Suhaib Webb – The Masses’ Creed Part One Style, the Tradition, Faith and Authors Introduction
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
We begin. We praise Allah We send peace
and blessings upon our beloved messenger, Muhammad, sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam,
upon his family, his companions, and those who
follow them until the end of time. So
last year, subhanahu, we actually had 2 harakas
every week on Tuesday Thursday.
Thursdays was tough year, and then Tuesday was
actually like a course.
It's kind of gotten inverted this year because
the 1st semester I was teaching
here on campus.
So,
co teaching a class with, Sheik Fayaz. So
I didn't really have the capacity,
to teach twice a week. But then after
the semester, Imam Khaled
reached out to me. So, like, can you
start, like, more like of a course type
class?
So, last year, we actually finished one book,
Essentials of Islamic Faith,
which is published. And then this is the
2nd book. I run an online institute called
SWISS. It's gonna launch,
next month, but then, like, in the summer.
And these courses would be like a Netflix
type thing. But it'll be like me actually
teaching you with, like, test exams,
because people don't necessarily have the time,
to, like, study in person. And teachers also,
we don't have time to teach, like, 1
or 2 people. Right? It's easier if you
can teach large number of people, and then
they can interact with you,
through questions and stuff. So the second book,
actually, that
in the series on theology
is a book called.
And
of course means, like the word
means to not something.
Right? The same word, knots, because the idea
is
we knot our we tether our actions.
We knot our hearts and tether our actions
to foundational beliefs.
So it's called Aqirah. Al Awa means the
masses,
and we'll talk about
that name in a second.
The
the the manuscript
is still, like, being edited.
So for those of you here, if you're
gonna be consistent and you're not gonna flake,
then you can send me an email. Just
put, like, master's creed in the email, and
I'll send you the PDF.
But if you, like, if you're not gonna
be consistent, like, don't worry about it. But,
like,
you really need a manuscript if you're not
gonna be consistent. Because the purpose would
be to subject the manuscript to your eyes,
so that you can it's not edited. Right?
So that's one thing you can say, hey,
like, fix
this. Or perhaps, like, this wording does not
work well, or we did this point wasn't
clear, or here's some questions maybe that you
can add. Because I believe
one of the biggest problems of religious scholarship
is it's like a one way street, and
learners aren't really active teachers.
Whereas, you bring a lot to the table,
alhamdulillah, your experiences, your
life, questions that you have,
the unique,
roles that you play in society.
Those are very important for us to inject
into the veins of the pedagogy of the
Muslim community,
so that the tradition is relevant to the
people.
If we just read classical texts
and regurgitate,
you know, like the old kind of issues,
That's the problem. That's why people don't find
relevance in their theology
and in their faith.
But if we subject the tradition
to
the contemporary gaze,
and then we take the questions of that
that gaze,
and plug that into the tradition,
then we have unique opportunity not only to
contextualize
the tradition,
but to make sure that our context is
orthodox.
So there's like a duality here that's very
important.
1 is critical thinking and engagement,
and then the outcome is like,
something that's relevant to people that speaks to
their issues.
And people find confidence in what's relevant to
them, what they can measure, what they can
understand.
And then number 2 is we, most importantly,
as Allah says,
we make sure, like, what we're doing is
pleasing to Allah.
We find
when it comes to the tradition, we find
Muslims falling into 3 camps.
Those who want to preserve the tradition
and forsake their era.
So it's all about preserving
the past
with no, like,
inspiration for the future.
We find people like this.
Number 2, people who want to completely reject
anything from the tradition in the name of
reform,
in the name of, like, what we call
tajdeed.
But this is not really tajdeed, this is
tavdeed. Tavid means to destroy. It's like to
completely ignore.
Like, what community would turn us back on
like 1400 years of scholarship and experience?
And then the third are people who,
almottawasitun,
who are in the middle, who understand that
the tradition is important because it keeps us
grounded,
and I like to use the word traditions
also.
The traditions
keep us grounded,
and by injecting our lives into those traditions,
we are able to revitalize
those traditions,
make them relevant,
and maintain, like, social responsibility.
As the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wasallam, said,
The reason that people don't like the third
option is it's hard to teach that way.
Right? It's easy for me to memorize, like,
I memorize this book. I can just read
it,
and I can leave.
But for me to try to answer questions
from you
about things that I'm not prepared for,
that's a whole another ball game.
And for you to try to interject
religious principles into your life,
that's a whole another ball game. So that
3rd,
educational philosophy
is one that's rooted in the sunnah of
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
Was rooted in our historic community
for many years,
and it forces us to take
education deliberately
and seriously
and as a process.
You can't be a great educator if you're
lazy,
and you can't be a great student if
you're lazy.
You gotta work for
it. So this may force us to kind
of do something we tend not to like
to do, and let's think,
and use our mind. So if you send
me an email,
you just put, like, masses creed. My email
address
is sw,
sorry.
Yeah. [email protected].
It's like easy.
Inshallah, and I can send you, the readings.
And then I'll I'll really appreciate
your your engagement. And I wanna encourage you
to engage, you know,
constructively and critically.
So, alhamdulillah, the first book that I wrote,
Essentials of Islamic Faith,
I was deliberately very simple.
I presented, like, the bare foundations of Islamic
theology and and and approach towards theology. The
Sunni community,
tend to have two approaches towards orthodoxy,
towards articulating,
what they considered were orthodox beliefs.
And in that book, which was a classical
text, like 200 years ago, 300 years ago,
was written in El Azhar by Sheikh Ahmedardir,
Akhir al Tohidiya. I just took the book
and really kinda let it speak for itself.
Unpacked a few issues just to prepare you
for the second book,
because I believe again, that education is a
process.
And that we prepare people to move from,
like, one stage to another stage to another
stage to another stage to another stage.
So this book, is going to be, perhaps
a little bit different.
It's really important that we think about faith
as 3 or 4 components. The first component
is to learn, it's cognition.
The second component is to believe.
