Without further ado, here are the three inspiring poems we've selected for today…

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My Love Story
By an anonymous submitter

She came into my life, when I needed her the most
When I had lost it all, the trust, the care, emotion.

She taught me that I could trust people again
That I could love and respect once more.

Making me think different to how others would perceive.
When I felt weak, she'd empower me.

Her presence was pleasing and brought peace to my heart
The scenes of the world were colorful now, pure art.

She encouraged me to ask Allāh, and He would give..
So by His Mercy I'd learn patience, and to forgive.

We'd work together and be strong.
Even though our journey was tiresome, and long.

But time moved forward, and situations changed.
The world distracted. The love didn't increase, just conflicted.

“I'm sorry,” I'd say regretfully.
“Repent to Allāh,” she would reply.

But the love wouldn't rise again. Sins would rise. Our relationship began to change…
My heart was greedy, and it wanted more.

The gaze wouldn't lower when passers flaunted
The heart said no, but the desires taunted.

The heart covered itself in dirt of black.
Soon.. she left, and didn't come back…

The regret hurt, and loneliness messed my head.
Couldn't go sleep, couldn't rest.

I covered the pain with sin
Might remove this pain I'm in?

The pain persisted and the desire more
So I increased in rebellion but this feeling wouldnt go..

I had lost myself…
My regret overpowered

I went in search, she was with her protector
Waiting to be found, just waiting for me to come around.

She missed me too
But I couldn't be with her, until I gave her her due.

What is your due, I humbly asked?

“To pray, to obey, and be steadfast
That's the only way our relationship lasts.”

“To be the friend of Allāh, and think of death often.
To humble yourself, and do good action.”

“To prepare for that moment, when we all run away
Except the one who prepared for that Day.”

“So fear Allāh and be committed
To our relationship, so you're admitted…
In the gardens of joy.”

“Don't be the people of hell
the home of destruction, a fire filled cell.”

“Mend your ways now, it's the right thing to do,
Deep down, you know I care for you…”

I listened attentively, understanding.
I was wrong in desiring more.

When she was enough for me, when she gave me joy.
That smile of that kid, who finds his best toy.

The simplicity, the balance, the pact we kept.
That's what we wanted – without regret.

I asked her Protector, who gave her to me, back.
This experience had put me on track.

Except this time I was sure
I didn't need to exceed desires for more.

The experience gave me fresh strength
The true Joy was in being content.

…

We're now together – together till death,
A promise we've, up till now, kept.

I hope it remains this way.
Oh Allāh, don't let us stray.
From your Mercy and pleasure.
Since that's the only way, we'll stay together.

Now you know, this was my love story…
Except, it wasn't what you expected it to be.

This girl, her name was Imaan*.
Except she wasn't a girl, she's my faith – that kept me strong.

Imaan is my joy, my love, and pleasure.
The one I've tried to find – through many – in Haram,
Except this caused the least harm,
The one I still treasure.

* Meaning Faith/trust [i.e. Iman billah (a trust/contract with Allāh/God)

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I am the child
By Manal Wazeer

I am the child that was rudely taken away,

The one whose picture in the newspaper, brought a storm of sadness and dismay

Stories were told, people felt – few wept

Perhaps, my murderer to him no guilt crept

I am the child who soon will become a mere body count

In the numbers that have long been forgotten, to whose account?

Some unlike me , didn't have a picture taken

Nameless, faceless to the world. Never to awaken.

I am the child whose mother's devastated face was lined with tears

As she held me in her hands, bidding good bye for a handful of years

Oh this suffocating pain, so cruelly unjust

Slowly she picks up the pieces of her now broken heart, only in Allāh will she trust

I am the child that defines the word oppression

The one whose now shut eyes , plead to all without discretion

Say a prayer, if you cannot do much

For in your silence, the invisible count just went up a notch

Soon enough, in a time to come – I am the child that will get my justice

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A War of Words
By Jasmine Javid
Silver Pens
Bleeding golden expressions
Thoughts manifest,
Subtle, yet powerful,
Toting abysmal meaning
Akin to these words, I seek to validate my existence
I know I've been chosen for a noble cause
So with this silver pen, my sword, and these thoughts, my steed,
The desolate lands of in cognizance await me

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I wanted to dedicate this one session to what I feel is one of the most pressing issues in the lives of Muslim youth and one that I have come to experience myself personally at one point in my life. As I've had the opportunity to travel more recently and interact with many young people across the country, I'm noticing it's not a problem localized to one community or limited to one specific kind of person, but rather it's happening pretty much almost universally. I guess I want to term it a crisis of faith, and a crisis of confidence in the religion.

Alhamdulillah, many of you that are sitting here are Muslims that are eager to learn something more about their religion and they want to advance further. Insha'Allahu ta'ala you guys are the hope for becoming the ambassadors of religion not just to non-Muslims but even to your struggling Muslims friends and family that are Muslim but they're barely holding onto their faith. They're barely holding on to any semblance of Islam in their lives and you are, at this point, the only connection Allāh has provided for them to Islam. So the fact that you are here is already speaking volumes for the kind of commitment you have. You might not think very highly of yourselves, but actually, I do, and perhaps Allāh ('azza wa jall) holds you in very high regard. May Allāh accept this gathering and gatherings like this one, and make us sincere in them.

#1: “Is this from God?”

Now what I wanted to talk about, this crisis of faith. I'll share a couple of stories with you and then I'll talk about it in general. The first story is from a couple of years ago. I gave a khutbah in a city that I don't want to name. At the end of the khutbah, a father came up to me and said, “I'd really like you to have lunch at our house. I want you to talk to my daughter.” I said “Okay, I guess, I have time”. He took me to his house, which was right next door to the masjid, and said, “If you're okay with it, my daughter has some questions about Islam, so if you don't mind, could you help her answer some of them?” His daughter comes out – and by the way, this is a Muslim family, born and raised Muslims, parents are born and raised Muslims, children are raised Muslims – and she has piercings in strange places on her face: on the side of her eye, and like a couple on her forehead. Weird places that you look at and you go “ouch!”. But anyways, she sits down and I'm kind of weirded out at this point, but you know what, let's have her ask her questions.

She had about thirty questions, and I didn't answer any of them. I just said, “So what else?” I kept saying, “What else?” and she kept adding stuff. She had questions like, “Well, you know, I have some friends in high school and they're gay. They're not bad people and they haven't killed anyone, so why do we hate them so much? And why did God make a hell, why did He have to do that, like…what's the point? And if He wanted to make a Hell, then why did He create us to begin with if He knows we're going to go there? Then why'd He do that to us? And what's so bad about having a boyfriend? It's not like murder, you know. I'm not that bad. What's the big deal? Why do we make such a big deal out of everything?”

At this point internally, I've already had three heart attacks, but externally, I'm saying to her, “What else?” And she just keeps going, and going, and going. And mind you, her father is sitting there, so if I'm having seizures…you know, I felt really sad for him, I really did.

And she just kept going and going. At the end of her thirty questions, I said: “Okay. I'm willing to spend time with you and discuss these issues with you, but I'd rather you just answer one of my questions first. If you could do that, then we can probably have a good, well-directed conversation.” There was a copy of Qur'an sitting on the dining table, so I picked it up and said, “Do you really actually believe this is from God through an angel to a man, (salAllahu 'alayhi wa sallam)? And whatever this has is perfect instruction for you and for me to live our lives in the best possible way, and if we live our lives this way, we'll find happiness here and forever, and if we don't, we'll find misery here and forever? Do you actually believe that?” She goes, “No, I'm not so sure.” I said, “Well then, all of those other questions don't matter. None of that stuff matters.”

That's what I would call a crisis of faith. That's the first crisis of faith, and she's not the only one. I've seen this story play itself out. A lot of people have those kinds of questions but they don't ask them, and you know I'm not just picking on girls here. Muslim guys will be raised in a religious family, will know certain things are haraam, and in their head, they'll say, “Why is this haram? Why can't I do that?” Then they'll hear, “Well, Allāh said so.” “You say that for everything!”

“Islam's no fun.”

And then if somebody was to ask them, “So what's Islam?” “Everything's haraam, here's my summary.” [Laughter] You know, Islam equals “'Don't smile, Don't have fun, Don't live life”, because all of that stuff is haraam, it's forbidden. And of course, it's reinforced because when you come to a typical masjid across the country, all you see are people that are frowning. All the time. It's like, “Mam'nu'u at-tabassum”: “it's forbidden to smile here.” It's like if they even see a child running a little bit with a smile: “Hey, Masjid! Don't you see the sign that says, 'Sadness Only'? [Laughter] It's like a depressing thing.

So for a child, even growing up, in a Muslim community, in an Islamic school…I'm not knocking on any Islamic schools here in Maryland since I don't know enough, but generally, it's run by some very angry aunties. [Laughter] Kids that are in class are just seeing angry people all the time, and the more religious they are, the angrier they are. The longer the beard gets, the bigger the frown gets, like it's very hard to smile. So they're in this environment all the time and there are some questions that start popping in their head. “Why am I even Muslim? Everybody around me is so miserable. We can't do anything! Every time I want to do something fun, they say haraam! They say wrong! And all the friends I have in school, they say they're going to hell! What do you want me to do?!”

Internally, a young man, a young girl, a young boy starts getting a little turned off by the religion. And then on top of that, let's be honest, most parents, even if they want to put their children in Islamic schools, can't afford to. It's a tough economy, it's not easy to afford, so most of our kids go to public school. That's a reality and it's not something you should embarrass people about. It's just a reality of Muslims living in this country that they go to public school. So parents feel guilty that they're not themselves able to give a quality religious education – they're certainly not getting one at school – so they put the child in Sunday school. That'll help, right?

It won't. It doesn't. Ask your child if it helped. [Laughter] I love Sunday schools by the way; I think they're a blessing, and that they're an important effort in the effort to educate our children. Nonetheless, ask the average child that is sitting in Sunday school on any given Sunday. You just take one random kid, especially a teenager. Pull them aside and ask them one question, “Do you want to be here?” Just ask them that one question and what is the overwhelming answer you will find? Uh-uh.

They've already served five days in prison at school. Prison for a child is behind a desk. What do parents do? “You need to serve some extra time. Here's a sixth day in prison.” By definition, kids hate class. I used to be a teacher at a school, and one of the ways I would punish students if they were misbehaving is when the bell for recess would ring, I would say “You can't leave yet, you have to finish ten more problems.” And you see all these kids sitting there and as the bell rings, the temperature in their seats rises. It hurts for them to stay inside their seats. And then they look outside the window and they see others entering the gates of Paradise. [Laughter] And they're like, “Aww…can we go? Please, please, please! Just anything but here!” They hate being in class, and you know what we do, we just stick them in another class! Oh well, at least it should be fun, right? No, it's not going to be fun either.

#2: Best Story Ever?

Okay, my second story now.

This actually happened in a Sunday school I used to be a part of. The class next to me was a bunch of preteen younger guys, like 11-13. Teacher walks in and says, “Today, children, I'm going to tell you the best story of all time. The best! Do you know what it is?!” This kid raised his hand. “Yes, tell me what it is.”

“Dragonball!”

This kid next to him goes “No! Yu-yu-Yugi-oh! Yu-Yu-Hakusho!” This other kid goes “Naruto!”, and they start arguing with each other. “No, that's the best story! No, that video game had the best storyline! And the sequel was even better because it went backwards in time!” The other one goes, “No did you see that movie, oh my God it was awesome! Have you seen the third season of this, or that, or the other?”

Oh my goodness, this argument breaks out in class, and the teacher is standing there in shock. His jaw is dropped and he doesn't know what to do. “No! No! No, this is all wrong! I meant the story of Yusuf ('alayhis salaam) in the Qur'an!” Allāh says it Himself, “We are narrating unto you in fact the best of all possible stories.” This  is a claim made by Allāh, and so he was expecting the child who raised his hand to say, “Yes, I know the best of all stories, it's the story of Yusuf ('alayhis salaam).” But nobody said that, it wasn't even a contender! So he says, “No, no, no, children, you're all wrong. The best story is the story of Yusuf ('alayhis salaam).” And the kids go, “Aww, I already know that one. Okay, yeah, sure it's the best. Mhm.”

Do you think they really believe it's the best? Uh-uh. That's a crisis of faith right there. Allāh said something, and our children, sitting in a Sunday school in the House of Allāh, don't believe it no matter how badly you want them to. They're just saying it because you want to hear it. That's a crisis of faith. That's a huge crisis, and we have to understand how to address that crisis.

All of the other problems we have for our youth; [you probably] want to make a list, and have programs about them: “How Facebook is a fitnah”, “How YouTube is a fitnah”, “How the Internet is a fitnah”, “How stepping outside of your house is a fitnah”, “How high school is a fitnah”, “How the mall is a fitnah”, “How your friends are a fitnah”, “How your car is a fitnah”, “How your cell phones is a…”- I mean goodness gracious, oxygen is a fitnah at that point! The list just keeps going.

I'm saying that list is superfluous. I'm arguing that stuff is fluff. We have to look underneath that fluff and look at what the real problem is. The real problem is a crisis of faith. We need to understand the problem, and the problem is that our youth are not confident, not proud, and not in love with Islam. They're not confident in the Qur'an. They're not confident that the Messenger of Allāh (salAllahu 'alayhi wa sallam) is the absolute best role model, that no one deserves to be loved more, no one deserves to be followed more, no one.

#3: Justin Bieber Mania

My third story. It's part of the crisis of faith. I mentioned this story at the ICNA convention too. We're flying to the ICNA convention and I usually take my whole family, all 28 of them. I have 6 children, and I lose count sometimes. [Laughter] But anyways, we're flying together, and since my kids are little, they're short and can't really see over the seats in the plane so they're just sitting there. My wife and I are taller, so we can see the TV screen when it drops. So there's a movie playing. We didn't want to see it, but it was right in our faces. And of course Alhamdulillah we don't have headphones, so it's a silent film at that point.

It was the Justin Bieber documentary. [Laughter] Yeah, imagine that. Well thankfully, it was a silent film, right?

So, for this documentary that is playing, I'm trying to avoid looking at it, but I can't help myself. I can't help myself because they're showing this kid come and start singing his songs, and girls in the audience are crying. You could tell they're just like, “We love you so much, I'll die for you.” Mothers are bringing their daughters to concerts. And then somebody's handed a voucher that says you get to meet him backstage. You should see the family, how they're jumping up and down in joy. And in the course of that video, I was like, “Oh man, these people have nothing to look up to. This is all they have to look up to and they're so happy at this! How sad of a life can it be?” In the next clip, there's a Muslim girl, wearing a hijab, and she's handed a voucher, “You're going to get to meet Justin Bieber!” She goes around a tree, hugging it, and going crazy. And she's not the only Muslim girl that would do that. She's not. Don't say “Astaghfirullah, what kind of Muslim…?” Hah, that's the average Muslim girl. That's normal.

So now, we have a crisis, not just of faith but of some of the fruits of faith. What are some of the fruits of faith? The faith itself is you're convinced Islam is true, but beyond that, a step above that is that you take pride in it. And a consequence of that is that everything that is NOT Islam no longer appeals to you. Everything that contradicts Islam makes you not only not attracted, but makes you feel sad for people who are. You look at it as something beneath you.

Let me tell you what a great thing for Muslims this would be. A point of pride for Muslims would be that instead of a young Muslim man thinking, “I can't do this, I can't do that, I can't do that either, everything is haram, look at my friends, they get to do this, and that, and the other”, instead of a Muslim girl who's going to high school wearing hijab, and everybody makes comments at her, pokes fun at her, and says weird things to her like, “You look so ugly because of that thing on your head…” and it makes her think in her head, “I wish I could be like those other girls who get to do whatever they want. I can't do anything, I can't have any fun in life. The only thing that's keeping me from being happy is Islam.”

[Short interruption: Personally, I think what he's trying to get at here is if those young people were instead sad for those same people who viewed them like that, but he got distracted.]

Proposed Solution #1: Create A Culture Around Strong Friendship

So I didn't want to just mention the crisis of faith. I wanted to also try to mention some of its solutions. It's easy to talk about a problem, but it's hard to talk about its solutions. It's hard, and my disclaimer will be that I don't claim to have absolute answers. I have some ideas, and I'd like to share those ideas with you. These ideas are the results of discussions with scholars, counselors, and youth. I don't want to give you generic kinds of answers, I want to try to give you some kind of practical answers that may not be the absolute solution but insha'Allahu ta'ala with your own discussions amongst yourselves, you'll come up with some better things.

