Rise & Reflect with Mufti Azeemuddin Ahmed | 03/29

Opening Du'a

O Allah, open my heart, open my mind, open my tongue, and make my speech understood. Glory be to You — we have no knowledge except what You have taught us. O Allah, teach us what benefits us, and benefit us from what You have taught us. And increase us in knowledge and action. O Allah, enlighten our hearts with Your knowledge, and use our bodies in Your service. And grant us what You love and approve of — in our speech, our action, our intention, and our guidance. Indeed, You are Able to do all things.

O Allah, O Wahhāb, O Fattāḥ — O Allah, O Wahhāb, O Fattāḥ.

Introduction: Bidāyat al-Hidāyah — The Etiquette of Companionship

Alhamdulillah, in the past few days, in the last 10 nights after 'Asr, we've been covering selections from Bidāyat al-Hidāyah — the Beginning of Guidance — before we read one or two of the Istighfārs and then conclude with Du'ā. Yesterday we had a guest speaker after 'Asr, so we didn't get a chance to read. Insha'Allah we'll read from this today. This is the last section of this book, from page 129 onwards.

Al-Qawlu fī Ādāb al-Ṣuḥbati wal-Mu'āshara — the etiquette of companionship with the Creator and the creation. So we covered: etiquette with Allah, etiquette with parents, etiquette with people we don't know, and then etiquette with friends and brothers.

Then we covered the fact that if you want to choose someone to be a friend, every single friend you have should be intentional — something you've actually thought all the way through before you become a friend of someone. The first condition of that friendship was intelligence, and how an intelligent enemy is better than a foolish friend. The second quality to look for after intelligence is good character — how they need to look out for your best interest and care for you. Alhamdulillah we covered beautiful statements there — the statements of al-Qama al-'Uṭāridī, rahimahullah, giving advice to his son.

The only thing left in that section is one poem of Ali رضي الله عنه. We'll start from here.

The Poem of 'Ali رضي الله عنه on True Brotherhood

وَقَدْ قَالَ عَلِيٌّ رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُ رَاجِزًا — Ali رضي الله عنه said in poetic form:

Verily, your true brother is he who is really with you — who will harm himself in order to benefit you. And who, when the troubles of the time break you, will shatter himself to pieces in order to gather you together.

Allahu Akbar. When you look at this aspect of good friendship — how many people can say they have even one person like this? We might have thousands of followers online, thousands of people we're connected with on LinkedIn or other social media platforms. How many of us are blessed to have a friend who literally will, as he says, shatter himself to put us together?

The Third Quality: Piety (al-Ṣalāḥ)

The third quality to look for in a friend is al-Ṣalāḥ — piety and righteousness.

He says: Do not befriend a wrongdoer who persists in committing a major transgression. Because someone who fears Allah would not persist in committing major transgressions. As for someone who does not fear Allah, you cannot be safe from his danger. Indeed, such a person changes as his objectives change.

So what he's saying here is that you want to make sure that whoever you're befriending is not committing major sins on a regular basis. Mistakes happen, but it should not be إِصْرَار — it should not be consistently and always committing sins. Because the one who is committing major sins on a regular basis means he has no fear of Allah. No fear.

A person who lies, a person who uses intoxicants, a person who watches or listens to what is ḥarām — whether it's Ramaḍān or outside of Ramaḍān, he's always doing these things — you do not want to be in his company. The fact that he's doing these major sins regularly means he doesn't recognize that Allah is watching him. He does not fear Allah. And if he doesn't fear Allah, that's a problem. You don't know what he's going to do next.

Right now he's smiling, right now he's nice and kind. But that's because it fulfills a need of his. When things change, priorities change, when the conditions change, then like a chameleon he will change his color and do that which is in his best interest.

This is the sad part of today — people are what we call مَطْلَبْ پَرَسْت — they care only for their own specific goals. If they don't see their goal being fulfilled, they dump you. They change based on whether their ulterior motives are being met or not. These are people who don't fear Allah.

My dear friends — how many of us have a friend that is intelligent in the way we've been discussing? How many of us have a friend with such great character that he's willing to destroy himself to help us? How many of us have a friend who is not involved in any major sin, and if a mistake happens, he immediately repents?

Allah says to the Prophet ﷺ:

Do not obey someone whose heart We have made heedless of Our remembrance, who follows his inclinations, whose case has gone beyond all bounds.

Allah is telling the Prophet ﷺ: do not follow this person. There are people whom Allah is not allowing to remember Him — even on these amazing nights and amazing mornings. They don't know whether it's Ramaḍān or outside of Ramaḍān. The Prophet ﷺ is being told by Allah: do not obey someone. If they give you an opinion, you don't take it with a grain of salt — you take it with a tablespoon of salt. Because these people don't fear Allah. Their hearts are disconnected from Allah. They have a veil over their heart. They are not thinking the way you should think. And hence the suggestions they give are useless — because they are based on someone who lives only for this material world. Even if he is a Muslim — but giving an opinion that does not make sense to one who prepares for the Ākhirah.

