Protecting The Faith

Protecting The Faith

By: Imam Omar Suleiman | #YC2K18

Opening

Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh

Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Raheem

Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen, wassalatu wassalamu ala rasulihi al-kareem wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam tasliman kathira

Introduction

First and foremost I want to thank the mashayikh that delivered their messages before me on how to establish that fortress. I thought I was getting charged on stage. So speaking of always keeping your guard up, I'm not very good at like paying attention when I get attacked. So I hope you all are watching my back insha'Allah.

But I want to thank the mashayikh for talking about how to establish that fortress and protecting our iman. And (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subhanAllah) a living example that you just saw in our brother who I find very hard to believe has only been in America for six years, may Allah benefit through you, extremely impressive and the dua that he made at the end actually was exactly what I'm talking about.

Which is making dua to Allah, praying to Allah for a good ending. Praying to Allah for (حُسْنِ الْخِتَامِ - husnul khitam), for a good ending. Praying to Allah that the best of your actions are the last of them. Praying to Allah that the best day of your life is the day that you meet him and that you meet him when he is pleased with you.

The Danger of Complacency

I'm going to speak assuming that everyone in here volunteers in some capacity for some good and is somewhat religiously inclined because you wouldn't be here on a Friday evening if you weren't somewhat religiously inclined, unless your parents were really good at forcing you to come here.

So I'm going to speak to you assuming that you are active in some capacity, either on a personal level or on a communal level. And I want to make this very clear that one of the greatest dangers of success and involvement, and when I say success there is a spectrum, but any level of accomplishment of doing good is a sense of complacency.

And there are a few things that can happen to you when you've already established the fortress but you leave the station. If you think about a battle that's taking place, sometimes you have a very well established fortress and you've got someone that's stationed to watch the front. And it doesn't matter how strong the army is, it doesn't matter how great, how strong or formidable the fortress is, if that person that's in charge of watching the enemy, watching the front turns away and he's caught off guard, he puts the entire army at risk, everything that's been accomplished at risk.

Everything suddenly becomes vulnerable, even though it's only one person or a group of people that have been entrusted with that particular task, everyone is at risk if that group of people particularly who are supposed to be watching the enemy leave their fort, leave their station.

The Battle of Uhud Example

A very practical example is the battle of Uhud, wasn't it only 50 archers that were put on that mountain to watch the other side of Uhud to make sure that the enemy could not come from behind? So even though it might be a small group of people or a fraction of the entire army, your entire gang becomes vulnerable if that part of it is no longer observant.

And one of the most dangerous things that happen to us is when we start to assume that because we are busy, because we are tired, because other people are telling us that we're doing good things, because we feel like we're doing good, that I must be on the right path. I must be pleasing to Allah right now.

Quranic Warning About Self-Deception

Allah tells us in the Qur'an:

"Say, [O Muhammad], 'Shall we [believers] inform you of the greatest losers as to [their] deeds? [They are] those whose effort is lost in worldly life, while they think that they are doing well in work.'"

Allah mentions losers, complete losers, people that think they're doing good. All the deeds that they're doing seem to be good, but at the same time they're misguided in their performance and because of that they come to find out on the Day of Judgment that none of it actually benefited them. And a lot of times this is a big problem that you think that I must be doing good.

Ibn al-Qayyim's Analogy

Because you can feel burdened and not necessarily be benefited. There's one of the most powerful sayings of Ibn Al-Qayyim (رحمه الله) where he mentions:

الْعَمَلُ بِغَيْرِ إِخْلَاصِ

"Actions that are done without sincerity"

the most essential component of not just accepted good deeds but sustainability of those good deeds until you meet Allah because your khitam your ending determines it all. He mentions that the example of a person who acts without sincerity:

كَالْمُسَافِرِ يَمْلَأُ جِرَابَهُ رَمْلًا فَيُثْقِلُهُ وَلَا يَنْفَعُهُ

"It's like a person who fills his water jug with sand, it burdens him but does not benefit him"

Imagine you're in the desert and you're on a journey and you fill your water jug with dirt, it burdens you but at the end of the day when you need to take a sip, when you've been carrying it along, as you're carrying it you're assuming because the jug is heavy that it must be beneficial water.

And when I'm thirsty and I take a sip then it's gonna benefit me but then after you've been burdened this whole time, you open it up and you dump it and it's nothing but dirt on your face. So it doesn't do anything for you. Because you weren't actually asking yourself the question, what's actually in this jug? What are the contents of this jug? Not just am I tired, not just do I feel like it must be good, I'm not making assumptions.