The third component is to act, and the
4th component is to be patient.
And that's why Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says,
Allah swears by time that if time is
not used
for learning in faith,
good deeds and patience and dawah, then that
time is going to be perhaps against us.
And that's why Luqman, with his son, first
thing he said,
Oh, my son don't commit.
So the first thing he starts out is
learning faith. The second thing,
The second is actions.
Establish
prayer.
The third,
Right?
Call to good, forbid the evil. He says
to his son,
And the last thing that he said to
his son is
Be patient. So Surat Asar, like those foundational
principles in Surat Asar, the acquisition of learning,
It's very important that we learn. That way,
we can be constructively critical. Our scholarship will
be crippled if the masses are not intelligent.
If the masses aren't engaging scholarship, then scholarship
becomes, like, you know, becomes very, like, static
and and and doesn't address
issues. And and, unfortunately, there's been
an attitude created or a climate created by
religious scholars
and activists and teachers that is probably largely
rooted in insecurity, that doesn't encourage you to
ask questions.
Just like having access. Like, very, very important
to have access
because that raises
and creates relevance in the knowledge.
So the first is the acquisition by learning
and thinking.
The second is to believe and affirm in
our hearts, to weigh it, to struggle with
it. The third is to act on it.
The 4th is to call to it, whether
personally or outside of our own spaces.
And then to be patient.
So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in the 47th
chapter of the Quran says,
Allah says that you should know,
you should learn the meaning of
and then you seek forgiveness.
So learning and then the action.
That's why we have a very important principle
that says,
The knowledge is the imam of action.
And Sayyidina Umar ibn Abdul Aziz, he said,
Sayna Umar ibn Abdul Aziz said, whoever acts
without knowing
creates more harm than good.
Mutanebi is a great poet. He said,
Which means to think before you're brave,
these 2 braveries.
Meaning to like strategically think about bravery,
not just to be consumed by passion.
So Islam
appreciates passion,
appreciates emotion,
of course.
Hadith said to love for Allah, to hate
for Allah,
but that should be tethered with knowledge.
And you can apply that to any situation,
like,
love. Like, people think they're in love, but
they they do we really know what it
means to be? Do I am I in
love with you or do I love you?
It's 2 very different issues. 1 is passion
without being rooted in, like, responsibility.
1 is responsibility
that tempers
and guides that passion.
Because we see in the Muslim community, oftentimes
people who suddenly become religious, and they have
that burst, they have that emotion,
but they don't have any type of foundational
tethering.
And they actually end up, like, sometimes pushing
people away from the religion.
They go too hard on people.
So it's like someone let loose in a
pharmacy who's not a pharmacist, and they're writing
prescriptions for people.
You know,
my head hurts. Okay. Take some Prozac.
You need Prozac for a headache. You don't
believe me? They're very charismatic, very passionate. We
might believe them. Okay. I'll take Prozac.
And then we end up harming ourselves.
That's why one of the great, great scholars,
he said something I put in the introduction
of the book.
He said,
The evidences that direct us to having a
relationship with the creator.
And his oneness
They are alike,
you know, prescriptions and medicines.
Which are used to cure the heart.
So what he's saying here is, like,
an educator has to be responsible
and wise,
and not just passionate. And often times our
community,
we fall for passion,
and we neglect
foundational learning.
And sometimes we find people who may be
very brilliant and gifted,
but they don't have, like, they don't have
swagger.
So the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam is
of sahul arab,
and the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam is
very educated, but he's also extremely eloquent. He
knows
how to talk. He knows how to utilize
mechanisms
to grab people's attention
and pull them into the discourse.
And then he says,
This is very beautiful what this sheikh is
saying. And he said,
he's he's using this as a metaphor for
the content provider, for the religious teacher.
Like, often times when I ask young people,
how would you describe your experiences in Sunday
school,
your experiences,
and the the number one answer I got
was curated.
Curated and intimidated.
So, subhanallah, meant we're creating
a community of intimidated people.
So the sheikh says
that the
the evidences, meaning the the educational process of
teaching people
about Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
is similar
to medicine which is prescribed to cure people.
And that, and he mentions 2 things very
important for content providers to think about.
If the person is not knowledgeable
of
the medicine
nor do they have experience
in treating people,
then their harm, his harm, her harm will
be greater
than his or her good.
So we see now, and this is something
that we're gonna talk about hopefully in the
future here, when we talk about training religious
leadership,
and training educators.
There's 2 important things that people should have.
They should have the experience, but they should
do some residency.
There should be like an apprentice process for
Islamic studies teachers.
There should be an apprenticing for future Imams.
When I came back from overseas,
they just threw me in a masjid, man.
I luckily had been trained before,
but
and worked as an apprentice mom for 10
years. But can you imagine if you just
come from overseas,
and suddenly you're plugged into a massive masjid,
and you have no human experience. You might
have never been married.
So you just don't understand the EQ needed
to be in that role.
So the sheikh is saying,
that there should be experience.
And there should also be, like, mastery.
And what he's talking about here is the
art of religious education.
How to teach people.
Then he says,
He said the same thing, like, with religious
knowledge. If you don't understand the people that
you work with, and you don't understand where
they are,
then you may over medicate them.
Or you may under medicate them.
But the point is you're gonna harm them.
So that takes us to the purpose of
of this book.
Imam al Ahmed al Marzukih al Husseini al
Mariki
is from,
the Ayla of Sayna Hussein alayhis salam.
He's Husseini. So he's from AhlUbayt.
And he was a great scholar. He lived,
like, 200 years ago in Egypt. He went
to Esar. Esar is like the Hogwarts of
the Muslim world without
magic.
And,
he noticed that in the beginning of 18th
century, there was this fishery
that was starting to happen between
Muslims, like you're just everyday people,
and scholars.
And understand that at that time, the language,
especially the legalese of scholarship in the Muslim
world, was extremely
refined.
To the point if I gave, like, any
Arabs here, if I gave you, like, a
classical legal document,
and it said,
read this, you'd be like, you wouldn't understand.
