Follow up on Ramadan

Auto-generated transcript: Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. Wasalatu wasalamu ala ashrafil amma ibn al-mussaleen. Muhammadur Rasulullahﷺ sallallahu alayhi wa ala alihi wa sallam. Tasleeman kathiran kathira. Wa mubadu. My brothers and sisters, we just celebrated yesterday Eid al-Fitr. The word Eid comes from the word A'ud. A'ud means to return. Something which returns. Something that you look forward to the returning of. So you look forward to something for it to return because you are happy. Right? Nobody looks forward to the return of some illness or evil or accident. Something which is good. You enjoyed it. It was very nice. You something which you look forward to. So you say, I hope it comes again and again and again. The reason why we look forward to the return of the Eid every year and may Allahﷻ grant all of us Ramadan again in good health and with the time and the tawfiq to take full advantage of it inshallah. The reason we look forward to the return of the Eid is because of the Eid. Because it represents for us victory. Fatah. Victory over ourselves. Victory over our own nafs. Victory over our own desires. We had a desire for food but we stopped it. We controlled it. We did not give in to that desire for food. Why? Because that was the hukam of Allahﷻ. There is no other reason. We did not stop eating because I think I need to lose weight or my glycemic index has to come down or there is some other reason. No. We did not eat from dawn to dusk, from before fajr to after maghrib only because Allahﷻ commanded that. There is no other reason. If somebody is fasting for any other reason that fast is invalid. Right? Why did we do that? Because Allah's order. We prayed. All of us. Alhamdulillah. We prayed Isha and we prayed Fajr by jama'at in the masjid. Throughout the month. 30 days. We prayed Isha and we prayed Salatul Fajr in the masjid by jama'at. So what did we get because of that? We got the reward. Worshipping Allahﷻ the whole night. Because the hadith of Jesus He said the one who prays Isha by jama'at, Allah gives him the reward of standing in Salat for half the night. Can you imagine? Even if you want to stand in Salat for half the night, maybe you can do it one day, maybe you can do it two days. How many days will you do it? But this is nothing. Just pray Isha by jama'at in any masjid. Pray Isha by jama'at in the masjid. Allahﷻ will give us the reward for praying half the night. And then Nabi said the one who prays Salatul Fajr also by jama'at, Allah gives him the reward for the rest of the night. So just praying Isha in the masjid by jama'at and praying Salatul Fajr in the masjid by jama'at, we got the reward for worshipping Allahﷻ the entire night. So the whole month of Ramadan, Alhamdulillah, we did that. Third thing is we stood in Qiyamul Layl. Tarabih is Qiyamul Layl. We stood in Qiyamul Layl. Whatever you prayed, whether you prayed 20 rakat or 8 rakat, that's not the issue. The issue is you stood in Qiyamul Layl. Alhamdulillah, as much as you could pray. So this is another beautiful thing. Qiyamul Layl is the time, is the Qiyam when Allahﷻ descends to the first heaven in a manner that suits His Majesty and Grace. And Allahﷻ announces who is there who needs anything from me, let him ask. I will give him. Who is there who needs my protection, let him ask. I will give him. Who is there who needs my forgiveness, let him ask. I will give him. Right? So think about this. Alhamdulillah, we can make dua at any time of the day or night. Allahﷻ, the doors are open. There is no problem with that. But to make dua specifically when Allahﷻ has set a time and Allah says, okay, right now is the time. Tell me. So Alhamdulillah, we did that also. We prayed Qiyamul Layl. Right? Then Alhamdulillah, Inshallah, for whoever Allahﷻ gave tawfeeq and may Allah have given tawfeeq to all of us, we increased our zakat and sadaqat and khairat and all kinds of things through the month. Then Alhamdulillah, bismillah ta'ala, we also controlled our tongues. We did not curse and we did not use bad language and we did not do ghiva and we did not do namima and we did not do any of the evil things with the tongue, which may Allah forgive us, this has become now almost the social currency, right? Social currency is ghivat. Four people sitting here, talking about someone. So either we talk, or if someone else is doing it, we listen. Both are the same. So, you may say, Allah has given two legs, go away from there. Why are you sitting? Either stop him, the fellow is talking, tell him, why are you talking about him, why are you doing this, Allah is haram, don't do it. You can't say anything, get up and go. Don't sit there, right? If somebody is doing ghiva, stop them, tell them, this is haram, this is like eating the flesh of your brother, Allahﷻ said in the Quran, what more do you want? Right? Please stop this, we don't want to listen to all this. Let us talk about something good, let us talk about the greatness