To Know Him is to Love Him

To Know Him is to Love Him

Introduction by Shaykh Omar Suleiman

Welcome and Introduction

Dear brothers and sisters, first and foremost, I want to welcome you all to this program. I want to welcome Shaykh Abu Abad, Shaykh Muhammad Al-Shinnawi, to our masjid. Alhamdulillah, we pray that it will be the first of many visits to this masjid.

We had him in our other masjid, our older masjid, Alhamdulillah, and I pray that he's able to come many times. Now, to introduce the topic, and before I hand it off to Shaykh Muhammad Al-Shinnawi, who I know everyone would prefer to hear, since you hear me way too many times. And I told him that I want to give him the maximum amount of time to speak, but I do want to kind of introduce the premise a bit to the subject of how you understand or how you learn to love Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, and how finding a connection to Allah's attributes actually solves pretty much every single faith crisis.

The Power of Connection

And I'll give you, you know, a couple of personal things that happened with me. I remember once I was asked to speak about something to a group of people that, you know, are not traditional, they're not Sunni, they didn't understand, or they didn't have the same understandings about the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) that we have. And, you know, I asked Imam Siraj, I said, "Imam Siraj, what should I talk to them about?" And Imam Siraj said, "Just make them love the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam)."

That's it, make them love the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam). Talk about the Messenger (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam). Don't talk about the issues of difference. Connect them to the person of the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam). If they connect to him as a person, they will naturally connect to his sunnah, they'll love him and they'll understand the importance and find joy in following him (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam).

Likewise, when it comes to the issues that reflect difficulty in our lives.

The Historical Precedent: The Qadariyya

If you look at the number one reason that people leave faith is because they can't come to terms with something that happens in their lives. And they're hindered by that. The question of evil, theodicy.

And it is the first deviant group in the history of Islam, was the Qadariyya, were the people who denied divine decree. And that came directly as a result of a personal experience. The Qadariyya took root, they found root when the Kaaba was attacked, and when the Kaaba was firebombed, and Abdullah ibn Zubayr (رَضِيَ اللهُ عَنْهُمَا - radi Allahu anhuma) and others were killed in the vicinity of the Kaaba.

This group that said, "God doesn't know what will happen tomorrow, nor is God in control, and this is, you know, it's all up to you, and there's absolutely no such thing as a God that has full power and absolute power over the divine decree." That's when that movement actually took root in the ummah, which shows that there's a connection between the things that we personally experience, and how we view theology, and whether text resonates with us or not.

So it was that idea that, well, of course, if God was in charge, this wouldn't have happened. If Allah could have prevented this, he would have prevented it. Therefore, the only way that we can derive this and make sense out of it is, Allah is not in charge, wa li'adhu billah, Allah does not have that control. And that hinders people, and so they look for solutions to their faith crisis, and they will craft up things that will make it convenient for them, or make it easier for them, make things settle easier in their hearts.

Ibn Abbas's Wisdom

And that's why Abdullah ibn Abbas (رَضِيَ اللهُ عَنْهُ - radi Allahu anhu), he said that whoever establishes the belief in Allah's decree, establishes their belief in Allah. If you get that right, then your belief in Allah will be sound, it'll be easy, you'll have tranquility in your connection with Allah. But if you have an issue with that, if you start to try to diagnose the individual situations in life, whether they're happening on a ummah-wide level or on an individual level, here's what happens to people who try to sit there and judge on why things are happening around the world, and try to come up with solutions, or try to pass judgment on the things that happen in the world based on their own intellect.

The Trap of Analysis Paralysis

What they end up coming to is a place of depression and idleness, batalah, complete idleness, absolutely unable to do anything, analysis paralysis is what they call it. You look around the world, everything is horrible, I can't do anything, so because things are terrible on a major level, I'm not even going to do what I can on a minor level. I'm not even going to do what I can on a minor level. And that's a problem, because then you remove your own responsibility to act, and you're not going to get better emotionally or mentally.