As I mentioned regarding the Ṣaḥāba, Allah says:

When it was said to them, "You need to have faith and Imān the way the Ṣaḥāba have," قَالُوا — the hypocrites said, أَنُؤْمِنُ كَمَا آمَنَ السُّفَهَاءُ — "Should we have Imān the way the fools do?" They were calling the Ṣaḥāba fools. Who? The hypocrites. Allah says: أَلَا إِنَّهُمْ هُمُ السُّفَهَاءُ — You are the fools. The Ṣaḥāba are not foolish — you are the fool. وَلَٰكِن لَّا يَعْلَمُونَ — but you don't understand, you don't know.

Calling the Ṣaḥāba safīh — a fool — was because the level of sacrifice the Ṣaḥāba made was so enormous that the Munāfiqūn thought it made no sense. Why would you make so much sacrifice? "Brother, you have to live in this world too. How can you just be preparing for the Ākhirah?" A Ṣaḥābī's life was built on so much sacrifice that if someone were to see him, he would think this person doesn't know what he's doing — because he's not thinking about his basic interests in this world. All the time he's just thinking about the Ākhirah, Ākhirah. "Brother, you have to live in this dunyā. Ākhirah, we'll see afterwards."

So the Ṣaḥāba were people who literally harmed their dunyā to benefit their Ākhirah.

You Cannot Have Both — Dunyā and Ākhirah Together

Beloved friends, there's no way around it. You can't eat the cake and have the cake. You want Ākhirah and dunyā together? Jannah and dunyā together? You're asking for something that's not possible. You have to choose one or the other. And there's no other way for me to put it.

The Prophet ﷺ said — and this is attributed to 'Īsā عليه السلام as well:

(Musnad Aḥmad; also related from the words of 'Īsā عليه السلام)

Whoever loves his dunyā will harm his Ākhirah. And whoever loves his Ākhirah will harm his dunyā. So give preference to what is everlasting over that which is going to diminish.

No one wants to speak like this — but this is the reality. You choose. You choose where you want to enjoy life — over there or over here.

A Lesson from a Brother: Redirecting a Hundred Thousand Dollars

SubḥānAllāh — one inspiring story from last night. A brother said he saw a beautiful home — there are many beautiful homes in certain suburbs or neighborhoods of ours. A young professional had built a brand new house. Huge, extremely massive, luxurious, and gorgeous. The brother says, my wife and I drove by it. He said, "Oh man" — you know, this is the fiṭrah of the human being — he himself lives in a large, comfortable home, but he says, "That looks better." That's dunyā. Dunyā is that you can never be happy with what you have. Once a person becomes materialistic — wallah — we feel sorry for materialistic people. They're never at peace. As soon as they see someone with a slightly nicer trim on a car, they become upset. They can no longer enjoy what they have, because they saw someone who has more.

So he said, "SubḥānAllāh, I saw this house and I was like, man, I should build a house like that." He was attending a Khatm al-Qur'ān in another masjid, and as he sat there listening to the talk and the fundraising, the thought came to him: this makes no sense. I already live in a beautiful home. What's the point of trying to get a more beautiful, more huge home, when within the next few decades I'm going to be gone? What am I going to do with this?

He said, "Whatever money I should, instead of spending on the house, I should give in the path of Allah." So while sitting there, the brother committed to a hundred thousand dollars across three different masājid. He said, "Whatever money I would have put there — I don't have the money right now in my pocket — but I make niyyah that within the year I'm going to give a hundred thousand in three different places."

This is what you call someone whom Allah — literally, just as he was about to fall over into the ditch — Allah brought him back. May Allah keep him safe and sound. And may Allah save him from ever falling into this rat race of materialism.

SubḥānAllāh. But this is my point: a person must choose. If Allah is going to inspire you to give a hundred thousand dollars in three different masājid, you simply cannot hang out with a certain group of people. That certain group of people will talk about the hundred-thousand-dollar kitchen. I read a review in the New York Times about a fifty-thousand-dollar mattress. A fifty-thousand-dollar mattress. There is such a huge market in dunyā because there are enough people out there who, if the price tag is high enough, will buy it.

When You Come to the Masjid, Some People Will Leave You

Some brothers tell me: "Ever since I started coming to the masjid, I lost a lot of my friends — my other 'cool' friends who drive that car and live in that home. They don't want to hang out with me." Exactly. That's how it is. When you start coming to the masjid, and you start praying ṣalāh in the front row, and you start focusing on your dhikr and your du'ā, learning your Qur'ān, working on your tajwīd, focusing on your wife's deen, your children's deen — then you don't have time for all the other stuff. And other people don't find you interesting anymore.

