Zia Sheikh – Capitalizing on the blessings of Allah swt Ramadan Khatira Day 28 732016
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Last night we completed the 29th Juz.
I just want to focus on some verses
in Surah Al-Qalam.
Surah Al-Qalam was revealed at the very
beginning of the Prophethood in which the Prophet
ﷺ had started openly giving dawah to the
people and in response to that dawah, the
Prophet ﷺ was called Majnoon, Sahir and Kahin
and so many different insults.
And Allah ﷻ revealed this Surah to kind
of put him at ease that he was
watching over everything and the fact that the
Quraysh were dealing with him so harshly, it
was not unnoticed by Allah ﷻ and therefore
he would be dealing with the perpetrators of
that crime in the future.
So at the beginning, Allah ﷻ, He takes
an oath and I just want to touch
upon that briefly before I move on to
the main subject, which is an example that
Allah ﷻ gives of the people of Quraysh.
First of all, Allah ﷻ takes an oath.
He says, Noon walqalami wa ma yasturoon Noon
is one of the huruf al-muqata'at
which we do not know the meaning of
and Allah says, I swear by the pen
and what they are writing, meaning what the
angels of Takbeer and Qadr are writing, Allah
ﷻ takes an oath by that and He
says, Ma anta bi ni'mati rabbika bi majnoon
O Prophet of Allah, you are not, through
the mercy of Allah ﷻ, you are not
majnoon, you are not afflicted by a jinn,
you are not crazy and the fact that
they are calling you that and they are
saying that you are majnoon, this does not
make it real.
And then, Wa inna laka la ajran ghayra
mamnoon And indeed for you, there is so
much emphasis here, indeed for you, especially for
you, la ajran, indeed again, laam is here
for qasam, is a reward, ghayra mamnoon, ghayra
mamnoon means an unlimited reward and mamnoon basically
means that favour which is counted.
So, if you give somebody something and then
you keep on reminding him of that favour,
Allah ﷻ says, you are going to get
a reward that nobody is going to count
that favour from you and nobody is going
to remind you, meaning it's an unlimited reward
which is unaccountable.
Allah ﷻ is going to give you a
reward for the fact that you have to
deal with these difficulties in the work of
Prophethood.
And then after that, Wa innaka la'la
khuluqin azeem Indeed, O Prophet of Allah, you
have the best of akhlaaq, you have the
best of manners.
And again, Wa innaka la And then, these
are all words of emphasis.
Inna, emphasis.
Laam, emphasis.
And the dhameer right there, it's for emphasis.
Indeed, you have the best of manners.
So, if you look at the context in
which the Prophet ﷺ is being told you
have the best of manners, it is not
the context in which people are dealing with
him favourably and saying nice things about him
and treating him like a king.
He is being insulted, he is being persecuted,
he is being called all types of different
names.
And in the context of all of those
insults and difficulties that he is going through,
the Prophet ﷺ still displayed the best of
manners.
That is what true akhlaaq is.
Otherwise, if everyone is good to me and
everyone is dealing with me in a nice
way, yes, I can have good akhlaaq and
I can deal with them in a nice
way.
That's not difficult.
The difficulty is when people are giving you
a hard time and you are having a
lot of difficulty with them and then on
top of that, you deal with them in
the best of ways.
That is what good akhlaaq truly is.
So, in the context in which the Prophet
ﷺ was told that you have the best
of manners, it was the context which we
can see from the surrounding verses where he
is being called majnoon and so on.
So, Allah ﷻ says to him, O Prophet
of Allah, you are going to see and
they are going to also see.
Which of you all are in a trial?
Meaning, who is a majnoon, who is on
the right path, who is misguided, you will
find out in the future, in the hereafter,
that will truly emerge.
So, you will see that.
So, O Prophet of Allah, be patient.
Your Lord, He has more knowledge of those
people that are misguided from His path and
those people that are on the right path.
After that, I'm going to skip and go
on to an example that Allah ﷻ is
giving.
