Akhirah or Dunya
By AbdelRahman Murphy | 2026-01-19T10:54:30.353201+00:00 | Topic: General
Akhirah or Dunya - Complete Khutbah by Ustadh AbdelRahman Murphy
Opening Prayers
"Peace, mercy, and blessings of Allah be upon you."
In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
All praise is due to Allah who revealed to His servant the Book and made no crookedness therein.
All praise is due to Allah who neither begets nor is begotten and for whom there is no equal.
All praise is due to Allah - we praise Him, seek His help, seek His forgiveness, and seek refuge in Allah from the evils of ourselves and the bad deeds we commit. Whomever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whomever Allah misguides, none can guide.
I bear witness that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah alone with no partners, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, may Allah's prayers and peace be upon him.
O servants of Allah, Allah Almighty says in His clear Book, after I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed Satan:
"Whoever desires the harvest of the Hereafter - We increase for him in his harvest."
The Story of the Ansar and the Battle of Badr
The Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) when he received the delegation from Yathrib from the Ansar, when they came to him and they signed the agreement, the pact where they would host the Muslims and they would then allow them to come and live in Medina, there was one condition on that agreement that stuck out.
So they agreed they said the Muslims can come and live here. They asked for the Prophet Muhammad 's wisdom and his advice and his counsel in solving the issues between Aws and Khazraj. But in order to convince them and soften their hearts and not to cause any fear amongst them, the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) he gave them a condition that they did not have to engage in any sort of conflict. They did not have to defend in any sort of conflict that the Muhajirun would be attacked with. That they were free from
involvement, they were not responsible for a certain period of time, for a certain number of years. Because any issue that Quraysh or other tribes had with the Muslims, the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) says: "We'll take care of that. You guys don't have to sign on to that. You don't have to agree to take care of that. It's not your issue, it's not your problem because you just accepted us as a community."
Now if you fast forward a few months after the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) arrived in Medina, he gets word there's this pressure that's building up from the outside where the tribe of Quraysh, the people of Mecca, are very upset. They're burned that the Muslims left them. They feel disrespected, dishonored. And so they're planning an attack. They're planning an attack on the city of Medina. They're gonna attack the Muslims and those who hosted them because they can't take this humiliation that they've been experiencing.
And the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) he hears of this attack, he hears of this plan, and he decides to cut them off. He decides to send a delegation to cut them off and to sort of intercept their attack as it's coming. And this actually occurred. This battle that happened is known as the Battle of Badr and it happened in the month of Ramadan - the month that we are in today.
And what's interesting is that despite the Ansar not being responsible, not being held accountable for having to defend the community at this time, you find that the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) he approached them and he told them that this is the situation that we find ourselves in, and this is the battle that we are going to engage in, and if you don't want to, you don't have to. He gave them a blank check. If you are not interested then you are not going to be held accountable.
But Sa'd ibn Mu'adh (رضي الله عنه) - the one who when he passed away, when he died, the throne of Allah (عز وجل) shook - Sa'd ibn Mu'adh, one of the first converts to Islam from Medina, one of the first people that accepted Islam from Medina, and one of the leaders of the tribes in Medina, he said:
"Ya Rasulallah, if you asked us to follow you into the ocean we would follow you. If you requested us to follow you to the end of the earth we would follow you. Ya Rasulallah, I know that we signed that agreement Ya Rasulallah, but that was just formality. That was just pen and paper. If you asked us to follow you anywhere you went Ya Rasulallah, we would be right behind you."
And the beauty of the Ansar at this point volunteering openly, accepting this responsibility despite the fact that they didn't have to, was that the Ansar were actually the overwhelming majority of participants in the battle of Badr. There was about 220, 230, whereas the Muhajirun were under 100 people, just around 80.
So if the Ansar had not gone above their expectations, if the Ansar had not pushed past what was expected from them, done the extra mile, gone the extra mile, if the Ansar had not done that, who knows what the outcome of the battle may have been? And you find that this happened - this miracle, both social, spiritual and real miracle - happened in the month of Ramadan.
The Choice Between Akhirah and Dunya
And this story of a group of people who decided that they wanted to invest more in their akhirah than their dunya, this story is a story of people who saw the priority of the afterlife versus this life. And this is what Allah (سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى) talks about in Surah Ash-Shura when he says that whoever wants to have an investment, whoever desires their - and he literally used the word harth, like to harvest something whoever desires their harvest in the hereafter, Allah says that this person will be receiving much more. Allah says: "I will give them much more in their investment."
And he says but at the same time, whoever wants to invest or farm or harvest their actions from the dunya, then that person Allah (سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى) says that we will give them from it. That that person will find that when they spend all of their time, all of their effort in the dunya, that they will get what they want. But you know what? When it comes to the akhirah, Allah says that there will be no naseeb for them there. There will be nothing waiting for them in the akhirah because they've invested everything into the dunya.
