Suhaib Webb – Prayer With Purpose – Part One
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AI: Transcript ©
I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed
Satan.
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most
Merciful.
All praise is due to Allah, Lord of
the worlds.
Peace and blessings be upon our master Muhammad,
the Seal of the Prophets and Messengers, and
upon his family and companions.
We praise Allah.
Peace and blessings be upon our beloved Messenger
Muhammad.
Upon his family, his companions, and those who
follow them until the end of time.
Peace be upon you all.
Welcome to today's workshop on transformative prayer.
Before we get started, just to update you
on a few things that are happening at
Swiss.
Number one is a lot of people ask
sort of how does Swiss work.
So Swiss is divided into three, actually right
now, foundational sections, which are part of the
Swiss certification process for people.
So for every level that someone finishes, there's
like a certificate, Alhamdulillah.
And this follows the normative sort of Sunni
classical curriculum of Islam that focuses on theology,
worship, and purification of the heart.
Alhamdulillah.
And eventually that will be 10 levels.
And eventually there'll be certain levels just for
people interested in religious vocation, whether it's as
someone who's dealing with like youth work, someone
who's leading hadapah, someone who is assisting an
imam.
And eventually we hope in DC to open
up an actual physical building where we will
train people to be imams, ordain them to
be imams in America, and do other things
as well.
So that iteration or that early iteration is
what you see here.
And so these are our three levels.
And of course, you have to go through
each level to move on to the next
level.
Alhamdulillah.
Added to that are a number of elective
courses that everything from Arabic language to Dr.
Jinnah's class on the names of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala to so many other programs,
qiraat, you name it.
It's there, Alhamdulillah.
Also, now we have a live Q&A
option that if you select, you can send
questions to us and that will or one
of our staff will answer the question for
you, either through written or a video.
Alhamdulillah, they're all housed here so you can
actually see them.
We also a lot of times people are
asking us questions.
There is a support option here that's right
there in front of you.
So if you click on that support option,
we have Chris who works with us.
She's actually in the Philippines.
But Mashallah, she speaks Arabic, she speaks English.
She's very gifted.
And she's able to usually get back to
people within 24 hours, except on weekends, of
course.
Our live classes will start again our fall
semester in the next few weeks.
So stay here to get those links.
We have a youth program that's going to
start, I believe, on September 12th.
We also have a program for new Muslims
that's going to start soon.
And then I will be teaching a class
for adults.
So look for those classes, live classes, to
start soon.
We'll send out emails to you as well.
Alhamdulillah Rabbil Alameen, but you can find them
here.
So I just wanted to give you some
updates on where we're at, Alhamdulillah.
Since October 7th of last year, we've all
been a little bit busy and pulled in
different ways.
Alhamdulillah.
So we're looking forward to getting back to
also focusing on our sort of wheelhouse, if
you will, which is Alhamdulillah, which is Islamic
education at a functional level, not at a
scholarship level.
So our focus is to make you functional,
to help you gain confidence, and then to
help us in our daily lives with our
kids, with our spouses, with people around us.
We have so many things going on.
Also in October, we'll be starting a class
for college students.
That's specifically geared towards addressing the issues related
to activism and how they intersect with theology
and how they intersect with Islam, so that
we can bring in an Islamic voice to
a lot of the activism and the passion
that we're seeing, Alhamdulillah, across the globe and
specifically our campuses in the United States.
Alhamdulillah Rabbil Alameen.
Today, Alhamdulillah, we're going to have maybe an
hour, hour and a half together on a
small workshop on transformative prayer.
I think before we get started, if we
can go through just some brief introductions if
people want to unmute themselves and just tell
us who you are and where you're from.
I would love to hear from you all
before we get started.
Amazing, Mashallah.
So Alhamdulillah, I guess I'll just introduce myself.
My name is Suhaib Webb.
I am originally from Oklahoma.
I embraced Islam around 1992, Alhamdulillah, and I
currently reside in the Washington, D.C. area,
Alhamdulillah Rabbil Alameen, where I live with my
wife and my kids.
I have four children, Alhamdulillah, and also I
teach and instruct in the area as well,
Alhamdulillah.
So thanks everybody for bravely introducing yourselves, Alhamdulillah.
So we'll begin our class today.
We're going to talk about the idea of
Salah and then try to help ourselves reframe
what Salah means in our life.
It's very important that we refresh and we
engage refreshing in acts of worship because that's
one of the keys to keep them from
becoming stale.
And it's very normal to experience that, as
we'll talk about in a minute.
We don't want to allow things that are
very natural and sort of part of our
daily life, things that after a while we
may struggle to keep the excitement, we may
struggle to keep things fresh.
That's a normal thing.
But what we want to think about is
how do we refresh things before it gets
too late, before it becomes drastic.
And the Prophet ﷺ, he said in an
authentic hadith that indeed faith, the example of
faith in the hearts of each and every
one of you are like clothes.
After a while, those clothes begin to fade.
And, you know, you have to like buy
new clothes.
He said, فأسأل الله عز وجل أن يجدد
لكم إيمانكم So ask Allah ﷻ to renew
your faith.
If that's the case with our own Iman,
then what about acts of worship like Salah?
So what I hope that you can take
away from today is number one, some steps
that you can use practically to keep your
prayer fresh.
What are some things that we can do
practically?
All of us have the ability to do
to keep our prayers fresh at a practical
sort of applicable level actions.
And also what I hope we can do
is to talk about some of the ways
we should look at prayer so that will
also encourage us, والحمد لله رب العالمين to
like have this excitement for Salah.
How do we understand and frame and locate
the idea of prayer, especially if we've had
traumatic experiences with prayer in the past?
How do we sort of reformat the understanding
of what prayer is in a way that
encourages us and excites us to pray?
Then number two, I said the practical things
that we can do at a daily level.
We can do them every day to sort
of reignite the Salah.
And then the third thing, we'll actually walk
through the prayer together.
So I'm hoping we'll be together for like
an hour, an hour and a half.
