Friday Prayer-1/5/24-Lecture by Sheikh Abdulrahman Cherri

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[0:27]allahar allahar [Music] illall brothers and sisters aldd muham muham muham muham

[2:23]one of the spiritual vices that has been talked about by the

[2:36]scholars of Islam is the spiritual disease of Envy Envy has been

[2:43]considered to be a disease that has to be removed from the

[2:46]heart of a Believer and the Hadith have been quite harsh when

[2:52]it came to dealing with the voice of Envy the disease of

[2:55]spiritual Envy in a Hadith IM says that the Apostle of God

[3:06]the prophet Sall Alam said that God Almighty addressed Prophet Moses peace

[3:15]be upon him and said oh son ofran never be envious of

[3:22]people concerning the favors I have confirmed on them confer on them

[3:28]by my grace do not succumb to your Envy self indeed the

[3:33]envious man or person is indignant at the bestow of my favor

[3:38]and contest my apportioning of gifts among my creatures who so is

[3:46]such he neither belongs to me nor do I belong to him

[3:50]God is talking about giving different favors to different people let me

[3:56]Define what Envy is first and then we can talk about it

[4:01]very briefly inall I won't take much of your time today the

[4:04]definition of envy which in Arabic would be hassad is a psychic

[4:10]state in which a person wishes for the deprivation of a blessing

[4:15]Talent OR Merit real or imagined possessed by another person it does

[4:24]not make any difference to the envious person whether lie possess whether

[4:30]he possesses or not whether he can acquire it or not so

[4:33]when you're Envy towards someone else it's not that you want to

[4:38]have that thing only sometimes you just want that person to be

[4:41]deprived of it you don't want that person to enjoy the thing

[4:47]you see someone has a blessing and you become envious if you

[4:51]wish that that person loses that thing and it happens a lot

[4:54]especially among Believers because they're prone to thisan tries to create disharmony

[5:02]between the Believers by creating these ill diseases inside of them now

[5:08]if you realize from the definition it says that it's related to

[5:15]a blessing a talent or a merit sometimes it could be a

[5:19]person was given or has a very nice house that you don't

[5:24]have or a person just purchased a car that you wish you

[5:26]could have or at least that you know you feel why did

[5:30]he get that car why didn't I get it I worked hard

[5:36]throughout my life I'm also a good human being and you start

[5:38]talking to yourself trying to justify that ill feeling that you have

[5:42]towards the other person getting that blessing well we have to understand

[5:48]that people are created differently with different circumstances people have different conditions

[5:53]in their life Allah subhana wa tala divides things amongst people not

[6:00]in a socialist or communist way where we think that everybody should

[6:04]have the exact same thing but people are abortion things according to

[6:12]their own capacity sometimes sometimes the circumstances of life that allows for

