Torch Bearers Streamlining the Sunnah

Torch Bearers: Streamlining the Sunnah

Imam Omar Suleiman | #YMC2K19

Opening Remarks

I want to be merciful and give you guys a chance to stand up and stretch. So give yourself 30 seconds, especially those of you sitting on the floors, stand up, stretch out, get that hurt out of you, especially those of you on the floor, for the incredible work that they do, for the volunteers, and for all of the organizers, y'all good? Okay now you can be seated. Some of you are hugging and acting like it's Eid now.

We're done intros. The topic that I was given is one that I've been given in various manifestations over time but I want to look at this from a different angle inshallah ta'ala.

Being Ambassadors of the Prophet

When you talk about this idea of being an ambassador of the Prophet (ﷺ), of being embodied words, embodied scripture, it's actually a really powerful concept, this idea that you embody text as a person, as an individual.

The Spread of Islam Through His Followers

And I want you to just take a step back and appreciate for a moment the fact that most of the places that Islam spread to, the Prophet (ﷺ) never physically got a chance to enter. And it's actually very beautiful when you think about that effect in his own lifetime of the places that Islam spread like Abyssinia and Persia and into the Roman Empire, into Jerusalem.

It wasn't that they met the Prophet (ﷺ) in Abyssinia, it was that they met the product of the Prophet (ﷺ) in Abyssinia, in the person of Ja'far ibn Abi Talib and those early Muslim followers of the Prophet (ﷺ).

It wasn't that they met the Prophet (ﷺ) in Jerusalem but they met the product of the Prophet in Umar and in Abu Ubaidah and in some of those great people that went and took Islam to those places.

It wasn't that they even met the person of the Prophet (ﷺ) in Medina, just around the corner from him but it was the product of the Prophet (ﷺ) in Mus'ab ibn Umair.

The Chain of Representation

And so the first thing that you have to understand is that the people knew the beauty of the Prophet (ﷺ) through the beauty of his followers. And the people knew the beauty of the Qur'an through the beauty of the Prophet (ﷺ).

The Prophet (ﷺ) is described as (كَانَ خُلُقُهُ الْقُرْآنَ - kana khuluquhu alquran) - He was a walking Qur'an, and that sounded like it hurt back there, hope everyone's okay. He was a walking Qur'an, an embodied Qur'an. The best way to describe him is that everything that he preached, he practiced, and that all of those beautiful virtues and qualities and characteristics that we find in the Qur'an, no one manifested them in the most perfect way like the Prophet (ﷺ).

The Qur'an would not have had the impact that it had on mankind if it remained as text on paper.

However, what made it transformative was not just the recitation or the words, but its transformative power as demonstrated in the person of the Prophet (ﷺ).

Likewise, what the Prophet was to the Qur'an, the companions were to the Prophet (ﷺ). People met his companions that never met him, but they said, look, if this is what he produces, then imagine what he's like. They each embodied special qualities that the Prophet (ﷺ) taught. Each one of them seized upon a gem of his personality, and they carried that forward.

And what the companions were to the Prophet (ﷺ), their children were to them. The generation of the Tabi'een that came after the companions, each one of them amplifying the beauty of their parents that was instilled within them by the Prophet (ﷺ), that was infused in him by the Qur'an.

Then every generation that comes after, they will know the Prophet (ﷺ) through his followers. They will know him through you.

The Weight of Responsibility

That's a heavy burden if you think about it. But I also want us to be a little bit humble in understanding that if the narrative out there is that Islam is barbaric and regressive, and the people who are being fed these brainwashing messages have not met a person that detracts from that narrative, what do you expect them to believe? What do you expect them to say about the Prophet (ﷺ)? What do you expect them to think about Islam?

Just like the beauty that radiated from Mus'ab was what gained the Prophet (ﷺ) his acceptance in Madinah before he set foot in there, and the beauty of Ja'far and Abyssinia radiated what the Prophet (ﷺ) imparted, likewise, when those that have been tasked with radiating the radiance of the Prophet (ﷺ) don't live up to it, then you cannot expect people to see that light on their own, because it's not just scripture, it's not just words on a paper.

What Does It Mean to Embody the Qur'an?

Now I want you to think about this for a moment, what does the Qur'an look like embodied? Is it just the idea that it's something that you can recite, you know the word Qur'an means that it's something that's frequently recited, or is it more than that? And what does it mean to embody it?

If what it means to embody it is that you recite it, then you're no more impressive than your phone, or than whatever device it is that you listen to the Qur'an being recited, because at the end of the day, that's called parroting, but actually protecting it and guarding it and absorbing it is a whole other level.

The Parable of Different Types of Land

And there's this beautiful example that the Prophet (ﷺ) gave about the way that the Qur'an lands upon people. When you think about someone who has substance, when people say people of substance, we need people of substance, what they're talking about is people that have something on the interior that's stronger than anything that can be explained or seen or visualized in the exterior, that you're made of something.

When people say you're made of something or what are you made of or what's on the inside, what they're usually referring to is a sense of strength, a sense of beauty, something that is both invisible, at least in the way that our exteriors are visible, and something that is inaccessible to those that wish you harm. Again, it's invisible in that you can't see it, and it's also inaccessible to those that are trying to harm you. It's deep inside, no one can access it except for you, and you access it in a way that causes you to transform the environment around you.

