 وعلى آله الطيبين والطاهرين المأسومين المظلومين أما بعد فقد قال الله سبحانه وتعالى في كتاب المجيل وقوله الحق وهو أستقص صادقين اسم الله رحمان الرحيم لا يكلف الله ونفسا إلا وسعها صدق الله العلي العظيم صلوات الله محمد وأهل محمد كل محاولة تبقى لله سبحانه وتعالى ونبدأ فيه بلسط name ونسأل لكم all رمضان كريم رمضان وبارك كرمي our fasting and our small services that we indulge in in order to abstain from the worldly pursuits that may lead to greed that may lead to self-degradation that الله سبحانه وتعالى غرنس us the strength in this month by which to reach that balance because as you know islam is a religion of balance الله سبحانه وتعالى وعزن بالخس ولا تخسر الميزان we maintain we ask we command you to maintain everything with a balance so in this month of ramadan is you know fasting is a means of balance it's a means of balance and when we abstain from food it is not the norm for us and we ask the question why should we abstain from eating well because when we do abstain from eating it makes us alert it makes us sometimes agitated because we feel that you know i'm hungry i really need to but there's a command of god that we have to obey and we wonder why is Allah commanding us to do something as such to abstain from eating and we find that that desire that we hold back is indeed something الله سبحانه وتعالى wants to strengthen us through صلوة الله محمد والمحمد while we're settling down because i do see sometimes a little bit of noise it's a bit of a distraction thank you this verse 286 of sot al bakhara as i mentioned yesterday and i was talking about the self and the journey the self has to go through in order to reach this self that has succeeded and fulfilled the obligation of why Allah created us so let me delineate in very simplistic terms why did Allah create us many people in Islam when you ask them Christians too sometimes even Jews but particularly Muslims when they are asked the question why did God create us they will typically answer that God created us to test us that's a very typical answer Allah created us to test us while that is true but that is not the reason He created us الله did not create us to test us He created us because He is merciful and He created us purely out of His mercy not to test us we exist because of His mercy simple Allah says كتب على نفس الرحمة and Allah also says in the Qur'an ولي ذلك خلقهم but this reason for the رحمة I created them so it means Allah created us purely out of His mercy and mercy is a very powerful word as I mentioned the first night we as Muslims should be the most positive people our character should be positive our demeanor should be positive our outlook should be positive we must be vigilant in maintaining a positive trajectory positive positive lifestyle and we should have low tolerance for negative behavior if we do that we will have the first level of paradise on this earth as you know this earth is a paradise it's hell on earth because us humans cause hell on each other as I mentioned yesterday in fact Allah has many verses like this الله says even الله does not do meaning He does not do injustice nor does He make hell for us on this earth He does not so I'm sure it's spinning in your heads right now but what about all these problems with earthquakes and we have floods you know death it can be very debilitating you know it can be very painful when we lose someone all these are consequences of lack of faith for when we have deep rooted faith with yakeen and certainty we will find these trials and tribulations will be easy to manage even if they are natural disasters because you will have hope in Allah and you will know that every second when we have lived on this earth we were positive and we will bring positive results and positive results leads to eradication of poverty mental poverty spiritual poverty intellectual poverty today most disasters that take place if you examine the ones who suffer the most are the ones who are in the lowest levels of the economic um strata meaning the poorest people are the ones who die the most they are the ones who receive the most punishment quote unquote when floods take place because they are living in flood zone the wealthy live on upper zones they know where the flood zones are when earthquakes take place the homes of the poor are the ones that collapse the rich ones have built them as earthquake resistant so is it الله who's causing such hell on people or is it us against each other due to our own greed and due to our own you know malice and hatred and desire to pontificate to push our own agenda over others think about it whereas الله created us purely out of mercy and he said if you think in a very positive way while negatives do exist and it's beautiful that negative exists if you don't have the power to lose in a game then you and I are not excited to go watch a game you know you have superstars in in soccer and in basketball and in all the sports tennis they become superstars because they avoided the losses but if the losses were removed then there's no value in their stardom so the negatives have to coexist with us they're essential the ability to lose and to get sick and to die and