 We praise God Almighty. We praise Him, and we thank Him. For He is the Lord of the heavens and the earth and the creator of all therein. And He is our Lord and our Creator. And we declare our belief that there is no deity worthy of worship except for God Almighty, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And we declare our belief in all of the messengers and prophets that He sent throughout all of humanity, including the Seal of the Mall, our beloved Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Ya'yuhu alayhi na'am. Send your praises and ask Allah to send His blessings upon our beloved Prophet. My dear brothers and sisters, on this day of Juma, in which we gather together to remind ourselves of the beautiful message of Islam, to remind ourselves of what's truly important in life, and to encourage one another to go out and do good into the world. I share with you, and I confess to you on this day, that although we just ask Allah to bestow His blessings upon our beloved Prophet, and I call him a beloved Prophet, growing up as an American Muslim kid in Phoenix, Arizona, in the 70s, I did not always love our Prophet. And I didn't love him because I didn't know him. The way in which his life story was passed on to me at that young age wasn't ideal because the focus was on always the conflicts and the battles and certain times and dates. And it didn't do justice to who the Prophet was. And it wasn't until I became a teenager and I began asking the bigger questions in life that I began to inquire more about this person, this person who was chosen by God to pass on the faith, this beautiful faith that has inspired billions of people over time around the world. And I began studying his biography by reading one after another, after another of his biographies in English. And then when I learned Arabic, I went abroad and studied. And I was studying at the Islamic University of Medina. I was able to start reading his biographies in Arabic. And it was probably towards the end of the second or third biography. When I found myself in tears when it came to the end of his life and the time of his passing. And I realized that I came to not only know and appreciate this human being who sacrificed his life, who struggled his whole life for the sake of his fellow human being, but I came to love him. And so in this first part of today's hookah, I want to share with you just a couple of insights that have helped me to grow with my esteem and appreciation and yes, love for the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Oftentimes we are told his biography. We are told the story of our Prophet having to do with conflict and battles, military, and there were conflicts. But I would suggest that the way to frame it that's most helpful for Muslims today is to look at the context of the Prophet, what was going on, what was his place in it, and what was the approach, the strategy that he took to carry out his mission. So bear with me a little bit as I lay the foundation, lay the groundwork for what was going on in Arabia, conceptually speaking. For Arabia at that time, before the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, was a land that was a barren desert land and it still is that today. But there were a few spots there that contained water and a few tribes were settled there. One of them, of course, was the city of Mecca, which had the well of Zimbabwe, and we all know the stories. Most of the tribes were nomadic. They wandered the desert, they had their cattle, they engaged in trade, and the trade routes at that time usually focused around a number of things, but one of the most important commodities at that time was frankincense, it was rude, we know it as rude. It's that really strong sap that grows in trees, what is now Oman in some parts of Yemen. And that was an important commodity in the Middle Ages because people didn't use the shower that was, body odor was a big thing, and so frankincense was a big important commodity. The Arabs would trade in that. And they would go from the south, they would have a stopping point in Mecca, and they would go into the north, and they would make their riches that way. But when you're out in the open desert, it was kind of like the wild west. Every tribe was for itself, and it could raid the other tribes, property and goods, engage in some clashes, and try and survive with the scarce resources of the region. Now, I'm explaining all of this to say that Mecca was a special place in this landscape because not only did it have the well of Zimbabwe, but it had the gap. And the Kamba was a universally recognized sacred location. And in fact, all of the Arab tribes, even though they were engaging open warfare, they agreed not to fight in the vicinity of Mecca. And the tribe that was settled there, the Quraish tribe, the one into which the Prophet, I believe the Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, was born, was in a very prestigious, had a very prestigious position in society because of that. They settled there, they had water that they would share with the visitors when they came to stop and visit the Kaba. And they also then opened a marketplace. And because there was no warfare, they had stability, they had water. All the tribes went through there on their trade routes. They were very well off. They enjoyed the status quo. And all of these tribes, in addition to worshiping God, in the 2,500 years between the time of our beloved Prophet Rahim Ibn Sanam and the time of the Prophet Muhammad, they had acquired the habit of worshiping false gods, idols. And that each tribe had many idols, but they would leave one of them oftentimes at the Kamba. And so they would get blessings from their idols, they would do business, they would get water, and they would go on their way. Now this is important for us conceptually to understand the role of the Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, because his mission wasn't just to tell people to worship only one true God and not worship false idols, but it was to, I would say, equally transform the moral values of the society. For although they believed in God, they did not believe in it hereafter. And what mattered to them most in that culture, in that mindset, what we refer to as the Jannahiyyah, the Days