2015-01-23 - Friday Prayer - Sheikh Khalil Abdul Rashid

The Story of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari: Hosting the Prophet ﷺ

In the name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful.

"Say, this is my way. I call to Allah with insight — I and those who follow me. And I am not of the polytheists." Allah has spoken the truth.

When our teacher ﷺ first entered into Medina, the children hit the street and everyone began singing. Everyone welcomed Habibullah. Everyone honoured and rushed to get a glimpse of rahmatan lil-'alameen. He was on his mubarak camel, and people were touching his hand and greeting him and welcoming him ﷺ.

Of course he did not have a place to stay, and so many people — the Ansar, being the generous group that they were — many of them offered their homes. The Prophet ﷺ guided his camel from one home to another. He ﷺ did not make the decision himself. He left it to his trusted companion, the camel, to decide where to rest.

And so the camel went from one house and it did not kneel. Went to another house and then did not kneel. Went from house to house, home to home, and did not rest, did not kneel — until it came to the house of one particular Ansar. The house of a man by the name of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari. And it knelt down, rested, and the Prophet ﷺ disembarked.

Abu Ayyub al-Ansari rushed out, welcomed the Prophet ﷺ to his home. He was a modestly wealthy man and his home at that time was two stories — had an upstairs and a downstairs. Abu Ayyub al-Ansari welcomed the Prophet ﷺ to his home. His wife had prepared something, his family had greeted him. And what a noble honour it was to be the very first host of the last messenger to walk the planet.

Imagine that. Imagine that sharaf. That mubarak. That mirror in your home or mine — what would we do? What kind of adjustments would we make in our home? What kind of things would we shift around? We would do house cleaning like we have never done before.

Abu Ayyub al-Ansari's Restless Night

So when it came time to rest, Abu Ayyub al-Ansari had offered the room to the Prophet ﷺ, and the Prophet ﷺ graciously accepted and went into the room and rested. And Abu Ayyub al-Ansari went upstairs and took the room on the second floor — he and his family.

In the first night, he was restless. He could not sleep. Could you sleep? Could you? You have khatib al-nabiyyeen in your home. How can you sleep? And even if your eyes sleep, how can your qalb sleep? And even if your qalb sleeps, how can your ruh sleep? There is no rest. Because you would do anything to stay awake to make sure he gets rest.

But it was not just about the fact that Habibullah ﷺ — the one who maintains constant conversation with Jibreel ﷺ — it was not just that that guest was in his home and was resting that kept him awake. It was the fact that there was a problem in the scenario. Something was not right.

It wasn't that he didn't serve enough water or dates. That wasn't the problem. It wasn't that the bed wasn't as comfortable. That wasn't the concern. The problem that Abu Ayyub al-Ansari had was: How can I sleep above the messenger of Allah ﷺ? How?

When he is above everything else — how? It doesn't add up. There is not enough math in the world to calculate that. It's just the physical challenge. Many of us would perhaps not think of it that way. If it's a spare bedroom, it's nice and comfortable — that should be fine. But Abu Ayyub al-Ansari said: I cannot sleep when the messenger of Allah ﷺ is below me physically.

He took his family, his wife — everyone went downstairs. Went to the Prophet ﷺ: "Ya Rasulullah, please — take the room above. Please. You are the best of creation, the master of the first and the last. Please. Let me be below. We are following you. Our voices cannot even raise above you. How can we physically sit above you?"

The Hadith of Constantinople

And the Sahaba would go on to learn the spirit of da'wah from the Prophet ﷺ. He would even — listen and hear the mubarak hadith of the Prophet ﷺ:

(Musnad Ahmad, Hadith 18957; also reported in al-Hakim, al-Mustadrak)

"Constantinople will be conquered. The best army is the army that conquers Istanbul. And the best ameer is the ameer of that army."

