Grounded

We praise Allah for allowing us to complete another month of Ramadan and to celebrate the day of Eid together.Today is a day of celebration. Today we are happy. Today we are joyous.But if you look into the global geopolitical events at the moment, it is hard for us to be joyous. It is hard for us to celebrate. Palestinians are still being killed daily, still facing genocide. The Middle East is burning. Iran is under illegal attack by the US and Israel. And now we see yet another part of the region falling into war.It is hard for us to be joyous, because the Prophet ﷺ said: if you don’t care about this Ummah, you are not from among us.So how are we to celebrate?The Boulder in the DarknessTo understand celebration in a time of conflict — when the future looks bleak and it’s easy to fall into despair — I want to take you back 1,442 years.The Muslims in the nascent city of Madinah, having migrated there only five years earlier, were now under attack by all of Arabia. The largest army the Arabs had ever assembled. The Quraysh from the south. The Ghatafan from the north. The Jews of Khaybar joining the coalition.The Prophet ﷺ consulted his companions, and Sayyidina Salman al-Farisi suggested a strategy the Persians would use when outnumbered: dig a trench so the enemy cannot breach through.The Prophet ﷺ accepted the idea and commanded the companions to dig at the most vulnerable point of Madinah. He joined them in the digging. It was winter. It was cold. Food was scarce. They were hungry. They were exhausted. Yet they had to keep digging — for survival.In the darkness of that trench, they struck a boulder they couldn’t break through. They called the Prophet ﷺ. He came — dusty like everyone else, hungry like all of them. He took the shovel and struck the boulder. A third of it crumbled. A spark flew. He said: Allahu Akbar — I saw the palaces of Yemen. Yemen is given to my Ummah.He struck again. Another third crumbled. Another spark. Allahu Akbar — I saw the keys of Rome given to the Ummah.He struck a final time. The boulder shattered completely. Allahu Akbar — I saw the Sassanid Empire given to the Ummah.In times of darkness — when it is easiest to fall into desperation and give up hope — the Prophet ﷺ inspired the Muslims. He told them there is a bright future for the Ummah. All we need to do is work hard and persevere in the path of Allah ﷻ.And here is what’s remarkable: the Prophet ﷺ passed away before any of it came true. Yemen had not yet been given. The Sassanid Empire had not yet fallen. Half the Byzantine Empire had not yet come under Muslim rule.But the companions did not despair. They did not give up because it hadn’t happened yet. They understood that when Allah promises something — lā yukhliful mī’ād — He never breaks His promises. All we need to do is fulfil our part.The Tried and Tested RecipeWhat is our part? Allah tells us in Surah Āl ’Imrān. The secret behind the victory of the Ummah — regardless of number, regardless of material strength — is two things: ṣabr and taqwā.If you have ṣabr and you have taqwā, Allah will send down thousands of angels to help you.And in the month of Ramadan, we trained exactly that.Ṣabr by day. And ṣabr here is not passive patience. It is not sitting quietly and doing nothing. In Arabic, ṣabr carries the meaning of steadfastness, perseverance — staying on the path regardless of how difficult it is, doing the right thing no matter how challenging.We did that in Ramadan. Allah told us no water, despite 40-degree heat. And this Ramadan, we saw those 40-degree days. We said no to water. We held the course until Maghrib. At 3:30 in the morning, we dragged ourselves up for suhoor, prayed tahajjud, prayed Fajr despite the weight of sleep. That is ṣabr.Taqwā by night. This is our direct line to Allah ﷻ — where the heart connects to Him in prayer, in tarāwīḥ, in Qur’an, in tahajjud, in adhkār, in du’ā.These two — ṣabr and taqwā — are a tried and tested recipe for 1,400 years. When the Ummah returns to them, Allah grants victory.Look at the history. The greatest victories came in Ramadan. Badr — 313 against 1,000 — in Ramadan. The Conquest of Makkah, the Prophet’s greatest political victory — Ramadan. Qādisiyyah, the fall of the Sassanid Empire — Ramadan. The fall of Iskandariyyah at the hands of ’Amr ibn al-’Āṣ — Ramadan.Victory after victory. Because Ramadan produces the two ingredients Allah asked for.Celebrate. It’s an Act of Worship.Islam is a religion that celebrates our fiṭrah. Allah who created us understands our wants, our likes, our nature. He knows we like to eat good food. He knows we like to dress well. He knows we like to be with our families and friends.So He legislated a day where dressing nicely is rewarded. Eating good food is rewarded. Sharing laughter with loved ones — within the boundaries of the Sharī’ah — is rewarded.What kind of religion is this? Everything we love, Allah rewards us for it.The Prophet ﷺ said that one of the most beloved deeds to Allah is to bring happiness to the heart of a believer. When we share happiness, when we cause others to be happy, when we create joy in the community — Allah loves to see that.And there is no better place to start than with the children. Especially the ones who fasted this year — in the heat, in public schools where their friends had cold drinks and ice cream at recess. They had ṣabr. They held on to their religion. They stood steadfast without wavering.Today is the day we celebrate them. We put joy in their hearts, smiles on their faces. Spoil them a little. Allah will reward you for it.The Work AheadToday we celebrate our graduation from Ramadan. We stand shoulder to shoulder and declare: Allahu Akbar. God is greater than our worries. Greater than our troubles. Greater than all the problems the Ummah faces.When we make du’ā, we say: Yā Allah, our problems are big — but You are Allahu Akbar.The Ummah needs ṣabr. And ṣabr is not passively waiting for miracles, not sitting around hoping angels appear. It is hard work. What do we need to do to strengthen the Ummah? What planning, what skill sets, what community building needs to happen? Let’s do it together.And at night, we maintain the line — prayer, Qur’an, du’ā, that personal direct relationship with Allah ﷻ. Taqwā.We ask Allah to accept all our deeds in Ramadan. To grant us ṣabr and taqwā. To make us the people of change who bring glory back to the Ummah. To grant relief to our brothers and sisters who are oppressed everywhere — in Palestine, in Iran, in Lebanon, in Syria, in Yemen, in Sudan, and in every place.اللهم آمينEid Mubarak.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ This is a public episode. 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Tonight is the 29th night of Ramadan. The last taraweeh. The last night of the year.Make full use of it. The best du’a for Laylatul Qadr is Allahumma innaka afuwwun tuhibbul afwa fa’fu anni ya Kareem — O Allah, You are the Pardoner, You love to pardon, so pardon me. Keep returning to it tonight, and especially at suhoor time. Allah mentions in the Quran a special rank for those who make istighfar in the early hours before dawn: wa bil ashari hum yastaghfirun. Some of our scholars would dedicate that time between the sunnah of Fajr and the salah itself entirely to istighfar — a hundred times, quietly, consistently. Do that tonight.And in your du’a, ask Allah not to make this our last Ramadan. Ask Him to grant us another.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.A few reminders: tomorrow night — Thursday, the eve of Eid — is our potluck iftar at Qaswa House. Doors open at 6pm, iftar around 6:35. Bring a plate to share. The kids will have games and activities, weather permitting. Friday is Eid prayer at MacDougall Park in Como — takbir at 8, prayer at 8:30.And this tafseer series continues. We will pick up Surah Al-A’raf every Thursday night at Qaswa — Maghrib together, some dhikr, tafseer, then Isha and dinner. 7pm. Starting this coming Thursday. If you want to follow the surah through to the end, come join us.Hadramaut, Nusantara, and the People of ’AdWe began the story of Prophet Hud last night. He was sent to the people of ’Ad — a civilisation that lived in Hadramaut, Yemen, not far from the city of Tarim.Hadramaut holds a special place in the hearts of Malay Muslims. It is the origin of the Hadrami scholars and traders who brought Islam to the Nusantara — the vast Indonesian archipelago. They came not with armies but with akhlaq. They traded honestly. They treated people beautifully. And when people asked why — why are your manners like this, why are you so trustworthy — they would explain: because I follow the teaching of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. That is how Indonesia became the largest Muslim country in the world without a single Arab army ever setting foot on its soil.Thousands of years before any of that, ’Ad was there. A people of extraordinary power. Allah says to them in this surah: We increased you in your creation — strength, stature, capacity. They built civilisations. The Quraysh of Makkah knew about them. They took pride in them as ancestors. And so when Allah tells their story in the Quran, He is speaking directly to the Quraysh: this is who you are proud of. Look what happened to them when they rejected their Prophet.The Message Never Changed — Only the DetailsProphet Hud stood before his people and said: O my people, worship Allah. You have no god other than Him.The same words as Prophet Nuh. The same words as every prophet before and after. From Adam to Muhammad ﷺ, the core of the message has never changed: La ilaha illallah. Tawheed. Worship only Allah.But the details of the Sharia — how that worship is expressed, what the laws look like, the specifics of punishment and obligation — those have changed across time. And that is not God changing His mind. That is God being perfectly calibrated to the people He is speaking to.Every generation is different. The laws of previous nations were stricter, harsher. The tawbah for shirk in the Sharia of Musa, for instance, required death — the only atonement for major sins was the taking of life. Christianity inherited this concept and built the doctrine of atonement around it: the idea that someone must die for sin to be absorbed. Our belief is different — no one carries another’s sin, and Allah does not need anyone to die on His behalf in order to forgive. He is Al-Afuww. He simply pardons. Islam came with the lightest sharia of all the prophetic traditions: even shirk, the gravest of sins, requires only sincere tawbah and the shahada.Why lighter? Because humans have become softer over time. That is simply true. My mother cycled ten kilometres to school each morning without complaint. My father hunted birds with a slingshot as a child, cooked them himself, and came home with his stomach half full before his parents knew anything about it. Today, children cry when they watch someone slaughter a chicken.People change. Allah knows this. The Sharia adapts. But the tawheed does not move.Some things remain constant from Adam to Yawmul Qiyamah: worship Allah alone, honour your parents, maintain good character, care for the orphan and the poor, speak kindly to people. The details of how — the minimum of zakat, the specific forms — may be calibrated to time and place. The principles themselves are eternal.