to fail are essential if we're going to honor each other when we pass and when we succeed heroes are not ones who go into safe havens heroes are the ones who go in dangerous places and they go and bring good out of that which is bad so الله سبحانه وتعالى has not done an evil thing when he says من شرما خلق say i seek refuge by the lord of dawn from the evil he created the evil here is the potential to go wrong like a teacher who gives you an exam and there are five possible answers in every question four are evil one is good but we don't say the teacher is evil the teacher created the evil in the exam because if you put the wrong answer you get a zero but the teacher is not evil the teacher puts the evil for you to avoid it in order for you to realize that you know it so الله has put evils around us and the potentials of evils but the transaction of evil comes due to our own ignorance and when we think negatively when we look at the قلص as half empty then we become destructive if not of course self-destruct this month of ramadan is a month for us to reflect on the graces of الله الله created us purely out of his mercy he put us on this earth only because of his mercy but the continuation of his mercy demands that when this human being among the creations has been shaped informed and given intelligence and beauty needs to be put in a system of trials so that this blessed creation is now able to honor themselves when الله says indeed we honored the children of Adam what's this honor the honor is that we are put under a trial for if you are not qualified to be tested then you're put aside it's like going playing for a team let's say you play soccer and the captain doesn't call you let's you sit on the bench and you're wondering why is the captain not calling me because maybe the captain feels you are not worthy of representing the team because you don't have the ability to be tested now ask that player how do you feel they'll say i feel insulted i feel bad i'm not chosen i'm not chosen to go out whether i win or lose the captain doesn't consider me worthy whereas الله in the quran says he has chosen you and he has not made the religion difficult upon you وسمكوا المسلمين من قبل وفي هذا you're following the religion of ibrahim it's a religion of guidance so in this month we asked the basic question we fast we abstain from eating as i started why because الله says you are under trial نبت ليه هل اتعال الانسان حين من الدهري لم يكن شيئا مذكورة انها خلقنا الانسان من نطفة امشاج نبت ليه فجعلناه سميعا اصيرا انها هديناه السبيلة اما شاكرا اما افورا الله says has mankind not considered they were not worthy of being mentioned but we created them not only we create them we created them from a clot simple thing you know when you sneeze and what comes out of your nose is the same clot you see but it's of a different character and it creates us you and i a complex being full of hope we question our existence we talk about eternity eternity infinity the creation of Allah is all finite nothing is infinite only Allah is infinite we're all finite but all we talk about is infinity ان فيها خالدهم إن الذي نامن وعمل الصالحات لهم جنة نعيم خالدين فيها ابدا الله سبحانه وتعالى is telling us if you believe and do good for you there is a paradise waiting forever who wants to live for a thousand years who wants to love for a thousand years who it's foolish the value of everything you and i hold honestly pay attention to this very important when we talk about values when we like something when we love something when we covet something when we want something when we want to become something you will notice all values have time stipulations all values i like my house i value it there's a time stipulation underneath it i like my job i get paid well there's a time stipulation in that i love my mother i love my father i love my spouse i love my children there is a time stipulation in it which we don't talk about some have time stipulation but that which is love its greatest value is in the value of eternity it's not bound by time you cannot say to somebody i love you for 10 years this year only this year i will love you next year i'll consider it does it make sense think about it if you really process this matter you know a father comes i love my children for 10 years only that's it after that i told my wife that's it or you tell your spouse you know the wife says to the husband the husband says to the wife let's get married but i love you only for a year or 10 years or five years it's silly doesn't make sense it's got to be forever brothers and sisters how can it become forever unless there is a forever and there is a being that guarantees forever the one who has been forever this question the way asked do you believe in god why do you believe in god we say to them without god there is no eternity and without values in eternity there is no reason to exist nor to even to talk about this matter it's ludicrous to say that i came from an accident and i'm going to die and become nothing but all my values are built and pegged on a fictitious eternity when there is no eternity after i die insanity honestly just capture this