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Written in Stone: Tips on Memorizing the Quran

Speaker: Shaykh Muhammad Alshareef

Opening

The Battle of Al-Yamamah

Dear brothers and sisters, after the death of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallá-llāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam), some of those people who were insincere to the deen, they left Islam and they apostated, and some of them claimed prophethood. And of those people who claimed prophethood was a man by the name of Musaylimah al-Kaddhab, the liar.

Abu Bakr radiyallahu anhu, because of the danger that Musaylimah possessed, he sent army after army after army to fight Musaylimah. And in the famous battle, the battle of Al-Yamamah, the Muslims were victorious.

Now you will know the conclusion, but you may not know that in that battle, the Muslims were actually losing the battle.

The slogan for the Muslims on that day was:

O companions of Surat al-Baqarah. And I know a slogan like that, very often today people don't know what it means. Maybe even I'm included in this. We don't know what it means, but that was the slogan of the Muslims on that day.

And as the battle raged forward, the Muslims were being pushed back. And now you had generals like Ikrimah radiyallahu anhu, Khalid bin al-Walid radiyallahu anhu. You had generals like that and they were being pushed back.

Until one of the companions, one of the most senior companions who lived his life in Mecca with the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallá-llāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam) who saw his mother and father killed for the sake of Allah جل و عز. It was Ammar ibn Yasir radiyallahu anhu, of the most senior companions. He was the khateeb of the Muslimin. He stood up on a rock so that everybody on the plane could hear him. And he started shouting out:

He started calling out to the fighters that only those fighters of the companions that had memorized Quran, let them step forward to my side. And so he made a battalion of only huffadh, meaning if you hadn't finished the Quran, you were not allowed to fight by his side. Step aside, it was only the huffadh, something that had never been done in the history. A battalion full of huffadh.

And let's just say that the battle was won. And the Muslims were victorious because these huffadh, they understood the discipline that it takes to memorize the Quran and learn it, that it only made them the best of people. And so they fought.

And don't think that they just fought this battle and they all went home. That many of these people, these huffadh, were killed shaheed on this battle. So much so that you have the mushafs on the shelves, you're looking at them nice and sitting up there. It's because of the sacrifice of these huffadh and how many of them got killed that Abu Bakr radiyallahu anhu decided to compile the Quran so that the Quran would not be lost in the future generations.

The Hafidh in the Community

Now come back to today. You're coming into the masjid, it's a quiet Friday night. There's supposed to be a halaqa or something like that. And people are busy with the different things. People are out to dinner or doing other stuff.

And then all of a sudden, you know, this is a gathering that might have some doctors and it has some lawyers and it has all the quote-unquote successful people in society. Salah time comes and then they look around for the imam. Then this young brother, unassuming, maybe sitting in the back, he comes forward and these doctors and lawyers step to the side.

As this young brother steps forward and leads the prayer. And mashallah, he has a beautiful voice. Unassuming, you never imagine that this is the person that stands up in the congregation. So then someone asks like: Who is this guy? And then someone answers: Psst, don't you know? This brother memorized the Quran. He's hafidh al-Quran. When he was a young boy, he memorized the Quran.

And Allah جل و عز raised him in rank in the community. You see that happening in every single masjid that has a hafidh like that.

(Sahih Muslim, Hadith 817)

Umar radiyallahu anhu narrated that the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallá-llāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam) said:

That Allah indeed will raise people up because of this Quran. Because of their attachment and following the Quran, they will be raised up. And because of the Quran, other people will be disgraced and put down.

Beyond Motivation: Practical Action

Now dear brothers and sisters, normally these khutbas are meant for motivation. Meaning that the khutba is given, you're supposed to move on to some action after the khutba. That's normally the natural process that's supposed to take place. But then some people, their only source of information is the khutba, and they haven't done much after the khutba for the last say 20-30 years.

So the question is: Is the khutba motivational or not? I think you would share with me and we say, no, the khutba for this person isn't motivational. So today inshallah, it's not going to be a motivational khutba. We've had enough of the motivational khutbas.

This khutba inshallah is dedicated to the people who have taken the steps towards motivation. That action, they made it into a verb. They're actually moving forward. They've registered for a Quran class. And now they're working towards memorizing the Quran. This khutba is dedicated for all those brothers and sisters who have actually began that path of memorizing the Quran.