Because it was written in a very very
formalized
legal wording.
That valued
small
expression
that carried massive meaning.
So it became like a problem because your
everyday
Arab speaker, like it's like us when we
read legal manuals,
we get lost.
We don't understand the terminology,
and sometimes words would have, like, multiple meanings.
So Imam al Marzukhi, he was an ezhar,
and and at that time, Ezhar functioned as
a public institution.
So he became very concerned, especially in issues
of theology,
understand that the French
have visited Egypt by this time. The British
are now paying attention to Egypt,
and Egypt has gone through a lot of,
like, political turmoil.
Egypt is one of the first Arab countries
to try to modernize education. What that meant
is not necessarily something bad.
What that meant is that every citizen has
the opportunity
to learn.
Whereas before,
learning
was a luxury.
Like being able to go and study and
learn how to read and write, it was
like having like an iPad.
It was like having something really nice. It
wasn't something that the masses had.
So sheikh, he decides I need to take
a text that's going to encapsulate
orthodox creed,
but then write it in a way that
fits
and treats
the ailments
of the people.
And that's why he calls it the masses
creed.
So it's almost like a tribute to his
community.
As if to say, like, hey,
like, I got your back.
So now, if we see, like,
brothers and sisters trying to use technology to
reach
Muslims
or different avenues of expression,
we should appreciate that. Like, they're trying to
do something. They may do it horribly wrong,
but at least they're trying. And some may
do
it, really really really right. So he he
decides to write this book, and there's 3
things that you're gonna take from this book.
Number 1 is, it should increase our relationship
with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Like, we should
improve
the sweetness of salah.
We should improve, like,
our relationship with the unseen.
Like, that's really, really important.
Number 2, it should prepare us for a
life of prophetic value.
What kind of impact do you leave in
the world?
Doesn't have to be massive. Right? I have
a problem with that. Everyone wants to be
like
the hero.
Right? Or the shero.
But like,
what if you just do something that's
not massively impactful,
but like really really successfully changes a few
people or
impacts
a few people around you.
Man.
So it should help us to live for
a life of prophetic value. And a life
of prophetic value is, I'm gonna be committed
to good regardless of the impact.
So whether people like it, whether it it
goes viral,
that's not prophecy.
Prophecy doesn't care it cares about viral, but
it understands that viral is from God.
My job is just to like, my
job is just to, like, do a good
job of relating the message. But if it
doesn't go viral,
Ma'alehi,
That's why the prophet, salallahu alayhi wasalam, said
there's some prophets, they had 0 followers. Like,
can you imagine?
I knew of a brother, subhanallah, in the
seventies,
Abdul Malik,
who used to be in Medina Masjid here,
in New York, years ago.
He was with the Jama'at Dawah and Tablih.
So he moved to Houston, like, back in
the dizz days before Houston became Little Karachi.
You know what I mean? Like, they call
it Little Karachi, or is that Chicago?
And,
he started a masjid
in his neighborhood.
And nobody came,
so he said,
I started and I would I I wanted
to be sincere,
so I would actually go and give lectures
to myself.
And he he wasn't mentally ill. Right? But
he was, like, I wanted to make sure
I was sincere.
So, and then hamdulillah, that community grew, mashallah.
But like his initial effort wasn't about like,
you would like to get all the likes
and everybody following me.
His initial effort was like, for Allah.
And so then he he said like, I
learned by not speaking to anybody how to
speak to people. SubhanAllah,
Allah teaches people, man. I learned by having
an empty congregation,
how to have a full congregation.
Because I've I've been empty,
and that emptiness taught me
what not to do. Subhan Allah.
But he was like, I didn't pay attention
to that stuff. Rahimu Halai, he passed away.
So, of course, strategically, we wanna make sure
we try to do our best, and we
wanna have the best effort, and we hope
that it's impactful.
But at the end of the day,
Success is from God. And that's why the
Muslims should never get upset because
if you've done it, you succeeded.
But the outcome is left to who?
It's left to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
The third is that it will allow us
to familiarize ourselves
with the depth, scope, and beauty of Islamic
scholarship.
And as a post colonial community that continue
well, not really post colonial.
I mean, we're still getting drones
and economic warfare declared on the Muslim world,
constantly.
We're still experiencing,
like, the hangover of
of, a white gin and tonic.
And when you come out of that, when
I come out of that,
it may have impacted our attitude towards our
tradition.
Vis a vis modernity,
spirituality,
There's some places in the academy
to be a believer
is synonymous with being insane.
So, like in that kind of spectrum, how
can I go back and say,
man, the tradition actually was very rich,
and there was a lot there?
And it doesn't mean that the tradition is
perfect. We talked about the three attitudes towards
the tradition,
but there are things there to be inspired
inspired of.
How how did this all come about?
In the year
1258,
after Hijri,
Imam al Marzuzbi had an incredible experience.
He dreamt,
that he was surrounded by the Sahaba. Has
anyone here ever dreamt of the Sahaba?
Anybody?
Masha'allah.
Masha'allah.
And
the Sahaba,
some of them they turned to him,
and he noticed that the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam
was like sitting
amongst them.
And the prophet said to him,
read the poem.
Whoever reads it will go whoever, like, memorizes
it, lives it, and learns it will enter
paradise.
And they will achieve the objective of life.
And they will align themselves with the book
and sunnah. Of course, we don't believe this
is hadith. Right? Like, don't get it twisted.
But we do have the hadith of the
prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
that said,
true dreams are mubasharat,
are like these true dreams are
a part of nabooah.
What that means is if someone has a
dream that agrees
with general principles of Islam,
not like I have a new dream. Right?
Like I have this dream that I can
change salah. Okay. There's Nabuah, I'm gonna change
salah now. That's Bida.
But a dream that aligns with something like,
maybe you have a dream that tells you
go to South Africa and
trafficked.
Like, that's considered like a prophetic dream.
So
when the prophet alaihi salatu wa salam,
he said that to the sheikh. The
sheikh, he said,
I don't know this poem.
