Tom Facchine – Reforming the Self #22
AI: Summary ©
The transcript discusses the motivation behind behavior and how it affects behavior. The motivators of human behavior include reward, punishment, and negative behavior. The afterlife is a result of actions that are not related to the afterlife, and individuals and groups need education and a focus on the joy of life. The speakers also touch on the concept of defiance and the "oppressive behavior." The segment concludes with a request for good luck and a wish of good night.
AI: Summary ©
Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim
Al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen
wa Salatu was Salam
ala Ashraf with MBA were more serene the vino with what's in a Muhammad Ali he offered a Salah was listening.
Allahu Allah Island that'd be million foreigner 1000 I'd be my Londoner. Was it an element? Yeah.
We are here on Sunday night
with a robot also Hani
and his book, one of many of his books that have survived to us on
that era, Eli McAdams, Surya.
The previous lesson
our author had tried to provide an account of why people do good.
And in his normal way, try to see some sort of pattern.
See some sort of order and structure
and relationship or rank
between the various motivations that drive people and what he found was that
upon reflection,
there are levels of sophistication to people's motivation.
He broke down what people are motivated, motivated to do into two categories and said, Well, let's look separately at what they're motivated to do good in this life versus good for their afterlives.
And he found that the two were analogous that the lowest level
Well, why don't we give you all the opportunity? So if we're talking about doing worldly good, a lot of us are how you said that there were three levels, what was the lowest level of motivation?
Wasn't praised.
I was a different level.
There was something even lower than praise.
Yes, reward and punish,
reward and punish and in the physical sense, right? Because reward and punish can also be, you know, praise and blame, but the lowest was rewarded and punished. Candy if you do it, right.
A spank on the rear end if you do it wrong.
Right.
Okay, that that makes it clear because it gives us examples that maybe we're used to as parents. But it's also a lot deeper than that.
Hoping for favors, hoping for kind of treatment, hoping for
kickbacks of any sort. This is also at that same crude level of reward and punish. It's the same crude level of the candy bar. And the Spank on the rear end is the same thing.
Right?
paying your taxes, so you don't go to jail, driving the speed limit, so you don't get a fine.
All these sorts of things, they work on the lowest level of motivation. And we're not trying to scorn the lowest level of motivation. Some people that's all they respond to. And so at the level of policy and law, often hangs out at the lowest level of motivation.
Right? Even the shitty a laws shitty
has, you know, dude, it has punishments that operate at this lowest level of motivation.
Right, because some people, that's all that they can respond to. It's certainly the broadest category is going to motivate the largest amount of people.
But for the people who are looking to get the macadam city, the people who are looking to become the full effect, right, people who are trying to reform themselves and embody
a lot beautiful attributes on this earth
and steward
this earth as a law would love us to steward and guard this earth. That's not sufficient. That's not adequate. We have to be motivated by higher objectives by loftier goals and purposes.
Reward and punishment is a little too crude for that.
So the set
Second level, as was mentioned is praise and blame. Okay, so bottom level, motivator, reward, punish middle tier praise and blame.
It's no longer about the allowance,
the paycheck,
or the fine.
Or the treatment by somebody, when we're talking about treatment, we're talking about favors, right? I'm going to wash the dishes so that my spouse doesn't get angry at me. That's reward and punishment.
If it's physical,
if it's only blame, that it's
it's one level, higher than that, right?
Still not optimal, still not ideal. Still not good enough for a laws only at a loss full of fat.
Right, you're not going to become
reformed, through only responding or being motivated by praise and blame. There's a higher level than that, but it's there. Right? So now we're afraid of what other people think of us.
Or how they'll treat us due to their opinions or reputation. Right? Maybe why we show up to the masjid sometimes, when we really don't feel like going, or the class, right you have that like, maybe you're in a CoreNet class or something. And you have that mutual accountability, where you feel guilty, if you don't show up, maybe you don't feel guilty
as you should, meaning you don't feel guilty.
