Surah Kahf Recitation & Jumu'ah Khutbah | Mawlana Ahsan Syed | 7/25

Jumu'ah Khutbah — Mawlana Ahsan Syed

Our brothers are requested to come to the masjid and start to read Surah Al-Kahf.

Recitation from Surah Al-Kahf

"Say, shall We inform you of those who have lost the most in terms of their deeds? Those who have lost their efforts in the life of this world, and they think that they are doing good. Those are the ones who disbelieved in the signs of their Lord and His meeting. So their deeds were in vain, and We will not give them any weight on the Day of Resurrection. That is their reward — Hell — because they disbelieved and took My signs and My messengers as a mockery. Indeed, those who believed and did righteous deeds — they will have the Gardens of Paradise as their abode. They will abide therein, not seeking any change from it."

"Say, if the sea were ink for the words of my Lord, the sea would be exhausted before the words of my Lord were exhausted, even if We brought the like of it as a supplement. Say, I am only a human being like you. It has been revealed to me that your God is one God. So whoever hopes to meet his Lord, let him do righteous deeds and not associate anyone in the worship of his Lord."

Khutbah: Allah's Provisions — For This World and the Next

Allah provided insan — the human being — with everything that insan needs. Anything that man needs, Allah made and provided for him. Whether these are his needs in terms of his survival in this world — from the smallest basic things that insan needs for his survival, the air we breathe, which a person doesn't even recognize — or for example, the alternation between the sun, the moon, the day, the night, the earth orbiting and the way it orbits. All of that is there to fulfill, in fact, insan's needs. It's there to fulfill man's needs.

The alternation of day and night, for example — the rising of the sun, the setting of the sun. Allah mentions in the Quran:

"And He has subjected for you the sun and the moon."

Perhaps somebody asked: how is the sun and the moon subjugated for us? I can't control the sun and the moon. But Allah gave insan knowledge. We know exactly, precisely the time that the sun will rise, the time that the sun will set. Now you and I, living in the type of world that we live in, the type of context we live in, we may not feel that that's something that we have power and control over. But you ask the farmer — ask the farmer for whom it is absolutely essential to know the seasons, to know the time the sun rises and the time the sun sets. Ask him, he'll tell you. But all of that is there for us.

Allah mentions in numerous places in the Quran about the day and night — the day is there for you to work, and the night is made for you to rest.

"Say, have you considered: if Allah were to make the night everlasting until the Day of Resurrection, what god other than Allah could bring you light?"

If we were to make the night everlasting — everlasting night — can you imagine everlasting night? Is there anyone who can bring the light back? No one.

"Say, have you considered: if Allah were to make the day everlasting until the Day of Resurrection, what god other than Allah could bring you night in which you may rest?"

Imagine — the day just continues, continues, continues, the sun constantly there. Is there anyone who can bring night in which you can rest? We all know the type of rest you get at night, subhanAllah. Nothing compares to it. Even a couple of hours at night — sometimes the type of energy that it provides for you is not the same as taking rest during the day. Sometimes you go to sleep during the day, you try to take a nap, and you just feel more groggy when you wake up. Something ajeeb — Allah put something remarkable in this system. There is fa'idah, there is benefit for insan in it.

Whatever the needs are — Allah made it for you. From your water, your food, whatever it is. And it's at such a profound level that we, being somewhat disconnected from nature, sometimes don't even think or realize. Of these animals, Allah provided — mashallah — the chicken and the goat and the beef, it comes ready at the store. You just come, you consume it. Your wife cooks it for you, it's there. You come home, ready. But subhanAllah, the whole process and everything that's associated with it — what Allah made for insan is ajeeb.

"In them there is warmth for you and benefits."

People in the past — for example, I was mentioning this in one of the classes too — here, if you go to the Field Museum, there's an exhibit they have for the Native Americans. They show the different things they used to use, all using animal hide. They used to make their tents from it. Allah refers to it in the Quran as well, in Surah An-Nahl. The bones — through the bones of the animals they would make various instruments, different tools. And, it may sound a little gross, but even the manure of the animals was used in farming. It's a form of fertilizer. SubhanAllah, ajeeb.

