We
don't seriously said the matter of Al Mahdi is we've never supported him
(Regarding the ISSUE Abolish the Tax).
He will open the city of Rome with 70.000 people. He returned with the
faded glory of Islam. He will wipe every
kind of tax, and call going apart of Allah with the sword (the firm). Who
followed the call for safe and who oppose will be killed . . . As the one mentioned in the Hadith of
Al-Mahdi: "He That Follow my Sunnah" ('Allamah Shaykh Muhammad Ali
Shabban: pp. 102, CET. IV)
What Is the Purpose Of Our Life?
The information which is to be
shared, may seem to be bit extensive but when you consider the capacity of the
human brain and the amount of information that it can store and that it can
decipher, then a few pages of information tonight, I’m sure won’t overburden
you.
All of you have an equal
responsibility and that responsibility is to listen with an open heart and an
open mind.
In a world full of prejudice
and cultural conditioning, it is very hard to find people that are able to take
a moment to think about life objectively.
And try to arrive at the truth about this world and the real purpose of
our life.
Unfortunately, when you ask
most people the question what is the purpose of our life, such a fundamental
and important question, they will not tell you what they have concluded through
observation or analytical reasoning.
Rather, in most cases, they will simply tell you what someone else
said. Or they will tell you what is
commonly presumed by others; what my father says the purpose of life is, what
the minister of my Church says the purpose of life is, what my teachers says,
what my friends says etc. If I ask
anyone about the purpose of eating, why do we eat? Everyone will say in one
word or another, its for nutrition because it sustains life.
If I ask anyone why they work, they will say
because it’s a necessity in order to support themselves and to provide the
needs of the family. If I ask anyone why
they sleep, why they wash etc. They will
answer this is a common necessity for all human beings. We can follow this line of questioning with
100 questions and get same or similar answer from anyone in any language in any
place in the world. Simple!
Then I ask you the question,
why is it, that when we ask the question, what is the goal and the purpose of
life, that we get so many different answers?
That’s because people are confused, they don’t really know. They are
stumbling in the dark. And rather than
to say I don’t know, they just fall for any answer that they have been
programmed to answer. Well think about
it tonight!
Is our purpose in this world
simply to eat, sleep, dress, work, acquire some materials things and enjoy
ourselves? Is this our purpose? Why are we born? What is the object of our
existence? And what is the wisdom behind the creation of men and this
tremendous universe? Think about that question.
Some persons argue that
there is no prove of any divine origin, there is no prove that there is a God,
there is no proves that this universe has come about for any divine purpose;
there are people who argue this way.
And
they say that perhaps this world came about by chance. A big bang and this
whole great world, with all its orchestration just came together. And they argue that life does not have any
definite purpose and that there is nothing that can be proven through by the
logic or science that there is a God or purpose or any divine reason behind
this WORLD.
In the Qur’an it’s Mentioned:
To Allah belongs the dominion
of the heavens and the earth and Allah has power over everything. Behold! In the creation of the heavens and
the earth and the alternation of the night and the day, there are indeed signs
for men of understanding, men who celebrates the praises of Allah standing,
sitting and lying down on their side and they contemplate the wonders of the
creation in the heavens and the earth with the thought, “Our Lord, not for any
foolish purpose has thou created all of these.
Glory be to thee, give us salvation from the penalty of the hellfire.
Now here in these verses, Allah
has mentioned very clearly to us by first drawing our attention to the creation
of ourselves, the different postures of the human body, the different attitude
of the human psychology. He draws our
attention to the heaven, the alternation of the night and the day, the firmament,
the stars, the constellation and then He says to us, “He has not created all of
these for any foolish purpose”.
Because
when you see the design of it, you know it that the design of it is very
powerful and very precise. And something
very powerful and very precise that is beyond your own calculation and
imagination, it cannot foolish. It
cannot be just thrown together.
If you took 10 marbles and
number them 1 to 10 and all of them with different colours and you put them
inside of a bag and shook the bag and then closing your eyes reached inside
that bag, and I told you, pull out marble number 1 and then marble number 2 and
then pull out marble number 3 in order.
