Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center

https://youtu.be/j09JBq9whEs Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and companions, and upon many, many. Amen. As a video, just to also give you an idea of what Hyderabad looks like to those who haven't seen the city. It's a very big city, around six or seven million is the population. As you can see, it is extremely alive. It's very urban, extremely built up. I don't know if you can see that in this video, but way in the distance you can see the high rises, the skyscrapers, which is the financial district of Hyderabad. Practically every brand name, every big name industry, every big name multinational is here. And there you can see one of the denizens of Hyderabad, the Blue Rock Pigeons, which we have. I think we have probably the highest concentration of them in the world. This is a little clump of forests near the house, and then you see the rest of the built up society. The traffic, today being Saturday, is very heavy. The traffic is very heavy. Today, also partly holiday, traffic hasn't started yet, but still there's quite a lot on the road. The traffic is completely insane. I will post a video later on. I'm trying my best to stay inside. The traffic is completely insane. These things here are to prevent... I don't know if you can see them. These... they're like... they're plastic thorns, spikes. These are to prevent pigeons from sitting on this railing. And because they make... they make a big mess. Now, having given you a very quick thumbnail tour of Hyderabad, let me come to the point of what I want to share with you. Yesterday was Juma, and I prayed in my masjid. Very... again, a bittersweet experience, because on the one hand, it's a wonderful feeling, and I hope Allah gives this opportunity to all of you. It's a very beautiful thing to see something that you started, which people have carried out and carried on, and you see it working very well and functioning very smoothly. And that was my experience in my masjid yesterday. When I went there Saturday, the khatib came and said to me, I cannot deliver the khutbah when you are here. So I said, are you asking me to leave? He said, no, no, no, Astaghfirullahalazim. He said, you please do the khutbah. So I said, are you trying to test me? He said, no. He said, no, no, I'm not trying to test you. But how can I give the khutbah? I said, no, please do give the khutbah. He said, okay, with your permission. I mean, this is, you know, coming back, coming out of America after a week, even counting my own culture of in which I was born and grew up, a culture of adab, a culture of Islamic manners, alhamdulillah. May Allah forgive me for grumbling about this at one point in my life. I used to say, oh, you know, we have lost our culture. But we're all right. When I come back now, I find that now I have perspective of what happened when you actually do lose your culture. May Allah have mercy on all of us. So anyway, so this is the, that was a beautiful part of it. And of course, you know, practically I know every single person there. So after the Jum'ah, I spent about two hours with everyone comes and meets personally and hugs and so on. And Mashallah, may Allah bless all of us. I said, that's the sweet part of it. Of the bittersweet. But the bitter part of it also was, I could literally see spaces were not actually vacant, because obviously the vacant space gets occupied. But places where my very, very dear friends used to pray, I see that place and that place has got somebody else sitting in it now. Because these are, you know, in Masajid, people who go regularly, we tend to form our favorite places. So, you know, you always go and sit in that place. You pray in that place. You pray in that place.

Auto-generated transcript:The second thing I want to remind myself and you is to thank Allah in good and as well as in difficult times. And therefore I advise you and myself to be grateful to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Grateful for what he gives us and even more grateful sometimes for what he takes away. Because the one who takes away does that for one reason only. Because he wants to give you something better. My Sheikh used to say that if you go, if somebody has this what we call da'at-e-aam. So this is you know feeding the poor. You got a whole Sufra Dastur Khan there and everybody in the whole village, the whole town is there. Hundreds of people and you also go there and you sit down there along with the people on the floor. And suddenly your host sees you. What will he do? He will come and grab you by the arm and pull you up. Now when that happens, what do you say? Do you cry and say, oh my God, he's depriving me of my meal? Or do you feel proud and say, alhamdulillah, I have been recognized. My host knows who I am. And he lifted me from this place only because he wants me to sit at the head table to give me honor. He's not depriving me of the food. He wants to give me that food in a much more honorable place. And therefore, we thank Allah for what he gives us and for not giving sometimes what we ask. And for what he takes away from us. In the hadith in Musnad Imam Ahmad, Abu Sayyid al-Khudri reported that Rasool Allah said, there is no Muslim who calls upon Allah who makes dua. And in this dua, there is no sin. He's not asking for something haram. Nor is there cutting of family ties. But that Allah will give him one of three answers. He says, Allah will give him one of three answers. He will quickly fulfill his supplication. He will give him what he asked. Or he will store it with him. He will store it for this person in the hereafter. Or he will divert an evil from him similar to what he asked. So the Sahaba said, Ya Rasool Allah, in that case, we will make more and more dua. We will ask more and more. And Rasool Allah said, no matter how much you ask, Allah has more. Allah reminded us of the way to increase His blessings, which He has given us. And He said, He said, He said, And remember when your Rabb proclaimed and announced, if you are grateful, I will certainly give you more. But if you are ungrateful, surely my punishment, is severe. See the mercy of Allah. Allah did not say, I will punish you. Allah said, beware, the punishment is real. All the promises of Allah are for the muttaqun. Not simply the Muslimun. When we accept Islam, we enter the gate, the boundary of the palace. You are not on the street, you are in the fort. You are in the boundary of the palace. But from inside the gate, to the palace, and through the door, then inside that, to the throne room, to the treasury, is a journey. But real rewards are there. If you are only standing on the outside, if you are running around in the periphery, you haven't even entered the palace, this is not a great idea. And therefore it reminds, it is for us to constantly remind ourselves, about Allah . And that is why Salah is made farad on us five times a day. That is why Allah sends Ramadan, to instill Taqwa in us. And that is why we have so many opportunities to worship Allah in so many ways. And at so many times. Let us not wait for a blessing to end, before waking up to the fact that it is gone. The last thing, I remind myself and you, is to maintain unity. And not allow divisions. For any reason. Any reason. Allah said, Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic Arabic and he saved you from it. This is how Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala makes his revelations clear to you so that you may be rightly guided. I advise myself and you to be together and not allow anyone to divide us. Please note Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala did not say

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family and his companions. Peace and blessings be upon them all. After this, my brothers and sisters, first and foremost, I would like to thank Allah the Exalted for having given me the opportunity to be here for these six years. It's a study in how fast time passes. I cannot myself believe that six years have passed. Alhamdulillah, they have passed. And we have been through, thanks to COVID and so on, different times and different things. And Alhamdulillah, I thank Allah the Exalted for His constant help and His constant courage and support that Allah the Exalted gave me. And gave all of us. I want to thank very specially the board of this masjid. And they know and I know that I don't, I'm not just saying this formally. But this is a masjid, the board of which represents the kind of brotherhood and diversity that brother Muhammad talked about. Where there is this understanding between the board members and their own dedication to serving this community. Many times in the face of opposition which is from people who don't understand what is going on. Despite that, they have been serving and they have been doing a brilliant job. And they all do it only and only for the pleasure of Allah the Exalted without any compensation. I want to thank especially Dr. Bajwa, who has been a mentor to me from day one. And Alhamdulillah, we have done some good work with the interfaith community. But I have always looked upon him and I continue to look upon him as a mentor and a teacher in how to deal with the interfaith community. My experience of the interfaith community was practically zero when I came here. Because we don't have this kind of thing in India. But after I came here, Alhamdulillah, we have been able to do things which I am satisfied about. But all of that is thanks to Dr. Bajwa's introductions, his guidance, his continuous support, his advice. Alhamdulillah, and I ask Allah to reward him in keeping with His Majesty and Grace. I will not name all the other people because there are so many. And they know and I know and Allah knows who they are. And I ask Allah to reward all of them in keeping with His Majesty and Grace. So I want to express my thanks to this entire community. To the children, to the elders, to the men and women, all of whom I have had the pleasure and privilege of interacting with. And Alhamdulillah, these are memories I take with me. The second thing I want to say to you is that while I am away, there are certain things which you have been receiving for me which will continue. One is the two classes a week. Right now, one of them Dr. Ali is doing, which is the Tafseer class. But that also is my responsibility. So two classes a week, the recording of the Jummah Khutbah. These three things you will get every single week. The second thing which you will get is the daily Khatira. Now here you get it live every alternate day. Because Sheikh Abdullah and I take 10 days. But the virtual is always there. But you will get the daily Khatira, InshaAllah, every day. That will also come to you. So InshaAllah, this will also continue. So also with regard to any advice that any of you want, any questions you want asked. I don't say I have the answer to all questions. I wish I did. But certainly I will try and I will try to get you whatever answers you want. Or any kind of help you like. InshaAllah. Whatever I can do, I'm at your service and will continue to be at your service as we go forward. So I want to start with these two things. So you are sure that I will, that you can't get rid of me that easily. I want to remind myself and you that we are on a journey and the name of that journey is life. And like in any journey,

