Safi Khan – Soul Food
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AI: Transcript ©
Alrighty.
Sorry,
guys. Okay.
Everybody.
How's everyone doing?
I'm
glad to see that everyone
made it out of the blizzard
this week.
Everyone enjoyed a couple of extra days off.
Yes?
Much needed. Right?
You know, you know, I'm gonna say something
right now. I am sick and tired of
people hating
on the South for the small moments of
pleasure that we receive
in the winter season. Okay?
You know, I I have family in New
York, and when I send them pictures
of the the Alaskan situation,
they become all sarcastic with me. And I
don't appreciate it, because you leave me and
my 1 millimeter of snow dust alone. Alright?
If I have fun being at home when
it's negative 8 degrees outside, just let me
be.
It was a good time. It was a
good time. I also loved how,
I also loved how people because they packed
it in on Monday, they just went ahead
and called Tuesday a fail as well.
Even though Tuesday was, like, beautiful outside, it
was, like, sunny.
The sun was out. It was so nice.
These are, you know, these are the small
blessings that Allah gives Dallas. You know? We're
blessed people. Alright.
Okay.
We are
going
to continue on with our
cultivating character series.
So
we ended last week with the advice
from
Allah if you guys can see up here
on the screen,
that
we've told the story about the group of
people that came to the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam's house. Right? Or the house of
one of his spouses.
And in the middle of
his
kind of, I guess, private
time, they knocked, you know, and they called
out to him. And they said, you know,
oh, Muhammad, you, Muhammad.
Certain narrations say that they mentioned, you know,
They and they wanted his attention. Come out
to us. We have some questions for you.
And Allah
he mentions about them. Right?
That the people, right, in the Ladina,
that the majority of them, they just don't
know any better. Right? And we talked about
the entire idea of
making sure that
mercy is a part of your Islam.
Right?
That the the the more
spiritually
you grow, the more spiritually mature you become,
the more merciful you naturally become towards people
around you. Right?
And, unfortunately,
we are very much seeing this trend
of people who are trying to
get in touch with Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
but for some reason, they're becoming more harsh
with the people around them.
And
we know from people who
engage with the Quran and we engage with
the sunnah of the prophet
that,
you know, when a person works towards God,
they also work towards being kind and generous
and courteous and gentle with the people around
them. Right? It's not the opposite way.
And today, in fact, we'll, like, double down
on this, and we'll talk even more extensively
on this about how
even when a person begins to love Islam,
an iman becomes
more and more beloved to them.
And even when they be when they begin
to kind of repel or stay away from
certain things that a Muslim should stay away
from,
even with that, they're still courteous to the
people who are going through those struggles. Because,
subhanAllah, one thing that we can all agree
upon, and this is something that we can
all say that we
kind of feel this, this advice, this point,
which is that whenever we see a person
who is going through certain struggles and sins
possibly,
it was just like, you know, that was
me.
Right? Like, I can't forget that I used
to also struggle.
I can't forget that I used to also,
you know, be, you know, falling into
certain bad habits and temptations and whatnot. So,
you know, it's very it's it's not befitting
of a Muslim
to
grow and have Allah
allow you to grow away from a certain
bad habit. And then once you're out of
it, look back at people who are still
struggling and look down upon them.
Right? It's almost like a weird form of,
like you know, it's it's a weird form
of hypocrisy. In fact, actually, you know, the
the the normal human soul,
once they get away from a bad habit
and they see another person struggling with it,
it should actually make them more sympathetic.
I know what you're going through. Right? I've
been through similar things.
Let me lend you a a hand and
we can work through this together. That's the
that's the attitude of a Muslim. Right?
And so now,
Allah
gives us this beautiful next advice in the
Quran.
So Allah he says and now
he
Allah kind of gives us the first few
advices
on interpersonal
relationships
within the. Okay?
We talked about how you should treat Allah.
We talked about how you should treat people
or sorry. We we talked about how you
should treat the prophet,
and now we're gonna be talking about how
you should treat people and handle yourselves. Okay?
So Allah, he says,
Okay. So the first advice that Allah gives
in this verse, he says,
oh, you who believe again, remember, this is
a challenge to the believers. If you believe
in me, if you believe in this, in
Islam,
know that the following should be something that
is relevant to you. Right? So he says,
oh, you who believe, if
okay.
If a person
who is known
to be
openly shameless about their sins,
if a person comes to you and they
don't have the best reputation,
they come to you and they, you know,
you you know that they sometimes cause trouble
amongst people, amongst the community.
They have a reputation that is a little
bit kind of unsettling. Right?
And they come to you, Binebaein,
with news,
with
tea. Right? Like, they're trying to, like, give
you something that is, like, nice and, you
know, it's a it's a cool piece of
information. It's a cool piece of news that
you wanna hear.
