Du'a: The Embodiment of Worship - Shaykh Ahsan Hanif

Du'a: The Embodiment of Worship

If there is one act of worship that Allah ascribes to them, gives to them, says that they used to perform on a regular basis — it is the act of worship of du'a. More than salah, more than fasting, more than charity, more than any other act of worship.

It is the act of worship of du'a. And that's why if you were to analyze the Quran and you were to look at all of those different du'as that come from the Prophets, peace be upon them, you would find a wide, vast array of du'as for everything that we could possibly need. There is a du'a that Allah has mentioned in the Quran from one of those Prophets, peace be upon them.

The Du'as of the Prophets in the Quran

If it is divine help and care and protection that you need, then you have the du'a of Nuh, peace be upon him, when Nuh called upon his Lord and he said: "I am overcome, so help and assist me, O Allah."

If it is children that you want, you have the du'a of Zakariya, peace be upon him. Thereupon Zakariya called upon his Lord and he said: "O my Lord, give to me, bestow to me a righteous progeny and offspring."

And if you have children and you want to make du'a for them and your parents, you have the du'a of Ibrahim, peace be upon him: "O my Lord, make me from amongst those people who establishes the prayer, and my children after me." How many of us in this month of Ramadan have made a single du'a that our children will be from the people of salah, that our children will be from amongst those people who stand five times a day and night and they worship Allah in the salah?

"O my Lord, make me from the people who establish salah and my children after me. O Allah, accept this du'a, and O Allah, forgive me and my parents and all of the believers on the day that You will hold us to account."

And if it is that you have some problem, some illness that you're trying to overcome — we have the du'a of Ayyub, peace be upon him: "O my Lord, I have been overcome by affliction, by illness, by disease, and You are the Most Merciful of those who show mercy."

If it is hardship and difficulty that you're in, we have the du'a of Yunus, peace be upon him, when he was in the belly of the whale: "None has the right to be worshipped except You, O Allah. Glory be to You. I am from amongst those people who have oppressed themselves."

If it is forgiveness that we want, we have the du'a of our foreparents, Adam and Hawwa, peace be upon them: "O my Lord, we have wronged ourselves and You are the One who forgives, and if You do not forgive us and show mercy to us, we will be from amongst the losers."

If it is acceptance that we want for our deeds — this month of Ramadan, our prayer, our fasting, our charity, our recitation of the Quran and all of those acts of worship that we've done — then we have the du'a of Ibrahim and Ismail, peace be upon them. They were constructing the Ka'bah and they were saying: "O our Lord, accept this from us and You are the One who is All-Hearing and All-Knowing."

If it is a responsibility that is upon your shoulders, and you find it difficult to discharge and fulfill that responsibility, we have the du'a of Musa, peace be upon him: "O my Lord, expand my chest, make my affairs easy for me, and untie the knot in my tongue so that the people may understand my speech."

If it is gratitude that you want to show to Allah for the blessings that He has bestowed upon you and upon your family — from wealth and from good health and from all of those blessings that Allah has given — we have the du'a of Sulaiman, peace be upon him: "O my Lord, give me the ability to show gratitude to You for that which You bestowed upon me and my parents before me, and that I should continue to do righteous actions, and enter me with Your mercy into the company of the righteous."

Du'a as the Embodiment of All Worship

Over and over again in the Quran we have these du'as. Over and over and over again, the du'as of the Quran that the Prophets, peace be upon them, made — Allah records them because it is the most consistently recorded act of worship that we have from those great illustrious Prophets. And that's because in the Quran and in the Sunnah of our Prophet, peace be upon him, the concept of du'a is more than simply the concept of raising your hands in du'a. Rather, the du'a is the embodiment of worship.

From the meanings of du'a, from the understanding of the concept of du'a, is that the heart leans towards Allah. When you turn to Allah in any type of worship — any act of worship, be that salah, be that this Jumu'ah khutbah here, be when you give charity — your heart turns towards Allah. So it is a form of du'a, it is a form of invocation, of supplication.