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Why Hud Said Something Different From NuhHere is something small but worth paying attention to.When Prophet Nuh called his people, he said: I fear for you the punishment of a great day. He had to tell them what was coming — because they had never seen collective divine punishment before. Nuh’s people were the first community to be destroyed. There was no precedent. The warning had to be explicit.But when Prophet Hud called his people, he said something different: Do you not have taqwa? He did not need to spell out what the punishment looked like. Because the people of ‘Ad still remembered. The great flood was not ancient history to them — it was recent memory, passed down through their ancestors. The story was fresh. All Hud had to do was point to what they already knew: don’t you remember what happened? Are you not afraid?This is the Quran being precise in a way that rewards attention. The surface looks similar — a prophet calling his people to Tawheed, the elite rejecting him. But the language shifts in exactly the way historical context demands. And when you notice those shifts, as Professor Sayyid Naqib Al-Attas — who passed away just days ago, may Allah grant him the highest Jannah, one of the greatest Muslim thinkers of our age — always said: the Quran is not a book for lazy people. It rewards those who think, who ponder, who are willing to ask why.Al-Attas spent his life arguing that after colonisation and the fall of the Ottoman Caliphate, Muslims should not paste Islamic varnish over Western philosophical frameworks. He said the answer had to come from within the tradition itself. His work gave birth to institutions like IIUM — the International Islamic University Malaysia — and ISTAC. His book Islam and Secularism remains essential reading for anyone serious about Islamic education and worldview. We lost a giant.Al-Mala’ — Then and NowAs with Nuh, the first to reject Prophet Hud were al-mala’ — the rich and powerful elite. But there is a subtle and important difference. In the story of Nuh, the Quran simply says al-mala’ min qawmihi — the chiefs of his people rejected him. In the story of Hud, it says al-mala’ alladhina kafaru min qawmihi — the chiefs who disbelieved from his people.Why the extra qualification? Because not all the chiefs of ’Ad rejected Hud. Some of them believed. The memory of the flood was still close enough that some of the powerful had held on to their fear of Allah. So Allah was precise: it was specifically the disbelieving chiefs who called Hud a fool and a liar — not all of them.The pattern of al-mala’ rejecting the truth is a constant across every prophet’s story in the Quran. It repeats so often it cannot be coincidence — Allah is drawing our attention to a structural reality of power. The elite benefit from the existing order. A prophet comes and says the order is unjust, that the weak deserve protection, that no one is above accountability. The elite’s wealth and status depend on that order remaining intact. So they fight back.And the masses, generally, follow whoever is loudest and most visible.The Prophet ﷺ said that every prophet before prophethood worked as a shepherd. Including him ﷺ. Because you learn people management from managing sheep — you learn how to lead those who follow instinct and momentum, who drift toward whoever is in front of them.We think we have escaped this. We are in 2026. We have the internet. We have access to every idea in human history. Surely we are not sheep.And then you walk into a supermarket. Milk and bread — the things almost everyone needs — are placed at the furthest possible corner. You have to walk past everything else to reach them. The placement is not accidental. It is psychologically engineered to make you spend. Children love McDonald’s not because of the food but because that golden arch has been placed in their visual field since before they could speak, associated with happiness, associated with play. We did not choose to love it. We were led there.The top influencer on Instagram earns more than the CEO of Instagram. The top creator on YouTube earns more than the CEO of YouTube. We have simply replaced the ancient al-mala’ with a new one — one that reaches us through screens instead of town squares, but shapes our choices just as effectively.This is why La ilaha illallah is not just a statement of theology. It is a declaration of independence. I submit to Allah alone. My thinking is shaped by what Allah has revealed. My standard for acceptance and rejection is not whatever the powerful say, not whatever is trending, not whatever algorithm is currently deciding what I see. It is La ilaha illallah, Muhammadur Rasulullah ﷺ.That is the only real freedom.Prophet Hud RespondsThe disbelieving chiefs called Hud a fool and a liar. He responded with quiet dignity: O my people, there is no foolishness in me. I am a messenger from Rabbil Alameen — the Lord of the universe.Every prophet, before prophethood, was known for their intelligence and their beautiful character. The people of ’Ad knew Hud. He was from among them — akhahum Huda, their brother. The accusation of foolishnes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comNight 28. The last taraweeh is tomorrow. It went fast.A few housekeeping notes: Thursday night — the eve of Eid — we will have a potluck iftar at Qaswa House starting at 6pm, with iftar around 6:35. Bring a plate to share. The kids will have activities while the adults eat. After that we’ll pray Isha together and do takbir to welcome Eid.Friday is Eid prayer at McDougall Park in Como. Takbir at 8, prayer at 8:30. And yes — since Eid falls on a Friday this year, the question of Jumu’ah comes up. The Shafi’i position is that Jumu’ah remains obligatory for those living in the city. The Hanbali reading gives the option to skip it for those who came from outside the city, but holds that the Imam must still lead it. Since we live in the city and the masjid is not far, I’ll keep my khutbah to 10 minutes and the prayer short so everyone can go and celebrate.This tafseer series continues after Ramadan on Thursday nights at Qaswa — 7pm, finishing with Isha and dinner around 9 to 9:30. If you want to follow Surah Al-A’raf through to the end, come join us.Was the Flood Global or Local?We ended last night at the great flood. Today I want to address the question that comes up every single time I teach this story to kids in Australia.Were kangaroos on the ark?And before you smile — it is actually a serious theological question. The Bible says the flood was global and every species of animal was taken two by two. That immediately creates a problem: Australian animals are unique. Kangaroos, wombats, possums, platypuses — they exist nowhere else on earth. How did they get to Prophet Nuh to board the ark? And how did they get back to Australia afterwards without leaving any trace of themselves along the way?This level of specificity is precisely why many scientifically-minded people struggle with the biblical account. The Bible gives exact dimensions for the ark, an exact timeline, an exact animal count — and when those details collide with scientific and geographical reality, the whole thing becomes very difficult to hold.The Quran does not work that way. And that difference matters enormously.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Three ReadingsOur scholars hold two broad positions on the flood of Nuh, and I want to offer a third that I find most compelling.The first position: it was a global flood. The argument rests on the generality of certain Quranic ayat — particularly in Surah Hud — where the language is broad enough to suggest the entire earth. Allah saved Nuh and those with him and destroyed everyone else. “Everyone else” could mean all of humanity everywhere.The second position: it was a localised flood, specific to the qawm of Prophet Nuh. The theological argument is straightforward — Nuh was sent to his people. The punishment was for their rejection. Why would Allah destroy people in Australia, people in the Americas, people who had never received a messenger and had no idea any of this was happening? That is inconsistent with the divine justice we know from the Quran. Allah does not punish people who were never warned.The third reading — and this is where it gets interesting — is that the flood was localised geographically, but effectively encompassed all of humanity, because at that point in history, all of humanity lived in roughly the same place.Anthropological evidence suggests that when we trace humanity back 50,000 to 60,000 years, we find our ancestors concentrated in one region — having migrated out of Africa and settled in and around the Fertile Crescent. At the time of Prophet Nuh, the human race was still young. Its population was geographically concentrated. A great flood in that region could have destroyed virtually all of humanity that existed then — without covering the entire physical globe. And when the Quran says Allah took animals onto the ark, it was not every species on earth. It was the animals of that community. The sheep, the cattle, the camels — the practical animals you would need to rebuild your life after the waters receded. Not giraffes. Not hippos. Not kangaroos.The Story That Made Me StopWhat makes this third reading extraordinary is the evidence you find when you look at how widely the flood story appears across human cultures — especially cultures that had zero contact with each other.The Aztecs of Mesoamerica were completely isolated from the Old World until the 15th century. And yet they have a flood story. A man named Coxcox went before the Creator God, complained about the wickedness of his people, and the Creator sent a great flood to cleanse the earth. Coxcox survived on a raft. When the waters began to recede, he sent a bird out — and it returned with signs of land. Identical in structure to the story of Nuh. Same moral arc. Same divine response. Same bird.And then there is the story from the Kimberley.