Good Deeds After Ramadan - Sheikh Ahsan Hanif

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إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ تَعَالَى وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا وَمِنْ سَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ، اللَّهُمَّ صَلِّ وَسَلِّمْ وَبَارِكْ عَلَيْهِ وَعَلَى آلِهِ وَصَحْبِهِ وَسَلِّمْ تَسْلِيمًا كَثِيرًا

أَمَّا بَعْدُ، فَإِنَّ أَصْدَقَ الْحَدِيثِ كِتَابُ اللَّهِ تَعَالَى وَخَيْرَ الْهَدْيِ هَدْيُ مُحَمَّدٍ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ وَشَرَّ الْأُمُورِ مُحْدَثَاتُهَا وَكُلَّ مُحْدَثَةٍ بِدْعَةٌ وَكُلَّ بِدْعَةٍ ضَلَالَةٌ وَكُلَّ ضَلَالَةٍ فِي النَّارِ

One Week After Ramadan

One week has passed since the end of Ramadan and since we celebrated the day of Eid. One month has passed since we finished that month in which we excelled in very many types of worship to Allah — in which each and every single one of us, according to our own ability, we worshipped Allah through prayer and fasting and charity and du'a and the recitation of the Quran and many other deeds. But one week on now, many of us, if not all of us, feel a difference in terms of our ibadah — that level that we were on in the month of Ramadan in terms of discipline and effort and hard work is no longer there, and it's only been one week since Ramadan.

The way that we would pray and the way that we would attach ourselves to the Quran, to the book of Allah, the way and the frequency in which we gave in charity — all of those many acts of worship. And there are many reasons for this, but one of those reasons is because the shayateen are now loose, and because the month of Ramadan is not like any other month. The month of Ramadan is there so that we can train ourselves and discipline ourselves, and that those good deeds that we perform in the month of Ramadan carry us forth for the rest of the eleven months, until, with the permission of Allah, the next Ramadan comes upon us.

Those good deeds that we have done in the month of Ramadan — no matter how few or little they may seem to us, no matter how weak and deficient they may be within our eyes — all of us should understand that those good deeds, insha'Allah, by the permission and the blessings of Allah, are something which have many great benefits.

The problem is that when you do good deeds, they are not tangible. In the sense that it's not like money — that you see an increase in your bank balance or it's cash in your hand. It's not like property or gifts that you get, cars or houses or something material that you can hold and feel and see and experience. Your good deeds are abstract, they're intangible. Your good deeds are recorded in the sight of Allah, and only Allah knows their true worth.

Some of us sitting here may well have performed a single good deed — an action in the month of Ramadan — and it will be the source of their salvation on Yawm al-Qiyamah. That single good deed, that single prayer, that single sajda, that single good word or good deed that you did to someone else — it will be enough to nullify all of their evil deeds and to raise them in the levels of Jannah in the sight of Allah. May Allah make us all from amongst those people.

Only Allah knows the true value and the true measure of the good deeds that we do. But one of the things that we find within the Quran and within the sunnah of our Prophet ﷺ is that good deeds — no matter how few of them you may do, no matter how small they may be — so long as they are sincere for the sake of Allah, they have a great many, wide variety of benefits. Only Allah knows that when you do a good deed, the impact and the reach of that good deed.

The Story of Charity Given in the Dark

Sometimes you go and you see a poor person and you give them some sadaqah, or one of the appeals that we had in this masjid when we were collecting for very many good causes — you gave perhaps a pound or five or ten or a hundred. You don't know the effect of that money. There is no way of tracing that one pound coin or that five pound note to its recipients and knowing the benefits that you may bring to that person and to other people who may indirectly also be benefited. We don't know and we can't appreciate this.

But rest assured that even though we do not know and we do not understand and we cannot comprehend, it is being accounted by Allah. Allah is recording it. And Allah on Yawm al-Qiyamah will give everyone their full reward and their full recompense.

Sometimes you give sadaqah or you do a good deed, you say a good word, you do something for someone else. You benefit them, you benefit their family, you benefit the people around them. Maybe you benefit generations to come from that single good deed. From the mercy of Allah is that all of that goes back to your scale of good deeds.

