Zia Sheikh – Ramadan Khatira Day 24
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The speakers discuss the importance of balancing work and life, not overthinking one's wealth and life. They stress the importance of focusing on balancing work and life, not overthinking one's wealth and life. They also emphasize the importance of not overthinking one's taqwa and the worldly life, and stress the importance of not overthinking one's wealth and life.
AI: Summary ©
Last night we completed the 25th juz' and
I'm just going to focus on some verses
in surat az-Zukhruf and then some others
in surat al-Dukhan and both are related
to the issue of wealth.
Now one of the questions that many people
have or maybe they wonder or think about
is the issue of discrepancy that we have.
Some people are rich, some people are poor,
some people are middle class, some are more
intelligent, some are less intelligent, some make so
much effort yet they end up with very
little, some make less effort yet they end
up with much more.
So Allah SWT He describes that in the
Quran in these few verses that I'm about
to read to you.
Allah SWT says, just go back one more
verse.
The question that was posed to the Prophet
SAW or about the Prophet SAW that why
did this Quran not get revealed to somebody
who was more elite than the Prophet SAW
in terms of his status, in terms of
his wealth.
So Allah SWT responds by saying that this
status is not something that you control.
That is something also given by Allah SWT.
So to think that somebody is better than
the other just because he has more wealth
or he has a bigger house or whatever
it is that people regard as being better,
that is not something that a human should
be thinking about.
So Allah says, are they the ones that
distribute the mercy of Allah SWT?
Are they the ones that distribute the mercy
of your Lord?
We are the ones that have distributed between
them their ma'isha, their sustenance in this
worldly life.
And we have given some a status over
the other.
We have given some a status over the
other.
Why?
So that some of them can take others
to work for them.
Sukhriya, the literal meaning is ridiculing or joking,
but it also means to take labor from
somebody.
So that they can take work from that
person and employ that person.
So if everybody, for example, has the aptitude
of a CEO, it is not going to
work.
Not everybody can be CEO of a company,
otherwise you would have so many companies with
just one CEO.
There will be no workers to work for
that CEO.
So Allah SWT gave people varying intelligences and
varying qualities and varying capabilities so that very
few would be capable of becoming the CEO
of a company.
And then there would be people with a
little less intelligence than that person who would
be in the management positions, and then sub
-managers, and then the general workers, and then
after that people that don't actually work in
the company, but they come in to clean
up the offices after everybody's gone.
Okay, so this need for everybody to do
the work that is required, Allah SWT gave
people varying intelligences and varying capabilities.
So that's the answer to the question that
people may have about this issue.
Otherwise you have people in the same household,
one may have a PhD, and yet his
sibling, his brother may not even complete high
school.
That happens.
And that's actually the reason for it.
وَرَحْمَةُ رَبِّكَ خَيْرٌ مِّمَّا يَجْمَعُونَ And the mercy
of your Lord is better than everything that
they acquire.
The main thing that a person needs to
focus on is not this worldly life.
The believer focuses on the hereafter.
And these different levels, these different statuses, these
are just transitions that we all go through.
Some people go through that in the situation
of being poor, some people go through it
as middle class, and some people go through
it while being rich.
But these are all things which are irrelevant
to Allah SWT.
The real thing that is relevant is a
person's taqwa and what he has built on
the inside.
And as a side note, this issue of
varying capabilities and varying intelligence, this thing is
why, this reason is why the system of
communism could never succeed.
It's destined to failure.
What was communism?
Communism was that everybody is equal.
Everybody has to be treated equally, they have
to have equal pay, and everybody puts in
their fair share, and then ultimately everybody is
treated on the same level playing field.
It doesn't work like that.
Allah SWT didn't create the system like that,
and if we try to enforce the system
to work like that, it is never going
to work.
So ultimately what happened with communism was that
initially it started off with something which seems
very good, that everybody is equal.
But then slowly, slowly, when it was realized
that it's not working, then it became some
people are equal, but some are more equal
than others.
This is what happened with communism.
So then you did ultimately get the elite
ruling class, the top people that again became
rulers and they had the subjects and people
that worked underneath them.
So the wisdom of Allah SWT creating these
different statuses is so that the system keeps
on working and everybody, all the responsibilities of
society are fulfilled, and the jobs that are
required from people to do, that some may
do, some may not do, but somehow some
people because of their lack of education or
lack of experience or lack of skills, they
have to do those works that other people
may not do.
But it's a system in place that Allah
SWT has created, but like I said, these
things are irrelevant.
The thing that we all need to focus
on when we stand in one saf, and
when we are going for Hajj for example,
what are we doing?
We are all equal in the eyes of
Allah SWT.
And the thing that we focus on is
our taqwa, our insight, and the iman that
we have in Allah SWT.
Then Allah SWT goes on to say, If
it wasn't for the fact that people would
be inclined towards becoming one ummah, meaning that
the thing is that Allah SWT has no
value for the worldly life.
The above that we've talked about, Allah says
that people are being given different levels so
that a system is in place.
But the worldly things, Allah SWT has no
value for them.
And He could give these worldly things like
gold and silver to the disbelievers so that
they would be rewarded in the worldly life
for whatever good that they do.