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comTonight is the 27th night of Ramadan.By the account of many companions and the opinion of many scholars, the 27th carries the highest probability of being Laylatul Qadr among all the odd nights. There is no guarantee — the Prophet ﷺ told us to hunt through all of the last ten. But if any one night has the strongest case, it is this one.The companions would dress nicely on this night. Apply perfume. Their wives would wonder — where are you going? And they would say: I am welcoming a very important guest. Because after the passing of the Prophet ﷺ, Jibreel only comes to earth once a year — on the night of Al-Qadr. Tanazzalul mala’ikatu warruh. The angels, led by Jibreel, descend.And the Prophet ﷺ said: if your eyes could see, on this night there would not be a single empty space on earth. Every spot, every gap, filled by angels. Recording. Witnessing. Think about that. Every angel comes down tonight — and what they record about you is entirely in your hands.The name Al-Qadr also comes from constriction — qaddara — because the earth, as vast as it is, becomes constricted by the sheer number of angels filling it. And in Surah Dukhan, Allah tells us this is the night when all divine affairs are distributed — the decree for the coming year is announced to the angels. Rizq. Life. Death. The angel of provision gets his list. The angel of death gets his. Every angel receives their assignment for the year ahead.Think of it like budget night — the night before the Prime Minister tables the budget, if you have something to submit, that is the time to submit it. Between the Luh Mahfuz and the angels receiving their instructions, tonight is when our du’a can be most profound. We make our requests before the roster is handed out.This is not a precise theological description of how divine decree works — nothing is comparable to Allah. But it helps us feel the weight of what this night is. Make du’a tonight. Make it seriously. And please — make du’a for me and my family as well.What We Established Last NightWe began the story of Prophet Nuh. He made da’wah for 950 years to the first people in human history to worship idols. The idols started innocently — statues built to commemorate five pious people who had died. Remembrance became veneration. Veneration became worship. Generations passed, the original intent was lost, and what began as tribute ended as shirk.This is why Islam is strict about statues — not children’s toys, not Superman figures your kids kick around the room, but the veneration of figures, the careful display of them, the collecting of them. The trajectory has been seen before. It doesn’t always end in shirk, but the path that leads there started exactly here. The fiqh rule exists because of history.A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. Da’wah Without Self-InterestProphet Nuh stood before his people and said: I fear for you the punishment of a great day.Not: I want to be your leader. Not: follow me and I will give you power. Not: I have a new system and it will make us great. He was afraid — for them. His da’wah came entirely from love and concern for the people he was sent to.This is the sunnah of every prophet. And it is the standard for everyone who inherits their work.If you are teaching Islamic studies, running a halaqah, leading a masjid programme — the moment you stop caring about the people in front of you, the moment it becomes about status or position or income, you have lost the plot. In Australia especially, there is almost nothing to gain materially from Islamic work. In Malaysia, a good hafiz leading taraweeh can earn 30,000 ringgit in a month of Ramadan. Here, you are lucky if the costs are covered. Sometimes the teacher pays out of pocket just to keep things running.So why do it? Because you care about the akhirah of the people in front of you. Because you are afraid for them, the same way Prophet Nuh was afraid for his people. That is the only motivation that sustains this work.Al-Mala’ — The Elite Always Push BackThe first people to reject Prophet Nuh were al-mala’ — the rich and powerful elite of his community.This is not a coincidence. It is a pattern. You will find it in the story of every prophet in the Quran, repeated so consistently that Allah is clearly drawing our attention to it. The rich and powerful elite reject the prophet. Every single time.Why? Because the prophet brings a new system. And the elite benefit from the existing system. They have built their wealth, their influence, their status within the current order — and now someone is standing up and saying: this order is wrong. You are oppressing the weak. You are exploiting the poor. The system you have constructed for your own benefit is not the system Allah approves of.Of course they push back. You are clearly misguided. That was what the mala’ of Nuh’s people said. It is what every elite says to every prophet who threatens the status quo.Prophet Nuh responded: I am not misguided. I am a messenger from the master of the universe. And I am giving you sincere nasiha.Nasiha — sincere advice. Not paid advice. The Arabic distinction is precise: if you are paid for your advice, you are a mustashar, a consultant. If you give it freely, from care, that is nasiha. The prophets were giving nasiha. Wa ana lakum nasihun amin — a sincere and trustworthy advisor. Unpaid. Uncorrupted. Answerable only to Allah.Feudalism, Communism, and Why Humans Need RevelationThe pattern of al-mala’ rejecting the truth is not limited to ancient history. It is the pattern of human political organisation without divine guidance.What did feudalism look like? Kings and courts doing as they pleased. Peasants with no land, no rights, no voice — working someone else’s fields for nothing. The system existed entirely to serve those at the top.And what was the extreme human response to feudalism? Marx. Communism. Abolish all class structures. Everyone equal. Everyone paid the same regardless of talent, effort, or contribution.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comThree nights left after tonight. The hunt for Laylatul Qadr is not over — tonight could be 25th for some people depending on moon sighting. Use every remaining night. Don’t coast.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comNight 25. Four nights left after tonight.Quick announcements: Eid will be this Friday insha’Allah, based on ANIC’s announcement. Qaswa will be praying at MacDougall Park in Como. Takbir starts at 8, prayer at 8:30. Setup is at 7:30 — the more hands the better. Bring a prayer mat or picnic mat, and a plate to share is very much welcome.Tonight is also a Sunday eve, which means tomorrow is a public holiday. No excuses. Sleep early, wake up at 3am, pray, read Quran, make du’a, do your adhkar. Then sleep after Fajr and sunrise. Use it.Allah Has Been Making His CaseBefore we go forward, let me zoom out for a second.The passage we’ve been in started at ayah 54. Before that, we had the conversations of Yawmul Qiyamah — the people of Jannah calling out to the people of fire, the people of A’raf watching both sides, the people of fire begging for a drop of water and being turned away. Allah was essentially laying out the map: these are the stations. Jannah. Jahannam. A’raf. Choose one. Pick your lane and start walking.Then from ayah 54, Allah pivoted. He said: you’ve seen the destinations — now let me tell you who your Lord is. He is the One who created the heavens and earth. The sun, the moon, the stars — all running on His command. And once you know that, He gives you the next step: call on Him. Make du’a. With humility on the outside and fear and hope on the inside.And now — if that still isn’t enough — He says: look around you.A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. Two Revelations, Both Meant to Be ReadAllah has sent us two books.The first is masthoor — the written. That’s the Quran. The second is manzoor — the observed. That’s nature. And our scholars tell us that both must be read together. If you read only the Quran and never engage with nature, you’ll be left behind as the world advances — because in the study of nature, properly done, you find your way back to Allah. And if you only engage with nature and ignore the Quran, you’ll have wonder without guidance.Both. Together. That’s the prescription.This is why our prayer times are tied to the sun and our fasting is tied to the moon. Islam is the only religion that makes you interact with the physical universe five times a day. But most of us have outsourced that interaction to an app. Which is fine — until two apps give different iftar times and then my WhatsApp fills up with the same question every Ramadan.Go outside. Look at the horizon. That’s when Maghrib is.Once in a while, find the Qibla with the stars. In WA, if you look for Orion’s Belt, that’s your east. Know when prayer time starts from the position of the sun. I make every student who comes through my class do this at least once. I don’t know if they remember it years later. But I hope they remember that they looked up at the sky and found their way to Makkah without an app.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comTonight is the 24th night. Eid has been announced — next Friday, insha’Allah. That means 29 nights of Ramadan this year. Which means we have five nights left.Before anything else — stay out of the arguments about moon sighting. Online or otherwise. This is not the time. There is a hadith that the Prophet ﷺ was once shown the exact night of Laylatul Qadr and was on his way to tell the companions — when he found them arguing among themselves. And Allah caused him to forget it. That knowledge was lifted because of the dispute. Arguments in the community literally cost us Laylatul Qadr. Don’t be that person. Not in these last few nights.Quick Recap Before We Move ForwardLast night we covered the four adabs of du’a from ayat 55 and 56:The external two — tadarru’, humility of body and word, and khufya, keeping your voice low and not screaming at Allah. The internal two — khawf, fear that Allah might ignore us the way we’ve been ignoring Him, and tama’, that deep aching hope that He — and only He — can answer.Both pairs working together. The outside and the inside. The posture and the heart.And then ayah 56 ends with a statement that stopped us last night: inna rahmatallaahi qaribun minal muhsineen — indeed, the mercy of Allah is near to those who are muhsineen.We said we’d come back to it. So let’s.Who Are the Muhsineen?Ihsan. We go back to Hadith Jibril — the hadith where Jibril came to the Prophet ﷺ in the form of a man and asked him about Islam, then Iman, then Ihsan. And the Prophet ﷺ defined ihsan as: to worship Allah as if you see Him. And if you cannot see Him — know that He sees you.That feeling of being permanently, completely seen. Not watched in the surveillance sense. Seen in the sense that matters — that Allah knows. That nothing is hidden. That what you do alone in the dark is exactly as real as what you do in front of people.A person with ihsan finds it hard to misbehave. Because wherever they go, they carry that awareness. They are, if anything, better in private than in public — because they’re not performing for anyone. They are performing only for Allah.The Prophet ﷺ is the living example. When he led the jama’ah in prayer, he kept it relatively short. He was always conscious of who was behind him — the elderly, mothers, children. He would actually turn and look at the congregation before beginning prayer, taking stock of who was there, adjusting accordingly. When Mu’adh ibn Jabal once led a prayer and launched into a long portion of Surah Al-Baqarah, the Prophet ﷺ pulled him aside after and said: ya Mu’adh, what is this fitna? There are people behind you.A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. But when the Prophet ﷺ prayed alone? Abdullah ibn Abbas narrated that he prayed behind the Prophet ﷺ one night. First raka’ah — Surah Al-Baqarah. Second raka’ah — Surah Ali Imran. Ibn Abbas eventually had to break his wudu, renew it, and come back. The Prophet was still praying. No audience. No performance. That is ihsan.And then there was the lady of the bukhur. There was a woman at the Prophet’s masjid whose duty was to bring incense and make the masjid smell beautiful. No name recorded. Just her role, quietly, faithfully. One night she passed away. She was washed, shrouded, and buried before Fajr — the companions didn’t want to disturb the Prophet ﷺ over someone they considered insignificant. After Fajr he turned around, noticed she was absent, and asked where she was. They told him. He said: why didn’t you wake me? And then he went to her grave and prayed Salatul Janazah over it.The cleaner. The incense lady. He noticed. He cared. He went. That is ihsan expressed outward — toward the people around you.