The Prophet ﷺ told us in a hadith reported on the authority of Abu Hurairah رضي الله عنه:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 1421)

The Prophet ﷺ told us that a man one day made the intention to give sadaqa in secret — that he would give some charity. And in those days there were no street lights; there was no way of knowing who you would go and give sadaqa to. He wanted to go in secret and give charity to the first stranger that he came upon.

So he went out that night and he had some money, and this man went and he gave some sadaqa. It just so happened that the man he gave the charity to was a thief — his purpose for being out that night was to go and steal, to devour the wealth and the property of others unjustly. So when the people awoke the next morning, the news had spread that there was someone in this community who, from all of the people he could have chosen, gave his sadaqa to a thief. So the man said, "All praise is due to Allah," because it was Allah who decreed that he should give that money to that thief. So he said, "I will go again the second night and I will give sadaqa."

So the second night he goes out again and he gives it to the first person that he sees, and it just so happens that he gives his charity to a prostitute. So the people wake up the next morning and they say the same thing — from all of the people he could have chosen, he gave it to a prostitute. So the man again praises Allah, and for the third night he makes the intention: "I will go and I will give sadaqa."

So again he goes out and he finds the first person that he sees in secret and gives him the money. And it turns out that that man was one of the richest people in that community. So again the people wake up the next morning and the news has spread that someone, from all of the people he could have chosen, gave his sadaqa to a rich, wealthy man.

This man will be brought on Yawm al-Qiyamah, and it will be said to him: for three nights he did this. Each day he wants to go and give to the poor but he ends up giving it to other people. Allah will say to this man: as for your sadaqa that you gave to the thief — because of it, he stopped stealing that night. He didn't steal, and so he saved many people's wealth and their property. And as for that woman that he gave sadaqa to who was a prostitute — she stopped, and so because of that she was able to preserve her modesty and the modesty of her family. And as for the third person, the rich man — when he received the charity, he felt ashamed that there were other people giving charity even though he had more than them, and so he began to give regular charity after that night.

The Benefits of Good Deeds

So the Prophet ﷺ is showing us in this hadith how when you do a good deed — from the good deeds that you do in Ramadan and outside of Ramadan — you don't know the true worth and the true measure of those good deeds. But Allah tells us in the Quran that those people who do good deeds sincerely for the sake of Allah, from the greatest benefits that Allah will give and bestow upon them is that they will have a good life — a pleasurable life.

A Good Life in This World and the Next

Whosoever does good deeds — male or female — whilst they have iman, then We will give them a good life. They will live a good life. And on the Day of Judgment, when We give them their rewards, they will be rewarded according to the best of the deeds that they used to perform.

Because we in our deeds and the actions that we perform — they are of varying levels. Some of them are greater in benefit and greater in sincerity, and others of them are less so. But from the mercy of Allah to the sincere believers, on the Day of Judgment He will reward them according to the best of the deeds that they used to perform. And that's why, even after the month of Ramadan — even though we may be going through those post-Ramadan blues, through that period where we now feel slightly demotivated, slightly dejected, slightly unsure of ourselves because we're no longer at that same level that we were on in the month of Ramadan — know that Allah, so long as you continue insha'Allah on this path and you continue to the best of your ability, will reward you for the best of the deeds that you used to perform.

And that's why the believer is the one who realizes that after Ramadan, if they are in a slightly better condition than they were even before Ramadan, then that in and of itself is a good sign. It is impossible for each and every single one of us to be like we were in Ramadan for every single day of the year. Nor is it the purpose of Ramadan that after Ramadan you never sin, or you never make a mistake, or you never do anything wrong — because that too is impossible. But the purpose of Ramadan is to reconnect you to Allah and to refocus your perspective in life, to reshift your priorities in this life, so that after Ramadan, even if you were slightly better than you were before Ramadan, then insha'Allah that is something which is a good sign.