The first part of the solution is that we have to create a culture around strong friendship. Identity itself, and not just Islamic identity, revolves around who you hang out with, who you spend most of your time with, and who you identify with. When you spend most of your time on a computer, you start taking on some of the qualities of the stuff you're reading and the stuff you're watching. It starts invading your thoughts. The kinds of people you spend time with affects you: if they're studying Islam all the time, you'll want to study Islam too. If they're playing basketball all the time, you'll develop a habit for playing basketball also. If they're going to watch movies all the time, you're going to want to go to the movies too. Your environment has an effect on you. The people you surround yourself with has an effect on you. The Muslim community, starting with the Muslim family and then evolving to the community, needs to actually have a campaign to ensure our young children are in the company of good role model older kids, like a Big Brother, Big Sister type thing. So when our girls are 12, 13, 14, when they're coming up in their ages, some of the more leading Muslim girls in our community – that are 17, 18, 19,  going to college, holding on to their religion and learning their deen –  are role models, they don't even know it. And our younger girls need to be spending time with these older girls, it's really important – that they have someone to look up to, who's strong in their deen. And they aspire to want to be like them.  That's really important.

The same goes for the guys at a younger age. It's not like what we do; we keep the little kids by themselves and the older kids by themselves and it doesn't work out. There needs to be a kind of mentorship happening at the community level, so that our younger boys are spending time with some of the older boys, especially the ones that are mature in their religion. And we have, māshā'Allāh, if not a lot of those, we have enough of those. We have enough young people who are mature in their religion, they really want to learn more about it, and they're good role models! You know, they have youth, they have energy, they have good looks. You know they could go any number of ways in their life and they chose to submit themselves to Islam – that in it of itself is huge, and that already makes them a role model. Whether they're ever grabbing a mic and speaking publicly or not doesn't matter; they're STILL role models.

And we need to put them in that position. It does two things. One, it gives young people someone to look up to, and two, it gives older kids a sense of responsibility. It makes them realize that other have their eyes on them, that they have to answer to a higher standard because they set the tone for others. And that kind of mentorship thing needs to start happening when families start doing that, and utilizing the community as a place where that kind of mentorship can happen. That's one, that's one suggestion.

Proposed Solution #2: Create An Open Forum

Another really important suggestion – and this is a long term thing – is that we have to be able to have forums where our young people can talk about the real questions they have without being afraid of reactions from their parents, their imam, their scholar, or their speaker. The speaker should NOT be in a position to say “You are so wrong – what you said is so bad, go make istighfar, go slaughter a goat and then come back.” We shouldn't put them into a position of them feeling intimidated for them to even want to be able to ask a question. We need to create a space, we need to create an environment where they feel comfortable enough to be able to ask certain kinds of questions. And I say this, because of some experience. Muslim community, generally, are very conservative people. We have certain expectations of ourselves, we have expectations of our children and we have expectations of other Muslims. Within even our own family, like if your boy, for the first time, got asked out on a date, or some girl came up to him and said, “You want to go to the prom with me?”, he's thinking about it but he'll never tell his mother. He's thinking about it but he'll never tell his dad. Because you know what's going to happen if he tells his dad, right? Inna lillahi wa inna ilahyi ra'jioon, that's what's going to happen! So he can't talk to his parents about this stuff, even though it's on his mind! He can't talk to her parents, or even the imam, because you know what's going to happen when she asks the imam? Next week the imam will give a khutbah: “You know what this sister came and told me?” They're afraid of being called out. They're afraid.

There needs to be a space where they can ask their questions. There needs to be a space where they can feel comfortable asking their questions. There needs to be training for our du'aat in how to answer those questions in a sensitive way. Realizing these are not just questions on a piece of paper that you can give a black and white answer to, there's a person who's really having problems. There's a human being who's really going through some serious struggles. And to want to spend some time understanding where this problem came from, and the best way to try and help them, this is a training in it of itself. It's not black and white, just telling our youth: “This is wrong you can't do it” isn't enough! You need to understand: “Why are they attracted towards it anyway?”, “What led to that?”, “How did they end up in that position?”

I'll tell you a story about a good friend of mine, AbdelRahman Murphy. He used to be a youth director in Chicago, and when I saw his work in Chicago, I kind of forced him to move to Dallas with me. And Alhamdulillah he's served as youth director in Dallas for sometime. And this is a huge masjid, I mean there's like 1000 people easily on a Friday night. It's insanely big, with 300, 400, 500 people regularly for Maghrib and 'Isha everyday. It's a big, big community with lots and lots of youth. This was the first time the community hired a youth director and his announcement was: “If you've got a problem, come to my office and we can talk about it.” So this kind of offer has never been made to the youth before. “Come to my office, you can talk to me about whatever and it'll stay between us.” First week: “I'm thinking about killing myself”, “I think I'm gay”, “I've committed the ultimate wrong act, what should I do?” All kinds of crazy stuff. And when he first came, about a hundred people just came one after another: “I think I left Islam, I don't think I'm Muslim anymore.” All kinds of stuff! The first week he fell into serious depression. I didn't realize…how bad things are. And it's not that Dallas is crazy, this is average. This is happening everywhere. But our youth don't have someone to talk to.

And I'm saying that I'm not even qualified, and for those of you who are activists, that want to serve Islam in some capacity, think a little outside the box. Yes, we need scholars, yes we need du'aat, yes we need khateebs, yes we need speakers, but man, we need counselors, really badly! We need people properly trained in psychology both in the Western sense and the Islamic sense. We need these people. We need teen counselors and mentors. We need leadership trainers, people that instill a sense of confidence and love in youth. This stuff is important! And to me, these things come first.

Internalization, Then Islamic Knowledge

And when these things are in place, then Islamic education on top of that makes sense. It makes sense because the people that are trying to learn now are already convinced of what they should be learning. Our assumption for a long time has been: “If we give people knowledge, automatically they'll be convinced.” It hasn't worked! Our kids will tell you about the life of the Prophet (salAllahu 'alayhi wa sallam). They are really intelligent children that are really good readers, children that get good grades in social studies, in English, in reading subjects. If you give them an Islamic studies textbook, they're going to read it, they'll be really smart at understanding the text, and they'll get a hundred on the tests.

But that doesn't mean they've internalized any one of those principles. That just means they're good readers, they're good at taking tests, and they're going to get an award at the end of the schoolyear for getting a hundred on that test. That does NOT mean they've internalized anything. Our gauges and measures of instilling Islam into our youth are very shallow. It's not the same as measuring whether your kid is doing well in math. They're two very different things. And then our children are very smart, kids are very adaptive – especially teens – and are very cunning. They'll tell you exactly what you want to hear. “What's the best story of all?” “Yusuf (alahyis salaam)! (Haha got 'em again!)” They'll tell you because they know that's what you want to hear. The scariest thing I've ever seen. Scariest thing: Murphy was doing a youth program, and he asked. “How many people believe that when you make du'a, raise your hands and make du'a to Allāh, that Allāh is actually listening?” Everybody raised their hand. Then he said “Okay, think about it for one whole minute, and then tell me.” Three people raised their hand. Three people, that's the scariest thing. This is the crisis of faith, and this is what we have to address first.

Psychological Crisis Among Older Youth

This is at the younger youth level. I want to talk a little bit about the older youth. The next level of crisis I want to talk to you about is more psychological in nature. But there's one higher up that's more intellectual in nature. A fundamental crisis, again. You know, we're living in a time now where obviously Islam is constantly under attack. When you think of Islam now, you think of criticism before you think of anything else. And there are certain ideas that are associated with the word Islam, with the word Qur'an, with the word Shari'ah, so if you say the word “Shariah” to an average person, what are the things that come in their head immediately, without you adding any adjectives yourself? What are some ideas that immediately pop into their head? Beheading, cutting hands, barbarism, stoning, this kind of stuff. This is popular society. And you cannot imagine and assume that Muslims that live in a society – rather, world- where Islam is constantly being bashed, will not have some residual effects on them also. It will. It has an effect on us. It impacts us.

So our youth already have some contamination in their views of Islam because they have mixed in with what others say about Islam and what they've come to learn about the deen themselves. A lot of times, the real foundation isn't there to begin with. Then they go to college. And when they're there, they already felt bad about looking Muslim, being weird, being different, being the guy that's being criticized all the time, and then they end up in Philosophy 101, and they end up in Anthropology 101, and they end up in Middle Eastern Studies 101. And you know what happens in these college courses, right? This youth, who felt bad about Islam this whole time, who didn't feel confident in the faith to begin with and was almost embarrassed about it, now have some philosophical arguments in his hands that justifies, “Well, yeah, I'm not that interested in Islam anymore, because you know…how do we really know if God exists? I took this course about whether God exists or not, and there's all these arguments!” But the real problem isn't that they have new philosophical arguments. The real problem is, they never had a real love, conviction, and loyalty to Islam to begin with. These courses only made it easy for you to make an excuse, to hide behind the façade of an intellectual excuse. That's all it is. But they're being equipped with those excuses.

Studying Islam in Secular Universities

And then of course you take people who want to study Islam in the west. They want to study Islam at the University of Chicago, or they want to do a Master's in Islamic Studies from George Mason, or wherever else. All over the country there are Islamic Studies programs now: these are ANTI-Islamic studies programs and these are UN-Islamic studies programs. The entire idea behind them is: criticism. The religion you've learned to appreciate, love, and admire your entire life: now you're going to do a Master's degree, and the entire time your teachers will constantly be doing one thing with Islam. What will that be? Criticism, criticism, criticism, criticism, criticism. You don't think that will have an effect on you? You don't think that'll start messing with your head eventually?

I met a friend who's doing a Master's degree in Islamic studies at Harvard. And he told me he was learning Islam in high school, so he got really interested, went to Syria, did some Arabic studies. When he came back, he said, “Man, I should learn more about Islam, so I'm deciding to join the Master's program at Harvard.” So he joined. The first semester was “Introduction to Hadith”. Sounds awesome. You know what the premise of the textbook was? “The more saheeh a hadith is, if it's agreed upon by both Muslim and Bukhari, the more it just means the authors went out of their way to tell people that it's authentic. So the more authentic the Muslims say it is, that's the more fabricated it actually is.” That was the premise of the course “Introduction to Hadith”. You take that for a semester and see what happens to you. Are we even equipped to handle that stuff? No, we're not. And I'm arguing that that's already happening. A good number of youth are in Islamic studies programs, they are developing some very strange understandings of Islam, and they are going to be the movers and shakers in the world. You think that these people that are on CNN, that come out, the Irshad Manjis of the world, are weirdos? There's a whole army of them on the way. There's a whole slew of them on the way. You think that's wacky? You haven't seen anything yet. The real show's about to begin.

Equipping Our Youth to Leave Being Defensive

We haven't equipped our own youth intellectually. Our Islamic schools should not be there to protect children from the “world of kufr”. Our Islamic schools are supposed to be: “This is what you're going to find them saying about Allāh's deen, and this is how we respond.” So when you go out there, you're not there to answer their questions, but you become the people that follow the nation of Ibrahim ('alayhis salam). He was not asked questions, he was the oneasking the questions! He was not shaken about his faith, he was making other people shaken about their false beliefs. It's the other way around. Our entire approach to Islamic education has become entirely defensive: “There's too much fitnah out there”, “We need to save our children and hide them from what's going on outside”, “I fear for them when they go to college.” No! Everybody else should fear when Muslims go to college. It should be the other way around! We should be the carriers of confidence! That's what it should be. It needs an entire rethinking on our part on how Islamic education is conducted. We're constantly on the defense.

This is my last point about building this kind of character and mindset. We're continuously, continuously on the defensive. I'm tired of it, personally. We don't have to constantly explain ourselves. You know, that's a really easy strategy that was employed even at the time of the Prophet (alayhi salaatu wassalam): just keep him busy answering those questions because if he's constantly answering your questions, he'll never get around to asking YOU any questions. So some Jews of Madinah would ask, “So, uh, who brings you revelation? Jibreel? Oh okay, that's interesting.”, “Who are these people of the cave? Oh, okay, you know who they are? All right, okay.”, “What's the ruh? Oh you got an answer for that too? Oh okay.” “How come sometimes a boy is born and sometimes a girl is born?” If he answers that, what are they going to do? Ask another, and then ask another, and then ask another. And you'll be explaining yourself. So Allāh answered a few. And then they moved on to another question. They said, “If we're going to be reduced to decayed bones – nothing- we're going to be created again? Really?”

This time Allāh did not explain. Usually He does, right? When they asked about the People of the Cave, did Allāh explain it in detail? He did. When they asked about Jibril (alayhis salaam), Allāh explained it in detail. This time however, Allāh drew a line: “Tell them: forget bones and decay. Even if you turn into rock, turn into metal, Allāh will bring you back anyway”, which basically means: “Shut up and get lost. I'm done answering your questions. Go ahead, turn into whatever you want, Allāh will bring you back. Whatever your imagination can come up with that's even harder to mold, go ahead.” “They say, “Who's going to bring us back?”: “Tell them the one who got you back the first time. Now get lost”. Straight answer now.

We have to see the fluff for fluff. We have to see through that not just for the sake of others, but for our own youth. We need to build confidence into our youth, as part of our education of them. If we don't do that, we will be paying the price for that in the next ten years. I say that very fearfully as I say this to you: we are not, as the leaders of the Muslim community, doing an adequate enough job thinking about how to instill the confidence of faith, how to fight the crisis of faith among our Muslim youth. When they have philosophical problems, we tell them, “Go make wudu' and make two rak'ah over there. If that doesn't work, come back, and I'll give you a special du'a. Recite that, and your problem will go away.”

If they have a philosophical problem and have doubts already, the spiritual solution is there, but you cannot ignore the intellectual solution. Our deen is intellectual and is not blind faith. Our deen is powerful. We have to believe that and have to instill that belief into our kids, especially at a time when everybody thinks they've got something on Islam. Christians are attacking Islam, do you know how ridiculous that is? Do you understand how absurd that is? I live in the South, or close enough. I live in Texas, and I drive around in the South a lot, and my hobby is listening to Christian talk radios. Most Christian talk radio is about Islam because they have nothing much to talk about anyways. “Oh these Muslims, their Koran thinks that we're doing shirk. Us believers are doing shirk! And we've got a Koran expert here who's going to explain everything to us!” And then they'll have their whole show. And I'm listening to this stuff, and I'm laughing my…It's such good comedy. It's quality comedy, except they're talking about “the contradictions in the Koran, and its grammatical mistakes”. When they talk about that stuff, I'm sitting there laughing…and at that the same time I start crying. Because somewhere, there's a Muslim listening to this, who has no foundation in faith, and he's listening to this and saying, “What?: to himself or herself? “Oh my God, that makes sense. They're on to something. They got us!”

You know, we haven't yet done our job of planting the right seeds. That's my only premise, that's my only point. We have to do that at an early age, and forums and regular programs like Young Muslims (YM), where youth get together and have company of each other, are components of building confidence in your faith because you're around other people who have similar confidence in their faith. Confidence feeds confidence. That's one part of it. But now we have to think even further, and really have to give some serious thought on how to develop these kinds of institutions, how to evolve our current institutions, and make them ready for these real challenges that are coming. We need to see the symptoms as symptoms, and see the actual disease that needs to be attacked. Most of the time we talk about the symptoms, but we don't talk about the disease. May Allāh (azza'wajall) allow us to see the disease, and empower us to be able to find a cure for those diseases through His Book and the Sunnah of His Messenger (sallalAllahu 'alayhi wa sallam).

Since 2003, under British extradition law, you can be arrested by the British Police subject to a US extradition warrant, not told why and put into prison for years on end without charge or trial.  London's Evening Standard newspaper last week reported that home secretary Theresa May, is preparing to reject reviews of this unjust legislature on the grounds that 'concerns about flaws are misplaced' and that changing it would have very little effect.

British lawyers and grass-roots campaigners have been exercising their democratic right to protest about this legislation, yet the government has been slow to respond.

The issue was put under the spotlight recently when over  140,000 people signed a petition calling for Babar Ahmad, a British Muslim who has been imprisoned without charge or trial for eight years, to be allowed a court case.  This led to a House of Commons forum on the wider issue of extradition.   Many cases of abuse under this legislation were discussed and the overwhelming majority of members of parliament spoke out in favour of changes to the current extradition treaty.  Whilst the legislature was put in place to deal with suspected terrorists, not only have people accused of other crimes been subjected to it, but guilt is not established before defendants are shipped off to the United States.

Other such cases include that of Talha Ahsan and Gary Mackinnon who both suffer from forms of Autism and who are awaiting extradition to the US, despite concerns that extradition will jeopardise a fair trial due to their mental health.

Defendants sent across to America may face detention in super-max prisons, where they are kept in solitary confinement for 23 out of 24 hours in the day, are kept under constant surveillance in rooms with metal or concrete furniture and have limited time in which to exercise.  Pre-trial detention can be lengthy and at best affect defendants mood and motivation.  At worst, these conditions have been described as 'torture under international law' by a New York Bar association study.