To Allah, right. But you may feel guilty because of the human element, you're afraid to disappoint your shape. You're afraid to disappoint the other students in the class. This is a mid level motivator, praise and blame.
We use this with kids all the time. You did a great job. Gold Star announced their name in front of the class you got 100 Good job.
And the highest rank student rankings right. First in their class valedictorian. Right, praise and blame.
But there's a level beyond that.
And what was that?
For the worldly good?
What was the highest level of motivation, the most sophisticated, the noblest level.
Jana, and the pleasure of Allah gets to the other worldly good. The good of the afterlife. What about the worldly good, we're talking about holding open doors, we're talking about forgiving someone. If they are, if they wronged you, things that happen in the dunya.
I know it's hard to separate them sometimes. Because as a person of faith, that's the calculus that we're going through. But we're looking a little bit more universally,
towards what's applicable to everyone, even if they're not a Muslim,
feel good feeling that's closer. That's closer, there's a certain satisfaction with the satisfaction is in what the satisfaction is in
embodying good and seeking virtue. Virtue
is what a lot of us for Hani had said.
Right? This is the highest motivator. Yes, exactly. A or still not transactional. Good, good, good. Right. And we'll get to that when it comes through the good of the afterlife as well. But it's not transactional.
You're not forgiving somebody, because you hope that they will forgive you remember the Golden Rule, do unto others, so that they'll do good tea. Right, we realize how crude the sentiment is of the golden rule.
Nor are we doing it so that people can know us as a nice person, as a forgiving person as a patient person. This gets into a lot of
this gets to the a lot of problems within the sphere of Imams and students of knowledge and speakers and things like that. Because a lot of things can end up being
for reputation. You want to be seen in a certain way. I want to be seen as knowledgeable in this thing. So I'm going to give an answer that I'm not really prepared or qualified to give. I want to be seen as modest. And so I'm going to do this certain thing or whatever this is chasing reputation. And it's a huge Pfitzner and trial because it can remove.
It can knock you off of that higher pedestal of seeking virtue, or of doing things for law and knock you down to the level where you're just chasing other people's opinions. Now you're a chameleon.
And now you're going to face shift to whatever the people want to see.
On for your brother what you want for yourself yes or no, that is, that's what we're talking about. Yep.
This is virtue, right? It's not transactional, it's not external. Right? The way that people treat you is irrelevant. The way that people respond to you as irrelevant. You're not nice to people so that they're nice to you. You're not forgiving to people so that they're forgiving to you. Nor are you nice to people so that people think you're a nice person, nor are you forgiving, so that people think you're a forgiving person. This sounds an awful lot like the Hadith of the prophets. I said, I'm told us that the Mujahid would be the hypocrites would be the first to enter the fire and throw it into the lowest level, the false scholar and the false warrior for faith, right? Because all of
these three in reality, they did it for reputation, they did they masqueraded as somebody who was doing it just for the virtue,
just for agenda just for Allah. But in reality, in reality, it was transactional. They were looking for their reputation.
So this is a universal concept that even we could apply to other people that aren't Muslim. Right? Even if you're not a Muslim, if you're seeking virtue, by doing some sort of good, you're operating at an elevated plane
compared to those who are
simply
in business, right? If they're tied up in this transactional nature, this is just business you're trading. You're trying to trade your good deeds for something else. And now it makes sense Allah is language that he uses in the Koran, that they bartered their faith for a meager sum for a paltry gain. Allah uses the language of transaction a lot in the Koran to describe the losses
Oh have the people who are caught up in this transactional thing and they can only make sense of it in terms of transaction.
So, this was doing good and the doing good in the dunya reward and punish praise and blame virtue
then the author he drew an analogy to seeking the afterlife and he said this same hierarchy exists with people who are Muslims. Okay, who are believers who are people of faith, who believe in an afterlife and are seeking it and are trying to obtain it? The lowest level was what was what was the lowest level for the people of faith?
Yes, getting Jenna avoiding hellfire, reward and punish same thing, it's just reward and punish in the afterlife. Right? You want the
the damsel the maidens?
