2014-12-19 - Sheikh Khalil Abdul Rashid

Khutbah: Upholding Justice Beyond Bias, Identity, and Self-Interest

By Sheikh Khalil Abdul Rashid

Opening

Alhamdulillah, we praise Him, we seek His help, we seek His guidance, we believe in Him and we put our trust in Him. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our souls and from the evil of our deeds. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide him, and whosoever He leads astray, none can guide him. I bear witness that there is no god but Allah, and that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger.

The Story: A Dispute Before the Prophet ﷺ

There is a circumstance — a situation — that happened during the time of the Prophet ﷺ where two of his companions got into a dispute. And they came to him ﷺ for resolution of that dispute and adjudication. So he sat with them and there was a dispute over property — which person was the true owner of a particular item. One of the men was wealthy and the other man was impoverished and poor.

And the Prophet ﷺ listened to both of their claims. But inside of the Prophet ﷺ — personally, even before both of them spoke and before both of them presented their arguments — the Prophet ﷺ already had an inclination to support the poor man. Already his mayl, his inclination, was towards the poor, because at that time the Prophet ﷺ felt that there was no way — how could it be that the poor man could have wronged and oppressed the rich man? How could that have happened?

So going into the majlis — going into the meeting to resolve the dispute — there was already an internal inclination in the Prophet ﷺ to be a bit inclined toward the poor man. And we know the Prophet ﷺ was instructed by Allah to pay attention to those that were poor, needy, and weak. But when both of those companions sat in front of him and they both sat in front of him requesting justice and fairness, then the command to look after the poor and the weak was put aside. Because when it comes to justice, external considerations are not to be given any due weight.

And so because of that internal inclination — and this was not something that those two Sahabas were aware of; that was an internal matter with the Prophet ﷺ that only Allah was aware of — when both of them sat and they began their arguments, an ayah of Quran came down. An ayah came down not informing the Prophet ﷺ about who was right and who was wrong, but instructing the Prophet ﷺ about how to adjudicate that matter.

Even though as a bashar — as a human being — you come into that situation with personal biases, personal affiliations, connections, prejudices, and experiences that are natural for us to have. We come to the table with those preconceived judgments and feelings that are natural. But when we step into the arena of justice, we have an ethical responsibility to put those aside and to seek justice.

The Ayah of Justice — Surah An-Nisa, Ayah 135

And so the ayah that was revealed is the one that I introduced this khutbah with. It is located in Surah An-Nisa — the fourth chapter of the Quran — and it is ayah number 135. Easy to remember: 135.

I encourage all of you to please go back home and through this weekend, go look at this ayah, think about it, discuss it with your children especially, and with your wives and your husbands, especially in light of current events — things that are going on today. Because being in the Muslim world or in our own country here, we have a crisis of justice. We really do. We are deficient — whether we are Muslim, whether we identify or claim to be Muslim, or whether we identify or claim to be American. We have a crisis of justice here. And that is because of our human biases that we don't set aside.

And so Allah introduces the Prophet ﷺ to the importance of putting your personal biases and judgments aside. But out of his love for the Prophet ﷺ, He doesn't say يَا أَيُّهَا النَّبِيُّ — O Prophet. He conceals the Prophet's situation. He covers the Prophet, because Allah is Ghafoor — and ghafoor means also that He does sitr. He covers faults.

And so the ayah begins:

يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا — O People of Faith. Everybody is included. Covering the Prophet's feelings. We know from the tafsir of the ayah that the context of this revelation was that resolution — that circle, that gathering — with the Prophet to solve the problems of those two Sahabas. But it begins: O People of Faith.

كُونُوا قَوَّامِينَ بِالْقِسْطِ — Uphold Justice

I'll do a general translation — I'm not going to do it word by word. Uphold justice. If you are people of faith, uphold justice.

شُهَدَاءَ لِلَّهِ — And take Allah to witness on that. Bear witness before Allah when you do that.