Following the house of commons debate on 5^th December, the British government has fallen silent and Babar Ahmad's case has remained low profile.  It is up to defenders of justice and freedom, to prevent this issue from being sidelined and maintain pressure on the government to respond as a civilised democracy should.

If government wants its citizens to believe in the power of democracy it needs to respond quickly and fairly and end the suffering of many caught in this unjust legal web.  Every day that the accused languish in prisons without trial adds further to the shame that those in power must be made to feel.

[The following is the video and transcript of Shaykh Abdul Nasir's lecture "ṣalāh in Focus." The transcript includes slight modifications for the sake of readability and clarity.]

The title of the lecture is ṣalāh in focus – creating some focus in regards to ṣalāh.  Let's go back to a time in the history of our ummah when the focus of ṣalāh was solidified.  The most important period in our history is the life of the Prophet .  To understand the focus ṣalāh has in our dīn (religion) and in the life of the Prophet , we have to go back to the most difficult and tragic time in the life of the Prophet : a period of his life remembered as The Year of Grief and Sorrow.

What happened during this time that makes it The Year of Grief and Sorrow?  What events led to the focus on ṣalāh (prayer)?  Probably the greatest personal tragedy.  There were many difficult events and moments of the life of the Prophet but the greatest personal tragedy of the life of the Prophet was the passing of his beloved wife Khadījah .  One common complaint that I have – and I make this complaint often to my students and my own community – is that too often, I find that particularly in regards to the sīrah, we have either a Wikipedia approach to the life of the Prophet or an entertainment-like approach to the life of the Prophet .

How so?  Let me explain.  When we typically talk about the life and life experiences of the Prophet , it is either a Wikipedia approach, meaning a bunch of random facts and bullet points and you just keep clicking 'Next' and scroll down the page.  You read that in the 11^th year of prophethood, the wife of the Prophet Khadījah died and then move down the list.

Or, it is an entertainment like approach, which means that if last week a another speaker gave a lecture on the passing of Khadījah and I show up this week and say, “Today as your guest speaker I'd like to talk about the death of the beloved wife of the Prophet Khadījah ,” right away somebody will say, “Excuse me, brother, we have already covered that and heard about it last week.”

Why do I call that an entertainment-like approach?  How do we treat entertainment?  If you have seen an episode of a sitcom once and then are flipping through the channels and that same episode that you just saw last week is being shown again, are you going to sit there and watch it?  No, you will change the channel because you've already seen this episode.  Maybe if there was nothing on and you've flipped through all the other channels and there happened to be a pretty good episode of that show, you may watch it for a second time.  When it is on for a third time, you are not going to watch it.  Let's just say it was a really great episode, you might watch it a third time, but at this point in time you can say the lines before they say the lines and can deliver the punch line before they do on the TV show.   When the same episode is coming on for the fourth time, are you going to watch it again?  Absolutely not!

If you have read an issue of a magazine once, you don't read it again.  When you are sitting in the waiting room of the doctor's office and pick it up, and it is last month's issue which you have already read completely, you put it down and pick up another magazine.  You don't read yesterday's paper again today.

It is either the grabbing of random information or entertainment.  Unfortunately, our approach learning about the life of the Prophet has become very similar to that.  “We already read that.  We already covered that.  We already talked about that.”

My goal here today, which is something we need to institute as a habit and practice, is that we need to really understand and grasp and put ourselves in those shoes.  We need to fully comprehend, understand, and grasp what the Prophet was going through.

Context of the Revelation of Prayer

In an effort to do that, let me tell you what it means when in the 11^th year of prophethood, the wife of the Prophet Khadījah dies.  At this point in time, the Prophet had been married to Khadījah for more than 25 years.  If you are younger than 25 years old, then the Prophet had been married to Khadījah for longer than you have been alive.  25 years is a lifetime.  Grasp that.

Do you know what happens in 25 years?  It is like you become one.  You know each other completely.  At that point in time, you know what the other person is thinking and what the other person will do before they do it.  You know what they are going to say and can complete their sentences.  You know everything about that person.  You are intimately connected.  Imagine 25 years of your most private, intimate, loving moments of your life with one person.  Think about how deep that connection was and how profound and deep-rooted that love was.  I know this sounds very cliché and to some people uncomfortable, but she was the love of the Prophet's life.  She was his soul mate and partner in life.  How do we know that?  We understand this when we read and hear about the Prophet's reaction to the memory of Khadījah years after she passed away.

During the time of the Battle of Badr, which was about four years after Khadījah had passed away, he had remarried and moved to a different city.  It's like we say, he had picked up the pieces and moved on with his life.  Life had moved on – he lived in a different place and was remarried.  So much had happened since then.

During the Battle of Badr, one of the prisoners of war was his son-in-law, the husband of his eldest daughter Zaynab .  The policy that the Prophet had instituted at that time was that the prisoners would be released if they were literate and taught 10 Muslim children how to read and write or if they couldn't do that, the family could send some amount of money to secure their release, and then they would be released back to their home, family, and people.

The son-in-law of the Prophet was a prisoner.  The daughter of the Prophet sends some jewelry – a necklace – to secure the ransom of her husband.  The Prophet had so much going on, he doesn't realize, and the ṣaḥābah say, “The next prisoner in question is so-and-so.  This necklace has been sent to secure his ransom.”  The moment the Prophet looked at the necklace, tears began to stream from his eyes.  He was overcome by sadness.  The ṣaḥābah asked the Messenger of Allāh, “O Messenger of Allāh , did we bother you?  Did we disturb you?  Is everything ok?”  The Messenger of Allāh said, “Everything is fine.  This necklace used to belong to my wife Khadījah . She gave it to our eldest daughter Zaynab, and Zaynab has sent it today as ransom.  Just looking at the necklace reminds me of the old days with Khadījah.  I can't control myself”  The Prophet was so concerned about Zaynab being able to hold on to this lasting memory of her mother that the Prophet requested permission from the ṣaḥābah: “If you don't mind, can we release my son-in-law to go back to his wife, my daughter, with the necklace?  I don't want my daughter to lose this memory of her mother.”  That's how strong the memory of Khadījah was in the heart of the Prophet .

Years later, the year before the passing of the Prophet when convoy after convoy was coming to Madīnah to accept Islam, one of the convoys that came from Yemen had a beautiful, expensive garment like a shawl, which was sent by the leader as a gift for the Prophet .  When the Prophet received this very exquisite gift, he took the gift and called one of the young ṣaḥābah in the community who would run his errands and said, “Take this garment to the house of that old woman who lives next to so-and-so.”  One of the wives of the Prophet doesn't know this woman and is puzzled.  She says, “Who is this random old woman that you sent such a nice gift to?  I know she is not related to you because I know your family.”  The Prophet responds by saying, “She is one of the old buddies of Khadījah.  Until today, I like to thank and remember and send gifts to Khadījah's friends to thank her for the years of friendship she gave to my late, beloved wife Khadījah.”  That was the memory of Khadījah in the heart of the Prophet .

One of the younger ṣaḥābah who never saw the era of Khadījah and never benefitted from her asked the Prophet , “O Messenger of Allāh, we hear a lot about our mother Khadījah but did not have the pleasure and honor of meeting, seeing, and knowing her.  What was she like?  Describe her to us.”  The narration says, “Innaha kānat…wa kānat (She was…)”  As an expression, what this means is that he is saying, “She was…she just was.  I don't even know where to start.  Where do you want me to begin?  I cannot even put into words how amazing she was.”  That was how strongly the Prophet felt.  He had just lost the love of his life – his wife and she was the mother of his children.  Can you imagine having to look your children in the eye and telling them that their mother is not coming home?  Can you imagine how heartbreaking that would be?

Personal Story

I was telling this story in the khuṭbah a few years ago.  A brother comes up to me afterward.  People generally have some feedback for you after a khuṭbah.  This brother says, “Brother, you know what you talked about today?  It personally really moved me.”  Sometimes somebody comes up to you and says something and they just have that look in their eyes like they have a story to tell.  This brother had that look, so I asked him, “Brother, if you don't mind, can you share with me how the khuṭbah personally relates to you and how it personally hit home for you?”  He sits down with me and tells me, “I know was born and raised Muslim, grew up in a good Muslim family – ṣalāh, masjid, Qur'ān, dhikr.  It was a part of our lives as a family, but today was the first time I have prayed in almost a year.”

SubḥānAllāh, what happened?  He tells me, “About a year ago I was at the point in my life where all of the pieces of the puzzle were coming together.  You know what I'm talking about?  You've been working for some time towards certain goals and you're at the point in time when it seems like the master plan is coming together.  I was about 30 and nearing the end of my medical residency and had a young wife and two little kids.  We lived the life of a student and resident in a small little apartment.  We had one beat-up, old, used car.  Life was tough, but we made it through school and residency.  I was nearing the end of my residency and fielding very lucrative offers from doctors, groups, clinics, and hospitals.  Things were looking up.  We had gone to look at some nice new houses where my kids could run around and have a backyard to play in.  We went minivan shopping at the dealership and were looking at nice schools where we could send our kids.  The whole nine yards.  Everything was looking up.

“One day I came home a little bit earlier than I normally would from the hospital.  I walked in and said salām, and nobody responded.  I realized that it was the time when my wife would usually put the babies down for a nap, and she would take a nap herself, so I decided I won't wake them up.  I went and ate some food and started reading and passed time.  An hour or so went by and I heard the kids from the bedroom.  They had woken up.  I could hear them being fussy in the room and got excited.  I went to the room and opened the door, and the babies were sitting there awake on the bed and crying because they just woke up, but my wife is lying there motionless and not responding.  I went in to take a look at her.  When I checked, I realized that she was dead.  She passed away.

“At that moment, my world just fell apart.  My life unraveled.  The first couple of days were a blur during the janāzah and funeral proceedings.  Once the funeral was done and reality set in that my wife was gone, the mother of my children was gone, for two weeks I did not come out of my bedroom.  I locked myself in my room with the lights off and just laid there.  I barely ate; I barely slept.  During those two weeks, I didn't even hold my own children in my own hands.  I didn't know what to do with myself.  My life didn't make sense.  What had happened?  What am I supposed to do?

“Finally, I started to recover and get my life back on track and went to work and reconnected with my kids and tried to put the pieces back together.  I eventually got back to work and trying to take care of my kids the best that I could.  I had some family I could lean on.  There was one issue that hadn't been solved:  my īmān.  I didn't know what I believed in anymore and felt like my heart had a hole in it.  I had lost my īmān.  I didn't know what I believed in because why did this happen and what am I supposed to do?  My brother who has been supportive had been there and taken care of my kids when I was incapable of taking care of them.  My brother kept encouraging and motivating and telling me, 'You need to pray.  If you pray, things will start to make sense again.  You need to talk to Allāh and reconnect with Allāh.'  I kept resisting and resisting.

“Finally today I woke up in the morning and my brother came to me and said, 'I'm not taking no for an answer.  You are coming with me to the masjid.  You are going to come and listen to the khuṭbah and pray in a large congregation.  Today is the day you get back on the horse.'  He brought me to the jumu'ah, and I wasn't really hopeful of the outcome or result.  From the minbar, when you talked about the Prophet losing his wife and his children losing their mother, I found the answer to my problem.  I realized that my Messenger Muḥammad has gone through what I'm going through.  He understands my pain.  He felt my pain.  I felt connected to him and realized that if he could go on, so can I.”

Sometimes when you try to understand the story and can't really grasp it and really truly can't appreciate what the Prophet went through unless you went through that yourself –  may Allāh protect all of us.  Sometimes Allāh brings someone to you so that you can get a better understanding.  You can look into the eyes of another human being and at least get some idea of what that pain was.

SubḥānAllāh, two years after this conversation with this brother, when the memory starts to fade and the story starts to become old for you in your mind and heart, Allāh sends somebody else.  I was giving this lecture at a community and a brother walks up to me after and said, “Brother, what you talked about, the same thing happened with me five years ago.  I came home.  My sons were 10 and 12 years old.  I said salām and my sons were playing games and doing what boys do.  I go into the bedroom and find my wife collapsed on the ground.  I check her and she had passed away.  Five years later, my boys are now 15 and 17 years old, and I feel that just now we are starting to put our lives back together after losing the most important person in our lives – the glue that held our family together.”

The Prophet lost his wife and the mother of his children.  On top of all of that, he lost his firmest and strongest supporter.  Who was the first person who accepted Islam?  Khadījah .  She was a woman of strength.  When the Prophet came home with this message, he is nervous and she puts his concerns to rest and says, “Allāh will never leave you out to dry.  Allāh will never put you in harm's way because you are such an amazing person.”  He says, “Fine, Khadījah.  I understand that and believe that, but who will accept this message?”  She said, “You are worried about somebody accepting this message?  I bear witness that there is no one worthy of worship but Allāh and I bear witness that you are the Messenger of Allāh.”  She was the rock and strength of the Prophet .  Imagine the pain and anguish of losing the Prophet .

The Ultimate Role Model

Allāh made the Prophet the ultimate role model.  About three to six months after the passing of Khadījah , another tragedy befell the Prophet :  the death of his uncle Abu Ṭālib.  We need the context to understand what this means.  When you hear about the death of an uncle, it is sad and tragic, but does it destroy your life and crush you?  It's someone you saw at the most two or three times a year.  Even if it is a closer uncle, it's not like losing your mom or dad.  This is where it is important for us to understand who was this uncle and what did he really mean to the Prophet ?  This wasn't the type of uncle that he met twice a year at 'Īd.

The father of the Prophet died before he was born, and his mother died when he was 6 years old.  He then went into the care of his grandfather 'Abdul-Muṭṭālib, and when he was 8 years old, his grandfather passed away.  Connect the dots and grasp this.  By the age of 8, this child never knew his father, had lost his mother and his grandfather, and he had no biological siblings.  At the age of 8, this child was basically alone in this world.  He didn't have any immediate family.  At that point in time, his uncle Abu Ṭālib took care of him.

Typically when we hear a story like this, we say he treated him like one of his own.  Abu Ṭālib didn't treat him like one of his own, he treated him better than he treated his own children, as impossible as that sounds.  I have children and know that sounds impossible.  How can you love someone else's child more than your own child?  Abu Ṭālib proved that it is possible.  The books of sīrah and history said that the people of Quraysh testified that they would see the Prophet in the lap of Abu Ṭālib more than they would see his own children.  Abu Ṭālib would never let the Prophet  out of his sight.  He was always worried about the Prophet .  He raised him and was his parent and family.  This was the man who raised him from the age of eight until adulthood.  All of his family was this one man Abu Ṭālib.  He was everything to him growing up.

The Prophet had just lost him.  This is like losing your mom and dad together all at once.  Imagine how painful that must have been six months after his wife had passed away.  Imagine how emotionally difficult this time must have been for the Prophet .

There was another tragedy embedded within the death of Abu Ṭālib.  There is a ḥadīth that paints the entire picture.  Abu Ṭālib was a very old man and had been sick for some time.  When the Prophet received the news that it looked like this was it and that it was time to say goodbye, he rushed to his bedside and fell down by the bed of Abu Ṭālib and held his hand with tears in his eyes.  He is losing this man that he loves so much.

He holds his hand and says, “Uncle, please, you have done so much for me.  Please just one time say the kalīmah.  Just once.”  The narration says that Abu Jahl and other leaders of Quraysh were there at the same timeand didn't want him to accept Islam before he passed away.  The narration says that Abu Jahl yelled and screamed like a wild animal on the top of his lungs, “Abu Ṭālib, don't leave the religion of your forefathers!  Abu Ṭālib, don't leave the religion!”  Over and over he is yelling loudly because he is already an old man and sick and ill and in the pangs of death.  With somebody screaming at the top of their lungs, Abu Ṭālib couldn't even hear what the Prophet was saying.

Abu Jahl didn't even want Abu Ṭālib to hear the Prophet , so he is yelling and screaming as loud as he can over and over again.  Abu Ṭālib looks over at his beloved nephew who he raised as his own and said, “Dear nephew, I can't hear what you are saying.”  The narration describes that the Prophet touched his mouth to the ear of Abu Ṭālib and whispered into his ear so that he could hear him clearly.  He said, “Uncle, please.  Just once whisper those words into my ear.  Those fools don't have to hear it.  Whisper it into my ear.  I'll be your witness on the Day of Judgment.  Abu Ṭālib looked at his nephew with love in his eyes and said, “Beloved nephew, you know how much I love you, but I can't do what you are asking me to do.”  He passed away without accepting Islam.