So that motivated Abu Ayyub al-Ansari, and he went on an expedition towards Istanbul — Constantinople. He never saw the city, because the sea was walled off. And even today, when you visit Istanbul, there are the old walls of Istanbul that are there today.

He actually lost his life. He died outside of the wall trying to penetrate it. And he — in his will, in his wasiya — he wrote that whatever happened to him, he requested that his qabr, his grave, be buried right in front of the wall of Constantinople. That was in his wasiya.

It is very interesting — he didn't request to be buried in Medina. No. He requested to be buried right at the gates of Istanbul. And that is where he is buried today. You go to Istanbul, you talk to any Turk, and they say you have to pay your respects. You have to go visit the sultan — they are not talking about the Ottoman Sultan. They are talking about the fact that you must pay your visit, you must seek the baraka, you must pay your respect by visiting the grave of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari.

Hosting Our Neighbours: The Da'wah Imperative

It is a beautiful paradox, a beautiful lesson. The one who hosted the Prophet ﷺ in Medina was the only Sahabi to make it to Europe. And today Europe is struggling with the idea of hosting the Muslims. And the child of Europe, America, has a challenge of whether or not Muslims can be good hosts to non-Muslims in this country.

We have not been — we have not reached the point where we have learned how to host our neighbours, our community members. We have learned very well how to establish the masjid. But we have not learned how to host our neighbours. Not yet. It is coming, but not yet.

There is a lot of ruckus about the misrepresentation of the Prophet of Islam, the false depictions and the false representations of the Prophet of Islam. But we have yet to represent — or shall I play with words and say re-present, as in present again — the Prophet of Islam to this community. We have not done that yet.

We do a lot of discussion amongst ourselves and in our own communities about who the Prophet of Islam was and who he is to us and his mubarak nature and the lessons. But these people don't know that. They don't know that. We haven't spoken to them. And for speaking to them, we have not been prophetic with them yet. We haven't reached that point.

And so we must not criticise false depictions when we ourselves have not yet represented. We have not.

The Way of the Prophet ﷺ: Sabeeli

We have levels of da'wah. The Prophet of Islam said — in the ayah that I quoted earlier, Allah told him: "Say this." He said: have this system, this message, this da'wah, this lifestyle that we all have been granted and blessed with — this is my way. This is my path. This message of Tawhid. This message of not being a slave to the environment and not being a slave to others, but being a slave to the Creator of slaves. That point is the prophetic point. That is the message we carry.

When everyone else is enslaved to materialism and social being, enslaved to depictions, enslaved to all kinds of things like poverty, discrimination, violence — various forms of enslavement — Islam is sent to free those people from that. That means we have a responsibility to stand up, to rise up.

This act and this process of teaching — teaching people how to, eliminating people from enslavement, and teaching them about Tawhid — that is Sabeeli. That's my way, he said. I'm about freedom and freeing people. Opening up doors. Presenting opportunities. Showing people the way. And that path is for me and for anyone else who walks in my footsteps.

How many people have we freed? How many people have we freed from hunger? How many people have we freed from violence? How many people have we freed from sickness? From discrimination? From injustice? From ignorance? How many?

Abu Ayyub al-Ansari was concerned about freeing people in Europe — that's why he asked to be buried there. But the first delegation was sent by the Prophet ﷺ to the king of Abyssinia, Negus, and the wazir asked one of the Ashab: "Who is this man Muhammad? What does he teach you? Introduce him to us. What is that core message that your community is carrying?"

One of the Ashab said: "Muhammad, our Prophet ﷺ, teaches us to be free from the slavery of human beings — to liberate ourselves from enslavement to people, and to be free as slaves to Allah."

What a beautiful answer. What a beautiful understanding of Islam.

Reaching Out: Action Beyond the Masjid

This week I've spent a considerable amount of time with different kinds of non-Muslims in the community — different people from various institutions, in different walks of life. And there's one common point that they share. One common point. And that is a profound ignorance about Islam. I don't mean people that have watched Fox News — I'm not talking about them. They don't call that ignorance, that's brainwashing. I mean people who don't know anything about Islam.

