Jummah Khutbah - Empathy

The Opening

We praise Him, we ask for His help, we ask for His forgiveness, and 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 is misguided, none can guide him. And I bear witness that there is no god but Allah, alone, with no partner. And I bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger.

The Prophet ﷺ and His Grandson Husayn

The Prophet ﷺ was one time sitting with his companions, and they were just sitting around chatting, talking. And he was also doing something that he loved, which was spending time with his grandkids, Hasan and Husayn.

And as kids go, little kids, young kids, when they're in that kind of a gathering and the adults are talking, they always want to get up and they want to be heard. They want to take part in the conversation. And so these children were no different.

And Husayn stood up and he wanted to speak, and he wanted to be heard, and he wanted to take part in this conversation with all these adults. Now one thing to understand about Husayn — his older brother Hasan was very well-spoken, he was very eloquent. He had that level of sophistication. Husayn, however, had a very terrible stutter. And he had a lot of difficulty speaking.

So he gets up to speak in front of the Prophet ﷺ and his companions, and he starts stumbling over his words. He starts stuttering, he's having difficulty completing even a basic sentence. And he's just falling through his words and he keeps going, because kids they want to be heard — he keeps going and going, stumbling and stumbling. And it reaches a point where it's a little bit uncomfortable.

And the companions kind of exchanged glances, not in a malicious way, but more like — poor kid. Like they felt bad, they didn't want him to have to go through that. And so he looked up at the Prophet ﷺ to see what his reaction was.

And understand for a brief moment — when you're the parent or the grandparent in this situation, what might you do? You might shush your child, even if they're not stuttering. You might shush your child and say, be quiet, be quiet, adults are speaking, I'll talk to you later. Or in this case, they might try to figure out what the child is saying, complete the sentence for them, and then tell them — be quiet, okay, we got what you wanted to say, that contribution has been made, now you can be quiet, let us get back to what we were doing.

But no — he didn't stop him. He let him finish. And not only that, the companions said that he sat there smiling ear to ear, grinning, just looking at him, smiling. And when he was done, the Prophet ﷺ turned to the companions and told them: "Don't feel bad for him — this is something that he inherited from his uncle Musa ﷺ."

And in that moment he demonstrated something very profound. He demonstrated what we would call empathy, or emotional intelligence. And he delivered it in such a way that he gave Husayn exactly what he needed at the moment that he needed it. He knew that at that moment this child was in need of compassion, mercy, positivity, and validation. And he gave him all of that immediately — and he said, don't feel bad, in fact, you should almost be jealous of him because he shares something in common with one of the greatest prophets of Allah.

The True Meaning of Good Character

And so that core characteristic of empathy is what set the Prophet ﷺ apart from everybody else. When we hear things like:

— that he was not sent except as a mercy to mankind — we hear that he was sent to perfect good conduct, that in him is the best example to follow, the best character and etiquette and all of these different things. What ends up happening is we hear this so much that we sometimes reduce what that means down to a very basic level.

And so we say, okay, my good conduct as a Muslim with good manners — when I go out to eat tonight, I'm gonna say please and thank you to the waiter or the waitress. When I talk to my parents, when I talk to my children, I'm not gonna yell, I'm not gonna be abrasive. I'm gonna clean up my room, I'm gonna do these kinds of things.

But the reality is those things that we chalk up as good conduct and good manners — for lack of a better term, they're just part of not being a jerk. They're just part of being a decent human being. When we say the pinnacle of good character, what does that actually mean? What is the epitome of the best of conduct that we're supposed to model?

And we find another ayah that describes the Prophet ﷺ:

— that there has been sent to you a messenger from amongst yourselves, and grievous to him is what you suffer, and to the believers he is kind and merciful. The hardships that you go through, the difficulty that you face, the pain that you feel — it hurts him. It keeps him up at night. He feels that same difficulty that you feel. And then he doesn't act in an abrasive manner with everybody, but he's actually kind and merciful and easy-going with the people. This is his character.

Empathy in Action: Prophetic Stories

The Bedouin in the Masjid

And so we find throughout his life this character exemplified over and over again. We know the famous stories. The Bedouin came into the Masjid of the Prophet ﷺ and urinated in the corner. And the companions stood up upset — and rightfully upset — because this man is desecrating the holiest of places. And yet he told the companions, let him finish. Not even like, don't do anything, don't stop him — let him finish what he's doing, let him relieve himself. And then when he's done, I'll speak to him.

