The Spiritual Struggle

The Spiritual Struggle

Opening Takbir and Khutbah Introduction

(اللَّهُ أَكْبَر، اللَّهُ أَكْبَرٍ - Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar)

إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ نَحْمَدُهُ وَنَسْتَعِينُهُ وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ وَنَسْتَهْدِيهِ وَنَتُوبُ إِلَيْهِ وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورٍ أَنْفُسِنَا وَمِنْ سَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ سَيِّدَنَا مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ

"O you who have believed, fear Allah as He should be feared and do not die except as Muslims."

"O mankind, fear your Lord, who created you from one soul and created from it its mate and dispersed from both of them many men and women. And fear Allah, through whom you ask one another, and the wombs. Indeed Allah is ever, over you, an Observer."

"O you who have believed, fear Allah and speak words of appropriate justice. He will [then] amend for you your deeds and forgive you your sins. And whoever obeys Allah and His Messenger has certainly attained a great attainment."

أَمَّا بَعْدُ، فَإِنَّ أَصْدَقَ الْحَدِيثِ كِتَابُ اللَّهِ وَخَيْرَ الْهَدْيِ هَدْيُ مُحَمَّدٍ صلى الله عليه وسلم وَشَرَّ الْأُمُورِ مُحْدَثَاتُهَا وَكُلَّ مُحْدَثَةٍ بِدْعَةٌ وَكُلَّ بِدْعَةٍ ضَلَالَةٌ وَكُلَّ ضَلَالَةٍ فِي النَّارِ

الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ، الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ الَّذِي أَنزَلَ عَلَى عَبْدِهِ الْكِتَابَ وَلَمْ يَجْعَل لَّهُ عِوَجًا، الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ الَّذِي هَدَانَا لِهَذَا وَمَا كُنَّا لِنَهْتَدِيَ لَوْلَا أَنْ هَدَانَا اللَّهُ، الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ

The Gift of Transcendence

All praises due to Allah. All praises due to Allah who has given us an opportunity to be truly human, and when we say that we mean that Allah has given us an opportunity to transcend the physical nature of our being. So obviously we are physical beings composed of physical matter, but we're also spiritual beings. And one of the great tragedies of our time is that the people who should be representing spirituality in the world are by and large capitulating to materialism and all that comes with that. We have to understand that spiritual consciousness is a consciousness that orients us towards Allah.

Taqwa: The Foundation of God-Consciousness

So Allah, or even before mentioning a hadith actually from our Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم we can go back to the verse that is part of the Khutbatul Hajah:

O mankind, O humanity, be mindful, be conscious of your Lord who has created you from a single soul. So taqwa is consciousness, is consciousness that translates into obeying Allah, but at the root it is consciousness. يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ So Allah is addressing humanity. ) اتَّقُوا رَبَّكُمُ الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفْسٍ وَاحِدَةٍ ﴾ Be conscious of your Lord - and sometimes taqwa is translated God-consciousness - who has created you from a single soul. And this consciousness, at the end of the verse we're reminded we should aspire to have this as our permanent state, or we can say in that case as a station that we arrive at that has permanence.

وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ الَّذِي تَسَاءَلُونَ بِهِ وَالْأَرْحَامَ إِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَقِيبًا

So at the beginning of the verse, what does Allah tell us? ) يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ اتَّقُوا رَبَّكُمُ الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفْسٍ وَاحِدَةٍ ) Be conscious of your Lord. And at the end of the verse, what does Allah tell us? ) إِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَقِيبًا ﴾ Verily Allah is watching over you. So the consciousness should lead us to a state where we are aware that Allah ta'ala is watching over us at every moment. And this is what we would like to address today, but we take the scenic route insha'Allah and not go directly there.