Right, like all of the orientalists think we obsessed with Right? Or you want the
you want the fruits, or you want the shade or you want the whatever the river of honey, whatever it is, all of these sorts of candy bar rewards, right? Are the opposite the stick, you're afraid of the fire, you're afraid of the punishment, you're afraid of this, none of this is wrong, but it is lowly and less sophisticated than other intentions that you could be having other motivators that you could be using.
So what was the second level? What was the level above that?
And just like how the city and how the law often does dwell at this low level of motivation, so does a laws
what I'm gonna say reprimand or reproach, right in the Koran, he This isn't to belittle these sorts of things. He talks to people at this level, because this is the only language that some people understand. Some people won't
obey or take this seriously unless we're talking about reward and punish, reward or punish.
Excellent, yes. So the next level above that is praise and blame as well. But the praise and blame coming from a law. Right. You're seeking Allah's praise of you as a righteous person as a pious person all those times when Allah mentions an elected group
Hezbollah
and then looked upon, right a Saudi Fein I
Cydia theme,
you that's your gold star. Right? You want a lot to put you in that category of people. You want to be mentioned in the same breath as,
as these sorts of people.
Right? And again, there's nothing wrong with that. That's fine.
But it's not the absolute highest level of motivation, which is seeking Allah's pleasure in and of itself. Right? Non transactional,
just like doing good in the dunya. You're not doing it for anything external.
Well, the highest level of motivation for the afterlife, you're not doing it for anything external. Yes, you want genuine? Yes, you want the fruits? Yes, you're afraid of the fire? Yes, you want a laws praise. And you fear so much a laws sensor, or censure and blame. But the main thing that you're going for is a loss of pleasure.
It's not about you anymore. That's the difference. You decentered yourself, and you have instead, centered Allah. So all of that was last class, and it was a significant one. But now, otherwise, Farhana. He's going to talk about
the obstacles, what prevents people from wanting to do good in the first place? Because all of the levels that he just explained and talked about?
They are for people who want to do good. How many people in the world right now want to do good?
Not everybody. Right? Some people, it's not even on their radar, that doing good is something that they should be
trying for other people, they want to do good, but they're confused as to what it is, other people are actively trying to sow chaos. Right. So we have a whole other population of people
that are far away from the good. So rather than us for having he wants to explore this, he wants to explore
what this disease is he compares it to a disease that
stands in the way of people wanting to
perform goodness,
not assaulted in the first place. And he compares it to a disease because he says that every disease has a treatment.
Right.
And diseases, some of them they have different stages. Right? If you don't treat it right away, in stage one, it will become more advanced, it will advance to an
a more
severe stage.
And if you choose to intervene at that second more severe stage, it's going to be more difficult to treat than if you had caught it early. Right. And then there's even more stages beyond that, where if you wait
a certain amount of time, or if you wait until it advances to a certain point, there's nothing that you can do.
There's no treatment to be had.
So this is the metaphor that a lot of us for Hanny's going off of and he identifies four phases
of this kind of what begins as negligence and what takes
somebody even further away from goodness than that.
So the first stage of this disease that prevents people from wanting to do good is ignorance is ignorance. Not knowing the truth
from the false.
Not knowing beauty, from filth, right by you, Bertie.
Not knowing not knowing what is good and what is bad.
This is the very first stage.
It's the easiest stage in which you can intervene.
You can intervene with things like
education and understanding.
Somebody at this stage when they they're kind of on the fence. They're not really sure. And we we know from our life in
North America, a lot of people are in this state.
They're not really committed to anything.
They work, they come home.
They hang out with their family, they watch television, Netflix whenever they go to bed.
It's
Eat, work,
entertainment, sleep, eat work, entertainment, sleep. And many people, they have tunnel vision they can't see outside of this. Doing good is not on their radar.
And it's not necessarily that they're trying to spread corruption.
But they wouldn't even know where to start.