And then he goes and speaks to him and explains that this is the Masjid. This is where we put our face on the ground and prostrate to Allah to glorify Him, to glorify His majesty. It's not appropriate to do this here.

And the thing was, in that situation, very profound — the Prophet ﷺ didn't make it about himself. He didn't say, how dare you disrespect me. He didn't say, how dare you disrespect my Masjid. Although he, of anyone, had the right to say that — he had that full right. But he didn't make it about himself. He didn't make it about his friends who were also offended. He made it entirely about this man, and what does that man need in that moment of time.

And he understood that this is someone who doesn't understand this religion, he doesn't understand what a Masjid is. He's not from the city, so to speak. He's not used to our customs and our way of doing things. He doesn't understand. And so he needs to be spoken to in a different type of way. And that was the intelligence that he has — that he was able to assess what situation a person is in and what do they need at that moment in time.

The Young Man Who Asked for Permission to Sin

When the young man walked into the Masjid and he said, Ya Rasulullah, give me permission to fornicate. Now can we imagine someone walks in at a Friday family night and makes this request — not with formal terminology, but in a perhaps more slang type of way. What would our reaction be? We would get upset, and rightfully upset. And the companions were rightfully upset. And they said, how dare you walk in and disrespect the Prophet ﷺ in this way?

And again, he told everybody, calm down. Again, easy-going, Ra'uf al-Rahim, kind, merciful. He told everyone, calm down, relax, take it easy. He took the young man aside and he spoke to him. He said, this request that you're making of me — would you like if someone did this with your sister, your niece, or some female relative of yours? He said, no, absolutely not. He said, so if I would allow you to do this, it would be with someone else's sister or daughter. So why would you put them through that same pain that you don't want to go through? He understood. He put his hand on his chest, and he made du'a for him.

Now what's very interesting is that the Prophet ﷺ could have told him, when he made this request — no. Adultery is haram. Zina is haram. These are the punishments for committing adultery. This is what will happen to you in the hereafter. He could list it all off — all the punishments in the hellfire for people who commit that deed. He could have done that. And that's what we often do. And of anybody that had the right to do that, it is him, because he could have pronounced that verdict on him at that moment in time.

But he knew that that's not what that young man needed at that time. He didn't need the information. The information was not going to change his behavior. Having knowledge of that was not going to absolve this particular situation. It wasn't going to make him act any differently. So he spoke to him in a way that understood — how can I make him understand this, so that we get the intended outcome? And that is the empathy that he has ﷺ.

Empathy in Our Daily Lives

See, the mistake that we make oftentimes is that we think that the information is going to be enough. And so sometimes our teenagers come home and they're going through something very difficult at school — like some major drama is going on and the whole world is collapsing around them. And the parent, with the benefit of 15, 20, 30, 40 years of hindsight, is looking at this and saying, you're a dumb kid, you don't understand what's going on. You need to worry about this right now? Three weeks from now, you're going to forget about it. Three months from now, this won't be a blip on your radar. You need to stop worrying about this, go back to your room, study, get good grades, get a good job — that'll solve all your problems.

And the thing is, they might be right. They might actually be 100% correct. But what the child hears at that moment in time is — my parents don't care about me. They can't validate the way that I'm feeling at this moment in time. And so there becomes that disconnect, where we might think that we have the right information, but we're not being very helpful.

Think about if you know someone who, for example, drinks alcohol. And so to be helpful, you say, okay, well, I'm not going to just come and dump the information, I'm not going to come and tell them that alcohol is haram and this is the punishment — now I'm going to take a wiser approach. And I'm going to tell them, look at me. I don't drink, you can do it too. I don't drink, therefore you can do it. Look how easy it is. I've never tried it in my entire life.

But even with that, there's a lack of empathy in this situation, because I might not be understanding the fact that perhaps I grew up in a home where my parents practiced Islam. And so we never had alcohol in the home. And by extension, the social circle that I grew up in — they also didn't drink. And so from the age of a newborn until the time I was in high school or college, I was never in a home where alcohol was openly served. And so by the time I got to college, or I got to a corporate work environment, and alcohol was offered to me, it was very easy to say no, because it just wasn't a part of my identity.