But the thing is that the believers when
they see that the disbelievers have houses made
out of gold and silver as these ayats
suggest, they would follow in their footsteps and
think that okay maybe they are doing something
right that they have these beautiful houses made
out of gold and silver.
It's mentioned in the hadith, If
the world it was equivalent in the eyes
of Allah SWT to the wing of a
mosquito, He would not give a disbeliever one
sip of water.
But He has given the disbeliever everything, so
what that means is that the worldly life
is not even equivalent in the eyes of
Allah SWT to the wing of a mosquito.
He doesn't care for it.
What Allah does care for is again our
deeds and our striving to get close to
Him.
So the verse says, if it wasn't for
the fact that people would become one nation
or try to become one nation, we would
make for the disbelievers, those people that disbelieve
in Rahman, that disbelieve in Allah SWT, for
their houses, ceilings or roofs made out of
silver and staircases that they would be climbing
upon.
So this indicates that it's not just a
one floor house, it's a house with two
floors which is again counted as a luxury
in those times.
And He would make for their houses doors
and beds that they would be leaning and
reclining upon and all of these things He
would make in Zuhruf, He would make them
in the form of gold.
Zuhruf, it has other meanings too, some scholars
say it means zina, beautification.
So He would make all of these things,
silver houses and silver doors and silver staircases
and gold beds, gold frames, whatever kind of
beauty that you can imagine, Allah SWT would
give them.
But He says, all of these things are
simply the benefit of this worldly life.
The Akhirah is what Allah SWT has prepared
for the people of Taqwa, this is what
we should be focusing on, and all of
the worldly adornment is something that we should
realize, it's something that we're going to leave
behind.
And that is where I'm going to focus
on, something which is mentioned in Surah al
-Dukhan.
Allah SWT describes the people of Fir'aun.
We know who Fir'aun was, he was
a person who had palaces and again all
the riches that you can imagine.
At one point, he thought himself to be
the one worthy of worship and he told
people to worship him, not the Allah of
Moses, he himself claimed to be God.
But ultimately he was destroyed.
Him and his followers, his troops, they were
destroyed, Allah SWT describes them.
And this description could fit anyone, anyone who
leaves this world.
So, كَمْ تَرَكُمْ مِنْ جَنَّاتِ وَعُيُونِ How many
gardens and springs did they leave behind when
they passed away?
How many gardens and how many springs, how
many rivers did they leave behind?
وَزُرُوعٍ وَمَقَامٍ كَرِيمٍ And how many fields of
pastures, crops and noble positions did they leave
behind?
وَنَعْمَةٍ كَانُوا فِيهَا فَاكِهِينَ And blessings that they
used to enjoy, how many did they leave
behind?
What happened to all of those things?
All of the money, all the wealth, all
the palaces, all the adornment, all the gold,
all the silver, what happened to it once
they were destroyed?
كَذَلِكَ وَأُورَثْنَهَا قَوْمًا آخَرِينَ We made other people
just become inheritors of that, other people just
inherited.
So again, the houses that we live in,
50 years from now, who's going to be
in that house?
Not us, maybe we're going to be dead
by then, most of us, at least 100
years from now, we'll all be dead.
The houses that we leave behind, it's going
to be inherited by somebody else, either our
own inheritors or the people that come and
buy it later on.
The wealth that we have, we're not going
to take it with us.
That's why the Prophet ﷺ, he says, يَقُولُ
ابْنُ آدَمِ مَالِي مَالِي The son of Adam,
he says, my wealth, my wealth.
And فَهَلَّكَ يَبْنَا آدَمِ إِلَّا مَا أَكَلْتَ فَأَفْنَيْتْ
وَمَا لَبِسْتَ فَأَبْلَيْتْ وَمَا تَصَدَّقْتَ فَأَمْطَيْتْ There are
only three things, O son of Adam, that
are yours.
The food that you eat and it finishes,
and the clothing that you wear and it
gets worn out, or the third thing that
is yours is the sadaqa that you give
and you keep it for yourself in the
hereafter.
These are the three things that are yours.
Otherwise the money that is in your bank
balance, or the money that you've accumulated at
home, the money that you've saved, or you've
dug a hole and put it inside as
a form of treasure, everything is going to
get left behind and your inheritors are going
to take it.
The only thing that is yours is the
stuff that you already used, or you sent
it forward and kept it as an investment
for the hereafter.
So these verses actually, you know, we really
get frustrated sometimes at the number of fundraisings
that we have.
Really, we should remind ourselves that every time
somebody calls for fundraising and calls for giving
us in charity, he's actually doing us a
favour.
He's not our enemy or anything like that.
He's giving us an opportunity to send money
for the hereafter and not leave the money
as a form of waste that we leave
behind and not take it with us as
an investment for the hereafter.
So these verses are very powerful and very
profound.
How many kings have come and how many
pharaohs have come and how many will continue
to come and we will see that they
will pass away, they will die and others
will just take over their palaces and their
wealth and everything.
But the reality of the life is mentioned
here, the reality of the limited time that
we have in this world and the reality
of the worldly things that we accumulate is
also mentioned here that ultimately are not ours
anyway.
So this is something that we should reflect
upon and ponder upon.
I pray that Allah SWT gives us tawfiq
to understand and practice what has been said
and heard.
Al Fatiha.