Anchored
The Prophet ﷺ, An Angel, and An Orientation for the Ummah | Anchored Ep. 2
Manners are not the polish on top of a religion.
In the framework Abdullah ibn Mubarak used, faith sits inside five concentric walls. Certainty at the centre, then sincerity, then the obligations, then the prophetic practices, and manners as the outermost wall of all. The order matters, because the outermost wall is the one that gets breached first.
Lose your adab and the sunnah starts looking optional; lose the sunnah and the obligations start slipping; lose those and whatever worship is left is self-selected, which means it was never very sincere; and at the end of that sequence a person’s certainty is gone. Nobody experiences this as a collapse. It happens inward, in order, over years.
The practical edge of all this is uncomfortable, and Sh. Mohammad Elshinawy lands it hard at the end. Islam was built on five pillars, which makes those pillars infrastructure rather than decoration. Everything else is finishing work, and finishing work on a structure in shambles is not piety. It is decor.
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This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings.
00:00Adab is huge. Whoever loses adab, loses access to the Shari'ah. There is no knowledge you will ever discuss in Islam except that it traces back to this hadith. This hadith of Islam, Iman, Ihsan, and the final hour. The sacred summary of our faith. The gist of your religion.
00:14Loneliness has become a global epidemic. Who's looking after me? Who cares about me? Who knows what I'm going through? How can I ever handle all the odds stacked against me? Belief in Qadr. Your Islam is built on faith.
00:27When your Islam is not built on solid foundations, it topples. You ever seen someone, maybe yourself in the mirror, who's religious in a certain domain, but as soon as you get into business with them, as soon as money is involved, different person. Wild. That's what this hadith is about.
00:46Welcome everyone back to the Forty Hadith of Nawawi discussions. Moving on today, insha'Allah, to hadith two and three. Hadith two is the famous Hadith of Jibreel.
01:01And we will read through it together, insha'Allah, and then reflect on whatever time will allow and our limited knowledge will allow us to. It begins with Umar ibn al-Khattab once again.
01:16And there seems to be a pattern of the most important hadith often coming through the great Umar al-Faruq. He narrates: "As we were sitting around the Messenger of Allah,
01:37there emerged, meaning they approached us, a man with very white clothing and very black, jet-black hair.
01:48La yura alayhi atharu as-safar wa la ya'rifuhu minna ahad. And it was like peculiar. Something was strange here, that there were no traces of travel on this man,
02:00yet no one of us here in Medina knew him. This was odd because you're either from Medina or we'll know because you look like a traveler. Neither was there. And he walked all the way up to the Prophet
02:16and sat directly in front of him. And he pressed or leaned his knees directly against the knees of the Prophet
02:28and he placed his two hands on his thighs. And then he said: "Inform me about Islam." And so the Prophet said:
02:43"Islam is to testify that none is worthy of worship except Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and to establish prayer (Salah) and to pay the Zakah, and to fast the month of Ramadan,
02:59and for you to perform Hajj to the Sacred House, whoever is capable of doing that." Then this man said: "You have spoken the truth."
03:13And this made us astonished, like how could you be asking the Prophet a question and then confirming that his answer is true?
03:26Like ordinarily, that wouldn't be very respectful— if you know the answer, why are you asking? And so he said, "You have spoken the truth." And then he went on to say:
03:39"Now tell me about faith, Iman." And so he said:
03:58"Iman, faith, is to believe in Allah, His angels, His scriptures, His messengers, the Last Day, and to believe in destiny— the good of it and the evil." Its good and its evil.
04:12He said, "You have spoken the truth." "Now tell me about, simply put, excellence. There's going to be a whole entire hadith on Ihsan, so excellence, Ihsan."
04:27And so the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, said: "Excellence in the religion is to worship Allah as though you see Him.
04:42And if you cannot see Him, then you know that He sees you." And then he said: "Tell me about the Hour, the final hour, the last day, the Day of Judgment."
05:00He said to him, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam: "The one being asked about it does not know anything more than the one who is asking about it."
05:14He said, "Then at least inform me about some of its signs." The signs that it's coming, it's on route, it's close. He said, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam:
05:26"For a woman to give birth to her master,
05:43and for you to see the poor, that was the missing word. For you to see the poor, barefoot, scantily clothed,
05:58like almost naked, barely dressed, shepherds of sheep competing with each other in the construction of high-rises, in the construction of tall buildings."
06:13And that was his final question. And then he took off. Umar sat there for a while. He said, "And then the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, asked his own question. And he said:
06:29'O Umar, do you know who that questioner was? That individual asking all of those questions?' I said, 'Allah and His Messenger know best.'
06:45This was actually Jibreel, the archangel Gabriel, who had come to you to teach you all your religion."
