Yaser Birjas – How The Quran Was Preserved From The Prophet To Today
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The importance of memorization and keeping a consistent letter for a whole year are crucial for learning a language. Personal challenges, such as a battle and loss of faith in Islam, caused some people to leave their scripts and lose their trust in Islam. They ultimately lose their minds and lose their minds. practicing the message and not reciting mistakes is crucial.
AI: Summary ©
If we talk about, we said that later
on, the Arabic language, of course, the Arabs,
they used to form words from different aspects.
But how did they form their words?
How did they form the sounds of their
words?
And what did they use to form words?
Yes?
Use nature, right?
Use nature.
Well, how so?
Why did they use nature to form their
words and their sounds?
To relate, right?
So, easy to remember, easy to memorize, so
they relate to the surrounding.
They relate to the light, to the sounds,
to the action, to everything, and so on.
So, when they hear a sound, they create
a word that sounds like it.
Like we say, a tarak, for example, or
hafif.
I mean, the sound of the wind when
it blows, basically, between the branches of the
tree.
The same sound, how it sounds like hafif,
so that's the word, it's coming from there.
So, they're very brilliant in the way they
actually chose the sounds to be the reflection
of the words and so on.
Yes?
Say it again?
So, were there any words that were not
Arabic words and they were Arabic-sized, you
could say?
The answer is yes.
But they became part of the Arabic language
before the revelation of the Qur'an.
Like the Arab, they used them in their
own culture long enough before it was actually
used in the Qur'an.
Like what?
Like istabrak.
Istabrak is a type of silk.
So, the silk is not organic and natural
to the Arabs, right?
It's imported from somewhere.
So, they used the name of the silk
as it was used in that culture.
So, there's nothing wrong with that.
But it has been used so long in
the business, in the market among the Arabs,
until it became an Arabic word.
Even though the origin was different.
Like Ibrahim, the name Ibrahim alayhis salaam, same
thing.
But it was used in the Arabic language
for so long until it became an Arab
language itself.
So, that's why we say it's still Arab,
even though the origin was not Arab.
Now, in regards to the qiraat, Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala revealed the Qur'an in
a standard language, obviously, which is the Arabic
language, but different huroof.
What was the final answer we gave about
the meaning of the harf?
So, when someone asks you, what about the
other huroof of the Qur'an?
What are these things?
What would you say?
You guys remember the answer?
Yes?
Say it again.
Huh?
Were merged together in one at the end.
But what do they mean originally when the
Qur'an was revealed at seven huroof?
Different dialects, different languages of the Arab languages.
That's one of the standard opinions.
Imam Mujadid rahimahullah wa ta'ala, he mentioned
a lot of opinions.
Some of the ulema, they say 30 different
opinions.
What does it mean to say the harf
of the Qur'an?
But they finalize it by saying it could
be different wordings to reflect the exact same
meaning.
But then, all the other languages were removed
or omitted for the sake of one harf
only, and that harf became the standardized one.
So, I know that we're going to see
somebody will say about the manuscript, the san
'a manuscripts, oh, the Qur'an had different
word, different, you know, kind of like expressions.
So, how come right now it's different?
So, we're going to see that, inshallah, coming
out, binillah azawajal.
All right, what about the qiraat?
So, what do the qiraat mean?
When we say qiraat of the Qur'an,
what does it mean exactly?
Yes.
So, different recitation of that same harf, right?
The harf of Quraysh itself, now, but had
different recitation, different pronouncements.
That's what it is.
But the word is still the same word.
We don't change the word, we change only
maybe the vowels, maybe the fatha and the
kasra, to represent different, actually, maybe sometimes the
pattern or different deeper meaning and so on.
We're going to see some examples, inshallah wa
ta'ala.
And how many qiraat do we have that
the ulema, they refer to?
So, we have seven, what we call the
mutawatir, which means what?
Absolutely authentic in terms of abundance.
And then three mashhoor, which means what?
Popular, is acceptable, but less than tawatur level.
And then there are others, they call them
shahada, which means odd.
And these are not acceptable as qiraat.
The ulema put two conditions to accept a
qiraat, to be a valid qiraat.
What are these conditions?
The three major conditions to accept a qiraat
to be a valid qiraat.
What are they?
Come on guys, you just had breakfast, right?
Yes, a manuscript, that's number one, had to
confirm the manuscript, that's one.
Number two?
Principles of the Arabic language and grammar.
Number three?
It has to be mutawatir, to be accepted
in that fashion.
So, three major conditions.
And we gave you different names of the
qiraat, obviously, but then we said that the
qari, that the most popular qiraat is the
qiraat of Hafs and Asim.
And the reason for that?
First of all, it's easier, the easiest one
to pronounce and to recite, that's what became
popular.
But then, obviously, politics plays a major role
in pushing one qiraat over the other one.
Now, just quickly in terms of the Arabic
grammar, who can tell me the specific pronouns
of the Arabic pronouns?
So, we have three styles.
We have the first person, the second person,
and then the third person.
What are these specific pronouns in the Arabic
language?
The first person, who can give me the
first person?
Yes.
Ana, for how many?
For one, right?
And nahnu for?
More than one, two or more.
Tayyib, who can give me the second person?
So, anta, for the man.
Anti, for the woman.
Antuma, for two.
Antum, for group of people or group of
men.
And tunna, for group of women.
Okay, who can give me the third person?
So, huwa, say it again, huwa, huwa, hiya,
hum.
It's one of them, but we're trying to
put them in the right order.
Huwa, hiya, huma.
The a is always for the dual, right?
Huma, for the masculine plural is always the
mm, the meme.
Hum, and then for the feminine plural, hunna.
So, huwa, hiya, huma, hum, hunna.
