Suhaib Webb – Stations of The Seekers Part 2 Awakenings & Repentance
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AI: Transcript ©
Imam Assalikin.
We praise Allah
We send peace and blessings upon,
our beloved messenger, Muhammad, salallahu alayhi wasalam,
upon his family, his companions, and those who
follow them until in time. You guys can
scoot, like, closer if you want to, inshallah.
As well as sisters, if you wanna scoot
forward, you can. I have people coming in
late, so
it's good to
to make, room for them. As Allah says,
that Allah
will make room for you.
It's great to see everyone, inshallah. I hope
everyone is,
doing okay.
Inshallah. And tonight,
I'm
going to continue reading now from a book
called Manazil Asa Ireen, which is like
the
the travels, if you will, of the people
who are,
seeking a relationship with Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
written by Imam Al Harawi,
a great scholar, a number of years ago,
hamdulillah.
And basically, what he did is he began
to theorize, like, what are what are the,
what are the train stops, if you will,
of
Like,
how do you measure that relationship? How do
you know,
and what are the signs that you should
look for
every time you say
like,
what are the stations,
the stopping points, what are called the.
And he divided these into different categories, and
we started The first is El Bidayat,
the beginnings.
And and what he's alluding to is like
the beginnings of emergent religiosity.
The beginnings of relationship with faith.
And these are very important. Masha'Allah.
So, we started
and the first one is Aliyahqava,
awakenings.
And we talked about
awakenings and how
different things happen in our lives at times
and like
those tests sometimes and those successes
can be opportunities
for
traversing the path of salat al Mustaqim.
The straight path.
And
we noted that both are important because, like,
this relationship from our perspective isn't going to
be fixed like we're always not gonna be
perfect. Right? We're always not going to be
in a high stead of iman. It's going
to be in flux.
So still the sheikh is saying, like, these
are things you should look for
on the path.
And another thing that we noted is that
these aren't just like once. Like,
I don't experience, like,
it once, and I've graduated, and, like, I'm
on my way. These are things that are
going to be reoccurring,
in our engagement with faith.
SubhanAllah.
So the first is aliyahqabah,
being
woke.
And he mentions the verse in the Quran
says say, oh, oh, Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam,
I exhort you.
Like I exhort you with 1.
1 here is
an adjective, a noun is not mentioned.
Like, I exhort you with this one word,
la ilaha illallah.
Or I exhort you with, like, atta'a,
like obedience to Allah.
And the outcome of me
imploring you
as the prophet
is that you rise.
So there's a lot that can be taken
from that verse. Like, number 1,
the idea of being, you know, like, an
a prophetic agitator.
Like, sometimes we need prophetic agitation.
Sometimes we need prophetic motivation.
So
could be either one.
That's because iman rest on
two things,
fear and hope.
That's why Sheikh Ahmad Dardir, he said
You know, he said the norm is that
you should allow fear to dominate your hope.
What he means is like, when you feel
like, I feel like I'm getting laxed or
I'm gonna start sinning, or I start justifying
doing evil,
then I need to treat that with an
antibiotic of fear.
And fear is part of our faith. People
don't like fear nowadays, but I remember when
I when I before I converted, I was
like thirsty to know who God was, man.
It was weird. It was very weird, like,
very profound,
like, gravity, man.
Like, who did this?
You know,
like, being in that state
where
we wanna be focused on the source.
The second is
The second state of waking up the heart
is being introspective about the crimes we've committed.
The sins we've fallen into.
And it's hard to translate is
like
an means I'm climbing something. So it's like
you climb the mountain of your spiritual state,
you reach the summit, and now you look
down, and you're like, oh, man.
There's stuff I need to work on.
So the idea of just that's why the
word is beautiful
because the idea is like,
that ain't easy for people to do. That's
a climb.
That's a process.
Very few of us, I put myself in
there first, like, we're willing to really
go into like looking into ourselves in that
way.
But not to the point that it leads
to losing hope.
To the point that it inspires me to
get better.
That's a tough balance, man.
And that's why most most, like,
people they say, like, don't take on all
your sins at once, man.
Right? Just like focus on incremental changes here
and there.
Slowly, like, improve on certain things and certain
habits.
And maybe even focusing on the triggers that
lead to the problem.
Sometimes we want to focus on the problem,
but there's,
like, surrounding issues.
I remember
before I converted, the night before I converted
I was blazed,
lit in a car with my friends.
Then the next night I took Shahada, I
was blazed on something else.
And then, I remember
the guy that I took Shahada with was
like, what's your biggest challenge? He was from
Brooklyn, so he could ask me that question.
