Safi Khan – Soul Food for College Students God’s help in desperate times
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Alrighty.
Everybody.
Hopefully, everyone is able to hear me decently
well.
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So, alhamdulillah. Bismillah, alhamdulillah, assalamu alaahu alaahu alaarhihi
wa sahabihi
Assalamu alaykum, everybody. So myself and Ustad Fatima,
we're back for another session of,
soul food.
This feels really weird, by the way, guys,
because I'm wearing headphones that are really noise
cancelling. So, like, I feel like I'm on,
like, an NPR
podcast right now. It feels very weird.
But For me, it's weird that we have,
like, both the laptop and then our our
well, I'm using my iPad right now. And
so I'm like, I don't know where to
look. I'm like, looking in 5 different places.
I have I I'm seeing double of Waseda
Fatima right now. This is more than we
see each other normally every week, and,
it's just a lot. It's it's a lot,
you know. Alhamdulillah.
We're going to be, kind of doing a
short few verses today, just keeping it kind
of short and sweet to end the week.
We've come to this almost, you know, I
read through some of the commentaries of the
Surah, and a lot of the scholars of
Islamic commentary, of Qur'anic commentary,
they say that the verses that we're about
to cover today, and Usad al Fatima will
give us a little bit of a background
before it, are actually, like, the climax of
the story of Musa and Firaun,
that, you know, for the past, you know,
month or 2, we've been talking about
the, you know, the birth of Prophet Musa
and how he was sent down a river
by his mother and, you know, him being
picked up at the palace itself by Assia,
you know,
the
wife of Firaoun,
who picked him up. And the Prophet actually
described Assia
as one of the best women of all
time, Right? Because of her mercy that she
had towards Prophet Musa alaihis salam. And so
today, we're gonna reach this ultimate kind of
climax of the story
where the persecution of the Bani Israel
goes to, like, a very, very serious
kind of extent.
And we all know as the background, Firaun
used to torture the Bani Israel before. Right?
And we talked about this that he used
to kill off the sons
every other year,
during this time period where,
Harun,
was actually the brother of Prophet Musa who
survived.
And Prophet
Musa himself was the one whose year was
in danger.
So now, Insha'Allah, we're going to be kind
of covering. Asadullah Fatim was going to give
us a little bit of a background
about, you know, why it got to this
extent
where we find in verse 40 that Firaun
is like chasing prophet Musa
to the the the the sea called the
Red Sea. So so the Fatima, why like,
what what got it to this extent with,
you know and and obviously, we know that
we talked a little bit about last week
how Allah had talked to Musa directly. Right?
That was one of Musa
greatest
kind of blessings was that he was one
of the ones who just directly spoke to
Allah and Allah told him that he has
to face
Firaun.
And prophet Musa made this du'a,
And then he goes and confronts
Firaoun, and there were something that went down
there. So what was it exactly that kind
of brought this scenario to where it is
right now? Yeah. So like we talked about
it last week, you know, Musa, alayhis salami,
you mentioned, you know, he's talking to Allah.
Allah tells Allah tells him you have to
go for your own. You have to tell
him, you know, that you're a tyrant.
You're someone who crosses the boundaries of people,
you don't treat people well, and Musa Al
Islam goes with his brother. You know, Musa
Al Islam doesn't even go by himself, he
goes with his brother.
And the interesting thing is that Musa alayhi
sallam,
you know, he's in this situation
and he goes to Fir'aun and Allah before
Musa Alaihi Salam even gets to Fir'aun, Allah
gives Musa Alaihi Salam very clear instructions.
He lets him know, like, yes, this person
is crazy.
He's basically
what we will call a psychopath.
He treats people in a way that is
not okay,
but when you speak to him, you need
to speak to him gently. And speak to
him gently just because there may be a
possibility
that he could turn back to Allah Subhanahu
wa ta'ala, that he can turn back to
Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. So Musa alayhi salam
and his brother, they go to Sirhan and
Fir'aun immediately at just completely
ignores Musa, Hadid alaihi wa Salam. And he
turns to Musa alaihi wa Salam, he says,
He says, who is your lord, oh Moses?