Auto-generated transcript:Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. Wa salatu wa salamu ala ashrafi al-anbiya wal-mursaleen. Wa hamadu Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam tasliman kathiran kathira. The seventh right that Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam has upon us which we are supposed to fulfill is that we accept his judgment in all matters without any resistance. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala shut all doors to personal opinions and differences when it comes to the decision of Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam in any matter. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala included himself in this ayah as the one making this ruling. This is a hukum of Allah. This is a ruling of Allah. To emphasize the position of Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and to support his authority. This is not oppression or blind obedience. But the basic requirement of having accepted that Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is the messenger of Allah and is guided by him in all matters. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala said وَمَا كَانَ لِمُؤْمِنِينَ وَلَا مُؤْمِنَةٍ إِذَا قَضَ اللَّهُ وَرَسُولُهُ أَمْرًا أَنْ يَكُونُ لَهُمُ الْخِيَرَةَ مِنْ أَمْرِهِمْ وَمَنْ يَعْصِ اللَّهَ وَرَسُولَهُ فَقَدْ ضَلَّ ضَلَالًا مُبِينًا Allah said no believer. Neither man nor woman has a right when Allah and his messenger decide on a matter to have an opinion different from that. To have a choice in that matter at issue. And whoever disobeys Allah and his messenger has gone astray into manifest error. Therefore if Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam rules in a matter that ruling is guided by Allah and is binding on us. We are allowed to have opinions. We are allowed to have our own thinking. We are allowed to have our logic. We are allowed to have our deductive reasoning. We are allowed to have all of that until it comes to a text. When we have our opinion and we are faced with a text, which is the Quran or the Sunnah, which is against the opinion, we give up our opinion and we follow the text. This is the meaning of being Muslim. Therefore if Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam rules in a matter, that ruling is guided and protected by Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and it is incumbent and compulsory on us as Muslims, men and women to follow that. Anyone who accepts Allah and his Rabb as his Rabb and Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam as the Rasul of Allah and the recipient of Wahi, of revelation, must automatically accept his rulings because he understands who Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is. This is a sign of obedience with understanding, not blind obedience. The one who does not obey is the one who is blind because he doesn't understand the fundamental principle of Islam. The declaration of faith, la ilaha illa Allah wa Muhammad wa Rasulullah, to accept the rulings of Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam without question is logical, reasonable, and the sign of intelligence and faith. The two are not mutually exclusive in Islam. Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-Las reports in Abu Dha'in, the Hadith in Abu Dawud, I used to write whatever I heard from Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and wanted to learn it by heart. Some people of the Quraysh dissuaded me and they said, do not write everything you hear from Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam while he is, because he's a human being and sometimes he may be angry like any other human being, maybe meaning he says something, he doesn't mean it. They meant that Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam might say something in a state of anger, which he did not intend to say. So one should be selective in writing his Ahadith. Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-Las conveyed their opinion to Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and he said to him that this is what I used to do. I used to write everything you say, but people are telling me don't write everything because maybe he says something in anger, maybe he doesn't really mean it and so on. Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam pointed to his lips

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Prot clause for the Healings. In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. O' God, make us poor. O' بَت便بْد كانف Doo Cool. Ceil pigeonaffen, We call it like any pigeon. He should bevet unbelievers with you. Nazim begu kilhh Germani, cheil� baili huua kufri, reprodu friends. Allah said, He it is who has sent his messenger Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam with guidance and the religion of truth, which is Islam, that he, Jalla Jalaluhu, may make it, make Islam the most beneficial, the most, the number one choice prevailed over all other ways of beings and religions. And all sufficient is Allah as a witness. As an honor for his Nabi sallallahu alayhi wa sallam Ummah, he, Jalla Jalaluhu, gave them the job of conveying the message of Islam to the rest of the world. This is the meaning of helping the deen of Allah. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala commanded his messenger sallallahu alayhi wa sallam to introduce himself and say, قُلْ هَذِهِ سَبِيلِ أَدُعِ لَلَّهِ عَلَى بَسِيرَةٍ أَنَا وَمَنِي تَّبْعَنِي وَسُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ وَمَا أَنَا مِنَ الْمُشْرِكِينَ He said, Say, O Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, this is my way. I invite unto Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, to Islam with sure knowledge, I and whoever follows me. Meaning, they must also do the same job. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, and glorified and exalted be Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, above all that they associate as partners. And I'm not of the mushrikeen. I'm not of the polytheists. This ayah declares very clearly our connection to Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. It's not a connection by birth, or by gender, or blood, or race, or tribe, or family, or nationality. It is a connection of faith and work. Those who wish to be connected to Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam must do the work that he did. They must do his work. He was ordered to start. He was ordained to start. Merestate, this is my way. I invite towards Allah. I and those who follow me. Like it was for the nabi, this job is not a choice, left to our discretion. It is incumbent and compulsory on the one who accepts Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, as his Rabb and Muhammad sallallaahu alayhi wa sallam, as his messenger, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and enters Islam. This job need not be done in a specific way. way is good for you as long as it is inviting people toward Islam by word, by deed, by action, by behavior, by culture, by appearance, any way which suits you. But the intention must be to present Islam to the people in the best possible way that is possible for us to do. In honor of that, he Jalla Jalaluhu granted the job of the Nabi as his life goal. The reward of that is the company of the Rasul alaihi salatu wasalam on the day of judgment and Jannatul Firdaus inshaAllah. Rasul alaihi salatu wasalam said in a hadith in Tirmidhi, whoever calls to guidance will have a reward similar to that of those who follow it without the reward of either of them being lessened. And this is in Muslim. Rasul alaihi salatu wasalam warned us in a hadith in Tirmidhi. He said, I swear by the one who has my life in his hand. It is incumbent upon you. It is compulsory upon you that you