I said, man,
weed,
man. I like it.
He was like, really? You gotta quit. And
I was like, I'm a quit right now.
Yeah, right. So
then,
I knew that I was supposed to go
see my friends after I took Shahada, I
I was gonna go and hang out with
my friends. Then subhanahu'ala had this thought like,
if you hang out with your friends,
you're not gonna quit.
So that's why, sometimes, they say like, the
awareness of the sin
is the awareness of what triggers the sin.
Like, that's more important
because that's, like, that step.
So the process of
climbing and uncovering.
And I don't know if you saw that
movie, the solo movie with the guy who
does it by himself without any equipment. Like,
it's probably better to do it with a
group of people. We'll talk about that later.
To have that supporting cast.
So he said the second is
to uncover,
right, to discover
your sins and their danger.
Like, how they impact you.
And that could be like spiritually as well
as physically.
And then to, like, work diligently
to uncover them.
Exhort energy
to find out
what causes them
so you can address them.
What takhanusi mean and then you
you can free yourself
from its bonds,
from their shackles. So when you uncover them,
then the idea is that you can now
free yourself.
The word he uses is like when you
literally
remove a shackle.
And then you seek
salvation by purifying yourself from them.
So the first is like recognizing blessings,
second is recognizing
sin and deficiency.
So 2 steps in
the process of of experiencing an awakening.
And the third
And the third is to recognize how we
have wasted our time.
This could have 2 meanings. Ziyadu nuksam can
be like how much life I have left
on earth. I was in this Uber one
night with this guy, man, and he was
like, 57. And as we were talking, he's
like, yeah, man. I only got like 20
left.
You know? I was like,
maybe.
But, like, yeah. He was, like, you know,
probably I got, like, 20 years
left. He was, like, telling me, so I
gotta do stuff with my kids. Like, I
gotta make sure I take advantage of these
20 years.
So that's one meaning of this is, like,
a person is aware
of their life cycle.
The other meaning is that I've looked at
my life and seen, and this is the
the the the the stronger meaning that's implied.
And I see where I have, like, wasted
my time,
or I have been miserly with my time.
Like, I didn't do good.
I could have used my time for good,
but I didn't.
I was asked to step up and help
somebody or to get involved in something or
to do some kind of good, and I
was.
So he's saying, like, 2 areas here is
like.
Speaking of life cycle,
and then being committed
moving forward not to allow my time to
be wasted
in 3 ways.
Number 1 is
That like, to think about when you commit
sin, that you've you've shut down that relationship
with you and God of that spiritual protection.
The prophet
that a person doesn't believe
at the moment he commits zenah, he's not
a believer at that moment. Doesn't mean that
they're kufari any.
But when they steal at that moment, they're
not a believer. When they murder at that
moment, they're not a believer.
Meaning that the iman has dropped, the relationship
has dropped. So he's saying be aware that
and that's why subhan'Allah,
this is a broader discussion.
We don't say that Adam, like, physically fell
to the Earth.
But what it means is that
that metaphoric fall to Earth,
right, is a reminder of our metaphorical fall
every time we fall into sin.
So if Adam fell from Jannah,
we fell from a Maqan.
We fell from Alwilaya,
wal Mahaba,
wal Korba.
So he said, be aware that the moment
that you and I fall into these kind
of things,
we risk
losing that special relationship.
Number 2, he said,
SubhanAllah.
So, like, that should cause you to think
like, I shouldn't do this.
The second he said,
that, you know,
you should ask yourself,
are you happy
that you're doing this? Like, are you happy
with sin?
Are you happy with something which God is
not happy?
So he said if you find in your
heart a sense of joy and evil,
then wake up.
The third he said,
He said the third part of that
is that
if you continue to do this, if I
continue to do this,
and continue to fall into it
even though I'm certain that Allah is staring
at me.
That
he said, like, you should say to yourself,
what the heck am I doing with my
life?
Where am I?
So again,
he said that you should think about, if
you're falling into sin, you should think about
these three things. I should think about these
three things if I'm falling into it. Number
1 is that,
I'm disrupting that special relationship with Allah.
On my end, number 2, am I finding
pleasure and joy
and evil? Number 3, am I continuing to
go back to this sin, and make this
mistake even though I'm certain that I claim
that God is seeing me?
And this is where we'll stop inshallah today.
He said the conditions of repentance are 3.
These are 3 things. Again, it's not linear.
Right? It's gonna happen like autopilot. Right? But
if we wanted to break it down and
think about it
and sometimes it's helpful because then I can,
like, evaluate myself,
look into my emotions, see myself.