Okay. Who is your lord, Musa? And the
interesting thing is that when you're when there
are 2 people there and 2 people are
bringing a message to you,
you know, and myself and, like, someone else
came to you and stopped talking. We're, like,
hey. We bought this message. You asked the
both of us, like, okay. Why? What is
this? But Kiran was so disrespectful in his
address
that he only addresses Musa al Islam. And
Musa al Islam replies and he says,
He says that our lord is the one
who gave
every every everything its form. Like, Allah Subhanahu
Waqqai created everything, gave everything its form, and
then he gave it guidance.
And for all things, he's so smart, you
know, he says so then he turns him,
he says,
What about the people who came before? Like,
you're are you telling me that, like, the
generations that came before believed in this Lord
of yours? Basically, that's what he's saying. And
Musa alayhi wasalam, he doesn't fall for the
trap. He says
that my Lord has this written down
Like, that's Allah subhanahu wa'ala, he took care
of the nations that came before. That's a
history lesson I'm not here to give you.
That's basically what Musa alaihi wa'am tells
and he says that my lord does not
forget or make a mistake.
And he's, like, letting him know that, like,
listen,
you think you're so great, but this is
this is and you think you're God because
we talked about this in the last last
session when he
literally
asked,
Haman to build what? These towers that are
so high so that he can go meet
the Lord of Musa.
And Musa, alayhis salam, continues to explain who
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is. He says, Aledi
Ja'ala lakum of the Mahdad. He is the
one who has spread out the earth for
you.
Has to put that and trace out its
roots for you. And
he set water down from the sky
And it brought forth every kind of plant.
And then he says
so that you need engraze your
cattle
with
it.
And these are signs for the people understanding.
And so the next thing the next thing
that happened was that Musa, alayhi, Salam now
he's bringing this message. He presents to Allah,
and
said, oh, he sees all of these signs
that Allah has brought forth. You know,
shows all of the signs of her own.
And then Allah literally talks about and
says,
We showed him all of the signs. We
showed all all of the signs. So what
Allah is saying here is that not only
do we get on our primer, we show
him the whole movie. Like, we show you
how your life would end up if you
do not believe, if you do not take
this properly.
Not only did he
deny that, but he refused. He turned away.
He he refused it. He turned away. And
then he tried to turn everybody else against
Islam.
And so what he starts to do is
that he starts to speak very loudly.
He starts to, like,
say it so everybody else can hear.
Are you coming to us to take us
out of our land?
Which Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala addressed in Suratul
Qasas when we talked about last time. It
wasn't your land. It was not your land.
You had no right over this land. But
what this should I all say? Very loud.
You know how
I don't know if you guys have siblings,
but I have siblings.
And I get from your siblings because I
heard you to your mom sitting in the
same room. You know what I'm saying? You
sitting there with your siblings and they come
and they just, like, tap you. But if
your mom is there and you're like, oh,
oh my god. I'm dying. I'm dead.
I can't breathe. Take me to the hospital
right now. It's over. Life's over. As you
can tell, I have brothers, so I have
to make sure that at the time,
I get them in the best time. But
that's what Firdal was doing. He's trying to
call attention to this whole situation. And this
is not the first time I was put
in this type of situation. Remember when you
accidentally killed a man? And what happened when
he came back the next day? The guy
starts to yell very loudly. Are you gonna
kill me like you're trying to kill like
you killed that guy yesterday? So everybody can
take the attention off of him. So for
us,
did you come to us to drive us
out of our land with your sorcery, with
your magic?
And then Musa, alayhis salam, he says
it goes on, and he says,
that we will confront you with some magic
that can match yours. He's like, you think
you're so great? I have magic that can
match you. And then he says,
set up an appointment between us. Like, let's
have a match. Let's duel this out. He
says, set up an appointment between us.
And in this the this appointment
will be,
no neither one of us will back out
of it basically. You cannot cancel the appointment.
It has to happen. It's a time. Set
up a date. We will stand here and
we'll go between each other. And I'm gonna
bring all of my magic. You'll bring all
your magic because for the almost making it
seem like it's magic. Dothanar knew what Musa
Eli Salim had. These signs that Musa Eli
Salim came with were not magic. Firdan knew
that. But he said, you know what? I'll
bring my magic. You bring your magic. Let's
set up a time of day. Let's get
it done. Well, that ends up a canon
sua, and he says that it it'll be
in a mutually
mutually agreeable place,
that we're both gonna come to a place
that is mutually agreeable.
