 We praise Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala as he ought to be praised We praise the one that has chosen Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam over all of humanity We bear witness that there is no deity no god worthy of worship other than Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala And we associate no partners with him subhanahu wa ta'ala and we bear witness that Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam is a slave and his Messenger sallallahu alaihi wa la alih And I give sincere advice first to my own self into my brothers into my sisters into my elders and my teachers and To the young ins here to have taqwa of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in privacy and in public inshallah Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in the Quran He talks about saying a Zakariya alaihi salam when he enters the mehrab the praise that saying a Mariam alaihi salam makes dua in his given risk fruits out of season by Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says kull ma dakhala alaihi a Zakariya al mehrabah wajada indaha risqa kala ya mariamu anna laki haza kala adhu wa min anndu Allah innallaha yarzaqum ma yashahu bi ghairi hisaab Says that every time saying a Zakariya enters the mehrab of saying a Mariam He sees there's fruits out of season. So he says oh Mariam. Where did you get this from? kala adhu wa min anndu Allah This is from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala Allah gives to those he wants without any account At this point saying a Zakariya alaihi salam a prophet his wife is bearing and he's not able She's not able to have children and he's kind of given up hope that he might not have a child But when he sees this young woman Making dua to Allah and it is accepted and she's giving fruits out of season It encourages him it increases him in Iman So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says hunalika da'a Zakariya Rabbuhu Hunalika Huna is here in Arabic if you say hunaka it's over there Hunalika is used to state if something is very very far But in this instance Allah is not talking about distance He's talking about the area that Sayyidina Mariam alaihi salam was making dua So he's saying that that spot hunalika da'a Zakariya Rabbuhu He says that Zakariya falls on his face in the same spot Because Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala chooses certain spots to be more sacred than others And he makes dua for a good offspring And he's given of course glad tidings of Sayyidina Yahya alaihi salam The cousin of Sayyidina Isa alaihi salam So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala he picks different times to have to be more sacred He picks different places He picked our Nabi sallallahu alaihi wa sallam over all of humanity That when he was born and he touched the earth Allah made the whole earth a masjid for him Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala the most sacred place in the universe Is the place right now that the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam is buried Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam When he touched the dates of Salman al Farsi The dates became alive And every single one of those trees he planted It grew to fruition And that he got his freedom from the Yahudi that he was enslaved to So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala chooses places in times We just finished the last We're in the month of Dhul Hijjah A sacred month A month that we had in the last 10 days And a lot of the Dhul Hijjah they went to Hajj And they visited the Bait of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala the Ka'ba And I wanted to put a little emphasis on this In order to talk a little bit deeper into this spiritual Into this physical and physical journey that one takes to the house of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala That when you first go to this house It reminds you of la ilaha illa Allah Of this ta'adheem and reverence And that when you enter Madina Manawara In the mosque of the Rasul sallallahu alaihi wa sallam You remind you of Muhammad al Rasool Allah Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam And then Baitul Maqdis in Quds One of the third holiest shrine The whole third holiest sacred place for the Muslims It shows the encompassing reality of our beautiful religion That the Jews did not accept Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam Nor Isa alaihi wa sallam And the Christians did not accept Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam But during the Isra and the Ma'raj The Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam Led every single prophet of every single tribe in nation in salah And he showed us that we are an encompassing An accepting religion So this trip to Makkah Is in reality a trip to the house of the beloved A man he is searching for the house of his beloved For many years and he finally goes And he finds this house in the desert And he knocks on it And the voice says who is it And he says it is I And the voice says go away Go away So this man perplexed And confused He heads back into the desert And he meditates And he prays And he gets it And he comes back after a few years Knocks on the door Who is it? It is you You may enter Why? Because the first time he said I He still had his ego He saw himself He was not dissolved In the love of the beloved That he still saw himself And when you love somebody so