And inshallah ta'ala, today I wanted to focus on how to more effectively memorize the Quran for those people who have already started that journey.

My Journey with the Quran

I stand here in front of you today, and many of you may think that I was born just knowing how to give khutbas, right? I just came out and said:

Just was born and just reading Quran. Obviously you say, no, that's not possible. There had to be a time where you actually learn this information.

And subhanallah, I was in Canada recently. And as you're sitting in a restaurant, a brother came in, he's wearing his thobe and so on. And I recognized him. He was the brother who used to sit beside me in Quran class. And we got up, we hugged each other.

And we sat to the side and we started discussing the olden days, when we were little kids in a Quran school memorizing. And he said to me, and this is his reflection of when I went to the Quran school. He said: I swear by Allah, Muhammad, I remember the day when you came to the Quran school and you did not know how to read Alif Ba Ta properly. He said, Wallahi, I remember that day. I was there. You were making mistakes in the Alif Ba Ta.

And I said, subhanallah. That Allah جل و عز from that, and I'm gonna give you tips on the process that someone goes from not knowing how to recite Alif Ba Ta to actually memorizing the Quran.

The Passionate Desire

If we were to ask the question: Who wants to memorize the Quran? I want you to compare that question to: Who wants to lose weight? Okay, two questions.

If I said: Who wants to memorize the Quran? Some people will slowly raise their hand, and they're like, come on, it's the Quran. And then everybody, okay, I'll raise my hand. I want to memorize the Quran.

But then you tell people: Who wants to lose weight? The hands will go up more with certainty. Yes, I want to follow the South Beach Diet. Yes, I want to follow Atkins. Yes, I want... You know these names. Subhanallah, you know the names that I'm talking about, because you've already searched out ways, because you're sincere in your desire to lose weight. And I dare say that the desire to memorize Quran isn't a passionate desire. It's not a desire like a person's desire to lose weight or something like that.

Why is that? Why is the desire not passionate? And here are some reflections on that, inshallah.

We go to school when we're younger, from kindergarten, the primary, secondary. You've gone to school for like 12 years, 13 years. Then you go to college, it's another four years. And then people, they spend like $20,000 a semester in order to take care of patients or something like that. $20,000 to take care of human beings, the humans are right there. Why are you paying $20,000 a semester? Because it's all about the money. It's all about the dunya.

The person goes through the education because they know of what the positive consequences are to that. And it's a slow process. We're talking about like 20 years of person, and they come out of the system. And now they see the results of this. So why doesn't someone, the Quran doesn't take that much time to memorize. Why doesn't someone put in the same effort, wallahu alam, that a person hasn't really understood the benefits of memorizing the Quran. Immediately for themselves, in their dunya, for the community and to the hereafter.

And so inshallah ta'ala, here's a few glimpse of those benefits.

Benefits in the Dunya

Consider two children. One of the children, he decides to go to a Quran school. Hifz school. And the other child says: No, I'm too busy playing my PlayStation. I have to get this high score on my PlayStation. Dad, I'm not looking forward to the Quran school. Dad said: I don't want to force you. I want you to love this thing from your heart. Just live your life. When you're older, you'll realize that I made a mistake.

So the two children go forward. This one's playing PlayStation. The other one's coming after maghrib, isha, memorizing. Every day, every day, every day. Like this, one year, two years happened. This child is hafidh al-Quran. The other child is getting bad marks at school. And he's still having trouble.

Now as these two children come to high school together, who do you think will be a more effective child in studying? It will be the one who memorized the Quran when he was younger. The parent who thinks: No, I want my child to study on dunya studies, doesn't realize that when it comes to dunya studies, the hafidh will be more

stronger and more efficient and more successful in the med school or law school, whatever he goes into.

Because he trained himself as a child to harness the power of his brain. And the other child who was focused on the television set, was trained to get immediate benefits, even though it meant that in the long term he would benefit nothing.

That's the difference between the two. So dunya and akhirah, bi-idhnillah, the hafidh al-Quran will benefit from that.

A Sign That Allah Loves You

Secondly, that when someone memorizes the Quran, even though a lot of parents will focus on: I want my child to be a doctor, get a lot of money and we're happy. We did our job in this dunya. If the child gets money and is successful and lives in a really fancy house and drives a really nice car, does that mean that Allah loves them?

