EPIC Masjid, Imam Abdul Nasir Jangda, Importance of being frequent to Masjid. Part 1/2

The Story of Banu Salimah and the Wisdom of the Prophet

At the time of the Prophet ﷺ, there was a tribe that had accepted Islam, that embraced the faith by the name of Banu Salimah. And I'll talk a little bit more about their virtues later on in the khutbah. But this was a people, this was a tribe that had accepted Islam.

And they had fully embraced the faith and the religion. There was a challenge that they faced. The challenge for them was that they lived a little bit of distance from the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ. Not considering modern means of transportation, heavily having to rely upon foot travel, or at the very most, maybe animals.

They lived at a little bit of a distance from the masjid, which made it difficult, made it cumbersome for them to frequent and regularly attend the masjid five times a day. Particularly for Salatul Isha and Salatul Fajr, the prayers that were at the time of darkness, at the time of night, it was very challenging for them. They decided as a tribe — and this is a testament to their convictions — they decided as an entire tribe to pick up and to move closer to the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ.

There was land that was available closer to the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ. At the time of the Prophet ﷺ, there was some land that was still available near the masjid. So they decided they will pick up as an entire tribe and move closer to the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ, no matter the inconvenience or difficulty that might cause.

The Prophet ﷺ came to know about this intention that they had. The Prophet ﷺ summoned them and said:

He said: "The news has reached me that you intend — all of you — to move closer to the masjid." And they said:

"Absolutely, O Messenger of God, that is exactly what we intend to do."

The Prophet ﷺ responded to them. And these words of the Prophet ﷺ are authenticated, mentioned in the Sahih of Imam Bukhari. These words of the Prophet ﷺ have lived on and carried on for 1400 years and have reached us today and will live on long after we are gone.

The Prophet ﷺ left lasting advice. And he said something very interesting, very thoughtful. The Prophet of Allah ﷺ told them:

(Sahih Muslim, Book 4, Hadith 1517)

"O Banu Salimah! O Banu Salimah! Your homes, your homes. Stay where you live. Don't leave your homes, stay where you live. Hold on to your residence. Your footsteps are written down for you as reward."

In an extended narration of the hadith, the Prophet ﷺ actually told them:

Or:

"For every step that you take, you receive a reward" — or — "you receive a higher stage in paradise." So stay where you live.

What the Masjid Truly Is

Now the reason why I bring this up — the first and foremost thing I'd like to address and talk about — is that we all understand the importance and the reality of what the masjid is. But a reminder never hurt anyone.

A reminder only benefits us. It can only help, it can only benefit. So I'd like to remind myself — and everyone here — what the masjid actually is.

There's a narration from the Prophet ﷺ narrated by Ibn Abbas, that is mentioned in the book of al-Tabarani, where the Prophet ﷺ says:

(Al-Mu'jam al-Kabir of al-Tabarani, narrated by Ibn Abbas)

"The masajid are the houses of God on the face of this earth." So the masjid just isn't a masjid. Masjid literally means a place where you do sajda, a place where you put your face on the ground before Allah. But that's not all that it is. A masjid is the house of God — it is sacred, it is sanctified by Allah and His Messenger.

"The masajid belong to Allah, so do not invoke anyone along with Allah." So they are very sacred places, they are very special places. These are the houses of Allah.

That same narration goes on to say that the Prophet ﷺ says:

(Al-Mu'jam al-Kabir of al-Tabarani, narrated by Ibn Abbas)

"The masajid shine and glow to the inhabitants of the heavens just as the stars in the sky shine and glow for the people living on the earth."

You know, at night when you step outside and look up into the sky and the stars are shining and brilliant and visible — the masajid of the earth shine like that unto the inhabitants of the heavens. That's what these masajid are. The masajid are the houses of Allah, places of worship — glowing, blessed places on the face of this earth. The masajid are places where we go to receive the blessings of Allah. Peace and tranquility, safety — guaranteed from Allah — is found here at the masjid.