Allah, he says,
Make sure that
you verify it.
Don't don't just, like,
jump on it and be like, oh, really?
Woah.
And that person who you heard it from,
you know that they're they've never had a
reputation of being truthful people.
It's almost like the bro the boy who
cried wolf. Right?
A person has this reputation of crying wolf
over and over and over again.
At a certain point,
the person who's receiving the news from them
has to take it upon themselves to know
that
maybe I shouldn't believe the first thing that
I hear. Right?
In fact, the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam,
very beautiful beautiful hadith, he said that a
believer, a mumin,
does not
get bitten from the same hole twice.
Right? Meaning what? Meaning that a believer, a
Muslim is someone who learns
from a past mistake that they made. A
Muslim is someone
who learns that
I had this certain situation with somebody, I
knew them or I was close to them,
and I got burned.
Right? I believed them one time. I lended
my ear to them one time. I remember
I spent some time with them one time.
And, unfortunately,
you know, it actually ended up kind of
really not
it it harmed me in the long run.
Right? I wish I didn't do that. And
by the way, that's okay.
We all live and we learn. Right? Nobody
in here has ever made a perfect decision
in their life in the past. We all
make certain decisions in our life where we
learn from them. We learn from that situation
that, okay. You know what? Maybe I do
things a different way if I had to
go back and rewind.
Right? But the prophet said that a believer
doesn't get bit in by the same hole
or from the same hole twice. Why? Because
a believer,
they learn from their mistakes. They're not people
who continue to repeat the same mistakes over
and over and over and over again.
Now, of course, Allah
is Ghafoor Rahim.
He is always forgiving. He is always merciful.
But on the onus of the person,
they should hold themselves to a standard where
they're not okay
just being taken for a ride over and
over again. Right? The prophet
we talked about this last week. He was
one of the most if not he's actually
the most merciful human being to ever walk
this earth. Right?
Allah says about him that we have not
sent you except to be a mercy to
all of mankind. Right? That was his essence.
That was what he was.
So the prophet being merciful,
what about when it came down to the
prophet
learning from past experiences?
And a lot of people, by the way,
believe it or not, we get this question
a lot. Like, what happens if I have
a friend who, you know,
possibly, like, you know, they were they were
good with me, they were good friends with
me, and then all of a sudden, you
know, they're not so great anymore. They've made
some life decisions that are contrary to mine.
You know, Islamically, is it okay to cut
them off? And, you know, how do I
cut them off? Do I do I still
spend time with them? And I say this
to people all the time, and I'm sure
the other teachers who are here at Roots
will say the exact same thing, which is
that as a Muslim,
you there is a way to be courteous
with people
without fully investing your heart and soul into
them. Right?
And, unfortunately,
you know, we we've cultivated this culture
of people who only know 0 or 100.
Either I dislike you or I love you.
Right? And since when have we ever been
a a a a religion that condones that
extremism?
Right? We've never been like that. And I
can ask you guys this question. Aren't there
people in your life that are very close
inner circle people that you would trust with
very sensitive delicate information?
And are there not people in your life
who you don't have problems with, but you
wouldn't share those in intimate details with them?
Of course, there are. Why? Does it mean
that you hate them? No. It means that
you've established some sort of boundary.
You've established some sort of, you know, the
this this understanding that, yeah, like, you may
not be a terrible person, but I just
don't know you that well.
And that's fine.
There's nothing in Islam that says, oh, you're
a bad person if you don't treat every
single person like you absolutely love them like
your mother. No. No. No. No. That's absolutely
not true.
And so
Allah he says that learn that there are
certain people in this world that Allah Subhanahu
wa ta'ala he says,
They'll come to you. What is a fasik?
A fasik, by the way, in Arabic is
not just a person who sins because there
are grades of a people who sin. Right?
People who struggle with sins and mistakes and
challenges and shahua, desires and temptations,
that's like every single person that's alive.
Alright. Who in this who in this hall
can dare say that I haven't struggled with
any sin in my life? I mean, this
is something that would make you inhuman.
Right? It would make you like like like
like malaika. It would make you an angel
literally.
So a person who sins is a person
who is a human. Right? That and that's
why we get that famous statement. Right? You
know, to to to is human. Right? To
be mistaken is human.
But Allah mentions the word fasik.
The word fasik is a person
who shamelessly
does what they do.
They have no remorse.
They have no care in the world. They
have no regret whatsoever. They have
no sort of mindfulness
over the things that they're doing that are
wrong.
And Allah mentions that particular characteristic when it
comes to verifying things that those type of
people say. Why? Why? Why do you guys
think that is? Why do you think Allah
didn't mention just people who sinned? Why do
you think
Allah mentioned specifically people who sin shamelessly?