If you remember these sounds, you will see
how easy you can recognize some certain words.
I don't know if you guys will listen
to the recitation of Fajr, and you can
tell from the sounds of the words, okay,
this must be plural, this must be singular,
this must be a verb, this must be
a noun.
Depends on how the pronouns they sound.
If you start with this, slowly and gradually
start recognizing things.
And slowly and gradually you can recognize words,
even if you don't know the meaning of
the word, you'll be able to recognize at
least what does it mean in terms of
the plural, the singular, and so on.
What's the difference between sarf and what do
you call it, irab or nahu.
With sarf means morphology, and irab or nahu
means grammar.
So what's the difference between these two things?
Yes.
So the nahu or the irab is the
end of the word based on its location
or based on its context in the sentence,
right?
So the term is the fatha, the kasra,
the dhamma, or the sukoon, and so on.
But as-sarf is related to what?
The roots of the word, the structure of
the word, the pattern of the word, to
determine if this is going to be a
subject or an object, or it's considered exaggeration
or otherwise.
So it's basically concerned with the actual structure
of the word.
So that's as-sarf.
So these are the two things that you
need to learn insha'Allah ta'ala, hopefully
to help you bid'allah azza wa jalla
excel in your recitation.
Bismillah.
Today we move next to the next level
insha'Allah ta'ala, which is the preservation
of the Quran.
So the Quran was revealed to the Prophet
ﷺ.
The Arab were mesmerized by the beauty of
the Quran, and these people were just like
so engulfed with the beauty of the Quran
and the meaning of the Quran that it
was easy for them to go and memorize.
Now, how did the Quran preserve?
During the time of the Prophet ﷺ, it
was easy.
As-sahabah, they learned the ayah from the
Quran, they know there's a new revelation, they
recite that, they start spreading it among themselves,
and eventually they start basically kind of like
keeping it together.
But in terms of the Quran as we
know it today, the order of the Mus
'haf, has it always been Fatiha first and
Al-Nas at the end?
Has this surah been organized in that fashion?
And if so, when the sahabah used to
do khatm of the Quran, what kind of
khatm are we talking about?
Has there ever been anything like this, any
concept of khatm of the Quran anywhere?
So let's learn this insha'Allah ta'ala
and see what the preservation of the Quran
looked like.
The first thing we learn about the preservation
of the Quran is the memorization, which is
the oral preservation, and there's also documentation and
written preservation.
The first era, or the first time, was
the time of the Prophet ﷺ, the time
of the Prophet ﷺ.
So when we say the Prophet ﷺ, we
know that the Prophet himself was an illiterate
man, so he couldn't read or write.
So if he ﷺ, he wants to relate
the Quran, he's going to have to give
it to somebody who's capable of doing that.
But the first thing that the people did
with the Quran was memorizing it, because again,
they were illiterate, they recite something beautiful, they
memorize it.
They did that with poetry before, they did
that with poetry before.
But when something is so valuable to them,
what do they do with it?
They put some resources in documenting it.
Remember we talked about the very famous poem
that they used to hang on the Kaaba,
and some write them even with gold.
So to that level, if something is so
valuable, then they would put resources such as
parchment paper or blades of bones, especially the
camel's bone, for example, they use that, and
they document that, they put it in writing.
They didn't have what we have today, alhamdulillah,
of paper or digital documentation, they didn't have
that stuff.
So it was very hard, but at least
they put some effort and documented that in
writing.
So at the time of the Prophet ﷺ,
the most common preservation was the memorization, and
that's why anyone who memorized was very well
known to have a special status.
Those who memorized, they were given a special
status.
There was a very famous incident in the
Sira in which the Prophet ﷺ, he highlighted
the status of those who memorized more than
others, in which position, in which incident was
that?
Anyone knows?
The battle of Uhud, when they didn't have
enough graves for everybody, so they would have
to put two, three people in one grave,
but what was the preference, who goes in
first?
Remember?
Those who memorized first, or those who memorized
more.
He would say ﷺ, who knows more of
the Qur'an?
And if they were almost equal, he would
say, who knows Surah Al-Baqarah and Al
-Imran?
And then the Prophet ﷺ would put him
in first.
So that gave the status of the Khifth
and the status of Surah Al-Baqarah specifically
and Surah Al-Imran in terms of its
status.
So again, that tells us the importance of
the memorization of the Qur'an.
The preservation in writing at the time of
the Prophet ﷺ also took place in the
form of Sahaba, specific Sahaba were chosen for
that mission.
There are certain Sahaba chosen for that mission,
we're going to come to some of their
names in a bit, but the Prophet ﷺ
in Mecca, he had some of the closest
people for him as a scribe, like Abu
Bakr as-Siddiq, he was an educated person.
Umar later on, he became one of those
scribes.
But was there any even reports that the
Qur'an was documented in Mecca?
Any story that you can remember which tells
that the Qur'an was actually documented in
Mecca?
Yes.
Can you tell what happened there?
He went to see his sister and Khabab
has scrolls with him.
So when he hit his sister, that scroll
dropped out and he wanted to pick it
up.
What did she do?
She took it away from him.
He goes, nope, you're not clean, you're not
clean, pick it up.
And he went, he took a shower and
came and read the ayat from Surat Taha
and Subhanallah, Allah opened his heart to Islam.
So yeah, it was also documented in Mecca,
but it was an individual effort, not an
organized effort.
Different Sahaba have their own writings.
One of the Sahaba that was famous for
his own documentation is very famous and very
well known from the early Sahaba, from the
early ones who embraced Islam.
Whose Sahaba was that?
No, not Salim.
Salim was a Qari, but now it was
not documented, did not document it.