And then,
We're gonna do this on a day of
celebration. This is what everybody is out there.
You know? So that it's not gonna be
a day that, you know, it's like, oh,
in the backyard. Like, no. This is gonna
be in the middle of the marketplace,
a day of celebration, and you shall and
the
people will come when the sun has risen
high, meaning this is the prime time of
the day.
So,
So went back, he got all his people,
he gathered his resources, and then he came.
So meaning he set up the stage, he
he taught his magicians exactly what to do
because Firoum, he knew what Musa was coming
with. Firoum, It wasn't gonna be a surprise
to Firan. It's just that everybody else would
be gathered there. So Musa, Firan taught the
magicians what they would do.
So Musa, alaihis salam said to them, don't
make up lies against Allah's counsel. Musa, alaihis
salam, is just letting them know, like, you
don't even know what you're getting yourself into.
You think this is magic. This is not
magic.
This is not magic. This is these are
signs from God. These are signs from God.
And the nature
of Allah
presenting a sign to a people is that
if you deny that sign, then you become
eligible for punishment.
You become eligible for your people to be
wiped out. And so Musa
is saying, don't don't do this.
Don't set yourself up.
You will be destroyed. Like,
that's what Musa Alaihi Salam says. You're gonna
be destroyed.
And whoever evinces lies, they always fall. They
always fall. So they've discussed upon themselves, they
talked secretly, they developed all of these
plans. And what they did was, just to
keep going,
is that they now came and it was
a day.
So what they said to Musa al Islam
was, yeah, Musa,
They said,
So they
throw their things down.
That they threw threw their sorcery, they threw
their ropes down and their staff their staff
seemed to be moving like a snake.
Again, Peron had a primer to the miracles
that Musa alaihisam came with, and so he's
teaching his sorcerers what to do. And so
they threw their staffs down, their staffs turned
into a snake. And the thing about this
is that when they threw it down, they
actually said in the name of Firam.
In the power of Firaun, the insit to
Firaun. In the power of Firaun and they
threw it down because Firaun thought it was
God, and he's the one who trained them.
And so they said in the power of
Quran, they threw their stacks down, and it
became like a moving snake. And you remember,
Musa Al Sam doesn't have a lot of
good experiences with moving snakes. Okay? He's on
top of the mountain talking to God. God
tells him, throw your staff down. It turns
into a snake. Musa Alaihi Salam was scared.
God said, pick it up and don't be
scared. So, like, it's you know, he's even
though he has a miracle, he's like, he's
like, wait. What is happening?
So, oh, just a fee nafsihi.
He
started to move in, like, his alarm. He
started to hold himself back. He got scared.
And Allah says to Musa, alayhis salam the
same thing that Allah said to Musa, alayhis
salam,
don't
be scared.
You have the upper hand. You're gonna come
out on top. And so Musa alaihis salam,
he then he threw down his staff.
So throw down what is in your right
hand, and you will swallow up everything that
they made. So Musa Al Islam threw down
his staff and it swallowed up everything that
they made.
He says that they only produce tricks out
of a spirit. This is just magic.
This is just magic. What they did is
magic. You know? Throw down your stick, throw
down your stuff because that is real. Miracles
from God are not magic. They're real.
What now, Yosni, Jose, had paid for a
time that no
sorcerer or magician
can ever prosper or come over Allah is
what Allah does.
No sorcerer or magician can ever be
truly that great because you're just playing tricks,
and God doesn't play tricks.
Whenever they saw that Musa Al Asam threw
them, his staff, and swallowed up all of
their stuff,
then the their sorcerers, they threw themselves. Like,
it's like something overcame them, and they automatically
just fell into such that.
Like, they were thrown into such a okay.
There it's not even that they've made the
conscious decision. It's like they overcame them.
So they fell to such such a
follow, they say,
We believe in the lord of Harun and
Musa. What's so interesting here is that this
whole time, they had been ignoring Harun,
Like, just did not exist.
But he was still there preaching the message,
bringing, talking, all these things, And that whole
time, they were just ignoring Harun. And what?
When they realized the truth, what do they
do? They open their eyes.
They said,
We believe in the word
of of Harun and Musa.