[6:17]one person to progress in their Financial State more than the other

[6:22]person it doesn't mean that they're any better than the other person

[6:26]but a Believer always has to understand that his or her value

[6:32]doesn't lie in the possessions that they have our value lies in

[6:37]the humanity that we have whether I own that car or not

[6:39]yes it could make my life much easier it would be nice

[6:43]to have a very big or spacious house it would be beautiful

[6:48]to have a very nice car but if I cannot earn it

[6:49]and someone else was in a situation where they were able to

[6:55]earn it I should be happy for them why because if I

[6:58]had getting that car gotten that that car and I worked for

[7:02]it or I was given it as a gift I would wish

[7:06]for other people to be happy for me as well right and

[7:08]this is what it means when the prophet or the Imam say

[7:12]that we have to love for other people what we love for

[7:14]ourselves whenever I see somebody who has been given a certain type

[7:22]of gift or a talent or a merit someone is physically more

[7:27]capable than I am then if I was in that person's position

[7:30]I would want people to be happy for me right so this

[7:35]is what how I have to think when I'm judging other people's

[7:38]merits that I should be happy for them because if I had

[7:43]what they have then I would want people to be happy for

[7:47]me and if I want people to be happy for me for

[7:48]what I have then I must be happy for them for what

[7:53]they have this is loving for other people what you love for

[7:57]yourself so going back to the definition it could be a blessing

[8:02]that that person has given it could be a talent that they

[8:04]have or it could be a merit now sometimes a person who

[8:13]possesses a certain thing let's say they have let's go back to

[8:17]the example of a car that person who has that car he

[8:21]might use that car in a way that I might not use

[8:26]it right just because they have a car and I think that

[8:30]I might have a car does not mean that we're going to

[8:32]use it the same way sometimes it's a blessing for me not

[8:37]to have that thing because if I have Envy towards someone who

[8:41]has something that I don't have it means that I'm not at

[8:46]a spiritual level that makes me ready to receive certain blessings or

[8:50]certain things in life because I might misuse them I might if

[8:56]I acquire that car or that house I might use it to

[9:01]show off I might develop other spiritual diseases in my life so

[9:06]sometimes the deprivation of something is not a bad thing at all

[9:09]now that doesn't mean that as Believers we should always seek to

[9:16]be deprived of things this isn't how we should look at life

[9:19]when we deal with things in life we always have to deal

[9:22]with them on a spiritual and moral basis if I want to

[9:30]acquire a possession in this world and Allah subhana tala has permitted

[9:32]me to do so and has asked me to work and acquire

[9:36]things in this world I have to make sure that as I'm

[9:38]developing financially I should equally be developing spiritually in fact I should

[9:45]be developing spiritually faster than financially because if we develop financially faster

[9:51]than spiritually then we're going to decline the more we gain things

[9:55]in this world because with a lot of financial possessions we develop

[9:59]spiritual diseases a lot of it involves showing off for example sometimes

[10:07]a person purchases something and begins to show up as if they

[10:11]got that thing from their own selves yes they worked hard for

[10:15]it but just as they acquired it they could easily lose it

[10:19]at the same time we have to understand that this world is

[10:22]not a world of Eternity and we don't have full control over

[10:25]everything if we receive something we thank Allah subhana wa taala for

[10:32]it we wish for others to have what we have if I

[10:34]advance in my life then I should try to allow others to

[10:39]advance as well a lot of people if they begin to advance

[10:44]and they become wealthier they become more animalistic towards others they try

[10:49]to destroy other people who are trying to become wealthy like them

[10:52]if you gain power in society there's this documentary about dictators I'm

[10:58]sure a lot of you might have watched it of how a

[11:02]dictator becomes a dictator one of the first things that dictators do

[11:06]is they kill all those who are close to them because they

[11:09]think that they're going to compete with them when it comes to

[11:13]power we can see that in the examples of Saddam Hussein Hitler

[11:17]and other dictators around the world the moment they get into power

[11:21]they start killing and assassinating those people who are around them especially

[11:27]family members because family members might be the first people that are

[11:31]going to try to take that power from you so this is

[11:36]a human Vice it's a human trait we gain something and we

[11:42]want to deprive everyone around around us from having it a Believer

[11:46]is not like that a believer's compass is always towards Justice and

[11:52]Justice means that we love for other people what we love for

[11:55]ourselves that we put things where they belong if we gain a

[12:02]special thing in life we don't attribute it to our own Merit

[12:05]and we don't wish that other people are deprived from it no

[12:10]we wish that they have it as well if I'm living a

[12:11]comfortable life then I wish that everybody around me is able to

[12:16]have such a comfortable life as well now if I can't practically

[12:19]do something to change that then at least it's a desire that

[12:24]I have to have in my heart for my other believers and

[12:27]my other human counterparts so this is one of the vices or

[12:38]spiritual diseases that has been spoken about now very briefly um I

[12:43]I'll discuss or just mention a few things that might cause Envy

[12:46]in a person and that person has to tackle these things to

[12:50]get rid of it the first thing that they mentioned is enmity

[12:53]a person might have an enemy so they wish that they and

[12:59]not not a justifiable enemy you just hate somebody because of some

[13:03]you know problem that you had with them so you wish that

[13:08]they don't have an enjoyable life a second cause is your feeling

[13:11]of Supremacy you feel that you're better than other people and this

[13:15]causes you to be envious for others you don't want other people

[13:19]to reach your rank so that you can preserve your nobility or

[13:25]your elevation above them thirdly pride pride also causes an individual to