But somebody was known for his Mus'haf,
yes.
Abdullah bin Mas'ud.
Abdullah bin Mas'ud, he kept his own
documentation of the Qur'an, like he had
his own Mus'haf.
We're going to talk about it later, inshaAllah.
But so we know that there was some
documentation of the Qur'an in Mecca as
well, in writing basically.
Now we're going to ask you a few
questions.
Question number one, why is it so hard
to memorize the Qur'an these days?
Today, although Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala promised
that the Qur'an, so we promise that
we're going to review this Qur'an, we're
going to preserve it, or actually not this
ayah.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, we made
the Qur'an easy to remember, so where
are those who would like to remember?
Now why is it so hard and difficult
today to memorize the Qur'an than it
used to be before?
I want to hear from you inshaAllah.
I'll give you one minute to talk to
your neighbors and discuss that.
Give at least three reasons you believe, three
reasons why it is harder to memorize today
than it used to be before.
Go ahead.
Let's hear from you right now.
I want you to tell me why do
you think it was easier before and harder
today to memorize the Qur'an?
First of all, do you even agree with
the premise?
Is it harder today to memorize the Qur
'an than it used to be before?
Okay, so let's see.
Why do you believe that actually it's harder
today?
Tell me.
Because of what?
Because we live today, right?
No, but what made it easy for them
to memorize yesterday, it's harder today, yes.
Not many distractions, right?
So literacy is higher right now.
So what exactly, you summarize all of this
in one word, what would that be?
Convenience.
Convenience.
Convenience is the enemy of really, I would
say, of what do you call it, creativity.
You know, if you look today, if you
ever watch these reels on Instagram and TikTok
and so on, about kids memorizing the Qur
'an in certain communities, especially African communities in
Nigeria, Senegal and so on.
Have you seen those beautiful kids, mashaAllah, they
sit there in hundreds and they memorize with
the teacher and when one of them recites,
the voice, the beauty, the tajweed is just
phenomenal.
These are kids living where?
In shacks.
And we have here, mashaAllah, kids living in
America and the UK and they live in
mansions and you could barely, I could barely
convince them to memorize Surah Al-Fatiha.
What's the problem with that?
The distraction is one of the biggest things.
Distractions.
Over there, these kids coming to the maktab
to recite the Qur'an and learn the
Qur'an was one of the highlights of
their day.
It was one of their biggest social events.
They get together to socialize and get together
and that activity in itself was one of
the activities that the whole community was really
praising.
In our time today, when you send your
kids to memorize the Qur'an, you're just
basically sending them to prison.
They resist.
They want to fight you back.
You have to bribe them.
So much just to convince them to come
and learn the Qur'an.
Distractions are so many.
I had some people asking me, what do
I do?
I said, look, you need to minimize their
access to those kinds of conveniences, really.
Because now, when you tell them to memorize
the Qur'an, there is so much to
leave so that they can read the Qur
'an.
There is their video games, their phones, the
TV, their fun with their friends and all
that kind of stuff.
So a lot of competition.
But back then, they didn't have that stuff.
So that's one reason why convenience is one
of the biggest enemies, unfortunately.
What else, jama'ah?
That makes it harder to memorize today.
Yes.
That's the understanding.
By the way, so this is very loud
for you, so I'll come here.
Understanding?
Implementation.
Yes, the implementation of the Qur'an.
So because it doesn't translate easily in our
life, it's hard to retain it.
Is that what you're saying?
Because they don't know what does it mean,
so they're just going to memorize sounds, and
it's easy to forget.
Okay, that's fair enough.
Yes, it's easy.
It's easy to find everywhere these days.
It's not like before.
Before, in some communities, like I remember in
Palestine, and even in Bosnia, they told us
when we were living in Bosnia, if there
was a mushaf in one village, it's just
like it's hailed as one of those villages
from heaven.
Like they have a mushaf.
Like the whole village had a mushaf in
their masjid.
That's one mushaf.
Today, mashallah, how many mushaf do you have
in our household?
You have it in big prints, small prints,
fancy prints, colorful prints.
You have it also digital format in your
pocket as well too.
You have different versions of the apps of
the mushaf in your pocket.
So the more access we have to it,
the less likely we're going to have that
drive to memorize it.
It's easy.
Yes, sister.
So you're referring to a very famous story
by Imam al-Shafi'i with his teacher,
Waqi' ibn al-Jarrah, when he had some
issues with his memory.
Of course, when we talk about issues with
his memory, it's a different level, different standard
we're talking about.
So he complained to his teacher, I complained
to him, to my teacher, that I'm having
problems with my memory.
So he told him, you need to quit
committing sins.
That knowledge is light from Allah and the
light of Allah is not given to a
sinner.
So yeah, I agree with you.
Maybe the way our lifestyle, our lifestyle also
preventing us, subhanAllah, from having the Qur'an
being in the core of that kind of
life.
So we have so many other things that
we do, we worry about, that the Qur
'an is no longer becoming something of that
importance.
So if we can realign our goals, our
visions, our life, hopefully will help us, inshaAllah.
Yes, sister.
So we don't see that's how important it
is for us to be the next generation
to preserve the Qur'an, right?
I want to add one more thing, by
the way, and that's especially for the Arabs.
The Arabs are less likely to memorize the
Qur'an.
Why?
Like if you look in your community, how
many hufadh in Arab families versus desi families?
Very few among the Arabs.
Why is that?
Because they speak Arabic.
Because they speak Arabic, so you don't need
it.
It should be fine, subhanAllah.
Unfortunately, there is another reason also for the
Arabs, why they're not so much into the
deyun versus other communities.
The subcontinent like India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh in
that area, when Pakistan was formed, during of
course the liberation and so on, it was
formed based on what?