The ṣaḥābah said that when the Prophet walked out of the room, he was crushed and so saddened.  His grief was unlike anything they had ever seen.  Imagine the anguish of not only losing this man that is your family, but on top of that you are the means of delivering the message, īmān, and guidance to everyone, but the man that raised you and who did so much for you didn't accept Islam.  The narration says that the Prophet was questioning himself and wondering what more he could have said or done.  That's when Allāh   revealed the āyah of the Qur'ān from Sūrat'l-Qaṣaṣ:  “You most definitely cannot guide those whom you have loved.  Rather, Allāh guides whomsoever He wills.”  We always understood this āyah as Allāh rebuking the Prophet .  Absolutely not – when you put it into the context, you understand that this is Allāh consoling the Prophet .  “O beloved, don't doubt yourself.  Don't question yourself.  You can't give guidance to the people that you love.  There was nothing more you could have done because guidance was not yours to give.  You can't give guidance to the people that you love, rather Allāh gives guidance to whom He wills.  This was Allāh's decision.  Don't doubt and question yourself.”

Imagine the pain and anguish of the Prophet .  A lot of us who are sitting here and whose parents are Muslim can't understand that pain.  Talk to somebody who accepted Islam on their own whose parents have not accepted Islam yet and ask them what du'ā' they make every night before sleeping and the first du'ā' they make after waking up.  They will tell you it is “O Allāh, let today be the day.”

I have old friends who accepted Islam whose parents had not accepted Islam yet.  Whenever they are about to go visit their parents or spend the day with their parents, I always get a text message that morning saying, “Bro, please make du'ā' that today is the day.”  Imagine the pain and the anguish of the Prophet .

I told you about that brother who went through one of these tragedies and literally could not get himself to wake up in the morning and could not face the world the next day.  He felt like he couldn't move on with his life.  He didn't know what to do with himself.  Imagine the Prophet went through not just one of these tragedies but two tragedies like this and there were tragedies embedded within these tragedies.

The question is:  how did the Prophet continue?  How did he wake up the next day?  We talk about getting back to work and going back to our jobs.  The Prophet had the biggest job of any human being:  “O Messenger of Allāh, you have been sent to all of humanity.”  He had the most important, pressing, and demanding job of any human being.  How did the Prophet continue and work harder?  What gave him the energy and healed his wounds?  What allowed him to recover?  Where did he draw the energy and emotional fortitude from?

After these two tragedies occurred, Allāh took the Prophet on the miraculous journey that we refer to isrā' wa'l-mi'rāj – the travel by night to Jerusalem and then the ascension to heaven.  At that time, Allāh granted a gift to the Prophet :  the five daily prayers.  This was his strength and allowed him to recover and healed his wounds and allowed him to continue on with his life and pick up the pieces.  When we look at it from this perspective, this is the historical significance of ṣalāh and the purpose and benefit of the prayer.  When you look at it from this perspective, it makes total sense what the Prophet meant when he said, “The coolness of my eyes has been put in the prayer.”

What does 'coolness of the eyes' mean?  It is in the Qur'ān, du'ā's, supplications and aḥadīth.  What does it truly mean?  With any figure of speech, to understand what it means and alludes to, you have to put yourself in the mindset and understand it from the perspective of the people who used it, or it won't make sense.  The ancient Arabs used this phrase qurrata a'yun.  Imagine being in the desert where it is 120+ degrees outside.  There is burning, scorching heat.  The hot winds blow the hot sand into your eyes.  Imagine how dry your eyes get and how much they burn.  There are no sunglasses to wear and no Visine drops.  The eyes burn, itch and scratch to the point that it feels like they are on fire.  While you are walking around and feel like you just want to rip your eyes out, you find some cool, clean water.  When you take that cool, clean water and splash it into your eyes, how cool and refreshing does that feel?  How good and amazing does that feel?  This is what the phrase means.  The Prophet says that when he prays, this is how he feels.

Anything can be going on, and the world could be falling down all around you, but when you stand up and say “Allāhu akbar,” you feel refreshed and healed and a burst of energy.  It takes away your worries, sorrow, grief and pain.  It heals your wounds.  This is the effect of prayer.  This is the effect of prayer we are all looking for and desperately in search of.

This leads to the question:  I pray five times a day and have been for many years, but I have yet to experience what you are talking about.  My prayer doesn't feel like that.  What is missing?  The key missing ingredient to bring about these fruits and benefits of prayer and make the prayer the coolness of your eyes is khushū'.  The Qur'ān and the Messenger of Allāh call it khushū'.

It involves a whole discussion to explain the meaning of khushū'.  I'll summarize the meaning of khushū' in one word:  quality.  You have to have quality in your prayer.  Unless and until we have quality in our prayers, we won't be able to achieve and realize the full benefits of the prayer.

That leads to the million-dollar question, and the question that all of us have asked at one point or another:  How do we get quality in our ṣalāh?  How do we get khushū' within our prayers?  We've heard a thousand lectures about the importance of khushū', but we are here to find out how do we get khushū'?  How do we get that quality in our prayers?

How to Get Quality in Our Prayers

There are lots of things we can do.  Books are written by the scholars which list dozens of things we can do to bring greater quality and implement khushū' in our prayers.  To keep the conversation flowing and brief and concise, I would like to group the things that we can implement into three areas of improvement.

1.  A change of lifestyle.

What that refers to is really very simple.  We can't expect to live our lives however we want (lying, cheating, backbiting, cussing) and then expect that when we stand up to pray and say “Allāhu akbar”, magically we have khushū'.  There is no instant khushū'.  The way I live my life outside of the prayer and the way I conduct myself normally throughout the day will affect and impact the quality of my prayers.  If I want more quality in your ṣalawāt, then I have to lead a better life, a more honest and truthful life.  I have to cut some of the sins out of my life in order to improve the quality of my prayers.

2.  Make ṣalāh an event.

Treat ṣalāh like an important part of your day.  Let me give you an example.

You have to be at work or school at 8 am, and you live about 10 minutes away from work, so you try to leave your house at 7:45 am so that you can drive there, park your car, and be at your desk at 7:59 ready to roll.  If you leave your house at 7:45 am, do you wake up at 7:40 and roll out of bed and get ready?  No – don't do that!  Typically, if you have to leave your home at 7:45 am, how much earlier would you wake up?  The average answer is 45 minutes.  Some people take a little bit less and others a little bit longer.  Why do you wake up 45 minutes before?  You would say it is your job and is important.  You have to wake up and brush, shower, clean and comb, eat something, pack your stuff and dress nicely.  You have to take it seriously.  That is why you invest the time and give it importance and treat it as something important.

How you prepare for it shows the importance.  It is an event and you prepare for it.  Compare this to ṣalāt'l-fajr.  I realize that is the most drastic comparison.  Let me explain to you the proceedings of ṣalāt'l-fajr.  First, before you sleep you have the route from your bed to the sink completely mapped out so that you can get do it with your eyes closed.  Why?  When you wake up for fajr, you don't like to turn on all of the lights because it takes the sleepiness away and you want to pray fajr and go to sleep.  You make it to the sink and have perfected the art of the 15 second wuḍū' – it is like a magic trick.  You make your way back over to your bed, and you pray next to your bed and then engage in a procedure I like to call:  stop, drop and roll over.  You would pray on your bed if possible.

How sad is that?  That is the condition of our prayers.  I'll give another example from sports.  When we watch a game, what is the quality of our prayer?  First of all, it's a blessing if somebody actually prays during the game.  Even if they do pray during the game, what is the quality of that prayer?  We wait for a time-out or a commercial and then hurry.  We leave the volume a little bit on so that we can hear if something big happens during the game.  That is how we pray, unfortunately.

I joke just to keep it light, but we have to realize what a tragedy it is we pray like this, especially compared to how we seriously we take everything else.  The second area of improvement to gain quality in the ṣalāh is to treat ṣalāh as something important.  Make ṣalāh an important part of your day.

What that involves is to prepare and get ready.  Make wuḍū' properly – it is an act of worship that leads you into the prayer and puts you in the right mindset.  Pray when it is the time of the prayer.  Don't keep putting it off.  Dress appropriately.  Don't pray in your pajamas.  Like we have work clothes, the Prophet had clothes for the masjid.  When he would come home, he would take them off and hang them up nicely.  When it was time for the prayer, he would put them on.

There is a chapter in the Sunan of Abu Dāwūd which describes the preparation of the Prophet for prayer:  The Chapter of the Diligence the Prophet in regards to Prayer.  The Prophet was very casual and friendly and loving at home.  It describes how when the time for prayer would come and the adhān would be called, the Prophet would become a stranger to his family.

I'll be honest with you because these types of discussions are meant for that type of honest talk and heart to hearts.  When I first read that, I didn't know how to understand it.  What does it mean that he became a stranger?  It's kind of harsh.  Then you realize when you are responsible for something what that means.  When you have to go to work in the morning at 7:45 am and you have little kids when they aren't old enough to be at the age when they want you to go to work but at the same time are old enough to know you are going to work and don't want you to go.  What do they do when you try to leave?  They start to pick up on the signs – the picking up of the briefcase and the keys rattling – and they cut you off at the door.  What happens when you try to leave?  It's like a scene from an epic movie and the most epic cry of all time.  “No, baba, don't leave!”  They cry and scream like it's the most tragic moment in the history of humanity.  I'm going to ask a very serious question now.  What do you do?  You put them aside and tell your wife to come and get him and then go out the door.  Does that mean you don't love your child?  You are doing this for the benefit of your child.  He doesn't grasp and understand it, but you are doing it for his benefit.

Just like we take work that seriously because we understand the benefit in our jobs and work, the Messenger of Allāh when it was time for the prayers, he became a stranger to his family.  If I don't maintain this, then the same family for whom I would leave that prayer would eventually probably crumble and fall away.  I have to take care of my ṣalāh.  It is for me and my family.  The Prophet   would become a stranger to his family.  Everything else was secondary.  Work has to wait, the phone call has to wait.  He would make wuḍū' properly and put on nice clothes and go to the masjid early.  To bring quality and khushū' into our prayers, we have to treat ṣalāh like an event and important part of our day.  We have to learn to do this.

Ibn Kathīr (raḥimahullāh) says, “Khushū' will be achieved by the person who empties his heart for the prayer.”  One tip and recommendation the scholars that scholars would give and would practice – which is especially important for our times, which is the age of distraction where your one phone has 18 different types of tones to it; a text message alert sounds different from a phone call and an e-mail, Twitter alert, and Facebook update – when you are getting ready to pray ṣalāh, put away all of your distractions.  Turn off the television and turn off your computer screen.  Put your phone on silent and put it away.  Put everything away for 60 seconds or even 30 seconds and sit down and be quiet.  When you do this, you feel like your mind is clear and not as cluttered.  Then say, “Allāhu akbar” and then see the quality of your prayer.  Put everything aside and free up your mind.

The third area of improvement, and this is the most important and most drastic in terms of change and effect is:

3. Understand the basic structure and technicalities of prayer (fiqh), which will give you the outline of the ṣalāh.  The most important thing, which is actually the life and spirit of the prayer is when you understand what you are reading and saying in your ṣalāh.

Ṣalāh is about reflection and pondering.  It is about comprehending and understanding.  It is about feeling what you are saying and then delving into it and being absorbed by the experience of the ṣalāh.  This can only be done when you truly appreciate and understand what you are saying in the ṣalāh.

I'm going to give you an example.  I've been speaking for an hour.  Most of you have been listening and paying attention.  There's a very simple reason why you have been listening and paying attention and why I have been able to continue speaking with so much energy for an hour.  I don't feel tired or exhausted, and you have been listening attentively for an hour.  There's a simple explanation of that:  I am enjoying talking about this because I understand, feel, and believe what I am saying.  It's from my gut and I believe in it.  You are listening to what I am saying for an hour because you understand every single word that is coming out of my mouth.  You grasp it and understand it and know what I'm saying and are able to comprehend and digest it fully.

Imagine if instead of speaking in a language that I understand and you understand, I had been reading something off a piece of paper or reciting something I memorized in a foreign language, let's say Chinese.  Imagine if I had been reciting Chinese poetry to you for an hour, how long before you would stop paying attention?  10, 20, 30, 60 seconds?  Only a generous person would even listen for 60 seconds.  You wouldn't be able to pay attention or focus, let alone conceptualizing and processing it and reflecting on it and pondering it.  You wouldn't even be listening to what I was saying.

If I was the one reading it to you and had spent months memorizing 30 minutes of Chinese poetry, I would start reading it but if I don't understand it, in about 3-4 minutes I would think it's the most pointless thing I've done in my life.

I apologize if I offend anyone for what I am about to say.  This is the part that stings.  As silly and ridiculous and preposterous as that example was, how different is our ṣalāh from that example?  We stand up in ṣalāh day after day and ṣalāh after ṣalāh and read through our prayers not understanding, not appreciating, not reflecting, and not pondering on a single word. How are we supposed to focus in that type of a ṣalāh?  Where is the focus magically going to come from?  It won't.

The most important thing we have to do to grasp some quality in our prayers is to begin to understand what we read and say within our prayers.  I don't just mean read translations but reflect and ponder.  Fully grasp what we are reading, saying, and reciting in our prayers. When we do that, the entire experience of ṣalāh changes.  It's a different game altogether.

Examples of Understanding Statements in Ṣalāh

I'll end here by giving you at least one example of how that changes.

Allāhu akbar

“Allāhu akbar” is typically translated as “Allāh is the Greatest.”  We are going to tweak that just a little bit.  The word 'akbar' is the comparative and not the superlative.  Those are technical grammatical terms.  Let me break it down simpler than that.  For instance if you were to say, “Zayd is faster than Khalid, but Ahmed is the fastest,” 'faster' is comparative and 'fastest' is superlative.  Akbar is the comparative and not the superlative, so “Allāhu akbar” doesn't translate to “Allāh is the greatest,” it translates to “Allāh is Greater.”

To fully understand this example:  If I was to say, “Zayd is faster than…”, you are waiting for me to continue and finish it.  When we say, “Allāhu akbar,” we are saying, “Allāh is greater than ___.”  The purpose of the blank is a rhetorical function and part of the balāghah of classical Arabic.  It is very commonly found in the Qur'ān where there is a statement that demands an object and that object is intentionally not provided and a blank is left for you.  The purpose of that blank is that you are supposed to fill in the blank for yourself with whatever it is that is distracting you from your ṣalāh at that moment.

Allāh is greater than everything and anything, but the reflection and thought process at that time is:  Allāh is Greater and more important than whatever is distracting me from my prayer at this very moment.  If my phone is ringing, Allāh is Greater than that phone call.  If my friend is waiting for me outside in the car, Allāh is Greater and more important than my friend waiting for me in the car.  If the restaurant is about to close in 20 minutes, Allāh is Greater and more important than the food in the restaurant. If the game is on the television, Allāh is Greater and more important than the game on the television.  Anything and everything that could be distracting me from my prayer at that moment, Allāh is Greater and more important than that thing.

If you ask somebody what the reflection on “Allāhu akbar” is, they may say it is how they start their prayer.  We are realizing that even  “Allāhu akbar” has a reflection built into it.  You are even supposed to think about something when you say “Allāhu akbar”. There is a focus and khushū' to “Allāhu akbar.”  The next time you stand up to pray and say “Allāhu akbar” and go through the mental process of thinking that Allāh is Greater andmore important than those things distracting you, then see the quality of saying “Allāhu akbar” and how long it takes you to just say “Allāhu akbar”.  It will change your life.

Because you guys have been so good to me, I'll share one quick little example for you.

Subḥāna Rabbi al-a'la

What position do we say this in?  Sujūd.  How absolutely perfect is my Lord, my Master, who is al-a'la.  Al-a'la is superlative because of the “al” and means “the highest, the most exalted.”  Reflect on this fact.  Typically when we make sujūd, we rush the words.  What does it mean?  How absolutely perfect is my Lord who is the highest and most exalted.

What is the reflection here?  What position do you say this in? Sujūd, when you are putting the most respected part of our body (the face) on the ground where somebody was standing with their feet.  This is the lowest position possible for a human being.  We put ourselves in the lowest position possible and say, “Allāh is the Highest and Most Exalted.”  The next time you make sujūd, reflect on this and see the quality of your sajdah.

This is a small sample of what happens when we appreciate the meaning and understand what we are saying within our prayers.

Closing Note

As a closing note, I want to pose one question to everybody.  The answer to this question will give you the answer on whether or not you have to make some type of an effort to improve the quality and focus of your prayers.  Ask yourself:  When is the last time you experienced the ṣalāh? That when you prayed, you felt like it changed your life and solved your problem and gave you the answer to your question.  When was the last time that happened?  If the answer isn't something that's very good or something that you like, then don't you think it is about time we make some drastic improvement in our prayers?