What’s the chance of your pulling out of these 10 marbles in order? Do you know the chances are? Its 26 millions
to 1. So what’s the chance of the
heavens and the earth being thrown in a big bang and orchestrated like they
are. What’s the chance of that?
My dear respected fellow humans
we have to ask ourselves a further question.
When you see a bridge, a building or an automobile, you automatically
consider the person or the company that constructed it.
When you see a plane or a rocket, a satellite
or a large ship, you also think about how incredible of a vehicle that it
is. When you see a nuclear plant in
orbiting space stations or a super international airport, you have to
thoroughly impressed with the engineering dynamics that are involved.
Yet, these are just things that
are manufactured by human beings. Then what about the human body; with its
massive and intricate control system?
Think about it.
Think about the brains; how it
thinks, how it functions, how it analysis, sort information, retrieves
information, distinguishes and categorizes information in a millionth of a
second! And does it constantly. Think
about the brain for a moment. This is
the brain that made the automobile, the rocket.
Think about the brain and who made that.
Think about the heart how it pumps continuously for 60 or 70 years, in
taking and discharging blood throughout the body and maintaining that steady
precision throughout the life of that person.
Think about it.
Think about the kidney and what
kind of functions that they carry – the purifying instrument of the body, which
performs hundreds of chemicals analysis simultaneously and also controls the
levels of toxicity in the content of the body.
And it does this automatically.
Think about your eye – The
human camera that adjust, focus, interpret, evaluate, and applies colour
automatically; the natural inspective and adjustment to light and
distance. All automatic, think about it!
Who created that? Who has
mastered that? Who plans that? And who regulates that? Human beings themselves?
No of course not.
What about this universe? Think
about this. This earth is ONE planet in our solar system. And our solar system is one of the systems in
the Milky Way. And the Milky Way is one of
the constellations in this galaxy. And
there are millions of galaxies like the Milky Way. Think about that and they are all in
order.
They are all precise. They are not colliding with each other. They are not conflicting with each other and
they are swimming along in an orbit that has been SET for them. Have human beings set that into motions? And
are those human beings maintaining that precision? No of course NOT!
Think about the ocean, the
fish, the insects, the birds, the plants, bacteria, and the chemical elements
that have not been discovered and cannot be defected even with the most
sophisticated instruments. Yet each one
of them has a law that they follow.
Did all of these sequence,
balance, harmony, variation, design, maintenance, operation and infinite
numeration, did this happen by chance? And also do these things functions
perpetually and perfectly by chance? And
do they reproducing themselves and maintaining themselves also by chance? No of
course not.
That would be totally illogical
and foolish to think and in the least, it will indicate that however it came to
be, it is totally outside of the realm of human capability. We will all agree to that.
The being, the all mighty
power, God, the creator who has the knowledge to design, to proportion, who has
created all of these and is responsible for maintaining all of these, is the
only one that is deserving our praise and gratitude.
If I gave each one of you a
$100 for no reasons, you would at least say thank you. What about your eyes, your kidney, your
brain, your life, your birth, your children – what about that? Who gave you
that? Is He not worthy of praise and thanks? Is He not worthy of your worship
and recognition?
That In A Nutshell Is The Purpose And The Goal Of This Life.
Allah the all mighty said to us
in the Qur’an: “I have not created the Jinn
(the spirit) nor the human beings for any other purpose except to
worship me”. This what the almighty says.
So our purpose of this life is to recognize the creator, to be grateful
to the creator, to worship the creator, to surrender ourselves to the creator
and to obey the laws that He decided for us.
In a nutshell it means
worship. This is our purpose on this
life. And whatever we do in the course
of that worship, that system, the eating, the drinking, the dressing, the working;
all of these are just consequential but we have been created to worship.
That’s the purpose of our
life. I don’t think that anyone who is
scientific or analytical, they won’t have much argument with that purpose. They may have some other purpose within
themselves. But that’s something they
have to deal with between themselves and all mighty God.
Introduction to Islam
What do you know about Islam?
Not what you HEARD about Islam, not what you seen in the action of some
Muslims. Because there is a difference between Islam and Muslim. There is a difference between a man and a
father. A man who has children is a
father. But father is a
responsibility.