of Ignorance, what mattered to them most was what other tribes thought of them, what other people thought of them, their reputation, their legacy. And so when the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said them again, preaching to them, and told them not to worship false gods only to worship the one true God, they said, well, this is what we found our forefathers doing, this is what everyone else is doing, why shouldn't we listen to you? And so Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave him or empowered him with an essential tool, the eloquence and the beauty of the Qur'an, the hands as it's, I would say, the second most important theme in the Qur'an after there is only one God, Ta'id, is that there is a day of judgment. And this is a complete shift of a moral framework from that of the Days of Jannahiyyah, what all they thought about was what other people thought. Now, the Prophet Muhammad was saying, you should not marry your daughter alive. You should not take advantage of the poor, the orphan, of the weak, of women, because there is a day in which you will be held to account and it doesn't matter what everyone else thinks, what matters is what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala thinks, what God Almighty thinks. He will be the decider, and by the way, your soul will live on in the Hereafter, either in heaven or in hellfire. And the fate of your soul is in God's hand. So this was a major shift of the moral paradigm for the people of Arabia. And his time in Mecca, those 13 years of preaching, from the age of 40 to the age of 53, when he was trying to win the hearts and minds of his population, the focus was on establishing great vividness through the revelation and through his teaching, the reality that there is a day of account. There is a day of judgment. There is a Hereafter. Your soul will live on. And all of the earlier revelations, if you look at them carefully, there is this heavy emphasis on that. And throughout that time, most people, even though he was the Prophet, God chose a great character. He only went at one over a few hundred converts in those 13 years of preaching. Now, in the second part of the book, I want to share with you a few of the, two of his talks. They're very short, but they summarize very eloquently, very beautifully the essence of what it is that he taught his companions. How it is, so he was charged with transforming the society in which he lived for being a society that was not only worshiping false gods, but perpetrating moral crimes against one another and against their own souls. So he had a big mission. And these two talks summarize, they tell for us the essence of how we should understand his mission and how it is that we can tell the story of our beloved Prophet when passing it on to our children and to the society around us that really has no clue who this beautiful man in history was. Let us ask Allah SWT for forgiveness on this day of Juma'a. Let us turn back to Allah SWT the humbleness and humility of the Almighty. Ask God, you will find him most responsive, most merciful. My dear brothers and sisters, when we study the biography of our beloved Prophet, he becomes beloved. We can't help but grow a sense of fondness and love towards that human being, in part not just because he was a good person, but because he was a human being. He was a man. Sometimes his life, that yes, God did reveal to him certain things about the future. But much of what he did was his own human effort, his judgment that he made to try to fulfill the huge mission that he was given to transform his society and the world in which he lived. And when he made a judgment to send some of his, the most vulnerable of his followers to Africa, to Habashah, to Ethiopia, to be protected by the just Christian king at that time, he was trying to find a way to fulfill his mission and protect his people, but he also did other things. He went to Aqaf and got chased away. He went to, he would stand and he would receive people who were coming from the Hajj from all over the place, and he would preach to them, hoping that there would be resonance with his message. And when we think of the migration to Medina, we think, oh, Allah just paved the way and opened the pathway for him to make that migration for him and his followers. But when we realize that what happened was a young man who was from this war-torn tribal city of Yefereb, where the two major tribes of the Al-Sum, the Khazivic, had been fighting one another, had for generations in there in a blood feud, they saw, he came on a pilgrimage, he heard the message of the prophet, he said, I see in him a peacemaker, someone who can reconcile our tribes. He embraced Islam, the prophet sent him back, and he came year after year with more and more people who had embraced the message of Islam from both tribes, the Al-Sum and the Khazivic, until one day in the place of Aqaba, 73 of them gathered to make a pledge and they put their hands on the hand of the prophet and they pledged to protect him and his followers should he agree to move there and might make the migration to Medina. And men and women from both tribes, they made the pledge and he agreed that he sent his followers ahead and he stayed behind. He stayed behind, traveled with Rebekah, he stayed even after him to return to the property. We all know the story, but when he arrived and it was through this human effort to fulfill the mission, when he finally found a home after other failures, what was his first speech? Fortunately it's a one-sentence speech, but what was his first speech? We can see so much because now he's about to establish for the first time a community of his own imagination, his own vision of the principles and values of the faith. What does he say for his first speech when he arrives there? He says, Yeah, you can ask. Oh, mankind, oh people, akshya salam, spread peace, establish peace, make peace. Doesn't just mean say a salam, right? Although some of the companions and there are anecdotes of companions taking that so seriously that when they would be walking down a pathway and they would be separated by a palm tree, they would greet each other on the other side of the palm tree with salams. But it wasn't just saying salam, it was reconciling because