Masajid are very, very blessed places. The Prophet of Allah ﷺ tells us that a prayer I pray in my home, or in my store, or wherever I may be — alhamdulillah, may Allah give me tawfiq, it is accepted by Allah. But if that same prayer I was to offer it in the masjid, I would get 25 times the reward of that. Another narration says I would get 27 times the reward, by praying it here in the masjid.

Light on the Day of Judgment

On the Day of Judgment — and this is going to be a little bit sobering for us, but it's helpful — there will be very severe circumstances. There will be hardship like humanity has never seen before. May Allah protect us all on that day. One of the many hardships on that day is that there will be darkness. Humanity will be plunged into darkness. People will not be able to see where they're going. And it will be frightening, more frightening than anything we've ever experienced in this life.

But there will be people on that day, and the Qur'an speaks about these people:

There will be people who will be moving swiftly. Everybody else will see these people flashing by them. They will be the envy of humanity on the Day of Judgment. There will be a nur, a light — and Allah says it will be their light, it will belong to them. The light will be moving in front of them and on their right, guiding them and protecting them, lighting the way for them as they move along.

Now where did they get that light? The Qur'an tells us:

"Go back to the life of the world and go find your light over there." That's where you find the light — in the life of the previous life, the life of this world, the dunya. Now where and how is that light achieved in this world so that we can have light on the Day of Judgment? A hadith of the Prophet ﷺ explains this. The Prophet of Allah ﷺ says:

(Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith 561; Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 223)

"Congratulate those people who would regularly, frequently walk to the houses of God in the darknesses of night — congratulate them — that they would have a complete light on the Day of Judgment."

That light on the Day of Judgment is promised to those people who would come to the masjid regardless of the circumstances, in spite of difficulty — they would come to the masjid. That's what these masajid are. That's how blessed these places are.

The Deeper Wisdom: Don't Move Closer — Stay and Keep Coming

These people of the Banu Salimah, for these obvious reasons that we've just mentioned, wanted to move closer to the masjid. They wanted to be able to come and go frequently. The Prophet of Allah ﷺ says: stay where you live. Don't move closer. Stay where you live. The reward is multiplied according to whatever sacrifice you are investing into this noble act, this noble endeavor.

Why not tell them to move closer to the masjid? That seems so logical. We all talk about it — "Man, if I lived next door to the masjid..." That seems such a logical thing to do. It's actually considered a very admirable thing. "Oh mashaAllah, did you hear about that brother? He built his house right next door to the masjid!" Seems like such a good thing to do, such a noble thing to do.

Why is the Prophet of God ﷺ telling believers — firm, solid believers, not hypocrites; the people of Banu Salimah have great virtues — why is he telling them not to move closer to the masjid? Because the words of the Prophet ﷺ were meant to live on for centuries and generations and millennia afterward as guidance for this ummah. And the Prophet ﷺ was cautioning us, instructing us, teaching us to think beyond the surface and to understand the situation.

What gets in the way of coming to the masjid or not coming to the masjid is not solely physical proximity. That's superficial thinking. You can move closer to the masjid and still not come to the masjid if it's not a priority for you.

I actually just came back from Umrah, alhamdulillah. I was speaking over there and I got to meet a family — mashaAllah, they lived in Mecca for 40 years, all their kids were born and raised there. I was talking to their sons, young men, very good boys, mashaAllah — they were doing Umrah in Ramadan and coming to the masjid to pray every single day. And I started to kind of observe and talk to them. You know when you're in this line of work, you have some baggage. Wherever you go, you can't turn it off — you're constantly in observation mode, constantly trying to understand what's going on with the ummah.

So I asked them: what's it like to grow up in Mecca? And I started to talk to them about their company and the other kids and things like that. And he told me that the vast, overwhelming majority of young guys they grew up with — all their friends, their schoolmates, their classmates, the kids who lived in their neighborhood — he said most of them have been born and raised in the city of Mecca and have never stepped foot in the Haram.

Shocking, isn't it? We spend tens of thousands of dollars, we plan for years and years and decades. My parents planned for 30 years to go for Hajj before they were able to. We plan for decades, save tens of thousands of dollars to be able to visit there. And I can't fathom how somebody could live a five-minute walk away and never go in. Not that they didn't do Umrah. Not that they don't pray Tarawih there. They have never stepped foot inside of the Haram.