And that's a really great sign — that those people whose hearts are disconnected from Allah may Allah allow them to not find us interesting. Because once you're surrounded by people who are not interested in the deen, you spend time with them, and they start taking you in a different direction. We are very weak. So we want to make sure we are surrounded by people who are focused on getting their relationship with Allah closer, always working on that.

We Are in an Era of Fitna — Choose Your Side

So we're saying that in this dunyā, we must choose where to go. And right now, my beloved friends, as we are in an era of fitnah, and every single day brings more challenges — understand that this ḥadīth is going to become more and more apparent. If you follow the deen, your dunyā will take a hit. The type of sacrifices a person needs to make for the deen — understand you'll have to make them. We're living in very, very strange times. But the weird part is that people don't understand that.

I'm asking all of you to make du'ā to Allah that He allows you to understand what I'm saying. It's right there, but somehow some people just can't see it — where we're headed, what's happening. So ask Allah: Ya Allah, please don't allow me to be veiled. Don't allow my eyes to be covered. Allow me to actually see what it means that we're in an era of fitnah. We're already deep inside it.

You're looking at the masjid filled last night. There are people who look at that and say, "SubḥānAllāh, Islam is strong. Look, everything is there." But one brother mentioned to me — and I'm being very blunt about this — in our area, every single masjid did the Khatm on the 29th, which was last night, packed. The brother said: "I ran out of one masjid after the 29th to go get some tea. As I was driving, every single Muslim-owned restaurant, coffee shop was filled to the brim. It's Khatm al-Qur'ān night across the entire region." But he said, there were the ones outside in those restaurants. Then the ones inside their homes. And the ones in non-Muslim restaurants. And the ones downtown.

We should not get deceived by what we see. Don't look at only what's happening inside the masjid. Look at what's happening outside the masjid. Then you'll understand where we're headed. We live in an era of absolute ghafla — heedlessness. Even if it's 'Eid, even if it's Laylat al-Qadr — people simply don't know. They are in their own bubbles. And while they're inside their own bubbles, even worse things will happen, and they will simply not recognize: "Wow, this is an era of absolute fitnah. My Imān is being tested. I'm being pushed against the wall. I have to choose between being a practicing Muslim or giving up my residency, my home, my passport, my wealth." Those are the types of decisions that people have to make. It's been happening all across the globe. And it's happening closer to us, closer to home.

We ask Allah for strength. As one person told me — he spoke to a shaykh and said, "Ḥaḍrat, it's a very bad situation. Islam is being attacked from all directions." The shaykh said, "Brother, you don't need to worry about Islam — you should worry about yourself." He said, "I'm very worried about Islam." He said, "You don't need to worry about Islam. Worry about yourself. Allah will take care of Islam — but what side of it will you be on? Will you be inside the circle of Islam or outside, when all this storm is over? When the storm is over, where do you find yourself?"

The type of questions we face today — a father was telling me about the questions his child had to answer when trying to get into some top-notch schools. The questions had nothing, nothing, nothing to do with IQ or EQ. Nothing to do with academics. It's completely, one hundred percent to do with politics. And that's where it is: when higher education, to be part of the upper echelon of society, everyone desires to get there — but to get there, what type of views do you have to have? This is a test of our Imān. This is the test. And many, many, many more tests are coming.

The key thing is: you have to tell yourself — you cannot eat the cake and have the cake. You have to choose. Where are you going to go? And for that, you have to be ready. You cannot have this mindset: "My dunyā and my children's dunyā should not be affected at all." This is very honestly the level of deen we have today: "I love the deen, brother. I love the program. I love the Khatm al-Qur'ān. I love the masjid. As long as my dunyā doesn't take even the slightest dent. As soon as I see a scratch on my dunyā, I say, as-salāmu 'alaykum, see you — it's too much, I can't handle it."

Brother — get ready for full impact. Full impact.

If You Love the Prophet ﷺ, Be Ready for Poverty

One of my students donated a couple of days ago, and I found myself responding to him differently than usual. I said: usually we say, "May Allah increase your reward by ten times." But I told this brother — for some reason this ḥadīth was coming to my mind right now — the ḥadīth where a man said, "Yā Rasūlallāh, I love you." And the Prophet ﷺ said, "Be careful what you're saying." He said, "No, Yā Rasūlallāh, I love you." The Prophet ﷺ said again, "Be careful what you're saying." He said, "I love you, Yā Rasūlallāh." He said, "Okay. If you truly love me, then you better be ready to face poverty — and poverty is going to come down at you, no doubt, straight at you, just like a log flowing downstream. There is no way you can avoid it, it's coming right at you."