He said, you know, here's these things to
think about
as
far as real repentance. Number 1, anadam,
is to feel a sense of regret, man.
The prophet said, a toba to.
Raohu Imam Ahmed, the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam said that
to feel remorse, man,
is Tawba.
Number 2,
tithar. Tithar means to make excuses for myself
in front of God.
Like, I was weak. But to be sincere,
I was weak.
To be honest, like, that's the place to
be vulnerable, man, is in that moment of
dua
when I'm turning back to Allah.
Could be like, I love these things.
Right now, I'm struggling to love this more
than I love you. Help me.
Those are like beautiful things to say.
Or like, I love you, but I slipped.
So strengthen me.
Solidify my heart. I cannot do it without
you.
So,
like, that sense of vulnerability and honesty and
being open. And the third,
to stop,
to pull away,
to avoid it.
And we'll we'll we'll add 1 more inshallah.
And then he said,
well how many think how many do you
think the are?
Good job. How did you figure that out?
Well,
He said like the reality of repentance
is also
found in 3 areas.
Ta'azim al Janaiyah, like, to think about the
severity of the mistake.
But not to the point that it becomes
counterproductive.
Number 2, with
to
charge myself like a criminal.
Right? To blame myself to the point that
it leads me to hold myself accountable to
the point that it leads me to seek
forgiveness.
Like, not to be laxed. To be like,
that's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.
It's okay.
Allah said fear the fire.
Like, fear the iqab of Allah.
The punishment of god is shaded
is strong.
So
there are some narrations that when the prophet
sali wasalam was shown that some people from
his ummah will go to *, He didn't
leave his house for a few days
because of his, like, fear and concern for
them.
So, there's times where I need to be
exhorted perhaps with and we talked about this
a lot, like responsible fear.
Not the fear that causes people to give
up or to become despondent. That's why he
said,
the same poet said,
after he said,
you
know, But, you know, allow fear to dominate
sometimes the situation, but never despair of Allah's
mercy.
So, it doesn't reach the point that it
becomes like I become despondent and counterproductive.
But he's saying here,
like the prophet was saying,
I'm stepping in
as a prophetic
interference
to adjure you,
to to to stand,
to be awake and hear
sheikh, he talks about what that means.
And then he says, you know, in the
verse that you stand, that you rise either
in groups or alone.
And
one of the great early
commentators of Quran said it means, like,
all the time try to be woke. Like,
all the time try to be in the
zone. Like, whether you're by yourself, whether you're
in a group, so,
you know,
personal
and private life doesn't have a contradiction.
The point is and this loses something in
English, but exhortation
leads to being
awakened.
Intervention, prophetic intervention
is the word I'm looking for.
And later on, as we continue, like next
year, we're gonna start asking and challenging you,
like, so what do you think a contemporary
Islamic expression of prophetic intervention is?
We love to live in the past because
there's a lot of security in the past.
There's no responsibility.
Like, what's the what's the Islamic idea of
love now?
Like, how would the Islamic idea of love
cure our own community and cure others? What's
the Islamic idea of beauty?
We should challenge ourselves to think within
the parameters of where we are, but it's
good to have some foundations, hamdulillah, first.
So, for activist, social justice people,
people engaged on the front line, like, what
is prophetic interference?
What is prophetic engagement on certain issues?
So he says that this verse,
sheikh al harari harawi
is using it
to show the idea of
that you arise, that you stand, and he's
saying like this is a metaphor for being
in a state of negligence.
That you stood for god, That you've risen,
you've answered the call for god
whether you're alone
or whether you're in a group of people.
And then he says that
And this is the first station, like the
first start where someone experiences something that wakens
them up. We talked about it before like
loss, gain, success,
failure,
test, trials.
Those moments where
you're like,
oh man, I gotta get my life together.
Or wow, like,
I'm so blessed.
Let me try to reciprocate that by
living a life which is
inspired by something.
Doesn't always have to be negative. Right? It
can be something positive.
And that someone also becomes aware that they've
wasted their time, they've wasted their life.
Like how does someone become aware of that?
That's that initial awakening.
He said this is the first moment where
the light of guidance starts to shine into
the heart of a person.
Like that that small
kind of,
you know,
glimmer of light
begins to appear in the heart of the
person, and it allows them to see
with life.
This is a metaphor as though like before
that, maybe spiritually, they were suffering. They were
either ill or dead.
And at that moment, they achieved this kind
of like,
oh snap, like the epiphany.
But the epiphany,
there's 4 things we should note about the
epiphany that tend to
snarl people.
