 Every time he takes an oath by something, it means it's magnified. It means that it's very, very important. In the Qur'an, Allah SWT often takes an oath by time. Various types of time, various moments in time, various parts of the day, but he takes oaths by time. He mentions, for example, Wal-Asr, literally taking an oath and swearing by time. He mentions Wal-Fajr, swearing by the time of Fajr. He mentions Wad-doha, swearing by the time of the mid-morning, and so on. And you have various examples in the Qur'an of Allah SWT swearing by different moments of time. And that means that it's important and that it is magnified in the sight of Allah. And the concept of time in general is magnified in the sight of Allah. Now in Islam, not every time is the same, right? And not every place is the same. For example, if you were to go to the plain of Arafat randomly in Shabbat or in Ramadan, let's say the plain of Arafat we're supposed to go to during the time of Hajj, and you go into Minna and Mustalifah in Arafat in those places, just in Ramadan, there's no extra benefit, right? You can go, you can look at it, there's not really going to be any people there. There's no extra reward for going there. There's just kind of you checking something out, right? But going during the days of Dhul-Hijjah, specifically in the time of Hajj, there's very specific benefit. Being in Arafat in the time of Arafat is very, very important. And so through this, Allah SWT has given us secret times to take advantage of. And Allah knows our condition. You and I are all very, very busy people, right? The life in these days, there's so much to do. You have to take care of work. Jobs are busy. Work is crazy. You have to take care of families. There's a lot going on in the community. And in general, it's very difficult to take out significant amounts of time to just do worship, right? Getting the five prayers in alone is already a big accomplishment, Masha'Allah. Let alone sitting and reciting extra Quran and praying a lot at night and learning extra about the Deen. I mean, these are all things, hopefully we aspire to do, but it's not easy to do by any means in the time that we live in. And so we have been these moments every single day, every single week, and every single year, different moments that are secret moments. And these are kind of like shortcuts that if you take advantage of, you will get extra blessings in your life. You will gain extra reward with Allah SWT. It's kind of like if anybody's ever, you know, I'm sure the children and teenagers here have done it. But anybody ever played like a video game, like Mario, for example, you're going and you're, you know, moving along. And then all of a sudden you get this star and then you become bigger. You get a boost and then you keep going and you keep going and these boosts come, right? Allah gives you these times in life to get spiritual boosts, but not everybody goes after the spiritual boost because they don't know where it is. And so you have to know what are the times that are important. And again, as we mentioned, there are times every day, every week and every month will start with the times that exist every day, starting with the morning time. And the morning time is absolutely essential in our religion of Fajr. There's no coincidence that why at the time of Fajr, the light first enters because it is also spiritually corresponding to light opening up in your heart. That is a very, very important time for light and for tranquility. And you feel a certain calmness in that early morning that you don't feel during the hustle and bustle in the middle of the day. And that's because it is a time that's important to take advantage of. And then there are times right after Salat al-Fajr, for examples. The ideal thing to do at the time of Fajr is for someone to, of course, pray and then in addition to pray, to sit and do some vicar and ideally try to pray in Jama'a. And if somebody sits and prays in Jama'a, does some vicar and waits up until sunrise and roughly 10, 15, 20 minutes or so after sunrise, at any time up until Dhuhr, someone prays to Raka of Salat al-Dhuhr. In the mid-morning prayer, you will get the reward of a complete Hajj and Umrah. Complete, complete, complete, as mentioned in the Hadjit. It's not, you don't really have to do anything. It's like 45 minutes. It's nothing, right? It's way easier than going and getting your visa and going all the way to Mecca and Medina and so on, which is, of course, we should still do that, but you're getting the reward. And there are some people who get that reward every single day. It's these boosts that they're getting, these spiritual boosts, because they knew the time and they took advantage of the time. They knew it and they took advantage of it. That's an example of something someone can do every day at an important time of the day. Another very, very critical time is the night time. Generally, at night, it is a time when someone should be trying to dedicate a little bit to draw near to Allah and spend alone time with Him. The night is special, is singled out. Allah also mentions Walayl. He also swears by the night. And so there are many things that one can do at night, but ideally, every now and then, if possible, if not every day, someone should try to take