Attaining the Love of Allah Through Deeds

From the benefits of doing good deeds, as the Prophet ﷺ told us in the hadith al-Qudsi, is that when you do those good deeds, Allah loves you. Allah says:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 6502)

There is no good deed that you can perform that is more beloved to Allah than fulfilling the obligatory duties that He has made obligatory upon you: the five daily prayers, giving your zakah, performing hajj once in a lifetime if you haven't done so, fasting Ramadan as it comes upon you each and every single year so long as you have the ability to do so, looking after the rights of those people who have rights upon you — your parents, your spouses, your children, people around you. These are from the greatest, most beloved deeds that you can perform in the sight of Allah.

So therefore, if after Ramadan all you did was pray five times a day whereas before Ramadan you weren't doing that, that is a sign of goodness. If after Ramadan now you're giving regular zakah whereas before Ramadan for years you never gave zakah, that is something which is a good sign. If now you have bettered yourself in terms of your character, in terms of the way that you deal with others, in terms of your speech and your conduct, then that is a good sign. That Ramadan benefited you. Ramadan had an impact upon you.

And then if you do more optional deeds — more good deeds — you continue to read more Quran and pray more prayer and give more sadaqa and make more du'a — you will not continue to do so until Allah loves you. For Allah, one of the ways and means of attaining His love is by performing optional deeds. You perform the obligatory good deeds — and that is something which Allah loves — and then you perform the optional deeds, and Allah increases in His love for you.

Good Deeds Remove Difficulty and Hardship

The Prophet ﷺ told us that from the greatest benefits of performing good deeds — and when the sunnah normally speaks about good deeds, it is a generic term that can refer to the smallest thing that you may not think has any relevance or significance or weight, but in the sight of Allah it may be extremely valuable — that from the benefits of performing good deeds, even the smallest from among them, is that Allah, as a result of them, makes things easy for you and removes calamities and hardship from you.

As is in the hadith of Abu Hurairah رضي الله عنه, that the Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 3382)

Whosoever would like that Allah should respond to their du'as in times of calamity and difficulty and hardship, then let them make more du'a in times of ease and happiness. When you attach yourself to Allah throughout the year — not just when it's the time of difficulty and calamity — Allah is more likely to respond to you when you are in need. When you do good deeds, Allah responds, and one of the benefits is that Allah removes difficulty and hardship from you.

Good Deeds Are a Barrier Against Evil

From amongst the benefits of doing good deeds, as the Prophet ﷺ told us in the Musnad of Imam Ahmad, also on the authority of Abu Hurairah رضي الله عنه, is that they prevent you from evil — they are a barrier that stops you from disobeying Allah. He said ﷺ:

(Musnad Imam Ahmad, Hadith 9764)

A man came to the Prophet ﷺ and said, "O Messenger of Allah, there is a man from amongst us within our community who all night long does nothing but pray. But in the daytime he is a thief. By night he prays and worships Allah; by daytime he steals." The Prophet ﷺ replied and said, "What you just said will eventually stop him." The fact that he is attached closely to Allah — that he prays, that he does good deeds — slowly but surely it will stop him, because he will soon come to that realization that those evil deeds are impacting upon his good deeds, upon his nightly prayer.

And that's why one of the reasons why we don't live up to that same level and standard that we were on in the month of Ramadan is because after Ramadan we sin more. We go back to our old ways. We go back to being negligent of Allah and negligent of the rights of others and negligent of the rights of the Quran. And when we become distant from Allah, that becomes a barrier between us and attaining the mercy of Allah.

So after the month of Ramadan, one of the greatest things that you can do is to stay away from evil deeds. If you stay away from evil deeds, that is one of the greatest signs that you had an accepted Ramadan. The scholars of the Salaf of the past رحمهم الله would say that every day that you come closer to Allah and every day that you don't sin, it is a day of Eid — it is a day of celebration. That day that you don't sin and you come closer to Allah, it is a cause for you to celebrate because you have come closer to Allah.