Don't Assume Your Sincerity

And yes, I'm gonna say this very clearly, don't make assumptions about your sincerity. Even if you started off sincere, it's very easy to lose that sincerity. So don't make assumptions that because at one point in your life you had a sincere epiphany, that your current trajectory with Allah is sincere and good.

You might get caught off guard and come to find out that somewhere along the way you lost your way but you just assumed that you were still doing it right. And so it's important to always reassess, important always to analyze ourselves, both the intentions to make sure that the contents are sincere as well as the direction to make sure that it's in accordance with the sunnah of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) and the righteous predecessors, the pious predecessors. Don't make assumptions that you're safe.

The Danger of Conceit

If you were to pick up one of these books, and one of the things that always fascinates me is that most of the books on ethics or the books on how to maintain motivation or how to be successful in a worldly sense, they're really repackaged concepts from the sunnah with secularized language.

Sometimes I wonder if it's this massive conspiracy. I know that there are some Muslims that are like that, you always get them on the videos on WhatsApp, like it turns out that Muslims really did this, and that we figured it out.

But sometimes (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subhanAllah) there's such a strong connection. And if you were to read about the dangers of success, the first danger of success, I'm talking about a person who's already gotten there because if you're looking at the program at least at this point now, you've already got the fortress, so how do you protect it and guard it?

A person who's already got success, what's the first danger? It's complacency, complacency. The Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) said:

(Sahih Muslim 2749)

"If you were not to sin, then I would fear for you something more dangerous than sin: conceit, conceit."

That you become self-deluded, that you start to think everything's okay, that you have already peaked because you don't see what you could do better.

Fighting Complacency Through Competition

And (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subhanAllah), the ways that you fight complacency compete with other people and success. So even if you're successful, you could be more successful, right? So what did Umar (رضي الله عنه) do? He kept looking to Abu Bakr (رضي الله عنه) as competition in a good way so he could keep on competing. And if you can't find anyone to compete with at all, then compete with yourself.

That's what Abu Bakr (رضي الله عنه) used to do. Push your own self further. Don't assume that you've maxed out in good or that you've protected yourself from evil. You've got to keep on pushing and you have to assume that you could become complacent and as a result of that complacency fall.

Complacency in Knowledge

(سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - SubhanAllah), there is complacency in knowledge. And it's interesting because the first danger of success is complacency. The first sign of complacency in that success is that you no longer listen to people anymore. You don't take advice anymore. You think you're there.

One of the scholars, Abdullah ibn Mu'taz (رحمه الله تعالی) he said:

الْمُتَوَاضِعُ فِي طَلَبِ الْعِلْمِ أَكْثَرُهُمْ عِلْمًا

"The one who is humble in their pursuit of knowledge is the one who will gain the most knowledge."

That the one who is humble in their pursuit of knowledge, meaning he continues to pursue knowledge all the time, continues in a state of pursuing knowledge. Even if everyone tells you you're the greatest scholar in the world, you still have to keep on learning. You still don't drink the Kool-Aid.

Other people tell you you're learned, I'm not learned, I'm a fool. Because I know at least a thousand people that are way more knowledgeable than me, I need to push myself to be like those one thousand. So the one who continues to be humble in that pursuit of knowledge is the one who will gain the most knowledge.

Why? He says:

كَمَا أَنَّ الْمَكَانَ الْمُنْخَفِضَ أَكْثَرُ بِقَاعِ الْأَرْضِ مَاءً

"The same way that the lowest part of the land will collect the most water."

The deeper you dive, the more you will collect, the more you will absorb. Even in our sins.

Right? ابن القيم رحمه الله Ibn al-Qayyim mentioned that shaitan thought that when he caused Adam to fall, that he won, but what he didn't recognize is that the deeper the diver dives, the more he collects those pearls and he rises up with them once again, those pearls at the bottom of that ocean. So sometimes hitting rock bottom even in your sin is a good thing as long as you swim back up and you collect the lessons that you learned from it.

Protecting Against Complacency

So if you think about this for a moment, you have to save yourself from becoming complacent and I'm talking about the religiously inclined in particular and the activism inclined and the volunteers and the people that are seemingly doing so much good on an individual level or on a community level.

You have to protect yourself from other people making you complacent by telling you how awesome you are all the time or by yourself and this is a more dangerous one when your self-talk becomes one of complacency. When you start to tell yourself, I'm there because you know what comes next, self-righteousness, arrogance, pride, where you actually start to look down on people and you start to think I've already saved myself so I will look at others.

That's why in our deen, in our religion, though it's a weaker narration, don't ever taunt your brother or your sister with a sin because if you do, you won't die until you committed that same sin. You'll fall right to where you're taunting someone else. You think you've protected yourself, you're not there. You have to hold on and assume that at any moment you could lose your way in a motivating way.