Auto-generated transcript:Salam alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alhamdulillah, Rabbil Alameen. Wa salatu wa salam ala al-sharafi al-anbiya ibn Musaleen Muhammad Rasulullah. Sallallahu alayhi wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam tasliman kathiran kathira. So, amma baadu, my brothers and sisters, Jazakallah khairun to all of you, especially the brothers from UMass for taking the time and trouble to come and see me before I go to India. May Allah bless you and keep you in His special care and concern. Some of you are freshmen and some of you are seniors. And I don't know by the time I return, you would have graduated and gone. May Allah Ta'ala keep you safe always in His special care. May Allah Subhana Ta'ala protect you. May Allah help you in ways that you cannot imagine. May Allah Subhana Ta'ala open doors for you from places where you can't imagine. May Allah Subhana Ta'ala protect you from all evil. That which you know and that which you don't know. May Allah Ta'ala make it easy for you. May Allah grant you your wishes, your goals, your aspirations with khair and barakah and maafiyah. I want to share with you four, what I call my four hard truths. And I call them hard truths because these are painful to accept to face, but they are true. I used to go to a gym in Hyderabad called Talwarkots. In that gym, there was a huge scene to floor poster which had a picture of a very, over-muscled, big, huge man. And the slogan said, shut up and train. And I think that's a very good, very good rule to follow for yourself. To shut up and train. Meaning, to focus on our life goals. You're here at the university. And remember that you're here for one reason only. There is no other reason. You're not here for the clubs. You're not here even for the MSAs. You're not here for absolutely any reason other than to get the best possible grades that you can get. Absolutely the best possible grades that you can get. Because you're here for the best possible reasons. And the best possible reasons are doing it. Because what you do in these three, four years that you're here will determine your future for the rest of your life, more or less. So therefore, it makes absolutely zero sense to spend this time focusing on anything other than your studies. Now, once you have finished with your studies for the day, for the week, for the month, and then you have spare time, by all means, spend that spare time doing another six. And in that, I would put your MSAs as the top priority because to learn your deem and to do something good for people, this must be your top priority. Do spend time also on your physical education, on being on physical fitness. You must be known for the best food among all American universities. And usually that also means that it should be known for the... its capability to fatten you the fastest. Because all best food translates into enormous number of calories. So you want to be in a situation where by all means, enjoy the food, but make sure that you burn it off. So hit the gym, have a beautiful campus, go running, go walking. 10,000 steps per day. Make this into an absolutely invaluable rule. 10,000 steps per day. And those 10,000 steps must be done at one stretch. It's not throughout the day. So the routine that I always recommend for people to follow is number one, wake up one hour or one and a half hour before the time for fajr starts. And then make sure that you pray tahajjud. Make tahajjud firm on yourself. And once you've prayed tahajjud, then read one juz, one zibar of Quran. And depending on your speed of reading, if you can't finish the whole juz, read as much as you can. And then go and pray salatul fajr by jama'ah. Go to the masjid, go to the masjid, make sure that you pray salatul fajr by jama'ah. And when you finish praying salatul fajr, then you sit there in the place where you prayed, and make this. And make zikr until the time for ishra comes. And then pray two rakat and two rakat, four rakat, but in twos.

Auto-generated transcript:As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. May the Lord of the worlds be with you. And peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah, Muhammad and the Messenger of God, and his family and friends and his family. Peace and blessings be upon him. Now we are walking in Ashley and with me is Zeeshad and Atiba. Who are both cousins and I have the pleasure of meeting Atiba for the first time and Zeeshad of course. For many many years now. Alhamdulillah. And as we shall see, very very beautiful place. Truly reminds us of what Allah mentioned about Jannah. We ask Allah for Jannah inshaAllah. The leaves are about to turn colour. So some signs of that colour we are seeing. But I know how what this place looks like another month. So we are completely transformed place. Very beautiful. Very very even more beautiful. We are talking about the issue of virtual reality. So we are talking about Apple's what is it called? Vision Pro. Vision Pro. Vision Pro which is a virtual reality supported device. And you wear it like a pair of glasses. And then it shows you all kinds of videos and images which you can see in the virtual reality. I mean it's VR so it looks real. And I was reminding myself and my brother said that we don't have to go to technology to understand this. Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala is showing this to us every day. What appears is not what is. There is a difference between the appearance of something and the reality behind it. And we see it throughout in life. You know some people who we think are friends. The way they talk to you, the way they sit with you, they invite you for dinner, for lunch and this and that. And then suddenly, Allah protects. But you discover that they are stabbing you in the back. Right behind your back they are talking stuff. And behind your back they are trying to stab you in the back. So I am always very happy when I hear that. Because it means now I am getting some free good deeds. So I don't confront them. The guy invites me for a meal, I am very happy. I never refuse free food. So I go have the meal. I make sure he eats first so I know it's not poisoned. But other than that, I say Alhamdulillah, please go ahead stab me in the back. And do as much Zaheer as you want. Because all that is good deed for me. And you cannot harm me. There is no one who can harm and no one who can benefit except Allah. So what do I care? Similarly we have, so appearance is something, friendship. Reality is enmity. Similarly, you see, you take the things in Israq. Many times people say, you know, this is not convenient, that is not convenient. The usual moons, not moon sighting but moon fighting arguments. About saying why should we wait so long to see the moon. Why don't we calculate? And this is the modern world. This is a combination of ignorance and self-importance. Because calculations are nothing new. The Hindus have had a calculation calendar for the last 3000 years. So there is nothing new about calculating. People have done, Egyptians had a calculate, moon, lunar calculations 5000 years ago. Because lunar calendars are nothing new. It's not as if the Arabs invented it. Lunar calendars have been there long before the solar calendars. Julius Caesar was the first one to bring a solar calendar. It was called the Julian calendar. So the point is that if you don't read history, then you have no clue what you are talking about. But anyway, so nothing new about that. But moon fighting. So arguing about, you know, which, which, whatever. What organization should you follow? I mean, all of this is for the sake of convenience. So why should we sit in the masjid till 11 o'clock at night waiting for a sighting report to come from California or wherever? But we don't ask this question. When the World Cup was being played in Qatar, because of the time difference, it was 2 o'clock in the morning or 3 o'clock in the night. And people sat. And they didn't just sit for one hour.

Auto-generated transcript:As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Faqala ta'ala inna allaha wa malaikatahu yusalluna ala nabi ya ayyuhal ladhina amanu sallu alayhi wa sallimu taslima. Allahumma salli ala Sayyidina Muhammadin wa ala ahli Muhammad kama sallita ala Ibrahim wa ala al Ibrahim innaka hamidun majid. Allahumma barika ala Muhammadin wa ala ahli Muhammad kama barikta ala Ibrahim wa ala al Ibrahim innaka hamidun majid. I remind you and myself that leaders come from the people. The leader is not sent from heaven. Leaders come from the people. If you have good people, you get good leaders. If you have a gang of bandits, you will not get Omar bin Abdulaziz as the leader of that band. Right? You will get the biggest. Bandit who will be the leader of that bandit of that gang of bandits. Abu Dahad al-Ansari. On a side note, I'll come back. Abu Dahad al-Ansari. He was sitting in Majid Nawawi Sharif. And he says, I saw a small boy who came to me. He was crying. He was weeping, tears flowing. And he came here. I want your help. Nawawi Sharif was, I mean, he's, there's no. When Allah. Subhanahu wa ta'ala said, What do you say about his Rama? What do you say about his heart? Allah is the one who is witness to that. This boy comes, he's crying. He says, Ya Rasulullah, I need your help. He says, what happened? He says, Ya Rasulullah, my father gave me, I'm an orphan. My father died. I left for me a small, you know, dead garden. And I want to build a wall around it. And there is a dead, big dead tree in the way of this wall, which belongs to my neighbor. And the neighbor is being difficult. He won't let me take the wall around the tree. I told him, give me the tree. He does not give me the tree. I said, sell me the tree. He doesn't sell me the tree. So now I don't know what to do. So now we saw that Salim said, who's the neighbor? The neighbor was Abu Lubaba. Who's also, he was not one of the manafiqun. He was a good sahabi, Mashallah. But you know, people are people. So, Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam called him. He called him. Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said to him, why don't you give this boy the tree? You've got a big dead palm garden, one tree, give it to him. He said, no. This is my haqq, my right. Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said, okay. He said, no. Sell that tree to me. Sell that tree to me. And I promise you a tree in Jannah. I'm trying to show you what kind of people these were. He said, sell me the tree and I promise you a tree in Jannah. May Allah protect us from ourselves. This sahabi who was one of those who in one Ghazwa actually shared a mount with Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. He's not a manafiqun. But human. He said, no. What is the meaning of Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam promising you a tree in Jannah? What does it mean? He's promising you Jannah. Okay. You're not going to be sitting in Jannah and selling your people there. You know what? I got a piece of a tree in the Jannah. No. You go to sell. He said, no. And he left. Now Abu Dada, this is not Abu Darda. This is Abu Dada. Abu Dada is sitting, listening to that. As soon as the man left, he came to Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and said, Ya Rasulullah, if I get that tree for you, will you promise me the same thing? Yes. Yes. Now he said, I said, yes. So Abu Dada went behind his man. By the time he caught up with him, he's in the middle of the market of Madinah on his way home. Abu Dada caught up with him and he stopped him and he said, Salaam. He said, I heard this conversation in the masjid and I came to ask you, sell me that tree. So he said, I did not even sell the tree to the Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. Why will I sell it to you? He said, no, no, no, hold on. I will tell you the deal. He said, my deal is, he said, do you know me? He said, of course I know you. Who are you? Who am I? He said, you are Abu Dada. What do you know about me? He said, everybody knows about you. He said,