وَلَوْ عَلَىٰ أَنفُسِكُمْ — Even if the justice that you are upholding requires that you yourself convict yourself. Even if it requires that you put yourself in a precarious situation. That you become the prosecutor of your own self in a case where you have wronged someone else. That is justice. You put aside your personal biases, prejudices, and personal convictions so much that even your own personal interests do not come before or supersede ideal justice. That is profound.

Even if it goes against yourself or one of your own parents. How tough is it to speak justice even if it puts our father in trouble? Or our mother in trouble? That is profound. When you really reflect — how many of us as human beings would tell the truth to such an extent that it requires that our mother pay a fine? Or requires that our grandmother give a piece of property back that was wrongfully taken?

And the parents — Allah says both of them, not one. And we know the station of the mother — we don't have to talk about that. But the position of the mother is secondary to the position of justice. And relatives as well — your aunt, grandparents, uncles, cousins, in-laws, grandchildren — their interests come secondary to justice.

إِن يَكُنْ غَنِيًّا أَوْ فَقِيرًا — Whether Rich or Poor

Then Allah comes to that individual situation with the Prophet ﷺ — if they are rich or poor. In the case of that dispute, one of them was rich, one of them was poor. Both individuals that came to the Prophet ﷺ, while they were individuals, were for the Ummah representative symbols of circumstances. The rich man was a symbol of wealth. The poor man was a symbol of poverty.

And so it should not be that we support wealth against the interest of justice. Nor should we be inclined toward supporting the poor man — the oppressed man, the dying man, the man who is beaten by the system — against justice. We don't support people just because they were beaten down. Or because their people were beaten down. Or because their country was beaten down. We don't support people just because they were poor.

There is barakah in poverty, and there is test in wealth. And there is barakah in wealth, and there is test in poverty. Neither one of them is purely good or purely evil. And so if one is rich and one is poor, Allah knows — and can best take care of both of them. Allah can best be a wali, a guardian, a supervisor, a protector, a caregiver — of both the wealthy person and the poor person. Don't worry about those external presentations that Allah Himself placed on the person. You worry about justice. You worry about uprightness.

فَلَا تَتَّبِعُوا الْهَوَىٰ — Refrain from Following Your Desires

So refrain — stop yourselves, hold back — from following your own inclinations in this matter. Cut that out. Enough. At some point, say no to special interests — even if those special interests are your own interests, your mother's interests, your father's interests. If those interests contravene justice, if those interests are against justice — refrain from that, Allah says.

Refrain from the hawa — those inclinations to support your own interests and contravene justice — so that you may act justly. In other words, if you follow your hawa, that will preclude you and prevent you from acting justly. You will not achieve that sublime station and characteristic.

فَإِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ خَبِيرًا — Allah is Well-Informed

The ayah continues with profound advice. Wallahi, if this was the only ayah in the Quran — in my personal limited view — if the Quran was Al-Fatiha and this ayah, it would be enough.

We are being told: if you neglect justice, if you disregard it, if you try to hit it but you miss it — and you miss it because you are considering your own personal interests — if that is the way you want to act:

فَإِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ خَبِيرًا — Then Allah is well-informed of what you do.

Allah didn't say He would put you in the hellfire. He didn't say there's a very painful punishment awaiting. Sometimes He uses that language. Sometimes He talks about punishment. Sometimes He says He'll go to war. Sometimes He says you'll have the anger of Allah. He didn't use that here. He said: if you want to neglect justice and disregard it — Allah knows. He knows very well what you do. Sufficient is the warning that Allah knows.

Because in reality, in order to achieve justice — in order to put our self-interest aside — the only thing that will enable us to do that is to take into consideration higher interests. The interests of Allah. What He wants, what He loves. That's the only way I can transcend my nafs. That's the only way I'll be able to transcend the interests of my mother, my father, my clan, my fellow patriots and neighbors. The only way I'll be able to go above that is to go to something that is above that — to go to the interests of Allah.

Sufficient is the warning that Allah knows. Not only does He know — بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ — He didn't say Alim, that He knows. He said Khabir. He is well-informed. You can't use excuses and false presentations with someone who is well-informed. You're not going to tell them something they don't already know.