Verify what they say before you believe
what they say to you. Why do you
think Allah make that that distinction between just
a regular sinful person versus a person who's
called a open sinful an openly sinful person?
Yeah?
Wow.
She said something powerful. She said something powerful.
She said, well, we just established that everybody's
saying, so who are you gonna believe?
Right? Who are you gonna believe? Right? If
some random person comes to you and they're
like, hey. Listen, man. I think, like, there's,
like, a, like, an ice storm coming to
town, you know, in the next couple of
days. You're like, wait a second. I remember
you forgot to make will do 3 days
ago.
I can't believe you. Right? Like, that's that's
ridiculous.
That's that's almost like that's illogical. Right?
But a person that we that we're talking
about here is a person who does things
so shamelessly
that they don't really they themselves don't even
care if they're telling the truth anymore. Right?
It's very poetic. Islam, by the way, is
very poetic because Islam
will try to help a person avoid certain
things that
the person who may be delivering it to
them also actually is struggling with. Right? Because
a person who is openly sinning,
they probably don't really care too much about
the truth to begin with. And so when
they come to you with something that's important,
you yourself should understand that there's another degree.
Right? There's another degree of authenticity that I
should actually kind of go towards in order
to make sure that what I'm hearing is
something that's actually valid. Right? This, by the
way, comes from a very famous incident from
the life of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasalam.
We don't have too much time to go
into deep details about it today, but I'll
give you guys, like, a very rough breakdown
of it. So, essentially, what happened and this
is in Medina. What what happened was when
the prophet was in Medina,
obviously, like I said last or last week
or a couple weeks ago, that the prophet
didn't have the bandwidth or the capacity to
be everyone's, like, religious guide all over the
Arabian Peninsula. So he had to start sending
people to kind of be his, like, kind
of, like, you know, his his, like, deputies
basically. Right? Like, he would send this person
to this city or that person to that
city. He would make sure that he teaches
these people, and he would train them, and
he would send them off to different cities
to basically almost, like, be his right hand
people. Yeah? And so one of these people,
he
wanted to send
to this city to collect zakah, because zakah
was something that wasn't instituted until a little
while back.
And so he sent this Sahabi, this person,
to go and, you know, go and make
sure you collect zakah from these people. Now
one really interesting thing about people who accepted
Islam and I want you guys to think
about this very critically. Right? This is something
that's very social that a lot of people
don't think about.
You think about the lives of some of
the converts that existed during the time of
the prophet.
Right?
And,
you know, we we're blessed to have converts
in our community today, people that we can
learn from and benefit from and really be
inspired by.
Some of the people who convert to Islam
during the time of the prophet,
they may have been in very, very tough
situations before.
Right? I mean, you look at Musaib ibn
Omer. Right? This man this young man was
literally locked up, chained in his home by
his own mother
when he said that I'm listening to Muhammad
Sallallahu ahi wa sallam.
Bilal
was,
you know, a boulder was placed
on his
body, and
the people that used to own him used
to tell him, now do you believe in
your God? And he continued to say,
There's only one God. There's only one God.
So when they left
their previous life
and accepted Islam,
like, they left a lot of trauma. I
want you guys to know that. Right? They
left a lot of trauma. It's not like
you accepted Islam and, like, oh,
Right? Everyone's happy, and you can come to
our community and pray with us. No. No.
No. Like, sometimes they were afraid for their
life.
And so when the prophet sent this one
person to go to this other city of
new Muslims to basically collect their zakat,
he was on his way.
And on his way, one of the narrations
say
that he basically heard a lot of, like,
hustle and bustle
in this town that he was about to
go to because it was a town
of the people who he was familiar with.
Okay?
And
he had some, like, conflict with them before.
Pre Islam. He had some conflict with them
before.
And so when he reached the area,
he saw, like, a lot of people kind
of, like, making noise and talking loudly, and
he was afraid
that
they were, like they heard that he was
coming, so they were, like, possibly scheming to
harm him.
Okay?
So he went back to the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wasallam.
Alright? And the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam, he
said, okay. Where's where's where's the zakat? Like,
where's the where's what where is the literal
reason why I sent you over there?
And he said, well, I think those people
were planning to, like, attack me,
and, you know, I I I don't know
if they wanted to give their zakat. I
don't know if, you know, like, they they
they really understood, so I came back because
I was fearful.
And some of the Sahaba, they heard this.
They're like, oh my god. Like, they were
trying to harm one of our people. Like,
we gotta go out there and get to
the bottom of this. Right? Like, they're not
only refusing to pay their zakat, but they're
also trying to harm one of ours? Like,
no. No. No. This ain't gonna roll. And
so they got angry. About the prophet, sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam, he said, no, no, no,
no. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait
a second. Let's just go
and figure out
what the issue is. Like, there something sounds
weird. You know, like, when somebody tells you
something and it just sounds weird?