But my friend that's struggling with it — that I'm trying to help — I might not be taking their situation into account. I might not be understanding that maybe they grew up in a home where alcohol was openly consumed, or maybe they grew up where they had relatives who were alcoholics, or their friends all drank. So by the time they got to high school or college or the workplace, it wasn't an issue of should I or should I not. It was an issue of, well, I've already done this 500 times. It's hard for me not to do it. And so when I come and say, look at me, I don't drink — I'm not being very helpful in that situation, because I haven't properly empathized with that person. I haven't come to them from a perspective of compassion and mercy. And this is again, Ra'uf al-Rahim — the Prophet's easy-going, merciful character.

Arrogance and the Lack of Empathy

And we think about how this empathy plays out. We look at the story of Adam and Shaytan. When Shaytan was commanded — bow down to Adam ﷺ — he said, I'm created from fire, he's created from clay, why should I bow down to him? And now objectively looking at it, it's a very ludicrous assertion because Shaytan had no control over what he's made out of. He had no hand to play in that. Allah made him out of whatever Allah intended. It doesn't make sense for him to get arrogant about being made out of fire. What makes him so much better? He didn't have any control over it.

And yet, as ridiculous as we can see that being, that situation plays out in our lives all the time. We look at discussions around racism — again, it's the exact same thing. I have no control over what color skin I was born with, yet when I feel that arrogance or lack of compassion towards somebody else and their difficulty, it is rooted in that lack of empathy and compassion.

When we look at the discussions in our country around things like poverty and healthcare and refugees, it's the exact same thing. It's an inability to understand that someone else's situation is different from mine. And had I been in the situation of that person, I would probably be doing the exact same thing. But yet we say things like, why should I have to shoulder the burden of somebody else? Why should I have to contribute more than my fair share to help somebody else?

— That when they are told to spend from what Allah has given them, those who disbelieve say to those who believe: should we feed people who, if Allah wanted to feed them, He would have fed them? Why should I have to shoulder this burden? Why should I have to feed them? Why should I have to contribute to help them? You are in manifest error. This is entirely the wrong way of looking at things.

And so when we look at these things and we say, well, why doesn't that person get a job? Why didn't they go to college? I went to college. I worked two jobs when I was in college. Why didn't they do that? Our religion does not teach us to judge people for their situation. We're taught that when someone is going through difficulty, we treat them with compassion and mercy and empathy. We can hold ourselves to a stricter standard. I can tell myself, I should have done this differently, I should have done that differently. But I don't know somebody's situation. Maybe I was able to go to college because I never had to make a decision between either going to college or caring for my child. Maybe I never had to make tough decisions like that, and so going to school was easy for me. Or maybe I had parents who paid for college and someone else didn't have the ability to pay for school.

We never know the depths of someone's situation. And we never know what we would do if we were in that situation ourselves. We have to look and see and try to understand where people are coming from, what they're going through. And this was the example of the Prophet ﷺ. And this was something that he trained the companions on.

From Burying Daughters to Honoring Them

We know that in the days of Jahiliyyah, the days of ignorance before Islam came, they used to have a practice of burying infant girls alive. Because they didn't like baby girls — they weren't as valuable as the young boys. The baby girl would be born, they would bury her.

For what crime was she buried? What did she do? She did nothing, but they did this.

And then we see that at the conquest of Mecca, when the Muslims are leaving, a young girl comes running out saying — don't leave me behind, I have no one to take care of me, I'm an orphan. And the companions start fighting with one another — fighting over who would have the honor of taking her into their home and raising her and providing for her and taking care of her. This was how much things had changed over time.

Abu Bakr and His Father's Islam

And we find a very beautiful story from Abu Bakr رضي الله عنه. See, Abu Bakr's father, Abu Quhafa, had not accepted Islam. Now as you can understand, anyone that embraces Islam later in life — one of the most difficult challenges that they go through is whether their parents will become Muslim or not. Because they say that I've been blessed with iman, I've been given this beautiful gift, this beautiful blessing, and there's no one that I wish had it more than my own parents.