Number 1, an epiphany is not accomplishment.
An accomplishment. So sometimes people think, well, just
because I had that moment, now I'm super
shy. Right? So, and this happens a lot
with us as converts. Like, yeah, we have
a cool convert story or some kind of
cool convert moment, but that doesn't mean like
we're qualified to teach religion.
So I remember like after I converted in
Oklahoma, they were like, so brother, are you
gonna like do tafsir?
I was like, oh, tafsir? Like, tough seer
what? 456 Pomona Peru, 107 Hoover. Like, I
don't tough seer what? How to use a
38? Like, I don't know. You know, roll
up a dime bag. I don't know. Or
what, brother? And they're like, no, brother, but
Allah has got it. And you can confuse
the convert. They start getting, you know, because
that can get to your head.
And that happens sometimes where the moment of
guidance becomes
equated
with, like, academic
accomplishment. That's not necessarily the case.
And also, sometimes you
And being aware of
the mistakes I've made,
and the opportunities that I have.
Because Islam, there's something very beautiful that every
mistake is truly an opportunity.
Because the prophet said follow-up a bad deed
with a good deed that will wipe it
out.
That's why we should always, like, motivate people,
man.
He's gonna talk about this later when he
says, in repentance,
that one of the true signs of repentance
is that you forgot the sin. We'll talk
about what that means. Like, you've moved forward
so positively,
you've reconstructed
your life in such a way that the
sin no longer hold you down. You've been
freed by grace.
So like you're in a different place now.
So the 3
kind of causes of awakenings.
Number 1 is recognition of blessings and favors.
I'll I'll put the translation of this up,
on Facebook later.
It's kind of a janky translation, but, you
know And then the second
is, after being
aware of blessings, is aware of my shortcomings,
my mistakes.
And then the third is
account taking account of my time.
How I've used my time.
Then he says,
like, how can you how does someone become
aware of blessings?
How does that happen?
He says that occurs in three ways. Number
1, with the light of your intellect like
And what he means here is an intellect
that's like been disciplined.
It's not moved by desire.
It's not moved by hua. So someone has
like worked on themselves.
If you ever notice that out of Ramadan,
sometimes you come out, like, seeing crisp, clear.
Your heart is like like 4 k, dude.
Because you're coming out of Ramadan, you,
like, you crushed your soul.
You pulled away, so you came in hungry
for food and you left hungry for Allah.
So you're in a different place.
So what it means is like
al aqal, which has been disciplined.
So, now I'm able to see properly.
The second is, again,
by
appreciating
and relishing in blessings.
And the 4th is
is to find in yourself
empathy
and recognition
of the less fortunate.
And he doesn't mean like the Tom Cruise,
Last Samurai, white savior boy complex, where you
go to Japan and become the greatest samurai
in 2 and a half weeks.
Only a white dude could do that in
the movies, man.
I hate that movie for the sake of
Allah. Alright.
Allahi, man.
As a white man, I walked out of
that movie ashamed of my people, man. I
was like, come on, Tom Cruise.
What he means is, like,
to care about people.
Like, to truly care.
The word means to travel. So it's like,
what I've seen has traveled from the physical
into my heart and moved me. That's why
it's called.
So it's not out of, like, I'm better
than somebody or I'm a it's a savior
complex. It means to legitimately
find that you have been
lucky enough not to be tried by those
trials,
but then to translate that into helping those
people that are going through that trial.
I don't know if I can repeat that.
That was that was like goofy drop right
there.
No. It says, like,
it means that, you know, that
is to travel.
So I say
like over years.
Across the country. So when I see the
things around me, like for example, what happened
in Mali.
Like, okay, a 100 and 200 people were
massacred. Right? So I see that, and then
it travels to me, and then it travels
to my ear, then to my heart, and
it moves me. Then I become like an
ally to that challenge.
So I make it,
So I've been impacted. I appreciate the fact
like, I'm not going through these challenges,
but then that's not enough. Let me also
really be
in my I can't take on everything. Right?
But where I can help, I help.
So sometimes I like to ask people when
they like in New Zealand people are like,
man, what can we do? And I was
like, what can you do?
Like, no. What can you do? He's like,
well, I know, you know, like, someone told
me, well, I know some youth counselors. Well,
that's what you can do then, like, let's
get them on board and plug them into
some people.
Sometimes we
we like wanna meta solve a problem where
it's like, my micro capability may be what's
like more needed in that moment.