Like, wait a second. Like, that doesn't sound
I don't know about all that. Right? Like,
we gotta figure this thing out. So the
prophet
he
sends another companion of his to go and
check, see what's going on, and ends up
that there was an entire group of people
waiting to give their succah.
But this one person actually
almost psyched himself out.
He just didn't come into the city,
and he got so afraid
that he left almost, like, listening to a
little bit of, like, the the the the
inner thoughts that he had.
And so the prophet
he used this as, like, a teaching point.
Right?
Don't first of all,
big, big lesson here.
Don't allow your own inner demons to get
to you. You know? Like, this is something
that is so common amongst human beings. Right?
We, like, think
of an entire movie script in our head
when we walk into a gathering of people.
Like, oh my god. There's this one person
there that, like, I unfriended on Instagram, like,
2 years ago. I don't know if I
can go in there and, like,
be okay. Right? Like, oh my god. I'm
starting to breathe heavily. Like, this is weird.
Should I even, like, go? Like, why did
I accept this invitation? Oh god. Like, why
did this happen to me? Right? The brothers
here just they don't get it. Right? We
we're like, she's like, yeah. Is there food
there? Inshallah. I'm in.
You know, like, there there's this kind of,
like there's anxiety. Right?
How
many
times have you been your own worst enemy?
You psyched How many times have you been
your own worst enemy?
You psyched yourself out.
You psyched yourself out. There was nothing there.
There was nothing there to be afraid of.
There was nothing there to be
anxious about.
In fact, you step foot through that door
and everybody's like, Sarah, assalamu alaikum. How's it
going? Welcome. Come come sit with us. And
you're like, well, you guys who's gonna hit
me first? I don't know. Right?
No. No. No. These are good people. Right?
It's a part of that Husnuddin,
by the way. It's a part of that
Husnuddin that you should have good assumptions about
people. We talked about this a few like,
week ago.
Never go into a situation of Muslims and
think that, oh, this is gonna be terrible.
This is gonna be the worst. Right?
Have good hope. Have good thoughts. And I'll
tell you, how many times have we mentally
walked into a situation,
and because of our own mentality, we robbed
ourselves of a good experience?
Right?
And in a weird way, when we're in
that situation,
like, nothing bad is happening, but we're almost,
like, anticipating it. Oh, gosh. I can't wait
till the first person says something bad about
me. Here we go.
It's, like, been 2 and a half hours.
No one said one bad thing. You're like,
here we go. 3 minutes left. When's the
New Year's ball gonna drop? Like,
no, no one's gonna say anything, nobody hates
you, everyone's cool with you, alhamdulillah.
But because of that anxiety, because of that
fear,
for
2 straight hours, you robbed yourself of a
very beautiful experience in good company. Right?
So
we gotta be wary of that. So Allah
he says,
And in another,
you know, version of recitation,
it says,
basically, like, like, to to to to make
strong or to, like, strengthen something. Right? Like,
when you hear a piece of information
from a person who may not be reliable,
make sure that you strengthen whatever they told
you. May make sure that you verify whatever
they told you. Why?
Allah, he says,
He says
verify it so that you do not harm
people,
bi jahlatin,
unknowingly.
And then you become
And you become a people
who are regretful over whatever you did.
Now think about this.
Has there ever been a time in your
life
where someone came to you and they told
you something,
and you believed it?
And because of that
believing
that part of information or that piece of
information,
you thought
very, very wrongly about somebody who was completely
clean of any sort of allegations.
But because you didn't verify,
you just believed it right away, you kind
of, like, thought badly of this person
for for weeks, for months, perhaps even for
years.
And then when you found out the truth,
you became extremely regretful.
You became so regretful
because you just realized, wow,
I, for 2 years straight, thought this person
was something
that at the end of the day, I
realized they actually were not.
Right?
I thought this person said something about me
when in fact,
they didn't ever say that about me.
I should have just verified to make sure
that that person said, but because I was
so emotionally wound up,
I'm always ready to square up. I believed
it right away. Oh, hey. That person called
you like a liar. What?
How dare they?
I will take them off the Dawat list
right now.
They're not coming to my wedding in 6
years. Right? Like,
you rob yourself
because
before you even, like, ask the question, like,
wait a second. Like, where did you hear
that from? Right? Like, where did you hear
that from?
Like, how did you hear that? What did
they exactly say? Can you, like, recount, like,
what they exactly said?
And if you ask a few of those
questions, that person's like, yeah, man. Like, I
don't really know. Like, I just heard.