(Note: Muslim Kids Matter is a monthly feature at Muslim Matters. You're welcome to send in your entries to muslimkidsmatter@muslimmatters.org!)

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I've been working on a project for kids to enjoy learning about the Qur'an and Ahadith.

Last Saturday was the first day of the Learning the Deen Class at the Zakat Foundation Community Center for this January/February session. The students from grades 3-5 (and one second-grader) were very attentive and enthusiastic during the class. I was surprised that they could learn the meaning of the ayahs in Surah Fatiha so quickly.

I told the students that their goal should be to get 100 points so that they could get a prize from the Treasure Box.  By memorizing the meanings of the ayahs, Ahadith, completing worksheets, completing Challenge Projects, and other such activities, they can get points. They also each have their own username and password with which they can go to the online website for the Learning the Deen class and can see their grades and points.

The students found the class more interesting and interactive because they could see their lists of weekly homework assignments there and they had fun taking the online quizzes.  The online quizzes were great learning tools for the students and is aimed to help them  study for their tests easily.

Even kids who don't live in Delaware and can't physically attend the class can still participate.  If you're interested in taking this free class, you can email me at nrkose@gmail.com and I'll send you the information as well as the worksheets you will need to participate in the class.  You may also send me your completed homework assignments and I'll grade them for you.

Learning the Deen Class Website:

www.wix.com/nrkose/learningthedeenl

Here is a sample worksheet from the class:

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Using Lessons from Surah Fatiha in Our Daily Lives

Read the following paragraphs and answer the questions that follow:

“Sparkles!” Hafsa exclaimed when she entered her room.  “What did you do?”

Her pet cat purred and jumped up, paws dancing in the air.

“Bad Kitty!” Hafsa shouted when she saw what Sparkles had done.  “You ruined my favorite doll.  You're the worst cat in the whole world!  I don't want to take care of you anymore.”  With that Hafsa picked Sparkles up and put her in the hallway.  She slammed the door shut and locked it even though she knew there was no way Sparkles could open the door.

1.      What did Hafsa do wrong?

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2.      What do you think she should have done instead?

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3.      What ayah or Hadith would you tell Hafsa to explain to her what she did was wrong?

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“Finally!” Hamza exclaimed.  “Thank you so much!”  He excitedly took the wrapped package from his elder brother and ripped off the wrapping paper.  He had been waiting to get this remote control car for so months and his brother had finally saved up enough money to buy it for him.

“Red?!” Hamza groaned.  “I wanted a blue one!”  He threw the remote control box onto the floor and stormed out of the room.

1.      What did Hamza do wrong?

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2.      What do you think he should have done instead?

_________________________________________________________________________________________

3.      What ayah or Hadith would you quote to him to tell him what he did was wrong?

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Khadijah angrily stormed into her room and slammed the door shut behind her.  Why did she always have to say mean things to her little brother and make him cry?  She hadn't meant to say anything but the words just spilled out.

“I hate you Shaytaan!” she exclaimed.  “You always tell me to do bad things.  Why do you tell me to do bad things?  Why can't you just leave me alone?”  She kicked her foot hard against the side of her bed and threw a pillow across the room.

1.      What did Khadijah do wrong?

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2.      What do you think she should have done instead?

____________________________________________________________________________________________

3.      What ayah or Hadith would you quote to her to tell her what she did was wrong?

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I've been having as much fun as the kids in preparing the worksheets, making the website look fun, and teaching them special things about the Qur'an.  I hope lots of other kids will join too, inshā'Allāh.
- Nur

[The following is the video and transcript of Shaykh Abdul Nasir's lecture "istikhārah: How to and Why?." The transcript includes slight modifications for the sake of readability and clarity.]

Click here to view the embedded video.

The word istikhārah comes from the root word of khayr.  Khayr in the Arabic language in its origins is representative of all that which is good.  Khayr is an umbrella word that represents all that which is good.  Istikhārah means to seek the good and seek that which is good.  This is the meaning of the word istikhārah itself.

Just like the meaning, the prayer ṣalāt'-l-istikhārah, which is from the Sunnah of the Prophet , is an authentically narrated Sunnah of the Prophet and an extremely emphasized practice of the Messenger .  Just like the meaning of the word istikhārah, the purpose of the ṣalāh is similarly to seek that which is good from Allāh .  I want to inshā'Allāh have this session to explain the procedure and the purpose of istikhārah.

I am going to split today's presentation into two parts.  The first part will focus on the ritual itself, meaning the technicalities, procedure, concept and outcome of istikhārah.  The second part of the lecture will focus on the purpose of the istikhārah, which is explaining the meaning and beauty of the supplication of istikhārah itself because that unlocks the purpose and the reason why we even do istikhārah.

Basic Points

To begin with the technicalities, I would like to begin with a few basic points.  The first is the concept of istikhārah to understand istikhārah conceptually and what it is.  I can explain best to you what istikhārah is by explaining to you what istikhārah is not.  As they say in Arabic, sometimes the best way to get to know something is to know the opposite of it.  The best way I can help you understand what istikhārah is conceptually and the role and purpose of istikhārah is by explaining to you what it most definitely is not.

Istikhārah is not a Magic 8 ball.  Did you ever buy that?  You get it at the mall as a gag gift.  You ask the Magic 8 ball, “Should I go to the mall today?” [Shake it]. “Maybe.”  This is the Magic 8 ball.  What I am trying to say by giving you this silly example is what people play around with when playing with the Magic 8 ball is throw out a random question, shake the Magic 8 ball and get a magical answer and go with it.  It is kind of like rolling the dice.  Istikhārah is not that.

Decision Making Process:  3 Steps

Istikhārah is the third of a three-step decision making process.  The first step of a decision making process is to use the God-given intellect, ability, and critical thinking that Allāh has blessed each and every single human being with in different capacities.  Allāh has granted every human being the ability to take factors into consideration and weigh different options and think about, ponder, contemplate, and process.  That is the first step of the decision making process in the life of the believer.  He first uses his 'aql, intelligence and ability to think that Allāh has given him.

There is a reason that Allāh emphasizes the 'aql, uli'l-albāb, and these types of things in the Qur'an because these are from the greatest of Allāh's blessings.  That is the first step of the decision making process: Take your circumstances into consideration, look at the options available to you, and then sit down and think and try to figure out and do some research and try to come to somewhat of a conclusion.  At least try to narrow your options and come to somewhat of a conclusion.  This is number one.

The second step of a decision making process is istishārah.  It is the Arabic word for seeking counsel and seeking advice.  The next step of the process is to then seek some counsel and advice, and it really depends on what type of a decision you are trying to make.  If you want to buy a car, you first do some research online and do some car shopping and test drove and narrow down to about three or four different cars that you are thinking about.  Then what you could do, for instance, is go to a brother from the masjid who is a car mechanic.  Sit down with that brother and say, “Brother, I want to take advice from you because you are experienced and knowledgeable about cars.  What do you recommend?  These are the three or four cars I am looking at.”  He says, “I wouldn't buy that because it has transmission problems.  This car wears out really quickly, etc.”

Now you are seeking counsel and advice.  If it is a more personal issue, something that is a life type decision, then you seek the counsel and advice from somebody who sincerely and honestly cares about you, somebody who is experienced and mature and maybe even spiritually focused so that they have a well-rounded perspective they can provide to you.

That is istishārah and seeking counsel.  This is the second step of the decision-making process.

The third and final step of the decision making process is now istikhārah.  What has occurred up to this point is that you started with no idea of what to do.  You narrowed it down to maybe half a dozen different options and sought some counsel and got some advice from someone and are down to your last couple of options.  At this point in time, you are struggling with this or that and are starting to lean a little more towards one direction.  You are thinking about two cars and are leaning towards buying a convertible, for instance – random example.  You are thinking about buying the Camaro over the mini-van.  No brainer, but nevertheless for some strange reason you are conflicted.  Maybe you have two kids, but it doesn't matter, they can sit in the backseat.

You are starting to lean in one direction, but you are little conflicted and just need a little bit of a push and convincing.  You are looking for that confidence to make your decision that you have come to by critical thinking – apply your intellect and do some research – and you sought some counseling.  You are leaning in a direction but need some confidence and some clarity of heart.  This is where istikhārah comes in.

What I have just explained to you removes many of the issues and questions that people have about istikhārah itself.  A lot of people are confused about istikhārah because they try to use it like the Magic 8 ball.  “I have got to buy a house.  Let me do istikhārah.”  What do you think is going to happen?  Are you magically going to see a house in your dreams and going to go searching for it and find it and buy it?  It doesn't work that way.  You don't decide that you need to buy a car and then pray istikhārah and a Honda Civic is going to fall on you.  It doesn't work that way.

When people try to utilize istikhārah in that way, then they walk away confused and say, “Shaykh, I made istikhārah and I can't figure anything out.  It's not working.”  You don't change the batteries in your istikhārah, right?  What is basically going on is that you are not utilizing it properly.  Anything that is not utilized properly is not going to work right.  You have to utilize it properly and appropriately.  Make sure you turn it into the third of a three-step decision making process.  This is the concept and role of istikhārah.

Prerequisites of Istikhārah

The next thing I would like to explain are the prerequisites of istikhārah.  What is required to do istikhārah?

I am going to give you the actual narration, but for now we are just going to roll with it and speak a little more generally.  What is required for the istikhārah is what is required for any other prayer, which is you need to make sure that you are pure and clean, clothed appropriately, have wuḍū'.  You do not require a bath of purification.  You face towards the qiblah.  That is what is required for istikhārah.

Basically whatever is required to normally pray is what is required for istikhārah.  There are no other extra prerequisites or requirements for istikhārah.  You don't have to pray it immediately before you go to sleep.  You don't have to take a shower and then immediately pray istikhārah.  You need wuḍū' for prayer; you need wuḍū' for istikhārah.  Istikhārah is a prayer just like dhuhr is a prayer and nafl would be a prayer.  You don't need to stop talking to people when you decide to do istikhārah.  You don't need to wake up in the middle of the night and do istikhārah.  You don't have to go stand on top of a mountain on one leg and do istikhārah.  You get my drift at this point – anything extra that you may heard, come across, or assumed that is needed for istikhārah aside from what is needed for prayer.  Wuḍū', dressing appropriately, facing the qiblah, Allāhu akbar – that is istikhārah.

The only thing I will add in here is that according to the opinion of the majority of scholars, there are small difference of opinion – I'm going to tell you what the majority of scholars say.  In ṣalāt'l-istikhārah, there are not major differences of opinion.  There are a few minor opinions here and there that differ from the vast majority.  I'm just going to go ahead and share the majority opinion because it is an overwhelming majority opinion.

The overwhelming majority opinion is that the only thing you have to watch out for is what you watch out for in other prayers.  Make sure you don't pray istikhārah at the times when prayer is forbidden.  Those are three basic times of the day:  while the sun is rising, when the sun is at its peak (which lasts for a minute or so), and the setting of the sun.  Those three times of the day are when we are told not to pray.  It is the same requirements of ṣalāh and for istikhārah.

These are the prerequisites of istikhārah.

Procedure

What is the procedure of istikhārah?  There is a sequence of events or procedure.  Once you fulfill the prerequisites, you will stand up and pray two rakʿahs, two units, of nafl (voluntary, supererogatory) prayer.  Why am I emphasizing and specifying it to be two rakʿahs of a voluntary prayer?  When we read the text of the ḥadīth together inshā'Allāh, at that time you will see it.  It is mentioned explicitly within the text of the ḥadīth by the Messenger of Allāh .  No debate and no question here.

What that means is that you can't pray ṣalāt'l-'ishā' and make the supplication of istikhārah – two for one, all done.  You can't do that.

The Prophet explicitly said that you have to invest two more extra rakʿahs of prayer that are voluntary and optional.  You pray those two rakʿahs of prayer.  There is nothing different about those two units of prayer.  You pray them as you should pray any other ṣalāh.  There's obviously room for improvement in my prayer, and I'm pretty sure everybody feels there is room for improvement within their prayers, so aside from that entire discussion, basically you pray istikhārah like you would pray any other prayer, which is two rakʿahs, qiyām, rukū', sujūd.  You sit at the end, tashahhud, ṣalawāt on the Messenger , supplication, salām, and that's it.  That is the procedure of the istikhārah.

There is no extra special sūrah that should be recited here.  There's nothing that is authentically narrated from the Prophet about reciting this in the first rakʿah and that in the second rakʿah.  There is nothing of that sort.  Just pray two rakʿahs of prayer.

Once you finish these two rakʿahs of prayer, which means the taslīm, you then at that time recite the exact supplication taught to us by the Prophet in the Arabic language.  You read it in Arabic.  Again, here, the vast overwhelming majority of scholars are of the opinion that the supplication of istikhārah is to be done after the prayer.  There are a couple of opinions here and there to do it before the taslīm; however, the vast majority overwhelming majority, and again, if you analyze the text of the ḥadīth, which I'm going to point out to you when we do read the ḥadīth of the Prophet , you will see that the Prophet mentions a word which makes it very clear that the supplication is meant to be said after the prayer is done.

Now at this point we recite the supplication.  Read the supplication in Arabic.  Why am I explicitly saying that?  Again, the ḥadīth very clearly mentions that fact.  A question comes up here:  what if I don't have it memorized?  Read it off of a piece of paper.  Fuqahā' have stated that very clearly if somebody needs to read it off of a piece of paper, that is ok.  Read it out of a book, read it off of a piece of paper, photocopy it, do what you have to do.  Nevertheless, read the actual Arabic of the supplication.  Don't read the summarized English translation.  When we read the text of the ḥadīth, we see the Prophet explicitly said, “Read it as I have taught you.”

The other thing I want to state is – just in case anyone is watching the video or listening to the lecture – what if somebody can't read Arabic?  Use a transliteration or something of that nature to the best of your ability.  Of course if somebody recently took shahādah or somebody recently came into connection with their dīn, there is always an exception to the rule.

We do not give enough consideration to people who have had a major turning point in their life, whether we are talking about people who may have been born in Muslim families but just not raised with the dīn and come to practice the dīn later on in their lives, or if we are talking about reverts and converts, people who took shahādah later in life.  Consideration should always be given to them, and it should be understood that they are doing the best that they can, and they should definitely make an effort to try to learn Arabic as much as possible and as quickly as possible, but until and unless they are able to get to that point, they are completely capable of practicing their dīn to the best of their ability, and it is ok for somebody like that to read it in English or to read the translation of it.  That is a very, very specific situation and consideration should be given to those types of cases.

Nevertheless, going back to the procedure.  We talked about praying two rakʿahs, completing the prayer, reading the supplication in Arabic to the best of your ability.  That is the procedure of istikhārah.  Read the supplication in Arabic, and it is done.  You don't have to make any extra du'ā' after that.  The supplication that you read in Arabic is the supplication and du'ā' itself.  There is no other extra procedure after.  Once you are done reading the supplication, you are done.

Outcome of Istikhārah

The next issue I would like to address is what is the outcome of the istikhārah?  Again, I can start by telling you what is not the outcome of the istikhārah.  You will not wake up in the middle of the night and have a 3D vision of what you should.  I can tell you that is not going to happen.  It is istikhārah and not Avatar.  That is one thing we need to be clear on.  While it might seem like a joke or silly to some people, sometimes people just don't know.  The outcome of the istikhārah is nothing out of this world.

The primary outcome of the istikhārah is the clarity of mind and confidence to make the decision that you need to make that I alluded to earlier.  You feel confident and good about making your decision.  You were already leaning towards one option – option A – and there is another option on the table, but you are a lot more confident about option A or maybe you have come to a decision about option A but you just need that extra little confidence.

You do your istikhārah and naturally start to feel more confident and feel clearer and feel ready to make that decision.  That is the outcome of your istikhārah.  The outcome of the istikhārah is to reflect internally and be a bit introspective and look inside and see if you feel good and confident about making your decision.

How do you know that the outcome of the istikhārah is maybe this isn't the best decision for you?  You will naturally feel down.  You will feel conflicted, doubtful, very scared or anxious or hesitant about making your decision.  Then at that point, this is your response of istikhārah that maybe this isn't the best decision for you.  That is how simple and easy istikhārah is.

The reason why istikhārah has become complicated for us a lot of times is because we are looking for something out of this world and something supernatural and really far out.  We look for something crazy like that, and when we don't find it, we feel unfulfilled.

If we learn to just think of it internally and learn to be a little more reflective and introspective, naturally you will find the response to your istikhārah to be a lot more facilitated for you.  You are thinking internally and feel naturally confident in your decision.  That is the outcome and result of the istikhārah.

What about Dreams?