Auto-generated transcript:As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Faqala ta'ala inna allaha wa malaikatahu yusalluna ala nabi ya ayyuhal ladhina amanu sallu alayhi wa sallimu taslima. Allahumma salli ala Sayyidina Muhammadin wa ala ahli Muhammad kama sallita ala Ibrahim wa ala al Ibrahim innaka hamidun majid. Allahumma barika ala Muhammadin wa ala ahli Muhammad kama barikta ala Ibrahim wa ala al Ibrahim innaka hamidun majid. I remind you and myself that leaders come from the people. The leader is not sent from heaven. Leaders come from the people. If you have good people, you get good leaders. If you have a gang of bandits, you will not get Omar bin Abdulaziz as the leader of that band. Right? You will get the biggest. Bandit who will be the leader of that bandit of that gang of bandits. So when we look at leaders and we criticize leaders that of course our leader, our leader, mashallah, are worthy of all criticism. But the point is that before we criticize them, we need to look at ourselves in the mirror and say, this is my leader because I am who I am. And I did not say this. Sayyidina Ali bin Abi Talib said this. A man came to him and he said, how is it that in your time? There is so much fitna when there was no fitna in the time of Abu Bakr and Umar. Radhi Allah anhu ma. Sayyidina Ali radhi Allah anhu said. The reason there was no fitna in the time of Abu Bakr and Umar. Radhi Allah anhu ma. Was because the followers were like me. And the fitna in my time is because followers are like you. Huh? So let us think about this. As any Muslim today, what is the biggest problem of the Ummah today? And they will say the biggest problem of the Ummah is lack of leadership. Right? Anybody. Lack of leadership. We don't have good leaders. My submission to you is that, yes, that is a problem. I agree with you. But equal. If not equal. But bigger problem is lack of followership. Not only leadership. Lack of followership. And I will tell you what that means. It is not only lack of leadership. Let me explain to you what is the meaning of followership. By two examples. Now take yourself back. Take yourself back. To the 13th year of prophethood of Risala. 622 CE. It is in the Ayam-u-Tashriq. Days after Hajj. Dark night. And some people are gathering. In groups. Twos and threes and fours. And moving very quietly. They are collecting in one place. And Kaab-in-Malik Radhialanu narrates this whole story. And he said that in the night we slept in our camps. And then when the third of the night had elapsed. So roughly middle of the night. We began to leave quietly. And we came to this Hilak. Which today we call this place Aqaba. And there were 73 men and two women. And the two women were Umm Ammara Radhialana. And Umm Muni Radhialana. And we waited there. And the reason they did that was because quite literally their lives were in danger. The Quraysh were looking out for people who were. Ready to support Muhammad and they would have attacked them. So they gathered there. With their lives at risk. Just think about that. This Deen began. With people ready to put their lives on the line. For the Deen of Allah. This Deen began. With people ready to put their lives on the line. For the Deen of Allah. By supporting Muhammad . Just reflect on this fact. They did not hesitate. They didn't say hold on a second. I mean I'm not going in there. This is a dangerous meeting. What happens if I get caught? So they gathered. They gathered. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. They were all in the same place. And Rasool came with his uncle. Al-Abbas bin Abdul Muttalib. And we don't know at that point whether he was Muslim or not. Because he had become Muslim and he was hiding it. We don't know whether it was before this or after this. But anyway he was the supporter of Rasool .

Auto-generated transcript:Peace be upon you all. I remind myself and you, let us make this into a regular practice of ours. I don't like to use the word habit because habits are unthinking actions. I'm talking about conscious thinking action. To send salat and salam on Rasulullah s.a.w. throughout the day, throughout the night, every waking moment. Keep your tongue moist with the dhikr of Allah and among the afzal of the dhikr of Allah is to send salat and salam on the Rasulullah s.a.w. And this is the only thing, only thing for which Allah s.w.t. said the one who sends salam on me one time, Allah s.w.t. will send salam on him ten times for each one time. Only thing. So let us take advantage of that to send salat and salam on Rasulullah s.a.w. I was reflecting for myself in the presence of our Sheikh that it is amazing that he is sending salat and salam on me. And I was thinking that if I ask you, for example, and I use this example there, I say that if, for example, if through this door in the front, if Rasulullah s.a.w. walks into this masjid, imagine this, just think about this, right? Many of us make dua, O Allah, show me the Rasul s.a.w. in my dream. So let us imagine that he walks in through this masjid. How many of us here, and you don't know, how many of us here, and you don't need to answer this question to me, it's for ourselves, how many of us here will recognize him? How many will recognize him? I'm not talking about how many will say, Oh, Mashallah, this is such a handsome man, wonderful man, I don't know who. Or will you stand up and say, Assalamu alaikum, Ya Rasulullah, SubhanAllah. You have come to my masjid. How many of us will say that? We ask Allah s.w.t, show me the Rasul in my dream. How do you know you're seeing the Rasul? If Nabi s.a.w. comes in your dream, how do you know that you are seeing Rasul s.a.w.? If we ask ourselves and say, and I suggest this also, so when this shock treatment happens, which I hope it will happen, be prepared for it. If someone gives you a plain sheet of paper and says, write down on the sheet of paper, what you know about Rasulullah s.a.w. How many of us can fill one sheet, just one single 15 line sheet of paper with what we know about Rasulullah s.a.w. Whatever it is. How many of us can do that? And to me, this is the SubhanAllah, may Allah SubhanAllah forgive us. Wallahi, this is something we should collectively ask Allah s forgiveness. We must make tawbah, sincere tawbah. Stand before Allah s.w.t. Pray two rak'ahs Salah and in sujood, cry, weep and say, Allah, forgive me for forgetting your Nabi. Forgive me for forgetting your Nabi. The tragedy is not that the enemies of Islam criticize the Prophet s.a.w. or try to attack Islam. The tragedy is, the Muslims have forgotten the Nabi. We have forgotten the Nabi. We have reduced the Zikr of Rasulullah s.a.w. to one day in the year. And then we have a dispute. Is this Milad Mawlud? Is it Milad Sharif and Milad n-Nabi? Is it Sunnah? Is it Bida? Let us accept. Milad n-Nabi, Bida. Haram. Don't do it. On the 12th of Rabiul Awal, don't do it. That is one day in 365. What about the other 364? What about January 1? What about October 20? Pick any date you want. Do we gather? Do we sit together? Do we talk about the Nabi's? What do we know about him? If Allah Ta'ala had wanted and Allah is the only one who had wanted to make him the Prophet s.a.w., he was the Prophet s.a.w. He is our Prophet s.a.w. He is our Prophet s.a.w. We all know that he is our Prophet s.a.w. He is our Prophet s.a.w. wanted and Allah is Allah. خَالِقُ السَّمَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ بَضِعُ السَّمَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ فَاتِرُ السَّمَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ رَذَّاقُ ذُو الْقُوَّةِ الْمَتِينِ خَالِقُ كُلِّ أَشْيَا وَالْأَحْوَالِ وَهُوَ عَلَى كُلِّ شَيْءٍ قَدِيرٌ There is no, there are no hudud to the khudrat of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala could have sent his kalam, kalamul majeed. He could have commanded Jibreel a.s. to go and land on top of the Kaaba