And then for the al who loses
it, he loses his mind because he thinks
he's a god. And now the people that
he's governing over or people that he has
gobs me over,
publicly
in a place where everyone is there at
a festival
admitting that they don't believe in Harun has
got I mean, believing for the almah's god
that Allah subhanahu is the lord and they
believe in the lord, a Musa Harun.
So what does what does a tyrant do?
What does someone who's oppressor do? Someone who's
oppressor, when you try to go against them,
they immediately threaten your life.
So Musa
so Fir'al gets pissed off and he says,
you how dare you believe in him beef
and believe in them when you believe in
the message that they brought
before I gave you permission to?
So when do you have to have permission
to believe in God?
He says, how dare you believe
in him before I give you the permission
to?
He says, you know what? He must have
been your master in teaching you
teaching you magic, which is absolutely
ridiculous.
Because who taught them the tricks in the
first place? Ferran.
Ferran did.
They had no idea how to do these
tricks. They know had no idea what was
coming up,
but Farang is the one who taught them.
Out of anger, he
projects his badness onto
his.
And he says, I'm gonna cut your hands
off from the opposite. So I'll cut off
your right hand and cut off your left
leg. This is what he tells them. He
threatens them. And then he says,
That he is going to crucify these people
and basically
put them onto their trunks of palm trees.
And he says, you will know for certain
who has the more the more lasting
and the worst punishment.
He's trying to compare his punishment to Allah.
He's like, oh, you're worried about the hereafter,
I'm gonna give you something now.
This was this is this it's so important
for us to go through these verses in
Surataha to understand the the gravity of the
situation, of what transpired between Musa and and
Firal.
Because when we get to the portion where
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala, Firal drowning
and and this last begging, a pathetic begging
that he does, you'll understand
that the amount of vow and disrespect that
could all show not only to Allah subhanahu
but to the people,
which is absolutely
disrespectful,
absolutely
disgusting.
And so what they but these people, they
don't even they didn't even believe in Musa
for that long. How do I stand up
to him? They said,
We will never choose you
over the clear signs that came in front
of us.
Do whatever you say you're gonna do.
If you feel like that's what you're gonna
do it, then you can do what you
will. Do what you think you will bring
do what you think you're going to decree.
Decree what you think you're going to decree.
Do it. Whatever you say you're gonna do,
do it.
You can only have decisions. You can only
make moves in this world.
They literally tell Ferron that, like, the life
that you're the the hardship that you're trying
to bestow upon us is temporary.
And Ferron was saying what? You'll see whose
punishment is gonna be
everlasting and more painful. They said, do whatever
you want
because you only have the ability to do
these things in this world.
We believe in our Lord,
that he's gonna forgive us for our mistakes.
And God is better.
Because before
said that he was better, they said, God
is
better. God is better.
He's
everlasting. And so the story continues with them
talking to Fir'aun and things of that nature.
And then Musa, alayhi salaam, Allah
gives him
why he. Because we're all just now, he's
now going after them. He wants to punish
them. He's like, I'm gonna deal with you
guys. I'm gonna put you guys, you know,
wherever that they are. I'm gonna cut your
arms off, all this stuff. So
God
Almighty
gives Messiah some divine revelation.
With my servants, my beautiful servants, the ones
who sacrifice so much, the ones who are
being hunted.
You know? Allah says go out in the
night, and he
says,
and strike a dry path for them across
the sea.
Have no fear of being overtaken and do
not be in dismay, meaning don't don't be
scared.
So they do this,
and what happens is that
in
his in his,
army, they start to pursue them. They started
to come right on their heels. And
and they were overwhelmed by the sea, meaning
the sea swallowed them. Like, I don't know
why I started laughing at that part. But
I just feel like you guys for
Like, to be over to to be overwhelmed
was literally to be drowning in all of
your responsibilities.
Mhmm. You know, to be drowning in all
of the things that, you know, you feel
like you have to do and all this
stuff. And that's exactly what Allah says about
this woman.
Oh, truly misled his people.
He did not guide them. And so this
is where we are at now in the
story of Surat Al Qasas. You know? That's
how beautiful the Quran is. Like, it's explained
in certain areas, and we took all that
time to just explain, but this is where
we at now.