And the companions رضي الله عنه, they were no different. We can imagine Abu Bakr — how much was he praying for his father to accept Islam? How much tahajjud was he praying for his father to accept Islam? How much du'a was he making on a daily basis for his father to accept Islam? We can only imagine that someone of that caliber, someone that worships as much as he does and with the quality that he does — how much he was begging and pleading with Allah.

Finally — the conquest of Mecca, almost 10 years after the hijrah. His father wants to accept Islam. So Abu Bakr brings him. You can now imagine this very old man, almost struggling to walk, white beard, white hair. And he brings him to the Prophet ﷺ. He says, Ya Rasulullah, my father has come to accept Islam. The Prophet ﷺ says, why did you bring him here? We should have gone to meet him because he's such an old man. It's not even appropriate that you brought him here. You should have told me — I would have gone and met him. He says, no, Ya Rasulullah, he should have come to meet you. He wants to accept Islam. So Abu Quhafa takes his shahada.

And Abu Bakr begins to cry. And the Prophet ﷺ looks at him — Abu Bakr, tears of joy. Like tears of — you finally got what it is that you've been wanting this whole time. You've been waiting for this moment for 15, almost 20 years. You've been asking every single day for this moment and it's finally here. Tears of joy.

He says, no — they're tears of sadness. Because I would give this up. I would give this up in a heartbeat, in the blink of an eye, for you to experience this with Abu Talib instead of me experiencing this with my father.

Abu Talib had passed away a decade ago. And we know that the Prophet ﷺ was hurt by the passing of Abu Talib because he was like a father figure — he protected him, he helped him. But he didn't accept Islam. And Abu Bakr, a decade later, in what should be the happiest moment of his life — all he can think about is not himself, not his father, not his own happiness, but wishing that the Prophet ﷺ experienced that instead of him. That was his example. That was how the companions showcased empathy.

So for us, we can take that example. We can think about people that are close to us, difficulties that they're going through. And just simply stop and reflect for two or three minutes. Friends of ours, people close to us — just think about some difficulty that they're going through and just make du'a to Allah to alleviate that difficulty for them. Just stop and think about something tough that someone else is going through. Make du'a for them and thank Allah for not testing us with that same thing. Because again, we don't know how we would react in that situation.

Second Khutbah: The Story of Hatib ibn Abi Balta'a

Bismillah, alhamdulillah, wa salatu wa salamu ala Rasulillah wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa man walah wa salam.

There is a very famous story about one of the companions by the name of Hatib ibn Abi Balta'a. Now if you've heard his name, it's because of this story. But if you haven't heard his name, you're probably not familiar with who he was. So before we get to his story, we need to understand who he was in particular first — what his resume was.

Hatib رضي الله عنه migrated from Mecca to Medina. So he's a Muhajir. He has the distinction of being a Muhajir — that's number one. Number two, he took part in the Battle of Badr — that special group of 300-some odd companions that Allah praises in the Quran, that He is pleased with them. Hatib is part of this very special group. And Hatib was present at the oath under the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah — another group that Allah praises in the Quran. He was part of that group as well. So he has these three very special distinctions.

The Secret Expedition

Now, toward their time in Medina, the Prophet ﷺ was sending out for an expedition. And normally when they would go on an expedition, he would make plans — he would tell people where they were going, or what to prepare, or give them some information so they could get ready. But this particular expedition he was being very secretive. He didn't tell anybody where they were going, what kind of terrain, how long they were going — nothing. He just told all the companions, make preparations, we're going out somewhere.

And so they start going around trying to figure out what's going on, because they need to know — how long am I gonna be gone? How do I take care of my family? What do we need to pack? All these questions that you would have for a trip, and they don't know anything. They go to Abu Bakr — he must have told you, give us a little hint. He says, I have no idea. They go to Aisha — Aisha, you must know, just give us something. She says, I have no idea. I don't know what's going on.

So Hatib, who is very intelligent, starts to figure out certain things. He says — okay, the Quraysh just broke the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, this other thing happened, this happened. And he deduces: we must be sending this expedition to Mecca. Like, that's the only way that all these different things add up — we must be marching on Mecca.

So Hatib writes a letter to the Quraysh telling them — the Prophet ﷺ and his army are coming, so do whatever you need to do. And he finds a woman who is traveling back and forth, gives her this letter without telling her what's in it. He says, this is a secret mission, I need you to take this letter and deliver it to the Quraysh. That's it.

