Gifts Come from Trials

Occasion: A transcription of a lecture delivered over Zoom on April 16, 2020, shortly before Ramadan 1441 AHSource: A transcription of a video lecture by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — Watch the original video on YouTube

In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, and peace and blessings upon the servant of Allah, His Prophet and Messenger, our master and our Prophet Muhammad, and upon his family and Companions, with abundant peace. To proceed: May Allah welcome you and be pleased with us and with you, and may He continue upon us and upon you goodness and well-being in religion and faith, and we ask Him, glory be to Him, for well-being of hearts and bodies, and we ask Him for contentment.

The themes of our gathering today revolve around welcoming the blessed month of Ramadan, and how this year's Ramadan is different from previous Ramadans, and how people feel that they are in a trial, and how we can turn from this trial into a gift, or at least feel that this is so in reality. And at the outset we want to set down some constants from which we proceed, so we distinguish between constants and variables: what are the things that are fixed in our lives, and what are the things open to change?

The Constants

Among the constants is that Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, is One, Unique, Singular, the Eternal Refuge, the Self-Sustaining, dominant over His affair, doing whatever He wills, extending provision to whom He wills and withholding it from whom He wills, raising and lowering, honoring and humbling, withholding and extending, glory be to Him. And among our constants is that nothing happens in the dominion of Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, except by the will of the Lord of Might.

And among the constants is that we were not created in this life to enjoy it with that animal kind of enjoyment, nor for life to be our first paradise or another paradise. It is a first paradise that precedes the Paradise of the Hereafter, and our paradise in it is not attained by what the paradise of other people is attained by, those who follow no religion and believe in no God. Rather our worldly life, as the Lord of Might has told us, is a point in the sea of bliss with which He, glory be to Him, envelops us, and what comes after it of the matter of the Hereafter is greater, larger and more complete in blessing than what is in this world. On this basis we are before an important matter, which is what Allah the Exalted said: ﴿إِنَّكَ كَادِحٌ إِلَىٰ رَبِّكَ كَدْحًا فَمُلَاقِيهِ﴾ (you are laboring toward your Lord with great exertion, and you will meet Him) [al-Inshiqāq: 6],^[17] and we have explained that at length in previous gatherings, and likewise the words of the Blessed and Exalted: ﴿لَقَدْ خَلَقْنَا الْإِنسَانَ فِي كَبَدٍ﴾ (We have certainly created man in hardship) [al-Balad: 4]. So the trial is that we not look beneath our feet, but look to the Hereafter, to the place of the good pleasure of the Lord of Might, glory be to Him.

The Variables

As for the variables, they are the fluctuations of worldly life based on the changes we perceive in it. And we ask a question of the utmost simplicity: when was life ever stable for anyone among creation, from Adam, peace be upon him, until today, and then until the Day of Resurrection, passing through all the prophets and all the messengers and all human beings? There is no one on the face of the earth who does not have a problem or an issue. And if we asked those present now that each of us mention one of his problems, each of us would stand out with an issue entirely different from the issues of those around him. And if each one chose the simplest of the problems he has to talk about, people would look at him in astonishment and say: Glory be to Allah, how patient you are! How do you endure this issue? Because people's capacities for bearing differ.

So this is a variable matter: the changes occurring in our lives are us; our acceptance of issues, our absorbing of matters, and our way of thinking about the mechanisms by which Allah, glory be to Him, turns the worldly life, and how the Lord of Might runs His universe. These change with us, but they are fixed with the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, the Exalted.

And we add to the constants a very important matter: ﴿يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ بِكُمُ الْيُسْرَ وَلَا يُرِيدُ بِكُمُ الْعُسْرَ وَلِتُكْمِلُوا الْعِدَّةَ وَلِتُكَبِّرُوا اللَّهَ عَلَىٰ مَا هَدَاكُمْ وَلَعَلَّكُمْ تَشْكُرُونَ﴾ (Allah intends for you ease and does not intend for you hardship, and so that you complete the period and glorify Allah for that to which He has guided you, and perhaps you will be grateful) [al-Baqarah: 185], ﴿يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ أَن يُخَفِّفَ عَنكُمْ﴾ (Allah wants to lighten for you) [al-Nisāʾ: 28], ﴿مَا أَنزَلْنَا عَلَيْكَ الْقُرْآنَ لِتَشْقَىٰ﴾ (We have not sent down to you the Qur'an that you be distressed) [Ṭā Hā: 2], «وإنما أنزلنا عليك القرآن لتسعد» (but We sent down the Qur'an to you that you may be happy).^[18] These are constants in our lives: that the Lord of Might does not want misery for anyone, and never treats anyone with any kind of hardship, exalted in His majesty. So when we know these constants we know that we are in a blessing so long as we are connected to the Lord of Might, glory be to Him.

Seasons of Obedience: Fasting and Night Prayer

The seasons of obedience come upon us, and their constants in Ramadan are that we have fasting and we have night prayer (qiyām). And the problem that people mention in this year's Ramadan is that we will not be able to go to the mosques. How do we live Ramadan without going to the mosques?

I have two comments on this. The first is that many people did not go to the mosques at all in previous Ramadans, with the mosques open and the means available. And I tell you this because I am close to you through the spirit of faith and the kinship of religion between us, praise be to Allah. We used to see some sisters throwing the children out of the car and one of them speeding off as though getting rid of them, then going away, as though the mosque for her were a "baby sitter" or a place to which children are tossed,^[19] so the children enter and run wild in the mosque and do such and such. And it is lovely for our children to be raised among us and in our embrace, but the other important side of upbringing is not present: the side of the mosque and the side of the home. The boy does something, so the sheikh or imam guides, and the mother advises and says: Adhere to this speech, or such.