Subhanallah. And it's and I'm really, really grateful
that Sada Fathima actually kinda gave everybody the
context because, you know, a lot of people
in Sada Fathima, you're definitely gonna probably kind
of relate to this maybe because you've possibly
gotten questions about this as well, is that,
you know, people will say, oh, the pharaoh,
in his final moments did actually say, you
know, like, I believe I'm one of the
Muslims.
And at that point Allah said no, like
it's too late now at this point like
there's there's there's no way there's no way
for you. And, you know, one of the
reasons why a lot of people question, like,
oh, why didn't Allah just forgive him? Because
Allah supposed to be a rahmanur Rahim. Right?
But you read all of the context behind
it
and exactly why he ended up being what
he ended up being, you realize why he
actually deserved
it. I mean, like, you you I mean,
guys, one thing I want everyone to to
truly think about this is that, like, you
know,
we have right now in our modern day
context, like our social lives, our cultural lives,
our political lives, we have very strong feelings
about certain people. Right?
Whether you look at any, you know,
you know, tyrant in, you know, the US
or in the in in in overseas or
any other country,
we we use such, like, strong verbiage with
those people. We're like, man, like, those people,
like, death isn't even like a like, the
death sentence even isn't even fair for them.
Right? They deserve something even worse.
Y'all, I want you guys to think about
that times 10 for Fedor.
Like, he was like that, but exponentially
worse.
This guy used to kill children,
y'all. Uh-huh. Like, it's it's not just like
a it's not just like a bad king.
You know, it's not just like a guy
who was, like, power trippy and power hungry.
That's not what pharaoh was. Pharoah used to
I mean, you think about the genocide that,
you know, happens in today's day and age
whether you're in Philistine or Syria or Burma
or Africa, wherever you are, in China with
the
the the concentration camps there. Like,
we have such strong feelings about people who
are conducting stuff like this.
But even but but then people are like,
oh, pharaoh, but he asked Allah for forgiveness
at the last second. Dude, pharaoh was, like,
20 times worse than these people. He was
literally, like, described as the worst human being
of all time. He killed
literally generations
of kids. That's what he did because he
was obsessed with his own image. Okay? And
so I'm glad that Osama Fatima gave us
that context through Surah Al Taha because it's
so important to know what this man was
responsible for. Right? It's so important to know
what this man was responsible for. So now
in in our current Surah that we're covering
in Surah Al Qasas Allah says in verse
40 Allah says
Right? So he says that so we seized
him and his armies and threw them into
the sea. And what's really interesting the scholars
say something really cool about this word yami.
So the word Yam is actually earlier in
Surat Al Qasas described as the river that
Musa's mother actually floated him down which is
really really cool because Allah uses the same
word
to describe the sea that swallowed
up Fir'aun
as the same word that he used as
the river that floated the basket with baby
Musa in it. Why? Why would he use
the same word? Because you see what 2
people who chose different lifestyles are like.
You know, you see the way that 2
people who were given certain opportunities in life,
but they chose very different and you see
the end result of that. You know? And
this is why human beings have such such
a responsibility.
Such a responsibility.
A lot of us are given
opportunities that are presented to a lot of
other people.
Now what you do with those opportunities is
up to you as a human
being. You know will you take it because
at the end of the day Prophet Musa
alayhis salam was also given tremendous challenges in
his life. Right? Tremendous challenges. The guy was,
you know, he he was floated down a
river by his own mother. He was raised
in a palace that he was foreign to.
I mean, he he accidentally committed murder, had
to flee from the area of Egypt to
go to Medellin. I mean, this is not
a life that anybody would envy. He was
given the challenge,
but what he did is he allowed his
challenges to
result in gratitude and shukr and dhikr of
Allah
and Fir'aun
took the challenge of being a king and
a ruler and an authority position
and he took it to satiate his own
ego
and so Allah uses the word yam right
filiyami,
as kind of like a really beautiful
nuance as,
dude, these two people were both they had
one thing in common, they were human beings.
They were human beings that were given the
opportunity to submit to Allah.