The Family: The Foundation of Spiritual Life

The first point we mention the consciousness, and then Allah says: ) اتَّقُوا رَبَّكُمُ الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفْسٍ وَاحِدَةٍ وَخَلَقَ مِنْهَا زَوْجَهَا Be mindful of your Lord who has created you from a single soul and made from that soul its mate, referring to Adam and Eve, Adam and Hawwa. And then He says: ) وَبَثَّ مِنْهُمَا رِجَالًا كَثِيرًا وَنِسَاءً ) And He sent forth from the two of them multitudes of men and women. And this is a reminder of the centrality of the family in the spiritual endeavor.

And one of the consequences of materialism and material society is its outright war on the family. So as we get deeper and deeper into materialism, the war on the family gets more and more intense, and it becomes increasingly difficult to hold families together. Because the materialism, one of its byproducts is egoism, because I want to possess everything I can possess. And when that reaches its logical extreme, there is no room for family, because family involves sharing, it involves sharing. And so as we become more and more materialistic, we lose our ability to share, we lose our ability to share, be that our possessions.

No, why should I get married? I can just live with her, she has her own money, her own place. Why should I have to spend on her? Or vice versa, no, he can go out and get a job, nothing's wrong with him, he's healthy, why should I spend my money on him? After all, we're Muslims, he's supposed to maintain and provide. What do you do when he can't get a job? So this is one of the pernicious influences of materialism - it causes us to lose focus on those things that are necessary to hold our families together.

The Ties of Kinship and Divine Consciousness

So Allah, He mentions God-consciousness, there's an indirect reference to the family. ) وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ الَّذِي تَسَاءَلُونَ بِهِ وَالْأَرْحَامَ ) Consciousness. )تَسَاءَلُونَ بِهِ ) That you ask each other through Him, people ask you "بالله عليك" - I beseech you for the sake of Allah. That requires God-consciousness on both parts - number one, for a person to ask through Allah and with Allah, on the other hand for a person to be responsive to that plea. In English we used to say "for God's sake." So that's when things are really playing, please do this, I need help, for God's sake won't you help me? This is what Allah is referring to ( تَسَاءَلُونَ بِهِ )You ask each other through Him and invoking Him and with Him,عز وجل

)وَالْأَرْحَامَ ) So this takes God-consciousness, and now it goes back to the family. So fear Allah )وَالْأَرْحَامَ . And Fear . اتقوا الله واتقوا الأرحام، معطوف على لفظ الجلالة، منصوب على الله :also in the grammatical accusative case الْأَرْحَامَ Allah, be conscious of Allah, and be conscious of the relations and ties of the womb. وَالْأَرْحَامَ And Allah is re-

emphasizing the family - )وَالْأَرْحَامَ ) these are the ties that keep us together. And for it to be real though, that consciousness has to be there.

So Allah ta'ala concludes the verse : ) إِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَقِيبًا Verily Allah is watching over you. Be mindful of that fact, be mindful of that fact. So consciousness of Allah culminates in a spiritual life. Consciousness of the material world culminates in a material life, and it culminates, as we said, in selfishness.

Iblis: The First Materialist

Understand, the first materialist was Iblis, Shaytan. We've mentioned this before, but to emphasize: when Shaytan rebelled, how did he justify his rebellion? Allah ta'ala mentioned:

What prevented you from prostrating yourself when I ordered you to do so?

He said, I am better than him. On what basis? ) خَلَقْتَنِي مِن نَّارٍ وَخَلَقْتَهُ مِن طِينٍ ) You created me from fire and you created him from clay. My physical composition is better than his physical composition. So he's not only the first racist - the physical difference I possess - and there's color involved because fire has the colors usually orange, red, and the clay Adam was created from has a color, it was black, it was black clay, all the tafsirs says this. So there was a physical, a racist component, but there's also the material component. He didn't justify his rebellion on any moral ground. So Shaytan didn't say I'm more generous than him, I'm more compassionate than him, I am more forgiving than him, I am more truthful than him. There's no moral argument, it's all physical. You created me from fire, you created him from clay, that's why I'm better. ) أَنَا خَيْرٌ مِّنْهُ Better than him. )خَلَقْتَنِي مِن نَّارٍ وَخَلَقْتَهُ مِن طِينٍ ( You created me from fire, you created him from clay.