If a man who does not
fulfil those responsibility, he is not necessarily a good father. Islam is a rule and an order. If a Muslims does not fulfil those rules and
orders, he is not a good Muslim. So you
can not compare Islam by Muslims.
We hear the term “Islam” and
“Muslim” quite often. And we read about
Islam and Muslims in the periodical textbooks of colleges and
universities. We hear and we see a lot
of inaccurate, misleading and purposeful misinformation through the media. And I have to admit that some of these
misinformation and misrepresentation has been perpetuated by Muslims
themselves.
Yet one out of every 5
persons in this world of some 5 billion people is a Muslim. This is the statistics that you can verify in
the encyclopaedia. How is it that 1 out
of every 5 people in this world is a Muslim and that we don’t know something
about Islam? The facts about Islam?
If I told you 1 out of every 5
people in this world were Chinese, which is a fact cause there are 1 billion
Chinese in the world. We know the
geographical, social, economical, political, philosophical and historical facts
about China and the Chinese. Then how
come we don’t know Islam?
What is it that joins all these
nations (around 35 Muslim nations) and this universal configuration into a
common entity? What makes a brother in
Saudi Arabia a brother to an American? What makes a brother from China a
brother to an Egyptian? What makes a brother from Australia a brother to a
Pakistani?
An African is my brother,
another one from Thailand is my brother, a Bosnian is my brother, the other one
from Canada is my brother. From Spain,
Russia, India, Germany and so forth. What makes them my brother?
We have that different
cultural, psychological background. What
is it about Islam that automatically embraces us and joins us together as a
brotherhood?
What are the accurate
characteristics of this misunderstood way of life that are followed by a great part
of humanity?
I will try to provide you with
some facts, but in addition to this as I mentioned to you before, it is
necessary for you to be open minded and open hearted. Because if a turned a glass upside down and
poured water on it, I will never get a glass of water. It has to be right side up.
Facts alone do not lead to
understanding, but rather a combination of tolerant, ambition and the ability
to appreciate and accept the truth when you hear it.
The word Islam means
surrender, submission and obedience to the law of almighty God. You can say “Allah”, you can say the creator,
you can say the supreme God, the supreme force, the all wise – all of those are
his names. We say “Allah”, because in
Arabic, there are no other expressions.
This expression “Allah” cannot be applied to any created things. Other
words we use for almighty – can be applied for created things like “the almighty Dollar” or he is the “greatest”
etc. But the word “Allah” can only be
applied to the one who has created all of these that we have previously
described.
The Word “Islam”
The word “Islam” is derived
from the root “salama”, it means to be at peace or to have security. Therefore, a Muslim is a person that
surrenders, submits and obeys the laws of almighty God and through this
submission; attains peace and security for themselves.
We can immediately see that by
such definition, the Arabia word “Islam” describe the same manner and the
behaviour of all the well known and respected prophets and messengers of
almighty God. Adam, Noah, Abraham,
Moses, David, Solomon, Isaac, Ishmael, Jacob, John the Baptist, Sulaiman, Jesus
the son of Mary and Mohammad (peace be on all of them).
All of these prophets
and messengers came from the same almighty God with the same message with the
same chain of transmission and they said ONE thing – obey God. Worship the almighty God and fulfil the
purpose of life and do good actions and you will be rewarded with another
life.
That’s all they said. Don’t make it more than that. That’s all they said regardless of what
language and what time and whom they came to.
If you read the scriptures carefully without your own interpretations
and somebody else’s addition or fabrication, you will find that this was the
simple message of all those prophets whom confirmed one another. Not one of those prophets ever said “I am
God, worship me”.
You don’t have to
think cause you won’t find it in any books that you have. Not the Bible, not the Torah, not the Old and
the New Testaments, not the Psalms of David.
You won’t find it in any book or in any speeches by the prophets. So where did it come from? That something
else that you have to investigate yourself.
We can immediately see that by
such a definition, the Arabic word “Islam” describes what all the prophets
did. They call came and submitted
themselves to God, surrendered themselves to God, called the people to God, and
asked the people, and insisted upon the people to do deeds of
righteousness.