The Letter is Intercepted

Now it's very interesting. We just said he's a Muhajir, a Badri — he has all these distinctions. And now there's this expedition going out and he's tipping them off, he's disclosing state secrets. What's happening here?

And so Jibril ﷺ comes to the Prophet ﷺ and informs him of what has happened. He tells him that there is this woman on this path going toward Mecca — this is her description — and she has a letter, and you need to get that letter back. He dispatches Ali رضي الله عنه and another companion with that information to go find her. And sure enough, they find a woman with that description on that path. Everything checks out. And they stop and say, you've got a letter — we need your letter. She says, I don't know what you're talking about. They said, look, neither were we lied to nor was our prophet lied to — meaning, we know you have it. Just turn it over. Okay, fine. Turn around for a minute.

She had braided the letter into her hair. She took it out and gave it to them. They came back. And the letter is read out to the Prophet ﷺ. The evidence is on the table. He says, bring Hatib. Bring Hatib over here.

Hatib's Defense and the Prophet's Empathy

Now Hatib comes. And Umar رضي الله عنه stands up and says, Ya Rasulullah, let me execute this man because he is a hypocrite. He is helping the non-Muslims attain victory over the Muslims. He's giving out sensitive information. Lives are on the line. This is a very important situation. Muslims could have lost their lives. The whole situation could have gone awry. All these things could have happened because of what he did. This is treacherous behavior.

And he says, Ya Umar, calm down. Hold on. Again — Ra'uf al-Rahim, easy-going. He didn't jump to conclusions. He said, let's hear him out. Let's hear what Hatib has to say.

So Hatib now begins talking. Now look, when your life is threatened in that manner normally, you plead for your life. You say, okay, I'll do anything, I'll say anything, just don't kill me. But Hatib actually begins by pleading for his iman. He says, Ya Rasulullah, I didn't disbelieve. I'm not a munafiq. I believe. I believe. But here's the situation.

You see, all your other companions — they have people back home in Mecca. They're part of these sub-tribes. And they have tribal protections. And so they're gonna be taken care of, their families are gonna be okay. But my family is not networked into any of those sub-tribes. So if anything goes down, my family is probably gonna be the first ones to be affected. And so I was hoping — and look, Ya Rasulullah, I know that Allah is gonna make you victorious. I have that iman. I know Allah is gonna grant you victory regardless of what I do. It doesn't matter if I tip them off — you're still gonna win, we're still gonna win. But I was just hoping that by giving them this little favor, they might do a favor by my family. My family would be helped or spared. That's all that I was hoping to get out of this.

So Umar رضي الله عنه, when he stands up again, he says, Ya Rasulullah, let me execute him because he is a traitor. Even if he's not a munafiq, he still disclosed sensitive information. He still put people's lives at risk. He did all of these things.

And he said, Ya Umar, maybe Allah looked at the people of Badr and said, do whatever you want because you are forgiven. And what Hatib said is correct — maybe it wasn't the wisest course of action, but it wasn't malicious. He really was just watching out for his family. So let him go.

Empathy Even in the Gravest Situations

Now the thing is, in this situation, we hear about things like empathy and mercy and compassion. We say, okay, that's all nice, that's all great. But there are certain times where we have to put that aside and we have to get down to business. We have to deal with serious issues. And so sometimes there's not a time for all these niceties and all these different things — we've just got to get down to it and fix the issue.

This was a situation of life and death — literally. This was a red alert situation with very sensitive information. And in that high alert situation — where companions are upset, saying this man needs to be executed, all this going on — even in that moment of high alert and stress, the Prophet ﷺ still found a way to empathize and be compassionate. Even in that moment when the stakes were highest, when it would be the most difficult to implement that behavior and that character, he found a way to do it ﷺ.

And that is why he is the pinnacle of good character. That is why when we say that he perfected good conduct, this is what it means. It doesn't just mean please and thank you. It means that when the times are most difficult to implement that good behavior, he found a way to act with that. He found a way to still put himself aside, put himself in someone else's shoes, see the situation from their perspective, and still find a way to be merciful and kind to them.

That was his overriding character ﷺ — and one that we hope to implement. That Allah gives us that empathy, that compassion, that mercy in all of our dealings with everybody.