On an individual level, something happens to you, and you get so caught up in why is this happening to me, that you don't ask yourself what I should be doing and what I can be doing to make the best out of the situation. And so you don't gain clarity, nor do you gain comfort. Instead, you are further disillusioned, and you're further unproductive.

The Solution: Divine Attributes

Now how do you solve that problem? The two biggest things that constantly come up is, well, how do we understand the question of evil? If you learn to defer to the justice of Allah, and the mercy of Allah, that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala sees what I do not see, He knows what I don't know. Then that does not cause you to escape your responsibility. It allows you to in fact take greater control of your own responsibility while trusting that the ultimate result will be reckoned with.

One of the things that one of my teachers in Tazkiyah taught that I found very profound, he said, you know, if you look at, divine decree was the first reason that people went astray. It was the most difficult thing for people to come to terms with. But if you look through the Quran, you actually don't find much emphasis on the question of divine decree as much as you do:

"Whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day"

Why? Because if you come to terms with a capable, fully able, and willing God, then you're able to relinquish that mistrust. Put the trust in Allah, and let Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala do what Allah does. And if you believe in eternity, and you believe in an afterlife, then you believe in a period in which things are eventually rectified.

And if you're able to come to comfort and solid belief and conviction in those two things, then everything in between gets solved. Everything else gets turned into a peripheral issue. Because I don't understand, nor do I know, nor is what is observable in this life, even though death has such a feeling of finality to it, nor does everything that I see that happens in this life, or everything that ends up happening in this life, the end of the story.

The Miracle of Life and Sustenance

And you know, I gave a khatira when my daughter Khadija was born, and subhanAllah, witnessing the miracle of life, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect our children, and may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala grant us health and aafiyah. And you know, you just watch that process, and you're like, wow, it's just crazy to see that. And it's amazing to see:

"Then He eases the way for him"

How Allah makes a way out, and how Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gives us life, and then we sprout to where we are.

And you watch that whole thing, and you go, there's so much that could go wrong, but somehow Allah makes it go right. And there's so much in us right now at this moment that could go wrong, but somehow Allah makes it right. And when you make du'a, when you supplicate every morning, and you say:

"Ο Ever-Living, O Self-Existing"

The one who gives life and the one who sustains after he gives life.

Al-Hayy and Al-Qayyum

The ulama mention in the attributes of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, that they are all derived from this idea of the ever-living and the ever-sustaining. Because Allah doesn't just create and then leave. Allah does not initiate and then abandon.

Allah creates and then sustains. Allah initiates and then nourishes, right? In your mercy I place my trust:

"Set right for me all of my affairs"

"And don't leave me to myself even for the blink of an eye"

Don't leave me to myself even for that moment of blinking an eye. You know, the smallest processes in life, when things are happening inside of you constantly, you don't say, "Oh Allah, I've got this, leave it to me now. I'll take care of everything going inside of me." You know what would happen if you were left to your own faculties to control your own body? We'd all be dead in a few seconds. Because there's so much that's happening inside of us that we can't begin to understand.

And that's what keeps us alive. Likewise, if you're able to instead look at the world through the lens of Allah's attributes rather than look at the world through your own understanding and then project them and try to create the attributes of God in the way that you think a God should be:

"Have you seen the one who takes as his god his own desire?"

At some point it's like making an idol. And you are betraying your own faculties and your own understanding and the way that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has caused you to come to terms with things.

Trusting Allah's Wisdom

So when people say, "How can this happen to this person and not that person?" Allah knows what I don't know. But Allah also tasks me to do the best that I can to uphold justice within my human capacity.

But why does this happen and why does that happen? I'm at peace that the one who is fully able and fully just is in charge and in control and will rectify. The same way that that baby who does not understand what's happening to them. When you talk to your baby and you think that they're smiling at you.

Sheikh Mohammed reminded me yesterday as he was holding Khadija that she just has gas. But when you're talking to a baby and it's like you realize no matter what conversation you have with them, there's no way they're going to remember this. Because when we think back, our earliest memories are two or three years.

If you meet the nurse that delivered you, the person that gave you your first pokes, and drew blood from you or threw you around like you were on a conveyor belt when you were born and did all that stuff with you, you're not going to be like, "That wasn't okay what you did to me." You're not going to remember anything. But all of that was to your benefit.