The Ten Commandments of
Moses, what was that? The speech of Abraham, what was that? The Psalms of David, what was that? The
proverbs of Solomon, what did he say? The Gospel of Jesus Christ, what did he
say? What did John the Baptist say? What did Isaac and Ishmael say? What did
Muhammad say? Worship one God, nothing more than that.
Allah says in the Qur’an: <
And they were ordered nothing except, to worship Allah, being sincere towards
him and this was the straight way.
> This was the original
message. By the same token, it will also
be appropriate here to consider those prophets and messengers as Muslims.
Don’t think about the
Arabic terminology, don’t think about how we are dressed, don’t think about
Mecca or Saudi Arabia or Egypt etc.
The Word “Muslim”
Think about the word “Muslims”
means he who surrenders themselves to almighty God, and obeys the laws of
almighty God. Everything that surrenders
to the law of almighty God is a Muslim.
So when a child comes out of the womb of its mother at the time God had
ordered, what is it? It’s a Muslim.
When the sun goes around in its orbit, what
is it? It’s a Muslim. When a moon goes around the sun, what is it? It’s a
Muslim. The law of gravity, what is it?
It’s a Muslim law. Everything that
submits to the almighty God is a Muslim.
Therefore, when we obey almighty God, we are Muslims.
Jesus Christ was a Muslim. His blessed mother was a Muslim. Abraham was a Muslim. Moses was a Muslim. All the prophets were Muslims.
They came to their people and
spoke different languages. The prophet
Muhammad spoke the language of Arabic. And so in the Arabic language submit and
surrender is Muslim. The one who submits
and surrenders is a Muslim. Every
prophets and messengers of almighty God brought the very same and fundamental
message – worship almighty God and be sincere towards him.
If we examine the message of
each of the well-known prophets, we can easily conclude this side. Where there is a conflict, it is a result of
false expression, fabrication, exaggeration, personalized interpretations of
alleged writers, historians, scholars and individuals.
For instance, how come throughout
the Old Testament, God is always referred to as one, the master, the lord and
king of the universe. And that in the
1st commandment given to Moses, he did not allow anybody to worship any graven
images. All the prophets said he was one
and that he was the almighty God.
Throughout the Old Testament, it’s completely repeated. Then all of a sudden, we get four
testimonials. The four Gospel called
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Matthew
who? Mark who? Luke who? John who? Four different gospels that were written 48
years apart, and none of these men, who did not collaborate with each other,
none of them wrote their last name.
If I
gave you a check for your pay this month, and I wrote my first name on the
check and tell you to take it to the bank, would you accept that check? No you
wouldn’t. If a policeman stopped you and
asked for your license and you only had your first name, would it be acceptable
to him?
Could you get a passport with your first name? Did your parents give
you only one name? Where in the history of men, is one name accepted as
documentation? Nowhere except in the Bible.
And how could you base your faith upon four gospels that are written by
four men who didn’t seem to know their last name.
Then after those four gospels,
there are fifteen more books, written by a man, who was an apostate, who killed
Christians, tortured Christians and then said that he in a vision saw Jesus and
he was commissioned as an apostle of Jesus.
If I told you, that Hitler
after he killed all the Jews, then he himself decided that he wanted to be a
saints and he meet Christ or Moses on the path and he became a Jew and he wrote
fifteen books and added them to the Torah.
Would that be acceptable to the Jews? No they wouldn’t accept that.
So how can four books without a last name and
fifteen other books that’s written by another man – and this is the first time
that God is called a man and the first time that God is called three, and the
first time God is given a son, then how would be acceptable to the Christians?
How? Think about it. We won’t argue that
point, I have just given you something to think about.
Advent of Prophet Muhammad
The advent of Prophet Muhammad
did not bring a new religion or a new way of life as some people claim. On the contrary, the prophet Muhammad
confirmed the life and message of all the previous prophets and messengers,
both through his personal conducts, and through the divine revelation that he
received from the almighty. The sacred
scripture that Muhammad (Peace be upon him) brought is called Al-Qur’an. It means that which is recited because
Muhammad (Peace be upon him) did not write the Qur’an.
He did not author the Qur’an. Nobody came and helped him to write it and
nobody collaborated with him to help.