And of course, the more questions you ask
and the more engaging you are, the more
interesting I can promise you things will be.
You know, Sayyidah Aisha radiallahu ta'ala anha
said, نعم النساء الأنصار that the best women
were the Ansar because Hayat shyness did not
keep them from asking questions.
So I really want to encourage you to
push in, to ask questions, to probe and
to think and even share some of your
best practices that you've done to keep your
prayer fresh.
But as the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam said,
إِنَّ مَثَلَ الْإِيمَانِ فِي جَوْفِ أَحَدِيكُمْ You know,
the example of faith in the hearts and
each of every one of you is like
clothes.
And over time, clothes begin to fade.
Over time, our Iman begins to fade.
فَاسْأَرُوا اللَّهَ عَزَّ وَجَلَّ وَيُجَدِّدْ لَكُمْ إِيمَانَكُمْ So
ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to revive
and renew your worship, your Iman.
One of the best things we can do,
one of the best ways we can engage
in preventing our worship from becoming so dormant
and stale is to think about what it
means to us and to challenge ourselves when
it comes to what does worship mean to
us.
So for example, I've had people that have
had really difficult experiences in the past.
Maybe they had caregivers that were overly harsh.
Maybe they've had teachers that were very difficult.
Maybe within their own minds, they don't feel
worthy of Salah, of praying as we'll talk
about later.
Or maybe they have a past history with
evil so they feel inadequate and insecure.
What we want to do is sort of
address those in a way that will allow
you to find remedies but then also address
ways we can reframe prayer.
So I've actually had people subhanAllah who were
abused by quote-unquote religious people and for
those people praying was something very difficult.
Even holding the Quran was something difficult.
So one of the things that we did
is outside of religious sort of encouragement and
discussions was to get them in touch with
a Muslim clinician who walked them through some
of that trauma and to let them know
it's okay, you're working on something.
You're not someone who's surrendered, you're someone who's
working to get to a goal.
The second are people who feel that they
have a past and because they have a
past, they are incapable of prayer or unworthy
of prayer.
But one of the things that we have
to remind ourselves is that if you feel
the urge to do good in your heart,
this is Allah subhanAllah's way of sending you
a message to come home.
And this is a way that Allah subhanAllah
is inspiring you directly in your heart through
that healthy sense of guilt to flee to
Allah.
As the Prophet ﷺ said that repentance is
to feel a sense of remorse.
Repentance is to feel a sense of guilt.
Guilt is only good as long as it
inspires to greatness.
We're not looking for the debilitating guilt and
the destructive guilt, that's unhealthy.
But the guilt that leads me to want
to live better.
So for someone in that position that's saying
to themselves like I am unworthy of prayer,
I shouldn't be praying because I had a
past or I'm doing evil.
If you were unworthy of prayer and if
you were unworthy of worshipping Allah, Allah subhanAllah
would not have called you to worship Him.
You wouldn't have the thought.
So you should feel confident that that signal,
that that lighthouse in the storms and difficulties
of dunya that's calling you to worship is
Allah subhanAllah's wonderful, beautiful way of reminding you
that you are worthy.
Allah has not abandoned you nor does Allah
hate you.
So take advantage of that opportunity.
Don't shy away from it.
فَفِرُّوا إِلَى اللَّهِ The Quran says race to
Allah.
And the Prophet ﷺ he said what?
بَادِرُوا بِالْأَعْمَارِ Compete to do good.
So don't allow a bad past to keep
you from a good future.
Don't allow a dark history to keep you
from an illuminated present.
Push in and be more confident in Allah
than you are insecure of yourself.
And understand that Allah loves you more than
you love yourself.
The third component sometimes that people struggle with
prayer, and I did mention it, I know
I experienced this as a new Muslim, is
they don't know how to pray.
And this falls under two camps.
Number one are people who become Muslim.
I know, you know, for the first year
or so when I was praying, I would
like look at people next to me.
That's actually how I learned how to pray.
Like I would look at people.
So sometimes I would even confuse like one
guy had his hands here, one guy had
his hands here.
So I would pray like one hand here,
one hand down, you know.
Because being a new Muslim at that time
without the benefit of, you know, YouTube and
instructive videos and classes like this, you had
to actually learn in community.
You had to learn in a physical community,
in a corporal reality.
So that's one.
I oftentimes find new Muslims who feel embarrassed,
who put a lot of pressure on themselves.
We have a class that we'll be starting,
Alhamdulillah Rabbil Alameen, for new Muslims in the
coming weeks.
Look forward, Alhamdulillah.
That will go through faith, acts of worship
like prayer, and then also purification of the
heart.
The other group of people that fall under
this designation of feeling unworthy of prayer because
they don't know how to pray are actually
born Muslims.
And sometimes for them, the sense of guilt
and grief is more.
And it could be to a host of
circumstances that have caused them to be in
that position.
Sometimes their families weren't practicing.
Sometimes they lived far away from Islamic institutions,
and they did not have educational resources.
But the guilt that I've seen from born
Muslims who don't know how to pray is
greater than the guilt I've seen amongst those
who become Muslim.
There's a very simple way to deal with
guilt, and that is to address it.
It's not to turn it into a pity
party.
Okay, so I was born Muslim, Alhamdulillah.
I don't know how to pray.
Okay, then learn how to pray.
Like pushing, Alhamdulillah.
At Swiss, we have three levels of classes
that cover issues of worship, right, that teach
you foundational acts of worship.
Okay, just deal with it.
Take that missed shot.
Take that air ball and keep going.
And don't question your past.
Try to find the wisdom and the power
that comes from the past, even if it
was bad.
What I've noticed sometimes with people who are
born Muslim and haven't really been raised in
Islam, they're great with the Muslims.
Like they are phenomenal with the Muslims because
there's a lot of shared sort of circumstances
between them in very different ways, and they
sort of kind of help each other.
So for that next category of people who
are born Muslim and don't know how to
pray, learn how to pray.
And don't allow your embarrassment.
Most people are not going to make fun
of you if they do.