Does it mean that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala loves them? No, it does not. Because Allah جل و عز can give wealth to whomever He wishes.

This child may never pray and still get good marks in their studies. The child may never do a sujood to Allah جل و عز and they will still be successful in the dunya. And their mentor in this path, they have examples of Fir'aun before them. Fir'aun was given wealth. In fact, if you ever go to Egypt, you're probably looking at the remnants of his wealth. He had so much wealth, so much so that Musa alayhi salam, he said in the du'as that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala recorded:

(Surah Yunus 10:88)

He said that: O Allah, that You gave Fir'aun and those who are with Fir'aun, zina, You gave them ornaments and wealth in this dunya, O Allah, so that they would use that to cut off the path towards You.

And so look at this, subhanallah, even I'm realizing this person had wealth, but someone as blessed as Musa alayhi salam is cursing him for it. And so that wealth was a cause for him to get further into hellfire. It actually would have been better for Fir'aun if he didn't have all that wealth to harm Islam the way he did.

Now, someone who learns the Quran, it's a sign that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala loves this child, girl or boy. How so? The Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallá-llāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam) said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 71)

Allah جل و عز wishes good for, He gives him or her understanding of the deen. And so I've seen this. When people go to memorize Quran, it's almost like test after test comes to them. And it's through these tests that they're filtered. Because going to memorize Quran, it's easy, but then the test will come.

The Buzzing of the Bees

Umar radiyallahu anhu, when they sent the governors, and a lot of people, these khutbas are given about the golden age of Islam. And we talk about the golden age. What did they do in the golden ages that made them golden like that? Umar radiyallahu anhu, he said to his governors, he said:

You're going to a people, these are the Muslim nations. And in fact, this township, that Umar radiyallahu anhu's township, the one he's talking about, some of you may actually be ancestors of these people. And that's why you're here in the masjid, because of their sincerity to the deen. He said: They have a buzzing, like the buzzing of bees in the recitation of the Quran.

He said:

He said: Do not distract them from that. Don't go to them and say: Hey, did you see this book? You should read this. Oh, did you see this Islamic topic? He said: Don't distract them with anything. Let them continue in their focus on the Quran.

Now this دَوِيُّ النَّحْلِ this buzzing of the bees, if you'll notice, and I've been thinking about this buzzing of the bees, I realized that every nation has a buzzing of bees. Even after salah, when you finish salah and the person gets up and says: I have some announcements. He'll say: Excuse me brothers, please sit down. Why? There's a sound that starts carrying upwards. It's a buzzing that goes.

And if you pass through an apartment building, you will hear buzzing. What is the buzzing? Is it people reciting Quran? No, it's not. As you go through apartment complex, you will hear the buzzing of music. And you will hear the buzzing of television sets. You'll hear the sounds of people wasting their lives with the TV. That's the buzzing that you will hear.

And if you've ever left the TV on, inshaAllah ta'ala you don't have TVs, but if you were to have a TV, leave it on, you will see it makes a hissing sound. SubhanAllah, it's not a buzzing, it's more of a hiss. Hiss of a snake.

That it will continue to hiss like that.

And so subhanallah, on the highway, when it's really hot, and some of you have been caught in traffic, and people pull down their windows, right? You hear on the highway even a buzzing. The buzzing of the cars playing their music. And this is what the people are entrenched in. And they've engrossed their lives in spending their commutes to work and back, listening to the music. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect us.

The 10% Shift

Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, here's two children. One of them blessed, he decided to memorize the Quran when he was young. And the other child said: No, I'm too busy, I have this and that, so I'm not gonna do it, I'm tired.

So these two children, this one made a 10% move, okay? This child made a 10% shift from his path of destiny, and this child kept on the path. Now the 10% shift, there's like a little difference, this one is just studying this subject, and one other is in a Quran class. It seems like a small change, but look in 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, that 10% shift will accumulate until a different destiny is written for this child.

And the one that kept on the track, the regular river path, will continue to go forward until they reach 50, 60, and say to his children: I want you guys to memorize the Quran because I didn't realize the benefit when I was younger. Do something differently, and we're gonna talk about the parents in a second.