simplistic idea that is so profound and so foundational when you and i have doubts should i believe in allah is he really there think about it remove allah from the picture nothing makes sense honestly it appears mechanical for the low for the low level thinker for time stipulation take allah out of the picture you are our entire value system collapses this is the rahmah of allah that he is in doubt intelligence in us allah says never telly he people ask where is god i can't see him allah replies ذلك الكتاب ولا ريبة فيه ودل المتقين الذين يؤمنون بالغيب بالغيب في this book there is no doubt for those who are god conscious who are they they believe in the unseen there is value in the unseen it's very powerful very powerful seeing something with the heart seeing something that is beyond time seeing something intelligently intellectually is superior than actual physical seeing and it changes value i remember a story i'll share it with you just to give you a gist of what i just stated صلوات الله محمد وعلم محمد you know we heard of the story of bahlul because you know bahlul was a companion of three of our imams so bahlul as you know was related to haroon and rashid they were relatives but bahlul was a very close companion of our imams and a very staunch full of ahlulbayt very intelligent person deeply rooted one of the olul al-bar he's on the street selling land in paradise so as you know haroon haroon is passing by the street he sees bahlul selling land in paradise i'm sure some of you have heard this story it's a good story so he says bahlul what are you doing says i'm selling land in paradise he says how much so he gives him a small number like ten dirhams a small amount so but haroon who was a non-believer as you know he was a kafir in many ways haroon and rashid laugh at him he says oh really this is like a ponzi scheme you're selling me stuff that doesn't exist because haroon was very material he loved material in fact haroon said if my children معمون and salim if they covet the khilaf i'll kill them that's how much he loved material but it's the same story you and i should understand this through this principle when we talk about dean when we talk about god when we talk about religion when we talk about high values you will see that they don't have they're not independent on material components they are superior to material components so haroon goes home and tells his wife that this bahlul is selling um land he said yeah i bought it his wife was a good person he said yeah i bought it so haroon goes to sleep at night and he has the most vivid vision of paradise he sees it in 3d next morning quickly he goes to the streets looking for bahlul selling land in paradise and he wants to buy it he says i want to buy the land so bahlul gives him an astronomical number like you know a million dirhams so haroon said yesterday it was only 10 today it's that much he said yeah yesterday you didn't see it today you saw it there's a big difference صلاة الله محمد والمحمد the moral of the story was the first day he had to believe in it the second day there was little belief in it that was tangible in his hand and you and i need to believe in judgment day you and i need to believe in the unseen the future and of course the unseen of the unseen is الله سبحانه وتعالى and if you take it to a higher stage of understanding within our prophetic and imam imami mission you will find the غيبة of our living imam is within that same principle that Allah put him in hiding precisely to ignite this character of trials upon us to make us realize that is there a function for a living imam who is in a state of hidden position meaning in occultation is there a function and many people have a difficult time understanding this idea of a hidden imam صلاة الله محمد والمحمد i'll talk about the غيبة if imam صحب الزمان عجل الله تعالى فرجك إن شاء الله in the next few nights to understand the principles but right now let's understand that Allah created us out of his mercy he's testing us and he's given us the ability to go astray he's given us the capacity to be incredibly good and to be relatively infallible we can become in fact we are some of you know human beings are generally relatively infallible in many things we can murder enjoy the world doesn't do that i know people who've never lied on this earth they don't lie they refuse to lie technically on the issue of lying they're infallible there are levels of infallibility of course our prophets and imams are of the highest level of infallibility but humans also practice that but Allah when he mentioned this i كليف الله نفسا إلا وصعها we don't put a burden on you except that which you can handle الله سبحانه وتعالى is telling me that based on your knowledge i will hold you liable based on your ability to acquire knowledge i will hold you liable based on your struggles to get to know i will hold you liable otherwise i don't hold you liable how do we know that i'll just touch it today i'll go deeper into this some other nights the story of mousa عليه السلام and خذر in سوط الكهف as you know الله says to mousa go you're going to meet somebody who's going to show you things go