06:57So interestingly, the scholars mentioned from certain cues around this hadith that this incident took place very late in the life of the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam,
07:10as if Jibreel, alayhi wa sallam, is coming to give us, not just the executive summary, the sacred summary of our faith. Islam came to guide us on every passing thought in life.
07:25Do it, don't do it, up to you. It still said something about everything. Now the most important things are being summarized for you, so they're not lost in the crowdedness, the comprehensiveness of everything else.
07:39He came to teach you all the gist of your religion. Now, how did Jibreel, alayhi wa sallam, teach us this? This is like the first and most important lesson that I always like to start with:
07:51that what didn't Jibreel, alayhi wa sallam, do here? He didn't give them a lecture about what Islam is. Right or wrong? And this was also the way of the greatest educator
08:06in all of human history. That was who? Our Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. We should never doubt that no one has ever been able to educate people in the most perfect way, in the most holistic way, in the most complete way,
08:20like the Prophet, alayhi wa sallam. Did the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, do that by lecturing people? Not much at all. I sound like I'm speaking out of both sides of my mouth.
08:33I'm giving you a lecture right now about the fact that the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, didn't give lectures. Generally speaking, that's not how he taught. Rather, he taught in piecemeal. He taught in little installments.
08:46The way we lecture nowadays was very uncommon, almost unusual in terms of the prophetic standard. Of course, someone's going to come back and say: "Wait a minute, but there's a difference.
09:00The Sahabah were coming to the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam." five times a day, and every time he'll give them a little bit. And that is the ideal setup where you can digest it and act on it. Because if you don't act on something, you probably wind up forgetting it. Yes.
09:13And so people don't come to the masjid five times a day. And so once we have them locked in at Jumu'ah, we're not going to let them go till we tell them everything they need to know. It's our only chance to keep them hostage. There's a better strategy, which is to convince them through Jumu'ah
09:28to come more often to the masjid because Jumu'ah is not going to cut it. And even if I were to lecture you for an hour at Jumu'ah, what's going to happen? It'll evaporate. I just want to identify this. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam did not really lecture people at length.
09:41He taught them through nuggets of knowledge. And before that, even through modeling sallallahu alayhi wasallam. Okay. And then Jibreel alayhi wasallam, he taught us in tandem with the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam
09:56through this dialogue, question and answer. And you know this, you know that you can listen to a back and forth podcast for an hour and two and three, but you can't hear someone talking straight for an hour or two or three, right? It was a dialogue.
10:10And so he was dialoguing here with the Prophet alayhi wasallam while everyone is listening. But before he spoke up, what did he do? He walked all the way up to the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam with adab, right?
10:24And sat right in front of him like a student between the hands of the teacher. And this is an important lesson as well. You know, many times we think of adab like manners
10:35as if it's some luxury or ornament, you know, a trinket on top of Islam that it's not an essential integral part of this religion. And that couldn't be farther from the truth.
10:50You know, Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak rahimahullah, I want you to picture this because this hadith is about what this religion is, what faith is about, what excellence in the faith looks like. Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak rahimahullah, one of the earliest scholars of Islam,
11:03he said, faith lives inside of five fortresses. I want you to imagine faith, five concentric fortresses within fortresses, right? These five fortresses are what?
11:18Certainty, sincerity, the obligations, faraid, the sunan, the recommended acts the tradition of our Prophet ﷺ, the completeness of his way,
11:32the sunan, he says, and then adab, manners. He says, so long as a person holds on to their adab, their noble conduct with Allah, with his creation,
11:45Shaitan despairs in being able to undermine his faith. But once he neglects adab, once he breaches adab, Shaitan turns the burners on. And then next, what falls? The sunan.
12:01They start sort of undermining, underestimating, trivializing the way of the Prophet ﷺ. And once you start cutting corners on the sunan, what falls next? The faraid. You start neglecting the duties.
12:16And then once you start neglecting the duties, the few you do are going to be sort of self-selected, which means they're probably not very sincere. You start dropping your sincerity. And once you drop your sincerity, ultimately you lose your what?
12:31Your certainty. Adab is huge. Whoever loses adab, loses access to the Shari'ah. Jibreel is coming to ask about the Shari'ah. The revelation of Allah begins with adab because it starts there.
12:45If you don't have this, you will not progress. You know, Ibn Mubarak himself, one thing reminds of another. He himself used to say to the people, نحن إلى قليل من الأدب أحوج منا إلى كثير من العلم.
13:00We have a far greater need for a little bit of manners than a great deal of knowledge. This one will get us farther. Otherwise, the knowledge just becomes tokenized, right? Self-serving. It's not real.