The Greatest Generation
Brothers and sisters, if there's one characteristic, you know we call the Sahaba, we call them the greatest generation. This is the title that they've been given. Allah (سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى) says about them in the Quran that they are pleased with Him. Allah is pleased with them and they are pleased with Him. Allah has given His blanket pleasure to these amazing role models, these companions of the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم). And on top of that, you have the people of Badr - those who participated in the battle of Badr - they're given an even loftier status to the point where the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) he gave them an even further blank check of the people who participated in that battle.
But if we looked at it from a core perspective: how did they become these people? How did they become so great? Weren't they just human beings like you and I? Yes, they were. But they had something rooted in their heart, and this is the discussion of today's short khutbah.
What was rooted in their heart was an intense desire - irada - like Allah says in the ayah (من يُرِيدُ) - irada. They had this intense desire that their akhirah be better than their dunya.
What Do You Make Du'a For?
You know I was doing a youth halaqah last week, and since the month of Ramadan is the month of du'a, it's the month of supplicating to Allah - that's why we say we say: "Oh Allah, please please accept from us our supplications to you. We stand here especially in the last nights and we make qunoot. People make i'tikaf because they just want to be in the presence of the masjid making du'a to Allah."
So I said why don't I talk to these young people, these youth, these high schoolers and college kids about what they make du'a for? Because you can tell a lot about the health of your heart by what you make du'a for. You can tell a lot about your relationship with Allah by what you make du'a for.
So I asked them. We went around the room, about 80 teenagers. I said: "What do you make du'a for?" Almost every single one of them when they responded, they said: "Academics, grades, exams." Some of them, right? So that was like 95%. Some of them said: "I make du'a for my grandparents who passed away. I make du'a for my life struggles. I make du'a for my family's financial situation."
So they talked about this world, the dunya. Brothers and sisters, almost none of them said that we make du'a for Jannah. Almost none. Maybe 5 said: "I make du'a that Allah give me heaven, grant me paradise."
What kind of culture are we establishing in our community when a person is more concerned about their grades than they are about their rewards with Allah? What kind of culture are we? What kind of personality are we instilling into our families when we get upset with them when they don't get an A on that final, but when they miss Fajr, it's okay - there's always tomorrow? This is not the characteristic of the companions.
The Prophecy of Weakness
You know we want to be great people. We complain about the status of the Muslim ummah, and you know the... he was sitting with his companions and this was in Medina, so they were really really powerful and strong, and they were experiencing the benefits of numbers. And the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) said to them that there will come a time where people will gather around the ummah and they will pick at the ummah just like people gather around a plate of food and they pick at that plate of food and they eat it.
And the companions they couldn't understand how this would be possible, so they said: "Ya Rasulallah..." because remember, and you know in Khutbat al-Wada'a, in the last Hajj there was over 100,000 people present, right? From a group that was only 83, you know, people who migrated. So imagine like how they felt. Like man, no one can stop us now, we're 100,000 deep, you know?
So they're sitting there and they said: "Ya Rasulallah, is this because we will be small in number? Is this the reason why?" And the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) said: "La, no, actually you'll be more in number." He compared us to like the foam on the sea. How many bubbles are in that foam? You can't even count it, it's so many.
So they were completely shocked. They said: "Ya Rasulallah, the only way that this could happen to us, this destruction could happen to us, the only way that we could be pulled apart from our relationship with Allah by others is if we're maybe small in number. So what would be the cause of that, Ya Rasulallah?"
And he gave an answer where he said: "Al-Wahn." He said: "From Wahn." And listen to their response. They said: "What is Wahn?"
And when you hear the definition of what Wahn is, you'll know why they asked what Wahn is. The Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) said: "Wahn," they said: "What is Wahn?" He said: "It is love of this world and fear of death."
The Sahaba were people who didn't even know the definition of love of this world and fear of death. It didn't register. It didn't process. When the Prophet Muhammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم) said there will come a time where
people will be more - they will prefer this life to the next life - they didn't understand how that could even be possible.
Understanding the Ayah of Harvest
So when we look at this ayah, brothers - if you could please scoot up inshallah and make some space so that the brother doesn't have to come and ask you - inshallah make some space for people in the back inshallah.
So when the ayah says that whoever desires a harvest from the akhirah, we take apart a couple points from this ayah. Number one is when Allah says... he's switching the tenses means the past tense is present. In the English language it's like whoever has had their desires set forth. So it kind of is a struggle, but in Arabic this creates what's known as consistency. Consistency. And the important point is that whatever Allah is mentioning here, it has to be done with consistency. It has to be done with continuity.