So this is the culmination of materialist thinking. So it's no coincidence that as our society moves deeper and deeper into materialism, it moves deeper and deeper into individualism and selfishness. He was selfish. I don't want to acknowledge anything for Adam. This is a distinction I should have. He's only thinking of himself. (أَنَا خَيْرٌ مِّنْهُ أَنَا I am better than him.

The Spiritual Virtues: Generosity and Self-Sacrifice

A spiritual system wants to remove the I and replace it with who? With focus on the divine and replace it on the other. One of our greatest virtues - we have three interrelated concepts as Muslims in our moral and ethical system : الجود والسخاء والإيثار. And they're all sometimes translated as generosity, but they're levels. The first level is السخاء - a person shares something but keeps most of it for himself or herself. سخاء. Then there's جود. جود is where a person shares something but he gives most of it but keeps something back for himself or herself. الإيثار is they give it all and they don't care about themselves, they don't care about themselves. لا نهل الله. So because why? They understand Allah will provide for me. Whatever I share, it came from Allah, it didn't come from me. And they believe that Allah تعالی will recompense them as He has promised.

This morning, this very morning I was reading in Imam As-Sulami's طبقات الصوفيةAbi Abdur-Rahman As- Sulami, and he mentioned a saying of Shaqiq Al-Balkhi. He said: إذا أراد الإنسان أن تعرف معرفته بالله فانظر إلى ما وعده

الله ووعده الناس أيهما أثق به - if you want to know the extent of your true knowledge of Allah, how much you really know Allah, look at what Allah has promised and look at what the people have promised you. Which of the two do you have more confidence in? Which of the two do you have more confidence in? What Allah has promised or what the people have promised? The people promise you if you give them their money they'll give you nowadays a 2% return, maybe 1 point something. Allah promises you if you give him your money by sharing it with his creatures, he'll give you a return that's exponentially greater than anything you can imagine. Which promise do we have confidence in? One will make us hold on, one will make us share. Which of the two do we have more confidence in?

الله أعلم. But if we're spiritual creatures, we have more confidence in that which is with Allah. And this is what we want to talk about in the balance of the khutbah.

Ihsan: The State of Divine Awareness

When Allah says ( إِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَقِيبًا verily Allah is watching over you, this is a state in our religion that's called Ihsan. When the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم was asked about Ihsan, he said:

(Sahih Muslim 8)

«أَنْ تَعْبُدَ اللَّهَ كَأَنَّكَ تَرَاهُ فَإِن لَّمْ تَكُن تَرَاهُ فَإِنَّهُ يَرَاكَ»

That you worship Allah as if you see him, and if you fail to see him, be mindful of the fact that he observes you. We can't see Allah, but we can be so conscious of Allah it's as if we see him.

And to make an example from our worldly experiences, all of you, all of us, myself included, we've been in a room and we knew someone else was in the room. We didn't see the person, but their presence was so intense that we had no doubt someone's in the room. That's consciousness, that's awareness, that's attentiveness. So we should be in a state where our consciousness that Allah is present is more real than that instance where we absolutely knew someone's in here. We're in the library alone studying, a lot of students here, we sense someone's in the room, then we're either relieved or startled when someone walks from behind the bookshelf depending on who they are, how they're dressed and what they look like. We're relieved or startled, but we say, yeah I knew someone was in here, I had no doubt. So in that sense we're not surprised.

But Allah is more real and Allah is more attendant, and our consciousness of Allah should be sharper than it was in that instance. And we should work to make that our permanent state - our awareness of Allah never leaves us.