Religious identity, supposedly.
They want a state for the Muslims versus
the Hindus, right?
So religiosity was in the core of their
national identity.
It's because they're Muslims.
Also, the Muslims who stayed in India, and
they're not few, they're many, but comparing to
the size of the country, they're considered minority.
The Muslims in India also, they knew for
them to survive, they have to preserve their
Muslim identity.
And that's why the religiosity became very important
for them.
Arabs, on the other hand, in the Arab
world, being religious means you're going to die
or end up in prison.
Because they grew up in fascist societies, socialist,
communist communities and rulers, and obviously in tyranny.
So anyone who tries even to try to
aspire to a Muslim lifestyle, they end up
in jail or they end up dead.
And the Arab Spring, the recent Arab Spring
is a final testimony for that until this
day.
I remember growing up, when I was a
kid, going to the masjid more frequently, my
mom used to tell me, mom said, stop
being too religious, because it's not good for
you.
I'm like, what does that even mean?
But that's for the culture.
So therefore, in the Arab community, they don't
have that sense of religiosity as part of
their identity, as in the Desi culture.
Is it still the same?
Has it shifted?
Allah knows.
But at least this is from back then.
So that's why you don't see among the
the path to religiosity as easy as it
is maybe in the Desi culture.
You have the Desi community, for example, in
the Pakistani community, at least in America, once
the child, they start crawling, they send them
to the Quran classes right away.
I was like, easy man, he's still a
baby.
But they want right away to start from
there.
But in the Arab community, no, they can
learn Arabic anyway, they can be able to
read the Quran on their own.
And they don't have that same emphasis, except,
of course, those who alhamdulillah, Allah guide their
hearts to be more religious.
Now, true colonialism and the same thing, it
brought the worst to us, unfortunately, like speaking
foreign languages became more appealing than speaking the
Arabic Pusha, which would be the easy, the
best to memorize in the Quran.
Like I grew up in Kuwait, and when
we were studying Arabic versus English curriculum in
elementary school, I would say, the Arabic curriculum
was boring.
You have a huge book with so much
text and no illustrations.
So therefore, when you open the book, it's
depressing.
You don't want to read anything in there.
But when you get the English book, they
gave us Oxford curriculum from here, the British
English.
And then for the high school, they gave
us Cambridge.
So when you read it, it's all actually,
it's all animation, it's all martial illustrations, and
colorful, and there are songs to sing over
there.
Of course, you're going to love the English
over the Arabic language, unfortunately.
So that's one of the issues that happened
to our community.
So that's why I hope, I hope from
this seminar, you guys will learn to teach
your children the love for the Arabic language.
I hope that we can have them, inshallah
wa ta'ala, love it.
It makes it easy for them to hopefully,
inshallah, connect with the Quran.
The second question we have for you here,
what are the characteristics you look for in
a mushaf?
If you would like to read the Quran,
if you would like to memorize the Quran,
if you're going to download an app, all
right, to have a full mushaf on your
phone, what are the characteristics people look for
in a mushaf?
I want to discuss this with your friend,
inshallah wa ta'ala, and let's see how
do you understand the script of the Quran
or the mushaf.
Yes?
Color coded tajweed rules.
Why?
But isn't that distraction when you start seeing
a lot of colors?
Which one?
Oh, did I miss one here?
What color means?
Is that a red light or green light
or?
But is that, it's not distraction to you?
Bismillah, so she looks for those beautiful colorful
mushaf for the tajweed rules.
Okay, what else?
The quality of paper and binding, why is
that?
Because you're rough with it, right?
So you want something to last long with
you.
So do you like glossy papers or matte
basically?
The glossy one, but it doesn't shine, the
light shining in your face, you won't be
able to see.
You like the magazine style.
Okay, you know that actually the glossy style
is actually, is heavier also, it makes it
heavier.
All right, what else?
Yes?
The script.
So the Indo-Pak script versus the standard
Medina script.
So which one do you prefer?
Indo-Pak, Astaghfirullah.
Like in your face, right?
Ours is better.
Okay, yes?
Number of lines.
So you have a standardized 13, 14, 15,
what does that even mean to you?
They call this mushaf al-tahfidh, mushaf al
-huffadh.
I don't know how many of you ever
had this before or seen these masahib before.
They used to print them back then, but
now they, with the mushaf of Medina became
the most popular one, they stopped doing that.
Mushaf al-huffadh, you have the standard number
of lines per page, and not just standard
line of page, no.
The exact words are in the exact same
location per page.
Which means, this page is going to be
starting with this word and end with that
word.
And the last word, the last word in
the previous page, which is the one on
the right side, basically you will find that
last word printed on top of the next
page, on the margin, above the margin of
the first line.
So even if you're not looking at the
right, you're covering the right page, for example,
you can still connect with the previous page
by knowing which word was the last word.
They call this mushaf al-huffadh, for those
who like to memorize.
So that's basically, before the Medina mushaf was
the most popular one.
And again it has a very standard also
number of lines.
Yes, what else?
Sisters, anything that you guys look for in
the mushaf?
How about the size of the mushaf?
Yes, go ahead.
Transliteration.
Oh come on, that's not a mushaf anymore.
No, don't memorize through transliteration, please, don't.
If you use transliteration and you fix your
pronouncement at a specific sound, it's hard to
change it later.
By the way, why is it so easy
for a bilingual to speak without any accent?
Because the way you speak, your tongue forms
muscles in a certain shape in order to
accommodate those vowels and those sounds.
So whether you speak Arabic, English, Spanish, whatever
language that you speak, eventually your tongue gets
shaped in a certain direction to accommodate for
those sounds.