That if a person truly has desire for the akhirah, it shouldn't be on and off. Maybe their actions might stumble here and there. You and I might make a mistake here and there. We might miss something here and there. But at least the desire in our heart is higher for the akhirah and it's always there. If we always check ourselves we can say: "I want proximity with Allah. I want to be in Jannah with all the anbiya and the shuhada and the salihin."
And then he says, but at the same time there will be another people who they invest their harvest into this dunya. And when you think of harvest, this word harth, it's a very poignant word, it's a very succinct word that Allah is using here. He could have used many other words, but he decided to use an example of farming.
The Metaphor of the Farmer
And when you think of the farmer, if there's any farmers in here or previous farmers or if you have any experience with farming at all, you know that there are some characteristics that are inherent to farmers. There are some things that are inherent to farmers. And just so that, for some of you who may not know, I'll explain very briefly:
The practice of farming, or really any business in general, is one that requires immense trust and patience. Because what farmers do is they plant, they nurture, they feed, they tend for months without any guarantee of the outcome, without any guarantee that what they're working on is going to happen. And then when it comes forth, whenever Allah gives them their rizq, they harvest that plant and they live off of it for the next bad season, the off season, the cold season. They sell it and they live off of it. It is literally their rizq for half of the year.
So they work for half of the year really hard, and they get their harvest, and they live off of it for half of the year. So when Allah is speaking about our actions in this life and he's calling it harth, he's teaching us something about what it means to live in this dunya.
Just like a farmer sits and plants their seeds, and just like a farmer doesn't know what the outcome of their actions are, and just like a farmer can't see what their harvest will look like until it comes, living in this dunya is similar to that. We pray, we fast, we make du'a, we give sadaqah, and we don't exactly know we don't have guarantee of what the outcome will be. But we pray and we hope to Allah after we've done all the work that he grants us a beautiful harvest for our actions. Say ameen.
We ask Allah to allow us to harvest an entrance to Jannah on the day of judgment, ameen.
So a person will use their entire life - 60, 70, 80 years if they're lucky - working, working, working without any sneak preview, no appetizer, no taste of what Jannah will be like. And that's why the heart yearns for Allah. Because after all that work, we stand here in the night and we say: "Ya Allah, please accept from us our deeds. Allahumma taqabbal minna siyamana wa qiyamana." That is what we say to Allah سُبْحَانَة وَتَعَالَى . We beg of him to accept that from us because we've spent our entire lives planting and nurturing and mending and tending to our crop. We hope that when it comes, it's fruitful for our akhirah.
The Warning About Dunya Focus
But the scary thing, brothers and sisters, is that the ayah continues:
"Whoever invests everything they've got into this dunya, whoever puts their all into this dunya, nu'tihi minha we will give them from it. They'll get what they want." Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى is so generous, he's so merciful, he'll give the person what they want. وَمَا لَهُ فِي الْآخِرَةِ مِن نصيب - "But in the akhirah though, what have they given up? They've given up any reward or appointment in the akhirah." We ask Allah to protect us from that.
So we see here, brothers and sisters, that there is a give and take. There's a challenge being presented to us that we either invest it for the akhirah - we either use this dunya for the akhirah - or we let this dunya become our reason why we lose the akhirah.
Ramadan: The Month of Investing in the Akhirah
And this month of Ramadan, brothers and sisters, is a month where we finally begin to feel what it feels like to have irada for the akhirah. This Ramadan, Ramadan is the month - the days and nights and the fasts and the salah of Ramadan are the actions where we begin to understand what it's like to plant for the akhirah. Because you give up food and drink and many other things for the sake of Allah.
Ibn Al Qayyim said that when a person fasts, they're proving to themselves that they love Allah more than they love this world. Fasting is a big deal. If you've fasted, if you've completed your fast, don't beat yourself up about not doing as much as you wanted. If you completed your fast, that's a big deal. Because Ibn Al Qayyim said that a person when they break their fast, they've proven to themselves that: "I love Allah more than I love this world because I can hold myself back from things that I think I need because I truly need Allah."
So the month of Ramadan is a time where we really understand what it's like to be ،مَن كَانَ يُرِيدُ الْآخِرَةِ حَرْثَ الْآخِرَةِ - that's what we develop in this month.
The Test of Continuity
But one of the signs, brothers and sisters, that these deeds are accepted of this month is the exact same effect that Allah built into the ayah: continuity, persistence, continuousness, consistency - that we keep things going after the month. That we don't just stop coming to the masjid after the month.
You know when the worst day for Fajr is in terms of masajid across America? You know when the lowest attendance for Fajr is in terms of masajid across America? The day of Eid. It's the lowest attendance because we've completed the month and we feel like now it's time to celebrate. And so the masjid is empty. Dhuhr time, no one is there. Asr time, no one is there. Maghrib time, maybe someone is there just stopping by because they forgot something from Ramadan.
