20161014 - 2nd Khutba - Ustad Ibrahim Ali

Opening — Khutbah Preamble

إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ نَسْتَعِينُهُ وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ وَنُؤْمِنُ بِهِ وَنَتَوَكَّلُ عَلَيْهِ وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا وَمِنْ سَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْهُ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ أَمَّا بَعْدُ

Allah says in His noble Book — I seek refuge in Allah, the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing, from the accursed Shaytan:

Sadaqallahul Azeem.

Introduction: Every Day Is a Reminder

Respected brothers and sisters in Islam, alhamdulillah, Allah blessed us with another day of reminder. For in fact, each day in our life is a reminder. Each salah that we pray in the court of Allah is a reminder — should be a reminder, is meant to be a reminder. And the day of Friday, every Jum'ah, tends to be a shot of a reminder, a high potency dose for me and you, so that the rest of the week is spent pondering over, reflecting over, and acting upon the points we learn on the day of Friday, on the day of Jum'ah.

Now I recited in front of you Surah al-Asr, which I spoke about approximately three weeks ago. And consequently, I recited the verses of Surah al-Baqarah, ayah number 177, that is famously labeled or known as Ayat al-Birr.

The verse that I recited from Surah al-Baqarah is far larger in size than Surah al-Asr. Surah al-Asr is one of the smallest, shortest surahs of the Qur'an, and this one verse of the longest surah of the Qur'an is three and a half times the size of Surah al-Asr. However, it is talking about the core aspects, the core fundamentals, the core means of your rescue and my rescue from being in total loss. Allah is mentioning that in Surah al-Baqarah, ayah number 177, which is called Ayat al-Birr.

The Meaning of Birr

Birr, my friends, has various meanings in Arabic. Birr means virtue — primarily piety, virtue, an act of piety, an act of righteousness. Whatever we consider as piety is what birr is.

Now Allah is clarifying an amazing concept — what you and I often indulge in, knowingly or unknowingly, about what the actual concept of birr is, what the actual concept of virtue is, what the actual concept of piety is.

Surah al-Asr and Surah al-Baqarah 2:177 as a Pair

In Surah al-Asr, Allah swears by the passing time, saying: certainly man is in definite loss. We spoke about this a couple of weeks ago — I won't go deeper into it, but just as a reminder, because this surah very well connects with this verse. These two surahs are a pair from the ring structure inside the Qur'an. Just as Surah al-Ikhlas and Ayat al-Kursi are related and connected — Surah al-Ikhlas talks about the oneness of Allah and each of those aspects of oneness come in detail in Ayat al-Kursi — similarly, Surah al-Asr is about how you and I can save ourselves, can protect ourselves, can prevent ourselves from being in total loss.

There were four factors that Allah mentioned. If we have all four of them at the same time, only then can I prevent myself from losing in this life. And the same way, you can prevent yourself from being a loser in the eyes of Allah in this life. And they were:

• Except those who believe
• Who do righteous deeds
• Who advise one another with truth
• And who advise one another with patience

Two of them deal with my private acts of worship — how I am connected to Allah from what is under the direct influence of myself: my body doing righteous acts, and believing in Allah. That is the core. The second two elements of this surah have to do with society, with the community — advising one another with truth and with patience. Because when you stand fast on Haqq, when you talk about Haqq, there will be trials, there will be calamities, there will be tragedies, people will turn against you, you will have to endure criticism. However, that combined with sabr is what completes the basic life-saving prescription for a Muslim to remain loss-free in this life, every day.

Now these four elements in Surah al-Asr — in the form of iman, amal salihat, advising with truth, and advising with patience — these four elements were like buds of a flower. When the flower is in bud form, that doesn't mean the petals do not exist inside. For the early stage in Makkah, when this surah was revealed, Islam was in its infancy, and Allah was addressing macro issues, broad issues using the shortest possible words. Surah al-Asr is one such example. He said mankind is in certain loss, and then mentioned who is not in loss — not if a person is from this group or that group, but if a person does this, and this, and this, and this — these four points — only then is he or she out of loss.