That's when you know the sun is extremely
weak.
You know, like, the chain of command is
extremely weak. Right? Who'd you hear from? Yeah,
man. Like, it was just some random dude.
Habibi, like, how do I know that dude
in the first place?
But because you're so emotional. Right? And that's
why, by the way, you know what's incredible?
Allah, he uses here,
You know what Jahala is?
Jahala, a lot of times, like, in Arabic
and Quran is translated as, like, ignorance.
Right? Ignorance or, like, you know, people talk
about, like, which
means, like, a period of of ignorance or
pre Islam or whatever it is. You know,
Jahala?
Jahala means a person who cannot control their
emotions.
They're so emotional.
They're so emotional.
They hear one thing about them and immediately,
they're like, oh my god. Like,
what? Are you kidding me?
After all I did for them,
they get so emotionally wound up that they
forget that there's a process
of making sure that something's actually true.
Right?
We have to stop living in this life
like everyone's against us.
We have to start living a life where
we think that, no. There's this person, I
don't think they said that about me.
I don't think they did. And even if
they did,
they didn't mean it.
They didn't mean it. Maybe they were in
bad company.
Who knows?
Right?
So he says,
lest you become a people,
And then later on, you become this regretful
person.
Now I wanted to ask a question.
This is gonna be an interesting question here.
Ready for this?
And I'm gonna ask you guys to break
off with one another, just kinda talk to
each other.
We talk about the regret
factor. Right? Because in Islam,
sometimes regret is a good thing. You guys
agree with that? Like, remorse and regret is
a good thing.
But why here would Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
say,
regret as something that's bad,
that you don't wanna become people that are
regretful.
So I want you to talk to the
person next to you, and I want you
to differentiate
what is the difference between
regret that is actually beneficial
and regret that actually may be harmful for
you. Okay? Go ahead, Talk to each other,
and I'll give you guys, like, maybe, like,
4 minutes, and then, we'll reconvene. Go ahead,
guys.
Alright. What do we got, guys? Here we
go. Bismillah.
Let's chair.
What do we got? What's the difference between
a regret and a remorse that in Islam
might be beneficial
versus a regret and a remorse that may
become harmful for a person. Yes.
Very good.
Yeah. She mentioned something really interesting. She said
that there's a difference of,
regret when it comes to, like, a like,
a situation with you and Allah
versus regret when you're kind of in a
situation with somebody else. Right? That it is
in a in a lot of ways. And
by the way, there are a lot of
that actually comment on this that it is
much harder
for a person to remedy
wrongs that have been committed against people,
right, versus certain kind of sins that a
person commits against the rights of Allah.
Allah. Right? A person who misses salah.
Okay?
Although this is a really, you know, serious
matter,
it is still something
that is under the realm of Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala's Maghfirah,
and it doesn't really affect other people around
them. Right?
But a person who spreads lies and, like,
backbites about other people, now not only are
you infringing upon one of the commands that
Allah
told you to stay away from,
but you're also now along the road harming
so many other people on the way now
that you actually have to remedy as well.
Right? It's no longer sufficient that you just
go home and like, yeah, Allah, I'm so
sorry for backbiting about 80 people today. Please
forgive me and allow me to be a
new Muslim tomorrow. Right? Like, there's 80 people
that are not, like, desecrated because of you.
Right? I mean, the so that's not enough,
right, at that point. So good point. Very
good. Anybody else?
Yes.
Right.
Beautiful. Yeah.
Right.
Yeah. Very good. So she mentioned, like, good
regret is something that helps you grow closer
to Allah. Right? And bad regret is something
that basically kind of, like, just pushes you
down into the ground. Correct?
Yeah. That's a beautiful point. Right? And this
is something that, you know, my my my
colleague, Gustavo Fatima, mentions quite frequently. She says
that, you know, how do you know
what really was a mistake? Right? Like, you
know, even if certain bad things
are deemed to be bad in your life,
right, or you kind of diagnose them as
bad, how do you know if they were
truly bad? And she always says that if
anything, you know, ends up bringing you closer
to Allah, it wasn't really bad in its
essence right at the end of the day.
Right?
So very, very powerful, Anybody else wanna share?
Yes, Timur?
Yeah.
Yeah. SubhanAllah. So he brought up the entire
idea of, like,
privacy and concealing a sin versus publicly and
shamelessly doing something. Right? A person who is
kind of harming other people,
they may not care as much about, you
know, that that that shame factor. Right? They're
okay kind of going around with people and
saying this and this and that and that
about other people.
A person who may sin more privately
is kind of worried. At least I mean,
even if they kind of may not have
internalized the idea of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
watching them, at least they understand that they
don't wanna be an influence in a bad
way on other people. Right? And by the
way, that's one of the greatest and we'll
talk about this in just a second. That's
one of the greatest elements of, you know,
the idea of sitting privately versus sitting publicly.