But the angel Gabriel recited to him and almighty God made his heart a
receptacle of that. Just like a
satellite dish, is a receptive of waves and gives you the TV image. The prophet Muhammad’s heart was a receptacle
of revelations and we have this Qur’an that has been preserved for fifteen
hundred years without a change of a dot.
Is there any other book in the
world that you know of that has been preserved as it was revealed without a
changing even a dot? No book! Only the Qur’an. Don’t take my world for it. Go to the library and read what the
encyclopaedia Britannica or any other universal encyclopaedia of the world that
has not been written by a Muslim – read what is says about Islam, the Qur’an
and Muhammad. Read what non Muslims said
about the Qur’an, Islam and Muhammad.
Then you will accept that what I am saying is universally documented and
clear. That Muhammad (Peace be upon him)
is the most profound individual in the history of humanity. Profound why? Read what they say.
That the Qur’an is the most
incredible, the most profound piece of literature in the annals of
history. Read what they say.
That is Islamic way of life, is
categorized and so precise and dynamic, it has never changed. Read what they say.
The sacred scripture that
Muhammad (Peace be upon him) received is called the Qur’an. And each of the prophets and messengers, they
also received a scripture. And in the
Qur’an, these prophets, their scripture, their stories, the principles of their
mission, is mentioned with profound details.
Did Muhammad (Peace be upon him) meet them and eat with them and talk
with them and collaborate with them to write their biographies? No of course he
didn’t. In the Qur’an Muhammad (Peace be
upon him) is referred to as the messenger of almighty God and the seal of the
previous prophets which is the limit of his role as a human being.
Muslims do not worship Muhammad. We are not Mohammedans. We do not have the right to take the name of
Muhammad to say we are Mohammedans.
People who followed Moses were not Moseians. People who followed Jacob were not
Jacobites. People who followed Abraham
were not Abrahamians. People who
followed David were not Davidians.
So how the people call
themselves Christians? Christ did not
call himself a Christians. Christ said
that whatever he received from almighty God and the order of God and what he
heard and this is what he said and this is what he did. So how we call ourselves Christians? We have
to be Christ-like. And what was Christ
like? He was a servant of almighty God so you should be servants of almighty
God.
And as the final scripture and
divine revelation, Qur’an makes it very clear and concise statement: < This
day I have perfected your religion and completed my favour upon you and chosen
Islam as a complete way of life. > So
through the Qur’an the word “Islam” came.
As a word “Islam”, it came in the Qur’an. Because when the building is completed, you
call it a house. When the car is on the assembly
line, it is not an automobile. It is in
the process of assembly. When it has
been completed, it has been certified, it has been test-driven, it is now an
automobile.
When Islam was completed as a
revelation as a book, as an example through the prophet Muhammad, it then
became Islam. It became a complete way
of life. So it is the word that was new
but not the practice, not the prophets, not the order from God. Not a new God,
not a new revelation but only the name Islam.
Another distinction to keep in
mind is that, Muhammad unlike his predecessors, did not come to the Arab or to
this own people exclusively. Therefore
Islam is not a religion of the Arabs, it is not for the Arabs. Yes Muhammad the son of Abdullah was born in
Mecca, a city in the Arabian Peninsula.
And certainly he was an Arab by verse.
Consequences of his birth
was the choice of the almighty.
Additionally the Qur’an was revealed in the Arabic language to protect
it, to make it pure and clear and precise.
Yet the Qur’an dispelled any information that the message of Muhammad
was limited or meant for the Arab exclusively.
Allah says: < you have not been sent O Muhammad, except to the whole
of humanity as a warner, as the one bringing glad tidings. And most of the human beings, they simply
don’t know. > As such, Muhammad is
the finality of the great prophets and messengers before him.
What Is the “Qur’an”?
Now some background information
regarding the Qur’an. First of all, the
Qur’an makes a claim that it is a divine revelation – that is, it was sent down
from the almighty God to Muhammad through inspiration. And Allah says: < Muhammad, he is not
speaking from himself, his own ideas or his own ambitions or his own emotions and
feelings. But this is a revelation (Qur’an) which has been revealed to him.
