Footprints in the Sand: Lessons from the Pious | Muftī Azeemuddin Ahmed | 03/17

Footprints in the Sand: Lessons from the Pious

InshāAllah, please kindly move forward and come close together. May Allah reward all of us for our patience and desire for seeking ilm. May Allah allow me to benefit, and all of us to benefit tremendously.

May Allah Azza wa Jal allow us to hear and share that which will, in these final two nights we have, become a means of our long-lasting transformation. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect us from not taking effect from ilm. May Allah Azza wa Jal protect us from becoming from amongst those for whom knowledge is a proof against them.

May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala create softness in our hearts for advice. Allow these pieces of advice to truly have an impact on our soul. Allahumma ameen.

The Night-Weeping of Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī

Ya Allah. It is narrated regarding Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī and his salah. It is narrated in Tathkirat al-Rashīd that Mawlī Mumtāz Ali Mubārakpūrī narrated that Mawlana Abu al-Khayr was in Baluchistan when news reached him of Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī's passing away.

He sent for me twice to come and meet him. When I finally arrived I found him crying profusely. The moment he saw me his condition worsened. He lost control and sobbed until he could be heard all around. Everyone in the gathering was shaken, and it seemed as though everyone would fall unconscious. Then he — meaning Mawlana Abu al-Khayr — finally spoke and said, "Ah, Mawlī Mumtāz Ali, a great personality has passed on from the subcontinent. It is so disheartening to see that people did not recognize his caliber. I have heard from countless reliable sources that the Shaykh would cry the whole night over a single ayah."

And that ayah was:

"The day when all secrets will be examined — meaning to see if they are true or not — then the man will have no power, nor any helper." Meaning, the secrets of our heart — one thing about it — the secrets of our heart: how am I presenting myself to be, and how am I really? That day will come when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will expose the reality of all of us, and we will not have anybody to stand up for us.

It is written elsewhere that the magnificence of Allah permeated his every vein and every pore. During recitation of the Qur'an, a state would overcome him, which became more evident when no one was around. In the last part of the night, in a quiet and empty house, he would stand before his Lord in solitude and recite in nawafil. He broke down crying, and was forced to pause repeatedly during the recitation. He choked on his tears and often went silent, trying to control the urge to sob. Tears flowed down his cheeks and into his beard, soaking the prayer mat on which he prayed.

Mawlana Abdul Rahman Khawarji says: "Once I came to Gangoh in the month of Ramadan. The Shaykh would lead the salah in Taraweeh. One night he started Taraweeh, and I was there at the time. He continued recitation until he reached a part in which Allah exhorts mankind to fear Him. Less than half of the congregation knew Arabic, and the rest were completely unlearned — maybe not even knowing how to read properly. His fear of Allah manifested in the recitation, which shook up the whole congregation. Some were crying while others were shuddering. When he started the next few passages about the mercy of Allah, the ambience suddenly changed, and the congregation was now jubilant. Some could not even contain their laughter."

Allahu Akbar. They don't even know what's happening. They don't understand the meaning. But the words are so powerful because he is reciting from a heart that is alive — that you don't need to understand Arabic to take effect. Abu Jahl understood Arabic better than all of the PhDs and the scholars of the world today. That was revealed in the language of Abu Jahl and Abu Lahab:

No one understood this better than Abu Lahab. Allahu Akbar. But guidance is not based on knowing a language. It is from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

The Sweetness of Īmān

So when a person recites and listens — someone just asked me this morning, a young boy asked: "What should I focus on when I am in namāz? What should I focus on?" It's a million-dollar question. When you're reading, recite and listen to the Qur'an as though it is the shifā for our heart. And when you're reading it, recite it as shifā.

Look, my dear friends — this is the same Qur'an that we've all been reciting since, mashāAllah, the beginning of times, and reciting this entire month, and been reciting this past week, and been listening and reciting Taraweeh. It's the same Qur'an, no different. They didn't have a different version of it. And we can't say, "Oh, some of them understood Arabic." No. The scholar who's reciting understood it fine, but not the crowd.

If we recite Qur'an — this is what we should be asking Allah right now — "Yā Allah, grant me khashyah, grant me khashyah, grant me khashyah, that I am able to take effect." Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says:

"Indeed the true believers are such that when Allah's name is taken, وَجِلَتْ قُلُوبُهُمْ — their hearts begin to tremble. And when the verses of the Qur'an are recited, the īmān increases." Where does it say that you have to know Arabic for this? Īmān is different. When īmān is in the heart, then my beloved friends, the smallest mention of Allah's name has an effect.

