Inviting Each other Towards Good - Mawlana Emran Salam | Islamic Reminder | Jummah Khutbah

Inviting Each Other Towards Good

"And remind, for indeed, remembrance benefits the believers."

"And I have not created the jinn and the human beings except that they may worship Me."

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 3493; Sahih Muslim, Book 45, Hadith 2638)

"People are like metals, like gold and silver. Those who were the best among them in the days of ignorance are the best in Islam, when they have understanding."

All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. All praise is due to Allah, the Most Gracious, who has brought us all here.

The Biryani Example: Balance in Deen

I wish to begin by giving a very simple example — Biryani. Biryani is not biryani unless it contains all the necessary ingredients of biryani. A person cannot say, for example, that I want to replace the rice of my biryani with the chicken and add more chicken, or I want to take out some chicken and add more rice. The ingredients of biryani have to all be in harmony in order for someone to make a perfect dish of biryani. There shouldn't be too much extra of a certain thing. There shouldn't be too much less of a certain thing.

Understanding this, we also understand that our deen is somewhat like this as well. We can't do ghuluww — we cannot exaggerate in our deen — and we have to make sure that certain things we're doing are in line with the teachings of Islam and deen.

Variety in Food, Narrowness in Deen

When we eat anything in our own houses, in our own homes, we always want variety. We want chicken, we want beef, we want lamb, we want fish, we want everything. We want curry, we want salan, we want biryani. For dessert, we want rasmalai, we want rasgulla, we want gulab jamun. We want baklava, we also want chocolate cake. SubhanAllah — so when it comes to food, we're not satisfied with one type of meal. We need variety in our lives.

But unfortunately when it comes to deen, we become very narrow-minded. Meaning, if we're involved in one certain aspect of deen, if we're involved in one khidmah or one service of deen, then if someone else is not involved in that same khidmah or same action of deen, then we start criticizing that other person.

The Vicious Cycle of Criticism

Let me give you a practical example. If someone is working relentlessly day and night in order to teach the Qur'an, the kalam of Allah — he's teaching the children how to read Qur'an, or how to memorize Qur'an, or for example he's teaching them how to learn Arabic, he's teaching them the hadith, he's teaching them the kalam of Rasulullah, he's teaching them how to become closer to Allah — we might say, okay, but why isn't this person involved in social welfare work? There's so many people dying without food.

And the people who are involved in social welfare work, they'll say: there are people dying without food, yes — but there are people dying without iman. SubhanAllah. People don't know how to even recite the kalimah.

The people who are criticizing the social workers also get criticized: yes, you know, people are dying without iman, so why are you giving da'wah to the Muslims? Muslims at least have iman. Why aren't you giving da'wah to the non-Muslims? The people who are giving da'wah to the non-Muslims also get criticized: you don't even know what you're doing, you're giving a bad impression of Islam, learn your own deen first. And so then they go back to the person who's teaching Qur'an — and it's sort of like a vicious cycle. Everybody's just criticizing everybody else.

Mawlana Rumi's Example: The Elephant in the Dark Room

Mawlana Rumi gives a beautiful example. He says there's a dark room, and inside the dark room there's an elephant. One by one, different groups of people are told to come inside the dark room and touch the elephant and try to describe it from what they touch.

One group of people goes inside and touches the tail of the elephant. When asked, "What is an elephant?" they reply: "Oh, the elephant is actually very thin — it feels like a rope, that's what an elephant is." Another group goes inside and touches the leg of the elephant. They were asked to describe the elephant: they say the elephant is like a tree trunk. Another person touched the tusks, so they say it's very smooth — very long and smooth. Another group goes in and touches the trunk of the elephant. They say: no, the elephant is not very smooth, it's very rough.

Different people go in, and unfortunately they're only touching or experiencing one part of the elephant. They're not experiencing the whole elephant. But because of their limited experience, they say that the entire elephant — the reality of the elephant and the true meaning of an elephant — is their limited understanding of it. Whereas in reality, the elephant is the entire thing. It's the entire animal.

The same way, unfortunately, we are only exposed to our work of deen. We're not exposed to the other works of deen. SubhanAllah.

Criticism Is the Easiest — But the Least Useful — Service

The easiest service a person can do for deen is to criticize. But criticizing — talk is cheap. Everybody can just criticize however much they want, but they don't give solutions. They don't give practical plans for how we can move forward, how we can work together.