Tonight is the 23rd night. And because the Islamic calendar begins at Maghrib, tonight is already Friday night. Many of our pious predecessors said that when an odd night of Ramadan falls on a Friday night, the likelihood of it being Laylatul Qadr increases.This is the night we’ve been hunting for all year. So do extra. Make lots of du’a. Don’t waste a minute of it.And as it happens — alhamdulillah — the ayat we reach tonight in Surah Al-A’raf are about du’a itself. About how to make it, what should be in our heart when we make it, and why it is the very heart of all worship. Allah has a way of doing that.A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. Now That You Know Who He Is — Call HimWe spent two nights on ayah 54. We talked about the six stages of creation, about Prof. Jenkins’ framework, about matter and antimatter, about why physicists keep stopping just short of saying “God” — and why that has everything to do with European trauma and nothing to do with the evidence.The point was this: Allah introduced Himself. He is the one who created the heavens and the earth. The sun, the moon, the stars — all operating under His command. And this matters because now ayah 55 opens with a natural next step.You know who your Lord is. So call Him.Ud’u rabbakum tadarru’an wa khufya.Call your Lord with tadaru’ — with humility — and khufya — quietly.The Outer and the InnerTadaru’ captures two things at once: humility on the outside and humility on the inside. Both. Together.The external side — your body posture when you make du’a. You don’t stand chest out, arms crossed, making demands. You beg. And the way we beg is with our palms open, raised to the sky. The Prophet ﷺ taught us this. And he said that Allah is — and I want you to sit with this — embarrassed when His servant raises his hands to the sky and then puts them back down empty.That’s not to say Allah owes us anything. He doesn’t. But it tells you something about how much He loves to hear from us. He is waiting for us to call. He wants us to call. So when we raise our hands, He will not let us lower them without answering.The Prophet ﷺ when making du’a would look downward — hands raised, gaze lowered. The qibla of salah is the Ka’bah. The qibla of du’a is the sky. But in moments of great need, moments of complete brokenness, he would raise his hands high and look upward. Not demanding. Just — there is no one else. There is nowhere else to turn. Ya Allah.Then there is khufya — quietly. The companions were once marching and making du’a at the top of their lungs. The Prophet ﷺ told them to bring it down. Your Lord is not deaf. He hears you.So the outer dimension of du’a: humble posture, lowered voice.But there is also the inner dimension — and that comes in the next ayah.What Du’a Feels Like on the InsideAyah 56: Khawfan wa tama’an. Make du’a with fear and longing.We talked about tama’ a few nights ago in the context of the people of A’raf. In Malay it means greedy — but in Arabic it means something different. It means a deep, intense desire for something. You want it so much. So tama’ in du’a means you are making du’a with a genuine ache for it. Not going through the motions. Actually wanting.And khawf — fear. What are we afraid of? Not that Allah won’t answer. But that we are not worthy of the answer. That we might be arrogant enough to think we’ve earned it. The khawf keeps us humble. It stops du’a from becoming a transaction — Ya Allah, I’ve been to taraweeh 23 nights straight, so now give me what I want, or I’m not coming tomorrow. That is not du’a. That is negotiation.Khawf and tama’. Fear and hope. These two things together are not just for du’a — they carry us through our entire journey to Allah.Think about what happens when they get out of balance. If a person only has fear — only reads the ayat of punishment, only thinks about Jahannam, only focuses on their sins — they will break. They’ll reach a point where they think: everything I do is wrong, Allah is going to throw me into the fire anyway, why bother? So they give up. The fear, without hope, destroys.And if a person only has hope — only focuses on Allah’s mercy, only reads about forgiveness — they get lazy. Why worry about halal and haram? Allah is Ghafurul Rahim. He’ll forgive me. The hope, without fear, makes you complacent.You need both. Fear reminds you that Allah is Al-Muntaqim — the Avenger, the One who punishes, the One who has full power over Jahannam. Hope reminds you that He is Ghafurul Rahim. And when those two things live in your heart together, you keep moving. You don’t collapse, and you don’t drift.Du’a Is the Essence of Every IbadahHere’s something that might reframe how you see worship.After spending all of ayah 54 introducing who He is — after all of that — the next instruction Allah gives is not pray. Not fast. Not give zakat. It is: make du’a. Why?Because the Prophet ﷺ said: al-du’a mukhkhul ibadah — du’a is the marrow of worship. The core. The essence. Every act of worship, properly understood, contains du’a within it.What is the most important part of salah? The Prophet ﷺ said: there is no salah without Surah Al-Fatiha. So what is Al-Fatiha about? Strip away the opening praises — Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen, Al-Rahman Al-Rahim, Maliki Yawmid-Din — those are the adab. You praise Allah first before you ask. You don’t walk up to someone and say I need five hundred dollars before you’ve even said hello. You warm them up. You acknowledge them. Then you drop the ask. And the ask in Al-Fatiha is one thing: Ihdina As-Sirat Al-Mustaqim. Oh Allah, keep us on the straight path. The entire prayer — seven times in every raka’ah — is that one du’a. Put me back on the path.And fasting? The Prophet ﷺ said: whoever enters Ramadan and leaves it without their sins being forgiven, Allah curses them. That means the entire month of fasting is one extended du’a: Ya Allah, forgive me. Every hunger pang is that du’a. Every moment of thirst. Every night of taraweeh. All of it is saying: Ya Allah, I am broken, I need You, forgive me.Al-du’a mukhkhul ibadah. When you understand that, you understand why du’a comes before everything else in this ayah.Don’t Spread Corruption After the Earth Has Been Set RightAllah ends ayah 56 with something that reaches far beyond our personal worship: do not spread corruption on earth after it has been set right.Ba’da islahiha. After its reform. After its repair. The earth has been made good. Don’t undo that.This is bigger than just don’t harm people. Our responsibility is to all of Allah’s creation — human beings, animals, plants, the water, the land. Allah follows this immediately with the image of wind carrying rain clouds across the sky, dead earth suddenly turning green after winter — that is Allah’s islah. He repairs the earth constantly. Who are we to corrupt what He keeps restoring?The Prophet ﷺ once saw a companion using excess water while making wudu. He asked him: what is this waste? The companion said: is there waste in wudu? I’m doing ibadah. And the Prophet ﷺ said: yes. Even if you are making wudu in a flowing river.A flowing river. 1,400 years ago, people could not imagine that human beings would ever have the capacity to destroy something as vast and powerful as a river. And yet here we are — post-industrial revolution, with water undrinkable in country after country, because we corrupted it. The Prophet ﷺ saw it coming. The instruction was already there.Even at war, Islamic rules of conduct prohibit cutting down trees and burning crops. If we cannot corrupt the environment in war, what is our excuse in times of peace?Qaribun Min Al-MuhsineenAllah ends with: indeed the mercy of Allah is near to those who are muhsineen — those who are excellent, those who do ihsan.We’ll pick this up tomorrow insha’Allah and explore what it means that Allah’s mercy is specifically close to the muhsineen — and what that tells us about the standard we should be reaching for.Thanks for reading Grounded! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit groundeddaily.substack.com/subscribe

The Last Ten Nights Are HereBefore diving into the final ayah of Surah Al-Muzzammil, a timely reminder — tonight is the 23rd night of Ramadan. The last ten nights are upon us, and the Prophet ﷺ told us to hunt for Laylatul Qadr in these nights, especially the odd ones. Tonight is one of them.So what should fill these nights? Extra raka’at. Extra Quran. Extra dhikr. And the best du’a for this occasion comes to us through Sayyidatuna Aisha (رضي الله عنها), who asked the Prophet ﷺ: if I encounter the Night of Al-Qadr, what should I say? He replied: “Allahumma innaka ‘afuwwun tuhibbul ‘afwa fa’fu ‘anni” — “O Allah, You are the Most Pardoning and You love to pardon, so pardon me.”Now, there’s an important distinction here between ‘afw and ghafar. When we say astaghfirullah and ask for Allah’s forgiveness (ghafar), the record of the sin remains — but the punishment is cancelled. The deed is still in the books on the Day of Mahshar, but Allah will not punish us for it.Al-’Afw is something else entirely. It is when the record is expunged altogether. Wiped clean. As if the sin never happened. This is why the Prophet ﷺ said that whoever fasts sincerely and prays during the nights of Ramadan — and catches Laylatul Qadr — will have all their past sins forgiven. They exit Ramadan like the day they were born. No record of sins whatsoever.It’s just a few nights. Sleep a little less. Yes, there will be tiredness — that’s okay. This is our training. Don’t miss a night that is greater than a thousand months, greater than 83 years of worship.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Where We Left Off — The Arc of Surah Al-MuzzammilThe surah opened with a command: stand up at night, pray, and recite the Quran. Why? Because the day is full of heavy tasks — spreading truth, standing for justice, enduring hardship — and the strength to carry all of that comes from the spiritual work done at night. Reading about Jannah motivates. Reading about Jahannam sobers. The connection to Allah realigns everything.Then came the warning through the story of Fir’aun — richer, stronger, more powerful than the Quraysh, yet destroyed in an instant when he rejected Prophet Musa. Then the terrifying imagery of Yawmul Qiyamah: skies torn apart, children’s hair turning white from sheer terror. And finally, the choice: believe and take the prophetic path, or reject and face the consequences. Every choice carries a consequence.Now the surah circles back to where it began — Qiyamul Layl — but this time with something remarkable: mercy.Allah Knows Our WeaknessThe original command was demanding. Stand up most of the night — two-thirds, or at least half, or at the very minimum a third. The Prophet ﷺ did this every single night, without exception, even while travelling, even during battle. But Allah knew that the rest of the ummah would struggle.Allah says: “Indeed, your Lord knows that you stand less than two-thirds of the night, sometimes half, sometimes even less than a third — and so do a group of those with you.”Allah is the One who measured the length of night and day. Some seasons, the nights are long and Qiyamul Layl is easier — in Perth during winter, Maghrib comes in at 5:15 and Fajr isn’t until around six. Plenty of time to sleep and still wake up. But in the peak of summer, when Fajr is at 3:30? That’s a different story. Allah knows all of this.And so He says: “He has forgiven you.” Qiyamul Layl is fard upon the Prophet ﷺ, but for the rest of us, Allah has already shown mercy and lifted that strict obligation.But Don’t Abandon It AltogetherHere’s the key — just because the full obligation has been eased doesn’t mean doing nothing is an option. Allah says: “So read what is easy for you from the Quran.” Stand up for even two raka’at. Read whatever surahs have been memorised. Carve out even a small portion of the night for spiritual work.This is a fundamental principle in Islam: what cannot be accomplished entirely should not be abandoned in totality. Islam doesn’t teach perfectionism — it’s not 100% or nothing. It teaches consistent effort. The Prophet ﷺ said that the most beloved deeds to Allah are those that are consistent, even if they are small. Two raka’at every single night outweighs a marathon session once a month.And this, by the way, is one of the great purposes behind memorising the Quran — so that those surahs can be recited in prayer. Al-Kahf, Al-Mulk, Al-Baqarah — they come alive when recited standing before