Provisions for the Hereafter

So everything insan needs — likewise, Allah also provided insan with that which he would need and requires to survive the hereafter. Because life is not limited to this world. That's the perspective — that's the limited vision of one who does not believe in Allah.

You ask the atheist, or some of these other cultures — they'll say, maybe a person dies and he's reincarnated to a different form, or whatever the case may be. Or the atheist will say, no, I'm just here. It's just time. I'll live my life, I'll become bones, I'll mix with the earth — that's it, that's the end of my life. And so when they say "you only live once," their perspective is: hey, do what you want, enjoy life. Because that's the extent of their knowledge. They don't have anything beyond this. Do what you want, enjoy life, take whatever you want from life, because you're not going to be living again.

But that's not the perspective of one who believes in Allah. One who believes in Allah knows that there is another life hereafter. But how do I survive in that life? Is there something set up for me? Is there something by which I can ensure that my life at that time will be taken care of?

Here, in our context, in our community, one of the things that, from the beginning, you're trained on — literally from the time you're young — is that you're going through high school and college, and you have to make sure you have a retirement fund. After you retire, after a certain age, what are you going to do? Where are you going to live? How are you going to have a source of income? So from the beginning, as a person is working, he's also thinking: I have to save, I have to make sure I'm investing, I have to have some type of fund that will take care of my needs when I'm in my old age. And that's the age when you actually have more needs, but you're young right now and can do many things. But what happens when that time comes in life? Where it's difficult to walk? Where I may not have people to help me? Maybe my kids are going to be with me, maybe not. Maybe my kids support me, maybe they don't. How am I going to pay the bills at that time? I may not have the strength in my hands to work anymore. I may not have my mental faculties anymore. They're not going to be as sharp. I may not be able to see or hear as well as I can now. What's going to happen at that time?

So a person worries about this. So we set up a retirement. I have to make sure that I have enough. But what's going to happen when you leave this world? When you retire to the next world? What do you have in place to take care of those needs?

Even those needs — Allah provided for you. If you want to work for that, I'll give you a solution. This is what you need to do, in order to ensure that your life at that time is secure. You can't just expect, "Well, I'm an American citizen, so definitely my retirement fund is going to be taken care of by virtue of me being an American citizen." Does anybody operate like that? Nobody operates like that. You know that depending on how much you save, depending on the investments that you make, depending on the choices that you make — that's how much you're going to benefit when you retire.

Preparing for the Day of Judgment

So when it comes to the hereafter, a person says, inshallah. The person who says la ilaha illallah Muhammadur rasulullah — the Messenger of Allah says this person will enter into jannah. But does that mean he'll immediately enter into jannah? Does that mean that he will not go through the difficulties of the Day of Judgment? Those are trials, my dear brothers, that you and I have no idea of how severe they are. We have no idea. The Quran mentions it, the hadith of the Prophet mentions it, but we cannot visualize, we cannot imagine the extent of how severe those days will be.

The Prophet mentions, for example, that on the Day of Judgment the sun will be brought near. And a person is going to sweat — some to their ankles, some to their knees, some to their hips, and some will be drowning in their sweat — based on their sins.

So have we done something to prepare for that? There is a solution. The Prophet mentions that on the Day of Judgment there will be seven categories of individuals who will be under the shade of Allah's throne. Did we try to make sure that we're from one of those seven categories? Am I working towards any one of those seven categories?

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 660; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1031)

"Seven are the ones whom Allah will shade with His shade on the Day when there will be no shade but His shade: the just ruler; a young man who grew up in the worship of Allah; a man whose heart is attached to the mosques; two men who love each other for the sake of Allah, meeting and parting on that basis; a man who is called by a woman of beauty and status but says 'I fear Allah'; a man who gives in charity so secretly that his left hand does not know what his right hand gives; and a man who remembers Allah in seclusion until his eyes overflow with tears."

