Khutbah Don t Live an Empty Life

It releases quickly out of that bow.

An eye is called مِمْرَح when it's easy for a person, they cry easily

Like the waterworks come out quickly. When the eye was having مَرّحit meant that the tears wouldn't stop, they just kept easily flowing, and flowing, and flowing.

The earth, again, plants, coming out quickly would be الْأَرْضِ مَرِحَةُ

And then when the crop comes out and finally the grain pops open, easily releases, that's also called مرح

The Example of the Horse

The most interesting use of it is actually used for a horse. So they say:

A horse that is مروح

When it's grazing, it's so hungry and hyperactive that it's grabbing some grass from here, leaves from there, and running around like crazy, because it's so hungry that it's erratic. You can think of it as a person being مروح when they're at a dinner table at iftar time, and they've been holding back, and as soon as iftar happens, they're like grabbing stuff. They're being مَرّوح. It's almost like they're quickly releasing their hands and grabbing at whatever they can.

The overall meaning of this word actually is to be impulsive, and to be very quick to act, to be very quick to do something, and to have no sense of direction. Even that horse is described:

Disturbed, it's moving around, it's not sitting still, it's very jittery because it's feeling hungry

The Father's Warning About Impulsiveness

When the father is telling his son, don't walk on the earth with مَرّح he's saying, don't go hanging out, or don't go outside engaging the world - because there's times where you're home, and then there's times you go out. You go out for work, you go out to hang out with friends, you go out to get food, whatever it is. Don't leave the home, don't go anywhere and be impulsive. "Oh, I want to do this, oh, I want to do this, I don't want to do this, I don't want to do this." And you have no purpose in what you're doing. You're jumping from one thing to the next, to the next, to the next.

Cultural Transition Example

A crazy example of that is sometimes, of course, there are different cultures in the world. People come from very conservative societies to America. Somebody may have been raised in a very religious or a very traditional village. They may not even be Muslim, they may even be Hindu or Christian or whatever, but very cultural conservative background.

Or think of a Muslim family, and somebody who's raised in this joint family system, and there's a lot of respect for elders, and you watch your speech, and you watch the way you walk, and you watch the way you dress, and the way you sit, and the way you eat, and then they land in America. They're a student with a student visa, and they're going to the university.

The university has parties on the weekend, and they've got fraternities, and they've got hangouts, and the other students in the dorms are doing drugs, and everybody's got a relationship of one kind or the other, all kinds of stuff. They're just bombarded with this stuff. Somebody can take those values that they were holding on to, but like that bow that releases the arrow without effort, they just let go of all of those values, and they just got exposed to a new world.

They become marah.

A Father's Realization

This is a very powerful bit of advice, because we have kids, for example, we want to raise them in an Islamic environment, in a protected, sheltered environment. So whether you live in America, Australia, Lahore, Dhaka, it doesn't matter where you live. You want to protect your kids, and you want to make sure that they receive positive reinforcement about "this is good for you, this is bad for you." "Hey, what are you watching? Hey, where are you going online? Hey, let me see that. Who are you on the phone with?" We're checking what they do. It's natural.

We're trying to create a sheltered environment for them, wherever we may be. But you know what? This father realizes, they're not going to stay home. These birds are going to fly off the nest. They're going to go outside. And when they go outside, all the things I protected them from, all the things that I didn't want them to just spill into, all the things I didn't want them to be exposed to, they're going to get hit with all of it, all at the same time.

Sensory Overload and Freedom

They're just going to get sensory overload. There's going to be so much access to so much wrongdoing, and I'm not going to have any control over it. And he's saying, in those moments, because now you have the ability, you have the appetite, you have the curiosity, you have the ability, you have the perception of

freedom. And then, especially in that moment, when somebody tries to give you good advice, you can turn your cheek. You can just, "I don't want to hear this."

In that moment, you can become impulsive and not think twice about how you're violating others and yourself. And that is a form of arrogance. So by extension, it becomes arrogance. By extension. Because arrogance is a lack of consideration for anybody else but yourself.

Hassan Jabal's Insight

The word marah here, Hassan Jabal added an insight of his own, and I really liked his insight in his lexicon. He said, this is when someone slips out, like the plant slips out of the earth, like the arrow slips out of the bow, like the water slips out of the container. It's when a person slips out of their value system. It's when someone leaks, they lose themselves.

The values that were holding them and containing them, they no longer commit themselves to them. It becomes too easy for them to let them go. It's too easy for them to let them go.

When does he let them go? He says:

The moment they find power and blessings

What he means by that is when you're independent and you can do it - "who's gonna stop me?" That's power. Blessings means you got money, you got strength, Allah has blessed you with the ability for transportation, your appearance, whatever it may be. Now you've got these blessings, "now I can do what I want with them."

The Connection Between the Two Pieces of Advice

The father is telling his son, "Listen, you're going to feel powerful, capable of doing whatever you feel like, whatever impulse comes to you. And that's gonna be a trial that you have."

But it's interesting that he put these two seemingly unrelated bits of advice next to each other. He said first, don't turn, don't scoff at people, and then don't be impulsive, basically. What is the connection between these two?

As we contemplate that, we can think about how when we become - we come of age, we basically, the Urdu expression is نکلیں پر - a person comes in their own and they kind of, the Urdu expression means they've sprouted wings. Meaning they act like, "I'm not a kid anymore, you can't tell me what to do. I'm not a baby anymore, dad or mom." So they've become their own person.