Why? Because when you're performing that act of worship and your heart turns and leans towards Allah, within your heart you have that ardent desire and hope that Allah will accept from you, that He will accept that deed from you. And you have within your heart that fear, that apprehension, that trepidation that perhaps Allah won't accept — perhaps He will reject those deeds, perhaps they're not worth anything in the sight of Allah. That is a form of du'a.

And that's why the Prophet, peace be upon him, focused so much on this amazing act of worship. That's why it is so closely intertwined with this month of Ramadan — because in this month of Ramadan our whole heart is leaning towards Allah. We're worshipping Allah more in Ramadan than we do throughout the rest of the year. And that's why there is a du'a for every occasion, not like other acts of worship.

If you want children, there is not a single specific salah that you can perform for children. There is not a type of other act of worship that you do to have children, or to have wealth, or for good health. But du'a is something that you can use for all of that.

And that's why the Prophet, peace be upon him, told us in the hadith of al-Nu'man ibn Bashir, may Allah be pleased with him:

"Du'a is worship — it is all of worship." (Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith 1479; Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 2969)

When you understand this concept of du'a, and the concept that your heart must lean towards Allah, then du'a is worship. And then the Prophet, peace be upon him, recited the verse of the Quran:

"And your Lord has said: Call upon Me and I will answer. For those people who are too arrogant and too proud to worship Me" — and Allah equates du'a with worship — "then they will enter into Hellfire for eternity."

The Companions and a Life Filled with Du'a

So the Companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, would be engaged in worship for the whole day. From the moment that they woke up — when they would go into the bathroom and come out, when they would eat and drink, when they would leave their house or return into the house, when they would enter into the masjid or leave the masjid, when they would go on a travel or a journey — the whole day is punctuated with du'a. And that's not the type of du'a where you have to face the qibla and raise your hands, but it is a du'a when you call out to Allah and your heart has turned towards Him — it leans towards Allah.

And that's why from all of the sins that we've committed, everything that we've done, all of the sins that we have — a single act of du'a, when your heart is filled with sincerity, filled with desire and hope of Allah's mercy, filled with fear of His punishment — years and years of accumulating sins can be forgiven in a single act of du'a. When you make tawbah and you repent to Allah, it is a form of du'a. When you ask for Allah's forgiveness and mercy, it is a du'a that you make.

The Boundlessness of Allah's Mercy and Bounty

The Prophet, peace be upon him, told us in the Hadith Qudsi that is collected — he said that Allah says:

"O son of Adam, so long as you call upon Me and hope in Me, I will forgive you for whatever sins you have and I do not mind." (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3540)

"O Child of Adam, O Son of Adam, O Daughter of Adam — so long as you continue to call upon Me and hope in My mercy and My forgiveness, I will forgive you for all of your sins, and that is insignificant for Me. It doesn't matter how many they are — it is insignificant to Allah that He should forgive all of that."

Not only that, but we've been told in the Sunnah in another Hadith Qudsi, on the authority of Abu Dharr, may Allah be pleased with him, that if all of us were together in a single place, Allah's treasures, Allah's grace, Allah's bounty is so wide, so comprehensive, so expansive that it covers all of us for everything that we need. The Prophet, peace be upon him, told us that Allah says in this Hadith Qudsi:

"O My slaves, if the first of you and the last of you, and the humans among you and the jinn among you, were all to stand in one place and ask Me, and I were to give everyone what they asked for, that would not decrease what I have by any more than a needle decreases the sea when it is dipped into it." (Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2577)

"O My slaves, if the first of you and the last of you — meaning from the time of Adam, peace be upon him, the first of creation to the very last of creation — and the humans from amongst you and the jinn from amongst you, all of you were together in a single plane, at a single time and a single place, and each and every single one of you were to ask Allah for everything that they need — not just one du'a that you choose, but all of the du'as that you have, all of the needs that you have — you were to ask Allah for everything. Allah says: And were I to give each and every single one of you all that you asked, it would not diminish from My kingdom except the way that a needle diminishes from the water of the ocean." That is how expansive Allah's mercy, forgiveness, bounty and grace is.

