ISWM Last Lecture #1 – Taqwa

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family and his companions. Peace and blessings be upon them all. After this, my brothers and sisters, first and foremost, I would like to thank Allah the Exalted for having given me the opportunity to be here for these six years. It's a study in how fast time passes. I cannot myself believe that six years have passed. Alhamdulillah, they have passed. And we have been through, thanks to COVID and so on, different times and different things. And Alhamdulillah, I thank Allah the Exalted for His constant help and His constant courage and support that Allah the Exalted gave me. And gave all of us. I want to thank very specially the board of this masjid. And they know and I know that I don't, I'm not just saying this formally. But this is a masjid, the board of which represents the kind of brotherhood and diversity that brother Muhammad talked about. Where there is this understanding between the board members and their own dedication to serving this community. Many times in the face of opposition which is from people who don't understand what is going on. Despite that, they have been serving and they have been doing a brilliant job. And they all do it only and only for the pleasure of Allah the Exalted without any compensation. I want to thank especially Dr. Bajwa, who has been a mentor to me from day one. And Alhamdulillah, we have done some good work with the interfaith community. But I have always looked upon him and I continue to look upon him as a mentor and a teacher in how to deal with the interfaith community. My experience of the interfaith community was practically zero when I came here. Because we don't have this kind of thing in India. But after I came here, Alhamdulillah, we have been able to do things which I am satisfied about. But all of that is thanks to Dr. Bajwa's introductions, his guidance, his continuous support, his advice. Alhamdulillah, and I ask Allah to reward him in keeping with His Majesty and Grace. I will not name all the other people because there are so many. And they know and I know and Allah knows who they are. And I ask Allah to reward all of them in keeping with His Majesty and Grace. So I want to express my thanks to this entire community. To the children, to the elders, to the men and women, all of whom I have had the pleasure and privilege of interacting with. And Alhamdulillah, these are memories I take with me. The second thing I want to say to you is that while I am away, there are certain things which you have been receiving for me which will continue. One is the two classes a week. Right now, one of them Dr. Ali is doing, which is the Tafseer class. But that also is my responsibility. So two classes a week, the recording of the Jummah Khutbah. These three things you will get every single week. The second thing which you will get is the daily Khatira. Now here you get it live every alternate day. Because Sheikh Abdullah and I take 10 days. But the virtual is always there. But you will get the daily Khatira, InshaAllah, every day. That will also come to you. So InshaAllah, this will also continue. So also with regard to any advice that any of you want, any questions you want asked. I don't say I have the answer to all questions. I wish I did. But certainly I will try and I will try to get you whatever answers you want. Or any kind of help you like. InshaAllah. Whatever I can do, I'm at your service and will continue to be at your service as we go forward. So I want to start with these two things. So you are sure that I will, that you can't get rid of me that easily. I want to remind myself and you that we are on a journey and the name of that journey is life. And like in any journey, we have to take our provisions with us. And Allah told us what the best provision is for this journey. And that is to be conscious of and concerned about gaining His approval in all that we say and all that we do. To ask this question before every speech and every action. Will Allah be pleased with this? And this is the meaning of Taqwa. Taqwa. To be always concerned about the pleasure of Allah and to let that supersede and override everything and everyone else. Allah said in the ayat of Surah Al-Baqarah Allah said the best, take the necessary provisions for the journey and the best of those provisions is righteousness, is Taqwa. And be, have my Taqwa, O people of reason, O people of intelligence. So I advise myself and you to have the Taqwa of Allah . Three things that I want to leave with you. First and foremost is to have the Taqwa of Allah in all that we say and do because this is the beginning of all goodness. The beginning of all goodness is to have the Taqwa of Allah . Allah said Allah said this is the book and there is no doubt in it. And this is a guide for the muttaqun, for the people who have Taqwa, for the people who love Allah and who are concerned always to have and