and mousa عليه السلام meets him and خذر تي says to him you won't be able to bear it what i will do you can't bear it you won't be able to understand it mousa says you know i mean he says i will be among the patient ones as they're going as you know hey the first you know sinks a boat and says what did you just do is didn't i tell you you can't practice patience now the gist of this moral story is that he does three things major ones the quran mentions one is this second is that he kills a young child number three he builds a wall reinforcing the wealth of orphans never did mousa apologize to خذر there is nowhere in the quran where mousa عليه السلام apologizes to خذر in fact mousa says to him don't hold me liable don't hold me liable he doesn't apologize because he's saying to him that the cliff god has given me is based on my understanding and if you sink a boat that is perfectly functional my fitra my understanding tells me it's wrong when you kill the child my fitra tells me it's wrong you see when you come to a community that is very harsh to you and they want to kick you out and you want to fix something my essence tells me that maybe you don't have to do this it's not wrong so notice mousa عليه السلام is saying to خذر don't hold me liable your knowledge is greater god has given you access on a greater scale but the cliff of mine is to understand what you're saying based on my capacity so الله سبحانه وتعالى will hold us liable based on our struggles you see so Allah has given us sight and hearing but it's logical for you and i to struggle to increase the knowledge which is why الله says in the quran to the prophet وقول رب زدني علمه and say my lord increase my knowledge increase my knowledge and الله says يؤتي الحكمة من يشاء وما يؤتي الحكمة فققوتي خيرا كثيرة he gives wisdom to who he wills and whoever he has given wisdom to he has given them much good these are things you and i have to aim for in this trial in this month of ramadan الله revealed the quran a brief introduction to the quran because the quran enables us to understand the unseen it strengthens our intellect to be able to reflect and understand the past the values of the present and the future in order to be secure that when we make decisions calculated risk decisions while we live they are predicated on a very clear understanding of how the quran has enhanced our thinking to become better decision makers and to secure our dunya and the other that's why the quran that's why the quran says in this quran يهدي للتي هي أقوم ويبشر المؤمنين الذين يعملون الصالحة أننا لهم أجرا كبيرة this quran guides you to that which is most upright and give good news to the believers who act on it the day shall have a great reward a paradise so Allah is saying the quran is a book of guidance let me introduce the quran briefly for us to understand that when we have this desire of our souls to reach from ammara to lawama to we have to indulge in acquisition of knowledge there is no way to fulfill when Allah swears by the self-accusing soul you and i cannot reach the stage of nasa lawama unless we are vigilant with our eyes and our ears and our hearts and our minds and watching and studying and thinking and reflecting if you and i do not reflect as i mentioned yesterday if we do not sit around our table and talk and discuss and enable children and adults to question and to get into debates with civility we will not progress when i see intelligent people who are very successful i monitor them and i notice that they have a habit or they have developed a habit i wish to sit and read and reflect and by the way reading you my young brothers especially and sisters always read read as much as you can if there is one thing that enhances the front and low and makes the intelligence sharper reading in the quran elegantly the first command الله gives is إقرا باسم ربك الذي خلق recite read in the name of your lord who creates reading quran is a book to be read unlike any other book in the world there is no book that tells me my existence my purpose my past my present my future and the one that consoles me when i'm in a state of trepidation when i'm in a state of anxiety you will find that there is no book الله says وننزل من القرآن ما هو شفاء ورحمة لي المؤمنين it's an elixir it's a it's a it's a it's medication it's calming when we read it you might think oh this guy is reading quran not i know the kids mashallah have a lot of energy there we can thank you if we have when we read the quran and we reflect we're probably thinking wait wait wait wait there are those who read who are who faas of quran but they killed أمر بن عاء أمر بن صاد these were people who knew the quran very well they were the ones who butchered the family of the prophet what about that does it make sense well there are people out there who learn the knowledge of allah to abuse it there are educated doctors and doctorates who use it to abuse but that's a minority shaitan is like that and الله will punish them but let's not generalize nobody can argue that knowing the quran is a wrong thing and what's a miracle of the quran think about it there is the bible the Torah bug vad gita the sanskrit