much You could only see what they desire You could only see their wants And you become annihilated In that love For that beloved So this is the house that we go to In this house This sanctity predates To all the other sanctuaries Of Jerusalem and everywhere else This is house This Kaaba signifies In meaning the infinity Of Allah, God That even before created matter God existed Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala says We have made this place A Masaba for humanity Masaba, a place of return A place you come to Masaba also means To come back to your senses The Arabs say who was He means that if he was unconscious And he came back to He comes back to reality He realizes He comes back to his consciousness So in reality What is this consciousness That when you come to the house Of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala That you realize In your consciousness You wake up Even though you were awake But your heart was dead When you see this Allah says you will come back too And you will realize You see all of humanity Praying and worshiping Allah You will realize your purpose That your purpose is to be a slave And a servant of God And to serve him And that you will return back to him Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala says That this is That this was the first house That was built for the worship Of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala In a guidance for humanity The first house This perfect structure A very simple perfect cube North-East At a size north-east West-south above and below That is indicative That it shows this very simple architecture That shows that Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala Does not face any direction That Allah is not confined To any single direction And Allah faces all directions simultaneously For he says in the Qur'an لِلَّهِ المَشْرِقُوا وَالْمَغْرِبُوا فَأَيْنَمَا تَوَلُّوا ثُمَّ وَجَلْلُوا That when you turn to the east Or to the west You still have the presence of Allah That righteousness Is not that you turn your faces Towards the east or the west But righteousness consists of belief in God The day of judgment The angels The books of God His prophets To give money for the love of God To relatives Orphans The needy The wafer Those who ask to set free the slaves To stay steadfast in prayers And paid as a card To fulfill your promises To have patience In times of distress and poverty In war And those are the ones who are true Those are the ones who are righteous It's a cube that's empty inside Free of any images Pictures Idols And this shows us that this emptiness Shows us that we cannot conceptualize God Say in Abu Bakr Sadiq Rady Allah Who says He says our inability to know God Is how we know God Our inability to know God Is how we know God Cannot be captured in any finite space That God is outside of all of creation And it's called baytul atiq Literally A'ataqa Means he freed, liberated It also means qadeem But it also means to free To free a slave Who a'ataqa He means that he freed a servant Or a slave So this bayt What does it free you from? It frees you from your superstitions Your delusions And you realize that who the true God is It is Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And that all the false idols in your heart The limited ego And the status in class And all of these gets shattered When you come to the house of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Every single person Has what's called a watan Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Talks about three types of idols In the Quran He talks about the sunam Which is like a piece of wood Or a rock Or something with no intrinsic value And then he talks about watan Which is What value you give that Object in your heart Or any other thing like Your tribe Or your nationality Or your pride Or whatever it is That you have in your heart And then he talks about the tim phal As an idol And Allah says And it comes from the word myth and light Allah says There's nothing unlike to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala So you can worship anything In association with him Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And this is why Ibrahim A.S When he's asked to build the Kaaba Allah tests him to see what's in his heart Because when he was young He destroyed all the physical Outward idols But then when he grew older He had his son Whether it was Ismail or Ishaq There's a difference of opinion Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Wanted to see what's in his heart And he asked him to sacrifice his son To see if the love for his son Was greater than the love For Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And Ismail himself He was a Nabi He was a prophet himself So when his father came to him And said, Ya Ismail I have this dream that I must sacrifice you Ismail realizes He's a Nabi himself That his Tawakal The trust that he has With Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Is greater than the trust that he has For his father He knows that Allah's Mawla He knows that Allah's is protector And Allah loves him more than anything And Allah will not let any harm come to him So both of them prophets They passed the test When he went to sacrifice And it was replaced by a Ram It was this test So once Allah saw that there was nothing In Ibrahim Aleyhi Salam's heart They commanded him to build this Kaaba That was symbolic for La Ilaha Illa Allah That there's nothing in the