Now what does that mean? That does not mean that if you give money, you're going to become poor. I'm not saying that. What I mean to say is: if you're going to follow the deen, expect difficulty. We don't like this — but this is the reality. Expect Allah to tighten things. Expect the heat to go up. Allah is testing: who is the one who will stay in the long run?

Like kids have all sorts of different competitions — who can stay silent the longest, who can stand on one foot the longest. Who's going to stay in the game the longest? And the game is the game of sacrifice. You and I are going to be asked to sacrifice again and again, again and again. And Allah is watching who's going to stay in the game the longest. So if you want to play the game, roll up your sleeves and get ready for sacrifice. And if you're not ready for it, get out of the game.

We have, mashaAllah, professional athletes here — they'll tell you: you can't get anywhere without an unbelievable level of hard work and commitment.

I was speaking to one scholar, and he said, "Bhāī, kyā karein? Log tawbah karne nahīn chahte." People say, "Yār, I'm lazy. Make du'ā for me." Du'ā? No. Sustī kā ilāj chusti — the treatment of laziness is by actually doing something. When you tell people, "Make tawbah" — "Man, I'm lazy." Well, I can't help you. There's no sharbat or Rooh Afza you can drink and suddenly be inspired to repent. You have to be willing to make tough, hard decisions — cutting things out from your life.

One of the main things you have to cut out is bad company. You say, "Bhāī, who am I to judge?" The person is not following the deen. Simple as that. The person is not following the deen, he's harmful, he's bringing you down. Stick around with people who make more sacrifice than you.

The Power of Good Company — Competing in Generosity

I remember one physician in one of the communities. He said, "May Allah give us the ability to be generous — we have a hard time being generous. We can't beat the Arabs." He said, "I attended a masjid with a lot of Arabs. And whenever there was any fundraising happening — mashaAllah — they dropped money as though they were, SubḥānAllāh, sufaha — fools — praying only for the Ākhirah." He said, "I'm in the same profession. I'm writing a $5,000 check, that guy is writing a $100,000 check. We live in a similar type of home, drive a similar type of car — when it comes to donation, I'm writing five thousand and this guy is writing a hundred thousand. Why is this?" He told me: "Just by spending time with the Arabs over time, alḥamdulillāh, their quality of infāq — of spending and being generous — began to rub off on me. And I said, I have to compete. If I'm going to compete in the home, in the car, and the subdivision I live in, I must also compete in giving."

So when you stick with the right group of people, they will motivate you to do amazing things. You see these kids who are reading Qur'ān — mashaAllah, tonight, today, right now, before Ẓuhr, after Ẓuhr, after 'Aṣr — they're reading. Why? One of the reasons is they found a group of fellow friends who are competing with one another to read more and more and more. Is this problematic? This is great!

Allah Himself says: this is where the competitors should compete with one another. Compete with one another in giving, compete in Qur'ān, compete in ṣadaqah, compete in tahajjud — all these things.

After Ramaḍān — We Must Change Our Company

So we have to be willing to cut things out from our life after Ramaḍān ends. We have to cut out things that are affecting us. You have to move on, brothers — we all have to move on. We have to find new friends. We have to find new company. Your Saturday crew has to change. Your Saturday morning crew has to change. Whatever you do, your wife's circle has to change. All of us have to find new friends who are on the same page.

And what we understand is: there is no such thing as middle-ground people anymore. It's going to be the ones who are firm in the deen and the ones who are not. The middle ground is going to be gone.

Allah says: I want to separate الْخَبِيث — the filthy, dirty ones — from الطَّيِّب — the pure ones. This is what you call filtration — sifting. Allah is putting us through a sifter. Difficult conditions will come, and now you will have to decide: what are you going to do? Are you going to remain firm and be at the top? Or, Allah forbid, are you going to go to the other side?

We have to have this conversation with our kids. Are you ready, son? Are you ready, daughter? What are you going to do? I'm not going to be there forever. But if you have to choose between following the deen and flipping burgers — versus not following the deen and living in a million-dollar home — what are you going to choose? You have to ask your kids. If you have to choose between following the deen and moving somewhere else — maybe a third-world country — versus enjoying the lifestyle you have and leaving the deen, what are you going to choose?

Maybe you and I don't need to answer that today. But definitely down the generations — one or two generations, or however much Allah wills — that question will have to be answered. You will literally have to choose between these two. And it will be such that you cannot play neutral. The world will be black and white. Either a strong believer, or absolutely clearly a hypocrite or disbeliever. That's it.

So the phenomenon of the "Ramaḍānī Muslim" — no more. No more Ramaḍānī Muslims. You won't have that. It's either you're Muslim 24/7 or you're not. Because it will just be too expensive to be a Muslim even in Ramaḍān. It will involve too much sacrifice to be a Muslim even in Ramaḍān. And that will not be something that people want to do.