And in previous Ramadans we saw many people come at the beginning of Ramadan with the utmost care, precision and excellence in prayer, masha'Allah, for a number of days, then after these days the number dwindles: it was a hundred people, say, in the mosque, after five days they became sixty, and after seven days they became twenty or thirty. Where did the rest go? You don't know; life took them again. This is our state in responding to the matters of religion. We had an old game with an elastic band and a ball that you throw to the ground and it bounces back up, glory be to the All-Creating, All-Knowing, and it is as though we deal with religion by this logic: we throw the ball and then come back. If we are drawn to the mosque for a while, the world takes us for a while, then we are drawn to the mosque and then go away again. Where is the matter of continuous belonging? It was not fully present with many people.

Night Prayer in the Mosque: A Virtue, Not an Obligation

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ commanded us to pray at night (qiyām), saying: «من قام رمضان إيمانًا واحتسابًا غُفر له ما تقدم من ذنبه وما تأخر» (Whoever stands in prayer in Ramadan out of faith and seeking reward, his previous sins and those to come will be forgiven).^[1] And when Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, spoke about the matter of fasting He said: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمْ…﴾ (O you who believe, prescribed for you is…) [al-Baqarah: 183],^[2] but in the matter of night prayer no all-encompassing command came from the Lord of Might to gather people in general in Ramadan for the tarāwīḥ prayer as an obligation. It is not an obligation, but rather a confirmed sunnah from the Prophet ﷺ.

And I am speaking here about the night prayer in itself, and there is a difference between the night prayer in itself and the night prayer in the mosque. The night prayer in the mosque was done by the Prophet ﷺ and then he held back from it out of compassion for the Ummah, or to show permissibility, and as an indication of non-obligation. I say it a second time: to show permissibility, that is, that it is permissible for us to gather in the mosque to pray tarāwīḥ, and as an indication of non-obligation, so the matter is not binding, and whoever does not pray the night prayer in the mosque is not to be blamed and no violation is recorded against him in any case. Therefore the texts of the Prophet ﷺ came as texts of encouragement for the people and not texts of obligation. For he ﷺ says: «من قام مع الإمام حتى ينتهي من صلاته فكأنما له كذا وكذا» (Whoever stands with the imam until he finishes his prayer, it is as though he has such and such),^[3] urging us to stay with the imam until he finishes his prayer. And was this statement specifically about the month of Ramadan and the night prayer, or is it a prayer to which the Prophet ﷺ urged in general, as encouragement of collective action, and encouragement of the spirit of community in the midst of the Muslim society?

And what is coming upon us in the days ahead is Ramadan, «أظلّكم شهر عظيم مبارك» (a great and blessed month has overshadowed you). And the Prophet ﷺ gives a number of counsels in it, the first of which: «أروا الله من أنفسكم خيرًا» (Show Allah goodness from yourselves).^[4] Well then, how do we show Allah goodness from ourselves? Each according to what he can bear. Among people is one before whom Allah has spread wealth, so he spreads it out to the people and spends on them; among people is one whose tongue Allah has loosed in speech, so he speaks among the people and advises them; among people is one whom Allah has given well-being, so he helps creation and extends a hand of help; and among people, and among people. It is the matter of disparity: ﴿وَاللَّهُ فَضَّلَ بَعْضَكُمْ عَلَىٰ بَعْضٍ فِي الرِّزْقِ﴾ (And Allah has favored some of you over others in provision) [al-Naḥl: 71], and the disparity of persons in the fields of helping people and assisting them. Allah opened this door, and the Lord of Might accepts from every person according to what he can do and perform.

Fasting Is Witnessed Only by Allah

So the first rule in my view is that in Ramadan we have constants before us called fasting and called night prayer, so how will they be performed? Fasting is performed individually by its nature; no one in the world can ever know whether this person is fasting or not, has broken his fast or not, is abstaining or not. The Lord of Might alone knows that. Therefore we see in the words of the Lord of Might in the ḥadīth qudsī: «كل عمل ابن آدم له إلا الصوم فإنه لي وأنا أجزي به» (Every deed of the son of Adam is his, except fasting, for it is Mine and I reward for it).^[5] And the people of knowledge speak about this ḥadīth saying that it is for Allah because none but Allah, glory be to Him, is aware of it, for He alone ﴿يَعْلَمُ خَائِنَةَ الْأَعْيُنِ وَمَا تُخْفِي الصُّدُورُ﴾ (knows the stealthy glance of the eyes and what the breasts conceal) [Ghāfir: 19], what souls hold within, what hearts contain and what minds keep secret of thoughts. And we have learned that even if a person is abstaining from food he may in fact be breaking his fast by his intention. So fasting and breaking the fast is a matter known only to Allah, and none is aware of it except the King, glory be to Him, exalted in His majesty. So we are before a constant called fasting that no one is aware of except Allah.

The Night Prayer: Individual in Origin

And the other constant is the matter of the night prayer. And the origin of the night prayer is that it is an individual act of worship. Do you not see the Companion when he says: I stood beside the Prophet ﷺ, so I stood behind him, and he took me and placed me on his right, so I went back and he took me and placed me on his right, then he taught me such and such.^[6] The Prophet ﷺ used to pray at night alone, and did not call out to the people to come behind him so that the night prayer would be in congregation, except in Ramadan, as we mentioned earlier, to show permissibility and the allowance of doing this matter in this form, so that people would not do it afterward as innovators, but would do it following what the Messenger of Allah ﷺ commanded.