Now this ayah, which is far longer than this surah, is actually the opening of those buds that were mentioned in Surah al-Asr, where Allah exposes what birr truly is.

Three Types of People and Their Notions of Virtue

The ayah tells us: righteousness is not only that you turn your faces toward the east or the west, but true righteousness is in the one who believes in Allah, the Last Day, the angels, the Book, and the prophets — and gives wealth in spite of love for it to relatives, to orphans, the needy, the traveler, those who ask for help, and for freeing slaves — and establishes prayer and gives zakah, fulfills their promise when they promise, and those who are patient in poverty, in hardship, and during a battlefield. And those are the ones who have been true, and it is those who are righteous.

Now the translation doesn't do justice to this ayah; however, I will try to break it into snippets for you.

There are three types of human beings from a psychological perspective that we may come across on a day-to-day basis — and even we ourselves fall into one of those categories:

Type 1 — The Externally-Focused

There are those people to whom virtue, or acts of righteousness, mean external appearances — externally doing certain things, appearing in a specific way, carrying a certain expression on one's face, talking about certain things, being in a specific outfit. That is what righteousness means in their minds.

Type 2 — The Internally-Focused

Whereas there are those who focus more on the internal aspects of righteousness. They say that your heart should be clean — that's key number one. You should be honest, you should be truthful, you should not gossip about people. And the external acts of worship? Those are individual matters, between the slave and Allah. Just have a clean heart.

Type 3 — The Sinner with a Private Yardstick

And the third category is of people who sin — who may be perpetual sinners or even not-so-perpetual sinners — but they sin, they are in the wrong, yet they have a criteria of virtue to satisfy their conscience. A robber, a thief, an adulterer, a bandit, a cheater — even they have their yardstick for virtue. Even they have to perform certain acts of virtue in their personal dictionary of good deeds. They have a filter through which they justify their wrong acts: "Yes, I am bad, but I am not that bad. Yes, I cheat and I steal and I lie — however, I give charity from that stolen money," for example, or any concept similar to this.

So what is common between these three groups of people? All of them have a criteria of virtue. Category number one had an external criteria of virtue. Group number two had an internal criteria of virtue. Group number three — no matter what their lives are like, what their actions are like, what their a'mal are like — they have somewhere some criteria of virtue that they define as virtue, to sustain themselves as a human being. For Allah has created you and me on fitra.

What Allah Says True Birr Is

So the concept here, in this surah, is that Allah removes the misunderstanding of each of these three people. He says what actually the birr is, what actually the virtuousness is, what exactly the piety is. He is saying: the virtue is not only turning towards east or west.

These ayahs were revealed at a very critical time. When Rasulullah ﷺ had emigrated to Medina, the Muslims were still facing al-Aqsa as a Qibla. The Jews were pleased — absolutely happy — because to the Jews, al-Aqsa was the Qibla, and they claimed that Muslims were following them. They were at peace. Even though when Rasulullah ﷺ was in Makkah, he would face the Kaaba from the side that would face both the Kaaba as well as Baitul Maqdis and Masjid al-Aqsa — and that was what Rasulullah ﷺ really cherished. But when he moved to Medina, he had no choice. He had to follow the command of Allah and face Baitul Maqdis, face Masjid al-Aqsa as a Qibla instead of the Kaaba, because Allah had not yet commanded the change.

At one point in time, Rasulullah ﷺ was in an area with his Ashab, and they were making Salah, during which the ayah of the change of Qibla was revealed. The beginning of Surah al-Baqarah talks about this in detail. At that point, the Prophet and his followers turned direction towards the Kaaba. And that was the beginning of a Fitnah — not amongst the Muslims, but amongst the Jews who were conspiring against the Muslims and indoctrinating them: "For the past eighteen months you have been facing the wrong Qibla — surely your Salahs must be wasted."

And some Sahaba — everybody is a human being; except the Prophet, nobody is infallible, remember that — so some Sahaba started thinking, started asking questions from Rasulullah ﷺ, and started feeling guilty: what would happen about the past Salahs they offered, facing towards Baitul Maqdis instead of the Kaaba? A rift was created between the Sahaba, and there were divisions. And then Allah revealed these verses — this beautiful verse called Ayat al-Birr.