On the other side, we have people that find out about Islam online and they learn about Islam online, and then the next step is they immediately radicalize. There's no place, there's no community to go to. And nine times out of ten, the new Muslims, the new jihadis that find Islam online, they live in communities where there are tons of Muslims. So how is it that a non-Muslim's encounter with Islam occurs online when there's a presence of Muslims there? How? It doesn't make sense. Where is the action of the Muslims? Where are the Muslim communities? Where is the outreach?

We do a lot of in-reach. But that's not who we are. We have to go out. We have to reach out. And we have to bring others in.

One day we had a program here. We had 40 people from SMU — Southern Methodist University — on a program we had on Islam here. It was before Rihab. They were requested to watch the Salat. Amongst the individuals that were here — and I didn't know this until the end of the program — we had 40 non-Muslims in here. One of them I would find out was a Jewish woman in a wheelchair. Another one we would find out was the top city attorney — the top attorney for the city of Plano. The other gentleman was the top attorney for the police department for the city of Plano. We had two top attorneys here. We had professors here. We had people that worked in business. And they were taking this one course, and that professor requested that he bring his class here to hear about Islam. We said Ahlan wa Sahlan. He called the masjid, we brought them in, we welcomed them, we talked to them about Islam.

Not one of those individuals — I asked them — not one, not one knew anything about the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. In general, when you mentioned the prophet, when you mentioned Muhammad, the word Muhammad triggered the Prophet of Islam — in general, they all had negative views. All of them. They have that representation because we have not represented.

They don't know who the prophet is. But they know who we are. They see us. They see the masjid. We are the legacy of the prophet — institutionally, individually, as a family, as a community. What we do and what we don't do — that is the picture of Rasool Allah ﷺ. And the question is: what are we painting? What picture have we painted?

Now, Alhamdulillah, when they left, at the very least they doubted their own picture. And I consider that progress. But what was it that helped them understand a better picture about Rasool Allah ﷺ? It was not the masjid. It was not the dome — although they found the masjid very beautiful. Do you know what it was? Do you know what impressed them?

The medical clinic. The dental clinic. The gym. The library. And especially when I mentioned the psychiatric clinic — that was what impressed them. And then the question came: "Is that only for you guys, your own community? Or if my grandmother has a problem, or a neighbor has a problem, are they welcome?" I said: "No, no — anyone from the larger community is welcome as well." Our teacher taught us: never turn away, give good news to people, don't turn people away, we don't close doors.

That was what reformed their understanding of the Prophet of Islam. Why? Because those things affect the larger community. All the talk and the conferences in the world are not going to change people's minds. It's action. But not action only in here amongst ourselves — it's action that affects the larger community as a whole. That's what we have to do. That's the mandate.

"I call others to Allah" — in other words, my path is about removing people from oppression and slavery, victimization, discrimination, poverty. And we need Allah. I call them to Allah. I don't call them to my personal agenda or to myself. We are representing the message of Allah here.

Basira: Calling to Allah with Insight

But he said ﷺ — as I close this khutba — I want to leave you with this. It is very important. It is the core of the type of da'wah work that we have to do. He said he didn't just say "I call others to Allah" — that's not good enough. We just can't say we call you to Allah. He said:

"I call to Allah with basira." With basira. Basira has a few implications and meanings.

First: Knowledge

One is that I call others to Allah on a basira — with basira being in knowledge. It's not enough to just know لا إله إلا الله محمد رسول الله. That's not enough. What is Allah? Who is Allah? Who is Allah not? What are His judgments? What is the Quran? We need to know details — ilm. And the ilm can't just be ilm about the sharia and the Islam and not connected to the world. It has to relate to the world.

We can't give people da'wah from 5th-century-old books and have it with no relation to today. They have to see that Islam is relevant, that it's practical, that it's useful, and that it's not something from over there that applies to life over there. They have to see it as being practical right here and being applicable right here. It has to be seen as part of their home and their life and their living. It has to be based on the ilm to apply it like that.

