Suhaib Webb – Lesson Nine Friends & Companions

Welcome back to

our first,

series on those things that we need to

understand as fundamental practices to helping us bring

life, and imen, and taqwa to our hearts.

And we're reading from the end of a

poem that we're going to read again

on theology

by a sheikh Ahmad Adardir, who wrote actually

the text I explained in the essentials of

Islamic faith.

And the next quality that he's going to

talk about is companionship.

When I first embraced

Al Islam,

Sheikh Abdulrahman al Balsir Rahim who died just

a few months ago of COVID 19. Keep

him and your family in,

your duas.

He said to me, if you show me

your friends, I can show you who you

are.

SubhanAllah.

And I recently heard from a podcast on

leadership that your 5 friends will tell you

why you are or are not

succeeding in who you want to be in

life.

The prophet

he says very beautifully in a famous narration

which is authentic,

The man or the woman

is on the religion of his or her

friend.

So the sheikh now he gets into

friends, because friends and the people whose company

we keep

are triggers to the kind of behavior

that we want to achieve. You know, there's

a great

statement that says, if you want to be,

you know, a professor, hang around professors. If

you want to be a body builder, hang

around body builders. If I want Jannah,

then let me be around the people of

Jannah. And the prophet

the Sahaba asked him,

which one of our gatherings is the best?

And he said,

you know, those gatherings

where

the person's speech

increases your knowledge of Allah. Subhanu wa ta'ala.

Like like the best people to hang out

with. Right? Those people who

his or her speech increases your knowledge of

Allah, and their actions remind you of the

hereafter.

So

say the sheikh, he says,

He mentions 2 important qualities of people whose

company we should keep. Number 1, that they

are

worshipers of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. Allah Subhanahu

Wa Ta'ala says in the Quran after 'audubilayimashaitanarajim

You know, resiliently

stay with those people who call on their

Lord all the time, morning and evening. We

know this verse in Surat Al Kahf

was sent to the prophet

in regards to Bilal and Salman al Farisi

and Suhay Baroomi.

3, quote unquote, non Arabs,

right, outside of the Arab community of the

Prophet, and who were known for being poor.

And in fact, after this verse was revealed,

the prophet said, 'alhamdulillah, praise be to Allah,

who commanded me to be with the poor.'

Why? Because these were people of

They call on the Lord on their Lord

morning evening means all the time. They're constantly

in the state of remembrance,

in the state of of, alhamdulillah,

du'a.

And Allahu

he says in the Quran,

voodoo, you alone we worship not I worship.

Because as human beings we're weak.

I'm a weak person. That's why the prophet

he forbid

for people who could not to live alone.

Because

we're weak, but when we're around others, if

those others are good, we're going to try

to rise up

to the standards that they and we have

set. So Allah says, 'Iyakana

buduwayyakanaastang.'

You alone, we worship not you alone, 'a'

budu, I worship.'

So the first quality of a friend is

that that person should be engrossed in Ibadah.

Of course, we'll talk about non Muslims in

a second.

The second quality, the Sheikh he says what

The second quality is they should have knowledge.

Seek refuge in being around the ignorant.

And here,

knowledge doesn't just mean here. It means also

in their character,

how they carry themselves. Sayna Imam Ahmed used

to say, I would rather be with a

righteous sinner than a fake saint, more or

less the meaning.

So what those

who are devout

to Allah,

those people who have knowledge.

That takes us now to a misunderstanding

that we find in the Quran as it

is translated, not the Quran itself where Allah

subhanahu wa ta'ala says

All believers do not take the Jews and

Christians as

Unfortunately,

some people translate

it as friends. But if you speak Arabic,

there is a difference between

and Friends and Disbelievers.

Friends, excuse me, and allies.

Friends and allies.

Here, 'Aulia' does not mean friends.

'Aulia'

means to take them as your allies

in war against the Muslimi.'

As the prophet,

right, we don't seek the help of polytheists

in these kind of situations.

So this verse is not talking about the

normal kind of friendships that we have with

people.

People as Sheikh Mohammed 'Ali Sayyas, he mentioned

to us in explaining this verse who was

the former in his tafsir, actually he studied,

he had passed away,

the former dean of the College of Sharia.

And Al Azhar in his book Tashir Ayat

Al Hakim,

said this is not talking about Ma'asharah.

Right? Like, the normal kind of friendships and

relationships we have with people. How are we

gonna make dawah and spread the light of

Islam if we're not nice to people, if

we're not friendly to people? And we know

the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa'alehi wasallam,

when he sent Mu'adhim Mujabal to Yemen he

said,

be good. Those people are Christian.

Be nice to them. Treat them well. So,

this idea that

means

is a mistake. But even with non Muslims,

we need to be around people who do

not challenge our foundational ideas and beliefs and

principles,

who are not, triggering us into unhealthy evil

behavior.

We ask Allah ta'ala ba'afiyyah. So this quality,

the sheikh, he says,

Sabeel anakisina

la'udama.

Friendship and the type of company that we

keep. Imam Al Khortubi in his tafsir in

Surat Al Kahf says that friends are so

important that sometimes it's even better to be

with a dog

than humans who aren't loyal and good people.