Now when the rest of Firaun's people did
it, he just did not do it. And
so we threw him into
the the the sea. And so at this
point, and actually in Surah Surah Surah verse
63 Allah you know and this is why
Prophet Musa story is the most vividly told
story in the entire Quran. That in Surah
Surah Surah and Surah Al Taha and Surah
Al Eunice even, you know, Allah talks a
little bit about
the demise of pharaoh and the the victory
of Musa. And Allah says in Surah Al
Shuharaha, he says that we inspired,
Musa. We inspired Musa, and we told him,
Right? That we told him with your staff,
strike the sea. Right? It,
adrib or adrib means, like, to strike something,
to hit something. So he told him to
hit the sea, the the dirt,
that was along the sea with his staff,
and it says here,
that that the sea literally
was like it it parted into 2 halves,
and the 2 halves didn't even look like
water anymore. Allah said that it actually end
up looking like mountains.
That the sea parted so wide
that the sea did not look like a
sea anymore. Like, y'all, if you went to,
like, LA or, like, Florida, I hope you
don't go there right now, inshallah. Please, please
don't be one of the people that go
to Florida right
And you go to, like, the ocean or
you see a giant body of water,
you're very accustomed to seeing waves. Maybe you're
accustomed to seeing, you know,
like, you know, whatever it is. Like, the
ocean has, you know, the waves and the
currents and the streams and all that stuff.
And even the the a little bit of
a stronger wave worries people. Yeah.
A wave coming, they're like, oh, get out
of the water. Get out of the water.
The tide's coming in. Right? And we've seen
this several times through, you know, science videos
and videos of, like, geography and stuff. You
see when the wave and the tide comes
in, people run because they're afraid that the
current's too strong. Now imagine
the sea literally
at the height of a mountain,
And Allah says go through.
Go through it, Musa.
And he has to take a leap of
faith at this point to go through that
thing. His people with him. Making people. It's
one thing, and this is a And brother
and Kael were not easy people to deal
with. We're not easy people, man. We'll talk
about this later that they're kind of flippity
floppity right here. They go from here, they
go to there. And this is why the
Bani Israel were always people who were like
they were always talked about in the Quran
as people who were they were grateful and
that they were ungrateful. They were good and
then they tried against Allah. This is the
common narrative with his people. And so when
Musa was he had he sees these these
the water part like mountains, and he's like,
okay, now it's one thing for me to
even trust to go through this right now.
I'm like, I can just wait 3 seconds
until whatever's happening is over, and this thing
is gonna about to, like, drop on me
like a sandstorm, like a like a rainstorm.
But now I tell all these people to
follow me as well. It's a huge responsibility.
Uh-huh. It's a huge responsibility. And, I mean,
Fatima, you can kind of attest to this
as well is that, you know, sometimes we
take risks for ourselves because we know that,
you know, I'm me and I'm responsible for
myself. But it's a whole another thing to
ask somebody to do something that you're even
unsure about.
Yeah. If you're not if you're not confident,
if you're not, you know, like, okay. I
know that lost my father got me. I
know that I we're gonna get through this,
and and you're trying to convince other people
to go with you,
people see can smell through it, you know.
If you're for example, when people on Instagram,
when people always try and get you to
buy products, right, And you know they don't
believe in those products themselves. Are you gonna
spend your money on it? No. It's a
very small chance.
There are very few people who are what
we call subnet and I love taught now.
I hear it in our way. There are
a few people in the world like that.
And the thing is too, as leaders, as
people who are who have to guide other
people,
it's so important that your faith
is rooted in whatever it is you're guiding
someone through. Like, you cannot you cannot
be flip floppy, wishy washy
by any means.
SubhanAllah. And, you know, one of the things
is, like, a lot of people are gonna
say here, and we're like, well, a lot
of us aren't like Musa. We're not prophets
or imams or teachers or anything like that.
But you know what? Everybody has a bit
of responsibility in their life. Everybody does. Whether
it's you being an older sibling
or maybe even you being an older role
model figure for somebody as you grow up,
or you being a cousin or a parent
or an or an uncle or an auntie
or whatever it is, you all have a
responsibility over people. And there will be positions
in your life where you are required to
show strength.
Even if you're afraid, you're terrified. I mean
look at parents, man. You know, Subhanallah, you
know, one of my most fond memories
was always, you know, when I was a
kid,
and, you know, there would be, like and
I used to live in Tennessee. I mean,
Texas pretty relatable here too is that we
have, like, bad right? We always had bad
weren't being in the South. And whenever, like,
you know, spring season came, you'd be really
kind of and and kids, you know, me
being 6 years old,
in 1st grade in in Memphis, Tennessee, there's
one time I remember in my life where,
you know, the tornado sirens went off in
school.