The question always comes up:  what about dreams?  The issue of dreams is one thing that needs to be understood.  We don't completely dismiss dreams altogether.  Authentic narrations of the Prophet tell us that dreams are something that a believer derives inspiration from.  Even the greatest of scholars like Ibn Sirīn of the tabi'ūn and great scholars of interpretation of dreams, one of the first things they would say or one of the first things they taught their students was that dreams are not a basis of making decisions.  Decisions should not be based on dreams.  These were the first and foremost to tell their students that even though these were the scholars of the interpretation of dreams.  They said at the most it is inspiration, motivation, encouragement.  That is all it is.  It is not something you base a decision on.

I would like to clarify that right here.  If you have a dream and it kind of inspires you or motivates you, alḥamdulillāh.  Don't read too much into it because you are not supposed to.

Two Miscellaneous Issues

That is the outcome of the istikhārah.  There are two miscellaneous issues I would like to explain.  The first issue is related to the outcome.

What if I make istikhārah and I just still don't feel comfortable or confident in my decision?  I still don't feel confident or clear and am still not comfortable making a decision, and I made istikhārah and followed the procedure properly.  What do I do at that time? The course of action at that time is:  do it again.  If it doesn't work again, then do it again.  If you are still not comfortable, then do it again.  Keep doing it until you feel confident and comfortable in making your decision.

There is even a narration from 'Abdullāh b. Zubayr , one of the companions of the Prophet and probably 'Ā'ishah's best and brightest student.  He says, “I made istikhārah with Allāh three times.  Then I was comfortable and confident in making my decision.”  He explicitly mentions while explaining to his students that if you have to make istikhārah multiple times, then you have to make istikhārah multiple times and that's ok.  He said, “I had to pray istikhārah three times one time to make a decision.”  Don't be afraid of repeating the istikhārah multiple times.

A lot of times, it is just a matter of – and this is a tragedy of our times – becoming spiritually numb and we are not very introspective and not very reflective.  Sometimes the superficial nature of the culture we live in or activities make us a little spiritually dull or numb.  We might have to do istikhārah a few times to break through the surface or crack the shell, and that's ok.

The last issue I want to mention here that is associated with istikhārah is that there is one very commonly asked question and issue that comes up quite often.  That is:  can I have somebody else do istikhārah for me?  There is no precedent.  There is no religious verification for having someone else do istikhārah for you.  There is nothing mentioned in the aḥadīth of the Prophet .  There is no precedent from the generation of the ṣaḥābah.  The classical fuqahā' have explicitly stated that istikhārah is meant to be done by the individual himself or herself.  That is a rule.  That's it.  A person has to do the istikhārah himself or herself.

There is a very honest and sincere question and concern that is in the mind's of people who ask this question.  The question or that concern is often:  I am not a very good person, I don't pray five times a day, I have a lot of sins and issues in my life, I feel distant from Allāh, I don't know if I make istikhārah if it will be clear or won't be clear, so I want to ask someone to make istikhārah who is a lot more righteous and pious, and someone who is a lot better person than I am.  That is a concern a lot of people have.

I would like to answer that concern by first saying that maybe part of the reason that you feel that way about your relationship with Allāh is because of the mentality and approach that you have where you don't feel like you are good enough to talk to Allāh.  You feel like you don't have access to Allāh.

The first thing that you have to get over is the simple fact that Allāh is just as available and just as accessible to the sinful person as He is to the most righteous and pious person.  Allāh is available and accessible to everyone.  We can all pray to Allāh.  We can all ask Allāh for whatever we need.  We can all do istikhārah with Allāh.

The second answer to that concern is if you are feeling a bit guilty and self-conscious about the fact that you are distant from Allāh and not praying and maybe that is why you should not be doing istikhārah, then why not fix the problem?  Why not say, “I have a situation.  I need to do istikhārah.  I don't pray five times a day and that's why I don't feel comfortable doing istikhārah.  Well, it's time for ṣalāt'l-maghrib right now or time for ṣalāt'l-'ishā' right now, why don't I go ahead and take that first step?  Why don't I go make wuḍū', stand up and pray ṣalāt'l-'ishā' and then pray two rakaʿāt to do my istikhārah.”  Get it out of the way and get it done.  That is the answer to the question.

There is no validity to having somebody halfway across the world in some village do istikhārah on your behalf and that person doesn't even know who you are and what's going on with you.  By the way, as a side note and a word of advice, if that person is charging you, it's probably a scam.  Just a little note of caution.  If a person is charging you, you need to stay away from that entire situation.

Nevertheless, I did want to address that in a serious issue and serious manner.  There is no validity, there is no precedent, and there is absolutely no authenticity to having somebody do istikhārah on your behalf.  The person him or herself needs to be doing their own istikhārah whatever situation they are dealing with.

Their might be situations where a decision affects multiple people.  Then everybody involved in the situation makes their own istikhārah.  If I will be implicated by this decision, then we all make our own istikhārah.  Nevertheless, it is not like doing a business deal.  If I'm getting into a business deal with a couple of people and we need to come to the decision whether it is good or not, we decide we've looked at the facts, crunched the numbers, and spoken to a couple of people and gotten some consultation, we need to do istikhārah.  Let everybody go and do their own istikhārah.  Even when it is a joint decision, everybody should be doing istikhārah.  Definitely when it is your own personal decision, make your own istikhārah.  Don't put it off on somebody else.  Nobody can do your istikhārah – you do your own.

The concern that is there that “I'm not good enough, I'm not pious enough, I'm not righteous enough,” it doesn't make any sense.  Allāh is Allāh.  He is accessible to you.  All you have to do is go get clean, make wuḍū', face the qiblah, Allāhu akbar, and you are talking to Allāh.  Done deal.

Secondly, if you do feel that you are distant from Allāh, then fix the problem.  Don't create another problem.  Repair the relationship and fix the issue.

It obviously goes without saying that we don't make istikhārah for anything that is impermissible.  There is no istikhārah for: “Should I drink alcohol (na'ūdhu billāh)” – of course that is very bad.  “Should I gamble, what should I put my money on.”  It goes without saying and it is common sense that you don't make istikhārah about the things that are impermissible.

Also, we do not make istikhārah about things that are obligatory.  There is no making istikhārah about “should I pray ṣalāt'l-'ishā' or not.”  That goes without saying that things that are obligatory and things that are a part of the dīn and things that we are supposed to do like fasting Ramaḍān, there is no making istikhārah “should I fast in Ramaḍān or not.”  Similarly, we do not make istikhārah for things that are impermissible.  Of course that is common sense, but I just wanted to mention that.

Supplication of Istikhārah

Now, let's go ahead and discuss the supplication of istikhārah itself.  I'll go ahead and read the ḥadīth to you.  This is a ḥadīth from Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhāri.

Jābir (may Allāh be pleased with him), a very knowledgeable companion of the Prophet of Allāh (peace and blessings be upon him), says, “The Messenger of Allāh would regularly teach us to do istikhārah in all of our affairs and issues just like he would teach us a sūrah from the Qur'an.”  What does that mean?  He is drawing a parallel.  This is the same type of verbage used to talk about the tashahhud in the prayer.  “He would teach us the tashahhud like he would teach us a sūrah from the Quran.”  It is also said about the istikhārah supplication.

That means two things and has two implications.  Implication #1:  he emphasized the importance of memorizing it.  Just like we memorize a sūrah of the Qur'an, similarly he emphasized the importance of memorizing the supplication of istikhārah.  Implication #2:  read it in the Arabic language like we read a sūrah in the Arabic language.  When we read a sūrah from the Qur'an in our prayers, we read it in Arabic.  Again, there is that rare exception that I talked about, nevertheless the general rule is that we read the supplication in Arabic.  The Prophet taught us to read the supplication of istikhārah in Arabic like we read a sūrah in Arabic.

“He would say, 'When any one of you is concerned with an issue or a matter, then he should pray two rakʿahs of optional, voluntary prayer aside from the farḍ obligatory prayer.'”  This is where I was explicitly saying it has to be voluntary optional prayer because the Prophet explicitly in the ḥadīth in the narration says it must be voluntary optional prayer.

Then the Prophet says, “Thumma…”  Thumma in the Arabic language in classical Arabic, the Quranic and prophetic language, is to say “afterwards, after that, then afterwards.”  It states that this occurs after the previous thing has been completed or concluded.  Based on this, the vast overwhelming majority of scholars are of the opinion the supplication of istikhārah is to be read after the prayer has been completed, after the taslīm.

The Prophet reads the supplication for us and teaches us the supplication.  I'm going to explain the meaning of the supplication.

'O Allāh, I seek most definitely that which is good from You by means of Your Knowledge' because O Allāh, You know what is good for me, and I don't know what is good.  The āyah of the Qur'an says, “You may like something initially and it turns out to be bad for you.  You might dislike something initially and it turns out to be something good for you.”  Based on that, Allāh is the only One who knows what is good for me, so that is why I am saying, “O Allāh, I seek that which is good from You by means of Your Knowledge.”

'And I seek the ability to do what I have to do by means of Your Power and Your Ability.'  Meaning:  I am weak and I am incapable, but I seek the ability to make my decision and to do what I need to do by means of Your Ability and Power.

'And I ask You, to grant me from Your great, majestic benevolence and great blessing to bless me.'  I ask You to bless me from Your Blessings and to grant me some from Your Blessings.

This is personally my favorite part of the supplication.  This states the mentality behind istikhārah.

'…because most definitely You are fully capable, and I am completely incapable.'

'And You know everything and I don't know anything.'

'And O Allāh, You are 'Alām. 'Alām is the exaggerated, hyperbolized noun which basically means the Complete Knower of al-ghuyūb.  Ghuyūb is the plural of the word ghayb – all those things that are unseen, all those things that are hidden, all those things that are unknown.  You are the Complete Knower, inside out, of all those things that are unseen, unknown, and hidden.

Now here comes the crux of the supplication:

'O Allāh, You know that this issue, decision, matter – if this is good for me in my religious affairs and my worldly affairs and in the end of my affairs…'  What do you think 'the end of my affairs' is referring to?  The ākhirah.  'If You know, O Allāh, that this decision that I'd like to make and have been struggling with is good for me in my dīn and my religion, in my worldly matters and issues, and if this is good for me in the ākhirah …'

Another narration of this same supplication, the Prophet said,

'In my short term and in the long term…'
What do you think short term refers to?  Dunya, this life.  'Ājilihi, the long term, makes reference to ākhirah, the life of the hereafter.

'O Allāh, You know if this is good for me in the short term and the long term, dunya and ākhirah.'

'Make it possible for me.  Make it happen for me.'

But that's not it.  Now we get to see the real beauty and magnificence of the supplication.

'Don't just make it possible and available to me, make it easy and facilitate it for me.  Make it simple, easy, and accessible for me.'

Thumma means after the fact.  After what fact?  After I have achieved it.  Put blessing in it for me.  We are going for the premium package.  I want the works, all the options.  I want it to be possible for me, O Allāh.  I want it to be easy, simple, accessible, and facilitated for me, O Allāh.  Then after I have it, I want barakah and blessing in it, O Allāh.

What a comprehensive supplication.  What a beautifully comprehensive supplication.  It then goes on:

'O Allāh, You know if this issue, decision, matter is bad for me in my dīn, in my worldly matters and in the end of my affairs in the ākhirah.

Another narration again says:

'in my short term and in the long term' meaning my dunya and my ākhirah.

Here we get to again see the beauty and eloquence of the supplication, the prophetic eloquence on full display.  Let me explain the words to you here.  The word ṣar means to turn something.  There are two entities here:  you and what you are making istikhārah for.  The supplication says, “If this is bad for me in my dunya and ākhirah, then turn it away from me and turn me away from it.”  Do you see the eloquence in the supplication and the visual that it provides?  Imagine you and what you are making istikhārah for.

O Allāh, if this is bad for me in my dunya and my ākhirah, then I want nothing to do with it.  Don't just turn it away from me but turn me away from it.  I want nothing to do  with it.  I got no business with it.  If there is no khayr, then what would I want with it?  This is what the supplication teaches us to say.

That doesn't solve the problem.  There is still an issue left. What is the problem?  Whatever it is you are making istikhārah for – your need, your necessity, your situation, your decision is still not complete.  You made istikhārah and realize that this is not good for you and felt uncomfortable, hesitant, or apprehensive about the decision and backed away, but your need still remains.

The Prophet doesn't leave us hanging.  He completes the supplication.

'And then make possible for me that which is good.'  This particular situation wasn't good for me, so I asked Allāh, “Turn it away from me and turn me away from it.  I want nothing to do with it.  O Allāh, make that which is good possible for me.”  The problem is I don't know where, how, when, or anything about it.  Where do I start?  Ḥaythuka – wherever and however that good may be.  Make that which is good possible for me whenever, wherever, and however it may be.  I leave it to you, O Allāh.  I will still do my due diligence and stay at work trying to find the right option, but O Allāh, lead me to that khayr.  I was saved from sharr, but make something good for me down the road.

This is consolation at the end of the supplication.  This situation didn't work out, which is actually good because it wasn't khayr.  You are asking Allāh for khayr, and Allāh will make khayr possible for you.

The yaqīn, the conviction, needs to be there when you make supplication.  Allāh will make that which is good possible, you just have to keep sticking to what you are doing and keep your hopes high in Allāh .

'So make that which is good possible for me wherever and however it may be.  Then make me pleased and satisfied with it.

In another narration, the Prophet says the words, “Then make me satisfied with it.”  Make me content, satisfied, fulfilled with it.  Make me pleased with it.

Again, it sounds like the same thing.  Even somebody who doesn't have any background in formal Arabic studies can hear the difference.  Thumma arḍini bihi and thumma raḍḍini bihi.  Arḍini and raḍḍini sound a lot alike, but are they completely the same word?  There is a little bit of a difference, which is a difference in verb pattern.  The thing about these verb groups and verb patterns is that they all have their own special implication.  In the classical form of the language, they have their own special implications.

When you have the same root word coming in two verb patterns, the subtle difference between the two is that arḍini means 'make something happen all at once.'  Make me all at once completely satisfied and fulfilled with it.  Raḍḍini has the implication for something to happen continuously, little by little, step by step.

SubḥānAllāh, the Prophet said it with the two different verb forms, and this shows us not only the eloquence of the Prophet but how well he understood people.  There are two types of people when it comes to making a decision.  Some people might take their time and do their due diligence and research and take time to come to a decision.  When they finally come to a conclusion, they are done.  The decision is made, and khalās they are confident and going forward now.

Some people are a little different.  They come to a conclusion and decision and feel good and everything is ok and they are going for it.  Then later at midnight you get a text message from that friend saying, “I'm freaking out.  I don't know what to do.  I'm nervous.”  You say, “Don't worry about it.  It's all ok.  It's midnight, go to sleep.  Everything will be alright inshā'Allāh.”  Then they say, “Ok, I'm good.”  You wake up to pray ṣalāt'l-fajr, and he calls you.  You answer the phone and he says, “Bro, I need to talk to you right now.  I'm not sure about this.”  That's ok – some people are like that and need that constant reassurance.

SubḥānAllāh look at the Messenger of Allāh and how well he knows his people and understands people.  He accommodated both types of people.  “Thumma arḍini bihi” for the type of guy who might take his time to make a decision but once he makes it, he is done.  “Thumma raḍḍini bihi” for the person who “O Allāh don't just make me pleased with it, but keep me pleased with it.”  Constantly reassure me about my decision, O Allāh.

At the end of the supplication in the narration of Bukhāri, the Prophet says, “And then he mentions his need.”  When you go back into the supplication, remember the part that I said was the crux of the supplication?

“O Allāh, You know that this decision, if this is good for me…” that is the moment where the Prophet says the person should mention his or her need.  The scholars explain that there are two options.  Somebody could just simply think of whatever it is that they are making istikhārah about, and that would suffice.  If somebody just visualizes or conceptualizes or thinks of what they are making istikhārah about, that is sufficient.  Otherwise, a person can feel free and should feel free to go ahead and verbalize it.  They don't need to verbalize it in Arabic if that is not their language.  They can say it in their own language.  Allāhumma in kunta ta'lamu anna hatha'l-amra… and then at that time the person says, “Buying this particular car, purchasing this house, marrying so-and-so” that this is good for me.  Then the supplication goes on and continues.

Similarly, there is a second moment when you mention it as well when you mention the other part of it.  “O Allāh, you know that if this decision and issue is bad for me,” then again you can think about it, conceptualize it, or verbalize it.  The Prophet taught us to do that.  It becomes very practical and real.  It is a real experience and you are literally stating your need, and this is something the Prophet taught us to do.

