 I hope you're all doing well. This is our second session since post Ramadan and Masha'Allah, we're in the month of Dhul Hijjah. This is the second official day, insha'Allah. All of you are well and enjoying this Mubarak time. I didn't realize it was going to be Dhul Hijjah last time, but Alhamdulillah, what we shared last time for those of you who were with us or weren't with us, I'll just kind of recap. We talked about the effects of post Ramadan, you know, where we are spiritually. And so I just read from something that I had created. It's just a little short list of 10 qualities that are helpful to know if you are growing spiritually or not. So I read from that. And so Alhamdulillah, here we are. It's Dhul Hijjah. And I mean it's kind of time, you know, it makes you think about how time moves so quickly sometimes. Of course, there's periods where time is stretched for us. So we ask Allah to stretch these next Mubarak nights for all of us and days for all of us so that we can really maximize the benefit. I actually wanted to start off with a few hadith just to, you know, get our hearts prepared on Dhul Hijjah, but then just give you the agenda for today. It's interesting that I said agenda, but there is a text I don't know how many of you are familiar with it but it's a transformative life changing text so in a similar vein to what we talked about last time which is really looking at the trajectory of our spiritual path kind of assessing whether we are growing or not. We, I wanted to continue that conversation but in a more proactive way. So I'm going to be reading selections from a text called agenda to change our condition. And I'll go ahead and show you an image of the book if you don't have it I highly recommend this textbook. There's a Hamsa Yusuf and a Shaker. Of course, Hamsa for those of us in the Bay Area San Francisco Bay Area we are very familiar with both of these incredible gems may Allah preserve them and protect them. But this work is one of, I think, you know, there's certain things in the in the Muslim home library that that I think every Muslim home library should have certain books, of course the Quran hadith, but there's certain texts that for all ages really in many ways, they're relevant, you could always use them to educate your families to come together for discussions for individual reading. So this is one of those texts. And so I'll get into that for the majority of the discussion but let's go ahead and start off by just reflecting on some hadith about this month inshallah. I'm going to screen share. So I will go ahead and I want you guys to have a visual I know sometimes when people are reading it's hard to follow along if you don't have that so I prepared some slides. So I'll go ahead and screen share here and let me see this middle. I hope you guys can see this. So inshallah you guys can see where we are here and your everything is clear for you. But this is the list that I read from last week, or two weeks ago, excuse me two weeks ago from today. We read from this list like I said I created this image created the list, based on just some of the readings that I've had of different scholars, where they talk about spiritual growth and so came up with this short list just to give us you know some guy is some something to test whether or not we're really growing spiritually, you're free to tune into that session it's up on the MCC website and if you want to listen to that talk. But this is the slide that accompanies that talk unfortunately I didn't have it last time on hand, but I wanted to provide it, at least here. So let's go ahead and look at the virtues of this beautiful time of the year for all of us. You know it's amazing when you think about how many opportunities we have every day, and throughout the year we're almost practice in many ways throwing us a lifeline spiritually. Ramadan is certainly a big one, and all of us are so in need of those 30 days to really renew our faith to commit to get into good habits. As we talked about last time it's very normal, because the ego is so strong and we don't have the incredible gift that we have gotten that we we had for so long and maybe even took for granted may Allah forgive us of our jamma right. Ramadan in many ways other than this virtual space has been taken from most of us now for months and it's been very spiritually taxing. I've heard from many people who are struggling with prayers, struggling with hijab, struggling with different spiritual works because even reading the Quran because what they had before this consistent weekly at least dosage of Ramadan or programs at the masjid where they could see community members. They no longer have that and it's difficult to manage the online classes, even though, Alhamdulillah Alhamdulillah we still have a great many teachers and organizations that are still providing programs. Of course MCC is included among them may Allah protect and preserve all of the staff and everybody involved with MCC for facilitating, but still people are feeling the effects of this quarantine that has just stretched out for so long. And so the spiritual reality or the reality is that many people are spiritually in those in that, you know, that state of just vacillating between, you know, with highs and lows and that's natural. A few a couple months after Ramadan ends, Allah gives us this next great windfall, spiritual windfall of the Hijjah at the first 10 days. So Alhamdulillah this is again from the mercy of our Lord. And when you reflect on the Hadith and you realize what an opportunity this is, then it makes you kind of reinvigorates you, you know, and inshallah we need to we need that we need that reinvigoration whenever we find ourselves slipping and just sort of losing momentum. So Alhamdulillah for our Deen, Alhamdulillah for Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala and his generosity for blessing us to witness these Mubarak days, may we make the most of them. So let's look at what the Prophet said and told us. He said here in this first Hadith, the Prophet said there are no days in which righteous deeds are more beloved to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala than in these 10 days. So MashaAllah I'm having made Hajj, I know from personal experience, the preparation of the excitement in the heart of the believer who's going for the journey of Hajj is, it's really hard to capture in words. For those who've been, you know what I'm talking about, even for Umrah, anytime you visit the sacred cities, but Hajj has a distinct quality of excitement, fear, there's just so much emotion preparing for that. But again, just reflecting on the mercy of Allah that he has made this period accessible to not just the Hajj and those on the journey, but for all of us in order of maximizing our deeds and the potential of amassing as many rewards as we possibly can. So SubhanAllah we have to reflect on that because every year I'm sure, with the exception of this year, every year there's always that feeling from those who are left behind wanting so much, yearning so much to be able to make this journey, whether it's Hajj or Umrah, but especially during this month. And so the fact that Allah SWT kind of levels the playing field, if you would, by telling us that all of our righteous deeds are beloved to Allah SWT in this time more than any other time. To me it's just such a profound thing and something we should not take for granted, which means really being mindful of what we're doing in this time. You know, so this is a period of time where you want to make sure you're not squandering it on anything that's wasteful. You know, doing things that are no benefit or just engaging in wrong deeds obviously would be reprehensible more so in this time than any other time because of the sanctity of this time. So you want to really watch yourself and say, what am I going to do in the next eight days now that we're in the second, you know, day already? What's my plan? Or do I have a goal? You know, much like some of the sisters on some of these threads that I'm, you know, we're all on WhatsApp threads. But I received from a couple of sisters this little hijab PDF and it was really like a chart or a way of keeping yourself motivated every single day of these 10 days. And I thought that was really great, especially for young children to get involved if you want to start creating that system of, you know, just holding yourself to account or having accountability, right? Because if you have a chart or something where you're writing things down, it's really easy to see your progress and it's good to get the kids started on something like that early. Similar to how we do it for Ramadan, right? We have the Ramadan calendars and a lot of parents get their kids excited with incentives and things like that. We can do the same for this period of the month. So taking yourself into account, setting some goals, what are you planning to do? If you're going to plan to read more Quran, are you doing selected prayers or making up for missed prayers? Are you planning to do anything? Attending classes? Something of virtue or the more the merrier, right? But really thinking for the next few days, or eight days or so, what is your plan and taking advantage of the potential of it. The next hadith here we have the Prophet ﷺ said, or was reported to have said, there are no days greater and more beloved to Allah than these 10 days of Dhul-Hijjah. So increase in them your declaration of the oneness of Allah, right? La ilaha illa Allah. Your exaltation of Him and praise of Him, right? Subhanallah. And your praise of Him, Alhamdulillah. All of the asqara that we know that they could that this be that we would do on a normal even more so during this mubarak time. And in the last hadith here, the Prophet ﷺ said, no good deeds can be done at a time better than these first 10 days of Dhul-Hijjah. And one of the Sahaba asked, not even jihad in the way of Allah, the Prophet ﷺ said, not even jihad in the way of Allah. Again, telling us how important it is that we take advantage of this windfall of Dhul-Hijjah and not take it for granted. I know, as I said before, we're all in a slump physically, emotionally, mentally, because of the difficulty of this quarantine and maybe other personal issues that people are going with. But the case remains that are the fact still remains that this is a incredible time for all of us to reconnect, maybe get capture what we were missing from Ramadan. So inshallah, may Allah unify our hearts and really help us to set some practical and sustainable goals. You know, you don't want to go too to the extreme when you're setting goals for this type of stuff. You want to have practical goals and really listen to yourself and work consistently. That's the most important thing. Creating habits, spiritual habits that are consistent, even if they're smaller as we know from the hadith, is better than trying to do too much. And then just tapping out or burning out afterwards and leaving it all behind. So we want to avoid extremes. So may Allah give us balance and bring our hearts together. So I just wanted to put these reminders as we continue the conversation for all of us to reflect on and so that when we leave this short time that we have together, we have some goals in mind or we start to prepare for some goals, inshallah. So with that said, I think this book Agenda to Change Our Condition is quite fitting because it really is about helping us to formulate better habits and there are so many treasures in this book. I actually considered starting in a sort of chronological order from the beginning, but I thought about, let's go to the back actually I'm going to do something a little different and I have my own reasons for that but I really think that we in order to set on the spiritual path and really commit to doing something that is consistent and transformative. We have to consider everything in front of us you know what the options are or what we're setting out to do sort of like when you prepare for travel right you have to really think about what your where your destination is what you're going to do to prepare for that. And this text mashallah from the beginning it kind of dives right into a lot of very obviously beneficial things, but I feel like the back of the book, where the appendix is has a lot of great advice and the more advice, the better right especially because we're just so bereft. And you know there's reasons for that this is a very difficult time in the world, and many of us don't have as I said access like we normally would or we just simply don't there are a lot of people I know sisters and brothers and communities that are far away. We don't have access to teachers so that's why they're so mashallah grateful for these types of programs because they really don't have that support system in place but the more we can learn from our predecessors before us, our spiritual guides before us the better So part of this book, we have appendix a is actually advice from city Ahmed Zaruk who was a great scholar kind of saint and he has many different wonderful. There's just so much guidance here so in the time that we have I'm going to try to time myself as much as you know be be a try to watch the clock because I can get ahead of myself and not go overboard but I will go through some of the advice he has and then whatever we don't complete today if we can't get to all of it inshallah will continue in our next meeting which will be two weeks from now so For those of you again who are joining and may not be clear. Normally when we do these haqqas with the sisters it was once a month but for the time being anyway during this quarantine we're going to do him twice a month so every other week. So we'll be back in two weeks but let's go ahead and go to the next slide where inshallah you will see. Here's the title of the book again for those who don't have the book I highly recommend that you get it. You can check sandala, which is the main publisher and find it there if you have a local bookstore inshallah it's always great to support the local businesses. So check it out there, but this is the name and the authors. So let's go ahead and look at this advice that city of itself gives us. So this the first what I like about the way that he structured his advice just to give you a little bit of context before I jump in is that he separates things in fives. Okay, so you'll see as we continue with the slides that there are five. You know, pieces of advice and each advice is sort of built upon what or how should I say it's kind of going backwards like this right here this first slide is the is the goal right it's the spiritual path. So he lays out what the foundations of the path are first in the way and we'll get to the details. But then the next slide. He describes to us how we get to these five and then the slide after that or the list after that is how you get to the five before so it's kind of like, in a way working backwards and deconstructing the spiritual path but I think it's really brilliantly done because there's so much good for thought and so much content that we can really use for a discussion so if we look here. He often says, the foundations of our path or five. So, first is mindfulness of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala privately and publicly. So if you want to be on a spiritual path and really be committed and devoted. This is the most essential point that you are a consistent person in your mindfulness of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala and of course from the Hadid of Jibril. We understand the difference between Islam, Iman and Ehsan right. Ehsan is to imagine that you see Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala knowing you can't see him, but also being aware that he sees you. This is what Jibril Alehsan revealed to us so that we understand that is the ultimate goal. Islam, of course, is important. It's, you know, it's actions, right. It's showing the display of your faith. Iman is what you're, you know, what you believe in. So of course those are all essentials. But to take your faith to the next level is to have that awareness at all times. And that you're so, you know, thinking of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala whether you are with people and they're watching you or not it doesn't matter even in the most intimate isolated moments of your day. That you are aware of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala and you seek to please him, obviously, but that you have that presence. So I kind of, I've been teaching through the Rahmah Foundation for the summer school program and we've been teaching teens. So we also covered this text. And one of the ways I tried to explain how this works, this concept of thinking of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala is kind of imagining like a cloud above your head that is always telling you to remember Allah, right. The cloud itself has some message, but there's a cloud that follows you everywhere you go. And even though you don't see it in front of you, because it's not right in front of you, you have this clear presence that it's above you. You feel the cloud above you, right. And so that's kind of how you want to imagine this mindset to this consciousness of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. You don't need you at any point. You're always aware that it's there. And so this analogy of the cloud is useful because sometimes we're distracted by things in front of us, right. That's the dunya. This is the whole test that we're all under is that the dunya is, it bedazzles us. It takes us away from the remembrance of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. But our objective as believers is to always, even in those experiences when we're, things are trying to pull us away, that we check in regularly, right. So we're, the cloud doesn't move. It's always there, but we have to also be cognizant of the cloud and bring awareness into our mind of the cloud. So we look up to make sure that it's there. It will be there, but it's just that it's on us. The onus is on us, because if we don't do that regularly, right. If we become deluded by all of the distractions around us and we forget the presence of the cloud, then clearly we will get sucked into whatever it is that's pulling us away. But our responsibility is that we have to actively become aware of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala in this way that we look up and then we realize that his presence is there. And you know, I'm speaking not physically, right. We're not placing Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala physical space, but I'm talking about the consciousness, the awareness of the mind, right, that Allah is always there. So, but having that in public and private space. Okay. And he says here, I'm just going to read the commentary mindfulness of Allah is realized through scrupulousness and uprightness. Right. And this is being scrupulous, being constantly aware of oneself and always, you know, putting the standard of having high standards right you're not taking it, taking these matters lightly so really do your due diligence and being upright. And then the next point is adherence to the Sunnah and word indeed. So this is another very important component. I was speaking to a friend earlier, and we were just having a conversation, but I just said, we have to be willing to always redirect the lens back on ourselves or, or, you know, to hold ourselves accountable for the things that we say and the things that we claim. So when we claim to love the Prophet, it's easy to say on the tongue, right, but the proof of the claim is in word and action. And so if we don't adhere to his Sunnah, if we prefer our own way over his way, then we cannot make that same claim of devotion and love. It's not consistent. If you truly are devoted to him and you truly love him, it's not enough to just weep at the mention of his name, or listening to a Nashid or a Qasidah and your heart use, or doing salawat and you are just repeating it. It's not good things in and of themselves, but the proof of true devotion of true love is whether or not you apply his Sunnah to your own life. So adhering to his Sunnah and word indeed, if you're truly wanting to be on the spiritual path, that that is a foundational principle you cannot be on the path and not be consistent with that. And he says here that adherence to the Sunnah through caution and excellent character, caution and excellent character, right, thinking about always what would the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam do, would he be pleased with me, right, and preferring always to have the most beautiful character in every situation. And I'll tell you, yesterday, my kids were watching the Celebrate Mercy broadcast. And it was said, Shem Mahmood and Shafi'as al-Fahmi, and they were both teaching last night during a class of Surat al-Mulk. And I encourage those of you who don't know to look that class up. It's a wonderful program. It's actually going to be happening soon, but 730, I think, to 839 every night. So anyhow, they were watching it. And both of the brothers, mashallah, you know, they were in totally prophetic character and the way that they were speaking to each other. So much adab, just preferring one another, just really beautiful display. But my son, because he was looking at it as a, he didn't understand like how they were so nice to each other, thinking that they were maybe not, they didn't really know each other. You know, it's normal to expect that from family or from really close friends, but he just thought, these are two teachers and they're just teaching in class. And I feel like, you know, curious, like, wow, they're just so nice to each other. And I reminded him, this is the prophetic way. This is the beautiful character of our prophet, so I said that they are displaying Mashallah, may Allah protect and preserve them. So we have to continue with that in our own practice. And also, I would add to this in public and in private so in our homes, and when we're out and about in the company of other people. Then we have the next which is indifference to the acceptance or rejection of others. This is also subhanallah really profound because we're living in a time and era where people pleasing is rampant. And many people sometimes even prefer to please people before Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, it's, you know, they're not, they're thinking short term versus long term. So this is where a person may, for example, be out with their friends and you know, adults and youth, I think everybody in between has possibly either been in the situation before or, or, you know, close to it. But the prayer time for prayer comes, you could be out with your friends or even in a social setting, right, a party, a dinner party. Some somewhere where where you may choose to prefer to just keep the peace or, you know, not ruin the fun. And so prayer comes in and you think to yourself it's okay I'll pray when I get home later. How many people have done that in our community. And we know that Allah's father created us for nothing else but to worship him. But we've gotten into the state of, you know, political correctness or social, you know, anxiety where you just start to think that if you do something and you have, you know, say something speak up, right, about something important that it might cost you socially. So you retreat, you don't say anything at all. And it's usually because you're too preoccupied with being accepted or rejected by other people. So the believer is not worried about that the sincere believer always thinks about the pleasure of Allah, knowing full well that if Allah is pleased with them, then everything else will fall into place. And the whole worry gain the anxiety that people get caught up in worrying about relationships worrying about impressing other people worrying about being included in groups, or, or what have you comes from a place of deep insecurity, but the believer who has strong faith and prioritizes Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la in every instance doesn't afflicted with that because they know that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, he will, you know, he can he can do anything and he can turn these people's hearts this way or that way, as long as we focus on pleasing him, we don't worry about the the people or anyone else. So really having that concrete, like your focus is on Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la and not worrying about other people. So he says here, in difference to the acceptance or rejection of others through patience and trust, right. So that's what it is that trust is that confidence that lack of insecurity, and that patience that, you know, just because someone may not understand you or not agree with you now, give people time, you know, there's time, some people need time to process things, but you have to have that trust. We were speaking again earlier during this class with with the teen girls, and one of the girls asked about, you know, what do you do about hijab, you know, if you want to wear hijab but your father is, you know, isn't as worried about your safety and security. And so, Shaytan, of course, would make that situation for that person black and white. Well, you can't do anything to change your dad's or forget about it. But being patient with people who may not accept something you want to do, even if it's obedience to Allah in this case anyway, is, is wise, right, because Allah can turn their heart eventually, but you have to be patient and strategic and wise and, you know, have that emotional intelligence to know how to handle that situation, but not to give up. Same with converts, right, many converts enter the faith and their parents or their family members in the beginning may reject them, but we have to be patient because they might not accept you, but their hearts are in, you know, they're with Allah's path so that he can do anything. And how many people have come after some time to say, you know, I, my parents were so against this faith and now a year later or three months later, my mom wants to take Shahada, my dad, my brother, you know, Allah can do anything So we have to just have that confidence in him, trust in him and be patient not to rush things, right, but really not to be moved or swayed by people. It's all Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Then we have, he has your satisfaction with Allah in hardship and ease. So this is also incredibly important. If you are on this path and you want to be sincere on this path, you have to accept that this world is a place of tribulation and that just as our prophets and the saints and the great people before us bore their tests with patients, we have to learn from their example. And we have to always, always make sure that whether we have hardship or ease that our opinion of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is not affected, right. We're not those like the fair weather friends who are only there when things are going good, but then they disappear when you're having hardships. Who wants a friend like that, right? Who wants anybody in their life like that, who's only there for the party, but then when there's challenges and difficulties, they've disappeared, right, nobody wants that. So we should never be that way with our Lord. We have to always have the best opinion of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that ultimately, even in those hardships that we endure, as long as we remain patient, that his pleasure to acquire his pleasure is worth every instance, every millisecond of pain and hardship that we endure, because his little thought is the is the prize. So that's the kind of attitude you have. And similarly, when things are going in ease for you that you don't forget to remember and to be grateful to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala where you start to take things for granted. As I said in the beginning, many of us just got so used to the liberties we had, whether it was traveling or ease of movement, going in and out of the house, visiting our friends and family, going shopping, all the ease we had, the masjid, you know, being able to just, oh, I'm going to go pray, you know, Maghrib at the masjid or Fajr or Isha, inshallah, Fajr and Isha. But you know, I'm going to go pray at the masjid. It was something that we just thought would always be consistent and available to us as long as we walked and drove over there. Well, here we are, right? That ease that we had, did we, we have to ask ourselves with all of the ease that we were given, did we truly show Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gratitude or did we just kind of take it as it's just, you know, it's what I deserve. There's a form of entitlement almost, right? Privilege. This is what privilege is when you forget that it's actually all a blessing. And even now, despite everything we're going through, the reality is the hardships we are enduring are nothing compared to what so many other people are suffering. And now, before us, after us, I mean, really, when we compare the lives that we have living in the West, living for those of us who are here in California, it's one of the most coveted areas in the entire world, we really don't have much to complain about. We are still in Nehmeh and we have to check ourselves whenever our nafs wants to take us into a dark place where we start to get ungrateful, check for yourself. No, sakhfirullah, be grateful for my limbs. I mean, we have to, there's times during the day, if it's, if this isn't something that's second nature to you, that you might have to just start doing where you actually start to look at yourself in a way that is, you know, almost like you're outside of your body and you're observing yourself, because that moment of just looking at your hands, for example, should really put you in a state of subhanallah, right? Just your hands alone are such a blessing, your eyesight, a sense of smell, so we could go through the entire body, right, that Allah swt has given us so much to be grateful for, and continue. This is the process of gratitude. This is exactly how people who are, you know, trying to be grateful and always be mindful of their blessings. These are the practices. It's taking account. It's listing mentally or by hand making actual lists or doing these type of exercises where you are becoming conscious of the blessings and bringing awareness to your blessings. So, you know, doing that as a regular consistent practice and not ever complaining to Allah swt. Audhu Billah from ever complaining about Allah or to Allah about what He puts us in. May Allah protect our hearts from being of those who complain to our Lord when He is so generous. The generosity of Allah is something we can't even measure. We can't fathom, seek protection from Allah, from being of those who are ungrateful and complain, and rather ask Him to make you of those who are patient, right? May Allah swt make us all patient and grateful, right? So the last point here, he says, turning to Allah in prosperity and adversity. So similar, right, that whether or not from a material lens you have prosperity, success, right? Everything's sort of going well for you. You have ample wealth. You're able to, you know, provide for yourself, your family, you have financial security, whether you're in that situation or you are in debt or experiencing real challenges financially, that you, your protocol is to turn to Him always in a state of immense gratitude and obligation, right? When you have wealth, it's a gift from Allah swt. It's also a test. It's supposed to, you're supposed to do something with that wealth and He's watching to see how you are responding, right? So you have to become aware that it's not just for me to enjoy this wealth and take advantage of this wealth, but I also have to respond in a way that pleases Him the most. So it's an amana to have wealth, and that's where the turning to Allah would take place, that Allah, please guide my decisions with this wealth that you've given me. Please, you know, be pleased with me. Please don't take me into account. Purify my wealth. This is the type of mindset that one has when they have wealth. And when they have adversity similar, they turn to Allah swt. Ya Allah, please increase my risk. Ya Allah, I have nothing without you. You are the one who sustains. You are the most generous and really having that yakeen that only Allah swt is going to be able to provide for you, only Allah swt. Nobody else will give you, and if he uses the means, obviously people can be the means to how that reaches you, but the source is always Allah swt. You have this solid in your mind, where it's just default, you know exactly what to do in these situations, and you don't stray from that. And so, Siddiah Mazarouk, again, on the last two points, he said that with the satisfaction with Allah and hardship, he says, the reaction through acceptance of what one is given and consignment of one's affairs to Allah, and then turning to Allah through praise and gratitude in times of prosperity, and through asylum with Allah in times of affliction. So he's much more eloquent than I am in the way that he simplified that, but inshallah it's the same message of really having the proper response to these situations. So now, as I mentioned, if anybody's joining late, the way that this advice that Siddiah Mazarouk has provided is constructed is that it's building upon itself. So we're going to deconstruct it in a way. We're going backwards. So these five foundations he starts with, then here we get here, where he gives us an insight on the qualities we need to have in order to get back to here. So we have to possess these, and then we can get here. So I love, again, how he's done this. And that's why I was really excited to share this with all of you. But let's look here. Possessing celestial aspirations. I love his terminology because it's just so, it's enough, right? It's very, it's so telling, it's clear, but just to offer a little bit more insight. You know, having high aspirations, this dunya is not our goal. We don't plan for this world as the end all be all, you know, we just, there are people who are really focused on success in the dunya. And it's sad because they compromise their akhira for it. They're that obsessed with material success that they'll compromise their akhira for it. And so we want to have higher aspirations because if you really think about it, no matter what you achieve in a material way, it pales in comparison, pales in comparison to any type of success in the akhira. And why? Because this life is fleeting, it's temporal, and it really in the grand scheme of things, it's very little weight, right, in terms of what it means. It's not very meaningful. The weight of our deeds will be really realized in the next life. So you want to have celestial aspirations. Look beyond the material world. Look to the next world. How can I get to Jannah? How can I please Allah's power? How can I be among those who love the Prophet's life and he loves them, and that we are with him? How can I have the ultimate, ultimate prize ever that we could possibly fathom, which is the beatific vision of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and Jannah the third of those? How can we have that? How can I get there? What do I need to do to get there? So we don't look to this world and just think about degrees and money and homes and carves and wealth and accumulation of worldly things as being the drive that wakes us up every morning. You know, it's sad because for those of you anyway who are in California, before all this happened, you know, I remember when I used to commute and go to work early when I used to work full time or part time wherever I was working. I was always amazed that there were so many people on the streets so early in the morning because I had early shifts. So, you know, Fajr and then I'd have to go teach at the school or go to the office. But I was always kind of an early riser. But it was kind of bittersweet. It was heartbreaking, right? Because you realize while you were up early because Fajr came in and you were praying to Allah and now you're going to go get your sustenance. Most people on the road with you driving on the freeway were likely doing many other things other than remembering Allah. They were maybe listening to the morning news or having their breakfast, curling their hair, having, you know, their coffee or doing their makeup for two to three hours. But they weren't remembering Allah. And now they're on the streets in pursuit of their dunya. And so, you know, this is what a lot of people like I said, they'll go to great lengths for the dunya. If it comes to Allah, they're forgetful. So may Allah protect us from that. But always seeking higher goals, right? Then we have preserving reverence for Allah. So key, you know, if you have a bad opinion or bad adab with Allah, it's going to be very difficult to elevate your spiritual path. Right. If you start to question, like, you know, people, this is why it's so important to read the books, like purification of the heart by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. Because he will explain to you that displeasure with the divine decree is a disease of the heart. So anytime you ever say why Allah, why did you do this to me? That is having a van of Allah. You are literally having a bad opinion of Allah. It's a disease of the heart. But how many times do people just become so loose with their tongues that they will say things like that because they're frustrated with the dunya or frustrated with something that didn't go their way. And so they end up in many ways. This is my opinion anyway, but I think they anthropomorphize Allah because when you start to speak to Allah in those human terms, you're forgetting that he is the Lord and Master of the universe. He is the one who created everything in existence. You cannot talk to the Creator of the universe in that way. Humble yourself as the stars and the mountains and all of the celestial beings and everything in creation, the fish and the sea and the rocks and the trees and the great prophets before like all of the greatest things in this existence have prostrated and humbled themselves before Allah. And here we are in 2020 because, you know, in many ways we've reached the height of human arrogance with with the modern, you know, scientific sort of mindset that we all have acquired that where we think we can talk to about Allah or talk to Allah in this way. We have to really make a saqfer from that. Allah is above everything. And when we say Allahu Akbar, we have to mean that literally. Allah deserves the best of the best of the best of the best and nothing less. And even if you're going through really difficult times and I'm not saying this, you know, from a soapbox, I hope people understand I have been through challenges in life. And so I'm speaking from lived experiences of I know it's difficult when you're going through a test to see the silver lining to see what could possibly be the wisdom of this. Yalla, I didn't plan for this. I didn't ask for this. I've had some people come to me and say, I made this the khada and you know, how could this happen? SubhanAllah, you know, this is why Sahaba is so important. If you don't watch the company that you keep and you don't have the teachers who reorient reorient you when you're getting out of line to remind you, wait a second, who do you think you are? Right? Who do you think you are? When you have prophets who suffered for decades, who suffered immense, you know, things that most of us couldn't even fathom, being ostracized, being pushed away, having stricken with disease and illness, having your children taken from you or killed, so much betrayal. Our own beloved Salih said, look what he endured. So we have to really ask ourselves, who do I think I am that I can, you know, have this attitude that tells me that I deserve everything a certain way. And if I don't get that way, I can go back to Allah and challenge him, right? And question him in this way of I don't deserve this. It's from Iblis, those thoughts. And so we have to reject that. And this is why when you commit to this path, you have to understand we are asked about everything that we do because we were brought into existence by Allah and we were nothing and He brought us into existence and then He gave us the incredible gift of existence. It's a gift of consciousness to be aware of Him. He gave us life. He gave us all that for one reason, which is to worship Him. And then He told us we will be held accountable for what we do. And it's pretty simple formula, right? But we are not, it's not equal. This isn't an equal relationship where we can question Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala on what He's decreed for us. Rather, we surrender. We submit Yallah. I don't know what's good for me. I have no clue. But if you're putting me through this challenge, even though I am frustrated, I'm angry, and you can feel those emotions. Sometimes people are testing you. Maybe you're in your family. There's relationships that are testing you. You're not a robot to turn off that emotion. So feel the emotion, but assigning blame to Allah, that's where we have to be very careful. So we never assign any negative emotion or blame to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. We accept if He's given us something, whether it's a positive thing or something about a blessing or a tribulation, that there's always, khayr in it, always. It's just a promise, right? Because He knows better. So having that vision of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala always with, as they say, rose-colored glasses, always hasnab van, never even entertaining a negative thought about Allah is so key and so important. And so the next is excelling in service of others. So again, if you want to be on the spiritual path and you want to, in your sincere and your desire to be on the spiritual path, you have to be willing to sacrifice your ego, your comforts, and to think of the other, right? Self-centered people are not spiritually very successful, because it's not the prophetic way. The Prophet ﷺ was in khidmah all the time. He was always caring for people, always taking care of everyone. So you can't try to, you know, be on his path, but not be up for service of other people, right? And always thinking of your own self. It just doesn't work. It's not consistent. Then he says, fulfilling one's results, right? Whatever resolutions that you have. So if you commit to something or you say you're going to do something, take your word seriously. Follow through. Again, this is just a very difficult time in existence because people do a lot of lip service. They say a lot of things. They promise things that they can't deliver. And so we want to be very careful of falling into any of that type of behavior where we are very lofty in our goals and aspirations. And it comes time to execute them. We kind of give up. So hold yourselves to account. And of course, you know, when there's moments of weakness, that's normal. Don't be too hard on yourself. But look at it like something you still have to achieve. I said it, I have to follow through. If I said it, my word is serious. If even if it takes me a lifetime, I'm going to do it because I committed to it, right? Oaths are important and we value them. So fulfilling one's results and then exalting one's blessings, right? Being always in a state of gratitude. As we said earlier, if you cannot, if it takes you a long time to think of your blessings, it's probably because you don't reflect on them enough. But if you were asked quickly, could you give me 30 of the things that you are the most grateful for in like five minutes. If that was an exercise that you were asked to do, and it took you more than five minutes to do, you need to be better. You should be able to list quickly every single blessing that you can. I mean, it should just come to you quickly because it's a habit. It's something that you reflect on enough. But I've been in those situations, you know, I do a lot of group work. So I've sometimes given exercises like that for people. And of course, I understand not everybody, you know, people process information differently. Some people are very quick and they can list things out fast. Other people might take their time. But the point is, is you have to ask yourself, am I doing this exercise of being able to really show my gratitude to always prep that up for different things enough? Or is recall difficult for me because I don't do it enough. I might know the big things like, oh yeah, I'm grateful for my health, my family. We have the cliche pat responses that everybody knows, right? But I'm talking about detail. I'm talking about things like, you know, our teachers, Mashallah would remind us like Shahumza would talk about eyelashes, you know, like think about eyelashes. That is something when who thinks about eyelashes, like who sits there and reflects like, wow, what a blessing it is that I have eyelashes. Except for the person who thinks about eyelashes, right? If you're, if you're aware, because you're purposely bringing things into your consciousness to think about, wow, I should be grateful for this, you're going to do it. But if you've never done that before, then it wouldn't occur to you to be grateful for your eyelashes or grateful for, you know, saliva, right? Grateful for the hairs in your nose. These are things that we don't think about when we think about gratitude. Like I said, we think about the big obvious things. But there are so many more things that we should be grateful for that when you start to compare yourself to people who don't have those things, then it suddenly hits you, right? Like, oh, wow, when you watch a documentary, for example, on someone who lost is a paraplegic and they lost their limbs, all of a sudden everybody becomes super grateful for the ability to move and walk and run. But maybe without watching something like that, we don't even think about it. So this is, you know, something we have to take seriously enough where it's automatic. We don't have to deliberate heavily on it. It's not something that takes a long time. So being in the habit of all of being able to recall your blessings. And he just says in his commentary quickly, for the first point, possessing celestial aspirations, he says, when one aspires to heights, one station rises, subhanallah. Again, I can't even compete. I won't even try to how beautifully he captures each of these points. You know, you want to rise to Allah, or you have that as your goal, Allah will elevate you, right? One preserves Allah's sanctity. One's sanctity is preserved. Subhanallah, so beautiful. We all want to be, you know, saved and have that safety and that just feeling of Sakina, excuse me. So how do we do that? Well, we, we of course have, we preserve the reverence for Allah. When one excels in service, one standing is assured. So when you put other people before yourself, excuse me, Allah subhanallah, will be pleased with you. So you are in that state, safe state. When one fulfills resolutions, one's guidance continues. So subhanallah, the more you are, hold yourself accountable for those things that you say that you're going to do and that you commit to doing and you follow through. Allah's path draws you near and near and your guidance continues. That's the byproduct of that, masha'Allah. And then when one exalts blessings, one is grateful and gratitude ensures increase from the ever giving in accord with his sincere promise. So subhanallah, Allah is again reminding us how generous he is because by telling us that the more grateful you are, the more he will increase us. It's just a proof of his, of why he is to be worshipped as he deserves because there's just, you know, his praises are innumerable, but we have to look at these things as reasons for us to reflect and to follow through. So subhanallah. Now, as I mentioned, these five perceive qualities, proceed the five foundations that I mentioned earlier, right? So in order to get to, sorry, the slide shows a little slow at the moment. Let me see. I'm trying to move the slide. Okay, so in order to get to here, we need these, right? But how do we get here? Well, we need these. So you see how it works? We're going backwards, right? So let's look at what he has to say. And I know we have just a couple of minutes left. So, or a few minutes left. So I'll try to be quick. But he has here the five foundations of proper conduct. So first, pursuing knowledge to fulfill the sacred affair. Really important, right? We want to pursue knowledge. And we have to be serious in our commitment to pursuing knowledge. We can't just say we want to be on a spiritual path but be, you know, negligent or ignorant and, you know, kind of accept that as they say ignorance is bliss. No, that's not right. And we will be held accountable. We're in the West. We all have access to knowledge, even if we are not in communities where maybe they have Islamic centers and teachers. We still have access to knowledge through this very medium that we're on right now, the internet. So we really have to take seriously the pursuit of knowledge and be consistent in that. Accompanying a spiritual guide and a fraternity to gain insight. You know, not only should we seek knowledge, but we should seek knowledge from the correct sources. There's a lot of people out there who presume to have knowledge and to, and they, you know, they amass a following and, you know, a lot will judge them, but it's very important that you recognize who the true scholar is or who the who a qualified teacher is versus someone who may have ulterior motives. And, you know, that's there's a way to vet teachers finding out where they studied who they studied with, whether or not their sources are authentic. You don't have to do that due due diligence, because there are people unfortunately who take advantage of other people with with faith or charlatans out there so you have to be really careful. Before you just take someone's word or follow them. And then also you want to follow, but you want to have a group that you are able to lean on as well so that because in our own mind sometimes when we're processing knowledge or taking knowledge we can come to conclusions but it's really helpful to have a jamma, a group maybe that you're studying with to bounce off ideas to share ideas and to gain from their wisdom and knowledge and vice versa, and not to take this endeavor as, as something that you do alone because shaitan draws to those who are always alone in things you know so you want to lean on the jamma, but seek those people who are trustworthy inshallah, and vet people correctly. Next, abandoning dispensations and excuses for one's own protection. So, you know there's a lot of times we're easy on ourselves right we let the ego make excuses, and we take the short cuts and we find loopholes, so that things are made easy for us you want to really be careful of doing not where you are cherry picking things and you're not consistent. It's just all about ease for you because now your nefs is in control right so really being careful of that managing once time for litanese that results in the presence of the heart. So, litanese are prayers right formulaic prayers that we do all taken from the sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and they include all of the daily protective Dawaz that he left for us throughout history different scholars created their formulas of how to take his prayers and adopt them during the day, so some would you know have selective prayers in a certain, you know as I said a formula, and they were different so there's the word that is one of the more common ones that our teachers have told us but imam of know he has them there's other scholars who have their own a rod or litany. But in here, managing one's time for litanese making sure that you are doing them, but not doing them where you are not you've lost mindfulness right of what you're saying, making sure that it's an exercise where you're truly aware of the purpose of it. So when you're listening to the way or you're reading the way we're citing the word whatever you're doing, that you're bringing those words into your consciousness that you're really internalizing the meanings and focusing. It's not just words coming out of your mouth that you don't know what you're saying like many of us in our prayers this is a challenge for all everybody gets distracted which is normal, but many people have a very hard time connecting to the prayer, because they don't know the words so that's always starting place if you're having a hard time connecting to your prayer maybe you need to look into the deeper meanings of what you're saying, and be able to recall all of those meanings while you're reciting, but if you if it's just a foreign language to it's going to be hard so really having presence of heart when you're doing those litanese, and then guarding against the ego to free it of whims and save it from destructive tendencies. The nafs is works against us right it's a part of us that works against us. It is very it's the portal or the access point for Iblis you know to to really reach us. So we have to be very careful and make sure that we can control it and command it, and that's what the whole to skid the nafs process is become so aware of one's nafs that you're able to dictate to it, instead of letting it always dictate to you so an example would be you wake up. Let's say fudger alarm goes off, or maybe even before fudger you know let's say fudger now and where I am. I think it comes in, like around 455 456 something like that very close to the 5am mark. So if you wake up at 430 your eyes are wide open. At that point, your nafs is going to battle you because there's a part of you that is awake, and maybe even aware that it's earlier than fudger, and maybe the thought may occur to you, you should get up. You should get up. This is a mubarak time. This is counted still as the Hajj, even though it's 30 minutes more till fudger, you should get up. If that thought comes to you, you want to look at it that maybe that was my angel might you know I have angels that are around me or maybe it was an invitation from Allah SWT like who Allah knows right we have different inspirations that reaches the hawat that right. So that internal dialogue of maybe I should get up versus what the nafs is going to tell you. It's, you got 30 minutes it's way too early you have to go to work after that you have a morning meeting later you got to catch up on your sleep otherwise you're going to be groggy you're going to be cranky. And so you start to confuse you know, make a really good argument for why you should remain in bed. Right. Now, remember, this is your nafs working against you. And but of course the blissful would, you know monopolize or, or pounce on that opportunity because it's, it's wonderful opportunity to completely make you miss your prayer how many people has that happened to where they dilute themselves to thinking that they'll just wake up for fudger or set the alarm, you know, at fudger time. Okay, I woke up my alarm hasn't gone off yet it's okay I'll just close my eyes and wake up and alarm goes off. But what happens to them. Right. They don't hear the alarm, because you've woken up, and now you're going to enter your deep sleep again and deep sleep for some even like if there was, you know, a fire bell, some people can sometimes sleep through really intense sounds like that because they're just so in their deep sleep. The point I'm making is that we are presented with opportunities like that all the time where the nafs is battling us because we have the Ruh which is always longing to for Allah SWT wanting to do the right thing. And then lower self. And when those two are at it, you'll, you have to pay attention because whenever you don't do what you know you should do your ego has won. And so that means that if that's a constant, then you are your ego dictates to you. But when you can push yourself out of bed in that example I gave, even though you are so tired and you are warm and it's so comfortable. You throw off your covers, and you change your body position quickly, and you force your body out of that bed. That is you dictating to your ego because it's going to not want you to do that. And then when you go make will do it's a whole other experience right I had this clear what happens when the person wakes up and the knots are untied. But the point is, you know, this is, this is our jihad every single day so guarding against the ego to free its wins so much wisdom and there's a lot more to cover. He again, may Allah bless him, has given us so much to reflect on and to think about this is it continues. So what I would like to do is, I'm going to stop here because we are at time a little bit over time, and invite you to join me in a couple of weeks where we will continue the advice from see David Zaroq inshallah. And if there are any questions, you know, next time I let me actually quickly look because I do have access to the Facebook link on zoom unfortunately I can't see the questions in zoom because it's a private room but let me quickly look on the Facebook page to see if there are any questions or anything that anybody has I forgive me for going over. I don't want to keep you on too long. There's some very sweet comments here but if there's anybody who has any questions about anything that was shared. I can stay on for another maybe we'll go to 810 just to to follow the questions if there's any questions I am on the Facebook group. Actually, let me see sorry YouTube I know there's, we're so high tech here at MCC Mashallah the Bible a male or reward brother Muneer and his fantastic team because they've got, you know, we're on everything we're on Facebook we're on YouTube. I'm on my own Facebook so there's a lot of screens here I'm going to try to find where this is to see, inshallah if there are any questions on the YouTube page. So let me look here. Okay, sorry. Oh, you're going to hear me. We mute myself. Alright, so I'm going to just quickly check the chat room or the there's a chat happening here. I want to make sure that I get all of your questions. Sorry. Okay, I can't open up the chat it just says there's a verse in the Quran someone's posting okay so I don't know if there's any further questions but I don't see anything there so let me quickly go back to the Facebook page of MCC and see if there's any questions there if not then inshallah we can wrap it up for tonight and I will. I look forward to seeing you guys in a couple of weeks, but let me do a refresh I don't want to miss any questions and see them afterwards. Okay, so I don't see anything. Ladies and maybe brothers I think brothers are watching on YouTube. I don't see anything so I want to thank you all for tuning in. InshaAllah, we will see each other in two weeks. May Allah protect all of you, preserve all of you, give you an incredible remainder of the rest of this Mubarak month of Heja but especially in these first 10 days. I hope that all of your prayers are answered if you're fasting inshallah you're faster accepted. Any charity you give may Allah accept it and increase it for you inshallah and reward you without measure in this world and the next all of you and your families. I know it's a hard time for our world and our community but inshallah we have to always put our trust in Allah so that he knows what's best for all of us and just remember he's in control. And we just have to be grateful for our community because there are many people who have no community that they belong to they have really nobody very very isolated in this world. Some of them are orphans, some of them have no family or have left hearted ways with their family and they're trying to manage this world without even a faith. It's just it's remarkable if you think about how people can have existence in this world without faith. It's really something that shocks me but alhamdulillah I'm always so grateful. Alhamdulillah la ni'mat al Islam. This is my my dua always so may Allah's father again protect all of you. Let's go ahead and end in dua inshallah and we'll see you in two weeks. Inshallah we'll see you soon and please continue to support MCC. Thank you. Salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. As-salamu alaykum. Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salamu ala ashif al anbiya'i wa al mursaleen. Sayyidina wa maulana wa habibina Muhammad. Salallahu alayhi wa salam. Wa ala aari wa sahbihi wa salam tasriban. Salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alhamdulillah. I hope everyone is doing well and inshallah you all had a blessed Eid celebration with your families and your loved ones inshallah. Alhamdulillah. Last time we were together we covered a text and I'm going to just reference it for those who are possibly joining us for the first time. The text is called Agenda to Change Our Condition. I'll go ahead and hold it up for you so you can see it yourself. This is written by Shechemza Yusuf and Imam Zeh Shaker. And there are so many gems in this book, masha'Allah. And I encouraged everyone who was tuning in last time to get the book for themselves because it really is a transformative text as the title reflects. Anyone who reads this from beginning to end should really walk away with a much clearer understanding about how to transform themselves and hopefully for the better obviously and really set themselves on a successful spiritual path. So there's so much content in this book but I'm choosing for the sake of our discussion and purpose to look to the appendix section at the back of the book. So if you have the book you can follow along. But Appendix A is titled Foundations of the Spiritual Path by Sidi Ahmed Zarruq. And this is advice, it's nasiha. And I personally benefit tremendously. Every time I read it I go back over the list and I think of more things. So it's one of those lists that's really masha'Allah just it bears a lot of fruit. So I think that this is the state we're all in. We're all in need of guidance, we're in need of nasiha, may Allah protect and preserve all of our scholars past and present for what they've blessed us with. But this advice is really timeless. I mean to think that he passed in 1493 but this advice speaks so ring so true to us today. I think just really speaks volumes about how insightful he was and how well he knew the human condition and human beings and human behavior. So I really wanted to go back to this text because we only partially covered the advice that he gave us. So I'm going to go ahead and screen share, excuse me, I have to mute myself here. I'm going to go ahead and screen share insha'Allah so that you can follow along because I did put together just a quick summary, sort of a slideshow I guess of the points that he makes so that as we're talking about it you have something to follow. So let me go ahead and do the screen share insha'Allah and we will bring this up, excuse me, share it and then present. So here's the presentation that again just follow along. I'll try to go over what we already covered as quick as possible so that those who are tuning in can follow along as well. So this advice that he's giving is really about the spiritual path. All of us insha'Allah we all are on a spiritual path of our own or we want to be on one and obviously we want to succeed. So he's giving us advice on how to be successful on our spiritual path and he starts off by giving us a list of the five foundations of the spiritual path which are covered here. Now again if you're tuning in and you weren't with us last time for the sake of time I'm going to ask that you go and watch that session to get more in depth commentary on these points because I'm just going to show you the slides but we're going to move on so that we continue from where we left off. But what I appreciated so much and I shared this last time as well is that the structure that he has this advice is working backwards in a way. He starts off with giving you the foundation of the spiritual path but then he sort of deconstructs it in a way where you understand how you build this path and so he goes into several different areas but I'll go ahead and move along so that you can see. So he gives us these five foundations and then he says that these foundations are predicated on these other qualities. So in order to get to the slide that we just looked at you have to have these five qualities first. And then he again continuing in this building phase where he's showing you how to get here he says that in order to get to those five qualities there's a certain conduct that's required of you and so he lists those out for us. And this is I believe where we left off on this particular slide and we went and you know covered it but the next slide is related to this obviously as we're continuing all of them build on each other. So I'm going to go ahead and start today's discussion on this slide which are the five pitfalls of the soul. So as you know he lists that in the previous slide that these foundations of proper conduct right are listed here. Well there's pitfalls that are associated with them and so you know things that we have to look out for and be vigilant. So this is where this next set of five comes into play. So he lists here that in our pursuit of knowledge right as we want to increase our knowledge of alas Prathara and you know that's part of our path. We have to be aware that there are pitfalls to that and he lists here that specifically pursuing your knowledge or academic knowledge spiritual knowledge that one can fall into company with image the immature right so you can meet people along the way that are perhaps not at the same level of maturity as you are or they in some way or another can take you down whether it's age or you know their understanding devotional practices. Or because they themselves lack you know maybe moral you know the virtue so they don't really have their unprincipled their ungrounded themselves. So this is part of the reality of a lot of people who are seeking the spiritual knowledge or otherwise and if you look in our modern context. And this is certainly true in any type of schooling right a lot of serious students some of their struggles doesn't really have anything to do with the knowledge you know acquiring the knowledge. It has to do with the social aspect. There's other distractions that can get that can pull them away that can, you know, take their focus away so a lot of college students or even high school students will throughout really throughout our lives. We find that the people struggle in this way because there's so many other people that share are on the same path with them, but may not be at the same level of maturity. And so you have to be vigilant about this when you are seeking knowledge. Who are you going to learn from? And are you doing this, you know with a group and have you vetted that group of people? Are there people that you have to be careful of because perhaps they, you know, have those domineering and strong personality types that that do tend to sort of take over and there are. And this is why, you know, self knowledge is important and knowing, you know, how different personalities work with one another. These are all really important knowledges. But something to just be cautious of that this is a potential pitfall because you could be really sincere in your desire to know Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. But if you're not paying attention to the company that you keep, it could contribute to you not doing very well, especially if you are on a very serious or rigorous path. Right. So he mentions that then he talks about another pitfall because, you know, proper conduct, which again in the previous slide he listed the second foundation of proper conduct. He said was accompanying a spiritual guide and having a fraternity to gain insight. So having, you know, someone to look up to or having a jamma that you belong to, it also comes with some pitfalls, which he lists as the pitfall of spiritual company is arrogance, deception and meddling in the affairs of others. And this is really important because, you know, if we look at, I'm just looking at my own experience. I've heard from several people that they have felt as, you know, arrogance coming from religious people, you know, from people who are who look outwardly religious and have knowledge, but they felt arrogance from them. And so sometimes, you know, you can fall into that if you're not cautious that self-righteousness can enter the heart and you suddenly feel you're more superior because you have more Quran memorized or you've, you know, you dress modestly as more than other people, or you are fluent in Arabic or, you know, it could be a range of things. But if, if you're not cautious of the, you know, what are the conversations that you're having in those, in those jamma, you know, is it a lot of just everybody's praising one another and, you know, you're feeling really puffed up every time you leave those gatherings, or are they gatherings that really do the opposite and they leave you feeling humbled about how little you know. And so we have to be careful. And you certainly see this not necessarily always in religious context, but even in academia, this is certainly an issue that a lot of people once they, you know, get a degree or are in a program, they can have a more elitist attitude and suddenly, you know, just think of themselves as better than, so these are all spiritual, you know, pitfalls that we can fall into if we're not vigilant. So just pointing these, you know, really important things out. The second, so the third foundation of proper conduct that he lists is abandoning dispensations and excuses for one's own protection. And so, you know, this is, again, there are, he has listed here the pitfalls of foregoing dispensations and excuses is self pity. So falling into, you know, just a feeling of that you, there's exceptions to the rule. A lot of times, you know, the, the nuffs is very indulgent, so it can certainly make a person feel that that they, you know, that they're an exception to certain rules. And so that's also one of the dangers. We have to be very careful not to, to take our faith seriously and not to look for those excuses or loopholes or whatever just because we feel that we may need, you know, an exception for whatever the issue is. The next rule or foundation of proper conduct he lists is managing one's time for litanies that results in the, in presence of the heart. So obviously it's very important that we establish an aura or a word and, and to, to make that a practice, a daily practice because it was the practice of the prophesy. And he, he, he did protective doors. He had, you know, he was very disciplined. His, his life was scheduled around prayer, around worshipping Allah at every different point. There was always a remembrance of Allah happening. And so we should be in the practice of that as well. But the pitfalls that he mentions here are that the pitfall of managing time for litanies is spectacle and ritualized devotion. So that you start to maybe seek attention. It becomes more performative, right? And so, and also you, you fall into doing things almost mechanically or robotically because it's something that you're just, you've habituated to. So the presence may be lacking. You're not really focusing anymore, but it's just now something you have to do or because you've habituated to. And of course, forming good habits is very important, but mindfulness is also important. We can't just mentally check out when we're praying or doing the kid. And so if we're, we're not aware of our mindfulness, this is one of the pitfalls of falling, of taking on those practices without that, that awareness of what we're doing and how we're doing it. And then he says, the last foundation of proper conduct, he says, guarding against the ego to free it of whims and save it from destructive tendencies. And so one of the pitfalls is guarding against the ego is complacency due to its excellence and probity. So, you know, if you start to think that you are doing really well, or because you're consistent in a practice, this can lead to complacency. And again, that, that, that, that notion that you're, you're, you're doing really well. And so there's a delusion there because the believer never is satisfied with what they do. The true seeker and the true believer always feels inadequate. There's always a sense of inadequacy, no matter how much you learn, how much you do, how much you've done, it's never seems enough. And you always feel that you should be doing more. And so one of the pitfalls of, of again, the soul is that you would start to think of yourself as being better than or safe in that regard. So these are things that he's pointed out again, really a lot of food for thought. If we, if we take each one of these and just apply it to our own selves, you know, all of us can do that. Where are we with regards to all of these pitfalls? Have we fallen short? Are we in, have we, are we in one right now? And how can we emerge from that? But, you know, the starting point is to become aware of the pitfalls. So, you know, once you're on a spiritual path, if you just think it's onward and upward and you're not paying attention to the fact that Iblis is always in pursuit. And he's, he doesn't rest from what his aim is, which is to destroy us spiritually. He doesn't take rest. This is a 24 hour constant, you know, thing for him. So we have to be vigilant. And that's why Marshala, this, this type of nasiha is so useful, because as I mentioned in the beginning, it's still relevant to all of us. It's timeless advice. I think throughout, you know, until we leave this world, this would be useful to anybody who read, who read it, a believer who read it. So, Marshala, again, there's so much, so much information here. So let's look at what he shares next. So he says now, so he goes from, you know, the pitfalls to the five foundations of treatment of illnesses of the soul. So now, you know, if you find yourself having maybe fallen, as we just discussed, then how can we emerge? How can we get ourselves out of those illnesses? So he focuses first on relieving digestion by reducing the amount of food. And this is, you know, if you've studied any of Imam al-Razadi's works and many of the great, you know, scholars of the past, there's a lot of emphasis on food and spiritual habit. And, you know, not only how much you're eating, the quality of what you're eating, we believe in that. We do believe that it affects your state. If you're obviously eating anything from the haram, it would affect your spiritual state. Likewise, if you are overindulging or excessive in your consumption of food, it's going to affect you spiritually in many ways. Primarily, you know, the sloth, the sloth is associated with overconsumption of food. You just find that, and it makes sense because physically, physiologically, you know, the, as we know, just basic information about digestion, that when you're consuming foods, especially if they're different types of qualities of food, the food is heavy and it can, you know, weigh you down. And your energy goes directly to, you know, breaking all that food down. So that's why after a big meal, you know, how many people feel suddenly, you know, like they want to jump up and go and pray 20 rakat. It's very difficult after you eat a large meal to feel that sense of that burst of energy. It's usually the opposite. And so you, you, this is just basic knowledge that food would make a person feel, especially if they're eating a lot or heavy foods, that they would feel spiritually ill because of that. So that's the first line that he attacks or that he offers the first advice that he offers, which is to, to reduce the amount of food that you're eating. Then he says to seek asylum with Allah from harm at the time of its occurrence. So, you know, we have to be in that mindset of seeking refuge with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala first, that when something happens, whatever it is, a tribulation, personal, you know, personal circumstance, or even on a large scale, like what we're dealing with now, that our heart, mind, soul, body, it just immediately defaults to going to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala first. Instead of, you know, turning to other people, panicking, you know, just having that calm sense of trust in Allah and getting in that practice. And it's not, you know, it's something that of course we have to all work on because it's, it's not always easy. It's not always the first thing that comes to mind. But if you, you know, the more and more you read, I was speaking to someone earlier today about her own personal, you know, struggles. She's going through a very big calamity right now. And I just reminded her that this is why we have stories of people of the past, you know, the prophets of the saints, of the scholars. We have those stories to look at how they responded and to take from their example. And of course the prophet said, I'm story in and of itself is enough. But you can look back to all of these incredible, you know, figures of the past and see how whatever their circumstance was, because we do have answers in terms of how to properly respond and we can gain strength from their examples. So Alhamdulillah that we have all of those examples. But just, you know, it's something that we have to work on and invest in thinking about and learning how to do. The next advice here he has for treating the soul, the illnesses of the soul is shunning places where one fears the misdeeds will occur. Is although we're in quarantine right now and we might physically not be able to go to places that are sinful because of the modern, you know, technology that we have access to, places can come to us just in the palm of our hand. We have these devices and machines that can transport us to several different places depending on where we want to go. And so I think this is really quite relevant now because you see a lot of people, maybe as I said, not physically or interpreting as something like that as meaning to say, you know, I'm walking somewhere I'm deliberately moving my physical body from this place to this place. But there are a lot of places that that again we can go to mentally, visually that are harmful. And so we have to really look at what we're doing right now with our time, because a lot of sinful behavior is happening, even though people are in their homes and they aren't physically going somewhere. And it's because their eyes are seeing things that they shouldn't see their ears are listening to things that shouldn't be listening to. And so in many ways, you know, those are still places that we choose to go to, right? I mean, if you're watching certain television or films that are inappropriate, or as I said, social media, the internet, there's a plethora of opportunities to engage in very, very harmful and sinful things. So really being cautious about what you're doing with your time and what you choose to engage in and and making sure that if there are places where you your guard is down and you're, you know, you're more likely to fall into sinful behavior, that you practice that, you know, that that you restraint and you you prevent yourself from even in opening those doors. So that's the third treatment that he has there. The fourth treatment is continual repentance, coupled with prayers upon the provost, I said I'm in solitude and society. This is important because we are in a time of immense, you know, just there's a lot of darkness in our world today. And we need light and what better light than the provost, I said I'm. And of course, Toba, Toba is light, Toba erases sins, Toba, those black spots that we all accumulate every day because of the sins that we commit. We need a way to erase those sins and Alhamdulillah, Allah has given us a way, very easy way really. If you think about how merciful Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la is and how many hadith and how many ayahs in the Quran. He's constantly reminding us that no matter what we've done, how much we've done it, that the doors of Toba are always open and it really is just a matter of true sincere repentance and remorse. And then words, you're just articulating words when you make Toba, of course they should be in the heart, but it's really such a simple thing that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la asks of us. After we've gone astray and done things that we shouldn't ever do, may Allah forgive us, that he's willing to erase all of it just based on words that we say. So this is the mercy of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, but doing that as a daily practice. And then of course the Sadawat and the prophecy that I'm doing those together is how we remove so much of our past misdeeds and all that darkness as we mentioned, but also open up our heart for openings, for light. I mean, so many people I know in my life as well as my own experience of when you're in this constant state of remembrance of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la or in Sadawat or the prophecy that things will happen and it's just amazing. You'll start to see visions, dreams of many people I've spoken to, the more that they say they're Sadawat, that Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la all of a sudden they're having openings. And these are people, I mean I remember I once gave a haraqah and we talked about the importance of Sadawat and seeing the prophecy Sadaam in our dreams. And there were all sisters and one of the sisters was really sad because she lamented that she had never seen the prophecy Sadaam in her dreams and she really wanted to see him. And so we just talked about Sadawat and how often are you, it's one thing to wish to see the prophecy Sadaam, but to remember him often, to say praises upon him is a different form of reverence and love that we need to be in the regular practice of. So when we talked about how often are we doing Sadawat, she admitted that that wasn't something that she was doing enough and so she started to do that. And I believe it was that night Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la and Allah knows best but she called me the next day after this haraqah because we talked about the importance of Sadawat. And she said that Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la she spent all night after the haraqah just doing a lot of Sadawat and then she saw a dream of him and it was the first time ever. And so she was so excited the next day to tell me that Allah was so immensely generous with her because she just in one night. Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la he fulfilled that wish for her. So Allah can do anything as we know but we have to be in the practice of these things to remedy the spiritual illnesses in our heart but also to open up experiences for ourselves. Sometimes people don't realize that it's, I've heard from for example many people who have a hard time getting themselves to start a practice, whether it's their five daily prayers or reading Quran or doing something consistently because they feel that they don't have the feeling in their heart to do those things. Or that sincerity, that burst of iman that they're all seeking, we're all always seeking, right? Because they don't feel it, it's hard for them to actually get up and to do it. And they're waiting for that feeling to be the catalyst for them to do those things. Well those feelings are gifts, immense gifts, but they're the fruits of your labor. You're going to get, inshallah, those feelings increase the more you work towards it but you can't expect it right off the bat. I mean of course Allah again can do as he wills so maybe for some people that's their experience that with very little effort they have these amazing spiritual openings. But for most of us you know we have to kind of realize that our efforts will be rewarded with the more we display our sincerity and how do we display our sincerity, it's with consistency. So you know just to be consistent in our practice will inshallah open up those openings for us inshallah as Allah wills and you know he again does as he wills. So that was the fourth advice that he offered to treat the illnesses of the soul. And then he talks about in the fifth one accompanying a guide to Allah or to the fare of Allah unfortunately such a person no longer exists. So Allah I mean he's talking again 1493 is when he passed I'm not sure when exactly he wrote this advice but it was around that time several centuries ago. And he's saying that back then these amazing spiritual guides didn't exist. So what can we say about our state today? Allah knows of course sometimes our scholars would say these things just really as a statement of the state and the condition of the ummah. And so we have to seek Allah's forgiveness and pray that Allah brings people like that in our lives. People who remind us of Allah who you know there are people out there. There's certainly people out there who mashallah just by looking upon upon them as soon as they speak a few words. One's iman you can feel your iman increase. And Allah's given that ability to to certain people mashallah. So you know asking Allah to bring people like that in our lives. So he again we're just following the text and it's everything that I'm presenting is written exactly as he's you know written it here. This next section are he's he followed up that section about the illnesses with advice that he inserted from another famous scholar. He says here and he shares this advice and again it's all related because we're looking at you know spiritual illness and how can we protect ourselves from those things. Well he's just sharing this further counsel and he says this is these are advice. So let's start with the first four. There's there's more that follow. He says first don't set foot in a place unless you expect a divine recompense. SubhanAllah that's really profound because we have options we have free will we have the ability to go right left you know forward backwards Allah has given us the ability and the you know the the mental or the intellect to be able to discern what is beneficial and what's not but to make it a rule sort of you know it's just don't ever go somewhere unless you expect a reward for being there. That's immense discipline right and that's showing you the level of awareness these people had about their movements about their words about every every moment of their lives. SubhanAllah may may Allah give us that type of awareness but to have this as a as an advice that you live by that unless I know that I'm going to be rewarded I won't go there. And of course there's ample opportunity for reward because Allah so generous. You can go anywhere unless obviously it's a haram place but somewhere you know that there's many places we can go where there is an abundance of reward. So that's the level of awareness and thinking and contemplation that we all should be in the practice of maximizing the reward because actions are judged by intentions. So inshallah if you go with the intention to please Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that would be the first step right before you even think of going somewhere that it's your purifying your Nia that inshallah you're going to go and take care of whatever it is whether you go to the store or the post office or you're visiting someone that you're very clear on your intention and that you're very clear on how you're going to go about your you know that that process like what's your plan of action. For example something that I think is lost on so many people today and may Allah guide us but it is absolutely a foundational principle of our faith in terms of interacting with other people is lowering the gaze. How many people think about that before they even step outside the house that I have to make that intention that Allah I'm going to go and take care of what I need to take care of but I'm going to consciously be aware of myself and lower my gaze because I anticipate seeing things that I shouldn't be looking at especially in this season that we're in. I live in California and the weather is warm and this is why summer is usually not my very my least favorite season because I you know there's just so many so much that we're not that it's hard you know everywhere you look subhanallah and for women as well as men we all have to be very vigilant about these things because it seems to be getting worse and worse and worse. I remember just the other day yesterday may be the day before there was a big news story on the cover of one of these websites about this woman who stopped a lot she went to. I think it was in Southern California she was at a beach and she was practically all the below just she was practically naked she was wearing very little. And there was a family who apparently called the police on this woman and she was the police came and had to argue back and forth with her and the party that she was with they were all very angry because they felt totally justified that she wasn't doing anything wrong that she was not naked whereas you know she was she was you know from the small glimpse that I saw it was enough to say all the blood this woman is completely naked. But you know there's that's what we're up against it's getting worse and worse people are very free carefree with their bodies. And so whether you're at the beach or you're at a shopping mall or at a store or just driving by you might see things that we shouldn't be looking at so but how many of us have the presence of mind to make that intention before we leave the house like y'all I'm going to do my best to lower my gaze and be in that practice so that I don't bring on that harm to myself right. So it's really a matter of having such discipline and awareness but you know in this particular point that the advice I just find it profound because it tells you again how ahead these people were where they made these rules for themselves like unless I know there's a reward I'm not going there so you know so maybe learn from that. The next advice is to never sit in a place unless you feel safe from sin. So it's one thing that you don't enter a place unless you expect a reward but also that you refuse to participate or go somewhere if you unless you feel safe from sin. So think about professionally how many I remember I used to work you know for for corporation before I started teaching and they would have Christmas parties and there was always a lot of pressure you know from fellow employees to come because it was going to be so fun but I was young you know I was in my 20s but I had to make those very clear boundaries for my coworkers that I don't drink alcohol and I'm sorry but I cannot be in an environment where I know there's going to be a lot of alcohol you know there and everybody's it's just it was very uncomfortable and I think you know they they understood it and they respected it. There was you know always a little teasing comments here and there and even afterwards about how much I would miss out on all the fun but they respected my decision and so we have to as Muslims be principled people and be confident and they never lack that courage to speak up about our beliefs and our and and to feel shy about that but it is a problem that you're seeing that we're seeing more and more people are afraid to you know they don't want to rock the road or offend people they don't want to come across as too religious or extreme or fundamental so they tend to make those excuses and it's hard I I've certainly been in environments myself with family where it's very difficult because you know that there are certainly certain things and it's out of your control but you know this is just showing you the level of discipline that these people had a male or guidance to have that strong conviction so that we can also apply these this advice in and of course the best way possible but it's certainly something to think about moving forward how are we as you know how are we going to do this you know are we going to be able to when things open up you know I'm still I'm kind of in the quarantine mindset that right now we're safe from a lot of these things because we were not really socializing but perhaps that's what we need to be doing is thinking you know taking ourselves into account about past behaviors past mistakes how can I improve because that's what the point of all this is right it's all advice to help us better ourselves on the spiritual path so the best thing to do is to listen to these points and then to go back on oneself and say well there was that time or I have done this in the past how can I change that moving forward so that's where I think we should all be this is you know we're all in the same situation of really taking ourselves into account a reflection hopefully that's what we're doing anyway but really thinking about moving forward when things open up again and we're able to visit people and we're able to socialize and do things like we did before are we just going to go back to how things were and and just you know status quo whatever it is I'll just go along with it or are we going to maybe take things a little bit more seriously and and create those boundaries you know from just just be more open and honest with people so something to think about but again I'm just appreciating much all the level of these scholars because they were just so strong you know to have this deep conviction to be able to do these things is certainly not easy so the third advice that I was in a shadow that he has for us is do not accompany anyone unless you find him or her supporting your duties to Allah subhanallah and the next one is and is similar right do not select anyone as a friend unless he or she has increased your certainty so really this is about the company that we keep you know if you are you know sharing time and being influenced by people who really don't respect your religious values then it's going to affect you eventually this is why people who are disciplined in their faith the more and more they hang out with people who have weaker faith you find them changing right and so we have to you know look at the company we keep and try to surround ourselves with people who increase our belief increase our certainty with Allah and that we you know those intimate people that we bring close in those inner circles that they are those people that they're the people who as you know the advice says they increase our certainty that inner inner circle should be those people we have acquaintances there's family there's friends there's extended people in our lives that we may have to meet periodically but what when we assign the label a friend or confidant to someone they should be people that again remind us of Allah that increase us in our in our e-men that they support us when it's time to pray that they're not the ones going oh man really can you do that later you know stuff for a while there are people who who would get annoyed if being around you know a religious family member I've had those experiences personally and I know of others who've had as well that you know if your religiosity doesn't match the people that you're with it can make them uncomfortable and they may indirectly or directly expect you to tone it down dial it down a little bit you know whether it's directly telling you to not do something or to not make a big deal out about something or just kind of passively aggressively making comments you may start to find yourself being influenced by that so being very vigilant about the company that you keep and the influences that are around you and making sure that those people again share your faith and respect your faith and also increase your faith and those are really the primary qualities you want to look for so Mashallah he continues to give even more advice that he's listed here about the you know the people that that are in our lives that we should all think about again first whoever directs you to the ephemeral cheats you the ephemeral is what's you know temporary it's not lasting it's not lasting so this is thenia right the dinia is not going to last and the dinia is very intoxicating and and very tempting but if we have people in our lives that are always reminding us of the dinia and pushing us towards towards you know towards the dinia and away from Allah no matter how close they are no matter how much they claim to love us and how much we love them they are in many ways cheating us because this dinia as we said is fleeting it's going it's dying it's not going to last and so for us to put all of our focus and time and energy on that and become heedless of Allah it's clearly we're we're on the losing end of that and the opposite would be true that the one who is reminding you of the next life and to work towards that life and to not fall into this dinia and temptation and your desires that they're actually your greatest ally and greatest friend even if sometimes you know it's a bitter pill to swallow and to see how sometimes people give you advice or you know they may be a little hard but if you really analyze their words and look at which is which of the two is looking out from my soul right one may be wanting me to have fun and to enjoy life and to you know to to to ride this this wave with them this wave of life but the other one is looking out for my soul for my eternity and if they're telling me not to go to this place or not to go to that place because it's harm even though I my might not like that to be reminded I have to appreciate that that person is looking out for my soul and that's a true friend so you know just very simple reminder but it's also profound because we tend to blur the line sometimes when it comes to how we define friendships and we forget that the true friend the true companion in this world is the one who is looking out for your Akhira not just who's your ride or die or you know the person you can have fun with you know that I mean they're they're you know they might be good for those things but in terms of true friendship the true friend is the one who's always trying to prevent you from slipping for with a lesson on that whoever directs you to activity exhaust you so this is actually it was sort of I separated the three but it was in one statement so he's making distinctions for us so that we can see different categories of people there are going to be those people who again pull us towards that to do things right to to be out and about and I think for for you this is certainly true I remember you know if you look back into your earlier years your teen years or your 20s and maybe early 30s that's the sort of the prime of life and there's the zest for life that a lot of people feel and so everybody wants to do things and have experiences and travel and do fun things and let's jump out of a plane and you know the kind of throw a caution to the wind and just be free spirited and so there's a lot of you know push to do those things because you've tasted freedom you're out of you know your parents home you have maybe your own financial you know freedom to do things the way you want to do you're in a relationship whatever the case may be there's a sense of I can do whatever I want let's just go and explore but it can be exhausting and so he's just making that distinction that people who direct you to always do things with them they can exhaust you people who direct you to the ephemeral Chi you and then the last point he says is whoever directs you to Allah is by that counsels you this is a Dina Nasiha right this is what we want we want those types of friends and those types of people in our lives who are always reminding us of Allah so when you're in a group setting you know sometimes it's all fun and games and people can get really silly but you want to look out for where's that friend who whenever they speak it's sort of like pin drop silence they always have wisdom to share there may be not the ones goofing off and dancing or acting silly or all the participating in the you know that gossipy corner over there you know they're they're not those people they're the people who are hey what time is it has more of come in or hey you know what we should go we should check out this this you know talk or or let's listen to this awesome new Nashi that came out instead of you know the other type of music that may may not have any benefit to it. So there are those people who are always kind of trying to redirect people back to Allah and when conversations get out of hand even they may have really thoughtful things to talk about maybe not always necessarily religious topics but at least thoughtful responsible worthy it's not idle talk you know you want to think about those people and that's those are the people you gravitate towards and if they if there aren't any of those people you should be that person you should be the one who is you know thinking about these things ahead of time. And so I've you know I've counseled people who have sort of social anxiety sometimes and they they're afraid of misspeaking or not really having much to say or being put on the spot. So my advice is always to you know to arm yourself with different topics that you can talk about why are you waiting always for someone to invite you into a conversation. Whereas if you're taking initiative and being proactive you come up with topics that are going to be important you know whether it's it's incidences of social anxiety or others like I've heard from many people who are like well what do you do when you're with family and friends but then they always gossip and they're always talking about Haram and we're doing things that they shouldn't be doing and you don't want to you know cause fitna and you know have a big blowout. What do you how do you deal with that situation. Same advice same advice be proactive you know come up with a short list of topics that may be interest everybody there could be a political topic could be scientific you know people like science people like to know facts that they you know that that they never heard before but be creative be think about these things and work so that ahead of time so that when you're in those situations you don't find yourself suddenly doing something you shouldn't be doing so you know again if you can't if you don't grab those people aren't around in those circles and be that person for everybody else inshallah but I like the way that he just sort of distinguished these different categories so that we can really think about the company that we keep and realize where where are those beneficial people in my life that remind me of Allah and to appreciate them more inshallah and then he says make mindfulness of Allah you're abode and the delight of your ego will do you know harm as long as it is not content with the vice nor persists in sin and you do not lose your awareness of Allah in private so if you are aware of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and try to be at all times then you can enjoy life basically as long as you don't fall into you know vice and then harmful habits or things that you shouldn't be doing sinful behavior and that you don't forget Allah so you know it's we don't have to look at being religious as being completely void of you know life I think a lot of people unfortunately have that that image that if you're always aware of Allah or just Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that you kind of lose your life that spirit of life because you're so serious all the time you're brooding you're just constantly you know reflecting and so you can't be too some of the most amazing people that I know are fun loving and and very you know energetic people but subhanahu wa ta'ala they love Allah and they always infuse the remembrance of Allah and their discussions they find ways to bring faith into into the discussion but in an animated and and relevant and fun way as opposed to being just you know very serious and and again and too intense so this is how we do it you know have that awareness of Allah and your ego can enjoy you know again the lights of this whatever this dunya has to offer without harming you because as long as you follow you know the guidelines here that it's not content with the vice so you don't fall into bad habits you certainly abstain from sinful behavior and you do not lose your awareness of Allah in private that's also a very important distinction because you know if you're in public and you make a lot of these claims and you're very overtly you know you're very forthcoming with your reflections about God when you're around people then you want to make sure that's consistent what happens when those people leave are you still thinking about Allah or do you completely turn into a different person entirely and now it's just like you know you do whatever you want and it's all about your whims and desires so there's that's the the test the test of sincerity is is it you know are you sustaining that same or maintaining that same state of awareness even in private or is it just you know a public thing because maybe there's an image that you're putting out so that's how we know whether or not we're we're sincere so let's see here I want to see how much time I have okay so I'm going to stop here because there's more slides and there's more discussions to have inshallah and I really want to hear from all of you to see if there are any questions I tried to do this last time so let me see on my page if there are any questions and then I'll see on the YouTube page I we have just about five minutes left so Bismillah let me see I'm going to go back to the MCC page just bear with me for just a moment because sometimes the questions come like last time I tried to answer your questions with Subhanallah I saw them pop up as soon as I logged off and I felt so bad so I'm really sorry for anybody who asked questions for people who are asking I see some questions about the text I'll put it up again so here is the text that I'm using this is agenda to change our condition so I hope that's clear it's I'm sorry Shukram Zayusaf and Imam Zaid Shaker who put this together you can get it from Sandala okay so that's the text and the section that I was reading is Sidi Ahmed Zarruq section the appendix a in the back of the book so it's there's a lot of text here Mashallah a lot of great information so we'll continue this in two weeks when we resume inshallah and we'll continue to read and there's more advice and like I said this book I really encourage all of you to have it because there's just so much amazing content that's quite relevant and if you're a parent especially it's useful for ourselves as parents first and foremost but in trying to help our children pave their own spiritual path this is a wonderful tool it just outlines so much that will help you and help them so definitely worth getting so inshallah I'm on the Facebook page I only saw questions about the text I don't know if there's any other questions but let me look at the YouTube page sorry because there's Mashallah technology right we can broadcast on multiple platforms here so it's some good opportunity for us to see let's see Mashallah any other questions so again if you guys have questions this is the time because I am going to give it a couple of minutes in case it takes a few you know a little bit to load but I don't want to have have happened what happened last time where I saw the questions afterwards and I felt really bad so we'll go ahead and wait just a couple minutes but if there are no further questions and we will inshallah continue the discussion next time we meet now for those who again are possibly joining for the first time these sessions will be broadcast here same time 7 to 8 p.m. every other Thursday so we don't meet every week this is a bi-monthly or bi-weekly halaqa and alhamdulillah it's open I know that there are it's it was you know initially when we were on site anyway it was for sisters but alhamdulillah it's open to really anybody who wants to tune in I don't mind if brothers are watching I have no issue whatsoever it's an open discussion for all of us inshallah so feel free to share it with other people if they feel like they want to tune in alhamdulillah they're more than welcome so okay I'm going to check one more time and just see if there are any questions and then we will end because I don't think there are I haven't seen anything pop up yet but I thank all of you for tuning in masha'Allah thank you for the lovely comments I see some of your very nice comments she's like a mullah you guys are very generous masha'Allah okay so I think we are good for as I said we'll continue the discussion next time so yeah I don't see any more questions okay so we will continue the discussion and we'll read continue to read from again this text agenda to change our condition inshallah please get this text if you don't have it and benefit from it and if you have any questions we can inshallah address it for future sessions but thank you so much for joining we'll go ahead and end in dua inshallah and I look forward to seeing you guys in future broadcast subhanakAllahumma wabihamdika shaduman la ilaha illa antanas taqtiruk wa natuhu ilayk bismillahirrahmanirrahim wal'asir inna linsayna la bi khusr inna ladina aminu wa amiru sallihaati wa tawassu bilhaqi wa tawassu bil sabr so alhamdulillah jazak allah khayr and again everybody inshallah have a wonderful evening it's the night of Juma remember us in your da'as inshallah and this is the prime time we talked about salawat to do your salawat inshallah tonight tomorrow as we know there's more reward for salawat on the day of Juma and the night of Juma certainly inshallah may Allah increase all of you and may He bless all of us inshallah with visions of our beloved salallahu alayhi wa sallam inshallah that's my hope for all of you so jazakum allah khayr and have a wonderful evening As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh As-salamu alaykum bismillahirrahmanirrahim alhamdulillah wa as-salatu wa as-salamu alayk as-shaykh al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibina Muhammad As-salallahu alayhi wa sallam wa alayhi wa sahbihi wa sallam tasliman katira As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh dear brothers and sisters Alhamdulillah today is the first of Muharram as we all know of this new year I woke up this morning with some really just soul-crushing news subhanallah You know sometimes you hear things that are just beyond your imagination So all day today I've been consumed with this news and I wanted to just mention it here because it's so important and it is in a way relevant to our discussion as we've been focusing on agenda to change our condition with this amazing text we've been reading from it if you've been with me for the past few weeks But the news story that came out this morning was that Netflix was sort of previewing some of the programs that are to come and I believe in September they're going to release a movie it's made in France it's a French production that won a Sundance Film Award and so it's called Cuties and in this film it shows a story of a young Muslim girl who her family is practicing Muslim and she struggles with her family over the issue of her wanting to be a part of a dance troupe where they specifically do a specific type of dance called twerking and if you're not familiar with this dance it's very provocative, very sexualized it's highly inappropriate so this film is basically showing pedophilia it's showcasing and encouraging pedophilia because it's showing the sexualization of young girls it's just very disturbing and in addition to that to add insult to injury it's also attacking Islam and Muslim culture some of the clips or the audio, the dialogue in the trailer are clearly trying to portray Islam and Muslim culture as being old fashioned, antiquated, it's not progressive you could just pick up on all of these on the subtext of this film just watching that clip, that short trailer, even the description of the film is an attack on Islam and Muslims, they refer to her family as being dysfunctional and of course this is a family that I'm sure just watching the trailer anyhow it's clear are not happy with her choice of wanting to be a part of this dance group anyhow very upsetting news and I posted about it on Facebook, on Twitter, on Instagram as soon as I found out about it, my blood was very upset I've been upset pretty much all day watching the news about this waiting hoping that not just our community but Americans, people who have also heard about this film we had an outcry and it was national, everybody, I saw a lot of people from different backgrounds protesting this film, angry, if you go to the Netflix Instagram account a lot of people are very upset, leaving messages, they're basically blasting them and of course their response was what we should expect from such a large entity they addressed, they focused on one thing which is the poster that they released was very different than the one that was released in France and the poster was actually horrible, it was atrocious on every level, highly inappropriate so the apology that they issued only dealt with the poster and it's amazing to me that all of the other complaints that they're receiving they're just not even addressing those things and this is where we're at, I'm still monitoring the situation there is a petition on change.org, you can follow my Facebook post about this film and you'll find some action items there, one of them is to sign the petition another is to leave really low ratings on the IMDb page and anywhere else this is how we get the attention of these people, this is serious an attack on children, we have to, when we again say agenda to change our condition this is a perfect opportunity, we cannot expect our world to improve or the state of our world to improve if we continue to turn a blind eye or just become apathetic to things like this this is a very big deal, when you start to promote something as depraved as pedophilia and gloss it over and make it like, oh it's just this cute little movie about dancing and teen girls and coming into their own and struggling with their sexuality I mean why does an 11, 12, 13 year old girl, why do we have to again exploit children it's mind boggling that this is happening in our world and that as we remarked through the day about the fact that it's not the fault of one person we can't blame necessarily the director or the producer or the person who put this story together there are hundreds of people involved in the making of a film the cast, the crew, the writers, the directors, the producers every single person is complicit in this story being shown to billions of people it's a global market right with film and so it can fall into many different markets and audiences but the point is what's the message, the message is that young girls to look at them with this again in this horrible way in this inappropriate way to exploit them so we have to as Muslims when we see things like this have the right response I really wanted to start off my conversation today with all of you about this because it's just been weighing on my soul that this is happening so openly there was a time where pedophiles and people who promoted this were hidden they knew better, they did whatever they did but in darkness and God, we pray that there weren't many of them but Allah really is the only one who knows but they at least didn't feel bold to act out their depravity in public but now we see films being made and nobody is blinking an eye that this is really inappropriate to see girls dressed in the way they're dressed in a film, you'll see them and just giving off these or sending these messages that are so dangerous for them what are we teaching our children, boys and girls, men and women when we allow this to happen so we have to turn to ourselves and all of us we really have some decisions to make there are people who are calling for a boycott of Netflix if they don't remove this and we know if you're paying attention to any of the programming this isn't an outlier situation there's many programs on Netflix that are completely against our faith and so we have to reconsider what we're going to do moving forward when it comes to these type of scenarios that we find ourselves in are we going to just turn again and all of us have to have this internal conversation we all have to think about the choices we make whether it's subscribing to a streaming service like Netflix or whatever if we are promoting are we somehow complicit in what they're doing by supporting them, by giving them our monthly subscriptions by in any way supporting them are we going to be held accountable? So may Allah forgive us and guide us it's a difficult conversation to have but I think all of us have to become aware my niece just a few minutes before this broadcast started she messaged me, she saw my post she's off to college soon but she was so upset herself being a young Muslim girl seeing this trailer that she became activated by my post and decided to address it she was also asking what more can we do other than sign this petition and try to affect the ratings and the reviews so my response to her was I think the best thing right now to do is to just become aware and to share this with people because the more people are upset and outraged then that's how we get these people to pay attention if this just becomes a small little group in our own corner and we're just screaming to the top of our lungs we're simply not going to get much traction because for them it's all about money it's all about are we risking people cancelling subscriptions, is that worth it or are we risking losing potential multi-million dollar film contractor agreement, I don't know we don't obviously know the terms of these things but clearly money is what talks and so sometimes the best thing to do is just try to mobilize and make sure that our voices are heard so that they take us seriously so I would say please share this information with your family, your friends tell them about the petition for now it's probably already passed 200,000 signatures since this morning but we can do better there's how many million people in just the US alone we're looking at two billion Muslims and if we started to wake up to the details and the ramifications of a story like this being normalized and that's really the danger is that this is just the beginning and we've seen it already, look in the past five years just look at the programs look what's happening to cartoons, to television to film, to social media everything, music, it's just it's getting worse and worse and part of that problem is that we're not pushing back strong enough so I think people of conscience, people of faith we need to stand up to these people and tell them you've crossed the line by normalizing this especially when so much attention has been brought about human trafficking and trafficking of children and the exploitation of children already, just this year alone we've seen so much with the Epstein case an acceptable choice to promote this film but I think that's really telling of where we're at that many of these people, this is normal in their world and they don't see anything wrong with it and may Allah all the belages anybody who engages in this behavior or you know even because you know they hide many of them hide behind their their wealth, their power, their status we have to get out of that idea that people who do this, these things are you know just hidden in their seedy in their own like corners of the world it's actually much bigger, there's people in very high positions people with a lot of power who engage in this but may Allah again protect our children protect our families, let us make better choices inshallah so I just wanted to put that out there because it's weighing on my soul like I said and I want to just get the word out now, let's change gears inshallah so for the past couple of weeks we have been reading from this amazing text called Agenda to Change Our Condition by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf and Imam Zaid Shaikh and if you have not been following along, I invite you to go to the MCC Facebook page or YouTube page to look at the previous sessions this book Masha'Allah is amazing it's life changing, it's transforming and I think everybody should have it and should read it and we should especially be teaching this type of content to our youth they need to be taught skills and and given the tools to navigate this world and this is the type of content that will do that for them so I encourage everybody to get it but the area that I've been focusing on in the past couple of books is actually at the end of the book so we're doing things a little differently and the reason why is because it's just so profound what's in the appendix I mean the whole book is, as I said, transforming transformative but this section in the back, the appendix A there is a advice here from Sidi Ahmed Zarruq and he he's a noble scholar of his time but he wrote here foundations of the spiritual path so with each session we've been going over this long list of it really isn't counsel, it's nasiha but the way that he structured it is that he lists what are the foundations of a spiritual path so if you decide to commit to a spiritual path what would you need what are your goals what are the objectives so he puts that out there and then from there he proceeds to give you the or deconstruct it to tell you what steps you would need to get the prerequisites before the steps that he's listing so we're kind of again going in a very interesting way but that's why this is such a fascinating piece so we covered quite a few different things already but where we stopped last week actually we had just shared because in the middle of his advice here he actually inserts advice from another scholar so we covered that last week the advice that gave and then from there he goes back so now we're back to Sidi Ahmed Zarruq's counsel and I'm going to pull up a screen share so you guys can follow along with the content that I'll be reading so let me go ahead and do that inshallah just give me a minute to pull everything up yallah screen share so let's do present and oh sorry that happened too fast share and then present okay so after as I said he shared nasiha let me actually show you that so the last thing that we covered last week was this which again is not from Sidi Ahmed Zarruq but from this other scholar and so he talked about different people in our lives and what they will direct us to and whether or not they're beneficial or they're harmful so he again you can watch the previous broadcast to get more content here but let's go ahead and move on to Sidi Ahmed Zarruq's so now let's look at his wording here he says I say complacency persistent sin and negligence of Allah in solitude are the roots of all calamities pitfalls and faults they in turn in gender 5 afflictions so these just the way that he's written this complacency and then persistent sin so every one of us as we're reading this text the best way really I think to do this is to constantly do that internal check at every point and ask yourself where do you fall in this spectrum are you in a place of complacency where you're just kind of not really doing much and you've gotten very comfortable with doing and you're not really motivated to do more are you in a place of sinning and falling into the same sins over and over again and again not changing are you totally negligent of Allah and remember all of these things he qualifies them in solitude and I think that's really important as well because as you study or as we haven't covered it on this in this program but I have in previous discussions talked about the 25 diseases of the heart that Shahmza has outlined in Purification of the Heart which is another book that's highly highly highly encourage you to get but you know we talk about the importance of we're distinguishing whether or not you are doing things for show Riyah is ostentation this is a disease of the heart where you're basically perform it's performative your spirituality is all for show so in public you have one persona and then in private you're a totally different person so we want to again look at how we are in private not how we present ourselves in public because that really shows us where we're at with Allah anybody can perform the Munafirqin they performed they did everything they would pray in the Masjid they would fast or pretend to fast they would say the Shahada so outwardly they look like everybody else they behave like everybody else but the true believer our reality is reflected in how we behave in solitude so again as we're going through this always do that internal check from where am I with this because he's telling us right there that these behaviors that when we become complacent we persistently sin and then we become negligent complete ghafla heedless of Allah swt this is the root of all of the calamities pitfalls and faults so all the stuff that we're seeing personally in our own lives but also look at our world right now for those of us who are in the state of California it's you know it looks like the apocalypse outside it's I'm getting pictures and videos from people in different parts of the state there's a haze that is so strong it's just it looks like one of my cousins she sent a picture she said it looks like the sepia filter right which is an old name of a filter but it has that yellow tint and this was you know broad daylight but there's just gloomy and dark and quite just it's unsettling to be honest but this is you know subhanAllah one of so many things we've seen already in the year 2020 right and of course Allah swt is in full control and he does as he wills but we have to take these things seriously you know it's not just like oh a difficult weather pattern I mean that's of course the scientific or material you know world the lens of the science of the material world but for us we don't take these things lightly you know Alhamdulillah we had for example Imam Taher may Allah protect and preserve him but earlier today he was encouraging and he actually did lead a prayer for rain you know because when you see these things happen around you we can't just whine and you know be upset and angry about it we have to remember to turn to the one putting us in these predicaments and call on him for relief so you know praying for rain and asking for relief because you know people have been evacuated a lot of people are suffering I know people who have asthma and you know it's really difficult to breathe and I was just thinking subhanAllah with covid and you know the pollution of this world everything that you know we've just caused so much destruction with all of you know the chemicals and just everything that we've done to the climate and to our world and then covid and its attack on the lungs and then you have these fires it's like subhanAllah there's this you know it's like there's a you know I'm just imagining that the earth is suffering you know so much as this deep of its airways and we have a hand in that we all have done something or not done something to contribute to that so when we find ourselves in this situation we have to ask Allah for relief from that and so we do have our amazing scholars and teachers leading the way in those efforts so you know just follow their lead we have to restore the balance our teachers and bless them do so much for us and so we have to make offer them remember them and follow their lead inshallah but it's so important again like I said to go back to yourself and then so here these qualities right that we just that he just outlined or defined for us the engender five afflictions so they'll actually you know these five other spiritual diseases are related to them so let's look here number one he lists preferring ignorance over knowledge so again there are some people who you know they have the fight or flight response to stress which is normal right but if you find yourself always running from the problem or just in denial not really wanting to hear it you know you this is you know as they say they're remaining blissfully ignorant um this is blame worthy right we can't just turn away from things that are right in front of us for convenience or because there's a discomfort that we feel around it or we would just rather not know because we're too busy enjoying life um so our state of mind as Muslims as believers is that we always want the truth we always prefer knowledge and in sometimes it's going to be easy you know I certainly know people who I get it they have a hard time coping or maybe they get triggered and so in those cases those are exceptional cases people trauma you know I'm not speaking to that because those are we have to be sensitive everybody's different but there are amongst us those who they just really don't want to be in convenience with the truth right so they would rather not know so if you find you know that this is something you just it's a burden to know things you want to redress you know address that because then who else you know if every if there's only a few people who have to carry the burden and then they you know and the rest just get off and don't have to worry about it is that fair right but if everybody is aware and that we're all trying to do something about the problems that we that we see then inshallah likely we'll get solutions faster but also it's just it's a more fair response right so I think we just have to all internally like I said our own conscience ask ourselves where where again you know do we fall here are we the type that runs from responsibility really that's really what it is essentially right because knowledge is power and when you're ignorant you can just be you know ignorant and you don't have to worry about things so think about that now the next one being duped by every spiritual charlatan so this is certainly a reality you know there are many people who fall for those who you know just are eloquent they have the right words they may promise things that you know they really can't promise they profit off of whatever you know they're they're selling or you know promises they're making or whatever claims they're attesting to that they can profit off of that so it's if you're not aware of yourself or you're not really doing the necessary work to become aware of who you should follow or not you likely will fall for those people you know I've seen it many times in our community you know or heard stories I should say about people especially back home in some of our countries who they make money off of the innocence but also the ignorance of other people right if you've never read the Quran or never engaged with the book of Allah or engaged with the Seerah of the Prophet said them or know your Aqidah well then sure you may believe someone who has again who makes certain claims and you may fall for it especially if you think about people who are in desperate situations right it's like they want something so desperate from this world that they may turn and pay you know pretty penny for oh this person will make the offer you or they'll give you this or they'll give you that and you know people who are Alhamdulillah not ignorant or they've actually pursued knowledge which is you know the first point here they don't prefer to stay in that state of ignorance they know not to fall for everybody and they know that you know the true Alhamdulillah or the true person of knowledge doesn't you know they're not like sorcerers or wizards you know they don't have magical powers they have strong yakin and they can certainly you know if Allah wills they can maybe their doaz or their certain things but they themselves would never make a claim about it they may just out of their grace and generosity offer to make the or maybe offer you some you know a formulaic prayer or with but they themselves know that everything is in the hands of Allah so they don't speak definitively about things you know like oh do this for sure this will happen to you nobody can predict those things it's all in the hands of Allah so you know again knowledge would protect you from falling to people neglecting one's duty in important matters so obviously you know you become just to you know relaxed about things and we're seeing this you know more and more in our society and and certainly in our community where there's a watering down and you see other faith communities have gone through that as well where the true the core tenets or practices of their belief are taken seriously by people in certain you know roles but then the majority don't really follow through you know you can see this in other faith communities and that's the danger that of not taking your faith seriously is that we may see that happen may God protect us from you know from that where only a handful of strong Muslims remain where they pray their far they don't question the what the farah are they don't try to have a different interpretation of a reverse or hadith and apply their own whims and desires they don't do that they just this is what Allah said it's in his book this is the prophecy I said I'm soon I'm going to follow it that type of just devotion Allah protect us from from that reality where only a handful of people are doing that or you know the numbers are just dwindling because we're taking our faith not as seriously and we start to neglect the important things that we should be doing so that's the unfortunate result though if you start to again you can play sin you persistently sin you'll just be neglectful um exalting in the spiritual path so this is when you are you know and you can see this it's interesting because you know people are at different levels right and so you will see people who may not really be doing a lot in terms of their prayer and their own personal practice getting swept away or emotionally swept away with with the path or certain aspects of the path I should say so it's like their lens is really off because you know there's we have work to do you know we're here to worship Allah's path and there's work that's required of that you know you can't just sit back and and just want it all to be about your feelings you know and that's in experiences and so that's all that you care about is that you just want to get that spiritual high but then when it comes to actually working for it um you're not doing as much and that's what what you know point number five also is about when you're hastening like you want certain things for example I've heard people say this you know and it's again just not having a clear understanding like hushu is something that it's a byproduct of effort right it's a byproduct of effort you have to be working hard to be in the remembrance of Allah SWT to purify your heart sincerely try your hardest to have presence and mindfulness in the acts of worship that you do but you can't expect hushu to enter your heart without effort and I've heard people that's one of the reasons that they don't pray for example you know that oh I don't feel it I've heard people actually say that well when I pray I feel disconnected you know they're just words that I don't quite understand if you know if it's a non Arabic speaker and so they'll find all these justifications so they essentially say I don't feel a spiritual high in my prayer so sometimes it's like ah why bother that's a total that's complete you know stuff for the law because you know those are gifts from Allah you know to have a spiritual opening is not something that you should feel entitled to without any effort you should I mean if you get that that's incredible and you should be in a state of absolute gratitude but this idea that it's a prerequisite to you worshiping just shows an entitlement that you should really deal with and say stuff for law you know why do I feel to that you know like people who get upset and angry and then demand that God reveal himself somehow you know sometimes people get in you know these are just when you study Al Qaeda with the teacher properly and you understand it you'll know that that behavior it's just that's not from the believer we shouldn't do things like that where we expect anything from Allah that we are completely at His mercy and no matter how much we do and how well we think we do it at the end of the day as Shechem always says you know that we should always ask Allah SWT for His mercy not assuming that any of us have done enough to warrant some reward from Him because we have it and that's why you know the famous Hadith about the man who worshiped for 500 years and then he shows up on the day of judgment and I mean it's a lengthy story but just quickly you know he he's told to enter Jannah by you know by the mercy of Allah and when he hears that he's kind of taken it back because he worshiped perfectly for 500 years so there's this transaction that happens between him and the angels and then when the angels you know recanted the story or you know relayed the story back to Allah and of course Allah already knows but still in the story it's stated this way Allah tells them to reply that okay all of that worship of 500 years was for just the blessing of eyesight and so when the man heard that then he said okay by His mercy I'll enter like he realized it was foolish to think that you know even though he was devoted and he did all that he did for that much time Allah gave him that much time that it wasn't it didn't warrant the reward of Jannah and that the only way we enter Jannah is through the mercy of Allah subhan Allah and there's many other Hadiths that support that even the Prophet said and was asked about that for the Sahaba and he said even himself it's all by the mercy we'll even enter so we have to get out of this mindset that we're entitled to things you know but this idea again of wanting some big opening or some you're a lot to be answered you know I made us the khada I didn't get answered you know I've dealt with people who have been through a lot so in no way trying to trivialize or diminish people's states to find out again where they are in this but there are people who have been through a lot and so shaitan attacks those people with these types of ideas you know and so we have to remember all this place is a place of tribulation it's a place of difficulty we've been told that from the very beginning you know it's throughout the Quran throughout the Hadith these reminders are there that this is we're only here to be tested so you know we're here to work and we're here to show Allah SWT that we take our covenant seriously you know when we testified that he's our lord we take it seriously it's not just lip service you know it's not just we're not nominally Muslim you know we actually mean it and the way that you prove that is through your actions and so you know just keeping that in mind that we're not owed anything we're not striving we're hard for it so these this is the advice that he shared here now the next slide so these five so yeah so just to be clear when you are complacent persistent and sin and negligent of Allah then it engenders it causes this to happen now these five are then cause five more so let me go ahead and move to the next slide here of course the delay just okay went too far this man now okay here we go so these foster five other afflictions first preferring innovations to the Sun now so you know if you again know that the prophesy sodium did things a certain way but you'd rather do it your own way this is where you have to you know be very careful because I mean nobody's way is better than the prophesy no matter how good it might be or logical or you know sometimes people make things appear to make more sense but this isn't you know we don't look too logic or we don't look at convenience or efficiency necessarily we look really to how did he do it you know if he prayed a certain way all of obviously the different acts of worship but he's our example and that's it but if you find that you would rather listen to you know someone else's and there are these people who come up with their own ideas you know this and we're living in a time so full hour these ideas aren't just you know they're spreading because we're we have we have the internet and we have access to to things by the you know just a click of a button you can access someone else's ideas you know you don't have to wait to meet with them or hear from them or wait for them to do anything public you can just it's within seconds someone just has an idea and you can go follow them on some social media platform and you'll suddenly be aware of their ideas so there's a lot of people who have ideas and you have to be careful not to fall for that trap that because they're smart you know they have that degree they they're accomplished they're successful they're wealthy they're in a position of power that because they speak a certain way that maybe their idea is refreshing you know it's new it's progressive all these things that are used to make it sound shiny and possibly better if it's against the Sun of the Prophet's life it's nothing right that's how you have to be and you have to have to keep that in mind right that nothing is better than the Sun of the Prophet's life and again like I said you're going to see a lot of people who make claims but you have to be careful not to in any way fall for those claims because when they it's arrogance I mean if you think that you have your knowledge or you've you know more you're more profound in your insight about something out of the blood in the Prophet's life you're deluded and you're out of the blood that's just straight up arrogance so be careful following people like that and also following messages like that next is imitating vacuous people instead of those of substance so vacuous are people who are just not smart ignorant people again there are a lot of ignorant people who claim to know there are people who don't for example who don't even know Arabic but then they will claim that they have some nuanced ideas about certain verses in the Quran or certain Hadith I mean come on you have to know that that right then there discredits them and if you don't even know the language of the text that you are attempting to analyze and comment on then you are clearly deluded but unfortunately again a lot of people they speak well or they have a platform or they have some status and then you know people fall for that so make sure that you can distinguish between the two because again all of those material or worldly things are not what make a person don't give credibility to someone who comes to religious understanding or insight it's really their character and people of the path are you can tell when you eat them they are humble and you have the prophetic example and they their actions follow their words so they don't have that duality where sometimes we see a lot of that too we see a lot of duality in our world today the people of Allah are very consistent people because the Prophet was consistent and they are on his path so you don't find duplicitousness you don't find one way with this group and then I present myself differently here they are consistent so people of substance are consistent and of course they fear Allah and they have taqwa and knowledge and all of those virtues behaving capriciously in both trivial and weighty matters so when you constantly follow your whims and desires your ego, your nafs is in control that's it if you don't take life seriously this is the kind of person you end up being someone who's just always making light of really heavy matters and even maybe a mockery out of things just because you're kind of in that place of nothing really matters what's the point, everything's a joke and you see a lot of that in our world today there's so much cynicism people don't really take things seriously everything's a joke it's stuck for a lot it's very dangerous because the world is very serious we're in a very serious place here and if you're not aware of that or you're so deluded and distracted by all the entertainment and just giving into your whims and desires and catering to your base desires then sure if that's all you do all day, play video games or watch movies and listen to music and eat and go out and laugh and have fun and shop it's just constant distractions then you're not going to see the seriousness of this world because you are medicating or putting yourself in that stupor, that sleep state although you're awakeful because you're in denial of reality which is this is a place again of tribulation, of grief, of loss of pain, you're going to suffer suffering is everywhere there's innocent people who are suffering every second of every minute of every day innocent people who don't deserve you know as people say they don't deserve what they're getting suffering is just part of dunia it's here but it's a very serious place and we should take our lives seriously I mean that's not to say don't enjoy aspects of dunia no, as the Prophet s.a.w. he enjoyed aspects of this dunia and this is again following his sunnah but it's in balance it's not that you live to play all day and you live to entertain all day we live to worship Allah swt that's why the believer that's your priority every single day when you wake up you should be thinking about you know where what your objectives are for that day in terms of your worship of Allah number one most important of course is your prayers there's people who don't take their prayers seriously and that's a very weighty issue it's the first things upon Allah that we're going to be asked about on the day of judgment is our prayers so if you don't take your prayer seriously then sure you're likely not going to take other things seriously as well but be very careful because this is what that behavior leads to when you're negligent of Allah you're just persisting in sin all the things that we talked about in the previous slide all those things happen and then this is what further happens even more spiritual disease entering the heart that manifests with this type of behavior preferring fantasies over realities you know this is one of the diseases of the heart living in having false hope and just living fantasizing and getting lost in your thoughts and not really again you're not really present because if you're present you're aware of what your own mortality you're aware of it it's like right in your face you can't deny it but if you're not really present in the day because you're again getting lost in dreams and hopes and again it's not to say we shouldn't have goals and hopes and dreams it's about how do you preoccupy your time if you are doing things where you're always in a meme land situation and not you're likely not going to fulfill the obligations that are right in front of you you know and there's people who just think about this for example there are people who read a lot of books like nonfiction they just like stories and so they're in book clubs and they have their kindles always reading reading reading other books right just regular any subject books but they'll get so caught up in those books that they will forget to pray or that they don't prioritize prayer same with television you know movies social media if those things because again you're lost in the fantasy of what those things the worlds that are open up to you through those mediums you know which is really what it is if you think about it social media film television music books literature all of these things are like portals to other worlds right to escape our own reality and so if you get lost in those other worlds then what happens to your reality you know obviously it's going to go to the wayside and that's exactly what we're seeing every single day in this world but it's not you know when we zoom out we don't have to always focus on just spiritual matters but reality in general there are people who get so lost or obsessed with their addictions whatever they are because again they're escaping their own reality that they neglect their children they neglect their spouses they neglect their parents they go into debt they don't take their finances seriously they you know lose their employment all because they have gotten into this habit destructive habit of just escaping whatever reality they're in with the vice of their choice right and what does that do it ends up eventually destroying them so we have to accept that people who are successful spiritually and worldly don't do that and remember there are people who are very successful they're not you know for example I just I forgot who it was but I just recently watching something and someone was saying that how they you know they've never they're not Muslim but they were saying they never drink alcohol never drink it because they don't their mind is focused they you know they know what they want they're very you know clear about their goals and objectives and they don't want to compromise that right so they don't engage in that type of behavior where you know I want to buzz and I just want to escape reality so a lot of people who are successful in the world also don't they don't fall into that behavior they don't do drugs they don't do alcohol they just stay away from it you know of course there's certainly people who do that stuff a lot of people but it's interesting right to see that you know they they could right it's not that like they necessarily have something that prevents them other than the fact that they you know made that choice that I don't want to compromise myself or put myself in that situation so I'm not going to do that but again you know spiritually successful people worldly successful people they're not always trying to run away so we have to look at our behavior and find out you know or figure out where our particular escapes are and whether or not they're affecting our spiritual health you know because it could seem benign oh what's the harm I'm just playing you know Tetris okay or watching sports sure you know those could be totally innocent you know leisurely activities or fun games that you're engaged in but again if you are defaulting or or shirking your other responsibilities right you're not fulfilling your obligations to Allah first and foremost you're not growing you know because there's the ritual acts that we do but there's also a simultaneous growth you should that you should inshallah we should all see growth right like from where we were last year the year before the year before our hope is that we're growing and in our understanding in our practice that we're incrementally getting better if we're not seeing that but then we're escaping and we're giving time to these other things this is clearly a problem and unfortunately I think because again the world that we're in these are so ubiquitous it's everywhere you really it's very hard to escape from it you know because it's just everybody's doing it a lot of these things and it's just so normal it's so normal normalized in our culture but when you're assessing your spiritual path which is what this text is all about right just trying to figure out where you are on the path you do need to take inventory about what you're engaging in where your time is being used what you're not doing enough of we all have to do that that's muhassabah it's literally taking taking account and you can do this daily every day you can mentally just kind of check in where did you mess up that day so in general trying to see where you were from maybe as I said a couple of you know months ago like in Ramadan of this year to now what has changed with the better or worse so you can do those regular check ins and then do the larger check in where you see like man you know last year at this time where I was I you know did I do anything have I done anything big or made any strides in the regular area you know and that's what what we should be doing regularly declaring insincere claims you know some people stuff again they will it's delusion they'll make claims of and it could be many things many examples but like you know dreams for example a lot of times we have to be very careful about our dreams we're not exaggerating them but also sort of exaggerating them to maybe convince ourselves or other people about where we are I know there's yeah I mean Shaitan could easily delude someone to think of themselves as being what they're not through these types of tricks you know where you start to make claims that are just not true whether it's about yourself or other people or you have there's insincerity right you don't really mean what you're saying you might you might again for the sake of your own reputation maybe claim that you will do something that you're not going to do something just the sincerity is missing so it could be either trying to exaggerate things and make yourself appear a certain way or to again protect yourself from maybe some consequence or just to be liked maybe by other people that you will make insincerity claims but these are all again they should all trouble us and may Allah protect us from having these types of qualities how much time do we have here we have just a few minutes time goes so quickly I always think it's an hour I hope there's enough content but then I start talking I just end so fast so let me stop the screen share there's more advice to come more comments but I want to see if there are any questions or anything like that so I'm going to check the Facebook page that I have here