Right? Is the factor that it has on
influencing other people around you. Right? You don't
wanna ever be that person. Oh, because of
this guy, I started doing this.
And then Allah
will ask, you're the one who influences this
person. What do you have to say for
yourself? It's just like the opposite is also
true. Right? You do something really, really beautiful,
and you influence somebody to go pray salah
that day. Allah will Allah will Allah will
reward you.
You didn't even know this, that this kid
started praying because he saw you praying mother
of that day. And you're like, what? Who's
that guy? And and and subhanallah. But because
of your your your purity of intention, and
sincerity, Allah will reward you for influencing somebody
in a beautiful way. Right? So very good.
You guys all answered the question. He says,
you know,
do not wanna be a person who's regretful.
And, by the way, the keyword here in
the Quran that I want you guys to
think about here is that this is a
regret
Right? It's a regret from
being absolutely ignorant
or being absolutely shameless and careless. Right? Because
a person who is regretful and remorseful
after they make a sincere mistake. Right? That's
different.
That's different. I thought about this action.
I thought about the deed. I kind of,
like, put a little bit of thought into
it, and then I made a mistake.
Different from when a person who carelessly just
does things. Because, by the way, when whoever
brought up the repentance factor, I don't know
who may who may have mentioned that, but
but the repentance and the toba factor,
a person who is careless
about their sins
will less likely
be mindful enough to ask for forgiveness for
You guys ever thought of that? Like, a
person who doesn't care about the mistakes that
they make
will have a harder time at the end
of the night, at the end of their
day, before they go to sleep asking Allah,
oh, Allah forgive me. Why? Because they didn't
even think that what they did was bad.
Right? They didn't even care that what they
did was a mistake.
So why even bother spending my time asking
Allah for forgiveness for it? How many times
have you seen the opposite, which is
extremely mindful people
who actually ask Allah for forgiveness for things
that the majority of people wouldn't even consider
sins.
Oh, Allah. I, you know, I I didn't
give that person enough time today in my
life.
Right? Oh, Allah. I, you know, I I
I ended that phone call a little bit
early. Even though for the rest of humanity,
be like, no, bro. Like, you're like you're
like a very busy person. Masha'Allah. You do
a lot of things in your day, so
you couldn't give more than 5 minutes. But
you know who this was? This was the
prophet sallallahu alaihi
wasallam. The prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam used to
beg Allah,
talk to Allah about things that the average
human being would be like, yeah. I've never
I've never spoken to Allah about that.
But the reason why is because the level
of care and attention that he put into
his life and his actions was something that
is very rarely found nowadays.
Things that we would just gloss over and
be like, yeah. No big deal. The prophet
would it would would would deem them to
be extremely big deals to himself.
Right? This is why you get those beautiful
stories. Right? That small kid who, used to
be very, very fond over his bird that
he had. And, one day, you know, he
wasn't seen with his little bird, and so
the prophet asked him, you know, yeah, Abu
yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Abu Nuhayr. Right? Or, sorry,
Yeah. Abu Umer.
He he called him Abu Umer, and he
said, what happened to and he used to
call this little bird Anur.
So he said, what happened to Anur? And
somebody told the prophet, hey.
That kid's bird actually passed away yesterday.
And the prophet, like, spent some time with
him.
He sat with him, spent some time with
him. Right? Would anybody ever blame the prophet
for, like, getting up and be like, alright.
I gotta go leave the Ummah right now,
man. Kid, sorry, bro. Like,
no, man. Like, we we we nobody would
bat an eye, but, like, yeah. I mean,
the prophet doesn't have time for that.
But for himself,
he's like, no. No. No. I have to
give this kid his hock.
I have to give this kid his time.
I have to give this kid his right.
He deserves time. Right?
So don't be people of
ignorant regret. That's what I would define it
as. Right? Regret that is kind of bred
from Jahala. Right? Ignorance. Alright.
Let's talk about this last one inshallah today.
So then Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala, he says,
Okay? He says, and keep in
mind, be weary, be thoughtful,
know
that
Allah's messenger
is in your presence.
Just something I want you guys to think
about. I don't know. I I I do
this exercise once in a while.
What would you
be like
if the prophet sallallahu alaihi sallam walked into
the room right now?
It's a very, very daunting question.
How would you behave
if you knew
that the messenger of Allah
walked into the room.
And let's just say he walked through these
doors,
because he's VIP access,
and he walks straight to the back, and
he just sits there. There. First of all,
I would jump straight out of this chair
and be, like, ashamed
of myself for even being up here.