All of that was to your benefit and in the making of you in some capacity, right?

The Perspective of the Hereafter

Likewise in the hereafter, you know, that moment that the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) mentions that the person comes on the Day of Judgment who had the most difficult life, the most difficult life:

"And they're dipped in paradise once"

(Muslim hadith 2807)

"And that person is asked: 'Have you ever seen any hardship, misery?' 'No.'"

What's hardship? I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know what hardship even looks like. That's the person who had the hardest life in this world.

Because it's just like that baby who would have absolutely no recollection of those moments. Because Allah controls all of that. And that time and those circumstances become irrelevant when you start to realize that there is a God that is fully in control.

That means as well that you are activated to your fullest human potential to try to amplify those attributes that have a dimension of mercy and justice in your own capacity in this world. Because you know you're charged with your responsibility and you leave the rest to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

Our Responsibility in Da'wah

The same way with our da'wah:

"Upon you is only [the duty of] notification"

And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will take care of the rest. And so I'll end with this and I'll pass it over to Sheikh Muhammad.

An Interfaith Dialogue Example

I remember sitting with a Catholic priest. It was an interfaith dialogue. And the question of hellfire came up. We were doing in New Orleans four weeks. And every week we took a different dimension of creed and discussed it. So afterlife, resurrection, salvation, all these different things.

And the question of hell came up. "How could this happen? Do you mean to tell me this person is going to hell and that person is going to hell?" Actually, that is all. I defer to Allah's justice and mercy.

Abu Hanifa rahimahullah, he was asked about this situation and that situation. He said, "I doubt that Allah is going to ask me about so and so. Allah will ask me about me."

That's what I'm going to worry about. There's no way I can be more merciful with someone than Allah will be. And there's no way I can be more just than Allah will be.

I'm comfortable deferring all of that to Allah. But the question again, like how could this happen? And what does this mean? And he answered with something. Catholic priest actually answered with something very insightful.

He said this is where you have to take things into your own hands. Instead of asking how could a loving God send you to hell, ask why choose hell over a loving God? Take it all back into your own hands. Put it back in your own hands.

I trust Allah the most merciful. I trust Allah the most just. I also know that I have certain things that I need to get done and that I can get done.

The Example of Ta'if

And Sheikh Mukhtar Maghrawi, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala preserve him, I remember he was talking about Ta'if. And he said the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) when he was in Ta'if, he didn't look at those people in front of him that hurt him and that did all the things that they did to him. Instead he looked to Allah and asked, "Ya Allah, what do I do next?" And that caused him to not focus on being angry at the people that hurt him, but instead longing for the next step in his journey to Allah.

What do I do to make this the most beneficial situation for myself? How do I get closer to Allah using this situation of difficulty? So it's not the people that are stoning me and hitting me. No, it's, "Ya Allah, what do I do or how do I use this to get closer to you?" Instead of asking why, ask what and connect yourself.

Conclusion

And so insha'Allah ta'ala, Sheikh Muhammad Al-Shinnawi, Alhamdulillah, he's actually, he's from the beginning of Yaqeen, Alhamdulillah. He joined Yaqeen from the very beginning.

And I had the pleasure of working with him on one of the first papers where we took 70 moments of moral greatness of the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) where the Prophet Muhammad (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) showed moral greatness by not responding to evil with evil in all different situations. And then he started to work on a proofs of prophethood series, in, you know, taking classical works and spending a lot of time on writing the proofs of prophethood series and has been working with Sheikh Tahir and others on systematic theology and what that looks like for us to really create an understanding of Allah's names and attributes and the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam) and connect ourselves to divine guidance in a way that can unlock our fullest potential and make sure that we have that full settlement of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in our hearts. And at the same time, that full action in accordance with what he's given us the ability to do and in accordance with the sunnah of our beloved Messenger (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ - salla Allahu alayhi wa sallam).

So insha'Allah, I'll hand it over to Sheikh Muhammad. Jazakumullah khair.