Tom Facchine – You Have Poor Character

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			The prophet Muhammad
		

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			said that there's nothing heavier in your scales
		

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			on the day of judgment than good character.
		

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			And everybody knows that hadith, and we hear
		

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			it a lot. However, it doesn't really necessarily
		

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			register with us. We live in a historical
		

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			moment where we prioritize
		

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			being right, being right, or knowing the right
		

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			thing as opposed to doing the right thing.
		

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			And so somebody can have all of the
		

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			answers in the world. Someone can be a
		

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			top scholar in their field. But if they
		

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			have arrogance,
		

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			what's that knowledge going to do for them?
		

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			Or what's that knowledge going to do to
		

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			the people that they teach? The prophet alaihis
		

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			salatu wasalam also told us that some of
		

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			the first people to enter the fire were
		

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			people who seem to do good things, but
		

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			they they were doing it for the wrong
		

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			reasons. They were doing it because of arrogance,
		

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			because of reputation, because of all these sorts
		

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			of things. They have poor character. Whereas the
		

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			opposite is true. If you have good character,
		

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			then even the little bit of knowledge that
		

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			you have is going to be it's gonna
		

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			be maximized. It's going to be optimized. It's
		

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			going to go very, very far. Even if
		

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			you make mistakes. Even if you are you
		

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			know, you don't get everything right. If you
		

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			have good character, it's going to be infectious.
		

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			It's going to be contagious. It's going to
		

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			attract people to you. It's going to attract
		

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			blessing. And it's even going to lead people
		

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			to want to emulate you in your faith.
		

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			So good character is something that comes first.
		

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			There's no secret why, you know, Imam Malik
		

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			and all the other sort of scholars, we
		

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			have these stories that are part of our
		

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			tradition that we tell and we not along
		

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			to, but but we don't really implement these
		

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			days. The first thing that you go and
		

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			learn is the character of your sheikh. Learn
		

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			the character of your teacher. Be humble. Get
		

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			that stuff figured out first. Because if you
		

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			start just learning the material before you fix
		

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			yourself, it's going to be against you and
		

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			not for you.