The Banner of Praise

Occasion: A summary of a Friday khutbah delivered at the Imams Academy mosque on 27 November 2020Source: A transcription of a video khutbah by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — Watch the original video on YouTube

This is Friday, the day whose virtue the Prophet ﷺ taught us, and the virtue of reading Sūrat al-Kahf on it,^[1] the sūra that our Lord opened with praise. And praise is the title of gratitude for every Muslim man and woman. Between gratitude to Allah for His blessings that flood us night and day, and the caution that dwells in everyone who has come to this country and other Western lands, lest his identity and his religion dissolve, our talk today revolves around gratitude.

An Issue That Has Taken More Than Its Due

Matters have occupied the conversations of Muslims and taken more of their time than they deserve: celebrating the Prophet's ﷺ birthday, birthdays in the lives of individuals, and the social and national occasions that people celebrate. I see that the sharia ruling on them can be stated in two words, and then we move on to what comes after. But before getting into them I want to ask a question that comes before them.

Do We Truly Belong?

Do we feel that we belong to this country with a true belonging, so that we defend it and the rights of its people as we defend the countries in which we were born? If someone touches one of the rights of our countries there, in Egypt or Jordan or Palestine or Algeria or Tunisia or Morocco, it is easy for us to ransom them with our lives. Has this country reached the same standing in our souls, so that we feel we are truly citizens on its soil?

An individual's belonging to the homeland in which he lives is one matter, and the conditions of governments and policies is another. And look at the conversation that repeats in our homes:

The father says: Why do you build a house in our country when we send all this money to it? So that our family may be reunited in it one day. The children answer: Do you really imagine that we will leave this country to live there? When we go to visit, it is not worth all this expense. The father says: Do not say this, for there is the homeland and the memories of childhood and companionship and the soil. They ask him: Which memories do you mean? Your memories or our memories? Your companions or our companions? And which soil? The soil you were raised on or the soil we were raised on? We have a homeland too; we grew up among its events and grew up among our friends in it.

It is a perpetual dialogue between fathers and children. We speak of memories, history, authenticity, soil, and air, and when something resembling it passes us here we recall our old moment there. As for our children, they have an entirely different mental map, and their roots in this country are like our roots in our countries. And the difference between our belonging to citizenship and their belonging is a difference in the way of thinking and of acting.

A Question to a Teacher

I once asked one of my teachers: How did you see America when you came to it? He said: My son, the land of America is like any other land, ﴿إِنَّ الْأَرْضَ لِلَّهِ يُورِثُهَا مَن يَشَاءُ مِنْ عِبَادِهِ وَالْعَاقِبَةُ لِلْمُتَّقِينَ﴾ [الأعراف: 128] (Indeed, the earth belongs to Allah; He causes to inherit it whom He wills of His servants, and the outcome is for the righteous) [Sūrat al-Aʿrāf: 128]. And the people among whom you live are the object of your call; so open their hearts with your good expression, and reach their hearts with good help to them, and their tongues will speak truth and good. Then he said: their hearts are alike;^[2] the people here are like the people there, the language is one and the scenes are one.

So if we do not feel belonging, there is no meaning in asking: do we share in people's celebration or not?

Maturity of Thought Before the Branches

And I ask you by Allah: do we adhere to the lawful and the unlawful in all the details of our lives with this precision, such that we stop at a food eaten today and come to a complete halt at it? Imagine a man who forbids himself to eat turkey on this day, while in his life there are matters far more deserving of stopping at.^[3] It is a crisis for some people: they narrow what the sharia made broad, and broaden what its fixed principles and foundations restricted, so they talk about the permissible and stop at particulars and leave the foundations. And maturity in thinking is a matter we must be sure of before speaking about the branch rulings.

Praise Is for Allah Because He Is the Lord of the Worlds

And gratitude with us is broader than returning a favor for a gift. For we say: ﴿الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ ۝ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ ۝ مَالِكِ يَوْمِ الدِّينِ﴾ [الفاتحة: 2-4] (All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds, the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful, Master of the Day of Judgment) [Sūrat al-Fātiḥa: 2-4], that is, we praise Him because He is the Lord of the worlds, not because He gave us a child; and because He is the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful, not because He had mercy on us; and because He is Master of the Day of Judgment, whether He gave us or did not give us. And this praise is a slogan that never leaves the tongue of the Muslim, who repeats it seventeen times a day,^[4] and it is an essential part of his prayer.

