Al Asr – 3

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family and companions. Many peace and blessings be upon him. Then after that, brothers and sisters, praise be to Allah, we come to the last part of this great surah. Allah took an oath by time and said, وَالْعَصْرُ إِنَّ الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ وَتَوَاسَوا بِالْحَقِّ وَتَوَاسَوا بِالصَّبْرِ Allah took an oath by time and said, Surely and definitely all of mankind is in a state of loss. Surely all of mankind is in a state of loss. As I mentioned before, the translation does not do justice to the original, because the original uses the word of emphasis twice. إِنَّ الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ إِلَّا الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ Surely all of mankind is definitely in a state of loss. Surely all of mankind is definitely in a state of loss. And this is the, on a side note, the beauty of the Arabic language, which indeed we as Muslims must make it further on ourselves to learn. So that not only can we truly understand the importance of what Allah is saying, but also enjoy the beauty of the Bani Al-Mu'minah, the Bani of the Quran. Then Allah said, truly after He said that all of mankind is definitely in loss, meaning that whatever mankind sees, whatever he must see and think of as beneficial, as profitable, as beneficial, as beneficial, as beneficial, as beneficial, as beneficial, as profitable, as profitable, as our wealth is actually false. That is not wealth. That is not something which is good. Actually it is something which is a source of loss, which is something which is a sign of sickness, illness, fatal, or sign of, you know, fatal faults. It's very important to understand this because this is not the opinion of an analyst or a, you know, commentator of some kind. This is the statement of the one who created everything, including all that we see as beneficial. All this also comes from Allah . Our wealth is from Allah . Our knowledge is from Allah . Our scientific development is from Allah . Everything is from Allah . But Allah is saying all of this are not signs of goodness. They are actually signs of the biggest problem. Which is that we are, these are signs of loss. They are signs of destruction, impending destruction. إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا Except for those, all of mankind is in loss except those who have iman, who have faith in Allah , who worship Allah alone, who recognize that لا ينفع ولا يذر إلا الله that nobody harms. And nobody can benefit except Allah. That everything comes from Allah . And then وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ And those who do good deeds. And what are good deeds? Good deeds are those which please Allah. They're not necessarily those which might seem to be good in our understanding. The condition for a good deed to be called a good deed is that it should please Allah . إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ And then in the last two episodes we covered this. And today we'll talk about the last piece which is إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ وَتَوَاسَوْا بِالْحَقِّ وَتَوَاسَوْا بِالصَّوْا Those who invite towards the truth. Those who state the truth. وَتَوَاسَوْا بِالصَّوْا And those who invite each other to have patience, to have perseverance, to have persistence. I cannot possibly emphasize the importance of these two things. Because in Islam it's not only about yourself. It's not only about passively doing something good for yourself. But it's about promoting that good. It's about a sense of social consciousness and social responsibility. Where you not only are happy to enjoy what you have, but you want to spread this goodness around you. Believe me, this was the secret of the spread of Islam, which we forgot. Today, when we have wealth, Today, when we have wealth, we build a big house. And then the thing we do is we build a huge wall around the house. And then we put a barbed wire on top of the wall. And we electrify that. And then we have guard dogs. And we have securities. And we live in a compound with all of the security. Why? Because we are afraid. Of who? Of the poor people of the world. The question to ask is why are you afraid of the poor people? Why? What was your responsibility with regard to the poor people? Rasool Allah sends Ahmad bin Jabal to Yemen. And he is giving him advice. And he says, you are going to a people of the book. Because Yemenis were Christian. He said, you're going to a people of the book. He said, invite them towards the worship of Allah alone. Invite them to the worship of Allah alone. And then he says, If they accept, then teach them how to worship. Teach them Salah. So invite them to the worship of Allah. And when they accept, teach them Salah. And then he said, And when they accept that, and they start praying, then tell them that Zakat, charity. He didn't tell them fasting. He didn't say tell them to make Hajj. He said, Zakat, charity. Tell them charity is further on them. Zakat is further on them. And take from their wealthy and give it to their poor. He didn't say take from their wealthy and build your palace for yourself. He didn't say take from their wealthy and send the money to me in Madinah. He said, take from their wealthy and give it to their poor. Which poor? The poor in Yemen. And then he says, And when you take the cash from them, from the wealthy, don't take what they love the most. Don't take their best. Take good. He didn't say take trash. He said, take good, but don't take something that they really love. See the hikmah, see the beauty of this advice. And link it back to this Surah, Surah Al-Asr, which I am explaining to you. And may Allah grant me the ability to do that in a way which pleases Him and helps me for my sins to be forgiven. Tawasob ilhaq. Invite towards good. What is good for you, share it with others. Today, as I said, we live in, or we like to live in, security compounds. We like to live behind big walls. You forget that the reason why the big walls are there is because there is poverty. Because there is a huge disparity between the haves and the have-nots. Islam is not against that disparity, meaning Islam is not promoting the disparity, but at the same time, Islam does not come from the communist, you know, irrational model of saying everyone must have ten dollars. Equality. You cannot have equality because you will have some people who are producing, some people who cannot produce because they are weak or they are not qualified enough, or they are old or something. So you cannot say everyone must have the same income. But you can definitely say that everyone must have the ability to have their needs taken care of, to have their needs satisfied. Right? We are not talking about here but desires. We are talking about their needs. If a person needs food, they need food. The one who is producing food needs food, and the one who cannot produce food also needs food. It's not a question of saying if you want it, produce it yourself. Some can, some cannot. But they still need it. And whose responsibility is it to give them that? Obviously the responsibility of the ones who are producing it. So the ones who are producing it are saying, no, no, we are not going to share it with our people. We will export it, make money, and live lives of luxury, and live behind high walls in fortresses. And we will go by helicopter from our fortress to the airport, and then take a plane and go to the French Riviera, or we go to Dubai, or we go somewhere else to have a holiday or to do our business. Believe me, that's a recipe for disaster. There is no fort wall that can keep out people who, when they get desperate. And then there is chaos. And then guess who suffers? The same owner of the fortress. And the solution is very simple, which is eliminate the need for a wall. Create a middle class. Create society which is based on the sharing of wealth. Empower people. Give people employment. Find ways of sharing the goodness. Give them education. If they cannot afford it, you pay for it. Consider it to be your life insurance and the life insurance of your children. Give them education. Help them to earn a living. And then see how, what a beautiful, peaceful society you will create. And see what the power of the middle class will be, because you will create buying power in this society. You will have people with disposable incomes who can have discretionary expenditure. And then who benefits? You. Because you are the person producing the product or the service. Right? This is what Islam is teaching you. Invite towards the truth is not only halal and haram. It's not only tawhid. It is. That's the foundation. That's the bunya. That's where it starts from. But it extends to everything else. Tawassul bil haq is also a beautiful, productive economic system, which is not based on interest, which is not based on things which actually destroy wealth. Interest destroys wealth. Interest does not make you wealthy. Interest takes away your earth. We don't seem to understand that, but that's the reality. Islam prohibits everything, which is? Intrinsically evil. And there's nothing more evil than interest-based banking. So to create a non-interest system is tawassul bil haq. It's inviting towards good. To create a system which is based on justice, which is based on compassion, which is based on kindness, which is based on haya, on dignity, as compared to promiscuity, as compared to indulging, to the basic, the base, not basic, the base desires of the human. These are not positive things. These are negative things in themselves, whether anyone considers them negative or not. There is nothing good about being unfaithful to your partner in marriage. There's nothing good about it. The world may accept it,