But, like, how would the rest of us
kind of, like, react?
Right? How would we react if the prophet
was around you? So the heaviness of this
ayah. Right?
Allah says,
and keep in mind
that the messenger of Allah is in your
presence. Can you guys just imagine? I know
we talk about this a lot. Like, oh,
the Sira, Medina,
you know, like,
but what was it like to walk with
him?
What was it like to see him in
between, like, prayers? What was it like to
just pass him by on the street?
There was a woman who described the prophet
one time that every time he spoke, it
was as pearls used to flow out of
his mouth.
Can you imagine living in a city with
a person that was described like that?
You're like, please. Like, I just wanna hang
out with you. Do you have any time?
Like, you would do anything.
Right? And so Allah gives a very stern
warning. He says,
if he were to okay.
If he were to obey you,
If he were to obey you in a
lot of matters,
Know that you would be, like, finished.
You'd be done for.
It's amazing.
It's a blessing from Allah
that you all listen to the prophet
You want one evidence of this without any
further explanation?
Go read about the battle of Uhud tonight
before you go to sleep.
That battle was
essentially lost
by the Muslims
because
the prophet
told some of the people in the the
the the the army of the Muslims
to stay on top of the hill of
called the archer's mound and don't come down
until I give you this the the the
signals to come down.
And because people were excited, they were winning
the battle. Uhud was a very lopsided battle
in the favor of the Muslims at that
time. But they got excited. They saw the
spoils of war, and they're like, you know
what? Like, maybe he meant that we should
stay up here, like, if the battle was,
like, neutral or if we were losing. But
now it's like man, you're, like, up, like,
98 to, like, 55 with, like, 3 minutes
left in the Q4. You're like, send in
the subs. Right? Like, you're ready to call
it. Right? Send in the g lead guys.
Right? Like, you're good.
And because of that,
Khaled ibn Waleed, at that time, was not
Muslim, came around from behind the mound and
attacked the Muslims from behind. And because of
that, it was a very, very devastating day
for the Muslims.
Right?
And, subhanAllah,
Allah, he says this. He says, look.
Whenever
whenever any of you all have ever challenged
the the the the the will of the
prophet,
it has always led to something bad
because the prophet
knows better for you than you even know
for yourself. There's actually even fact
even an ayah in the Quran
where Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, he says,
and
if the truth
had been in accordance
with their desires, meaning that
if the prophets
were just saying things from their own desires,
verily, the heavens and the earth and whosoever
is in it
would have been completely
corrupted.
They would have been finished. What does that
tell you? That whatever the prophet said was
an echo from whatever
Allah said.
The prophet never said anything
that was affecting the that was completely from
his own accord.
If he ever decided something, it was because
Allah
signed off on that decision.
You know what? You wanna know proof of
this, by the way? If you talk to
anybody about this topic,
the number one proof of this was anyone
know? Big deal. One of the biggest instances
of the prophet's life.
The move from
Mecca
to Medina.
The prophet didn't wanna leave.
He didn't wanna leave. Y'all know why? Because
before he left, he looked at the Kaaba,
and he says,
by god,
if I was not forced to leave you,
I would have never left you. He left
crying.
He left crying.
I don't wanna leave. This is where I
grew up.
Although that there are people here that are
harming me because I say,
I
don't wanna leave my house. This is my
home. This is where I grew up. This
is where my parents are.
Going to a random city, starting from square
1,
starting a life with new people, building a
new place all over. I mean, this is,
like, no joke. I mean, anybody in here
ever move, like, drastically in their life? I
mean, y'all know. Y'all know how difficult it
is.
The anxiety of starting a new life with
new friends, finding a new space,
knowing where the nearest Kroger is, you're like,
can't have groceries tonight. Right? Don't know where
it is. I mean, this is this is
this is tough.
Why the prophet move? Because he loved Allah
He moved because he trusted Allah
And because of his trust in Allah,
the Ummah survived. The Ummah flourished.
We're here in Dallas, Texas.
Maybe if the prophet never moved from Mecca,
we would not be here in Carrollton, Texas
reading about the Quran right now together.
We have a lot of gratitude that we
owe the prophet guys.
It's uncanny how much we owe him. And
the last the last part that we'll mention
here is and we'll finish with this inshallah,
where the where where Allah
he says,
Okay? Allah
then says, whenever you follow the prophet, let
me tell you what will happen for you
in your life. Ready?
If you follow the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam, in your life, let me tell you
what will happen.
Iman
will become
beloved to you.
Islam
will no longer be a burden for you.
What does mean?
Means something that's beautiful.
Within your hearts.
It's gonna be your prized possession in your
life.
How many people
walk around with Islam as a burden?
Oh, I have to pray.