earn the reward and the pleasure of Allah . Allah then told us what is the benefit of those and many others for those who have Taqwa. When Allah said Allah said Allah said and the one who has Taqwa, Allah will solve his problems. Allah will extract him from all his difficulties and He will provide for them from sources they cannot even imagine. And whoever puts his trust in Allah, whoever has Tawakkul in Allah , He alone will become sufficient for that person. Taqwa is to avoid all doubtful matters. No Muslim can or should deliberately go into something which is haram knowing it is haram. Our problem happens when we are not sure. And Taqwa is to avoid all doubtful matters. And to always ask this question before every decision. Will Allah be pleased with this? Allah's promise for the muttaqun is not only to solve their problems, but to delight them while doing it. So that they can praise Him even more. Just ask this question. Allah said He will provide them from sources they could not imagine. Now I question myself when I say that If Allah provides you from an expected source, is there a problem? There is no problem. You can take what you need from a source which you expect. But when you get the same thing which you need from a completely unexpected source, you say, oh, SubhanAllah. This is Allah's gift to the muttaqi. That He provides him from a source which he cannot even imagine. So, if you ask this question, Allah will provide you from a source which he cannot even imagine. And then Allah gives the muttaqun a gift. A gift of tranquility, of peace of mind, of total elimination of worry and concern. And that is Tawakkul. Tawakkul is the trust that Ibrahim had when he was trussed up and sitting in the cup of the trebuchet. Tawakkul is what Musa had when he was standing in the court of Ramesses II, the Firaun of Egypt. And Tawakkul is his condition when he was on the shore of the sea and had no clue what's going to happen, how will he cross. And he had the army of the Firaun rapidly approaching from behind. Tawakkul is what RasulAllah had in the cave, in Ghar-e-Thaur, when he said to his companion, Abu Waqar as-Siddiq , يَقُولُ لِسَاحِبِهِ لَا تَحْزَنُ إِنَّ اللَّهَ مَعَنَا He said to his Sahib, he said to his companion, have no fear, have no sadness, verily Allah is with us. In all these cases and many more which Allah has mentioned us in the Quran, and which we see around us if we have the eyes to see, all of these appear miraculous to us, but for Allah it is nothing. And in that we take hope and we take comfort that no matter what the problem is that I may be facing in life, for my Rabb it is nothing. It is nothing. It is literally less than nothing. It may look big to me because I am small, but for my Rabb رَبُّ الْمَشْهِزَةِ وَالْمَغْرِبِ رَبِّ سَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ رَبُّ الْعَرْشِ الْكَرِيمِ خَالِقُ سَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ مَضِيُّ سَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ For Him what is it? For Him it is nothing. So when we ask Allah, we ask with this Yaqeen, we ask with this complete certainty, and with the glory and majesty of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala illuminating our hearts. We don't ask Allah with doubt. Will it happen? Will it not happen? SubhanAllah, who are you asking? Who are you asking? Ask with dua, make dua with complete certainty. Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala urged the mutaqoon and may Allah make us among the mutaqoon to race towards His mercy, not just walk, not even run, to compete with one another. And among the many examples, we have the beautiful example of how Sayyidina Omar ibn al-Khattab and Sayyidina Abu Bakr Siddique used to compete, in goodness. In goodness. There was no jealousy involved in that competition. They used to compete. And in that competition, after Sayyidina Abu Bakr Siddique passed away, and Sayyidina Omar ibn al-Khattab became the Khalifa, several years after that, one day Sayyidina Omar was walking down the street, he overheard a few people, and they said, SubhanAllah, Omar is a much better Khalifa than Abu Bakr . Sayyidina Omar stopped. He said, what did you say? They said, Avin, Avin, we are praising you. He said, Astaghfirullahil-Ladhim. He said, Allah is my witness, by the one who has the life of Omar in his hand. One day and one night, in the life of Abu Bakr, is better than Omar, and all his family, and all that they ever did. One day and one night, in the life of Abu Bakr , is better than Omar, and his whole family, and whatever they did. And they asked him, which day and which night? He said, the night in the Ghar, the night in the cave, and the day of Udaybiyyah. Huh? That is why Imam Malik bin Aras , he said that Abu Bakr's, , position and his maqam, and his darja, and his elevation, and his nobility, is not because of how much he used to pray, or how much he used to fast, or you know,