Right?
And then the prophet
salallahu
alayhi
wasalam
said,
Then
the prophet read
a poem to him about faith, about theology.
And when he woke up, he had it
memorized.
SubhanAllah.
So he went to
his students and he said, I'm gonna read
this. Write this down.
So when they wrote it down,
he
This is the poem that's in front of
It's really cool, man.
And that's why it's important to get beyond
the the smugness, and the dimness, and coldness
of
the secular world
into a place where people still believe in
dreams.
And not like dreams do crazy stuff.
Right? But
like, dreams that have like real meaning and
value.
So subhanAllah, they wrote it, and then he
wrote an explanation, and then he dispensed it
to the scholars. He was like, peer review
is very important.
And, you know, masha'Allah, the book was like
widely accepted and praised by scholars. They were
really shocked,
and it's taught now in places like the
Gambia,
and Senegal,
Mauritania,
Morocco.
It's basically taught everywhere, except Saudi Arabia.
So,
except in in certain parts of Saudi Arabia,
like the far,
like the far east, southeast of Saudi Arabia
and Assa.
So,
and that's not to, like, go after the
Saudis or things.
It's just they ain't rolling like this.
Yes?
So so the sheikh is from this generation
of people who believes in
making the language accessible.
So the writer of this book had this
dream, and then the book
is representative
of his one of his attempts
to to to, like, quell that divide. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Good. No. It's a good question.
Don't be shy. It's wonderful. It's my fault
for not explaining it.
Then after some time, Sheikh Hamadi saw the
prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. Has anyone here
seen the prophet in their dreams?
It just means you're more responsible.
It doesn't mean you're special. You know, people
are, you know, that's not the problem of
my dream. No. I can, like, go crazy.
No, man. It's not like, you know, you
did CrossFit, and I can eat pizza.
Right? That comes with great responsibility. But the
prophet said, whoever sees me faqdrani.
But Al Qadir Iyad said that, the only
way you can be for certain that you
saw the prophet in your dream, is that
your Adam will be Shefati.
That you know how the prophet looks from
a to z. If not, then you ask
people who know.
So something to think about. But a few
a few months later, he saw sayna Muhammad
alaihi salatu salam
in his dream,
and the prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam said, hey,
recite that poem that I read to you.
So he said, alhamdulillah, I I read it
to the prophet, and each line he would
say, ami.
Again, it's not doesn't mean this act this
didn't happen. Right? But it's like Mubasharat.
And the scholars of his era,
they didn't
reject this.
One of the challenges
of the Salafi Saudi
Salafi,
Da'wah,
is that it has aligned itself with secularism.
And that is that secularism not only opposes
the supernatural,
and not only opposes superstition,
it also opposes the supernatural.
Islam opposes superstition,
but affirms what?
The supernatural.
We see now an effort to destroy the
houses of the Sahaba,
the the tombs of the righteous people, you
know, to erase our history,
to, your dream means nothing.
Right? So now we became the smugness of
the secular world in the name of puritanical
literalism.
This doesn't apply to all all Sadafis. I'm
talking about that that's being pushed into communities,
just like there's a apolitical Sufism. It's a
problem also.
Right?
Pushed into communities
to divide us and weaken us and keep
us from fulfilling our prophetic goal.
So
none of the scholars around the sheikh said
to him, like, this is Baqwas, man. How
you had this dream, bro? Stuff for Allah.
No. They said, alhamdulillah, that's like a beautiful
thing,
and that's a great thing, and that's why
anyone who taught the book, they mentioned it.
But of course, it's not a hadith of
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
It's just a beautiful experience.
I consider these kind of moments like when
you're on the treadmill and you want to
stop, and then someone says something really nice
to you, and you can keep going. That's
kind of what this means. We don't take
any legal rulings from dreams.
We don't take, you know, I saw this
in a dream that all of you should,
like, take me to the dining hall every
Thursday.
The prophet said, you should take me there.
That's how people get used, man.
So we have a very important principle.
And he's not allowed to, like,
to take rulings from dreams.
Yes, sir?
It's definitely mentioned about
seeing the prophet. So I don't know how
to deal. Is there also a price in
other prophets in dreams? Of course. Beautiful, man.
Those are great things, Insha'Allah.
But again, we don't tell you, like, I've
seen people come, like, yeah, you know, I
saw this sign in my dream that said,
like, go right, so I knew I shouldn't
marry that person.
I was like, no no. It means you
should take all your money out of your
bank account, and in your right hand give
it to me.
Like, how do you know it means that?
I'm like, well, how do you know it
means that? Like, that's very subjective.
So what we say is, like, these dreams,
Like, the general
vibe is they're great they're good things.
But we don't take tafsir from them. Like,
we don't take, like,
specific we don't say whoever read doesn't read
this poem is a bad person, for example.
It's not like that, hamdulillah.
So after the poem was completed, and this
was his effort to kind of, like, create,
What's funny is now it may seem hard
for us. So imagine in his time he's
trying to make it accessible.
Maybe for us it's difficult,
And it's important to understand that Escar went
through a lot of changes, and still is
going through a lot of changes. And one
of the important changes
that Esar went through, this kind of Harvard
of the Muslim world, where it it found
a lot of opposition from that first tier
of kind of a traditional school,
was that Esar was trying to make the
tradition accessible
to everybody.
What was called Tabsit Turath.
And he
becomes one of
the first to start this.
The first to start this. So today, inshallah,
we'll read the introduction. I just wanna advise
you, like, it's not hard. Like, don't be
intimidated.
You should enjoy this experience.
And, like, if you have questions, you can
just ask me. Don't worry.
I want you to feel comfortable.
Center yourself,
and and don't, like, tell yourself, like, this
is not for
me. Like, I feel sorry for people. Like,
we put them in positions where they feel
that way. If it wasn't for you, why
are you here?
You know? So, like,
have some confidence in yourself.