find me a religion where even young children have memorized the entire scripture cover to cover not with one haraqa out of place other than the quran i'd like to hear it you will never find christians memorizing the entire bible cover to cover with all due respect muslim children when i went to the islamic republic i met saeed muhamad the saint tawa tawa six years old he knew the quran cover to cover and i questioned him back and forth i asked him questions and he would respond with quran by quran i said subhanallah this is a six-year-old seven-year-old how it does he do this الله says it's a shifa know it understand it walk it talk it it will protect you it will guide you it's the only book in the world that's moral entirely hence it doesn't follow a chronological order and you and i understand it we say when we read the quran there's a story then the story ends and another story starts like in surat al-kaaf there are four stories why not finish one story in another chapter in surat al-taha الله continues to talk about musa but why not the whole thing like yusuf you know نحن نقص عليك أحسن القصص بما أوحينا إليك هذا القرآن give me this قصص tell me the whole story surat yusuf is the only sura where الله focuses entirely on a story to prove to us that الله does and can tell stories with such precision that when the movie yusuf was made there were i think 45 series of it yet in a set of two dozen verses the entire story was encapsulated with depth on the story of yusuf al-it brilliant so deep that when yusuf is talking to his فاضا يا أبتي اني رأيتوا احد عشر كوكبان والشمس والقمر رأيتهم لساجدين i see 12 planets moon and the sun bowing to me it says يا بني لا تقصص رؤيك اخواتك do not say this to your brothers the quran is establishing a story children of prophets brothers yet they are jealous get ready you're gonna live in this world a world of trials it's going to be filled with jealousy even if you're the son of a prophet and that jealousy will lead you to be destructive and you will you know manipulate and you will strategize rather than be positive that subhanallah فتبارك الله احسن الخالقين oh الله you gave me a brother who's good who's better than me let me become good too and let him become better no get him throw him in the well kill him if he dies this is many of us in the world today unfortunately we see the glasses half empty and we empty it but الله says نحن نقصوا عليك احسن القصة we're gonna give you a story that's going to be a lesson for you a lesson where while the brothers hoped that their handsome young brother who was intelligent and doubt love it by الله the brother said we're gonna stop it الله says try it that jealousy factor let their brothers to be their brother to be thrown in a well but Allah had a better plan that it came in the future that the same brothers who were so jealous had become older and now they were bowing to yusuf for a grain of rice and wheat and yusuf is standing as the treasurer of Egypt what's the moral story behind it be patient as luqman says to his son وصبر على ما أصابك إن ذلك من عزم الأمور be patient it will come to you you will succeed but you need to have vision of the unseen you need to be able to project intellectually you need to be you need to be able to go further and understand the value of today in order to reach that stage when yusuf is standing on that theater of incredible glory that even his father who's a prophet bows to him and says we honor you oh yusuf because الله has commanded us to do this so then what about us the Quran is a book of guidance it's a moral book but it doesn't follow chronology because morality is not bound in time stories are bound in time morals have no time i was once at concordia university and a professor among the concordia schools of the lutherans and he asked she asked me no he asked me he said you have this original Quran this 1400 years why isn't it big changed why are you not editing it i looked at him and i said why should we edit it it's a complete book he says well is it adaptive to our modern times i said adaptation on a mechanical basis will require changes but quran is not a book of mechanics it's a book of morals and morals have no time stipulation so whether i tell you today or a million years from now or a million years ago somebody was generous and kind and submissive and gentle and caring and sharing and loving and giving would you say that today that has changed and he looked at me said no i said the quran needs no change it's a book of morals it doesn't change that's why the quran is constantly shifting story to story to tell you that i'm not a book of stories i don't have to tell you chronologically it's not important it's the message that you need to bring out of it and Allah can shift from one prophet to another to the past to the future to any moment Allah says i have never lost my connection of morality to you have i have you lost توحيد in the quran have you lost نبوه in the quran have you lost guidance have you lost hope have you understood the purpose have you known what is hell and what is heaven and paradise have you known what prophets missions are do you know why they