Surah At-Tur: Elevating Our Ranks in Jannah | Divine Reminders with Mufti Abdul Wahab

بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ. الحمد لله. وصلِّ يا رسول الكريم.

Ya brothers and sisters, welcome back to our Read and Reflect session. This is just session 27 that we have completed. For those of you that have been watching along since day one, thank you so much for being with us. For those of you that have come in and out, we're equally grateful to you. InshaAllah you're able to watch the previous sessions too, if you wish to benefit from the entire Qur'an recitation from these two young Qurrā'.

Alhamdulillah, it's been a joy being with you every single day at this time and hopefully Allah accepts from us. Today we recited surahs from the 27th Juz: Surah At-Tur, Surah An-Najm, Surah Al-Qamar, Surah Ar-Rahman, Surah Al-Waqi'ah, Surah Al-Hadid.

Six surahs, six different chapters that we recited. One common theme within them — if we were to look at all of these surahs and we were to find a common theme within them — each of them discuss something to do with Jannah in them. There is some discussion of Jannah, there is some discussion of Paradise, but in either of these surahs we'll find a discussion of Paradise inside of them. And in Surah Ar-Rahman, there are two entire passages speaking about Paradise.

I have an entire class on Surah Ar-Rahman. It's on our YouTube page — if you go on Mufti Ahmed Yusuf's YouTube page, if you have not yet, do go on and subscribe to it inshaAllah. And if you search Surah Ar-Rahman, you'll find I had a five-hour session during pre-Ramadan and COVID that I did online. You can watch inshaAllah. Maybe it can serve some benefit. So I won't speak about Surah Ar-Rahman — that's a whole different discussion.

The People of Jannah in Surah At-Tur

Today, I will dive into a few verses from Surah At-Tur, where Allah speaks about that theme that I was talking about — the people of Jannah. Allah says, when the people of Jannah will enter into Jannah — and we spoke about this a little while back in Surah Az-Zumar, so I won't repeat what we talked about there:

That they will be enjoying in the gardens and in the fruits of Jannah.

They will be indulging and engaging with all of those blessings.

They will eat and drink with ease, with comfort — because this is the reward of the acts that you completed. As Hafiz Idrees was mentioning:

That your effort — you will see yourself. No one else is going to benefit from your effort except for yourself. ثُمَّ يُجْزَاهُ الْجَزَاءَ الْأَوْفَىٰ — and you'll be given the best recompensation and reward in the hereafter.

They will be relaxing and enjoying on these beautiful carpets and these beds — or these maq'aads where they're sitting at a raised level — side by side, مَصْفُوفَةٍ — in rows, like sufoof — with their friends and their associates.

Parents Elevated in Jannah by Their Children

Then Allah says something very beautiful, where we only find this discussion in two places in the Qur'an. One is over here in Surah At-Tur, and the other is at the end of Surah Az-Zumar.

Allah says that while they're sitting there, the children will think to themselves — wow, this is beautiful. Jannah is everything we thought, but more. They will remember that hadith:

That which no eye has seen, no ear has ever heard of, no mind or heart can ever conceive or perceive — this is Jannah.

As they're thinking about it, they'll say — but where are our parents? Where are the people that got us here, our parents? They were the ones that set us up for Jannah. They were the ones that brought us into this world and that nurtured us and nourished us and sustained us through the will of Allah. Where are they? And as we're thinking this, we'll turn to Allah and say, Ya Allah, can you bring our parents here too? Can you ask them to be with us?

And it will be told to us that they are at a lower level in Jannah in comparison to us — that we are at a higher level and they are at a lower level. So naturally, in this world, when someone's at a higher level and another person's at a lower level, in order to meet him or her, you have to go down. He or she has to come back. You can't go up.

I'll give you an example. I was traveling once with one of my brothers and he got a free upgrade to the first class or business class. Very long flight — 14 hours. And obviously we want to sit together so we can discuss, talk and so on and so forth. And I went to the air hostess and said, hey, is there a way that I can also get a seat somewhere in the first class, business class area next to him? Because he got a free upgrade, maybe I can get a free upgrade too. You never know — you try your luck. And she said, no, you can't get it. It's full, it's packed. I said, okay, I want to sit with him though. So she said, it's very simple — if you want to sit with him, he has to come back to you. You can't go forward to him. That's not the way it works. The only way it's going to work is that he comes back. And I said, you really want to come to the back? She said, no, no, I don't want to come to the back. I'm in first class, business class — I'm happy over here. I don't want to go back anywhere.

But in the akhirah, Allah says that the parents may be at a lower level in Jannah. And when the children ask Allah — and the parents may not even be in Jannah at the same level, they may not even be there — but when the children ask Allah, Allah does not lower their rank. Rather, Allah says that He allows the parents to reunite with their children at the higher levels of Jannah, without taking away any reward or any virtue from the children. Meaning that He does not bring the children lower — He takes the parents higher. And they reach a higher level of Jannah.