a portion of the night and about hour, two hours before slath al-Fajr, be awake and pray slath al-Hajjit. It is a time where dua is accepted. It is a time where forgiveness is granted. It is a time when spiritual secrets are accessible. It is a time when spiritual breezes are blowing. It is a very, very important time. Such was the importance that one of the great Imams of the past, he was very concerned about people being up to no good at night time. Because usually you either can take advantage of the night or you can be having a different type of night life. There are different night lives that people can choose. And so he used to be concerned about what people were doing at night. And he was so concerned that he said, you know, I know that at night is a time when people are caught up in no good. And so he would gather the people together to give them something else to do. He would have a gathering of knowledge and a bicker and of a discussion. And he would try to continue it as much as possible into the night, right? This was not, this was like, you know, seven, eight hundred years ago, not in the time we live in. And then they would wait up until Fajr and then they would pray slath al-Fajr together and he would send them home and go to sleep. And he would be so generous. He would give them their wages for the day because he's like, I know I kept you at night. You're probably going to be tired and not able to work as hard. But at least I kept you away from sin. And it was the level of honor he gave to the night to make sure that, you know what, people are going to be caught up in something or another. Let me make sure that they're able to take advantage of this. And so it's about taking advantage of the different times that come throughout the day. And then there's also times that come throughout the week. Jumma is a prime example. Jumma is the most honored day of the week for a reason, Friday. And it is a time when two things everybody should try to make sure that they do. At first, of course, attend slath al-Jumma and ideally try to make a strong intention because there's many angels present in the gathering of slath al-Jumma. And there's a lot of light being distributed in this gathering. It is a very, very important gathering. Allah literally has a whole surah about slath al-Jumma in the Quran. The other thing that's mentioned is to take out a little time on Friday just to dedicate to the hereafter. You can't do it the whole week. Things are busy. School, work, homework, stress, bills, everything else, socializing, everything people have to do. But Friday is the one day, take a little bit extra time and say, you know what? I'm going to dedicate this to my achara. I'm going to think a little bit about the fact that I'm not going to be here forever. I'm not going to be in this dunya forever. I'm going to die at some point. And you dedicate a little time to the hereafter on Fridays. And try to do that post slath al-Jumma before coming to slath al-Jumma. And then the second time that's called out within Jumma is the time between Asr and Maghrib on Friday. It is a special, secret time where many of the ulama mentioned dua is accepted, number one. And it's a time to do abundant salawat upon the Prophet, alayhi salatu wa s-salam. A time to do a lot of salawat, Allahumma s-salayah, ala Sayyidina Muhammad. Darood Sharif upon the Prophet, s.a. That if you can, again, ten minutes right now, you know, you could Maghrib's coming in 6.15, by next week it'll daylight savings time. You come in at 7.15, take out a little time at like 5.30. Work's done, hopefully, right? Go and just do ten, a hundred salawat, whatever you can do. And you will make extra dua for yourself and for your family. Make these as consistent rituals you do in your life and your week to take advantage of time so that you will have assistance throughout the week. And then the third thing to do on the day of Jumma, as many of us know, that it is sunnah to recite surah al-kaaf on Jumma. Sunnah to recite surah al-kaaf on Jumma. You can recite surah al-kaaf on other days and there's many advantages, but it is not the same advantage as doing it in the time you're supposed to do it. Right? So it's al-kaaf, the 18th chapter of the Qur'an, the cave. It takes maybe, you know, 25 or so minutes to recite, but there's immense reward. As it comes in narration, the person who recites this surah will have a light that assists them throughout the entire week. You will have a light and you don't know what that light is until you try it. You can't really explain it, but there's some type of extra benefit in barakah and blessing you will feel throughout your week, throughout your job, with your health, with your family and so on, just from the benefit of reciting surah al-kaaf on Jumma. And so that's, again, taking advantage of the time and doing what the Prophet, alaihi salatu wa s-salam, recommended that we do in that time. And so that's the day, that's the week, and then there's times of the year that are very important. And we're coming up on one that's very, very close. Of course, the month of Ramadan, about 20 days away, and in order to help prepare us for that month and get us ready for that month and get us access to extra spiritual boosts, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala honored us with a night known as leila tul nisfu sha'ban, the middle night of sha'ban, the 15th of sha'ban, which will fall on, insha'Allah, roughly one week from now, so Thursday night, right, and the day will be Friday and in Islam, as we know, the night begins at Maghrib, so it will fall on Thursday, I think that will be the 17th or so of March. And so that Thursday night is a very, very important night, a very critical night, that it mentioned, it's mentioned in the hadith, that one time I say that Aisha, radiAllahu anha, she noticed the messenger of Allah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, he left the house. And so she went after him, what's he doing? What's the Prophet sallam doing? And she saw him that he was at the graveyard of Baqee, Jannat al Baqee. As you know, where the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam lives, which is where his masjid is, right, and Jannat al Baqee, if anyone has ever been to Medina, it's very close, you're talking like a few minutes walk, to get to Jannat al Baqee, to get to the graveyard. And so he, she saw him there and she saw that he was making dua. She saw that he was making dua. And so she said, what are you, what are you, you know, she asked him, what are you doing? And he said, this is the night of the middle of Shabbat. And on this night, Allah forgives more people on this night than all of the hares on the sheep of a specific tribe known as the tribe of Kalb, which was known as a tribe that had a ton of sheep. That's like a metaphor, because in our time, people don't really have sheep. So you could think it's like Allah forgives all the people, as much traffic as there is, you know, on 8.80 at 6 o'clock. Like that's how much forgiveness could happen. Or whatever metaphor you need to think of, a lot, a lot of forgiveness, right? That's how much forgiveness is handed out on this night. And this hadith narrated in the Musa ma'am Ahmad and the collection of At-Tirmidhi and Ibn Majah. So that is one of the secrets that opens up on this night. Now the Prophet ﷺ, he would regularly be making dua. He was always up at the Hajj of time. He's always up in the middle of the night, often making dua. But look at this, he's singling out something in order to teach us, in order to teach his ummah. And he's making dua at this time. And then he, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, also said, that's narrated in the collection of Ma'am Ahmad, that Allah gazes at his creation on this night, on the night of the mid-Shabbat, and forgives all of his servants and slaves, except two types of people. First, the one who's associating some partner to Allah, that person, who is giving weight to someone other than Allah, who is attributing power to someone other than Allah. And secondly, those who hold ranker and hatred against other Muslims, against their fellow Muslims. Two types of people. And so you think about it, this is an amazing night of all of this forgiveness, of the ah being accepted, of all these special secrets and breezes that Allah is giving out, and yet, there are people who cannot get access to this. By what? Not because of anything they did physically, not because of anything that they necessarily have even done, but something that exists inside of their heart. It's the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam showing us how important the state of your heart is. That if in your heart, you, number one, are worshiping and magnifying something other than Allah, there's a big problem, right? And there's very few people in the time that we live in that literally will worship, you know, physical idols and so on. The majority of this is now become figurative. Where people will have worship, instead of worshiping Allah, they worship the God of money. Instead of worshiping Allah, they worship the God of fame. Instead of worshiping Allah, they worship power. And they worship status and so on. That is a problem. That means that something is a higher priority than Allah. And so before this night comes, and as we enter into the month of Ramadan, it's important to assess ourselves and to think, okay, where is my heart at? And what am I magnifying? And how can I remove that? And how can I, inshallah, try to get closer to Allah and make him my objective, right? And then the second is to make sure to not hold anything in your heart against your fellow believers. And now this is a problem that's rampant in our community. That people could go to the same masjid, but they disagree with somebody because of the way that they do things, the way that they worship, a belief that they have, whatever. And they just, like, all this ranker and these problems and this fitna develops between two people. Even though they worship the same Lord, they have the same prophets, Allah says, and they have a different way of understanding things. And instead of unifying, there's ranker. If you are somebody who holds ranker and you look down on others, you look down on other Muslims, you think low of other Muslims, you think of yourself as something. There is a big problem there. All the ibadah that you do is pointless until you fix that. And the ibadah should be helping you fix that. The ibadah should be helping us fix that instead of elevating us and