13:17And so now let's get into the knowledge aspect. The adab, now the knowledge. And there is no knowledge you will ever discuss in Islam, except that it traces back to this hadith. Ibn Rajab said this, commentating on the hadith,
13:30that every discussion in Islam traces back to this one singular hadith of Jibreel, alayhi wasallam, this hadith of Islam, Iman, Ihsan, and the final hour. All right.
13:44So he said, tell me about Islam and I will not cover this part because the next hadith, hadith three, is about the five pillars of Islam. We'll visit it then. Correct? Now tell me about Iman. Tell me about faith. And he gives them the six pillars of faith.
13:58Now, Islam and Iman. Islam, submission. Iman, faith. These are actually interchangeable. They're synonyms.
14:13When they are used separately. So like you can say faith, but don't jump to assuming it's only about the heart. Faith can be referring to any aspect of the faith,
14:27including the external actions. Right? The Prophet ﷺ said, I swear by Allah, he does not have faith, the one whose neighbor doesn't feel secure from his harm. Meaning it's part of the faith. It's part of you completing your faith
14:41that this manifests from you. Right? Or he said he does not have faith, the one who goes to sleep full while his neighbor is hungry. Or the fornicator does not fornicate while he is a believer at the moment he's fornicating.
14:55Right? That's an outward action. Faith. Right? And he said of the branches of faith is removing harmful objects from the road. So these are all external acts. External acts of submission. Compliance with Allah.
15:09Surrender to his guidance, even though it's called faith. And the opposite is also true. When the Prophet ﷺ was asked about submission, he didn't just limit it to the external. They asked him, what of Islam is best?
15:26The best thing I should perfect in my Islam. He said, to perfect your conviction in Allah, the Most High. Subhanahu wa ta'ala. Now, that's when they're separate. When I say Islam,
15:38I could mean the external acts or the internal. Right? And when I say Iman, faith, I could mean the external acts, I could mean the internal. But when they come together in the same context, then they take on different meanings.
15:52When they're used in the same discussion, like this hadith, that is when Islam is a reference to the external actions. And Iman is referring to the internal beliefs. Is that clear? Clear or no?
16:08Very good. This graphic should take a half hour to explain, but we're going to be ambitious here and do it in five minutes. All right? From top left downward. Let's work through this. Okay?
16:22To have complete faith, even though it's a dotted line, because there's no such thing as complete faith in a way that you can quantify or identify. That's between you and Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. No ceilings, sky's the limit. That's also called Ihsan, by the way. That's also called Ihsan.
16:36Complete faith or Ihsan, excellence, has no ceiling. Has no ceiling. Then there's the mandatory level of faith. When do you have the mandatory level of faith?
16:47That is when you're fulfilling everything that's currently mandatory on you. So you're fulfilling all your duties, and no one's perfect, so the sins that you're doing, you're repenting from them, so you're back up to your mandatory.
16:58Mandatory means what? To dip below this level means you have faith, but you are punishable. I didn't say you will be punished. Allah may forgive. But you are punishable.
17:09You are blameworthy for dipping below this line of mandatory faith. But you're still within Islam, because there is what's called baseline faith, right?
17:21Your faith decreases, decreases, decreases, decreases, till you're at the baseline. You look at the complete opposite end of that, it says Islam. Islam meaning bare minimum Islam, which is also bare minimum Iman.
17:33It's when you're at the pass-fail line. Is that clear? So any person that has Islam, valid Islam, baseline Islam, has some Iman. He has the seed of faith inside of them.
17:44Okay? Now, coexisting with your Islam or your Iman, you may have some blemishes.
17:51 And as you see here very briefly, dhulm is a wider category.
18:05Because even the minor sins, like when you're just starting to fall between your mandatory faith, that's a form of dhulm. It's an injustice you commit against yourself, right? Minor sins.
18:14And dhulm can bring you all the way down to baseline faith, and even dip you beneath the line, because shirk is also dhulm.
18:24It can remove you from Islam to commit that great act of injustice, of setting an equal to Allah. Nifaq, hypocrisy, or fisq, like flagrant sins, that's a little lower.
18:35Because minor sins are not included. Minor sins are not included. Any act of hypocrisy is a major sin. Any act of fisq is a major sin.
18:45And then there is something also called minor shirk, minor kufr.
18:51That's when your Iman, your Islam is critically low, you're too close to the pass-fail line, and it can take you into actual kufr and shirk.
19:03Is this clear? Hope this was helpful. Alright, bringing it back insha'Allah.
19:11To believe in Allah, His angels, His scriptures, His messengers, the last day, and to believe in destiny. It's good and it's evil.
19:21So, the discussion or the question of destiny, which we will visit many times throughout our course insha'Allah, was actually the grounds or the reason for why this hadith was narrated.
19:32You know how there's a verse in the Qur'an, there's reasons for revelation? The same occurs for a hadith. Many times the hadith, there's a reason why it was shared with the people. The context for its mention.