Therefore, if we are to
convince you or anyone else of the authenticity of the Qur’an, we must prove 1)
that it was impossible for Muhammad to manufacture such a book 2) we must prove
that it was equally impossible for any human agency to have created it.
Let us think about this. The Qur’an makes the statement: And we
created the human beings from a hanging clot that was clinging to the wall of
the womb. How did the prophet Muhammad
know that the embryo started out as a clot hanging and clinging to the wall of
the uterus of the mother? Did he have a telescope? Did he have a microscope?
Did he have some kind of X-ray vision? How did he receive this knowledge when
this was discovered 47 years ago? How did he know that the ocean have a barrier
between them to separate the salt and the fresh water? How did he know that?
How did he know that the sun and the moon and the planets are all swimming in
an orbit that has been ordered for them? How did he know them when these things
just been discovered 25 or 30 years ago?
Technology and science, the sophistication of which you and I well know,
have just discovered these things. How
did Muhammad know them fifteen hundred years ago? An uneducated shepherd who
could not read or write, a man raised in the desert, how could he say something
like this? How could he produce something like this? How could anyone else living with him before
and after, produce something that has been discovered recently?
Impossible. How could a man who never
left the Arabian Peninsula, a man who never sailed on a ship make such clear
and astounding descriptions that were recently discovered in this half of the
20th century? Also if this is not enough, let me mention to you that the Qur’an
has 114 chapters, over 6000 verses and there were hundreds of people in the
time of the prophet Muhammad who memorized this book entirely. Was he come kind of genius? How did that happen? Did anyone memorize any
of the gospels? Did anyone memorize the
Torah? The Psalms? The Old and the New Testament? Nobody, not even the pope
himself. But there are millions of
Muslims today, who has memorized the entire book. This is the ambition of every Muslims. Not some but every Muslims. How many Christians have you meet in your
life that as memorized the Bible? You have never meet any Christians that
memorized the Bible because you have never meet a Christian who even knew what
word the whole Bible. Because the
Christians themselves have over 700 different denominations and there are
around 39 different versions of the Bible with different books and different
versions, with different amount of verses and different amount of chapters and
they don’t agree to that. So how could
they even memorize what they don’t agree about?
Finally, this book, Qur’an, has
been universally preserved without the slightest alternation of any kind in
fifteen centuries.
If all of these are true,
and if it is all true, would you agree that this book is quite profound and
unique to say the least? Would you be honest enough to say that? Of course you
would if you are honest.
The Basic Things In The Qur’an
Let us now turn to another
subject matter – The Basic things in the Qur’an
It talks about the supreme
oneness of almighty God which includes his names, attributes, the relationships
between the almighty and his creatures and how man should maintain that
relationships. It also talks about the
continuity of the prophets and their lives, their messages and their overall
mission. It insists upon following the
final and universal example Muhammad, the seal of the prophets and messengers.
It reminds the human beings of
the shortness of this life and calling them towards the eternity of the life
hereafter. After you leave this place,
you are going somewhere. After you die,
you are also going somewhere whether you accept it or know about it. You are going there and you are responsible
because you are told even if you have rejected it.
The object of this life is not for you to sit
here and do nothing without an effect.
Every cause has en effect. And
you came into this life for a cause and a purpose and it must have an
effect. You don’t go to school to stay
there. You don’t go to work not to get
paid. You don’t build a house and don’t
move into it. You don’t get a suit made
and don’t wear it.
You don’t grow up as
a child and don’t become an adult. You
don’t work without expecting a reward.
You can not live without expecting to die. You can not die without the expectancy of the
grave and you can not expect that the grave is the end. Because that would mean God has created you
for a foolish purpose. And you have not
gone to school or worked or chose a wife for a foolish purpose. How can you assign to God something less than
yourself?
In an attempt to capture and
convince the imagination and faculties of reasoning, the Qur’an goes through
great length and beauty to expound upon the oceans and rivers, the trees and
plants, the birds and insects, the wild and the domestic animals, the mountains
and the valleys, the expansion of the heavens, the celestial bodies and the
universe, the fishes and the aquatic lives, the human anatomy and biology, the
human civilization and history, the description of paradise and hell, the
evolution of the human embryo, the mission of all the prophets and the purpose
of life on earth.