Al-imam al-adil — the just ruler. Shaabun nasha'a fi ibadati rabbi — a young man who grows up, who spends his youth in the worship of Allah. That time, that part of one's life when you have physical ability, you have the strength, you have no responsibilities. A person feels: I can do whatever I want. But instead of choosing what all other people do, and other options that they have, he chooses to worship Allah.

Or, for example, that man — rajulun ata'hullahu malan fa anfaqahu — he spends the wealth that Allah gave him, in such a manner that his left hand doesn't even know what his right hand is spending. He spends for the sake of Allah, without even worrying: should I give this much or that much? He says, no — fee sabeelillah, no problem. How much do I have? Okay, no problem.

Or that individual who remembers Allah — zakar Allaha ta'ala khaliyan fafadat aynah — he remembers Allah when he's in isolation, when there's nobody there to look at him, nobody there to say, "Oh wow, mashallah, he's such a righteous pious person." Nobody's watching him. Nobody's looking at him. And in that isolation he remembers Allah, and tears flow from his eyes out of the remembrance of Allah.

These are the individuals who will be under the shade of Allah. Did we make an effort? Did we try in the life that we have — which this life is mazra'atun lil-akhirah, a field that Allah made for us to cultivate so that we could reap its rewards in the hereafter — did we make an effort for that or not?

The Shari'ah: Allah's Divine Law

What I originally had planned to talk about was where Allah gave all of these things for us. Allah made these arrangements. One of the things that Allah gave is also the shari'ah. I know today you hear the word shari'ah and everybody gets scared. What's going to happen? But what is the shari'ah? Shari'ah is divine law. It is a law that Allah gave to ensure that your life in this world and in the hereafter go in such a manner that is pleasant — that is best for you.

Now it may be possible that there are certain laws of Allah that a person is not comfortable with. That can happen. But just because something is uncomfortable for a person, it doesn't mean that it's not beneficial for the person. We have so many examples of that in life. Sometimes we have to take our kids to the doctor. When you take the kids to the doctor, they get their vaccinations. The kids are crying, they're screaming, they don't want to get it. But what do you do? No, you have to get it done. It's uncomfortable. The first time you take your child and they're screaming at the top of their lungs because they need a vaccination — do you say, "You know what, forget it, I'm not going to get this vaccination done"? No, you give it. Why? Because you know that there's some type of benefit in it for them.

You have to get a blood test done — that's a little uncomfortable, but you still get it done. Why? Because you know there's some benefit for you in it. You have to take some sort of medication. Most people don't like to eat vegetables, but you know vegetables are healthy for you, so you say: in order for me to be healthy, I have to eat this. You go through things that are uncomfortable. Why? Because you recognize that there's some benefit.

So when it comes to divine law, there may be certain things that you may find uncomfortable. And especially what happens is when you are desensitized to the law of Allah and you're taught a different framework — then you have even more questions, even more problems: why this? why not that? Whereas that child who grows up and whose parents and environment teach him about Allah and the authority of Allah — from the time that he grows up, he never has any questions. He says: Allah created me. If Allah says I have to do this, I have to do it. There's no question about it.

The Adab of the Believer

And this is the point I wanted to get to. Our whole system — Allah provided for everything that we need. In fact, in the books of hadith, just one chapter alone contains hundreds of hadith — for example, the chapter of Adab, how a believer is supposed to conduct himself. What are his values? How should his behavior be? There's a whole chapter in the books of hadith — hundreds of hadith just on this subject, Kitabul Adab.

And Allah says in the Quran about the Prophet, peace be upon him:

"And indeed, you are of a great moral character."

Now — how do we build these Quranic, prophetic adab? You have to learn them. These are not going to be taught in public schools. They have a completely different framework. You see the behavior — I used to remember my grandfather sometimes, when seeing kids misbehave — "This is not how we grew up." There was something different. Why? Because there was a different framework that was taught.