I'll tell you my own personal story. All the years have gone, me doing what I'm doing here. There was one time — I was in 2007, I've reflected on it so many times — it was the most amazing experience. I graduated from iftā in 2005, after spending eight years abroad. In 2007, after doing imāmat for two years, I went in jamā'at. I was on khurūj in India, 2007.

I remember — after maybe a few weeks, or a month, or a month and a half — that day came in my khurūj: not for one day, not for two days, but for weeks, maybe even a month or more. In which any random person who happened to speak after Maghrib, after Asr, after Fajr — it was not an ulamā jamā'at. Some of them were the most illiterate people I've ever met in my life. From the villages of East Africa. One of them was a barber, a farmer — ya'ni they had nothing. They told me they traveled for seven days. One man came from Mauritania — it took him seven days to reach India. Seven days, in this modern day, 2007. By donkey cart, horse cart, camel, walking, bus — you name it, all sorts of things.

Very simple, illiterate. One of them told me, "You know how I came to this country?" I said I didn't know. He said, "I came with a plastic bag" — you know, a shopper bag, like a Walgreens bag, a Walmart bag. He said, "That's all I brought. I own nothing." "How did you afford it?" He said, "How can I tell you? That is a story that only Allah and I know." He couldn't even afford a passport, much less a flight and a journey.

Wallahi, I spent time with these brothers. There were seven of them from Tanzania with me, among other people. He said, "This is our Amīr." He said, "Whenever we need to collect money — in khurūj he'd say, 'Let's collect 200 rupees, we need 500 rupees for food' — we just put our hand in the Amīr's pocket. Whatever we need, we just pull it out." None of them had money. That pocket was where they said, "Okay, Bismillah, Amīr Sāhib's pocket is where the money is going to come from."

So I was there. They were broke — beyond broke, beyond broke. You don't know what broke means. We look at these people. They just take it out. It's coming out. From where? From Allah's khazānah.

So now — imagine their understanding of Arabic. Zero. Their reading of Qur'an, very, very weak. Citation of hadith, they can't. I have done imāmat, I did iftā, I did imāmat for two years. I'm sitting there, and they can't. So one brother would give a bayān in Swahili. The other guy would translate it. One guy knew English, and he would translate it in broken English. I would translate it into Urdu. So it's Swahili → English → Urdu.

Allah is my witness, my friends — they would say things and I'm like, "How am I supposed to translate this? What is this even saying?" But every bayān — not only of these Tanzanian people, but everybody — they had broken accents, they didn't always know what they were talking about, they were simple villagers. But I'll tell you — Allah is my witness, sitting in front of you in the state of fasting in this masjid — within 30 seconds of any of them starting to talk, when they would say, Bismillah ar-Rahmān ar-Rahīm, "Allah has created us, Allah is this..." — I would break down crying. It would hit me like it has never hit again after that. Just hearing Allah's name was so powerful. I didn't even know why I was crying. But the fact that he took Allah's name, the level of love for Allah was so intense, that it didn't make a difference who said it. It didn't make a difference about how educated he was, how charismatic he was, how knowledgeable he was. It made no difference. He just said "Allah" — that's all I heard — and I would just break down.

I tasted that. Many of us, inshāAllah, have tasted it in the past. And I beg Allah that He brings that reality back to all of us. Allahumma ameen.

But that's what you call the sweetness of īmān. That's when a person is in that state, then these stories make sense. Otherwise it makes no sense — like, what's wrong with you? How could you sit there and spend a whole night crying over one verse? How could your body shake? How do you sob until your prayer mat is wet? How does a whole crowd behind you wail in salah? When the hearts are attached to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, it really does happen like that. And Allah is still there. Who has changed? We have changed. Nobody has changed besides us.

So at least let's make that a goal. I make this a goal for myself; you make it a goal for yourself. Let's work on our relationship with Allah. Let's work on our īmān. Let us do those things which are absolutely beneficial for our deen and our relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

May Allah jalla jalāluhu remove ghaflah and heedlessness from me, and ghaflah and heedlessness from all of us. May Allah keep us far away from such places, such things, and such people who create heedlessness within us. Ameen.