They wouldn't know like, what do you what do you even? It's not even a language that they're familiar with? What do you mean? Do good? What what sort of good should I be doing?
Maybe they think about giving money to charity, maybe some easy things like that. But that's not their orientation. So this person, this person, what they need is they need education.
Not just the education of schools, but the education of purpose. Right? You you're here right now, fast forward, days, weeks, months, years, you're not here anymore, you're dead. You know, your life is a precious gift. It's very, very, very short.
And there is a life that's after this life, these sorts of things that motivate people realizing their own imminent demise.
That all of this sort of entertainment, it's just distraction.
You watch this Netflix series, and then you binge on this Netflix series. And then there's another series after that. How many years have gone by how many series? Have you completed? This is not enough. This is not saying that it's not okay to ever watch Netflix, don't get me wrong. But for some people, this is all their lives are.
And then five years go by 10 years go by, and they look back and what did they accomplish.
They're in the same job with the same friends with the same, everything's the same, no progress. And since they're getting older things are actually slowly starting to deteriorate, but they don't even realize it yet.
They're starting to have more aches and pains, they're starting to get a little sharper, or excuse me a little less sharp, upstairs,
they're not able to do things as quickly, maybe at their job, they're getting younger people who are more qualified, they don't see the writing on the wall, they thought that they can just coast.
But life is not like that. You can't just coast. You have to keep pushing and keep pushing and try to get better.
So this is the first group and it's fairly easy to intervene if you can show or under make this person understand that there is urgency
that you can't just sit back and relax and kick it that that's going to happen when you're gone. Right?
There's no rest until you're put to rest.
You can save this person pretty easily, you can light a fire under them, you can motivate them. But there is if it goes on for too long.
Then it can advance to the second stage of the disease.
And this is misguidance.
So this is not simply
we can talk Muslims here too. Sure. I mean, I'm mostly thinking about non Muslims when I'm thinking about the imagery of the individuals. But there's nothing there's nothing to prevent this from applying to Muslims as well at all.
How many Muslims
are content to just have the same sort of lifestyle work entertainment, work and attainment?
A lot of Muslims.
Now we're not talking about you know, Heaven and * here because a Las Palmas Ana is a rough man.
And even those who commit major sins, the Prophet saw a sudden he said in the severity, normative, right. So we're not talking about who's in the fire who's in paradise, but what we're talking about
is that it's Toby. Okay. It's scary.
If you let yourself go, if you try to just coast and the years go by, and the years go by, and the years go by, you might turn around one day and realize that your faith has been taken away from you.
It doesn't usually happen in a moment. That usually happens with a long, long runway, things happening and just you know, backsliding, backsliding, backsliding
and the absence of any sort of urgency or desire to do good, isn't that a mark of incomplete faith?
Of course it is. Right? So all of these things are tied up. The point is to try to intervene in somebody's life before it's too late, and to warn them about what this is.
Z's can progress into if they're not careful whether they're Muslim or not.
So the second stage of the disease is misguidance. Okay? It's not just not knowing what's true, or not recognizing the true from the false in a sense that they don't know.
It's
believing that what's false is true. And what's true is false. It's bleak, it's believing that what is beautiful is ugly. And what is ugly is beautiful. We have this in our society so much.
What do people think about chastity? And modesty these days? Is it seen as something that is beautiful or something that is ugly?
It's seen as something ugly, it's seen as something oppressive, it's seen as something backwards, it's seen as something
you're approved.
in a negative sense.
Puritan
all of these words that we have to describe people that don't really belong to this time and era.
Right, these people have started to believe that revealing yourself
that objectifying yourself
and your body is actually freedom is actually
dignity is actually honor.
And they actually take pride in being able to walk out on the street and being able to attract the glances of
unrelated men or unrelated women, depending on
what their * or their gender is.
People take pride in this sort of thing. They think that's good.
And if anybody wants to cover up or if anybody wants to have this sort of different lifestyle, they think that that is oppressive.