thinking over something. And amongst those people who are in this category, as mentioned in the ulama, are those who they just declare everybody is wrong other than them. Everybody is an innovator. Everybody is doing something wrong other than them. That's highly arrogant. Highly arrogant to do something like that. And then to hold this ranker and not associate with those other Muslims. Or you might hold a grudge against somebody, gotten into an argument with your family member, whatever it is, but it's important that before this time and before especially the month of Ramadan that you and I forgive and let go. We forgive and let go. It's not worth it. It's not worth it to hold on to these things. It's going to do more damage to you at the end of the day, internally, spiritually, because your deeds will be at risk of getting accepted. And if you and I want Allah to forgive us and to pardon us and to not be angry with us, given all the mistakes we make, how could we go to Allah and say, you know, someone made some mistakes with me and I didn't pardon them. We don't want to be amongst those people. And so the Prophet ﷺ is showing us here the heart and how the heart is so important and to work on these traits in relation to how we worship Allah and then how we take care of our relationships with other people. And then the Prophet ﷺ also told us specific things to do to take advantage of this night. That he says first is when this night comes to take advantage of it by spending it in prayer as much as possible. Right? Some people have the himmat to do many hours. If you can do even 30, 40, 50 minutes extra of extra qiyam on this night, it is a very good thing to do. It is a very good thing to do. As it comes in a collection of in a Hadith narrated in the collection of Ibn Maja that Allah ﷺ asks and calls out from his calls out from sunset until Fajr of this night that is there anybody seeking forgiveness such that I may forgive them. Is there anyone seeking provision from me that I may give them? And is there anybody suffering that I may relieve their suffering? These three things, forgiveness seeking help and assistance in our life and removing our problems. I mean what else is there that most people make da'a for? These are usually the three big categories. And Allah ﷺ is giving an open invitation to make sure to try to do this on this night. So it is very, very important. These three elements. The first is Allah is the one who is all forgiving. It doesn't matter what sin you and I have done what sin our children may have done what sin anybody here might have done we have all made big mistakes but to try and in this night sincerely turn to Allah. Allah is the most forgiving, the most merciful the one who loves to forgive the one who looks he loves for people to turn to repentance and for people to turn to him and so you and I want to try to do that on this night. Whatever mistakes we've made Ya Allah I'm sorry I screwed up, I did this, I shouldn't have done it I looked at this, I shouldn't have done it I listened to this, I shouldn't have done it and it prepares you for Ramadan. Ramadan is only going to be two, three weeks away and so Ramadan is a time when we even more fervently ask for forgiveness because we all make mistakes and yet the best people, as the Prophet ﷺ said amongst those who make mistakes are those who ask Allah to forgive them and then the second category is to make a lot of dua for your provision your provision here, your dunya your job, money, school these types of things but also your spiritual provision, your spiritual provision to have access to higher yakin and certainty and states of spirituality and access to good traits it's a very very important time to single out, very few of us just sit down and like spend a lot of time Ya Allah make me from the people of patience and from the people of gratitude and from the people of contentment and from the people who are not attached to the dunya we might not be doing that often but to make sure we find time in this night to do that and to make dua for our provision worldly of course for everything we want and then also for our spiritual provision and then third is to ask for help from tribulation that many of us, everybody has their own problems sick themselves are sick, family members are sick people are going through financial problems people are going through other tribulations family families and so on, tension and stress this is a good time to turn to Allah and to ask Him to give faraj and relief relief for ourselves, relief for our family members relief for the fellow Muslims throughout the world relief for all the wars going on throughout the world specifically the wars that have been going on for decades and decades in the Muslim world often which are ignored and the new wars that have popped up all of these types of things we should be asking Allah for relief for tribulation because when collectively as an ummah relief is sought for, relief is given and so again these nights are there for us to turn collectively to Allah and it is also a practice of the righteous this is not from the hadith this is just a practice of the righteous of the people of the elect of Allah that they will recite surah yasin a few times in this night because as it is mentioned in