You think about this excitement of Khatm al-Qur'ān — I honestly ask myself: is this going to be there 50 years from now? That excitement? We have to learn the lesson from the Christians and the Jews. Just look at their churches. Look at their synagogues. Where are the people? To get people in, they have music, they have dance, they have all sorts of different things just to make church exciting — and even then, no one wants to come. You have to go out of your way, bend over backwards, water everything down — and maybe then some people show up.

That worry for the Muslim community has to be: today we're all here, mashaAllah, what a beautiful environment. But 50, 100 years from now, do we really think the excitement of Khatm al-Qur'ān is going to be there? Will there be some people? Of course. There will always be some people. But what's the major trend? Will my son or daughter be there? Will my granddaughter, my grandson be there? That's the question. So the planning and planting of seeds has to happen from now. We cannot think only for tomorrow — we have to think for the next 100 years and beyond.

Today the fitnah that's happening — it didn't start 2 months ago, it didn't start 4 years ago, it didn't start 8 years ago. This fitnah has been planned for decades. And so a Muslim is supposed to be smarter than anyone else. We're not supposed to be planning for tonight or tomorrow — we're supposed to be planning long term. What decisions do I need to make because of which my children will remain firm on the deen?

Beware of the Company of the Wrongdoer — It Desensitizes the Heart

He says:

So you must be wary of friendship with the wrongdoer — for witnessing wrongdoers and their transgressions on a regular basis will remove from your heart all sense of their enormity and make them seem insignificant.

When you watch and sit with people who sin all day, the sin no longer seems like a sin. It's just like, "Yeah, it's life, man, it's 2025." Āj kal fashion hī aisā hai yār, kyā kahtey ho? — "This is how things are done nowadays." When you see things again and again — what happens? You just get accustomed to it. And you won't feel it.

You remember the last time you went for 'Umrah or some other spiritually uplifting environment, and then you went to the airport afterwards. When you got to the airport, you were like, "Oh my God, what's going on over here?" But the point is: when you're in the hotel, or the restaurant, or the airport — by the time your flight arrives in Turkey or Dubai, you no longer feel a big problem. And of course, when you're back at O'Hare, everything is back to normal. What happened? Just by surrounding ourselves with sin, the gravity of it goes away.

This is where one of the things I mentioned in previous talks: our honorable Ustādh, Ḥaḍrat Muftī Muḥammad 'Ali, dāmat barakātuhum, would say — he gave feedback to one classmate of mine who gave a khaṭīra. It was a khaṭīra in which he spoke a long ḥadīth about zinā, explained in the madrasa after 'Ishā. Ḥaḍrat Muftī Muḥammad 'Ali, dāmat barakātuhum, said the next day in class: "Your khaṭīra was great. It was delivered in Arabic. It was powerful, eloquent, fluent, and beautiful. But — you should not use that word, the explicit term for fornication, so many times. You can refer to it in another way, but do not explicitly keep repeating that same word five, ten times in your short reminder."

"Because when you get accustomed to hearing something, you will also get accustomed to its meaning and what it represents. And if a person gets accustomed to listening about the sin, they may unfortunately get accustomed to going further beyond that. And the filth of that sin will get removed from the heart. So when you need to speak about it, speak about it — but use a reference point, and do not need to explicitly mention it."

Look at the foresight of our teachers. Look at the foresight of our ulamā — how language plays a very big role. Whatever we get accustomed to listening to, and whatever we get accustomed to watching — it will become difficult for us to stay away from it.

So don't say, "Brother, at least I'm not involved in the ḥarām — I just go out to eat with them, I have my hand-slaughtered chicken sandwich, and after that he smokes, I don't, I just have my chai." Now you do this every day — what happens? Vaping, e-cigarettes, smoke — the harm or the disgust from it goes away. Allah forbid another friend has a different sin at suḥūr — drink, this, that. Just by us spending time with them, it normalizes it.

So again, he says: you must make sure you stay away from people who are committing major sins.

And this is the reason why the crime of backbiting has become acceptable to people's hearts and is taken lightly. Why? Because everyone is doing it. How often are you in a gathering where someone says, "Brother, I'm going — I'm leaving." "What happened? The party just started." "I can't take it — you're speaking ill about someone. I'm done, that's it, I have to leave." It doesn't happen. Everyone is like, "I wasn't backbiting — someone else was. I was just a bystander." Bystanders get shot too, right? That's what it is — this is a drive-by shooting if a person is listening to ghība. SubḥānAllāh.

He says: if you were to see a gold ring or a silk garment being worn by a religious scholar, they would strongly disapprove of it. The whole community would say, "Astaghfirullāh, what's going on?" He says: they would have a big problem with that scholar. And yet backbiting is a much more serious offense than that.