19:44And this was people in Al-Basra of Iraq. They started getting into these weird misguided beliefs about how destiny does and doesn't work. So, two wise men went to the source. They went all the way to Mecca and said, we're going to make Hajj.
19:57And if we can find any of the companions of the Prophet ﷺ, we will find them and ask them this question. So, they met Abdullah ibn Umar, the son of Umar ibn al-Khattab.
20:09And they said to him, we have someone up there in Iraq, his name is Ma'bid al-Juhani. He's saying that things just happen spontaneously and that God doesn't know things till they happen.
20:20So, he said, you go tell him that Abdullah ibn Umar said, he has nothing to do with me and I have nothing to do with him. We're not on the same religion basically. And that if a person were to spend Mount Uhud in gold,
20:33has anyone ever spent Mount Uhud in gold? No one ever did, no one ever will, right? It will not be accepted of them until they believe in Qadr, until they believe in destiny.
20:43So, and he said, my father Umar ibn al-Khattab narrated from the Prophet ﷺ and he mentioned the entirety of this hadith. So, that was sort of the grounds for this getting proliferated or getting sort of mentioned and spreading across the world.
20:57You know, Subhan'Allah, the fact that Islam not just taught us belief in destiny, which I promise you we will discuss, insha'Allah, but it obligated you to believe in destiny.
21:07It obligated you to armor yourself with belief in destiny, right?
21:13You know that Harvard sort of like, and so many prestigious universities have studies on the fact that nothing quiets the mind, meaning from its anxieties, right?
21:27Like belief that everything is in one hand. That's what belief in Qadr is. And to believe in destiny, it's good and it's evil means what?
21:37That it's good and it's evil, what we perceive to be evil, all comes from Allah, one hand. Nothing quiets the mind, nothing brings inner peace, like that belief. And to believe in Qadr.
21:51To be with Allah, to trust Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala, to marvel at His decisions in His universe, this removes so much of a burden. You know, even Subhan'Allah, even you think about loneliness.
22:05Sometimes people feel like they can't trust people and they can't trust life and they just, they sit there between anxiety and loneliness together. And they do a number on them.
22:16Malik ibn Migwal, rahimahullah, it was said to him, because he would spend so much time at home, they would say to him, Don't you ever get lonely?
22:28Keep in mind, loneliness has become a global epidemic. Just like there's ministries of health in every country, there's ministries of loneliness now.
22:39They popped up in the UK, they popped up in Japan, and they're spreading, right? Loneliness. So they said to him, don't you get lonely? So he said back to them,
22:53Can someone actually get lonely in the company of God? This is what he's saying, he's saying, people in the world are always trying to figure out a way to silence their loneliness, right? To smother their loneliness.
23:04You know, people go out to the malls, to the noisy malls, to distract themselves from their loneliness. Or perhaps the digital malls.
23:12But as soon as they have to go back home, as soon as the lights turn off, as soon as the noise turns down, the numbing noise turns down, they fall right back into their what? Into their loneliness. Who's looking after me? Who cares about me?
23:25Who knows what I'm going through? Right? How can I ever sort of handle all the odds stacked against me? Belief in Qadr. Belief in Allah.
23:35Being satisfied with this being His secret, and it's in the best hands. Subhanahu wa ta'ala. You know what, this is lifelong work, to get to that point where being with Allah is enough for you.
23:49You don't need to socialize, which is normal, by the way. You know, when it's unhealthy levels, it's normal. But this comes from what? It comes from Islam and Iman. Right?
24:00Like, your ritual labor, your devotion, right? In the rituals that Islam taught you. And also, of course, respecting Allah's boundaries. It's not just the rituals. And avoiding Allah's prohibitions.
24:14And spiritually refining yourself. This is how those six pillars come into view. You know, they start as a mental conviction.
24:22But they can become, with your heart, of course, they can become a lived reality for you. You reflect on the six pillars through the ayat and ahadith. You devote your life to Allah.
24:34These two things coming together is what brings you there. I'll ask you guys a question. Can anyone tell me what the Yaqeen Ramadan series have been about? Has anyone ever clocked the pattern? How many of you watched the Yaqeen Ramadan series?
24:48Raise your hand high. About a third of you. The rest of you do better, okay? Do better. So if you pay attention, actually, the Ramadan series were very deliberately designed.
25:02Shaykh Omar, may Allah bless him and have mercy on his parents. And bless the whole Yaqeen team that worked on these series. If you pay attention, it was the faith revival series, right?
25:14The fundamentals of faith and the reality of faith. And then he moved on to what? Angels in Your Presence. Belief in the angels, right? And then he moved on to Meeting Muhammad ﷺ. Belief in the messengers.