His Commitment to Salāh and Taking the Higher Road

SubhānAllah. It is known that Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī always relied on the most preferred and most cautious opinion on issues of difference of opinion. Whenever there were two opinions, he would always take the safer opinion. Despite need or necessity, he never forsook prudence.

The smallest example of this: when he adamantly refused to sit down and pray, even when he was extremely sick. In the days before his death, two or three people from both sides would prop him up with their hands behind his back — as he was praying. Where are we going to get this right now? If you tell people, "Don't lean against the wall, come closer," they'll give you weird looks. But he had four to six people holding him up as he performed salah — because he didn't want to sit down and pray.

That is why you have to sit with people. Even if you try to do a little bit of mujāhadah, everyone around you pulls you down. "Come on brother, it's okay, you don't need to fast." "It's okay, you can lie down." "It's okay, you can skip Taraweeh." "It's okay, you can break your I'tikāf." "It's okay, you should go home." All of a sudden, everyone has sympathy for us. No one has sympathy for our ākhirah. Everyone has sympathy for our comfort and our dunyā.

Every man is going for his own grade. Why don't you desire what's best for him? If you care for him, you love him, you will want him to be in the front row. And in order to be in the front row, you have to do what? Mujāhadah. No pain, no gain. That is the mujāhadah that has to come. Does that make sense?

So we have to be surrounded by people. May Allah give us such spouses. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala give us such people who constantly push us. "No, you can do it. Stop being a crybaby — you only got one life, one chance, one Ramadan. Make the most of it. Push yourself." We need people like this in our lives.

This is why one of the du'as that is mentioned:

"O Allah, grant me a righteous inner circle." بطانة — what is بَطْن? The stomach, right? بِطانة — things that are super close to you. بِطانَةٌ صَالِحَة means your inner circle has to be righteous.

All the bayāns that you hear in the masjid affect you when you're in the masjid — you're in the audience, you're focused, you're listening. If you're downstairs, in the lobby, in the side prayer hall, it's not going to affect you the same way. Even if we take effect while we're sitting somewhere, that effect will only last as long as we're in that environment. It's natural that when you go home, when you leave this environment, the outside world will, of course, overtake us. That is when بِطانَةٌ صَالِحَة is so important. You have to have your inner circle that is God-fearing, that is righteous, that is pious, that loves Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala — that can echo whatever you heard in the masjid.

The Hadīth of the Khalīl

If you say, "I heard the virtues of XYZ in the masjid," and you mention it at home, and someone says, "Come on man, we're in 2026, take it easy — what happens in the masjid, stays in the masjid" — a'ūdhu billāh. If we have that type of environment at home, then we cannot progress.

So you're going to say, "What should I do right now? I have an environment like this at my home." Naturally. Then we need to make sure we build a بِطانَةٌ صَالِحَة outside of our home as well. Think about it: there are so many people who smoke, who drink, who do all kinds of harām — their wife has no idea about it. But how do they do that? Because he has a بِطانَةٌ سَيِّئَة outside of the house. He has a close network, close friends outside the home. His wife prays tahajjud and he lives an entirely different life. There are so many cases like this — reality I'm telling you. The husband does not pray, and the wife cannot remember when was the last time she missed her tahajjud.

How does this happen? Whoever you connect with as your core friend:

(Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith 4833; also narrated in Jami' al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 2378)

"A man is upon the deen of his closest friend, so let each of you look carefully at who he takes as a close friend." Have you heard a hadith like "Al-mar'u 'alā dīni zawjatihi" — "a man follows the deen of his wife"? The answer is no, there is no such hadith. The actual hadith is: Al-mar'u 'alā dīni khalīlihi — a man is upon the deen of his best friend. Allahu Akbar.

No matter who you get married to — if your heart is not attached to her or him, but your heart is attached to someone outside the house — the religion of that individual is what you're going to be following. Who do you hang out with? The person you gravitate towards, you want to go out to eat with, you want to go bowling with, you want to go golfing with — that person is whose deen you will be following. This is the Prophet's ﷺ hadith. So be very careful about who you befriend.

All of us are a product of our friends. Even the person you choose to marry is a product of your friendship. Why are you marrying her? Why are you even desiring to marry her? It's a product of your friendship. Someone pushed you in that direction, nudged you in that direction, made you desire that.