Oh, I can't do this. Oh, I have
to do that. They almost speak about it
like it's some cancer
that's just weighing them down.
But one thing that we may have missed
is because we never treated Islam
anywhere near the way the prophet used to
treat
it.
Maybe maybe we should give fasting on Mondays
a shot.
Maybe we should give, like, you know, maybe
we should give some of his other sunnahs
a shot
and see what it feels like.
Maybe maybe maybe religion will no longer be
this burden upon us. Rather, it will be
something that liberates us, man. How many of
you guys think about this. As you guys
have matured and got older in your life,
how many of y'all have realized that Islam
is actually the thing that liberates you and
doesn't constrict you?
Isn't that incredible to think about? When the
rest of the world, they look at Islam
and they're like, wow. Oppressive.
Right? Constricting,
rigid,
terrible,
and you're like,
man. Like, I am so happy that I
believe in Allah and his messenger that I
don't have to worry about half the things
the rest of the world worries about.
So Islam goes from this idea of, like,
difficulty
to this idea of what I I don't
know what I'd do without it.
That's what it means.
You love your faith.
You love your iman. You can't even imagine
what a life would be like without it.
What?
And it beautifies your faith. It beautifies your
heart. And not only that, by the way.
1 of the, they said something about this,
about
that it beautifies whatever's within your heart so
you beautify whatever's around you.
But the sign of a true Muslim,
the sign of a true person who follows
the sunnah of the prophet
is
that it has beautified their heart. And because
of the polishing of their heart, they have
beautified whatever they touch. You know, like that
the the the green thumb they talk about
when it comes to planting? Like, everything that
person plants just, like, beautifully blossoms and grows.
As a Muslim,
whenever you, like, are around something,
you see beauty coming to that situation.
You're that person who decides to believe in
Allah and his messenger and you love it.
You go to, like, a gathering, and that
gathering just becomes beautiful.
Everybody at that house is like,
oh, he's here. Right? Like like
and the opposite when, like, we don't have
Islam
is when, unfortunately,
everything we dabble into just starts to break
down.
You ever have that thought in your head?
You're like, man, everything I everything I touch
just crumbles.
Like, why?
You gotta look at everything the prophet used
to be close to. I mean, it just
flourished.
It flourished. Why?
Because of his beauty.
Because of the iman that Allah gave him.
And then he says, and we'll finish with
this inshallah. He says,
Allah, he concludes. He says, and
when you have iman
and it penetrates the heart,
naturally,
it will push away other things.
And I don't know if I told you
guys this. I mentioned in one of the
that I gave here. I said, I believe
in this concept called spiritual real estate, where
if something good occupies your heart, spiritually, other
things that are bad will be pushed out.
Because 2 things that are antithetical to one
another, they're opposites of one another. They cannot
exist at the same time in one place.
Right? Truth and falsehood cannot exist in the
same place at one time. 1 will eventually
win.
Arrogance and humility cannot exist in the same
place.
Right? Kindness and harshness cannot exist in the
same place.
Jealousy
and, like,
good thoughts of other people cannot exist in
the same place.
Eventually, you will have to pick which side
you are on.
And when you pick which side you are
on, you will truly prove to yourself who
you are.
I chose iman.
I chose humility, so I don't have time
to feel arrogant over other people.
I chose to think good about that person
over there. So I can't I can't be
jealous of, like, that nice jacket he has
on. Like, inshallah, Allah gives us both of
those one day. Right? Like, I have no
desire for him to go through anything that
was bad. Why? Because I love for I
love for him what I love for myself.
Right? Hadith of prophet
And these are the people who are rightly
guided. These are the people who are known
to be Rashidun.
Right? The people who are walking in a
path that is blessed by Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala.
So we ask Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
to make us of the people who are
heavily, heavily
occupied
by the beauty of iman and Islam. And
we ask
Allah
to keep us far away from the things
that threaten
the equality of our religion. We ask Allah
to protect us from ever thinking wrongly about
other people. We ask Allah
to allow us to fall in love with
the prophet sallallahu alaihi sallam. We ask Allah
to allow us to be people who do
not view Islam as a burden, but rather
we view Islam as a means of liberation
and beauty in our lives. And we ask
Allah
to push away from our hearts the things
that harm it. The things that harm it
are things that displease him. The things that
displease the prophet we ask Allah
to allow our hearts to be filled with
the things that he loves, and we ask
Allah
to make us of the people who are
Arashidun,
the people who are rightly guided. We ask
Allah
to free the people of Palestine, and we
ask Allah
to liberate the people of Gaza. We ask
Allah
to allow them to be free from the
occupation and the oppression, and we ask Allah
for his mercy.
Everybody. Thank you so much for being here.
Inshallah, we will be back at it next
Thursday.