One of the great stories about a great grammarian — he spends his entire life studying the field of grammar and nothing else. He's traveling, and he hires a ship or a boat to take him across the sea. And it's just him and the boatman. And he asks the boatman: "Do you know anything about grammar?" He says: "No, I don't know — I never studied grammar. Arabic grammar, never." And the grammarian makes the guy feel so bad — he says: "You've lost half your life. You don't know any grammar, you don't understand one bit of the language."

And all of a sudden there's a big storm. Waves come. And the boatman is navigating the waves, but then the ship is about to sink. And the boatman — the last word he says to the grammarian — "You want to swim?" He says: "No, no, no — I've just been studying grammar!" He says: "Then you've wasted the other half of your life."

You just can't stay isolated. You have to exist in the world. Islam is just not about grammar. Not about logic only. It's about grammar and sailing. It's about zikr and life. It's about everything — the masjid inside and life outside the masjid.

We stand together in this salat. But we have to stand together as a community. Whatever happens out there — if it's right, we have to say it's right. Whatever happens out there, if it's wrong, we have to say it's wrong. We just can't make announcements about injustices in Palestine and Iraq. We have to make announcements about injustices in Kansas and Philadelphia and Chicago. We have to look at here. Basira — relevance. Local relevance. Practical relevance.

Second: Certainty

The other thing is yaqeen — certainty. You have to be proud to be Muslim. You have to be certain. Why isn't someone entering into the masjid or entering Islam? Because he himself has doubts. He's not sure about how to represent the message of Tawhid. Yaqeen — this has to be it. This is the life. This is the duty.

Third: Levels of Basira

The other thing is that basira is of levels. The first is when you're calling somebody to Tawhid, you're benefiting the community, you're working with the community — this is called the basira of Islam. And the basira of Islam is when you're talking to people about Islam and you're doing actions at the external level. So you're doing things that benefit the community, but in the process you're talking about and explaining what Islam says about x, y, and z. And so the person receives a general picture about Islam.

But then there's basira of basira — not just about Islam, but basira of iman. And that is when you're depicting, when you're engaging with people — your neighbours, your co-workers, your partners, your institutional partners — and everything you say, everything you do, all of your harakat, all of your actions, and all of your second-hand, everything you don't do, your policies that govern your actions and your inactions — all of that is through keeping in mind that you're not calling people to Islam, you're calling people to Tawhid.

That's the difference. So the first is: what kind of message are we crafting? Are we trying to bring people to Islam? And often times that's the level — and that's okay, it has its place. But it is more potent and more powerful to focus on Tawhid. Why? Because at the end of the day, Tawhid governs everything. And Tawhid is the seed that needs to be implanted in the minds and the hearts of everyone around us.

We have to keep in mind the Tawhid, the sifat of Allah, the aman of Allah. Everything we do is because we are reflecting the actions of Allah. Allah is ar-Raheem — is merciful. So our services should be a mercy to our neighbours. Allah is ash-Shafi — He heals. And so we heal because God heals. Everything we do from a da'wah perspective should reflect the divine attributes of Allah.

Everything. And when we explain what we do and how we do it to people — and what we don't do — it should be within that framework. And so we call people to God, to Allah, and that brings them to Islam, as opposed to trying to bring them to Islam and then help them to Allah. It's a different level. It's a higher level. And that is the process of doing da'wah. That's when communities grow and develop.

Du'a

May Allah increase us in our basira. May Allah increase us in our actions. May Allah give us the tawfiq to expand the knowledge and to represent and to present the teachings of Tawhid and the beauty of the practice of the Prophet ﷺ. And may Allah empower us with the humbleness so that we never fall asleep when the Prophet ﷺ is — figuratively — below us, counting on us to represent him. May Allah grant us that humbleness and that awareness. Ameen.