So we have fasting in Ramadan and night prayer in Ramadan. And will the night prayer in Ramadan be in the mosques or not? Several questions branch off here: how will we go to the mosque? We will not go to the mosque unless our Lord wills something, ﴿وَسِعَ رَبِّي كُلَّ شَيْءٍ عِلْمًا﴾ (my Lord encompasses all things in knowledge),^[7] and His mercy encompasses all things, glory be to Him. So the point is that we will not go to the mosques. How will we pray tarāwīḥ? We pray it in our homes.

The First Thing Revealed: Where Is Your Qur'an?

And here our shortcomings are exposed, and a very, very large amount of defect is exposed among us. Why? Because I find someone saying: Sheikh, I cannot pray tarāwīḥ at home. Why? Because I do not know of the Qur'an except ﴿قُلْ هُوَ اللَّهُ أَحَدٌ﴾ (Say: He is Allah, One) [al-Ikhlāṣ: 1]. So we ask here: How can you not recite from the Qur'an except "Say: He is Allah, One"? How old are you? He says: I am sixty or fifty or seventy or thirty, whatever it may be. And I ask about this age: this age in your life, thirty years or forty or fifty, in which you have not memorized from the Noble Qur'an except two or three sūrahs? Here comes the exposition of the defect and the uncovering of the shortcoming.

People used to go to the mosques to listen to the Noble Qur'an from the noble leading imams, may Allah preserve them. So another question comes: all these years of listening to the imams, and Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, has spread out for us provision in the means of learning and its causes throughout this life, and you did not take in from the Qur'an, and from what the imams recited, except this much? As though we were going only to listen. And listening accompanied by concentration leaves an effect in the mind. And I swear by Allah, besides whom there is no god, that I still remember that my father used to relate about my grandfather that he memorized many sūrahs of the Noble Qur'an by listening only, from the radio that had then come out as something new in the world of villages, hamlets and countryside. He memorized from the radio, from repetition, and he had no one to teach him and instruct him in the Noble Qur'an, and they did not have all these applications on the iPad or the iPhone or Android and so on. As for us, Allah has spread provisions for us and subjected them, and yet we have not memorized of the Noble Qur'an what would help us perform the tarāwīḥ prayer. So a first shortcoming has been exposed to us, which is the matter of the night prayer in Ramadan: performing this act of worship with an amount of the Noble Qur'an. Where is your Qur'an?

Well, we have an alternative. We have an alternative that gives us the chance to open the muṣḥafs and recite from the Noble Qur'an outside the obligatory prayer, and this is an open matter on which, God willing, you will find no objector at such times.

Then: I Fear Reciting Wrongly

And another comes out and says: By Allah, I cannot even recite, I fear reciting the Qur'an wrongly. How do you fear reciting the Qur'an wrongly? We said about memorization that perhaps memory does not absorb, or that people's provisions in memorization differ, so how can we not even recite the Noble Qur'an?

And we have learned, may Allah bless you, that the scholars of tajwīd, when they spoke about the ruling on learning tajwīd, mentioned that there is a learning that is a communal obligation, which is learning the rules by their names and designations and the attributes of the letters and what they deserve, and that there is a learning whose obligation is individual upon every Muslim to learn, by which he establishes the basic recitation of al-Fātiḥah, without which the prayer does not stand, and by which his prayer stands from the rest of the sūrahs he uses. So the Ramadan that comes this year reveals to us multiple shortcomings, among them for example the amount of neglect we have in respect of the Book of Allah, the Blessed and Exalted.

The Gates of Paradise Are Not for Mosques Alone

The Prophet ﷺ tells us that among the virtues of Ramadan is that the gates of Paradise are opened.^[8] Are they opened only onto the mosques and those in them, or are they opened to the earth and those upon it? And that the gates of the Fire are closed; are they closed except to the one who has restrained himself from sin, in whatever place on earth he may be? And when the Prophet ﷺ told us that Ramadan is a month in which Allah grants gifts and abundant good, and that the Lord of Might frees necks from the Fire in it, all these matters are not connected only with mosque-goers, but are connected with the root of the heart and the pillar of what is in the mind and what is fixed in the believer's certainty of his connection with Allah, glory be to Him, and his practicing the acts of his religion to the extent that his effort allows in the right of the Lord of Might.

So we are speaking about welcoming Ramadan: it is the virtue of a month, and the virtue and goodness that Allah the Exalted spreads and drives to all of Allah's creation alike; the believers receive the favor of the Lord of Might granted to the people of faith, and the rest of humankind may receive of the worldly good that Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, spreads on the earth. And what remains in our hands is how we can fulfill the right of Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, in Ramadan. And the answer is that each of us will fast the day and will pray the night.

Tarāwīḥ Behind a Screen?

And questions come to us at this stage, and I am sorry to put them before you now, for perhaps they depart a little from the course of the talk, but they are among what we need: can we perform the tarāwīḥ prayer behind the radio, or behind the Internet, or behind a Facebook page, with the sheikhs who perform their prayers in their mosques? I pause at this matter and ask, and perhaps this speech will not please many, but it is only brainstorming, we think together out loud. We have not seen anyone among the recognized people of knowledge so far permit that in any form, and we have very many questions as comments on this matter.