are there the quran is the only book in the world that maintains consistency in its morality from cover to cover and it's so firm in it that it challenges us try it get come together and bring something like this i dare you الله says and all humans had to do was dare it said yeah we can we'll do it when the prophet said make something equal the Arabs of the time were very good in poetry they were very good in structuring conversation nobody could challenge it because its consistency is so unique it's so unique but you and i have to understand arabic to appreciate it but the quran is so beautiful that it even touches the lay even the one who doesn't know arabic it touches them just the verses are so soothing my employee when i used to pick him up in the morning and quran i would have quran in the car he was of a christian faith very good human being he said i don't know what that is but every morning i've been coming with you in the car this thing calms me and i love coming to work having heard it but i don't know what it is now of course maybe it was the beautiful voice but i truly believe when you and i recite it does something i am a firm believer because i've practiced it you know when i go up and lecture in very hostile environments especially sometimes i go and we have debates and sometimes we go and have conversations with people of other faiths and they are totally misinformed about us or disinformed about us as muslims and i don't blame them with their hostility sometimes you know when you keep hearing negatives about somebody you can't avoid to feel negative about that person but now how do you win their hearts and how do you bring them back and you recite a verse or you recite a surah before you go out like the way mosa recited listen my tongue expand my chest my breath make me clear in communication with them or you recite a verse when i would recite surat al-khlas when i was once in a panel of christian jews hindus muslim they were all faiths and buddhists and i was representing islam and i started with surat al-khlas and everybody looked at me like wow what was that but after that it's like you're in control الله says take it this audience is yours because you used my words believe me we can be as eloquent speakers as possible there is no greater power than quoting the kalam of الله there is no greater power i say it in front of you on this pulpit we can be eloquent as eloquent الله calls them they're like embellished pieces of wood poets but when you quote the quran and you touch it and he talks to you إمام علي عليه السلام says ask the quran talk to it it will talk back to you إمام خميني رحمة الله ياله mentions in his book عذاب الصلاة he says on judgment day the most beautiful creations will look at you and you will wish you they were yours that creation will look at you and say you could have been mine if you were my friend on earth and you will ask that creation who are you on earth he said i was surah such and such did you make friends with me then if you did then i'm your friend now take a surah this month make friends with it short along make friends read it over and over and over talk it walk it and see it's a book of morals brothers and sisters leave it alone besides that it calms us it negates negative behavior and it promotes positives we'll discuss the essence of this quran in the next few nights it's power it's powerful versions of how it tells me to look at life in very positive ways and never to lose hope never it describes it with graphic details it tells me who i really am why i'm here what's my function and i believe the reason many of us are apathetic we have less we we lack spirituality we lack security we're very material we're very impulsive if not compulsive because we lack stability and we lack stability because we haven't touched the calam of allah the way it deserves it may Allah give us a torque fake on this blessed night to become acquainted with it that a verse should pass us and it should enlighten us بعد إذ حديتنا وحبلنا بندنك رحمة إنك أنت الوحاب ربنا خفر لنا والإخواننا الذين سبقون بالإيمان ولا تجعل في قلوبنا غلل الذين آمنوا ربنا إنك رأوف الرحيم وأخر الدعون الحمد لله رب العالمين والسلام عليكم جميعا ورحمة الله وبركاته شكرا جميعا حج حسنين again we'd like to welcome everybody to the Islamic Education Center it's the first Saturday night of the month of Ramadan the announcements i made before حج began speaking i will repeat now in both english and farsi so that way we can begin the دعا ربنا first off if you're like me you have not yet signed up for any donations for the coming nights of the month of Ramadan we're still awaiting some sponsors for nights in the coming month please see the sheikh Bahraini or in the back and sign up or give your donations for the month next on monday night wednesday night and friday night of next week it'll be a potluck dinner the center will be providing the regular bread and cheese and walnut plates please be sure to join the center even after Ramadan on the Tuesday night Thursday night programs as well as Salatul Jum'ah it's a potluck the center will be providing the regular bread and cheese and walnut plates