If you're young and you speak multiple languages,
your tongue still accommodates to all these sounds,
so the muscles will be shaped differently.
But if you become adult, your tongue is
fixed on a certain right now shape.
Once you start learning a new language, no
matter how hard you try, there will always
be an accent.
Because your tongue is not as perfect in
terms of flexible anymore as it used to
be before.
So that's why transliteration, if you memorize with
transliteration, you're getting your tongue used to that
pronouncement.
So it's hard to fix that.
So for example, one of the most common
mistakes in the Desi tongue, for example, when
it comes to pronouncing the Qur'an, is
the Tha is pronounced Seen, and the Thal
and the Tha is pronounced what?
Za.
Like, I had one time somebody kind of
like arguing with me that I'm pronouncing it
wrong.
Like, alright.
Like one of those uncles.
You're good, keep it that way.
It's okay.
But yeah, so because they're used to pronouncing
it with transliteration as Za, and frankly, no
one really corrected them to tell them, no
it's not Za, it's Tha.
Yeah, it's Za.
No, it's not Za, it's Tha.
And then eventually they got used to it
and they never corrected afterwards.
So that's why it's very important to keep
actually the tongue in the Arabic language.
So the Masahib are many.
If you would like to have a Mus
'hab that you use, I recommend always to
have the same print.
Don't swap or switch from one print to
the other one, because the eyes also get
comfortable with certain print, and if you keep
switching it and changing it, what do you
call the picture and photo memorization changes and
becomes difficult.
So always keep a standardized Mus'hab for
you, whether it's a big print, small print,
pocket size on your phone, use the same
print if you can for memorization.
Now, for translations, for anything else, that's different.
But at least for memorization, try to keep
one standard of a Mus'hab that you
have, inshallah.
Is there any specific Mus'hab that I
would recommend for you?
Honestly, it depends, because if you're in North
Africa, like in Morocco and Algeria, the script
they use is different than the script used
in the Mus'hab of Medina.
And the same thing like the one in
the subcontinent, also the same thing.
And now Medina has actually, Medina Print House
is accommodating to all these different scripts.
So they print the Mus'hab in the
subcontinent in a script, they have it in
the also North African script, and other scripts
as well.
So whichever that you're familiar with, feel free
to memorize the Qur'an using that, inshallah
ta'ala.
And on that point, you can ask of
those different versions from Medina?
No, just go to the website.
Yeah, so for memorization, I keep PDFs of
those?
No, if anyone wants to do that, and
you would like to download the entire Mus
'hab, the entire Mus'hab from the King
Fahd Print House in Medina, they have all
the PDFs available over there.
You can go there and download the script
that you feel comfortable with, and use it
for memorization reading, inshallah ta'ala.
And it's better than the one printed in
Pakistan, just to let you know.
No, I mean, it depends on the reliability
of the Mus'hab, because when you open
the Mus'hab, they always have a certificate
of authentication.
That's coming from Wazirat al-Awqaf, from coming
from Islamic University in that country, for example,
the Azhar, for example, Print House.
So if you have, alhamdulillah, reliable names that
authenticate in that print, then go for it.
So it doesn't matter which one, if you
feel comfortable with that, alhamdulillah, then go for
it.
There were some, I remember that when we
used to memorize back in those days, the
Mus'hab was printed in, even poorly, to
be honest with you.
I still remember those Mus'hab were huge
and big, but the print is not the
standard print that we see today.
And by the way, most, I don't know
if you know that guys, but the Mus
'hab that you, that are produced in Malik
Fahd Print House, they're handwritten.
All these Mus'hab are handwritten by the
very famous Khattab and this Uthman Taha.
Uthman Taha, he does, and it takes about
two and a half years to write the
full Mus'hab in one script.
And then from that, they create the templates
and they start printing it and it comes
out.
He's still alive, alhamdulillah, and I don't know
if you have ever seen that, there was
an interview with him not too long ago
on YouTube, speaking about the honor of being
another person assigned to do that.
He does everything, he does everything, he does
that.
Now, one more question for you inshaAllah, quickly.
Who is your favorite reciter and why?
Go ahead, talk to your friend next to
you.
I want to see the debate.
Which reciter is better than the other one?
Tell me, who's your favorite reciter and why?
Don't tell me Abu Isa.
Isa is okay, but Abu Isa, I don't
know about him.
Okay, yes.
Al-Husari?
Okay.
So, the quality of the recording, his voice,
deep voice, and also he has that kind
of quiet, slow recitation for people to learn
the tajweed properly.
Is that what you're saying?
But he doesn't have the beautiful voice though.
Like I said, Al-Husari is just like,
there's no emotion in the recitation.
How would you like that kind of recitation?
So, he has the perfect tajweed I'm looking
for first.
I don't care about how beautiful my voice
is going to be yet.
I want to first perfect my tajweed and
then I can look for somebody else for
beautiful recitation.
So, you're saying the contemporary reciters right now,
they make a lot of mistakes, right?
Okay, let's see from somebody else.
Who's your favorite reciter?
Yes.
Khalifa Al-Juhani.
Okay, why is that?
Slowly?
Yes.
Are you okay with his tajweed?
Yes.
Are you sure about that?
Yes.
And someone certified it for you?
Yes.
Do you listen to his recitation from taraweeh
or from studio recording?
Studio recording.
Okay, fair enough.
I don't know him personally, so I'm going
to look him up inshaAllah wa ta'ala.
Now, anybody else?
Yes.
Al-Minshawi.
Why?
So, he had the tarteel and tajweed.
Well, thank you very much.
He's my favorite, by the way.
Al-Minshawi, for me, is the top, inshaAllah.
Yes, Al-Hussar is the man for that,
but Al-Minshawi adds to it the beautiful
recitation.