Among them is that the matter of the mosque, or coming to congregational prayer, has as its basis the people's sharing one location. And when people spoke about following, they said: We can follow the imam while we see him and hear him. So we say: when the Prophet ﷺ said on this matter: «من غدا إلى المسجد أو راح» (Whoever goes to the mosque in the morning or the evening),^[9] we have going out in the morning and going in the evening; people going and people coming, so there is a real, physical movement to the mosque so that we take part in the congregational prayer. Then some say: Sheikh, may Allah be pleased with you, we are in the Haram and we are in the hotel and we pray behind the imam, and the distances there are short, and the viewing and presence are real even in the hotel for someone who cannot, or wanted to go out while it was crowded. So there is what is called the connection of rows, and there is what is called the exception which, if generalized, we will never be able to close this door in any case.

So how can we get past these prophetic texts? Then there were people who stayed away from the congregational prayers that the Messenger of Allah attended and the Muslims with him, so he ﷺ wanted to go out to them and burn their houses over them, because they refrained from the prayer.^[10] But if they are prevented from the prayer, they have that excuse that stands between them and coming to the mosque. And as the Prophet ﷺ told us that in the time of plague, whoever confines himself in his house to protect himself and to protect the people from himself has the reward of a martyr, even if he does not die in this plague.^[11] And likewise the Prophet ﷺ told us that whoever is prevented from an act of obedience he was accustomed to, Allah the Exalted gives him its reward in full, undiminished.^[12] And the evidences for that in the Sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ are many.

Why This Whirlpool?

So what remains in our hands now: is it permissible to pray behind the radio? I ask: Where is your house? He says: My house is here in such and such a place. And where is the imam you will pray behind? In such and such an area. Between me and the imam there is a whole city, in fact cities! Well, where is your house here, and where is the imam's place of prayer here? How do you stand before the imam and pray? I pray behind the television! Are we forced into this confusion? Do we have a necessity for exceptions like these that go beyond what is reasonable?

And I am not speaking now with any sort of rigidity or intellectual stiffness; on the contrary, I hope that means will open before us that make things easy for people, but who deserves to have things made easy for him? And I always speak about ease in a time of hardship. Are we in a time of hardship? Yes, coronavirus, the epidemic season that exists. But I am not speaking about this; I am speaking about worship: my Lord, glory be to Him, commanded me to pray, then the Messenger of Allah ﷺ made it a sunnah for me to pray in the mosque, then the Messenger of Allah ﷺ made it a sunnah for me, if I cannot pray in the mosque, to pray at home. So am I in a crisis? I am not in a crisis, because I will pray. But the middle matter is what will not exist. So I will pray at home, and I have no problem, so the alternatives of Islam available to me from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ are that I will pray at home by his command. But can I pray behind a radio or behind a Facebook medium or otherwise?

I am now broadcasting on Facebook on a private page, and I am certain that the words I am saying now will reach people after ten seconds or at least fifteen seconds. And in these movements: Allahu akbar, sami'a Allahu liman ḥamidah, Allahu akbar, perhaps with slow Internet at some people's end the imam is prostrating while the follower behind him is still standing, so the imam moves two movements without the follower catching up with him, so the congregational prayer is invalidated by it according to some jurists. So what carries us to enter into this whirlpool? Merely to follow the imam!

Then following through satellite channels, and you know, may Allah preserve you, and you are all present with us now on the Zoom program, the sisters (may Allah honor you and be pleased with you all, O Lord of the worlds), a question now: which of you does not pray at home while one of her children is making a thing or a "racket" in such and such a corner, or calling: Mama, where are the socks that are hidden in such and such place? So the mother is about to say: Just a moment, my Lord, in the right-hand drawer, Allahu akbar, and we continued. This is by way of example, so if we are going to follow the imams in the homes, I have a second problem.

Sir, we have a number of examples of sheikhs with beautiful voices in the area; one says: I like to pray behind Ahmad, so he gets in his car and goes to pray behind Ahmad, and another says: No, I will pray behind Ramadan, so he gets in his car and goes to pray behind him. And today we are at home, and I want to pray behind Sheikh Ahmad, and you want to pray behind Sheikh Ramadan. Well, what do we do about this problem? Which of us will pray behind whom? Will we pray in one place, or will we branch out, so each of us enters his house or his room or his own place to pray behind an imam he likes to pray behind? And have we managed to gather people in a single house on one prayer, if we cannot gather them in a single place of prayer?

Allah has commanded us to come to the mosques for a supreme purpose: that we gather and ask one another and consult among ourselves and talk, and that meeting takes place between us. So if we are prevented from the mosques by a legitimate excuse that the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, accepts, the basis is that we remain committed to the alternatives that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ prescribed for us. Being present in the mosques is a matter recognized in the Sharia, but following the mosques through satellite channels in prayer is a matter that still sticks in my throat; I cannot swallow it so far. I do not forbid anyone and I do not bind anyone to what I speak, but it is purely a reading of the situation and thinking about it.

And Do We Broadcast Tarāwīḥ?

The other matter remains: can we broadcast the tarāwīḥ prayer for whoever wants to follow it? There is no harm in my doing that, but to whom do I broadcast it? To the people so that they follow me? Do I oblige people to stay in their homes without praying so that they watch my prayer and look on at it? We did not agree that when I broadcast the prayer, a live stream, they will follow me, and stay sitting looking: Huh, where is he reciting? But if the matter is limited to someone who is unable to come to the prayer, or someone who likes to lag behind in the prayer and opens the muṣḥaf to follow along with the imam what he is reciting, there is no harm in that. And the question remains: is the benefit greater here or the harm greater? And it is a matter connected with the differences among societies, and in each of them every imam rules in his own mosque by what he knows of his community's affairs.