Allah at night.The Three Excuses Allah AcceptsThen Allah provides specific concessions. First: those who are sick. Illness isn’t a choice — when rest is needed for recovery, Allah says it’s okay.But then come two more categories that are remarkable, because they are things people can choose — and Allah still grants them as valid reasons for doing less Qiyamul Layl.The first: those who travel the earth seeking Allah’s bounty — meaning those who are out working, doing business, building economic stability. The second: those who fight in the path of Allah, defending the religion and the community.These two are placed in equal standing. Working hard to earn a living is given the same weight as defending the faith. That is extraordinary. It tells us something profound about how Islam views economic productivity — not as a worldly distraction, but as an act valued by Allah Himself.The Prophet ﷺ said the best rizq is what a person earns from their own effort, and he pointed to Prophet Dawud (عليه السلام) as the example — a prophet, a king, and yet also a blacksmith who worked with iron and ate from the labour of his own hands.Ibn Umar expressed this beautifully. He said the best deaths he could wish for were two: martyrdom in the path of Allah, and dying on a business journey — on his camel, with his trade goods, on his way to earn a living. Because this ayah puts them side by side.Islam Wants Muslims to Be Wealthy — But With PurposeThe encouragement to work hard and build wealth doesn’t come without direction. Islam doesn’t say: get rich so you can buy the fanciest car, then a fancy island, and once you run out of things to buy on earth, spend a trillion dollars trying to conquer Mars.Islam says: be rich, but that’s not the end goal. The ummah becomes strong when Muslims have economic power and an akhirah mindset. With wealth, the community can build schools, support students in critical fields, fund long-term projects. This is Sadaqatul Jariyah — continuously flowing charity that keeps giving long after the initial contribution.There’s a telling hadith in Imam Al-Nawawi’s Forty Collection that captures this tension perfectly. The poor companions once came to the Prophet ﷺ and complained: “Ya Rasulullah, the rich have taken all the extra reward! They pray like we pray, they fast like we fast — but they can give charity from their surplus wealth, and we can’t.” The Prophet ﷺ reassured them that dhikr — saying SubhanAllah, Alhamdulillah, Allahu Akbar — is also charity. The poor companions went away happy. But a few days later? The rich started doing dhikr too. Now they had both. The poor came back and said: what about us now?The point isn’t to vilify poverty. The Prophet ﷺ went on to explain that there is charity in every good act — helping someone onto their ride, carrying someone’s load. But wealth opens doors that nothing else can. Zakat, the pillar of Islam, is only payable by those who have wealth. And the framing matters: it’s not that the wealthy have to pay zakat — they get to pay zakat. Without wealth, that entire pillar of Islam is inaccessible. And hajj is the same.The story of Sayyidina Uthman (رضي الله عنه) at the Battle of Tabuk drives this home. He donated so generously — horses, camels, wealth — that the Prophet ﷺ said: “Nothing Uthman does after this will harm him.” Guaranteed paradise. And Uthman wasn’t living in poverty. He had luxuries. But look at the scale of what his wealth allowed him to do for the ummah.At the same time, Islam doesn’t expect anyone to give 100% away. The best charity, the Prophet ﷺ said, is what is spent on family — on spouses, on children. The balance is always there: spend on yourself, on your family, and on the ummah for the sake of the akhirah.The Beautiful LoanEven with all these concessions, Allah says: still, read what is easy from the Quran. Establish your salah. Pay your zakat. Don’t let the extras overshadow the foundations — a hundred raka’at of Qiyamul Layl mean nothing if Fajr is missed. Generous charity donations mean nothing if zakat is neglected. The obligatory always comes first.Then comes a stunning phrase: “And give Allah a beautiful loan (qard hasan).”A qard hasan is a loan with no deadline for repayment and no interest. Every good deed — every act of worship, every charity, every kindness — is a loan to Allah. And here’s the beauty of it: Allah doesn’t need our loan. He owns everything in the heavens and the earth and everything in between and beyond. He could simply say: “That’s Mine, I gave it to you, give it back.”But in His mercy, Allah understands human nature. He understands that people are wired to think in terms of profit and return on investment. So He frames it as a transaction: give Me a loan, and I will surely repay you — multiplied many times over. In human transactions, demanding extra on a qard is riba. But with Allah, He is the One promising to multiply the return. It’s the ultimate ROI.And what can a person invest with? Two things: wealth or skills. Both require Muslims to be hardworking.It’s All For UsAllah then makes something clear: whatever is sent forth for the akhirah, it’s essentially for our own benefit. Allah doesn’t need our investment. Every command He gives is for our sake, not His.And there’s a profound observation embedded here. As humanity lives more and more comfortably — materially, physically — mental health continues to decline. The richer the country, the

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comEight nights left. Make them count.Quick reminder before we get into the tafseer: Zakatul Fitr is wajib on every Muslim — $20 per head this year. It’s due before Eid prayer, so don’t leave it to the last minute. If you’re not sure where to give locally, I’ll post the details for MWSC — Muslim Welfare Support Centre — in the Qaswa Community Group. Six Days — Picking Up From Last NightWe were in the middle of something last night and I want to finish it properly.Allah created the heavens and earth in six days — sittati ayyam. We established last night that no classical scholar ever read this as six 24-hour days. The word yawm in Arabic simply means a span of time — an epoch. Allah Himself uses the same word elsewhere in the Quran to mean 1,000 years, and in another place 50,000 years. The six-day literalism came from the Protestant Reformation, not from Islamic tradition, and it quietly seeped into some Muslim circles when logic (mantiq) got stripped out of the curriculum.So what do the six days actually mean?A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. One of my teachers — Professor Muhammad Mahdi Jenkins, formerly Gary Jenkins, a nuclear physicist turned psychologist who eventually became Muslim — spent years building a theory that maps the six stages of cosmic creation to the Quranic account. Is this the traditional tafsir? No. But does it violate the Arabic, contradict established tafsir, or conflict with what the Prophet ﷺ or the early generations said? No. So it sits within the acceptable range of new tafsir.Here’s what the physics looks like:Stage one: light. The universe began as a singularity — a point of infinite density containing intense concentrated energy. That energy expressed itself across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. When we say light, don’t just picture what your eyes can see. Visible light is actually a tiny sliver of the full electromagnetic spectrum. The rest — radio waves, microwaves, X-rays, gamma rays — is all light we cannot see. That was stage one.Stage two: particles. When energy exceeds E=mc² — energy equals mass times the speed of light squared — matter emerges. The first particles came into existence. But here’s where it gets interesting. Physics tells us that whenever matter is created, equal amounts of antimatter are also created. And when matter meets antimatter, they annihilate each other. Cancel out completely. Leave nothing but energy. By pure theory, nothing should exist in this universe — because every particle of matter should have been cancelled by its antimatter counterpart.And yet. Here we are.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comNight 21. First of the odd nights.Go all in from here.We’ve been over this — Laylatul Qadr is greater than a thousand months. Greater than 83 years. Most of us won’t even live to see 83. And yet Allah is handing us this, every single year, completely free. One night of worship worth more than a lifetime. Don’t let it pass.The Trap of Being Born Into ItWe stopped last night at the people of Jahannam begging for water. Not a glass — just the overflow. The spillover from the cups of the people of Jannah. Just whatever drips from the abundance that Allah has given them.And the people of Jannah are told: it’s haram. Nothing from Jannah reaches those who took their religion as entertainment, treated it like a game, and were completely deluded by the life of this dunya.This ayah made me pause. Because if I’m honest, this description can creep up on any of us — especially those of us who were born Muslim.Think about it. Most of us didn’t make an active decision to be Muslim. We didn’t wake up one day, study the options, and choose Islam. We were born into it. The guidance was handed to us without us having to do anything to earn it. And because it was given for free, we sometimes treat it that way.The attitude becomes: yeah, I’m Muslim, what’s the worst that can happen? I’ll burn in Jahannam for a few thousand years and eventually get to Jannah anyway.There’s a story — I can’t verify the chain on this one, so take it as it is — apparently Muhammad Ali would light a match and put his finger through the flame whenever he felt tempted to do something haram. Just to remind himself: if you can’t take this heat, what about the fire of the akhirah? He would talk himself out of it right there.Now that might sound dramatic, but the logic is sound. Imam al-Ghazali addressed exactly this problem — that we inherit our religion, we grow up with it, and we stop thinking seriously about it. We don’t study our aqidah with the weight it deserves. We don’t appreciate who our Lord is. We assume rather than know.Some people say: don’t ask too many questions about your religion, it’ll make you doubt. Imam al-Ghazali disagreed. He said doubt is actually useful — because when you doubt, you seek answers. And there are always answers in this deen. Our scholars have spent centuries engaging with every objection from every angle. The answers are there. You just have to find them.The problem is not doubt. The problem is sitting in doubt without seeking.Following along? A paid subscription includes a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. A Book With No Room for DoubtAllah says: We have sent down to them a book, explained with knowledge — meaning certainty. No doubt in it.In the study of usul al-fiqh, knowledge (ilm) is defined as that which reaches the level of absolute certainty — 100%. Below it you have zhan (probability, around 75%), then shukk (50-50), then waham (25%), then nothing. Ilm is the highest level — no room for doubt.And this book operates at that level. Allah is saying: We gave them the tools. The argument was complete. There is no excuse.One small thing from this ayah that I want to highlight. Allah says this book is guidance and mercy lil ladhina yu’minun— for those who are in the process of believing. Not lil mu’minin, not for the confirmed believers. The verb form rather than the noun form. Why does that matter?In Arabic, a noun is stronger than a verb. If I say someone is reading, that just describes what they’re doing right now. If I say someone is a reader, that tells you who they are. So when Allah uses the verb form here — yu’minun, those who are believing — He is saying: even if you’re not there yet, even if you’re still on your way, still trying, still working to get to iman — this book will be clear to you. You don’t have to have arrived to see it. You just have to be making the journey honestly.This Quran is not a book for passive consumption. It’s not like opening a novel at page one and following the story. It jumps. It shifts. Surah al-Fatiha, then straight into Baqarah which changes topic to topic. It demands that you think. Allah literally asks: afala yatadabbarun al-Quran — why don’t you do tadabbur of the Quran? It’s a book that rewards effort. When you start to dig, you start to see the coherence — and when the coherence becomes apparent to you, SubhanAllah, you realise this could not have come from a human being.