And that's why the Prophet, peace be upon him, told us in the hadith in al-Tirmidhi: there is nothing that is more noble in the sight of Allah than making du'a.

"There is nothing more noble in the sight of Allah than du'a." (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3370)

Because when you turn towards Allah, before you raise your hands, your heart has already attached itself to Allah. Before you open your mouth and utter those words of du'a, you've already shown your poverty and your need before the Lord of the heavens and the earth, the Lord of all creation. And before you put your hands down, Allah has seen that need and that poverty.

In the hadith of Salman al-Farisi, may Allah be pleased with him, our Prophet, peace be upon him, told us: Allah is shy, and Allah is Most Generous. He is shy that a person should raise their hands in du'a to Him and He should return them empty-handed.

"Indeed Allah is Modest and Generous. He is shy to return the hands of His servant empty when he raises them to Him." (Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith 1488; Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3556)

Allah is shy that you should turn towards Him, ask Him, show Him your poverty and your need — especially for something that you really need, especially at a time of desperation and need — and that Allah should return you without anything.

So the Prophet, peace be upon him, in some of the most pivotal times in his life — like for example before the Battle of Badr — he was engaged in du'a, turning towards Allah, raising his hands towards the heavens, because he understood the importance of that act of worship. That wasn't a time for salah, wasn't a time for charity, wasn't a time for any of the other illustrious acts of worship that we have in this religion. It was a time for du'a.

And that's why the Prophet, peace be upon him, if he was perturbed by something, distressed by something, he would rush and hurry towards the prayer — because the salah, the prayer, all of it is du'a: in ruku', in sujood, in tashahhud, it is full of du'a and supplication to Allah.

Du'a is Always Answered

The Prophet, peace be upon him, showing Allah's generosity and the mercy that is on offer — especially in this month of Ramadan — said in the hadith of 'Ubadah ibn al-Samit, may Allah be pleased with him:

"There is no Muslim upon the face of the earth who calls upon Allah with a du'a except that Allah gives him what he asked, or diverts from him an equal harm, or stores it for him as reward." (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3573; Musnad Ahmad)

There is a thousand of us gathered here, two or three thousand in this masjid, and each and every single one of us calls upon Allah in our own language, in our own way, in our own manner. We use different words and expressions and we have different needs and wants and supplications, and Allah hears all of us. Those voices, those needs, those supplications — they're not confusing to Allah. Allah doesn't mix up my du'a with your du'a, and Allah doesn't have a problem understanding my speech or my dialect or my accent, subhanAllah.

There is not a single Muslim upon the face of the earth — one billion-plus Muslims — except that if they make a du'a to Allah, our Prophet, peace be upon him, told us: if they make a du'a to Allah, Allah will give them what they want, or He will remove from them some harm that was coming to them. Your du'a is answered in one of these ways — either Allah gives you that reward now and gives you what you asked for, or He gives you that reward on Yawm al-Qiyamah, or He removes some harm that was coming your way — so long as you don't ask for anything which is sinful, and you don't ask Allah to break the ties of kinship and family.

A man heard this hadith of the Prophet, peace be upon him — a companion — and he said: "Ya Rasulullah, idhan nukthir" — O Messenger of Allah, then we should increase, we should do more! The Prophet, peace be upon him, said: "Allahu akthar" — and Allah has even more. You can't wear out Allah. There is not a limited, finite resource of what Allah has. There is not a limited amount of du'a that you can ask Allah for.

'Umar and the Wisdom of the Scholars on Du'a

And that's why the Companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, would be engaged in the act of du'a. 'Umar, may Allah be pleased with him — this amazing illustrious companion — he used to say: "I don't worry about Allah's response. I worry about my du'a. That's my job, my responsibility. That's what I have to do, and Allah will respond to my du'a if I make it."