And I'm I'm with you. Like, I'm I'm
a convert. Being a convert is to be
constantly in a state of exploration.
You know, like, oh, chicken tika, amazing.
Right? Mauba, amazing. Right? So today, we were
downstairs with, our friends, Arida
and Monya, and they're, you know, I was
telling them, like, you know who Muhammadu Eredi
is? Muhammadu Eredi is like the Michael Jackson
of East Africa. Right? And she was like,
how do you know that? I'm a convert.
And then Shah Rukh Khan, we started busting
out Shah Rukh Khan. How do you know
Shah Rukh Khan? I'm a convert.
Wu Tang,
you're converts.
Right? But like, the point is,
you know, for me Islam has always been
about
learning and
growing and and not challenging,
but within that realm of of of growth
to, like, enjoy it. So
don't don't worry, inshallah. And then next week,
you'll have the text
and, you know, you'll be able to, to
write some notes and stuff. So it's a
poem.
Here's a question.
Why why would he write in poetic form?
And there's 13 ways to conduct a poem
in Arabic, more or less. He he writes
in the simplest way. It's called rajiz. Rajiz
in Arabic is called Himaru sha'ara,
which
means the donkey of the poet. What that
means is, like, if you want to work,
if you wanna get into it, this form
of poetry is the one that you can,
like, use for anything. It'll work like a
donkey.
And a donkey, from Oklahoma,
I could talk about it, is a lot
easier to ride than a horse.
So it's like it's easy to to to,
you know, work with,
but then also
it's accessible and easy for who?
The people, man.
And
perhaps the reason he wrote it as a
poem
is that in his age, illiteracy was very
common.
So people learn by memorizing.
I've had teachers, I had a teacher I've
told you about him before,
Sheik Ali Salih.
A Sheik Ali Salih
is blind.
Masha'Allah, his wife was blind, she used to
make khatamu Quran every 3 days.
SubhanAllah.
Sheikh Ali Salih.
If you're from Cairo, he lives next to
Bab Azawala.
So Shaykh is like a poet. Like, he
has, like, extemporaneous,
like, bars. He can just drop
bars for days
about anything. So my Ijazah, in one book,
he wrote it, he told me write it
as a poem.
Right? You make like this,
you know, like so he made it like
a poem. I was like, yo how do
you do this man? Because it's not easy.
One time I brought my children to visit
him,
Shifa and Malik.
And he said, because he can't see, he's
like, Deidah?
Who's that? I said, damn.
He said,
I memorized it, and I didn't write it
down. And I'm not Arab.
The point is, like,
that's the system of education that used to
exist. So I said to him like, how
did you learn how to do this? He's
like, my mom
was blind too, and she used to play
in Masjid Al Azhar. So she used to
listen.
So she learned from all those shuh.
Imagine now, we kick people out of the
mosques.
Allahu Akbar.
But his mom, so she memorized the Medheb
Hanafi, she memorized it.
Poetry, she memorized it.
Composition, even though she couldn't see to write,
she memorized it. And she was a hafila,
just by
like being in the
the area of knowledge.
So the sheikh, he wrote it
as a poem because in those days,
poetry
was easy.
So we learned something now, like, in our
work,
regardless of our profession,
if our job is to work with people,
because sometimes people in a scholarly setting, there's
a certain type of,
you know, language
and format that we're stuck to, but like,
if we're really trying to serve people,
then we need to be able to serve
people.
So he begins, he says, Abda'u
Bismillahi
Wabil Rahimida
imil Hassani.
He said I began
Bismillah.
Here Bismillah,
the ba means atabarruk.
So like when we slaughter an animal we
say Bismillah, like
with barakah.
So the idea is here like I'm opening
my text
seeking
Allah.
Because without Allah, I won't be able to
do it.
Here we learn something from the sheikh.
The Sheikh, he became the Mufti in Mecca,
by the way. Like Sheikh was a g.
So
he, like someone today got traded. Right? He
got traded from one city to another. The
Sheikh, he got he traded and went to
Mecca.
And in Mecca, he also was very successful,
but the point is,
even though he's really accomplished at what he
does,
and he's a great composer of poetry,
he doesn't allow
professional
accolades
to cause him to forget
he needs Allah.
Do you feel you need Allah?
Like, in our moments
where we're doing what we're really good at,
Do we remember Allah?
The Sheikh
is teaching us something here. That's why one
of my teachers said about the Ulama, the
good Ulama. He said, the sign of a
great scholar, like a great person with god,
is They
may be dead, but you still learn from
them. Like how they carried themselves.
How they acted.
So for example, when people used to see
Sayna
Sayna Fatima,
alaihi salaam.
They said, man, she reminds us of the
prophet, salallahu alaihi wa sallam.
How she looks, how she talks, how she
acts.
Right? And after her, Sayna Husain.
So like,
mat
wa'esh.
So like, if you think about it, you
talk about some of these luminaries of history,
like, you think they're still alive. Like, if
there was someone here that didn't know much,
they'd be like, she's, Imam Sheifi. Oh, where's
that imam at? Is he in Jackson Heights?
Like, the way we talk about Imam Sheffi,
or Rabi al Adawiya, the great woman, saint,
like, they're still around.
So the sheikh, he said the signs of,
like, a great person is matwaash.
They died,
but
their their impact,
like Malcolm X, like, still feel like he's
here
because of the impact was so systemic.
So the sheikh, even though he's, like, really
really successful, this poem is he's writing this
poem for, like, for the basics, like, he's
writing for people. He can do this in
his sleep. Right?
But still, he's like, I need Allah.
So he says, Abdu'u.
I began Bismillah
with Allah.
And, actually, there's something beautiful that may also
help us, like, when we pray and stuff.
You know, when you say Bismillah,
actually, it doesn't mean with the name of
God.
This is a little technical. It means with
the names of Allah. Because oftentimes
singular possessive in Arabic means a plural.
That's why the Basmala is amazing, man. So,
like, when you say,
you're saying,
So when you say Bismillah,
you mean all of Allah's names.