There are five fingers on your hand. The thumb or the little finger doesn't say to the middle finger, "You're good for nothing." The five fingers work together. The people in an army, an organization, or a hospital don't criticize each other's workers. The sergeant and the front lines don't criticize the foot soldiers. The foot soldiers don't criticize the sergeant. The person working as a surgeon doesn't criticize the janitors. The janitors don't criticize the surgeon. But each and every single individual is part of the entire whole. Each and every single individual is necessary to ensure that the entire organization functions and runs smoothly.

Fix Yourself Before You Fix Others

Criticizing means that a person is somewhat secure with himself, and then he can lend some advice to someone else. The rule of the world is: if you're drowning yourself, you don't go and try to help someone else. If you're travelling on a plane, you hear the announcement — if you're travelling with a child or someone who requires assistance, please fasten your oxygen mask first before you try to help someone else. The rule of the world is: save yourself before you save other people.

But SubhanAllah — how many of us are confident in our own a'mal? How many of us are confident in our own actions? How many of us are confident with our salah? How many of us are confident that our salah — I can present it before Allah? My fasting I can present it before Allah? My hajj I can present it before Allah?

So the paradox is: we're criticizing others, but at the same time we don't have enough assets in our own bank while we criticize everyone else. So the real problem is we should be worried about ourselves. We shouldn't be worried about what everybody else is doing.

Solutions: Being Involved in Every Work of Deen

Now someone might say: okay, Imran, I understand. We shouldn't criticize. But aren't you doing the same thing? It's easy for you to say — you're just speaking behind a podium and you're criticizing everybody. You're not giving any solutions.

We understand that each one of us cannot be involved in every single work of deen. Every single work of deen has proof from Nabiy-e-Karim. Our mindset should be: how can I meet Allah on the Day of Qiyamah? How can I meet Rasulullah on the Day of Qiyamah?

While I wasn't giving da'wah to non-Muslims — how can I meet Allah and Nabiy-e-Karim? If I wasn't learning my Qur'an — how can I meet Allah and Nabiy-e-Karim? If I wasn't involved in social welfare — how can I meet Allah and Nabiy-e-Karim? If I wasn't part of building masajid — how can I meet Allah and Nabiy-e-Karim? If my own Muslim brother who is living on my street for over ten years — I don't invite him to the masjid, and he doesn't know the kalimah لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ مُحَمَّدٌ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ, and his children don't know the kalimah — how can I meet Allah and Nabiy-e-Karim?

All these works are part of Islam. We have to be part of every single one of these works. We have to be part of every single thing — and not only criticize, but help one another so that we can move forward, and Islam can move forward, especially in America where everyone is against Islam.

The Story of Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi and Abu Hurayra

Today, every single person in the world knows about Abd al-Rahman ibn Sakhr. Everybody knows about Abd al-Rahman ibn Sakhr. But nobody knows about Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi.

Who was Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi? He was the leader of the tribe of Daws. This was during the time of Makkah, when Nabiy-e-Karim was still in Makkah. Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi comes to Makkah. He is the leader of his tribe. Before entering Makkah, he meets the Quraysh.

The Quraysh were masters of propaganda. They were telling Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi: you know, we understand you are a very intelligent man — smart man, very nice, very good, respected leader. But watch out — in Makkah there is a person who will make you lose your mind. There is a person — such propaganda against Nabiy-e-Karim. They call him a magician. They say he destroys family ties — a brother is not going to talk to his other brother, a son is not going to talk to his father, a daughter is not talking to her mother. He destroys family ties. He is like this and he is like that.

Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi gets very worried. He gets scared. He gets so worried that he takes cotton and puts it inside his ears. He is saying: I don't want to hear any of this.

But when Allah wants iman — when He wants something to happen — nothing can stop Him. If Allah wanted iman for Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi, then Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi was going to get iman — no choice.

Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is walking through the streets of Makkah. As he is walking, he is saying to himself: SubhanAllah — I am very knowledgeable myself. I can distinguish between falsehood and truth. Let me hear what this person has to say. So then he takes out the cotton from his ears. He passes by Nabiy-e-Karim, and as soon as he hears some Qur'an, Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi immediately accepts Islam. SubhanAllah.

And then he doesn't ask Nabiy-e-Karim what he has to do — he automatically understood that it is his responsibility. He tells Nabiy-e-Karim: make du'a for me. I am going back to my tribe of Daws, and I am going to invite them to Islam.

He goes back to his tribe of Daws. He tries to invite them to Islam. It didn't work out. He goes back to Nabiy-e-Karim on a separate occasion and tells him: these Daws people — they have no hope. No hope at all. Nabiy-e-Karim, raise your hands and make du'a to Allah that Allah destroys them.