The Nur on the Face

Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala also blesses the person with a nur, with a nur. I'm just gonna give you this very example. As I was preparing this khutbah, I remembered something that happened, actually just about maybe 3 or 4 weeks ago. I was giving a lecture in New York, and people after the lecture, they come up and they ask me questions, I sit down and we're talking about the questions.

So this young brother came up to me, and he said: I have a question. And before he started, I looked him in the face and I said: You know what, I'm pretty sure that you memorized the Quran, am I right? And then he was shy, he put his head down, and he said: Yes, you're right. I did memorize the Quran.

He said: How did you know? I said: Wallahi, I could see it in your face, that you had memorized the Quran. And I knew out of the whole congregation that this child had the Quran memorized, because of his demeanor and the nur that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala had put on his face. And that's what your children can have, that's what you can have, no matter what your age is, that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala allows you to be carried with this nur of the Quran that you have in your heart.

The Condition: Taqwa

These gifts of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, they come with a condition. And that condition is the taqwa of Allah

جل و عز. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala doesn't give these gifts to just anybody.

Like we said with the wealth, anybody can get wealth. Firaun can get wealth, this person, that person, it's not a sign. But the gift of Allah has to come with the taqwa of Allah جل و عز.

As Allah جل و عز says:

That fear Allah جل و عز, be conscious of Allah, place Him in your heart, and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will teach you. When people say: No, my studies are based on my own work, they've forgotten that it's based on your taqwa of Allah جل و عز,and through your taqwa you will be sincere in working hard, through your taqwa جل و عز of Allah

Ibn Mas'ud radiyallahu anhu, he said, that I believe and I feel that:

He said: Verily a man will forget knowledge that he knew before, he actually learned it, but he forgets it, because of a sin that he commits.

The Example of Abu Hanifa

And Abu Hanifa rahimahullah, many of you when you're talking fiqh, you'll talk about Abu Hanifa said this, Abu Hanifa rahimahullah said this, and you might not know: How did Abu Hanifa get to the position that he got in? So that he's out of all the ulema in the entire history of the ummah, he's the most followed, rahimahullah.

When he would be studying in his class, and he wasn't able to come to a fiqh conclusion, he would say to his students, that I can't get this fiqh issue, and just imagine this, a hifz class, someone's not able to memorize a specific page of Quran, and they think: Oh it's hot outside, or the teacher did this to me, or I'm busy on the weekend - no, that's not the excuse. Abu Hanifa rahimahullah would say, that I'm being blocked from this answer because of a sin that I committed.

And they say:

Like in the class, he will get up استغفر اللهhe would turn and pray two rak'ahs in tawbah to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Prostrating to Allah, asking Allah جل و عز to forgive him for the sins he committed, and then when he would get the answer, he would be so happy, not because of the answer, but because of the glad tidings, insha'Allah, that Allah had forgiven him for the sin. That the actual knowledge was based on his tawbah to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

And as people who commented on this, they said that only a few people understand this. Only a few people understand it. And bi-idhnillah, we hope that all of us in this majlis today, in this Jummah khutbah, we understand this, bi-idhnillah.

The Role of Blessed Parents

Dear brothers and sisters, in this country, because the focus is on material wealth, a lot of people pay a lot of money to study the wealthy people. Massive accumulation of wealth. They look at these people and they say: What have they done to accumulate wealth? And there's books like this, and I've read some of these books.

But what's interesting, as I was listening to these books, the statistics of people who accumulated massive amounts of wealth, I thought to myself: I wonder if we could accumulate statistics about people who memorized the Quran. Like take all the huffadh, bring them all together and just do surveys with them. And I started doing this myself.

And I'm not saying this is a scientific survey, but to the best of my knowledge, I'm gonna give you one of the common characteristics, I've never seen a hafidh of Quran who doesn't have this characteristic. And it's a most significant characteristic, and that characteristic is this:

The hafidh of the Quran, always, to the best of my knowledge, always has blessed parents.

Always has encouraging parents, who they themselves fear Allah جل و عز and that fear of Allah جل و عز and that blessedness, translate to this child. I have not met someone from a dysfunctional family, where the parents are messed up, and they don't pray, and they're going here and going left, and this child is memorizing the Quran. I've never seen that.