So the idea here is, like, how can
I if I can and if I can't,
I say
or at least I have a niyah to
change the situation
as best I
can? And then he says,
and then, like, being aware of sin and,
like, overcoming and becoming aware of sin that
also happens with 3 things. Number 1,
is like
magnifying the truth,
amplifying the truth in my life,
meaning god
and
Quran.
Number 2, Omarifi said, you know, Ibtad,
you should distance yourself from making excuses for
yourself.
And then the last he said,
to seek the pardon of your lord.
To seek his forgiveness.
Berri Uzzaman in Norsi is a great Turkish
theologian.
He wrote about,
that dua of Sayidna Yunus.
That he made in the belly of the
fish. Right?
He said sometimes, you know,
the depths of sin
and
the the coldness of sin,
and
the lack of clarity of sin may cause
us
to lose
hope. He said, but Sayid Naiunas was at
the depth of the sea
in complete isolation,
in complete confusion.
And what saved him was
This prayer that's in the Quran, there's no
god except you.
Praise be to you. Glory glory to you.
I have wronged myself.
So next week, insha'Allah,
we're going to continue,
through Tawbah, and then we'll finish Tawbah. We'll
do, like, some cool group exercises
and stuff.
And then we're going to talk about the
3rd, which is accountability.
Auditing myself.
And these are are things again, it's not
linear. These are things that we can use
in different times in our life,
different places in our life, Insha'Allah.
So
if there's any questions, inshallah, we can take
them. If not, we'll
be done, inshallah. Yes, sir.
Yeah. So next week, we'll talk about what
what he what he he asked me about,
like, what about where the point where you
said there's, like, points where you've been I
guess a better word is you've been emancipated
by the Tawba.
So
the mercy of Allah is more of the
catalyst
than the the sin was. So you've moved
on into becoming, like I've moved on say
to becoming a better person. I've healed. I've
changed my life. I still may remember that
sin to keep me balanced and humble,
but
the grace of Allah has become now where
I'm at.
Right? That's where I'm, I'm I'm no longer
like, oh, I did this really horrible thing.
That may still always be there, but what
is the catalyst in my spiritual movement is
may Allah help me to overcome that spiritual
thing, or I become a better person. That
becomes the focal point. That's what he means.
Yes.
Yeah. That's a great question. So I think
it's very important. We talked about this before.
She's asking about,
you know,
it's impossible to care about everything,
like, in
in the sense of I can care about
it, but impactfully care about it. Right?
So, we have a very important find people
who are like really really accomplished academically,
and they're like, I never had to hide,
you know, the moment of Hidayah, so I
don't think I can teach.
So it works two ways. So we shouldn't
confuse
the moment with qualifications.
The second thing is that when people tend
to experience that moment
because of their mashala thirst and like their
passion,
you know, shaitan tends to try to lead
them
to a irrational conservatism.
Because they think like, well, let me go
full throttle.
Like, Alhamdulillah,
I'm here, let me just go hard. Right?
And I think the best example of this
is like,
Abu Zar, when he becomes Muslim, and then
he's like, I'm gonna go tell
all the people in Mecca Muslim, and the
prophet's like, don't do that. And he did
it, and he got beat up. Like, hello?
Like, there's a very simple lesson there. Those
3 men that asked say to Aisha about
how did the prophet Muhammad worship? And when
she told them, they were, like, I'm never
gonna marry. I'm never gonna, like, I'm gonna
fast.
I'm always gonna never sleep. And then the
prophet ran to them, and he was like,
I fast and I break my fast. I
marry.
I sleep and I pray
for like,
stay balanced, man.
So oftentimes,
people tend to, like, project themselves in a
in a vein of insecurity and passion
to places where they're very vulnerable
and they're not equipped because, like,
religious literacy
needs, like,
experience.
It needs nuance.
It needs wisdom.
So, to just rush in like really fast
like that,
they end up sometimes harming themselves
and harming people around them.
The third is that sometimes when people
go that fast and have that moment,
they tend to project their angst and frustration
with their lack
of spiritual agency on everybody else. So it's
everyone else's fault that I suck.
It's because the ummah is bad that I'm
not good.
It's because the ummah is like this that
I haven't achieved.
Where in fact,
it's neither that nor that. It's just like
that's life, man.
Like, being religious doesn't mean that God's gonna
give you what you want
or make you who you wanna be.
That's selfishness.
So you tend to see people like, who
have just come back to that moment of
being
woke. Right?
And this applies even to like other areas
of life, not just religion.
And then, they like start to take it
out on everyone else around them who,
like, isn't vegan.
Now, I'm just saying like, or whatever, or
isn't woke into the social justice scene, or
isn't quite there at the same speed.
Whereas, you know, don't blame, man. Work on
yourself.