And another matter presented itself to us as we discussed the matter of praying behind a broadcast with the honorable scholars, may Allah preserve them all: that one of us says, for example: I liked to pray behind a certain sheikh in New Jersey or New York, so there remains the time difference, and there remains the difference of the imam from his follower in their circumstances, and so on, whatever else we can talk about by the leave of the Lord of the worlds.

Make an Imam in the Home

And I have another matter, which is the matter of the roles required within Ramadan, inside the homes. What will we really do? The matter of gathering people on one act is of the utmost importance. Do you have an imam in the home or do you not have an imam in the home? In the name of Allah, if you do not have an imam in the home, then make an imam in the home. That is, one of the children gives the call to prayer, another gives the iqāmah, and another is the imam for this night, and that the third, or the second, or the first, or the same person, is the one who leads us in this prayer, even if it is short or simple, then gives us a reflection or speaks among us with an exhortation.

And perhaps Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, wanted us to learn good manners as we deal with the mosques when He confines us from them with a complete confinement; perhaps Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, wanted to return to us the value of these houses of Allah, glory be to Him, in our lives. You know that we often call on people to donate to the mosques and to give them money, and people save, until a very witty proverb appeared among us in Egypt that tells you: "What the house needs is forbidden to the mosque." And I always say that the houses of Allah the Exalted are the first priority, and we used to save away from them, not for them. So now we feel their value and wish we had given much or little just in return for their being opened. But the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, wants to teach us manners.

The Mother of Moses: The Trial That Carried the Gift

Come with us, may Allah preserve you, to look at the matter of how the gift is in the trial. And I am now speaking with the mothers: imagine that you were commanded to throw your child into the river, to throw him into the sea. And who was the one tried with this? The mother of Moses, peace be upon him, was commanded to throw her son into the river. Imagine the state of the mother and the heart of the mother as she holds her child in her hand and throws him into the chest and then into the river, that is, she will place him in a small box, barely, Allah knows what the waves will do with him, and put him in the water, imagine, she will put him in the water and the water will take him and go. I am watching this scene and looking at the pounding of this mother's heart as she glimpses her child, how she dares to put him in this vessel, then the vessel begins to move and her heart flutters. Therefore Allah the Exalted said: ﴿وَرَبَطْنَا عَلَىٰ قَلْبِهَا﴾ (and We strengthened her heart) [al-Qaṣaṣ: 10]. And the matter is very important, connected to the matter of the heart; so the Lord of Might steadied her heart. Reflect on how great was the trial in which this woman was placed at that time, and how it would have been for her had she not put her child in the river.

So we have, by Allah, a very great gift in that our children are in our embrace, keep him in your embrace. Then the king's soldiers come to take him or to kill him, as they used to do: letting the women live and killing the children or the sons. So it was a very great trial for this poor woman who was commanded to throw her child into the chest and then into the river: اقذفيه في اليم (cast him into the river). Then after that this chest, or this small vessel, goes on until it reaches the palace of Pharaoh. That is, now the mother throws the chest into the river and says: My Lord, my Lord, may the water carry him to any place far from Pharaoh's soldiers, not from Pharaoh alone, but far from Pharaoh's soldiers. And lo, the chest takes him and goes with him directly to the stronghold of the one who issues the orders to kill the children. If this child arrives at this palace in these circumstances, destruction is certain at a hundred percent, no doubt of that. And the news of this boy will come to us after a while, but the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, arranges for creation and arranges for His servants.

And how many times do the children in the home feel, how many times they feel, that they are in a very great trial from which they cannot escape in any way, but their father or their mother arrange their affairs in a way that brings them out of the crisis. The children feel that we are in a trial, there is no allowance, there are no large expenses, there is not the food we claim, but what the father or the mother brings out of the store that they know exists and the children do not know makes the kids pass through the crisis with some hardship, but they pass through it into a great opening afterward.

And if we imagined the size of the tragedy the woman was in when she threw her child, and then how Moses was afterward, we would realize that the gift came only from a trial that was very great. And Allah forbade him the wet nurses, so his sister came and said: ﴿هَلْ أَدُلُّكُمْ عَلَىٰ أَهْلِ بَيْتٍ يَكْفُلُونَهُ لَكُمْ﴾ (Shall I direct you to a household that will rear him for you?) [al-Qaṣaṣ: 12], then the Exalted said: ﴿فَرَدَدْنَاهُ إِلَىٰ أُمِّهِ كَيْ تَقَرَّ عَيْنُهَا وَلَا تَحْزَنَ وَلِتَعْلَمَ…﴾ (So We returned him to his mother that her eye might be comforted and she not grieve and that she would know…) [al-Qaṣaṣ: 13]. So Allah the Exalted made knowledge reach her after a few days or weeks, if the information is sound, for the time is short: it may be hours, it may be days, and it is not conceivable that it was weeks. She said to his sister: Follow him, so the sister followed him, and saw what happened, and said: Shall I direct you to a household? So the woman came to nurse him and he nursed, and the matter ended, and the boy became in his mother's embrace, she could not disclose that he was her son, but at least she sees him night and day and nurses him herself and he stays before her eyes, and she became the wet nurse. There is no harm in that.

Jacob and Joseph: A Trial That Opens a Door for the World

But how was the state of Jacob, peace be upon him, when he did not know where his son had gone, nor who had taken him, nor what his fate was, nor where he had gone? By Allah, the matter of the mother of Moses was easier. This is a man who nearly goes mad, glory be to Allah; how could he know where his son went, in the world of the desert that existed at that time, with means very limited in utmost simplicity, and the land everywhere likewise? Where did the boy go? They cannot perceive where the boy went. And the brothers had arranged their affairs, and he knows that his brothers had arranged his killing, and had come with false blood on his shirt, and he knows what actually happened to his son, that he was killed or gone.^[20] But his certainty in Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, remains attached.