Opening Reminder: The Last 10 Nights of RamadanTonight marks the 21st night of Ramadan — one of the odd nights in which Laylatul Qadr may fall. The Prophet ﷺ urged us to seek it in the last ten nights. Allah describes it as a single night greater than a thousand months — more than 83 years of worship.The minimum we should commit to: praying Isha and Fajr in congregation every night of these last ten. The Prophet ﷺ said whoever does so receives the reward of praying the entire night. If you can’t get to the masjid, pray with a family member.Make extra effort with additional rakaat, Quran, and dua. Sayyidatuna Aisha asked what to say if she encountered Laylatul Qadr, and the Prophet ﷺ taught her: Allahumma innaka ’afuwwun tuhibbul ‘afwa fa’fu ’anni — “Oh Allah, You are the Pardoner and You love to pardon, so pardon me.”The aim: to exit Ramadan free from sins, as though born anew.Tajweed Breakdown: Ayah 20, Surah Al-MuzammilThis is the final ayah of the surah — a lengthy one spanning half a page. Key rules covered include:The letter ’Ain — produced from the middle of the throat with partial constriction. It flows, unlike a full glottal stop.Qalqalah — a bouncing sound applied to the five letters (qaaf, taa, baa, jiim, daal) when they carry sukun. Avoid bouncing non-qalqalah letters.Noon Sakinah and Tanween rules throughout the ayah: ∙ Ikhfa (partial merging) — when noon sakinah meets letters outside the yarmaloon and idhar groups (e.g., noon before thaa, taa, sin, faa). Keep the back of the tongue flat when the following letter is light. ∙ Idgham (full merging) — when noon sakinah meets a yarmaloon letter. Read with gunnah for ya, nun, mim, and waw. No gunnah for laam and raa. ∙ Idhar (clear pronunciation) — when tanween is perfectly aligned, or noon sakinah carries a sukun sign before a throat letter. No gunnah, no merging.Identifying tanween type: A perfectly aligned (stacked) tanween indicates idhar. An unaligned (offset) tanween indicates merging (idgham).Mim sakinah before mim — idgham mutamathilain, read with gunnah.Madd rules: Madd asli (natural prolongation, two harakat) applies throughout. Madd badal appears in several places but operates under madd asli rules in this reading. Madd ’arid lil-sukun (two, four, or six harakat) applies when stopping at the end of a word — keep it consistent throughout.Lafzul Jalalah (the name “Allah”): The laam is read heavy when preceded by fathah or dhammah, and light when preceded by kasrah.Pronunciation reminders: ∙ The letter haa at the end of a word must still be subtly pronounced, not swallowed. ∙ Kaaf carries a slight exhaled breath when stopping on it. ∙ Laam is produced from the sides of the tongue against the upper molars, not the tip.Closing: The full ayah was recited together. This completes the reading of Surah Al-Muzammil, built up week by week across the series. A reminder to make extra dua in these final nights. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit groundeddaily.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comFollowing along? A paid subscription includes the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.The last ten have begun.Taharaw laylatal qadr fil ashril awakhir min Ramadan. Hunt for Laylatul Qadr in the last ten nights of Ramadan.Here’s why this gift exists. The Prophet ﷺ once told the companions about a man from the Banu Israel who worshipped Allah for 80 years straight. Not 80 years of regular life with some ibadah mixed in. 80 years of dedicated, committed worship. The companions were jealous — and honestly, who wouldn’t be? We live 60, maybe 70 years. The Prophet ﷺ himself said the age of his ummah is between 60 and 70, and very few go beyond that. And yes, there are billionaires today spending fortunes trying to extend human life to 120, 130 — but biologists will tell you that quality of life drops significantly past a certain point, no matter how much money you throw at it. That’s just how the body is built.So the companions asked: Ya Rasulullah, how do we compete with people who had 80 years to worship Allah when we barely get 60?And then Allah revealed an entire surah — Surah Al-Qadr — answering that question.The night of Al-Qadr is greater than a thousand months.Not equal to. Greater than. 1,000 months is 83 years. And Allah didn’t say you get this once. You get it every single year. Think about that. If you start taking your deen seriously at the age of 10 and you live to 70 — that’s 60 Ramadans. 60 Laylatul Qadrs. 60 opportunities where one night of ibadah is worth more than 83 years of continuous worship. In terms of quality of ibadah, how old are you really?That is the gift Allah gave the Ummah of Muhammad ﷺ.So don’t let any of these ten nights pass you without something in it. The absolute minimum — and none of us should drop below this — is to pray Isha in jama’ah and pray Fajr in jama’ah. Just those two. The Prophet ﷺ said whoever does that, Allah writes for them the reward of praying the entire night. Imagine praying the entire night. Now imagine that night is Laylatul Qadr. Do it every night for these ten nights and insha’Allah you will not miss it. Beyond that — pray your sunnah, do taraweeh, read some Quran when you get home, wake up a few minutes before suhur and make dua.For the sisters who can’t pray right now — you are not left out. Your dua is the same. Your dhikr is the same. Sayyidah Aisha RA asked the Prophet ﷺ what to say on Laylatul Qadr: Allahumma innaka afuwwun tuhibbul afwa fa’fu anni. O Allah, You are the Most Forgiving, You love to forgive, so forgive me. That’s the dua. Fill these nights with it.The People of the Heights — And What Their Story Tells UsWe stopped last night at the Ashab al-A’raf — the people standing on the elevated ground between Jannah and Jahannam, neither here nor there, their good and bad deeds perfectly balanced at 50-50.From their vantage point on the heights, they can see both destinations. And here’s a detail I want you to sit with: the ayah says wa idha surifat absaruhum — when their gaze was turned towards the people of fire. They didn’t choose to look. Allah turned their eyes. Given the choice, if you’re standing on the A’raf and Jannah is right there on one side — you know exactly where you’re going to keep your attention. You’re not voluntarily turning to look at Jahannam.But Allah turns their gaze. And the moment they see the punishment the people of fire are enduring, they immediately make dua: Rabbana la taj’alna ma’al qawmidh dhalimin — O Allah, do not place us among the wrongdoers.Then they recognise people. They call out to the people of fire and they know them — ya’rifoonahum bisimaahum — by the marks on them. And this makes sense, because the Ashab al-A’raf are the in-between people. In their life on earth, they moved between both worlds. Sometimes in the company of good people, sometimes in the company of bad. So on Yawmul Qiyamah, they look at Jahannam and they see faces they know. And they look at Jannah and they see faces they know too.They point to the people of Jannah — people like Bilal, like Sumayyah, like Khabab ibn al-Aratt — and they say to the people of fire: are these the ones you swore would receive no mercy from Allah? Look where they are now.Why Do They Get to Enter?And then comes the moment. Allah says to the Ashab al-A’raf: udkhulul jannah — enter Jannah.Some of the mufassirun say this is the Ashab al-A’raf congratulating the people of Jannah as they enter. Others say it is the angels — who had been guarding the Ashab al-A’raf at the heights, preventing them from moving — now giving them permission to enter.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comThe Last Ten Begin TomorrowTonight is the 19th night of Ramadan. The last ten start tomorrow.The Prophet ﷺ told us that whoever misses the good of Laylatul Qadr has been denied all good for the entire year — because that person looked at a night worth more than a thousand months and said: I’m fine, I don’t need it.One thousand months is 83 years. One night of ibadah — one raka’ah, one dollar given in charity, one dua made sincerely — on that night is worth doing that same act every single day for over 83 years without a break and more.And we’re in Australia. Our odd nights might be someone else’s even nights. Our even nights might be someone else’s odd. So cast the net wide. All ten nights. If you’ve had an unfinished TV series to get through — tonight is your last chance. From tomorrow, for ten nights, we give everything.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.The Wrongdoers IdentifiedWe left off last night with a mu’adzin in Jahannam announcing: the curse of Allah is upon the wrongdoers. Tonight Allah defines who these wrongdoers are.They are those who block people from the path of Allah — who not only refuse to walk it themselves, but actively work to prevent others from finding it. This was the Quraysh in real time. Abu Jahl would hire musicians to play loudly across the street whenever the Prophet ﷺ was reciting Quran or giving da’wah, so that the sound of music would drown out the revelation. Abu Lahab would greet every caravan arriving in Makkah and warn them: don’t listen to my nephew — he’s mad.The result? Many of the Quraysh never actually heard the Quran. Not because they rejected it, but because their leaders made sure it never reached them. This is why Islam insists we are not sheep. We do not follow our leaders blindly. Every statement, every ruling, every claim — we measure it against the Quran and the Sunnah.The same ayah mentions those who bend the path — those who speak about Allah without knowledge, declaring halal and haram on their own authority. The root of this, Allah tells us, is disbelief in the akhirah: wa hum bil akhirati kafiroon.This is the key insight. The Quraysh had no fundamental problem believing in Allah as the ultimate creator. Their problem was with the akhirah. Because believing in akhirah has consequences — it means you can no longer cheat, oppress, or abuse without accountability. In Makkah, the rich and powerful could do whatever they wanted. Islam came and said: there is a day coming where none of that will protect you.This is why throughout the Quran, iman billah and iman bil akhirah are paired together. You could, technically, believe in Allah without believing in the akhirah — the Quraysh did exactly that. But belief in Allah without belief in akhirah will not reshape who you are. It is the akhirah that governs behaviour. It is accountability that changes people.And this is what keeps the believer sane when they watch the world. Schools bombed. Entire populations under siege. The powerful openly declaring that international law does not apply to them — that might is right again. Where is the justice? The akhirah is where. Every oppressor will stand before Allah. No title, no army, no wealth will help them. This is not a coping mechanism — it is a theological certainty that the Quran repeats again and again.The HeightsBetween Jannah and Jahannam, Allah says, there is a hijab — a barrier. And rising above that barrier, there is the A’raf: a height, an elevated terrain, from which both destinations can be seen.On the A’raf, standing on this high ground, is a group of people. They can look across and see the people of Jannah. They can look the other way and see the people of fire. And they know — from signs visible to them — who belongs to which side.Who are the people of A’raf? They are those whose good and bad deeds are exactly equal. The scales balanced perfectly. They are neither in Jannah nor in Jahannam. They are suspended — waiting.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comAfter BadrThe battle is over. The Muslims are victorious. Fourteen Muslims were martyred. Seventy Quraysh were killed, including Abu Jahl — the man who had led the persecution of the believers for over a decade.And then the Prophet ﷺ did something that tells you everything about his character. He instructed the Muslims to dig graves and bury the Quraysh dead. These were men who had tortured and killed companions. Men who had tried to kill the Prophet ﷺ himself. Men who had driven the Muslims from their homes, confiscated their property, starved them, humiliated them.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Bury them.No mutilation. No revenge. No public display of contempt. The body is the body — even the body of an enemy is to be respected.Only one man was not buried in the conventional way: Umayyah ibn Khalaf — the master who had tortured Bilal RA, dragging him into the desert sun and placing a boulder on his chest. When the companions tried to lift Umayyah’s body, his skin disintegrated. They could not move him. Rocks and stones were placed over him where he lay — just as he had placed a rock on the chest of Bilal in the desert. The Arabs say: what you give, you get back.The Prophet ﷺ then walked to the grave of Abu Jahl and asked him a question — the same question the people of Jannah will ask the people of Jahannam, which we reach tonight in the surah. Did you find what Allah promised you to be true?The companions asked: Ya Rasulullah, can the dead hear us? He said: they can hear you as clearly as you hear me — but they cannot respond. When we visit the graves of our loved ones, when we make dua and say our salams, they hear us.Iman and Amal — They Cannot Be SeparatedAllah now turns to the people of Jannah: those who believe and do good deeds.Islam does not offer salvation through faith alone. Iman and amal salih must come together — and they are inseparable by nature. True iman will always manifest as good deeds. And truly sincere good deeds can only come from a heart that has iman. Without iman, the deeds may look the same from the outside — but the intention is elsewhere. You are doing it to be praised, to be seen, to be known. The action and the heart become disconnected.A sincere heart shows. It shows in what a person does when no one is watching. Publicly and privately, the same. That is the mark of iman.And those who say my heart is good while their actions tell a different story — Islam does not accept this. A good heart is not invisible. It is expressed.