And at that moment, the words of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ were ringing through my head, echoing in my head. He said: no, no, no, don't fall into the superficial trap of thinking "we'll just move closer and then alhamdulillah everything will take care of itself." No, no, no. Stay where you live. Keep putting in the work. Have your heart and your mind in the right place. Let this place have value to you and understand why you need to go and what is at stake. That's why the Prophet ﷺ gave them this advice.

What Is at Stake: The Ayah of the Masjid

We have to understand what's at stake for us in going to the masjid. Salah can be prayed anywhere. The Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 335; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 521)

As a gift to the Prophet ﷺ and his ummah, the entire earth has been made a masjid. We can pray salah anywhere — as long as it's clean, we can face towards the qiblah, and we can pray wherever we're at. That's a gift from Allah. But we still have to make time, we still have to put in an effort to come to the house of Allah. That was something we did throughout the month of Ramadan. We have to keep that going.

What's at stake? Let's talk about what's at stake. The ayah that I alluded to at the beginning of the khutbah:

Those people are fit to attend to the houses of God, to the masajid of Allah — those people who believe in Allah; who believe in the last final day, the Day of Judgment, the day of reckoning, the day of retribution, the day of accountability, the day we have to stand before God and answer for how we lived our lives; those people who established the prayer, that no matter where they were, what was going on with them, what was occurring at that point in time in their day or in their life — they knew: it is now time for me to stand before Allah, and they would step aside and pray to Allah.

وَآتَى الزَّكَاةَ — and they not only were cognizant and aware of Allah and had a relationship with Allah on a daily basis, but they were also conscious of what was going on with their fellow man. They were aware of their communities and their societies. They knew what was going on. They did not turn a blind eye to the suffering of people within their own communities. They were aware of who is financially struggling, who is poor, who is needy in their communities. And they did something about it — they gave charity, they contributed, they tried to help those people who were less fortunate in their communities.

وَلَمْ يَخْشَ إِلَّا اللَّهَ — in following this path of believing in Allah, living life with the consciousness and awareness that the Day of Judgment is coming and I'm going to answer for how I lived my life, having a relationship with Allah on a daily basis, and being conscious of the suffering and the plight of their fellow human beings — they knew that challenges and difficulties would come. It wouldn't be a walk in the park. There would be resistance, there would be trouble at times. But they feared no one but Allah. They knew what they had to do and they were willing to do it.

فَعَسَىٰ أُولَٰئِكَ أَن يَكُونُوا مِنَ الْمُهْتَدِينَ — Allah says that it is very, very hopeful that these people will be rightly guided by Allah. These people will be taken care of by Allah. And Allah will guide them through life and into the life of the Hereafter for eternal salvation and eternal bliss and success.

Now there are two ways to understand this ayah. One way is that the people with these qualities are the people who are fit, who are suited to attend the masjid, who qualify to attend the masjid. But the mufassirun and the scholars and the sahaba, may Allah be pleased with them, tell us this is meant to be understood the other way around as well — that when you attend the masjid, these are the qualities that you will develop by attending the masjid. When you frequently and regularly attend the masjid in spite of all of your issues and keep coming back to the house of Allah, these are the qualities that will start to manifest within yourself:

Your iman in Allah will become stronger. Your faith in the Day of Judgment will become stronger. Your prayer will become stronger. You will become more conscious of the suffering and the plight of your fellow man. You will become stronger in your resolve to obey Allah no matter what the challenges may be. And Allah will continue to light the way and continue to guide you.

This is what's at stake. This is the incentive. This is why we cannot shun the masjid from our daily lives. We have to come, we have to be here.

Overcoming the Obstacles to the Masjid

Now I talked about how the Prophet ﷺ told the people of Banu Salimah: don't just physically move closer, but remember why you come and then keep coming. Let's talk about some of the natural challenges — what we do have to overcome in order to keep coming to the masjid.