25:28And then he went on to The Last Day and Home at Last, the Jannah series. And then he went on to what? The Why Me series, which is Qadr. Why does this have to happen to me series?
25:40And the last series was about what? Who remembers? The Names of Allah ﷻ, which is the first and the most important. And the root of them all. So you learn about them to increase your faith.
25:52And also you live by Islam because you have to live Islam to love Islam. You have to live Islam to awaken your heart through the ritual devotion of Islam. And that is how you get to Ihsan, which is the next one, right?
26:04You have spoken the truth. Now inform me about Ihsan. Ihsan, excellence. He said, for you to worship Allah as though you see Him. And if you cannot see Him, then you know that He sees you.
26:17You know that He sees you, subhanahu wa ta'ala. And then he said, tell me about the Hour. He said, the one that's being asked doesn't know anything more than the one asking.
26:30And that was from the great humbleness of the Prophet ﷺ. You know, all these people that claim to know stuff about like when the world is going to end and Armageddon and otherwise. These people are very prideful. These people are very deluded, conceited, right?
26:44The Prophet ﷺ was always so keen on reminding the world about the difference between God and man. He said, even me, I don't know anything about it.
26:56This is the territory of the Almighty. Knowledge of the unseen, when the Hour will be. The greatest messengers, the nearest angels don't know it.
27:06You know, that's why when people tell you like the Day of Judgment is going to happen in year X or year Y. Every once in a while someone takes a gamble and says these things. You're not allowed to believe as a Muslim in the possibility of this being right.
27:20It's like, oh, maybe they just stumbled on it and cracked the code. Impermissible. You cannot believe that. Allah said in the Qur'an, لَا تَأْتِيكُمْ إِلَّا بَغْتَةً It will only come upon people suddenly.
27:34Okay, so this is from the humbleness of the Prophet ﷺ. So Jibril ﷺ says, فَأَخْبِرْنِي عَنْ أَمَارَاتِهَا Tell me about its signs. Some of its signs. He said for the young girl to give birth to her master.
27:48What do you think that means? Quick, though. Yeah, the scholars mentioned two possibilities.
27:59The first of them is that there will be great warfare and many captives taken. There will be lots of warfare, which means lots of prisoners of war.
28:09And then as a result, people will be having children from their female captives. And that child now is going to be attributed to the free man, the father, right?
28:23So the child is free. She's the master of her mother because her mother is from the slave class. That's one explanation the scholars gave. The other, more likely explanation, and Allah knows best,
28:36is that children will treat their parents as if they are the slaves and we are the masters. You know, I was gathering my thoughts for the class tonight. I had to do an emergency run for one of my kids at the dentist.
28:48And I was thinking about this hadith all day. And I hear this middle-aged woman in the waiting area saying,
29:00Mom, let's go. And I was like, what?
29:07And I'm looking around. And then I see this elderly woman there, and then she repeats it. Mom, I said, let's go. She finishes yelling at her mom.
29:21Her mom gets up and, like, humiliated, grabs her purse and walks behind her daughter. Just make sure, as a Muslim, at the very least, don't be one of the signs of the Day of Judgment. Not to say that they're all bad, but predominantly many of them are frightening events.
29:34Because this hadith is telling you about how things get flipped, how the world becomes upside down. Of it is that there is no notion of regard whatsoever for our parents.
29:44Well, no one's saying our parents are perfect. No one's saying our parents are ma'sum, infallible.
29:53But they suffer for a lifetime, quietly and sincerely. That you cannot deny. And even if you want to deny that, know that Allah has obligated you,
30:03even if you don't think you owe your parents anything. Right or wrong? Know that the reward is multiplied.
30:16Perhaps a huge reason is because it's that difficult. When your parents are becoming older and you've sort of gotten your own wheels, and you're out and about in the world. For someone to give birth to their master. Meaning someone that treats them, the parent, like the slave.
30:30May Allah protect us and you. Then He said, And for you to see poor, barefoot, barely clothed shepherds of sheep, competing in the construction of tall buildings. Competing in skyscrapers.
30:43Competing in high-rises. And of course, this is one of the very clear prophecies of the Prophet ﷺ. That, subhanAllah, only unfolded in the last century with sort of the eruption of oil from under what's now called the Gulf countries. That have all this petroleum.
30:56That is certainly a manifestation of that. A very clear and glaring one. But deeper than this, or in addition to this. Deeper than this, in addition to it.
31:10Not negating it. Someone that just yesterday was poor. God gave him sort of opportunity. He used that opportunity for what? For vanity.
31:22For just flexing on the world. People are going to be obsessed with what? The exterior world.
31:35Tall buildings. Right? People are going to be obsessed with flaunting. The closer you get to the Day of Judgment. The more the people of the world will be so fake. Does that sound familiar, brothers and sisters?