He doesn't read from his throat.
He reads from his heart.
Like when you hear him reciting, it's just
like, oh my God, the beautiful emotions that
comes with the recitation is just gorgeous, beautiful,
inshaAllah.
Now, I'm not being biased right now, but
it's up to you.
Yes.
Shuraym.
Okay.
So, he used to go to the haram
and listen to recitation there.
So, that's for nostalgia.
Even if he's made mistakes?
Okay.
So, here's the thing, guys.
When it comes to selecting a Qari, it's
always better for, if you're a beginner, alhamdulillah,
always start with someone who's perfect in his
tajweed, perfect in his tajweed.
So, whether it's Al-Hussari, although for some
people it's very technical because it's very dry
and very slow.
Although he has, by the way, he has
some special, even full mushaf for children.
And that's even, actually, it's even slower and
has absolutely no emotions in it.
Like saying, alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen, arrahmanir raheem.
When we were kids, we used to memorize
on this recording.
You can imagine how excited we were, mashaAllah.
Like later, the elementary school, back then, they
gave us the cassette.
Back then, they were cassettes.
They gave you the cassette for the surahs
you're supposed to memorize, and you go and
you play it at home.
And you listen to his recitation.
It's like, what is this, really?
It's just for us kids, it's not as
exciting.
But then they brought them in shawi, actually,
recording as well.
It's better for the children with a group
of kids reciting after them as well, too.
Adopt with the kids, obviously.
But the most important thing is to find
a reciter who is perfect with their tajweed.
And I recommend for you to listen to
somebody's recording from studio, not from the taraweeh.
Because taraweeh, they make sometimes mistakes, and unfortunately,
they don't really fix them.
And I'm talking about famous qurra, famous qurra.
Because they're humans, after all.
So they may have made mistakes.
But studio, they will go back and forth
until it's perfect before they release that recording.
So that's for memorization.
Now for listening and enjoying, listen to whoever
you want.
But for memorizing, make sure to first start
with someone who's known to be good with
tajweed, inshaAllah.
I recommend that you ask one of your
local teachers or imams to help you with
that, inshaAllah, to barakah wa ta'ala.
Let's move on right now.
So at the time of the Prophet ﷺ,
we said there are two forms of memorization
that was taking place.
Number one was they called hafd al-sadr.
Hafd al-sadr, which means memorization.
That's what I mean by that.
Hafd al-sadr means you memorize it and
you retain it in your heart.
That's what it means.
Memorization by heart.
By the way, there's a documentary that was
done by HBO, I believe, a long time
ago.
It's called the Qur'an by Heart.
If you haven't watched that video, I suggest
that you do.
It's so beautiful, talking about the journey of
a few kids from different countries, Muslim countries.
They went to Egypt for the competition with
the recitation of the Qur'an, mashaAllah.
It was such a beautiful thing, although there
was some depressing moment in that documentary about
one of the kids, and I felt so
bad.
I believe racism was involved in it, unfortunately.
But it's a very interesting, actually, something to
watch.
And it was done by non-Muslims, just
to let you know.
They were impressed by the idea of kids
memorizing the Qur'an, even though they don't
understand the language.
But at the time of the Prophet ﷺ,
this is how the Sahaba used to do
it.
So he's saying that those who taught us
the Qur'an from the Sahaba, he's not
Sahabi, he said they used to learn the
Qur'an 10 verses at a time.
They won't pass those 10 verses until they
made sure that they understand, they memorize, they
understand, and they practice.
And then they come to the next 10,
and so on.
Now that's obviously, not necessarily every Sahabi did
that.
But some of them, they had a specific
systematic way of memorizing.
Others, they memorized every time they hear something,
they memorized it right away.
Their capacity of memorization was not equally the
same.
Not all the Sahaba, by the way, were
well-known to be Huffadh.
So therefore, from the Huffadh among the Sahaba,
we have specific names.
Who can tell me some of the names
of the Huffadh of the Sahaba?
Ubayy ibn Ka'b.
Who else?
From the famous ones.
Ubayy ibn Ka'b, Mu'adh ibn Jabal,
Zayd ibn Thabit, Abdullah ibn Mas'ud, Salim
Mawla ibn Hudhayfa.
So there are specific names among the Sahaba
known to be the Qur'an There are
the most famous people to memorize the Qur
'an.
Some of the Sahaba didn't have that kind
of capacity.
Like the young man, Mu'adh used to
pray behind the Prophet ﷺ in his Masjid,
and then he goes back to his community
Masjid, the local Masjid, to lead the people
in Isha'a Salah.
So he comes late sometimes.
And one of those nights, Mu'adh wanted
to recite Surat al-Baqarah.
So the moment he started with Surat al
-Baqarah, one of the people behind him, he
broke his Salah, and then he went to
pray by himself, and then he left.
Now Mu'adh was in his 20s, was
a young guy.
So you can imagine the young guys, how
they want to teach you how to be
a good Muslim, mashaAllah.
So therefore, I'm going to recite Surat al
-Baqarah, all together, Surat al-Isha'.
So after he was done, he was told
about this man's attitude, and he said, leave
him, he's a munafiq.
Unfortunately, as young people, we do that judgment
sometimes.
Leave him, he's just a munafiq.
So some of the friends of this guy,
reach out to him and say, hey man,
I mean, last night Mu'adh said that
you were a munafiq, just to let you
know.
And he said, he did?
I'm going to complain to the Prophet ﷺ.
So he goes to the Prophet ﷺ, and
he said, Ya Rasulullah, I'm a shepherd, I
spend my day in the desert all the
time, dealing with the camels and this and
that.