They're evil people.
But push in and take ownership of your
salah.
So those are like three of the categories.
A fourth would be women who after menstruating
or after they've experienced sort of like postpartum
birth, they've told me that they struggle to
kind of, you know, get things going again.
Get things going.
And we'll talk about that.
Dr. Angie has a great class on this.
It's actually up on Swiss.
That's under the FIQH administration.
But I think one of the things to
do is to appreciate that Allah has given
you a break.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has alleviated from
you this act of worship during this hormonal
time, right?
And so now you want to go back
and thank Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala by
establishing worship.
So those are kind of the people that
I've seen, if you will, when it comes
to struggling to prayer.
And those are some of the remedies for
sort of overcoming some of those challenges that
are related to prayer.
What we want to talk about now is
reformatting sort of how we see salah.
So before we get started, I just want
to ask you, you guys can type it
in or you can unmute yourself.
Feel free to do either one.
When you hear the word salah, first of
all, ask yourself this question and think about
it.
I'm going to give you like a minute
or so.
When you hear the word salah, what do
you think of?
And be honest.
And then afterwards, we'll ask everyone to share
inshallah.
So I'll give you like a minute or
so to think about what does salah actually
mean to you?
Mashallah, I'm seeing like people sharing really wonderful
ideas.
So Safras is saying obligation.
What do you mean by obligation?
Like what does obligation mean?
You say obligation.
What does that mean in your thinking, in
your feeling, in your emotion?
What does that mean to you?
Safiya and Noah, hey, mashallah.
Wow, those are really also nice.
He's talking to Allah, thinking Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala.
A break from the world and connecting with
Allah.
Zahra is saying that's beautiful.
Again, worshiping Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Does anyone else want to share anything?
You can either unmute yourself or feel free
to type it in the comments.
Those are really beautiful and very powerful.
Like one of the things you get from
all the responses that we can see that
subhanAllah, salah is something powerful.
So by obligation, you mean the definition according
to fiqh.
Mashallah, which is a mandatory act.
Right, a mandatory act of Islam.
Mashallah, mashallah.
Excellent, excellent.
Alhamdulillah.
So I've always seen it as an obligation,
especially I guess when I was younger.
First of all, as-salamu alaykum.
Wa alaykum as-salam.
I used to always see it as an
obligation, something all I have to do.
But I think as I get older and
more stress in my life, more things going
on, I've actually seen it as what I
said, a break from the world and just
stopping and de-stressing, grounding, and just kind
of connecting with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So it's been a bit of a transformation.
So I'm hoping that also this course will
continue to transform my prayer into something else.
Ameen.
Ameen, ameen.
That's really nice.
Thank you for sharing.
Wa alaykum as-salam wa rahmatullah.
Anyone else want to jump in and chime
in?
Alhamdulillah, that was wonderful.
We have quite a few people here today.
Alhamdulillah.
Sorry about last week.
I was stuck in the airport.
So we had to move it to today.
Are there any other suggestions or ideas or
thoughts about what salah means to you?
Have a meeting or conversation with Allah.
That's really powerful.
Mashallah, mashallah, mashallah.
Excellent, excellent.
So let's talk about what is salah.
First of all, the word salah, does anyone
know the word it actually comes from?
Sillah.
You know, the word salah, if we really
want to appreciate it, we kind of want
to go to the root of its meaning
because the root is where we can root
ourselves.
And this is going to allow us now
to sort of scale through our discussion today,
our brief discussion, how we see salah and
what I want to happen by the time
we finish our discussion today.
It's not only do you see salah as
something offering you incredible efficacy, but it's something
that you love, like something that, and if
you already love it, like you'll love it
more.
But the word salah in Arabic, actually its
root word is a word which means to
be connected.
And many of you said that, mashallah.
It's something that we feel from our nature.
It's very interesting that we saw over the
last 10 years, you know, within sort of
the hipster non-Muslim community, this discussion about
mindfulness and centering ourselves and, you know, avoiding
triggers.
And what I've always found interesting is in
order to do that, they think about the
world.
Whereas Muslims, and what Zahra said is incredible
and very powerful, like in order for us
to center and understand priorities in this world,
we're mindful, but first and foremost, we're mindful
of Allah.
So the five prayers come in almost like
every day, like a spa, man, like a
massage for the Iman.
And that's why the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
said to the Sahaba, if you took a
bath five times a day, would you be
filthy?
They're like, of course not.
And he was like, well, that's Salah.
That's how we should understand it, that it
not only removes the filth when we make
wudu or ghusl to pray, but also Salah
five times a day is a bath for
our soul, a bath for our mind, a
bath for our self-worth.
Like the whole world may turn against me,
but if Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A
'la has guided me to pray and stand
in front of Him, that's enough of an
honor.
And that's why some scholars in the context
of connection, they named Salah Mi'raj Al
-Muslim.
The Mi'raj, like the Prophet, when Mi
'raj was raised, when everybody rejected him, when
everything turned its back against him in Mecca,
Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la granted
a Mi'raj to show that if everything
in the world has rejected you, the heavens
have accepted you.
SubhanAllah.
So no matter where I am in life,
if I know it's time to pray and
I feel that need to make that connection,
this is my personal Mi'raj, a reminder
that no matter what's happening on the face
of the earth, the Creator of all things
is inviting us to pray.
SubhanAllah.
SubhanAllah.
It's very powerful.
And that creates that intimacy that we want
to see.
So the first is that we see Salah
as really a means of feeling valued, not
feeling valued by things in the world, but
feeling valued that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta
-A'la Allah calls to Jannah.
So anything that is calling us to Allah
is a reminder that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa
Ta-A'la is calling you and I
to Jannah.
And at a deeper level, that should inform
us about a healthy intrinsic sense of self
-worth that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A
'la is calling you.
SubhanAllah.
How many people are not called?
How many people are not in those places?
The second really beautiful understanding of Salah is
that Salah gives us wings.
Like you should, I love what Zahra said,
right?
You should see Salah as something that gives
you like metaphorically like wings.