Tonight is the night of Badr.On this night, 1,443 years ago, 313 Muslim men camped on the plains of Badr — underprepared, outnumbered more than three to one — on the eve of a battle that would determine whether Islam survived or was extinguished.There is no tafseer of Surah Al-A’raf tonight. Tonight belongs to Badr.How They Got ThereThe Muslims left Madinah on the 12th of Ramadan. The mission was straightforward: intercept Abu Sufyan’s caravan returning from Syria — the largest trading caravan the Quraysh had ever assembled, loaded with profits from goods financed largely by wealth confiscated from the Muslims at the time of Hijrah. Not a battle. An interception.But Abu Sufyan’s scouts were sharp. One of the Bedouin trackers found camel droppings along the route, opened them, and recognised the date pits inside as coming from the farms of Madinah. The Muslims were tracking them. Abu Sufyan immediately rerouted and sent the fastest rider in his group back to Makkah — the rider sliced the nose of his camel and smeared the blood on himself to arrive with maximum drama, ensuring the message landed with urgency.Abu Jahl raised 1,300 men. Not to protect the caravan — the caravan had already escaped. This was about something else now. We are going to crush Islam and the Muslims once and for all.By the time 300 of that army turned back — satisfied that their property was safe — 1,000 Quraysh warriors were marching toward Badr with that single purpose.The Muslims, meanwhile, had 313 men. Two horses. Seventy camels. And eight swords.They had not come prepared for battle. They had expected a small caravan escort — ten, twenty, thirty men at most. They found an army.And they did not turn back.The Leadership of the Prophet ﷺWhen the Prophet ﷺ chose a campsite on the plains of Badr, a companion — al-Hubab ibn al-Mundhir — approached him and asked a remarkable question: Ya Rasulullah, is this position based on revelation from Allah, or is this your personal judgement?The Prophet ﷺ said: personal judgement.Al-Hubab said: in that case, may I suggest we move further forward — to the wells of Badr — so that we control the Quraysh’s access to water?The Prophet ﷺ accepted. He moved the entire army.This is a man who could have said: I am the Prophet of Allah, my opinion is final. He said nothing of the sort. He distinguished clearly between what came from Allah and what came from his own thinking. And when a companion had a better idea, he took it.A leader who cannot be corrected is a leader who will eventually fail. The Prophet ﷺ modelled the opposite: you are not any stronger than me, and I am not any less in need of the reward from Allah. When they shared rides on the 160-kilometre journey — three men, including the Prophet ﷺ, rotating on one camel — his companions begged him to ride the whole way. He refused. He walked his share.The Night BeforeThat night, with a thousand armed men across the plain, Allah gave the Muslims a gift: sleep.Anyone who has had a major exam, a difficult interview, a high-stakes day ahead knows what that night feels like. You lie awake. The mind races. The Muslims knew what was coming — and they slept.Allah also sent light rain on the Muslim side. The ground compacted. The march in the morning would be firm underfoot. On the Quraysh side, Allah sent heavy rain. Sleepless. Muddy ground. No access to water. Before a single sword was raised, the advantage had already shifted.The Prophet ﷺ spent much of that night in dua — arms raised so intensely that his shawl fell to the ground. Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, waking before Fajr, wrapped it back around his shoulders and stood listening. Among the duas the Prophet ﷺ made that night: Ya Allah, if You destroy this group, You will never be worshipped on this earth again. These were the best of the Muslim men. Most of them. If they fell here, there would be no rebuilding.The dhikr of Badr — the one the Prophet ﷺ repeated through that night and into the battle — was Ya Hayyu Ya Qayyum. The Ever-Living. The Ever-Sustaining. The One who holds everything in existence. Repeat this in your own difficult nights.Islam Is a Salad BowlWhen the Prophet ﷺ organised his army on the morning of battle, he divided them into three groups: the Muhajirin on the right, led by Sayyidina Ali; the Ansar on the left, led by Sayyidina Sa’d ibn Mu’adh; and a mixed group at the centre, where the Prophet ﷺ stood himself, with the banner held by Mus’ab ibn Umayr — the first companion to migrate to Madinah, the man through whose teaching most of the Ansar had embraced Islam.Why keep them separate? Why not one unified mass?Because Islam does not erase identity. It never has. The Muhajirin were Meccan. The Ansar were Medinan. Different dialects, different traditions, different cultures — and at this point in history, genuinely different peoples. Islam acknowledged that difference and worked with it. Each group fought with the strength that came from who they were.Islam is not a melting pot. It is a salad bowl. A tomato remains a tomato. A cucumber remains a cucumber. Mixed together, each contributing what it is — they serve something greater than any one of them alone.Keep your cultural identity. Be proud of who Allah made you. Learn your mother tongue. And be equally proud to be Muslim — guided by Islamic principles, united by La ilaha illallah Muhammadur Rasulullah, with Arabic as the thread that connects the entire ummah across every language and culture.Help Comes in Ways You Cannot SeeWhen the battle began, most of the Muslims did not know they were being assisted by angels. They raised their weapons and fought with everything they had. Some were injured. Some were martyred. They had to show up. They had to put in the effort. The help came — but it came to those who were already in the field.Jibreel came wearing a yellow turban, marked like Mus’ab ibn Umayr. A thousand angels — one for every Quraysh soldier — came wearing white, on white horses. The Quraysh saw them coming from across the plain. They did not know what they were seeing.And then Iblis — who had marched alongside the Quraysh in the guise of Suraqah ibn Malik, who had promised them safety, who had said I am with you, no one can defeat you today — Iblis was the first to see the angels. He turned and fled.I see what you do not see. I am afraid of Allah.The Quraysh: You were the one who convinced us to come! You were the one who promised us victory!Iblis said nothing more. He left.This is who Iblis is. He is there when things are going well. The moment the cost becomes real, he disappears. The friends you make in sin will not be there when the consequences arrive.Abdullah ibn Mas’ud — a man so small he stood barely above a metre — captured Sayyidina Abbas, the Prophet’s uncle, a giant of a man with a voice that could carry across a battlefield. Abbas was humiliated. He told everyone who saw him: it wasn’t this small man — there was someone bigger, someone else who took me down. When Abdullah ibn Mas’ud brought Abbas to the Prophet ﷺ, the Prophet ﷺ confirmed: it was not you, Abdullah. You were assisted by an angel.Do not be arrogant with your success. You put in the effort. But the victory was never yours alone to claim.The Secret of Badr — And of RamadanThe Quran tells us the secret of Badr in Surah Ali Imran in two words: sabr and taqwa.Sabr is steadfastness — continuing on the right path regardless of how difficult it becomes. Taqwa is your living connection with Allah.Ramadan trains both. Every day of fasting hones sabr — the steadfastness to stay on the right path regardless of hunger and exhaustion. Every night of prayer and Quran builds taqwa — the connection with Allah that carries you through what the day alone cannot prepare you for.The Prophet ﷺ won his greatest military victory in Ramadan — on the 17th, on the plains of Badr. His greatest political victory, the Conquest of Makkah, was also in Ramadan. Sa’d ibn Abi Waqqas defeated the Persian Sassanid Empire at the Battle of Qadisiyyah in Ramadan. Amr ibn al-As conquered Egypt in Ramadan.The pattern is not coincidence. It is a formula.Fast your days. Pray your nights. And trust that when you show up on the field with whatever weapons you have, Allah will send what you cannot seeBadr Wallpaper for smartphonesBadr Wallpaper for tablets.Badr wallpaper for computersAfter Witr tonight insha’Allah — Salawat Badriyya.Following along with the series? Consider a paid subscription to receive a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit groundeddaily.substack.com/subscribe

A quick note before we begin: from tonight, we recite Dua Qunut in Witr. The Shafi’i madhab holds that Qunut in Witr is only in the second half of Ramadan — following the practice established by Sayyidina Umar ibn al-Khattab when he unified the companions behind one imam for Taraweeh and instructed Sayyidina Ubay ibn Ka’ab to lead with Qunut in the final nights. May Allah enter us among those who pray with the imam from beginning to end, and receive the reward of a full night’s prayer.The Battle of Badr — ApproachingThe Muslims left Madinah on the 12th of Ramadan. Tonight, in the timeline of history, they would have been settling into the plains of Badr — fasting, outnumbered, about to face something no one had fully planned for.The original aim was to intercept Abu Sufyan’s caravan returning from Syria — laden with the wealth the Quraysh had confiscated from the Muslims at the time of Hijrah. Abu Sufyan’s scouts, however, found camel droppings containing date pits from the farms of Madinah. He understood: the Muslims are tracking us. He rerouted the caravan and sent the fastest rider back to Makkah with a call for reinforcements — the rider even smeared camel blood on himself for dramatic effect, to ensure the message landed with urgency.Abu Jahl raised 1,300 men. By the time they reached the plains of Badr, the caravan had already escaped via a different route. Three hundred of the Quraysh army turned back — the property was safe, their reason for coming was gone. But Abu Jahl pressed forward with a thousand. This was no longer about a caravan. This was about crushing Islam once and for all.When the Prophet ﷺ chose a campsite on the plains of Badr, one of the companions asked: Ya Rasulullah, is this position based on revelation, or is this your personal judgement? The Prophet ﷺ said: personal judgement. The companion said: in that case, may I suggest we move further, to control the Quraysh’s access to the wells?The Prophet ﷺ accepted. He moved the entire army.In that moment — a Prophet, the most beloved of creation, moving his troops based on a suggestion from a companion — is a masterclass in leadership. A good leader takes counsel. A good leader distinguishes between revelation and personal opinion. A good leader is not too proud to be corrected.We continue the story of Badr tomorrow insha’Allah.The Blame Game Has No EndReturning to