inshallah and if you do have any questions please let me know now let's see let's see okay so I don't see anything on the Facebook page but let me check the YouTube because I know sometimes there are questions there so I don't see anything here yeah does anyone have any questions before we end I'll keep all of these open I have a lot of windows open right now just so that I can see the thread but no questions or any questions you know it's like I said it's a really transformative text and there's a lot of food for thought but the text like this that sometimes questions and realizations may come after the fact so I'm happy I don't know well you guys should all know where to find me but I am on social media so you can always message me on Facebook or Instagram and let me know if you have any questions but for now I don't see anything so that's left I didn't want to start the next section because it's five more points and so I stopped beforehand but for next week we'll continue with the same text or the same section of this text of Agenda to Change our Condition the Appendix A we'll continue and see what more insights are to come it's really again fascinating so thank you if you have any questions I hope they don't pop up like last time after I hang up or after I end the call hang up after I end the zoom but inshallah if you have any questions please feel free to message me privately in the meantime alright thank you all let's go ahead and inshallah end in dua Bismillahirrahmanirrahim wa la'asirina linsana la fi khusr illaladina amanu tawassum bin haqi wa tawassum subhanak Allahumma bi hamdika as-shadu an la ilaha ila antara astaghfiruk wa natsubu ilayk Allahumma salli wa sallim wa barak ala Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa ala alayhi wa sallim ala alayhi wa sallim inshallah we will see you guys in two weeks where we will continue with Agenda to Change our Condition and I'll see you guys then alright salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh everyone I want to apologize first of all for being late we changed the time and I'm not sure if you guys all saw the changes to the time change it was done a little bit hastily and that's my fault I actually wanted to change the time from 8 to 9 and I completely forgot to do that we are here in California our maghrib comes in around 730 735 so I just thought it might be better to change the class time to after prayer so that people aren't anxious or rushed about the prayer myself included and we can just peacefully have the class so I requested the time change a little too late but then in addition to that we were just going through some technical issues my internet is a little unstable right now I don't know why I haven't gotten any notices from our provider there's issues but it's pretty slow and I'm having a very difficult time loading the page so if there's any issues with the broadcast I want to apologize in advance I'm going to just do my best inshallah to get through this hour and hopefully you guys will stick around with me but thank you for being here we have been doing a class now with I mean here at MCC covering a text and you can watch the previous broadcast the class is on agenda to change our condition we're going to inshallah my hope is to go through the book properly but I wanted to start off with this particular section which is in the back the appendix section and so that's where we've kind of done things a little backwards but it's okay there's a you know there's a wisdom inshallah and hopefully inshallah and doing it this way but anyway let's I'm going to try to broadcast this if you just give me a minute to supahallah okay something's going on I don't even know if you guys are with me right now I'm getting a message that says fail to live broadcast so I might be talking to myself but hey we record these sessions so if the live broadcast fails because of internet issues then inshallah we'll at least have the recording and we can do the class I mean post the class later but let me see if it's just my internet or if it is actually on the web page I'm not sure just give me one moment supahallah okay I don't see the broadcast for today just yet maybe it'll kick in a little bit or in a minute oh wait there we go alright I see something let me see if I can share it now that would be very helpful so that way it's on my page as well um okay supahallah it's very slow alright I don't know how to share or it's just not loading so I'm just going to share it after we're done alright supahallah I remember the advices that um on foundations of the spiritual path and as I've explained in previous videos he sort of does um you know a deconstruction in a way of the path and how one lays the foundation of their spiritual path but goes in this order that's very interesting in terms of what to look out for what you know the objectives of the pitfalls the dangers of the path and so last session which was two weeks ago now right we meet every other Thursday um we started off on this section and I do have a presentation let me see if I can at least post that um I'll share screen inshallah so that you guys can see what I am doing here so let me Bismillah present and share let's see if this works present so this presentation we ended on last time let's see was it this one we ended on this one so this is the slide that we covered at the very end of our last session which um again there's different advices that he gives about the spiritual path and each one sort of leads into the previous one so we talked about how he says here I say that complacency persistent sin and negligence of Allah in solitude are the roots of all calamities pitfalls and faults they in turn engender five afflictions so when you are complacent with your spiritual practice you're persistently sinning and you're negligent of Allah when you're alone okay these are the roots this is where all of the spiritual calamities will befall you and faults you'll start to you know really display faults and once you do those things you're gonna follow up with five more things and so he lists these so we went over this you can watch the previous session where we talked about all five of these and then for today we're gonna talk about what he says these five qualities right here they actually foster five more afflictions so if you you know do these things where you're going to eventually do the next five and that's this list here so number one having obsessive compulsive thoughts during worship you know someone who has been again working with different people throughout the community for the past 20 plus years and hearing talks and hearing you know even our teachers talk about these realities this has been a constant theme that I've heard from many people about how to control one's thoughts especially during prayer right the waswasa we're all afflicted with waswasa right during prayer but some people have this you know really to a degree that's very difficult for them to have any peace or hushu in their prayer because you know they're under a clear spiritual attack during their prayer but it can come in the form of this type of you know obsessive compulsive thoughts and it can be about anything and everything you know just being distracted maybe sometimes you're looking at the prayer rug and instead of thinking about you know the verses that you're reciting or reflecting on Allah swt now you get lost in the pattern of the carpet that you're preying on or in some other thought that you've been maybe thinking about or dwelling about so this is one of the you know the afflictions that can manifest if you again have what we just covered in the previous set of five the other one is oh actually I'm sorry he talks about this about obsessive compulsive thoughts and he says they arise from innovation the basis of which is ignorance of the sunnah or some psychological affliction so if you have obsessive compulsive thoughts you might likely be innovating or adding things to your practice that are not from the sunnah and this is you know when you become very sort of too relaxed about your spiritual practice and you don't take it as seriously you're not as committed to following the sunnah and disciplined in that way you may you know follow your own whims and desires and start to innovate or introduce ideas that are new to worship and then from that this can happen when you start to just have thoughts and you don't have real peace and he also talks about psychological affliction so that is true for some people this just could be a condition or some disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder there's real problems that people may have that could contribute to this so it's important to make the distinction there then he says overindulging in normal human activities so his commentary he says as for those overindulging in worldly matters had they realized they would know that worldly engagements are a dispensation due to human frailties and should be limited to the necessities of life, nothing more so indulging in worldly matters or just being excessive in leisurely activities for example things of pleasure and enjoyment when you're overindulging in those things you're prone to have have these types of spiritual problems they'll just become worse because those things are just given to us by Allah swt we're human beings, we're weak we have certain needs and so we're allowed to enjoy some of this dunya but not to become completely obsessed with it and distracted by it to the point where we forget Allah swt forget our obligations and so this is the danger of overindulging is that you will create habits that are very difficult to break and you will likely renaig on more important matters like your prayer, like your responsibilities and duties to your family people sometimes get swept away by hobbies and by obsessions and by things that they really love sports, it could be things that are not necessarily in and of themselves haram but because they distract one then that's what happens it says here, no one is unrestrained in worldly pursuits unless he or she is far from Allah so it's a sign that if you become so unrestrained in just pursuing different things from this dunya that you may likely be away from Allah because that's when you're connected to Allah swt, your whole world revolves around worship of Him, remembrance of Him so you don't really have that much time to dedicate to just indulging your desires and whims all the time you don't do that, there's balance and you know your boundaries but if it's unrestrained because you're just obsessed or you have these again indulging all the time then you're likely going to it'll come at the expense of your spiritual connection to Allah so another affliction that would manifest if from these bad habits that one would fall into is gathering ritually for invocation and chanting now that might seem like a little perplexing like wouldn't that be a good thing well sure, if you're balanced in your practice and you are from time to time just enjoying those experiences just to revive the heart it's one thing but if you're not even praying your prayers consistently, you don't fast you don't pay the zakat or do all of your funnel and then you find these opportunities to get together for those types of events and you'll make time for those things then you clearly have your priorities straight and there's also a delusion that can come about because you think of yourself as someone who is spiritually you know practicing and you're really connected but when in fact this isn't a reflection of your spirituality it's just a reflection of you following your own whims and desires you may just enjoy the ambiance of those gatherings you might enjoy the social aspect of it you might even enjoy the benefit of the and whatever enjoyment you get from that but when it comes to a spiritual practice that if it comes if you're not even as I said doing the more obligatory acts then this is just delusion so he says here as for devotional gatherings they are permitted for people overpowered by their states or as a respite for people of excellent character indeed such practice is akin to a lighting upon the carpet of truth if done according to its conditions among suitable people and in an appropriate place not to mention fulfilling its required courtesies and protocols so there's a decorum of gathering in those places and you have to be aware of those conditions and aware of those etiquettes and you also have to be mindful of who you're gathering with if you're mixing with people who again may not know may not have a good character or know their faith properly and they're just sort of doing things based on again their own whims and desires and that's all these gatherings are and there's really no respect for these necessary protocols and it's also dangerous so then we have drawing attention to oneself at every opportunity so this is also really dangerous we live in a time where people want to be seen and heard and this is just the reality of our world with social media and the pursuit of human popularity and you know it's just very intoxicating to want to have people talking about you and you know just being aware of what you're doing and having sorry I'm seeing all these signs that are saying my internet connection is unstable I really hope you guys can hear me otherwise I'm talking to myself but Khair inshallah as I said you know it's just such a big part of our world now where people are really they want to be seen and heard and they want that they want attention for everything and anything but if you start to do that this is really gonna I mean it's clearly a reflection of your state because when you're on a spiritual path you don't want that actually because you recognize that your deeds especially that those deeds that you do for the sake of Allah are best done in secret they're best when they're hidden not when they're shown so you don't actually want people to you don't want to draw attention to yourself for really any reason but unfortunately again when you don't have clarity about these matters then you fall prey to the tricks of shaitan which is what we're seeing you know a lot of people unfortunately are affected by this is that he makes the pursuit of fame notoriety really exciting and you know it's just what everybody wants now so we have to be wise and realize that comes with a very serious price to your spiritual connection when you do things for show, for public show it's one of the diseases of the heart if you study purification of the heart ostentation riyah in Arabic summa which is wanting people to know what you're doing to talk about you to kind of boast about what you're doing in front of people so that it gives you some sort of clout or status with people those things are diseases of the heart in the world now that's what a lot of people are into self promotion you know whether it's on social media or otherwise they don't mind talking about their you know accomplishments, their resumes, they're very open about everything whereas people who are on the path they realize that those things are better left hidden and to keep oneself sincere and one's intention sincere that you always you know you fear the opposite which is being known and having you know attention from people that's something you actually push away you don't want it so if you're drawing attention then clearly it's a sign of serious spiritual affliction the last one is accompanying world things even mixing with members of the opposite sex and adolescence diluted by events that happen so this is a little bit more you know extensive here and remember he's speaking in the context of his time so when he's talking about Sufis he's speaking about people who are you know spiritually on the path right and then making mention of their judgments and justifications so this is just in general you know mixing with people without really looking at the quality of those people and being very free with who you're mixing with you know we see a lot of intermixing now we see a lot of people mixing with different levels of people so it's like we don't have standards anymore and everything is just free and open and we're not really mindful of how you know mixing with different groups of people may impact our own selves right so he says here he talks about he says resorting to creation is eschewing reality especially when one resorts to an obsequious pedant a thoughtless tyrant or an ignorant Sufi the company of the immature is oppressive and both a worldly and other worldly faults so you know really and then he goes into the description of immaturity like how this is you know another you know sign of someone's state is that if they're not really you know a little bit more judicious with the type of company they keep they invite immaturity into their lives through the people that they hang out with or that they mingle with and that they you know commune with so he says here immature means anyone not conforming to the spiritual path you are on even if he's 90 years of age I say an immature person is one who never persists in anything but jumps at each new occurrence and is impassioned by it you generally find such a person among the devotees of the path so there are some people and I think he's specifically again speaking in the context of his time but he's talking about some people who get on the path of spirituality and they are very zealous you know they get very excited they're very excitable people but they're not very serious you know they're not disciplined and they kind of maybe jump around from one thing to another you know again surrounding oneself with that type of person is that they may again because they're on the path with you assume to be of good character but you find that they are rather immature in their practice and then just in their world of you and so then he talks he says so then okay so after he talks about this group of people he goes on I mean these five afflictions he goes on to talk about he says anyone who claims to have a station with Allah yet reveals any of the following five is either a liar or is deluded so now he's moving on so he's you know these are five afflictions that are going to come to those who have the previous you know signs right and let me see if I can move the slides over again there's a bit of a delay so I apologize with the internet I don't know it's not cooperating with me today but let's see so these five lead to these five and now that we're done with describing these afflictions these spiritual afflictions he's now being very clear about who is delusional in their spiritual state or who's just a flat out liar and you have to be careful and know how to recognize those people unfortunately who you know pose as being spiritually somehow enlightened and they're you know they have so much knowledge but when you look a little deeper you may find some qualities about them that actually say the complete opposite so here are the signs that he's outlined he says that a person who's uses one's limbs and sinful acts right away you know matter how they look right let's look beyond the surface look beyond the hijab the beard the you know garb of a practicing or spiritual person look beyond the surface and look at their actions if you find that they're engaging in sinful acts no matter what they say or what they claim to to be you should know that that person is a liar or he's or he or she is delusional right feigning piety so if they are acting like they're very pious but in fact you know they're it's kind of performative almost you know you have to be aware these this is also a delusion because you don't have to be over you know the top with you know with acting pious and just you know it's all a show that that kind of behavior is not it's not a sign of someone who's genuine and sincere you know there's the believer has a comportment that that does display self-respect and humility in a very beautiful way so if you you know completely are over the top and with with a display of piety that's a red flag desiring the ephemeral world so people on the spiritual path they know that this world is fleeting right ephemeral is like it's just it's all going to go and they don't attach themselves to this dunya because they realize that so they have loftier goals they're not you know they're not afflicted with diseases of the heart like you know they don't they don't you know want or aren't obsessed with this dunya or material wealth or you know just things status things that are are from this world they're always think of they're always thinking of the next life so their goals have to do with reaching you know jannah pleasing Allah they're not stuck in this world right so again people who may make claims about their spiritual level or you know awareness or height whatever they they claim you want to look to these qualities if they have these qualities and then that's clearly a red flag the next quality is speaking ill of Allah servants so again people on the path or sincere they don't talk ill about other people they don't you know they definitely don't engage in things like riba but they also don't unveil people you know like there's some people who are quick to unveil other people and they don't really have a problem with doing that or just speaking in general in very hateful language where it's just you know there's they're quick to condemn they their judgmental they will like I said unveil people those are all qualities that you want to stay away from and lacking the respect that Allah commands toward all Muslims so you know Subhanallah that's also another it's sort of an extension of the previous one because clearly if you speak ill of people of the servants of Allah then you don't have respect for them right and so this is another quality is that if you're speaking in a way that where you're insulting or speaking down to or you're you know thinking of yourself as better and there's little respect then you're not mindful that Allah swt you know does we do have rules about how to treat one another as believers and part of that is to honor and respect that we have rights over one another so a person who is on the path would do that knowingly they know those rights but someone who claims certain things may not do those things so that's something to be mindful of so then he goes so after he describes these qualities right which are the qualities of liars and delusional people he then says let's see he has commentary I think on this section but he says after this he says such people rarely die in a state of grace so Allah protect us from having any of these negative qualities but then he says so after he describes these negative qualities right of people you should stay clearly away from then he goes on to say that the qualifications of the spiritual guide with whom the seeker may safely entrust his or her soul are five so now we're going to go to the opposite so what do you look out for I mean these are all clearly things you want to stay away from so what do you look for when you're looking for a spiritual guide so he goes on to say and again just give me a moment because the internet is slow and not moving okay Bismillah okay so here we go so these are the qualities of trustworthy spiritual guys people that you could trust so unadulterated spiritual experience you know you can just see from maybe what they share or who they are that there's no you don't question you know their their level because their level of practice is in alignment with the sunnah like they're reflecting reflecting truth it's not there's no bidah in there there's nothing that's strange or just a little makes you uncomfortable everything is clear it's directly from you know the Prophets or the Quran they're very clear and transparent in their practice and they're on the path so it's unadulterated there's nothing that they are adding or omitting and changing and altering it's just you know it's very as I said crisp and clear in terms of their practice and their experience sound outward knowledge pretty self-explanatory so again what they're teaching what they call you to is from the tradition it's not their own ideas and just things that they've made up it's verifiable you can find it the evidence the proofs so people who are on the path are very comfortable you know sourcing their knowledge they're not just speaking without doing things like that if you ask them directly where'd you get that if they're sharing some knowledge with you where did you hear that where did you learn that they'll be able to cite their sources or tell you exactly where they got that from because their students are committed and they they're not speaking from themselves most of the time you know people again who are on the path they take their knowledge seriously and they give credit to where it's due and and they their knowledge as it's said is sound so you don't question it celestial aspirations this is what I was talking about before right loftier goals that are not just looking at the dunya and trying to you know make it big in the material sense they actually really are striving for Jannah they're striving to against themselves to for the pleasure of Allah SWT so they take the bigger objective the bigger goals as their goal which is to beyond this dunya right it's beyond this world they also have a pleasing state right so when you're around someone who's truly inshallah worthy of this you know the station of being considered a guide and teaching other people you will draw to them right they'll they just have something about them that makes them likable that makes them lovable that makes them trustworthy that gives you a sense of calm and peace you know you won't see things in them that make you uncomfortable inshallah because they have that beauty right and most people who are again on this path especially if they've reached that level of being a guide they understand the importance of inner beauty so akhlaq and having you know all of those beautiful prophetic qualities that they try to develop will emanate from them when they speak when they sit with you when they look at you they have a way about them that's gentle right these are all prophetic qualities so they're just being in their presence is something beautiful and that you enjoy and then they're treating spiritual discernment you know not everybody I mean there's a lot of people who have knowledge but they might not have wisdom so to be able to discern things with wisdom right to have that ability to look at things from a holistic perspective and to weigh things in their proper context and to really again have this skill set something that everybody necessarily has but people who've been on the path for a while and who've studied and who've sat with the Ottoman scholars and they've taken from them they inshallah this may be something that they receive from them which is this ability again to have wisdom and insight into things and not just you know sort of a superficial lens but they can actually penetrate deeper with their insight so these are all the qualities that he's described about again people who are worthy of being trusted and then he says beyond this he says whoever has any of these five qualities cannot be a true spiritual guide so now he's switching it again so we're going back and forth and you see this you know sort of shift happening throughout this list but now we're going into what you want to also be careful from with spiritual guides so the previous list we're talking really about you know what can happen with pitfalls right your own spiritual pitfalls but now he's focusing on guides like if someone's making a claim to be a guide you want to know what to look for and what not to look for so these are the five qualities that if a person has they are not qualified to spiritually guide anyone and they're likely charlatans right first and foremost ignorance of the religion so they don't really know you know the dean very well they may know a few things here and there but when you actually look to their how much they've studied or how you know who they've studied with what sources they've studied it may be very very little and so they don't really have sound knowledge disregard for the reverence of other Muslims so again you know there's a certain level of respect that everybody's do every human being is do but when it comes to someone who claims to be a spiritual guide they would know to you know look to others especially other believers other scholars maybe other learned people with us with this with the level of mutual respect right but if you're you know someone who's in it for yourself or just you know misrepresenting yourself to be something you're not you may disparage quickly other people you know there might be you might have no problem talking bad about other Muslims or other people that you think are not maybe at your level or whatever so it's just this very negative quality to to talk you know disrespectfully about other people meddling in matters that do not concern him you know this is clear or her this is clearly you know the problem is him told us about minding our own business so people who make claims you know that they can guide you but then they're also you know really nosy or just want to know and and meddle some those are qualities that that are they're not compatible with anybody who's truly a spiritual guide following whims and everything so you know making up their own rules about things on the fly not really taking the you know the Sharia or Fiqh seriously for example would be one thing or just making fatwas for themselves whenever they need it you know it's just like oh it's okay there's people unfortunately who are like that in our community who tend to make it rules for themselves you know there's always these exceptions to to the rules and they somehow find those exceptions or remorseless displays of lack of comportment so when they do lose their comportment when they kind of you know act out of line they don't really care there's no feeling of guilt maybe they justify it they they don't really feel or they're not showing any humility because we all I mean people lose sometimes control of their themselves they may lose their temper they may say something they don't mean but people who are truly sincere and striving against themselves right for the sake of Allah will admonish themselves they'll be quick to you know want to correct themselves but if you're someone who doesn't have that ability then you who show no remorse at all you'll just act as if nothing happened so again these are the five qualities that defines as someone who cannot be a spiritual guide if they display these qualities you don't look to that person for guidance now he shifts and we're almost at the end of this but he shifts now to the courtesies of the of a student so now if you're a student and you want to have you know a relationship with a spiritual guide and also other students who are on the path with you there's also there's expectations of you too that are there that need to be made like how do you if you find someone that you want to learn from how do you conduct yourself and what qualities should you want to have so he talks about that in the next slide here let me wait for this to come up again here we go this is the courtesies of a student with his or her guide as well as other students so first it says following the directions of the guide even if contrary to one's own preference so this is interesting because I think it's very different than modern academia where in our modern world we're almost encouraged to be a little contentious with someone who has more knowledge than you so you see a lot of that behavior in classrooms whether it's you know on college campuses or in high school I mean I'm a teacher so I've seen it before where sometimes students feel that you know they get rewarded by other their peers and sometimes maybe even other adults but if they you know can prove for example that you're wrong about something or they go against them or they just show there's no real reference there's no real respect there's no humility that this person has some level of authority or knowledge above me it's just sort of seem like it's a very different dynamic but in our tradition we do look to our teachers with this level of respect and this acceptance that they may ask of us to do things that we may not like in the moment but it's beneficial to us in the long run I kind of liken it to a trainer you know like a fitness trainer if you want to get in shape when you go to the gym and you sign up your trainer might ask you to do things that are you just do not want to do because your nuffs doesn't like it right but if you trust them that they are actually trying to get you into a healthier place then you follow what they tell you to do same like with a doctor you go to a physical doctor and you do a check up and they tell you that you have problems they may give you a medicine to take or may tell you to do certain lifestyle changes but if you trust that they have your best interest at heart then even when they tell you to do things that you don't want to do you are still accepting of that so you have to keep that in mind is that you trust them with your trust you are entrusting them with your spiritual guidance so you should also entrust that what they tell you to do inshallah is for your benefit avoiding what one's guide forbids even if doing so seems highly adverse so the same opposite right if they tell you not to do certain things that you don't push back or argue or try to find loopholes or whatever that you just again whatever they are telling you to do or not telling you not to do is with the same intention it's for your benefit honoring one's guide when he or she is president or absent alive or dead so you know there is a sense of duty a sense of loyalty a sense of fidelity the same that we would expect from our family members our loved ones people who are taking care of us we do this isn't you know for most people this is very common sense you know why wouldn't you speak well of someone in their absence or when they're present if they're alive or they moved on when you have this sense of connection with them you know this this duty this this bond that you've formed so the guide has the same right you you speak well of them and you defend them fulfilling his or her rights to the best of one's ability without neglect so if there are certain rights that they have over you or expect from you that you try your best to fulfill them and then the last one is abandoning one's understanding knowledge and leadership to that of the guide unless they are already in accordance with one's guide now here he has a little bit of he has a footnote because he's he's going to explain what he means here because it's not what we may think which is you know completely abandoning one's own mind and taking on or doing everything that your guide says that's not what he's saying he says here actually this so this last point he says this does not mean surrendering one's sovereignty to another person as the relationship of a subject to a tyrant rather the student forgoes the egos desire to constantly lead and be in control a true guide does not cultivate a controlling relationship based upon despotic models of domination so now he's speaking also about you know the quality of a true guide so if you're with someone who's really got your best interest and they are actually worthy of this you know station again of being a guide they're not going to want to control you that's not the objective to you know just have you as you know some sort of you know indentured you know servant to them that you they just get to tell you whatever and you do it that's not the point he says on the other hand even in the world of material travel a guide cannot lead someone who has hired him if he refuses to follow his directions the best model is the prophesies relationship with his companions hence a guide should exemplify the prophetic character so you know being like the problem is I said where there's a difference between commanding and demanding respect right the process that I'm had this ability where because of his beautiful character and all of the virtues he possessed people wanted to serve him they wanted to follow him and take his opinion and they preferred his advice over their own all the time and why wouldn't you I mean he's the problem is I said but his example is set before us so that we know that the quality also of a spiritual guide should be an aligned with his example where they're not demanding they're not you know manipulative they're not in any way tyrannical in the way that they are with you they're very gentle but you know you not wanting to take command of your ego are willing to you know in a way just take on your teachers teachings above your own so it's really more a reflection of your own willingness to go against your own ego and that need to always be in control and to lead and to say you know what when it comes to my spiritual health or my spiritual well-being I don't until I get to that level of real awareness or discipline or practice I should defer to someone who knows better for me and that's what it's about it's about deferring to your teacher because that's exactly the purpose of your teacher is that you're asking them to help you because you need help but if you are resisting their advice or you're not listening or you're willing to go against what they say then you are still your ego still in charge right and so that's what this is about it's about overcoming that so Alhamdulillah this was the full list of again the foundations of the spiritual path of Sidi Ahmed Zarruq it's one of there's another in this appendix there's an appendix B the next is the council of Imam Annoi so inshallah we can likely yeah I think it would be good to go over this and then there's even more advice from Sidi Ahmed Zarruq so for future for the next broadcast I think I'll still try to finish Sidi Ahmed Zarruq and then we may look at Imam Annoi to see what he says actually his advice is pretty short so yeah for next time I'll continue with appendix B and C which are again the council of Imam Annoi and then the council of Sidi Ahmed Zarruq so we have even more inshallah advice from these amazing teachers and scholars of our past who've left us such so much you know beautiful advice for all of us so Alhamdulillah there's a lot of benefit in this book and we will inshallah with future sessions go through the actual text from the beginning because there's chapter one for example Taqwa its definition and benefits chapter two the heart and its treatment chapter three practical steps to change our condition four is exercising for attaining Taqwa five civic involvement and then it gets into the appendices so you see that you know this is why I feel like this book is so relevant because a lot of us we need all of this we need all of these advices but here's the book for those who may be here for the first time the agenda to change our conditions is Alhamdulillah so I'm gonna go ahead and stop here I have no idea I hope the recording went through because we had so many problems with the internet but inshallah you guys all were able to tune in and understand and there wasn't any delays or glitches I'm gonna try to see if there's any comments on the chat here and I thank you for your patience I again apologize today was a little rough we started late some internet issues but hopefully next time I won't have these problems I thank you for your patience you guys and I'm again waiting for them for the Facebook page to load so I can see if there are any comments here from anybody I'll also try you to just let me try both of these in a few minutes that we have left I don't know why this panel of the page is so slow it's really running very slow today and I haven't had this problem in a long time even YouTube is not loading it's a problem oh you know what I'll do let me check my phone maybe that will be better because I can get off my internet so just one moment I want to make sure I don't miss any questions if there are any we have just a few minutes left I you know what I'll do sorry as a parent of two daughters I thank you for all that you do oh you're so sweet thank you this is sister Rashad or no brother I'm sorry brother sorry my I thought I read it Rashida okay thank you so much brother that's very kind of you Jason Ross thank you for all of your very kind comments are there any questions anybody has it's really I can only see the Facebook page right now but let me check the YouTube page maybe there are sometimes you know there's people tuning in from various locations and so that's which is really nice I really appreciate that that you guys are tuning in so yeah oh there are a few people still here are there any questions the delay is funny huh this is going to come up in the recording that's funny gosh today is as if it's as if it's my first time ever doing these that's what's funny okay so I can't unfortunately see the chat box oh man if you are here with me on zoom do you see any questions that I can't see I can't see the chat box on the YouTube on my phone um but do you because you're with you're humble I'm moderating please make go from brother Salman Marshal he's very helpful and he helps to arrange these classes for us here at MCC please make up for all of the staff at MCC they're fantastic but I'm very blessed to have such a great team to work with if you are still there I know you Marshal we're also juggling a few things can you let me know if there are any questions in our zoom maybe chat and I will follow up also when you see so um any questions from the YouTube page okay so let's see we have like four minutes before this is although I did start late so I could stay a little longer and I don't mind but this is such a the reason why I love this book is because it's got come to the last such a great um there's so much conversation that it can generate you know just from one of these lists of five I mean if you're if you followed along for the past few weeks um you know each slide that I presented I think is enough to have a really good healthy discussion we're just kind of going through it and doing a very quick reading of it I do encourage you to get the book and and study it and look at it and consider all of the points that we brought up in these past few sessions for yourself because we're all inshallah we're all on the spiritual path right we're all trying inshallah to do our part to to to protect our hearts and to cultivate um you know that a healthy environment for our spiritual growth for our families you know we're doing our best inshallah and it's not easy but it's this type of advice is just gold I mean you know it lays it all out for you how to what the foundations are how to avoid pitfalls what to look for what not to look for red flags because you know that's one of the things too about like for example the purification of the heart why is it such a powerful transformative text because you could be practicing this faith for decades and doing everything you know but then if internally you haven't figured out that you're you've got disease like spiritual disease um that could be corroding all of your acts and it could be you know destroying the purity of your acts because you haven't worked those things out then how tragic would that be right but that's what this you know studying these things it gives us an opportunity to really do the inner work to say it's not just a matter of the outward right because even the monotheists they uh they worshiped outwardly you know you could we could all do that outwardly so you have to find the balance between the outward and the inward so you sure you have to fulfill your your obligations but internally you should be constantly working on bettering yourself so that's why these these texts are so important and may Allah you know increase us inshallah and protect protect us from you know illusion protect us from our own arrogance protection protect us from all the spiritual diseases but sometimes those are the things that work against us we think of ourselves a certain way you know and this is definitely a problem in our world where our own we get in the way of our own spiritual well-being because of the nefs the nefs can delude you to think of yourself as better you know there's people which is why there's also a disease of the heart you can find people who've been practicing for a very long time but they have this affliction where they do think of themselves as better than people who know very little who may not do very much in terms of their outward practice but that right there's a sign that you know all of that is what is it good for if you just sit judging people all day long and thinking of yourself as better than anybody else because maybe you pray five times a day maybe you fast for the all of you know your adult years or you've made 10 you know you've done all these things but if that leads you to a place where all you can do is judge other people then you've clearly missed the point because that's not Islam that's delusion it's a matter of you know like I said aligning yourself with the example and he was is the most beloved to Allah the most perfect human being and yet he was also incredibly humble so who are we to think of ourselves as anything compared to him right but yet you'll find many people not just Muslim many people who have this arrogance about them so these are the things we want to seek protection from and ask Allah always to remove that veil of delusion of self delusion so that we see ourselves for who we truly are and are not are willing to admit our own shortcomings and our own faults and are willing to work on those things which is the benefit of having people in your life who can spiritually guide you whether it's one teacher or if you have like it's not easy for many people there's people who are maybe they don't have scholars accessible to them or teachers accessible to them but if you can find a good group of people that you help each other with you support one another which is so important they can serve as your spiritual guides in a way of doing that checks and balances with one another when you are with a really strong group of people ask or just sort of seek because the believers are mirrors for one another they can hold you to a high standard and you can hold them to a high standard and you can do that for one another and inshallah it's mutually beneficial for everybody in that group that you when you're with each other for example you don't engage in idle talk you don't waste your time talking about things that are like other people or have no benefit that you are productive that you talk about things that are beneficial or you do things that are beneficial you engage in good works that always puzzles me is in the modern world for example when we socialize like socializing is now in our world it's all about passive sort of entertainment or being entertained that's what we think of socializing which is sad because if you are working full time and you have all these responsibilities but then as soon as there's some opening in your schedule and you have a little bit of time to maybe do something enjoyable that the only thing you can think of is let's go watch a movie or let's go do something go to a concert or something like that with people that you don't see every day your friends, your family your cousins, people that are hopefully you have strong bonds with but then when you do meet them that's all you're doing you don't realize that's such a waste of your time together because one day we're all going to go and then do you want to look back at every memory you have if you had snapshots of all those times you spent with people as just being things that you were doing in a social setting or would it be more meaningful to get with people and actually have meaningful conversations and connect and get to know each other on a deep level and do the viket of Allah talk about beautiful stories share beautiful stories with each other and inspire one another to good to really have good time with one another that's quality that you'll get rewarded for as opposed to you may as well for a while slip and say something you shouldn't say or hear something you shouldn't hear which is often times what happens when you're not on guard but if you're very choice in who you spend your time with and how you spend your time then you can protect your spiritual heart but unfortunately like I said we have this very interesting concept of how work hard play hard this is how a lot of people think fulfill all my responsibilities and do all these and then the rest of the time all I'm going to do is seek out entertainment and enjoyment and given to my my nefs all the time but that doesn't really produce what you think it does it actually from a spiritual lens it does more harm if that's how you use your time your time is very valuable and even though it might seem counterintuitive to read a book for example if you don't have free time as opposed to turning on a TV and just watching a movie that movie you're going to forget about it how many people watch a movie or a show and you don't remember it you cannot remember it afterwards it did nothing for you you may have even fallen asleep during it I know that's happened to me several times I know other people too it's like you know you just you're checked out stimulated by whatever it is so you made doze off so it's meaningless it has no real impact on you and you wasted that one hour two hours or whatever if it's like a Bollywood movie you're looking at three hours sometimes have a waste of your life but then what if you had instead like I said taken a book that has been collecting dust on your shelves for years and I know we all have in my office here books, I'm looking at a bunch of books have had them for years and you know they're all looking at me every day going when you're going to read us and I have to force myself sometimes to make that decision I'm not going to just go and indulge my nuts I'm going to do something serious so having a shift in your perspective about how to use your time is really helpful but if you have supportive friends and supportive people in your life that you spend time with they'll encourage you to do things like that they're going to tell you, yeah it's a good idea you should do that or they'll give you helpful tips and they'll always be looking out for your best interests those are the kinds of people you want to spend time with not people who are just pulling you away from the remembrance of Allah and pulling you into whatever you know pastime that they're interested in and that might sound fun like I said it might be fun here and there but at the end of the day we're all going to be responsible for ourselves and how we use our time so we have to just put on a more serious thinking hats and contemplate what is the better use of my time to always just do frivolous things and nothing really serious to take myself a little bit more seriously and start to develop myself start to enhance my understanding you know grow in my knowledge and perfect my practice and even though we'll never be perfect the pursuit of that is also there's great benefit to that if you spend time really trying to think about how can I make my prayer better right and you do that as a sincere act like I want to improve my prayer y'all I pray let's say you pray and shortly you pray all your five prayers but now your intention is I want it to be quality prayers it's not that I'm just doing them but I want them to be really good so how do I do that what should I do and you know and there's ways to improve your prayer our teachers taught us for example that you don't just look at the prayer you have to also look at your will do you know that's the benefit of having a good teacher is they'll point to you maybe in a direction you didn't think about like sometimes people think of will do and prayer is being separate but they you know as the saying goes that the quality of your will do will reflect you know the quality of your prayer or vice versa right however your will do is it'll reflect in your prayer so it's actually that's where you should focus on because will do is an act of worship but a lot of us are very quick with our will do right we're just you know sloppy and we're just a water bath all over the place you know water sprayed everywhere and we're rushing usually because we don't time manage so if we're doing a hasty will do likely will do a hasty prayer yes inshallah Allah is the most generous and hopefully inshallah he'll accept we can only hope what we put forth but when you start to really want to improve yourself that's the kind of prioritization you do you know what I rather go watch a game or like I said go shop for five hours or would I rather study something that will help me in my spiritual path so this would be an area that you then you know dedicate to which is how can I improve my prayer and then you start putting into practice you know so you start instead of rushing your will do or rushing your prayer and just doing all you know you start to add a little bit of the lengthier surahs you know and if you don't know lengthier surahs then you might start to memorize a few lengthier surahs and then if you don't know the meanings you start to memorize the meanings and you start to understand and you start to think and reflect and so this is how it's like a you know a domino or snowball effect to just one thing leads to the next and inshallah you find yourself busying yourself with more worthwhile posts to frivolous and wasteful things but a lot of that again can happen organically because you wake up and inshallah Allah is guiding you and he's putting all of this into your heart and inshallah you're waking up to that or it could just come from having really good friends and really good people that you are with and that you spend time with or that you seek time out you know with if you know people that you admire in this regard then you seek them out for their help or for their assistance for their advice and you just start to grow and inshallah Allah will give you tawfiq because our actions are judged by intention so if you want to draw near to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and you seek him out in these various ways inshallah he will reward you for those intentions and he will increase you the more you draw closer to him inshallah he'll draw closer to you so it's this beautiful you know reciprocation that happens inshallah that's what we want but again back to this book for we'll continue next time inshallah with with with the further the rest of the appendix B and C and then inshallah we'll start talking about the actual book so bear with me I know there's a method to my madness but inshallah if you're sticking around this long hopefully you're enjoying these sessions and I'm always open to hearing from you I don't know what happened with the questions I did not get anything so I apologize if you are asking me anything but you're free to email me you can email me I can actually put my email out there I don't mind I have an email for public it's events you know like an event with an s events.hosai my first name at gmail.com let me know if you're participating here and if your questions didn't get answered either in this session or in previous sessions because I know I may have missed some please do feel free to message me directly and I will inshallah respond to you as soon as I can but thank you again everybody have a wonderful evening and jizak we'll hit them for your patience tonight inshallah next time we'll be better we'll see you in two weeks ok inshallah thank you so much I'm sorry for the schedule change on Thursday that was entirely my fault I had a conflict and something came up so that's why I had to reschedule this session but alhamdulillah MCC was so gracious to allow me to to do it this Sunday so that there's not too much time that passes before our next scheduled session inshallah what that said for those who are maybe tuning in for the first time you know it's a new night I don't know there might be people who haven't followed all these weeks but for those who are already welcome thank you for being here so what I've been doing since we established these bi-weekly halaqas is going over a text that some of you may be familiar with some of you may never heard of it before but it's a very amazing text in my opinion and the opinion of many people but I'll go ahead and show it to you it's called Agenda to Change Our Condition and this was written by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf and Imam Zaid Shakir alhamdulillah so as I've explained in previous sessions I'm kind of doing a different take on this reading because in the back of the book there are these gems these advices these councils that alhamdulillah they incorporated in the text and I felt that these councils are so just there's so much value to looking at them and really getting a good grounding about the importance of studying and learning and committing to the study of our deen and so the first appendix that we covered we talked about at length for the past maybe 3-4 sessions was appendix A the foundations of the spiritual path by Sidi Ahmed Zarruq so we covered he gave brilliant advice really but in a very interesting way and so we did that already and in the last session I said that we would continue with the next appendix which is what we're going to do today so I invite you to go to the MCC YouTube page and check out the previous videos if you want to catch up and kind of see what we've been doing all this time if you're just new today inshallah we're starting something new so hopefully you'll be able to follow along with ease so with that said I'm going to share a screen because I want you to be able to follow along as I go through this council and this council subhanallah I'll show you it's quite amazing it's just this one page that's it but as we go through it I hope you'll realize or see why it's I find it so beneficial or clearly it's beneficial it's in this book but why I felt we should dedicate some time to it so let me go ahead and screen share inshallah if you give me just a minute if I can have a brother salman if you can please enable my host my screen sharing that would be great so I forgot to ask you to do that I'm sorry but if I can get that then I can screen share brother salman are you with us I don't know if you stepped away which I wouldn't blame you if you had something to do I know it's late but if you are there or maybe I can text you bear with me everyone mashallah we have an awesome team but I forgot to ask him to do this for me so let's see oh okay thank you brother so you were quick to respond excuse me so one second to let me go ahead and screen share bismillah and we will get the screen up here okay I'm going to present so again this is the text that we've been covering agenda to change your condition and so appendix b this is what we're going to be talking about today this is the council of imam and now we okay and this is from his text and it's the section concerning arrival to the knowledge of Allah so again it's one page but there's just so much incredible information packed in here so let's talk about this here we go bismillah arriving or arrival to the knowledge of Allah is achieved by and he says right away repenting from all things unlawful or offensive so you know all of us inshallah we all want to hopefully we all want to you know have a nearness to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala we want to establish that connection to Allah that we're on the path we testify to the truth of this deen and we believe inshallah our actions reflect that our heart is inshallah committed but there are things that we have to do sort of like a purging in order to really solidify that intention and so this is this would be the purging process where we really look at whatever we're doing or have been doing whatever we've habituated to that would in any way fall under the unlawful or the offensive the haram or the and we would really be serious about purifying our intentions because many people say things and they make claims but really action is where you know is the proof of your claim so that's where we want to see are you truthfully on this path with true intention then purge the things that you know would just please Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and really just step away from those things and everybody's gonna it's subjective so everybody's gonna have a different list of things to purge but that process is necessary it's necessary to evaluate yourself to look at what things in your life are potentially harming you are potentially derailing you in terms of your spiritual growth and start to remove things remove bad habits you know if you're watching things for example we know that the eyes and the ears and the mouth I mean we speak things we shouldn't say we look at things we shouldn't look at we listen to things we shouldn't look at so that would be you know somewhere to start what am I taking in what am I consuming is it food is it drink is it gossip is it foul you know television or film lyrics what am I taking in that is haram and I know it's wrong and I should just stop it and stop making excuses and start getting rid of those habits and then even what's makru what would be disliked or offensive you want to look at those things that you know you're maybe again taking the easy route with certain things and see well if I'm really serious about trying to you know get close to Allah's that I should be able to sacrifice these vices these bad habits these things that I've you know over time just again habituated to so that's the starting point purge then we have seeking sacred knowledge in in accordance with one's needs and I love the phrasing of this because it's you can interpret it a couple of different ways but I think I looked at it like you know we have to pace ourselves but also remember that being too ambitious and and kind of putting you know putting your pursuit of knowledge before other obligations before family obligations before taking care of the people that have rights over you it could be your parents it could be your spouse it could be your children this would you know not be the right course there has to be moderation there has to be and so where you are just pace yourself because I've over the years I've had to work with individuals who've either you know been in situations where someone in their family was you know taking their their spiritual path to that extreme you know this I have to go here I have to travel to this place I have to do this and they were in some time some cases they were shirking other responsibilities because they went to this extreme so I think what I get from this advice is to just be balanced you know where you are we're all in different you know places and levels in our in our growth and our spiritual understand a path or an understanding and so you just you know grow organically and naturally but keep that intention always instead of going into extremes because people burn out you know that's and that's what shayathon wants he wants us to get really zealous and and committed and and just throw ourselves into it but then if we don't have balance we will burn out eventually and I mean we may never want to pick up a book again we may never want to attend a class again or take on a serious study of a subject again because it just you know it didn't resonate well with us and it was may have caused further problems for us so you create this negative association with something so beautiful and then you abandon it and this has happened to people so we are the end of moderation of the middle way so you want to take it easy and just pace yourself inshallah and then maintaining ritual purity this is also something I'm delighted you know when I understood it and started implementing it I noticed an immediate change in not only my state but also the ease of practice because you know there's sometimes steps right to our practice we have to do certain things their prerequisites before we can do certain things right for example we make wudu before we pray right and so in that example I found that for a long time and you know this is again when you're not aware of things you're not paying attention to what are the things that hinder you for a long time it was that inconvenience quote-unquote although we should never of course look at any active worship as an inconvenience but this is the nuffs you know we have to know that our nuffs will always prefer comfort and try to make worship difficult and burdening but it's anything but right so anyhow we make these associations with certain things that we stand in our way or that we prevent ourselves from actually growing because they become as they say you make a mountain out of a molehill so something like wudu you think about wudu it's not difficult at all is it really think about it what is it it's getting parts of your limbs and parts of your face and your body wet for a few minutes and then you're in a ritual state of purity and subhanallah that facilitates you to read the book of Allah to pray your prayers to be in a state of purity and to repel evil energies and to attract good energy so there's so much benefit to it but the actual act itself is not it doesn't require much effort however when you're not in a state of wudu and prayer enters and you think about prayer sometimes the thought of having to do wudu is what makes you procrastinate right so it's like oh man you know it's cold let's say it's in the winter months you know and I know I get it it's difficult for some people they don't like to be cold so the idea of having to go get wet fudger or isha or times where the temperatures can drop it just seems like such a hardship so one of the ways that this can resolve that is that you try to always maintain a state of purity so that you're more efficient in your worship even with my children well at least with my oldest one now you know praying his prayers he's in that age or he's learning that but he I even tell him you should always be in a state of wudu so even when you use the restroom just make it and get in the habit of doing wudu as part of your routine with using the restroom so that you leave that state in a purified state and then inshallah you maintain that likely for your next prayer window and you can immediately when the thought of prayer comes to you you don't have that additional step you're already in a clean purified state and so boom you can you know get to the prayer rug inshallah and complete your prayers and then go back to your activities so it's working around all of these barriers that your nafs and shaitan of course tries to create so that it makes worship hard it's working around it it's a state of virtual purity and of course as I said earlier there's other benefits too you attract good the angelic realm is attracted to you and the jinn are repelled by you or you repell them they don't come near you because you're in this beautiful state so there's that and just as I said it facilitates worship so inshallah trying to always maintain that and when you step outside the house or if you have to go around errands and you leave what that will do and then something happens to your car let's say God forbid or you end up having to do more things than you thought and time is running out and now prayer has entered and you don't have will do and all of a sudden what do I do if you're not really on top of your prayers you likely will make that excuse for yourself oh well I don't have will do I guess I'll do it when I get home missed your prayer delayed your prayer all because you're not thinking proactively so being in a state of virtual purity is proactively operating and working to facilitate your faith practice inshallah and to really make it not such a burden where you look at steps that are really quite beneficial to you as being something that you don't want to do but rather something you look forward to doing it's something that is quite easy when you really think about it so inshallah that's one of his advices then we have performing the obligatory prayers in the first of their time and in congregation as well as the oh that's a typo sorry should be sunnah with an H sunnah prayers that correspond to each of the obligatory prayers so this is also really important and as I was just you know so you know alluding to that once you are in that ritual state of purity it makes your prayers easy well that's the next goal the next goal is to not procrastinate your prayers because you know inshallah all of us now anyway we're in this quarantine we're home most of the time we really don't have any reason other than our own bad habits possibly or just not taking the the time of prayer entering as seriously as we should that we delay and we procrastinate you know we might get caught up in a project or we're really doing something that we think is really important and I'm sure everybody has important things to do but if you habituate yourself to again thinking that I need to have really good habits so I want to be in a state of and I need to start establishing or doing the prayers when they come in when the time enters like it's just a goal and you start working towards that goal it becomes something you prioritize then you set your alarms we all have these devices and you know I've seen people inshallah some friends who have like a long list of alarms set for everything and anything we're just in that age of too much information too much too many responsibilities too much juggling so we need those reminders and alhamdulillah we can benefit from these devices in that way by setting those alarms that correspond to the prayer times so that you're reminded prayer just entered and even though I'm doing this thing and I really really want to finish it it's better for me to stop this and and and do my prayer in its earlier time than to let my nefs convince me in a few minutes in a few minutes and then we forget we're forgetful right it's part of our nature we forget and then an hour lapses two hours laps and then you're scrambling because oh my god also is about to come in and I didn't do this is how many times does it happen to all of us right and that's unfortunately you know one of the tricks of Iblees is he likes to push us to procrastinate for that reason so that we we don't fulfill our obligations in their time so making it a goal to perform your prayers in their time and then also in congregation this is another really important nasiha again with all of us who are home if like in my family alhamdulillah both my husband and I are working from home we've been working from home for months now under quarantine and so alhamdulillah alhamdulillah all the prayers are done in congregation it's just we've established that early on and we have even alhamdulillah before covid that whenever he was home he would lead and in his absence when he was working full time and I was with the kids we always pray in congregation and I've said this in previous parenting sessions as well you know the family that prays together stays together you know we there's little sayings but in all seriousness it's such an important thing to do with your family with your children to model for your children how seriously you take your prayer you know how important it is that prayers entered we pray together and to have that memory that alhamdulillah all your prayers when they were younger inshaAllah they'll have those memories as your children get older we prayed with mama and baba and we prayed as a family it was a beautiful experience it wasn't because now often times when we're so all in our little silos operating your room someone is in their room and someone's in another room and the whole family sort of divided because we're all either going to school or we're working or we're doing other things we're all separated but sometimes what can happen is that things also start to be separated food you know people are now eating separate meals and then where's the unit where's the family unit where's that cohesiveness that we all want that togetherness that bonding time and then you know let's add in a bunch of other problems with the you know devices that are in our hands pretty much all day we have really a lot of just disconnection happening in our homes throughout and so this is one way to stop and say no no matter what's going on this is the rule for this family if it's prayer time we pray together so that you're not sitting in your room and just calling out you know across the hall to your children if you're the mom or the father did you pray and you've seen a lot of this you know yelling in the house about prayer because everybody's you know trying to hopefully be reminding each other at least but wouldn't it be better instead of doing that to just have someone in charge of either calling the event or playing the event or even if you can schedule automatic events if you have those clocks or apps that it's just the whole family knows what to do you know this is our this is our family rule when we hear that event or we hear someone calling the event or calling us to prayer no excuses and imagine inshallah you know the ideal scenario everybody's in a state of will do you know all the the children because we've all gotten into these really good habits of doing that so that when prayer time comes where we it's just this nice you know subhanallah organized process and everybody gets in line and they complete their prayer inshallah the hearts are in sync and you you know do your du'as together I've had many opportunities after prayer where I heal you know they're just golden opportunities to teach a lesson to my children to you know make the offer for someone in need to give them really good habits so that they have those memories but also again build those habits for them that when your prayer praying it shouldn't be rushed you know don't fall into it so many of us in our youth and in our ignorance may have fallen into which is thinking that the world is you know our role in the world is so important so we have to rush through the prayer in order to get back to how important we are and this is again the delusion of the nafs because there's nothing more important than praying to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that's the reason why we were created there's no other reason right everything else is just his grace and his mercy and his generosity to us but the purpose of our existence is to worship him so we have to plan our lives around the prayer not the opposite and this is how you get that embedded into your children that says you know no matter what's going on whether you're playing with your toys or doing your school homework even if it's a really important test you have to study for you know Baba has a meeting you know that he has to prepare for I have a presentation I have to do whatever it is we as a family understand prayers come in we take our prayer seriously we do our prayers subhanallah and again what is it it's you know five maybe maximum six seven ten minutes if you're doing a lengthier I mean surahs but most of the time even that subhanallah you know we don't we don't do right there's certain surahs that I think are definitely repeated more often than others because of the nature of our of our world and just the rat race that we're all in but the point is is you know it's it's not a big chunk of time to pray so making it a priority for the family shouldn't feel like it's such a hard thing to do you should do it as again a show of your commitment and your seriousness so that it translates and inshallah when you're not around anymore because let's be real you know this that's the way the world works that our children will have had all of this time and experience with us so that they create those really great habits to carry forth inshallah so you know doing the prayers together and of course doing the sunnah prayers forgive me again this is a typo should be sunnah prayers also committing to that you know my kids same thing after our prayers when they are there are sunnah prayers they know it's time to do your sunnah and I also have a rule about no talking between the father and the sunnah where we just you know get up you know do your afkhar but don't break the that moment you know it's a sacred time it's a time of focus it's a time of remembrance and so if you start to play around or goof off or get silly or start to you know talk about other things it kind of breaks that so have those established rules as well you know get up do let's do our sunnah and then after the sunnah prayers finished and we've talked and we've had maybe an exchange of some type then inshallah we can go back to just normal talk but letting them