You know, when I first became Muslim, I
really saw Salah as like a tool, as
I'll talk about in a minute, to sort
of help me grow into a better state.
But at the same time, not only does
it help us kind of grow, it helps
us soar.
And that's why SubhanAllah in the Quran, in
Surah Al-Fatihah, when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa
Ta-A'la talks about the number of
the angels' wings, who knows like in that
verse, how many wings do angels have as
mentioned in the Quran.
In that opening of Surah Al-Fatihah, how
many wings are mentioned?
It's actually very remarkable.
Who knows who can chime in, do their
best, and there's no wrong answers, Alhamdulillah.
Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says,
masna wa thulasa waruba that the angels have
two wings, three wings and four wings.
Think about the correlation that we have two
raka'a Fajr, the angels have two wings.
We have three raka'a of Maghrib, the
angels have three wings.
We have four raka'a of Dhuhr, Asr
and Isha, the angels have four wings.
So our teacher told us that just as
the angels have two wings and three wings
and four wings to soar and to complete
Allah's commands, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A
'la has given us two raka'a of
Fajr, three raka'a of Maghrib, two cycles
of Fajr prayer, the morning prayer, three cycles
of the evening prayer, four cycles of the
noon, afternoon and night prayer so that we
can soar metaphorically to the obedience of Allah
Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la.
SubhanAllah.
So salah has like this deeper meaning, mi
'raj, number two to soar and that's why
when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la
talks about the faithful in the Quran, Allah
Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says, عَلَى
الصَّلَاةِ عَلَى الصَّلَاةِ upon, which means high, like
they are high on their salah.
There's a metaphoric meaning here, استعارة بالأحروف that
the idea that prayer lifts you.
SubhanAllah.
It doesn't lift us physically but that lifts
us in other ways, Alhamdulillah.
So we want to like reformat how we
see salah and we want to interrogate, even
though it may be painful and it may
even be therapeutic, our past if it's linked
to trauma and that's why I try to
encourage parents not to tell your children to
pray but tell them to love Allah.
Not just like namaz, we say in Urdu,
read namaz, صل يا ولد, go and pray.
We say in Arabic, in English, pray.
But we should see prayer as المغامرة النورانية
as a adventure filled with illumination and light
and discovery and blessings.
And we should put that mystery into it
to encourage, especially ourselves and our kids and
people around us to flee to salah.
That's why in the adhan we say حي
على الفرح because prayer is success.
The last sort of way that I think
we can reframe salah and what salah means
is as a tool because the dunya is
hard.
The temporary world is difficult and there are
a lot of challenges, a lot of difficulties,
a lot of things that come at us
in this dunya.
And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, we believe
that everything He has made an obligation is
for a benefit, to achieve some type of
benefit or blessing or noble objective, المصلحة.
So for example, fasting, it's not just about
being hungry and tired and feeling that we're,
you know, having to go through our caffeine
withdrawal.
Allah says about fasting so that you will
achieve taqwa.
There's nothing better than taqwa.
Imam al-Ghazali mentions eleven benefits of taqwa.
Number one, Jannah.
Number two, Allah being with you.
Number three is that Allah will help you
out of difficult situations.
Number four, Allah will love you.
Allah loves the people of Jannah.
May Allah make us from those people.
And so on and so forth.
So fasting, there's a value prop there, right?
There's a value prop there.
It's not just I fast.
Nothing that Allah has legislated does not have
meaning, does not have purpose because Allah is
alim, hakeem.
The same thing with zakah.
Zakah has a tangible benefit and that is
that we assist those who are underserved.
But also for the one who gives, it
takes away greed, it takes away unhealthy attachments,
it creates a resume of altruism which is
really crucial in living a life of faith,
being someone who's consistently generous.
And zakah, wallahi, every time I've seen people
give zakah, Allah increases their wealth.
SubhanAllah.
In other ways, not just monetarily, but in
other ways, they become enriched in their lives.
So Allah says, tuzakkihim, right?
Take zakah from them to purify them.
There's a tangible benefit to zakah.
What's the benefit of the iman?
The pleasure of Allah, Jannah, to live a
responsible life.
SubhanAllah, to live a responsible life.
I met a Muslim a few days ago.
Wallahi, that brother, he looked like he was
40.
So I said to him, mashaAllah, you're like
40?
He was like, I'm 70.
So I said, subhanAllah, how did you maintain
such a youthful look?
And he said, I left the haram.
Like I left the haram and living on
tayyibat and halal, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
has blessed me.
So there's tangible benefits to this as well.
We want to ask ourselves, what are the
benefits of salah identified in the Quran as
a tool?
So first we saw salah as a great
blessing, our mi'raj.
Number two, we saw salah as a means
of soaring above sort of the muck and
mire of the world.
Number three, we talked about it being a
cleansing in the very beginning, like five daily
baths, right?
Five daily spas.
As the Prophet ﷺ used to say to
Bilal, it's amazing that the Prophet ﷺ used
to say to Bilal, let us take a
break with salah.
Like how we feel when we take a
break at work.
Like how do we feel?
So the Prophet ﷺ saw dunya as work
and saw salah as break time.
We want to reformat it.
Many people see salah as work and twitch
as break time.
Salah as work, Netflix is break time.
Salah as work, watching movies is break time.
Salah as work, an act of leisure, sports
is break time.
Salah as work, shopping is break time.
The Prophet ﷺ is the opposite.
All of those things are work.
Where is the source of rest and leisure?
Salah.
So he used to say to Sayyidina Bilal,
Ya Bilal, bring us rest with salah.
So we want to reform it.
Salah as being something that purifies us, makes
us aware of ourselves.
And then finally, salah as a ala, ala
tul ibad, a tool that worshipers use.
For what?
The Quran says, That salah
should keep away from fahsha.
Fahsha is like sexual deviancy.
Sexual deviancy.
Wal munkar is sin and evil.
So salah should keep me away.
If I'm observing my salah correctly, it should
keep me away from those things.
It should protect me from those things.