The Example of Umar ibn al-Khattab

I'm not telling you to be paranoid. Paranoia is not good for you. Not in religion either by the way. I get it. I mean, you miss Fajr one day and you assume that it must be that someone put some sort of spell on you. Paranoia is not good for you.

But diligence is, being vigilant is, being overprotective of your iman, of your faith is never a bad thing. You can never be too overprotective of your iman or guard it too much because you've got to stay stations. It's one of the beautiful things about Umar ibn al-Khattab (رَضِيَ اللَّهُ تَعَالَى عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu taʿālā ʿanhu) that Umar (رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) was always ready to be reminded.

Shaitan couldn't get on his street. He couldn't even be a neighbor of Umar (رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) because as soon as someone said, (اتَّقِ اللة - ittaqi Allāh) "fear Allah" to that giant, then he started to cry like a child. He was there. He was ready to be reminded at all times and ready to push himself at all times and saw himself in ways that other people did not see him.

Umar didn't drink his own Kool-Aid. Umar (رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) paid attention to himself, focused on his shortcomings and spent his entire life trying to overcome those shortcomings. And if I've overcome 9 shortcomings out of 10, I've still got one more that I don't want to meet Allah with. So I'm going to work at this one. I'm not going to say, well at least I've got the other 9 going for me.

No, I've got to work and I've got to make sure that I'm pushing myself further. I don't care if other people think I've arrived. I don't care if the voice inside of me says, you're there, you've arrived.

The Example of Imam Ahmed

Because until that last moment, and that's the point of Imam Ahmed (رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) and I know many of you have heard this story a million times. Every time I hear it, I think of a different fa'idah from it (سُبْحَانَ الله - subḥāna-llāh), a different thing to benefit from it all. That when Imam Ahmed was passing away and his son was telling him, say:

"La ilaha illAllah"

and he kept on saying:

"La, laysa ba'd" - "No, not yet."

As he's going in and out of his consciousness, and his son told him, why did you say that? When I'm telling you say, (لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا ٱللَّٰهُ - La ilaha illAllah)," there's no God but Allah, and you're saying, not no, not yet. And he told him that I saw shaitan projecting himself to me in the form of a humiliated man saying that, I've never been able to get you, oh Ahmed, I've never been able to get you, you've escaped from me, you've escaped, it's over. I lose, you win, I concede.

And Imam Ahmed's saying, no, not yet, not till I die. This battle continues until that last breath. Until that last breath, then I will not stop being on guard against you and how you are trying to penetrate that fortress.

The Prophet's Most Frequent Dua

We learned a lot about some of the du'as of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam). And I want to ask you all, what was the most frequent du'a of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam)? Does anyone know? Other than the mashayikh? Yes? Someone? What was the most frequent du'a of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam)? Yeah?

"Ya muqallib al-qulub thabbit qalbi 'ala dinik"

"O Turner of Hearts, make my heart firm upon Your religion." (Sunan at-Tirmidhi 2140)

If you think about the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam)and I'll translate it, he reached the position that none of us would ever reach, that no man has ever reached in terms of righteousness. But even he, his most frequent prayer was:

"O Turner of Hearts, make my heart firm on your path."

Even the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) is still making du'a for the preservation of his faith and the preservation of his righteousness and not taking it for granted. If the Prophet of Allah (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) not sometimes makes that du'a, but always makes that du'a, to a point that his wife says that's the most frequent du'a, what does that tell you about his character and his pursuits? It keeps you humble, it keeps you determined, it keeps you vigilant. You don't make assumptions.

You see other people commit major sins and you don't know that you might not die until you commit that same major sin. So you don't taunt that person, you make du'a for Allah to forgive them and to keep them firm because you want the same thing for yourself. You're afraid that you might fall to that.

The Story of Pressure and Ease

And you know (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subḥāna-llāh) with the three minutes that I have, I just want to give you this contrast. And this is a story that always shakes me because a lot of times when the environment is not one of pressure, you know pressure can do two things to you. It can either make you stronger or it can make you crack.

You need good pressure, like think about when you're lifting weights. You want to increase the tension, you want to increase... Some of you have never lifted weights before, you're looking at me like, no, I don't

know what you're talking about. You want to add on to the weight so you can learn how to carry a greater weight.

But if you try to take on too much at one time, you'll throw out your back and you'll never be able to lift weights again. So you want to build that pressure so that you know how to handle it more. But you don't want to break.

So pressure, there's a healthy pressure that you want because you want to be able to grow, you want to be able to develop that strength so that you can deal with the hardships on the outside. That's why Allah says:

"Those are the ones whose hearts Allah has tested for righteousness."

