Yaser Birjas – The Status Of The Ummah Today
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AI: Transcript ©
The genocide that happened in Bosnia and Srebrenica
back in 1995,
we're still witnessing another one in front of
our eyes in Gaza and in Palestine. May
Allah make it easy for the brothers in
Gaza and Al Amin.
Brothers and sisters, if this is an example
of anything, the example of the failure of
the global community
for supporting
and standing for justice and for the vulnerable
and the weak.
1995, the situation in Bosnia was so dire,
and it's in the heart of Europe. We
expect them to make sure that they take
care of their own, but because they're Muslims
unfortunately were left as being prey.
And it was supposed to be a security
space,
a safety shelter for the people in the
center of in the central area of Bosnia.
But when they were all gathered there, under
the protection of supposedly the United Nations, there
was a breach
allowing the enemy to come in and massacre
more than 8,000 plus men and young boys.
Brothers and sisters, we look back in that
history and we're thinking about it, saying, how
could this possibly happen today?
Why would even this should happen?
And we keep reflecting and saying to ourselves,
this should never happen again and here we
are today,
9 months later
in Gaza, the onslaught is going on and
no one is doing anything about it. There's
a huge
failure, not just on the ummah level, on
the entire global community. Brothers and sisters, if
there is anything we learn from this is
today, as we speak, there's a huge competition,
huge competition among nations,
among countries, to be the dominant culture after
the failing of the global leadership of our
time.
And you can see that.
Everybody is trying to be the dominant
country, the dominant culture, the dominant state, to
rule over after the failing of our state
over here.
So there's a competition of cultures,
who is going to be the standard for
the world afterwards? And if anything we learn
from this as an ummah,
we ask ourselves, where are we?
Truly, where are we as Muslim ummah? What's
the status of the Muslim ummah today?
Why can't we be those dominant
cultures and traditions that people always found safety
within the past?
Subhanallah, if you look at the history of
the Ummah, wherever we go,
we establish higher prosperity to the people as
well too. It's not just a matter of
robbing them and leaving them and, you know,
to become markets for for our goods only
as was happening in colonialism era. It's different.
But you ask yourself, where is the ummah
then? What happened?
See, hadith in Sahih Muslim Hayat Abi Ray
when the Prophet
he said
that, 6 things have been given
separate from
what the other prophets had been given. He
says,
I've been given victory over my enemies
by just the distance of a month, which
just hearing about our presence is enough deterrent
for people to misbehave.
But nowadays,
what fits our situation is hadith al Ubana
I want to share with you hadith that
was reported in Muslim Imam Ahmed and Surin
Abu Dawood
and learning from it for ourselves
to understand the status of the ummah, what
needs to be done.
The Prophet said this hadith that the nations
around you, they will just gather around you
just like when they call upon each other
to come and feast.
So, when there's food they all come to
us, they call each other, come over here.
And the same thing is happening in our
time today, taking opportunity for the uniqueness of
the ummah. For
and the Sahaba they ask,
Are we gonna be is that because we're
weak?
We're few in numbers?
No. He says, no, you're going to be
many, like never before. In terms of numbers,
you're probably the largest.
Unfortunately, you only become like the scum on
the surface of the water,
which means no value to it, nothing.
And then the prophet says, God and Allah
will remove the fear of you from the
hearts of your enemies and place in your
heart
The desire for this dunya
and fearing death, disliking death.
Why? Because that means we have built so
much in this world that we attach ourselves
so much to this dunya that we don't
want to leave it behind.
Like I have so much, I've done so
much in this life,
I forgot too much about the akhirah probably,
so that's why I'm feeding what's coming, because
I don't know if I've done more here
or more there.
So the Prophet
in this hadith is teaching us lessons here.
I'm going to share with you some of
these lessons, my dear brothers and sisters, because
I believe personally
in this time when everybody is looking around,
looking for a standard of morality,
because we have seen the hypocrisy of the
west, of the Western civilization,
the call for freedom, and democracy, and all
these kinds of things.
People start seeing with their own eyes how
hypocritical that is, especially exposed by the situation
in Friese and Gaza.
We've seen that. And now everybody just don't
believe these people anymore.