Because it's a single in Arabic, this is
a lot like a singular plural.
A singular possessive
actually means a plural. So the sheikh says,
walrahmani.
Why would he mention alrahman?
Because of the Quran, of course.
And to remind himself like I may make
mistakes, I may screw up, but Allah Rahmah
Rahmah, hamdulillah,
to his benevolence,
I will be able to achieve this goal.
And the one who exercises mercy.
Da'im al-'sani,
meaning that Allah's
excellence and benevolence
is constant.
Doesn't, like, have a good day, doesn't have
a bad day. And this is one of
the foundational principles of our faith.
And and there's happened there's something happening here
that I'll talk about in a second, that
scholars
used to allude to the subject matter of
a book in the introduction.
It's like a style. Like, I'm a show
you what I'm talking about. So it's like
if it was like a cipher,
right, he's setting you up with his bars.
She's setting you up with her rhymes. So
the sheikh is saying, I'm gonna kinda give
you an idea about what I'm talking about
in the introduction.
This was like
a classical style of Muslim scholars. So now
we learn something, man. Our scholars were people
of letters.
He was a poet.
He wasn't, like, you know, you need to
believe god is 1. We're gonna go to
*.
You lama salama.
Right?
He he's employing
art and beauty and expression.
So he cares about people.
He wants to reach people.
So he says,
And how we say it in Arabic is
very nice.
You can hear the
That's why in in the poetry it's called
because
the Arabic
is an ocean because it's like you're on
a wave.
So eventually, when we read it, like we'll
read a lot of it, you'll feel like,
oh.
Oh. Yeah. And there's some forms that are
like,
but luckily that wasn't this form.
That one's tough.
And we know that this is the sunnah
of sayna Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam
Whenever he would undertake something, he would start
with Allah,
even though he's the prophet.
Salallahu alaihi wa sallam. So even like salah,
like the prophet knows how to pray.
But whenever he would pray he would say,
Like, I turn myself completely
to the one who
originated the heavens and earth.
Hanifa in Tawhid.
Now, don't associate any partners with him. So
even though the prophet is the best one
to ever pray,
he still turns to Allah.
And of course, we all know that when,
the prophet,
even in life
when he was faced with things that were
perplexing, what would he do?
It's tikhara.
Like, whenever you would have choices to make,
you will turn to Allah. For the mundane
and for the serious.
And that's why in the Quran, when Allah
praises the people of faith, he calls them,
Those who are close, meaning their thoughts are
always close with God.
They're always like,
you know, kind of revolving around this constant
relationship. Whether it's in the mundane,
whether it's in the great. Doesn't mean that's
sinful behavior. We're talking about achievement
and motivation.
So he said,
means to look for good, khayr. I'm looking.
Sometimes people tell us things about which we
don't we shouldn't do. Like, we Islam is
too cool for us, man. So we always
add something to the kale.
Like, there's no need to add blue cheese
to this.
It's already good.
Right? There's no need to fry, you know
what I mean, some brussels sprouts.
So people be like, you know, for your
Istikhar to really be Istikharah, you have to
have a dream. No, you don't.
For your Istikharah
to really be Istikhara,
like something has to, like, some weird thing
has to happen.
The classical early community of Muslims understood
that istikhara was to pray 2 rakat,
make this dua, and then go for what
you feel is right.
If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't,
it doesn't. Habibi.
These are your letters and lettering you become
your trans maybe
manifesting from people who are unlettered to letter.
And the letters I'm prescribing on to you
are bringing reality to your existence.
So speak through my letters that I've given
you. Masha'Allah.
Something like that?
Mean, Alif
Lamim. Not not not to say that that's
the only example. It's to say when you
said Don't backtrack though. What you said is
beautiful.
Don't worry. Go ahead though.
Continue in your backtrack even though you didn't
need to.
No. No. Go ahead, please.
Yeah.
And that that
and mukharabin are those who have understood the
letters that Allah has prescribed upon us.
And like how the word is made in
the Quran, it has a form and how
it connects from letter to letter that makes
the meaning. And harakat
are on the accents on the the word,
almost are like the prescription of how to
act with the word to fulfill the meaning
in your life to get
that. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. There's Adeb and Alephlamim.
And Alephlamim is saying, look, there's some things
you just don't know the meaning to.
Then there's other things that you will know
the meaning.
As if to say, like,
So there's this idea of, like,
transcend like, transcendent knowledge and engagement, seeking.
So in this famous dua istikhara,
like, you don't have to see a dream.
Nothing strange has to happen. Can you pray
multiple istikhara for the same thing? Yes. As
long as it doesn't become compulsive.
Because the prophet, salallahu alayhi wasalam, he warned
us. He said, Allah doesn't get tired.
And you can't compel God. Like, if I
do this a 1000 times, God will do
it. No.
That that would make me God.
But I pray it's tikhara,
and I try.
There is one thing though with this
which is is is agreed upon. You shouldn't
wait.
Like, okay, I'll make his tikhara now. Okay.
Nothing's happening.
Okay. Exactly.
What do you think
You're in your phone like, oh my god.
Oh.
Spectrum,
oh, my Spectrum bill.
No. We have to make effort, hamdulillah.
And trust
Allah. Well, how do I know that effort
is right? Who inspired you to think about
that effort?
So that's part of your istakha.
So the dua, and it's here, so when
people,
get the text, you can learn the dua.
I know it's important.
And and sometimes girls ask and women ask,
like, what if I'm on my I'm menstruating,
so
I can't pray the 2 rakat. You just
make the dua
for istikhara.
Because in axiom, orders are based on ability.
It's like, do your best.
Can't be like, I got this like really
important job opportunity, well right now, I I
can't pray, so when I can pray I'll
make istikhara,
and I'll let you know. The job's not
gonna be like, oh, okay. We'll wait till
you're ready to pray your turekah,
and then we'll hold the job for you.
That's not gonna happen. Like, I got my
Columbia scholarship information. I'm sorry, NYU scholarship information.