Umar (رَضِيَ اللهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) mentioned that this is the person who is exposed to sin and resist from it. That that person is better than one who's not exposed at all.

The Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) mentioned:

(Sunan at-Tirmidhi 2507)

"The one who mixes with the people and deals with their abuse"

or their hardship is better than the one who doesn't mix with the people or deal with their abuse. So that tension and that pressure is necessary sometimes, it makes you a stronger person.

But sometimes you don't dictate the level of that pressure. And that pressure can make you crack. And the only way to prepare for that is to keep strengthening your ability to handle pressure, internally and externally. So that if that moment comes, when it comes, you know how to deal with it.

So with sabr, with patience, you practice patience until you get there to where you can handle a major crisis or a tragedy in life. Because you're being patient with smaller obstacles in life. You're learning to deal with the pressure.

The Story of Ubaidullah ibn Jahsh

But what happens to a person that sustained a lot of pressure and then found themselves at ease? There's a story from the seerah that always moves me. And for the sake of, you know, amanah ilmiya as they say, you know, transparency and knowledge. Some of the scholars don't accept this narration. But it's widely narrated in the seerah about a man by the name of Ubaidullah ibn Jahsh.

Ubaidullah ibn Jahsh is the cousin of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam). He's one of the people that believed in Allah in Mecca before the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) received revelation. Meaning, he was a

hanif, he was a monotheist before the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) received revelation. He already believed in the oneness of Allah in an Abrahamic conception. Just didn't have the methodology of the religion yet to guide that belief.

He becomes Muslim when the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) starts to preach. He suffers persecution in Mecca. He's married to the daughter of Abu Sufyan who at that time is one of the greatest persecutors of Muslims. And then he even migrates to Abyssinia to escape with his belief.

But (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subḥāna-llāh), his wife starts to see dreams about him in darkness. And in the comfort of Abyssinia, he leaves his religion. This is what's widely narrated. And he dies upon other than Islam according to these widely narrated, you know, narrations that we find in the seerah.

Now his wife was Umm Habiba (رَضِيَ اللهُ عَنْهَا - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhā). So she married the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) afterwards. When the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) found out about her, imagine, she was the daughter of Abu Sufyan and her husband left Islam and she's in a strange land. So the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) sent a proposal to her to marry her, even though they would not be together for years and years and years. But to give her better than that which she lost.

And his brother was Abdullah ibn Jahsh who died a martyr and his sister was Zainab ibn Jahsh who married the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) as well. So (سُبْحَانَ اللهِ - subḥāna-llāh), he's the cousin of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam)his brother died a shaheed, his ex-wife, his widow would marry the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam)his sister would marry the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam). But somehow he lost faith.

The Contrast: Different Responses to Ease

And here's the lesson here. Amr ibn al-'As (رَضِيَ اللهُ عَنْهُ - raḍiya-llāhu ʿanhu) went to Abyssinia who was one of those that was persecuting, would become Muslim and die spreading the religion. One of the greatest companions of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) even though he was trying to persecute the Muslims in Abyssinia and he persecuted the Meccan was trying to carry that persecution out there, he died on Islam.

Abdullah ibn Jahsh has the opposite fate. How is it that a man that was suffering under so much pressure could find that loss in ease because sometimes when you're not feeling the pressure you lose yourself. And I say (الحمد لله - al-ḥamdu li-llāh) for the pressure that we feel here in the United States. (الحمد لله - al-ḥamdu li-llāh) Alhamdulillah for the pressure we have that forces us to hold on to that deen.

Because the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم - ṣallā-llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam) mentioned and I end with this, that person who holds on to:

"Behind you, oh companions, what comes after you are days of patience. Days in which holding on to iman is like holding on to a burning coal." (Sunan at-Tirmidhi 2260)

As long as it's burning you're reminded that it's burning and you're paying attention. Don't stop paying attention and don't think that you've arrived. Don't ever think that you've arrived in your knowledge. Don't ever think you've arrived in your activism. Don't ever think you've arrived in your sincerity. Don't ever think you've arrived at Jannah until you actually get there.

Closing

May Allah allow us to have (حُسْنَ الْخِتَامِ - ḥusna al-khitām), a good ending. And may Allah allow the best of our deeds to be the last of them. And may Allah the Turner of Hearts keep our hearts firm upon faith so long as we are alive and until our very last moments and allow us to meet Him with that faith.

And may Allah (جل جلاله - jalla jalāluh) make the best day of our existence the day that we meet Him and we ask Allah to be pleased with us on that day when we meet Him.

Allahumma ameen

Barak Allahu li wa lakum, wa's-salamu 'alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh

May Allah bless me and you, and peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah and His blessings.