[13:34]be envy and fourthly wonder the envious person is puzzled to see

[13:43]the great blessing enjoyed by the object of his Envy in the

[13:48]Quran for example it talks about when people were envying prophets you're

[13:53]living amongst people then a prophet emerges Allah subhana decides that one

[13:57]of the people amongst you is going to be a prophet and

[14:01]he didn't choose you and the Quran talks about this it's a

[14:04]it's a human state so for example in one of the verses

[14:10]Allah subh says that the people told the prophets they used to

[14:14]address the prophets and say oh you're just humans like us why

[14:17]do you claim prophecy why do you why do you claim that

[14:22]God is speaking to you why didn't God choose me to be

[14:24]spoken to well just the fact that you have that Envy inside

[14:29]of you is a clear reason why God has not chosen you

[14:31]you haven't overcome that egotistic self that you have so a lot

[14:38]of the times when we think that why don't we receive this

[14:41]blessing from Allah subhana wa ta'ala maybe because the way the attitude

[14:46]that I have towards this blessing makes me not deserving of it

[14:49]that if I had received it I would have used it for

[14:53]the wrong reasons and not the good reasons number five fear of

[14:59]person might have fear of competition for example so they Envy other

[15:04]people you open a business and you fear that someone else might

[15:10]open something similar to it and they might deprive you from money

[15:14]or profit so you envy them and you wish that they are

[15:17]unable to open businesses or be successful in life just like you

[15:24]are a lot of these billionaires or very rich people what they

[15:27]do is they try to eliminate the ability for other smaller businesses

[15:30]to grow they don't want any other competition because anything that they

[15:35]gain is a loss for them even though they have millions of

[15:41]dollars they still don't want to lose that small amount they have

[15:44]that fear you see a lot of people who have things they

[15:50]begin to have this anxiety they have to protect their belongings they

[15:53]want to protect their property the Richer they become the more they

[15:58]possess they have fear of losing it instead of wanting to share

[16:02]it because of their attitude the way they behave they have that

[16:06]fear so these are a few reasons that cause Envy in a

[16:10]person and a person who wants to relieve themselves of this Vice

[16:13]have to tackle these things individually now in theith IM says that

[16:25]Envy um sorry the IM says that Envy eats up Faith just

[16:40]like fire eats up the wood this is how destructive Envy is

[16:43]when it comes to the faith and the soul of the individual

[16:45]it's a very very bad voice to have one of the ways

[16:55]of trying to resolve the problem of of Envy given by a

[16:58]scholar who wrote about morality and ethics he says that if you

[17:05]feel that you have Envy towards an individual someone that you think

[17:11]is better than you and you're unable to accept that you have

[17:14]an ill feeling towards them whether it's a talent or they possess

[17:17]something then try to be extra kind to that individual and one

[17:21]thing that our spiritual schar emphasize on is that you don't always

[17:27]have to be real when you're fixing spiritual problems at the beginning

[17:32]because you have an ill nature or you have a spiritual disease

[17:36]and you acknowledge that you're going to have to understand that when

[17:40]I'm dealing with these other people I'm going to have an artificial

[17:44]type of behavior it's not going to be real so when I'm

[17:48]going to be kind to someone at the beginning it's not going

[17:51]to be real it's going to be artificial now you're going to

[17:56]start getting some westwest satanic thoughts telling you that because it's artificial

