Yaser Birjas – Being Watchful Means Holding Yourself Accountable

As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.

Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen.

Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa baraka to our

Prophet Muhammad and to his family and companions.

May peace and blessings of Allah be upon

them.

Imam An-Nawawi, may Allah have mercy on

him, in the book of Al-Muraqaba, the

self-examination and always being watchful of Allah

SWT, he adds Hadith Abu Ya'la Shaddad

Ibn Awus, may Allah be pleased with him

and please him.

Hadith 66, Here, the

Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam says in this

Hadith, Al-Qayyis, which means a wise person,

a wise person, a sensible person, is the

one who calls himself to account.

What does that mean?

Means what?

Like you deal with your nafs, the Prophet

describing your nafs like what?

Like a debtor, somebody owes you something.

So you deal with your own self, as

if it's a separate entity that owes you

so much.

If someone owes you money, how frequently would

you go back to the money, and say,

hey man, I mean, it's due, I need

my money back.

How often would you invite, tell somebody, hey,

I need my money, I need my money.

And would you give them a slack?

How often do you give them a slack?

And then when they keep resisting and trying

to keep you in a slack, eventually you're

going to start putting into account, hey, wait,

I need my money now.

Imagine how you deal with your nafs, but

now it's not about money right now, it's

about the akhirah.

Now, you're bringing your nafs to the account

in matters of the akhirah.

Like, hey, don't do this.

Hey, stop this.

Hey.

Like, as if your nafs is robbing you,

and it's taken so much from your account,

and you need to keep stopping it.

So the Prophet ﷺ says, A wise person,

the one who takes his nafs, as if

it's somebody that actually robs your account.

So what are you going to keep doing?

Keep holding it.

Making sure to get that back away from

it.

And made all of this for the sake

of what?

What's going to happen after death?

Now, all what you do is because of

what you expect to happen after death.

So I need to make sure that my

account on that day is clear.

So that my nafs, that's the one that's

supposed to act on my behalf, it doesn't

mess it up for me.

So I need to always put it to

the account.

Now that requires what, O Jama'at?

That requires muraqabah.

This is where the muraqabah comes in.

I need to be watchful of what I

say, and what I do, what my nafs

desires, where my nafs pulls me, how much

it keeps pulling me, and how far it

takes me away.

So I need to keep my nafs on

the track.

I keep holding it on that track, because

I remember what's happening after death.

He said ﷺ, And for the foolish person,

and I just mean the incompetent, that's what

it means.

The incompetent.

Someone who always feel incapacitated completely, like I

can't do anything.

They convince themselves, my nafs always gets the

worst out of me, my nafs always wins,

no matter how much I try, so they

give up.

And what do they do?

They start following their nafs wherever it goes.

In whichever opportunity, a nafs sees something desirable,

it follows it.

It goes after it.

The Prophet ﷺ says, that incompetent person, that

foolish person, is the one who subdues himself

to his temptations, all the time.

And then, and then he starts having hope,

that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, would help

him.

On one of two things.

That Allah make that desire to be fulfilled

easily, like still wants Allah to make it

easy for him.

The other narration, hope that Allah subhanahu wa

ta'ala, will automatically save him from that.

Like not to put the effort.

So they follow their desire, and they hope

Allah azzawajal, will just kind of like, protect

them from it.

You can't do this, ajma'ah.

You need to have that muraqabah.

You need to keep yourself under check.

And you always deal with your nafs, as

if it's a debtor, that you keep trying

to get back your wealth from it, and

your accounts from it.

Keep it always clean and straight.

That's how you deal with your nafs.

And obviously, the only way you could do

it, is if you have muraqabah.

Like always check what you say, what you

do on a regular basis.

May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, make us

among those who are aqiyas.

Those who are truly wise people.

Those who are always in control of themselves.

Ya rabbil alameen.

Wallahu ta'ala alameen.

Any questions, ajma'ah?

Yes.

The concept of nafs.

Man, you start upon a question, it's going

to require the whole night to explain.

Imam al-Qayyim, rahim Allah, he talks in

details about this.

What is nafs?

Is the nafs a ruh?

Is the nafs the function of the ruh?

Is it something like a cognitive understanding, or

a separate entity?

Like different definitions of that.

But the easiest way to understand really, is

you could say that a nafs is really,

it's more of like the function of the

ruh, just like the reason is a function

of the aqil.

And nafs is the function of the ruh.

So therefore, you try to control it.

It's the one that keeps going after what's

desired.

But at the same time, it needs to

be trained.

It needs to be controlled, so it doesn't

take you to ruins.

So there are many interpretations to it.

Is it a separate entity?

No.

But this is the operation of both the

heart, and the mind, and al-ruh, the

complete functionality together, when you put them together,

they constitute a nafs for you.

So it's something desired by the nafs, by

the ruh, by the mind, by the heart,

and you have to work them together to

make sure to control it.

Wallahu ta'ala alam.

Kullu nafsin da'iqatul mawt.

That's now the general definition of the nafs.

Like I said, the Arabic language sometimes use

the term, an inclusive term, which is basically

representing the whole living being.

So nafs means what?

A human being, all of you together.

And sometimes it speaks about a nafs as

being what?

Separate from the body.

Wallahu ta'ala alam.

Subhanakallahu wa bahamdik.

Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.