Color of Skin

Color of Skin - Khutbah by Nouman Ali Khan

Opening Praise and Introduction

اَلْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ خَالِقِ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ مِنَ الْعَالَمِ وَجَاعِلِ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ مِنَ الْبَلَمِ وَمُقْتَضِي الصَّبْرِ مِنَ الْعَالَمِ وَمُقْتَضِي التَّوْبَةِ مِنَ النَّدَمِ

فَنَشْكُرُهُ عَلَى الْمَصَائِبِ كَمَا نَشْكُرُهُ عَلَى النِّعَمِ وَنُصَلِّي عَلَى رَسُولِهِ الْأَكْرَمِ بِالشَّرَفِ الْأَعْظَمِ وَالْمُؤْمِنِ الْأَعَمِّ وَالْكِتَابِ الْمُحْكَمِ وَخَاتَمِ النَّبِيِّينَ وَالْخَاتِمِ

All praise and gratitude belong to Allah in the skies and on the earth and in the evening and in the times that you spend in the afternoons. The point being that everything you're about to learn, every single thing that Allah says is another reason for you to say alhamdulillah. So every one of his ayahs when you ponder on it, every one of his signs when you think about them, then it should lead you to a conclusion that you and I should be grateful to Allah, and we should be thankful to Allah and praise Allah for what He's done. So this is actually the mindset with which the rest of the passage is read. That was important to say.

Understanding the Word "Ayah" (Sign)

The next thing that's important to say is just something about the word signs or ayahs. I've given a lot of different lectures about the meaning of the word ayah, but for the purposes of khutbah, and I know a lot of kids are listening also, so I want to make this as simple as possible. Today I just want you to think about three things that an ayah means.

The word ayah, when we say the signs of Allah or the ayat of Allah, what does that mean? It carries inside three things:

1. Something valuable from the Arabic point of view, something very valuable
2. Something that has a purpose - that's the second thing
3. Something that points you back to Allah - meaning it's a reminder of Allah Himself

So if Allah says, for example, that the skies and the earth have ayat in them, well every mountain reminds you of the maker of that mountain and the beauty with which He made it, or the beautiful night sky. So the mountain has a purpose. It has value, it's valuable, and it takes you back to Allah. Three things.

The Sign of Marriage and Spousal Relationships

Having said that, humanity, when Allah brought us on this earth, He made it so that we will have to live together. And the first human beings that have to live together are the husband and the wife. Because all of humanity starts with a man and a woman. And that's how Allah started the story of humanity with Adam and our mother.

So here He says, among His miraculous signs are that He made spouses from within you. He created spouses from your own selves so that you can find peace when you head towards them, and He put love and care in your hearts and between you:

"And He placed between you affection and mercy. Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought."

In all of that, there are many miraculous signs, many ayat, for people who think deeply. So Allah says, think about marriage. And when you learn about these lessons from marriage, about a man and a woman coming together, then the man and the woman coming together is something valuable. It's not something worthless. It's something rich. And then it has a purpose. And even the union of the man and the woman, the point of it is to make each of them more grateful to Allah.

The Sign of Creation - Heavens and Earth

When He reveals these ayat, they are مُحْكَم - also means that they are stitched together. So when Allah tells us one thing, now our mind is in a certain place, it's ready for the next lesson. Just like a teacher does, right? The teacher tells you one lesson, when you get good at that, you think about it, then they're ready to make the next point.

And then the next point, they build on each other. So what's the next point that Allah makes? He says:

"And of His signs is the creation of the heavens and the earth."

We were just talking about husband and wife, and from there He took us straight to what? The skies and the earth. And that's a pretty powerful point of contemplation. The One who made my spouse is the same One who took the care to make the entire universe. Is the same One who designed the beauty of the entire landscape of the earth and the entire life inside of the oceans. Is the same One who provided me the oxygen that I'm breathing has provided me a spouse. It's coming from the same source.

The Foundation of Peace in Society

By the way, why is the spousal relationship so important? Because it's the foundation of humanity. If a man and a woman can't be at peace together, that means the family can't be at peace together. If a family can't be at peace together, then there is disruption in the way children are raised. And when those children have disruption in the way that they're raised, they are not going to be a source of peace for their friends, or for their community, or for their society. And enough disruption, and you'll have an entire society made up of disruption.

You can't have peace in the world because a man and a woman can't come together. It can escalate to that point, because peace is ripple effects. It starts in the home, and builds, and builds, and builds, and builds, and builds.

There was an interesting judge who retired after many years of service, maybe half a century of service, in Brooklyn, in New York, and he was asked, because he was a juvenile court judge - lots of kids, teenagers in gangs, and drug violence, and whatever else, and even killing, and all that kind of stuff. He said, what to you is the source of all of this? What do you see as the problem? He says, broken homes. He says, broken homes is the problem. After 50 years of seeing the tragedy of humanity, of young lives wasted, he looks back and says, that's all I can tell you.

The Main Topic: Diversity of Languages and Colors

Actually, the khutbah today isn't about family, it's about society. He says:

"And the differences of your tongues, and the colors of your skin."