That concludes the discussion on the meaning of the supplication of istikhārah and it gives you an insight as to why we do istikhārah and what the purpose is and the spirit of istikhārah.

One thing I would like to explain here about the supplication of istikhārah is that it is the perfect example of prophetic eloquence of the Prophet and how beautiful the supplications are that he taught us.  There is a lot of good and khayr in learning the prophetic supplications, and we should invest some time and energy in learning these beautiful supplications.

Quotes from Scholars

The last little note I wanted to mention here is a few little basic quotes from some scholars about the blessing of istikhārah and why we do istikhārah.

Ibn Abi Jamra (raḥimahullāh), a great scholar, said, “The wisdom behind putting the ṣalāh before the istikhārah is the istikhārah combines both the good of this world and the next.  Just like in this dunya a person needs to go the one he needs something from and win their favor and then put their need before them, the ṣalāh precedes the supplication is like knocking at the door of the King and presenting yourself before Allāh and making sujūd and humbling yourself and putting your face on the ground before Allāh and then spreading your hands and presenting your need before Allāh .”  This is the beauty of the sequence of events.

Ibn Taymiyyah says, “He who seeks guidance from the Creator and then consults with the creation (people) and then once he comes to a decision that he is confident in and goes forward with, such a person will never regret and have no remorse about the decision that he makes.”

Imam Al-Nawawi says, “After performing the istikhārah, when a person is wholeheartedly inclined and feels good about a decision, then the person should say bismillāh and go ahead with the course of action and the conclusion and decision.”

Istikhārah is like a training in adab with Allāh.  “O Allāh, I will not make a decision without praying to You.  Even though I'm fully confident, I will still do istikhārah.”  It shows adab with Allāh, and part of the adab with Allāh is that when you do come to a conclusion and decision and did make istikhārah and feel confident about your decision, then you go with it.  You remove doubt at that time and don't second guess and don't doubt because that would show disrespect to Allāh and this practice of istikhārah.

Final Note

The last and final note I want to mention here is one other requirement for istikhārah.  I didn't mention this in the prerequisites because I was talking about more in terms of fiqh.  The primary ingredient of the istikhārah is conviction.  Know who you are praying to.  You are praying to Allāh, rabb'l-'alamīn.  You are praying to the One who created each and every single thing.  He watches and controls every single thing.  He sustains and maintains each and every single thing.  He is capable of doing whatever He wills.

Have that level of confidence when you do istikhārah.  I am not just consulting with anyone.  I am talking to Allāh, and Allāh will help me in my situation.  Allāh will give me clarity of mind, and Allāh will bless me with confidence.  When you do make istikhārah and you do feel hesitant, remember what the end of the supplication said.  Don't feel disheartened at that time because at the end of the supplication, you do ask Allāh for khayr, and if you have the level of conviction in Allāh, you will have the conviction that Allāh will provide to you that which is best for you.

Have that conviction.  Have that level of īmān and yaqīn in Allāh and His Ability to take care of you and Allāh will inshā'Allāh take care of us.  As it says in the ḥadīth qudsi, “I deal with My slave according to how he perceives Me.  If he perceives that I can take care of him, I take care of him.”  When he is doubtful, maybe he won't be taken care of.  The onus is on us.  How do we perceive our relationship with Allāh?

May Allāh give us the ability to practice everything that we said and heard.

I will end with this one last ḥadīth mentioned in the Musnad of Imam Aḥmed and narrated by Sa'd b. Abi Waqqās who said that the Messenger of Allāh said, “From the blessing of the son of Ādam is the ability to seek good from Allāh, doing istikhārah with Allāh.  Also from the blessing of the son of Ādam is that they are pleased with whatever Allāh has decreed for them.  From the wretchedness of the children of Ādam is when he leaves doing istikhārah with Allāh.  Also from the wretchedness of the human being is that the human being is displeased with what Allāh has decreed for him.”

May Allāh bless us all to do istikhārah and to be pleased with Allāh's Decree and decision in our affairs and issues.  Jazākum Allāh khayran.  Al-salāmu 'alaykum wa raḥmatullāh.

by Hira āmīn

Political

From the political front unrest was found both in the provinces and in the elite Janissaries. The Janissaries, who comprised of young Christian boys being conscripted into the dervishme system, were trained to be officers, governors and soldiers. This method of strict discipline and rigorous training provided the government with skilled workers and was the key tool in early Ottoman success. However, the Janissaries who were once part of the most revered army in the world had become militarily ineffectual by the end of the 18th Century. The Crimean Tartars served as a support for this decay however as mentioned above, in 1774 when Crimea became independent they left the army.

The success in the Janissaries lied in their strict obedience to the Sultan, however; their ability to live on military salaries faded due to the costs of warfare and inflation. The government could no longer pay them a sufficient salary, which led them to violate the Janissary principle of only being a soldier and celibacy. They integrated into the urban class and became butchers, bakers, porters, craftsman; many owned coffee shops.[21]They married and their children were recruited and replaced the peasant boys in the divershime recruitment rounds, the last of these rounds being in 1703.[22] Thus by the early 18th century the Janissary corps were hereditary and urban in origin, so as Hourani says “their exclusive loyalties had broken down”.[23]

Due to their proximity to the Sultan and their elite status this had a catastrophic political impact. They had the power to make and break rulers as seen when they denied Sulayman the Magnificent's son Selim the throne until he paid them extra money.[24] Their integration within the urban classes gave the urban class a voice and power to object. Moreover, as the Janissaries became a hereditary corps – precisely what the prohibition of marriage rule wanted to prevent – this created an elite-popular urban class who had power to overthrow viziers and officials on behalf of the popular classes or due to intra-elite quarrels. It was for this reason in 1826 that Sultan Mahmud II killed and captured them to silence their voices and stabilize the Empire.

Unrest also lay within the province itself. The balance of power shifted from the Sultan to the viziers. At the end of the 17th Century the centre of decisions shifted from the Dome Chamber in the Palace to the Sublime Porte which was the vizier's house.[25]  However; Hourani asserts this could not change the situation, as the vizier's role was weak and could be easily dismissed by the Sultan, thus no radical changes were possible. Throughout the 17th and 18th Century the power shifted further into the local elites, decentralizing the system further.

The local elites always played a crucial role in the government and were loyal to the Sultan in providing taxes and recruits for the army. Quartaret claims this was due to the 1695 tax farming system where the government granted the right to collect taxes for a particular land in exchange for cash payments to the treasury. This ensured the central state maintained some control over the local elites as they could remove this lucrative privilege. However, the rising cost of wars and the inability for the government to pay cash back caused the local elites to keep the taxes for themselves. As we saw, above four fifths of the state revenue failed to reach the central government in 1789.

Quartaret emphasizes the lack of economic contingency for the cause of decentralization, but Lieven and Hourani assert this was largely down to ineffective leaders chosen by a hereditary process.[26] It seems that even though the quality of the leaders had declined, they did not simply sit back and watch the Empire fall apart. The leaders tried to modernize the system to try and salvage what was left. For example after the humiliating defeat and the treaties of Karlowitz (1699) and Passarowitz (1718) the Grand Vizier, Damad Ibrahim Pasha, sent an ambassador in 1719 to Paris with instructions to make a thorough study of the means of civilization and education.[27] In 1731, the Grand Vizier, Topal Osman Pasha hired a French nobleman to reform the Bombardier Corps on European lines. In 1734, a new training centre, the school of geometry was opened. The Janissaries found out and forced its closure, however; it re-opened again in 1773.[28] This and many other attempts of reform, such as the Tanzimat and Ghul Hane decree, show that the leaders were not inactive. However; it was the additional external economic factors and the ideological factors which hindered any of these reforms to have a substantial effect.

Ideological

The Ottomans began with a strong ideology; Islam. Islam was defined against the Christian West; it affirmed its many beliefs, but completed the line of Prophethood hence perfected and cleansed it from its adulteration over time. This view was crystallized with the destruction of the Byzantine Empire and the capture of Constantinople. Therefore the Christian West was inferior from every aspect – militarily, socially and above all religiously. This concept of superiority which at first served well for the empire was by time its ultimate cause of destruction. The sense of pride and fear of adulteration prevented them from taking the Western seeds of discovery and allowing them to flourish in the Muslim lands.

A good example of this was the length of time it took for the printing press to become widespread within the Empire. As Lewis says, “the most important technical innovation from Europe outside the military field was undoubtedly printing”[29] The Turks knew about the printing press since the 14th Century but only adopted it in the 18th Century. The delay was due to religious conservatives skeptical of European inventions and its evil effects in society.

Both the Janissaries in 1826 and the Mamluks in 1805 were massacred by the rulers for this very purpose – to clear the way for reformation. The fact that these brutal massacres had to take place to prevent uprisings against modernization and reform shows the superiority of culture, which was prevalent at that time.

Moreover, loyalty to the Sultan suffered greatly from two movements – Wahhabism and Nationalism. In the 18th Century a more conservative religious strand began in Arabia known as Wahhabism. They believed that the Islam the Sultan protected was not the “true” Islam and thus he was not the “true” leader of the Muslim Ummah. The movement spread with Ibn Saud taking Wahhab's ideology of “true Islam” and he conquered central Arabia, the Persian Gulf, Karbala and Hejaz.[30] They wanted the caliphate to be an Arab as “the Arabs were more worthy of it than the Turks.”[31]

The ideas of the French Revolution infected the Empire – in particular Egypt, which was invaded by Napoleon in 1798. The French left quickly but not before sowing the seeds of nationalism through their propaganda. They spread the message of the Turks ruining Egypt by their greed and the idea that the French will free them. Napoleon said, “It has been said to you that I have only come to this country in order to destroy your religion. This is a clear lie; do not believe it. Say to the slanderers I have come to rescue you from the hands of the oppressors.”[32] The Egyptians were not pleased with non-Muslim rule, however; the hatred towards the Turks developed. Mohammad Ali came into power in 1805 and while he still gave allegiance to the Sultan and supported him in battles, such as the Greek revolt and the Wahhabi revolt, they controlled their own internal affairs and as mentioned above kept their revenues within Egypt.

Conclusion

In conclusion, militarily, economically, politically and ideologically the Ottoman Empire declined from the reign of Sulayman the Magnificent. These factors were of course intertwined, which was why when reforms were made in one aspect the other factors stifled progress. Due to the influx of wealth from the New World they advanced both militarily and economically with the industrial revolution. Even if the Janissaries had not revolted and adopted their advance methods, the industrial revolution and the shift in global trade would have starved the empire from the financial means to survive. The strong ideology which at one point was the impetus to rival and take over the Byzantine Empire became the very reason not to adapt and take from the “inferior” Christian West. Hence the Ottomans were locked in an inextricable knot, thus divide and conquer were inevitable.

Bibliography

Freeman, Edward. The Ottoman Power in Europe.

Smith, Dan. The state of the Middle East.

Hourani, Albert. Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age.

Quartaert, Donald. The Ottoman Empire.

J Shaw, Stanford. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey Vol 1.

Mann, Michael. The Sources of Power.

Lewis, Bernard. The Emergence of Modern Turkey.

Lieven, Dominic. Empire.

Marcus, Abraham. The Middle East on the Eve of Modernity: Aleppo in the Eighteenth century.

Barkey, Karen. Bandits and Bureaucrats: Ottoman Route to State Centralization.

[21] Donald Quataert, The Ottoman Empire, page 45

[22] Ibid page 45

[23] Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, page 35

[24] Donald Quataret, The Ottoman Empire, page 45

[25] Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, page 35

[26] Dominic Lieven, Empire, page 146, Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, page 35

[27] Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, page 46

[28] Ibid page 48

[29] Ibid page 50

[30] Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, page 37

[31] Ibid page 37

[32] Ibid page 50

[The following is the video and transcript of Shaykh Waleed Basyouni's lecture "Enlightenment of the Soul." The transcript includes slight modifications for the sake of readability and clarity.]

Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) created us in a unique and sophisticated fashion.  It is perfect.  When you contemplate how Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) created man, it is amazing.  You don't know much about so many things in you, and you don't know much about your own self.  “They ask you about the concept of the soul, and it is from Allāh.”  No matter how much knowledge you have, it is not much compared to the knowledge of Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla).

Imam Ibn Al-Rajab said, “'ilm is three stages.  Whoever enters the first stage becomes arrogant.”  This is very natural.   When you see people start learning physics, medicine, or whatever field of knowledge, in the beginning you are arrogant because you think you know everything.  “Whoever enters the second stage humbles himself.   Whoever enters the third stage realizes his or her ignorance.”  You are exposed to a mountain of knowledge, and you compare whatever you have acquired over all of these years to what is out there.  You realize there is so much knowledge out there.  Imagine the knowledge of all of humanity together, and compare it to the knowledge of Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) and it is nothing.

Of the amazing things Allāh has created is al-qalb (the heart).  I am not here to talk about the muscle that pushes the blood in the body.  There is something unique about this heart.  There are secrets about this heart that even us with all of our technology today are not familiar with.

The heart is the place of īmān.  Allāh and His Messenger (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) have said īmān is related to the heart of the mu'min.  Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) told us that those who will survive on the Day of Judgment and those who will be saved from the Hellfire and from Allāh's Wrath are those who will come with a clean and pure heart.  It is a heart that is pure from the desires, lust and the evil feelings.  It is pure and free from all the doubts about Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) and His religion and His Messenger.

Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) told us about those who will be saved on the Day of Judgment:  He will come on the Day of Judgment with a qalb that is muneeb.  What is muneeb? It is a heart that comes to Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) all the time and is attached to Allāh and His religion and what Allāh loves.  It is a heart that is detached from what Allāh dislikes.

Allāh told us to control our hearts in a verse in Surat'l-Anfāl.  This verse was explained by the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) many times.  Imam Muslim reported that of the du'ā's of the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) was:  “O Allāh, the One who controls the hearts, direct my heart towards You.”  This means that the heart can be directed in other directions and occupied with other things and focused on other things.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) himself said he wants Allāh to direct his heart towards Allāh.

In Sahih Muslim, the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) controls the hearts and all of the hearts of humanity are between Allāh's fingers.”  Allāh controls the hearts the way He wants.  Some people say the qalb linguistically is called this because it comes from the word taqallub, meaning to change.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) defined al-qalb and said it is called this because it is constantly changing.  It constantly moves.

In another hadith in the Musnad of Imam Aḥmad, he (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “It is like when you boil water and it bubbles – this is how the heart is inside of your body.”  This means that our heart cannot stay or remain at one level.  It is either heading up or going down.  Your heart will never pause.  Sometimes it shoots up faster than other times and sometimes it declines faster than other times.  It is in constant movement.  The only time your heart will stop moving up and down is when it stops beating.  At that time, when you die your īmān will stop.

If we can establish this fact and everybody realizes this, then everybody should be so worried about his īmān.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said the heart is like boiling water.  Every time you boil water for tea or coffee in the kettle, listen to the bubbles and remember this – that is how your heart is.  You have to be constantly aware of your heart and which direction it is going.  Unfortunately, brothers and sisters, so many of us take our hearts for granted.

One of the great scholars Sufyān Al-Thawri said, “I'm always worried about my heart and the impact of sins on my heart and how my heart will change.”  The gates of Jannah are open to those of pure and clean heart and the heart which is filled with īmān and faith.  Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) describes the hearts as solid and harder than the rock.  Aren't you worried that your heart will turn to that status?

When you are praying, do you sometimes not feel it and think your heart is not that soft anymore?  It is like a picture without sound, and you don't feel the closeness to Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla).  Whenever you raise your hands, you don't feel that you are close to Him and that you are truly talking to Him.  You don't feel His Presence in your life and the love taking over your heart.

So many of us feel distanced from Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla).  The moment your heart is away from Allāh is the moment your soul will be lost.  The moment your heart is free from Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) and is not occupied and filled with the love of Allāh and His Messenger, believe me it will be filled with something else.

The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) told us the heart is like a container.  The worst thing is to fill your heart with things that are not beneficial, which is why the hadith said poetry – it is a waste to fill your heart and mind with just poetry, leaving no space for anything else.  The hadith is not meant to criticize poetry.    The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) is criticizing those whose hearts are filled only with poetry and have no space for anything else.  The heart is like a cup and there is only so much space in it.  Look carefully at what you are occupying your heart with.  Your ears, eyes, memory, tongue, and words you say occupy your heart.  Everything you acquire and everything you do brings things inside your heart.

Be careful about your heart.  Make sure you are filling your heart with something good before you fill it up quickly with junk. If you don't have filtration in your mailbox, it will in no time be filled with junk mail.  Similarly with your heart, if you don't have filtration, it will be quickly filled with junk.

Today I would like to remind myself and my brothers and my sisters about one of the most important issues that should of concern:  the weakness of īmān.  It is what can bring darkness to the soul and can make it shine again.