[18:04]you shouldn't be doing it you see you can't be real about

[18:07]this just forget about it you're not going to fix your problem

[18:12]but don't listen to that once you begin to change it has

[18:15]to be artificial because that's the opposite of your nature don't expect

[18:19]it to be real but slowly the more you do it the

[18:23]more you practice it the more kind you are to people artificially

[18:29]the more it will begin to develop as something that's real it

[18:34]takes time change in the human being requires time it's not something

[18:39]that happens instantaneously the same thing when it comes to crying for

[18:44]example when it comes to worship we have in our Hadith IM

[18:47]he says those who cry for IM Hussein or act as if

[18:55]they're crying will be rewarded why does he also mention act because

[18:58]some people they're unable to release tears from their eyes whether it's

[19:03]because they're shy or because of the stiffness of their heart they

[19:10]don't have that emotional Purity or Clarity in their heart that allows

[19:13]for them to feel sadness and grief but if you start artificially

[19:18]trying to cry then you slowly begin developing that ability you have

[19:26]to practice it artificially at the beginning and then slowly it will

[19:33]start to improve so if you envy an individual then try to

[19:35]be nice to those people try to think about how if you

[19:40]had that thing then you want other people to be happy for

[19:47]you try to be more compassionate with other people so this is

[19:51]one way we can try to amend this and it applies for

[19:56]every other spiritual disease that we have I ask Allah subhana T

[20:02]to remove Envy from our hearts and to allow us to understand

[20:05]that all the blessings in reality come from him and we ask

[20:11]him to give us what is good for us sometimes if I

[20:13]receive something that I think is good for me it might harm

[20:17]me so we ask Allah subhana T to keep those things that

[20:23]are harmful to us away from us for Al Ali Muhammad Ali

[21:57]Ali Muhammad Hassan as everybody knows of the from the Believers the

[22:26]situation in the Middle East and specifically Palestine has not improved much

[22:38]and I'm going to speak just about General things today without going

[22:44]to specifics inshallah and very briefly so that I don't take much

[22:49]of your time I know a lot of you have to go

[22:51]back to work today but I watched the video the other day

[22:57]somebody showed me a video of a Palestinian activist I believe um

[23:03]she's in the west and she was criticizing a lot of the

[23:07]movements that came out to came out in support of the Palestinian

[23:13]cause and her argument was that the Palestinian voice is the one

[23:20]that has to determine everything that occurs in the situation other people

[23:24]should not be calling for things that they think are right and

[23:29]unfortunately she has a I think a series of videos that she

[23:33]released and she was very angry in these videos and I understand

[23:35]the pain that this individual has of course but it allowed or

[23:41]it made a lot of these activists from the Jewish organizations and

[23:45]other organizations to kind of back off and they released videos as

[23:50]well apologizing for not putting the Palestinian voice at the Forefront and

[23:54]for allowing themselves to take that place and we see that there's

[23:59]a lot of these movements that are fearing protesting or organizing certain

[24:05]types of protest or objections because of this idea now this idea

[24:12]of having a localized narrative it's it's it's a very modern idea

[24:20]a contemporary one and we see it developing in certain political circles

[24:26]the idea is that we can not have a grand narrative we

[24:30]always have to have a localized one and what it seeks to

[24:37]do is it seeks to empower the minority voices so for example

[24:40]if I be if I belong to a minority group then I

[24:45]have to allow that minority group to talk about their narrative from

[24:50]their perspective me someone who let say is privileged should not be

[24:54]the one who speaks about the suffering of other people even though

[24:59]it might be just so the Injustice that happened to the Native

[25:03]Americans we shouldn't allow the non-natives to speak on their behalf this

[25:08]is what this idea is talking about the African-American Community we have

[25:13]to allow them to be the ones that speak about their Injustice

[25:18]instead of us creating the narrative for them and in some aspects

[25:24]there's truth in this in some aspects it's a good thing cuz

[25:27]yes if you're not the one who's suffering and it's not your

[25:30]community who's suffering then the demands the demands that you're asking for

[25:37]or the narrative that you're creating about these people might be overlooking

[25:42]certain types of suffering that these individuals are going through it's true

[25:48]but it's not possible to expect everybody else to become silent especially