And we were just I mean, man, a
6 year old, you hear the sound, you're
terrified. And the kid you know, the teachers
tell you to go out into the hallway
and, you know, you gotta put your tuck
your head into your knees or whatever. You
know how on earth you do that unless
you do yoga everyday of your life. And,
like, you go there and then they tell
you I I remember a specific memory in
my own mind. They had to call our
parents to come get us that day because
it was so bad.
And I remember one very vivid memory in
the car.
When I got in the car and I
was terrified, I was actually crying, I remember
as a 6 year old, and I told
my mom, mom, I'm scared. Mom, I'm scared.
And my mom,
you know, at that point in my life,
she was like, don't worry. There's nothing to
be afraid about. I'm here with you.
I'm here with you right now.
But only as you get older do you
understand that she must have also been very
terrified.
Yeah. Because not only is she worried about
her own life, but she's also worried about
her kids,
the the livelihood of her son, the livelihood
of her daughter. I mean, this is serious.
And the responsibility that the Prophets have over
their people is tremendous.
That they cannot just make a decision and
say, well, whoop dee doo, you know, whatever
happens to them, happens to them. This is
the same thing with the Prophet This is
why, you know, a portion of his life
was dedicated
to migration because he realized that we can't
stay here. Not because of me, because I
could probably handle it. I could handle it
because I'm I can withstand this stuff, but
I don't want to see the people that
I love go through this anymore. Yeah. You
know, It's a tremendous responsibility.
And so now Musa takes his people and
they go through and they're very, very cautiously
going through the sea and Firaoun catches up
to them. And there's the tafsir actually said,
and we'll end here inshallah because this is
a good spot to end. That the tafsir
actually says that there was a moment after
Musa had crossed the sea,
and his people had reached close to the
other side, and he saw Fir'aun and his
army coming through the sea as well.
And Musa for a second got extremely worried
that
are they gonna reach us? Are they gonna
get to us?
Should I strike my staff again on the
sea like my lord told me to do,
to collapse the sea for them for onto
them? And he felt these human emotions. Should
I do something? I gotta do something. I'm
gonna I'm panicking. I gotta do something. They're
almost on the line. The punishment that's on
the line. Faram was telling them that you
will never ever be able to live a
normal life again. I'm gonna cut your as
if it wasn't enough to just cut their
hands off, what did you tell I'm gonna
cut off one of your right hand and
a call off your left leg? So if
you try
to be a person in society to be
able to make your own money, to be
able to do anything,
you will not have the physical
ability. I'm going to mentally enslave you, physically
enslave you. This is what for all this
is what was on the line.
Mhmm. SubhanAllah.
And, you know, one of the most interesting
things is that at this moment when Fir'aun
is trying to go through the the the
sea, it says in Surat,
Surat sorry. I think my
sorry. My battery on my headphones just told
me it's not medium. Can you still hear
me?
Yeah. I can still hear you. It just
got really loud loud loud in that word.
That that that Firaun
was actually pursuing them with his people. And
he says, you
know,
Right? That that in tyranny and enmity.
He says at this moment that until
fear
until fear overtook him, until drowning overtook
him. That when he was drowning at that
moment,
That he finally said when the water was
overtaking him he goes okay okay okay I
give up.
Okay I give up I believe. And this
was not a sincere plea to Allah, this
was not and this is why Allah actually
laid it out as an example
in the Quran. Allah would not kept it
in the Quran if it was not exemplary.
Allah kept it in the Quran because it
was an example for people.
Do not
live a life that is filled with abuse
and assault
and and just taking advantage of other people.
And in the final second as some sort
of like a last second hail Mary hope,
just be like, alright. Fine. I give up
and you win. That's not that's not the
way Islam works. That's
not the way Islam works. You know? Like
like, when people say, like, as long as
you accept this as, you know, your Lord
and savior, you're saved. You can do whatever
you want to, and this is what you
do when you're saved by by by God.
We as Muslims believe in.
We don't just believe in faith,
is just half of it. Aminu Imanu Imanu
is the other half that you got to
prove your faith by by by walking the
walk. How many of us honestly
how many of us have been through life
seeing people who religiously talk the talk, and
then when we look to action, we're like,
why not? How they treat their family is
not that great.