We're looking for now a truthful path,
somewhere we can find really peace and tranquility,
not just for my people, for everybody in
the world. And Rasulullah
was sent as an example
for this, Azzalullah says, That you Muhammad,
you've been sent to the world nothing but
mercy.
Mercy to the world. He brought mercy with
him
and we are the engines of that path.
Brothers and sisters, our path was mentioned to
us in the Quran.
You're the best nation ever produced to mankind.
How so?
Because you enjoy good and forbid evil.
Like the first quality that was mentioned about
this ummah,
that you really promote that which is right
and good, and stay away from that which
is wrong. You stand for justice, that's what
it means. You bring higher to the world.
But when we become so individualistic
right now, thinking too much about ourselves, our
personal gain, our personal prosperity
on
a personal level, group level,
racial levels, or even at the state level,
that's when we get divided. And if we
get divided, as Allah mentioned in the Quran,
don't get divided among yourself,
and you will fail.
Your power will be just will dissipate and
just leave,
and you still have no power whatsoever. So
you'll fail altogether.
So what do we learn from this hadith?
Five things I want to share with you.
Number 1, the prophet
is sending us a grave warning
against internal weakness.
He's saying this is weakness on your part,
and he's warning us against
And of course in response to that, he's
also showing us the importance of our spiritual
strength.
Like, as individuals,
as Muslims, as individuals,
we're suffering a lot of weakness. The amount
of
of questions you get from people
failing to understand the purpose of their life
and the purpose of their existence
and the need to serve
Allah and live for the akhirah.
Also, the greed that we have in our
hearts and the competition happens with people for
the matters of dunya and so on. All
these questions just tell you, subhanAllah, what happens
to the ummah? Where is the when it
comes to Ithar, you know, altruism and caring
for one another and assisting one another
and spiritual strength in your iman, and conviction
in your heart about Allah about the akhirah.
You know,
on a massive level, there is a massive
weakness in the ummah, but
strength in people like the people of Gaza.
With all what they're going through, they give
you an example of what it means to
be a true believer.
Losing everything, including their loved ones, and they
still say
we all belong to Allah
and to him our return shall be.
Nowadays, you lose your job, you lose your
mind with it.
This is it, people start freaking out.
Where is the trust in Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala? Where is the fact that you need
to do your part?
This is it. People start losing it when
matters of dunya start affecting them. So the
first thing the prophet is warning us against
is that internal weakness
and he's commanding for us
to look for that spiritual strength. Number 2,
the prophet is now warning us again also,
or showing us the importance of unity as
a group, as an ummah, the collective strength
as an ummah, and warning us against division
and disagreement.
It's very obvious.
When he said that they start calling upon
you from different places, what does that mean?
I mean, we see today, Allahu al Mustaan,
people from
places they couldn't even imagine, and they're targeting
you as Muslims. Islamophobia
is rising everywhere in the world in places
that you can't even imagine, like really? You
people? Out of all the people in the
world?
Because we are divided.
There is no unity that was in the
past. Even not too long ago when the
Muslims were unified
for a specific purpose such
as Al Aqsa, the case of Philistines, and
Jerusalem,
they were one front
and they had some relative power, I would
say. But today, when
they gave up on the case and that's
it, now it becomes very individualistic interests on
a state level, individual level, we get divided
completely, and that's when it becomes so easy
to prey on. Look at the Muslim world
today. Almost there is war in almost every
country you can think of today,
everywhere.
Subhanallah, look how divided we are because of
that. And the Prophet warned against us because
if you get divided and start fighting among
yourselves,
how do you expect
to be leaders in morality and center the
path to the world? Number 3,
the Prophet
in this hadith, he was warning us against
indulgence
in matters of dunya and encourages
us to be minimalist in terms
of the dunya here.
Now, that doesn't
mean to abandon every halal pleasure that has
been given to you in this life. No.
Allah says in the Quran,
He says, whatever Allah has bestowed upon you,
whatever Allah has given you, seek, He says
seek the pleasure of Allah
for the akhirah.
Like please Allah with this for the akhirah,
use it to benefit you in the akhirah.
And then he said,
but don't forget about your share from the
akhir, or from this dunya, from this world.
So, yeah, think about the akhir, build for
it, but don't forget about your life. Still,
benefit from it in the halal way. Unfortunately,
today it's the other way around.