remember there were those two boring plans. Society was a tribal society. It was like gang warfare, that was ripping apart society. He said, you have to make peace, embrace one another. Then he said, Give food to those who need it. Feed those who are hungry. This is his platform for creating a healthy community. Make peace with one another because inevitably as human beings we're going to have friction even if there's entrenched parties that are warring with each other, you have to overcome those differences. And then share your resources with one another because there can't truly be peace when some people don't have enough food to eat. Some people's basic needs aren't even being met. Give food to those who need it. Number three, he said, and maintain family connections, family relations. This is a commandment in Quran when Allah says in Surah Al-Baqarah that those who cut the ties that God has commanded to be connected, they are the ones who will be losers. God, what are the ties that God commanded to be connected? Family ties. It's not permissible for us to break family ties. And so the prophet, even though he's coming with a revolutionary message that reorganizes society from being a tribal society to a society of the umma overall, he's saying nonetheless family is important and maintain family connections. Sometimes it's the most difficult thing. Nonetheless. Number four, he says And lastly, the principle for establishing a healthy community, he says pray at night when other people are asleep. Now the first three principles that he says of making peace, of sharing your resources, of maintaining family ties even when it's difficult to do so, those all have to do with interaction between human beings. What does the fourth one have to do? It seems like it doesn't fit praying at night when other people are asleep. But this is precisely the foundation of the other three for it is when you are able to deepen your well of love and generosity through connection to God Almighty in a sincere way when other people are asleep and there are no problems about it. It is only when the individuals of society have that deep well of generosity and love and spirituality that they can overcome the pettiness of holding on to their possessions and not sharing the food of holding on to a grudge and not overlooking the faults of their brother and being forgiven or their family member and therefore they're not able to make peace in society with the ideals of creating a healthy community. This was his first speech and in his second speech that I want to highlight it's one of the final speeches, mass speeches that he gave in his life it was during the Farewell pilgrimage during Hedred without and there estimated some 10,000 people are listening to the essence of the message of the Prophet. Next, after having established the community in Medina, fleeing the persecution in Mecca but then now establishing Islam even in Mecca after the Fikh of Mecca what is the message that he wants to pass on to the ummah? It's a longer one than one sentence but I'm going to summarize three points that he makes in this one and the three points quite simply are as relevant today as they have ever been throughout humanity. This is the summarized message of the Prophet that he shares with the ummah some of the long-awaited sentences. Let us listen because we still have a ways to go to realize and he, what it is that he advised us. He said, number one he said, don't be racist. None of you are better than the other because of the color of your skin white over black, black over white, Arab over non-Arab, etc. etc. and you can argue and Pew Research has shown that the Muslim-American community is the most diverse ethnic community of religion in the United States. We hail from all over, one fourth of the world's population half of Africa we are a diverse community and we come together shoulder to shoulder foot to foot we're an example to the rest of the society or are we because having served as an imam in Los Angeles for many years when it came time for marriage and there was interracial interest there and the couple were pious and God fear it but one was African or not of the right national background or ethnic background the parents often times would resist the community the social pressure would intervene and I can't tell you how many engagements were broken and how many communities were split we have a problem so even though we might be a gender curve in terms of the rest of this country we have a ways to go to really embrace one another fully, how many of you in addition to saying Salah here to someone from a different ethnic background invite that same person to your home your daughter marrying his or her son or daughter that's number one number two he said your property and your lives are sacred in other words we shouldn't engage in corruption where we steal each other's property we shouldn't deceive one another and fake each other's property nor should we engage in any kind of violence that harms one another the word that he uses haram your property and your lives are haram and lastly he said have fear of God almighty and how you treat women have fear of God and how you treat women and we see in today's day and age not just the me too movement outside of the Muslim community but the kind of corruption and the mistreatment rather an abuse of power that takes place to inside organized communities and cultures around the world in which we are not God fearing how we treat women and he said be mindful of God and how you treat women especially those over whom you have authority and power my dear brothers and sisters we should love our prophet for he was a person of integrity he was a person of integrity who did his human best effort to fulfill the mission that he was given and I shared with you just a distilled reflections of his message in this football but let us dedicate and re-dedicate ourselves to not only studying his biography but embodying his message and carrying on his mission let us ask Allah for forgiveness give us guidance give us clarity of visions so that we know how best to navigate through this complicated world in which you have placed us give us sincerity of intention give us strength of endurance so that we can persist in doing the right thing