Now imagine — sometimes I have young men come and say, "I want to balance my deen and dunya." So what do you mean by balance? "Well, I'm studying, I'm doing this and that, I want to study a little bit of deen. How much time should I spend for deen? I want to balance it." What do you mean by balance? If you're spending once a week studying the deen of Allah — do you consider that a balancing act?

Haya, Ghairah, and Taqwa

Now imagine — and I really want us to think about this — a child, or even those of us who came from a Muslim country, or back home where there was an environment of Islam. There are many civilizations where they adopted Islam and those Islamic values became part of the culture, part of the language. Take for example the concept of haya. Is there even a word in English that is equivalent to haya? But anybody who comes from an Arab background, anyone who grew up in that type of environment, anyone who comes from a desi background — the word haya is incorporated within their language. So a person knows what haya is. He feels what haya is. He knows what ghairah is. He knows what taqwa is. He's seen it. But here — is there even a word equivalent to haya, ghairah, and taqwa? How am I going to explain this to the kids?

Perhaps half the crowd here is probably wondering: I don't know what haya is. I've heard about haya, I've heard about ghairah, but what is it?

The Prophet, peace be upon him, said — when an incident happened and a companion expressed his ghairah — the Prophet said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 5220; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1499)

"I have more ghairah than him, and Allah has more ghairah than me."

Do you and I know what ghairah means?

In the Quran, Allah talks about haya — that when the daughter of Shu'ayb came to Musa, peace be upon him, she walked with haya:

"Then one of the two women came to him walking with shyness."

Do you and I, or our children, know what haya means? The Prophet, peace be upon him, said:

"If you have no haya, then do as you wish."

And this is from the earliest teachings of all the Prophets:

"Indeed, among what people have preserved from the speech of the earliest prophethood is: if you have no haya, do as you wish."

Do we know what haya is? How are we going to incorporate haya, ghairah, taqwa, these adab? Are we going to learn it from the ghair, from non-Muslims? No. That ta'leem has to be from us. It has to be from among us. That's why when it came to taqwa, Allah said:

"O you who believe, have taqwa of Allah, and be with the truthful."

You're not going to learn taqwa from reading books. You're not going to learn about haya. You're not going to learn about the akhirah through reading books alone. You have to see people who have haya, who have ghairah. That's how you know what haya and ghairah is. That's how you're going to learn it. That's the whole idea behind islah and tarbiyah and ta'leem. But most of our time, our ta'leem, our education, is something else.

So we have to be worried about this and we have to think about this. Alhamdulillah, we have many, many opportunities. Allah gave us the tawfiq to use those opportunities, to be able to understand these things. May Allah change our state. These are core values that believers have. If we don't know what those core values are, how are we going to implement them? We ask Allah for tawfiq and afiyah.

Announcements

Please donate. Please pass the donation boxes from the left to the right. There are also kiosks in the lobby. Sadaqah wards off calamities.

We have our upcoming Darussalam Tanweer Intensive as well as the Tadrees Integrated High School. The Tanweer program is for anyone who is 17 and above, and the Tadrees high school program is for ages 14 to 16. Both of these programs will begin on August 11th. This is a good opportunity — again, I was mentioning that we have so many resources that Allah gave us here in this city. Individuals are coming from all over the country to take benefit from the programs that are here. So those of us that live nearby, whatever programs there are — whether the evening programs, the weekend programs, or the one-year program — we should try as much as possible to take advantage of them.

We have our weekly programs: Tuesday night — Tafseer, every Tuesday after Maghrib. Thursday night — Salawat in Urdu, also after Maghrib. Saturday after Fajr — a program on the divine names of Allah.

Du'a for the Believers

There are requests for du'as. Part of our iman is that we make du'a for the believers — so wherever the believers may be, whatever difficulty they are going through, whichever country they are in — our brothers in Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Myanmar, and wherever they may be:

May Allah alleviate their difficulties. May Allah assist them. May Allah help them.

Salah Recitation — Surah Al-Qari'ah & Surah At-Takathur