Be that example and teach people
and let them learn.
But especially in the religious area, like, I
had this lady one time. She called the
mosque, man, back in the days, and she
was like, do you guys have a problem
with pictures?
I was like,
who's this? She's like, my name is such
and such, and my my daughter, she took
shahada,
like, a few months ago. And then, yesterday
she came home. I came home from work,
and all the pictures were broken
like of our grandparents,
and our uncles, and aunties, and cousins, and
everything was broken and thrown thrown in the
trash.
And then, she told me like, this is
idolatry.
Is this like idolatry?
I was like, no. Stupidity.
Why would you throw pictures in the trash?
Right? But, like, of course, there's an opinion
out there. It's the minority opinion that you
can't have pictures.
But, like, she took that one opinion that
she read maybe online,
and just
like took it out on everybody else.
The other also happens people
tend not to last long, so then they
balance the other way like
there's no salah, there's, you know, there's no
Ramadan.
So it's like you find these 2 extremes.
And that's why Ibn Al Qayyim said,
Like Allah has not sent a command
to do or not to do something except
shaitan.
Satan sits on that command
and pushes people to either be, like,
too harsh
or too laxed?
How how do you remedy that? It's like,
slow down, man.
Like don't you hate going to the gym
after New Year's?
Because all those people show up that haven't
been there the whole year.
Right? And then they they they they're going
hard like, they are really going hard. But
you're not gonna see them a month later.
Right? That's kinda how this is. Like, I
jump into religion, I find religiosity,
and now I'm just going like nuts.
So one of the ways
is to give it time,
to be patient.
Number 2 is
to have a good, like, mentor, man.
To have someone that's like maybe more experienced
and that has been
kind of seen as someone that can balance
folks.
Number 3 is to stick with a larger
community.
Because like the larger community forces people sometimes
usually usually
to, like, find themselves in the middle. Yes,
sir? How do you advise that person who's
going on minority opinion and sitting down on
the pictures? Because I feel like there's a
lot of people in our lives often, not
just people who are new to Islam, but
there are certain cultural
things that they follow or they know someone
really religious to give them an opinion that's
technically legitimate
but maybe not knowing
the diseases of my heart.
What are the things that move me?
That's why last year we went through Ghazali's
book. Right?
On that chapter on, like,
the things that can challenge our soul.
And the last with
is believing
in the promises and threats of the hereafter.
So heaven and *.
And then he said, as for understanding how
to organize your time and your days, then
that also
And those will that will also be rectified
with 3 things.
Number 1,
knowledge.
Just basic knowledge of how to use my
time.
Number 2,
disrespecting the sacred.
Like, honoring the sacred.
Like, we have people now who get famous
because
they climb on top of tall buildings with
their girlfriends
90,000 floors up in Dubai,
and they call themselves influencers.
No disrespect,
I call that crazy.
Right? Like, that's not a good use of
my time, man.
How am I using my time? And am
I respecting, like, the sacredness of time?
The third
is suhbatus
saliha.
It's a strong a strong supporting cast.
So, you think about the hadith of those
people when the rock fell in front of
the cave,
and each one of them makes dua, and
each time one of them makes dua,
the rock moves.
Without good friends, the rock wouldn't have moved.
So, like, the the hadith is saying something
very profound that,
you know,
a strong supporting cast can move mountains.
Then he says,
and this goes back to what we went
through like a month almost ago. And he
said, and the way to control all of
this is to oppose
your bad default mechanisms.
What we watched in that show,
like that that small lecture, is to oppose
bad habits.
To, like, look at yourself and see what
are your to say yeah. To look at
myself and see, like, what are the things
that I do
that, like, trigger bad things.
To do the opposite of that. That's tough,
man.
I like to watch miss Marvel at 1:30
at night,
or whatever miss Mesa, whatever it's called. My
wife and I start watching it. Right? Some
lower your gaze moments, Masha'Allah. But in general
it's a good movie It's a show. So,
like but now I was like, man, I'm
a miss Fajr.
Right?
How do I, like,
change bad habits?
That's what he's trying to say.
Like, how do you address that?
So that's the first station,
awakenings.
He says awakenings rest on 3 things.
Right? The clarity of an awakening happens in
3 areas.
Number 1
is related to
recognition of blessings.
Number 2, recognition of sins and evil.
And then,
number 3 is organizing my time.
And that happens sometimes by being inspired to
organize my time. Yes, Abdul Heel.
Just because I'm thinking about this topic first
for many years for myself.
