Purpose of Ibaadah

Auto-generated transcript: Bismillah irrahmanir rahim. Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. Wassalatu wassalamu ala ashrafil abduhi wal mursaleen. Muhammadur Rasulullah **ﷺ** Tasliman kathiran kathira. My brothers and sisters, Allahﷻ ordained on us some actions of worship. We have, for example, salah. We have fasting. We have zakat. We have hajj. Different actions of worship. The important thing to understand and realize is that each act of worship is a tool to achieve something. The action of worship is not for itself. Each action is a tool to achieve something. And that is why it is important to understand what each action of worship is supposed to achieve and to monitor that. Is it happening or not happening? For example, Allahﷻ ordained upon us the salah. Allah said, Aqim is salat al-dhikri. Allah said, I will establish the salah for my dhikr, for my remembrance. And the purpose of salah, Allahﷻ said, Salah separates you from all fawshat and munkarat. All shameless things and all acts of disobedience. So the salah is meant to achieve this. The salah is meant, first of all, the salah is for the dhikr of Allah. In the salah itself, we must think and say, Am I remembering Allahﷻ or is my mind wandering somewhere else? Because the salah is for dhikr, right? Aqim is salatah. Why? For what? For dhikr. For my dhikr. For my remembrance. So if I am praying and my mind is wandering somewhere, then it's a ridiculous thing because it's like saying this food is to fill your belly, but I am eating, I am still hungry, so something is wrong. How can you be hungry? You are eating. The food is meant to fill your belly. So the salah is meant for us to remember Allah. And if in the salah, we are forgetful, if there is ghaflat, in the salah, you are not remembering Allahﷻ, you are thinking of something else, then the salah is itself, you know, I mean, I won't go into the fiqh of it because khusho in salah is also one of the arkan of salah. It's one of the pillars of salah. But even without going into that, the fact is that salah is not doing what it's supposed to do. And then we say, well, what is the effect? What is the effect of this salah? What is it supposed to do? It is supposed to separate me from all forms of disobedience, especially from the fahushat, especially from shameless things. So I am praying, but I am looking at stuff which is haram. I am listening to stuff which is haram. Right? I am messaging things which I should not be doing. I am praying, but I am earning haram. I am eating, I am eating haram. I am talking haram. Something is wrong. Because this salah is supposed to wash my hands. Hands are supposed to be clean. I am washing and washing. Hands are still dirty. So something is wrong with the soap. So something is wrong with the salah if it is not separating me from the fahushat and balkarat because Allah said this is for His purpose. So the ibadah is a tool. The ibadah is not for itself. Similarly, now we are in the month of Ramadan. We are in the last 10 days, the most blessed of the nights. Allahﷻ said about fasting, why are we fasting? What is the reason? So that you may become muttaqoon. So that you may become people who are concerned only and only to please Allahﷻ and nothing else. Now how does fasting achieve that? Fasting achieves it by reinforcing the fact that we do something only because it is the command of Allahﷻ. There is no other reason. You are not fasting to lose weight, you are not fasting to adjust your blood sugar, you are not fasting for any reason. You are fasting because Allah said so. During the period of the fast you have made haram on yourself things which are normally halal. Eating and drinking and relationship with your spouse is halal. But during the period of the fast, from the end of the suhur time to the beginning of the iftar time, we have made these things haram on ourselves. Why? Because Allah said so. Therefore, the lesson which is being reinforced is if you can even make halal haram on yourself because Allah said so, what about things which Allah already made haram? Right? What about things which Allah already prohibited? Even the halal you are saying, no, I will not do it because Allah said don't do it. So if Allah said don't do it, even for the halal you will not do it, you are obeying Allah, alhamdulillah, very good for you. Then what about the things which Allah already prohibited? What about interest-based dealings? What about gambling? What about alcohol? What about being disrespectful to your parents? What about ill-treating your spouses? Right? Or they all get food, they all get drink, they all get nice place to sleep? There should be a difference, no? Kids are not pets. And so on and so on. So what Allah has already made haram, how can you do that? Because in the fast, this is being reinforced. You say, I will obey Allah. Allah said so is reason enough. I don't need any other reason. Logical, illogical, scientific, not scientific, modern, not modern, we don't need any of that. Allahﷻ said so, that's it. Because Allah said