As a tool.
Years ago, we had a classmate who could
not stop doing a certain sin.
And he asked one of the brothers in
our class, you know, who was like a
sheikh, he asked him like, do you have
any advice that I can break this vice?
It was *.
And so the sheikh, the brother told him,
now he's a sheikh, he said, every time
you want to watch *, make wudu and
praise Huraqa.
Like before you do it, make wudu and
praise Huraqa.
I've seen this too sometimes with couples when
they're mad at each other and they're about
to explode.
Take a step back, control yourself, regulate your
emotions.
Go make wudu.
The Prophet said wudu will cure anger.
And praise Huraqa.
And then see how different it feels.
When we feel overcome by fear because of
pressure at school, maybe pressure in our social
life, maybe economic pressure.
Make wudu, praise Huraqa.
Doesn't mean it's going to be suddenly fixed,
but it will help center you and help
center me.
And that's why Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta
-A'la recognizing the transformative power of prayer.
Says, Seek help with prayer.
Seek help with prayer.
So that brother, he came back actually to
our halaqa and he said like, I had
to battle.
This is crazy.
I had to battle to pray Huraqa before.
Because I knew that if I pray Huraqa,
I would not do evil.
I knew that if I pray Huraqa, there's
no way I could say, As-salamu alaykum,
and then go and do evil.
So he said, I found the problem was
within me.
Like salah exposed that I have to take
ownership of this unfortunate evil desire which falls
under fahsha, which Allah protects from.
Wal munkar is sin, wretchedness, harshness, cheating people,
any other sin falls under munkar, wal baghi.
This is very important that salah should protect
us from oppression.
Anyone who prays should not be an oppressor.
Because when we pray, we are reminded how
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala through salah has
emancipated us from the oppression of our own
sin.
When we establish salah, it is a reminder
that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has lifted
the bar of the dunya from us and
given us the capacity to free ourself from
unhealthy attachments and stand and have a conversation
with Allah.
And that's why Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
says inna salata tanhaa anil fahshaa wal munkari
wal baghi that indeed salah protects from sexual
deviance, from sin and evil, and oppression.
The last because of time is that we
should see salah as a flashlight that directs
us through the confusion, ambiguity, and challenges of
the dunya.
And the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam has
said wal salatu noor.
He said salah is a noor.
In Arabic, noor is translated as light.
But noor is a light that is not
the outcome of combustion.
That's diyaa.
Noor is a cool light, usually a reflection
of something else.
So we say noor al qamar.
The light of the moon.
Not diyaa al qamar.
Because the light of the moon is reflective.
It's a cool light.
It's not from combustion.
Whereas with the sun, we say diyaa.
Al shams al muddi.
Al shams al muddi.
Because its light is coming from combustion.
Look at the beautiful language of the Prophet
salallahu alayhi wa sallam about salah.
He says wal salatu noor.
Salah is a reflective cool light.
What's it reflective of?
Our iman.
Our iman is combustible.
Subhanallah.
Our iman is bright, strong.
The reflection of that light is in salah.
Number two, salah is a noor that we
use to be able to see through the
dark times.
To be able to cast itself on the
path.
Just as the moon, it casts a light
on the face of the earth that allows
us to see how to traverse it.
Salah is a light that reflects the light
of our iman that allows us to traverse
through the challenges of dunya.
Subhanallah.
So what we just did, and we could
go all day, is to go through some
things we can use to medicate maybe bad
experiences with salah.
I had a teacher years ago from Syria
who he passed away, Allah have mercy on
him.
And he would take his grandchildren to salah
like once or twice, or three times a
week.
And every time he would take them to
salah, he would buy them like ice cream
or some kind of nice thing so that
subliminally their connection to salah is sweet.
How many of us in our formative years,
unfortunately, our connection to salah was one of
intimidation, one of unhealthy guilt, one of sort
of like a sense of arrest.
That can have an impact on us as
adults.
Those experiences as children, especially with worship and
religion, can impact us.
What we have to do is learn to
reformat how we see those things.
So I gave you a few examples.
Number one, salah as a cleansing agent.
Number two, that salah is our mi'raj.
Number three, that salah is something that we
can soar with.
Number four, that salah is a way to
protect from evil and oppression.
And then number five, the fifth I gave
you was that salah is this cooling light.
Are there any other thoughts or questions?
How does this make you feel to sort
of hear some of these things about reformatting
our relationship with salah?
And is there anything you would like to
share or any other ideas around the meaning
of prayer that have helped you or helped
you sort of stay motivated?
I would love to hear from you guys
now.
As-salamu alaykum.
Thanks.
As-salamu alaykum.
As-salamu alaykum.
I'm up in Syracuse, New York, originally from
Brooklyn, New York.
And it really benefits from you immensely.
Alhamdulillah.
And I'm really enjoying and needing this seminar
for the salah.
Not only for myself, but our children.
We have nine children.
MashaAllah.
You gave birth to nine kids?
Yes, Alhamdulillah.
You should get like the Nobel Peace Prize,
man.
Alhamdulillah.
Wow.
After my wife had...
He's four months now.
And how old is your oldest?
She's 21.
Man, my wife after two, she was like,
I'm done, bro.
That's how I feel.
That's how I feel.
She turned in her union card.
May Allah bless all nine of them.
Yes, I mean.
And so you're making me to understand I
need to make sure with those nine children,
some of them adults, young adults, to make
sure I, like you're saying, reframe the idea
of salah.
Not that they dread doing it, but it
can become very robotic.
And so this has given me a lot
more fresh understanding to give to our children
so they can look forward to their salah
much more better.
I had a teacher years ago when his
child would eat, he would say to the
child, did you say bismillah?
And the child was like, no.
It's like, say bismillah, it will taste better.
So now as an adult, that person actually
tells me like, when I say bismillah, it
does taste better.
You know, like linking it to a tangible
sort of gain, especially in a society that's
so gain, gain sort of focused, unfortunately, in
an unhealthy way.
There's some benefit.
May Allah bless you.