https://youtu.be/rQgmlIImpQE Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and blessings be upon his family and his family. May Allah bless you a lot. Amen. WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM WIIFM It's because of how I presented that idea to them. In terms of what's in it for them. And that is the channel or the FM station. What's in it for me. WIIFM Presented in terms of what's in it for me. So somebody comes to you and says, well, can you help me in a fundraising project that I have? I'm raising funds for this project to do this. Ask the question, what's in it for me? Because when you do fundraising normally, you go to venture capitalists for funds. What do they ask you? What's in it for me? Why should I help you? Same logic. The venture capitalist is putting his hand in his pocket to, get the funds for you. Whereas you, as the fundraiser, are enabling or encouraging or inspiring other people to put their hand in their pockets to fund that project. So same logic. What's in it for me? Same logic. Apply the same WIIFM also, to, to decide on your priorities in life. Nobody has unlimited resources. Nobody has unlimited time. Nobody has unlimited money. Nobody has unlimited energy. No one has unlimited life. No one has unlimited anything. No matter how wealthy you think you are in any of these aspects, it's never enough. It's never something that is unlimited. It has limits. So, what makes sense? To get the biggest bang for the buck. And that is the meaning of prioritization. When you prioritize, you are ensuring that you are getting the biggest bang for the buck. The best benefit that you can get for something. And you get that by prioritizing. And the way to prioritize is, ask this question. What's in it for me? Spend your time and energy on something, where you get the maximum benefit from whatever you're doing. And don't waste your time with other things, where that benefit is not the maximum. What's in it for me? WIIFM. I ask Adas Mahantala to help us to make the right choices, to get the maximum benefit from it. And in that context, we will find that we are getting the maximum benefit from it. So, the thing to think about is, that as a Muslim, we don't think of benefits only in terms of the world, of this life, but we think of real benefit in terms of the Akhira. Now with that in context, when you look at the seerah of Rasulullah , when you look at the hayat of Sahaba, the lives of the companions, you will find that they constantly made this choice. So, they constantly applied this, what's in it for me, continuously. And that's how they were able to make choices, which today seem to be so difficult for us. The choice is not difficult, it's the criterion. It is the framework. It is the screen on which you are measuring that choice. That screen has changed, and therefore the choice is not the same. So, therefore the choice becomes difficult. But if the screen was the Akhira, that choice would be very easy. Very, very easy. Because what's in it for me, in the context of the Akhira means, what's in it for me in terms of eternal benefit, not temporary benefit. Choice becomes easy. And that is the point I want to leave you with. We ask Allah to help us to see, see the truth as the truth, and to see falsehood as falsehood. Allahumma arina alhaqqa hatka warzookna ittiba'a wa arina alba'tila ba'tila warzookna ijtina'a ba'a O Allah show us the truth as truth, and help us to follow it, and show us falsehood as falsehood, and help us to stay away from it. Wa sallallahu ala nabiyyil kareem wa ala alihi wa sahbihi al bayyin bi rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu.

https://youtu.be/hGL9gB3jBzY Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the Prophets and Messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and his companions. Peace and blessings be upon him. Amma Madhu, we've been talking about priorities, taking advantage of opportunities. We were talking about WIIFM, what's in for me. Now think about this. We are here in Maine, and we're staying in this beachside apartment. And as you can see here, there are beachside apartments all around the beach, all the way. We also know that early mornings are very special. We know that there is... special concentration of ozone in this early morning air blowing from the sea. And if you are doing any kind of aerobic exercise here, walking or riding or, you know, running or whatever, this is the best time and place to do that. We know that. Umm... Yeah. This is the best use of this time of the day. So we know all the... We know all about the benefits of all this. But see the number of houses that are here, right? All the way. And then see the number of people who are actually on the beach at this time. Okay? So, I can bet you that probably every single person who is in... who is in these houses, they know about the benefits of getting out in the morning, going for a nice walk, and... And today is Sunday incidentally, so it's not even a question of saying I have to go to work. Umm... They know the benefits of all this. But how many people are here? But how many people actually take advantage of that? How many people are saying that it's not enough knowing about the benefits? I want the benefits. And the way to get the benefits is to get out and walk. Right? Now, second truth. Let an hour pass. And today they are predicting temperatures in the morning. They are predicting temperatures in the 90s. So the sun comes out. The same beach is going to be not a very pleasant place to be in. It's going to be very hot. It's not a scrap of shade. And the absolutely beautiful experience that we are having here will not be there for anyone who comes later. So this opportunity, this door, is going to shut. Maybe in an hour, maybe in two hours from now. So the question is not only whether the opportunity exists. The question is to remember and understand that opportunities don't exist forever. They exist for a short time. And when the time is over, the opportunity is gone. No more opportunity. Now, people who realize that take advantage of the opportunity by going through that door of opportunity while it is still open. And those who do not do that, who don't have that foresight, will spend the rest of their life complaining about how the road is not going to be the same. And they will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. They will be the same. There was no opportunity which would be a lie or some other excuse about why they could not take advantage of the opportunity which still doesn't help. Because who are you trying to convince and who do you need to convince? Nobody. Nobody. Nobody needs to be convinced. And nobody frankly gives a damn. If you lose out in life, who do you think cares? Nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody cares. Maybe your mama. No one else. Right? Who cares? So, the choice is yours. The choice is yours. What do you want to do with what has been given to you? Not moan and groan about it, but ask a simple question. What do you want to do about what has been given to you? As a person, I don't have to be convinced. I can't be convinced. I can't be convinced. As I'm walking here, I'm seeing there is a couple there and they have a chocolate lab. And they also have what looks like a professional photographer who is photographing them.

https://youtu.be/HquHcnLZpy8 Auto-generated transcript:I am on this beach in Maine. Atlantic Ocean, the tide is just going out. So this part of the beach is nice and flat and clean. We can see the waves coming in. Now you can see the few boats in the distance. Very, very tranquil, peaceful, wonderful scene. You've got the gulls doing what gulls do. Living for fish. I must recommend this wonderful book called Jonathan Livingston Seagull, which I suggest you should read. I think it's one of the finest books to read, to understand, especially the concept of excellence in life. I read it. I read it many times. The first time I read it when I was in school. And it teaches the concept of excellence. In that context, I would also recommend that you read all the books of Ayn Rand. A-Y-N-R-A-N-D. It also focuses on the concept of excellence, of taking pride in your work, of building a legacy that you can be confident and proud about, leaving behind some traces. Unlike traces in the sand, which wash off every time the tide comes in. But these are more long-lasting than that. Now, all of that comes from one very, very important thing in life, which is to actually do some work. Not just the pretense of work. To actually do some work. The reason I'm saying that is because, I was speaking to another very dear friend of mine who's studying, he's doing his engineering in one of the Ivy League colleges here, universities in America. And he was telling me that, I mean, he said it jokingly, but obviously he understands the seriousness of that. So he was telling me that, people are submitting assignments using ChatGPT. The whole thing. And so he said, professors have now a way of detecting where ChatGPT has been used and catching it. But he says now they have come up with a tool where they do what is called humanizing ChatGPT. So you don't get the usual flat kind of writing. That's what I'm saying. So you don't get the usual flat kind of writing. That's what I'm saying. You find with ChatGPT, you get something which sort of sounds half a human. And then of course, we know how this technology develops and how it will, it is capable of, you know, constantly improving and so on and so forth. Simultaneously, and so on. This is, I mean, I think Allah guides and helps in ways we cannot imagine. So, while I was listening to this friend of mine saying these things, I also got a message from another friend of mine who's also doing engineering, who sent me a New York Times article. And lo and behold, to my great delight, I discovered that New York Times not only published the article, but New York Times gives that article for you free. So the firewall, doesn't affect it. And I'm going to ask him to put it, put that article into the description of this, of this reminder. And that article talked about an actual case, complete case history of this person who, the chatbot convinced him that he was one of the greatest mathematicians of all time. And, um, you know, resulted in him, in him, um, sort of actually falling into mental illness. And good news is for in his case was that he managed to get out of it as well. So he was able to break that, which may not be obviously the case with everyone who falls into that kind of a trap. So you have this case of these people like that, uh, also happening because of chatbot. Another thing which happened again recently, and all of these things, I, you know, they happened together, uh, which in, which is a message in itself is, um, two people wrote letters, uh, in which I was mentioned. And very interestingly, both the letters, although these are two different people writing these two letters, and, uh, they're trying to make it seem as if they are two independent letters, but they have both used chatdpt, uh, very clearly visible from the tone of the letter and so on. And to the extent that the words they have used are the same, the exact same words in both the letters. Now, so of course it is, you know,