1. Work

Most common issue, most common obstacle in coming to the masjid: work. "Brother, I'm very busy. I work a full-time job. With the economy, I work two jobs. It's very, very tough, it's very difficult." And I understand that it's a legitimate struggle for many people. May Allah bless them and may Allah make it easy for them. Our hearts go out to those brothers and sisters who are working hard trying to live an honorable, dignified life and are just struggling.

But for those of us who conveniently may use work as an excuse, we have to look in the mirror. We have to be real with ourselves. We have to be honest with ourselves. We have to be honest with Allah. I can make time. If I make 10 minutes to pray, I can add on an extra 10 minutes to at least come to the masjid at least once a day, can't I? It's the house of Allah. Doesn't Allah deserve that much from me? He's given me everything that I have. This job that is so amazing — that I'm using as an excuse to be far from the house of Allah — shouldn't I in turn be more grateful to Allah for that job that He's given me? And make extra time for Allah?

And I'll even be very honest with you — brutally honest — if the motivation is there, if the intention is there, where there's a will there's a way. I know of brothers and sisters who have very difficult work situations. They can't get off at the actual time of prayer to pray salah in congregation in the masjid. You know what they still do? Say Dhuhr is at 1:30 pm — they're working at that time. Their boss is very strict. Lunch break is from 11 to 12. No ifs, ands, and buts. You cannot go at 1:30.

So what do they do? I know brothers and sisters who, between the hours of 11 and 12 — even though there's no salah at that time, even though there's no congregation at that time — during their lunch break, instead of just going and sitting at a restaurant laughing and joking, instead of going and sitting at Starbucks and wasting an entire hour, they will use that lunch break to come to the masjid. You'll see them — walk into the masjid at random hours between the times of prayer, and you'll see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 people quietly in a corner, praying on their own.

One of my teachers actually said: "Those are the awliya of our time." Because no matter what the challenges or the struggle may be, that person says: "I know there's not a salah at this time, but I just cannot go a single day without presenting myself in the house of God and saying: Ya Allah, I came. O Allah, I showed up. O Allah, I'm trying my best." That's sincerity.

So if we want to come to the masjid and be a guest in the house of Allah — if somebody famous invited us to their house, how honored do we feel? If we get invited to some big Dr. Sahib's house for Eid, like mashallah, I'm going to put on something nice and conveniently inform everybody — even though they didn't ask — "Oh, I'm really busy, I have to go to his house today." Why? Because we're proud of that. I'm going to his house for Eid. And here is the house of Allah.

So work is a challenge, but it can be overcome if we want to.

2. Family

Another challenge, another obstacle in attending the masjid and frequenting the house of God is oftentimes family. There's a struggle in terms of family: "I work so much, when I finally get off work I have to spend time with my kids, I have to spend time with my family. I have to give some time to my wife, I have to give some time to my kids." And that's a legitimate concern. Very legitimate in our times.

Right now, currently, globally, nationally, and even in the Muslim community, we have a crisis of family going on. Homes are on fire. Families are crumbling. The foundation of the institution of family is crumbling before our very eyes. So somebody who is focused on their family — I got nothing but love for that person. I congratulate that person for being sensible in a time of senselessness.

But at the same time, we can manage this situation better. We need to create a culture within our homes and our families. And we need to create an environment and an atmosphere in our masajid, in our communities, where quality family time can include, can involve, coming to the house of Allah. That needs to happen.

Otherwise we force people to choose between one or the other. Just like as families we go out to eat together, we go to the mall together, we go to the park or the lake together, we go to Six Flags together — just like as families we go out for recreation or entertainment together, as families we need to be able to go to the masjid and pray together. And that's going to require us focusing on teaching our families this. And it's also going to require us as a community to create an environment, an atmosphere, and a mentality that allows and accommodates families to come to the masjid and be in the masjid — so that this can be a place that is part of the family activity, part of the family bonding experience.