Good Deeds Bring the Forgiveness of Allah

From the benefits of doing good deeds, as the Prophet ﷺ told us, is the immense amount of forgiveness that Allah gives to us as a result of those good deeds. Because one of the ways that we attain the forgiveness of Allah is by making tawbah and making istighfar and asking for Allah's forgiveness. But another way in which we also seek forgiveness from Allah is by doing good deeds, as Allah says:

Indeed the good deeds — they remove and extinguish evil deeds. And as Allah says amongst those people whose tawbah He accepts:

Those are the people that Allah will change their evil deeds into good deeds — not only does He wipe them away, but some of those evil deeds are turned and changed into good deeds. The Prophet ﷺ told us in the hadith of Abu Hurairah رضي الله عنه, collected in al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim:

Whosoever every single day says سُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ وَبِحَمْدِهِ one hundred times — Allah will expel for them all of their evil deeds, He will nullify all of their evil deeds, even if they are like the foam of the ocean. Irrespective of their quantity and number and volume, to simply say سُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ وَبِحَمْدِهِ one hundred times a day — something that won't take you more than two, three, four, five minutes maximum — but every single day you are conscious of Allah and every single day you understand what you are saying when you glorify and praise Allah, and then you say it one hundred times, Allah expels all of those evil deeds from you. A single good deed overcomes thousands — if not hundreds of thousands and millions — of evil deeds.

Good Deeds Make the Accounting Easier on the Day of Judgment

From the benefits of doing good deeds is that Allah will not only bless us in this life, but on Yawm al-Qiyamah He will make easy for them the accounting — those people who do good deeds, their hisab, their accounting on Yawm al-Qiyamah, will be easier for them. In the hadith collected in al-Bukhari and Muslim that the Prophet ﷺ told us: a person will come on the Day of Judgment and Allah will say to him or her, "What did you do in the dunya? What are your good deeds? What did you do in this life?" That person will reply and say, "O Allah, I never did anything good except that I was a person who had wealth — money. This was my only good deed: I had money, and I would give it to people as loans. And when the time would come back for them to repay their loan — if they had the ability to do so, I would collect my money; and if they didn't have the ability to do so, they were going through financial difficulty, I would forgive them."

So the Prophet ﷺ said about this man: forgive him, because Allah is more worthy of showing forgiveness and pardoning someone than this man was to those people who couldn't pay him back his money.

So the good deeds that we perform in Ramadan and the motivation that we have to continue after Ramadan is that those good deeds — no matter how small they may seem, no matter how insignificant they may seem to us — we don't know the weight they hold in the sight of Allah. And so we hope in the mercy of Allah and His forgiveness, even if it is a single good deed. As Umar ibn al-Khattab رضي الله عنه would say — and this is a companion who spent decades with the Prophet ﷺ, so many years preserving Islam and fighting for Islam and sacrificing for Islam and supporting the Prophet ﷺ, and many years after the death of the Prophet ﷺ he continued to do so as well — he would say: if I knew that only one good deed was accepted from all of those good deeds, then I would place all of my hope onto that single good deed.

We don't know what we do that Allah accepts, and we don't know which one of those good deeds that we do will have such a lasting impact that on Yawm al-Qiyamah it may be the source of our salvation. So when shaytan comes to us after the month of Ramadan and whispers to us and tells us that we didn't do enough, or that Ramadan is over, or that we need to go back to our old ways — we need to be strong enough and disciplined enough to say to him: no. Even if we continue to do something small — continue to read only a single page of the Quran a day, read two optional rak'ahs a day, give something in sadaqah just once a week or once a month. But every single one of those good deeds that we continue on, it is in and of itself a sign that we had, insha'Allah, a good and accepted Ramadan.

We ask Allah as the companions would do: after the month of Ramadan, for months they would make du'a to Allah that He accepts the deeds that they performed in Ramadan. So important was the month of Ramadan in their eyes that they wouldn't just forget Ramadan the day after or a week later, but they would remember it for months on end and make du'a to Allah that He accepts their deeds from Ramadan.

So likewise we ask Allah on this blessed day of Jumu'ah that Allah accepts our deeds from Ramadan — all of our deeds, our fasting and our prayer and our charity — and that Allah makes us from amongst those people who after the month of Ramadan are better than we were before Ramadan. And that He makes it an accepted Ramadan and allows us to witness many more Ramadans in which we continue to excel and come closer to Allah.

