. So he gave up everything and
became,
the traffic, start start traveling and he went
and lived in Gaza in the same Gaza.
Well, we traveled around the world. It's it
became people, a lot of people found out
that this king had given up his his
palace and everything and was living
the the life of of a wayfarer. You
know, working, doing odd odd jobs, but but
worshiping Allah. He had given up everything. So
the stories have spread around, but no one
actually knew him. No one knew what he
looked like, but they knew his story that
this was a mess. The king had 40,
castles of gold used to be in front
of him behind when he walked. And he
give he gave it all up, and he
used to do menial work, you know, Madaba
and and and feed himself.
But he was very pious and, one of
the great
saints that they they called him.
Anyway, one day, he was he he went
to Medina,
Musil,
Nabi sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
And he was a traveler, so he didn't
have food. He didn't have place to stay.
So during the night,
the people, they used to close the mosque.
He lived in the 2nd century of history,
but but they
the people who are taking care of the
mosque didn't allow people to sleep in Masjid
Nabu. You could stay during the day, but
and he had nowhere to go. So he's
insisted. I have nowhere to go. Well, what
am I going to do? You know, just
allow me to sleep. And the guards there
grabbed him by they didn't recognize who he
was. So they grabbed him by his feet
and dragged him out, outside and and threw
him off. And it was cold.
It was winter.
And there somebody was walking past a a
a baker,
and he said to him,
why don't you come with me? I'm,
I'll be baking tonight.
I'll be baking.
You can come sit sit sit in my
shop. Maybe you can stay with me. It's
warm. I I have a an oven, and
you can sit next to it. You'll be
warm, and, you know, you can spend the
night with me there. So he said, okay.
I'll go. So he comes and he sits
with him, and he's watching this baker. He's
making his
dough, and he makes a dough, and he
puts it into the oven. And he says,
Bismillah.
And he puts this, and then he took
it out. And when it comes out, he
says, Alhamdulillah.
And
all night
long,
and
this scholar, this person have become a great
scholar in Islam now thought, well, you know,
I'm going to give this person
that all night, just this one dikr he's
doing Bismillah.
Don't you have any other zikr, man? Can
I teach you some other things? I mean,
what do you And he said, he said,
no, no. I I I just do this
because from this one, everything I ask Allah
for has come through
From the everything I asked Allah, Allah has
given me exactly it.
And he said, really? Everything. And he said,
well, not really. I mean, one thing he
hasn't given me yet, but I'm hoping.
And he said, what is that? He said,
I made a dua once. I'm I'm I'm
I'm made a dua but it's not come
through yet, which is that Allah will give
me the honor
of meeting
the great the great the great friend of
Allah, Ibrahim ibn Adham.
He says he says this to him.
And he says, really?
He said, but
do you know that you are better than
Ibrahim Ni Adam? He said, well, what makes
you say so? He said, because I'm Ibrahim
Ni Adam
and Allah has brought you
has brought me to you
dragged by my feet.
So you are better than me.
That's what he said to him. So
the moral of the story is that the
blessing of Bismillah and hamdulillah,
the dhikr is to bring it into your
life. Bring these mentioning of these names
because it is the greatest name. It is
the most valuable name you have that you
can offer on your tongue. So use it.
Use it in every opportunity you get. It
is it is a great blessing. That
may Allah enlighten
our hearts with this
and bless us to keep
on the straight path.
We will,
pray now, inshallah, we'll do do
Allah
Oh, Allah,
cleanse our souls.
Oh, Allah, cleanse our souls and fortify our
hearts with the dhikr of your beautiful names.
Oh, Allah, beautify our hearts with the dhikr
of your beautiful names.
Grant us refuge and protection
from the designs of the evil, from the
designs of Shaitan
and his followers.
Oh, Allah,
these young people have come here today seeking
your guidance,
seeking your mercy.
They're asking for your forgiveness.
They are repenting from all sins.
They're turning a new page and returning to
you. They're seeking
your love and your grace
with hands raised
as beggars do.
We're all beggars and begging of you.
Oh, Allah, we're begging your kindness. We're begging
you of your love and mercy. Oh, Allah,
you are most kind. You are the most
kind, the most merciful.
Do not turn us away empty handed.
Oh, Allah,
if you were to turn us away, we
have no one else to turn to.
We have no one but you. You are
our only hope. You are.
We have no protection except from you. Protect
us.
Protect our brothers and sisters suffering all around
the world and in the land of
Masjid Al Aqsa. Oh, Allah,
our brothers, our sisters,
our innocent children,
our mothers, our fathers, our elderly, the sick
are suffering great pain and great oppression
at the hands of those who've lost all
sense of humanity and mercy.
Oh Allah, with these feeble hands and painful
hearts,
we beseech you and beg you
to help them and help us. Oh Allah,
bring your help closer, oh Allah.
Allah.