The "Whatever" Generation

In that moment when they become their own person, it is when they become extremely averse, extremely hostile to any kind of advice. Actually it is a time when because you're hostile to any kind of advice, you develop this shell around you which is constantly putting others down or dismissing others.

The modern way of doing that that captures so many young people around the world that are coming into adulthood is the word "whatever." You "whatever" everything in the world. Anybody is giving you this, "whatever." And you don't have to say "whatever." You can just say half the syllables and "whatever, whatever." Or you can just roll your eyes. "Oh God, here we go again." Or you can just take a deep breath of disdain. "Are you done yet?" You can just say that with your face. "Are you done giving your lecture yet? Can I just go live my life now?"

This is:

You don't have to disrespect someone by raising your voice and getting angry. You can just dismiss someone and dishonor them. And now that you've dismissed them and you can't hear their voice anymore, their advice anymore, now you're left to your own devices.

He's putting those two things together perhaps because he understands that when a person stops listening to the advice of others, that's when they become impulsive.

The Importance of Good Advisors

Having people in our life that can give us advice, that can give us the benefit of their wisdom, and keeping an open ear and an open heart towards them is an important part of life. And then:

This isn't even spiritual in nature. There are other experiences in life that apply to this. Because even Luqman رضي الله عنه said:

Don't scoff away from people. Like I have non-Muslim friends who were into drugs, alcohol, crime, getting in trouble, you name it. And then later on in school and they hated their teachers, but one teacher decides to give them advice and show them the ropes and say, "Hey, you're talented in this, maybe you can get a job in this." And that one teacher or that one positive influence and the person turns their life around.

Because they didn't turn away from that one teacher. They said:

Had they not had that person, they would have been impulsive and doing all kinds of things and ruining their future. They look back and say, "I saved myself," and we look at it as, Allah saved this person because they had someone that they could listen to.

This happens in the world, not just in the Muslim sense, but in humanity this happens.

The Devil's Opportunity

These are the two bits of advice that he starts off the ayah with:

But beyond that, he says:

He says, certainly Allah does not love anyone who is مُخْتَا فَخُور . By the way, one last comment about these two words, about the first two words.

The first two phrases were, turning your face and also being مَرَحًا. Notice in the first of them, Allah mentioned people:

So people are mentioned. And in the second one, it's not about people, it's all about you:

There's no mention of people. Don't walk on the earth with مَرّح in a state of مَرّح and there's no mention of people.

The Spiritual Insight

What's the benefit of knowing that? Allah is telling us, a person is at the devil's disposal when they have cut themselves off from good people. The devil's whisper comes from this direction, that direction, that direction. And when there's no good people around you, then you are susceptible to this whisper, then this whisper, then that whisper, then that whisper.

So the first thing is, don't isolate yourself from good people by dismissing them. That's the first step. And if you are doing that, then you are handing yourself over to the world of evil and negative thoughts that are inside you that can pull you in any direction whenever, especially when you go in the outside world.

Bad Influences vs Good Influences

The strangers that you're gonna meet, the people that are gonna be in the marketplace, the people that are gonna be in the university, on campus, the people that are gonna meet at school, the people that are gonna be working with you, those are not necessarily people who care about your well-being. They don't care about your well-being. They care about themselves. But many of them will represent invitations to do something wrong.

Those people will have some allure to them and you'll be drawn towards them, but they don't mean well for you. And you'd rather hang out with people that don't criticize you, so you don't wanna be around anyone who keeps it real with you and tells it to you like it is. So people who tell you like it is, you just wanna keep your distance from them.

You've already:

You've already turned your cheek away from them. Now you become:

The Fake Social Life

That second bit of advice comes - actually, it doesn't matter how, what a social butterfly you are. It doesn't matter how many online friends you have, and how many people know you, and how popular you are, or you can make friends anywhere you go. Those kinds of people that are super outgoing and have friends everywhere, watch out, because sometimes their worst connections are the people closest to them. The people closest to them are the ones they dismiss the most, ignore the most. They're so nice outside, so horrible inside. That's actually a kind of fake life. That's a kind of fake set of connections.

That's actually what's going to be commented on in that last comment where Allah says:

"Indeed, Allah does not like everyone self-deluded and boastful."

Personal Reflection

We'll wrap up that discussion inshallah in next khutbah, because I certainly didn't want to rush through these phrases and these ayahs, because I think they're of value, and it's something that we should really think about for ourselves, and the young people that are listening.

I don't want myself or you to hear these words and say, "Man, I can think of somebody that this applies to 100%. Man, is he talking about..." And then you're sharing it with your cousin saying, "Look, here's a

khutbah about Bushra, our cousin." Or, "Look, I think this is about you." Somebody sends a... And you can use khutbahs for insults. "This is about you, I think. You should really listen to it."

This is the height of the problem. Because this is you, ironically, scoffing at people, turning your cheek away from people. As if the ayahs are about them, a criticism of them, and they have nothing to do with me.

Closing Prayer

I pray Allah allows me to look in the mirror, to find these faults in myself and address them. And I pray Allah allows all of you to look in the mirror and find those faults in yourselves and address them for yourselves. And I pray Allah protects our young generation from these kinds of character flaws and makes them a better example for the world than we could ever be.

Indeed, Allah orders justice and good conduct and giving to relatives and forbids immorality and bad conduct and oppression. He admonishes that perhaps you will be reminded (Quran 16:90)

Establish prayer. Indeed, prayer prohibits immorality and wrongdoing, and the remembrance of Allah is greater. And Allah knows that which you do Quran 29:45