So the parents' level of Jannah is increased because of their children. Can you imagine? In this life, how much pride or honor does a parent feel when a son or daughter is honoring the name of the family, or is bringing light to the name of the family? Imagine how much honor or pride the parents would feel — being raised in the ranks of Jannah because of their children. That the children are becoming the source of the parents getting higher in Jannah. I mean, that's the least we can do to give back to our parents. We can actually be — this is beautiful — we can actually be a source of their Jannah being higher and it being raised.

So rather than making an effort only on how my son or daughter can bring honor to my name in this world by wearing a white coat on the day that they become a physician, or graduating from an engineering school, or graduating from becoming a Hafidh or 'Alim, wherever it may be — rather, let's also make some effort that this son or daughter of mine can hopefully become a source of me being elevated in the ranks of Jannah because of the way that they live their life. Because of the obedience of Allah that they have in their life. This is the goal for us.

And it can happen — by extension, as Imam al-Qurtubi says — for parents, for children and spouses and so on and so forth. Let's be that source for others to increase in the levels of Jannah.

Sharing Fruits, Glasses, and Conversation in Jannah

And Allah continues and says that when the parents come, they start eating together:

They start eating fruits, appetizers, sweets — and they have meat and so on and so forth. And at the same time:

They're sharing glasses. You know, to share glasses — no one does it in COVID, not supposed to do it in COVID time for sure. But to share glasses is a sign of great love and informality. You drink from my glass, I'll drink from your glass. Because you have no fear of any sickness, and you have love. To share a glass with someone is a sign of love — how Aisha would do with the Prophet ﷺ. It was a sign of love to share the glass, to share where you're drinking from.

Allah is saying that you'll be sharing your glasses. Why? لَا لَغْوٌ فِيهَا وَلَا تَأْثِيمٌ — because there is no hatred, there is no animosity between anyone.

And then Allah continues and says:

They'll be sitting across from each other — not behind each other. Because sitting behind each other would mean someone feels they're behind someone's back — it can be a source of disrespect. So rather than sitting like that, they would be sitting actually across from each other. And they will start talking to each other.

The Conversation of the People of Jannah

One of the things they will say — and this is very powerful:

That — oh, once upon a time, when we were sitting as a family, we would speak about this day. And we were very scared. We were skeptical. We were unsure about how Allah would treat us.

But:

But Allah bestowed His great virtue upon us by protecting us from the fire of Jahannam and bringing us into Jannah.

قَالُوا إِنَّا كُنَّا قَبْلُ فِي أَهْلِنَا مُشْفِقِينَ — do you remember, oh parents, or children, or spouse, or family members, that once upon a time we would make this du'a: Ya Allah, please allow us to come here, please allow us to come to Jannah — and He allowed us to come to Jannah.

You know, sometimes in life when we plan something for the future — for our children — and that time finally comes. Like, I remember when we started thinking about this, when we started planning this. We put the building blocks for the institution. We put the building blocks for the house. We put the building blocks for making you this or that. It happened. That's what we will be saying in Jannah — we made it, Alhamdulillah.

طِبْتُمْ فَادْخُلُوهَا خَالِدِينَ — you definitely made it, you should be happy — this is what the angels would say to us.

The Lesson: Be a Source of Elevation for Your Family

So, dear brothers and sisters, the lesson from this specific passage in Surah At-Tur is that the only people who can get a higher rank in Jannah because of someone else are parents — due to the effort of their own children, from the Qur'an — and by extension, our own family members as well.

So let's be that source of happiness — not only for this world, because the happiness of this world is very temporary. Today we are a source of happiness; tomorrow we may be a source of sadness. But in the akhirah, we can be that source of honor and pride for our parents and for our family members, by our effort in committing ourselves to the sunnah of our Habib ﷺ and the commandments of Allah.

JazakAllah khair. May Allah bless you all for listening and being a part of this journey of reading and reflecting, and hopefully post-Ramadan, you will continue to come on and enjoy the programs that we have planned for all of you, inshaAllah ta'ala.

JazakAllah khair. We'll see you all at 9:30 p.m. or at 1 a.m. for the top 10. Thank you so much.

Lastly, please do register for our Thursday, May 21st, 11:30 p.m. webinar. It's the last one of the month of Ramadan. JazakAllah khair. And it's a very powerful one. We have Shaykh Omar Suleiman coming. We have a world-renowned nasheed artist, one of my favorites, Zain Bhikha. We have Omar Esa, who's from England. We have Khalid Mahmood, who will sing Urdu nasheeds from Dallas. Mu'adh al-Nasr from Houston, who will recite some Arabic poetry. So we have a lot going on and we really want everyone to enjoy. So if you have people that have not joined during the month because they've been busy, motivate them to join at least this webinar. It's free — I've already shared the link above — and inshaAllah they will enjoy.

JazakAllah khair. Assalamu 'alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.