How could a man born in the
desert who could not read – could expound upon things which he was never
exposed to? The most unique aspect of the Qur’an however, is that it confirms
the previously revealed scriptures, and that if you should decide to become a
Muslim, you do not have to consider yourself changing your religion.
If you lost some weight and you
had a suit and you really liked that suit; you don’t have to throw that $500
suit away. Do you? No. You go to the tailor and tell them to make it
smaller for you.
Your belief, your honour, your
virtue, your love of Jesus Christ, you attachment to God, your worship, your
truthfulness and your dedication to almighty God – you don’t change that and
throw it away. You hold onto that but
you make alteration where you know that the truth have been revealed to
you. You just have to be honest enough
to know that you have lost some weight, and you need to make some adjustment.
Islam is simple my dear
Brothers and Sisters. Bear witness that
there is none to be worshipped except almighty God. If I ask any of you to bear
witness that your father is your father, how many of you would say yes my
father is my father? My son is my son –
my wife is my wife – I am who I am- then how is it that you hesitate to bear
witness that almighty God is One and almighty God is the only and almighty God
is your lord and your creator? Why? Are you arrogant? Do you possess something that God does not
possess? Do you have some secret that you want to share with us? Or are you
confused?
That’s the question that you have to ask yourself. If you thought that you would die tonight and
in front of you was paradise and the back of you is hellfire – and you had the
chance to put this straight with God, and ask God to accept the best of your
deeds – if you had that chance to do that before you die, then you would not
hesitate to bear witness that there is only one God. You would not hesitate to bear witness that
Muhammad is a messenger of God. You
would not hesitate to bear witness that you are one of those who would like to
be written down in the book of God as those who submit.
You would not hesitate. But you
think you are going to live a little while.
You want to enjoy some more. You want to drink a little bit more
scotch. You want to lay down with few
more girls. You want to wear few more
fancy suits. You want to dance a little
bit more. You want to sing a little bit
more. And of course, you are not ready
to pray everyday. That’s cause you think
you are going to live a little while.
But how much is a while? Some of us have baldhead. How much is a little while? How long was it
that you had a full head of hair? How long was it when you had all black
hair? You got aches and pains in your
knees and elbows and another places. How
long ago was it when you were just a child?
How long was it? It was yesterday.
And you are going to die tomorrow.
Then how long you want to wait?
Islam is to bear witness
that almighty God is God, the only God, the only One without any partners. Islam is to acknowledge the existence of the
angels, who were sent with the duty of revealing the revelation to the prophets
– carrying the message to the prophets, controlling the winds, the oceans and
the mountains and taking the lives of those whom God ordered to die. Islam is to acknowledge that all the prophets
and messengers were righteous men and they were all sent by the almighty
God. Acknowledging the fact that there
will be a final day of judgment for all creatures. Acknowledging that all good and evil has been
proportioned by the almighty God.
Acknowledging that there will definitely be a resurrection after death.
Fundamental Duties Of A Muslim
The fundamental duties
incumbent upon every Muslims is simple – the five things.
Islam is like a big house. And every house has to be built with pillars
and a foundation. And you have to build
a house with some rules. The pillars are
the rules. And when you build a house,
you must follow all the rules. The five
rules of Islam are:
1) To uphold the code of strict
monotheism – not to accept any partners with God, not to worship anything along
with God, not to say anything about God that you have no right to say, not to
say he has a father or son or daughter or mother or uncle. And to bear witness that Muhammad is a
messenger of the almighty God.
2) To observe the prescribed
prayers.
3) To pay the prescribed
charity.
4) To fast during the month of
Ramadan.
5) To perform the pilgrimage.
One may ask the question –
isn’t that difficult?
No my friend, it is not. Not to those who opens their mind and open
their heart and accept the truth.
I put the matter before you –
and you sentence yourself. You take the
sentence that you want. You sentence
yourself to peace and paradise or you sentence yourself to confusion,
frustration and hellfire and punishment.
Enjoy the bounties that Allah
has bestowed upon you.
May Allah guide us, may Allah
help us. Amen
More on the 5 pillars of Islam
Islam has 5 pillars.