I used to live in Brooklyn, alhamdulillah.
Big friend of Imam Siraj, our imam.
Masjid Khalifa, you know, mashallah.
Good old days in Brooklyn.
Yes, alhamdulillah.
I smile and be so happy to come
from that because it makes us who we
are today.
Alhamdulillah.
Imam Siraj is a mentor and father to
me and so many.
And Ali, rahimullah, ta'ala, you know, for
today as well.
So, you know, alhamdulillah, we were there for
the janazah and everything, of course.
And we lost another pillar of the community,
that's for sure.
Absolutely.
May Allah give him jannah and grant him
a missed blessing here.
Anyone else?
Thank you.
Thank you, Umm Jannah, for sharing.
Alhamdulillah.
Anyone else want to jump in on any
thoughts, ideas, or things that you may use?
Saheb, you might have already touched on this.
I'm not too sure.
But one of the things I always thought
is, like, I don't have time, you know,
having a career, having three kids, and, you
know, having a social life, and all those
things of this world.
I always felt like I don't have time
to pray, and it's just going to take
up more time.
And what I have actually found over the
years, the more I pray regularly, that I
have more time.
There's barakah in my time, and that I'm
able to actually achieve more in my day.
So, yeah, I think that's kind of one
of the blessings.
Absolutely.
And hopefully we'll have some time at the
end to talk about some contemporary fit questions
around salah that people ask.
One of them is that.
But it's very interesting in the context of
religion, how the Quran, when it talks about
worship, says, like, push in.
Oftentimes, we don't have the necessary confidence to
push into religion, but a good Muslim is
a confident Muslim.
Not an arrogant Muslim, but a confident Muslim.
And like, so you said, like, actually having
the bravery to step in, and then discovering,
like, you know what?
Once I started to do this as a
habit, actually I had more time than I
thought I had.
Very good point.
Very good point.
And I think that touches on something that
we need to appreciate, that our experiences with
prayer.
Like, we should be asking ourselves, like, what
is my khibrah with salah?
What are things I've noticed in my life
that have been beneficial in relationship to prayer?
And keeping a resume of successes is very
important.
MashaAllah, thank you so much.
Anyone else want to jump in before we
move on to our second part of our
sort of three-part series today, a small
workshop on salah?
Anyone else want to jump in?
Awesome.
So let's talk about now the idea of
khushu'a.
The word khushu'a is taught in the
Quran.
The word khushu'a is from the word
khashat furu'ul shajarah.
We say that the branches of a tree
are like low, khashat.
That's the meaning of khushu'a, is to
be like low.
That's the physical meaning.
Within the context of salah and within the
context of life in tawheed, khushu'a is
synonymous with reverence.
To feel a sense of indebtedness and awe
and sacredness directed to Allah.
In salah, it's synonymous with focus.
Focus.
Focusing on Allah and trying to peel away
those things that are going to keep my
mind off prayer.
And sometimes we read, right?
We read incredible stories of the early Muslims
who like walls would fall and they were
praying or something would happen quite drastically and
they would be in prayer and then they
would say As-salamu alaykum and then people
would say to them like, you weren't aware
the wall fell?
I'm like, no.
Or you weren't aware that this was happening?
Sometimes we read those stories and we're like,
I don't believe it.
But if you're married, especially if you're a
husband, you know how many times your wife
has been talking to you and you didn't
hear one word she said.
Because you might have khushu'a on a
basketball game.
You might have khushu'a with whatever you're
doing.
And wives do.
Your husband could tell you a lot of
stuff.
Happens all the time.
Happens to all of us.
And then husband says to you, Hey, did
you hear what I said?
I'm oblivious to it.
That's khushu'a.
It's possible to have that level of khushu
'a.
But why is it difficult to have khushu
'a in salah?
Our teachers tell us that khushu'a is
the outcome of interest.
So number one, I'm interested in it.
Number two, interest is the outcome of a
connection.
So I've connected to it.
And number three, the connection is the outcome
of love.
Or a sense that I'm gaining value from
this.
And that's why when you read books like
Riyad al-Salihin, the Gardens of the Righteous,
you always find chapters on the virtues.
The virtues of prayer, the virtues of the
Quran, the virtues of charity, the virtues because
the scholars want us to love acts of
worship as the Prophet wanted us to love
acts of worship so that then we would
connect out of interest, out of love, that
leads to focus, that leads to khushu'a,
that leads to reverence.
So our teachers say that the seed of
reverence is love.
So the degree of my love with Allah,
and it's not a shallow love.
It's a fantastic love.
It's a love that tickles us.
It's a love that has a sense of
mystery and exploration in our relationship with Allah.
Subhanahu wa ta'ala will bring about the
passion needed for reverence in salah.
And that's what we find in the Quran.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala describes the prayers
of the successful believers in an incredibly powerful
way that's sort of lost in English.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says قَدْ أَفْلَحَ
الْمُؤْمِنُونَ The word qad in Arabic, we teach
it at our Foundations of Arabic class at
Swiss, means to emphasize something.
Like something's done.
It's so close to it's done.
So when we say the iqamah, what do
we say?
قَدْ أَقَامَةِ الصَّلَاةِ Like the prayer started.
Indeed it started.
So here qad, indeed, without a doubt.
أَفْلَحَ أَفْلَحَ means to be successful.
But the word falaha actually is from a
word which means to farm.
So we call our farmer falaha.
Because the successful person in this world is
the one who farms for the hereafter.
They farm now with their good deeds and
their iman and being good to people and
being agents of justice and conduits of mercy
and prophetic light.
Through that, they cultivate a harvest that they
will experience in Jannah.
That's why it says مُفْلِحُونَ They're successful meaning
they have properly harvested their time in this
world to bring about the fruit that they
will experience in the hereafter.
So حَانَ الله قَدْ أَفْلَحَ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ المؤمنون Those
who affirm in their hearts tawheed.
What's the first quality of those people who
believe?
Well, before we say it, there's a beautiful
hadith of the Prophet ﷺ which is a
good hadith.