There are girls here, in our own community, who tell their dads: "SubhānAllah, I want to get married to a scholar." And the dad says, "But he won't be able to buy you a home." She says, "I don't want that. I want to live with someone who has simplicity in their life. I don't want to marry someone who has a lot of money, because there's a very good chance that might spoil me." There are people right here, right now, in this community, who are like this. How did they become like that?

How are there people who say: "You don't want expensive purses? You don't want $2,000 or $5,000 shoes? You don't want weekly vacations, weekly dinner outs?" And they say, "No, that's not what life is about." They're telling their dad. They're telling their mom. "How about this doctor? How about this engineer?" "Nope, none of this stuff. Find me a madrasa student, a scholar. He's not going to keep up the same lifestyle. No, I don't want that. But the sukūn and itmi'nān I'll get from having someone who'll support me in my deen — I just started wearing my niqāb, I want someone to help me in that. I just started wearing my jilbāb, I want someone to help support that."

How does a girl speak like this in a time when you hear all the opposite things? How do you hear a young man say: "SubhānAllah, what I want is just a God-fearing, righteous person. I'm not here looking for all the other things." It is a product of their own friends. A product of their own friends makes them desire something like that.

So, even the spouse that we're choosing — before that comes the friend circle that we have. SubhānAllah.

So once we have this spouse, ideally that spouse will become your khalīl. May Allah give all the unmarried people here a spouse who becomes their khalīl. And for all the married people, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala also make their spouse their khalīl. Ameen.

And not just any khalīl — a khalīl could be a bad khalīl. It should be a khalīlun ṣāliḥ, and a biṭānatun ṣāliḥah. That inner circle — like the t-shirt that is super attached to your skin. All the bayān is like this jacket I'm wearing on top. The wife or the friend is the t-shirt inside. What affects us is the t-shirt, not the jacket. The t-shirt is what is closest to your heart.

So once we understand this framework, we see post-Ramadan life clearly. How will I stay strong? These talks are not going to keep us going on their own. Rather, it is the biṭānatun ṣāliḥah or sayyiʼah that you and I choose to keep — that's what's going to keep us going. Someone to drag us out of our home and bring us into the masjid. Someone who will say, "Oh, it's majlis tonight, it's a bayān tonight, it's a gathering tonight — let's go, let's go."

They say misery loves company. Think about it — all the people who go to clubs and do harām, do they ever go alone? They never go alone. The sin alone is no fun. They will try their level best to fill up, if not the whole car, at least the front seat. Bāṭil understands that — Shayṭān has gotten these people to not just do evil themselves, but to become ambassadors of evil. The more the merrier.

Then why do we go to Fajr alone? Why do we attend a talk alone? People will never go to a wedding alone. They won't go to a dawat alone. Who wants to go watch a basketball game alone, even with front-row seats? You feel, "Come on, I need to take somebody with me." My friends, we have to have that same feeling for the deen. I don't want to go to Jannah alone. I want to be surrounded by people. And in the process of getting people to Jannah, hopefully I'll get there myself. Think about that.

If you make a commitment: "I am not going to go to Fajr alone. I am going to take three people from my street, from my subdivision. I am going to bring people for Isha." I was just thinking last night — one of my dear beloved uncles of this community came and met me, jazāhullāhu khayran. I remember he used to come here for Fajr ṣalāh. He would literally fill his entire car with people and bring them to this masjid. And now since he started praying elsewhere, none of those people come here. But that was a beautiful example of someone who said, "I am going to carpool." He was the eldest of his whole street — but he would not come without filling up the vehicle with six or seven people. Imagine how much khayr and ajr he got from that. That is the temperament we have to have.

One uncle just hugged me and cried right after Asr, and he thanked me for last night's du'ā. And then he said: "I was leaving — I had no idea we were going to have dhikr and du'ā." He was leaving, and that same uncle who used to bring people to Fajr said, "Hey, sit down." Because of him, he sat down and stayed for last night's du'ā. Otherwise he would have been deprived. You see the temperament here. I'm not going to go to Jannah alone. I'm not going to do good things alone. In the process of that, I'm going to try to get as many people as possible.