There will always be, and it doesn't have to be that they're married, it might be just a mother, it might be just a father, but there is a parent there that is encouraging this child.

Now let me give you examples of this. Many of you here, you may have none of your children have memorized the Quran. That's just, you know, these are statistics I'm talking about. I would say 99.99%, don't have children that have memorized the Quran. Now, the statistic continues.

There is one family here, who has two children who have memorized the Quran, from their children, two children have memorized the Quran, and insha'Allah ta'ala, the third child is going to memorize the Quran, very soon, I ask you to make dua for her, insha'Allah. Three children in one family, and you're thinking: Everybody else has no children who have memorized the Quran, and here's one father who has three of his children who insha'Allah have the Quran memorized. Maybe he should share some of those children with us, right? Like spread the children around.

Is it fair? There's something, subhanallah, very significant. This brother doesn't know, but I study him, and how he was able to do this with his children, while other parents were not able to do this. And I said, subhanallah,

and I studied this also in the history of the khulafa class, this brother, the parent, and this is advice for all of us, he is also part of a Quran program.

That's the most significant thing. That not only are his children in the Quran program, but he himself is showing his children: I am going to memorize with you. I'm old, I may not be able to memorize, but I'm gonna do my best, and that's what I expect from you.

And so you'll see that the parent and the children, they go and review Quran at home together. That is the difference.

The Dua of My Father

And I'm telling you from my personal situation, as you know, some of you may have known, that my father was detained after hajj this year. He was detained in Egypt for 20 days. The government detained him, and I sent out an email, and there was like a big, some noise happened. I wasn't here, I was in Canada, trying to facilitate the release of my father.

But someone sent me an email, and it meant so much to me, this email. The brother sent me an email, because in hajj time, I was giving a lecture to my father's group, my father's hajj group, and in that, subhanallah, it was just a blessed moment in Mina, I was giving this lecture, and you know, like half the people are crying in the lecture. And in that, with all the people sitting there, my father, I could see him sitting there, and towards the back of the group, he was also crying, but without him slouching his shoulders, his shoulders were so high, and his head was so high up, he was looking at me directly in the face, and in the khutbah, I was saying to myself, that I'm happy that I made my father proud, that I had done that, alhamdulillah.

And one brother who was sitting there watching this, he's seeing my father, he's seeing me, and we look very similar, almost like twins, people think it's my brother, but it's my father. He's looking at the two points, and then he said to me, he wrote this email, he said: You know, Muhammad, I realized at that moment, that it was the dua of this man, that got you to where you are today. And then it hit me, I hadn't really thought about it, I said: You're absolutely right.

That you may see me giving the khutbah today, but it's not because one day I just got up and said: I want to give khutbahs and I want to do this. No, it's the dua of my parents. And throughout my whole life, and like I said, this is a recurring theme, you will see, with people who memorize the Quran, and accumulated knowledge of Islam, is that they had parents, who used to pray qiyam al-layl, they had parents who made dua for their child, as boy or girl, and they had parents, who when their child had an obstacle, where they were going to swerve left or right, from studying Islam, they stopped them and kept them firm on the path, to studying Islam.

My Grandmother's Mushaf

Some of you may not know as well, that my grandmother, from Egypt, she came to Canada, and my uncle lived

here in Virginia, and she came to Virginia, and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala willed it, that she would die in Virginia, and she's buried here in the Adelphi graveyard. And so in College Park, my grandmother is buried here. Alhamdulillah, I was here in those last few days, that she was alive, and actually this is just the past summer.

Rahimahullah. One of the things that my grandmother used to do very often, and something that I was in a good jealousy, and like I said, as I'm saying this to you, you might feel jealous, and I'm telling you it's okay to feel jealous. In fact, I encourage you to be more jealous.

The reason being, is that the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā Allāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam) said two things, that you're allowed to be jealous of, and one of them is someone who memorized the Quran. Because your jealousy will lead you towards that path, for you yourself insha'Allah ta'ala, to come closer to the Quran. When she passed away, one of her habits was that she used to read Quran all the time.

Rahimahullah. And some of you have grandmothers like this. When I went back to visit my uncle, like some months later, I found a mushaf on the shelf, not like the shiny polished mushafs that you normally see on the shelf, but this one had scotch tape wrapped around it, all the pages were dark, and the mushaf was like this thick, from the pages that had been opened and read.