You know? Meanwhile, you're the best the one
talking about, you know, how is
that
like the one who's best of the best
of you is the one who's best of
their family and the best of my family.
And then you see them just
Absolutely. And it makes no sense. And so
this right here, when Firaun drowns, he says,
He goes I'm of the Muslims. Okay? He
goes I'm one of the Muslims. Okay? He
just says this in the last second. Allah
goes Allah goes now
like when you were one of the most
corrupt people then your entire life now you're
gonna stay
Allah goes, I'm sorry. Like, I'm I'm sorry.
I mean, you know, you're one of my
creation, but this is not gonna work. This
is not gonna work. It's too late at
this point. And so
one of the things I wanted to end
with, inshallah, because we're at 7:45 now, and
I'll let Usala Fatima, you know, give a
last second reflection if she if she wants
to. But one of the things I wanted
to end with today is
understand that Islam
is not a last second religion. It's not
a last second religion.
You know Allah says about the Prophet It
was a pattern of beauty.
The keyword is uswat,
that that it's a pattern.
It's not a it's not a one hit
wonder. Islam cannot be a one hit wonder.
You cannot be like, oh, yeah. You know
what? I'm gonna troll around my entire life,
and then, like, you know, I'm, like, 55,
61. Life gets kinda boring. It's gonna start,
like, doing this, like, whole salah thing and
this whole, like, fasting thing and this whole,
like, kind of abstaining from, you know, bad.
You know, I'm gonna do that when I'm
kinda bored.
Islam does not work like that. Islam is
a religion that requires you to put your
best effort forward. Islam doesn't always Islam doesn't
always tell you to succeed 100%.
Islam tells you to try. Doesn't really expect
you to be perfect.
Mhmm. It's sad. It's about it's sad. It's
about doing the best you can with the
circumstances that you have. SubhanAllah.
That's all Allah asks you to do, is
don't put it off till the last second.
Just try it. And if there are any
students watching this, or the college students, this
is a kind of college oriented program. This
is, like, the equivalent of, like, you know,
us saying, oh, you know what? Like, if
Allah if Allah really has my back, I
don't really have to study. I can go
make du'a the morning of the exam and
pray Fajr, and then I'm gonna go wing
this test. And if I get, like, a
c, then what the heck was upon me
praying, homie? Like, that's not how Islam works.
Who told you that? You know? Islam tells
you,
put a little bit of effort and study
a few days, study a couple of week
or 2, and then do your dua, then
do your Fajr, and then insha'Allah, Allah got
you. Don't it's Islam has never been about
miracles. Miracles come to those who put hard
work in before the miracle happens. Yep.
Musa, alayhis salam,
had to take a leap of faith and
run away from Fir'aun
and go through the Red Sea himself before
Allah collapsed the Red Sea on pharaoh. It's
because he did the hard work before. This
is why Allah rewarded him with the escape
from Fir'aun. And so that's kind of like,
you know, the the the lesson that I
wanted to end with today, Insha'Allah. Asadha Fatima,
anything before we wrap up? No. Badla? I
thought we took enough time to Awesome. Appreciate
you guys. I'm sorry. When me and I
saw the Fatima kinda start, you know, ranting
about Islamic,
tangents, we kinda get this is, like, our
normal conversations when we're talking about random stuff.
Alhamdulillah, we have the blessing of being able
to kind of, you know, remind us 1st
and foremost, and then to help us kind
of reflect together as a community. So, inshallah,
we'll wrap up with that. We ask
Allah to accept from us, and we ask
Allah
to allow us to be people who show
that pattern of faith and that pattern of
effort and behavior. And we ask Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala to allow us to be relieved
of any sort of stress and anxiety that
we have because of the effort and the
work that we put in to lead up
to it. And may Allah
Allah allow us to benefit.
Aisha,
this is a regular session, Insha'Allah.
Every single Thursday,
at 7 pm Central Standard Time, my stuff
and Usala Fatima go live on the Roots,
Instagram account, and it's called Soul Food. So
you're welcome to join in anytime, insha'Allah, on
Thursdays from 7 to to 7:30, 7:40, Insha'Allah.
Alright, guys? Jazakamu alaykum wa karunasalatfathum wa for
giving us your time. We really appreciate you
again. And may Allah reward you and your
family and protect us all and