3. Social Issues

Thirdly, another issue that oftentimes gets in the way of going to the masjid is social issues. "I like him, I don't like him. She said this, he said that. He does this, he does that." I will be very blunt for just a second — and I apologize in advance, may Allah forgive me — but very honestly, that shouldn't matter. Who's there and who's not there, that should not matter to me. Whether I like that person or not — that's irrelevant. We're talking about coming to the house of Allah, to pray to Allah, to make du'a to Allah, to remember Allah, to read the Book of Allah. I only see one consistent thing that should matter, that should factor into my decision of going or not going — and that is Allah. That's it. I'm here for Allah. Who else is there and who's not there is irrelevant to me.

And more often than not, that is a sign of a disease of the heart — that I'm so set on hating someone, having animosity towards a Muslim brother or sister, that I will let that prevent me from coming to the house of Allah. That's a problem. I need to remedy and fix that problem by coming to the house of Allah. Stepping on my ego, on my nafs, and coming to the house of Allah. Humbling myself before Allah, putting my face on the ground and saying: "Ya Allah, I'm here for You. Cleanse my heart, Ya Allah."

4. Ideological Conflict

And lastly, an obstacle in coming to the masjid is oftentimes ideological conflict or being very opinionated about issues within the religion. "He doesn't conform to my ideals of Islam and they don't practice Islam the way I understand it." These issues are things that have to be resolved and addressed — this is a topic and an issue in and of itself, and Shaykh Nadim, the imam of this community and masjid, is much better suited and qualified to address these. So I won't overstep my boundaries and talk about that.

But I will say this much: once again, that cannot and should not factor into my decision for coming to the masjid. That is the peak of arrogance — the pinnacle of conceited arrogance. My opinion in regards to something is so paramount, so important to me, that I will let that prevent me from coming and standing amongst the ummah, in the congregation, in the jama'at, and praying to Allah. That is true misfortune. We should never ever let that factor in.

We need to understand why we are here. I'm here to pray to Allah — the One who created me, feeds me, sustains me, provides for me, maintains me, cares for me, guides me, protects me, has given me everything that I have — the things I realize and the things I don't realize. How dare I let anything get in the way of me coming to the house of Allah and submitting myself before Allah? It's a sad, terrible thing. But we need to understand we have to keep coming to the masjid — regardless of what's going on, regardless of what other obstacles there may be. We need to understand that our motivation for coming is that relationship with Allah.

A Final Word to the Regulars: Custodians of the House of Allah

The last note that I will mention here — especially now that Ramadan has been over for five days and obviously we've seen the numbers dwindling in the masjid — this is advice and counsel for me and for all my brothers and sisters who might struggle in going to the masjid.

But I will also offer one last humble reminder to those brothers and sisters who might be more regular in attending the masjid — mashaAllah, the punctual brothers and sisters who are in the masjid on a daily basis, every single day. We have to understand: if we are regularly in the masjid, we are the custodians, the servants of the house of God. We are the custodians, the servants, the janitors of the masjid. That's all we are. That's all we are. We're not in charge. We're not the boss. This is not our house. This is the house of Allah.

And our job is to make the house of Allah as welcoming and as open as possible for all the creation of Allah, for all the servants of God to be able to come here and pray. I need to very, very seriously check myself: Have I ever been an obstacle in anyone coming to the masjid, the house of Allah? If I have — may Allah forgive me — I need to change my ways, because that is something I will be held accountable for before Allah. This was not mine to run. I was nobody to push someone away or to bring someone closer. I am simply a servant here. I have to make this as open and as welcoming as possible, come here to pray myself, and pray for my own salvation.

It's the house of Allah. And our job is to make it as open and accommodating as possible. The stories go on and on. Time doesn't allow for all of them. A Bedouin comes and urinates in the masjid — can you imagine that? We've been told this story so many times we've become desensitized to it. I want you to try to imagine it — have a visual of a man, right now, walking into the masjid and standing right there and urinating in the masjid. Get that visual in your head. And then think about how shocking that is.

How did the Messenger of Allah ﷺ handle that? We can have rules — he told him: "Listen, sir, it's not appropriate, we can't do that in the masjid." We can have rules. But look at how he went about implementing them — with kindness, with love, with generosity.