It said when Allah ﷻ created Jannah, He
said speak.
The first thing that Jannah said, listen brothers
and sisters, was قَدْ أَفْلَحَ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ Successful are
the believers.
That verse is for the مؤمنون.
What's really cool also about the verses in
the past tense, they were successful.
قَدْ أَفْلَحَ Indeed, successful were the believers.
Why?
Because Allah has chosen them to be believers
before the creation of time.
And Allah ﷻ commanded that these people will
be the people of faith before they even
existed.
So their success happened in the past even
before they knew themselves.
قَدْ أَفْلَحَ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ Another way to understand it
is if like you ask someone, hey, can
you take me to the airport tomorrow?
And they say, consider it done.
That's the feeling here.
قَدْ أَفْلَحَ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ It's done.
Their success is done because of their Iman.
SubhanAllah.
What's the first quality of those who believe?
And that's why our first level class in
Swiss is on belief because the believers are
successful.
What's their first action that they are known
for?
أَلَّذِينَ هُمْ إِي صُلَاتِهِمْ خَاشِعُونَ Those,
only those who in their prayers have Kushu'
are reverent.
All the things I talked about earlier.
In Arabic, the word Fi means to be
in.
They say like the water.
Fi, glass.
The water is in the glass.
Why?
Say the water is in the glass.
الماء في الكوب Because the word Fi means
to be submerged.
To be inside.
Isn't it interesting that when Allah SWT talks
about Salat, He uses, SubhanAllah, He uses a
word that implies submerged in Salat.
Engulfed in Salat.
Salat has like surrounded them.
They're submerged in it.
أَلَّذِينَ هُمْ إِي صُلَاتِهِمْ خَاشِعُونَ How do we
attain Kushu'?
The first is to ask Allah SWT to
give it to us.
Oh Allah, bless me with Kushu'.
Just as we say وَإِيَّاكَ نَسْتَعِينُ This is
now an extension of that.
Maybe when you read Fatiha, you say إِيَّاكَ
نَعْبُدُ وَإِيَّاكَ نَسْتَعِينُ You think about what I'm
asking for is to help me with my
Kushu' in Salat.
Number two is to learn as we did
earlier about the meanings of Salat.
Like what does Salat actually mean vis-à
-vis my own experiences, my own understandings.
How do I prove that?
How do I motivate myself?
How do I relocate Salat in a way
that challenges me, encourages me, and pushes me
forward?
Number three is to learn new chapters of
the Quran and new verses to say in
prayer.
I had a roommate years ago in college
who subhanAllah he told me I'm bored with
Salat.
So I was a new Muslim so I
was learning new chapters of Quran because I
had to pray.
So I said to him what do you
read in prayer?
And at that time we were in our
20s.
He says so like basically I only know
two chapters.
After Fatiha I know Surat Al-Ikhlas and
like Surat Al-Fir like that I feel
comfortable reading.
I might know other chapters but these are
the two I feel comfortable reading.
So I said mashAllah man for 20 something
years you're reading the same chapters bro like
I love biryani.
I love you know brisket but I'm not
going to eat it every day.
It's going to become boring to me.
So what I've noticed sometimes is Muslims will
be saying the same chapters over and over
and over again then they wonder why their
prayer lacks fluidity.
So one of the best things you can
do is just learn a few verses here
and there in fact just go through the
Quran and maybe you find some verses that
are speaking to your life at that time.
So learn those two verses those three verses
and say them in your Salah because now
your Salah becomes a tool.
Now it becomes an interpretive tool for a
grammar to make sense of the chaos and
run-on sentences of the dunya.
So learning new chapters learning new verses and
even finding chapters and verses and parts of
the Quran that are speaking to my life
that are contextually appropriate to our lives.
Like for example our teenagers I always encourage
them to read Surah Yusuf regularly Surah Kaaf
regularly Surah Maryam because they talk about young
people but even to memorize parts of them
so parts of those chapters like when Prophet
Yusuf says رَبِّ سِجْنُوا أَحَبَّ إِلَيَ مِمَّا يَدْعُونَنِي
إِلَيْهِ Oh Allah the prison is more beloved
to me than this evil they call me
to.
Like that's very powerful for a young person
to know that verse.
It's very meaningful.
When women are going through pregnancy I encourage
them to like read Surah Luqman or Surah
Al-Ahqaf حَمَلَتْهُ أُمُّهُ وَهْنًا عَلَى وَهْنٍ وَفِصَارُهُ
فِي عَمَيْتٍ Right?
That she carried him carried her child pain
upon pain.
Surah Maryam also is great for women who
are experiencing you know pregnancy.
So now the Quran is like contextual to
where I am in my life.
And now those verses in my Salah take
an added meaning.
The marriage of the Quran with the Akhwan
the marriage of the Quran with creation with
my life.
It's very important that we have that contextual
sort of relationship that intersectionality.
I remember one time we were at a
protest and people asked me to lead prayer
for Palestine and I read Surah Isra.
Of course parts of Surah Isra because it's
talking about our brothers and sisters in that
sacred land and people started to cry.
My voice is like a broken crow because
it's not about the voice it's about the
context.
So you want to think about a part
of the Quran or a chapter of the
Quran a few verses the minimum you can
read is three verses of course it's a
good question not the whole chapters but parts
small verses here and there that speak to
you that are contextually relevant to you.
So like when people come to me and
say I want to get married I want
to get married I have them memorize the
verses about marriage read that in your Salah.
Read the verses about Taqwa.
So that's a beauty of the Quran.
The third is to change up your duas
the things you say in Salah.
We know that the Prophet ﷺ he taught
us different things to say in prayer.
Don't just say the same thing every time.
You should even think about saying things once
again that speak to you and your situation.
Different ad'ia different adhkar different dhikrs different
dua that he would make in Salah.
We go through those in our Foundations of
Worship course and also there's a course on
Swiss somewhere that goes to all of the
duas like huge number of duas of the
Prophet ﷺ that I didn't finish still in
the process of being finished.