This may be the question asked. Is that
really the outcome
feeling that you need to affect yourself
from sins or at least mitigate them in
your life as a mode of protection
and then to beautify your actions
in the realm of what you live
with? Is it is it just learning to
play tennis without thinking of its components anymore?
Just playing? Yeah. For sure. I mean, I
don't think it's linear.
Right? I mean, I think that different people
are gonna come
to these to
god is Alim Hakim. Right? Like, if we
try to construct god a constructions, then that's
idolatry.
Right? I think what this text is trying
to do is just give language
to spiritual path.
But most definitely, like,
it's incredible, man.
Like, I I don't think I've ever met
a person that came
through the same door, man. Like, particularly,
maybe like a general kind of shared
entrance, but the particulars are always different.
What do you guys think the next
stop is on our
path
down Surat al Mustaqim.
1st is being awakened.
We think so now someone's awake. Right? Lights
are on.
They rub their eyes.
They're kind of confused, but they're sort of
aware of, like, man, I've been tripping.
So what do you think will be next?
Okay. Good. Masha'Allah, what's your name?
Awesome. Nice to have you, hamdulillah.
So taking action is correct, but what kind
of action?
Yes, sir? Hello?
Yeah.
Repentance.
Because now I'm awake, like, I understand what
I've done. I see the I see it.
So I'm clear.
So he said circumstance.
How do you engage with that person? Yeah.
So I get I don't think we should
say, like, I don't agree with that opinion.
Okay? But I wouldn't tell them, like, that
opinion is wrong.
I would just say, is that opinion right
for where you are and the people around
you?
Right? That's that's where I think kind of
the discussion has to be. And then they
they might respond and say, well, this is
the Haqq. No. This is not the Haqq.
This is an area where there's a difference.
That's right. Right? Yeah. So that's where you
explain that. Like this is an issue
where scholars differ. Right? And when scholars differ
on an issue,
then we're allowed
to choose the opinion which is best for
our circumstance
that doesn't lead us to haram.
Right? Or to something forbidden, something evil. Right?
And the fact that this person has non
Muslim family members, they're not even Muslim. They
don't care about this Imam has that opinion.
And they You know what I mean? Like,
they're not even in the same fold as
you.
So, do you Either way, you don't have
a right to go and like destroy their
property. That's agreed upon, forbid.
So, I think that's where
that discussion has to take place.
Like, it's always important to remind people, like,
your religiosity has to be meaningful and sustainable.
Right? It needs to be in, like, I
need to be passionate about it, but it
has to sustainable. Is that really like a
sustainable model?
Either way,
right, when people are too laxed,
then they start to have kids, and they
start to be, like, oh, man.
My kids have nothing. Well, I mean, you
know. So there's that balance. May Allah help
us, Insha'Allah.
So the sheikh he says,
and he says
is to
rise from the state of negligence,
meaning in our relationship with God, and it
could be applied to other things as well.
And wasting and,
you know, destroying our lives.
It
says, and that's that first moment where the
the heart experiences like an illumination.
And the person begins to experience spiritual life
and awakenings.
And he said,
the things that cause this
are 3.
So the first is that the the
heart
That the heart
begins to note blessings.
The heart starts to see like
blessings of God.
And at the same time, it becomes aware
that
it will be impossible to quantify the blessings
or to reach their ending. Like, the idea
of, like, infiniteness. Like,
I have so many blessings in my life,
it will be impossible for me to,
you know,
like take inventory of them.
That's tough because sometimes, like, we go through
hard times, man.
So the opposite would be that I'm going
through so many difficulties
that I realize the only way out is
Allah.
So you can invert them.
And then I become aware
of these blessings,
and I also become aware that I'm able
to reciprocate their rights upon me.
Like, man, our eyes, man.
Just like, just think about the blessing of
your eye.
Like, what would I do for my eye?
Or basic blessings that I have that I
don't take for granted.
Like, what would I do
for those things? It's impossible for me
to truly reciprocate their blessings.
And the beauty of these things is that
while he's talking about the relationship with God,
he's also
talking about emotional maturity in our relationships with
people, man. Like, I can never pay my
wife back for what she did for me.
My wife's pregnant, dude.
You know what I mean? Like, that is
a battle. I forgot I have 2 grown
kids. I forgot, man. She has freaking Ronaldo
kicking free goalie kicks in her stomach every
day, dude.
Like, or our parents.
People that we have normal relationships with, I'm
not talking about if we've been abused by
people. That's a different discussion.
Our friends, man. People who like, you know
how I'll
I'm a little older man, so I can
just say this like I'm Cha Cha status.
Right? Like, to be loved is a blessing,
man.