This is what I'm hoping you all walk away from the Dār us-Salām Zakāt-e-Kāf program and Ramadān at Dār us-Salām with — that you make this commitment: "Yā Allah, I promise You, I will be an ambassador of the deen. I will be an ambassador of Rasūlullāh ﷺ's Sunnah. I will be an ambassador of the masjid. And I will ensure that I will become a biṭānatun ṣāliḥah for others." Say, inshāAllah.

That others should say, "Brother, if it wasn't for you, honestly I don't know where I'd be." I want the neighborhood to say that — "Thank you so much for looking after my Fajr. Thank you so much for looking after my sons and daughters. Thank you for treating my daughter as your daughter, my son as your son."

Most of the time we think that treating other kids as our own kids means looking out for their dunyā. But the real, real mahabbah and love for other kids is that you care about their deen. That you want to make sure that their sons and daughters are on the right path. And if you see any type of deviation, that you worry about them the way you'd worry about your own kids.

Today, a sibling doesn't care about his sibling's children. "My son is doing well. My son's kids are not doing so well — but it's okay, I don't want to start a fight with my sister-in-law, so let me stay quiet." What is that supposed to mean? You don't have to cause a fight. But if you know something is wrong and you care, you need to speak up. Every son and daughter of the community is our nephew and niece. If we see them deviating, how do we sit there and stay quiet?

The Warning of Imam al-Ghazālī: The Deception of False Concern

Your son comes back from school and says, "Baba, Ammi — Uncle at the masjid, man, I saw his daughter doing something crazy. I saw his son doing something crazy." What are you going to do? "Shh! Astāghfirullāh, don't speak." But you will talk to other people. You will say, "Did you hear about so-and-so? Did you hear what his son is doing, what his daughter is doing?" We'll tell the whole city. We'll backbite. But you won't go tell the father who's sitting in the masjid or who is next door.

You know who I'm quoting here? I'm quoting Imām al-Ghazālī. He literally gives this example in Bidāyat al-Hidāyah. He said: do not fall for this huge Shayṭānic deception. In the name of making du'ā for people, in the name of caring for people, you expose people's faults. He says that is a dual layer of harām — you're backbiting, and you're making yourself feel like you're someone great.

If you're just going to backbite, at least be honest about it: "Hey, I'm a backbiter. I want to let you know, XYZ is doing this." Fine — that's one sin. But why are you acting all pious in the process?

What happens is that someone says, "Did you hear about so-and-so's daughter?" And the other person says, "What happened? I mean — don't worry about it. Forget it. I shouldn't have said that." Then he builds the excitement: "Man, the dad is sleeping right next to me in this room, but I heard something about his daughter right now." And the other person says, "Please tell me!" And then in the process of it, he mentions everything that she or he is unfortunately involved in — and then covers it up with, "Astāghfirullāh, this is a big night, inshāAllah let's make du'ā for her." And the father is next to you sleeping and has no idea what you know.

That's what I'm trying to say. These are the multiple layers of Shayṭānic deception. So if you know something about someone — do not keep it to yourself, and do not talk to other people about it. Go directly and tell the person.

A Story of a Ḥāfiẓah in Doubt — and Her Return

I'll tell you an example. Alhamdulillāh — the story is difficult, but it ends on a good note. That's why I'm sharing it. I got the news through multiple people, and eventually someone called me on behalf of someone on behalf of someone else, saying that such-and-such person's daughter — who is a ḥāfiẓah of the Qur'an, a teenager — was expressing clearly online that she wants to leave Islam. She doesn't want to be a Muslim, she wants to run away from home, and she was saying very concerning things in a WhatsApp group of fellow girls. One girl's mother saw it and was shocked.

Eventually that reached me. I asked, "Do you know whose daughter this is?" "Of course." "Did you approach the parents?" "No. How can we say that? It's going to be very hurtful. Who has the courage to go and tell them that your daughter is saying this?" I said, "Then let me flip it: if your daughter did this, what would you want to happen? Imagine three years later when your daughter is an ex-Muslim on a university campus — president of the ex-Muslim group. And someone tells you, 'I'm very sorry, but we knew about this three years ago.' How would you feel?" "I would feel really upset." I said, "Then why are you doing this to someone else? This is not our deen. Love people the way you want people to love you."

So I took down the number and I called the mother. Of course — naturally — there was denial. I said, "I'm not here to make you feel uncomfortable for the sake of it. This is a real situation." I had the screenshots that were forwarded to me.