Spreading Goodness and Being Part of a Legacy

One of the greatest ways of attaining good deeds — and one of the greatest ways of attaining those deeds that you don't see their ramifications and implications, but Allah will reward you for in full on Yawm al-Qiyamah — is when you work for the religion of Allah and you are a means of goodness and you spread that goodness to others.

What we did last week in the park — last Friday on Yawm al-Eid — when we had tens of thousands of people in a single place, and the vast majority of those people are not people from this masjid or members of this congregation, because we only have three, four, five thousand people on a single Friday. But those other tens of thousands of people who also turned up on that single day — it is something which, insha'Allah, for those people who were involved, even in the slightest way, even if it was just by giving a pound towards that cause or whatever that they did, insha'Allah it is something that they will see on Yawm al-Qiyamah.

That is one of the greatest ways, and it is one of the greatest forms of continuous charity — sadaqah jariyah. When you do something good and that goodness spreads, and you don't even know how far it will spread and how many people it will affect and how many generations it may continue for.

And so on this blessed day of Friday — one of the first Jumu'ahs that we have after Eid and after Ramadan — I want you to think about this very seriously: what you can do to help others and to help this masjid in facilitating this message of Islam and spreading it to others. Some of you have the ability to volunteer, some of you have skills and talents that you can share, some of you have the financial ability to give, some of you have other things that you can contribute. But each and every single person in this congregation — no matter how old or how young, male or female, whatever your condition may be, whatever your status may be — every single person has a part to play.

And that is what made the companions such an amazing generation — that all of them would contribute. And even though we only know the names of maybe a handful or a few dozen or a few hundred, there were many thousands of other companions who were part of that community. Their reward is with Allah. They too have that status and that honor of being companions of the Prophet ﷺ.

It is from the greatest types of hirman — of loss — that you see all of this goodness around you and you're in the midst of it and you're a part of it, but you don't partake. You see everyone else going forward and everyone else doing things, and even though you have the opportunity — time and time again — you stand back. It is one of the worst traps of shaytan.

So now that we've finished this month of Ramadan and you have another year until the next Ramadan, don't let it be something which you don't fill with anything that is good until the next Ramadan comes. From today, start — whatever you can do. And even if it's not with this masjid but you yourself, in your individual capacity, as a community, as a family — whatever you can do. It is one of the greatest forms of charity.

Some of us only have the ability to look after our children — give them a good upbringing, make sure that they are good citizens and people who are constructive to their communities. Even that is something which has a great reward in the sight of Allah. For the Prophet ﷺ told us that a person will come on Yawm al-Qiyamah and they will be presented with their good deeds and they will recognize them. They will see them and they will recognize their prayer and their fasting and their charity and all of the good deeds that they did. But then Allah will say to that person: look over there — those good deeds belong to you as well. And so they will look and they will see those good deeds but they won't recognize them. They will say, "O Allah, these do not belong to me. These deeds are not mine — I never did this." But Allah will reply and say: these are the deeds of your children — you have a share of that reward. Your children, your grandchildren, your great grandchildren. Because you planted that seed, that reward goes back to you.

And that's why everything that we do — all of the good that we do — eventually that reward goes back generation before generation until it comes to our Prophet ﷺ. And that's why he has the greatest station in this Ummah — because all of the good that we do, he was the one who, by the permission of Allah, guided us towards that goodness. Be a part of that legacy so that when you do good and others benefit, it is something which ultimately you do for yourself and you will benefit on Yawm al-Qiyamah.

Closing Du'a

We ask Allah that He gives us the ability to be people who do continuous charity and people who spread goodness and we benefit from that goodness on Yawm al-Qiyamah. May Allah bless us and our families and may He reward us and our families and forgive us and our families. May Allah shower His mercy upon those of our brothers and sisters who passed away in the month of Ramadan and before the month of Ramadan and after the month of Ramadan. We ask Allah that He allows us to witness many more Ramadans, and that we take benefit from those months, and that Allah makes us from amongst those people whose deeds in this life will be a source of salvation and success for them in the next life.