31:47Right? This is what the hadith is talking about. Just so fake. What's extra tragic is the Prophet ﷺ in other hadith said.
32:01Even the building of masajid will be subjected to this. This is what the hadith is talking about. Just so fake. What's extra tragic is the Prophet ﷺ in other hadith said. Even the building of masajid will be subjected to this.
32:15He said the hour will not arise until you compete in the extravagance of your masajid. كَمَا شَيَّدَتْ يَهُودٌ مَعَابِدَهَا
32:29In the same way that the Jews boast against one another in how they build their temples of worship. Why is that extra tragic?
32:38Because the masajid are supposed to be the very place where we learn how to bow down not just our heads but our hearts to Allah. Yes? You know the masajid.
32:51When Umar ﷺ saw a masjid needing to be rebuilt. He told the people, like, build for them durable roofs so the water doesn't keep flooding them. But don't use red and don't use yellow.
33:04This is Sahih al-Bukhari. You guys are looking at yellow walls right now. But this could be relative. He's saying don't use unfamiliar colors. Don't use colors that people are not used to seeing. Why?
33:18Because it's going to attract their eye. The masajid should be pleasant. The masajid should smell nice. The masajid should be comfortable. The masajid should be welcoming. The masajid should not be distracting. You get it?
33:29When you overspend on it or you put unfamiliar sights in it. It cannot be this way. The masjid is where you look inward, not where you look outward. Yes?
33:41And we tried very hard in this masjid actually to keep the colors sort of calm, warm and simple. Elegant but simple. That is the Sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ.
33:52And otherwise actually one of the signs of the Day of Judgment that we have to be very careful about. Not to be extravagant in masajid. And definitely not to intend by whatever we do with the masjid to be boastful. That's not what the masajid are for. We missed the whole point.
34:06You know the idea of masjid is for you to bow your heart to Allah and learn how with social support. And tame that ego. You think about all the politics that can happen in a masjid. Or just the turf wars in general. Politics I don't just mean on the management level.
34:20Like the standoff about how the youth want to have the masjid and the adults want to have the masjid. And the elders want to have the masjid. Or sort of the Middle Easterner with the South Asian with the African American or otherwise. The demographic or the intergenerational.
34:33So much of this is what? Is the tug of war of the egos. You know every evil in the world if you trace it back you may find hidden in the middle of it all is the ego. Egotism.
34:46Like it's me, me, me, me. Right? Racism is a manifestation of egotism. Sexism is a manifestation of egotism. Tribalism. Nationalism. They're all manifestations of what? Of the ego.
35:00In the masjid at the very least we have to be vigilant of this. The way we build it. The way we run it. It must be an open door for all.
35:12And we can't be the obstacle in the path of that. Is this clear? Then he took off. And the Prophet ﷺ eventually said to me, "Oh Umar, do you know who that was?"
35:25He said, "Allah and His Messenger know best." "Why would I answer when the Prophet is here to answer?" Umar, رضي الله عنه. He said, "This was Jibreel. He came to teach you your religion."
35:35Yes, this is proof that a non-prophet can see an angel in human form. Extremely unlikely. But you're still supposed to live with the angels. Right? Through your faith. Through the eyes of your heart.
35:48And also he came to teach you your deen. Islam is so much more than what comes to mind when we say in English "religion." The deen. You know deen in Arabic means a debt. What you owe. The deen is that which you're indebted to.
36:01That which you're liable for. That which you're committed to. In that sense everyone has a deen, brothers and sisters. You have a deen of Islam and Iman and Ihsan. Other people have a deen.
36:14Their commitments are their national laws, maybe. Or their local laws. They keep changing. Their 'aqeedah, their belief system is whatever they believe. They have blind faith in science. Right? Then there's the Ihsan element. The sort of morality.
36:28The spirituality. Some people have energy crystals. Some people have horoscopes. Right? Some people have sort of gender fluidity or whatever else it's going to be. And so deen is what you are committed to.
36:41We were given through this hadith what our deen commits us to. The superior commitment. Moving on very quickly to the hadith of the pillars of Islam.
36:53This is from Abdullah ibn Umar who said that the Prophet ﷺ said, "Islam was built on five. They say five pillars because he said 'built.'
37:07So you build on pillars. Right? So built on five pillars.
37:33You know Ibn Umar when he narrated this hadith to the people, the people tried to correct him. The people said to him, "Don't you mean fasting Ramadan and then hajj to the House?" Because the hadith before it you remember, right?
37:46It's fasting then hajj. This one mentions hajj then fasting. He said, Ibn Umar, don't you mean the opposite? He said, "No. I heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ with my own two ears say it this way this time."