the narration that yasin is for its intention and they will recite one time surah yasin for intention of a life in obedience of Allah again taking care of the spiritual provision they will recite surah yasin with the intention of that tribulations are diverted and problems are warded off in this next year and they will recite the yasin with the intention that to be blessed and not be in need of people to have enough provision to not be in need of people is something good to do again not required by any means and none of these things were mentioned are required again these are extra things to do if we want to get these extra boosts but because we don't have that much time throughout the year to specifically single out and concentrate we should try to take advantage then of these special nights and these special breezes that do exist and then lastly to try to fast the following day that there is virtue to try to fast number one it's going to prepare you for Ramadan most of us haven't fasted either since the last Ramadan or maybe you know Yom al-Arafat or Ashura or some one of these days right so to try to fast the following day so next Friday and to try to take advantage of that day by fasting and prepare yourself right for for Ramadan this is an important night it is a night that is magnified by the ummah it is a night that we should take advantage of that we should encourage our families to take advantage of and then we should also continue to take advantage of all the various days and moments of the week and moments of the year that exist in order to draw us nearer to Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala Alhamdulillah Alhamdulillah We are getting as we just mentioned very close to the month of Ramadan and Sha'ban is an excellent time to prepare for Ramadan as the Prophet peace and blessings of Allah be upon him would say When Rajab began O Allah, please put blessing and barakah in the month of Rajab and in the month of Sha'ban O Allah, please put blessing and barakah in the month of Rajab O Allah, please put blessing and barakah in the month of Rajab and in the month of Sha'ban and allow us to reach Ramadan and so again, we're very very close to this blessed month of Ramadan three things we should all do in Ramadan or begin to try to prepare for Ramadan first is to try to pick, again focus on the heart of this Ramadan pick one bad trait that you have that you have and say I'm gonna work on this trait and if you don't think you have any bad traits just ask your spouse or your children and I'm sure they can give you a list hopefully short, but if it's long you can pick one and work down that list but to try to pick one, okay maybe getting angry easily, getting annoyed all the time not having any sorrow or patience being arrogant or whatever it is there's certain bad traits I'm gonna try to work, for example on trying to think way too often about work it's constantly on my mind I'm like, no I need to detach in Ramadan just detach a little bit, work when I need to work but then not think too much about it afterwards there's different traits everybody has to work on pick something that you have to identify number two find one good trait to work on this Ramadan don't overdo it, pick one and say I'm gonna try to get this down again, good traits exist, suburb being patient, being grateful being kind, taking care of other people taking care of your parents, taking care of your family trying to do some extra good but pick something because a trait once it's established has benefits for you and everybody around you if you've ever met people who are on the Sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ who have good character that they will be people who they always make you feel good they're always down to help they're always people who are giving out and giving other people because people of traits are people who don't only benefit themselves they also benefit others so that would be the third thing to do or the second thing to do and third is make a strong intention for an act of Ibadah that you want to do in Ramadan that you want to continue for many it's reciting Quran it's the time when most people restore connection to the Quran for many others it's to do extra prayers at night to look at the tarawih and other prayers but pick something and then find something sustainable that you and I can continue that you and I can continue and you'll see in the example of the people of Allah that they were so firmly rooted in traits that no matter who came to them they magnified goodness and they magnified traits amongst the great people of Allah that one of the great Shuyuch of the Umma Sheikh Abu Bakr bin Salim was a very very generous man very generous man and he had this whole kitchen where he would supervise the affairs of the kitchen assist in preparing the food and prepare food for all of these people that would come and would work to bake a thousand loaves of bread every single day 500 for lunch 500 for dinner for the people who didn't have food and so this wasn't included the food that he might have prepared for his guests and others and so one time a poor woman she came to him and she offered some small amount of food and his person who was there who was not the sheikh who was assisting him and he said no no no