1) Bearing witness that there
is none to be worshipped except Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.
2) The performance of the
prayer – praying 5 times a day – based on the order of the almighty Allah. Somebody might say, why do we have to 5 times
a day? Well, if I said to you, listen – I got a job for you and we pay 5 times
a day. You wash yourself, line up and get paid.
Would you have any problems with it? No you wouldn’t. When the bell
rings, you will be the 1st one to wash yourself, line up and get paid. Because you know the benefits of it. The prophet Muhammad told us: if any of you
had a house with a stream in front of you – if you went into that stream and
washed 5 times a day, would there be any dirt on you?
The purpose of the prayer is to
keep you pure, clean and to remind you about Allah. And how long does a prayer take? It only
takes less than 10 minutes. It takes you
longer than that to smoke a cigarette, it takes you longer than that to call
your wife, it takes you longer than that to drink some juice, it takes you
longer than that to talk some foolishness on the street.
You mean the one whom you
worship, the one who created the heavens and earth, the one who gives you
paradise, the one whom you believe in, you are not willing to stop what you are
doing 5 times a day and just ask him? Praise him for forgiveness? Worship him?
Be grateful towards him for 10 minutes? Of course you are. This is what the prayer for. So the idea is to keep you pure, clean,
honest, keep you reminded, keep you knowing that you are a Muslim, keep you
reminded all the time that Allah is your Allah.
That’s why you tell your sons
and daughters when they are young, be in this house at 8:00 o’clock. You don’t think at 8:15 they are going to
become a pumpkin. But you want them to
get accustomed to respect that house and coming at 8:00. So it is the same thing with the prayer. Allah wants you to get accustomed to remember
him. Allah does not need your
prayer. You need it. But he ordered for us prayer as a
blessing. That’s why a Muslim have such
a great blessing because these 5 prayers a day acts upon his minds, his
psychology, his physiology and his social posture. Every thing in his life revolves around this
prayer.
3) Zakat (charity) – the word
“zakat” mean to grow, to prosper, to benefit.
When you give something from your saved up wealth (i.e. money that you
are not using, piling up in the bank) to the poor – Allah purifies your wealth.
Don’t those people who are less
fortunate – don’t they deserve a portion of your wealth? And if Allah did not
order us to give it, would we give it? No we wouldn’t. So Zakat is for the poor and it purifies your
wealth.
4) Fasting – Fasting in the
month of Ramadan, is for discipline.
It’s to learn self-control. If
you can’t fast from sunrise to sunset – if you can’t control your tongue – if
you can’t stay away from the desire of your wife – if you can’t stop thinking
lustful thoughts – if you can’t control your anger – if you can’t keep away from
food – if you can’t keep away from those for 12-14 hours, then what kind of a
person are you? How powerful are you?
And after that fasting period,
you can eat, go unto your wife etc. And from that fasting hours, you kind of
get an idea how those people are feeling in Somalia, Ethiopia, India – other
parts of the world, who are fasting involuntarily – everyday!
Through fasting, you get an
idea how they feel. You become more
humble, you do more righteous deeds, you become aware of your responsibility as
a Muslim, you think more about the almighty God – and as a result of that, you
elevate yourself spiritually.
5) Hajj- (The Pilgrimage) –
It’s the journey to the Ka’aba (house located in Mecca and was built by Abraham
and his son Ishmael to commemorate the worship of one God). As a Muslim, you can go to Mecca and visit
Ka’aba and make the lesser pilgrimage called “Umrah”. And then when the Hajj times come, you make
that pilgrimage and that is when you are going to see the power of this Islamic
brotherhood.
You will never see, never
witness it, never sense it and never know it, unless you make this pilgrimage.
Malcolm X said in one of
his letter: “"Never have I witnessed such sincere hospitality and
overwhelming spirit of true brotherhood as is practiced by people of all
colours and races here in this ancient Holy Land, the home of Abraham, Muhammad
and all the other Prophets of the Holy Scriptures. For the past week, I have
been utterly speechless and spellbound by the graciousness I see displayed all
around me by people of all colours.
Remember: "Do not let yourself left by the train"