This is a stray, this is misguidance. This is backwards, of what it should be.
How does it happen?
It happens with the assistance of the devil shape font,
because this is about justifying,
not asking, this is about justifying sin. Right? We mentioned this in the in the clip of the other day with the story of debt. Right? The devil, he wants to
beautify.
He wants to beautify evil, too.
And so he's going to do whatever he can to beautify evil to his job is to flip the script entirely to make what's good, seem ugly, or make it seem bad, and take what is bad and make it seem good.
So a person who is involved in bad and they're used to
the taste of it, because it's tasty. It's delicious. It's kind of fun. It's exciting. It's exciting to be young and attractive.
Is it not? It's exciting to be able to grab the attention of the opposite *, is it not? Yeah, there's a thrill to it. It's exhilarating in some sort of way. Even if people deep down know it's wrong, but they will allow themselves to be convinced otherwise, they will allow themselves to be convinced that this is good. This is empowerment. This is freedom. This is liberation.
This is open mindedness, all of these empty slogans and platitudes that we have,
right?
To make this thing seem good. And then to look at the other
to erase any memory that we used to be this way.
That's backwards. That's old fashioned. That's medieval, that's Puritan oppressive.
No man can tell me how to dress.
Right? These sorts of things people are ready with.
It's all about justifying the sin, and making it seem beautiful beautifying what's ugly. This is the second stage and it's much, much, much more difficult to intervene
with a person at this level
than the previous level.
The person in the previous level, the stage of ignorance, they're open for a discussion. They might not care. And that might be their biggest problem, that they don't care enough to figure out what's good and what's bad. But somebody who's convinced
because they like the lifestyle,
they find it exciting, they find it attractive, they find it edgy, to live in a certain way. And they've got all their justifications and rationalizations as to why it's good. And why the other way, the pure way is actually wrong and backwards. That's a very, very much, much more difficult person to convince.
And a much, much more difficult
case to intervene.
But even such a person,
there's a difference between such a person who has this backward, switched around view of reality, if they've come to that reality, later in life, right, you can still talk to them,
and try to get them to remember a previous time.
Right, maybe in their young adulthood, or their teenage years or before that,
when they had some sort of betrayal, they had some sort of purity.
And you can try to touch and access that but the next stage, the third stage, that even harder state
to intervene in is when someone has been raised on that idea, or that lifestyle from day one.
So we would draw the example of for example, let's take a Muslim family, okay. The previous stage, we can imagine a Muslim family, they come to America, the parents are fairly practicing maybe, or they have some sort of semblance of Deen. But then they don't really, they're not very careful about their children's upbringing. And so their children, they become very very westernized, they start to they take off the hijab, the hijab is done, they start to dress like everybody else. They listen to Beyonce, and Cardi B and Nicki Minaj. And all of these, you know, pop stars, and they get influenced by how they dress and how they talk and all of their sort of morality.
That person knew. Yes, that person knew a different life at some point, right? They weren't raised that way.
But over time, like you, like the Shadowfang said, diluted Dean over time, over time,
the grass seems greener, and the forbidden fruit seen the sweeter. And so they came around to this other way of life.
Because it's shallow wax, right? Because it's your it's, again, it's tasty. It is
appealing, alluring,
right?
That type of person, they still have a past, they still have a childhood or some period in their lives, where you can kind of try to remind them that remember that you were not brought up like this.
You can even and this is something just from my own personal experience, you know, like this is a an imposition from outside. Right? If you say that you're free, in this country, to practice your faith to do what you want, then wouldn't you be free to kind of to cover up the way that you wanted to, or that your religion asked you to, to do all these other things, right? Like you can kind of maybe try to talk to a person like that. But what if the person has been raised on that from day one.
That is the third and more advanced stage
of this disease.
This is the stage that a lot of us Mahony calls defiance,
their defiance because not only do they see ugliness as beauty, and beauty as ugliness, but they're certain that that's the way it is. And they've never thought that it could be the other way around.