A Crisis of Justice in Our World Today

This ayah, dear brothers and sisters, is tremendous. It has tremendous implications on our behavioral apparatus. Because, as I said before, we have a crisis of justice.

This week, we've had folks that claim to be Muslim murdering over a hundred children. This week, we've had a person that claimed to be Muslim kidnapping folks, putting them in a café, and two or three people died. We've had folks claiming to be Muslim kidnapping women and girls in Africa. In our country, we haven't had folks kidnapping folks, but we have had people that don't claim to be Muslim — they claim to be police officers, who claim to have been acting legally — who put a chokehold on a gentleman who posed no threat and took the man's life on camera, using an illegal tactic. We've had a 12-year-old shot and killed by a police officer. We've had a teenager shot in the middle of the street. A couple of weeks ago, there were two men in a car stopped by police — they counted the number of bullet holes in the car. It was 120. 120 bullet holes by police. The officer was said to be doing his job, acquitted, in Cleveland, Ohio.

In all the cases of the individuals that claim to be Muslim — who are identified as Muslim, although their acts are completely anti-Islamic — those acts were acts of terrorism, acts of murder. They were not acts of justice, and they were certainly not acts that were legal. Lives were taken. Lives were forever altered. And I guarantee you that in the long run, justice will not be done. Over 140 kids murdered and I haven't seen military action, I haven't seen police go — we haven't seen anything. Over 200 girls and women dropped off the planet in Africa and nobody does anything. In this country, police officers taking the lives of innocent people — even on camera — and they are acquitted on the excuse that they were following their training. That's the excuse. That what they were doing was legal.

That is not who we are. We don't do acts of terror, and we don't support legal acts that are acts of injustice that take people's lives — especially on camera. And if those actions are legal, then they are unjust, and we as Muslims have to speak out against that. We have a crisis of justice.

Allah didn't say be people that follow the law. He said be people who uphold justice. So if the law isn't good enough, we have to speak out and say this isn't good enough. We can't have innocent children dying in the streets. We can't have innocent citizens dying on camera while bystanders stand by and do nothing, and then the systems say that's okay because they were following their training. The training has to change. The teaching has to change. And as Muslims we have to speak out in support of that — and speak out in a dignified way, in a productive way, in a constructive way.

We have to say no to what's happening over there, but we cannot say no to what's happening in Muslim countries and be silent about the injustice that's happening in our own country. Because murder is murder. If a life is taken outside of justice, then a life is taken outside of justice. We can't say what happened in Pakistan is a tragedy but what happened in Cleveland is not. We cannot condemn one and be silent on the other just because a cop did it. That's not justice.

It's also not justice if we support our country, our leaders, our representatives in acts that are illegal or unjust. We have to write letters. We have to speak up and say: I'm concerned as a citizen about the level of justice in this country. We are a country that supports justice, and I as a Muslim am commanded to uphold justice. What I see going on in my communities is not just. What can I do? What can we do to improve our communities? To support law enforcement personnel. To support living change. To raise the standard of justice.

Justice Cannot Be Based on Identity

We don't support cops because they're cops. We don't support Muslim cops because they're Muslim cops. A Muslim running for president — I'm not going to vote for him just because he's a Muslim. That is a mistake. A Muslim running for mayor — so what? Is he going to speak justice? Is he going to uphold justice? I know Muslims can do terrible things. I know Muslims do tremendously horrible things. Just because someone says he's a Muslim doesn't mean he's a just person.

We have to be people who uphold justice. We cannot be externally motivated — we have to be internally driven for the right reasons. I can't support someone just because he's African American. Just because he's black, I support him for mayor? Or I support him as an Imam candidate because he's African American? What is that? That's not just. Whoever upholds what's right — he might be the greatest person in the world, but if he's corrupt, then my supporting him is supporting corruption. I can't support someone just because he's Bengali. My father is Bengali, so I support Bengalis? What is that? Tribalism. Nationalism. It's isms. It's a disease.

We don't look at external features. Why? Because Allah does not look at external features. He doesn't care if you're Bengali, or black, or white, or American, or if you have a badge, or even if you wear a turban and have the longest beard in the world. Allah doesn't care about that if you are committing acts of injustice. Those things are irrelevant. And that is the point.