Of his ayahs, are the differences of your tongues, and the colors of your skin. Now what in the world does that mean? That means Allah created the world, and he meant it to have different languages. And a language isn't just a language. A language is an entire culture.

The Value of Different Languages and Cultures

It's not just words that sound different, and phonetics that sound different, and grammar that's different from one language to another. But every language behind it is an entire heritage of how these words developed, how they were formed, how they started getting used, how they became part of the poetry of a people, the philosophy of a people, the history of a people, the culture of a people.

So when he says, your tongues, he's saying, of his miraculous signs, are the very different cultures in the world. Not just the languages, but the cultures in the world. All of that comes behind the tongue, behind the language of the people.

It's also interesting that the tongues are different not just between different languages, like English is different from Spanish or something, but it's also that the language of a people that live in a certain neighborhood is different from the same English, but in a certain neighborhood it's a different lingo, and in a different neighborhood it's a different lingo. Young people have their own language. Older folks may have their own language.

The Value of Different Skin Colors

Go back to what I said about the ayah. I said three things about the ayah: the ayah is valuable, it's purposeful, and it takes you back to Allah.

So every language that's different is valuable. One language is not worthless compared to another. They're all given by Allah. They're His ayah. They're not mine. They don't belong to a culture or a people. They actually go back and belong to Allah and Allah has given that value or respect and dignity. Every language, every culture has respect and dignity inherent inside of it. And then second, it has a purpose. It's not pointless. It's not that one needs to be erased or removed and replaced with another. Because it has its own purpose.

And now if you wonder, and then that's about the languages, but then he says the same thing about colors of skin. Every color of skin is valuable to Allah. Every color of skin has a purpose. Every color of skin is a reminder of Allah himself.

A Mirror for the Muslim Ummah

The thing is, we are in the United States in the middle of a news cycle and in the middle of a social phenomenon and a crisis that is all surrounding race. And there's a lot of exclamation and commentary of all different kinds and people are waiting for others to say something and be inflamed by it and all of it.

The thing that I wanted to - I don't have much to add to that conversation. All I can do is take a step back and ask myself a very hard question about ourselves, the ummah. Ourselves. The Muslims. Because before we jump and say we support people that are being subjugated because of the color of their skin. Before we say that the police doesn't have a right to murder someone in broad daylight just because, for whatever reason, including the color of their skin.

Self-Reflection Before Speaking Out

If any of that is unjustifiable to us and we want to speak out about it just like everybody else is speaking out about it and you're right to speak out about it. Then before we do that we maybe should be taking a really good look in the mirror as an ummah that is made up of many colors and many languages and many cultures and be able to honestly answer about ourselves that we don't look down on any color other than our own, any language other than our own, any culture other than our own. Because then we have some moral footing on which we stand before we say this is wrong. Because we have a backbone on which we stand.

Lessons from South Africa

I was in South Africa last year and when I was in Cape Town I was given a walk by some of the seniors of the Muslim community, some of whom are very dear to me, I love them dearly, some of them are no longer with us now. May Allah grant them forgiveness. But I had the honor of meeting with some of these foremost senior members of the Muslim community who were part of the apartheid struggle who showed me neighborhoods they lived in where this side of the street all the black kids could be and that side of the street were all the white families and if you went on the other side you'd never get it back because you'd get arrested.

Sometimes these kids would break the law and play with each other but they'd have to stay on their own sides of the street. They've actually seen that life, they've lived that life, they've experienced that struggle. I met people, older members of the masjid that had gunshot holes in them from the time where they stood up and stood for the rights of people - not just themselves by the way - for all of society. And these people have a credibility on which they stand. They did something so remarkable that left an impression on the entire earth.

Racism Within Our Own Community

But when I think about the ummah wherever we are in the world, when we think about standing up against racism and we blind ourselves to the fact that there is the ugliest kinds of racism inside the Muslim community. I started with the ayat of the Quran to maybe help myself and all of you realize that maybe we don't even - when we want to give people da'wah to this book and its beautiful teachings, maybe we should give ourselves a little da'wah at the same time.

Maybe we should look at this and say wait, but we knew that we've done some of this. Now we may not have killed someone but humiliating someone is not very different from killing someone, is it? The Quran will place a high value on human dignity just like it does on human life. It puts a high value on both of them.

The Closer to Religion, the More Honor Should Be Shown

If we have exhibited - ironically the closer people get to religion, this religion, Islam, the more they come closer to it, the more loyalty they see, the honor they see of someone who just says they're a child of Adam.

"We honored all children of Adam" - that's what Allah says.

So the closer you come to Allah's book, the more you start seeing people without the filter of color of skin. By the way, I don't say you don't see color. As a matter of fact, you're supposed to see color because every color has purpose, every color has value. So I don't say, no, no, no when you become Muslim, you're colorblind. No, you become very color sensitive and you honor each color for what it is and you honor each language for what it is and you honor each culture for what it is and you accept its unique identity as a gift from Allah Himself.