This is a strange thing. There are certain sins in our culture that we regard as very serious — we give them so much importance, "This is completely ḥarām or disliked." But then there are other sins which are major sins, yet people have simply decided to accept them because they have become widespread. A person will be very particular about a mustaḥabb act — they have to be at such-and-such gathering — but they sleep through Fajr. The criteria of what's right and what's wrong should not be based on cultural acceptability. It's about what is actually right or wrong in the sight of Allah.

This is the third quality you need to look for in a friend. Insha'Allah, we'll cover the others later. The fourth one would be the absence of greed, and the fifth one is honesty.

Questions and Answers

Q: What du'as should we recite to remain firm at the time of fitnah?

There are many du'ās — all the du'ās from the Qur'ān about keeping your feet firm.

O Allah, do not allow our hearts to become crooked:

Grant us mercy, and:

This is the du'ā of the People of the Cave — because you have to find a cave. We all have to find a cave. "O Allah, make my affairs easy for me."

Then in the ḥadīth, there are many du'ās. For example:

O Allah, keep me firm. O Allah, I seek refuge in You from turning away from the deen after You have given us Imān. I seek refuge in You from leaving the deen after being a Muslim. And Yā Allah, I ask You for āfiyah — well-being. And:

O Allah, if You choose to put a nation into fitnah, call me back without allowing me to be touched by fitnah. And:

Do not allow our muṣībah to be in our deen. Do not allow our deen to get tested. We don't want our dunyā to be tested either — but we can take the dunyā being tested. Please do not test our deen. These are the many du'ās that a person can recite.

Q: When an elder, teacher, or parent is backbiting, what should one do?

A person can excuse themselves and leave. A person can respectfully say, "I actually don't want to listen to this" — but in a respectful manner, of course. The problem is: how many parents are willing for their kids to say, "Abbā, I don't want to hear this"? They'll get so upset. They don't realize this is ḥarām. And so often we are sinning — so much sin — and then involving our kids in that sin, telling them about this person and that person. May Allah guide us, may Allah protect us, may Allah save us from this horrible sin.

If you can't speak up, you don't have to speak — at least quietly leave, or say, "I've got to go." Another good approach: if you don't want to directly stop them, change the topic. Change the channel. If you know your parents get upset about a certain person and then start backbiting, try to avoid discussions that will lead them there. And if they end up going there anyway, change the topic.

Q: How do you raise children — keeping them protected but also resilient?

In this day and age, there is no bubble. Wherever you have someone who's got a phone, there's no bubble there. Even if you never gave your child a phone — anytime he's around any human being who has a phone, he is no longer in a bubble.

I remember when I used to go to school — my classmates, mashaAllah, many of them are here — they'd say, "Oh, we watched this cartoon last night." I had no idea. We could never even participate in those discussions because we never had a TV at home. We actually lived in a bubble. But you can't live in a bubble anymore.

So do not think your children are in a bubble. Do as much as you can — but whatever the trash is out there, they will unfortunately get exposed to it. Instead of being overly protective and thinking they won't get exposed — they will. So we should be the first ones to break the news to them. Whether it's the LGBTQ issue or whatever — explain it from an Islamic perspective first. "This is what's going on in the world. And this is what our Islamic stance is."

Number two: at home, discussions on deen — discussions about the greatness of Allah, Imān bil-ghayb (belief in the unseen) — is very important. The stories of the prophets, the stories of the Ṣaḥāba, signs of Imān, the powerful prophecies of the future found in the Qur'ān and ḥadīth. These are the things we have to discuss.

Understand that our children are not part of our generation. Recently someone told me: a three or four-year-old, during a stormy night with thunder and lightning, asked his parent — "Why is Allah doing this to us? Why is He scaring us?" The problem of evil, starting at age three or four. It wasn't like this before. We would have never ever thought to ask a question like this. If you try to raise your kids the way you were raised, we will fail. It is a completely brand new, uncharted territory we have entered. Be extremely wary. Have a very good ear — listen carefully to what your children say. In any one statement of theirs, you will learn a lot about the condition of their mind and their heart. And you'll have to address it appropriately. It's a full-time job.

Q: What do you do in a place where you cannot avoid seeing sin?

A person needs to try their best to lower their gaze and constantly engage in istighfār. Sins will happen — you're right. But as long as we are regularly doing 100, 200 or more istighfārs with genuine sincerity from our hearts, insha'Allah, Allah will hopefully allow us to not be affected by the evil of what we're exposed to.

Q: What about the ḥadīth that whoever focuses on the Ākhirah, Allah will take care of his dunyā?

Yes — the dunyā does not mean that you're just going to make lots and lots of money. Allah will take care of your dunyā — you'll be content, your needs will get fulfilled. You may make money, or maybe not. The ḥadīth says:

(Sunan Ibn Mājah, Hadith 4105; also Sunan al-Tirmidhī, Hadith 2465)

Whoever's concern is only the dunyā — Allah will bring poverty right before his eyes. He will always be thinking he's going to become poor, even if he has millions. Allah will make all of his affairs scattered and in disarray. And only that amount of dunyā will come to him that was written for him. But whoever's concern is the Ākhirah — Allah will make all of his affairs sorted out, Allah will make him rich in his heart, content and happy. And the dunyā will come to him disgraced at his feet.

