Sadullah Khan – Towards Taqwa through Tazkiyah
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Today, however,
I want to pay attention
to one of the major avenues
that could lead us
to the objective of fasting.
The avenue
is Tasqiyah
and the objective is Taqwa.
The avenue,
Tasqeeh
and the objective is Taqwa.
And I begin by referring to a supplication
made by Nabi Ibrahim alaihi salaam, the patriarch,
the forefather of Rasulullah
and of many prophets, peace be upon all
of them. Ibrahim alaihi salam made a dua.
He made a dua while he was in
Makkah.
And he asked Allah, oh Allah send it
from this by family, send from the people
in Makkah, which was his wife and his
son was there. From their progeny,
someone will come. And he said,
commissioned someone
and the of the Rasul
began in Makkah.
Signs
of Allah in the heavens and the earth
and also the signs of Allah by revelation.
Or
you may tease them the book which is
also revealed first in Makkah.
To the prophet Muhammad salallahu alayhi wasalam.
All of this
the book and the wisdom
and
we use a key him so that he
may purify them.
Among the primary request of the Ibrahim in
this dua documented
moral and
the moral and spiritual development of the people
of Mecca and beyond.
To make tazkiyah of the people.
And linguistically,
the root word for tazkiyah from the word
zakayyah
implies both cleansing,
purification,
as well as development and upliftment.
So tazkiyah in the Arabic language
means the purification,
the growth,
and the development
and implies in the Quranic
context to bring the self to the heights
of excellence.
And the highest level of that
excellence is to reach nobility.
And the estimation of Allah,
nobility is
The highest degree of that nobility is to
have taqwa in the estimation of Allah.
And taqwa
is the objective
of our fast in this month.
Allah has prescribed fasting for you and verse
goes
In order that you may attain
unto piety, unto righteousness, unto Allah consciousness.
We note that
and Taqwa
are interconnected.
For example, Allah
Don't ascribe purity to yourself.
Only Allah knows those who are pious.
Don't ascribe
purity to
The relationship between and
in this verse of Surah Al Najm.
But also remember
that
does not only relate to the good you
do,
but also to the wrongs that you avoid.
It's not only what you need to do
but also what you need to avoid.
And
many people we know who pray, who fast,
but at the same time, they insult people,
they denigrate people, they humiliate people, they oppress
people, They beg bite people. They do wrong
to people, but they are fasting.
And such fasts
Any person who engages in this kind of
backbiting, fitna mangling, causing problems, causing troubles.
Allah sees no reason why that person is
not eating and drinking.
Allah sees no reason. You may as well
eat and drink.
So many people pray and they fast and
but they shall insult and denigrate the oppressed.
That is not piety. You can't say
but. You can be aiming for
if you're a and of, you know,
dua of the
in which he prayed,
Prophet
righteousness. Grant my soul, my inner being, the
capacity
for piety
and purify myself.
Again,
the soul released in
the dua,
is combined. Oh, Allah, grind my soul its
capacity for piety and purify myself.
You are the best of those who purify
and you are the guardian and you are
its master.
Dua documented in the sahiyah of Imam
Muslim. So Tasqiyah is integral to the pursuit
of Taqwa.
Almost as the gateway, the avenue towards Taqwa
is. You cannot be fasting and praying and
making 20 rakaats or 8 rakaats or whatever
we do, and you expect, you know, that
I'm on the path of fasting and so
on and so forth. I'm giving some charity
and that's it. There must be a purification,
a cleansing, and a moral and a spiritual
development simultaneously
with that.
So this is integral to the pursuit of
taqwa.
And ultimate success for any individual
comes from
Indeed,
most successful are those who purify themselves.
As a matter of fact,
after the longest series of oaths in the
Quran, you know,
Allah takes, you know, normally,
by the morning light and the night and
the night when it's still, then Allah says
That's the qulanic style. That Allah swears an
oath by something and then he brings attention.
Oh, what?
By the morning light. Well, lady at the
night when he's
still. We will we will we will not
leave you on your own, You Rasoolullah.
We will not forsake you, You Rasool. So
very often in the Quran,
2 or 3.
But
the longest out in the Quran Allah takes
is
in
Suratul
Shams.
All this just to draw our attention to
what?