38:00I just want to point out how keen they were. How careful they were. Of even the wording of the Prophet ﷺ. And this is why they are as Allah already attested,
38:13but this another demonstration of why they are so trustworthy with bringing to us Islam. So these are the five pillars of Islam. You already know them. What can we say about them?
38:27I want you to appreciate when the Prophet ﷺ tells you Islam is built on these five. It's as if Islam is this brilliant towering structure inside you, right? It's a structure.
38:40This is the infrastructure. You know, like there's infrastructure then there's the rest of the structure. There's this, you know, the structure has, where's the engineers? Where's the architects, right? There's the doors, there's the windows, there's the floors, there's the stairs,
38:53there's the faucets, there's the piping, there's the electricity, but there's the infrastructure, right? If that's not there, you don't have a building. If you're missing other things, we can work around them. Is that clear?
39:07Built on these five. Without these five, your Islam is non-existent or it is extremely defective. And we'll unpack that for a few minutes.
39:20The first pillar is the Shahada, right? That is not infrastructure. That's not foundation. That's like the super foundation. That's the most important of the five, obviously, to start with. Because that is what gives you your compass.
39:34How does the Shahada give you your compass? You know, guys, know what a compass is? Pre-GPS, there was something called a compass. No, I'm joking. The compass shows you where you're going. That's what the Shahada is. The Shahada is "La ilaha illallah."
39:48That's my objective. That's where I'm going. And Muhammad Rasulullah ﷺ. And he is my path to it. That's how I'm going to get there. So the destination and the road are in the Shahada. If you don't have a compass, it doesn't even matter how much effort you put in.
40:02Because you're not getting there. "La ilaha"— there is nothing worthy of worship but Allah. And there is no way to Him all valid, all guided except through Rasulullah ﷺ.
40:15Okay, so that is that. When you have that, you understand what it means to be a Muslim. You understand. You've accepted in principle what it means to be someone who surrenders—Islam, submission—surrenders to Allah.
40:29And by the way, that is the greatest distinction you can have. This is why throughout the Qur'an, over and over and over again, whenever Allah is speaking about something of a very high distinction,
40:40He would call His Prophet "the 'abd," the servant, the servant, the servant. Because that's actually the highest level you can go. And likewise for us, the highest level we can go is to walk after him in that way.
40:52You know, when Allah says about the greatest gift, the Qur'an, "Praise be to Allah who sent down upon His servant." And when He spoke about the great night journey, He said,
41:06"Glorified is the one who took by night His servant." And when He spoke about the greatest occupation of da'wah, He said, "And when he rose, the servant of God,
41:20giving them da'wah." Right? So this is 'ubudiyyah. This is, you know, servitude. When you have complete submission to Allah, and total love for Allah, a love that makes you submit—
41:34submit to your beloved. That's what He was. That is the highest rank anyone can ever receive. And to the extent that you walk behind him on that path, you have your distinction with Allah. That's what the compass is about.
41:47Then the next four pillars are the actions within Islam. Right? These are the greatest acts in Islam. In fact, some scholars, because the hadith says Islam is built on these, some scholars, not the majority of you,
41:59but some scholars paid so much attention to this hadith, that they said if you don't do any of these four, you're not Muslim. Most scholars said your iman is critically low,
42:13and you may fall out of Islam. You're towing the cliff on baseline faith. You may fall out. If not now, then tomorrow. If not tomorrow, then when Shaitan really blitzes you at depth, you may fall out.
42:26Because these are the greatest acts of Islam. The next thing I want to say, and we're moving fast. We've got to close out here. I want you to also recognize the beauty of these pillars.
42:37Why did Allah choose these four as the pillars within Islam? If you look at them, you analyze them, you'll see that everything is there.
42:48Like you have here actions and inactions. They summarize Islam for you, right? Actions like what? Salah is an action. Zakah is an action. Hajj is an action.
43:01That involves staying away from some things as well. But fasting is an inaction, an abstention, right? So these four pillars remind you that Islam is about recruiting all of your positive energy for Allah,
43:15but also recruiting all of your resilience, persevere against your desires. Stay back. Refrain for Allah. That's one side.
43:24Then these four pillars also combine between public worship and private worship. Right? Like salah, you're going to do some privately. You're going to have to pray Jumu'ah and 'Eid, right?
43:37And janazah—public and private. Zakah, it is between you and Allah, but there has to be a recipient. Fasting, it is also very much a communal effort,
43:50even though it is a personal, sincere act of devotion. And Hajj, as you know, Hajj is when the world comes together responding to Allah's call. And so public, private.
44:02Sort of the communal and the individual. Also, if you look at the four pillars, it covers what? The limbs, the tongue, the body, the wealth. Surrendering to Allah in every way.