Speaking to Our Youth

And so we must speak up. I get questions all the time from youth. Last night I was in my office and three youth were in my office — college students. They were in a crisis. They had all kinds of questions. All these things are going on in our country. What does Islam have to say about this? They're all on social media. What does Islam have to say about this killing and that killing? All these things that happened in Ferguson, Missouri and Cleveland, Ohio. And on top of that, they hear "Muslims are terrorists" at their schools.

One young man — a high school student — went to his high school and they had a round table discussion. One of the topics was Islam. And one non-Muslim older senior asked him: "I heard in your religion if you kill people you get all these virgins in paradise and stuff. Why should I be convinced that your religion is worth anything?" These are questions high school kids are getting. They came to me and said: how do we deal with this stuff?

As a community, we have to start talking about this. As parents, we have to start talking about this. And the first place to start is a discussion with your kids — with each other — about justice. Say: yes, what's going on out there was wrong. What those people did was wrong. What those cops did was wrong. All the people in the world can say it's right — it's wrong. And that is the difference between our approach and theirs. Some people look at the legal approach: if the law says it's okay, it's okay. That's not our approach. We support the law, but we support justice first. And so if the law doesn't meet justice, our approach is: let's go through the system to change the law to meet the standard of justice. Our approach is not a violent extremist approach — but it's also not a passive, laid-back, don't-do-anything approach. No. We move. We say something. We speak up.

And so the first thing is to tell our kids: yes, there's injustice in the Muslim world. There's also injustice in our communities as well. And you must learn about it. You must speak up about it. You must learn what your deen says about it.

Know Your Tradition — The Scholars Who Stood for Justice

Do not be well-informed about what Facebook says and Twitter and Yahoo, but ill-informed about what Imam al-Ghazali says, and Imam Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, and Imam al-Suyuti, and Imam Ibn Taymiyyah, and Abu Hanifa. Don't be ignorant about the opinions of our ulema who lived their lives speaking about social inequalities, structural inequalities, oppression, and injustice. Don't be ignorant about your own tradition.

Because the ammunition social media gives our kids is not good enough. We do not want our kids to parrot the words of Facebook and Twitter. We want our kids to relate the words of Imam al-Ghazali, and Abu Hanifa, and Ibn Taymiyyah — and all of their imams who were locked up, and beaten, and whipped, because they spoke against injustice.

Abu Hanifa was imprisoned for three years because he refused to bow to the will of the khalif. Imam Malik was publicly flogged — his arms were stretched out, he was publicly whipped — because he refused to go along with the political will of the khalif. Imam al-Shafi'i was dragged in chains from Yemen to Baghdad — imagine that — on charges of treason and corruption, and imprisoned. Imam Ahmad was dragged from Kufa to Basra and was beaten in public for three days, abused and tortured, because he refused to accept the doctrine of the createdness of the Quran. Ibn Taymiyyah spent a third of his life in jail because he refused to agree with state fatwa opinions that supported other agendas — agendas he felt were against the Quran and Sunnah and were not just.

Our tradition is filled with ulema who were relatives of the anbiya and aides of the Prophet ﷺ, who spoke about injustice — and yes, paid a serious price for it — but they achieved the ultimate reward with Allah. That's who we want our kids to be like. Not that we want them to be locked up, but we want them to know what our deen says, and to be able to speak about it, stand up for it, advocate for it in communities, be inspired by it, and not just accept what goes on out here as normal, regular, lawful, and okay.

Closing Du'a

May Allah give us all tawfiq and success. May Allah forgive us for our lapses in judgment and for our complacency in advocating for justice. Ameen.

Alhamdulillahi rabbil 'alamin, wa salatu was salamu 'ala sayyidina Muhammad wa 'ala alihi wa sahbihi ajma'in.

I advise you and myself with the taqwa of Allah.

Allah says:

O servants of Allah, fear Allah. Indeed Allah commands justice, excellence, and giving to relatives, and He forbids immorality, wrongdoing, and oppression. He admonishes you so that you may take heed.