It swears 11 oaths. In other words, Allah
says, by the brightness of the sun
and the subsequent moonlight that follows and by
the daylight which makes everything conspicuous
and by the night when it obscures certain
things And by the celestial spheres
that has that Allah has established. And by
the earth that he has spread wide. And
by the human self
and him who has grounded in balance.
Having guarded it the innate capacity to distinguish
wrong from right.
Then Allah says after saying all of that
note,
successful indeed is the one who purifies the
self.
And
debase is the one who allows the self
to become corrupted.
So
or the cleansing
of the self
is essential,
absolutely essential
feature in human development. And
development and
focuses on the purification of the self or
the inner self from all negative and evil
tendencies
that may arise.
Purification from weakness
in human inclinations.
Purification
from those negative aspects
which could appeal to our desires and lead
to impropriety. May Allah protect us. All of
that. And we should realize
that being spiritually sound
necessitate certain things.
See very often with the idea. I do
so I've been Hajj 5 times. I mean
fajr and jamaah. I wear my robe. I
do these things. I wear like this and
that. I do the stuff.
I must be good. I must be right.
Allah must be pleased with me.
We should realize that being spiritually sound
necessitates
being morally good.
And goodness
emanates from quite a few things.
Good intention. When you speak to people, besides
the salah, you make good good intention and
the fasting and so on. When you speak
to people, what is your intention? When you
say something good or bad, positive or negative,
what is your intention?
Then positive consideration.
Something which is very lacking in our community.
That's why we can make each other so
easily. Someone says something you deliver with, maybe
take out some and call a person.
A good consideration.
What was the person trying to say afterwards,
my Muslim brother? If he's wrong, I'll guide
him. Or maybe I don't understand it.
You know, the statement Allah knows best, Abu
Dharraghafari, a very close companion of Rasul. He's
considered a part of the family of Rasulullah.
Abu Dharr Ghafari.
So one day somebody came to him asking,
how are you this
morning? He said,
So Abu said said, no. It cannot be.
The Rasul said, Abu will stay for the
truth until he meet me at the fountain
in Pervez and how they go through it.
It cannot be.
So they said,
he's his very close friend, what he may
have meant.
So he said, yes. He said,
I hate
but doesn't mean the truth of the Quran.
I dislike
Surely your wealth and your children are fitna.
I love my children.
But you say you make salah without wudu.
Why would you do that?
There might be
some story to it. Even when I told
it to you now, I'm sure you thought,
no. No. It can't be coffee. There might
be something. That's
is now you hear something shocking. You assume,
wait a minute. There might be something good
to it. Is there a good positive explanation
for that? We don't have that in our
community
and even in our religious circles in particular.
That's why it's so easy for people who
are most learned to call each other
on flimsy matters. And it's really upsetting
because it's causing a destruction in the trust
of leadership by the youth.
So
you need
positive consideration.
Good consideration, good intention, but also good character.
How you deal with people? And it must
be manifested in Amaluzar, Yahad in righteous deeds.
A person who is spiritually developed
is expected to harbor good intentions
if you are spiritually developed or spiritually developing
harbor good intentions begin with it
Begin with it some people say normally
5 katoms and then on the fastest day
of Shawwal, please do.
I'm read the katami Arabic can in English
on who to do whatever language you want.
Please do that.
Bless you. Whatever you do, and then I
may tell you, please do that. But that's
not the only thing that goes with it.
You haven't moved.
You're on a spiritual journey.
You can't fill the gas in the car
and say, well, I'm ready to go. Check
the tires. If you're going overseas, check if
you got a passport. If you're traveling interstate,
you need a vaccination. I'm just saying.
You're not ready. You have taken one part
and made it very ready.
So be very
cautious and conscious about that. A person who
is spiritually developed is expected to harbor good
intentions. A clean heart, a positive attitude, and
an endearing personality,
while always
displaying exemplary behavior.
All of these are characteristics
of perhaps the ideal social being.
We are in this special month of Ramadan.
This month of high intensity
moral development, the month of tazkiyah.
And the month of spiritual re rejuvenation.
This month
is the month of training for us,
for the enhancement of our soul and of
our very being.
Let us make a commitment
to purify our hearts. Begin with that.