https://youtu.be/qBk84YkaAYU Auto-generated transcript:My brothers and sisters, we are sitting here in Maine, literally opposite the Atlantic Ocean. And we can hear the waves, you can see the waves and the sun is gently rising. Not yet, but just finished the Fajr. And I'm reflecting on the, and I also advise you to reflect on the glory of Majesty of Allah SWT. This ocean which we see in front of us, obviously you can't see, it stretches all the way to the horizon. In Hadith, Rasulullah SAW said, that not this one ocean, but if all the seven oceans were collected and poured on top of the head of Mikhail SAW, that water would not drop off his head. So, when I first heard this Hadith, I was thinking to myself, you know, I mean, obviously, we know the Hadith is true, we believe the word of Rasulullah SAW, but the water of seven oceans, then this is only one piece of one ocean, which we are seeing here. We are not seeing the whole Atlantic, there is the one small piece of it. And it stretches all the way to the horizon. You can't see, there's no end to that. Collect that, the Pacific, the Indian Ocean, all of them. Put all that water on the top of the head of one angel, and it will not even drop. And then I thought to myself that if I take a teaspoon of water and pour it on my head, it won't drop. Even with the, sort of, you know, my head is not exactly full of air, but if it had enough air, even water wouldn't drop. Even water wouldn't drop. A teaspoon of water wouldn't drop. So it's the question of skill. How massive is the angel? How big is the angel? And he's not, this is not the biggest of them. Rasulullah SAW, in Al-Isra and Miraj, when he, Allah SWT, took him up the seven heavens, he said, I saw the angels holding up the throne of Allah, the Hamal-e-Arsh. He said, there are four of them. And he said, they asked him, the Sahaba, they said, Ya Rasulullah, how big is this angel? The angel is holding the throne of Allah, so how big is the angel? Nabi SAW said, if a bird takes off from the shoulder of the angel, it will fly for 500 years, and it will not even reach the lobe of the ear of the angel. After 500 years of flying from ear to ear. And that is not reached, so we don't know how far it gets. And there are four of those. And Nabi SAW said, when Allah SWT created the Arsh, he created the angels, and the angels held up the Arsh, and they were sinking. They could not hold the Arsh. And they were sinking. So all that massive strength of four angels is not enough to hold up the Arsh of Allah SWT. Until Allah SWT inspired those angels to say, La hawla wa la quwwata illa Billah. And then it held. And on the Day of Judgment, Allah SWT's Jalal will be such that Allah will create another four angels only for that day. There will be eight holding up the Arsh of Allah SWT on that day. We ask Allah SWT on that day to grant us the shade of His Arsh. Allah SWT says, Allahumma adhillani wa adhillana taht Arshuk. Yawma la adhilla illa dhilluk. Allah SWT grant us the shade of Your Arsh on a day when there is no shade except Your shade. To come back to the ocean, I don't know whether here we will see any whales, maybe we will. But think about this. This ocean has humpback whales. A humpback whale in one day eats one ton of food, which is sardines, krill, all kinds of things. The blue whale eats four times that, four tons. And the food of the blue whale, the blue whale is the largest creature ever to be created. Allah SWT created them. The largest creature ever to be created. The call of the blue whale, blue whale's calling off the coast of California were recorded in Japan, across the Pacific. His Sheikh was a blue whale, he could have spoken to his father in Morocco without a phone. He was a blue whale. He was a blue whale. He was a blue whale. Kreel eats four tons of food And what is the food of the blue whale? Krill Kikle is like a small shrimp, it looks like a shrimp. But the biggest, the most massive of krill weighs one gram,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkljOLcnQbM Auto-generated transcript: Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. I begin in the name of Allah, the Creator, the Sustainer, the Maintainer, and the Protector of the entire universe and all that it contains, the most beneficent, the most merciful. We send salutations on his messenger, the last and final of them. Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, his family, and all those who follow him in excellence until the last day. Imagine this scene that happened over 2,000 years ago. A young woman, known for her incredible piety. Suddenly comes forth with a baby boy. People are shocked and blame her and call her and chase. She points to her son. The people say, how can a newborn baby speak in his cradle? Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. His creator and our creator tells us this story. Fātat bihi qawmahā taḥmiluhu. Qālu yā Mariamu laqad jī'ti shayyan fariyyā. Yā uqtahārūna mā kāna abūki murā saw'in wa mā kānat ummuki baghiyyā. Fāshārati ilayhi. Qālu kayfa nukallimu man kāna fil-mahdi sabiyyā. Qāla inni abdullāh. Ātāni alkitāba wa ja'alani nabiyyā. Wa ja'alani mubārakannayna mā kuntu wa usā. Wa usāni bil-salāti wal-zakāti mā dumtu hayyā. Wa barra biwalidati wa lam yaj'alni jabbaran shakiyyā. Wa salāmu alayya yawma wulittu wa yawma mūtu wa yawma uba'athu hayyā. Zālik. Nisa bunu Maryam. Qawla al-haqqil ladhi fīhi yamtarūn. Mā kāna lil-lāhi ayyattakhitha min waladhin sub'āna. Idhā qadāy amran fa-innamā yaqūl lahū kun fa-yakūn. Fa-innā Allāhi. Wa-rabbī wa-rabbūkum fa-abūduhu. Hāzā sirātun mustaqīm. In Surah Maryam, in the Qur'an, Allah says this which means, Then she returned to her people carrying him. They said in shock, O Mary, you have certainly done a horrible thing. O sister of Aaron, your father was not an indecent man, nor was your mother unchaste. So she pointed to the baby. They exclaimed, How can we talk to someone who is an infant in a cradle? Jesus declared, Isa spoke as a baby in the cradle. I am truly a servant of Allah. He has destined me. He has destined me to be given the scripture and to be a prophet. He has made me a blessing wherever I go. And bid me to establish prayer and give zakat, the alms tax, as long as I live. And to be kind to my mother. He has not made me arrogant or defiant. Peace be upon me the day I was born. The day I die and the day I will be raised. The day I will be raised back to life. That is Isa, son of Maryam. Jesus, the son of Mary. And this is the word of truth about which they dispute. It is not for Allah, God Almighty, to take a son. Glory be to him. When he decrees a matter, he simply tells it be and it is. Isa also declared, Surely Allah, Lord Almighty is my Lord and your Lord. So worship him alone. This is the straight path. I submit to you that we confuse earning a living with living itself. Life is not only about earning a living. Life is about something much more important than earning a living or making money. Life is about living with honor and about leaving a legacy to be remembered. And that is the way of life. That is the way of life. So in the example of the skyAndres' photo. ¡ Boy, this is eternal respect for you! Life is not about competition, but about having an impact on the hearts of others. Life is not about consumption, but about contribution. Because power comes with territory and contribution defines territory. I want to share with you three points that we must never lose focus on. ¡ For the love of humankind, If we want to live a life, where we will be influential while we live and be remembered long after we are gone. The three points in one sentence stand for justice with compassion and courage. Remember that all goodness begins with justice. Justice means that you give everything it's due. To respect elders, to be kind to the young and the weak, to stand against oppression, to help someone in need, to comfort someone in grief, to walk the path that others don't want to are all signs that you are focused on justice.