The fourth thing that you want to think
about is what are you doing before you
start prayer?
You could think about it this way.
Like if you have an important meeting with
someone you prepare for that meeting and sometimes
it's hard with children with work.
So ideally we're seeing here ideally but usually
the ideal like just now before this class
I had to take my kids to get
food had to take them to a farmer's
market.
Look man all of us here we're coming
from experiences that are informing us at this
moment like none of us are just coming
from a vacuum.
We all if you look at my Instagram
page today you'll see we're at the creek
we're here talking about Harry Potter going to
a farmer's market getting lunch and I have
to be here to make sure this class
happens.
So none of us are are beyond the
challenges and stresses of life but if it's
possible every once in a while we need
to prepare for that prayer and that's why
some of the early Muslims say that wudu
is actually a part of Salah like when
you start making wudu that's like getting your
game face on that's like shooting threes before
the game that's like warming up before you
work out that's like stretching.
So I want to think about the things
I'm doing before prayer if I'm super busy
if I'm super occupied if I had an
argument with my spouse if my kids just
destroyed something maybe that's not the best time
to pray maybe that's not the best time
to pray for sure maybe I should give
myself to balance my and regulate my emotions
to think about where I am maybe I
just got some bad news I should be
careful about what triggers me being online sometimes
I tell people don't look at comments post
and ghost post and ghost because the comments
may stress you out may wreck you emotionally
by people that don't even know you that
have no value in your life but I
want to think about creating a space of
decalibration before Salah I want to sort of
peel away certain things as best I can
so that when I push into Salah I'm
with Salah I'm present I'm present in prayer
it's very important I want to think about
what I'm eating I want to think about
what I'm ingesting I want to think about
what I'm watching what I'm listening to what
are the things around me that I'm exposing
myself to all that is going to impact
our Salah how we push in in that
moment in our khushu' in Salah you know
Sayyidina Imam Hassan before prayer he used to
turn blue and people asked him why he
said do you know who I'm about to
meet do you know who I'm about to
talk to the last sort of step that
will help us have khushu' and some of
you alluded to this earlier is to appreciate
the fact that Salah is indeed a conversation
and it's not just any conversation it's a
conversation with Allah and one of the things
that we can appreciate is all of us
love to receive nice mail you know the
nicer the mail the more significant it seems
wow why am I getting like first-class
why am I getting it like this why
is it hand-delivered why are they asking
me for a signature hopefully I paid my
tickets but how a Salah delivered to us
should really impact you know our ability to
have focus in Salah to see this as
a conversation that starts with this incredible delivery
because unlike every act of worship in the
Quran and in the Sunnah Salah is delivered
directly to the Messenger of Allah on the
night of Isra and Mi'raj by Sayyidina
Jibreel like is there a better courier than
Sayyidina Jibreel who takes the Prophet to Sidratul
-Untaha escorts the Prophet and the Prophet says
you go and Jibreel says no you go
only you can go and it's there in
his conversation with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
that Salah is made for there's no intermediary
it's the only act of Sharia that is
coming directly from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
to Sayyidina Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam without
the agency of Sayyidina Jibreel alayhi salatu salam
subhanAllah subhanAllah and that formulates this idea of
a conversation because the conversation between God and
the Messenger of Allah is where prayer is
obligated and as an extension of that conversation
every time you and I pray Surat al
-Fatiha we are reminded of this conversation that's
why the famous narration of the Prophet peace
be upon him from Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala I have divided Salah between myself and
my servant in two ways the first is
for me so when the person says Alhamdulillahi
rabbil alameen Allah says Majadali ya abdi you
have glorified me you have honored me so
every time you read in the verse of
Surat al-Fatiha Ar-Rahman ar-Raheem you
have praised me you have acknowledged me Mariki
yawm al-deen also acknowledge me Iyyaka na
'budu wa iyyaka nasta'een this is between
me and you Ibadah is for me help
is for you Ihdina al-sirata al-mustaqeem
sirata al-lazeena an'amta alayhim ghayru maghdoobi
alayhim wa ragdaaleen that is to the straight
path the path of those who earned your
favor not the path of those who have
gone astray or the path of those who
have earned wrath or the path of those
who have gone astray Allah says this is
for my servant and my servant will receive
what they ask it's also a reminder not
to be negligent because what am I thinking
about when I say that what am I
thinking about Ihdina al-sirata al-mustaqeem sirata
al-lazeena an'amta alayhim what am I
thinking about is what I may receive so
it's an encouragement to be focused like what
I ask for is what I receive what
I intend what I think is what I
will get as the hadith says I am
to you as you think I am but
the point is salah is a conversation and
that's why you need to any other act
when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala wants to
show that an act is virtuous He mentions
parts of it in the Quran salah is
the only act where all of its parts
are mentioned in isolation in the Quran sujood
ruqoo qiyam qira'a Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala says faqra'oo maa tiyassara min al
-Quran read maa tiyassara min al-Quran what
is easy for you from the Quran insara'
inna al-sirata inna al-Quran al-fajri
kana mashhoora that reciting the Quran at Fajr
is being witnessed so here Quran number two
wali-tukabbiru Allah to make takbir is mentioned
in the Quran allahu akbar wakabbiru takbira number
three standing waqoomu lillahi qaniti stand to Allah
in obedience in salah the next ruqoo wa
raka'oo maa raka'een make a ruqoo
with those who make a ruqoo sujood wasjoodu
waqtarib Allah says make sujood and seek to
draw nearer to Allah so you see here
Subhanallah every component of salah is mentioned in
the Quran uniquely compared to other acts of
worship to show that salah is so virtuous
that a macro level and a micro level
as a whole and as its parts it's
full of barakah because it's this conversation with
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala we'll stop it
for a short break are there any questions
or comments up until this point and then
in the next session inshallah we're going to
actually walk through salah and share some ideas
on how the meaning of salah should impact
us to really stretch the capacity of our
hearts to be those who love salah any
questions or comments before we continue we'll take
a break and then we'll continue