What are the signs that you should look for?  If you have any of these signs, then it is an alarming sign and you should take it very seriously.  There are many signs, and I went over them five times, without exaggeration, to make sure that whatever I bring is relevant to us here today.  If you can see the signs and the symptoms, then you can quickly react and start fixing yourself.

One of the first signs is that you see yourself starting to not fulfill the duties of Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) upon you – the wājibaat.  You know that these are obligatory to do but you start missing it, such as ṣalāh.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) only one time in his life missed ṣalāh'l-fajr.  Why?  He was on a journey and would ask someone to guard the time.  One person would stay awake for a while and then would sleep while another guarded the time until fajr.

Bilal volunteered to guard the time the whole night until fajr because everyone was tired.  He was waiting and waiting, and he fell asleep.  Everyone woke up from the heat of the sun.  Do you know what the companions were doing?  They put the sand over their hands, a sign that they thought this was their destruction and that they had committed a major sin.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) couldn't control the crowd with anything but to tell them all to ride their camels.  They kept walking and traveling until everyone became so tired after an hour or two, and then the adhan was called and then they prayed the sunnah of fajr and then fajr in congregation.  The crowd was so disturbed because they had missed one ṣalāh.  They couldn't believe they missed ṣalāh'l-fajr.

Do you know how many times we miss ṣalāh'l-fajr?  Not long ago, a young brother was proposing to a girl, and the future mother-in-law asked, “How many times have you missed ṣalāh'l-fajr?”  He said, “Eh, once or twice a week.”  He thinks that this is good.  Missing ṣalāh'l-fajr is missing one of the most important salawat.

Also, one of the signs of weakness is missing ṣalāh'l-‘aṣr or ṣalāh'l-maghrib.  It is not only missing the wājibaat, but then it becomes something easy and not a big deal.  The ṣaḥābah would wake up crying if they missed the ṣalāh.  We don't even care if we miss the ṣalāh.  People pray ‘aṣr just before maghrib and don't care about it.  This is a big sign of weakness of īmān.

Hajj:  Allāh made the Hajj obligatory on you.  Every year the opportunity comes for you to make Hajj and you have the money, health, and time and every reason to go, but you think you'll go next year as if it is nothing.  This is one of the pillars of Islam.

Also, sometimes the sisters don't care much about the hijab.  She used to take care of the hijab but now she starts taking it lightly.  This is a sign of weakness.

Birr'l-walidayn:  In the beginning you call your family every week and care about them.  It is wājib to look after and respect your family.  All of a sudden you start to not care and weeks go by before you remember your mother.  This is a weakness of īmān.

According to the majority, ṣalāh in jama'ah according to the majority of 'ulemā' is wājib, especially for those who live close to the masjid.  You start thinking it is for socializing and not the ṣalāh itself  A blind person came to the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) and said his house his far and he did not have a way of reaching the masjid and he asked if he could pray at home.   The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) first said yes and then asked him if he could hear the adhan and because he could, he (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) told him that he had no excuse and had to go to the masjid to pray.

The first sign of weakness of īmān is not fulfilling the obligations and not caring much about the wājibat.

2.  Ghaflah in dhikr of Allāh.  Not remembering Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) much.

One of the most important dhikrs is the Qur'an.  From last year, how many verses have you memorized?  How many surahs have you memorized?  Ask yourself honestly.   Don't say that you don't know how to read Arabic.  I'm happy if you have only added one verse.  Have 12 months gone by and you could not increase anything?  The only explanation of this, in my opinion, is that it is a sign of weakness of īmān because you don't care anymore.  It is a clear sign.

It is narrated that Anas b. Mālik said, “The one who doesn't make khatm'l-Quran every 40 days and they know how to read the Qur'an, this is a sign of hypocrisy.  What about us?  How much do you read?  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “If you read 10 verses every night you will not be among the ghafileen (heedless).”

Why did the 'ulemā' call the dhikr of Allāh wird?  Wird comes from a word in the Arabic language meaning a place the Arabs would bring the camels to drink when they traveled in the desert.  Imagine what would happen if one of them missed the spot.  You would not be able to survive and would die of thirst.  'ulemā' used that word because that is the relationship with dhikr every day and night.  If you miss it, it is very hard to survive.  It is what keeps you going.

Shaykh Al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah would make dhikr in the morning and was asked why he spent so much time in this.  He said, “This is like my food.  If I don't do it, I won't have the power to continue my day.”

One of the signs of weakness of īmān is when you see yourself after ṣalāh rushing out.  You start checking your e-mail or the last status on Facebook.  You miss the adhkar and dhikr.  The last thing you look at is movies or watching YouTube videos.  Where is the adhkār before you go to sleep?  When was the last time you remembered to say bismillah when eating and drinking?  When was the last time you remembered to say bismillah and alḥamdulillāh?

If dhikr of Allāh is not a habit of your tongue, it is a very clear sign of weakness of īmān.

3.  Another clear sign is doing the ḥarām.  All of a sudden a person finds himself or herself doing the forbidden acts without even caring.  You will see the person starts doing the ḥarām dealing with interest and not caring.  Cheating, lying, backbiting, dating as if it is nothing.

4.  One of the signs is that the person doesn't care much about the recommended acts.  Someone asked me a question and I said don't do it, and he asked, “Is it ḥarām or makruh?”  If I say that it is not ḥarām, then it means he will do it.

Ibn Al-Qayyim (rahimahullah) said, “There are hundreds of narrations describing how the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) used to be with the companions.  In not a single one did the companions ask if it was wājib or just recommended or if it was just ḥarām or just makruh.  None of them asked these questions.  All of them accepted what the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) told them.”  This is a big difference between them and us.

Yesterday I was telling a story in my masjid about Shaykh Safwat Al-Hijazi, a great scholar from Egypt.  Once he was saying that there was a man who prayed qiyām'l-layl and never missed a ṣalāh in the masjid for the past 15 years since he was 15 years old.  He said, “One day he came to me and told me, 'I've been doing qiyām'l-layl and this and that.  What is the difference between me and the ṣaḥābah?'  I could sense from his words that he had arrogance.  I said, 'You are a righteous person. Ask Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) to show you what the difference is between you and the ṣaḥābah.'  He came at fajr and said, 'I found the difference between me and the ṣaḥābah.  Last night, I prayed and asked Allāh to show me the difference between us and the ṣaḥābah.  I saw the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) come to me in a dream with the same description that I've read in books.  He was holding my hand and in the other hand he was holding the hand of one of the companions.  We were on a highway and a car was coming very fast, and the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) told me to stop the car from hitting us.  I took a rock and threw it.  I tried everything, but the car kept coming.  I felt so sad.  I came to the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) and told him I threw everything I could and couldn't stop the car.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) looked at the companion and told him to stop the car, and the companion went and stopped right in front of the car and the car hit him and stopped.  He stopped the car with his own body.  Then I woke up from my dream with tears in my eyes and realized the difference between us and the ṣaḥābah.'”

Allāh chose the companions specifically to be in the company of Muhammad (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) because they are role models.  We learn from their lives.

Sa'Īd ibn Al-Musayyib once missed the first takbīr.  For the past 20 years he prayed right behind the imam.  One day he came late and was in the back.  He was crying and said he saw faces he had not seen the past years because he neer prayed in the back.  If you see someone who doesn't care about the first takbīr and being with the imam, he said, “Wash your hands from him.”  This is an Arabic expression and means that there is no hope for this person to reach a high level of īmān.

Sometimes we wonder when the ṣalāh will finish.  It is so sad when you see someone who doesn't care anymore about halaqat of ''ilm.  You tell them that there is a halaqah, a class, a weekend seminar or a conference and they don't care.  When you see this in yourself, it is a weakness of īmān.

When you pray jumu'ah and you pass by the box and there is nothing in your heart telling you to give money or when someone is calling you to give sadaqah and you turn your cheek, there is something wrong.

When mixing with the opposite gender and using bad language and text messaging each other with bad words means nothing to you, it is a sign.  Allāh said, “Allāh dislikes anyone to pronounce improper words or evil words.”

When you see yourself not caring much about recommended acts or do disliked acts, then it means you are coming closer to the grey area.  If you go to the grey area without hesitation, I guarantee you, you will cross the line.  It will lead you to leaving the obligatory and doing the ḥarām.  Today you are looking and then you are just touching and then tomorrow it is beyond that.

5.  One of the signs of weakness of īmān is when you don't care about da'wah.  All you are interested in is your family, kids, business and da'wah doesn't even cross your mind.  What have you done to serve the deen of Allāh and to spread the Word of Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla)?  What have you offered to the da'wah?

6.  One of the signs of weakness of īmān is whenever you see yourself trying to hide your Islamic identity.  You feel ashamed to make wudu' or wear anything to identify you as Muslim.  I'm not saying everybody should wear shalwar kameez tomorrow.  When you feel very uncomfortable and see this in yourself, there is a question mark.  Be proud of your deen.

7.  When you see yourself excessive in the mubah (permissible things).  For example, you spend more time in the gym than the masjid.  Muscles will not open the gates of Jannah.  Yes, it is good to be healthy, but it is better to be a good Muslim. If you spend hours in the gym and miss ṣalāh'l-fajr or are losing your īmān, then it is not acceptable.

Some people care excessively about beauty and looks and it becomes an obsession.  If while you are making sujūd you care about if you messed up your hair or not, it is a problem.

8.  One of the signs of weakness of īmān is when you cannot continuously do a good deed.  You start and you stop, you start and you stop.  You start reading Qur'an and then you quit.  This means your īmān is weak and you don't have enough fuel to keep you going in your good deeds.

Also, whenever you do an act of worship, you are always looking at the end.  When fasting the day of Arafah, one of the brothers asked me when maghrib is at fajr time.  This shows that there is a sign of weakness here.

9.  One of the signs is when you get frustrated quickly or have anxiety and so much stress.  A mu'min should not live such a life.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “Īmān is being patient and being easy.”  You live a life of ease.  If you are with Allāh, you will see every day as an easy day and a good day.  If you see every day as a terrible day, it is a problem and a sign of weakness of īmān.  When you fight with everyone, this is not how the mu'min acts.  The mu'min loves and will be loved by people.

10.  One of the signs of weakness of īmān is when you don't get angry when you see the ḥarām in front of you.  People are dying in Syria day and night, and if it means nothing to you and didn't bother you even one day enough for you to make du'ā' for them in ṣalāh and you didn't pray qiyām'l-layl even one night for your brothers and sisters who are suffering anywhere in the world, it is a sign of weakness of īmān.  You have now been reminded of this – do you feel anything in your heart?  Dhulm is happening.  Your reaction shows how strong your īmān is.

11.  Whenever your sujūd is short and your du'ā' is so short, it is a sign of weakness of īmān.  Sujūd is a road to ask for whatever you want. A man came to Al-Hasan Al-Basri and said, “I heard you say that if you commit sins, then Allāh prevents you from things.  I do all the sins that you can think of and don't do many good deeds.  I have a beautiful wife and beautiful kids and a lot of money and land and am successful.  Allāh did not prevent me from anything.  How is it that you say that because of sins Allāh prevents you?”  He said, “Do you pray qiyām'l-layl?  Do you enjoy your du'ā'?  Do you enjoy your ṣalāh?  That is enough prevention that He prevented you from communicating with Him.”  When Allāh wanted to speak to us, He revealed the Qur'an, and when we want to talk to Him, we raise our hands.  He cut you off because you are not worthy of it and your īmān is not strong enough.

This is scary if you see yourself like that.  Do you turn to Allāh and ask for His Help in every moment of your life to ask for His Help?

12.  Also, when you say so much but do so little.  Allāh said, “O you who believe, why do you say things you do not do?”

13.  One of the signs is that you don't like to be in the company of those who remind you of Allāh.  Al-Hasan Al-Basri said, “I love to be with my students and my brothers more than being at home with my family.  My family reminds me of the dunya.  My brothers remind me of the ākhirah.”  It has also been said:  if you can't find your heart on three occasions, ask Allāh to give you a new heart because yours is dead:  1) when you are with good people remembering Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla), 2) reading Qur'an, 3) witnessing the janazah.

14.  Also, one of the signs of weakness of īmān is when a person starts arguing.  They keep asking why and arguing.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “No one is misguided after Allāh guided him except because of arguing.”

15.  One of the signs of weakness of īmān is when a person is always frustrated with what Allāh has decreed for him or her.  One of the clear manifestations of this is hasad.  You envy others and are never satisfied with what you have.  You are always looking at what other people have in their hands.

Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) said, “Isn't it the time for the believers and their hearts to turn to be soft?”  Soft whenever you remember what Allāh revealed and you hear the Qur'an and the reminders of the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam).  Don't be like the people of the book who came before you.  They stayed for a very long time away from their book and away from the source of goodness and what would remind them of the ākhirah.  What is the result?  Their hearts turned to be hard and solid.

Be very careful of being far away from what softens your heart.  Don't stay away from the Qur'an, the masjid, the siyam, the ṣalāh, dhikr, 'ilm (knowledge).  Heart softeners are good reminders, but after that you need fuel to learn your deen, which is ''ilm.  It is not enough to wear a scarf or grow a beard.  This does not make you a religious person until the heart changes and the īmān settles in the heart.

What will help you strengthen īmān?

- Learning.  Learn about Allāh as much as you can and about His Names and Attributes.   Learn about the Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam).  Learn through books, CDs, conferences, seminars.

- Take it step-by-step.  You are not going to be super religious all of a sudden.  If you are consistent in a little, it is better than not keeping up long term.

- Always remember that your death is soon.  The Prophet (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) said, “Jannah and the fire are so close to you.”

- Always try to make a lot of du'ā' that Allāh supports you and strengthens your īmān.

- Always stay with good company. Muhammad (ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam) was ordered to be in the company of good people.

- Be patient.  Sometimes you are frustrated, but you have to be patient and stick with it.

- Don't ever delay the good.  If there is an opportunity, take advantage of it.  Rush to good deeds.  Sometimes you feel in a high mood.  Take advantage.  Do as much as you can of good deeds.

- Make sure that you pray at the beginning of the time.  Make the commitment.  Don't delay the ṣalāh.

- Visit the graveyard.  It will remind you of the ākhirah.  Sometimes it is good to visit those in the hospital.  Give them gifts.  Realize the ni'mah of health that Allāh has given you.  There are people who don't have hands and legs, say alḥamdulillāh.  Be grateful for what Allāh (subḥānahu wa ta'āla) has given you.

- Wish good for others even if it doesn't happen to you.  This will help your heart to be pure.  A man was running in India behind a train.  On the way, he lost one of his shoes.  He took off his other shoe and kept going and caught the train.  He was asked why he did it, and he said that when he lost the first shoe, he knew that they would not find it and it would not benefit him.  He threw the second shoe so that whoever finds the first shoe would also find the second one.  He was thinking about others.

From BBC

Gunmen have attacked a church in north-east Nigeria killing at least six people, the church's pastor says.

Johnson Jauro said the killings took place when gunmen burst into his Deeper Life Church in Gombe, capital of Gombe state.

He said his wife was among those killed. Ten other people were injured.

Nigeria has recently experienced a surge in ethnic and sectarian violence. The government declared a state of emergency in parts of the country.

“The attackers started shooting sporadically. They shot through the window of the church, and many people were killed including my wife,” Mr Jauro told Reuters news agency.

“Many members who attended the church service were also injured.”

No group said it carried out the attack, but the Islamist group Boko Haram recently carried out a string of bombings on Christmas Day, including against a church in the capital Abuja which killed dozens of people.

Earlier on Thursday, two suspected members of Boko Haram were arrested after a father and son were killed in Maiduguri in neighbouring Borno state.

Escalating violence

Attacks by Boko Haram have become increasingly frequent and are a major problem for the Nigerian authorities.

President Goodluck Jonathan has vowed to “crush” the group.

Several northern states surrounding Gombe have had their borders sealed off under the state of emergency declared by Mr Jonathan following the Christmas bombings.

Boko Haram is fighting to create an Islamic state and wants to impose Sharia law across Nigeria.

Followers of Boko Haram believe any political or social activity associated with Western values should be banned.

This includes voting in elections, wearing shirts and trousers and receiving a secular education.

Boko Haram regards the Nigerian state as being run by non-believers and this was the case even when the country had a Muslim president.

In unrelated violence on Sunday, at least 50 people died in the eastern state of Ebony in clashes between two ethnic groups over a land dispute

الَّذِينَ يُنفِقُونَ فِي السَّرَّاءِ وَالضَّرَّاءِ وَالْكَاظِمِينَ الْغَيْظَ وَالْعَافِينَ عَنِ النَّاسِ ۗ وَاللَّهُ يُحِبُّ الْمُحْسِنِينَ