So definitely, we're supposed to do that. But the idea is: do not think that you will continue to be able to enjoy what is ḥarām. "This ḥarām investment has huge returns — you can't do that anymore." You cannot go wherever you want to eat. You cannot go out with any type of crowd. Your dunyā will be curtailed. You cannot do whatever you want if you start following the deen.

Focus on the Ākhirah — what does that mean? What's your priority? Is the priority the 8 o'clock meeting or making it to Fajr? If my meeting doesn't go well, do I feel more remorse over that or over missing my Fajr? It starts from the morning. Priority — the most important thing for me needs to be my deen. The most important thing should be the ṣalāh of my children, not the grades of the children. The most important thing should be the akhlāq of the children — not their grades or anything materialistic.

Whatever work you're doing, be intentional: "Yes, I can get a promotion. Yes, I can get more money. But how will it affect my relationship with my Qur'ān? My daily visits to the masjid? What will happen to my new travel schedule?" Constantly be thinking: how will this affect my deen before I make my next move? And whatever dunyā you pursue, keep saying, "Yā Allah, I'm doing this only for Your sake. This dunyā also is for Your sake — You asked me to go earn the dunyā, so I'm doing it. And hence, allow me to spend it in the manner that You want me to spend it." Then that dunyā also becomes deen.

Q: When seeking advice from a friend about another friend, doesn't that become backbiting?

When seeking advice, you don't need to give all the details. You say, "Hey, my friend is struggling in something — what is the advice on that?" That's the key thing. We should not unnecessarily speak about details. And number two: if Allah knows your genuine intention — that you are actually seeking assistance and help — then that would not be regarded as backbiting because of the purpose behind it. Like someone who is being oppressed or cheated — going to warn others, "This person just swindled me out of a thousand dollars, be careful with him" — that is actually something we should do. That's not backbiting.

Q: Would moving to a Muslim country help in raising children?

There are definitely benefits to a good, practicing Muslim environment in a Muslim country — I'm not going to deny that. At the same time, the world is of course deteriorating everywhere you go. So as long as you're in that environment, you'll be okay — but when you come out of it, you'll face the same challenges. The world is what it is.

For now, the key thing is the environment at home. If you keep the environment at home strong, then — mashaAllah — we have amazing men and women in this country who were born and raised here and their parents raised them to be beautiful people, strong in their deen. So alḥamdulillāh, I think this can be achieved here as well, as long as you're focused.

Q: How do you balance encouragement and criticism when raising children?

Every child is different. Some need a lot of encouragement to get them going. Some you can tell it as it is and they don't mind. Some need correction delivered with sugarcoating. Some you don't have to sugarcoat at all. We need to be conscious of the temperaments of each child and address them accordingly.

The balance you have to create: self-confidence without over-confidence. Lack of self-confidence is a big problem. Over-confidence leading to arrogance is also a very big problem. You have to tread the middle path. If they do good, say: "MashaAllah, you should go pray two rak'āts of shukr right now. You did an amazing job. But that's not you — that's Allah."

Q: On the importance of prioritizing Islamic education

What's been raised is how the curriculum in public schools and the exposure one gets there is so detrimental to a person's deen, their ḥayā, and their modesty — and it's very difficult to unlearn what has been learned and undo that damage. That's why you have to have alternatives that focus on the 'ilm aspect — the intellectual tradition as well as the iṣlāḥ and tarbiyah.

But most people — that's not their priority. They're just focused on grades and what college their child is going to, what internship they're doing. They'll send their kids to ḥifẓ class when they're 7, 8, 9 years old — that child is innocent. But as soon as he finishes high school, when you tell them to send him for a one-year Islamic studies program, they say, "No — he'll fall behind in college." If there was ever a time when it was important for him to learn the deen — both the intellectual portion and the tarbiyah portion — it's when they become 18 or 19 years old.

Notice how few students are in the 'Ālim program — two students, three students — when that is the actual time they need to be focusing. It's more important. It's because of priorities. They don't want to say we're going to fall behind in college. So that's the point we have to wake up to. All the things we're doing should make us say: we need to do something different. Otherwise, our children may unfortunately not even remain Muslim.

Q: What is the difference between venting and backbiting?

If you're venting but the person you're speaking to has understood who you're speaking about, that becomes backbiting. Speaking about another person should only be for a specific purpose — the purpose of iṣlāḥ (rectification). And only speak to the one who can actually bring that rectification — not just your friend. What is he going to do? And only speak about that amount of information that is necessary. Do not reveal anything beyond that.