It's so just natural and obvious of their fitrah has been entirely corrupted. They've been singing these lewd, explicit songs since they were five, six years old, old enough to old enough to understand or be able to memorize lyrics. They've been copying dance moves off the TV since they were four or five, six years old. Right? Getting normalized to you know, revealing clothing and and acting like a * or playgirl and these sorts of things. So they don't even have a past or a fifth row that was intact. They even saw their parents doing that.
Most of the time.
For this type of person, it's very, very, very hard
to even talk about doing good. motivating them to after
like these sorts of things, it's extremely, extremely different. Yeah, it is a kind of ignorance. And I'm glad that you, I'm glad you brought that up. So
it's about a reasonable offer, honey, he doesn't he's not trying to say that these are mutually exclusive. If the first is ignorance, and the second is astray,
the second is astray and ignorant. If the third is defiant, it's ignorant and astray. Undefined, right? It's like adding another layer.
And I see what you I see what you mean, you could imagine the type of person that this is, since this thing is just with them from the beginning.
It might not be defiance in the sense that we're used to thinking about it. Right? Like I'm trying to rebel, right, because trying to rebel kind of presupposes that they are aware that there's something else to rebel against. That's true.
But what a lot of us for Hani is trying to communicate, or at least what I understand that he's trying to communicate, is the sense of scandal that something could be otherwise.
Right? Because if you take that take the previous example of a Muslim from a Muslim family, a young person that's westernized or whatever, they are aware that religious people are out there doing living life differently. They've got aunties right, like, you know, and they've got uncles, and they've got their grandparents and they see them at read and whatever. And even if they have a boyfriend, or they have a girlfriend, or if they smoke, or if they drink or do any of these things, they still have this connection. So they it's in the same universe, they're able to understand. Right?
Whereas the other person, they can't even fathom that this sort of thing is a thing.
How do you not?
Like I remember, even people would ask me, like, how do you not drink?
Like, that's weird. How do you not, you know, pick number like, buy a lottery ticket? How do you not like,
toke up once in a while, like, like, it seems so strange to them. And that's the aspect of the fines that are all of us for hernias trying to get at not the defiance, like reacting, acting out against some sort of other force.
But sort of this, like, shock.
At being exposed to anything else.
They're exposed to people who are on the right path. Yes. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, maybe a sense of supremacy. It's really, maybe scandalized. Maybe would be the word. Right, a person who knows nothing else would be scandalized. Right.
If they, when people when some Muslims learn that women can't be an Imam, for example, right. Or that,
you know,
us as men, we're not going to hug other women. Right? For people who only know like that culture, there's a sense of scandal.
The first time that they interact with that sort of difference. That's what a lot of us for honey is trying to get out. And I think probably tucked in there is supremacy.
But it's the being scandalized that I think he's really trying to hone in on and a lot of stuff. Anyway, the, the final stage and the disease.
And also, he says is a shot of evil. Okay, evil. So this takes the first three stages and it adds a fourth layer. So we have ignorance, we have misguidance. We have maybe
scandalized or supremacy or
defiance, whatever we want to call number three. But then we have what he says is a certain level of brutality, and crudeness
that take someone over into an area that almost nobody comes back from. This person is an evangelist, if you will. They're proselytizing
for these sorts of twisted beliefs and practices, and if they see anybody opposed to what they're doing, they're not just scandalized. They want to destroy it. They want to take it down.
I remember I had a friend from, from Saudi Arabia, from Saudi Arabia. And he was here he was a master student.
And he was talking to me about, you know, he was trying to do Dawa, to some people in his college and stuff like that. And there were these couple of girls, that were always very, very flirtatious with him.
And he told me, and I was like, you know, I'm really conflicted what to do, because I tried to be a nice guy and do this other stuff, or whatever. But they keep talking about inappropriate things in front of me. He was telling me, like, they keep talking about very, very intimate
things, and act in front of them.