44:16As Allah says in the Qur'an, "Yā ayyuhā alladhīna āmanū, O you who have believed, udkhulū fī as-silmi kāffah— enter into Islam in its totality." And let me say here again
44:30that you will never find inner peace in your life until you do that. And this is a big deal. This is a big deal that I want to close out with, spend a few minutes on.
44:42You know, if your body submits to Allah but your mind is not submitting or your heart is not submitting, right? You're not going to be able to feel the sweetness of faith that only exists
44:56when you truly, wholly, holistically— people talk about holism, right?— holistically submit to Allah ﷻ on every level in a way that you are reminded about at the forefront
45:08in the four pillars of Islam after the Shahada. It's lifelong work, you know. There are many people who can convince others outside of how Islam is superior intellectually,
45:21like they have it. But they themselves, they are spiritually behind, right? So they will not be able to enjoy intimate acquaintance with Allah ﷻ like that. You know, Ibn Taymiyyah, when people would praise him—
45:35rahimahullah— he would say, to stop them from praising him, he would say, "I swear to you, I renew my Islam every single day and I cannot vouch for myself that I have ever fully submitted correctly yet."
45:48Islam—submission. So when you find yourself sort of faltering in that, you want to go back to the foundations. That's why the hadith is saying Islam is built on this. You know, some people
46:00pick and choose from their Islam. I'll tell you two stories Dr. Hatim always mentions to us. about Imam Ahmad, rahimahullah, Ahmad ibn Hanbal. Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, rahimahullah, one scholar,
46:13Muhammad ibn Tariq al-Baghdadi, he says Imam Ahmad used to come out to the classes when he would study and he would have his inkpot. Do you guys know the inkpot? He'd put the feather in or whatnot and he would have his inkpot. And people, it was normal. It was normal for people
46:27to sort of like take ink from each other. It's not worth mentioning. So some people started saying, you know, Ya Imam, like he says, al-Baghdadi says that, I said, oh Imam, can I take some of your ink?
46:39Can I sort of dip in your inkpot? So Imam Ahmad said to him, he looked at him and said, ما ورعي ولا ورعك هناك
46:52My piety and your piety is not there yet. Like don't act like you're so strict with yourself and everything that even the ink, you want to make sure you have permission to use my ink.
47:06By the way, Imam Ahmad's being humble. Imam Ahmad actually would never use anybody's ink. There are reports about this. But he's telling them like, unless you've covered all your bases, don't pick something in Islam to tell yourself I'm so amazing. That even on this level,
47:19I fear Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. Not a drop of ink will land in my scale of evil deeds. You get it? He's trying to tell them like, don't trick yourself. My wara', my pious caution, your pious caution, we're not at that level.
47:33On another occasion, they said to Imam Ahmad that someone is asking if he should stipulate, the string they use to tie your vegetables
47:47when you buy them. So you go to the market, you say I want a kilogram of like asparagus or something, right? So they give you a kilogram and they tie it up with a rope. So he's saying a person is asking am I required to tell the man
48:01is the rope part of the deal or do I need to bring the rope back? So Imam Ahmad got very upset. He's like, what kind of question is this? Like who's the goody two-shoes who's asking about the permissibility
48:15of keeping the string? Who's asking this question? It's ridiculous. And they said to him, Ibrahim ibn Abi Nu'aym, a man by the name of Ibrahim ibn Abi Nu'aym. So Imam Ahmad said,
48:29in that case, that matches. Like Ibrahim ibn Abi Nu'aym, he has covered all his bases, right? He's allowed to ask that question, but nobody else is allowed to ask that question.
48:43And so the idea is build your Islam from the ground up or else you're probably just showing off, showing off to yourself or showing off to the people. And you know how you know this? You know this because when Islam is built on five,
48:57when your Islam is not built on solid foundations, it topples. You ever seen someone, maybe yourself in the mirror, who you know you're really solid on your prayer or your fasting, you only eat halal meat, but you have no problem
49:11eating people's flesh. You backbite, you gossip, you circulate news. What happened to your Islam, right? Or someone is religious in a certain domain, but as soon as you get into business with them, as soon as money is involved, as soon as the conflict is there, different person, wild, right?
49:24That's what this hadith is about. Go back to these pillars, perfect them in their entirety, revisit the foundations that Islam was built on. It's as if the Prophet ﷺ
49:38is telling you, Muslims, you're on the clock. Don't get busy with the paintings and the windows and the ornaments and the décor when the structure upon which Islam is built is in shambles. Isn't that beautiful?
49:51This is the idea from this hadith. Invest in your salah, learn about your zakat, perfect your siyam, right? Prioritize your hajj. That is how you are able to do everything else in Islam once those structures
50:04are solidly in place. once those structures are solidly in place.