And
and they're like, sorry, University of Oklahoma
scholarship information.
But I told them, wait,
because I can't pray for a few more
days.
Of course, like, Islam would never ask someone
to have to, like, burden themselves in that
way. You know what I mean? So just
make as best you can. But the dua,
Oh, Allah. I seek your help in making
this decision about which I'm confused.
I seek the from you
by your knowledge
and by your power, and I ask you
of your infinite blessings.
Because you have authority,
I have no authority,
you know, I don't know, and the unseen
is in your hands.
Then we say,
oh Allah, if you know that this thing,
and then you say it. And you can
also say it in English, like, if you
can't say it in Arabic, it's okay.
We gotta make things hard for people, man.
Right? And I'd rather someone say it and
feel it and mean it, and just like
say it and not understand it. And we
say the issue.
It's good for me in this life.
Is good for my religion, is good for
me in my life, and good for my
hereafter.
Then make it easy for me. Facilitate it
for me.
Make it a potential for me.
And if this thing, you know, and your
knowledge is not good for my faith and
my life and my hereafter,
cast it away from me.
And cast me away from it.
And then
2 narrations, bless me, another narration, like, give
me contentment.
But the idea is that the prophet, even
though he's really the prophet Masha'Allah,
he still turns to Allah. So the sheikh,
we learned from the opening line, that he
turns to Allah, he has hope in Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
And that's like an important quality we can
have. Even and sometimes when you catch yourself,
like, yo, I got this. That's when you
should turn to God.
It's easy to turn to Allah when the
boat is sinking.
Oh, when the boat's sinking, everyone becomes Abdul
Karajalani.
Everybody becomes like the great saint. Like on
airplanes, man, when you hit that air pocket,
and everybody's like,
oh.
Like, everybody becomes like
Adi Feen of Allah.
Right?
But when you land it's like, alright. Alright.
We either landed.
The letter ba. We talked about this before,
but the letter ba actually means to be
with talked about on Tuesday. So we say,
I believe with God, that's a better translation.
I believe in God, because
first thing is when he says,
with Allah, that implies, like, wherever I'm at
in life, my comings, my goings, my successes,
my failures,
I'm with Allah. That's why many scholars said
that ba is hard for
ihsan. That ba is the letter of ihsan
because to worship Allah is though you see
him. So if I know Allah is with
me,
I'm going to live as though
there's this constant relationship.
So we translate it as faith in god,
we really cut it short.
Faith in god is the acquisition of rules
and principles. Faith with god is learning and
living.
Then he continues
and he says,
and the rest you can read, insha Allah,
on your own. He says, Falhamdrullahi
alqadeem al awari.
Then praise be to Allah, the one who
has no beginning and no ending. So again,
he's like trying to tell you, hey, this
is about theology.
He's like, Ishara to the maldur of the
kitab.
Again, I said earlier, that was like the
style of classical writers to, in their introduction,
show you this is what I'm going to
be talking about.
So
he says,
He said that then praise is due to
Allah who has no beginning and no ending.
Allah is beyond physical time.
Al Baqi,
the one who never will die,
and doesn't change.
Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Then he says
is everybody okay?
Then he says,
peace and blessings upon
constantly
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. Sarmada means
forever,
like
upon the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
The best who ever
singled out God.
As though like in the introduction,
he gave you the crux of tawhid. The
crux of tawhid is understanding
and living. So when he says, Allah has
no beginning, Allah has no ending, he's
he's Ar Raheem. Then he mentions the prophet
sallallahu alaihi salam, and the prophet as the
best
to single out god for worship. It's like
now he's saying,
second part is Ibadah.
There are a lot of
important blessings to send upon, in sending
peace upon the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
And that's something all of us can do.
You know? No matter where you are in
life, the prophet, he loves
you.
I mean, the prophet,
he showed love
to sinners
as he showed love to saints.
That's why, SubhanAllah,
there's this funny narration,
Sayidina Amr ibn Aas
was sitting with a group of Sahaba,
and
they started to argue. What was the argument
about? There were women there too.
The prophet loves me more than you.
They all legitimately thought because of how the
prophet so like Imams and
leaders in the community, you don't have like
favorites.
You should be good to everybody.
So they were like legitimately confused.
No no, I know he loves me more
than you, man. No. No. He loves me
more than you. He visit the right? So
Sayyidina Amer, he went to Sayyidina Nabi and
Sahih Muslim. He said,
So oh, messenger of Allah,
who do you love the most?
Write this down, brothers.
He said, Aisha, it's my wife.
Now, this toxic masculinity in the Muslim community
no. Well, we can't say, like, I love
my wife in front of people. Like, brother,
I don't think you should have said you
loved your wife, brother, because, you know,
subhanAllah, you know, loving your wife is haram.
Like, loving not loving my wife is good?
Like, where
are we going at?
Where is Sayna Nabi Alaihi Salam
was say that, Fatima,
Fatima, do you love what I love? I
love what you love.
For Asha Ra'ilah Say to Aisha.
He said, well, then love her, then he
pointed to Aisha in front of everybody.
It wasn't like
a problem.
So when Amr ibnas
asked him,
and now you're gonna understand why Amr ibn
Aas said what he said.
The next question he said, what about the
men though?
Right?
Also, a very smart answer.
Abuja,
her dad.
But the point is, they're confused.
Sometimes, we come into communities, one time a
hero, she told me, you know, you're not
the same with me as you are with
the guys.
This is a year ago, I was like,
what?
She's like, yeah.
That's that's a tough conversation to have, but
I'm glad she had it with me.
Right? We gotta be careful.
Do people around us, our kids, our family,
our friends,
people that we work with,
they feel
that we care about them. And also, sometimes,
you know,
you've got to invest in that.
So, like, make people feel loved.
So the Sahaba, they don't even know. Who
does he love the most? I don't know.
Let's ask.
So there's a lot of virtues in
in understanding that no matter where you are
as a Muslim, like the prophet had a
lot of love for everybody.
And our communities should be communities of love,
man.