Had this trial not been in the life of Jacob, peace be upon him, would we have seen this gift? Not only for the house of Jacob, but for the house of Jacob and for the brothers of Joseph and for all of Egypt and for the entire surrounding world. It was through this trial that these people came and took that boy after one of them let down his bucket, so he brought out Joseph, peace be upon him, with him, and moved with him to Egypt, and he was sold. Then he also goes to the palace of the ʿAzīz to learn there how the affairs of rule are run and the matters of the state are turned, and then he grows up after that.

And how was the trial of Joseph, peace be upon him, himself, when he was defending chastity and honor, and yet was thrown into prison for several years or a large number of years, Allah the Exalted knows how many they were, and he could not withhold his good from people, and could not hold back the breaths of pain with which he suffered from that manifest injustice from these people: ﴿بَدَا لَهُم مِّن بَعْدِ مَا رَأَوُا الْآيَاتِ لَيَسْجُنُنَّهُ حَتَّىٰ حِينٍ﴾ (Then it appeared to them, after they had seen the signs, that they should surely imprison him for a time) [Yūsuf: 35]. That's it, to relieve themselves of him, they throw him into prison, and the detention centers are open and wide for all the people. ﴿وَدَخَلَ مَعَهُ السِّجْنَ فَتَيَانِ﴾ (And there entered the prison with him two young men) [Yūsuf: 36], to the end of what the story says as the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, related it to us. Then how were the results? The prison was a direct cause of rising to the throne, and the throwing into the river, into the well, was the direct cause of his going to this first palace. So from a palace to a prison to a higher palace, matters rotate in our hands.

Uhud: The Flaw Is in Us

And how great was the trial the Muslims lived through in the Battle of Uhud, when they did not defeat their enemies! And the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, says: ﴿وَلَقَدْ صَدَقَكُمُ اللَّهُ وَعْدَهُ إِذْ تَحُسُّونَهُم بِإِذْنِهِ حَتَّىٰ إِذَا فَشِلْتُمْ وَتَنَازَعْتُمْ فِي الْأَمْرِ وَعَصَيْتُم مِّن بَعْدِ مَا أَرَاكُم مَّا تُحِبُّونَ مِنكُم مَّن يُرِيدُ الدُّنْيَا وَمِنكُم مَّن يُرِيدُ الْآخِرَةَ﴾ (And Allah had certainly fulfilled His promise to you when you were killing them by His permission until you lost courage and fell to disputing about the order and disobeyed after He had shown you what you love. Among you are some who desire this world, and among you are some who desire the Hereafter) [Āl ʿImrān: 152]. There is a flaw in our own souls, which, if we mend it, Allah will mend for us the whole of life.

If each of us considered himself like this computer, or this telephone, and that it has an internal fault, so that if this fault is repaired the device can connect with the heavens, so the signal or the direct transmission arrives in it,^[21] so it can communicate and go onto YouTube and do whatever it wishes, on condition that the flaw within us is mended. There is a flaw which Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, has become aware of in us, so He wanted the features of life to halt for us until we mend it so that we come out to the world again anew. And the patient in whom a defect occurs in himself is kept by the doctors in the recovery room until he regains his health completely, and when he comes out to life he comes out to it stronger and more able to do what he could not do before.

Our Measure Before the Power of Allah, and the Value of Life

Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, wanted to halt all of life for us so that we may know our true capacities before the power of the Lord of Might, glory be to Him. For there is that which is not seen by the naked eye, and the world cannot come to know the truth of its sudden growth and development without any preliminaries, and this intelligence it has, as they claim, in the face of human ability. No, there is one stronger than you, even if he is invisible to you. The Lord of Might wanted to make us know our true worth in this world.

Then He wanted to make us know the value of life in itself. For when the limits of my freedom are the limits of the house, what is the value of life except that I go out of this house? So the concepts of ambitions in human life change. We used to roam the earth and do as we pleased, and when matters reached this point where we are, and we see the fear that one of us might touch his brother, and some people speak to me and say: I am afraid to touch my wife, or I fear that the children will come and embrace me,^[22] a state of terror, we came to know the value of life: it is in family warmth, and in relationships that contain good among people. And we learned that the eyes' gazing outward is no longer useful because it will not bring any result at all, and we learned that hearts should not be attached to anything worldly because it may be withheld from us or we may be withheld from it, we do not know what Allah the Exalted will do with us. So we knew our own worth, and we knew the value of worldly life in itself, and we realized: ﴿وَمَا الْحَيَاةُ الدُّنْيَا إِلَّا مَتَاعُ الْغُرُورِ﴾ (and the worldly life is nothing but the enjoyment of delusion).^[23]

A Person Being Alone with Himself

Then we moved on to another matter of the utmost importance, which is that a person is alone with himself and realizes how much he had been disobedient to Allah, glory be to Him, the Exalted. And am I at the doors of death just as so-and-so and so-and-so and so-and-so died? Is it my turn, or what's the matter? Allahu akbar! So he fears and is apprehensive, and reviews his accounts with himself and seeks forgiveness from Allah the Exalted for every sin he committed. I wrote a post a few days ago: Awaiting death is like awaiting the morning, you don't know which of them is coming first; you do not know whether the morning will come first or death will. And we learned that from the Prophet ﷺ, but we were not paying attention to it, when he ﷺ said: «إذا أصبحت فلا تنتظر المساء، وإذا أمسيت فلا تنتظر الصباح» (When you reach the morning, do not wait for the evening, and when you reach the evening, do not wait for the morning).^[13] Without coronavirus or anything, without a virus or otherwise, that was the motto of the Prophet ﷺ. «الموت أقرب إلى أحدكم من شراك نعله» (Death is nearer to one of you than the strap of his sandal),^[14] not from the virus entering me and my going to the hospital and sitting on the machine two or three days and then they say: So-and-so died.