Before I got to that, I asked, "How are things at home?" She said, "Alhamdulillāh." "How's your daughter?" "Very good. She's doing her ḥifẓ. She finished ḥifẓ. She does duḥā. She wants one day to become a scholar." "How is she really at home?" "Oh, she does the chores. She helps me with the dishes. Everything is fine." Everything apparently checks out. But there was another whole dual personality going on.

People think they know their son or daughter. But honestly, this is the Shayṭānic era we live in. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala save us. It's very scary. No one knows what's going on.

When she said she had no idea, I said, "Okay, I have to break some news to you. We've got a serious problem here." I shared what happened. Naturally, I can imagine how shocked she was. I said, "Stay calm and relaxed. InshāAllah, we will get out of this mess. The main thing is — don't let her know that you know about this. That is going to cause a bigger problem. It has to be done quietly."

The issue is that somewhere along the way she had gotten infected — a virus of shakk and shubhah. She had been reading the wrong things and listening to a wrong group of friends that had pulled her into doubt. She doesn't want to be like this, but the rot has taken over inside. We need to cure it without letting her know.

What do we do now? Continue to show immense love and mahabbah, and maintain a very open relationship — where she can ask anything. How many of us can say our kids feel free to say, "Baba, I don't understand this āyah. I don't understand this hadīth"? Even if they say it in a manner that sounds disrespectful — your īmānī ghayrah makes you want to lose it. But what can you do? It doesn't help. Losing your temper is only going to push them further away. You have to stay calm and collected — I have had to sit in such conversations, your nose and ears going red with anger, because of the type of filth I sometimes have to hear about Rasūlullāh ﷺ and about Allah from ex-Muslims. But for the sake of Allah, I control myself, because I know this is a patient. I have to deal with this properly.

So I told them: stay loving, caring, maintain an open relationship, and start ta'līm at home. Start with Hayāt al-Ṣaḥābah, Faḍā'il al-A'māl, Faḍā'il al-Ṣadaqāt — to soften the heart. But then as you make your way in, start doing ta'līm of books like The Divine Reality by Hamza Tzortzis, which is taught here as well. It addresses the main reasons people fall into confusion and leave Islam. This is part of your 'aqīdah.

I also said: if you want to do ta'līm of The Divine Reality as a parent, you have to read ahead. Because there are some complex topics — you want to be teaching the class, not getting stuck. Also look into the course Why Islam is True by Ustādh Hamza Karimī. And what is the name of the institute? Basira Institute. They do great work — support them financially if you can, and take their courses. They came and did a weekend course in Chicago where they offered students Amazon gift cards as an incentive to attend. That's the best investment you can make — to get the young people who need it most to come and study.

I would love to host something like this here over a weekend. I need a few people to privately message me and say, "I'm ready to contribute a gift card" — because it's so hard to get the people who need to come. The ones who want to come, alhamdulillāh, they'll pay and show up. But we need to entice those who won't come otherwise. If you and I can save even one boy or girl from leaving Islam — Allahu Akbar, that is huge. And inshāAllah we will do much more than that.

Alhamdulillāh — my dear students, dear brothers — they did start a ta'līm of Faḍā'il al-Ṣadaqāt, Faḍā'il al-A'māl, and other books. Hayāt al-Ṣaḥābah — the stories of the Ṣaḥābah. And they brought in The Divine Reality. At the end of it all, I told them: Sūrat al-Kahf — the first ten and last ten āyāt. Make sure you sit in a circle and read it together. And if you have the himmah to read the entire Sūrat al-Kahf every day — which you should — blow it into water and use it in your food and your tea, every single day.

Alhamdulillāh, today, mashāAllah, the situation has done a complete 180. The person is fully back on the deen, studying the deen, advancing in ilm and amal. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala keep her and her whole progeny safe. And may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala grant many, many success stories to our community and beyond.

But the key thing — I went into this story to explain that if we had not reached out in time to the mother and father, all would more than likely have been lost. We would have never known. It would have just become another statistic of an ex-Muslim ḥāfiẓ or ḥāfiẓah, unfortunately. This is why it's so important for us to love one another for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala's sake. SubhānAllah.