Like, people who truly love you.
So there's a a sense of, yeah, this
is with God, but then, of course, in
the regular human sphere also, like,
I recognize people's like grace.
And then I feel like, you know,
not in a way that I'm manipulated, but
in a way that I'm sincere, like,
it'd be very difficult to like, repay that
person. So that will make me like always
good.
And always caring.
And then he says,
and then at that moment when you've reached
this position where you realize that,
like infinite number of blessings, and
the fact that you could never repay them,
then what you do is you flee. Your
heart becomes emptied
solely to understanding the source of the blessings.
And that's Allah.
So that's the first step
out of the 3,
is the awareness of the heart.
The awareness
of the infinite
unbounded nature of the blessing,
the awareness of the
inability to ever repay them,
and
then the reliance and focus on the source
of them.
It's Baba Tova.
And the reason the reason scholars used to
call chapters Bab is because Bab means a
door. So it's like you're entering into a
new place.
And also to
remind
you, the doors of jannah.
So like, sincerity and like,
feeling, like, motivated.
So he said, a toba. The word toba
in Arabic means to turn away, tiptu, like,
a term from something like this.
And when scholars use the word toba, what
they mean is the is the internal turning.
That's followed by actions.
So, like, I've I've achieved an internal awareness
of something's wrong,
turn away from it inside, and that leads
to me turning away from it physically.
So, qara ta'ala says in the Quran.
I think this is the 49th chapter verse
9,
that says whoever doesn't repent
is a dholim,
is an oppressor.
And sheikh he says for
us. He said notice how the verse is
phrased as though the one who does repent
then oppression is removed from them.
They're not an oppressor.
They haven't done any wrong to themselves.
And he says,
There's something beautiful about this. He said the
only way you can repent is to know
you sinned. So sometimes we find ourselves, like,
we're overcome by the fact that we've sinned,
and there's where shaitan comes.
So Imam Ibn Qayyim, he says something so
beautiful.
He said,
before
the sin,
Shaitan will make you the greatest theologian in
God's mercy.
So it's like, yo, let's go to the
club. I can't. Don't you believe Allah will
forgive you? Allah's forgiveness is transcendent.
Allah is so merciful.
Don't you believe You Allah no problem.
But then he said after
when the person wants to come back,
he makes them the greatest fool in Allah's
mercy.
So like they won't he said,
You know, so before the sin, man, the
person they they're like in some kind of
high spiritual plane breaking down God's rahma. They
could, like, write a freaking encyclopedia on it.
But then after the sin and they feel
like, yo, I gotta fix it.
Homie couldn't even write one paragraph.
So there's a trick there
that being aware of a sin doesn't mean
you're a bad person.
Being aware that I'm a sin sinner doesn't
mean I'm a bad person. That's why in
Suratah Tawba something really incredible happens. It's very
beautiful, man.
Allah says, you
know, Allah has indeed turned
to the believers.
Right? And then at the end it says,
which means
God turned to them first
so they would make Tawba.
Tabaa Alayhim
liatubu.
So
most people say what that means is Allah
turned to them by making them aware
of their mistakes
so that they could
fix those mistakes.
So when we're experiencing guilt,
or when we're experiencing this sudden powerful awareness
of our evil,
that's a sign of Allah's love.
And that's why the prophet
said,
the example of the believer
is like a horse that escapes
only one day to return home.
And that's why the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam said that the person who repents
is like that guy who lost everything in
a desert.
Then he gave up, then he looked up
and he saw his camel with all his
goods, and he said, Allahu
was so happy.
He said, oh, Allah, you're my servant. I'm
your lord. Prophet Allah forgave him because he
was so happy.
But the point is that he said Allah
is more pleased with someone who repents
than that person was who lost everything.
Because the person who repents is like someone
who found everything when they were lost in
the desert of Dunya.
And that's why usually
the word repentance
and the idea of rahma
are used in the Quran
with the word
and
Why? Because the word actually is katabi mentioned
the great scholar means the umra of Allah.
But Allah used ruh because ruh is synonymous
with what? With life.
So tawba brings life to a dead heart.
Repentance
resuscitate
someone spiritually.
So it's like when you're making toba it's
like your toba is your chest going,
pushing on you, get that pulse back.
Right? That's the outcome of toba.
So the sheikh, he says very beautifully
that the only way you can repent is
to know you made a mistake.
So,
like,
mistakes
shouldn't destroy us.
Mistakes are an opportunity.
He likes 3, man. He said, and that
is to look at sin from 3 ways.
Like, in order to become aware of it
is to think about sin.