We learned that death has no cause. One of our brothers in New York, who knows that some people are sick, takes a respirator and goes to them, so they are healed by the grace of Allah and he dies after forty-eight hours, a strong person, masha'Allah. Allahu akbar! What is happening in the world of the universe? So we knew our own worth before the power of the Lord of Might, glory be to Him, and we came to know the value of worldly life in itself, and came to know that we have mistakes we must repent from.

Reviewing the Accounts

The matter of reviewing accounts, our dear sisters and brothers: reviewing accounts between us and our spouses, between us and our children, between us and our worldly goals that we strive for. Reviewing accounts: what do you want from the world? What exactly do we want? What can we take? If we imagined now that one of us owns a million dollars in some place but cannot leave his house, we are not able, a million dollars, but we cannot buy, may Allah honor you, toilet paper for example!

The Conclusion

So again we return: Ramadan is in our hands, its constants are fasting and night prayer and remembrance and glorification of Allah, glory be to Him, and standing for the Lord of Might, and remembrance of Allah, the Mighty and Majestic. These are the constants in our lives, and Allah, glory be to Him, has shortened worldly life, and what is required of me is human effort in this world.^[24] And we move to another matter: the variables in this life are what Allah brings, not what events bring nor what time brings, but what Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, brings. And to the extent of your certainty in Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, you can cross over.

Questions from the Attendees

Then the speaker moved on to the questions that came in during the gathering.

The ruling on a menstruating woman reciting the Noble Qur'an in Ramadan. He said: We are speaking on this matter, and we have an opinion on it that says: ﴿لَّا يَمَسُّهُ إِلَّا الْمُطَهَّرُونَ﴾ (none touch it except the purified) [al-Wāqiʿah: 79], that what is meant is the one fully purified among people, and these require for reciting the Noble Qur'an and touching the muṣḥaf complete ablution and total purification. And some of them said: none touch it except the purified, those meant being the angels, and hence permitted. But recitation in itself, the statement on it is easier than the matter of touching the muṣḥaf. So there is no harm in a menstruating woman reciting the Noble Qur'an as a kind of remembrance of Allah, glory be to Him, in Ramadan, and she is not kept from the good intended for her by the leave of the Lord of Might. And this too is by way of broadening and relieving people in such conditions, God willing.

Why do I find difficulty in performing voluntary prayers and in stopping sinning? He said: We are speaking now about two things that crowd each other in the heart: committing sins occupies a large place in the heart, so when the voluntary prayers come they find no place to enter. So repentance is necessary so that we can integrate voluntary prayers with it, or we say: let the voluntary prayers compete with the sins that are present until they overcome them. And a man, or a young man, comes to the Prophet ﷺ and says: O Messenger of Allah, direct me to a deed I should not do, and he says to him: Do not lie,^[15] that's it, so he does not lie, and it follows from it that he does not lie, then does not commit adultery, then does not steal, then does not do such and such. So seek help from Allah, glory be to Him, in what you are unable to do, and ask Allah, glory be to Him, to help you do it. And if you cannot increase in performing voluntary prayers, begin with the first stage, which is increasing in supplication to Allah, glory be to Him, that He help you, for «من داوم قرع الباب يوشك أن يُفتح له» (whoever keeps knocking at the door is about to have it opened for him), and whoever persists in asking the Lord of Might, Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, answers him.

Praying behind an imam who is young in age and does not recite as he should: is it accepted? He said: We have the Ḥanafī masters who permit following a discerning boy as imam,^[16] so if the boy understands what he is doing, then following him is permissible by Allah's leave, even if he is not able to recite perfectly, but it is a chance to encourage and teach him. And there is no harm in connecting him with one of the imams or sheikhs or Qur'an teachers so that he sets right the vocalization of the Noble Qur'an for him. And children, as you know, are only drawn to what motivates them, so we can make a reward for them at the end of the month: if you can memorize, say, this much, or recite in this way, or learn from Sheikh so-and-so, or the Sheikh says that you now deserve it, then I bring you this gift.

Closing

And after answering the questions, he said: This is what I see, and Allah knows best. And I apologize if I have prolonged this for you, may Allah preserve you and be pleased with you, and I hope you will include us in your supplication. Then he concluded with "peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah."