Surah Al-A’raf — yesterday we saw the people of Jahannam blaming each other as they entered. The followers blamed the leaders. The leaders said: you chose to follow us. Taste what you earned.Now Allah introduces a further dimension: the former and the latter — early generations and those who came after.Think about what this means personally. If someone in your family tree was the first to introduce something harmful — idol worship, a corrupt practice, a tradition that led generations away from Allah — and their descendants followed without question, then when all of them meet in Jahannam, the descendants will turn to the ancestor: you started this. This is your fault. You deserve more.It is a sobering thought. The decisions we make do not end with us.The Reverse Is Also TrueBut the reverse is equally real — and this is where the heart lifts.A thousand years ago, the ancestors of many Muslims sitting in our community tonight were not Muslim. The Malays were Hindu and Buddhist. The Turks were sky-worshipping pagans on the steppe. The Indonesians had their own traditions. And then — somewhere up that family tree — one person made a decision. I am going to be a Muslim.Because of that one decision, generations of descendants were born into Islam. Every salah they prayed, every fast they kept, every act of charity they gave — a portion of that reward travels back up the chain to the one who made the original call.That ancestor has been in his grave for perhaps 700, 800 years. And he is still receiving dividends. Still collecting on that one decision. This is the real passive income. Not a pyramid scheme — a multi-level reward that compounds across generations until Yawmul Qiyamah.And in Jannah, insha’Allah, we will find that ancestor. We will say: thank you. Because of you, I did not have to make the hard choice. I was born Muslim. All I had to do was protect what you gave me.For those among us who did make that hard choice — who came to Islam as adults, who chose this path when no one around them did — your reward carries the same weight. Every person in your lineage who comes after you and remains on this deen is a continuation of your decision. Do not underestimate what you started.Do Not Trivialise Small Good DeedsThis is why we must never dismiss small acts of goodness as insignificant.Teach one child Quran. That child teaches his children. His children teach theirs. How many generations between now and Yawmul Qiyamah? Every one of them who recites the Quran — you carry a portion of that reward. A tiny portion, yes. But multiplied across centuries, across an entire family tree — it becomes something beyond calculation.Whatever good deed you start, its consequences ripple outward in ways you will never live to see. A Muslim thinks in generations, not just in lifetimes. The question is not only: what am I doing today? The question is: what am I starting?The Camel and the Eye of the NeedleFor those who reject the ayat of Allah, who are arrogant against His guidance — la tufattahu lahum abwab al-sama’. The gates of heaven will not be opened for them. Their good deeds will not ascend. The angels carry our deeds up twice daily — at Fajr and Maghrib, which is why these are the great times of morning and evening dhikr, when two shifts of angels overlap and the same act is recorded twice. But for the one who rejects Allah, those deeds remain earthbound. He gets what he intended — praise from people, a legacy among men — and nothing more.Hatim al-Ta’i was the most celebrated generous man in Arab history. His name became a byword for generosity — Arabs still use it today, 1,400 years later. His son asked the Prophet ﷺ about his father’s fate. The Prophet ﷺ said: he never gave for Allah’s sake. He gave to be known as generous. And Allah gave him exactly that. He is still being praised. His intention was fulfilled in full.You get what you intend for. If you intend for Allah, Allah rewards you. If you intend for people, people reward you. But the gates of heaven remain closed.And if a person who rejects the ayat of Allah still imagines they might enter Jannah — Allah gives us the measure of that hope: try fitting a camel through the eye of a needle first. In Arabic this is the expression for the impossible, the never-happening, the stop-dreaming. It will not happen. Not through arrogance. Not through denial. Not through rejecting the messenger.Tomorrow insha’Allah — the people of Jannah. The Quran always balances: after the warning comes the glad tidings.Following along with the series? Consider a paid subscription to receive a free digital copy of the Surah Al-A’raf Study Guide and Workbook. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit groundeddaily.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comA Ramadan Halftime Check-InBefore we dive into today’s ayat, I want to take a moment to remind myself and all of you — today marks the 15th of Ramadan. We are at the halfway mark of this blessed month.It’s time to pause and reflect on our first half. How has it been? Have we been building momentum? Because here’s the thing — it is no longer time to warm up. We should already be warmed up by now. We are gearing up and preparing ourselves to hunt for the greatest night of the year: Laylatul Qadr, the Night of Power, which will fall on one of the odd nights in the last ten nights of Ramadan.So let’s make sure our ibadah is increasing every single night — our Quran recitation, our prayers, our charity, our kindness to family, friends, and neighbours. Everything must now be on an upward trajectory so that when the last ten nights arrive, we are ready to go all out. We’re hunting for a night that is greater than a thousand months. Let’s not miss it.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Where We Left OffLast week, we explored how Allah was preparing Rasulullah ﷺ for the enormous mission ahead. The Prophet was troubled by the verbal abuse and humiliation inflicted on him and his followers by the Quraysh. And what was Allah’s prescription? Stand up at night. Pray. Recite the Quran. Make dhikr — mention the name of your Lord.This is how we find the strength to face every challenge in life, especially the challenge of becoming and remaining a good Muslim. The more we connect with the Quran, the more we connect with Allah, and the more everything else becomes easier.Allah then told Rasulullah ﷺ to take Him as a Wakil — the One who looks after all your affairs. When you have Allah as your Wakil, you do a little and things become a lot easier. Then Allah turned directly to the Quraysh and warned them of chains, choking food, and a burning fire.Now we come to a new passage where Allah expands the audience. He is still addressing the Quraysh, but He is also speaking to every single one of us.A Messenger as Witness — For Us or Against UsAllah says: “Indeed, We have sent to you a messenger as a witness over you.”Think about that for a moment. Rasulullah ﷺ is going to stand on the Day of Judgement as a witness. The question is — will he be a witness for us, or against us?If he testifies for us, that means shafa’ah — intercession. He will stand before Allah and say: “Ya Allah, this person is from my ummah. They followed my teaching, they followed my sunnah, they tried their very best.” He will intercede on our behalf, asking Allah to forgive our sins and tip the scales in our favour.But he could also testify against us. And Allah has already recorded in the Quran what that looks like. On the Day of Judgement, Rasulullah ﷺ will say: “O my Lord, my people — they received this Quran and just put it aside.” They chose to ignore it. Chose not to put it into practice. Chose not to be guided by it.That is a terrifying thought. If the Prophet ﷺ — Habibullah, the beloved of Allah — testifies against us, who is going to stand up to defend us? Who would dare?

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit groundeddaily.substack.comHalfway. Fifteen nights in, fifteen nights to go.The warm-up is over. From here, we accelerate. The last third — the ten nights of salvation — is coming. But before we get there, the middle ten: the days of forgiveness. Use them.A brief note before tonight’s tafseer: on the 17th of Ramadan, we commemorate Yawm al-Furqan — the Day of Criterion, the Battle of Badr. The Muslims left Madinah on the 12th of Ramadan, fasting, unprepared for full battle, setting out on the instruction of the Prophet ﷺ immediately after prayer. 313 men. In a few days, they would meet an army of a thousand. What happened at Badr is the most important battle in human history — the moment truth and falsehood were separated with finality. We will cover it over the coming nights insha’Allah.Grounded is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.The Worst Wrongdoer“Who does more wrong than one who invents a lie against Allah?”This phrase — faman azlamu mimman iftara ala Allahi kadhiban — appears in multiple places in the Quran. It is one of the gravest charges the Quran levels. And it falls into two categories.The first is inventing objects or forms of worship and attributing them to Allah. The Quraysh who worshipped idols and claimed these were the daughters of Allah, that Allah commanded their worship — this is the obvious example. Creating your own god and calling it Allah’s command.The second is subtler and closer to home: declaring halal and haram without knowledge. Pronouncing that something is forbidden or obligatory without proper grounding in revelation — and then attributing this ruling to the Sharia of Allah. This too is lying against Allah. This too is a grave sin.The early imams understood this acutely. They rarely used the word haram unless something was explicitly stated in the Quran or Sunnah. If their ijtihad pointed toward avoidance, they would say: stay away from it. They would not say haram. Because to declare something haram without certainty is to speak about Allah without knowledge — and that is the very sin this ayah is addressing.Over time, something interesting happened. When the imam said “stay away from it,” later generations heard: it’s not haram yet — we can still do it. So the scholars had to escalate to “haram.” And then people started asking: is it a major sin or a minor sin? If minor, Allah is most forgiving — carry on. The language had to become stronger because the taqwa had become weaker. The early generation did not need to be told something was haram. The imam’s caution was enough.Be very careful about declaring things halal or haram. That is the domain of Allah alone.

al-Muzzammil 15 - 19This week we read and dissect the tajweed rules in ayat 15 - 19 of Surah al-Muzzammil. When it comes to learning a new skill, like Quran reading, remember that consistency beats intensity. It is very important that we practice daily even if it is just for 10 - 15 minutes. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit groundeddaily.substack.com/subscribe