house In the heart of the human But their Lord Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And it's covered in a beautiful black veil A black cloth And this black cloth Is to honor what is sacred And precious And out of adab and respect and reverence For the Kaaba it is covered And when they replace this cloth They actually don't even render the Kaaba Naked all at one time But instead they do it stripped By stripped They take a strip off And quickly cover that strip Out of respect and honor And somehow, some way Unfortunately the hijab Of our sisters are misunderstood That when Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Honors them Honors them that they treat them Like they are our Kaabas That they have this reverence And tazim for our sisters That they cover themselves They are giving the womb Through which Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Transports that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Sends mercy through this womb And Allah says To ar-Rahim min ismi ar-Rahman That I derive the womb Of the mother from my name Ar-Rahman So it is out of respect And reverence for the woman And when you make this Tawaf around the Kaaba And a counterclockwise And your heart is close to this Kaaba It also shows you how close You can get to it But in this realm There will always be a veil Between you and Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And this veil also extends again To our sisters and daughters And mothers who protect themselves And wear these veils That when you look at it It's the symbol that they're the Kaaba It's the symbol out of reverence And respect that you should not transgress That you should lower your eyes And it is amazing that these places These places are full Of some of these Zalim That are going around They're trying to strip Our sisters of their hijab That are talking about Our Nabi Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam That they have no respect For what is sacred And the reason they're trying to do this They're trying to strip Our sisters of their hijab Because they know that they are The backbones of our society They know they're the backbones Of our society And this Tawaf that is done In this counterclockwise In meaning means that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Is out of time And out of space That he's the creator of time That when you make this Tawaf You understand that your relationship With Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala Is out of the realm of time It is an eternal relationship That we're going to have With our Lord Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala And as you make this Tawaf Counterclockwise It says though You see all of humanity Doing this circular motion Purposely done To bewilder a person To give to As he makes this Tawaf And he's bewildered He loses his connection With this material world With color, race, economic status And any other change That is holding him down And he gets dissolved Into this black hole of the Ka'bah And when you look at it From a bird's eye view When you look at it It literally looks With all these people Dressed in white shrouds And the Ka'bah looks Like this black pupil It is the vision Of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala For humanity That transcends all barriers All borders That this is the vision Of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala For humanity I say this And forgive Allah the Great For you, for the sake of the Muslims And the Muslims So forgive him He is the Forgiving, the Merciful All praise be to Allah We praise him We respect him We forgive him And we believe in him And we trust him And we seek refuge with Allah From the evil of our souls What is left of Allah And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is left of him And what is negative of him And what is negative of him And it is presented by Allah That we will not forgive They will accept them When people are unhappy And we tell them And we explain to these people There is a Copper to kiss it abundantly. And so when Sayyidina Umar, who he becomes Khalifa, He kissed it, but he says, I know that you're just a stone. I know that you cannot benefit me. I know that you cannot harm me. But if I wouldn't have seen the Prophet kiss you myself, I would have never kissed you. So in this essence, Sayyidina Umar here, he's showing that he doesn't understand this thing, but he follows his Prophet, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, that he does not question the Rasul Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. So he starts crying and Sayyidina Ali is behind him. And this is when Sayyidina Umar is Amir al-Mu'mineen and he says to him, Ya Amir al-Mu'mineen, but it does harm and it does benefit, for case. And he says, how does it harm and how does it, how does it give benefit? Sayyidina Ali Mashara, Baba Matinat Al-Alm, he is the door of knowledge of Medina, a spiritual one. And he says that when Allah Subh'anaHu wa Ta'ala took the covenant from humanity, took the Mithaq, it was given to this rock and this rock testifies against those that show infidelity and do not believe in Allah and it shows those that have wafa and that believe in Allah Subh'anaHu wa Ta'ala on that day. So what is this Mithaq? This Mithaq is that day when all of humanity was gathered before Allah Subh'anaHu wa Ta'ala. Every single soul was gathered before Allah Subh'anaHu wa Ta'ala before the creation, before material