So we have to make a commitment inshallah that as this month finishes - because we are here in the final Jumu'ah of this month which is bittersweet to even say that, and this might be the last Ramadan that you or I ever get to experience, wallahu a'lam - we have to make a commitment that we keep up the good actions that we've been doing after the month.
Some of us who have never ever prayed qiyam get up in the middle of the night and we give two rakat to Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى. Some of us who don't fast the entire year, we fasted 29, 30 days - we can keep something going. Some of us who miss Fajr consistently, this entire month have prayed Fajr every day - I know because breakfast is right before - but we've prayed Fajr every day. Look at the barakah that's entering your life in this month and realize that it's not because of the month alone, but also because of how you change in this month. Who do you become? And how can you keep that alive?
The Meaning of Eid
To conclude the khutbah inshallah ta'ala, I want to talk about the Eid, the celebration of Eid al-Fitr, the breaking of the fast. Omar ibn Khattab رضي الله عنه said that when a person celebrates Eid, they're celebrating getting closer to Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى . When a person celebrates Eid al-Adha, they're celebrating the completion of the pilgrimage of the season of Hajj. Eid al-Fitr is a celebration of change, of transformation - that a person is not the same person they were on the first day of Ramadan as they are on the day of Eid. That that person has transformed themselves, their behavior, their characteristics are different, that they've invested in the harth of al-akhirah.
So brothers and sisters, as we gather for Eid and we're doing the takbirat and everyone's wearing very nice clothes and we enjoy each other, we hug and smile and we go to people's houses and eat food, don't celebrate nothing. Don't celebrate the day of just completing your fast. As the Prophet Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم said, there will be some people in Ramadan that they will complete the month of Ramadan gaining nothing from it but hunger and thirst. That they'll literally fast the entire month and all they'll gain on Eid is: "Man, last month I was really hungry and I was really thirsty."
The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم is saying this almost condescendingly like what a shame it is that a person can traverse this entire month of spiritual benefit, of salah, of connecting to Allah, of du'a, of qiyam, of siyam... what
an amazing, like what a very ajeeb instance it is that a person can go through this and this person can only come out of it hungry and thirsty.
So this Eid we ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to make us people who are celebrating change, celebrating coming closer to Allah. No one celebrates failure, okay? The Cleveland Cavaliers didn't have a party this year. No one celebrates... no one has a graduation party if they didn't graduate. You don't give someone a dinner if they didn't get the promotion at their job, right? Only when you achieve something do we celebrate.
So if we're going to celebrate Eid, we have to make sure that we earn that celebration. We have to make sure that this month is a month of achieving something. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to grant us tawfiq. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to give us sincerity. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to make us people who harvest for the akhirah and not for the dunya, ameen.
The Month of Miracles
This month, brothers and sisters, that we are concluding in the next 7 days, inshallah - in the next 7 or so days - is the month of miracles. It is the month, as Allah says, where the Quran was revealed. It was the month where the Muslims miraculously defeated the Quraysh in the battle of Badr when they were understaffed by at least 67-70%. It is the month where the tribe of Ta'if that rejected the Prophet Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم and that made him bleed from his head to his toes, it is the month where they accepted Islam. And it is the month where the city of Mecca that was surrounded by 360 idols, where the Ka'bah was actually a center for shirk unfortunately, it is the month where that Ka'bah was purified, that city was purified and the conquest was made and the city was opened for the worship of Muslims. It is a month where things happen that people said: "This will never happen."
So the action item that we have from today, from this khutbah, is in these next 7 days: look deep into yourself and ask yourself what things do I think about my iman that I think I could never ever change? What habits do I have that are bad that I think I can never break? What habits do I want - what habits that are good habits that I think I can never achieve? And realize that you are in the month of miracles. You are in the month where things happen where people thought they could never happen.
So make yourself a list and work hard. These last 10 nights are not easy. These last 10 nights are not for the weak. Work hard, put your foot to the pedal inshallah - pedal to the metal - and earn the Eid al-Fitr that we are going to be celebrating inshallah together.
Closing Du'a
We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to accept. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to forgive our sins. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to make us haritheen min al-akhirah. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to make us people who are going to receive our harvest in the akhirah, and we ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَیٰ to save us from being people who only harvest in the dunya with not ever looking up to the akhirah. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to purify our hearts and souls, to give us happy and loving families. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to accept all of our siyam and our qiyam and our du'a and our sadaqah. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to bring our
communities closer together, and we ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to not allow this to be our last Ramadan, to allow us to continue seeing Ramadan over and over again. We ask Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى to allow us to have everlasting change.
أَقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ
وَالسَّلَامُ عَلَيْكُمْ وَرَحْمَةُ اللَّهِ وَبَرَكَاتُهُ