The famous illustrious Sufyan ibn 'Uyaynah, may Allah have mercy on him, said: it doesn't matter how many sins you have, how evil you've been, doesn't matter what major sins you've committed — never think, never think that Allah won't answer your du'a. Because Allah tells us in the Quran that He even answered the du'a of Iblis, and there is not a single person here — no one, no matter what sins they committed and what they've done in their life — that is more wretched, more outcast, more evil than Iblis. But when Iblis, knowing Allah's power, knowing Allah's grace, knowing Allah's bounty, turned to Allah and made du'a — Allah responded to him.

Iblis said, as Allah mentions in the Quran:

"O Allah, allow me to live, give me respite until the Day of Resurrection." He made that du'a at the beginning of time, at the time of Adam, peace be upon him. "O Allah, allow me to live until Yawm al-Qiyamah." And Allah said: you will be given that respite. He answered the du'a of Iblis.

Then what about our du'a — when we have within our hearts iman and a love for Allah and a love for the Prophet, peace be upon him, and the acknowledgement and realization that we are in need, we are in poverty of Allah's blessings and His mercy, His forgiveness, His bounties and His grace? Do you think that Allah wouldn't respond to your du'as?

And that's why the Companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, used to say that we ask Allah for everything. We make du'a for everything — even the shoelaces upon our shoes and sandals, we ask Allah for. We make du'a to Allah for it. There is nothing small or insignificant that you think is beneath Allah, and there is no du'a — no matter how great or how big — that you shouldn't make to Allah.

A Lesson from the Sick Companion

The Prophet, peace be upon him, once went to visit a companion who was sick — so ill that the narration says that his body had become weak and he sounded like a chick, a chickling, because of how weak his voice had become. The Prophet, peace be upon him, saw his illness and said to him: "Is there a du'a that you used to make?" The man replied: "Yes, O Messenger of Allah. I used to say: 'O Allah, if there is a punishment that You have for me in the next life, then bring it forward to this life.'"

"If there is a punishment that is in store for me on Yawm al-Qiyamah, I would rather have it here in this life." Why? Because the man was thinking that in this life the punishment is nothing like the punishment of the Akhirah. Our Prophet, peace be upon him, told us that the fire of this world is only one of seventy parts of the fire of the Hereafter. So he wants the punishment of this life.

The Prophet, peace be upon him, said: "SubhanAllah — glory be to Allah! That's not something which you can ask for. It's not something which you can bear. It's not something which you can withstand. But rather it would have been better for you to say:

"Allahumma atina fid-dunya hasanatan wa fil-akhirati hasanatan wa qina 'adhaban-nar — O Allah, give to me the best of this life and the best of the next life, and save me from the punishment of the Fire."

And that is from the beauties of the du'as of the Quran — they are comprehensive in meaning, short in phrase and words, easy to remember and memorize, but they are amazing in their potential and their reward.

May Allah accept our du'as in this month of Ramadan. May Allah show His mercy and forgiveness upon us, accept our deeds in this month of Ramadan, and make us from amongst those people whom He frees from the fire of Hell — us, our families, our parents, our wives and our children.

سُبْحَانَ رَبِّكَ رَبِّ الْعِزَّةِ عَمَّا يَصِفُونَ، وَسَلَامٌ عَلَى الْمُرْسَلِينَ، وَالْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ

The Second Khutbah

بِسْمِ اللَّهِ، الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ، وَالصَّلَاةُ وَالسَّلَامُ عَلَى رَسُولِ اللَّهِ، وَعَلَى آلِهِ وَصَحْبِهِ وَمَنْ وَالَاهُ، وَسَلِّمُوا تَسْلِيمًا كَثِيرًا، أَمَّا بَعْدُ

Our Prophet, peace be upon him — from the types of du'as that are not rejected by Allah is the du'a of the person who fasts. He said: "Thalathu da'awatin mustajabat" — three types of du'as are accepted by Allah, and from them: "Da'watus sa'im" — the du'a of the one who is fasting.