Being Shy Before Allah

But if we can't arrive to that station, as Ibn Juzay Al-Kalbi mentioned in something we read last week in another venue, then we should at least try to attain to the state of consciousness where we're aware at all times that Allah is observing us. And then it's easy to take the advice, to implement the command of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم استحي من الله حق الحياء - be shy before Allah, it should rightfully be the case. We're shy before our elders, we're shy before people we assume or believe have a refined religious state. We would never say certain things in their presence, we would never do certain things in their presence out of our shyness for them. While Allah ta'ala has more right that we're shy before Him, because our grandmother or grandfather or the imam or whoever, they don't determine the fate of our soul, they don't assess our actions, they don't weigh our deeds يوم القيامة. That's something reserved for Allah that Allah ta'ala has reserved for Himself.

So if we're mindful for them when none of those consequences in terms of the fate of our soul rest in their hand, how much more mindful and how much more shy should we be before Allah, how much more should that awareness check our actions.

The Path to Spiritual Attentiveness: Mushahada

But that takes work, and just summarize something we read from Ibn Juzay's tafsir last week, not here but elsewhere, just to remind the brothers and sisters. He says that if a person can't arrive to that first state of constant attentiveness before Allah, constant alertness before Allah, constant awareness of Allah ta'ala's presence, then try to arrive to the second state because it will check your action. And then he mentioned a plan to get us there.

So if one, the first state is called Mushahada, the witnessing. And to get to that state we have to remove the dross of the world from our hearts, because our hearts have witnessed that reality of Allah ta'ala's presence when Allah ta'ala brought us into His presence and assembled us, extracted us from the loins of our forefather Adam and called us to witness. Here is the Mushahada:

And he called them to witness against their souls saying, am I not your lord? ) قَالُوا بَلَىٰ شَهِدْنَا ) They said certainly we bear witness, certainly we bear witness.

So why don't we bear witness now? Because as we said, the material dross of this world has clouded over our souls and that reality that was so clear at that time. Why? Because it was before we even knew of the physical world. There was no material reality or substance or essence to cloud over our hearts and to darken our spirits. So we immediately responded ( بَلَىٰ شَهِدْنَا أَن تَقُولُوا يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ إِنَّا كُنَّا عَنْ هَذَا غَافِلِينَ ) So that we would not say on the day of resurrection we were heedless of this fact.

So if we're going to give that answer yawmal qiyamah, we have to remove the dross. And one way to remove it, he gives a program. He says the first thing is Musharata - make a condition on yourself each and every waking day that you will not rebel against Allah on that day, that you will do everything in your power to implement everything Allah has asked of us as we go into this day. Musharata.

And that's followed by what he calls Murabata, and then interrupt to wrap up, enter into a binding covenant with Allah that you will be faithful in the condition you have entered into. And this is the state of the true believer. Allah ta'ala mentions in Quran:

Amongst the believers there are men, and women are included also, who are truthful in the covenant they've convened with Allah. They are truthful in the covenant they've convened with Allah.

Self-Assessment and Spiritual Growth

So we make the condition and then follow that by Muhasaba - we assess ourselves at the end of the day to see how well and how faithful we've been in fulfilling that condition. And if we've been faithful, we praise Allah.

And if we find that we've fallen short, then he has another step which he calls Mu'aqaba - to rebuke ourselves, either verbally, talk to yourself sometimes, not idly. If you're idly talking to yourself, someone might call 911, but in the privacy of your home or the park or somewhere, talk to yourself, have a discourse with your soul, have a discourse with Allah, and if you find you've fallen short, rebuke yourself. Why did you do that? You're better than that. That's one of the best ways to rebuke yourself - remind yourself you're better than that. Why did you smoke that? Why did you drink that? Why did you say that? You're better than that. You're the son of Adam, you're the daughter of Adam, you're the vicegerent of Allah in this world, you're the witness for other people, other communities, other nations. You're better than that. Rebuke yourself.

And then renew the condition and renew the covenant and renew your examination in the following day and proceed in that way to Allah, and if we're serious in this, then we'll find our awareness of Allah grows and we'll