And,
you know, he kind of had this doubt in his head
of, should I maintain some sort of relationship hoping that I can try to influence these people? Or is this thing getting so dangerous for myself,
that I need to get out of here and break off this sort of acquaintanceship.
And I told him, I said, you know, you think you're doing damage to them.
But in reality, they're doing damage to you.
Because they see you, a religious person doesn't have a girlfriend doesn't smoke doesn't drink.
The fact that you exist,
is a condemnation of their entire lifestyle.
And so you're a trophy for them.
They want to take you down and bring you down, and they would love to see, why do some Kufa, why do some non Muslims love to see Muslim women take off their hijab?
It's not natural. Right?
Yes, threatens their late way of life and identity. Why do they love it? When a Muslim leaves Islam?
They find this person they get them a book deal, they get them a speaking circuit, they put them on, you know, there's a politician? Why does this happen?
Or somebody, you know, from a Muslim family
comes out of the closet, they say that they're gay, these sorts of things they love. There are some people that love this sort of thing. They seek it out. Every time this thing happens. It's a victory for some people,
these types of people are
they know exactly what they're doing. They're trying extremely hard to push the push to push to push their view and any sort of practice that contradicts their, their way of life, their identity, their platform, their ideology, they want to take it down.
This is an advanced, this is the most advanced stage
that I'll go with. Also, when he talks about it's mixed often with brutality, or with crudeness.
Oh yeah, sure. Asylum. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.
Fast Track that, that visa, you get the express lane, right.
These are the three rounds. Right? These are the coma loop.
Right, like these types of people that are they're not just content to do it from themselves. They're trying to put down any opposing viewpoint or opposing lifestyle.
Oh, yeah, exactly. Because every time one of us anytime Insha Allah, may Allah make us among the righteous. I mean, anytime a righteous person slips.
This is the type of person that takes joy in that. That takes Glee in that because every single time that happens, it's a confirmation for them, that people are all really just the same. That there's no really virtuous path to be on. That it's really all just about maximizing pleasure, and these sorts of things. Right. This is the kind of mentality and so I thought it was funny. He says, This is the most advanced stage of disease.
And this is a significant barrier to doing anything that resembles good at all. And it's extremely, extremely difficult to intervene or to treat a person once they have reached that level. But a lot is called the aliquot history. He is able to do anything that he wills and nothing is beyond allows ability. Anybody have any
Questions, comments before we break up for tonight?
Means
a lot can change anyone's heart? That's true.
Rob was fine. He's just talking probabilistically.
Right? Yes, we can't. That's a very good point. That's a very good point. We can't assume
that we know.
You know, we can't like take this like perspective that are also Hani has. And we can't just like go around like labeling people. Oh, here's, here's a stage four person.
You know, because we could be wrong. First of all, because we only see people for snippets of their lives. And the law can guide anybody. A lot can guide anybody. He's guided hardened criminals, and people who have done horrible things and all these sorts of things. It can happen. It's easy for All right, so we can't get a determinist. What the whole purpose of it all of us for HANA using this is to guess what? To diagnose yourself. Right? He's trying to scare you and I in the saying, Look, if you don't hasten to do good. If you don't keep pushing yourself, you can backslide.
And here's what backsliding looks like, it can go from here to here to here till you're all the way over here, it can happen.
So it's mostly meant to be self diagnosis. Ah, what would your suggestion if any of us ever come across someone that we think is fourth level? I mean, it depends on what your proximity to that person is? Are they your boss? Are they your coworker? Are they just a random person on the street? You know, nine times out of 10 If you can avoid them, avoid them? You know, they're not it's not your job to solve them or to try to whatever, you know, minimize harm. The Muslim always has to try to minimize harm
to themselves and to others.
And yes, this is parallel definitely to the traps of shaytaan Yeah. 100%. Now the shaytaan is responsible for the descent all the way down. That's that's a very good point. And Omar, of course, all good points.
Very good. Anyone any other comments? Or questions?
Meanwhile, yeah, okay, everyone have a great night in sha Allah. And I will see you next time I said on Monday. Good luck.