Q: Is speaking against a sin in society considered backbiting?

No — criticizing a munkar, speaking against a sin in society, is not backbiting. In fact, that's the problem — we're not doing enough of it, and that's why people are committing so much more. Don't call out individuals. Call out the practices.

Q: Once you realize that certain company is toxic, how do you distance yourself?

You just become firm. Automatically they'll either change or they'll leave you. "I'll go out to a restaurant — it's time for 'Ishā, I've got to go." You grab a cab, drive home, whatever it may be. When you do that kind of thing consistently, either these people start respecting you for it or they say you're just not their type anymore.

A brother was telling me he was in medical school and connected with another student to study in the library. It was Maghrib time, so he said, "Can you give me a few minutes? I've got to take a 10-minute break — I need to do wuḍū and pray." He did wuḍū, came back, and prayed by his desk. He came back and the other guy said, "Oh yeah, I went to my car to get something — I prayed in my car." And then they studied. After that, this person never wanted to meet again for any study session. Very sad for him. But the fact that he didn't even want to be next to someone who takes a few minutes out to pray — that's what it is. So he said, "I tried, but he does not want to sit with me to study."

Q: What is the virtue of sitting in dhikr after Fajr until sunrise and then praying?

When a person sits after Ṣalāt al-Fajr in the remembrance of Allah until sunrise, and then performs two rak'āts of ṣalāh, Allah will reward him with the reward of a ḥajj and 'umrah — and Allah will fulfill the needs of his day. If a person cannot sit the entire time, then whatever time he sits in dhikr, alḥamdulillāh. But after sunrise — 10 to 15 minutes after sunrise — a person should try their best to perform their ṣalāh: two rak'āts, or two sets of two — four in total. You can recite whatever you wish in that ṣalāh.

Q: How do you know if you're on the giving end or the receiving end in a friendship?

After spending time with someone, do muḥāsabah — take stock of yourself. After that one hour, how do you feel? Am I taking or am I giving? I don't want to be sitting with someone who is actually giving me something I don't want. If I'm sitting with someone, it should be that he is receiving from me — not the other way around. At the end of the conversation, ask yourself: what did I get out of this one hour? Do I walk away thinking about a new car, a new house? Or did I walk away thinking, "SubḥānAllāh, this person read the Qur'ān three times this entire Ramaḍān — I barely got through one. I've got to do something different." Check yourself: are you taking effect from him, or is he taking effect from you?

Q: A non-Muslim friend who goes out of his way to make it easy for you to practice Islam — is that okay?

That's fine. But again — keep checking who is taking from whom. As long as you are giving, alḥamdulillāh, no problem.

Q: How do you make deen enjoyable for children?

For example, you have a checklist — the Ramaḍān checklist. You can definitely give prizes to those who complete it. One brother was telling me his wife told all her daughters: "Whoever recites the most Qur'ān — on top of any Eid gift — I'm going to give a nice, expensive jewelry set." Because that's how desperate she is for her children to read Qur'ān. These are acceptable things to encourage. When they're little kids, they're doing it for the gifts, for the lollipop, for the Eidi. But they keep on doing it — keep on doing it — until they get hooked on it, addicted to the ibādah. And then insha'Allah, they will stick to it.

Q: Is competing in ibadah considered riyā (showing off)?

Riyā can come in, but Allah Himself clearly asks us to compete — as Abū Bakr رضي الله عنه and the rest of the Ṣaḥāba competed. We all have this desire to be in front. If he's doing it, why can't I? If he's going to go to a beautiful Jannah, why should I be behind? That's the motivation: "I want to go ahead in the Ākhirah." That's what drives it.

Q: Should one do i'tikāf or go out in the path of Allah (jamā'at)?

When you go out in the path of Allah, you're doing nafil i'tikāf. We should all try our best to do Sunnah i'tikāf at least once — minimum — to fulfill this Sunnah. Many people are not able to do Sunnah i'tikāf every year; they do it once and then for many years they're not able to. For nafil i'tikāf: if there is no structured program in a masjid, then going out in jamā'at is very beneficial — at least you use your time properly. Because most people, if there is no masjid program, end up not making the best use of their time. And we have our phones with us too — you'd benefit more from going out in jamā'at, for most people.

If someone is super self-motivated and says, "No, I'm going to sit and read Qur'ān for 12 hours a day" — mashaAllah, that's different. But for most people, that's not what happens. They read a little bit and then waste time. We see this in Ḥajj and 'Umrah — in Mina, everyone's on their phones; at 'Arafāt they make du'ā for half an hour and then waste the rest of the time. It just depends on the masjid you're in and your own specific situation.

Insha'Allah, we'll stop here.

Assalāmu 'alaykum wa raḥmatullāhi wa barakātuh.