So there's a number of beautiful virtues
that we should take with us sending
salawat upon the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
Number 1 is
that angels will pray for you.
Like sometimes when you're down or you're struggling,
no one has my back
Send salawat.
Then that Malaika will pray for you. The
prophet
said,
So the prophet said that, as long as
someone is sending salawat upon me,
the angels will send salawat upon that person.
And it can be done in any language.
Right? Any form.
Muhammad. Maybe you don't have time. You know,
You don't have time for that. You're
on the train, man. You're trying to get
it in. It's okay.
The next is your duas will be answered
in this life for the next.
So
one of the companions of the prophet said,
I was praying with the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam.
So I was praying
and the prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam was
sitting with Abu Bakr and Sayidna Umar, radiAllahu
Omar.
So he said after I finished my prayer,
I begin to make dua
and I praised god,
and I sent peace and blessings upon the
prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
And then I prayed for myself.
Then the prophet
said to him,
sal
Allah. The prophet said, make Dua now because
it will be answered.
Like after you praised god, and you said
salawat,
ask ask ask.
So he said I was sitting next to
him, and he was like, I'm making dua,
and he was like, ask
Ask. Keep asking.
And then he said,
keep asking. Keep asking. Keep asking. And he
understood by sending salawat upon the prophet, salallahu
alaihi wasalam,
praising Allah,
the back the door of Dua, insha'Allah, was
opened to him. Insha'Allah.
Also, it will help remove anxieties.
Doesn't mean, of course, like, that we don't
seek help or for any therapy, you don't
call your therapist and say, Suhayb told me
I don't have to come anymore.
Of course not. That's not what I'm saying.
Those are very real issues for people, man.
But we can couple that with spiritual practices.
Neither this nor that.
So,
one of the companions of the prophet, sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam,
he said,
shall I make a third of
my dhikr
sending
prayers upon you and peace and blessings?
Prophet said, no, I'm in shit if you
can.
He said, what about half?
He said, okay if you can.
He said, what if I make my dua
just about you, and my dhikr just about
you?
And the prophet said,
If you were to do that, then Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala will suffice you
in your hamak
and your anxieties
and your fears
and your concerns.
Allah
And
those affairs that worry you about this life
and the next.
Of course, we know that the prophet has
a great status. There's a lot of beautiful
poetry
dedicated to him, salallahu alaihi wa sallam. When
the imam said,
he said, you have surpassed all the prophets
in the internal and external character.
And nobody this is Bulsayri.
And nobody came close to you, and your
generosity,
right, and in your knowledge.
And everyone
will fall short. The prophets, all, and people
will fall short
compared to sayna Nabi alaihi salatu wa sallam.
They'll be in need of him.
You Allah.
Like, how you compare
the drop of an ocean
or like
the sprinkle to the the flood,
is like comparing someone to the prophet sallallahu
alaihi wa sallam.
So that's the introduction,
And what did we learn from it as
we stop?
We learned
the philosophy of the writer,
his approach,
what he was trying to do.
Number 2, we learned,
that he took his ability to communicate ideas
very seriously, deliberately.
He had a lot of love for the
community of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
You can't be really an imam
or a teacher if you don't love the
people.
Like, you won't be prophetic.
Even if you're good at it. Like, if
you don't care for the people, it's like,
it's the wrong place to be, man.
And then we talked about the introduction,
we learned to start with God. You know,
Imam Ibn Said,
Al Hikm, he said, the sign
of a successful ending
is that you return to Allah in the
beginning.
Inshallah, we'll talk. We're gonna do a special
weekend on the hicom, inshAllah, in the future,
but it's very nice, like, start with God,
man.
They used to say,
Whoever illuminated their ending is because they illuminated
their beginning.
So to start with Allah,
and then to send peace and blessings upon
Sayna Mohammed, his family,
and those who follow them.
Next week, we're going to start we'll finish
the the introduction. There's 2 lines we didn't
mention,
quickly. And then we're going to start the
first chapter on faith and reason.
That's his first chapter. Like,
how
how how did scholars
deal
with the idea of proving
something that you can't see
in the classical world?
How how do they understand
the existence of Allah?
And then we're going to talk about 20,
what are the universal principles in our understanding,
of Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So be consistent,
you know, give it time. One of the
challenges also of
our community is that we tend to want
things like AJ plus videos,
which are good. Don't get me wrong. They
have their place.
But learning about religion
is a process.
It takes time. And what happens, we tend
to go for the event based Islam, like,
man, that talk was so amazing. I'm so
super inspired.
That's great, but that's salt on the food.
But, like at the end of the day,
I need to have some foundational
principles
that are understood because
I'm not always going to be like up.
You know? I'm not always gonna be, like,
super excited.
I'll have ups and downs. So the knowledge
is there to, like,
anchor
me to the good and to the bad.
Any questions
before we before we break out?
The email for the book again is,
Maybe some people remember back in the days.
Uhsuhebweb.com.
So,
And just put, like, masses creed or Thursday
night,
and I'll send you
the PDF. Don't send me any spam, please.
I beg you. It's my work email.
Any questions
about anything before we
make a move?
How's everybody feeling?
Does anybody need like special dua?
Everybody okay? Yes, sir.
Matan is about,
I wanna say 46 lines.
Yeah. Yeah.
I think 46 or 76. Sorry. Big difference.
Make dua from my memory.
So we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for
anyone who's, like, too scared to ask, you
know, to be vulnerable. May Allah
make things easier for you, inshallah,
and facilitate
good for you, in your home and in
your school and in your personal
life, as well as in your family.
Ask Allah
to be pleased with us, to forgive us,
even though we have so many mistakes and
shortcomings.
Ask Allah
to let us truly be, here for each
other,
in a way that's sincere
and honest.
So like next week, you probably wanna bring
it with you. You can use it even
on a handheld device.
So you can take notes inshallah.
And imagine like you're gonna finish the whole
text
without any exams.
So although there are questions in the in
the and answers here.