And then when I come back home, I
barely could open my eyes, and here's Mu
'adh reciting Surat al-Baqarah for us.
So the Prophet called Mu'adh, and he
goes, Ya Mu'adh, what's wrong with you?
Are you going to cause people to leave
Islam?
Because of this?
And he said to him, if you're going
to be leading people in Salah, recite Surahs
such as, Sabiha Isma Rabbika Al-A'la,
Iqra Bisma Rabbika Al-Ladhi Khalaq, Wa Al
-Layli Idha Yaqsha, like small, short Surahs relatively,
Fa Idha Salayta Nafsika, if you're going to
be praying for yourself, Fa Atil Mashid.
Then recite whatever you want.
Then he asked this man, he goes, by
the way, what do you do in your
Salah?
He goes, Ya Rasulullah, honestly for me, I
come, I praise Allah ﷻ, I ask Allah
for forgiveness and ask Allah for Jannah and
that's it.
And I don't understand, La Dan Danataka La
Dan Danata Mu'adh.
I have no idea what you're humming, you
and Mu'adh.
Now those humming, I don't understand that stuff.
So this man, he wasn't very well-versed
with the Qur'an, and it's okay.
He was one of the Sahaba radiallahu anhu
wa rida.
Another Sahabi such as Khalid bin Walid radiallahu
anhu wa rida.
Khalid radiallahu anhu wa rida was what?
Was a general, and he also embraced Islam
late.
So by the time he became Muslim, 17
years already passed from Islam.
So a lot of Qur'an was revealed.
He couldn't catch up as much.
So he was busy also with Al-Jihad
Fi Sabilillah.
One time he was leading the people in
Salah.
He was leading basically his military commanders.
He made mistakes.
And when he finished, he said to them,
Qal Wallahi laqad shaghana Al-Jihad Fi Sabilillah
al-Jihad Fi Sabilillah.
Like fighting on the back of the horse
has distracted us so much from memorizing the
Qur'an.
So not everybody is equipped for that, but
you don't know until you try.
You try your best insha'Allah.
So the Sahaba radiallahu anhu, they will memorize
that.
And the other way that they memorize the
Qur'an, or at least they kept preserved
the Qur'an at the time of the
Prophet ﷺ.
So how did they memorize that?
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, he actually promised
the Prophet ﷺ that he will help him
memorize it.
Because when the Prophet ﷺ used to receive
the Qur'an from Jibreel, he would rush,
try before Jibreel even finishes.
He wants to repeat after him.
And he wants to repeat while Jibreel is
reciting.
You know when sometimes you hear somebody speak
and you try to move your lips with
them?
So Jibreel told, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
told the Prophet ﷺ, Sari'u quri'uka
fa laa tansa.
He said to him subhanahu wa ta'ala
that take it easy.
Don't rush.
That we are going to help you memorize
the Qur'an.
And also surah al-Qiyamah as well, Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala told the Prophet ﷺ
that we are, laa tuharrak bi lisanaka li
ta'jala bih.
Inna alayna jam'ahu wa quran.
Don't rush.
Don't rush.
Take it easy.
We're going to preserve the Qur'an for
you.
And how they also preserved the Qur'an?
Through the night prayers.
The night prayer is the best way to
memorize the Qur'an.
Why is that?
Because when you pray tahajjud, you're not going
to cheat unless you do.
Which means you're not going to be holding
the mus'haf and recite.
Is it haram to do that?
No, but it's not going to do you
any service and come to the memorization of
the Qur'an.
Because if you know you can still hold
the mus'haf if you make a mistake
or forget an ayah, you're not going to
put the effort to excellently memorize the Qur
'an.
So tahajjud is the best way.
You wake up at night, you review what
you're going to be reciting and then you
stand up at night.
If you make a mistake, you review it
again and you try it again until you
excel in your memorization.
So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala made it
mandatory upon the sahaba for an entire year.
An entire year before it was made optional
afterwards for everybody.
This ayah actually, the whole memorization or praying
tahajjud was actually mandatory upon the sahaba, all
of them, for one year until the obligation
was removed from the sahaba but was kept
for the Prophet ﷺ.
So it became still obligatory for the Prophet
ﷺ to pray every single night.
Then we have hifdh al-kitaba.
Hifdh al-kitaba is the documentation in writing.
That's what it is.
So the first one, hifdh al-sadr, means
memorization in the heart.
Hifdh al-kitaba, the preservation in writing.
So it's documentation.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala promised the Prophet
ﷺ that inna alayna jam'ahu wa qur
'ana.
So we are going to make you memorize
and recite.
Back to the word jam' means collecting it
in your heart and also of course the
preservation.
Fa idha qur'anahu fattabi'a qur'ana
thumma inna alayna bayan.
So Allah promised the Prophet ﷺ that you'll
memorize it, it will be gathered for you
and you will be able to understand it.
So we're going to explain it to you.
Some of the major scribes at the time
of the Prophet ﷺ that we know were
the four khalifas, Abu Bakr as-Siddiq, Umar,
Uthman and Ali.
They were scribes but not necessarily the official
scribes but the Prophet ﷺ instructed them with
documenting the Qur'an and the Mus'haf
when it was revealed.
One of them is Adhan ibn Sa'id
or Adhan ibn Sa'id, not very famous
actually name among the Sahaba but he was
one of the scribes of the Prophet ﷺ.
Ubay ibn Ka'b, Zayd ibn Thabit, Mu
'adh ibn Jabal.
These are most of the common names that
were entrusted as scribes to document that.
Zayd particularly, Zayd ibn Thabit, why?
Because he was a young man, he was
very young at the time when the Prophet
ﷺ arrived in Medina but he was very
well known for having beautiful handwriting because to
be a scribe what is the main quality
you need to have?