Auto-generated transcript:My father taught me many lessons. And his way of teaching was he didn't sort of sit down with a class. He would just ask some question and that would be my mind. And alhamdulillah it worked very, very well. Two of the most critical lessons that he taught me, I want to share with you. One was, he always said, get your priorities right. Get your priorities right. Which thing should take the most of your time? Most of your energy? Most of your wealth? You know, and which should be next? Which should be next? Get your priorities right. The reason is because at any stage in life, whether you are in school or whether you are in college, university, whether you are working, you just got married, you have been married for a long time, you have children, no matter what, any stage in life, there will be many things that will try to draw your attention, try to draw, you know, come to you for various things. Give me time, give me money, give me donation, come and spend time with me, come talk to me, do this, do that. Many, many, many priorities. And if you don't get those right, and getting the priorities right means for some things you do, for some things you say, sorry, I have to do this. You say, sorry, I will not do this. I cannot do this. You have to say no. If you don't do that, then your life will be a dog's life, literally. Because you will get pulled in every direction. And your impact and your effect will be zero. Because nobody is, if you spread yourself that thin, then nobody even knows you existed, right? Although you try to help everyone. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. You cannot. So get your priorities right. And the second thing which he taught me was, he used to ask for everything. If I read a book, he used to say, what did you learn from that? If I went to, I spent some time with a friend, I came back home. So he would say, where did you go? I'd say, I went to so and so. Okay. So what did you learn from that? I mean, I went to spend time with my friend and, you know, I went to the gym. I went to the gym. What is the learning? He said, no. There has to be learning. There is always a learning. What did you learn from that? I go for a walk. What did you learn from that? I used to do a lot of horse riding. What did you learn from that? Learn from the horse? Yeah. What did you learn? I mean, Sheikh will understand this. Do you learn from the horse? Many things. Many things. Many things. What did you learn from that? Now, this thing is in my mind to such an extent that I continuously ask myself this question. I tell you, I have learned so much in life only for this reason. Because I ask this question, what did I learn? No matter what, what did I learn? So get your priorities right and what did you learn? So one of the most important things today in our life and our world, especially in the Muslim Ummah, is that as a rule, as a Ummah, as a people, we have got our priorities completely screwed up, completely upside down. Our attention, our focus, our resources, money, everything is spent on all kinds of things. All kinds of useless things. Whereas if you take at, if you look at, you know, key things which we need, they're always starved of resources. They don't have resources. Now, we like to, as general people, we like to criticize the billionaires and we like to criticize the kings. And we say, so-and-so bought this yacht, super yacht for a billion dollars. And see the standard of education in this country. Okay, fair enough. That's a reasonable comment, right? Ask yourself, where are you spending your money? Ask yourself in your country, in your place, what are the projects which are being funded? What are the projects which people are trying to raise funds for? If you see in this country, in America, one of the,

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise belongs to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honour of the Prophets and Messengers. Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, with a lot of peace and blessings. And then, dear brothers and sisters in Islam, Allah Almighty said in another verse, My brothers and sisters, Allah revealed in the Qur'an many ayats in praise of His Nabi Muhammad defining his status, defining his honourable status, and his honourable position before Allah. But in this ayat of Surah Al-Ahzab, which all of us know, Allah mentioned specifically and He said, Verily, Allah and His Malaik and His Angels send their blessings on the Messenger and then He commanded, Ya ayyuha allatheena aafi, Ya ayyuha allatheena aamanu, Whenever you hear or read this phrase in the Qur'an, Ya ayyuha allatheena aamanu, O you who believe, this precedes a command of Allah. Whatever comes after Ya ayyuha allatheena aamanu is an Amr of Allah. It's a command of Allah. It's a Hukm of Allah. And Allah is saying, Ya ayyuha allatheena aamanu, Sallu alaihi, Ya ayyuha allatheena aamanu, You also send blessings on him. Wasallimu taslima. And when you greet him, you say, Assalamu alaikum. The beauty of the Sahaba and one of the many ways in which the Sahaba differed from us is that the Sahaba did not invent, the Sahaba did not imagine, the Sahaba did not use, their intelligence to discover or to figure out what to do in a situation where Allah commanded something. When Allah commanded something, the Sahaba went to the Rabbi alayhi salam and said, this is the command of Allah, what shall we do? They did not invent something on their own. Allah said, they did not say, okay, fine, khalas. I will decide what is Salah. No, they went to the Prophet, what must I do? Allah is saying, I'm ready. And so on and so on. So in this case, Allah says, Send Salam on the Rabbi alayhi salatu wasalam. So the Sahaba did not just stand up and start reciting Ghanasheed and Ghazal and Hamd and Sana. They did not start reciting Naat. They did not put their hand on their chest on the right or the left. And they did not say, they didn't start in this or that. They didn't start in that direction. And they did not say, As-salatu as-salamu alayka ya Rasulullah. They didn't say any of this. They did not say anything. They went to the Rabbi alayhi salam and said, Ya Rasulullah, this is what Allah is commanding. What shall we do? Please teach us. Al-inna. And Rasulullah taught them what we know as the Dhurud Ibrahim, which we recite in the Tasha ul-Masjid. After Ad-Diyat. Abu Muhammad Ka'b min Ujra reported, Rasulullah came to us and we asked him, Ya Rasulullah, we already know how to greet you. Meaning, As-salamu alaykum. But how should we send Salat wa Salam on you? How do we send Dua on you? How do we send blessings? And he said, Say, Allahumma salli ala Muhammadin wa ala aali Muhammadin Kama salli ta'ala Ibraham. Wa ala aali Ibrahima. Innaka habidun Majeed. Allahumma barika ala Muhammadin wa ala aali Muhammadin. Kama barikta'a ala Ibrahima. Wa ala aali Ibrahima. Innaka habidun Majeed. He said, O Allah, exhort the mansion of Muhammad and the family of Muhammad as you exhorted Ibrahim and the family of Ibrahim . You are the praised and the glorious. O Allah, bless Muhammad . And the family of Muhammad and the family of Ibrahim , and you are the praised and glorious. And this is a Hadith in Bukhari and Muslim. Uba ibn Kaab , Radi gia Allah . He said, I said I asked." ya Rasulullah Now the question is how many Salat do you send to your Prophet . So this is a beautiful Hadith about Uba ibn Kaab He said, ya Rasulullah , I look at your meal, Send a great deal of blessings on you meaning. I decide to rule many times a day I said salat and salam on many times a day How much of this of my dua meaning? I also make dua to Allah for different things that need and so on how much ...