Nabiy-e-Karim lifts up his hands and makes du'a to Allah:

"O Allah, guide the people of Daws and bring them to Islam quickly."

He says: go back, try again, make more effort. Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi tries again. He is constantly giving da'wah. And his entire tribe becomes Muslim.

Abu Hurayra: The Gift of Tufayl's Da'wah

From that tribe came the famous Sahabi, Abd al-Rahman ibn Sakhr. Everybody knows Abd al-Rahman ibn Sakhr — this is his real name. People generally know him by his kunya. His kunya is Abu Hurayra — the Sahabi who narrated the most hadith from the entire galaxy of Sahaba. He narrated more than 5,000 to 6,000 hadith. SubhanAllah.

Every single Muslim person knows the names of Abu Bakr, Uthman, Ali — and then Abu Hurayra — because his name is so frequently mentioned in the books of hadith: An Abi Hurayra an Rasulillah.

Now the question is: who is getting the reward of all the hadith Abu Hurayra narrates? Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is getting the reward. It doesn't matter that nobody knows who Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is — Allah knows who Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is. Every single person who recites the name of Abu Hurayra, getting to the hadith of Nabiy-e-Karim — Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is getting a share of that reward. SubhanAllah.

The Reward of Inviting to Good

A person in Islam — the closest way to get to Allah is through fard. Praying your fard salah. Nafl is there, but a thousand rakat of nafl salah cannot equal even one fard salah. A person can only pray five fard times every single day. He cannot say I want to pray six times fard — it won't count. A person can only do one Hajj — he can't say I want to perform Hajj twice. He can perform Umrah more than once, but he can't perform the fard Hajj and get its reward again. A person can only fast during the month of Ramadan for thirty days — you only get the reward of Ramadan for those thirty days. You will not get the reward of Ramadan outside of the month of Ramadan. Everybody only has thirty days, five salah, one hajj, one time zakat.

But a person — if he knows someone in his family, he knows someone who is not coming to the masjid, who is not praying his salah, who is away from Allah, who is disconnected from Him — and that person goes to his brother and invites him towards the masjid, gives him a kind word, narrates to him a hadith, just gives him a small bit of encouragement, a bit of information — and that person, because of that, changes his entire life. He starts praying five times salah. He starts going to Hajj. He starts giving Zakat. He starts giving Sawm.

Not only is the original person going to get his own reward — his reward of five times salah, his reward of one Hajj, his reward of thirty days of fasting, his reward of Zakat — he is also going to get the further reward of that other person he invited. SubhanAllah.

Every single person who, through the barakah of Abu Hurayra's hadith, read his hadith and changed his life — Tufayl ibn 'Amr al-Dawsi is getting the reward. That's why the lowest wali — the lowest friend of Allah in our times today — cannot come close to the lowest Sahabi. The highest wali of today's time cannot even come close to the lowest Sahabi. Why? Because of the Sahaba that the wali even accepted Islam in the first place. He can do all the reward he wants — the Sahaba, because they conveyed the message, they conveyed Islam throughout the generations, are getting the reward of every single person after them. Nobody can catch them in terms of reward.

(Sahih Muslim, Book 20, Hadith 4665)

"The person who guides towards good will get the same reward as the person who does good."

(Sahih Muslim, Book 45, Hadith 2638)

"People are like gold mines." Every single person is valuable. A person we see — the person who had honor and status outside of Islam, as soon as he accepts Islam, he is the person who is best. Outside of Islam, when he accepts Islam, he is also the best.

Umar, Khalid ibn al-Walid, Abu Sufyan — these were the leaders of the time before they accepted Islam. When they accepted Islam, they became the leaders also.

Every Person Has Unique Access

Every single person has access to a group of people that nobody else has access to. The way you are able to communicate with your families — I will not be able to communicate with your families. If you speak Chinese or Japanese, I can't speak Chinese and Japanese. You can communicate with your co-workers, your friends, in a way that different people can't. So this is our responsibility — how we can invite people to Islam, our own families, how we can encourage people to come to Islam.

Staying Aware of the World Around Us

For this, Allama Ibn 'Abidin al-Shami — he passed away in 1252 AH — he says: whoever doesn't know what's going on around the world, then he is a jahil. We should be updated with what's going on.

Closing Announcement

For this reason, the Ijtema is starting from today and it will continue until Sunday. Everybody is requested to take part however they can in this Ijtema.

JazakumAllahu Khayran.