Good handwriting, that's the most important thing and
Zayd had that actually beautiful handwriting so the
Prophet ﷺ chose him to be one of
the major scribes of the Qur'an as
well.
Adhan, it's Adhan, is that said?
Oh it's Adhan ibn Sa'id, actually it's
autocorrect, it was autocorrect so it's Adhan ibn
Sa'id actually as a matter of fact
it's true, Adhan ibn Sa'id and Laysa
Adhan ibn Sa'id, it was also even
corrected as Adnan ibn Sa'id as well
too so it's Adnan, Adhan but it's Adhan
ibn Sa'id ibn al-'Asr, may Allah be
pleased with him.
But again they were scribes that are assigned
because of their handwriting.
Now next to that the phases of preserving
the Qur'an after the time of the
Prophet ﷺ, when the Prophet ﷺ passed the
Qur'an was not preserved in one volume,
it wasn't still, it still was not preserved
in one volume but so there was no
urgency really to do that anyway, there was
no urgency to do that so they continued
their ways, those who have their own scripts
written in certain pieces they would still use
them, those who are memorized they still review
the Qur'an for themselves alhamdulillah so it
was still going on as it used to
be before.
It wasn't until the time of Abu Bakr
as-Siddiq when most of the Arabian Peninsula
renounced Islam, most of them they apostated, why?
Because they thought Islam was only determined for
the time of the Prophet ﷺ so some
of them they entirely left Islam entirely and
some they only rejected certain aspects of Islam,
like they wanted to tailor Islam to their
own needs and Abu Bakr as-Siddiq he
said I'm gonna fight them all and he
did, he fought them all, there was one
particular battle, one particular battle that is a
very famous battle in which they lost a
lot of the Huffadh, who knows which battle
was that?
Al-Yamama, Al-Yamama was against who?
Anyone knows?
Musaylim al-Kaddab, Banu Hanifa, Musaylim al-Kaddab
and that was when a lot of the
Sahaba, the Huffadh were martyred so that's when
Hudhaifa radiallahu ta'ala and Umar ibn Khattab
they sound the alarm to Abu Bakr as
-Siddiq, they sound the alarm to Abu Bakr
as-Siddiq and they came and they said
look we need to put the Qur'an
together in one volume, Abu Bakr as-Siddiq
was not comfortable with it, why wasn't he
comfortable with that?
The Prophet ﷺ didn't do that and he
was actually he was concerned that this could
be bid'ah, that's the story actually in
Arabic and also in English, you have it
in your book insha'Allah ta'ala.
So he radiallahu ta'ala he felt that
you know what no no I can't do
this, the Prophet ﷺ didn't do that, how
could I do this?
Umar ibn Khattab he kept after him, ya
Abu Bakr as-Siddiq we should do that,
please let's do this, we should do that,
preserve the Qur'an.
He made his istikhara until Allah ﷻ opened
his heart to this and he decided you
know what, okay, bismillah, we will do it
and he did radiallahu ta'ala anhu wa
arda, so when and that was the barakah
of Umar radiallahu anhu and also Abu Bakr
as-Siddiq to put the Qur'an in
one volume.
How did he do it?
What was the process?
The process was creating a committee, so Abu
Bakr as-Siddiq radiallahu anhu wa arda he
actually he called for a committee to be
formed, now that committee was supposed to be
of course familiar with the Qur'an and
who would be the best person to lead
that committee, he looked around he found that
the best is somebody the Prophet ﷺ entrusted,
entrusted with his handwriting, so he was a
trustworthy to document everything for the Prophet ﷺ
and who that person that he chose to
be the head of that committee?
Zayd ibn Thabit, Zayd ibn Thabit was in
his 20s at that time but he chose
him because the Prophet ﷺ chose him as
a scribe, not just for the Qur'an
also for what?
For his correspondence and communication with other nations,
because Zayd he knew languages and the Prophet
ﷺ used him to write his documents, his
communication to go to the world, so he's
entrusted him with his secrets ﷺ, so Abu
Bakr as-Siddiq he immediately no-brainer to
him, if the Prophet ﷺ trusted Zayd this
much then he's the man for it, so
he calls Zayd, yeah Zayd I want you
to do this, so what was the response
of Zayd when Abu Bakr as-Siddiq came
to him?
What do you guys think?
So Zayd he immediately he's made a celebration
a party, oh my god I've been chosen
for this right?
No, he was so scared he goes it's
wallah it would have been easier for me
to ask me to move the mountains, if
you asked me to move the mountains I
would have done it for you, but to
do this, this task like this is hard,
so he kept going after Zayd until Zayd
accepted, when Zayd accepted it he also asked
him to collect three more people with him,
so they made a committee of four people,
their job was to collect all the written
material that existed in Medina, all the written
material that existed in Medina and they want
this of course to be collected in the
Masjid Nabi ﷺ, they review everything and they
have to have two people at least to
give testimony that they memorized this ayah and
they did all of this until they formed
one volume of the Mus'haf.
What kind of material back then they had?
I mean in the hands of the people
all kind of materials, but the standard one
that was written for Abu Bakr as-Siddiq
was parchment or leather, actually the camel's leather,
so they did that which means when you
write it on parchment or not parchment on
leather material, how big do you think the
Mus'haf is going to look like?
It's going to be massive, like literally massive,
you can't, you can't care, so the purpose
of that Mus'haf was not necessarily to
use it to read, was only to do
what?
To document the Mus'haf and preserve the
Mus'haf, so it was not really practical
to read from it and we're going to
see inshaAllah when we come back with Allah,
but let's take a break inshaAllah azza wa
jal and then we will we will come
back, we'll return back inshaAllah wa ta'ala.