know that where we pray it's a space of again remembrance of God so we want to respect that space and be mindful all of these you know terms that we now hear so often that's the time to put it into practice is in those congregational prayer moments inshallah with the family it's really important and so relevant this sunnah siha because we need it right performing the late night prayer at the hadjad and fulfilling wudud you know I've heard in mashallah over the years many people talk about the importance of this and even when telling stories about great saints or scholars of the past and they would share their biographies and share different things that they would do and it would always marvel at subhanallah how committed they were, how many prayers they would pray and how many khatims of the Quran they would do and it would just seem subhanallah how will I ever reach that state inshallah we all hope to wish to reach even a fraction of the state that some of these incredible people had but you know when you think of it that way that it seems so unreachable then that's your enough straight telling you you're not there yet so the hadjad might seem to you like something that only the saints do or only the awliya do or only I mean the people who are really really super religious and just committed like you might have that you know idea or that notion that only certain people do that but you know subhanallah the people of the hadjad the people who know the value of the hadjad you know the ones who understand that this is such a sacred time and a time of you know the time of silence you know in our world where there's so much distraction and chaos all around us and we see it you know with everything that's happening right now in our country in our world there's a lot of just turmoil and instability and lack of certainty anxiety fear all of these things are are everybody's experiencing it to some degree or another so we need places of refuge we need places where we can just get away from it all and what better place than when everybody is you know the world is asleep and it's it's just pin drop silence in your house inshallah you live in a place where you can have that experience but that it's that quiet time in the night where you can actually retreat into a space somewhere in your home and just connect with Allah and purge and unburden your soul and really show and reflect your love of him and your devotion to him and also your gratitude you know because it's easy to fall into despair and sadness and get really worn you know worn down by everything that's happening and just be in that negative state but the opposite reaction is what's what what we're expected of which is to be patient but also to be grateful to start to count your blessings and so that's a great display of of that of gratitude to Allah like you know that you're you appreciate everything he's given you your health your family your home you know the conveniences of the lives that we all live especially for those of us in the west we have to be honest with ourselves we are living lives of of immense luxury you know many of us you know and we may not think that because maybe we're paycheck to paycheck and we struggle but if you compare our lives in the way that we live the clean water that we have so much convenience all around us you know we don't have to drive or walk you know on bare feet or without shoes to get sustenance for example there's people throughout the world they don't have access to drinking water or food with ease they actually have to really physically go out of their way and it's it's an immense hardship for them to just get the bare necessities every day this is not a once a week thing or once a month or once a lifetime we're checking every day that's their that's their reality and they have mouths to feed they have children they have maybe parents if you really compare what we have with a click of a button we don't have to go anywhere food comes to us water comes to us everything can come to us we don't really have to even leave our homes so we have to understand our privilege and then be grateful for that privilege and show our gratitude so when you wake up for tahajjud you're waking up as a seeking from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala we're inshallah seeking his forgiveness his guidance we're seeking from him and only him inshallah but we should also do it with that feeling of this is I could never truly my gratitude to to the way to the amount or to the degree that Allah is deserving of but at least this is you know an effort it's something it shows something inshallah of course Allah is the most generous and the most forgiving and and so he'll accept it from us that's the art and hope but taking that as something that is you know tangible it is something you can do you just have to make the intention and the way I like to present it is you know to also not make it seem so so hard that the way that you may have always thought of it is okay I have to sleep let's say 10 o'clock 11 o'clock I fall asleep and then I have to wake up at three four in the morning and I have to pray for hours and then stay up and stay up and then pray pleasure that if you make it tahajjud that type of an experience you know it's gonna you'll definitely never want to do it but if you say that what is tahajjud it's praying in that last third part of the night right or any time you sleep and you wake up in that night during the night you it would count as tahajjud right that you want to make it a process that's easy to do on a regular basis and it doesn't disrupt routine doesn't disrupt your sleep doesn't complicate your life but it's actually something again easy to manage easy to do so waking up you know 15 20 30 minutes just do it incrementally start off by you know just trying to wake up a little bit before fudger enters and so that you start to see the sweetness of it and you experience the sweetness of it and then you increase and you can do it as much as you need if you have a very early start to your day and it's hard for you then just wake up you know a little bit before fudger but if you can afford longer time to do more then just pray extra that or you know if you want to read Quran at that time or do a dik'ah of some type and you have more time then wake up a little bit longer before fudger enters so that way it's just an easy transition and you can pray or tahajjud you can pray or with it and you can pray fudger and this would be something that is manageable and many people do that because they've committed to it they know the seriousness of it but you know this is again an advice from Imam Noli to tell us this is how we you know gain our knowledge of Allah and also just solidify our sincerity when it comes to wanting to be close to Allah the next is fasting on Mondays and Thursdays and the three white days this is something I can't personally you know speak of I pray inshallah that I can get to this level I know people who do this regularly and it's always been a personal goal of mine inshallah to do it on a consistent basis and I know people who again will say once you start it's always like exercise like anything right it's always hard in the beginning because you're not used to it but once you get in the habit of it you'll find it's just part of you know your routine and it's so easy like anything else you do so inshallah but this is recommended and we know this is from the sunnah right to fast on those days and the recommended days of the year to fast and now we know within intermittent fasting I try to do that and I know friends of mine as well who are also really mashallah you know committed to or disciplined when it comes to intermittent fasting but these are all wisdoms of our tradition that now that we've known for centuries that when you give your body that break to heal itself to repair and to restore it can have immense blessings I know even during Ramadan I spoke about this but I absolutely feel the difference when fasting so inshallah may Allah give us all strength and himma to do that as a regular practice but this is all nasiha we all need nasiha right so inshallah that's something we can commit to as well then we have reciting the Quran with the hearts presence coupled with reflection upon its meetings I really loved again the phrasing here because you know when I was younger and we were learning to memorize Quran children in many you know schools madrasas masajid homes even across the world are taught to memorize Quran because alhamdulillah their brains are like sponges and they can absorb it easily and mashallah Allah makes it easy for them so we get very focused on the memorization part of it but we don't realize that if we don't transition out of that and into a more mindful state and to really pay attention to what we're saying how we're saying it and then of course the meanings of what we're saying then we there will be a disconnect so you have a lot of people who don't read the meanings of what they're saying don't look into the book of Allah and try to really understand the message but they'll know many surahs you know and or they may have a lot of surahs memorized but they never went through formal study of tajweed which is also you know it's sad because when you study tajweed and the way to properly recite the book of Allah it connects you even more to the book of Allah so not having that but having all these surahs memorized is in my opinion tragic you know and I know I was me for many years up until my mid 20's or so when alhamdulillah I had the opportunity to study tajweed with the teacher and so when that happened and I started to learn why we recite the way we do why we stretch certain sounds why we make certain repetitions in certain parts what is the reason for that and this incredible science of tajweed started to make sense of so much of what I was doing for years throughout my childhood my teen years I had surahs memorized but I never understood the purpose behind those rules or the way I was reciting but studying it and realizing the immense amount of you know I mean it's obviously a sacred science but just to see how our scholars codified it and made it easy to learn and the way that the script is written subhanallah you know many of our must have when you learn tajweed your teacher will teach you that the way that the script is written is also to facilitate the reading of it with tajweed and there's little marks that are made to differentiate different rules as you're saying them so suddenly the Quran starts to you know it's unveiling all these hidden treasures within it just by the mere knowledge of the science and knowing how to recognize the symbols as they come so there's this connection that you make that way and then of course when you start to look at the tafsir and look at the meanings and the interpretations and the different interpretations that different scholars had of the meanings and the context of those meanings it's just incredible and it makes you your relationship with the Book of Allah so much richer than just you know memorizing and knowing surahs for prayer because that's the reason why you memorize surahs right it's because you needed to know them for prayer and that's you know your relationship with the Book of Allah and unfortunately that is the case for many people in our community I know many people in an older generation they weren't taught to read for example you know from my family I've heard that for many people that you know they never really learned how to read and so they don't have that relationship but for us for those of us who have that capability who are of the age and of course now with the internet there's so many teachers so many places that you could learn that if you don't have or if you've never studied to read I would highly recommend making that a priority and it's far line first of all it's one of the obligatory acts that all of us should be doing so that in and of itself is enough reason but it's also for you know our Eman our faith we need to hold on to the Book of Allah these are really dark times and there's so much solace that can be found just by turning to the Book of Allah when there's all this madness around you but also for those of us who are parents and we want our children to have a connection with the Book of Allah it's very hard to do that if we don't show them what that looks like you know if we don't prioritize and so reciting with beauty for example you know it's so important to show them that that's how we recite Quran we don't rush through Surahs and I used to teach Quran you know at the Islamic schools and I taught children and adults but that was always one of the points I tried to make to the students and to their parents that you know we have to honor the Book of Allah with beautifying our voice and our voice will naturally obviously be beautified because of the Book of Allah so it's this you know two-way thing you have to make that effort and so you want to teach your kids not to haphazardly recite the Quran and I've seen this before unfortunately you know where they will rush through Surahs or just be kind of careless with the way that they are saying Surahs and you know and parents don't take a moment to correct them maybe because of their age maybe because they're just happy that they know the Surah but once you start taking that seriously then you want them to have ihsan when they recite the Book of Allah and really take that seriously bring the adab of the Quran the adab that they should have with reciting and reflecting and being quiet knowing not to speak over the Quran so if someone is reciting or you know even if it's a video you're watching or on your phone you're listening to something that they know that there's adab and we shouldn't be listening or excuse me we shouldn't be talking over the Book of Allah we should be listening we should be quiet so making you know the all of these things priority in your family but it has to start with you you have to show that you have to model it in order for your children to take it seriously so I encourage anybody who's watching again if you've never thought of taking Pajweet or you are always intimidated maybe you're embarrassed I've had people tell me I'm embarrassed you know my kids go to Sunday school they know more Quran than me I never learned but they let that embarrassment prevent them you know this is one of the diseases of the heart you know blame worthy modesty when you prevent yourself from doing the right thing the right thing is to learn the Book of Allah inshallah and to not let the embarrassment or the way that other people may you know react and at the end of the day doesn't matter really you know we shouldn't care so much about what other people think about us the most important thing is that we do things for the sake of Allah so don't be a barrier that stands in front of you you know in your own way but rather prioritize and inshallah make that a commitment that you do seriously maybe you know put a deadline for yourself that by next year today I want to have you know completed my studies in Pajweet and I want to be able to really read the Book of Allah the proper way so that I can recite with beauty and enjoyment and fulfillment and then teach my children to do the same make that intention inshallah and Allah will give you tofiq and just on a final note on that you know when I was studying Quran I wanted really to memorize and to read and to learn how to read and I had I had a difficulty I was in a way dyslexic when it came to Arabic I don't know what it was I had a very serious challenge making the letters connect it was always difficult for me to read but I alhamdulillah memorized you know with different teachers by ear just auditory listening and repeating and watching their mouths you know repeating after them but it was very difficult for me to read and I remember you know going through several teachers and it was just a time in my life that there was you know something blocking me and I didn't know what it was but alhamdulillah Allah gave me an opportunity to learn with a teacher for the first time the actual science of tajweed I had always learned you know the qaeda and just basic but you know this teacher really broke down the rules in a way that just made sense so sometimes it's just having the right teacher and I went from years of having a hardship reading one month of instruction in that class I was able to read fluently and I credit of course the teacher but also alhamdulillah Allah his promise is true when we work hard and we put that mojaheda forward and we try and try he will give a stofiq so I feel like I can really speak on that I'd live that experience of having a challenge inshallah his reward is with those who struggle harder inshallah we know that right that we get more reward so that's my hope is that all those years that I was struggling inshallah I still get the reward for that but alhamdulillah within one month as I said I just went from having a really difficult time to suddenly being able to read so it can happen inshallah okay so Bismillah the next one is frequently asking forgiveness of Allah swt this is also really important I think sometimes we're not aware of because there are so many things that are normal in our society and in our world and even in our families that we may not be aware of how sinful they are and that they are actually harming our states so that lack of awareness and forgetfulness very much inclined to is also part of the reason why we should be in the habit of asking for forgiveness every single day and we know even the prophecy I said and he was perfect he didn't sin but yet he was practicing this for us he was showing us that this is something that we should be doing throughout the day you can do it just any time you have but to have this idea always in your mind and this reality it's a humility that you are a sinful person and not necessarily by intention of course there's those people who outwardly do things that are sinful and may Allah guide them and forgive them they should certainly seek forgiveness but for those who may not intentionally or as I said be aware of their sin just being in the practice of daily will inshallah help you to hopefully clear the slate every day and to clear the heart to polish the heart because again there are things we might say we might do we might look at something we might hear something or laugh at something these are all things that we have to be aware of that's why when we study the diseases of the heart some things are so as I said normal in our culture that we don't associate it as being wrong but in fact it is wrong it's haram as I said laughing at something we have to be very careful what we find as humor because a lot of the humor that we have around us is actually quite it's foul it's horrible making fun of people mocking people so much of comedy is actually derision which is a disease of the heart where you are mocking people so much of comedy is mockery which is in the Quran it's completely haram but again if you've seen that your whole life all the shows you've ever watched every movie you ever watched it's like slapstick comedy and someone's falling and someone's being called out and made fun of there's impressions that people do and they're making fun of entire communities and races and languages or what have you you might think that's normal right and so you don't think of it as oh it's harmless it's just a joke and so you fall into that behavior as well or like nowadays we're in a meme culture where there are people exchanging on every social media platform all day long twitter, whatsapp, facebook, instagram you see memes and memes and videos so many videos my god it's shocking sometimes how much people take time to mock other people but it's really actually disturbing that you have this gift of life and that you would spend hours videotaping yourself mocking people or doing something a prank on someone I've seen these videos are really harmful especially for the youth what they call that jackass humor that became very popular in the 90s in the early 2000s with shows on MTV and some of these other shows that they just would go around and really foul wrong circumstances there's so many too many examples but the point is a lot of the jokes were just not what we shouldn't anyway be a part of but if you are watching certain things or doing certain things and those things enter your mind, your heart and you get a little chuckle out of it just it enters your heart in the way that it does other people even if you without intention someone sends you a meme and you think it's funny catch yourself I've done that many times in the moment it's like oh that's funny because it looks funny there's something of value or some comedic association or thing that you may attribute to it but when you actually think about it what's actually happening in the scene or in the video or in the meme or whatever it is or in the joke then you think stuff for a while you know this is not funny it's not funny at all I remember I don't know when it was but there was actually about a month ago right before school was starting you know on tiktok and now reels on Instagram if you're not familiar with these two good for you but they're basically platforms where people post videos but it was a very popular trend to have because of online distance learning all these parents were doing it it was so sad they would find pictures of drug users you know sometimes you have mug shots of people who are heroin addicts or alcoholics online and you can access them or people with you know some form of disability or something pictures of those people and create a little image of them on the phone that looks like it's an incoming call like on FaceTime you know how on FaceTime it has that little image at the top of your phone if you're an iPhone user that's just something that they that's the way that it looks right so what they would do is they would take that image and then take it over to their children who are innocent you know children are purehearted and just to capture the shock off of their child while they told them oh this is your new teacher say hi and you know it was just so despicable honestly it was horrible because the parents are laughing at the expense of this innocent human being on the other end who has no clue that their picture is being used in this awful way but they're also teaching their children that this is okay to do and at one point they use the image of someone who was on TikTok actually and that person they had some they were disabled in some way a person with disability and so they made a video really just saying please stop using it was a person's child actually it wasn't her herself but she was saying that's my child's video or picture that you guys are using for your fun and that's not funny it wasn't funny it was horrible it was humor that people fall into all the blah and they think it's not a big deal but if you really analyze what you're laughing at I can, I bet you 9 times out of 10 is at the expense of another human being and you want to think about that for a moment like how would the Prophet Salaam receive you if you saw you laughing at someone like that right so these are the kinds of things we have to take ourselves into account for and then when we do that quickly wow I'm sinning likely all day, every day throughout the day so then it becomes necessary at that point please Allah forgive me to just get into that habit but being humble enough to hold yourself accountable on everything you do on every moment, every interaction you have every thought you have and catching yourself I shouldn't have thought that about that person and ability Maintaining prayers and blessings upon the Prophet Salaam this is again very important part of our faith to not abandon the Salaam on the Prophet Salaam to do it as often as possible certain times and days we know that it's even more reward the night of Juma, the day of Juma there's even more reward just to be in that habit from the Quran we know that we say Salaam is a commandment from Allah so getting in that habit it also helps to connect your heart with him inshallah and so not just doing the Salaat part but also I would add to that reading his Seerah reading the Shama and just being really connected to the false Salaat because he's the one who's we're going to intercessor we need his we need his support we should remember that we need that connection with him we want him to be proud of us when he sees us on the day of judgment inshallah and that him to recognize us because we know that he'll recognize inshallah his umma by the marks of we want that connection um that he yeah that we make him inshallah proud and not disappointed with us but how can we do that if we don't know who he is we don't study his Seerah we don't follow his Sunnah we don't say Salaat on him how can we expect that so this is part of it is that we have these habits and that we do it as an active love as an active devotion to him so may Allah increase us in that but doing it as often as possible and remembering when you have free time and you know whenever you're doing something um it doesn't necessarily have to be on the prayer mat you know when you're driving in the car if you have a counter you know sometimes people use counters sometimes people use the speed but you can you know just do your Salaat if you're um you know sleeping and you're having a hard time in bed you know rest less just you know instead of daydreaming about you know things or thinking about the problems of the next day just you know do your Salaat in the Prophet's life Salaat on anything washing dishes there could be so many chores you know as long as you're in like you know a good place there shouldn't be a problem with you using that time to do a car or you know any type of of remembrance of Allah or of the Prophet's life but just getting then adhering to the meritorious invocations of the morning and the evening that have been transmitted to us from the sunnah so this would be the wird or the awrad right and Imam know he has one I'm trying to see if I have it here I don't have his but I had I don't know where it is um the Imam al haddad you know wird al latif and there's two of them that he has you can access them if you don't know what those are um they are a wird is a litany of prayers it's like a formulaic prayers all based on the the sunnah of the Prophet's life but many of our scholars of the past would have their own formulas of different prayers that they would do from the morning to the night and so the main ones that we know of that our teachers recommended to us are the wird of Imam know we um who's this is his advice but also Imam al haddad um and he has two of them and you can look up wird which is you know w-i-r-d very easy word and then you can look up their names where the Imam know we or where the Imam al haddad and you will see pdf files or youtube videos where people have uploaded the the files as well it takes you know like the wird al latif we do it with my family now we've been doing it for years I talk about this often um and she comes actually you said we did a brilliant talk on the benefits of the wird al latif you can find that also on youtube um but you know many of our scholars taught us that when you do that as a regular you should do that every day regularly in the morning and in the night so thank you for us we just in the morning when we wake up it's part of our everyday routine during breakfast time we'll play it and we have the bluetooth speaker so it's you know throughout the whole house and alhamdulillah children are now it's just they know it they know what to do they go play it and we just you know have that quiet time while we're listening to it takes about 18 minutes and it's all seeking protection all the du'as that you want to start your day off with it's like creating a force field you know of positive energy a shield of you know against harm around yourself and your family and your loved ones alhamdulillah and you you know you do that every day just gives you a nice start and then at night after mahrib you can also um do the same there's prayers that are for night and morning but even once a day is good so inshallah those are the um the advices so I think we are almost out of time or we might be oh wow I went all the way to the end of the hour just for a lot of time just sometimes it seems to go quickly so it's about 857 but this was the last yeah so that was the end of imam and always advice and as I said it was one paragraph you saw it subhanallah but so much wisdom packed in in that so alhamdulillah I don't know if there aren't any questions um this happens to me uh every session so I'm gonna try to go on the Facebook page and see if there's anything um where there are there are any questions and inshallah if there are I will answer those questions if I'm able to so just give me a moment here while I click on this okay I don't think that is the correct one you know Facebook changed their whole uh interface I'm not a fan of it I don't like abrupt changes so um anyhow I can't see yeah I don't see it I don't see the video here okay let me try the YouTube page I'm sorry I feel like every single week I do the same thing where I'm like hold on but I can't see anything um maybe it's under the videos tab I'll try one more thing oh there are comments okay alhamdulillah um aww mashallah thank you you guys are so sweet I see some lovely messages you guys are so sweet thank you I really appreciate your your kind words there salamu alaykum to uh sabiha to lora to sumayah to edelin mashallah so beautiful to see all these new sisters here thank you for being here um I don't see any questions there so I'm going to go to the YouTube page quickly um and see if there's anything here inshallah but yeah feel free you know that's if you have a question that may not necessarily be related to the text if I'm able to answer it I will try I will certainly try for lora um so let's see alhamdulillah alhamdulillah salamu alaykum so sweet I'm always so tired I feel like I'm just going through the motions I don't feel the closeness you know subhanallah that's a great question um you know clearly the time you know if you're waking up and it's hard for you because you're not getting enough rest or sleep then this might require some tweaking of your sleep schedule a little bit but honestly the fact that you're getting up you have to really hold on to that but that is an invitation for you that Allah swt is you know it's because of his uh you know favor upon you that you're waking up and sometimes we forget that it's not really our efforts um it's really Allah swt that he wants you to be drawing close to him in that hour so the fact that you're responding to that call and you're getting up and you're trying even though it's hard for you is an amazing thing but you also may want to look at the circumstance like if the room is dark and you you know they recommend some of our teachers recommended for example using water when you're making your because if it's like on warm tap you know or hot water if you like if you like things hot then you you're just um continuing the state of comfort and sleepiness and drowsiness but that cold water is intended to really wake you up and to kind of get you out of that slumbered state so you might need to do that you might need to drink some water you might need to just make subtle tweaks so that you have more presence of mind turning on because for me I have a light I pray close to my bed but I have a light that I started turning on because I realized the same I wanted to have more presence and so you know I would do that and also you can break up you know sometimes people get into the numbers with the Hajj so it's like they just want to do blocks and blocks of prayer and that can be physically exhausting but if you do even turaka of really present mindful prayers and you just sit and you are totally there totally mindful and making the offer all of your loved ones and asking you making a stuff that and all of the things that you really want from Allah those two prayers are treasure you know and don't underscore or undervalue that for because you think I need numbers you know it's not about quantity it's about quality so if that's what you can do and still stay awake and still stay engaged then Alhamdulillah try that and then make little other tweaks like I said try the cold water splashing try some drinking some water turning on a light or moving the space sometimes leaving your bedroom into another space also helps you because the bed the bedroom is too inviting and you just can't wait to get back into the bed because you're tired you might feel more inclined to you know rush through or not rush through you know you're just you're kind of going through the motion so try disrupting you know what you're or the system you have a little bit you know change it here and there and see if there's an opening for you and of course ask Allah to give you more rest maybe you're not getting enough rest when you sleep so that when you're waking up and I've talked about this actually in previous Harqas but you can look up you know the sleep cycles when you study and understand sleep cycles it's also really helpful because you'll know how to wake up you know during the time where you're not disrupting a really important sleep cycle you know so there's cycles that we need it's about I believe one and a half hours where we hit that deep sleep and when you hit the deep sleep that's when you're going to feel rested so if you wake up after completing that cycle you'll feel more rested but if you wake up in the middle of the cycle this is usually what a lot of people do because they're not aware so you wake up in the middle of a sleep cycle then you don't get the restful sleep that you need and therefore you wake up groggy you know you just you're out of it right and that's likely because you didn't complete that cycle so you go through I don't know three four or five cycles I think depending on how many hours of sleep you get each night so you always want to set your alarm or just you know you'll get into certain habits where you body will know from myself for example after I had children you know I started having some back issues and other health issues so I just by nature wake up every two three hours I'm always awake you know I there's nothing I can do about it I will always wake up and see that it's I've only been asleep about an hour and a half or two hours and then I you know I so I just I'm grateful for it because I'm not in that slumber where it's really hard to wake up out of but I don't remember ever having slept like that for years I mean I can't I honestly can't remember when I slept that way where I was just knocked out for more than two to three hours so sometimes age and certain life circumstances like a health issue might facilitate it for you so for me I have that advantage is that I'm always waking up just by my own internal clock but I know that there is a way to train yourself to do that as well so sleep training just like you know they do for children adults can also sleep train so you can start to become less dependent on hours of sleep and really look for getting the best quality of sleep in the time that you need and this is you know study the way of the profits and of the ODA they didn't sleep overnight you know they did the recovery sleep we know but they did recovery sleep during the day but the night was for worship so it's very possible to not be a sleep dependent person but you want to do your math you know to see how much you need for functionality and health and make sure you're definitely getting your sleep in some way covered throughout the day so you know just maybe need to do some research and see what works for you but I hope that helps you I mean I'll reward you for your beautiful attention I'm sorry Faisa you were asking is this page 66 in the text that was a long time ago that you asked that question but that's where we started with Syriah Mazarouk's text we read from page 73 so today's session was from page 73 that's appendix B so I don't think there are any other questions I hope inshallah I didn't miss anything but thank you so much for all of you for tuning in and let me know actually if you wouldn't mind because I haven't told anybody at MCC but I am considering maybe doing a time change or a day change for these sessions and I'm trying to figure out if Sunday would work better for some of you because in the middle of the week I know with work commitments in school and you know with children dinner it might be hard but weekends tend to be a little bit more flexible so if you like this time from 8 to 9 Sunday evenings can you let us know in the comment section on MCC just let us know if you prefer Thursday evenings or Sunday 8 to 9 and let's see what happens I'm not sure if MCC what they'll say but at least we can explore maybe some options but thank you so much again for tuning in I will see you guys inshallah in two weeks at our next session and we'll continue with more from Agenda to Change Our Condition so thank you again Jazakum Allahu Khair and we'll end in Dua Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem Al-Asr inal insana la fi khusr illa alladina almanu wa amil asman ya haqi wa tawasab as-sabar subhana rabbika rabbil azati yama yasifun wa salamun a'lam al mursalim alhamdulillahi rabbil a'lamin alhamdulillahi jazakum Allahu khairan again have a wonderful evening inshallah and we'll see you in a couple of weeks alright salamu alaykum it's about seven pages long and the three main areas that he covers is our current state and this was published in 2013 so keep that in mind that this text was seven years old but still when we talk about our current state a lot of the things that he discusses is still very much relevant then the inner and outer transformations and the importance of family so we'll likely not get to all three of these points because there's so much content to cover so inshallah we'll continue wherever we left off for the next session but let's go ahead and begin Bismillah so first the very first page here I'm going to read along and then we'll stop for some commentary here and there so he says, Islam is submission to what is real with the capital R it is a recognition and an acceptance of the way things really are and not as they appear everything is in submission to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala who is the real al haq you know just Friday I did another program the dunya and the verses from surah the kaaf verses 7 and 8 where Allah says that he has adorned the world and we looked at the meaning of those verses and the the seed of those verses and what it indicates is that as we know the word for the earth dunya is actually translated to mean of low place at the now dunya it's a low place and so what we extrapolate from the verses that in its essence the dunya is low but there's embellishments, there's beauty there's adornments in the dunya and so when we talk about what is real we're not talking about what those adornments and embellishments are we're talking about the reality of the dunya right or the reality of things and the fact that everything in this dunya including us we will all perish everything will perish and be removed and destroyed except for the face of Allah this is what we're informed of in the Quran so here this is again speaking to the same truths that when we submit as Muslims we acknowledge that there's reality and falsehood and we have that recognition that what we see in the illusory world around us is not reality it is illusory, it's deceptive it's enticing, it's attempting and it's by design that way because Allah SWT created all of those adornments to test us to test who is true in their faith and to test who will fulfill be virtuous in their deeds and who isn't so it's all part of the design element so here again this is the reminder that we are to be a believer is to submit and to accept this as truth right and then he goes on to say only human beings and willful spirits which are the jinn can rebel against our creator right so all other creation is in submission animals right they can't all living things they can't be anything in any other state but in submission whereas we humans and jinn can we have free will we can choose right over 1400 years ago this path of Islam was renewed to mark the entry into the last phase of human experience on earth it was renewed by the best of creation the Prophet Muhammad SAW as the final prophet and the seal of all of Allah's prophets upon them all be peace he was its greatest wayfarer and he never deviated from its course his blessed footprints remain clear and unchanged for anyone desiring to set out on that ancient prophetic path so then the next paragraph he now talks about what the this text is right so he says before you is a concise treaties on the path to taqwa so now we're being introduced to this concept of taqwa which is conscious awareness of our Lord devotion to God through taqwa is the primary reason for our existence and the means by which we are insured continued succor from our creator so this is a really powerful reminder because you know it's very easy to get caught up in the delusions and the illusions of the dunya and get so preoccupied with all of our responsibilities right some of us are you know we our parents are still alive so we're still dutiful to them we have spouses maybe we have children we work we have dependents that we take care of we have responsibilities at work we're community members so we have all these different roles and wear different hats and all of those things can sometimes you know take over our frame of mind our thinking and we become so obsessed with all of those things that we can sometimes forget that even though those things are important certainly they're important the main purpose for our existence isn't necessarily those things or our career paths or our dreams and goals those are not the reason why we were created we were created solely to worship Allah SWT and so that's what Taqwa is and so then he says Allah says in the first command in the entire Quran right he says O humanity O mankind worship your Lord who created you and those before you in order for you to realize Taqwa so again this is the whole purpose of our creation and he's reminding us that this is the first command Allah SWT gives us and it's right in the very beginning of the Quran the second chapter sort of the Baqarah verse 21 and then on the very next page he says he reminds us of the first prohibition so right after this verse you know where he's giving us the first command now we have our first prohibition where Allah SWT reminds us do not set up false deities besides Allah you are aware of what you are doing so what we should be doing and what we should not be doing right and then this next verse which comes later right he says while there are many false this is Sheikh Hamza's commentary while there are many false deities besides Allah the self is the greatest and most subtle so this concept of a false deity you know sometimes when we think of a deity or an idol we think of a little statue or a big statue something that people prostrate to and it's symbolic and there's you know there's something real before a person and they you know they have this they worship that idol right but here he's making it clear that you know there's many idols in the world there are many people who still ascribe to those beliefs but the one that is the most subtle and the greatest is the worship of the nafs the soul I mean the ego right the nafs and so the translation of that verse is have you not seen the one who took his desire as his deity so Allah swt is reminding us that there are people who literally worship their own desires and whims they just live to fulfill their whims and desires and if we are being honest right now looking around the world it is clear that this is true because we have never likely I mean again I can't I'm just making a general observation but the amount of indulgence and extravagance and access to things that we have now is unprecedented we don't you know have to really do much in order to get what we want it's so easy now with everything now moving to digital and online formats you can request services you can order food you can order gifts you can order whatever necessities you have your medication can come to you can do so much you can even have online doctor visits there's so many things that we can do in a click of a button so it's clear that this access to indulge in our whims and desires and this ease of access or ease in doing that can definitely create a dependency and then some form of addiction preoccupation which is all in line with the same sort of thought that this is a form of worship if that's what you live to do if you eat and your whole day is centered around food and what you're going to eat and you can't wait to wake up and have this meal or that meal or you have a craving and you can just order it and that's how you live then you become naturally because of that I mean it's human nature you'll become entitled right and once you become entitled to your you become accustomed to your nafs you become a slave of your nafs and then it's very difficult to do anything else besides that so when it's time to pray for example well your nafs is like I'm too tired you know I'm exhausted I'm too comfortable to get up and move right now so all of those challenges become or just the natural nature of the nafs which is to be lazy and to procrastinate they are exacerbated because you've habituated yourself to doing these things to giving into yourself all the time so therefore that is how you live you live to serve yourself you're not living to serve Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and this is the reality of most people now especially in the west you know of course there's a lot of poverty and a lot of people who are certainly not doing this because they are in impoverished states but I'm talking about our reality so in our reality this is very true right that many people they take their desire as their deity so then he goes on to say that struggle with the self is the means by which we purify our hearts of false deities so fighting those urges fighting those desires suppressing those desires is how we can overcome these things right it is the ancient way of the prophets it is to walk the path toward a realized state of submission to the will of Allah our God is mighty and transcendent exalted above and beyond the pettiness of this lower world right but he is also an imminent Lord who sustains and nourishes his creation at every level of existence so then he says here I'm not sure actually if I have this no I don't have this verse but I'll read it what has caused you to be deluded about your generous Lord who has created you and made you so perfectly proportioned and fashioned you in whatever form he chose right subhanallah may Allah forgive us for our delusions so now that he's introduced these ideas right that the believer is in submission to what is to the real to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and that we have a clear understanding of what taqwa is and we also understand the first command and first prohibition that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave us and the idea that you can actually worship your own desire you know that's something maybe people never thought of before but that's again these are verses from the Quran to get us to think about our own behavior how are you proving your ubudiyah your understanding of your relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala as a servant and he's your how are you proving that if you're indulging in your nafs all the time so getting that across that it's very possible that you we may fall into this behavior unwittingly because we're not we don't know how to we're not aware of the signs and the symptoms of this but clearly as we said many of us are very indulgent and we do give into our nafs a lot and we will prioritize our nafs over the worship of Allah it's just this is what the mujahidah is right and so acknowledging all of that and then that we can be deluded so now that he's done that we enter the first section of this introduction which is the titled our current state so let me go ahead and read this and we're going to get to these to the slide in a moment but in this section he starts off and he says now the current state of the people of this ancient path is deplorable generally speaking we are powerless, bereft morally bankrupt objects of history rather than subjects of history as were our pious predecessors who engage the world with the power of truth and dispel darkness with their spiritual light our condition is far from that of our noble forebears it is as if we never recited or even heard the prayer of our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam which he recited every morning O Allah I seek refuge in you from grief and anxiety Allahumma inni aawudu bi kameen al- hammi wal-hazan wa ajazi wal-kasal wal-jibni wal-bukhal wa wa dallail daini wa qalabatil rajal right so this is O Allah I seek refuge in you from grief and anxiety impudence and indolence cowardice and miserliness and from being overcome by debt and overpowered by men so this is our reality right he is comparing our state to our noble forebears as he says and saying that we are nowhere near them right so the question arises well how did we reach the state there's two questions that when we examine our condition this is what where we are how did we reach the state right and then how do we get out of this state and he goes on to say that the answers to both of these questions are quite painful and complex but subhanAllah again from the Quran we get an answer that summarizes both or gives the answer to both of these questions in this verse and this is chapter 13 verse 11 where Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says Allah does not change a people until they change what is in themselves so he then continues to give commentary on this particular verse and shares the commentary of Imam Abu Tadeb al-Makki who in the nourishment of the heart he goes on to say that the beauty of this verse is that it comprises a twofold meaning first it means that Allah does not remove blessings that he has bestowed upon a people until they transgress from obedience to disobedience so it works both ways when we talk about change right it can work for the good or for the bad right so here he's giving that perspective and so this is the response to our first question right that we're in this state because of our disobedience and then the second meaning of this verse is that Allah does not change a people's outward state of abasement, humiliation and objection until they change what is in themselves so this then answers our second question right so again when we ask these questions do we reach this state well we're in the state that we're in because of our disobedience how do we get out of this state we must consciously move from a state of disobedience to a state of obedience so SubhanAllah again so much to think about there that you know instead of just you know some people when things get tough or difficult or just seem so hard to move forward they want to give up right they don't have the will the motivation so it's like what's the point you know damaged goods it's a done deal and that's you know what's supposed to be from shaytan because of course he doesn't want us to be motivated he doesn't want us to have hope he doesn't want us to think that change is possible or there's potential so he may and there's certainly people who do that they look to the past and they see the glory of the past and then they go what's the point we're just a ruined people we're a ruined species this is human nature and they get very cynical and just negative but this verses to remind us that you know doing that if it just if that's your end you know the end of the result of contemplating the history and where we are and you know kind of assessing why we are we where we are that you just want to give up you're not you're not putting your trust in Allah SubhanAllah this verses is empowering and it gives us hope right that if we find ourselves in any situation we can change it you know I I received an email yesterday from a sister who it's just it's hard because you know you see shaytan how he weighs on people how he strips them of hope and he you know he really makes them feel worthless because you know they falter they do things that they have shame about and then he fills their heart with all of this hopelessness you know and so we're reminded constantly our teachers remind us and of course the Quran that we we're not a people that should fall into despair right this is Islam is not a faith of despair it's a faith of hope and so when we look to this first we should you know remember this because you know this sister when she messaged me the entire first you know few lines of her email where you could just see the she was guilt-ridden she had done some things that she was very very ashamed about but she had very little hope in herself and just riddled with with guilt and sometimes you know you know this is a little footnote but shame is when it's shame between us and Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala that's healthy you know it's it's healthy to have that but we should also not fall into a a sense of again despair where we just think we where there's no hope those that's a when you reach those types of thoughts you should know that those are for me please right there's there's a line a fine line so if you've done something you shouldn't do and you have remorse and you really feel bad and you just sits with you for a while and it weighs heavy that's good because inshallah there's purification in that remorse is a good sign right because hopefully you won't fall back into that sin so you shouldn't rush through that process either which is like oh well I did it and now you're just back to being carefree no sit with those feelings of remorse and regret and really just you know you know beseech Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala ask him plea to him beg him for forgiveness make toba a process that you don't rush because of your discomfort with it right some people they have a hard time taking blame and criticism and so when even when things are clear you know it it's undeniable that they've done something wrong maybe because they don't they're just not comfortable with that sense of shame and guilt they just zip right through that process altogether and those people are likely the ones that return to sins right because they didn't really do the proper process of toba so toba is something that we should you know let just sort of play out naturally and the natural processes to feel that guilt remorse maybe kind of you know not not want to see people for a little bit and just be really preoccupied with centering yourself back with Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala trying to reconnect with him that might take a few days maybe it takes a couple weeks maybe it takes a month maybe it takes longer for each situation in person it will be different but the point is knowing that there's a healthy way of doing that but when you get to the point where your sins and your wrong deeds make you doubt that you have any hope or that you're damned and you're condemned and there's nothing you can do about it those are clearly from Iblis because he wants you to not think of yourself as being redeemable right he wants you to feel a fall into despair fall into depression and then God forbid do something to harm yourself or just lose faith because that's a lot of some people do they lose faith out of out of total guilt sometimes right it's really sad but we should just know that there's a balance to that right so the point again here is that when you when you take a verse like this it's not just to you know look back and think well you know get cynical like I said about where we are with the state condition that we're in like oh we had this glorious history and now we're all doomed and look at our the Muslim umma and we're all this way and that way you can get really negative and that's not a good place either you know every time and every people have tests every person has tests so instead of you know getting to that place just look at it like it is what it is you know these this is pretty clear we are in the state because we disobeyed and we can reverse course that's what the verse is telling us reverse course you got here because you strayed now if you want to you know go back and and you know be connected to all this profit again on course and you know what to do right so alhamdulillah and then he goes on to say so we're back on if you're if you have the text I'm still on page three so as I said there's a lot of text here so we're we're going to pace ourselves but he says here that um let me see actually so this question how right how do we change our condition right so then he answers this question and he says sorry the slide shows a little slow nope went too far okay so here the first thing he says is that we must recognize that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave us guidance through messengers okay in our case the final prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and that as long as we adhered to that guidance in large numbers we were under the protection of Allah so when you look at the you know history you know the Islamic history and you see that you know all of the the different stages of our history and you see the tofiq that we had and all the scholarship that came out or just so many incredible things that scholars were able to do you want to attribute that to obedience to Allah right because we were in obedience to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala he gave us tofiq and we saw all the success right the golden age of Islam and all of the you know accomplishments that we had as a as an Islamic came out of because of the obedience to Allah then he says as those numbers right the numbers of people in obedience to Allah diminished throughout Muslim history the outward enemies of Islam began to make inroads into the heartland of the Muslims until they actually conquered the Muslim lands so he's giving us some you know a summary of the historical facts like this is what happened there was a period where we had we were flourishing and we were successful we were in obedience to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala then you know as we started straying the enemies you know came in and they they found a way to to further you know water us down and further take us away from our faith so he then goes on to say today both the Muslim heartland and Muslim hearts are oppressed by inward and outward forces that oppose the purpose of Islam which is to free people from submission to created things by helping them achieve submission to the creator of things subhan Allah and he goes on and says a culture of vice usury and consumption that enslaves people to the lowest aspects of their nature cannot survive amid large numbers of people committed to freeing themselves from those aspects of their nature so when we see you know everything that I talked about before all of the indulgence and the extravagance and all of the things that we have all fallen in you know these into these bad habits of doing because it's easy to do or it's excess it's it's there right people are doing it so we do it too those things only can exist because there aren't enough people resisting right and so if we want to you know remove those things from our society or culture we need to start working on restraint we need to start working on disciplining the nops and really you know fighting against our own selves because that's the only reason why they're thriving there's you know it's we learn in you know economy 101 right scarcity and now I'm forgetting my words right a supply and demand excuse me supply and demand right so you see these things because there's a demand for it but if we you know don't ascribe to those things and then things will change so we have to go back to ourselves and hold ourselves accountable he goes on on now on page 4 and says that the earlier infestations of such dark forces that succeeded in penetrating the muslim lands also set up schools to inculcate their ideas and ways into the hearts of the young impressionable muslims of the last two centuries you know subhanAllah this is actually really important because I mean he's you know mentioning the history but even now when we see what's going on in our world you know a lot of the things that are happening to the younger generation of muslims do happen in the schools right indoctrination is a real thing you have I mean I work with teens and I've worked with teens for several years and I can tell the difference between teenagers who are you know in muslim schools or maybe home schools because they haven't been exposed to certain ideas or beliefs or they don't have you know relationships and connections with people who are so different than them you can totally tell the difference because you know it starts early and unfortunately in some places it's starting earlier and earlier you know and here in California we have had a lot of issues over the past few years of things being introduced you know early to even elementary school children or preschool children ideas that are just completely antithetical to our faith and we've had you know people school boards and there's a lot of you know just legal issues going on with things like that because it's you know for us as people of faith there's certain ideas and concepts that are just not part of our faith so to have a school decide for families and communities that nope we are going to teach this no matter what it's really tragic and you know it's what it's done unfortunately is it has affected the way that some of our Muslim youth see the world they have adopted the lens of the you know the larger society because that's what they've been exposed to you start them off I mean you're thinking about and well just be practical I mean just be logical here you put your child in an environment for eight maybe ten hours a day if you if you consider after school programming or tutoring or something else that's beyond you know the school day they have your home and they are being with people who may have ideas that again differ from yours so if that's their predominant you know culture like that's what they see the most of the time every single day and the only time they get to spend time with you and your family or your community you know it's one day a week if that because some kids don't necessarily you know because they're over scheduled with sports and instruments but they're a part of especially as we get to the older you know older group of teenagers they don't have time and sometimes they have no interest in attending the last or on a Friday night you know youth program I've worked with many families where that's the case the parents are you know just really frustrated because they don't know how to get their child to want to be a part of the Muslim community because they're so over spread thin in other ways that are not part of their community right so things that they are into with people again that don't necessarily share the same faith that is the most of their social experience or their experience outside the home so it's a big challenge and a lot of you know Muslim families are struggling with this fact right I mean I mean now with COVID and quarantine inshallah I'm hoping and praying that more families are coming together and there's more connection with the family but it's absolutely a reality for a lot of our our community members that this is an issue so going back to this point that subhanAllah even historically you know schooling was one of the ways with which they were able to get to the Muslim youth is not surprising right ala bilah so then he goes on to say they undermined the spiritual authority of the scholars of Islam I mean again this is this was written you know seven years ago or even maybe before that because it was published seven years ago but it was I'm certain before that but the undermining spiritual authority of scholars of Islam that's what's been happening you know in our community unfortunately for a while now with social media and you see cancel culture there's been a lot of rhetoric that's just alien to our faith tradition to many of our cultures that have been you know injected into the discourse amongst Muslims especially the younger generation you know just this idea of not really seeing religious authority as authoritative and or you know or blurring the lines with what is an authoritative figure and what isn't it's happening a lot unfortunately so again you know this is history repeating itself right they undermined the spiritual authorities of scholars of Islam making them appear backward and foolish I mean that's also the other thing you know there's we live in a meme culture and then a lot of you know mockery and you see people in authority whether they're law enforcement or politicians and I'm not defending those groups but I'm just saying that generally speaking the idea that authority whether it's religious or otherwise parents parental authority it's undermined very much in this society you know you can look at cartoons films they start them very early right I mean I was raised in the era of Bart Simpson I know it's still going on I mean it's the longest writing cartoon right but you learn so much about you know mocking and undermining authority from those types of shows and so it's just part of the culture to do that right so again history repeating itself that that's what they did and they do that by making them into buffoons and you know they're old they don't know what they're talking about they have thick accents and so there's this culture of mockery that unfortunately has taken over the youth culture and a lot of it sometimes is directed to to religious authority so then he goes on to say that again they make them appear backward and foolish by promoting the idea that the scholars religious cosmology cosmology is paled before the impressive pillars of modern science and industry this is another tactic right to the war between science ism and faith in general right any type of religion there's it's an intellectual war and the people of science or atheists you know they posit themselves as being superior because they're more they have more advanced understanding of things you know they have science on their side which is verifiable and testable and then faith is you know based on faith it's so there's definitely that these realities is still even today right then they then begin to remove the powerful cultural distinctions of Muslims that had flourished for centuries and replace them with the accoutrements that's the French word right of western experimental cultural norms and more so Hanallah so the you know appropriation of Muslim culture Muslim foods and just the again watering down of our cultures of our traditions of our norms and giving them that flair that western you know American US or just western flair right that's still again subhanallah very valid slowly the dress of Muslims changed the scarves fell from the heads of our women and the beards from the faces of our men robes and modest dress were replaced first by ridiculous brimmed hats starched suits and ties and finally by jeans and t-shirts causing Muslims to appear not as caliphs of Allah but as wage slaves of the western styled factories that sprouted up all over the world sandals so beloved to the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam were replaced with tennis shoes made in sweatshops by people so poor that they could not afford the very shoes they produced subhanallah you know that I have so much to say on that but I remember when I was younger and you know looking at albums of some of the photos that my parents were able to bring back with them we became as refugees from Afghanistan but they had they had some pictures it always shocked me when I saw how European the fashion sense was in Afghanistan because I just I assumed that it was a culture where people dressed in traditional clothing you know and that they had that that was the predominant way that people lived and they identified very much with their Afghan heritage so it was really shocking to see my mom for example and my aunts and some of my other relatives wearing very European style clothing even my dad you know that the haircuts the suits the dresses the music they listened to they were very familiar with western culture this was something that always shocked me and then when I the first time I ever traveled outside of the US into a Muslim land it also troubled me deeply because I was I knew that I would have a cultural shock but I think I was expecting to be pleasantly shocked you know going into a Muslim land for the first time as a practicing Muslim who in that time there weren't very many visibly Muslim in like there are now when I first started wearing hijab even in my own family and amongst my friends and community there weren't that many so I just couldn't wait to go to a land where I didn't you know have to hide or not that I did but you know just feel a little awkward and out of place I was just so excited to do that but actually the opposite happened where of course I saw people who were dressed you know Muslims and they spoke you know they had those same you know customs and all of that which is great and I loved it but there was definitely an obsession with American culture there was just this love you know and I went to Jordan for the first that was the first country that I ever went to outside of the US and I met Jordan and I just remember thinking wow I you know I just I expected such a different scene than what I had and even some of the people that I encountered they were very interesting and very sweet and very kind and hospitable but some of the conversations we had just left me you know scratching my head like how is this even happening you know they would be shocked when I would be when I was introduced to some of them and they find out that I wear hijab in California or in the West they were shocked like how why and they would question me like why are you wearing hijab you're in America you don't need to and so some of the things even I remember having discussions with some of them who were so surprised that I prayed five times a day so that was you know really a little difficult to be honest to absorb but you know I understood it was because and I figured it out quickly actually when I was driving through the city and I realized the ads and the stores so many of the similar things that we have in the U.S. they had set up shop in the Muslim countries you know a lot of big retail chains and other things but also what really made it clear for me was that I went to some of the poorest areas of Amman and there are a lot of really poor areas but I was struck by the amount of satellite dishes upon every single rooftop it's like unbelievable people no matter what their socioeconomic level is there were even I went to tent cities you know there's a lot of tent cities in Amman as well or areas there as well for for people who are refugees from Palestine and other places but oh my gosh subhanallah I was shocked because even there we saw satellite dishes so I just realized like western culture they were so exposed to those things and you know we can go and talk about that as a whole issue in a separate program but the point is they were exposed and once they got a taste of that life and the Hollywood way that life is depicted here in America that's what they aspire to so it was really really sad but it was obvious too in the styles and the clothing and like I said the shops and the stores and what people were really in the way that they gained status had to do with adopting very western styles so not surprising right subhanallah one need only to look at the photographs taken by the first Europeans in the land of Islam 100 years ago to see the nobility of Muslim dress so now we're being shown the other side that before all of this happened before these colonial powers or imperial powers went into different lands in the Muslim world where how did Muslims dress right let's look at that and he says the American poet Ezra Pound remarked that he had no idea of the force that was unleashed from the Arabian peninsula in the 7th century that led to a thousand mosques in Cordoba Spain until he caught a glimpse of it in the way a Muslim walked in Tangier in 1913 subhanallah that's pretty powerful right the way that Muslims carried themselves were being you know reminded that there was this just natural this way of walking of being of dressing that we were that was very custom to customary in many Muslim lands that even non-Muslims observed these things right compare that image to the current Muslim cities teaming with desolate youth looking for a ticket out of their empty lives to anywhere but home subhanallah right again these are really powerful images it's very you know descriptive language but it is intended to really make us reflect right when you go to a doctor you know I just this past week went to get treatment for some things after a long time having seen a provider and you know the first appointment took a really long time because it's an intake appointment and they make you go through your history and so there's a lot of questions and back and forth but that's part of the analysis process you go over the symptoms and how did things happen and why did you know when did you notice this and so doing that reflection is important in order to you know get the right diagnosis and then eventually to get inshallah the right treatment so in many ways that's what we're doing here we're looking visiting the past really trying to look at what went wrong like how did we go from this place of nobility or even as in this example non-Muslims were so struck by and in awe of just seeing a Muslim walking in a way that they dress to a place where we've lost that completely we don't have any appreciation for those things anymore we were taught in some places we look down on those things you know it's embarrassing for someone to wear traditional clothing out in public they should wear European style clothing because why would you do that it's okay in the home or in private places but how did we go from that to this right so we're looking at the history for that reason to really let it sink in like there was somewhere we went wrong and in order to again know how to get back on course we have to analyze things then he moves into Muslim cuisine once the envy of the world produced in the homes of the believers with love and remembrance of Allah's blessings people I don't know if you've ever had I've had two very like memorable meals in my life where I just felt like the food was completely blessed once was in the city of Medina we were invited to a large gathering but you could just everybody said the same it was just so there was just something incredible about that meal and it wasn't anything that we hadn't had before but there was definitely something there that we couldn't explain and another time a friend who I just felt a lot of love from may Allah bless her and her family I felt that her food was very melodic and it was like I remembered those meals I hummed it on my mother as a wonderful cook my sisters I have many people in my life Mashallah who are amazing cooks so not to take anything away from them because everybody's food is delicious but there's something about people of you know who are close to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when they cook they do it from a place of you know it's they're remembering Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala even as they're chopping the onions and you know cleaning the meat or doing all those little tasks it's a labor of love and that reflects in the flavors of the food so he's reminding us this is the envy of the world because people loved to have these meals and there's a reason for it right they were remembering Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and now it's replaced right by techno food which is not produced or livestock but a product bereft of barakah Muslims have forgotten that food is the foundation of behavior according to our scholars understanding of Allah's words right that oh you messengers eat of pure things and do righteous deeds subhanahu wa ta'ala you can see it too in the Muslim lands when you go to any Muslim country subhanahu wa ta'ala so many people right what do they look to do when they get into a Muslim country I mean I've been guilty of it I think it's because we're so deprived of certain things in the west that it's exciting to say hey I'm going to go and have a you know a halal big mac or a halal this and Kentucky fried chicken or whatever your special or your favorite food is but you know that we leave these lands and we go to Muslims to have that type of food we've lost appreciation right for our own that our own food had and so in the fact that we are commanded to eat of the pure foods subhanahu wa ta'ala so I'm just going to do a quick check of time let's see here um okay so let me I have about 10 minutes and I want to make sure I don't go over and I can answer some of these questions I've received a question here from brother Salman who's asking where are these two passages from sister I don't know if which passages you're referring to but everything I'm reading is from this book called the agenda to change our condition so and this is the introduction believe it or not there's still a lot more masha'Allah gems throughout this book but this is the introduction and we covered just page four so you know insha'Allah we'll try to get through this but I think we'll stop here um and then yeah because let me actually see you know what let me read one more paragraph and then we'll stop so this paragraph that comes after this reflection about eating from the pure food as she goes on to say pure food is being replaced with fast food made with haste and waste two attributes of the devil right consideration is from God haste is from the devil sugared sodas replace natural milk water and juice corporate fast food chains with their mass produced disease ridden pathogenic food now appear everywhere even in the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina meanwhile Muslims who for centuries food filled with Baraka made by people with loving hearts who found joy in feeding others now line up to consume products with less nutritional value than dog or cat food all the bellahima shaitan of regime I think that's I know it's heavy on the heart to hear words like this but we have to be accountable for our own behavior and we've all likely fallen into into this before but it's not to do anything to remind us of where we were and why we are here now how did this happen how can we go back to to being where we once were we can't like I said do that if we don't have this uncomfortable real or these uncomfortable realizations about our own you know behavior and hold ourselves to account and that's really what this is right so much Allah so many gems and so much more to reflect on if you don't have this book again I'm going to urge you to get it in the meantime until our next session you can certainly read up ahead and if you do get the book I ended at the top of page 5 so likely for next session I will finish you know I'll try to finish this some introduction for the next session and then we'll get into chapter 1 and proceed from there inshallah so I hope you found this a benefit if you did please don't forget to make da'a for our beloved scholarship for giving us access to these texts and for translating these you know many of the texts that they have worked on and have provided for us it's their efforts that we're able to benefit from this knowledge Alhamdulillah so please remember them in your da'a remember the people at MCC all of the staff and all the donors and board members and everybody who gives us these spaces these virtual spaces to convene and to talk and to remember Allah's praises we could all be doing anything for this one hour but inshallah our hearts are pure and we have the intention the right intention to come together in the remembrance of Allah's praises with the intention that He draws closer to us inshallah by seeing our efforts so may Allah's praises bless all of you I hope you have a wonderful evening unless actually forgive me let me get off of the I forgot to stop screen share so I apologize for that but yes I will quickly check to see if brother Salman has any other comments for me and also I know sometimes on the YouTube page there are some questions I'll quickly survey that before I go so that I don't miss anything excuse me just give me at one moment inshallah but yes in the meantime again may Allah's praises bless all of you and make it easy for you and keep you safe inshallah and as any other comments sorry I need to do that Alhamdulillah I don't see any other questions on YouTube brother Salman so if there's nothing else on the Facebook page then inshallah we can go ahead and we can wrap it up for this evening and just for those of you again who are maybe tuning in for the first time these haraqas are they're called it's a sisterhood sorority and sisterhood but I want to make sure that you know I don't personally mind if brothers are tuning in I know some people might have different views on that but I don't mind inshallah so if your family wants to watch I'm honored that you'd want to watch so please feel free to share this with others but we will be meeting from now on Sunday evenings 8 to 9 inshallah no longer Thursdays inshallah until unless things change but for now we'll keep it Sunday evening and we'll continue with the rest of the text inshallah the next time we see you which will be in two weeks so these are not weekly they're every other week so not next Sunday but the following inshallah so I look forward to seeing you all there have a wonderful evening and may Allah keep all of you safe inshallah inshallah inshallah inshallah inshallah inshallah inshallah Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibra Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, wa Alaa Alaihi Wasallam Tasbeeman Katera. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Welcome, alhamdulillah, to all of you, brothers and sisters who are out there tuning in to our official second halaqah here or session on Agenda to Change Our Condition. It is a text that we have been covering actually for several weeks now, but we started a little differently with the appendices in the back of the book. And so we're now reading the actual text. So if you don't have the text, I highly encourage you to get it. It will be easy to follow along with me, but I do have slides prepared, which I will bring up in just a moment. But here is the book. Again, for anybody who's new tuning in, it is a text that is written by Shechemza Yusuf and Imam Zed Shaker. And it is called Agenda to Change Our Condition. And again, this is our second official reading. So we're very early on into the text, alhamdulillah. So I'm gonna go ahead and pull up my slides here. And that way we can begin, inshallah. If I have one minute here or one moment. Okay, Bismillah. So here we go. I apologize one second. Stop screen share. Okay, okay. I don't know what happened. Let me just, sorry. We had it all set up just a second ago, but for some reason I'm getting an error message now. So if you bear with me, while I pull this up, how do you sharing that location? Huh, okay, I'm not exactly sure why I'm getting this message, but once I'm sorry for the inconvenience, we just had everything working fine. Subhanallah. Screen, because if Brother Salaman, can you just verify if you can see my screen? For some reason, I'm getting a strange message. Are you able to see it? Brother Salaman, are you there? Subhanallah. We come on early and we can, okay, so I think you've sent me a message. Okay, inshallah then we're good to go. I apologize. I was getting a very strange error message I've never seen before, so I'll have to do that. All right, let's go ahead and begin. So again, the last week or last time, it's been about two weeks now since we meet every other week. We started reading the text. We were very much in the beginning of this text. I'm sorry, one more second. I'm gonna full screen it so that we don't have any issues with the display. Okay, so now inshallah we should be good to go. Anyhow, alhamdulillah. We started reading this text together and I said there's so much to get through. We ended up only getting to a few pages. So where we are right now, if you have the text, is we were talking about the rapid changes in the Muslim world due to imperialism, colonialism, a lot of Western influence that came into the Muslim world. We began to see and so in the text, Shahamza here and the introduction, he describes all of these very rapid changes. He describes changes to the cultures in many Muslim countries, food, clothing, language, even the infrastructure and architecture of Muslim lands started to change and become more Westernized institutions. And many other things have just started to transform away from the traditional Muslim architecture and design and just the way that the cities and towns were built and more and more Western influences were coming in. So he talked about that. And then on page four at the very bottom of the text, he says here, one need only look at the photographs taken by the first Europeans in the lands of Islam 100 years ago to see the nobility of Muslim dress. The American poet Ezra Pound remarks that he had no idea of the force that was unleashed from the Arabian peninsula in the seventh century that led to 1,000 mosques in Cordoba, Spain until he caught a glimpse of it in the way a Muslim walked in Tangier in 1913. Compare that image to the current Muslim cities teaming with desolate youth looking for a ticket out of their empty lives to anywhere but home. So again, he's just describing the contrast of where we were to where we are now. The stunning architecture he describes on page five, gardens, parks that engendered awe in the eyes of all who gazed upon them, right? Those were suddenly transformed and more commercial buildings with just brick buildings or stone buildings with very little color or dimension or design took their place, right? And then he goes down and he talks about the schools, the madrasas where the love of Allah and his Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam was instilled in the hearts of the students along with the rich understanding of the Dean of Allah and with memorization of his book have been replaced by secular institutions that instill in people a disdain for the past and a boredom that lingers long after the last empty book is closed and an equally empty career begun. So, you know, all of this is to really help us to see why we're in the situation that we're in. The text is about changing our condition and we cannot help ourselves or heal from where we are if we don't first diagnose ourselves and see where the problems began. And so the problems in many instances began with these things that were introduced into the Muslim world, right? The government systems that we have currently, right? Many of them are abusive systems of power of rule. And so he's describing all of this at length in the very early pages of page four and five. And so then he goes on, let me just change the slide here. Bismillah, give me one minute. Okay, went too far. So then he goes on and he says on the next page on page six here, he says that, you know, if Muslims were truly living Islam, our greatness would dispel any negative influence from the West in the traditional lands of Islam. And he quotes the famous historian Arnold Toynbee. He said that he recognized Islam as a spiritual power that could help reinvigorate the dissipated state of society and its life threatening social ills. So other people recognize the power Islam had, but unfortunately we lost appreciation for our own tradition in many ways because we were so quick to replace it. And that's really what he's pointing out here. And then he talks about how subhanAllah, I mean today, first of all, I didn't mention it, forgive me, but it's, you know, the first day or now it's the second night of Rabi al-Awwal, the month of the birth of the Prophet Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So Mubarak to all of you who are out there, but important to reflect on the Prophet Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and his experience. And so in the middle of page six, he talks about how the Prophet Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam asked only one thing of the Quraysh, right? All he said is, let me be that I may invite people to Islam. He wanted them to just leave him alone so that he could do his Dawa and do what he was meant to do. And they didn't, they were relentless and they were brutal and they didn't give him that opportunity at all. He had to of course overcome them. But Shukram Sahir says, we on the other hand are given, leave to invite people, yet we do not. You know, and again, this is symptomatic of the fact that we have lost appreciation and value for our own tradition and we have in many ways become preoccupied with the world and the dunya and acquiring wealth and materialism and all the other things that this dunya can delude us with, right? So then he goes on and he, again, we're on page six here and he talks about, he says, we on the other, I'm sorry, he says, this is not to deny that there are some who oppose the spread of Islam. Among such people are those who will not sit idly by and allow others to invite people to Islam without attempting to undermine Muslims, cause dissension in the ranks of believers and place obstacles along the path. They ultimately manifest disbelief in a very real way and their existence is a test from Allah to distinguish real believers from hypocrites. However, our prophet, Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, in a sound hadith said, do not seek confrontation with your enemies, but when it occurs, be steadfast. So again, he's just giving us some insight into the current dynamic of our community where you have some people who are just really disconnected and disengaged and other people who are, you know, they're being obstructive. And so we have to be steadfast and continue to do what we're meant to do, which is spread this tradition, value this tradition. That's what our responsibility is. And so he goes on on the same page. And again, let me pull up the slides. So those of you who don't have the text can at least read along partially here with us. If you give a moment, there's always a bit of a delay. He says here that true Muslims, so now he's defining for us where we all should be because we're clearly confused, we're lost, we've lost value for our tradition. We're seeing it all over the Muslim world. And in many cases, those of us who are living, who are Muslim minorities living in non-Muslim lands, we're also reflecting the same problem of just not really appreciating our faith tradition as we should because we're too caught up in the pursuit of the material world, right? The material world. So he's reminding us here that where we all should be. And he says, true Muslims love peace, obey the law, but are also commanded by a law to be witnesses unto humanity. And in order to fulfill this, we must first be witnesses unto ourselves. So he's making us hold ourselves to account here. We can enjoy the privileges, the opportunities that we have here. Alhamdulillah, we live in a time and place and many of us where we do have immense privilege. And so we can certainly enjoy what Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has given us and we should do our best to be the best citizens wherever we are. But our ultimate objective, we can't lose sight of it. It's just to worship Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala and also to bear witness as Muslims that this is a true faith and to live this Deen and to teach it when we can, when we have the opportunity. But he reminds us here that in order to do that effectively, we have to first not forget our own selves. We have to hold ourselves to account. And so here in this ayah from Surat Al-Baqarah, I ta'moruna nasa bilbiri wa tansona anfusakum, right? Do you command people to righteousness and forget yourselves? So this is really about not becoming a hypocrite. You can't espouse the beauty of Islam and all of these amazing things that are true. But then you don't live it yourself. You have to have consistency, you have to have truth. And so this is the starting point. Know what your objectives are, but hold yourself to account and have the balance. Be in the dunya, but also know that you have an important, a very important role in this dunya. And now he's gonna introduce what that is. So in the next page, or actually, excuse me, the next section, again, if you're following along in the book, the very bottom of page six, we now have a section titled, Inner and Outer Transformations. And so here, let me just check if I skipped a, no, I didn't. Okay, I thought I skipped a slide. So Inner and Outer Transformations. Here he says that the path for us, and now he's speaking specifically to the Muslims who are in Western lands, okay? So he says, the path for us in these Western lands is twofold. The first is Inner Transformation through Spiritual Struggle. You know, I'm so sorry, I think I did skip a slide. Let me see if I put it somewhere else. Where did that slide go? Here it is. I don't know how this slide got all the way at the end, forgive me, but I knew I definitely skipped over this. Here we go. So he talks about Inner and Outer Transformation. So he says that the first is the Inner Transformation. This is the spiritual struggle with the soul, right? This is a very first part of our path here in the West. The second is the Outer Transformation. And this is struggle with the vices and degrading aspects of society. This means working toward the realization of social justice and a culture that embodies moral comportment, protects children and enhances family and community life. Now, again, you know, this book was written several years ago and published in 2013 as a text, but it was written even prior to that. And so when you think about where we are now, this is such incredibly relevant advice. I mean, I just, you know, I gave a parenting, started a parenting class yesterday and we talked a lot about some of the struggles that parents are having with their families. And so, and one of the things that I hear a lot from people are the fears, legitimate fears that they have about raising their children in this society and in other parts of the Western world as well because so many of the things that are now acceptable and normalized in these societies are completely antithetical to our creed, our belief. And so it's very difficult to try to navigate, well, how can we live in these societies when every thing that you see out in that again is acceptable and even encouraged is pulling people away from their faith. And so you have natural fears from parents and about future generations, about their children now, you know, what's gonna happen to them when they get a little older? Are they gonna be able to maintain their faith? These are all very, very legitimate fears. And so this, you know, part of the text is really for us to contemplate where are we with both of these aspects of our path? Where are we with our own inner transformation, right? Where are we with our own mujahedah? What are we doing? Are we living this Dean as much as we can or have we sort of just given up in certain areas? You know, are we not really striving to be better? Have we become stagnant and stale and we're just kind of going with emotions? Are we making efforts at all, you know? And the best way to really gauge that is to ask yourself, where were you, you know, just a few months ago, where were you last year? Where were you 10 years ago, five years ago? What major changes have you committed to in terms of your spiritual, your own individual spiritual identity, your own individual spiritual path? Are you having the same problems or have new problems emerged? Like were you better five years ago? Or have you really overcome a lot of your struggles? But where are you right now? And this is something we all have to do individually and independently and have those really honest conversations with ourselves. Because it absolutely impacts the second part of it. I mean, again, the whole book is agenda to change our condition and we know from the verses in the Quran that Allah SWT that it says He will not change the condition of the people until they change themselves. So if we want to see our community healing, our societies improving, we cannot expect that to happen if we're not first willing to look to ourself, which is what the entire purpose and the majority of this book deals with. It deals with really the inner, the inward lens, the looking inward and trying to figure out what all of us have to do differently. Because if we don't do that, then it's very likely that we're not gonna have success when it comes to all of these other things outside of us that we so desperately wish we could control. So these two things, for all of us again, just to give us perspective, very important to reflect on. Now I'm gonna go back because the slide got out of order. So just bear with me a moment while I find my placing here. But let me go back. Bismillah. So this is the slide that should have come next. So here on the top of page seven, we have a quote from the great scholar, 11th century, Mufassir and scholar of Arabic, Raqbal Isfahani. And Shahamza quotes here that he gave us two main reasons or in his opinion, there were two main reasons why Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala created the human being. The first is to worship Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, right? And so here we have the verse, right? وَمَا أُمِرُ إِلَّا لِيَعْبُدُ اللَّهَ مُخْلِسِينَ لَهُدِّينَ حُنَفَاءَ They were only commanded to worship Allah with purity, making the religion solely for him. So this is again the reminder that this is a part of our creation. The second reason is to cultivate the world, right? وَاَنْشَاءَكُمْ مِنَ الْأَرْضِ وَاستَعمَرُكُمْ فِيهَا So he brought you forth from the earth and has caused you to cultivate it. So this idea of first recognizing our own purpose, we're here to worship Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, that's solely our purpose. But then also there's the other side of the coin. We have to cultivate this dunya that we've inherited, that we're a part of. And how do we do that? So then the rest of the text he now describes that. So he says here, again, if I can get to the next slide. Bismillah. I went far. Okay, so here, so what cultivation means? He says here, cultivation here means to sow seeds that produce both temporal fruits as well as eternal ones. Such cultivation entails building schools, hospitals, farms, roads, bridges and cities and towns, wherein Allah is worshiped and the sanctity of the earth is preserved. In order for us to realize our God given potential within our lifetimes, we must break the cycles of stagnation by abandoning methods that have proven ineffective in fulfilling our responsibilities as people committed to Islam. We can accomplish this only by changing our current condition. This requires courage, commitment and above all critical introspection. So I mean, look, that's a pretty tall order, right? If you think about what we're supposed to be doing and what we're all actually doing, many of us and I can speak for myself as well, it's very easy to get caught up in our own individual goals and pursuits and forget the bigger picture, right? We all work, we have families to take care of, we have children to take care of, parents in laws. And so we can just kind of get caught up in that routine and then lose sight of the fact that we should also be looking towards the future because our children, what are they going to carry forth if we're not also trying to help in some way? So whether that means we actually get involved with institution building or supporting institutions and organizations some way or another, you can do that financially, you can volunteer and work, you can serve onto committees or boards. Some part of us should feel compelled to do that. I think that's what the point is here that we should look to the benefit that all of this will bring for generations to come as well as for our own progeny, our own children, our grandchildren, they are going to reap the benefits if we prioritize these things, but if we just get caught up in our own material worldly pursuits, just making money and buying homes and cars and vacationing and eating the best of foods and buying all the clothes that we want and just it's all about what we benefit from for ourselves instead of looking at these other very important big picture things, then we have no one else to blame but ourselves when we see that our children, for example, are not really interested in being part of their community, right? If we don't take them to the masjid and have them appreciate, for example, what a great resource and what a great blessing it is to have you part of a community and to have a community center, to have teachers, to have classes regularly and it's understandable that we're not gonna always be able to attend every single event or lecture, but at least to value it, at least to have appreciation for it so that when you get that email from the masjid asking for some support, some donations that you don't just roll your eyes and become cynical and act as though it's just here we go again, but rather instead of spending money on whatever big purchase you might have had your eyes on for a while, that you see the bigger picture, that it's better to pay it forward for the benefit of your community, the benefit of your children and grandchildren, inshallah. So really thinking big picture, but to think about all of these things that this is what cultivating means, that we actually invest in schools and hospitals and building institutions and improving our world and our society and taking that seriously. So civic engagement, getting involved with what's going on in local government and actually being a part of that is a big part of the role that we should have as Muslims here living in the West. So I have that really great powerful reminders for all of us to reflect on and that last line is so important, right? We can accomplish this only by changing our current condition. This requires courage, commitment and above all critical introspection. So we have to be willing to think critically about our own culpability and why we are in the state that we're in as a community, because we all do have some part in it. And that's, again, a very subjective individual process, but we have to start there. And that's what the whole objective of Mujaheda and really trying to change your condition is. It's a matter of let me first, again, diagnose the problems, look inwardly, look outwardly, analyze the situation, make sense of it, and then from there, figure out what I have to do next. So it's an essential part of the process. Now the next slide here, Bismillah. Give me a second here. Okay, so the next section on page seven at the bottom, he has titled the importance of family. So here he says that the family is the first and most important unit of society and is designed to nurture and prepare the young to carry on the civilizational enterprise. It is in serious crisis throughout the world and our children, whether in Muslim households or those of other faiths and beliefs are suffering everywhere. So, I mean, this is just an absolutely true statement and you can look at research, whether it's from different academic institutions or scientific institutions, journals, psychologists, therapists, there's a lot of people who are looking at what's happening with our youth and it's very concerning. Anxiety disorders are on the rise globally and mostly in amongst the youth teen demographic, young adult demographic, we're seeing a lot of mental health issues and it's getting worse and worse and there's a lot of thought and analysis on why what's happening, but the bottom line is it is happening and it's everywhere and we have to hit pause for a moment and just try to at least figure out what are some of the potential reasons why kids are suffering so much more today maybe than ever in human history. Allah knows, I don't know if we can make a specific or exact claims, but when you do look at the data of how many teens are reporting problems, suicidal ideation, cutting, a lot of anxiety, as we said, disorder, social anxiety disorders, depression, these are not, we shouldn't take them lightly or act like, oh, this is just a reflection of typical teenage angst and all teens go through that and they can be dramatic and sometimes people get very cynical, these millennials, these generation Z, they're also spoiled and they're just brats and that's not how we should stuff a lot, talk about people, I mean, clumping people and those types of generalizations is never a good thing, but especially when it comes to young children, I mean, that I think is just deflecting because as adults, it's our duty to protect them and to take care of them and so when you see children engaging in really risky behaviors, whether it's drugs, alcohol, premarital relations, all the things, the risk factors and the fears that every parent has for their child, when you see them doing those things and in doing things that maybe you couldn't even think of doing when you were their age, instead of blaming them and making it sound like they're just inherently flawed, I think it's more effective to look back on where did we as adults fail them? How did we fail them? What did we do that led to this problem in terms of society and culture, the messages that they're getting, the access to a lot of these things that they're getting, we have to look back to ourselves. For example, I mean, very simple thing to look at is again, access, like when I was in high school and even throughout my childhood and well into even my college years, my parents had very strict rules and I'm sure many people of my generation can relate about curfew and about who we could be around and there were rules in terms of what we had access to. And so that built in maybe just an awareness that was Alhamdulillah with us even when our parents weren't there, we just knew we couldn't do certain things because very early on those things were understood and communicated and there were consequences. So when we are vigilant as parents and we can implement those types of rules and really be vigilant and be firm, our children will naturally fall into line but a lot of what's happening is that we aren't as vigilant and I can say that because the structure of our homes are different. When you have at least one parent in the house and they're stable and they're consistently there and they are present and watchful over the children, you have less likely chances of things passing through that or getting the children getting through a way with things. But when both parents are disconnected and just really distracted, I should say, because of other obligations and it doesn't always necessarily have to be work. It can just be personal other things that come up or roles that maybe a parent plays in terms of other family members. I've seen some friends and people that I know who are very consumed by other obligations in their life due to other family members maybe or other things going on. So the point is is when we don't have that type of vigilance in the home, then you see a lot of things happen and kids of course, the world that they're in, they don't really have to go very far to get access to some of the worst, most toxic, dangerous, poisonous elements of society. It's all within reach within seconds because of social media and devices and all of these very dangerous things that our children do have access to. So vigilance isn't always necessarily where our children are going outside of the home and watching, I mean, that's part of it, certainly who they're spending time with, who their influences are. But I think from our generation and previous generations, it's the opposite now. It's inside the home, what are the influences that our children have? Are they watching a lot of television? Are they watching a lot of Netflix and all of these other streaming services that may seem like not a big deal because, oh, they're in the home. It gives you kind of like a false sense of security if you think about it as a parent. Oh, they're just in their room. They're watching something with their friend or their sister, they're just watching a movie. But if we're not being vigilant to know what are they watching and do we follow up? Do we have measures in place to be able to know what they're watching? Or do we just give them all access passes to a lot of these, I mean, HBO, there's Netflix. There's like, there's all these streaming services that do not have very good content at all. And the sad thing is, is that their generation, the shows that are tailored for their generation are some of the worst. Some of the worst shows that you could possibly imagine are made for and presented to as, you know, as entertainment for the teen demographic. For example, there's a show on HBO I mentioned, Euphoria. If you don't know this show, know that your teens most likely know about this show because it's very popular in that demographic. And I believe it just won an Emmy, it won some award recently. And it was very, you know, it received a lot of awards, I believe. But the point is, is that show, if you watch even a few minutes of it as a Muslim, it should absolutely fill you with horror because every type of debauchery you can imagine is shown in that show from the get-go. It's like, you know, just within a few, for a few minutes. There's many other shows as well that are like that, but they celebrate ideas that are not part of our faith. And yet they are marketed specifically to teens. And so as parents, if we're not aware of the, again, the shows or the music, look at the music industry and how much it's changed in the past, I would say 10, 15 years, even when I was younger, much different lyrics, just different type of content that teens and young children were exposed to. Now, if you're paying attention at all to what's going on with social media anyhow, you have on TikTok, for example, there are so many trends with young children. Forget, you know, older teens who are, at least you could say, you know, from our tradition, they're young adults, right? They have accountability. I'm talking about young children, like seven, eight, nine, who are dancing in very provocative ways to songs by someone like Cardi B, you know, it's like really horrific. But this is the world that our kids are in right now. And so we have to pay attention. And this is where the onus is on us as parents to know that it is a very difficult time for children, but we have to stand vigilant and make sure that what is coming to, what they have access to, that we know what it is. So all of those, you know, those systems that you can find, whether it's online, you know, just security systems or apps or whatever it is that will allow you at least some level of control over what they're taking in and consuming is essential. We can't take it like for, we can't assume that just because they say that they're not gonna do something or going to do something that that's going to be the case because temptation is real. We all know what peer pressure is. We all know that young children and teens do not have very strong ability to regulate themselves because those functions aren't fully developed yet and that part of the brain. So we know these things. So we shouldn't assume that just because they're good kids and they're sweet and we love them, that they won't fall. I mean, we know from just reading our history that some of the best people have fallen. And so that's just naive to think that a young child, just because they're good, that you can necessarily trust them to not get curious, to not wanna look, to not wanna do something. And also aside from that, there's predators that are very good at grooming and luring children into traps. And so the bottom line is is we have to be very serious about the crisis that is unfolding and has been unfolding in front of us with regards to our children and to really be worried. We should be worried. If we're not worried, there's a problem anyway. I mean, that's my personal opinion because I work a lot with teens and I deal with a lot of issues that I think would really, to be honest, just startle, freak out and make a lot of parents just fall into deep, deep despair and depression because it's like, how can this be happening to our young children? Unfortunately it is. So I think that's the point that he's making here is that it's children are suffering and we really do have to help them. And then he goes on to say, now he's giving us some insight into also another area that we have to be aware of. And he says here on the bottom of page seven, he says, schools once meant to nourish and enhance the intellects, bodies and souls of our youth, now dumb them down and prepare them for a life of mediocrity and servility in many instances to perform meaningless jobs that neither benefit humanity nor help the individual grow morally and spiritually. There's a lot of, there's a lot more content here just regarding the government and just different ways of how these things are influencing our ability to parent our children, privacy issues and other things. But I think that point about schooling is something we should also take very seriously as Muslims because as someone who went to public schools my whole life when I was growing up here and who's visited public schools since then, I've spoken at many public schools for Islam and other topics. I am shocked. I think the last time I went to a public high school was a year ago and to give a talk and I just remember immediately from the get go being totally shocked by my experience because it was so different than anything that I remembered or experienced in my own life. For example, one of the things that immediately I saw was police cars, vehicles in the parking lot of the school that I went to and it wasn't necessarily a dangerous neighborhood or anything like that. I came to find out that that's pretty much standard now in many schools across, public schools across the country where maybe in major cities or close to major cities and maybe more but the point is I was shocked that there were so many police vehicles in the parking lot and all the school entrances were gated, completely gated and it was a very tight knit security system which to be honest it felt like a prison. I'm not exaggerating because they had metal bars throughout every entry and exit point of the school of the perimeter of the school. And so I just remember going, how do the people working in these institutions and attending these how do they feel peace? Because in my short visit, I did not feel peace. I actually felt very anxious being there and I remember I was walking, being someone who is an adult and you need all these passes. I had to go from one part of the parking lot around the building and there was a kid, he was a high schooler behind me but he had his backpack on in a very strange way and he was very closely walking behind me and I remember feeling like fear. Why is he so close to me? And his backpack was in front of him and he was like doing all these weird things that just felt very uneasy. So then I thought, wow, here I am a visitor and I'm feeling so uncomfortable. Imagine this is every day for these students. So the point is, public schools have just changed so much due to all of the violence and the risks that are out there and we're not, I mean, this is just reality that many people have experienced unfortunately some really horrific things at the schools on site. And I'm not speaking just about terrorist attacks or any type of school shootings necessarily, but bullying. I mean, bullying is such a big part of a lot of teens' everyday experiences which is why you see so much depression and so many other mental health issues is because a lot of kids are traumatized from bullying behavior. And then just exposure to other things that are when you think of teens and how vulnerable they are and what a difficult time it is in their life to have to on top of managing their own emotions and all the changes that are happening to them physically, mentally, emotionally, all the fears of their future. You have, what am I gonna be? What am I gonna do? How well am I gonna perform in school? Am I gonna go to college? All of these very legitimate concerns that they have, the pressures that they have from their families, on top of that to have to go into an environment where they are judged very harshly and critically for their appearance, girls are anywhere. Girls, of course, we know are judged very harshly for how they appear, for how they look, immense pressure, boys as well, for not just how they look and appear, but how, whether or not they measure up. There's a lot of very just close minded, narrow definitions of what it means to be a boy or I mean toxic masculinity, just look it up and you'll see what I'm talking about. But all of those things are real and so a lot of our teens experience daily anxiety and pressure because they are going into environments where those things are just, that's their everyday for eight, 10 hours a day, that's what they have to deal with. And then on top of that social media, which is just an extension of the school now because everybody's online, everybody's connected and so a lot of these behaviors follow them even after they go home, right? And I know right now we're in quarantine so this may not seem to be relevant in the moment but if we're just speaking generally about life before quarantine and likely what's going to happen when things resume, this is the reality that the public schools are very toxic environments that we have to protect our children from and so here, Shahamza as well speaks about that and he says that we must raise our children outside of the modern schools that are designed to make them no more than functional literates. So, and this is I would say also a moment of pause for many of us who may have become so wrapped up in the, what we've been conditioned to think is the script that you parents work, whether it's one income, double income, children go to school, we come home, we have our meals together and then weekends we do things together. That's very typical for a lot of American or Western families because we work, 40 hour plus work weeks and there's schools are morning to afternoon and then you have all these other extracurriculars. So there's not a lot of time in between for families to really connect but I think that's the point is that that being status quo isn't good and it's actually causing a lot of these problems. So just because everybody is doing it we should be able to step back and see that there's harm and the harm is obvious when you look at what's happening with parental authority over children and just the total lack of respect that a lot of teens have for parental authority. If you look at Dr. Leonard Sachs's work he really does a phenomenal job about describing the breakdown that is happening in what he calls the collapse of parenting in America but this is affecting Muslim families as well. There is definitely a problem with teens just being so disconnected from their family because they're not spending enough time with them that when it comes to parents trying to establish authority it's just falls flat. I have literally worked with many families and spoken to many parents who are completely at their wits and they've lost hope. They just don't know what to do. They feel like they really don't have any options anymore because their teens or their even college students have lost total respect and value for the family and they are rebellious. They're just doing a lot of things that the parents don't know how to control. So these are symptomatic of the fact that we are not spending enough time with our children and our families need that bonding time. And so we have to prioritize that and if schooling and the model of schooling and I'm speaking now very specific maybe to where I am which is in the Bay Area of California and it's a very highly competitive area. There's immense pressure on parents and teens to not only excel in their school but then beyond school to have to be scheduled basically until they zonk out at midnight or even past midnight because they have all these extracurriculars and it's all about getting into the best schools and getting into this system and that system or whatever dream career path that they may have but the pressure that that puts on the teens and then of course the how the effect of that pressure on the family, the family dynamic is real. It's very real. And so we have to step back and say, is it worth it? Is it worth it to push our kids so hard, so fast and so intensely into that direction if it's at the compromise of the family of their faith identity of their identity in general because when they're exposed to so many different groups or messages and different paths all at once it can affect their ability to really discern what is in my best interest and what isn't and this is why we have to study about teens for example, like their peer group at a certain point has more influence over their decisions than their family. So if we're not even aware of who their peer group is because they just go to this school and then after that, once they get their license anyway they can drive themselves to wherever but if we're not aware of the influences that our children are exposed to we shouldn't be shocked when they come home and say, I don't wanna do this anymore. I wanna do that or I identify as this and I wanna explore this lifestyle. We shouldn't be surprised because that is their what their environment is for the majority of their day they're spending time with people who have different maybe views than you do. So I think the point here is that we have to step back and say, is this model effective? Well, clearly it's not. We're seeing a major problem with youth culture in this country and a lot of it does stem from the school system, from social media. So let's step back and see what our alternatives are and that's why he offers here again in the same text he says, we must remove our children from state schools and then the onus is back on us. So it's like, okay, you see the problem is in these public school systems or these systems that again do offer or influence and condition and indoctrinate children. It's just a fact. If there's a problem in those systems and you're aware of that, pull them out because that's your duty but then at the same time you have to work towards what we talked about earlier the cultivation, it's your obligation to be part of that, to be part of the building of institutions that are actually going to help your children and other children. So design, build, support life enhancing places of learning and alhamdulillah, I personally am so grateful because I actually know people who did this exact thing and if we look at here in the Bay Area we have alhamdulillah Islamic schools that were started grassroots from nothing from like one classroom, one teacher, a handful of students meeting in a very humble beginnings but alhamdulillah because of the sincerity of the people involved and their vision and their ability to see the longer picture and wanting to work towards that they made it happen to where now we have institutions like North Star School, for example it is masha'Allah one of the most successful schools in our community, Peace Terrace Academy, Averaweez. We have, of course we have the longest, I believe it's the longest established Islamic school in the Bay Area, the MCA high school and school system. So we have alhamdulillah, great models but all of those were started by parents who did not want to just let their kids fall into the system but actually saw the problems that were there and they decided to do something about it. So that's on all of us to be actively trying to fix the problems that we see instead of just ignoring them, sweeping them under the rug or just saying, oh well kind of acquiescing to again the status quo that this is what everybody else was doing, I guess I should do it too. We have to be thinking about the consequences of these things. So that is for maybe parents who are contemplating or having children or have young children and they're thinking about their future. I just got a message actually recently, I think it was yesterday or today about that, moms who are worried about the schooling of their children who are younger now and that's good. It's good that they're worried because that's where inshallah some good changes will come. It's that fear of the unknown, the fear of the risks and the desire to not want your kids to suffer that will hopefully inshallah lead you down the path of protecting which is our number one job as parents, right? So he really emphasizes this point a lot about moving kids from those school systems. And then this last point is also very important. We must abandon cruel and punitive child rearing techniques as this is the primary source of social dysfunction and hypocrisy. We all need to be reminded of this message because unfortunately some of our cultures and some of our family, philosophies of parenting that maybe we received from our own families are really broken systems. They're just not, they actually contribute to so much of the suffering of children and so much of the dysfunction that we see in society because if you come from a culture or a family that condones abuse of any type towards children, we should be very clear about it, unequivocally state to everybody out there that there's no room for that in our tradition whatsoever as a good Muslim as a God-faring Muslim, you do not strike, you do not abuse, you're not harsh especially with young children and those that are weaker and smaller and who are dependent on you, you don't do that. I mean, subhanAllah, the prophet said in so many of the hadith that we learned from him, he defended the rights of animals who were being mistreated. So what about children? Of course, he rebuked any type of abuse towards the innocent creation. So we have to be very careful about allowing ourselves or justifying ourselves to do that because we think that this is gonna get them in line and they'll respect us and they have to listen and some children are so unruly and they don't learn the easy ways we have to teach in the hard way. Those are all just excuses that you're making to justify your abuse of behavior and you're not willing to actually do the hard work which is to maybe take them to the professionals who can help determine why they're acting out if there are actually legitimate behavioral issues that you have to deal with. But that is what the parent does. The parent who's responsible and who understands that the child is in a manner from Allah and that they will be held accountable for their treatment of that child doesn't look at the child as a burden and as just this nuisance that they have to deal with but they look at it like this is a trust from Allah and I have to take care of it. So when I see that child unable to regulate themselves or their emotions acting out, speaking out or doing something they shouldn't be doing I wanna fix it, right? That's different than I wanna just subject them to some sort of punishment and shut them up and get them out of my face. That's a total different attitude. So we have to go back and really again have these internal dialogues where we hold ourselves to account about the choices we make with regards to our children and protecting them because our families as Shahamza mentioned here it is the most important unit of our society. So if we see our families are breaking down we have to determine what the sources are if our children are not again respecting us following the rules of our home. What is the reason? Is it because we ourselves are failing in some capacity? Are we being hypocritical? Are we establishing the prophetic model of parenting or are we just being authoritarians who are wielding our power and abusing our power in some cases and then we're expecting our children to listen to us. This is a broken system. Are our kids being influenced by external sources and what are those sources? Do we know what those sources are? Are they from media? Are they from social media? Are they from friend groups that are toxic to them? How are we protecting our children? Are they going into schooling systems that are detrimental to them spiritually? What are we doing to protect them? So all of this is on us to determine and to really take seriously because again, the importance of the family cannot be overestimated. It is the most important unit. So we have to do everything in our power to protect it but it's really a matter of doing this type of internal introspection, analyzing, thinking and holding ourselves to account. So Alhamdulillah, this is the end of today's class. I think, yeah. There's more, inshallah, that I invite all of you to independently read in that section, the introduction. And then inshallah, in two weeks, when we rejoin we will start with chapter one, which is on taqwa. It's definition and benefits. So Alhamdulillah, we'll actually start the official text next week but we did the introduction, Alhamdulillah, we did the appendices. So I look forward to our next meeting. I'm gonna quickly get out of screen share here and see if I see any questions. I think I did go over. I apologize for those of you who are tuning in but let's see if there are any questions that I can get to, if you give me a moment. Bismillah, Alhamdulillah, thank you. I see some comments. Thank you, I believe they came earlier when I began asking about my screen. So I don't see anything on a Facebook group but I'll check the YouTube page as well because I know we have people tuning in on different platforms. So I again, don't wanna miss any questions. So bear with me real quickly. Alhamdulillah, I hope it doesn't play here. I don't want it to play, I just wanna see if there's any questions. Okay, Alhamdulillah. So we have a question here from, I think if it's Sister Anjum, can you please give me an example of raising children outside modern schools? That's a great question. Alhamdulillah, we do see a lot of alternative school systems, a lot of co-ops, a lot of charter programs, a lot of private schools and people I think are getting even more creative now that the pandemic is fully underway and they're losing their maybe patience with the online virtual public school systems. I think there are people who are thinking of other ways. I know some people who have actually opted to homeschool, not necessarily through a charter or any government program but actually independent homeschooling where they take full control. And as a homeschooling mom and someone who has sort of explored all the different options, I think there is a lot of misconception and fear around homeschooling unfortunately. And it's sad because when you actually come to this side and you see that your children thrive and of course it's hard work. I'm not gonna simplify it. You have to do a lot of the legwork to find the proper resources and the curriculum and all the stuff that is required to keep your child active and engaged and tailored for him or her. It takes work but Alhamdulillah, we have so many amazing resources. I'm very fortunate enough to know many, many homeschoolers. Alhamdulillah, we have, there's Kinza Academy, we have, let's see, there's, I'm trying to think off the top of my head but there's a lot of different programs here anyway that they do work with parents who are interested in exploring alternative options but we have the East Bay here in the Bay Area. We have the East Bay Homeschooling Group. We have the Silicon Valley Homeschooling Group which is based in the Silicon Valley. We have, I was part of the Southern California community for many years and they have a very large homeschooling community. Many sisters who've, masha'Allah, successfully homeschooled their children from young age, I mean preschool all the way through college and successful, amazing stories really, really done a phenomenal job and they're available to talk to and to get ideas from and they have a lot of resources online. So I think that the fear we have to help people overcome that it's not like maybe what it was 20, 30 years ago, I understand, there's certainly a time where maybe I myself may have looked at homeschooling and thought, what, that sounds so strange but I'm a teacher by profession so I've never really shied away from teaching but I know people who tell me I just, I don't think I could ever do that but Alhamdulillah, I've also heard from people who were fearful and never in a million years thought that they would find themselves as homeschoolers but then Alhamdulillah, Allah opened their heart to the idea and they began to do it and suddenly it's, they're so overjoyed by all the strides and the successes that they've seen with their children. So I think every parent needs to make that decision but the point I think that Shahamza was making in that text is to empower parents to start thinking about their choices and to see the consequences of some of those choices and to know that there are alternatives so that's really what we should take from that that there are other options and now Alhamdulillah maybe because of the fact that so many people are exposed to a different form or model of education even though it's not necessarily always ideal through the virtual system but at least it's something different that parents can start to think, you know what maybe I don't need to rely on this system that I thought was the only option and rather look at other options because my children their mental well-being their physical well-being, their safety their, you know, their spiritual well-being that's the most essential thing is the most important thing to preserve and so I need to do my job as a parent to make sure I can do that for them. So inshallah, but thank you for the question sister and I don't know if there's other questions but I'm assuming because I don't see anymore that that is all that I have kept you five minutes past the hour but thank you so much and forgive us for the technical delays we try every session to come early figure all of it out but there always seems to be something and Alhamdulillah it's humbling but I appreciate your patience inshallah we will see you in two weeks we will begin inshallah chapter one on Taqwa so please if you would like read ahead and we'll see you there Jazakumullahu khayran and end in dua Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim wa la'asir inna linsan la fi khusir illa nadina amin wa amir as-salihati wa tawassu bil haqi wa tawassu bil sabr SubhanakAllah wa bi hamdika as-shirwan la ilaha illa anta na astaghfiruqa wa naitoobu ilayk Allahumma sallim wa sallim wa barak ala Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa ala arihi wa sahbihi wa sallim wa sallim wa ala kafirah Alhamdulillah, Jazakumullahu khayran And again, I'm going to be the first Mubarak to all of you. InshaAllah we'll see you in a couple of weeks. As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh Alhamdulillah, Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salam wa ala as-shirb al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa ala arihi wa sahbihi wa sallim wa salliman katira As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh Dear brothers and sisters, Alhamdulillah, it's great to be with all of you again. We were together just a couple of weeks ago. We do these every other week for those of you who are joining in for the first time. Alhamdulillah, these sessions are open to everyone. We are covering a text called Agenda to Change Our Condition which is written by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf and Imam Zaid Shakir. And Alhamdulillah, we are today actually, we just finished up the introduction, the last session, the last two sessions, we were working on the introduction part. And so today I'm excited because we're gonna start chapter one. Alhamdulillah on Taqwa. So if you have the text, you can read along with me. I also have slides which I'll share in a minute. But just for those of you who do not have the text, here is another image of it. I like to always show this just in case there are people who are joining us for the first time. So let me go ahead if you permit me, excuse me, permit me just a second. I will share my screen, inshallah. Okay. And let me expand this so that you have a large view. Bismillah. Okay, so I'm going to again, we're gonna pick up on chapter one, it's page 12 in the text. And so Alhamdulillah, this chapter is on Taqwa. And here we have the slides are all from the text. So if you don't have the textbook or the book, inshallah the slides will be sufficient. So right off the bat, the very first thing that's shared is the meaning of what Taqwa is. And we have a few different scholars that are quoted or a couple of scholars that are quoted. First off, Sidi Abul Wahed ibn Asher defines Taqwa as follows. It is the summation of, or the summation of Taqwa is avoiding prohibitions and fulfilling injunctions both inwardly and outwardly. And then Imam al-Jorjani defines it accordingly. He says that linguistically it means to ward off. In other words, it is to take precaution. According to other scholars of truth, it is to protect oneself from the punishment of Allah by obedience to him. And it is to guard the self from Allah's punishment due to an omission of a right action or a commission of a wrong action. What is intended is in one's obedience is sincerity. So SubhanAllah, we can clearly see there the definitions are all pretty consistent of what it is. And especially this last definition which is expanded on again by Ibn Asher. He says that the aspects of Taqwa are four in number. And so we wanna look at these four as well. So I'm gonna go ahead and go to the next slide. Jump to head there. So Ibn Asher, he tells Aradi Lahhan, he says that the aspects of Taqwa are actually four, right? And these four, the wayfarer are the pathways of benefit and the four are fulfilling obligations outwardly, right? So whatever is incumbent upon us, we do them that are outward, we do those actions. Also those inward actions, right? So whatever is from within our heart, what we should be believing, but also you could read this as outward actions versus private actions. So thinking about being again consistent in one's practice and then also avoiding prohibitions outwardly and avoiding prohibitions inwardly. Because again, we know that the Munafiqin or were the ones who outwardly they may have displayed a type of action or belief, but inwardly they had a total different reality. So the believer who has true Taqwa is consistent in his or her outward and inward realities, but also in their, when they're with people in private places, I mean in public places or privately, they're consistent. So it's not that they only pray or fast or speak well when they're with people, but they're actually that is just their character, right? So these four qualities or these four aspects of Taqwa have to be applied to eight things. And he's defined those as the heart and then the following inroads to the heart. So all of this has to be again consistent in one's internal spiritual heart and one's belief system, but as well as the actions that one does with our tongue, eyes, ears, stomach, genitals, hands and feet. So you cannot be a person of Taqwa but then have the sort of cherry pick where you want to apply Taqwa or on certain things you are obedient and you fear Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala or you claim to fear Allah, but then you make excuses in other areas. It has to be again, across the board, these four factors or four aspects of Taqwa have to be applied in all of these different areas. So then we go on and he says, here, let me get the slides to pick up here. Bismillah. One, two, four, ahead. Okay, so then on page, so this is all covered subhanAllah, just on that first page, all of this content given to us right away. And then we move to page 12 and now we have from some gems from Imam Ibn Juza Al-Kalbi who tells us that the stations of the human being are five, okay? So what are they? First is guarding against disbelief, right? This is the station of submission as a believer, as a Muslim, as someone who accepts Islam, you're in a state of submission and you are protecting yourself from disbelief. Guarding against forbidden things. So now it's not just that you believe or you submitted, but you're actually, this is the next step, right? And this is the station of repentance. So you're actually really concerned about seeking repentance, but staying away from those things that are haram, guarding against doubtful matters. So there's a lot of things that are kind of in that gray area, right? The haram is clear, the halal is clear, then you have the makru and you have those things that are just not always clear. So this would be scrupulousness. A scrupulous person is the one who's really just very specific and tedious or very careful, very careful about their practice. So they guard against doubtful matters, right? So that's the station of scrupulousness. And then your move, so all human beings, we find ourselves in one of these five. So you have to, as we're reading through the list, consider where are you in this list, right? Are you at that level where you really are trying to stay away from those things that are just not clear? And if so, then the next station is where you would, it's like a goalpost. Then the next station that you elevate to is guarding against extraneous matters. This is the station of freedom, zuhad, right? So really just trying not to be excessive in any way. There's a lot of things in our world as we all know that we indulge in. So when you take a path of zuhad, you're trying to really just limit yourself to the bare necessities and not really indulge your enoughs very much and really you're very much more focused on, again, your worship and your, they could have Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And then the last is guarding against other than Allah occupying the heart. And this is the station of vigilance. Obviously all of us, our hope is that we can inshallah reach this last state to be totally free of all the distractions of this dunya. And I thought it was interesting again that this is the, you know, we all, if you think about all of our paths, right? We inshallah, we're all obviously, as even stated here, every believer is, we're already past inshallah, that first state. But we're, there's growth, right? And that's the objective of Mujahidah of constantly struggling against the self is that you don't just remain in one state or get stagnant and resign yourself to just being comfortable where you're at. You're always looking to better yourself. And that's how we inshallah achieve taqwa is that we're never satisfied with where we are. If you get to the place where you think mediocre, you know, being mediocre is good enough or just your, you know, bear a minimum effort is good enough, then you wanna really think about this list here in front of you. You know, why are these things taught to us? What is the point of all this? It's because we're supposed to be getting better. We're supposed to be, you know, working towards purification and transformation. And again, the whole point of this text is to change your condition. So think about really seriously where you would fall in this list and ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for Tawfiq to give you the himma, you know, the strength, the ambition, the will to want to elevate to the next level and to protect you from slipping back because so many people, unfortunately, that's also a very true reality, you know, people who do go through these different stations and maybe achieve a certain level of practice, but then because they weren't, you know, maybe they got a little self-righteous, maybe they attributed their success to themselves, right? Which is one of the great tricks of Shaitan that a lot of people fall for is that they think that their spiritual growth is because of their own actions and they forget to keep asking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for guidance, to keep asking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to protect one from losing whatever they've acquired, right? So it certainly happens to many people that as I said, they'll progress along and then all of a sudden they fall back and fall short. So we wanna constantly ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for protection from that, but you have to have the humility to know, first of all, that that can happen to anyone, but also to have the understanding that the point of our struggle, our spiritual struggle is to move up this ladder, to be always looking to the next place. So for example, if you're inshallah, you know, staying away from the haram, like you've given up, you know, or you just don't indulge and really try your hardest to not do any of the haram acts. And of course there's clear haram and then there's subtle things that most people still struggle with. For example, you might, you know, people might not drink alcohol because that's very clear haram, but then they still indulge in gossip, right? So if you haven't yet purged yourself from the haram and really understanding what constitutes the unlawful, you need to focus on that and look at your behavior, look at the conversations you have on a daily basis, your actions on a daily basis. What are you doing that is potentially, you know, not letting you move forward. If you, you know, I speak to people all the time who kind of express that they feel like they're not really getting anywhere and they haven't really grown very much, even though they do continue to pray, they fast in Ramadan, you know, they'll do things, but they don't really feel like they're, they're growing spiritually or that they have khushu in their prayers. There's too many distractions, there's too many other things going on, or, you know, they're just, their thoughts are not always clear. There's an internal clear battle happening. So they're trying to figure out what the potential cause is. And a lot of times it could just be that even though they're abstaining from the clear haram, maybe they haven't purged other things that are still, that would still fall under the haram, like, you know, consuming ribba, just things that you have to take inventory and really think about what is preventing me from having spiritual growth, but always again, looking to get up this ladder, where am I, you know, if I've covered the, inshallah, don't indulge in the haram, then let's look at the makruh. What am I doing that's potentially makruh that I need to change? And then beyond that, how much am I indulging my nafs? You know, if I've covered the haram and the makruh, okay? Am I really, am I giving into my desires so much that it's preventing me from really doing my prayers with khushu, reflecting on, you know, Allah Subh'anaHu's attributes, doing all the extra ibadah that I wanna be doing. Are my actions or my nafs? Because sometimes, you know, the dunya is very tempting and we may not realize that the food that we consume or the wealth that we have that we're not distributing fairly or adequately, the excess purchases that we make that we don't need. You know, a lot of people have, especially now that we're in quarantine, you know, it's so easy to be bored that you may think, oh, I'll just go, you know, Amazon, just go do some shopping, online shopping, and you end up spending money that you really don't need and you're accumulating things that you, like I said, they're excessive that you don't need them, whereas you could have, you know, donated maybe something to a cause or done something more important. So those habits, those actions are also sometimes contributing to why we're not increasing or moving forward, moving up on this ladder, this spiritual ladder. So taking inventory is really important, but we all, inshallah, the objective is again to get to that last place where the dunya just loses its flavor. You know, we don't, inshallah, want to be here to the point that we're willing to let it take over that very, very special real estate in our heart. You know, the real estate in our spiritual heart is incredibly valuable and it should be for Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala, for the Prophet's life, for things that truly matter. And so if we're attached to things in this dunya, then it's gonna take over that real estate and that's where when you start to think about the value of things, what really matters. You know, what do I really want out of this world? Then it's a lot easier to let go of some of those attachments. So that is, you know, the higher level, inshallah, it's a hard, it's not easy process at all to get to, but we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for it. So he goes on here, and this is from, again, Ibn Jazeb Kalbi, he says that every believer is at the station of submission, but we increase Allah's protection over us by attaining the higher stations. So the more we progress, then Allah will protect us, which is of course, we all want his protection. This dunya, again, is not a place of safety for anyone really, it's a place where there's a lot of danger to our personal selves, but also our spiritual hearts. So we're always, inshallah, in need of and seeking Allah's protection and of course protection of the next life. And then he says, because the vast majority of the Muslim community is only at the first or second level, we all suffer. This is a really important point because now it's talking about, you know, the collective responsibility we all have. When we talk about the agenda to change our condition, this is on a very personal level, but also, you know, a communal level. Like let's think about the Muslim ummah right now, let's think about the suffering that's happening in so many parts of our world. Why is that the case? It's likely because, again, we're at those two bottom tiers and we haven't moved forward. And he says, when a critical mass of believers commits to moving to the third and fourth levels, we will see the benefits of Taqwa permeate our communities as promised in the Quran, subhanallah. Insha'Allah, that's we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for that. So what are these benefits of Taqwa? Let's look at the text is now moving to describe the benefits, inshallah, on the page bottom of 13. So the very first one listed, here it says, the benefits of Taqwa are innumerable, right? There's many things that are hidden, we don't know them, but of course Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala knows all the benefits. So ones that are known are perceivable and are important, he lists here in this text. First is the moral rectitude of one's offspring. Now, you know, for those of you who may not know, I do parenting classes, I'm actually in the middle of one right now, we're having our last session next, this coming Saturday, but this question about, you know, the worry that's or, you know, one's children, the concern about whether or not our children are gonna maintain their faith, they're gonna be able to, you know, withstand all of the fitna of this world is probably one of the questions, the most common questions I get and I see, and of course I have it as well, I have two kids. It's always ways on my mind that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala please protect my children, you know, keep them in fitra, they're still young, but also preserve their e-man, let them only, you know, exist in this world with the shahada fresh on their tongues and, you know, they're connected, their hearts are connected to Allah and His prophets, Allah said them and that they really have a strong Muslim identity. That's my, certainly my law for my children and I'm sure all of us. So here right away, it's the very first thing listed that if you really care about your children, then you have to think about your own behavior, right? But because it's connected. If you have taqwa, then this is one of the benefits, right? That Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala insha'Allah assure you that your children will be protected. So here the verses that are cited, Oh my son, establish regular prayer and join what is just and forbid what is wrong and bear with patient constancy, whatever afflicts you. Surely this is resolve in your affairs, right? And then another verse, those who have left behind weak offspring are fearful concerning their wellbeing. Let them have consciousness of Allah subhanallah. So it's the remedy is right there. If you're worried about your children, and I know I've talked to parents who