So I think of this hadith, the Prophet (ﷺ) said that the example of people upon whom the revelation falls are like the different types of lands:

Type 1: Hard Rock-like Land

Some people are like hard land that's shaped in a way that's like a rock, the rain just hits it, it doesn't absorb it, the rock doesn't absorb it, the surface doesn't absorb it, nor does it benefit anybody or anything else around it.

Type 2: Hard Bowl-shaped Surface

Then the Prophet (ﷺ) said, but there is then a surface that's like, it's hard but it's bowl shaped, or it's shaped in a way that it could carry some water, but none of the water is absorbed.

Type 3: Fertile Soil

Then he (ﷺ) said there is a surface that's like soil, it takes in the water, it absorbs it. And if you think about this in terms of benefit by the way, the bowl shaped surface that carries water right away offers an immediate sense of gratification and benefit to everything but itself, but once the water is gone, it's just like the first type of land, right? It's exposed for its bareness and for its hardness.

That type of person, the Prophet (ﷺ) said, is like a person who benefits others with the revelation but does not benefit themselves.

The Deep Meaning of Absorption

Meaning for a short while, you're able to get something out of it and you're able to offer something from it, but the water gets drunk really quick and then there is nothing left to it. You never actually absorbed it, you just gave others something of it to benefit from.

But that other person that's like soil, when the soil absorbs the water, that means that first and foremost, the primary beneficiary of that water, of that revelation is the person themselves, that it went deep inside of me, it penetrated.

The other implication of that is that it's going to bear fruit and bear vegetation in the long run. So while the surface that carries the water that's a hard surface in the short term gives people an immediate sense of benefit, the soil doesn't provide immediate benefit but it provides long term benefits. And that type of benefit is not just to other parties but it starts off with you.

You soak it in, your heart gets saturated by it. And SubhanAllah, you know what else? That type of vegetation, whatever comes out of that, you might be able to break a branch or break a tree, but it's so deeply rooted in the soil of your heart that even if people are able to get to you momentarily, you'll just grow something else back.

The Importance of Personal Absorption

When you talk about how you are meant to represent Islam, I recognize the immense pressure upon young people in particular to have to represent Islam, especially when they have not been able at times to absorb it in its most beautiful sense.

Taking Time for Yourself

And so I actually want to tell you something that you probably won't hear in the messaging from myself and from other people throughout this conference. Make sure that as you're interacting with religion, in a time when people immediately hear and speak, receive and show, make sure that you're taking some quiet time to actually try to absorb and appreciate the profound transformative nature of this message. Make sure that you're actually taking time for yourself.

Sister Suzy talked about this idea of disconnecting to connect. Make sure that before you preach it, you practice it. You know, with every other form of knowledge, you learn it and then you teach it.

In Islam, you learn, you implement, then you teach. You learn, implement, teach. And that process never can be interrupted.

It has to be that in between your learning and your teaching, there is some level of implementation. And for a person that has to interact with a broader society that has such ugly impressions about this beautiful religion, what that means is making sure that you allocate some time to read by yourself, to meditate upon the meanings of this religion by yourself at times. To do it, and I'm a biggest fan of the neighbor nets that they have, that YM has, but you know what? No social structure is going to fill that void of your own ability to sit and to ponder upon the meanings of the Qur'an and the sunnah of the Prophet (ﷺ). What the neighbor net does is it reinvigorates you, it motivates you, it gives you the tools so that you can do that on your own.

Becoming a Person of Substance

But take a step back and actually try to absorb it, to be a person of substance. Because if the only way you've interacted with the Qur'an is listening and reciting, and the only way you've interacted with the sunnah of the Prophet (ﷺ) is treating it like a reference, so that you go and you get the hadith that you need or you get the lecture that you need so that you can give it to somebody else. At no point in that process was there a moment for you to actually absorb it, to sit with yourself and actually absorb it.

You know, a lot of people think that the reason why I don't need to do that is because I'm already living or demonstrating some of those meanings. But the reality is that you're just that bowl that's giving water to other people, but you haven't given it a chance to actually penetrate deep into your hearts.

Learning from Incarcerated Individuals

I actually want to share something with you that, you know, subhanAllah, I don't know how many people in here have been to prison.

I know that a lot of people talk about prison like it's, you know, or they attach certain connotations to prison, but some of the most deep and devout people that I've ever met are people that were incarcerated, formerly incarcerated. Not encouraging you to go to prison, not encouraging you to get incarcerated, but some of the people that have the deepest substance, like you talk to them and you realize there's been some deep thought, there's been a lot of time that's been put into a generation of thought and like where I go from here, you realize that that time that they had in prison where they were reading, where they were meditating, where they were thinking was a time of great growth on the inside and prepared them for things that were even more difficult after their prison years once they got out.

It's hard to explain, but that's a blessing from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that sometimes even in your hardest moments, Allah gives you an opportunity for growth, to grow out of that hard moment.

Understanding True Character

And the idea here is that you don't really know that you're a person of substance or what you're made of until you're put through something that shakes you. And that's where it comes out. You know when you think about good character and sunnah, and by the way, since my topic is streamlining the sunnah, usually when I ask people, what's the first thing that comes to your mind when I say the word sunnah? Usually it's something that is external in its nature.