Let us make a commitment to purify our
hearts.
To cleanse our mind and our soul.
That's clear of all base thoughts
and destructive emotions.
Of destructive beliefs,
destructive concepts,
destructive
habits. This is not possible
unless we guard ourselves.
The faculties of our tongue, of our stomach,
of our hands, of our ears, our eyes,
our hands, our feet,
and of our mind, of all sins, both
outward and inward. As imam Ghazali said, there
are different levels of fasting. There are those
who just abstain from
eating food
and drinks, so they're fasting.
Then some alhusus, they are those who fast,
but not only that, they abstain
from not only doing eating halal, anything haram,
or not eating and drinking, they abstain from
bad actions and bad behavior.
That's second level.
Then
the extra special fast, the fasting of the
of the rasus salallahu alayhi wa sallam, even
the thought of evil doesn't cross their minds.
The has developed to an extent that even
the thought, I may say, should I lie?
No. I shouldn't lie. I'm fasting.
Should I be angry?
No, I I am fasting.
That's
When you're at a level where the thought
of hatred, the thought of lying doesn't even
cross your mind. Imam Ghazali said, so
we're entering the period
in which we search for.
Of the last 10 nights of Ramadan. Please,
I want to urge you. I know traditionally
we come on the 27th night. Masha'Allah. No
problem. Do come. But 27th night is not
necessarily
there's no evidence that there's no evidence that
there's no evidence that there's no 27th night
only. I know normally we're khatam this year
making
on the 29th.
29th night inshallah. But I mean, 21 from
Monday onwards, a little Qadr.
Search for it. The prophet didn't say it's
in one of the night. He said search
for it. The harrow.
He didn't say well you find it on
the 23rd, 25th. In Egypt, for example, they
generally have it on the 23rd or 25th.
In Cairo, you go to the Masjid Hussain
or Al Azad. The bigger night, you see
the crowds are on the 23rd and the
25th, not on the 27th. For
example. So search for it. Are we searching
for it or just coming to mosque on
the 27th night or making a vigil at
home? Whatever we do. It's not that. Search
for it. That's part of tasquir.
The search for it is a request of
Rasulullah
to
In these last 10 days of Ramadan, last
few days of Ramadan, let us remember.
Fasting obligatory upon you. It contains 1 night
in that month,
greater than a 1000 other months.
1 night greater than 8 years of your
life.
Whosoever denies himself the benefit of that night,
indeed denies himself or herself
a tremendous amount of goodness.
So let us let ourselves
of all diseases
of the heart and of the mind
and of emotions such as pride and jealousy
and malice
ill feeding, backbiting, lying,
anger,
self righteousness,
dishonesty,
pretension, vanity,
showing off selfishness,
vainglory,
oppressive love of the world, manipulation of power,
oppression of of people, abuse of wealth. Get
rid of all of that. Then you're on
the path of
How many people are there who pray all
the time and they achieve nothing by the
prayer except tiredness and exhaustion? And how many
are there who fast and they achieve absolutely
nothing but a fast except hunger and thirst?
May Allah save us from that.
By pursuing spiritual development,
we will be performing the greatest service service
to our self and through that insha'Allah, the
pros and tazkiyah to others as well. We'll
become a positive force
and could better contribute to the advancement of
a better world.
The challenge before us
is to develop our souls
along with our body
and along with our mind.
If we accept this challenge
and sincerely pursue the realization of that challenge,
we could through
pursue
pathways
to Taqwa
and perchance
attain spiritual fulfillment
in the context of the modern world we
live in. So we too can be of
those who fulfill
successful are those who purify themselves. I concluded
the dua of Rasool
Allah.
Allah,
grant our soul the capacity for righteousness
and purify. Let us purify ourselves.
Oh, Allah. You are the best to
aid us in purifying ourselves.
In
will be leading us for
on Sunday evening. He'll be leading I think
the first or so. So inshallah is here
to tell. It's really may Allah bless him.
One of the mellow this recitation but really
it's a heartrending to listen to the brother
as well. So inshallah,
with the permission of the and the board
and so on. They have requested that he
be on Sunday and I believe that he
will be on Sunday. So inshallah. If you
wish you benefit and enjoy additionally
the Quran from Khalizi