And the Prophet ﷺ was the leader of the grateful and the bearer of the banner of praise in his hands on the Day of Resurrection.^[5]

Deeds Are by Intentions

As for people gathering on a particular day or not gathering, the Prophet ﷺ said: «إِنَّمَا الْأَعْمَالُ بِالنِّيَّاتِ، وَإِنَّمَا لِكُلِّ امْرِئٍ مَا نَوَى» (Deeds are but by intentions, and every person will have only what he intended).^[6] Deeds may be alike, like people gathering now in the prayer hall, while intentions differ: this one came sincerely, that one came accompanying a man, a third came so that people would see him, and a fourth came to meet so-and-so for a deal between them. I cannot know; only the Lord of Might knows. So be sincere to Allah and seek His help.

Where My Opinion Stands

I say: our festivals in Islam are ʿĪd al-Fiṭr and ʿĪd al-Aḍḥā. But sharing with people in what is not forbidden by the sharia, I have no objection to it, for a blessing that Allah made lawful does not become forbidden merely because eating it is joined to an occasion that is not objectionable in the sharia on which people gather. As for the value of gratitude in Islam, it needs more detail and understanding.

Gratitude Is Action

Our Lord said: ﴿اعْمَلُوا آلَ دَاوُودَ شُكْرًا وَقَلِيلٌ مِّنْ عِبَادِيَ الشَّكُورُ﴾ [سبأ: 13] (Work, O family of David, in gratitude; and few of My servants are grateful) [Sūrat Saba': 13]. So He tied gratitude to action. Gratitude for well-being by diligence in worship, gratitude for sight by looking at what has good in it, gratitude for hearing by listening to the truth, gratitude for the tongue by speaking righteousness, taqwā, and what is good, and by advising people and fulfilling their needs. For every blessing there is a gratitude of its own kind.

And even if the servant had nothing in his hand at all, he praises Allah for His strength, His oneness, His exaltedness, and His authority, and praises Him that He alone has the command of the heavens and the earth in His hand, and that He did not entrust our affair to another and did not leave our management in the hand of anyone else, glory be to Him, exalted in His highness.

Supplication

O Allah, we ask You for pardon and well-being in our religion, our worldly life, and our Hereafter. O Allah, prepare for us right guidance in our affair, bless us in what You have provided us, and protect us from the punishment of the Fire, and the last of our supplication is that all praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: Regarding the virtue of reading al-Kahf on Friday, there is a ḥadīth «مَنْ قَرَأَ سُورَةَ الْكَهْفِ يَوْمَ الْجُمُعَةِ أَضَاءَ لَهُ مِنَ النُّورِ مَا بَيْنَ الْجُمُعَتَيْنِ» (Whoever reads Sūrat al-Kahf on the day of Friday, a light will illuminate for him between the two Fridays), reported by al-Ḥākim and al-Bayhaqī, and its text was not given in the transcript. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: ﴿تَشَابَهَتْ قُلُوبُهُمْ﴾ [البقرة: 118] (their hearts are alike) [Sūrat al-Baqara: 118]; the phrase occurs in the verse in the context of earlier nations, and the teacher used it here in the sense of the closeness of people's natures. ^[3]: Editor's documentation: The speaker gave in the example other circumstances of that man whose wording came out garbled in the transcript, so only the general meaning is kept here. ^[4]: Editor's documentation: He means the number of obligatory rakʿas in the day and night, which are seventeen rakʿas, in each of which al-Fātiḥa is recited. ^[5]: Editor's documentation: It is reported in al-Tirmidhī and elsewhere that the banner of praise is in his hand ﷺ on the Day of Resurrection. ^[6]: Editor's documentation: Reported by al-Bukhārī and Muslim from the ḥadīth of ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (may Allah be pleased with him).