And I'm going to go through that example
first and then we're going to compare it
with the purpose of bringing those particular verses.
Indeed, we have tested them, tested the Quraysh
to whom the Prophet ﷺ was sent, just
like we tested the people of the garden.
So, it's the story of a people who
have a garden that is ready for harvesting,
the fruit is ready and they are about
to get that fruit.
So, Allah ﷻ is saying, we are testing
the Quraysh just like we tested the people
of the garden.
When they took an oath that most certainly
they're going to harvest it in the morning.
So, the fruit is ready for picking, they're
ready to harvest the fruit or the crop
and they are taking an oath.
They are saying that, Wallahi, we're going to
go in the morning and we're going to
harvest the fruit.
This year we've had a very good crop.
This year we've had a very good harvest.
We're going to take it tomorrow.
And they didn't make any type of exception.
What does that mean, taking an exception?
It means that they did not set aside
a share for the poor people.
They didn't set aside a share for the
poor people and they said basically everything is
ours and nobody is deserving of this.
We put our back into this harvest.
We made a huge effort and now we
are the ones that deserve it.
Nobody else is going to deserve it, no
poor person or anything.
So, what happened?
They took an oath that in the morning
they're going to harvest it.
Overnight something happened.
Something came overnight.
A punishment from Allah ﷻ came overnight.
Ta'if basically means, from the word Tawaf,
right?
Tawaf, it means to circulate, circumambulate.
So, this punishment of Allah ﷻ in whatever
form it was, whether it's a fire or
a tornado or a hurricane, whatever it was,
it destroyed everything.
While they were sleeping.
And this whole harvest became like chewed up
or harvested crop.
Sareem, according to Ibn Abbas, means like a
black night.
Everything became darkened and charred and destroyed.
And according to the majority of the scholars,
As-Sareem means that harvest that has already
been chopped down.
So, you see a harvest one day and
the next day the farmer, he chops it
down and he takes all the crop.
So, what remains of it, that is As
-Sareem.
So, it became as if it's already been
harvested.
And now they don't know that's happened.
So, they wake up in the morning and
they're calling each other.
They are calling each other in the morning.
Let's hurry and go early to the fields
so we can do the harvesting.
If you want to do the harvesting, let's
hurry to the fields if you're going to
do it.
And they walked while they were doing Takhafud.
Takhafud means talking slowly and quietly.
Why?
The next ayah says, And they were talking
slowly and quietly so that the Masakeen and
the poor people don't realize that they're going
for the harvesting and they don't come and
ask for their share.
That today, no Maskeen should enter upon this
harvest because we want everything for ourselves.
And they came to Hard, basically means with
a strong resolve, with a strong intention.
They came fully equipped with a good intention,
a full intention that they're going to do
the harvesting today and they're going to keep
it all to themselves.
And when they saw it, they said, Looks
like we lost the way.
This isn't our harvest.
This isn't our field.
We probably took a wrong turn somewhere.
And they said, And then they realized, no,
it is their field.
In fact, we are, we have been deprived.
So this is actually what happens when a
person is faced with a tragedy or difficulty.
The first thing that happens is there's denial.
There's a psychological, you know, steps, psychological steps
that take place when a person is faced
with a difficulty or grief or a tragedy.
Somebody, a doctor tells him, you have a
very bad illness.
So the person initially, he will say, no,
the test must be wrong.
I'm going to get a second opinion.
Denial always there.
So this is what happened.
The first thing they said, this isn't our
field.
They denied that it was their field.
The denial took place.
And then when the reality sets in, then
the person starts to actually believe it.
And he says, and the next Ayah, The
reality is, yes, I have got that illness.
I've taken that second opinion.
I have got that illness.
And they realized that it is the field
that they have.
The middle from amongst them, and Awsat, according
to the scholars, it refers to, the best
among them, the most just amongst them, said
to them, Didn't I tell you, why don't
you make the tasbih of Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala?