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: Narrated by al-Bukhārī and Muslim from the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him) with the wording «من قام رمضان إيمانًا واحتسابًا غُفر له ما تقدم من ذنبه» (Whoever stands in prayer in Ramadan out of faith and seeking reward, his previous sins will be forgiven). As for the addition "and those to come" that the speaker said, it is not in the narration of the Ṣaḥīḥayn, and we have recorded it here as he said it. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: The speaker mentioned "O you who believe, prescribed for you" in the context of speaking about fasting and night prayer and did not complete the verse, and its completion is ﴿كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الصِّيَامُ كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَتَّقُونَ﴾ (fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, that you may become righteous) [al-Baqarah: 183]. ^[3]: Editor's documentation: It resembles what Abū Dāwūd and al-Tirmidhī narrated: "Whoever stands with the imam until he departs, there is recorded for him the standing of a night," and the speaker related it by meaning. ^[4]: Editor's documentation: "Show Allah goodness from yourselves" is part of the Prophet's ﷺ sermon on welcoming Ramadan, "O people, a great and blessed month has overshadowed you," and there is criticism of its chain of transmission among the ḥadīth scholars, so it should be checked before being used as proof. The speaker did not attribute it. ^[5]: Editor's documentation: Narrated by al-Bukhārī and Muslim from the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him) in similar wording, and the speaker related it by meaning. ^[6]: Editor's documentation: It appears to be the ḥadīth of Ibn ʿAbbās (may Allah be pleased with them both) about his standing beside the Prophet ﷺ and his turning him to his right, and it is in al-Bukhārī and Muslim; the speaker did not name the Companion. As for his ﷺ praying tarāwīḥ in congregation for some nights and then leaving it for fear that it would be made obligatory, it is the ḥadīth of ʿĀʾishah (may Allah be pleased with her) in the Ṣaḥīḥayn, and the speaker did not attribute it. ^[7]: Editor's documentation: The sentence is repeated in the Qur'an, among them al-Aʿrāf: 89 and Ṭā Hā: 98, and the speaker did not specify the location. ^[8]: Editor's documentation: Narrated by al-Bukhārī and Muslim from the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him): "When Ramadan comes, the gates of Paradise are opened, the gates of the Fire are closed and the devils are chained," and the speaker did not attribute it. ^[9]: Editor's documentation: It resembles the ḥadīth "Whoever goes to the mosque in the morning or the evening, Allah prepares for him a lodging in Paradise every time he goes in the morning or the evening" (agreed upon from the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah), and the speaker was content with pointing to the wording of going in the morning and the evening. ^[10]: Editor's documentation: It refers to the ḥadīth of the intention to burn the houses of those who stay behind from the prayer (al-Bukhārī and Muslim from the ḥadīth of Abū Hurayrah, may Allah be pleased with him), and the speaker related it by meaning. ^[11]: Editor's documentation: It resembles what al-Bukhārī narrated from the ḥadīth of ʿĀʾishah (may Allah be pleased with her) about the plague, "he remains in his town, patient, seeking reward ... except that he will have the like of the reward of a martyr," and the speaker related it by meaning. ^[12]: Editor's documentation: It resembles what al-Bukhārī narrated from the ḥadīth of Abū Mūsā (may Allah be pleased with him): "When the servant is ill or travels, there is recorded for him the like of what he used to do while resident and healthy," and the speaker related it by meaning. ^[13]: Editor's documentation: Narrated by al-Bukhārī from the ḥadīth of Ibn ʿUmar (may Allah be pleased with them both), and the speaker did not attribute it. ^[14]: Editor's documentation: The speaker transmitted the expression this way, and I did not find that this is the wording of a specific ḥadīth; what is narrated in al-Bukhārī from Ibn Masʿūd (may Allah be pleased with him) is: "Paradise is nearer to one of you than the strap of his sandal, and the Fire is likewise," so it should be checked. ^[15]: Editor's documentation: The story in this form (the Prophet's ﷺ saying "Do not lie" to one who asked for a deed) is narrated about the man who asked him to direct him to what he should leave, and the speaker related it by meaning and did not attribute it, so I did not verify its origin in this wording; so it should be checked before relying on it. ^[16]: Editor's documentation: The speaker attributed this view to the Ḥanafīs, and what is known in the Ḥanafī school is that a boy's leading adults in an obligatory prayer is not valid, and that those who permit it in general are the Shāfiʿīs; so its attribution should be checked before relying on it. And tarāwīḥ and voluntary prayer may have a different ruling from the obligatory prayer according to some jurists. ^[17]: Editor's documentation: The speaker did not utter the address, and the completion of the verse is ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الْإِنسَانُ إِنَّكَ كَادِحٌ إِلَىٰ رَبِّكَ كَدْحًا فَمُلَاقِيهِ﴾ (O man, you are laboring toward your Lord with great exertion, and you will meet Him) [al-Inshiqāq: 6]. ^[18]: Editor's documentation: The speaker cited this sentence joined to the verse as though it were from it, and it is not the completion of the verse; its completion is ﴿إِلَّا تَذْكِرَةً لِّمَن يَخْشَىٰ﴾ (but only as a reminder for those who fear) [Ṭā Hā: 3]. ^[19]: Editor's documentation: In the transcript it is "siyāw ilayh," which is garbled, and this is the closest meaning to it. ^[20]: Editor's documentation: So it is in the transcript, and the apparent sense of the Qur'anic story is that Jacob, peace be upon him, was not told what his brothers had done, and he said to them ﴿بَلْ سَوَّلَتْ لَكُمْ أَنفُسُكُمْ أَمْرًا﴾ (Rather, your souls have enticed you to something) [Yūsuf: 18]; so it should be checked by listening to the audio. ^[21]: Editor's documentation: In the transcript "al-sijn" (prison), and perhaps it is "signal," which is not certain. ^[22]: Editor's documentation: In the transcript "fīḥ wa nūn," and this is the closest meaning to it. ^[23]: Editor's documentation: The speaker did not mention the location of the verse, and its wording is in [Āl ʿImrān: 185] and [al-Ḥadīd: 20]. ^[24]: Editor's documentation: The wording of the transcript here is disordered ("the shortening of worldly life, required from me as human effort"), so it was phrased with caution.