are worried. My child is so meek, so kind, so vulnerable, gullible, gentle hearted. I'm so worried so, you know, they're gonna lose their way in this dunya. So if you have sons and daughters or a son or a daughter that you are worried about because again, the world is increasingly becoming such a dark place. Well, here is the answer, you know? You know, taqwa of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make sure you are fulfilling your obligations. And insha'Allah, it's one of the benefits that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will ease your heart in that regard. So the next one or the next blessing of taqwa, for us, insha'Allah, if we commit to again taqwa is that blessings come which come from above and below. So I mean, who doesn't want blessings to descend upon them, right? We all do insha'Allah. Here in chapter seven, verse 96, had only the people of the cities believed and had taqwa, we would have opened up for them blessings from the heavens and the earth. So all of us have to think about that right now, you know, that in this strange time where we all are seeing very odd weather patterns, right? Global warming is a big topic that's always around or it's a buzz topic. But let's think about if we want that, you know, if we want protection as well from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to make easy for us, you know, the weather and whatever else is happening in this planet that we are just completely unaware of, you know, things are always happening in outer space, for example, that we may not even have any idea that could be imminent danger, Allah knows, right? But we want peace, right? So here this ayah subhanAllah is giving you a clear solution that if you have taqwa and you have strong faith in Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, then inshaAllah he will again bring you blessings from the heavens and the earth. So you're not gonna come manifest itself in many ways. I just used weather because it came to me, but of course blessings from the heavens and the earth can be many different things depending on whatever Allah subhanAllah decrees for us. Another blessing is provision from Allah and a way out of difficult circumstances. So how many of us struggle, right? With maybe financially, there's a lot of people who are struggling right now. They may not know if they're going to have rent money or money enough to withstand the rest of this year or the rest of this quarantine and COVID lockdown period. So there's that and then there's also just difficulty. You know, it could be a very difficult situation of relationship that you're in or a job or some other situation that you find yourself in. Again, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is giving us the solution that if you are in a difficult place in your life, then taqwa could be the answer to giving you, inshaAllah freedom and ease from that. So whoever has taqwa, we will prepare for him a way out and provide for him from where he was not expecting subhanAllah. And that's really deep if you, I mean, we could all if we really think about moments of utter desperation, of just feeling like we had no solution that came to us or that we didn't think there was a solution to maybe a really difficult problem. But maybe we prayed, maybe we got up in the middle of the night and we asked Allah yalla, please, I don't know what to do, right? We have, I mean, that's what this taqada is for, right? This taqada is really a thought of total utter desperation. Like I'm stuck between two situations or I just am lost. So you're asking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for guidance. And when you do that with true sincerity and taqwa, how many of us have had those experiences where shortly after suddenly the answer comes, and it's again, it's confirming what the ayah says. We never anticipated or thought that such a solution was even possible. And here Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala makes it easy for us. This happens to people every day. There's people who can attest to this, but they were in a very difficult situation, but Allah gave them a way out. So, Alhamdulillah, and in safety, right? So again, similar themes here, but safety, we saved those who believed in us and had been people of taqwa. So safety can come in, I mean, the context of that can be, there's so many different ways to interpret that, but if you want to feel safe, insha'Allah, this is increasing in taqwa and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will give you safety or that feeling of safety. Because right now, I was just looking at some research yesterday actually on anxiety disorders. You know, that's the most common mental health issue in the world globally. And especially here in the U.S., plaguing, you know, more than, close to half a billion people worldwide. So a lot of people are suffering from the feeling of unease, the feeling of anxiousness, the feeling of instability, just not feeling safe. So Alhamdulillah, this can, just increasing our taqwa of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala can give us that, can restore that feeling of peace in our hearts and that feeling of safety in our hearts. And the next is the divine presence manifested as Allah's protection. Again, surely Allah is with those who have taqwa and who beautify with excellence. And you do, I mean, Alhamdulillah, if you've ever been with people who have really strong faith, they don't get shaken up very easily. It's like subhanAllah, they're just, they're walking around with, these spiritual bulletproof vests or something because the world, things can happen, but they just seem to be really composed and they don't get shaken up. And it's likely because Alhamdulillah, Allah has just given them the state and it's from Him obviously, because they have that taqwa and they're working so hard on themselves that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protects them from falling apart in the event that something happens, subhanAllah. Victory, right? Whoever obeys Allah and His messenger, oh, that's the next slide, one second, let me go to the next slide, Bismillah. So whoever obeys Allah and His messenger and knowingly has awe and consciousness of Allah, those are the victors. I mean, who doesn't wanna be the winner, right? Who doesn't wanna be successful in the sight of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala? We all do, so this is it. If we want to inshaAllah be among those who are victorious on the day of judgment and we show up inshaAllah with good news, then this is how we do it, knowingly having awe and consciousness of Allah. So being aware of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala but also being in that state of truly just having, I've talked about awe and it's so sad because when you think about children, we were all children at some point, but even if you ever spend time with children, it's like subhanAllah we have, all children have an awe, they have wonder and the slightest thing can impress them and put them in this state of just being amazed by very simple things, that we as adults often take for granted and even with my own children and I teach them, I'm around children a lot and I just love to see how something that, again, I may have maybe desensitized too because I've seen it so many different times but for them, they are just in awe of, one of the things my kids have recently really grown to love is to stargaze. So we have these apps, you can get these apps like I think it's one of those, it's called like Sky View. There's a few different apps, but they've been just eager every night and now that it's getting darker earlier, it's actually even more time for them to do it but we restrict it, we don't let them on that there for too long but they enjoy going out and just looking at the stars through this app because if you aim it to different directions, it'll tell you which constellations, which planets, whatever's going on at that time and so they're, they just love it, they're so in awe with outer space and the mysteries of the universe and then I think about, I've seen much of my share of documentaries and I've read different facts here and there but I think because the adult brain can only maybe juggle so many thoughts at once or responsibilities kick in. We sometimes just tend to, oh yeah, mashallah, subhanallah and then we move on to the next thing but if you actually take time to pause and to deeply allow yourself to reflect on a lot of things, the all will enter your heart, which is why it's so important to disconnect, to take a break, whether you love the ocean or love the mountains or love the desert. There are people who like to go to, I mean, we have in Southern California anyway, there's a Joshua tree. There's places that are apparently really beautiful. I have not yet been, maybe one day, inshallah, but I've heard really amazing things from even places like that, you know, that people feel spiritually connected because you can go out there, it's so empty and there's no light pollution so that you can actually see the stars and you can appreciate the universe of all of Sparta but it's so important to connect in some way to be out in nature, go on a hike, even walking in the grass without your shoes on can have immense benefits, just physiologically, there's research that shows just touching, grounding, being grounded to the earth is very healing but it also makes you marvel and appreciate the things that we take for granted, the simple things, the feeling of the texture of grass. I mean, of course, unless you have an allergy, you don't do that, but touching sand, things that are, as children, we loved to do. I mean, every kid at the beach is like, could stay there for hours playing in the sand while adults are eating, talking and just doing whatever, sometimes even on their phone. I've been guilty of that. We lose awe and this is the problem with the modern world is that we're so distracted by so many toys and gadgets and things that sparkle and shine in front of us. And then, of course, obligations and work and all the serious stuff that we lose awe. So I love that it was mentioned here that part of having taqwa is knowingly having awe, like really consciously trying to bring those feelings back into your heart and really reflecting on things that are just pausing and taking a minute to think about the blessings that we have that we take for granted. I mean, I know Anisha Hamza has talked about, for example, the blessings of eyelashes, something that, sad enough, it didn't occur to me anyway to think about the blessing of eyelashes until I heard him mention that. And so it's like, oh yeah, I've never actually sat and thought about the function of my eyelashes and what a blessing it is and how, Alhamdulillah, I can see and do so many things because these little tiny hairs are able to capture dust particles and protect my eye from drying out when they're open for too long and all of the other amazing functions of the body. But the point of reflecting on those things is that it leaves you with that just beautiful, pure, unadulterated love for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. That's just, from a simple exercise of reflection or a purposeful expedition seeking awe when we go out and we're trying to have those moments of awe, that the outcome of that, inshallah, is that you're really our subhanallah, Alhamdulillah, Al-Khalik. Thank you, y'all for this beautiful creation that you've left us in and given us the experience of, thank you for existence. Those are the thoughts that really fill your heart instead of complaints and all the other negativity are so often for consumers. So, the next benefit here is a goodly end to life. Again, we all ask, inshallah, for khusna khatama, we all want a beautiful end and inshallah, an end where we're not compromised, in some way, our faith is intact, inshallah, we die in a state of, we'll do in a state of ibadah. I mean, there's people who die, subhanallah, inshallah, reciting Quran on a hedge. I mean, how amazing of a death is that, as opposed to other ways where people can be humiliated. Some people all the blood are who are not obviously on the path or doing what they should be doing. They die in really horrific, but also humiliating ways. So, we ask all of us to always, for protection from that and to be taken from this life in the best of states, but that's one of the benefits of having taqwa, that inshallah, he will give us then. Here's the ayah, surely for the people of taqwa is a beautiful end, inshallah. Paradise itself, I mean, that's the ultimate prize, right? We all want, inshallah, Jannah, we all want to, I mean, that's why we're here, that's why, or that's what our objective is, is that we pass the tests of this dunya, inshallah, and we are sincere in our faith, and that we, inshallah, receive the ultimate reward of being with those we love, and of course, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, the process of them, and finally having the beatific vision of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, that's the ultimate prize that we all should be seeking and making our objective in this world, that that is what we want. Every prayer you do, every fast, every vikr, every good charity, or every charitable act, every good deed, it's all for that. I want the final prize, inshallah, to be in the highest of Jannah. So these are the benefits of taqwa, of attaining and really working on taqwa. So now, let's see here. So the text now goes into, how do we achieve taqwa? The only way to achieve taqwa is through spiritual struggle, mujaheda, okay? Oh wait, did I skip, yeah, here, sorry, this is the correct slide. Now in the text, it mentions here, that spiritual struggle is not something that miraculously just comes into one's life. So it starts somewhere and the starting point is the heart. So when you have a stirring, a movement of the heart, that leads to the limbs, right? So there's this feeling of remorse maybe, of guilt, of grief, of fear. There's a lot of motivating factors for why people suddenly wake up from their spiritual slumber and wanna get right back on track. There's many life events that can put people in that place, right? Of rethinking their choices and their life trajectory and really wanting to renew their faith. And so the movement starts in the heart. For me, for example, I was raised in hamdudana Muslim family and I always had a strong Muslim identity, but that didn't necessarily translate in actions. I did not wear hijab, I was not consistent in my five prayers. But yeah, if anybody ever dared say anything about Islam or Muslims, I was very vocal and not afraid to defend my faith or my people for my cultural background. I just had strong cultural and religious identity. So it took actually a few different events, but for me, one major event was the loss of my grandfather, seeing someone that you love slowly decline and finally leave this world and then seeing their body. I mean, it was the first death for me, a personal death and the first body that I ever saw, which is really, I think, proof of the wisdom of the remembrance of death and of making sure that we don't fall for the just the modern, obsession with running away from death. There's this fear, immense fear of, because when you have habad dunya, which is one of the diseases of the heart, the attachment to the world, then obviously the last thing you wanna be thinking about is death, disease, all those things that make you uncomfortable. So what you do is you start to obsess over youth, obsess over, just maintaining anything that erases the thought of death. And so when you look at in our society, where the elderly, it's really sad, but because of our obsession with youth, you don't see the elderly out and about and walking the streets in America like you do when you travel in other parts of the world. In Europe, when I went to Spain a few years ago, so like everywhere, somehow they were everywhere, they're a very big part of society. They're sitting in their little cafes or restaurants and, but they were there, they were part of the city life. Turkey was one of my favorite things when we traveled to Turkey a couple of years ago. I think it's been, gosh, time just seems to have stopped since this year, but yeah, it wasn't last year, I think the year before, but Turkey was also subhanallah, something really amazing when I observed how many elderly people were in the squares or in the restaurants or in the shops. Sometimes they were behind the counters working. It's like, wow, this is such an impre... I mean, they were not hidden. And so we have to think about our own, like I said, obsession with youth and not remembering death because it takes us away from the remembrance of all the subhanallah. And so for me, that was it. As soon as I saw that dead body of my grandfather and I realized like, whoa, that's gonna happen to all of us, it started really making me think seriously about my faith. And then there were other events that eventually led me to really just making a commitment. Like I need to start being more honest of a person. I cannot claim to be Muslim, but I don't dress like a Muslim. I don't behave like a Muslim. I don't do my prayers, like what kind of Islam was that? That was for me, my own journey, right? So that stirring of the heart, Allah chose for me for that to happen in my early first year of college. Alhamdulillah, we'll show you that. It's, Alhamdulillah, he's guided me throughout, but it can happen like that for other people, car accident, near-death experience for themselves, or maybe they just had a really tough relationship that they came out of. So there could be multiple, multiple paths or experiences that give people the awakening, but it starts in the heart, moves into the limbs, and that's when the struggle really takes in. And then it's also from an awareness of the distance, that you've had between you and God, which leads to Toba. So when you start to realize like, wow, I have really not been doing what I should be doing, and there's this remorse and guilt that enters the heart, that Toba, it has a lasting effect. It's not just a passing, fleeting thought. Sometimes we may feel bad about something, but it doesn't really stay with us. When we're repentance or Toba's really feeling the heart, the guilt, it's an agitation to the soul, right? It's like you're not comfortable in your own skin. You don't feel good about yourself. You could be the most successful, accomplished person, beautiful person, come from a great family, in all of the material, from the material lens, but because you internally feel guilt for maybe sins that you committed, a lot of people, that's another path. They commit terrible sins that they feel so horrible about that it makes them yearn for Allah's purification, right? Like, I want to be cleansed. So then they turn to Allah in Toba. So all of these things are where the Mujahidah, how it manifests, right? And it's like I said, it has that lasting effect. And so he says here that the Mujahidah is a move of the heart that affects the limbs and results in repentance in which we seek to purify ourselves of prior wrongs and remove them from our present activities and make a strong commitment to a future free of the mistakes of the past. So that is true Mujahidah when you feel again remorse, but want to never turn back to what you were doing, the person you are. And the best example of those really are people who convert to Islam. Mashallah, they're amazing because you see a lot of them come from completely different backgrounds and then they make a 180 and are fully committed and you would never in a million years associate them with their past. That's Tawa in practice, that's faith in action. It's like I don't ever want to be reminded of or remind anyone of the person I used to be the one who drank alcohol, who had illicit relationships, who cursed, who smoked, who cheated people, who lied to people, people have backgrounds like that. And so then when they take their faith seriously and they take their Shahada and they commit, you see such a departure that you would never in a million years think that that was the same person. That is true Thakwa, right? So on page 16, which is where we now come to the end of this first chapter, or let me see here, this is repeated. Yeah, at the top of page 16, he says here, this is our purpose for being here. We must simply start, not tomorrow or the day after but today, right now at this moment. The heart must make a firm commitment and never turn back. The rewards are immense, the pleasure of mastering the self is second only to the subtle knowledge and pleasure of intimacy with Allah that is a result of that mastery. So again, wherever you are, when we go back to that, to those other, to the initial slides, right? The five stations that we describe, wherever you are in that list, you want to think about what is it going to take for you to move to the next level, you know? And then, this text is a transformative text, so the advice is very clear. It's telling us, if you have a desire to change yourself and it's true and it's sincere and you want to be better, then don't postpone that, Nia, don't make false promises and procrastinate later. At the end of this year, once COVID is over, I'm going to start doing my prayers on time. A lot of times, that's just, West Wisa from Shaitan, he knows that we're forgetful and that when the moment is gone, we're just going to get distracted by something else and that's why, how many people have that experience where they have high hemma, maybe in Ramadan, for example. A lot of amazing openings happen to people in Ramadan and they start making all these promises. I'm going to start doing this, this and this and this, but if you don't strike when the iron is hot, you will lose the momentum, you're going to lose it and it'll just then be a memory and watch. It's happened to myself, I've certainly, this has happened to me many times, but I know others as well, is that when that hemma is there and it's strong and it really feels like it's a new leaf or you're turning a new chapter to turning a new leaf in your life, then you want to seize the day, right? Seize the moment and say, I need to do this now. And for every view that's different. Some people, once they, their word is their word and if they say they're going to do something, they'll do it. For other people, they need to be accountable to someone. So maybe you share this noble intention with your spouse or someone that you're really close to who's a support system for you spiritually, but you kind of externalize it, you verbalize it because holding good thoughts also is a problem. There's an internal battle constantly happening where our rule, the part of us that is always yearning for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala may have really great lofty ideas and goals, but then the nafs and shaitan battling it out against the rule will use all the tricks possible to just destroy our momentum or distract us. So the best way sometimes is to verbalize it so that you can hold yourself accountable and maybe talking to someone about, you know what I really want to start? The most important place, starting point really for all of us, if we're thinking about making some lasting changes or permanent changes to our worship is to look for, first and foremost, at our prayers because those are the first things that we're going to be asked about on the day of judgment. So we want to think about the timeliness of our prayers, right? The sincerity with which we come to the prayer. Are we coming, dragging our legs, frustrated and tired and exhausted and just not really wanting to be there and doing it because we have to? Or are we doing it because we realize that we owe so much to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and this paltry act of praying, which will never be enough to show our gratitude should be done with at least a present heart, you know? And of course we're humans, we're gonna get distracted but it's the intention, right? If you get to the prayer intending, y'all, I wanna really have khushu on this prayer, I wanna be present and you want that, like it's a true yearning, it's a true desire and you keep coming to the prayer with that. Insha'Allah you'll get there, you know? Some people have this really crazy notion that unless they have that feeling, what's the point of praying? That's pure waswasa, okay? You can't get that feeling if unless you put the hard work in, you know, it's not like you're gonna stand, you know, it could be at Allah Huwaka but then all of a sudden you're gonna see a light and angels are gonna descend around you and you're just, you know, you're gonna see visions of jannah. Like is that what you're expecting that should happen before you pray and then you'll commit to prayer? If so, then Shaitan's just deluded you. You have to say the prayer is the debt I owe, which I'll never be able to repay for existence. It's the reason why I'm created. And so I need to really prioritize my prayer, Fajr, Vahar, Asr, Maghrib, Isha, all of them. You can't pick certain prayers that you're gonna do, you know, dutifully and devote your time and do them beautifully with amazing, you know, recitation and then miss other prayers and excuse yourself from other prayers because you're thinking, oh, well I do, you know, the Maghrib and the, you know, Vahar and Asr, but I can't do Fajr. Fajr is so hard for me. If you're already letting yourself go with that because, you know, I have to work and I have to get up early and oh, it's just too hard, Allah will have mercy on me, you know, subhan Allah. That's, I'm sorry to say, it's just another trick of Shaitan because we're all in this, you know, world for the same reason. We're here to worship Allah, the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam who had been guaranteed Jannah is the beloved of Allah, not only prayed all of his prayers on time with excellence in every which way, but he did additional prayers. It's because we should be humble, we should be grateful and we should be, we should feel the weight of how much we should be grateful to Allah, subhan Allah, for. And nobody gets exceptions to that, you know, people of course who are ill and who have other circumstances, Allah of course makes things easy, but the prayer for even the ill, even the one who's laying flat on their back and cannot move is still further upon them to do when it comes in and Allah of course makes it easier for them with the wudu and it may, you know, facilitates all of that, but you could even do it with your eyes if you're paralyzed, for example, you know, there's always something that for each person's circumstances that will, that are acceptable, but the bottom line is, is that everybody prays who is of sound mind and who is able to, we pray. So don't let Shaitan, you know, make you think you're special somehow or that you allow your nefs and your, you know, your physical circumstances to seem like they're so extreme and so exceptional that you get a pass to not pray on time and then you can just wake up your alarm for the time you need to get up for work or what have you. A lot of people, that's what they do. They convince themselves it's okay. Allah knows my intentions, I wish I could, but I can't. Don't do that. Commit, say Allah, I know that this is gonna be hard for me. I'm probably gonna have really tough days ahead of me, maybe because it's my routine. I've just gotten a routine. I've never really committed like this before. I might have headaches. I might be grumpy at work. I might just not be happy because my sleep was interrupted, but you matter more. So if I have to set five alarms, I have to call my friend or, you know, do something to get myself out of bed, that's taqwa, that's realizing that I cannot make excuses for myself because Allah, who Akbar, he is greater than anything that I can bring, you know, to justify why I'm not worshiping as he deserves to be worshiped. And so make those commitments and do them now. Don't make, don't put them off. And this, for every single person, it's gonna be different. Maybe, Alhamdulillah, you're doing your prayers on time and you're really committed in your prayers. Then you look to the next level. You know, what can I be doing additionally? What can I take away, right? Avoid, that's blame worthy. And what can I increase? That's praise worthy. And you just start evaluating yourself on such a deep level that your mind is constantly preoccupied with what? You know, people sometimes think about, you know, the hadith of Iman, Islam and Ahsan, right? Ahsan is, you know, being in such a state that you, it's almost as if you see Allah knowing very well, you can't see him, but knowing that he sees you, right? This is the definition of Ahsan. And for some people that might be like, wow, wow, that's so amazing, you know, that people can be in that state. Well, if you spend your day trying so hard to take inventory of your actions and find where you can improve and you're really guarding yourself against those things that are harmful, in many ways that is, that is a Ahsan, right? That's a display of Ahsan because what are you doing? You're mindful of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la throughout your day, right? You're always thinking about what I, the choices before you. And if you think about every single choice that we make, every choice, especially in our transactions with other people, but also with ourselves, there's always a right way and a wrong way to do things, you know, from the most subtle things, like just basic etiquette, you know, when you're eating, let's say, you know? I mean, we could just take it to that level, but if you evaluate your behavior, you know, are you eating with, are you eating with the presence of, you know, mindfulness of God? Are you saying this, madame? Are you just jumping right into that meal, slobbering all over the place, getting your fingers dirty and checking your phone every two seconds, watching inappropriate videos? I mean, people will sit at the dinner table over a meal where Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has just given them a beautiful meal and it could be hand, you know, it could be made by their own hands, but even that is still a gift from Allah. He gave you the ability, he gave you the ingredients, he gave you the, you know, the, everything, the home, right? To be able to create these meals. So is it not, you know, does he not deserve to be thanked with at least something in the beginning? Bismillah, right? But how many people jump into their meals? No remembrance of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. And not only that, they'll be eating this delicious food, but then they're doing things like gossiping, you know, or watching things, you know, is in the eyes of reality. So you're watching the haram while you're, you know, you're, you're taking in this nourishment that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has given you. Those are things you have to watch for, but if you're conscious of your decision, decision of choices, what you do is you bring awareness to your mind. That you know what, this is wrong. I shouldn't do this, Safaullah and you start to change your behavior. That is the process of taqwa. Anything that you do, you're thinking, would Allah be pleased with me or not? And you start to change in that way, right? That pleases Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. And so here, and the last pages of this chapter were reminded that Allah has commanded us to turn to Him with sincerity. Oh, you who believe, turn to Allah, all of you together with sincerity in order for you to have success. And then this last ayah is with Baqarah, right? It is, This is Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, the first command that Allah is telling us, right? We have to worship Allah as He deserves. And to remember constantly that everything that He has given us, every action we're able to do is by His grace that we're able to do it. And if we just have that awareness, you know, of those things in the moment, or even as an afterthought, you know, and you're lying in bed and you're thinking about your day and you're just re-evaluating things. And you start remembering, Alhamdulillah, Allah is so generous, you know, He was able to, or He gave us this opportunity, He gave us that opportunity. You start taking account of things. That's taqwa, that's bringing awareness and mindfulness of Allah and having gratitude in your heart, inshallah. So may Allah's power that increases in taqwa, I'm going to, I think I may have to check the time. Ooh, very close. Okay, Alhamdulillah, almost at the end. Let me exit out of this so we can check the chat here to see if there are any questions, inshallah. If you give me just one moment. I'm gonna go to YouTube as well, because I think there's, I know Mashallah there's people on YouTube who are tuning in and that's where a lot of our questions do come in. So let me check YouTube. Okay, Alhamdulillah. So I don't see any, oh, actually, hold on, let me do live chat. Okay, so I don't see any questions on the thread here, but inshallah, we do have a few minutes or a couple of minutes left. If you would like to ask a question, you're more than welcome to. But yes, we are at the end of chapter 60. I'm just gonna make sure I didn't miss anything here. Oh, he mentions here that, well, follows next, so chapter two, the next class we'll do is a series of exercises designed to help us set out on the path. They're difficult, but earning paradise was never meant to be easy. All things of worth are only obtained through great effort, whether the pearl at the bottom of the ocean or the skill of the master craftsman. The pleasure of our Lord is infinitely greater than the material gains of this world. So much of the next chapter, chapter two is on the heart and its treatment. So now we're gonna get into some more practical exercises and reflections on how we can do this. Achieving taqwa is of course, something that we know as part of that mojaheda, but how do we battle it out with our nefs? Literally, what is the, how can we fight our own nefs and shaitan and overcome our weaknesses? So Insha'Allah, we'll look to that in the next session. But I thank you again for your time. And if you don't have the text, please do. Get it, you can get it from sandala, s-a-n-d-a-l-a dot org. Agenda to change our condition, check it out. But thank you so much for being here this evening with us. Insha'Allah, if you have any further questions, you're more than welcome to communicate me, excuse me, communicate with me directly. I'm on Facebook, I'm on Instagram, so you can message me there. But thank you again. We are ending right on time. So Insha'Allah, we'll see you next time and have a wonderful rest of your night. Okay, oh, before we forget, we should do our da'a. Alhamdulillah. Bismillahirrahmanirrahim wa-l-a'asir. Inna l-insana la fi khasir illa ladina aminu wa amin iswalihaati wa-tawaseb wa-l-haqi wa-tawaseb wa-sabr. Subhanak Allahuma wa bi hamdika shadu an la ilaha ila anthina astaghfiru kuna tubu ilaik. Allahumma salam wa salam wa barakala Sayyidana wa maulana wa habibana Muhammad. Sog Allah wa alaihi wa salam. Wa ala li wa sahbihi wa salam tasliman katira. Alhamdulillah. Jazakum Allah khaydan. Thank you so much. Have a great evening everyone. As-salamu alaikum wa-rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alright, Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Alhamdulillah wa-salatu wa-salam wa-ala as-shif al-anbiya'i wa-l-mursaleen. Sayyidana wa-maulana wa-habibana Muhammad. Sog Allah wa alaihi wa salam. Wa ala li wa sahbihi wa salam tasliman katira. As-salamu alaikum wa-rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Again, welcome everyone for being here. Thank you so much. We are covering a text that was written by Sheikh Hamza Yusif and Imam Zaid Shakir. It's called Agenda to Change Our Condition. I have the book here in front of me for those who are first-time viewers. I like to just preview it right in the beginning so that you can bring you up to speed about what we're doing here. I do have a presentation that I've also prepared to go over the chapter that we're gonna talk about today. So again, if you don't have the text, you can follow along with the slides. I do highly encourage you to get the text just because there's so much great content and it's really a wonderful resource to have for just reference and to look it over and we should review this text as maybe once a year or more often than that, whatever we need. So Insha'Allah, let me go ahead and screen share. But just to, while I do that, last week, sorry, one second. Okay, I apologize. I need to quickly message to get my screen share going. So just give me a second. So last week, what we did was, we talked about the chapter on taqwa, how to attain taqwa, the benefits of taqwa. So you can, and all of the recordings, by the way, are available. So if you go to the previous, if you go to the YouTube page, the MCC YouTube page, you will find all of our previous recordings. And so again, just to kind of give those of you who may be tuning in for the first time a quick summary, the text is quite, I mean, it's not very lengthy, but there's several different sections. But what I did is I started at the back of the text. So we covered the appendices and then we did the introduction in chapter one. So today we are doing chapter two. And today's chapter is on the heart and it's treatment. So I'm really excited to get into that discussion with you today. So let me go ahead and screen share. And inshallah, I will bring this up in just a moment. Bismillah, one second please. One of these technical things we have to do, inshallah, it'll be worth it. Okay, so Bismillah, we're gonna present here. And hopefully you guys can see everything. So yes, today we're gonna talk about the heart and its treatment. So if you're following with the text, you wanna go to page 18, inshallah, and you'll be able to read along. So let's go ahead and jump into the discussion. It starts off and tells us that facilitating action is based upon true knowledge and action has two modes. So the first mode is the action of the heart and then the second is the action of the limbs. As for the heart, there are two concerns. So what are the concerns of the heart? First and foremost, belief, aqida. We have to have a strong aqida, the creed, the belief. What do you believe in as a Muslim? What are the points of aqida that we should all know about Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la about the universe, about our place in the universe? So that is all taught to us by our aqida. And then the second concern of the heart is sincerity of faith because people can claim to have faith, but only those who are sincere will have tawfiq with Allah, right? Because there are many people who are munafiqin and they're the worst of people, the hypocrites, those who claim to be believers, but then their actions say otherwise. So the sincerity of faith is also a very serious concern and a primary concern of the heart. So let's talk about belief and sincerity a little bit more. In the text, right here, that sound belief is accomplished by removing any doubtful matters from the heart. This is facilitated for us. Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, by His grace, He makes it easy for us to remove doubtful matters. And Alhamdulillah, this is why it's so important for us to be reflective, to think, to try to look at the universe and just the awe that we should feel when we contemplate everything in creation. Again, from the cellular level, atomic level, just small particle level to the astronomical level when you look out into the universe and you see things that are beyond our imagination, are very difficult for the human mind to conceive. All of these things are signs, are ayat that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has put for us to really remember or to reflect on the fact that this is not by chance, it didn't just happen. Stuff like there are people who, again, from with no basis, that that's what they claim, that this all just was some big, large accident. But of course, that couldn't be further from the truth. This is not an accident, this is all intentional, there's design, and that's why you see design in everything, you know, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. So we have to look out into the world and really think about this. And when you think about these things deeply and of course you seek answers from proper sources, from knowledgeable people, from people who know, they will be able to help you to go, whatever doubts you have or issues that you have to just work through those things. But the answers are there. We don't shy away from asking, but we also accept that we can't answer everything. There's many things that we will just simply not know in this lifetime, but inshallah, we have high hopes that inshallah, in the next world, we will have answers to those things. So, but inshallah, that's been facilitated, right, belief. Sincerity, however, as they written in the text here, it's more difficult to achieve sincerity of the heart through the actions of the limbs. And this is really, you know, a lifelong process. When we talk about Mujahid enough, so when we talk about the struggle of the human being to just fulfill all of their obligations, a large part of it does have to do with actually perfecting our deeds and making sure that we have the right intentions and that we do them with sincerity, because many people accumulate deeds, you know, you could do a lot of good deeds in your life, but we don't know and we likely won't know in this life whether or not those deeds are accepted, right, we don't know. And that's the challenge is that throughout our lives, we're always doing that internal check to make sure that we are sincere when we do things, when we give sadaqah, when we pray, when we recite Quran or when we give nasiha or when we do any good act that our intentions are always in the right place. And that is why it's not, that's not very easy to do. And that's something that is going to be, for most of us, a very, you know, part of our struggle, part of the lifelong struggle that we all have. And so even in the Quran, right, here they say that the entire creation was at a standstill when it heard the words of the Creator. So when Allah SWT revealed these verses, everything in creation was just, you know, it's an amana, it's a huge trust, right? They were only commanded to worship Allah sincerely, muqlisin, with the religion solely for him, right? And then Allah SWT also challenges us here to this question, is not the sincere religion, ad-din al-khada solely for Allah SWT? So we have to think about, you know, this is part of our mind or our, you know, every day, we have to have this presence of mind to know that it's not enough that I'm doing, I have to be doing them sincerely. Cause if you just look at it quantitatively, then, you know, a lot of times, Shaytan can delude you to think, oh, I, you know, and this is where self-righteousness is a disease of the heart. Many people who are practicing, you know, their faith, ritualistically, they're doing everything, you know, they do their prayers, they do all of the obligatory acts, they may, you know, fall into self-righteousness because they think that it's enough that they do them, not realizing, well, it's from Allah SWT that you're doing them, but the sincerity with which you do them, that's where you, you know, you make your mark, whether or not you're truly sincere or not. So that's the part that you have to focus on more because the fact that we get up to pray is from Allah SWT. We don't attribute that to ourselves. Guidance is from Him, right? Guidance is the, you know, when you have faith, you know that that's from Allah, he's inspired you, but how well you show your faith, right? How well you, the ihsan that you put into your actions, that's on us. So this is where sincerity becomes more of a challenge. Now, on page 19, they go into a longer explanation of this word, purity, and really trying to understand why this is such an essential part of our struggle. And so I'm gonna read a little bit here, and there's just an accompanying slide to give you a little bit of context, but here they say that the Arabic word, holus means purity, and the term leban khales means milk that is free of impurities. This is the milk taken from the animal before it is contaminated with anything else. So just giving you a visual of something that's pure, free of contaminants, right? In that state that's preserved, right? That's pure. And then immediately they go into the heart. The heart's purity is contaminated by what? By wrong actions and can only be purified by repentance and remorse, okay? So purity, now another analogy here, comprises a great station. So someone who's reached this station of being a person of ikhlas, right? Of sincerity in the religion, it's a high station to achieve. And they've given you sort of like the contrast to say that just as fornication, for example, is a precipitous fall into wrong action, right? Someone who engages in that act of something clearly haram, it's like a decline. So in the same way, a person who's achieving or who's achieved ikhlas, it's gradual. It's something that's, it's elevating them, right? So it's kind of the contrast between the elevation of the mochles and the downfall of the one who engages in a sin like fornication. So just to show you, this is a really heavy thing, a very important thing. Then they go on to say that scholars of the heart have identified both corrupting and purifying actions that affect the heart state. So this text, now the remainder of this text and particularly this chapter, this text focuses on what facilitates the path to purity and how to draw near the way of struggle with the commanding soul, right? Moreover, it clarifies matters that edify the way to free one's intention from any contingencies that cause one to act for the sake of anyone other, for anyone or anything other than Allah. So inshallah, this is what we hope to achieve going through this text, right? That we are able to facilitate the path to purity and to free the intention to make sure that our intention is not contaminated, that we're not in any way doing things for other than the sake of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. And they go on and say that the likeness of the one who acts for the sake of anyone or anything other than Allah is described in the following example. A shop owner hires a laborer and then says to him, this is my shop and this is my work. Therefore do all your work in my best interests. Despite this decree, the laborer performs his work in the best interests of someone else or himself rather than those of the owner. As Muslims, we cannot do Allah's work and bidding when we have only our own worldly interests at the forefront, right? And this is where again, purity of intention is so important because there are in many cases where people may be outwardly presenting themselves as doing things for the sake of Allah but their intentions, they have ulterior motives and it's not for Allah, it's for something else. It's for status, it's for maybe to gain some worldly benefit here, reputation. There's many benefits in certain cultures, certainly in certain positions in society. There's many benefits of presenting oneself as a religiously committed serious person, right? So there's could be, someone could have many agendas, right? But this is why it's so important to have purity of intention. So then the question becomes, well, how can we remove worldly motivations from our actions? How can we make sure that our actions are truly for the sake of Allah and it's not that we want attention? And this is a very relevant question more so maybe now than any time in human history. When you think about how the world is turned into a giant fishbowl in many ways, everybody's lives are, I mean, there's obviously people who are not participating but there is a great number of people, billions of people who are in fact participating in this experiment of social media where every part of their life is documented and throughout the day you get updates about everything that someone's doing or what they eat, where they're going, who they're with, where they work. So this idea of getting attention constantly and seeking attention is certainly one of the ways that one's intention can be compromised because it's very alluring to have people watching you fame and all of that that comes with it or just even notoriety or people knowing that you're doing something, that reputation that you get from that, even if you're not necessarily of a celebrity status, you could be within your own community or social circle or family even, there might be something that you gain from sharing your life with everyone else but if this becomes part of the way that you are and you live, then you can imagine how potentially every deed that you do that you're saying is for the sake of Allah could be compromised because is it really if you needed to show everybody, when you went to volunteer at the soup kitchen and you're taking a selfie and showing everybody what you're doing, can you make that claim that was truly for the sake of Allah or was it what they call virtue signaling where people do things of virtue and they just like to get that attention for it. So this is a very deep issue that I think a lot of us have to really think about but this question is something that the text is gonna help us understand and it says right away answering that question, how can we remove worldly motivations from our actions? The answer lies in the rectification of our intentions. Actions are only in accordance with intentions, right? In the Malamanu biniyat and thus starting with the intention behind an act is the beginning of achieving a state of living for the sake of Allah. So the process of actually asking yourself and knowing within your heart of hearts, you cannot, we cannot deceive Allah so we cannot try to hide what's really in our hearts. So you don't have to necessarily verbalize or articulate these things to anyone else but certainly to yourself, you should be at that level that where you can honestly say why you did something, was it so that someone could hear that you did it? You could get status, you'd get praise, you'd get likes, follows, like again, bringing it back to social media but that process of questioning all of your actions, especially those actions that are you claim or you are trying to pass off as for the sake of Allah. Go back and do that inner work of really questioning but they go on to say that if one applies perfume it can be done in order to follow the sunnah of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and also as an act of charity for others. When it is intended to be for the angels of my Lord and an adherence to the tradition of my Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam we take a permitted act and elevate it to a recommended or obligatory one. Likewise, food should not be eaten merely for pleasure. We should intend the energy derived from the food to be used for the strengthening of our bodies to better serve Allah. So in this case, you can go and, as we said, question what you've done to ask yourself is it really for the sake of Allah but the flip side of it is actually acting with intentionality on this deep level where every single thing that you are doing even just regular everyday acts like eating or putting on perfume, that you are trying to find the way for it to become an act of where you're seeking the pleasure of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So aligning yourself with the sunnah, for example as was mentioned with the perfume, right? Or looking back at something like the blessing of food as not being just this automatic process that we have to do because we have to survive but rather elevating the intention to say, insha'Allah I'm eating this food because it nourishes my body and from that nourishment my body can be strengthened so that I can pray more, I can go and help people more. Do you see, it's like you're elevating the niyah with which you're doing actions by instead of just like robotically automatic processes that we've all sort of developed where we just wake up and just, this is our routine, right? And we're not really thinking about how can I gain more reward for even those things that aren't necessarily worship? We don't equate basic things, meeting our basic needs, for example, as being worship but it could be in fact a form of worship when you take the time to apply this beautiful intention to it, right? And then they go on again, we're still on page 19 and they say here that the following hadith emphasizes the importance of intending our actions for the sake of Allah. So this is the hadith. The first people to be judged on the day of resurrection are the following, a man who was martyred, who was brought into the divine presence and shown his blessings, who admits to them and who has asked, what did you do with all of these blessings? He will reply, I fought for your sake and was martyred. Now look at Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala's response. Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala says, the exalted will say, you lie, you fought to be called a courageous man and it was said about you and thus you have been recompensed, right? It is then ordered that he be taken to the fire. So this man is claiming that he died for the sake of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala, of course knows better and he's telling him, no, you wanted that notoriety, you wanted the fame, you wanted all of those things to be said about you, the praise. You got it, therefore you were rewarded for what you did, you see? The reward was given to you already. And then Audhu Billah, he sent into the fire. Then someone who studied the Quran and taught it is brought into the divine presence and shown his blessings. And he again acknowledges them and is asked why he did them. And he responds, I studied knowledge and transmitted it and I recited the Quran for your sake. And it is said to him, you lie, rather you desired to be called learned and it was said about you. It is in order that he is taken and he's dragged along the face and thrust into it. It continues and there's another narration about a generous man who also did the same. And he said that his generosity was for the sake of Allah but it was for people to praise him for being generous and the same, he had the same fate. So this hadith is such an important hadith to reflect on because this is clearly telling us, as I said in the beginning, that we may never know if our intentions are sincere in this life and we will know in the next life but revisiting the Nia and constantly questioning and really being real with the fact that you cannot in any way, trick Audhubillah or lie or deceive to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. We should know that, that's just basic common sense that he knows what's in our hearts and there's no way that we can try to defend any other position than the truth when we're being asked about it. So we should do that internal process in this life instead of God forbid facing a similar fate where we end up on the day of judgment being called into question. May Allah protect us from that. But the point is, if we do that in this world, we are really clear about our Nia inshallah, we will make sure that our intentions are actually aligned with the pleasure of Allah's prophet and not for anything else. So let's go ahead and go to the next slide. So the next section now we're on page 20, the next after they related this hadith, now we're talking about achieving sincerity. Okay, so as we said, belief inshallah and getting rid of the doubtful matters, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala facilitates that for us inshallah and many people have been able to overcome those whisperings and those doubts but achieving sincerity is a different thing. And this is where the struggle begins. So some of the ways, effective ways to achieve sincerity are here, we have guarding the tongue, right? So very important that we focus on the things that can potentially harm or as an inroad to the heart, right in the tongue certainly and the limbs can cause spiritual ruin. So we guard our tongue, right? We speak truthfully and we maintain discourse in private and public gatherings. So this is one of the first advice that they give is it's very important to do these three things. Watch how you speak, what you say, make sure you're a truthful person and also make sure you're consistent, that you're public and private person, that it's not that you're wearing masks or you behave one way in your home and then in public you're a total different person or vice versa, but did you have consistency? And of course, there's certainly just to make that clarification, everybody has a certain degree of private behavior that would not be something they share publicly. We're not talking about that. We're talking about just your character. If you are praying and you don't do foul things and you don't speak of foul things, that should be consistent. Those types of things should not change based on whether or not you're home or out in public, right? So think about that, like are you the same person or would people not recognize you? May God protect us from that, right? And so the first step towards sincerity of the heart is to protect our tongues from these things and then to specifically protect it from falsehood, dissembling, which is to conceal our true motives, feelings or beliefs and prevarications, which is to deviate from the truth. So this is what we're seeking to protect our tongue from these three things. And this is the first step to achieving sincerity. So then they go on and they describe for us the four sources of the destructive qualities of the tongue. Okay, very important. So there's four specific destructive actions or qualities that the tongue may do and we should know what they are and really how to avoid them. So the first of course is lying. And so right away we're on page 20 still, moving into 21. The first, just help us to understand that we all know lying is forbidden in Islam without valid reason, but what are the valid reasons? So across the board, lying is impermissible, it's haram, we're not deceptive, we don't lie. However, in certain situations, it may be acceptable. And so let's look at what those three situations are. First, as a means to rectify between people. So as we know, human beings, we don't, some of us struggle with our temperaments, with our anger, with our moods. And so sometimes disputes happen, things within families, within marriages. There's things that can really be very disruptive that happen. And so we can avoid sometimes things from escalating just by maybe slightly changing some, saying some half truths. For example, like let's say between a husband and a wife, if you are a family member who is involved in someone, maybe your sibling, maybe someone else in the family whose marriage is on the rocks and they're really having a hard time, and you are trying to soften the hearts towards one another and just really help them to appreciate each other more or to turn their negative feelings into positive feelings. If the Nia, that's your Nia, and you go to the wife or the husband and you say, oh, they were saying all of these wonderful things about you and they always compliment you. And maybe that's not true. Maybe they don't do things like that, but you're just trying to soften the heart, right? The hearts between these two people, these two spouse, this couple. Isha, that's a benefit. I mean, that's a praiseworthy thing to do because sometimes the ego gets to, the egos prevent them from seeing the truth about one another and all they see is their own anger and resentment and shape out of course there. So for you to be able to give them a different lens with which to look at their spouse with just through a few soft kind words about one another or just slight, as I said, half truths or white truths, white lies, excuse me, inshallah, that's okay. I'm sorry. And the next is, of course, in war, we know all is fair and love in war, right? And as an effective military tactic, sometimes you may need to deceive, and that's to save lives, thousands, hundreds of lives, you gotta do what you gotta do. So there's certain rules of engagement that would apply here when we're talking about military tactical situations. And then when an individual plays with his young children again sometimes, we may tell tall tales or kind of, just in a playful way, engage our children. And so if you're a Nia is to do those types of things just to expand their creative mind, imagination, be in a playful state, this would not be considered deception, right? Which is a total different thing. And there may be other nuanced situations too, but we get the idea, right? The Nia is good. You just are doing it for certain reasons, but they do also make the distinction here that the permissibility in the first two cases, right? Directified between people or war is through subterfuge and prevarication. It should never be through manifest lies, except in a case where the other party will clearly see through the stratagem. So you're subtly saying things. You're not completely being blatant with your lies, right? Because again, it would defeat the purpose. So in such circumstances, one may lie with the tongue but must reject it within the heart, okay? Again, this is only applicable in a scenario where one's well-being or provisions of those of others is endangered. Nevertheless, be cautious with the words because a lie might in some instances result in a binding obligation. So this is more just like, FYI, be careful that you don't go too far with this. Try to be very subtle because you could entangle yourself into a much worse situation. So just FYI extra cautionary advice there. And then they give an example. An example of a case where lying is permitted is that of an oppressor pursuing a just man. In that case, one should deceive the oppressor openly and lead him astray in this search, in his search. This is permissible because a lie is not prohibited for its own sake but rather for the harm that is implicit in lying. In such cases, when truthfulness causes greater harm, lying in its stead is preferred. So yeah, if there's someone who's after a totally innocent person and that person's innocent and you're trying to basically throw them off the hunt or the search and you lead them down a different path, your intention is to protect someone who's innocent from further harm and it's not about the lie that you're telling, right? So that's why it's permissible. And then they go on to say, for this reason, the notion that good is good for its own sake and evil is evil for its own sake is considered false. For example, a murderer committed by an aggressor may appear identical to an execution that occurred in compliance with sacred law in both its outward form and its characteristics. Someone who is unaware of what actually transpired might confuse one for the other. Therefore, killing may be just or unjust. It is neither good nor evil per se. So that's just again another clarification. So that's the first thing that's mentioned as a destructive quality of the tongue. The second is backbiting. And this is again something we all need to be very clear about because it's not always understood to mean what it is. Sometimes we, you know, people find these loopholes or they just don't have the correct definition of what is backbiting and they may think that it is when it isn't backbiting or it isn't backbiting when it is. So let's clarify what it is. So backbiting or ghiba is again, haram across the board in the Quran, the sunnah, scholarly consensus. There's really no dispute about that. And it's defined as mentioning someone in a manner that would upset that person should they hear it. So if you think about this could go in so many different directions, right? Speaking about a person's person, for example, their appearance, you know, things that they can't control. We know for the most part that, you know, whether or not a person may smile and kind of go along with the joke. If you, you know, most people don't like to be, I mean, it's offensive. Most people will take offense to comments made about their appearance. Again, things that are just very, very personal, deeply personal, but we still find a lot of people passing these things off like it's no big deal. Like for example, coming up with a nickname, you know, about someone who maybe is, their stature is, you know, shorter than others or maybe than the average, right? Height. A lot of people will pass that off like it's not a big deal thinking, oh, well they don't seem to mind. But just, if you really think about it, what person, what person, whether they, again, their reaction is irrelevant because it's really about just common human decency to attack someone for something that nothing to do with and they had no control over like their physical appearance, you know, is never acceptable. And so if you think, oh, it's not a big deal if I make a comment about someone just because they are that way or it's the truth. I'm speaking about, I'm describing someone, let's say you're trying to describe someone who is, you know, heavy set. And instead of trying to be careful with your words, you just kind of, that's the first word you use. You don't have fat woman or that fat man or that, you know, people can sometimes be so like careless with the words that come out of their mouth, thinking that, well, I'm just speaking the truth, it's not a big deal. But here, right here, the definition is clear. Mentioning someone in a manner that would upset that person if they heard it. Would you say the same words if the person was sitting there? If someone asked you to describe the same person while they were in front of you, would you use a different set of words? If so, then you know that that form of, you know, describing or the words that you used to describe that person would fall under this category of riba. It's just not, it's not acceptable. And so you have to be more careful to know that just speaking matter of factly or stating truths, even if, yes, someone may be a certain size, it doesn't make a difference. The bottom line is, how would they feel if they heard it? If they heard it, it would upset them, it's riba, halas, you see, very simple. Then it goes on to say that even if, sorry, it would be upset that person should hear it, even if it is a true statement. So that's what we just said. Even if it's true, it doesn't matter, they're upset. Now, if the statement is untrue, so let's say now you are exaggerating something or literally lying about something just because you don't like them, right? The act is known as a calumny or a columny, I think. That's how you pronounce it, columny. And that would be namima, right, in Arabic. So this is where you're now lying and backbiting at the same time. And this is much worse. So there are some people who just out of their annoyance with a person, a hatred for a person, they may embellish things or just literally distort truth, I mean, just lie about them, al-dabilah, when speaking about them or if their name is mentioned. And that's completely haram. There's just no way to justify that at all. That's just a rotten thing to do because this is how rumors get spread and lives can be destroyed based on a single rumor that you created just out of feeling, like you feel anger towards someone, you think that's okay. So we have to be very, very careful. And of course, we know in Surah Al-Hajjadat, chapter 49, verse 12, this is the whole concept of backbiting is described very clearly, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says, neither allow yourselves to speak ill of one another behind your backs. And would any of you like to eat the flesh of his dead brother, you would hate it. So be conscious of Allah for Allah is most relenting, most merciful. I really love this for so many reasons, first of all, because of course it's the Quran and it's Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la's words, but also because he is reminding us to not have, don't be hypocritical, don't have double standards. Don't make okay something that you know for yourself if someone did it to you, you would hate it. So don't, because I know when I've, in the past, sometimes when we talk about these topics, people who engage in this, they may find or try to find ways to work around what they've done in the past, just the guilty conscience, right? And because some people just don't really think it's that bad or if they're speaking about someone who's wrong to them, they feel so justified that they don't really wanna hear you correct them or reprimand them for speaking about people behind their back, if they just don't like it. And I'm sure all of us have found ourselves in those awkward situations where we've had to shut down conversations and you get some attitude from people, right? But this is again, calling us out on our double standards because if you're gonna justify it, you doing it for on whatever basis you think is more in stat, then you cannot just be real with yourself. How would you feel if it was done to you, right? If you had a taste of your own medicine, as they say, how would you feel? You would likely hate it and it would bother you and you would never accept anybody's excuses if your best friend or your sister or someone else, you heard or speaking ill about you or mentioning even a slight, small, maybe blemish or problem or flaw that you have or bad habit, people sometimes, the spouses do this, right? I've certainly been in awkward situations where my spouse may unveil their partner in front of a group setting and you can see that it's so uncomfortable for the whole group and you know, there's gonna be a huge fallout once they get in the car. But it's like those little tiny words that are said when you're not ready for it or it's just not comfortable to have people know your business can set off such a strong reaction, right? So we all have that. Every person would feel hurt to know someone speaking about them behind their back. So if you know that it's true for yourself, then don't justify doing it for someone else. I mean, I love forgiveness because sometimes again, we work careless. And so here on the bottom of page 21, another reminder about this idea of Aldabla, eating the dead flesh, you know, that analogy is just so hard to stomach, literally Aldabla, right? Likewise, you should detest backbiting because it tears into a person's good name and honor. And this can be much worse than actually tearing off a piece of that person's physical flesh Aldabla. And we see that now in our world of cancel culture, how devastating it is when people's entire lives are completely turned upside down based on sometimes a rumor. And we don't know, it's very difficult to verify certain things. We see it on, I'm talking about like high profile cases but it's like really tragic if you think about how sometimes people's lives have been completely destroyed because of this, just creating false stories or gossiping, backbiting, whatever, and then it just, it's like a fire that just gets acclaimed that it goes out of control. And at the end of the day, that person's reputation is smeared, it's completely dragged through the mud. It's very hard for people to recover, right? So we have to ask the last father for protection from that. And then on page 22, it says that in the above verse, Allah likens the absent one to a dead person. The dead person is gone and thus unable to defend himself. Just as the absent one being talked about is unable to defend himself or herself. Furthermore, biting off part of something causes harm to it. Just as speaking ill of people causes harm to them. A poet said, a cut inflicted by the tongue is not unlike the cut inflicted by the hand. So again, just really important reminders for all of us to reflect on and inshallah to take ourselves into account for. So now we go into, well, are there circumstances where backbiting is permitted? And believe it or not, yes. There are specific circumstances where the act of speaking about someone's potential flaws or just things that they've done that's harmful wouldn't fall under the same category as what we just talked about. Because again, it's about the harm that not speaking up about or disclosing some knowledge that you have about a person may cause further harm than the actual harm of disclosing that knowledge. And so let's look at those situations. So here we have backbiting is permitted only in the following circumstances. One, when appealing to an authority to remove an injustice. So maybe sometimes you have to unveil, speak about something or someone in a situation like this where you're again speaking to an authority figure and it could apply to many different circumstances but you are trying to prevent further harm to remove an injustice. So you might have to disclose certain information, right? When seeking help from others to change a wrong or to stop an oppressor from his wrongs. So again, there's sometimes context is needed. You need to give context for something that context may involve speaking about someone when they're not present. And so in those cases again, if the intention is to prevent further harm it would be permissible. When seeking a legal opinion, there are people who may be going through some business issue with a ex-partner, business partner and they need to get consultation. And in that consultation, they may have to unveil unethical business practices or other things that are private knowledge but you need to know what your rights are. You have to protect your interests, right? Or some, there may be again another issue that you're trying to avoid. And so you seek legal counsel or this would likely also apply to seeking a counsel from for other situations as well. Maybe you need to speak to a therapist or a counselor about certain things in a relationship, for example, right? When warning others concerning commerce, marriage, neighbors and companionship, okay? For example, it's acceptable to mention the violent temperament of a man to his prospective wife. So if you have knowledge about someone and then you find out that they are being asked about for the purpose of marriage, maybe someone asks you directly, hey, I'm thinking of so-and-so for my daughter. What do you think of him or so-and-so for my son? What do you think of her? And you have knowledge that you are convinced or that you have evidence of, you have proof of and you really do think it would potentially cause damage to this person, you know? I mean, there's a lot of people out of the below who are, they do this, they trick people. There's a lot of fraud that happens in our community, unfortunately, around marriage, you know, where people will present themselves as being a certain way, but then you find out later that they have a whole family or have children that they never spoke about or health conditions or debt or all these other problems because they concealed those things and they were not upfront and honest and truthful. So if you have knowledge that you think is actually could potentially help people avoid being hurt or being scammed or being, you know, and somehow abused, it's your, it's obligation to warn those people, right? So those are situations where it'd be principle. When one mentions a man by a nickname, he's known by such as the lamented one. So this is, you know, again, if you're gonna, if you know of someone who has a nickname that might not necessarily sound like really nice, but that person is not being mocked or teased or you, it's not a nickname that's necessarily used to disparage the person, but, you know, it kind of doesn't have the most nice connotation or meaning to it. If you're using it, in that case, it would not be considered Riba, right? Because it's sometimes nicknamed stick, you know, people in childhood, they'll get a name that, you know, grandparents or a parent gave them and their whole life they're known by that name. And if they don't have a problem with it because, hey, it's not a big deal, you know, it's kind of what I've always known and you've just, you know, gotten to the habit of referring to that person by that name, that's not an issue. But if you specifically create nicknames or use nicknames that you know for a fact are actually to mock that person, belittle that person. It could be anything, a totally original nickname that someone came up. It could be a play on words, maybe that has to do with their name. I mean, sometimes people get really, they can get very crude when speaking about other people that they will speak in code, you know. It's like, in order to justify, or not even justify, but to not reveal who I'm speaking about, I'll use this code name. This is the person's name. So every time I say this, you know who I'm talking about. And that nickname you know is to totally belittle that person, to disparage them, it would upset them. This would not be permissible, this would be prohibited. So the distinction is very important to understand. Nicknames that are, the person themselves has no problem with and it's kind of, you know, just everybody calls them that, it's okay. But anything done to mock them would be impermissible. The next one would be mentioning innovation. Someone's innovations in terms of their religious practice, right? So if you know that someone is doing something with their, or they have a, you know, practice or a belief that is considered, you know, again, outside of what are the acceptable differences of opinions, right? There's valid difference of opinion on certain things. Those things are not what we're talking about, right? We don't, you don't mention that. But if you know for a fact, they have an idea about let's say, and there are people in our community who have their own ideas about a lot of things, you know, prayer, you know, you don't need to do this. You don't have to always do this. And they'll give people their own like fatala, you know, like, oh, you don't have to make, we'll do for every prayer or you can, you know, combine this prayer and that prayer. And they just kind of speak from their own ideas. And you know that that's not consistent. There's no room for that in our tradition. It's just their own, you know, innovations. You can certainly mention that in a context that it would apply because it's important for people to know, you know, who people truly are. And especially, for example, in the case of marriage, you know, that's really important. Also, when mentioning the wrongs of someone who openly commits those enormities, right? So if someone is openly committing sins, but that person's name is mentioned in some context and everybody kind of knows that they do that. If they drink alcohol, for example, or they gamble or they, you know, have relations outside of marriage, and it's kind of something that everybody is known, knows about and for some reason, maybe you're discussing that person for some context, maybe they are in the community and they're, you know, someone needs their services for something. And so mentioning someone who their public, their sins are public and you're just kind of warning maybe someone or mentioning those things is okay. Again, with the right intention, but speaking about their sins and unveiling people about what they do, what others don't know is completely forbidden. You can't, we're not allowed to unveil people just because, you know. And so if you are even in the context of marriage, for example, if there's a specific issue or business, like if you're, you know, know that someone's about to go into business with someone and you want to warn them that, oh, did you know they went into business two years ago with so-and-so and it didn't go very well and you can have, you have details, maybe very private knowledge that you know about, that is fine because your intention is clear. But if you're going to add on and say, oh yeah, by the way, he cheated on his wife and then I found out that he gambled or he fornicated or he, you know, or he, I'm sorry, I mean, he drinks alcohol and he does drugs and you're just kind of piling on a list, of all the sins, this is now, it's like a, you know, you just have verbal diarrhea, you can't stop yourself and you're just, you know, unveiling someone and you need to stop because that is not the, that's not in the context of why you're telling, talking about the person to, you know, the one you're speaking about. The context was, I'm warning you because of the business fallouts that they've had in the past, for example. And so the extra information you can't share, okay? So that's really important to remember. And so let me check time. Oh, wow, wow, that hour went fast, ma'am. I still have a couple more. Let's see if I can do these. Oh, no, I don't think I can do these. There's a lot more context. Okay, content I mean. So let me, I'm going to stop here at point number two, which was backbiting. And I'm going to get to the question and answers because the rest of the sections, they need more time and I'll just cut them off. So we'll have to continue with chapter two for in two weeks, inshallah. And yeah, I think it'll be a good discussion, inshallah, because there's a lot more commentary. Again, if you don't have the book, highly recommend because I love like to just peruse this book. I'll just go over sections I've read before because they're just really good reminders, you know, for all of us. We all have, this is our jihad. May Allah give us sincere intention, you know. And of course, may Allah give us, make our actions in line with our intentions, but give us sincere intentions. We want to have the Nia, but we also want to follow up the Nia with actions, inshallah. So alhamdulillah. Let me go ahead and stop the screen share right now. And then I will, inshallah, come and check the discussion or the comments. Let's see, alhamdulillah. Just give me one moment. I'll check Facebook as well as the MCC page just to see if there's anything going on. Okay, so if you have any questions, again, please feel free. I just see some nice comments, just some salams and mashallah, which are always lovely to hear. But if you have specific questions, let me go on to the YouTube page. Let me know. Alhamdulillah. Okay, I'm logging on. Oh, sorry. Okay. The best of you is someone who feeds others. Mashallah. Yes, some nice comments here. What about oils, sister? I'm not sure if that question was for me or someone else because we did not discuss anything like that. So I don't see any questions pertinent to our discussion here, but we still have a couple of minutes, like two minutes. So if you wanna ask, please feel free. But other than that, inshallah, I hope you guys are benefiting from this class because I really do enjoy putting together the slides and having this discussion. I wish it was more interactive. I wish we were doing this in real time, in person instead of the virtual. Alhamdulillah. We have to be grateful to Allah, SubhanAllah, for the opportunities He gives us. And we all remember what happened when the quarantine started and it was Ramadan very shortly after. And I think a lot of us were really worried for a good reason too because it was our first Ramadan like this. But then SubhanAllah, how many of us had probably the most exceptional experiences? I know many people did. I had a really amazing Ramadan this past year. So sometimes we think things are a lot worse than Allah, SubhanAllah, shows us the opposite. So always have a good opinion of Allah, SubhanAllah. Yes, it's a difficult time for most people and it has been for a while, but Allah, SubhanAllah, His promise is true and we have to hold on to that always, no matter how intense things get, never forget, because that is what gives our heart life. Like we believe in the promise of Allah, SubhanAllah. If He says, after every difficulty, there's ease, we believe in that. And inshaAllah, this too shall pass. So may Allah keep all of you safe, your family safe, inshaAllah. And may what's to come in the next few months, again, may Allah give us strength and hold us together and protect us, inshaAllah, from the fitna and just, yeah, make all of this, I mean, help us to come out of this with a renewed, inshaAllah, understanding of our place and our purpose and to really just see the world with a different lens. Because I think if we are being honest with ourselves, likely why we're in this situation is because we fell into heedlessness, we became forgetful, we lost our way. And so sometimes we have to learn the hard way to come back and to remember who we are. So inshaAllah, we ask Allah to provide that for continued guidance and patience and may Allah provide that. Bless all of you. Thank you for spending your Sunday evening with MCC East Bay, inshaAllah. Please make doh for the organizers, all of the volunteers and the staff, inshaAllah, and support MCC. They didn't ask me to say that, but it is an organization. If you are in the Bay Area, they absolutely deserve our support, maybe more so now than before because it is tough times, even for organizations to just make their overhead costs and all the other things still are happening, even though we're doing a lot of things virtually. So anyhow, that's just my little short spiel for MCC, but do keep all of them in your doze. And thank you. Thank you again for being here. We will go ahead and end, and I'll see you then, inshaAllah, in two weeks. So Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim. Wa al-A'asir in al-insana la fi khusir illa aladheena amin wa amin as-salihati wa tawasub al-haqi wa tawasub al-sabr. Subhana Allahumma wa bi hamdika shadu an da'ilah ilaha ila al-adham, astaghfiruq wa la tubu ilayk. Allahumma as-salam wa s-salam wa barakah ala sayyidina wa maulana Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa s-salam wa ala ani wa s-salam wa s-salam Alhamdulillah. Jazakum Allah wa khayran. Have a wonderful evening, you guys. InshaAllah, take care. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. As-salamu alaikum. Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim. Alhamdulillah wa as-salatu wa as-salam wa ala as-shif al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen. Sayyidina wa maulana wa Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa s-salam wa ala ali wa sahbihi wa s-salam. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Welcome everyone. InshaAllah, you all are doing well. You're all safe in your homes, comfortable with your families and everybody's in good spirits. We just had a holiday break, so I hope you got some chance to rest and relax. I know tomorrow is back to the grind for many of us, but inshaAllah, we've had a good time off. And so I'm so happy to be spending this evening with all of you. Jazakum Allah wa khayran for spending it with me. Now, for those who may be tuning in for the first time, I am covering a text in this session or in a series, in the series called Agenda to Change Our Condition. I have the text here in front of me. It is written by Imam Zed Shaker and Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. And this text is really, as the title says, about changing oneself and working with practical steps on how to do that. And so we've been covering several different sections of the book, but currently we are on the second chapter, which is titled The Heart at Its Treatment. We didn't get a chance to finish this chapter. It was two weeks ago that we last met. So we are going to finish the second chapter and possibly, if we have time today, continue into the third chapter. So with that said, I'm going to go ahead and share my screen, inshaAllah. So just give me a second. Bismillah. Let me present. All right. So now I'm going to do a quick review because the second chapter, we just started at the last session. So let's just quickly go over this. It'll be a summary, but of course, if you want to get the more in-depth reading of this text or of this chapter, please look at the previous recording from two weeks ago. So we started off with talking about, first of all, the title, as I said, was The Heart and Its Treatment. This is the beginning of the chapter. And so right away we talked about the, that action has two different modes, the heart and the limbs. And then what the concerns are of the heart, which is establishing a strong glee for Al-Qaeda and then purity of intention, sincerity, right? Iqlas, as we say in Arabic. So we describe those two terms in detail here. What is belief? What is sincerity? And then we further expanded on this concept of purifying the heart and rectifying our intentions. And then we talked about achieving sincerity and how we can be more sincere. Because of course this is, for all of us, the most important thing. It's really about the quality of what we do. Like the quantity, there's many people, even the monotheistic one, right? They can amass a lot of deeds, but if there's no sincerity in the heart, then that's, it's all for nothing, right? So the most important objective for us is to have sincerity when we do anything for the sake of Allah, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. So how can we achieve sincerity? Well, first and foremost, we guard our tongue. We make sure that we are truthful speaking people. We're honest people. And then we maintain discourse in private and public gatherings, right? So we maintain our way of behaving publicly and privately. And then we went on to talk about specifically how we can protect the tongue from falsehood, dissembling, right? To conceal one's true motives, feelings or beliefs, and perverications, to deviate from the truth. So how can we do this specifically? And so this is all from the text. I hope you have the text in front of you, but these slides are just meant to guide us in this conversation. So Bismillah, sorry. It's sometimes we get a little delay there. So here we are. So after we talked about that, we went into the four sources of destructive qualities of the tongue. And so we talked about lying and in what situations they are permissible and what, when they are not permissible and then backbiting, which of course we know is haram, and the difference between riba and namima, kalamni, right? And so we talked about that distinction. And then this is where we, we ended on this particular slide, the slide about backbiting. And you know, this is an important topic because unfortunately it is so common. It's, you know, human beings are, are prone to certain things more than others. And I would say that in our time of really being able to know so much about people's private lives, maybe more than ever before, we have access to information about people, right? Just with a click of a button, you can know a lot about how people live. You can see their family life, their home life, their relationship status. You can see their work sometimes, their vacations, the events that they go to on the weekend. So because we have so much access to people's private lives and their choices, the way that they live, their lifestyle, it does give us fodder, right? To, to speak about them and to judge them. And so unfortunately this is a very common problem that we have in our community and, you know, within the world, I would say. Because, you know, there's the whole, there's a whole industry, right? That thrives off of gossip. The tabloid industry, we see it from, I mean, when I was a kid, we saw the magazines when we would go into the supermarket stores or even the television shows, right? Shows like Entertainment Tonight. What were they, but gossip shows. They were just there to, you know, speak about what's going on with different celebrities, but really give a lot of information, scandals, anything that was going on. And then throughout the years, of course, that's changed as mediums have changed. And so now there's TMZ and there's different websites that people will go to just to get access to gossip. So it's definitely a big part of our society to talk about people to gossip. Even if the, we don't know, you know, I mean, these are people removed from us often. We don't know them personally. They're celebrities or politicians, athletes, singers, but still the fact that it's such a acceptable thing and nobody really thinks twice of how grotesque it is, how despicable it is to spend your time judging other people, then it's normalized. And when it's normalized, you know, on such a large scale, then of course, you know, in private conversations with friends and family, you start to let your guard down and not become, you know, not be aware of yourself that what you're doing is so detestable to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So really we want to talk about why this is such an important topic of guarding the tongue from backbiting. So we did distinguish though, in some cases, it is permissible because the harm of not mentioning certain things could be greater, right? So that's the wisdom of our Dean, is that it helps us to discern when certain behaviors are acceptable and when they're not. And so we talked at length in the last session about the situations where backbiting would be permissible. So again, if you wanted to get more on that, check out the previous recording. All of it is available on the MCC YouTube page, inshallah. So now there's four, right, sources. So we only got to number two. So the third one is where we're going to talk about next. I'm just going to wait for the slide to kick in here on this delay. Okay, and I went ahead. Okay, here we go. So argumentation for its own sake. To dispute using sophisticated reasoning, right? Sophistry, what is that? It's people who just like to argue, even though their arguments are fallacious, they're all based on fallacies. There's really no truth to them, but they just like to argue. They like to wind people up and get people angry over whatever it is, whether it's politics or some other issue, religious debates. There are people that do this and they enjoy it. They thrive on it. They love it. They love to prod people, just annoy them. And so this is definitely something that is harmful and destructive to the tongue to engage in this type of behavior. So when you know that you are arguing a point that you really, there's no substance to it. There's nothing really serious in your heart. You're not really invested in it, but you just want to argue for the sake of arguing. You just like to, like I said, rile people up. This would apply to you. This is something you really have to watch, contentiousness. You know, there are people, like I said, who enjoy this. They may just part of their personality type. They like to pick fights or pick arguments. So we really want to watch our behavior. If this is something that you have been told that you do, that you just argue a lot, and this doesn't necessarily have to be verbal. We see now on social media, a lot of people who use, you know, the various different platforms to just incite people just to go and, you know, they call them trolls. They'll just go and bring up things that have nothing to do with anything. And then they move on. They go to the next person, the next person because they likely have, you know, something that's going on personally with them or they're not happy in their life. They're not, you know, they're not content with their own circumstances. So it gives them some relief to go and bother other people. And unfortunately, of course, this would be a disease of the heart, right? To go and harm people just because you can, or because you can't contain your own emotions. Of course, it's unacceptable, right? This is definitely a disease of the heart. But again, we have people who do this. So now a days it's not just verbal argumentation, but it can be behind a screen with a complete stranger that you don't know about. So you want to think about that. Or here, for example, to defend a religious innovation intentionally. So sometimes people just because they, again, don't want to lose an argument, they may defend a position that they know is not true just because they don't want to look embarrassed maybe in front of a group or another person. So they will, you know, again, advocate for something or push for something, defend something without, while knowing that it's not the correct position to have. So there are unfortunately, again, people whose pride and their egos get in the way. And so argumentation just becomes a defense that they use to protect their own pride and ego. But it is destructive. It's destructive to the spiritual heart. It's destructive to the tongue. So here are the problems I said and reminds us that disputation with the Quran is disbelief. So for anybody who, for example, will come and refute a clear position in the Quran. This is kufr, right? We cannot do that. If Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says something, we accept it without any question that it is Haq. It is true. But there are, again, people nowadays anyway, who believe, unfortunately, that Islam needs a reform and that the Quran needs a reform. And so they apply their own whims, desires, interpretations to ayahs, and they begin to, you know, they spread messages that completely disagree or are in opposition to everything in Islam and the Orthodox positions in Islam. And they still call themselves Muslim. So we have to be very careful of these people because they may claim to be Muslim, but if they are assuming to know better or to think that their interpretation of something that has clearly been as a consensus about is correct, we have to be very careful of people like that. May Allah protect us from becoming people like that and may Allah protect us from being influenced by people like that. We have to do our best to guard our heart and our Eman, which is why it's so important to make sure that we take from the correct sources from teachers who have been trained, who have the chain of transmission that you know that they have gone through the proper training because nowadays anybody can claim to be a teacher or a scholar or a sheikh just because they can read Arabic or they just claim it. And unfortunately this is very common. I know people, public figures who this is what they do and they are very controversial in certain community groups because they will for example say, the hijab is not something that is far from women. And then they'll interpret the verses of hijab in their own way and it causes a lot of problems in families and marriages because one person may take this person as an authority and so it just causes a lot of problems. But the clear sign for all of us is that when someone goes against the hijab of our scholarship in Islam and goes against the majority opinion on things, we should definitely see that as a red flag. No matter what they assume in terms of their credentials, just know that right away that is a sign of some serious problem because again, our Dean has been protected and preserved over all these centuries because of the Senate because we have respected this chain. And so to break from that chain and to think that you know better and to presume that again Islam needs some type of reformation all the blah is just kufr. So we stay away from that type of thinking and we ask Allah's Father to protect us from that. So that was the third destructive quality of the tongue. Now the fourth is mirthful jesting on serious occasions, right? Gesting, making light of, joking around of a serious matter. And this is something again very problematic in our society at large, in our world at large. We live in a time where you know it's a time where people really take things that are very serious lightly and it's you know, memes for example, you see all this joking inappropriate mockery which is haram in Islam. All of this is very common now, very normalized behavior. You see it every day. If you open up your email or your browser to check news, likely you will see some form of this of just not really taking things seriously or taking a very serious matter and then as we said, making a joke of it, making light of it. So we have to ask Allah for protection from that that there is a time and place for everything and we do not lose comportment, lose our adab in different environments or with different people in different scenarios just because we have this internal sort of impulse to joke around and so we have to regulate and this is why it's so important to learn to regulate yourself so that you're not caught in those moments where you're being wholly inappropriate in a situation and this is unfortunately again very, very common. So here the Prophet Sallam reminds us a beautiful quality in someone's practice of Islam is minding his or her own business. So beautiful hadith that we should all internalize to really try not to get involved in other people's business, not to ask or probe or pry into the private personal affairs of other people because it's those questions that open the door often times for the gossiping, the backbiting argumentation for the inappropriate joking, teasing, taunting, mockery of other people, right? So sometimes it's just best to, again, to take yourself seriously and to take the discussions that you engage in seriously to take the gatherings that you have or the people that you're with and those times where you're speaking or just engaging with other people to take those moments very seriously and to be aware of yourself so that you don't, again, fall into all of these really destructive behaviors. So these are the four sources of destructive quality. So let's go ahead and look at what's next. We're still on, by the way, chapter two. Let me just look at the book here to let those who do have the text know where we are. Oh, there are actually some other hadith here. Let me mention. Qadi Abu Bakr said, and this goes back to the previous slide here where we talked about mirthful justing. He said, I once heard Imam al-Tertushi say that the Joker is an ignorant fool because Allah revealed to us a dialogue between the children of Israel and Moses upon him be peace. Do you take us as the brunt of a joke? Ask the children of Israel? And Musa al-Aislam replied, he said this, right? So he said, I seek refuge in Allah that I should be of the ignorant ones. So he took this accusation from the Children of Israel that it was such an insult that he was seeking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for protection or refuge in Allah from being amongst the ignorant ones. So this was the commentary of Imam al-Tertushi. And this was on page 23 again of the text. And then Qadi Abu Bakr also said, it would seem to me that if the answer concerns a matter related to religion, then it is ignorance. But if it was some other concern, then it is merely speech. It's ruling as it's ruling and it's characteristic is defined by what it contains. So again, just discussing how to distinguish between something that is stated out of ignorance or otherwise. And then the text continues and it says, after we purified our hearts from other than Allah and our tongues from the aforementioned faults, then we have established firm foundations for divine protection. The next step. So now, again, this is a process, right? So we're looking at all the different steps. So the next step on the journey towards sincerity is developing concern for the rest of our responsibilities. Among those we should focus on ensuring the following two essentials. The five foundations of religion, the five pillars of Islam and avoiding mortal sins that combat it vigilantly. So again, once we've done this work, this deep internal spiritual work where we're really trying to look at our behavior and change our behavior, then this would be the next step, is that we are focusing on the five pillars and avoiding the Qaba'ir, which are the enormities, the large sins, right? Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says, if you avoid what has been prohibited for you from the enormities, then we will cover over any wrongs. So inshallah, if we are vigilant in protecting ourselves from doing any of the major haram, then inshallah, Allah will protect us and cover us from other wrongs. And so then the text goes on to say, None truly knows the mortal sins with any certainty except Allah. Indeed, He has concealed them among the prohibited matters. However, some of the masters of knowledge have gathered them and codified them for us. They tally 17 in number. Abandoning the major sins makes it easier for one to leave lesser wrongs. And that's a really important point. I mean, if you think about it, if you're working so diligently and vigilantly to protect yourself from the 17 major sins, then you will inshallah, as a byproduct of that vigilance, guard yourself from the lesser sins. So it's really a two for one in many cases. Just be vigilant about your heart, protect your limbs, protect your tongue, protect yourself, and inshallah, the frivolous or the smaller deeds, misdeeds, mistakes, sins, those will kind of just go away as well, right? So then He says, likewise, the lesser wrongs that one commits will be removed from one's record through ritual prayers, washings, the Hajj, and the lesser pilgrimage. Subhanallah. And that's out of the generosity and rahmah of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala that just by doing some of these ritual acts that we do in order to do other acts, for example, we'll do, right? We know that when we make wudu, that our sins are falling as the water drops, right? That is the mercy of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala but how many of us really take that into account every time we make wudu that we're actually imagining that happening, right? So some of these things are just given to us without us even being aware of it or having it in the forefront of our minds, right? But it's still happening. So Allah, out of His generosity, gives us all of this mercy and forgives us of so many sins just by doing these things, right? And in the Prophet's life said, one daily prayer to the next and one Friday prayer to the next remit wrong actions as long as enormities are avoided. Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So every single day that we are able to successfully complete our prayers one after the other after the other after the other. And in between, we're not engaging in any of the larger sins or the heavier, weightier sins. And again, as the text says, most of those things are known only to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. Some of them have clearly been stipulated for us but truly only Allah would know, right? So if we protect our hearts from doing those major, major sins from prayer to prayer, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala is removing our sins for us and in the same vein is from jama to jama if we do the same thing, right? So Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala Again, out of the generosity of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So now the next section here is on the enumeration of the enormities, okay? So this is where we now talk about what these major sins are that our scholars have put it, you know, codified for us and put it in this list. So the very first one, the most important one, of course we know is Shirk, is associating any partners with Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala This is according to one narration, the one sin that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala will not forgive and there are other narrations, of course that speak also to the heaviness of the sin and that it is at the top of the list, right? It's the greatest sin that we can make is to in any way attribute a partner as well as Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So that's right away, we know this, inshallah we all know it because it is part of our creed, inshallah we all understand this clearly. The next is perseverance in wrongs even when lesser ones. So this is important because when we commit sins habitually, even when they're small they turn into enormities, right? So they pile up you want to think about that, that smaller sins like grains of sand can eventually turn into mountains before us if we're not careful. So we have to be careful of habituating to sin and to making becoming heedless and reckless and not taking ourselves into account when we do sin. Toba should be part of our every single day experience. Because we should, even if we don't actively sin, we should remember that we sin sometimes passively, we sin when we're unaware of it. So we make Toba regularly every day, we are mindful of ourselves and inshallah that will prevent us from engaging in sins especially when we know that it's sinful behavior. So really important to make sure that we don't habituate to sins even if they're small. Despair of the mercy of Allah Despair is a really important one because, you know, again we live in a time where anxiety disorders, mental health issues are on the rise and a lot of people struggle with their circumstances and trying to just find peace in life. A lot of problems are happening and it's because of the nature of our world. If you look at the world, it's become an increasingly difficult place for people to find some semblance of peace. So all of these things are understandable given the intensity of our world. There's a lot of evil in our world a lot of darkness in our world. So with that though there is something that has happened in terms of this concept of despair and, you know, it's a term that is thrown around lightly but we have to understand that as Muslims, we do not despair and it's actually considered great it's a haram to have despair because we should never lose hope in Allah SWT. So again, people who struggle with really serious mental health issues we're not speaking about that but people who kind of go through grief or stress or some problem in life and they immediately default into losing hope we would say this would be something that you don't want to normalize and you certainly don't want to make acceptable just because you're having a difficult time you don't want to challenge that and, you know, be bothered by it and want to remove it that I don't want to feel this way I want to always have the best opinion of Allah SWT not to think that my circumstance is hopeless in dunya or in afshara some people for example sin and they do major sins and then they lose hope that they will ever be saved and nobody should feel that way and that's why we have so many hadith where Allah SWT is reminding us over and over and over again not to put limits on his mercy, you know, if he can forgive a man, a mass murderer you know, then we should not assume anything about Allah SWT and it's in his decision alone, right but to have hope because that is a better position than to lose hope, right so be very careful about that and then also a false sense of security from the design of Allah this would be, you know, the opposite issue of people just assuming that everything is going to go in their favor just because right, self-righteousness is a really serious disease of the heart, arrogance, self-righteousness assuming that you kind of have it and, you know, you haven't made and that, you know it gives you this false sense of security with Allah we always have to you know, find that balance of hope with Allah but also fear and awe and maintaining that respect and that uncertainty because we don't see our our deeds as being good enough as worthy, right, it's a humility it's humility before Allah SWT recognizing that no matter what we do, we could spend our entire existence worshiping Allah SWT perfectly but it will not ever be enough to show gratitude for all of the blessings He's given us when you have that understanding then you don't assume that you are special or that you have some special rank with Allah but you always, you know, kind of are walking between those two states, right, or hanging in the bounce between those two states of hope and fear so those are the four enormities of the heart, right, this is why it's so important to have those really deep internal conversations with oneself to question and check in these don't have to necessarily be verbalized to anybody, it's really about ourselves holding ourselves accountable and being truthful with ourselves, right so the four enormities of the tongue are the false testimony so this is very serious if you ever testify against someone or in a situation you find yourself but you are not being truthful and you potentially ruin another person's life or livelihood many scenarios would apply to this, this is huge it's absolutely haram it's people of truth and honesty we cannot make claims about other people and this is why it's so dangerous because there have been several public cases, right of people making allegations against someone and then later on it turns out that they were untrue and it was false report we have to seek protection because this is something that people fall into sometimes because of greed or they have some other ulterior motive and they think that they can justify doing it because it'll serve a better purpose, I'll be able to do good but you could put so many different spins on it but at the end of the day it's haram you cannot bear false testimony accusing others of adultery so this would kind of fall into the same category you are lying but also if you're basing it on just suspicion, right you may see a situation and presume something but without evidence and without really following the the rules I guess of a situation like that in Islam we know there has to be a certain number of witnesses it has to be done a certain way before you make an accusation publicly about someone doing something like that but you'll find people again making light of these things and they don't think twice they look their emotions, get the best of them they'll pick up the phone call and I saw your husband, I saw your wife or I saw somebody, whoever it's either a gossip train that continues or it's actually getting involved and meddling in another person's relationship all based on suspicion not true facts or anything that could be verifiable by another witness or other witnesses, right so we have to be very careful of ever making those accusations sinful oaths again if you're promising or vowing to do things that are haram, making oaths you want to be very careful this is totally impermissible first of all be careful with how we use our tongue in this way but also what our hearts are aligning with so you want to be careful that you're not being loyal to or showing some allegiance to something that you know is clearly haram, so not making oaths and vows and promises that are not that are simply haram and wrong, right and then magic we know seeing people who are promising to look into your future or reading cards or tea leaves this is very popular in some cultures more than others to go to people like that and unfortunately in many of our cultures there's a presumption right away that if something isn't going your way in life maybe you've missed some opportunities some things haven't worked out for you that it must immediately be seher magic and then that leads in some cases ironically it leads people to seek out people who do seher or who are known to dabble in black magic to seek revenge or to you know it's just it's really mind-boggling but we have to seek protection from Allah's path for ever engaging in things like that so those are the the four enormities of the heart and of the tongue so let's go to the next slide here I want to get through this list because I'll leave some time for questions but okay so the next are the three enormities of the stomach and so again look at the sections and how they have separated each section inshallah to get to this total of 17 right so right away of course we know intake of alcohol or intoxicants of any type if you are intentionally digesting or consuming something that you know has been spiked or is haram or is in any way just not permissible because there's some level of intoxicant in there you should seek refuge from Allah it's definitely haram to do that willingly knowingly that's the first one consuming the wealth of an orphan how many ayahs in the Quran does Allah warn people of doing this but unfortunately it happens there are many people who are caught up in this type of behavior in countries and in places where there are actual orphans and they may have something of their own but also if you think about inheritance disputes and you know other matters that get into family politics there are people who are may Allah guide them and forgive them but they let their greed get the best of them and they will scam sometimes their own family members in those scenarios so it can be in both ways you know actual taking the wealth in other ways just scheming and plotting to take the wealth of someone who again would be categorized as an orphan taking interest on wealth so I'm not going to get into all the debates about this because there are different opinions on that when it comes to minority Muslims living in non-Muslim lands and there's just a lot of different opinions on interest in general but for the most part we all know that we should avoid it we have some of us have credit cards you might have take a loan here and there and that's when you have to just follow the positions of whichever scholars that you listen to or that you follow they may have different opinions on that but most of the scholars regardless will always advise that it's best to avoid any type of interest and because it will you know eat away at the barakah of our wealth so it's best to always try to avoid it there are specific of it again you can defer to the scholars that you follow and see what their positions are the enormities of the genitals so this is again another one that we should be very mindful of because it's everywhere it's happening we live again in a time where everything's inverted in terms of what's normal in society is often times haram you know it's just it's a very strange time but these things having illicit relationships outside of marriage premarital sex is so normalized in this society nobody very few people think of it even as an issue and if you are on the opposite side and you have conservative values they will look at you like you're crazy and there's something wrong with you and this isn't just with adults but you find even I work with teens and I see what's going on in teen culture and it's even pervasive in teen culture that if you haven't had sexual relations by the time you're a senior or even a junior maybe it's changed and now it's even a freshman or a sophomore I don't know how early the pressure is to be sexually active but I I know certainly that there is a lot of pressure and that you are considered weird or you're treated as if there's something wrong with you if you choose not to participate and you want to be just protect yourself and be chast people will look at you like there's something wrong with you so this is very common and that's why we can't have this attitude that oh Muslims don't do these things no Muslims are absolutely doing these things and that's why a show like Rami this show that got very popular and won an Emmy I think and probably other awards it's it's very open about you know young Muslim singles that are engaging in this type of behavior as far as I know I haven't seen the show but I heard enough to know that that is a very popular ongoing theme in the show and so a lot of Muslims are fans of the show by the way it's not that it's just non Muslims watching Muslims do these things or you know depicting Muslims doing these things it's actually very popular with the younger Muslim American or Western Muslim generation because they likely identify with it or they have also adopted the same attitude about these behaviors so we have to take it seriously that these are very you know they're enormous are harm and we know just looking at Sharia and the rules and the positions about you know these matters where what's acceptable what's not we know that premarital sex is forbidden of course adultery is a whole other topic but that would also be included because it's illicit relations and so illicit is premarital or adulterous and then of course homosexual acts this is now also very common and very it's increasingly becoming normalized in society just yesterday on a group that I've read that I'm on someone posted that a sister was inquiring about how to navigate a situation in which a young Muslim girl has come out as gay and wants to introduce her partner to her family and you know this is we hear these stories now more and more with the younger generation because their generation has accepted the idea that gender and you know and sexuality are fluid and they don't believe that there's a binary that you know this is what unfortunately they've been conditioned to think in you know it's indoctrination it starts sometimes very young but we have to just open our eyes and accept the reality that we live in a time where this is part of the progressive social movement the left the liberal movement to normalize these things as far as gender and sexuality is concerned and therefore that becomes the you know resounding message to everybody that it's not a big deal you know you kind of just go with the flow do what you feel why do you have to apply some moral lens to it you're born this way these are the messages that our youth are hearing so what that does when you hear that throughout school and I working with teens I have had to intervene in situations where junior high school students have had a conflict with their gender or sexual identity because of these discussions happening around them with their friends or just with the celebrities they follow or the singers and the different shows and programs they're watching it's so normal if you really are paying attention they had I think it was 2015 that they call the year of the trans it's like the transgender year where a lot of transgender celebrities were coming out like Caitlyn Jenner and then I think it's Laverne Fox or Cox I can't remember her name but there are others as well who are RuPaul we know right people who are transgender and they became very popular during that year of 2015 so since then if you are paying attention you'll notice that there is much more representation of the LGBTQ community in popular television popular shows music cartoons now there's you know pressure to make sure that there's representation even if it's just a character in the background you'll see sometimes you know two moms you know pushing a stroller or something like that in the backdrop of a scene in a cartoon so the messaging is there it's quite prevalent and it's continuously increasing so you can see why people are accepting this as being normal even though it conflicts with their faith values and I have actually worked with groups including teens who have a really difficult time reconciling what the faith says and then having friends who are part of the LGBTQ community or just hearing the messages that come from the left or the social movement that says it's all fine and respect people and of course we should respect people regardless of their orientation regardless of their faith that's just a principle of our faith is just to treat people well and be always civil so that's not nobody's arguing that but I think they have a hard time trying to reconcile you know how the faith is very clear about these things and then society says no there's nothing wrong with it so people are having a hard time with this issue but we have to be strong as Muslims and be confident to stand up for our values and our principles without getting swept into or pulled into any types of traps that may be set up for us it's unfair I think in my personal opinion that someone who chooses to practice their faith as a Muslim Christian Jewish or any other faith tradition that doesn't accept these acts as being permissible that they are treated as though they're bigots and that there's something inherently wrong with them because they don't agree with that particular lifestyle I don't accept that and I don't think we should I think we should just be people that say we reserve the right to practice our faith and to hold on to our faith values without having to compromise or capitulate to political agendas and movements and yet in the same you know breath we can say we respect all people's rights to live and to exist in peace and harmony and not to be harmed and that's it leave it at let's just have mutual respect you live your way I'm not going to bother you and you do the same for me don't dictate to me what I should believe in and don't label me as being someone who is a bigot or prejudice just because I have my beliefs no because you know as Muslims we treat people inshallah based on the content of their character how you know whether or not they're good people and just basic civility we're not looking at personal choices and lifestyle choices and we should that should be extended to us as well you know just have mutual respect for people but going back to the topic of is it an enormity yes we believe that those acts are haram and that's it I mean that's just there's really no dispute about it from the orthodox position of Islam you might find other people who claim that there's other positions but orthodoxy is pretty that's it it's it is what it is so that's the two enormities of the genitals then we move on to the enormities of the hands of course these are pretty obvious right killing and theft we know our kebab are haram so may Allah protect us from ever falling into those behaviors human beings of all stripes and backgrounds have unfortunately found themselves in these situations so we should never think that we're above it we should always ask Allah for protection right from ever falling into scenarios like that or situations like that where our emotions lead us to do something so heinous as to as to kill take a life or to take property that's not ours or something that's not ours so may Allah protect us from that um the remaining enormities are let's see here just give me a second some of that uh oh one too far so the enormity of the feet is just one fleeing from battle right so we know that you know the deflectors that's what compromised the Muslims and at Uhad and other battles so we know that it's over time this is unfortunately it has happened where people have deflected they've gotten afraid or some other reason so this would be definitely a haram and then of the whole body this is you know a really serious one for us all to think about the disrespect of parents uh so so important again because it's so relevant in our time when we see that uh this idea of parental authority being constantly undermined and parents being presented as just fools, buffoons easily gullible this is what a lot of our films are cartoons even the characters and the cartoons you know the Simpsons you look at the parent parent uh you know characters they're usually very dull you know just not very bright um and there's a lot of undermining of the authority that happens so it's very common and this is one of the signs of the end of time as well right there are also some more in this about so we have to look to how we treat our own parents if they are living inshallah one or both if they're still living how do we speak to them right do we what tone of voice do we use with them and it's understandable that because I know several friends and people who are my age who are caring for elderly parents or parents with you know just really difficult uh uh circumstances and tough personalities and you know they're not they're set in their ways you know some of our parents are just really set in their ways and they're not always willing to compromise with their uh young adult children and so I've had to in many uh many times in my life help my friends or other people I know deal with calming their themselves down when they're talking with their parents because they get so angered easily and so frustrated you know it's it's a time where the uh generational gap um really is common uh you see uh not just you know um because of the different uh or times that that each uh the parent and the child were raised in but also just the age you know the the with age comes uh a lot of challenges right you have health challenges our parents are oftentimes taking medications um or they have their own long history of trauma PTSD God knows you know and a lot of our parents if we're coming from cultures and backgrounds where they saw a lot of hardships and strife they likely do have residual um emotional baggage from all of that and so we have to bear in mind that you know the to just be more as patient as we possibly can and to um to know how to deal with those situations by regulating our emotions because that's really the only thing we can control right so anyway that's like a larger discussion but the point is is just to be very mindful of how we speak to our parents and the um and also how we teach our children to respect us um always in my opinion it's very effective to always attach the you know the respect that our parents give excuse me our children give to us as parents to Allah SWT that it's really kind of that that's the the the trajectory right it's not that we are um that all of their all their respect should just stay with us but it's more it's like a conduit right if they can respect us and treat us um well and be mindful of our rules and obey then it will make their spiritual path easier and so framing it that way I think also keeps us accountable as parents so that we make sure we don't you know go over the boundaries because there are parents who certainly um you know are excessive and and can be uh too harsh or just take advantage of the relationship with their kids and because they think that they have that right but when you look at parenting the prophetic examples what parenting in Islam is all about it really is about Allah SWT our objective is to raise strong moral agents you know servants of Allah SWT we can't get in their way we shouldn't get in their way we're just a means to an end inshallah that they have uh strong and we can give them that in our homes and as long as they're with us so that should be the objective inshallah okay so the final comments here one should avoid all the wrongs that relate to or affect any of Allah's servants because those wrongs can be possible can be impossible to rectify as for what remains between an individual and Allah is less harmful to others and is much easier so this is an important distinction too that any of these sins that have to do with wronging other human beings or another person are far heavier on the scale than the things that we do where we wrong ourselves we shouldn't do either as best as we can we should always guard ourselves from either but to know that when we engage in behavior that harms other people this will be much heavier on our scales against us so may Allah protect us from all of this inshallah I mean so I'm going to stop here we didn't we did this is the end by the way I'm pretty sure I don't think there's any more after this of chapter two so our next session we will yeah we'll do chapter three here which is practical steps to change our condition okay so let me go ahead and stops the screen and I will now look to the comments to see if there's any Bismillah I usually don't see any so I don't know if you guys are just shy but I'm going to look anyway Mashallah I see some people thank you for your comments on the facebook page anyway and now I'll check YouTube as I always do I try to cover both so that I don't miss anything um just give me a second here here we go see if there's any questions sorry okay so let's see I see comments where they maybe okay okay good comments here some very nice comments thank you I see I just see some nice comments and salams and other things but I don't see any questions so thank you all for tuning in again it's always an honor that you spend your evenings, Sunday evenings with us here at MCC so thank you so much two weeks from now we will continue the discussion with Chapter 3 I look forward to seeing you guys there we'll go ahead and end in Dua SubhanakAllah Bismillah Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Have a good evening. Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Bismillahir rahmanir raheem. Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salamu ala asheb al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen. Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habib al-Muhammad. Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, wa ala alaihi wa sahbihi wa sallam, Tasbeeman katira. Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh, dear brothers and sisters. Alhamdulillah, it has been a few weeks since our last meeting and I want to first apologize for anyone who may have been online last week waiting for the class to start. I just got my schedule mixed up completely. So please forgive me for that. My responsibility. But Alhamdulillah MTC was kind enough to accommodate us this week. So inshallah it kind of works out because this will be the last session for the this year and then we'll resume inshallah ta'ala when we come back. But we know that a lot of people have already begun their holiday break. Maybe they're traveling, maybe they're not, but they might be just spending time with family. So inshallah you'll enjoy a nice break before we come back. But for today, Alhamdulillah, we're going to go ahead and kind of pick up from where we left off last time. And so I do have the presentation. Let me pull it up for those who may be joining us for the first time in case you've never been or have never attended before. We've been covering a text that is called Agenda to Change Your Condition. And it was written by Imam Zed Shakir and Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. So Alhamdulillah I have the text with me and I'll show you in just a minute actually before I screen share. I should do that since the camera is nice and big so you can see it. So this is the text. So Sheikh Hamza Yusuf and Imam Zed Shakir wrote this and it is really a life altering transformative text that just covers so many different topics. And so I'm really excited to jump back into it because we kind of, we almost closed out chapter two last time. There is a couple more things to talk about, but we're going to begin chapter three, which is on the practical steps to change our condition. So if you don't have the text, I definitely advise you to get it because it's just something that everybody should have at home. But also it will bring you up to speed so that, you know, what we're going to talk about moving forward. So look into that in the next week or so. If you again are new to the class and you'd like to stick around, inshallah, I think it'll be a great thing to do to prep you before we come back after break. So with that said, I'll screen share. Bismillah. And we'll pick up where we left off. So just give me one second here. So this is the presentation, but we are quite a little bit ahead here. So we almost, yeah, we were on this last slide here. So actually the last slide, if you go back by the way, MCCLHUM.com records all of these sessions. So there are recordings available. You can go back and watch them just kind of follow along. But the last slide that we talked about actually was a slide. It was on the different enormities, which are of course, you know, the sins that we do with the different limbs that we have. And so we ended on this slide. And then the very last slide for chapter two were recommendations on how to achieve or reach sincerity. And so these are just general advices, but again, very important for all of us to reflect on. The recitation of the Quran first and foremost, that is the first advice, you know, if we really, truly want to be sincere and we want ikhlas, inshallah, all of us want ikhlas in our Ibada and in our relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, then we cannot underestimate the importance of really committing to daily practice of reading the Quran and really thinking about its meanings, inshallah, if we're able to. And then if we're not able to contemplate its relevance, then to at least recite it. You know, some people, maybe because of language limitations, they're, they don't, they can't really, you know, go beyond the recitation. They may be, I mean, I know I have family members who don't read the Quran from the text because they were never taught and they're much older and it's very difficult for them or they have vision problems. So there could be many, many reasons why someone can't commit to actually doing more in-depth, you know, reflections on the meanings. But if they're not able to, if you're not able to do that, then the least that we should be doing is reciting the Quran and really finding a routine and a rhythm that is, that works for us. Everybody's schedule is different. Everybody's abilities may range based again on, on your experience or how much you've studied. But, you know, it's important to note that learning to Jweed is one of the farghain. It's one of the obligatory deeds or actions that we must all do as Muslims. And so, you know, in this day and age with so many opportunities online to learn, you know, once upon a time it may have been much harder for people because they didn't have access to knowledge. But now that we are in this very, you know, connected world and we have all of this access, we should take it very seriously to learn the book of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and make sure that our recitation is done correctly. Before, you know, we leave this world, it's one of the, again, the farghain that we should commit to doing or at least make the intention and start looking around, shopping around as they say, you know, ask around. You might find friends or, you know, community members that have, that know someone. Maybe there's someone in your community who is willing to teach you. Maybe, of course right now we're all in quarantine so they could do Zoom sessions. They could somehow figure it out and be willing to pay if they ask for that because this is something that is really important. And, you know, don't get, don't let that be a barrier to learning is, you know, try to find, and there's very reasonable programs. I mean, I know many international programs now that will accommodate schedules even if it's really late for them in different parts of the world, Pakistan, Egypt. I know people who use different services. I've used different services. I still actually use services for my children that are international and they're very affordable. But the point is to make sure that you really take it seriously to recite the Book of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala in the correct way. So tajweed becomes a priority. And then learning Dua's and, you know, supplications and litanies or al-rad, right, or Dua's, these are very important to commit to. I have written several posts on my social media about the importance of committing to a daily formulaic set of prayers. Again, this is all what our teachers taught us for many, you know, many, many years ago that we need to rely on the protective Dua's that the Prophet ﷺ left for us. All of it is from the sunnah. And throughout history, all of our great ulama had this practice. They were very committed to regular, you know, recitation of the Dua's that the Prophet ﷺ left for us. And we know, Alhamdulillah, our deen is complete. So from the morning, you know, time that we wake up in the morning until we go to sleep, throughout the day, there are Dua's to say at every point, you know, regardless of what we're doing, we leave the house, we eat, we get dressed and going into the bathroom, leaving the bathroom. There are so many different Dua's that we could, we should memorize and learn, right, waking up, going to sleep. So finishing our meals, drinking, right, all of these different activities that we do throughout the day. We should know those Dua's and really commit to them. And then the specific protective Dua's that will protect us from all the evils and harms in the world. So when we do these things regularly, you know, we recite the Book of Allah and try to really focus on its meanings or at least get in the practice of regular recitation. And then we recite the Dua's and the supplications of the Prophet ﷺ left for us. Obviously, all of that benefits us in more ways than one. But it also inculcates the sincerity because now our claim of faith is proven by the follow-up of our actions, right, where it's aligning. You know, a lot of people are nominally faithful people, right. In all religious traditions, you have many people who will, you know, claim to be a part of a faith. But the proof of one's faith is certainly in one's actions. And so that's how you want to think about it. And here, of course, the Prophet ﷺ is through these hadith that he's left for us is emphasizing the importance of learning the Qur'an and, of course, teaching it if you take it to the next level. If you do know the Qur'an, this is also an incredible way to gain many, many rewards is to teach the Qur'an. So those were the last or that was the last section of chapter 2. And so again, we're back to now the text. And so the chapter 3 is titled Practical Steps to Changing Our Conditions. So up until now, we've really been talking about it. I mean, if you look at chapter 1, right, we talked about Taqwa, its definition and benefits. Chapter 2 is about the heart and its treatments. So it's really starting from, you know, the foundational beliefs that we should all have about Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala how to inculcate, you know, Taqwa and then, of course, to prove our sincerity. So working on purification of the heart, working on matching again or aligning our deeds with our beliefs. So now we're getting into more practical, everyday, day-to-day activities that our beloved teachers here, Shahamza and Zaid have left for us in terms of really taking it to the next level, sustaining your faith, right? Because all of what we've been doing now is talking about how to purify and really try to maximize our potential in terms of our own devotion and our own beliefs. But now it's like, how do you sustain that? Well, let's look. Let's look at what the advice is. So chapter three, practical steps. So there are a lot of different sections in this chapter, which each section has a lot of, you know, just amazing advice. And I've gone ahead and made this, you know, slide just for us to kind of look at all of the different pathways, you know, practical things that we can do to again solidify, fortify, sustain, maintain our level of faith. And so let's, you know, just look at some of these, the five pillars, of course, we know this is, you know, Islam 101. We all know that you have to know what those five pillars are and know how to regularly tend to those every day, our prayers, our fasts, our zakah, our Hajj, of course, our testimony of faith. All of that is essential to the to sustaining your faith. But then also we look outward, right? Because that's very internal work. But then you want to look outward. So there's the active outreach or that way that we that we'll get into the focus cooperation, good character, right? Coming break. So you'll see this theme ongoing throughout the text where, especially from this point forward, whereas there's this back and forth back and forth this emphasis on outwardly, you know, doing things practically, you know, basically actions that prove one's faith that benefit not just you but other people, right? Being good stewards of the earth. But then it brings it back inward. And so you'll see this repeatedly and in here you know, kinship families, maintaining ties, you know, so important, giving charity. A lot of that is outward, right? Then we bring it back to the Quran. We bring it back to the remembrance of Allah, commanding, good and evil. Again, we are, you know doing that outwardly when we see injustices and things that are wrong we should be speaking up. Empathy. It's another very outward action, you know, to be empathic with people is to feel their pain and to try to remove burdens and to really be selfless and to think of others, right? And then we bring it back to supplication, physical health. We bring it back to our own taking care of the Amana that Allah has given us. Being committed people, respecting time our attitude, devotion. So all of these really great topics are covered in chapter 3. And obviously we're not going to have time to go through all of them. So we'll just do the best that we can in this hour that we have. So let's start off right away with the first one, the five pillars. So this is again, remember the point of this chapter is for you to sustain your faith. It's the whole book is about agenda to change our condition. So if you've done all the internal work, or at least you're working on those internal things about, you know, purifying your heart, you need to also realize that burnout is real, right? Spiritual burnout is very real. And we also have a sworn enemy that will do everything possible to prevent us from moving forward, which is why we have to rely on the jamaat. The jamaat is very important in Islam. You know, we're not, we are a dean, we're pretty much everything we do in many ways. If you think about it, there is that group component to it, right? When we pray, of course, we have our own internal very deep dialogue with Allah swt when we're praying, but we're also encouraged to pray in jamaat as often as possible. When we fast, we fast in a month we should fast as often as we can. Of course it's very beneficial, but the emphasis of fasting in Ramadan is that we're doing it as a group and everybody's doing it together. We go to Hajj together. So the jamaat is very important in helping to sustain the momentum and to to take us to the next level, so that we're always growing. So right away, you know, the advice is that we form a serious study group to learn the 5 pillars and this is really good advice too for all Muslims. As I said it in the beginning that it's kind of 101, but if we're really being honest, this isn't just something that converts should be understanding, right? Every all of us can benefit from just reviewing and making sure that we have a clear understanding of the 5 pillars, the spiritual components, the benefits of them and really looking at each one and trying to perfect our practice of those things. So when we talk about the 5 pillars you don't have to simplify it as something that we teach in Sunday school or even in secular schools that's one of the first things they'll teach you about Islam. There's 5 pillars of Islam and you'll see a lot of references to that. That's not a very deep study of the 5 pillars it's just naming them, but when you form a study group this is actually looking at the more detail, the more intricate aspects of these 5 pillars and really getting a detailed understanding of it with guidance of course looking at what our great scholars of the past advised how to do the prayer for example, just a prayer alone, to have a haraqa on the prayer alone this would be impossible to cover in one session it would have to be ongoing, so you could break it up and there's many many different ways to do it, but the point is to take it seriously for yourself that I need this to sustain myself if I'm feeling those spiritual low points maybe it's because I'm trying to do all this by myself, but if I form a group with 2, 3, 4, 5 maybe just a small circle doesn't have to be a big giant group and I know there are many people throughout the country or world who are blessed to have a Sahaba, good companions that they can do these things with and maybe they meet with them regularly, you might already have a haraqa that you're a part of which is great and if you do alhamdulillah I'm sure you feel the weekly or monthly or bi-weekly whatever sustenance you're getting from that group, you feel the benefit of that and in its absence you also feel you know that the effect of that, so this would be really for people who don't have that and they may have never thought of doing that and I've certainly had many many instances where I've given this advice of creating haraqas and not to get intimidated by the idea that oh I'm not a teacher, I don't know anything, you know what do I what can I teach people and so a lot of people they get deterred because they think you'd have to be qualified with a certain amount of knowledge in order to do something like that but you don't, study circles are exactly what they are just like in college or in school when you are a student and you're learning and you realize hey I learn a lot better when I work with groups, it's the same idea so you're an equal member with your peer group or whichever group you get together and the purpose of it is to enhance the studying instead of just being on your own and getting burnt out or not being motivated so there's immense benefit of it and then of course you look to the the text that like Agenda to Change or Conditioned Purification of the Heart, all these other great texts that can offer you guidance on what to talk about, what to study together just reading a text together or even listening to I know people who've done that they will get together in a group but then their study is the Druze of another scholar so they'll listen to scholars and then they'll talk about it, it's like a discussion group so there's so many different formats but the point is take it seriously, take it to the next level make sure you have a Gemma or a circle that you study with and then here the second advice, once you reach adulthood it is required to learn the far behind the individual obligations which I mentioned earlier one of them anyway which was the Tajweed and the five pillars at a starting place so this is for our young children even, we should inculcate this in them that they should have knowledge of these things when they reach the age of adulthood and maturity and that they know that these are very important things and then back to again what we should be focusing on for our own development we should learn Aqidah or creed, what does a Muslim believe in what are the six articles of faith for example and what do we believe about Allah SWT what do we believe about heaven and hell what do we believe about the prophets and about the scriptures all of those things are very important and we should commit to studying them from sounds, traditional sources and teachers but making sure our understanding is solid and I would say just in my experience with working with the community and I say this a lot that I really think a lot of faith crises that we're seeing today is because people don't have very solid creedal understanding they may have learned just some basic things growing up or through their family or even in their local communities but they haven't formally studied it and there are Alhamdulillah texts available but I would definitely encourage you to look into studying it with someone who's qualified because there will be questions that you may have and you want to make sure that you get those answered correctly. I had actually someone reach out to me just earlier this week it was a very deep Aqidah question and it was on an Instagram direct message and so I just replied to her she was really struggling with certain faith concepts and I just told her the questions you have are very deep difficult to have a textual exchange about these things because they're very high level but I referred her to a clip of one of our teachers discussing the very issue she was asking about so there is great content Alhamdulillah online and there are classes being offered you just have to find out where people are teaching Aqidah and try to make sure that they're good sources and sign up because it will really help you to understand your place in this world and how to react accordingly because if you don't understand the design element for example of this world or that it's ephemeral and it's fleeting and you shouldn't attach your heart to it, right? You may be susceptible to things like the spiritual diseases like because you're not seeing it for what it is where when you study Aqidah deeply you'll understand the value of this dunya and especially when you contrast it to the Akhira and you start to just have a better grounded understanding instead of getting swept away so it's very important to study Aqidah of course the prayer making sure that you understand the Fiqh of Tahara, of Salah, of making sure you know how to pray and follow Madhab and make sure that you are doing it according to again how it's been done for hundreds of years and that there's a consistency in your practice making sure you pray on time and that you have that Salah inshallah and then Zakat fasting, pilgrimage, all of those again as we talked the five pillars that you have that you've studied it as part of your own journey that this is something that you really did formally study and then as you learn you practice what you learn pretty simple but you take yourself seriously and I think this is something I've heard our teachers say which is an important little note to make a little side note but you know we live in a time an era where there's just so much frivolity and everybody's just