Auto-generated transcript:My brothers and sisters, as I mentioned I think in the reminder on Stoicism, I mentioned Marcus Aurelius who was the Caesar of Rome and an amazing human being. He was unlike any other Caesar that you can think of or read about. He was a stoic and a very wise man. Now he's written this book which is called Meditations and obviously I don't have to say that it's definitely worth reading and also worth following the stuff that he talks about. Here are four different things that he has mentioned and this was in one of the Twitter posts from the Daily Stoic. There's a Twitter site called Daily Stoic and they send, you know, every day they post something from Stoics, different Stoics. Now he says four rules for a better life and this is from Marcus Aurelius, the Caesar of Rome. First and foremost he says focus on the essential. Focus on the essential. He says if you seek tranquility, which is peace of mind, if you seek tranquility do less, not nothing, less. Do only what's truly important, which brings a double satisfaction. You get to do fewer things and you get to do those fewer things better. Remember this rule daily. Keep a reminder in place. You will often see. Focus only. On what's essential. I'm going to repeat that. I'll repeat all of these. He says focus first rule of a better life. First rule for a better life. Focus on the essential. If you seek tranquility, do less. Not nothing. Less. Do only what's truly important. Which brings a double satisfaction. You get to do fewer things and you get to do those fewer things better. Remember this rule daily. Keep a reminder in place that you will often see and focus only on what's essential. Now the tool that I teach with this is what I call my three by three rule. And that three by three rule is that every day you begin your day with three things that you need to do. You need to do three things that you need to do. You need to do three things that you need to do. So, in my product here at My Childhood School. This will only hit one hurdle. So, it's this one. One that I'll set the two pickles. I will write out five goals for the entire class. I will send you a list here of all theレ that you need to accomplish. So, three things completely and all the opps always get left out of the box. So, that group three. Three things. Obviously, you can't check it with those three things. You want to know your schedule. Repeat your work your process and you're good to set it up. All right. Now, let me show you two things that you should do today. Three of them I will explain. First one is the day you only realize on 책 itself. One thing you do that's a key. goal. If you have no life goal, then you're going nowhere and you can't get there. So, before that comes, what is your life goal? Why do you exist? What are you supposed to do? How do you want to live your life? So, life goal. Based on the life goal, what are the three things that I must do today? Then start on the first one, complete it, go to the second, complete that, go to the third. If you get interrupted, say you're doing the first thing, you get interrupted, come back and complete that first thing. Do not go to the second one, skipping the first. That's very important. You start on the first thing, complete it, then go to the second thing. If you can't complete the first thing for some reason, then do not go to the second one until you complete the first thing. You get interrupted, come back and complete. In the evening, you look at what you accomplished. And again, journal, write down. You started off with three things. You were able to do all three, excellent. Then you write in that journal, what is it that helped you to accomplish those three things? You could not accomplish some of them, one of them, two of them. Then write down what is it that came in the way, what prevented you from accomplishing those, the things that you could not do. And this is the lesson for the next day,

Auto-generated transcript:Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salamu ala Rasulillah. We are talking about Allah's plans and what we should, what should be our attitude with regard to that. In short, the attitude of a Muslim to the plan of Allah is an attitude of submission. Which we say, we are pleased with whatever Allah decrees for us. Now, in the Quran, Allah gives us many, many examples of the prophets who seem to be in positions of being oppressed. Prophets who are not in powerful positions, they don't have wealth, they don't have military power, they don't have authority, they are not heads of state. Yet, they stand up. To injustice, they stand up against tyrants and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gives them victory. Imagine, for example, Musa a.s., Moses, standing in the court of Ramesses II, the pharaoh of Egypt, the head of probably the most wealthy and powerful empire at that time. He became king of the formerónsрей school, new kings that night accepted victims. The King of Upper and Lower Nile, Upper and Lower Egypt, stretching from the Sudan all the way down to the South. Master of wealth, the position of authority, where he declared himself to be God, and the pharaohs considered themselves to be deities, and they compared people to two dès. to worship them. That's the reason why the pharaohs married their sisters, because no one was considered equal to the pharaoh, so he could not marry any other woman. They married their sisters and of course produced all kinds of genetic issues, that's a different thing. And Moses, Musa , single man, staff in hand, imagine him standing in the court of that pharaoh, and that pharaoh has power of life and death, he can order Musa to be chopped into small pieces, but as we know, to make a long story short, how did it end? It ended with the pharaoh and his army, perishing and Musa and the Israelites who were enslaved at the time, being freed. We take the story of Ibrahim , for example, where he is sitting tied up in the cup of the siege machine which is going to throw him into the fire, he is certainly not 엄청pants and gives the people a huge hole. But Ibrahim describe him as a man of complete helplessness. It is a picture of complete helplessness. Noawk saw an arrow which which he made into the scrip of the shape of alon? The picture of complete helplessness. Here is a man who is completely tied up in ropes. He is in the the cup of the trebuchet , he is about to be shot into the flames, Jibreel, the angel Gabriel, came to him and he said, O Abraham, O Ibrahim, what can I do for you? And Ibrahim, peace be upon him, smiles and says, nothing. He says, nothing. He's sitting there facing the fire. And the fire is so big, they lighted this fire and they made it so big that they can't go near it to throw the man. So they need actually a catapult to throw him into the fire. And Jibreel comes and says, what can I do for you? He says, nothing. Because by nothing, he means that I ask Allah. I don't ask you. You may be the angel, but you are makhluk, you are a creature. And we worship only the Rabb. We worship only the one who created us. So I ask help only from Allah. So Jibreel-e-Salam goes to Allah. Of course, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, he's seeing what's happening. He knows what's happening in real time. But Jibreel goes to him and says, Ya Rabb, they are going to burn your Khalil. And I went to him, asked him, can I do something for you? He says, no. So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, go now and tell him, I am asking. Your Rabb wants to know what do you need from him. You're talking about the plan of Allah, right? So Jibreel comes and says, and of course, all of this Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala knows and Allah knows that he knows and you know. So, but for the time being, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala knows that he knows. For the sake of narration. So Jibreel-e-Salam comes back and he says, Ya Ibrahim, your Rabb sent me and he wants to know what do you want from him?

Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise belongs to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honor of the prophets and messengers. Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and companions, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon many, many. Today I thought let me quickly share with you some thoughts and then request Sheikh Abdullah to speak to you. In that context, I want to talk to you about, there were a bunch, even now it's there, but there was a philosophy called Stoicism. So the people who followed that and believed in that and lived by it were called the Stoics. S-T-O-I-C. And it's something very worth studying and worth thinking about. This was roughly about 2000 years or something ago. That's when it seems to have started. And among the many, many very famous people in history who were Stoics, and one of the very famous ones was Marcus Aurelius, who was one of the Caesars of Rome. So a very famous Stoic philosopher. The thing about Stoicism, especially the reason I'm saying, I'm talking about Stoicism, because Stoicism is something which seems very close to Islam and to some of the principles of the Quran. So I'm not saying that the Stoics were Muslims, Allah knows best from whatever we have records of, I don't think they were Muslims. But irrespective of that, they had some very wonderful wisdom, which we can all learn from. So here are some, of those principles. First of all, first one he says is, safeguard your innermost anxieties and doubts. Safeguard your innermost anxieties and doubts. Voicing intimate struggles can undermine resilience. And resilience is the ability to recover from loss. The ability to struggle with, you know, especially emotional things and to come back. He says to make these things public. Now, just think about this in the context today of social media. Think about what people post on Facebook, for example, or what people post on, especially Facebook. Instagram is not that much of this stuff, but especially Facebook. People really sort of pour out their hearts on Facebook. The Stoics say that this is the most damaging thing to do. They say never, never do that. Your innermost thoughts and your innermost anxiety, your innermost anxieties and doubts, believe me, everybody has it. First and foremost thing I want to say to you guys is, you might think that, oh, you know, we are teenagers, we are in college, we are in high school or whatever, middle school, and we are all kinds of thoughts and, you know, feelings and counterfeelings and, you know, all sorts of things and anxieties and fears. So believe me, this is not, join the club. Literally join the club. Everybody has it. So, believe me, this is not, join the club. Literally join the club. Everybody has it. Everyone and his grandmother has it. The only thing which differs is the kind of doubts. Some people have some kinds of doubts. Others have other kinds of doubts, right? I am 70 years old at this age. I'm at the top of my profession in terms of business consulting. I don't consider my Islamic thing to be a profession, but alhamdulillah, I have an international standing there also. But every time I stand in front, I stand on the mimbar, I stand on the mimbar, I stand on the mimbar, every time I stand in front of people to talk to them, every time I lead two rak'at of salah, there is doubt in my heart. Not doubt about Allah, but doubt about, can I do this job properly or not? Will I make mistakes? Will I say something which might not be beneficial? Will I say something with the best intention, right? But it has a different effect on somebody else. Maybe it raises a doubt, right? Maybe it raises a doubt, right? Maybe it raises a doubt, right? But it starts to reach out in the mind of that person, or maybe it causes that person to think something contrary to what I am trying to help them understand. And you know,