Yousuf Raza – Quran Daily Surah Fatiha Alhamdulillah 1
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All right, bismillah, alhamdulillah, wassalatu wassalamu ala rasoolillah,
assalamu alaykum and hello to all those watching,
to all those listening This is Qur'an
Daily and we're gonna talk about Surah Al
-Fatihah, officially beginning with the first ayah Alhamdulillahi
rabbil alameen What we're gonna do is we're
gonna take up the first phrase, alhamdulillah, explore
that and Then move on with the rest
of the surah.
So alhamdulillah, all praise is for Allah That's
the very rough translation as to what that
Implies, but going into it a little deeper,
the word hamd has two connotations, two Dimensions
of this word that have to be understood
if we have to be cognizant of what
we're saying, what we're reminding Ourselves again and
again and again, whatever we're reciting Fatihah.
The first of those dimensions is, as we
know, praise and More than praise, an affirmation
of all that is good, that whatever we've
experienced, whatever we're gonna experience, whatever We're not
experiencing, whatever is reality outside of us, the
praise for that is It belongs to Allah,
that it is Inherently good, that there is
goodness in it.
So there is a recognition of that Belief
in the goodness of reality, that it is
essentially, despite Experiences to the contrary, it is
a belief that says that yes Some stuff
may have been bad and negative and evil
and suffering and all of that in its
own place But ultimately it is good and
that goodness is sourced in Allah.
It is an answer to the question of
the Ultimate meaning of reality, as to how
that is sourced in Allah, as an individual
Being, that he is not just some random
blind force or not just some Imagination of
anyone just to make themselves feel better, but
an individual in whom all of All of
nature as we know it and as we
don't know of it It is, it is,
it finds its creativity It finds The creator
of that in Allah, that he is Al
-awwal, that he is the first one from
whom all of this has Emanated, who has
caused all of this to be, right?
So to recognize and affirm this Dimension of
reality, to recognize and affirm that behind all
of this experience of reality is Allah Subhanahu
wa ta'ala, that he is meticulously engaged
in directing the affairs of Every single particle
and the giant cosmos itself Himself, that he
is the one doing it from the largest
to the smallest It is Allah Subhanahu wa
ta'ala managing all of those affairs, directing
all of those affairs Controlling all of those
affairs and this control, this This power is
based in his knowledge, in his wisdom, and
it is all Essentially purposeful, that it is
directed towards A higher purpose that we're going
to talk about At some point later in
all of the ayat that come out But
essentially it is purposeful, that there is meaning
in every situation is what we're saying when
we affirm the praise Towards Allah Subhanahu wa
ta'ala and again as our, as the
negativities of our experience tend to Overwhelm us
and our depression tends to get the better
of us It becomes all the more difficult
to recognize Goodness, it becomes all the more
difficult to recognize that there is any positivity
that can even be possible So in those
circumstances Reiterating that no, we are affirming the
positivity and praising to praising Allah as being
its source is Reminding yourself that regardless of
how long it's been since you've seen the
Sun and it's been cloudy for as long
as you can Remember, but it's still there.
It is still there You believe in it
to be there and it is that belief
that allows for yourself to at least As
much as is humanly possible for you to
contribute to the positivity of the world that
it is Essentially a negation of nihilism, of
meaninglessness, of purposelessness, of a of a blind
Pessimism that doesn't see any point to Reality
itself whenever I am reiterating to myself Alhamdulillah
I am affirming positivity and goodness and sourcing
it in the Individual being of Allah Subhanahu
wa ta'ala and that's what I'm doing
and that's what I'm reminding myself of Precisely
because the opposing sentiments the opposing beliefs that
of meaninglessness that of negativity that of pessimism
may be very very Overwhelming they may be
very strong with respect to my individual experiences
at that Particular point in time in my
life or any particular point in time of
my life or the life of others So
as to remind myself of the presence of
this positivity of the presence of this goodness
becomes all the more necessary that this is
something that in a conversation I may be
able to Talk about with evidence and everything
that no there is meaning in suffering even
there is meaning even in evil and we'll
talk about those subjects later on in more
detail, but When your emotions tend to overwhelm
you particularly depressive Emotions, then this dimension of
reality becomes blurred.