Many of us, we what we focus more
on is this dunya, and whatever
time that is left for us, we dedicate
to the akhira.
So if you ask yourself how much of
your 24 hours truly
you use to
improve
your relationship with Allah
or even
to bring you closer to Jannah and make
your status, inshallah,
versus the time that we spend to improve
our life in this world.
Once again, it's not haram,
and it's not wrong to take care of
your dunya and bring the best out of
it, As long as you use this to
make it better for you in the akhirah.
That is not your purpose. So the dunya
stays in our hand, not in our heart.
Number 4,
what we learned from this hadith of Prophet
the role of leadership
in guiding the Ummah in our time and
warning us against
failing in this, you're going to become a
target exploited by the nations around you. So
when the Prophet said that these people started
calling everyone around
to come and attack you,
as if he's saying, where are your leaders?
Where are those who really care about standing
between you and that aggression?
Where are they? We see what's happening in
Gaza right now, in Palestine, in Syria, in
Sudan
today,
which is one of the most forgotten
crises of our time, as we're busy
worrying about what's happening in Gaza and Palestine
and what's happening in other places in the
world,
we completely
forgot about what's happening in Sudan.
Unfortunately, the situation in Sudan is the Muslims
among themselves.
That's what it said about it, and that's
what probably maybe people they want to talk
about it because it's embarrassing.
It's very embarrassing.
But that's another
example of failure in our leadership, to be
examples for the world. So here the prophet
is telling us that this is the importance
of having those leaders. But here's the thing
my dear brothers and sisters,
we complain about leaders, the lack of leadership,
but
those leaders are actually representative of your communities,
which means, how are we? Are we people
of faith? Are we people of honesty and
decency? Are we people of dunya, people with
akhirah? Depends on who we are, we're going
to get these leaders anyway.
So you want to have better leaders?
Then become better communities, better people.
That's what matters over here, and the prophet
has highlighted this for us, and finally, the
Prophet
is encouraging us as we work, we work
for the akhirah and strive in the way
of Allah
which means you make a stance.
You take a stance as a believer for
justice, for that which is right. You can't
just see injustice around the world and just
kind of play a blind eye on it
as if it doesn't matter to me,
even if it's not related to you directly.
But we live as a global community. Whatever
happens somewhere in the world will definitely affect
us, and we're responsible for this as an
Ummah as well too.
So you're going to have to learn to
take a stance.
We've seen the young people in their encampments,
in different campuses here in the country, Subhanallah,
and it took us by surprise,
putting adult leadership
to shame,
because they took the stance and they sacrificed
their time and even their studies and even
their career, they put it on the line
because they believe in this cause.
And that sort of teaches us a lesson
that if everybody took a responsibility like this,
they won't be left out to be targeted
right now and being attacked and being fired
and expelled from schools.
If everybody
took responsibility to defend these young ones at
least, and you took a stance in your
own position, whatever you do, whatever you work,
imagine
imagine how the ripple effect of all that
stands for justice.
We need to cooperate with one another,
urging our our community to be ready and
prepared.
Because like I said, the the future is
gonna be competition.
Which culture is gonna be dominant?
Which path? Which way? Which court of moralities?
And if Allah
send the Prophet
as a standard for this, then we are
the agents of that standard and we should
do our part. May Allah make it easy
for us to follow our baalameen
and be true to our faith and
practice.
My dear brother, this is like I said,
it's because of that internal weakness, that this
organization,
the lack of true leadership, and focusing on
this dunya in our hearts, and not being
prepared and really taking our tasks seriously to
prepare ourselves individually,
to be there for those who who who
need us, that's why we're failing as a
community and as a global community as well
too.
But be prepared, my dear brother, just take
it seriously. As an individual, don't say there's
nothing I can do. You can do more
than what you think.
But not just as an individual, collectively we
can make a big effort inshaAllah.
At least let's begin with something tonight, today,
inshaAllah. After Jum'ah, we have a group that
is coming to vouch for our brothers and
sisters in Sudan.
We think so much about Gaza right now,
and of course, there's no doubt it's an
urgent matter. But we don't wanna ignore the
other situation that's happening around the world. So
please show your support to the brothers and
sisters in Sudan. May Allah make it easier
for them