so is reason in itself. And that is being reinforced in the fasting. So when we are fasting, we should, for all the abayat, for salah, for fasting, we should internalize that. We should ask ourselves, we should reinforce that and say, why am I fasting? Zakat. Allahﷻ said, it purifies your wealth. Huh? Prophet **ﷺ** has commanded, take from their wealth sadaqah, which is zakat. So that they are purified by that. Why is it purified? If I take two and a half percent of my wealth and give it to somebody, my wealth is purified. Why? It focuses the attention on the fact that the earning of that wealth itself should be pure. Right? The fact that zakat is good for the economy and money circulates, all of this is happening, but that's not the reason. The reason is because Allah said so. And hajj is the most strange thing in the world. We all gather in one place on a particular day. What is so special about 9th of Zulhijjah? What's special about it? Nothing. What's special about Friday? What's special about Ramadan? It's special because Allah made it special. Period. Jummah is a day like any other day, except that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala made it special. Period. Ramadan is a month like any month, except Allah made it special. 9th of Zulhijjah, the day of hajj, is a day like any day, except Allah made it special. If I go to Arafat on the 10th of Zulhijjah, there's no hajj. I go on the 27th of Ramadan, no hajj. You can go, nobody stops you. You can't say, no, I did it. I put on my haram and I went and stood there, khalas my hajj. There's no hajj. Hajj is on that particular day. There's no other day which is for hajj. Look at the whole hajj thing. You go from all over the world. You go to that particular place. Right? You put on clothes, especially for the men. Which is one of the most uncomfortable things to wear. And we have to, whether you like it or not, you have to wear it. Because without the haram, there's no part of the rogan of the hajj. And then you are making tawaf of the Kaaba. You're doing sahih for your umrah. And then from there you go to Mina. Why Mina? Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has said, make hajj to Baitullah. So Baitullah is in Makkah. Why are you going to Mina? And then from Mina you go to Arafah. And in Arafah you have to stand within the boundary. If you step outside the boundary, it's gone. Then you come back to Muzdalifah. Then you come back to Mina. And you're strolling Jamarat. Every one of these actions, there is only one logic. Why are you doing that? Because Allah said so. And we learned this from Rasulullah **ﷺ**. He said, Qudu manasikakum. Take the manasik, take the rituals of hajj from me. So the following of the sunnah is embedded in the obedience of the commands of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. We pray Salatul Fajr. Two rakat. Why? Why not four? We made ruku first. Then we made sujood. One ruku, two sajda. We know that the slave is closest to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. In which position? Sujood. But we start the Salah in Qiyam. Standing. Which is the farthest you can get from the floor is when you are standing. You start the Salah from the side. Why don't you start from the side? You want to get close to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala? Go and sajda. Why do you do that? Because Rasulullah **ﷺ** did it. He said, Pray as you have seen me pray. So the sunnah is embedded in the obedience of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And I am giving you one example of Salah. The same thing applies throughout, for everything. So I remind myself and you, let us remember this. That the purpose of the Ibadah is to achieve something. So let us monitor ourselves and say, 21 days have passed. Behavioral scientists say that 21 days is enough for habit change. If you do something for 21 days, then the habit changes. So at least one habit which we have done, alhamdulillah, for 21 days is Qamulil. We are standing in the night. Yes? This is what everyone does. Salatul Qiyam. If you see in Mecca, what is the announcement they make? Salatul Qiyam, he says. They don't say Salatul Salawi. Salatul Qiyam. It's Qamulil. So we are doing that. 21 days. So inshallah, now this one habit we must take for the rest of our lives. Let not a single day pass when you have not prayed at least two rakat of Qamulil. Get up a little bit before Salatul Fajr. Make wudu, pray two rakat. Because this is the time when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is closest to us. So one habit change. Similarly, monitor for yourself and say, what habits have I acquired? Good habits, alhamdulillah. Thanks to the fasting. Which I will now continue because 21 days have passed. The habit is supposed to become now permanent. And we still have some more days, inshallah. So it becomes even more permanent. And this we must carry on through the rest of our lives, inshallah. Alright? So inshallah for this, same thing for all the ibadah. I don't want to take more of your time. But remember this,