And then for that moment, I said to my uncle: Is this my grandmother's mushaf? And you know, he didn't even have to answer, I knew it was her mushaf. That this is, subhanallah, out of everything that she left behind, no inheritance, no nothing, she left behind a mushaf, that I pray to Allah (جل و عز - jalla wa ʿazza) will testify on her behalf on the day of resurrection. And I hope inshaAllah that every one of you, including myself, has a mushaf at home, where the pages have gotten darkened, darkened from your fingers touching it.

The pages have gotten thicker, because they've been constantly opened. I want you to go home, and look at the mushaf on your shelf, and by the quality of the mushaf, you will know your attachment to that Quran.

Excuse-itis: The Disease

One of the excuses, or this is a disease that happens in human's life, and specifically here in memorizing Quran, it's called excuse-itis. Excuse-itis. Where the person, they say: I want to memorize the Quran, but... And then we say, nuqta, nuqta, nuqta, right? Like dot, dot, dot. As soon as I hear someone talking like that, I say: Stop.

Your first statement, that you want to memorize the Quran, is not true. Because of the fact that you made an excuse. As you make your excuse, you know that your statement is not correct, be truthful with yourself. You do not want to memorize the Quran. When you want to memorize the Quran, come, let's talk about it, but don't make excuses.

And you will see people, who have accomplished things in their lives, they did not accomplish by making excuses. It doesn't mean that they didn't have excuses in their life, they did, but they took them as challenges,

and they jumped higher in life. They said: This is an obstacle or hurdle, I'm gonna jump higher than this. And then they jumped higher, and higher, and higher.

And now you see that they're your boss at work. And you'll see that they're the people who are leading the prayers. They're the people who didn't allow those excuses to stop them in life.

And bi-idhnillah, if you have this disease of excusitis, you're busy on the weekend, or you're tired or stuff, I ask you inshallah to take an injection of non-excusitis, whatever that injection is, inshallah. But I'll give you some of those, those injections right here.

Practical Tips for Memorizing Quran

Here are some quick tips, inshallah. With these tips I'm concluding, these are very practical tips on how to memorize the Quran. You're now, you've agreed, you're in the Quran class, you're memorizing and you wanna know. And this, subhanallah, I know as the summer comes closer, students tend to get a little lazy. They start blaming the heat, and making excuses: Oh, someone's coming to our, oh, we're going overseas, oh, we're doing this. This is the reason why we're not doing good.

In those last months, I'm asking all those young brothers and sisters in the Quran school, and in al-Hudud school, and in every kind of education, don't make excuses. Work just as hard as you did from the beginning to the end.

Tip 1: You Must Have a Teacher

Number one, if you wanna memorize Quran, you absolutely have to have a teacher. You absolutely have to have a teacher. Someone comes to me and says: I memorized this much Quran. I say to them: Who's your teacher? They say: Oh, I memorized on my own. To me that means that they memorized nothing.

That their Quran, even though they think they've memorized it, it's full of mistakes. They cannot possibly lead a single rak'ah with the Quran that they memorized. And so when they say that they memorized the act, they're just tricking themselves. They have not memorized that.

You have to be in a Quran program. Absolutely you must have an instructor, a guide, someone who you respect and fear. That when you come to class without your lesson, you should fear this person. It cannot be your friend, who you said: Oh, I was busy, sorry about that, I'll see you tomorrow. It can't be a teacher like that.

It has to be a program. And so if someone says: How do I memorize Quran? Step one, don't forget this, register in a Quran program. And insha'Allah ta'ala that will be your first step towards benefit.

Tip 2: Stay Away from Distractions

Number two is distractions. You want to stay away from distractions. Imagine someone, he wants to memorize juz amma at a football game. Or someone goes to King's Dominion or Six Flags or something like that, and he

says: While I'm there, I will sit down and memorize for 10 minutes. Do you think they will memorize anything? Obviously not. So in order to memorize Quran, you have to take distractions out of your mind.

TV and subhanallah, even the non-Muslims they said: If you want to improve your memory, shut off the TV. This is for the kuffar. And now you're trying to memorize Quran and be stronger in your intelligence, the TV cannot be part of your life. Not on the weekends, not on special occasions, just completely out of your life. Just throw out the TV. If you're on a big balcony, just throw it off the balcony.