"Three supplications are answered: the du'a of the fasting person, the du'a of the oppressed, and the du'a of the traveller." (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 1905; Musnad Ahmad)

This month of Ramadan — these last few days that we have left of this blessed month — it is an amazing opportunity to make du'a for everything that you can possibly ask for, in any language that you choose, in any way that you wish to express yourself. Praise Allah, send salah upon the Prophet, peace be upon him, and then ask Allah for all of your needs.

Our mother — 'A'ishah, may Allah be pleased with her — she said to the Prophet, peace be upon him, in the hadith in Sunan Ibn Majah: "O Messenger of Allah, if I find that I am in Laylatul Qadr, what should I say? What du'a should I make?" He said, peace be upon him: say:

"Allahumma innaka 'afuwwun tuhibbul 'afwa fa'fu 'anni — O Allah, You are the One who pardons, You love to pardon, so pardon me." (Sunan Ibn Majah, Hadith 3850; Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3513)

These days and these nights are a time to make du'a. This day is the last Friday of this month of Ramadan — the last Friday — and in the time between 'Asr until Maghrib there is a time to make du'a. It is a time when du'a is accepted. You're going to be fasting. It's the blessed day of Ramadan, the blessed month of Ramadan, the blessed day of Friday, and you have that time on a Friday in which du'as are accepted. Make that du'a.

The Du'a of the Prophet for His Heart

And from the du'as that I want to recommend that you make in this month of Ramadan is the du'a which the Prophet, peace be upon him, would always make — in Ramadan and outside of Ramadan. It was one of the most common du'as that he used to make, but it is something that we often neglect. And that is that he would make du'a for his heart — he would ask Allah to rectify his heart, to make his heart steadfast upon this religion.

In the narration of Ibn Shihab, he said: "I came to the Mother of the Believers, Umm Salamah, may Allah be pleased with her, and I said to her: 'Ya Umm Salamah, when the Prophet, peace be upon him, was with you — meaning he is at home, behind closed doors, the Companions are not around him, he's in his home with his wife and his family — what is the most common du'a that you used to hear him make, peace be upon him?'" She said that he used to make this du'a most often:

"Ya Muqallibal qulub, thabbit qalbi 'ala dinik — O Turner of hearts, make my heart firm and steadfast upon Your religion." (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3522; Musnad Ahmad)

She said: "So I asked the Prophet, peace be upon him: 'O Messenger of Allah, why is it that you make this du'a most? Why is it that you make this du'a more than any other du'a?' He said: 'Ya Umm Salamah, there is not a single human except that their heart is between two of the fingers of ar-Rahman, and whomsoever He wishes He will make steadfast, and whomsoever He wishes will be misguided.'" So he would make this du'a often.

Our shuyukh, our 'ulama — the ones that we met — one of the du'as that they would most make is that they would ask Allah to rectify their hearts. The Prophet, peace be upon him, told us: iman disintegrates in the heart just as your clothes disintegrate over time. So ask Allah to renew iman in your hearts.

The Prophet, peace be upon him, would often focus on these aspects of forgiveness and rectifying the heart — because if they are done, then all of the other affairs become easy.

So in this month of Ramadan, in these last few remaining hours, make du'a for yourselves, make du'a for your families, make du'a for your brothers and your sisters and for the Muslim Ummah. And we ask Allah that He accepts our deeds in this month of Ramadan and that Allah gives us the blessing of being able to witness this month over and over again whilst we're in good health and with iman.

We ask Allah that He elevates our ranks in this month of Ramadan, that He accepts our deeds, showers His mercy and forgiveness upon us, enters us into the highest ranks of Jannah, and that He frees us and our parents and our families from the Fire.