His Refusal of Surgery and the Takbīr he Missed

So today we discussed Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī's commitment to salah — how focused he was, how much he cried, how much he inconvenienced himself — but he would not sit down and pray. He would take the 'azīmah — the higher road. When his health deteriorated and he could no longer stand even with the help of attendants, he prayed some of his salah in a sitting position.

Hazrat Gangohī suffered a cataract in the last few years of his life. The attendants pressed him for surgery, but he refused. One surgeon promised he would not allow Hazrat to miss a single salah, and that he would only need to pray Fajr at its earliest time and Zuhr at the end of its time. The only condition was that he make sajdah on a raised pillow for a few days to allow for the cataract surgery. He said, "A few days of salah on a cushioned pillow for me is too many. I cannot miss a single sajdah." That's it. I don't care about the cataract — I can't miss a single sajdah.

In another incident from Tathkirat al-Rashīd, it is mentioned that he came to Deoband for the annual graduation ceremony. It was likely Asr ṣalāh. Mawlana Muḥammad Ya'qūb Nānotwī moved forward to lead the salah. In his haste to catch the jamā'ah, Mawlānā Rashīd Ahmad Gangohī missed the Takbīr al-Taḥrīmah and reached the imām only a second after the recitation of Sūrah al-Fātiḥah had begun — due to the rush of people clamoring to shake his hands and meet with him. He couldn't walk from the back of the masjid to the front. Oh — salām, salām, salām. You know how it is.

This happens here too with influencers and YouTube stars. But in India and Pakistan, mashāAllah, there's some genuine and beautiful khayr there. There's genuine respect for ulamā. People think, "If I touch him, I'll go to Jannah." Someone once said, "You know, I don't like all this hazrat, hazrat business." I said, "Listen — ten times more than this respect, people give to influencers, musicians, artists, and sports stars in America. If any of those celebrities walked in here, nobody would be listening to my bayān. Everyone would run out to the parking lot. That's the reality."

Appreciate the fact that people still have love for ulamā. Appreciate the fact that they are not as materialistic as we are here. That there is still some genuine care for righteous people. The idea being: "We regard him to be pious, and because of our mahabbah for him, perhaps Allah will forgive us." That is a beautiful thought.

Yes, people can go to excesses — taking someone's ṭopī, and things like that — that's not correct. But I want us to appreciate the spirit behind it. And I want us to develop within ourselves the shawq — that we should not only line up to take selfies with Mufti Tāriq Masood dāmat barakātuhum or Mawlānā Tāriq Jamīl dāmat barakātuhum. Ask yourself: why are you making salām with them? Is it because they have a hundred million views? If their own ustādh showed up here, no one might even sit down for it. What is attracting you toward these personalities — is it fame, or is it genuine love for ilm and piety?

Someone once asked me, "Mufti Menk is here in Medina, can I make salām with him? I heard you know him." I asked, "What is your intention of meeting him? If your goal is that he's famous and has a well-known online presence — that is not a valid niyyah. You're not going to get any benefit from it. But if you say, 'SubhānAllah, millions of people's lives have changed through him, and I want to get his du'ā, I want to get some inspiration' — okay, I understand that." But Allah knows your intention.

The first time I saw people wanting to take selfies with a great scholar, I was mortified. "What are you doing taking a selfie with Hazrat? Where did this culture come from?" Because the goal is: "I want to show people I was with him." Those pious people — you go there and shake their hands, sit at their feet, and say: "SubhānAllah, I want some nūr that is descending on his heart to fall on mine." That's where you're supposed to be sitting. Not to take a selfie with.

Like I said last night — the trending culture. Whatever is trending, that's where we jump. And the most trending thing soon will be Dajjāl. So if we're always driven by fame and trends, that is a very wrong motivation. Our goal should be: "I am sitting in front of this scholar — not because of how well-known he is, but simply because he is, inshāAllah, an 'ālim, a walī, and I will benefit from him." This intention, my beloved friends, is very important.

Closing Du'ā

We ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to allow us to love those who love Him. Allow us to be surrounded with people who love Him. Allow us to be surrounded with such people who will push us to our furthest extent when it comes to the matters of deen — who will not say, "It's okay, there's a leeway here, there's a leeway there." Instead, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala grant us — as we said earlier in the talk — such friends and such spouses who will become a means of us capturing whatever we did in Ramadan, and allowing us to continue to build on it, inshāAllah, month after month until next year.