of Allahﷻ, let us talk about the Seerah of the Prophetﷺ, let us talk about something useful in life, I mean, need not always be the Quran and Sunnah, anything useful in life, something which we can learn. Why are we talking about people? And if for some reason you cannot do all of this, go away. Get up and walk away. I mean, alhamdulillah, Allah has given us two legs, use them. Right? We did all this, in Ramadan, mashallah, we did all of this. And whatever else good we did. So Eid is a celebration of this. Eid has nothing, like for example, people say, see the conditions today in the world, there is so much of death and so much of this, I am not celebrating Eid. Eid has nothing to do with what's happening in the world. Eid has nothing to do with who died and who did not die and so on. Eid is the celebration of your victory over yourself. Your victory over your own nafs. Your victory over your desires in obedience to Allahﷻ. This is Eid. Whether somebody else died or did not die has nothing to do with Eid. Now, question is, Ramadan is over and we of course ask Allah to give us many more to come, inshaAllah, in good health and tawfiq. But now what? Between now and the next Ramadan, we have got 11 months. Now what do we have to do in 11 months? What do we need to do in these 11 months? So, reinforce the same things in Ramadan. We did not do certain things, we stopped ourselves from certain halal things, only because Allah told us. So, what about stopping ourselves from haram things going forward in our life? We don't have to stop from halal. Alhamdulillah, Allah has made it halal, so do it halal. But haram things, Allah said don't smoke, don't let the smoke get in your life. Don't smoke. Don't let the smoke get in your life. Don't let smoke come out of your mouth. It's a sign of people of Jahannam. Why do you want to imitate people of Jahannam? May Allah save us from Jahannam. May Allah put us in Jannah. This tongue, for example, in Ramadan another thing we did was, we read Quran. Right? Some part of the Quran we read and we read inshaAllah more than what we normally read. So, now keep that. Keep all the good habits. We used to pray Isha and Fajr by Jamaah. Now let us make the niyyah to say, for the rest of my life, inshaAllah, I will pray Isha and Fajr by Jamaah in the Masjid. Make this niyyah. And if Allah will give us, that also means that even if you are very old, you will still be able to walk to the Masjid and pray Isha and Fajr by Jamaah. Because Allahﷻ, you made the niyyah, Allah gave you. The fringe benefit of this thing, Alhamdulillah. So, literally think about that. How about if I say to you that it is possible for you from today until the day you die, to pray the full night every night. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? You cannot even, even if you want to do it, we cannot do it. But Allah made it so easy. This is the beauty of this Deen. Small things, huge rewards. Just pray Isha and pray Fajr by Jamaah. We got the reward of praying the whole night. And if we do this for the rest of our lives, inshaAllah, we got the full reward. And number two, we have to pray Isha and Fajr by Jamaah. Now, let us talk of peace. peace good regularly, when he cannot do it because of ill health or some reason and so on, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala commands the angels to write that deed continuously in his account until he dies. And the angel, the malaika, you know, they are accountants, so they will say, this is Allah, but he did not do it. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, he did not do it because of whatever I gave him, otherwise he would have done it. So write it for him. See the beauty of this. This is the beauty of our religion. Small things, we get huge rewards. That's the small thing we should do. So going forward, let us make this niyyah. I will not miss Salatul Isha and Salatul Fajr by Jama'ah, insha'Allah, until I die. Let us make this niyyah. We ask Allah to make it easy for us. Whatever other Salahs we can pray by Jama'ah, Alhamdulillah, good for us. Pray all five. But definitely these two. Number one. Number two, let us make the niyyah that we will pray khiyam. We will pray tahajjud every day at least two rakaat. Just get up a little bit before the time for Fajr, half an hour before, 45 minutes before, whatever Allah gives you tawfiq. Pray Salatul, pray two rakaat of tahajjud. Make all the dua you want. Get all the things you like, you want from Allahﷻ. Then go to the masjid for Salatul Fajr. The thing which I prescribe, when people ask me how should I do, I tell them this thing. I say wake up one hour before the time for Fajr starts. So now the time for Fajr is right now around, around 5, 7 or something, right? So say 5 o'clock, you wake up at 4 o'clock, you pray tahajjud and then you read one juz of Quran, one sipara. You read one para of Quran and then you go to the masjid for Salatul Fajr, you pray Salatul Fajr. Imagine what a beautiful day that will be.