creation existed and Allah Subh'anaHu wa Ta'ala asked all of us, everyone here and from the time of Adi Amal-e-Islam to the end of time, Allah is to be Rabbikum, am I not your Lord? And the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, the first one that said, Yes, we testify in all of humanity after him. Yes, we testify. And this was the Mithaq, the Sayyidina Ali said that this rock was a witness to and it will witness for them on the day of judgment. It's called the Yameenullahil Ad, the right hand of God symbolically on this ground and in classical systems, in traditional systems, what do you do with the hand? You kiss, if you want to pledge allegiance to the king or you're watching these Turkish movies, they have these bays, you go pledge allegiance to the bay and what do you do? You kiss the hand to fulfill your pact of allegiance and pledge your allegiance of loyalty. So when we kiss this rock, it is our pledge of allegiance, our loyalty in our pact, in our covenants, that yes, Ya Allah, we heard, we obeyed, and here we are, we're Muslims, we believe in the Prophet, we believe in the Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, we believe in the prayer and believe all of these things. And in this Mithaq and in this time, Abu Lahab was present when he said Shahidna, Hitler was present when he said Shahidna, Trump was present, every single soul good and bad was present. And that is to show us that every human being, every single human being has this potential of that, that they're able to recur, regurgitate those words that they are Muslim again, that they could say la ilaha illallah, Muhammad Rasulullah, that every single one of us, that we just, I got a, I got a message from our beloved Sayyid Asif showing us Habib Omar when he sent the clip of Sayyidna Yahya's father when he became a Muslim and he said, we congratulate Sayyidna Yahya when his father became Muslim, so we congratulate Sayyid Yahya for his father becoming Muslim. So where would that, where would that have been? So we look at people with what not with contempt, but with the eyes of hope that they too one day will become Muslim. And that is a reminder that every time you come to this Hajar al-Aswad, and that is that, and we also know that if that is for the non-Muslims, if that is from the non-Muslims and everything we just mentioned about the greatness of the Ka'bah and about the black rock and about all of that stuff, one day the Prophet he was making tawaf around this Ka'bah and he looks at the Ka'bah and he says, I swear by the one, I swear by the one whose hand possesses the soul of Muhammad ﷺ, that the sanctity of a believer is more precious and more valuable and more sacred to the sight of Allah than you, O Ka'bah, that a believer in the sight of Allah, his sanctity, his value is more precious than this Ka'bah that we talk all of this stuff about and it's his blood, his life and what he owns, his property and that you think nothing but good of him, that you think height of a person. So then Allah SWT tests us with this, we all say, yeah, no, Masha'Allah, I treat Muslims rigored and then all of a sudden Allah is the one that a fitna comes, a test comes and then what happens and what happened a few years ago when the Taliban entered Afghanistan and we're not talking about politics here, by Allah we're not agreeing with anybody, we're just talking about what happened, what happened after that and we're here in America on a stage and we have a price to pay for our luxuries in this whole world, everywhere people are starving, we're on a stage that we put across the media and everybody sees the state of Muslims through us and we started pointing fingers, oh the Pashtun, oh the Hazara, oh this wars on Facebook and all this stuff, tribal stuff, putting each other down, sanctioned Pakistan, sanctioned star of the children of Pakistan is their fault because they for decades and decades and decades they have been letting millions of Afghan refugees every time a war occurred into that land and to feed them and to clothe them and to protect them and again not about your position, your political stance but where is that unity that when you point fingers that are individual fingers that these fingers could break but it takes a fist of unity to make any kind of move, any kind of power and where is the example of Salman al Farsi, Salman al Farsi during the battle of Khandak when he's sitting down with the Ashab and all of them they start reminiscing about their lineages and Sayyidina Umar radiallahu ta'ala anhu, he talks about his, he's an Umar from and then it's Sayyidina Abu Bakr Siddique, and Sayyidina Salman al Farsi is sitting there and he's not from the Arabs and they're all looking at him, it's his turn, Sayyidina Salman, what's your son that tell us and Salman puts his head down and he looks back up and he says, I am the son of Islam, I was born with this religion, I was reborn the son of Islam and the Muhajireen suddenly start screaming Allah, Allah, Salman Salman is from us, the Ansar Salman Salman is from us and the Prophet Salam hears what happens and he comes out Salman Salman is from the family of my house Salman, so are we all not born of Islam are we not all from the family of Rasulullah sallallahu ta'ala alihi wasallam do we not all transcend all of those barriers as Muslims that he not say sallallahu alihi wa la ilihi wasallam all of you from dirt and you all of you for Adam and Adam is from dirt we should reflect