And the tasbih here refers to the issue
of giving in charity.
Because glorification of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala,
it comes in many forms.
And one of them is giving in charity.
It doesn't necessarily mean to make the tasbih
itself.
In the context in which the word is
being used, it means to give in charity.
Didn't I tell you to give in charity?
And they realized that our Lord is pure
and we were the wrongdoers.
And they turned to each other and started
blaming each other also.
So this also happens.
When people get into trouble, one of the
things that they do is they start blaming
each other and they don't take responsibility for
their own actions.
They started saying that indeed we were transgressors.
Maybe Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is going
to replace it with something better than that.
We should now turn to Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, This is
how the punishment comes.
And the punishment of the hereafter is greater
if only they knew.
So what does this mean?
That the punishments that we get in this
world or the tests that we get in
this world, these are minor in comparison to
the tests that we will get in the
hereafter.
We will certainly make the people taste the
smaller punishments in this world.
Affliction with illness, you know, difficulties in the
marriage, difficulty with the children, problems with the
business, financial difficulties.
This is the small test that Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala sends sometimes.
But the main punishment is in the hereafter.
So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala keeps us
on the straight path by giving us these
small doses so that we keep on turning
to him.
So here Allah says that the punishment of
the hereafter is greater if only they knew.
So what is this story about?
And what is it meaning?
What does it mean in the context in
which Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala brings these
verses?
The Quraysh, they are insulting the Prophet.
They are not taking the message from him.
So what it means is that Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala, he is giving the example
of a good village that is getting so
many different types of benefits from Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala in terms of harvesting, fruit,
crops, and so on.
And this village, it's referring to Makkah al
-Mukarramah.
And the people of Makkah, they are getting
all types of fruits because of the fact
that the Ka'bah is there.
People are coming, they are migrating, they are
coming to do the pilgrimage.
So a huge economy is based upon people
coming to Makkah al-Mukarramah.
In addition to that, people from north and
south are respecting the people of Makkah because
the Ka'bah, the Baytullah is there.
And they get privileges for that reason.
So when they go to the north in
the summertime, they do trade in Jerusalem and
Bilad al-Sham.
And in the wintertime, they go to Yemen
to the south and they do trade over
there.
And everything is beautiful.
Business is booming.
They are getting so much profit.
And then one prophet comes to them.
And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala mentioned here,
Awsatuhum.
Who is the Awsatuhum?
The Prophet ﷺ comes to them and tells
them that Allah has blessed you with so
much.
Why don't you worship only Him?
Why don't you worship only Him?
But they don't listen to Him.
They don't listen to His message.
And Allah is saying that there is a
big possibility that these people that do not
accept the message that is given to them,
they would be deprived of the blessings that
they have.
And a punishment comes to them in this
world.
So this is the message that Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala is giving to the people
of Quraysh.
That don't be like these people, this example
that is being given to you.
It is for you to wake up and
realize how many blessings you've been given.
You should listen to the Prophet that has
come.
Otherwise, there is a high possibility that Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala could punish you.
So the same thing actually applies to us.
If we take it away from the context
in which it was revealed and we take
it upon ourselves, Allah has blessed us with
so much.
And the only thing that Allah wants from
us is that we lead our life in
His obedience.
Stay away from His disobedience.
And to lead our life in a way
that pleases Him.
And sometimes if we do not, then Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala can send down these
calamities and tests.
So that first of all, we wake up.
And secondly, so that our sins are forgiven
in this world.
So we don't have, you know, the punishment
of the hereafter.
So, if Allah has blessed us with these
blessings, first of all, we need to use
those blessings to please Allah subhanahu wa ta
'ala.
And in His obedience.
And also, keep a share for the poor
and the needy.
And don't be stingy with them.
And this is basically the lesson that we
learn from these verses that Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala has told us in Surah Al
-Qalam.
I pray that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
gives us sufiq to understand and practice what
is being said in it.