He said again: piety, righteousness, is not only that you turn your faces towards the east and the west. Allah is talking about the core of what righteousness is. He is saying: the birr, the righteousness, the piety, is in the person who believes in Allah. That is the crux, the core. For any righteousness to emanate out of us, for it to be considered as righteousness in the eyes of Allah, for it to be the kind of righteousness Surah al-Asr is talking about, it has to come after belief in Allah.

Spending as the First Act of Righteous Deeds

Allah hasn't even spoken yet about Salah. He hasn't yet spoken about any of the other fundamentals of Islam. He begins — except the one who gives wealth in spite of his love for it. And the wealth goes to whom? To his relatives, to his near and dear ones first. And then Allah mentions the orphans. And then anyone who is needy — they may be driving a car and still be needy. There is a hadith of Rasulullah ﷺ where he is reported to have said: even when a person comes to you riding a horse asking for help, give him charity. Horses back then were a mode of transportation, but they were expensive modes of transportation.

And also to the travelers. The concept of traveler's checks is a modern-day phenomenon — back then they didn't have traveler's checks. Something could have happened; money could have been robbed or stolen, and a traveler needs help. So Allah is asking us to help travelers. The "son of the road" — ibn al-sabil — is the metaphor used for the traveler. And those who beg for money — even though at another place Rasulullah ﷺ discourages you and me from begging for money, yet Allah says in the Qur'an: do not turn away the beggar. So we are encouraged to give to the beggar and not be impolite to those who ask for money. And then the setting free of slaves.

So my friends, the way Allah has divided this ayah: first He talks about what actual birr is — the first criterion is to believe in Allah. That is the Amanu defined and so on. And then Allah talks about, after iman, the aspect of righteous deeds, righteous acts — and that is spending. Righteous deeds, priority number one: spend.

Spend — not only on the needy, but the first priority is your relatives. Because it is hardest to spend on relatives. It is easiest to spend on anybody whom we feel is deserving. But it is the hardest to spend on relatives, because of the differences between us, because of the differences between loved ones that keep them separated. When we spend on a stranger, we don't get bothered by the thought: "He did this to me, he did that to me." But the moment we think of spending money on our relatives, Shaytan starts whispering. He keeps reminding us of what they did to us, of why we should not be so generous to them.

Patience, Truth, and Fulfilling Covenants

We are talking about Ayat al-Birr, and inshallah one day we will spend hours contemplating and reflecting on this specific ayah. However, the purpose today was to tell you, through the gist of this ayah, what actual birr is. We spoke about the belief aspect that was mentioned briefly in Surah al-Asr and detailed in this ayah. The second aspect was spending after belief in Allah — that is the core and fundamental, that is the driving force.

And moving to element number four mentioned in Surah al-Asr, where Allah says that one is safe from being in loss if they advise one another with patience. Now remember, patience comes by default when the person stands on Haqq, when Haqq is being talked about. So the concept of Haqq is implied in this surah — even though Allah is not explicitly saying it here. Allah is talking about our society, our community dealings, and after the mention of patience, He says: they fulfill their covenants when they promise, or which they committed.

Allah then concludes by saying: those are the ones who are truthful, who are upon truth — they are the ones, and they are the ones who are actually the muttaqoon, the possessors of piety, the possessors of taqwa.

A Hadith on Completing One's Iman

But there is a hadith of Rasulullah ﷺ, and I quote:

Whoever loves for Allah, hates for Allah, gives for Allah, and withholds for Allah — he has indeed completed his iman.

(Sunan Abi Dawud, Hadith 4681)

Closing Du'a

So it is my du'a that Allah make us understand this concept of birr. May He make us act upon the Qur'an — and this is just one word. May He make us act upon the entire Qur'an.

For each of these 114 surahs, 114 chapters of the Qur'an, are called surah. And surah does not mean a chapter in Arabic — for surah in Arabic means a fortress, a wall. And there are 114 fortresses in the Qur'an to protect us. So may He make us spark our lives, switching from one fortress to the other and back and forth, until we meet Him on the Day of Judgement.