So a conscious reiteration Reminding of yourself again
and again as to how no no, no,
you've you've you've dealt with it.
You've been in the You've had those conversations
with yourself and you have Consciously concluded on
the positivity and the goodness and the optimism
that is Present in the world that is
there that is meaningful about reality and existence
but because the negativity comes with a strong
surge of negative emotions as well and Emotions
tend to be all-encompassing they tend to
be They tend not to leave any room
For anything other than themselves and if they're
negative then this it becomes all the more
difficult to deal with But how do we
deal with them is through these?
these repetitions that we identify those phrases or
those Beliefs that we know are positive and
we are reminding ourselves Through them and so
as to oppose the negativity of those emotions
as they look to overwhelm us and the
more we reiterate That the more we focus
on it the more successful we will be
in fighting off that negativity that comes from
within ourselves by the mere practice of repetition
itself and understand that just Repetition is is
is effective.
But also if that if that that Repetition
is backed by actual Reflections that these are
not just phrases that you're saying but the
the how how deeply you believe in them
is Those are conversations that you've had with
yourself or with others.
Those dimensions are conclusions that you have intellectually
brought yourself to and then this repetition is
a further reinforcement of that a reminder of
those Conversations or those reflections or those readings
that have led you to those positive conclusions
to those informed worldly wise optimistic understandings that
source themselves or that final though that they
find the Ultimate source of all reality in
Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala as the individual being
from whom all of this comes so when
I am Reciting alhamdulillah.
This is all of what I am reminding
myself of and I am looking to generate
habits and Behaviors that are more in sync
with this understanding of reality rather than any
other negative or pessimistic Understanding of reality and
how that blends in with gratitude That is
the other dimension that alhamdulillah carries that we
will speak about and before I Before I
close I do want to say that both
praise and gratitude When we say that all
of it belongs to Allah all of it
is due to Allah that is not negating
any praise or any Gratitude that is due
to other than Allah.
What do I mean by that that there
is for example?
We will talk about this tomorrow that whoever
is not grateful to the people is not
grateful to Allah Being grateful to Allah does
not negate gratitude to people just like that
affirming Allah does not require for us to
negate creation negate the world negate all other
aspects and dimensions of reality rather it is
in Affirmation of Allah that they find their
affirmation as well, whether it is the world
of the concrete world of fact or the
world of Ideas or the world of emotions
whatever it is that we're talking about those
they find their affirmation in affirming Allah in
saying alhamdulillah and We affirm Allah through affirming
them since they emanate from his creative Activity
and they are a product of his purposeful
creation of reality so we We understand their
affirmation through alhamdulillah So all praise of it
belongs to Allah does not in any way
negate any other Dimension of reality as not
being as being all deception and nothing no
there is the belief about Allah's greatness assimilates
within itself accommodates an affirmation of all that
is other than Allah as a Necessary corollary
as a necessary prerequisite actually that it is
his creation that it is his world That
he has valued as his ayat as we
will talk about later and we have to
Love him through the love of his creation
We have to affirm him through the affirmation
of his creation of his of all the
ayat that he has Spread out before us,
right?
So just a few reflections on alhamdulillah and
how powerful this one dimension of affirming the
praise of Allah This really is an affirmation
of all of his attributes of all of
the attributes that we will speak about in
Detail as we come across the other ayat
They're encapsulated in alhamdulillah and inshallah in the
next video.
We'll talk about how Gratitude to Allah and
what incredible benefits it has for us Psychologically
speaking we'll talk about that in the next
video.
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Thank you so much Alhamdulillah