there's all these people coming to give all this this significant amounts of food and gifts to the sheikh what is this little bit of food that you're trying to give right he turned her away the sheikh listened he said no no he went to his servant and he said stop and then he turned to her and he accepted he was graciously accepted thank you for this offering thank you for what you were giving us to and he gave her a reward and exchange and then he chastised the one who was helping and he said the one who doesn't show gratitude for little things they won't show gratitude for big things and the one who doesn't show gratitude to people they won't show gratitude to Allah this was a person who was great in his outward worship great in the amount of prayers he did great in the amount of vicar that he did but look at his character he was firmly established in the kindness and the generosity and the good character of the Prophet sallallahu sallam such that his goal was to make sure people around him don't feel off and bad if that's something you and I have in us that we make people feel off and we make people feel bad and we make people feel constricted inside of us it's something to work on it's something to work on in the month of shaban and especially in the month of Ramadan and lastly and inshallah we'll end with this in this night of the miss shaban many people get caught up and debating the merits of it and debating should we do it or should we not look the big thing is if you don't want to do extra ibadah you don't have to it's totally fine up to you there's no point debating though there's no point getting caught up in it the reality is for the majority of Muslims as mentioned who live in the silicon valley are very very busy people it's very difficult to find time to do any extra ibadah so if you are amongst the category of people who regularly every night you're reciting Quran you're doing a few khatams a month or a khatam a month at least you are often learning knowledge you are often waking up for the hajjah you are often reciting books of Adqar and doing extra prayer and taking care of the needy you don't necessarily need any specific night just do it all the time masha'Allah that's really good however it's not the state for the majority of people so don't limit people when they need these shortcuts and they need these secrets and they need these boosts to come in don't do that because otherwise the majority people will say oh yeah don't do ibadah but it's fine to watch netflix and go on tiktok and all these other things that you're doing and watch the news and see and then but don't do extra ibadah how? that doesn't make any sense think use the brain it doesn't make any sense to limit the ibadah to don't close the door to Allah ever don't close the door to anybody with their intention who wants to do extra ibadah that there is strong proof for in the Islamic tradition that there is strong proof for in the Islamic tradition but if you choose not to do it you don't have to do it so try to take advantage of this night that's coming up inshallah this following Thursday night take advantage of that following day to try to fast make doaa for yourselves make doaa for your children make doaa for the community and make an intention to try to take advantage of the time that you and i have left every day that passes by is a day you don't get back you're never going to get that day back and only Allah knows how many days and hours and minutes you have written before the angel of death comes and takes you and at the end of the day if we don't find a moment in our life and make that intention that you know what i'm going to take this religion seriously i'm going to take this worship seriously i'm going to take the akhira seriously we will regret it and it starts with exposing ourselves to the days and the moments when these these special breezes are coming from Allah when special breezes of forgiveness are coming when special boosts are coming because that will create an internal reality in you and will insert light and noor in you that will then make you want to get closer and closer in the normal days and that's what we all need in this time it is a time of tribulation and struggle and many people are struggling and insha'Allah we should make that intention in Allah and the angels and the prophet Allah and the prophet and his family and the believers Ya Allah Ya Rahman Ya Ghaffar Ya Tawab we ask Allah that you forgive us and that you pardon us and that you give us barakah in our time allows us to take advantage of our time allows us to take advantage of this blessed night of littleness for Sha'ban Ya Rabb Al Alumin Ya Allah allows us to live our life Allah allows Ya Allah to worship you and only you and to make our intention focused on you Ya Rabb Al Alumin Ya Allah and whatever difficulties and problems we are going through please we ask that you remove those problems and difficulties and we ask you for everything good that the prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam asked for and we ask you for protection from everything evil that he asks protection from wa sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa barakah ala Sayyidina Muhammadin wa ala aleyhi wa sahbihi wa sallam wa alhamdulillahi wa l-naqir wa l-naqir