constantly joking around and entertaining themselves and eating and consuming and finding all of these ways to not take life very seriously you know watching sports all day watching movies all day listening to music browsing, shopping all of these things we do of course we have to live in this dunya but as Muslims we know to do these things in moderation and when you know necessary but that's not why we live we don't live to do those things we live to worship Allah SWT but we see that in the world that we live in there's so much running away from responsibility running away from serious subjects like death nobody wants to talk about death nobody wants to talk about things that are too serious you know because we're also conditioned to think that life is about fun fun fun well it's not it's about taking responsibility for yourself realizing you will be held accountable making sure that you watch what you say how you behave but holding yourself to a really standard than just being silly and trying to have fun all day that's not the purpose of life so you want to practice what you learn you know it's not enough to just learn something absorb it and then repeat it to other people you have to put it into your own practice so very important piece of advice and then when all of these things with regards to those five pillars are are solid and you really are practicing what you what you've learned to go on to other aspects of which are the rules of marriage you know buying and selling and any other sections that would pertain to you specifically you know there's different people in different circumstances but if you need to study certain areas that would be certainly something that you should look into and so that becomes your focus right that you're taking account of what you know what you don't know and you really are trying to better and that's how we should all be every day or every month every week we should look back and feel like we're progressing because we're doing something and that doesn't have to you know be a big monumental change you know we don't big changes are hard to sustain but doing smaller deeds as we know from the hadith is better right than just kind of going becoming very you know super super religious overnight and trying to or ambitious and taking on too much and then you go back to your ways or completely go the opposite direction because you've burnt out so certainly not saying that but you want to just keep yourself always moving forward and feeling like I've been doing better than I was right if you're the same person or relapsing to worse then there's something off and that's what should tell you I need to start doing something differently right and then to more advices about again related to the five pillars commit to studying Arabic so if you're able to again important to know how to read and write Arabic Arabic is a language it's obviously one of the the greatest languages if not the greatest language because it is the language of the book of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala but in terms of study you know many people who are subhanallah not even Muslim will recognize its beauty and its utility so there's so much usefulness studying Arabic if you can some people have an act for languages and it's easier for them other people maybe they're not very that's not easy for them but you can at least learn the basics and the basics in this case which would be the most essential part of learning Arabic is to do it to make sure that at least you know how to recite the book of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and if you want to take that further to the next step and learn grammar and all of that it would be great so then the next advice here we're going back to the slide show is to study at least one sacred text on purification of the heart so there are different texts on feski et al nafs and the one that we may have heard I've certainly referenced it several times because it's very much connected to this text agenda to change our condition is the book that was translated by the use of called which is book on the purification of the heart and did a translation commentary of this book and so I have it actually right in front of me I always have the books that I think are really you know just we should have them in every Muslim home library easy access for me because I do speak often and I like to refer people to them so hopefully you can see this but here it is again again I'm posting this for people who don't are listening for the first time or may not be familiar with this text this is the probably in my estimation anyway because I've seen it the most popular English written for the English audience book on the diseases of the heart and and it's an incredible text I love it I actually have several copies of it I just think that everybody should have this book and you can teach it to children I actually did a children's class on purification of the heart it's available through the MCC website if you go through the playlist you'll see up there it was I think we did it during Ramadan of this past year we did certainly did it this year but I'm not sure I think we did do it yes during the month of Ramadan but check that out for if you have children very important to teach these subjects to your children early on because you know you want to prevent your children from forming habits that are destructive and that's the reality of the human being we're creatures of habit and so once we start doing something over and over and over again especially you know in that those formative years right children before puberty are just kind of you know in their own world but once they come to maturity they do start to solidify the personality their temperament all those things come together and so you want to make sure that they are very aware of the potential you know shortcomings or spiritual pitfalls before them and recognizing the spiritual diseases knowing its signs and symptoms and then of course the cures is very important and critical to help them overcome their nefs because you know Majahid and nefs are the struggle with the self the ego is the lifelong struggle all of us have we all go through this every day every you know our minute of the day we're struggling against our our base carnal desires our you know our irascible self the part of us that is quick to anger that's just you know irrational or you know doesn't isn't thinking about long term you know benefits we have we all have our numbs the ego right thinking about immediate pleasures and it can be very indulgent and selfish that part of us is a barrier between us and Allah SWT so for us parents the best gift we can give our children is the tools that they need to overcome that part of us and the earlier you start the better if you wait for your teenager or child to reach you know mid teens or late teens or early adulthood and they've now have five or six you know years or seven years of bad habits it's harder for them to regulate themselves but if you enter you know introduce these things early then inshallah ta'ala you can really help them to learn to pay attention to their thoughts learn to pay attention to their inclinations their desires learn to self-regulate learn to control those impulses and inshallah ta'ala that will really tremendously pay off for them spiritually speaking as they grow older and so if you have never studied as an adult the diseases of the heart then certainly that's something that you want to look into and say I need to understand what they are what does Islam say about spiritual diseases because you know other traditions they have the same ideas about spiritual diseases but they may vary you know here and there but alhamdulillah our scholars identified 25 26 different main diseases and how they some of them are very subtle and you know unless you really know their definitions you may not know that you have that disease so once you are aware of it then it's like whoa I had no idea I had that disease forgive me but a lot of these things are again all available in this in these texts particular one purification of the heart so I encourage you to get that if you don't have it so do that you know at least once in your lifetime I mean you should in my opinion we should be studying this as often as possible and putting it into practice every day but at least try to get the book and read it through once so that you have some understanding of it inshallah and then in this case or the last advice here a qualified licensed teacher is always recommended but if not available find a study group on humility and the ability to say I do not know when necessary I love this advice because it kind of you know what I was saying earlier about starting you don't it's not required to have a teacher that is more knowledgeable or that has certain licenses in certain areas it's not required of course it's ideal certainly if you can find someone who has that join those groups but if you don't then you should just form that group with your friends or people that you know are committed and just agree to this philosophy that we have humility in this group and we're not trying to prove ourselves to anybody we're here to study together and if we don't know we don't know we can look to getting answers from again those who don't know as the Quran tells us right if you don't know ask those who don't know so this was the first section chapter three practical steps to change our condition the next section so again if you look at what I was saying earlier this is a lot of it's focused on oneself right again we're working a lot on improving ourselves now we look outward so it goes back to that you know inward outward so the this is active outreach first step here and again the advice you have to think about where you are on your journey this may not be right now maybe you just entered Islam and you're like wait a second I've got a lot to do this is all you know it's not necessarily in any particular order it's just giving us advice on how to move forward in our journey so some people they may have worked a lot on those internal you know just working on themselves internally so they're ready now to move forward or move outwardly but if you're not ready don't worry about this but it's still valuable to go over so first point here create an active outreach that program designed to produce results so if you feel like how that you've been practicing the dean consistently five ten years you have a really good rhythm you're really committed but you want to do more you feel there's this calling or something that's compelling you to do more for your community more outreach this is where you start so you may want to look to you know first of all your particular message have a program in place that is focused on outreach in that one and if so you know you can join them sign up as a volunteer and figure out what your part in that group would be are you going to take a lead position or do you just want to be called on for certain events but you kind of have to figure out what is best for you but if you do have that leadership you know impulse and you want to start sort of start things that aren't there then here's advice number two reach out to the non-muslim community through teaching doing community work and feeding others so you can start to you know take your again those those that feeling of wanting to do more beyond just yourself and look to what other community groups are in your particular area and see if there's a way to collaborate with them I know there are a lot of great interfaith groups and churches synagogues temples other groups that do do things together and this is really important I think in this day and age when religion and religious institutions and religious groups are attacked so fervently and you know there's a lot of unfortunately really negative messages that are directed towards religious groups I think it's important that we do band together on those things that we have in common shared values shared principles so obviously feeding people and just doing outreach is really important you know I was very fortunate when I first came into Islam I met some great pioneers in our community here in the Bay Area trailblazing women that I credit to I call them my sheroes but we have people like sister Amina Jandali who started the ING Islamic Networks group and I remember I was you know I believe I was either fresh out of high school or very like first year of college when I became aware of their work and I attended some of their sessions where they would go to churches or schools and speak about Islam and you know I was so impressed by seeing these very strong empowered Muslim women speaking to non-Muslim audiences about Islam but in a very just a beautiful way in a way of you know not their intention was not to convert people it was just to educate and so I was just really impressed by their skills and their knowledge and then a few years later or shortly after I actually ended up working for ING for a while and it was really great to learn you know on just be on the ground and you know as a speaker I spoke with them as well that's kind of where I started a lot of my public speaking but I learned so much not just from them and all of the other great speakers but also the non-Muslims that I had access to going to churches going to police stations going to different you know events that we were invited to high schools colleges it was really great because you just see it increased it increases your faith to do those things because you see this healthy pride you know that you start to have about being a Muslim and just really wanting to share your faith and so interfaith work it's not for everybody but if it's something that does call to you then look into it and see how you can start and I would absolutely say ING is a wonderful resource even if you go to their website ING.org they have so much wonderful content you can reach out to them and tell them if you're interested in learning more about how to get some of their resources and think about even opening I'm actually not sure if they still do that but when I was working with them they had chapters all throughout the country of different affiliates that were working with them so you can see if something is lacking in your community but you want to do it that's certainly an option for you but the point is to feel you know to do it right right to do it right so here point number three is something to talk about point number three and four relates to this so work to allay the fears of the dominant community and show them that we're not a threat to anyone's safety as we know because of Islamophobia it's real there is a very targeted attacks against Muslims and Islam to have that you know mission to say I'm gonna you know just do whatever I can work with my community work within you know my even if it's a school setting like sometimes maybe not connected to their local or the large scale but even working in smaller efforts like you know at your children's school but somehow making that part of your mission which is I'm going to make sure that you know people realize that I as a Muslim bring so much blessing because of my faith to whatever I'm involved in and so this is why it's so important that we work on ourselves because when you're part of a group you're in representing that group you should have the highest standards because not only is your person you know being represented but you're also representing your faith and so it's on doing things right so when there's school meetings or boards or committees if you belong to them doing it just with that intention I'm gonna show up on time I'm not gonna come in late I'm going to let these people know that I'm an asset to this organization and so I'm gonna hold myself to that high standard and inshallah make sure that they realize that I bring so much value and so that's a beautiful intention that we should all have in everything that we do because it's a slam you know just having like I said high a high standard is part of our is a big part of our faith so doing things correctly and in the the next point point number four when we present Islam at the institutional level whether again it's because we're doing interfaith work or just in our own private lives in our schools in our neighborhoods in our work that we do it with the aim of educating and informing not trying to convert people right because our faith is not one of you know where we go and prostilize or try to convert you know outwardly we invite people to see the beauty of Islam through our inshallah good character our care and concern our desire for the common will and really wanting to benefit people that they want to know more about our faith because we're representing it beautifully so that those are the intentions when we talk about outreach interfaith work any type of contribution you're making to your community that you do it with that intention and then back to a more intimate you know intention again in our personal lives we should be proud of being Muslim and we should be open to discuss and share our faith with others you know for example you know when you're I know many people have over the years and I have worked with non-Muslims I've worked in corporate settings so I know that things have drastically changed first of all like when I was you know much younger there weren't a lot of representatives or you know like mohajibah for example in my community it's grown exponentially since then but it was hard to be mohajibah when very few people knew what that was or what that meant and of course you know prejudice was real all those things were very real I experienced it so I know and I know others who have experienced it so it was hard to sometimes have open dialogue about religion and we know also in this society there's certain taboo topics right so and I would say it's still in place with certain things but you know you don't openly talk about politics or or religion and certain things that are very private affairs people tended to not really be receptive to those discussions but we've changed you know the society has shifted so much now that people are very open about their lifestyle choices they're very proud identity politics is real everybody's out and showing up with their symbols you know whatever those symbols are they're very proud of who they are and so we as Muslims I mean we didn't have to wait for all of this to happen we should have always had that you know sense of honor in our faith and alhamdulillah feeling like we do want to share it with other people but even more so now that all of those barriers societal barriers and norms have moved away and we can openly discuss things then why not why not talk about you know for example if you're fasting during Ramadan instead of shying away from telling your co-workers because you don't want to make them uncomfortable oh you know I've heard a lot of things over the years where people are you know just trying to navigate these things and they don't know how but it's a lot of it is you know I don't want to bother people I don't want to impose I don't want to impose well you're not imposing if you just tell your co-workers oh I can't attend the company lunch or dinner because I'm fasting and I need to break my fast that's not in position that way I think we need to reframe the conversation honest and truthful and you're being open and proud of who you are but also if you need to pray you know how many people don't pray in their workplaces because of fear that they're going to be misjudged and you know there might be consequences oh I you know might affect my relationship with my boss or my co-workers you know if I have to keep taking breaks I don't want them to think I'm slacking off I have heard every excuse that people have but fundamentally it comes down to you know you're not praying because maybe there is a hesitancy to share aspects of your faith with people you want to address that and figure out you know what is it is it really you know is there a shyness there that I need to work out and actually if you study the purification of the heart you'll find that one of the diseases of the heart is what we call blame worthy modesty where there is a sense of feeling embarrassed in certain circumstances when you shouldn't and you become shy or you know it can manifest in different ways but there is a bit of cowardice and it's considered a disease of the heart so if that's the case you want to have honest conversations with yourself and then say well you know if I change that if I start to be more proud of my identity as a Muslim you know you wear hijab or you have a beard you wear a kufi their brothers masha'Allah who represent who are out there very proud of their identity so they're outwardly clearly Muslim but then also they're happy to tell people oh I don't drink alcohol yeah we don't we don't shy away from topics like that and then if you do that guess what your children will also learn from you so that when they're in high school and it's prom or some other social event and someone asks them why they can't attend or can you come to this party it's a mixed party they can be very strong to say yeah I don't do parties I don't date I don't do those things I'm a Muslim and there's no conversation beyond that that has to be had you know they don't cower when those conversations come up so it's so important that we have that understanding of real just pride in who we are not pride in the sense of we think we're better out of another people but that we are very honored you know right it's the dot that we should say every day thank God for the blessing of Islam that we're so honored to share our faith with people and to talk about things openly Ramadan Hajj you know not to minimize conversations I've been in those situations where I can see the discomfort that some Muslims have around non-Muslims when talking about faith and it's sad because you know they shut down the conversation sometimes oh let's not talk about that it's okay don't worry about it and it's like no maybe that person genuinely wants to know but you've assumed or you've projected your discomfort onto them and then the whole conversation is gone and that person could have maybe benefited maybe they would have you know learned more and and been interested more or they would have helped to counter all of these lies against Islam and Muslims because you gave them the knowledge to do so so the point is is in our own personal lives let's have let's show up more be more courageous to talk about things of course with decorum with proper understanding time and place for everything you know you don't want to take over a board meeting or an important staff meeting just to do that one that's not what we're talking about but it's more not shying away from those conversations for any reason but being proud of your Muslim identity and then you know the sixth point here which is also really important is that we should try to be collaborative people you know instead of just starting something on our own just because we like control you know we just want to do things our way it might cause further problems and how many you know communities have suffered in that way because there were people who may have had initiative but they didn't have that that foresight to see hey you branching off and doing something on your own may actually affect you know an existing group or an existing organization or something that's doing that work already how about reaching out to them first and seeing if there's an opportunity to collaborate and being that's the spirit with which we should do things you know it's not about me and then I think we have to get away from centering individuals in these types of efforts you know it's not about the individual the greater good and the case of starting up an initiative whatever that may be if you think it's something you want to do always look to see what's already you know in existence in your particular area and see if you can work with them first so this is again great summary great guidance on how to actively do outreach in the best way with Hikma and with real you know just an order or an organized way of doing things now in the time that we have I'll try to do the last one here that I had prepared because I only I knew we weren't going to get through all of them so we'll do this one focus so now it's bringing it back to you know it's kind of bringing it back to oneself but also focusing on the work that we're doing but just giving us guidance on how to focus our intentions here so the first point and it's an extension of the previous slide but it's it's a let's look at it so find an area of concern that instills a passionate response and begin to work to alleviate the respective obstacles to produce change in that area so there's a lot of people and I would say maybe you know new Muslims may feel this a lot or just parents who are looking to get their kids involved you know I work a lot with parents and families so I know sometimes around those teen years parents are like oh gosh I don't want my kids to get caught up in all those terrible you know things that behaviors that a lot of teens can get risky behaviors that teens can get caught up and so I want to preoccupy them I want to get them involved in the masjid I want them to start volunteering do you know any things that they could do well whether you're doing it for that for your own self there are people who've retired and they may want to you know use their time they've worked they're now in those you know comfortable years of life where they have ample time and so they want to start to do more outreach or do something with their time so this is really good guidance for all of those different you know people or if you're a young professional there's some people who are students college students or you know even high school students who are working towards building their experience you know their their CV and they want more experience so whatever your ania is and whatever phase you are in life you want to make sure that there is whatever you get involved in it's passionate to you you know and there's some people who are very politically active so they an organization like care may be right up their alley because they're politically activated they as soon as something comes up about politics that you know they perk up other people are more oriented around relief work so if you find yourself wanting to do you know local relief work soup kitchens you know all those things you know pantries helping build rentries and feeding you know working with immigrant communities within your community to try to help new immigrants or the things that are relief oriented how did it there's a lot of potential there some people love education you know so if there's a way to teach and to go out into offer people you know workshops and different you know ways of teaching them something you can do something orphan relief you know there's so many different organizations but you want that the where you give your time to which whatever organization or group it really does come from the heart and it's something that you're very passionate about and then figure out again what you can offer in terms of time resources money guidance knowledge whatever you have inshallah those organizations will benefit from but pace yourself don't don't again go overboard always be aware of that there's a lot of people who post to do too much too fast too soon because a lot of times those are from from shaitan he knows that it's like a pendulum you know push push us into something really fast then it'll overwhelm us and then we just back away and you see people do that you know they'll just want to do it all and then also they disappear so this is where being aware of yourself is important recognize the power the wonderful organizations that we have even the masajid alhamdulillah in our community often times if you go back and you read the history of that organization it's usually one or two people who were grassroots bare bones had nothing very limited resources but had so much high him right had a lot of ambition and Allah subhan Allah gave them to feel and now they're you know have multimillion dollar organizations or groups or businesses or whatever but the point is they started with that strong intention and with that trust Allah subhan Allah and so never let shaitan take that away from you and make you think oh I can't do anything because there's a lot of people who have great ideas but they don't really go far with it because they let these thoughts of it's not going to happen deter them you know but there is immense power in one and of course Allah subhan Allah is proof of that right he is one so that and it's mentioned here in the book as well about focusing on that they said let me try to find that section we should remember that the greatest oh wait sorry that's not the right section it is Allah's number and everything good in this world of human endeavors was initially one individual's intention action and vision when there is commitment with sincerity creation moves to serve the purpose and we must keep in mind that actions are judged by intentions right in them and I haven't been yet so very important to remember that also we must work on changing ourselves so now look the advice even subhan Allah within the advice is bringing it back to ourselves you can do all this outreach do all this focus try to find every cause or any you know a cause that speaks to your heart and have high ambition but you have to commit to changing yourself first you know if you're trying to go out there and make the world a better place but internally you haven't done the work at all or aren't really doing the work regularly then you know you don't really have a lot of weight in your words right or as they phrased it little moral authority in demanding of others what we ourselves fail to practice we if you don't have those changes that you're speaking about you're trying to go out there and you know inspire other people with if you're not even doing those things and you have no authority to speak so focus on improving oneself committing to making those lasting changes constantly this internal and external you know dialogue it's always about what do I need to improve what can I do to improve the world but make sure that they are always at play and you don't leave one the other then the greatest struggle is speaking the truth in the presence of unjust authority we know that this is a you know it's very difficult most people struggle with this all people I would say struggle with this but I love how they took a different direction using this very commonly understood idea right that it's it's one of the greatest things to do is to speak to someone who's unjust but here what do they say this includes unjust authority at our own lower self when it disobeys Allah subhanAllah so when you're enough takes over you and prevents you from obeying Allah subhanAllah it is an unjust authority and so you have to speak against yourself see so actually being able to admit that you make mistakes and that you do wrong and you don't have to go out and scream it at the mountaintops you know on the mountaintops or confess your sins to other people but when you look at yourself in the mirror or when you're sitting there on the prayer rug hopefully with your head you know a hung low and humility that you recognize with internal shame before Allah subhanAllah where you've gone wrong and you are willing to rebuke yourself to really take ownership of those things and then the last point they made here is that the internal struggle or greater jihad is really purifying ourselves so constantly reminding ourselves that that is life long we need to be doing this we're never going to get to a place where you know we're done with mojahed enough it is an everyday process and that's why we have to revisit toil away work hard and it's so important to have these continuous conversations and ajama that we can work with so wow we are almost at the end of the hour here mashaAllah so let me stop share and I will go ahead and open up the facebook page here I don't know why I closed it sorry and I'll see if there's any questions but inshaAllah again for those of you who are joining us thank you this is we're still in the early part of chapter 3 there's a lot more sections to go so when we resume inshaAllah after this break and in the new year we will pick up with chapter 3 from where we left off so let me just quickly see if there are any questions oh I realized I forgot to share the this on my page today I'll share it afterwards but bear with me while I open up this page and then in the meantime I can also go to YouTube so I hope you enjoyed today's session inshaAllah and let people know if you have any non-muslims who are looking for a group I hope inshaAllah that they can benefit so please feel free to share with them sorry let me so I see some questions here I need help learning the rules of marriage mashaAllah so there are classes on fiqh classes I think I would certainly look at groups the rahmah foundation because they offer regular classes for women on a variety of different topics and fiqh is absolutely included in that so I can post their name for you inshaAllah it's called the rahmah foundation they are here in the Bay Area but they have online programs that anybody can join so inshaAllah you can benefit from them sorry I'm at the MCC page looking for the live video but I don't see it I don't know if it was posted this talk I hope it was but I don't see it on youtube hmm that's odd it's usually here yeah I don't see the live feed on youtube so brother salman if you are listening I don't know if you're there is it available on youtube today because I don't see a link for it I don't know if brother salman is there okay well if you're on youtube I am sorry I cannot find the link on youtube it's not up or I don't see it so I apologize if you are there and I don't see your question but inshaAllah may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala reward you and thank you for being here you can always send in your questions if they're urgent or you have any you would like if there's a specific thing that you need just let me know you can check with MCC's info I think email and inshaAllah they'll get it to me but for facebook I only saw that one question so I don't see anything else but I do thank all of you at MCC Sunday evening it's 9 o'clock so inshaAllah we will end in dua and I look forward to seeing you guys next year after the new year inshaAllah in health optimum health the best of health I hope all of you are stay safe stay safe you're you and your families inshaAllah and that we resume inshaAllah in a better condition I'm sorry one second I'm sorry give me one second now I feel bad because I just got a message from brother salman brother salman I saw your whatsapp but where's the youtube link because I don't see the youtube link but are there any questions no questions ok ok he said there's no questions thank you brother salman we'll go ahead and end in dua inshaAllah we'll see you guys next year I know that sounds like it's a long way off but it's only a little over a week so may Allah protect all of you and your families and your loved ones and I hope you'll be safe stay safe and take care stay safe stay safe thank you so much everyone inshaAllah again we'll see you guys next year I know that sounds like it's a long way off but it's only a little over a week so may Allah protect all of you and your families and your loved ones inshaAllah have a wonderful remainder of your year and we'll see you inshaAllah soon for those of you who are joining we are covering a very important text called agenda to change our condition which I have right here in front of me and what I'm going to do inshaAllah is screen share because we're going through some slides that I've created so let me go ahead and share my screen if you just give me one moment alright so as I'm just going to do a quick summary because some may be joining again and I want to bring them up to speed so we're on we're in this we're reading this text together called agenda to change our condition by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf we're on chapter three which is titled practical steps to change our condition and we've covered so far let's see here we have the five pillars active outreach and focus that's what we and I'll go back to the slides here so we covered these three slides last time so it was about two weeks before right when we met so we have these three that we went through for today we're going to continue with chapter three and actually let me go back to this slide in this chapter this is all as you know there's several sections in this chapter and so these are all the different sections so that's where we cover the five pillars active outreach and focus and so now we're going to inshaAllah do the next four sections here and we'll talk in depth so go ahead and read from or get to that slide so the slide for today we're going to do is cooperation so this is for those who do have the book it's on page 29 so if we read this particular section of the chapter it talks about the and I'll just go ahead and read this religion is based on recognizing the abilities of the believers that constitute the umma the Muslim community and facilitating the use of their respective gifts we need to understand that if one person focuses upon an area that differs from our own area of concern he or she is complimenting our own work and not detracting from it by not joining us so this is again practical steps to how and how we can change our condition right so we need to understand the importance of working together with our fellow community members the people around us so that we have mutual goals and we don't see one another as in any way a threat or a competition but rather we see that we all have the same basic desire which is inshallah to do the work the good works that will please Allah and that can be in many different forms there's people who are very politically activated there's other people who do relief work there's other people who enjoy teaching and grassroots work working within the community so everybody has their own niche or their own calling and we should respect that and also see that inshallah we're all part of a larger body the ummah and we have to respect one another and so this chapter or this section is really about cultivating that and so again if you continue point three here to not see individuals or organized groups as competitors or antagonists but rather again as brothers and sisters it goes the same purpose and really they go into a lot of detail about just the importance of the inculcating that love for one another you know through the all of the sunnah that we're taught you know we smile smiling is a sadafa so when we see one another whether it's in the masjid or at events or just you know in the grocery store when we know that people are working for the cause of Allah that we wish them well success but that we're genuine in our love for them and that we really are about seeing one another as part of again one body that ummah and there's so many hadith that reinforce that idea to always write that the ummah is one body if one part of the body hurts the entire body hurts all these had either to remind us to really see one another as being part of something great and not to in any way let those divisive feelings enter our hearts where we start to compete or maybe even do worse than that right to to deter people or to ruin or somehow affect the progress of other people's works there's you know people protect us from those diseases of the heart that would lead to that but there are some people who you know may sabotage another person's efforts just because they don't see them as as their brother or sister but rather as a competitor so really trying to rid your yourself from that and they go on to say so there are many paths to Allah and he guides those who struggle with themselves for his sake alone we should not see other Muslims either individuals or organized groups as competitors or antagonists rather we should see them as brothers and sisters and either work with them or work separately with amicable relations the least of which is giving them the greeting of peace with a smile right our communities suffer from an unhealthy competition viewing another's failure as our own success we should all hope and pray for the success of any activity that is good in nature and beneficial to the aims and purposes of sacred law so for example competing massages or you know organizations or even businesses you know somehow like you have you know a restaurant business that you don't see another Muslim who has a similar business or restaurant down the street or in another part of the city as being your competitor but rather as another believer who inshallah is providing you know the community members with halal risk and is inshallah you know putting halal income back into the community so you always see the fruits that these fruits will reach everybody instead of just looking at your own personal maybe you know your own personal issues that you may have those we have to work out right so really getting rid of those feelings in the heart and then they go on to say Islamic work through diverse organizations should never be the basis for negating the bonds of brotherhood and sisterhood established between us by Islam when that happens we are no longer doing Islamic work but are engaged in politics so you know really may Allah protect us again from fitna from in any way being a part of fitna because we may be part of you know some organization or a masjid or other you know school or something else but if we allow politics to enter you know the community and to cause divisions and you know parties and a lot of breaking up then obviously we're not doing much you know to please Allah we may in fact be held accountable for our part in all of that so we should really seek refuge from that we should speak well of other organizations or be silent about them you know instead of trying to take down or discredit or you know just cast a negative you know opinion or perpetuate maybe gossip never do that right just with with anybody let alone an entire organization right once we recognize that most of them are engaged in a different aspect of the same struggle we come to respect their efforts now there does you know there's some space here for thinking if you feel that an organization or an individual may be Allah doing something wrong of course that's a different situation right so if some appear to be or actually are misguided then we should offer counsel and pray to them if they have deviant positions or beliefs then we should request that qualified scholars clarify with clear proofs what those deviations are in doing so such a scholar must not use personal opinions but rather those of the rightly guided scholars of our tradition who are recognized by the scholars of the past so when there are again those people who may be doing something questionable you want to always have casting people out or what now is very popular which is cancel culture is it's really tragic because you see communities being really affected by that and I personally spoken with community members who have a hard time with their faith when they see fitna or people being canceled or entire organizations almost being shut down because of some scandal or what have you and most of the time it's because you know the approach to these situations is off we should try to always seek to fix the situation with good intentions not just to want to see something go down just because we're unhappy or upset or angry about it but rather thinking of the collective benefit or the collective harm and that's where we make our decision so if there's going to be a collective harm then of course we should be very careful make sure that we approach the individual or the organization with discretion request meetings privately try to approach them that way first and then however the consensus is to proceed at least doing it that way inshallah the consciences are clear and we can avoid some really horrible things from happening so just to make sure that we know that there's protocol and that protocol we should follow that always with the best of intentions inshallah rare opinions of one or two scholars that stand in disagreement with the majority of scholars on a given issue must not be used at the cost of unity through diversity though the opinions may be valid if it turns out there is a difference of opinion among our scholars regarding the issue then we should leave it for the sake of unity not argue or fight over it however if it is indeed wrong by consensus then we can bring it to their attention wisely and with a sincere desire to help them so you can see the intention and the council here is to always seek to do things without causing bigger problems right to have the most minimal effect you know that you can possibly have give the council try to of course you know make sure that the right opinion is issued and is understood but not to argue not to fight and not to let it you know have ripple effects that affect the entire community we ought to keep in mind that Musa alaih salam was commanded to go to Firaoun and speak to him with a gentle word which is of course chapter 20 verse 44 and this is advice for all of us really because giving advice is something that not everybody can do it really isn't we should learn how to I should say you know just because you want to correct someone doesn't mean you're the right person to do it because if you don't have the gentle or right approach it could actually cause a further a bigger problem so you want to make sure that you're somewhat aware of the art of giving to see how how does one do that being gentle again not having not being accusatory right off the bat you want to approach it very just in doses and steps and make sure that you're aware of how to do that in the best way possible and so this reminder is good for all of us just in general but especially those in the community who may be charged with this responsibility to correct another individual a public figure a teacher someone in the public eye or an organization on an issue that's controversial that person should absolutely know what approach it and here's the advice right to be gentle but of course firm and try to not cause further problems and then they go on to say that remembering that we are not more righteous than most of the salam and that our brother or sister is certainly not farther astray than found we can approach the matter with gentle humility and a genuine desire for the well-being and guidance for all and that again is the mutual benefit right the collective benefit inshallah for everyone we have an example of this gentle approach when Imam Ali sent Ibn Abbas to reason with the seceders Ibn Abbas succeeded in guiding thousands of them by providing clear proofs this mass repentance lessened the severity and length of the complagration when the two forces met on the battlefield such as to you know from history we cannot view other Muslims as objects of hatred no matter who they may be if they are Muslims they have the sanctity of Islam and their name is to be honored unless a situation obliges us to condemn an act or position that is in contra distinction to the sacred law and tenets of universal Islam as opposed to sectarian views of Islam and then moreover we should not listen to or partake in backbiting Muslims or people of other faiths and I think this is also a very important council that you know backbiting or any negative quality lying in and of itself they are blame worthy they are wrong, they are haram it is not a matter of the object sometimes people think oh well if it is non-muslim why does it matter or they are kafat or they are this you are reflecting the disease within yourself and the target of it is irrelevant at that point the fact that you do it, the fact that you backbite the fact that you lie is the problem it is not who you are lying about and so this distinction that we should not harbor negative feelings towards Muslims but also we should not allow these habits to extend to people of other faiths is very important it is just wrong in and of itself if it is necessary to point out deviations to clarify them we should do as the messenger of Allah did on occasion he declared what is wrong with the people who do such and such so when the Prophet said he would want to correct something or someone's behavior he would never out them he would never mention their name in public in any way embarrass them or humiliate them he would always focus on the issue and so this is a very wise way of addressing the problem without speaking directly to the individual so that is certainly acceptable and of course we should be tactful and mindful of how the phrasing and the words we use you want to make sure like our teachers would remind us not to use identifiable or identifying language if you are speaking about a specific situation or incident or organization you don't want to in any way reference things or give clues that would lead people to know who you are speaking about or which organization you are speaking about so you got to be tactful and very general in your delivery so that people can't draw their own conclusions because otherwise you are just contributing to further maybe suspicion and unwarranted suspicion or gossip and those things so you want to just keep it to the issue itself we should also be vigilant in avoiding stale and sterile debates that have persisted for centuries and produced little benefit and much harm really argumentation is there's plenty of hadith and proofs against arguing it's really blame worthy it's something we should avoid at all costs healthy, productive discussions are different than argumentation in addition we should avoid labeling people or groups such as Salafi Sufi, Wahabi for example as these in gender animosity name calling is condemned in the Quran if the intention is contempt so if you are referring to a group of people in your delivery it's clear that you don't like them this would fall under this and may Allah forgive us because sometimes again we think we are in the right sometimes you see something that maybe deviant or you just don't agree with and you feel justified why do they do this to anybody who's been to the sacred lands for example you may have seen things or heard things that really bother you or trouble you but if you are using those labels again in this way this is what they're speaking about that we have to be careful from that if the intention is to elucidate a position that we must examine our intention and also our level of understanding most of us are not capable of debating with any legitimate authority whatsoever and he said disputation is detestable for scholars and those close to Allah so what is to be said of the argumentation of the uneducated and foolish consider the words of Allah to his prophet so Allah said to him we said debate with them with what is most excellent this is in chapter 16 verse 125 so this is all still we're still talking about cooperation they've given Mashallah more than two pages almost three pages to this section and it's because there's so much fitnah that we already see in our community but also to hold ourselves accountable so that we're not in any way participating or condoning or blind to what is behavior that would be blamed more than on us so all of this is really important to consider then they go on to say that thus Allah did not permit the prophet's life to them to dispute without stipulating that it be with kindness in a beautiful manner over Allah describes the prophet's life to them as being a vast ethical character and disparages argumentation in his words this is chapter 43 verse 58 they did not say it except to argue and in another verse Allah says from among humanity are those who argue about Allah without knowledge or guidance or an illuminating book that's chapter 22 verse 8 and then always they say advice of Allah if you find those who ignorantly discuss our signs then turn away from them that's chapter 668 verse 68 and Imam Manik said he said disputation is not from our religion so this all of these verses all of these proofs all of these quotes are to reiterate the point of not falling into disputation argumentation especially when you don't have the knowledge and you're not in the position of authority to do that may Allah forgive all of us and you see this a lot now maybe not so in the masjid or in the community per se but a lot of it is online you can go to anybody's any of our scholars pages online and you'll see trolls people who are that's all they do they just go around picking arguing they've lost adab they may even address the scholar it's really lacking basic adab because they think that they have a position that's superior or better or they found some mistake the scholar made and they're ready to just cancel the scholar you see this all the time online it's very very toxic behavior and this is demonic behavior it's not part of our tradition so may Allah protect us from that behavior and when we see it we should certainly not encourage it you know you see some people liking these comments it's just vitriol it's just pure poison and you'll see a bunch of likes and you're just like subhan Allah so the one who's doing it at least they were able to speak up and say whatever they wanted to say even if they were wrong but the cowards who don't say anything but then fan the flames by liking and forwarding and sharing and spreading the fitna those are also we have to you know because that's the it's just as worse that just potentially even worse because you're spreading this right so all of this is on the section on cooperation now we go into the next slide here which is on good character and this is just a shorter section but of course reminder for us all right we must inculcate good character in our daily lives and always display courteous behavior with Muslims and non-Muslims alike this is again reinforcing what was previously said about just being a good person and not falling into bad character flaws with anybody Muslim or non-Muslim doesn't matter we should rid ourselves of those character flaws and really display the best character inshallah the most effective outreach is good character this is if we want to do effective dawah to our family members you know there's people who have non-Muslim family or secular family people who are just not practicing you know giving them lectures is not really effective you know you can guilt I've seen it unfold in front of me but I've also seen people really get worked up because you know so-and-so doesn't pray or they're not fasting and I get so mad I can't help myself and they get really worked up because they feel so justified to correct our family member when they're you know when they're heedless or they're disobeying Allah but we have to be very careful from that because everybody's at different levels and there's also this is where going back to the point I made earlier about nasiha not everybody is able to give nasiha because it takes patience it takes understanding it takes emotional intelligence to know where people are at are they emotionally stable are they even listening are they receptive are they having a faith crisis you know there's something going on if you're not aware of that and you're just you know caught up in your own self-righteous indignation and anger and frustration then you may very well push them further away from Islam instead of you know what you may think is this tough love approach so within our family when it comes to Muslims who may be not practicing we want to be very careful and then of course outside of that our neighbors our co-workers the people that we meet in this markets or wherever we go we want to remember that the best dawah is not you know we're not people that you know go and force our faith on people we don't prostrate everywhere we go we're not preachers we invite people right we invite people with good character we're kind or patient or gracious we are you know generous we're hospitable we have all those inshallah qualities we try to inculcate them in ourselves and we display them so that when people meet Muslims they are impressed and then they may inquire like oh wow you know or they're just curious like why are all of these people so kind or why do they treat their elders with so much you know respect or their children or all the beautiful things that we learn from the Prophet so I said this will hopefully make them want to learn and that's how we can do effective dawah and then they go on to say that with good character people achieve levels of proximity to Allah but even those who are persistent in praying and fasting have a hard time reaching Subhanallah that's really you know just a powerful reminder for all of us that the ritual acts of course they're far they're important we have to do them but they are many times you know they're self-serving they're more fulfilling our obligations to Allah and they benefit us but when you you know suppress your or when you're patient with people who are difficult or you're displaying these beautiful character qualities that may require restraint that is harder often times to do right it's a sacrifice you're actually it's more of a Mujahidah so people who have really great characters MashaAllah they've gone through they're disciplined people and they often times do suppress themselves for the sake of you know the good the sake of the other and that is why there's so much immense reward in that so that's the point here is that you could really advance in your relationship with Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala by having really beautiful character because the Mujahidah is so sincere and it's really truly difficult whereas some people pray in fast but they don't work on their character and they don't really excel they don't get as ahead because they may be impatient or rude or just you know we've all I'm sure had incidences with people who outwardly look practicing but they just didn't really leave us feeling good you know and that's that should be a sign when you're with a believer someone truly sincere you should feel good in their presence you should feel positive you should feel their light you should feel love genuine sincerity we have the love all those beautiful qualities but if they constrict you and they make you feel bad they chastise you admonish you or they speak ill or other things even if they outwardly look the part then clearly there's a problem there right so good character is very very important this is the most important thing that we should be working on every single day to achieve so then he goes I'm sorry then they go on to the next section so good character again very short section this is on page 31 now for those who are following along with the text the next section is on kinship so we should strive to maintain excellent kinship bonds and forgive the shortcomings of our relatives for the sake of Allah and hope that he may forgive our shortcomings the sacred bonds of blood must never be severed one of the greatest of the major sins is filial impiety which is prevalent in modern society so we know what filial piety is right that's good serving our parents well this is the opposite right relationships are a trial from Allah and the Quran reminds us we have made some attribulation for others will you show patience this is chapter 25 verse 20 and they say family is difficult subhanAllah right family is difficult but the rewards of kindness toward family are immeasurable in this world and only realized in the next moreover the least harm that is accrued from severing kinship bonds is a life of pinery so you know the fact that and I guess because in my work I deal with this quite a lot actually you know people have complex relationships with either their parents or their siblings or you know mother in law father in law or someone in the family and a lot of times they feel that the only thing to do is just cut that person out of their life and you know they don't have time for them and there's a lot of just intense emotions and you know they want to they're protecting their own interests and so it just seems like the easier route to take right to just say I'm done I'm not going to care anymore I'm cutting this person out and that's it we'll remind it over and over again that you know cutting ties is one of the combat is actually considered you know a grave sin and so we really an enormity we really want to ask Allah to protect us from that but also to just remember that you know the Prophet told us in a Sahih hadith and this is related in the Muslim that the believer who mixes with the people and endures their harm has a greater reward than the one who does not mix with the people nor endures their harm so this is a really powerful reminder for us that you know in some cases the family member who gets on your nerves who maybe asks too many questions who's you know just you know prying and always you know into your business and orgies don't really like to be around so much not coming around causing you know problems with the family because you just can't handle that person you don't like that person is actually you know less there's it's you're not getting it you're losing out on so much reward here the hadith is clear if you go and you sacrifice your comfort for an hour half an hour however long it is just for the sake of your parents let's say it's an uncle or an aunt or someone that is close to them but maybe you have no connection to and you're there and you're just going to take a little bit of that discomfort for the sake of your parents just imagine the immense reward in doing that right first of all you're pleasing your parents but then on top of that as this hadith reminds us that you're enduring that hardship and so the process is promising that the reward is greater right so remember that if you have to be around people that are challenging to be around instead of just wanting to take the easier route because you know again it's very in this society if you look at the you know the breakdown of the family bonds it's just everywhere you know people don't talk to family members for decades sometimes or they've lost touch with aunt's uncle's grandparents and they don't really think twice about it but then you know you'll know the value of your family over other friendships or other relationships that may come and go even marriages are not sometimes they don't last right we know that divorce divorces are very common so you know sometimes people think that giving up their family is worth whatever they're going to get you know peace of mind or because of this relationship I want I need to you know give up my family but the reality is is those relationships are oftentimes conditional and you know they may not may or may not last whereas with family in many cultures traditional cultures anyway there is this unspoken sort of understanding that even if you don't agree even if you have very very different lifestyles and just beliefs or you know you just don't see eye to eye on a lot of things the bond of family keeps you together and so you'll be able to call on your family when God forbid you're you know facing some hardship maybe you have a debt or a health problem that you didn't know about and all of a sudden you're in need you know how many people have had their lives saved because of a family member who stepped in not because of that friend or that roommate or that coworker that you maybe yes enjoy a rapport with and you get along with and you you know everything is fine but again when the going gets tough that's when you really know right who's there for you and who's not and often times it is your family so we have to really appreciate appreciate our families and not take them for granted and so this is the reminder and I apologize I just realized there's a little typo here on this slide it should be kinship bonds I don't know what happened here I was like clearly missed that but so that's the this is the slide on kinship and then right after this particular section is it follows up you know kinship of course has to do with extended family members but now we get bring it a little bit more closer with regards to the actual family right and so the next section is called families so here they mention that we're obliged by sacred law to treat our families and especially our spouses with the utmost respect and dignity the Prophet said the best of you are those who are the best to their families a man is judged in this religion by the honor and love he shows his wife and children wives should treat their husbands with respect and flexibility for most women the spiritual struggle of this life is within the confines of home and family according to the tradition to bear this with patience and righteousness is to obtain the reward of a warrior for the sake of Allah no room whatsoever exists in the Islamic tradition for domestic abuse or violence a home is a sanctuary and if the wife and children do not feel safe it is not a Muslim home but a jahili house and jahili means ignorant violence toward family is clearly prescribed prescribed in the sacred law and the blight of domestic violence must be uprooted from our communities this is a really important section also to think about because you know there's so many homes where there's immense strife and conflict and you wouldn't know it because we've gotten to a point where people are very consumed with their image right so social media of course adds to that but even prior to social media reputation right you want to have a good standing with your community members you know I'm an upright citizen I go to the masjid I do this I do that I volunteer at my child's school so you have parents who are very concerned or very good about keeping those appearances and making sure that they look put together and everything's fine they'll show up at weddings and events and parties and other things and you would never know that behind closed doors is a completely different reality and this of course is troubling just hearing something like that should trouble anybody but also for the people who are living that lie you want to think about your standing with Allah you know that if everybody in the community sees you with respect and they come to you and maybe they ask you for advice maybe you have that position right of status and importance and people turn to you and so you are feeling the benefit of all of that but then in your home you are a different person you know you are a tyrant or you're abusive and you use foul language and you curse and you you know just threaten and you withhold and you're very harmful you're not going to weaponize your words your actions are harmful then where do you think your reality is is it because the people all praise you and you have their esteem is that who you really are or is it that your spouse may be displeased with you may not may have issues with you your children may be afraid of you think about that think of what your family feels about you how they would describe you is really I think a good indicator for all of us to evaluate where we are with Allah like if you're inshallah your family members of course are upright and good but if someone were to ask them what do you think about this person are they kind are they compassionate are they patient are they you know do they care are they genuine are they sincere all those beautiful qualities that we readily display to strangers you know subhan Allah some people it's like a switch they can go outside their house and their neighbor they can be so kind and just engaging and really chatted up and generous and willing to help their neighbors or willing to help their family members I've worked with many couples where this has actually been really big complaint in the marriage that other people my spouse is so gracious is so kind and everybody thinks that he or she is just an angel you know has the best character and they all sing his or her praises all day long but in the house it's a different story and I always you know that's to me very it's just subhan Allah we should all really wake up to that to the fact that what what does it matter we are good actors you know what does it matter how does that say anything about who we are if we've managed to impress everybody outside our home or at work or in the community to assume that we are upright and kind and this and that if to the people closest to us we are the complete opposite and this is actually a reality that's why we have you know domestic violence is a very common problem unfortunately in our society and certainly in our community we have shelters we have and it works both ways I actually know of you know males who have been abused or have been in situations that are incredibly toxic and they have had they've been threatened and they've had their rights taken or you know those things have been threatened against them so they've been forced in really difficult circumstances forced to accept conditions that they wouldn't normally accept because of a threat that was a real threat to them their finances their their standing you know stuff for a while there's a lot of very addictive behavior that can happen in marriages sometimes and or in divorce situations and we have to really all the ask a lot to protect us from falling into that type of a delusional state where we you know think we can get away with it these things you know within our because nobody knows about it right and and then go outside and present ourselves as something else now Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala sees everything and we should fear Allah in that you know every injustice every harm a harmful word every harmful action is accounted for and he you know will certainly take us to task over those things so not to get too comfortable especially for anybody in a marital situation who has more power you know we really want to think about what that means because it's not just about physical power anymore a financial power is also very big you know that this is probably more of an issue in many marriages that the one who has more financial power tends to wield that power and they can sometimes unjust because of it right so you want to be really aware of these things that how your spouse your children see you is really telling about who you really are and if you feel that there's been complaints you want to work on those complaints because like I said if social media you have a great following and you're getting all this praise or in the community like I said people are just always turning to you and they feel like you're just the greatest thing ever but in your home that's not consistent then none of that is relevant because they don't have rights over you right community members and strangers but your family your spouse your children they absolutely have rights so those are the people that you want to prioritize and make sure you're impressing them and that your the best of you is to them and this is why the processor tells us right here the best of you are those who are the best of their families he didn't say the best of you are those who are the best in their communities or have the most friends or have the most titles and get the most praise that's not what the hadith says right and so really important to hold ourselves accountable inshallah and then this last comment about domestic abuse violence you know inshallah I've worked with so many couples and sisters over the years it's certainly I agree 100% with the wording here it's a blight in our community in our world and we have to do everything we can to remove it so one of the advice or something from my experience I'll just share is making sure that if we know that someone is in a situation where we think that they are either being emotionally verbally or God forbid physically abused that we don't give them that advice of oh just be patient it's okay be patient where we don't take their pain seriously or maybe we are so uncomfortable with the situation somebody may turn to us with their deep secret and we just are really uncomfortable knowing that information and so we take that quick exit out of the conversation and say hey you know it's okay he'll change or maybe she'll do this and you just kind of give some you know general advice because you want to move along from the topic you're not thinking about the persons well being or their safety or what if you know there's children involved in your own safety or excuse me your own comfort and this is wrong that's not Islam if someone confides in you you should really help them to get help you may not be the right person you shouldn't feel obligated to counsel them and check on them and do that because that's not for everybody to do but the very least you can do is one of them to turn to the professionals inshallah in the community or the services that are provided in the community where they can figure out what their options are it doesn't mean that you're pushing them into divorce and the family is going to fall apart and now you're going to bear the brunt of all that that's I think the line of thinking that a lot of people think oh I don't want to be a part of that I'm just going to stay out of it because I don't want that on my head I don't want to be the right person the poor kids and everybody kind of takes the story to that extreme and so they recuse themselves completely and want nothing to do with it but then they leave that poor brother or sister or you know situation they leave it they just completely leave it and wash their hands clean of it and then subhanAllah there's so many ways that that story can end we've certainly seen horrible because nobody wanted to step in and do the right thing. So if we become aware of a situation of violence or any type that would even lead to that, young couples, you know, if you know of a new couple where already red flags are present, encourage them please to be brave enough to speak up, you know, and that can be to their parents, to the people that, you know, are there appointed mahram if there's someone, you know, a convert, for example, or the community members that are doing this type of work, whether they're a therapist or a spiritual counselor or someone who has the background to be able to advise them, but not to just turn away and be like, oh, no, my problem, you know, sakhfirullah, because you could very well help, you know, that couple, inshaAllah, save their marriage instead of, you know, let it go down into a really horrible, worse situation. So anyway, you know, just an advice there about really being responsible with information that comes to you and putting the needs of the other people before yourself, inshaAllah, in the advice that you give. So alhamdulillah, that concludes this section. So, okay, we're sort of right on time. I'm gonna go ahead and stop here so that I can see if there's any questions. But again, I'm just looking over if there's anything else that I missed. So chapter three, we covered five pillars. I'll active outreach focus, cooperation. Yeah, so alhamdulillah, the rest, the next section will be on charity and we'll continue with the remainder of chapter three, inshaAllah, but let me go ahead and stop the screen share here. All right, alhamdulillah. So now if you just permit me, I'm gonna try to go on here. And again, I'm doing this solo. Brother Salman, inshaAllah, was had a previous engagement. So he was not able to facilitate tonight, but inshaAllah, he'll be back with us, hopefully next time around. So let me look and see if there are any questions. And if there are, please do feel free to, I'm on, by the way, I'm not sure if this is broadcasting live to Facebook. I have no, or excuse me, YouTube, I have no idea. But I'm on the Facebook page. So let me reload here and see if there's any questions or comments. MashaAllah, as-salam. I see some lovely comments from some of you here. I just see, this is interesting. I see one, two, three, four comments, but it's saying there's nine comments. That's odd. I've never seen that before, but let me see if I switch this around. Do I see any more? No, I don't see any more comments. Okay, so I don't know where the other four comments or five comments are. I don't see them. But if there aren't any questions, then inshaAllah, we can conclude. And, oh wait, is there, is it okay to ask a sister to make a dog for a son or a family member? Of course, of course. We can always ask someone to make a dog for another person. There's nothing wrong with that, inshaAllah. I don't, you know, you don't have to give the details, you know, if it's a private matter.