Believe me, it'll be the best thing that you did in your life. There cannot be distractions in your life, and you'll be stronger in your knowledge and in your study of the Quran.

Tip 3: Memorize Through Audio

Number three, memorizing the Quran through audio. What that means is that, in a Quran class, you have certain students who recite quietly and other students recite loud. When I was in Quran school, I went to read to my teacher, and the teacher said to me in reply, there was a boy sitting beside me, little kid, and he's hafidh of Quran as well. Now, alhamdulillah.

He was like:

"Indeed, those who have said, ‘Our Lord is Allah’..."

He's shouting like this and I couldn't recite properly. So I told the teacher: You know, I'm getting confused, can you tell him to be quiet? And the teacher said to me in reply, he said: No. He said: You read louder.

Because if you read louder, then he won't distract you so much. And then I said: Oh, you want me to read louder? I'll show you what I got. And then I started reading louder and louder, and I drowned out this kid.

And subhanallah, till the day I finished the Quran, I always kept that lesson. The louder you read, you're actually memorizing what you're saying. So it's coming out of your mouth and entering into your ears and locking.

If you're just reciting with your lips closed and trying to photographically remember the page, it will not work.

And now in the taraweeh times, you see me leading the prayer in taraweeh. In taraweeh, I review Quran through audio. I record myself, I burn a CD of my recitation. And throughout the day, I listen to the CD. And I can do that, I don't have to open the mushaf.

And I'll still open the mushaf, but it's through audio. As I'm leading the prayer, the words come naturally to my mind, because I memorized it in audio. Memorizing it in audio.

Tip 4: Location of the Mushaf

Number four is the location of the mushaf. And inshaAllah ta'ala, I know you have to go to work, inshaAllah, I'm gonna conclude here. Location of the mushaf.

When you ever, and subhanallah, there's another connection. A lot of people, they put the mushaf on the ground, and someone tells them: Astaghfirullah, raise the mushaf up. Well, I'm gonna tell you a technique.

If you put the mushaf on the ground and try memorizing with your eyes looking downwards, the direction of your eyes in memorization is not a downwards direction. You have to look forward to memorize something. So, if you were to take your mushaf off the ground and put it in front of your face, even to the left a little bit, you will memorize faster.

And notice people who have the Quran on the ground as they're memorizing Quran, they're always looking up from the mushaf. Always. And the teacher will say: Put your eyes on the mushaf. But that's actually forcing the child to not memorize correctly. The child's eyes have to be up in the forward direction to memorize.

Tip 5: Eat Brain Food

Number five, you'll see people, and the number five is eat brain food. You'll see a lot of uncles, they'll say: Eating badams makes your memory work stronger, right? Badams, you know what badams are? They're almonds.

Almonds actually, you may laugh at the uncle who said that, but the uncle is absolutely right. The food you eat directly affects your ability to memorize. And so imagine this child doesn't eat breakfast, and then at lunch eats french fries. How are they possibly gonna memorize anything? It's a very tough, and then they say: Oh, it's hot outside or something. It's actually the food.

Eat a light breakfast, but nutritious. Eat a light lunch, nutritious. And keep eating these badams for snacks, inshaAllah, the almonds and you'll be okay.

Conclusion: How Many Ranks?

And in conclusion, inshaAllah, the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā Allāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam) said, that the person who is devoted to the Quran will be told on the day of resurrection:

(Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith 1464)

"Recite, and rise, and recite as you used to recite in the world, for your position will be at the last verse that you recite."

It will be said to that person: Recite and ascend in ranks in paradise, according to the verses as you used to recite in the dunya. And so with each ayah that the person memorized in the dunya, they will go up in ranks in jannah.

And so I conclude with this question: That on the day of resurrection, how many ranks will you be climbing?

But rather, how many ranks would you like to climb in paradise?

"I say this and I ask Allah for forgiveness for myself and for you and for all the Muslim men and Muslim women, so seek forgiveness from Him. Indeed, He is the Forgiving, the Merciful."

السَّلَامُ عَلَيْكُمْ وَرَحْمَةُ اللَّهِ وَبَرَكَاتُهُ