[25:54]at a time when people are beginning to become awake about the

[25:59]suffering of a of a group of people yes they're going to

[26:04]make mistakes yes they're not going to understand what's really going on

[26:10]it's true for the longest time in history you know this group

[26:13]of people in uh Palestine have been killed and bombed they live

[26:19]in very brutal conditions and the most for the most part of

[26:25]the world nobody was even aware of their suffering if you watched

[26:28]a lot of the videos that come go online right now a

[26:31]lot of the podcasts that are happening a lot of the voices

[26:33]that are coming out and you read the comments a lot of

[26:37]people especially here in the US say this is the first time

[26:39]we ever hear that the Palestinians have been going through these challenges

[26:44]and difficulties and it's true for the past 75 years their voice

[26:52]has hardly been heard they've always been shown as animals and that

[26:57]they are are the ones who are oppressing other people now I'm

[26:59]not here to talk about details and the history of the whole

[27:04]conflict what happened and there's a lot of things that a person

[27:09]can be talking about but to come and criticize other people for

[27:13]standing with you I don't think it's the right time to do

[27:17]that now unfortunately a lot of times people get together from different

[27:21]F factions to support one cause one common cause and it's obvious

[27:25]that there's going to be conflict in the way we look at

[27:32]this situation some people might see that this is a Palestinian cause

[27:36]other people might see that this is a human cause this is

[27:39]Injustice that's happening whether it's happening to Palestinians whether it's happening to

[27:44]people in Pakistan and their Muslims that are oppressing other Muslims when

[27:50]it's happening in the west over here in the US when certain

[27:53]minorities are not given a proper treatment in certain cities this is

[27:59]a case of Injustice and at least we can agree to speak

[28:03]about that aspect of things now we can respect the other opinion

[28:10]and say okay I'm going to fight for that for the general

[28:13]title which is called oppression and This Is Why when im in

[28:19]the letter he gave to he sent to he said that the

[28:32]an enemy to the oppressor and the supporter of the oppressed the

[28:37]Imam gave a very general title here he says the oppressed he

[28:41]didn't say the locally oppressed one or the minority that lives in

[28:47]your city or because these things if you get too much into

[28:49]the nuances then you're going to have differences and fights and then

[28:55]you will never be able to advance your cause you have to

[28:58]all agree agree to a general theme that Allah subhana wa taala

[29:04]wants us to support that transcends our limitations when we talk about

[29:09]Injustice occurring then Injustice could occur to any person in this world

[29:14]on any level whe whether it's a political level or it goes

[29:20]down to a local level or even a family level a child

[29:22]may be oppressed in a family just like a citizen may be

[29:27]oppressed in a country and a nation could be oppressed as well

[29:31]if we use that title of Oppression to be the thing that

[29:39]unites us to fight against that then that's at least what we

[29:42]have to work towards now the details of everything that follows every

[29:46]Community should be able to have the right to express what they

[29:51]want based on their desire this is something that's acceptable and we

[29:54]have to support that as well I shouldn't be the one creating

[29:57]narratives and solutions for other people that I am not directly involved

[30:01]with but I shouldn't dismiss the effort of other people who are

[30:06]supporting the cause on a certain degree or certain level so we

[30:11]have to be able to differentiate between these two if I see

[30:14]something wrong I will stand against it and I will try to

[30:21]reestablish justice but that doesn't allow me because I did that to

[30:24]come and dictate to the ones who were oppressed what to do

[30:27]and how to live lives they might also require some time to

[30:31]develop to relax to think about things they might not have been

[30:35]given the opportunity for many years to develop some theory of how

[30:41]to live the best life so that when they're given Justice they

[30:44]might fail once they might fail twice that still doesn't give me

[30:48]the right to come and dictate upon them what they should do

[30:53]they should have their own Learning and Development happen they were deprived

[30:58]from that ability for many many years so they're going to make

[31:01]mistakes they're going to fail many times I have to be a

[31:04]supportive person I should allow them if they fail then to help

[31:09]them stand up on their feet again but let them learn how

[31:11]to walk I shouldn't be the one trying to walk them unfortunately

[31:16]some you know people who want to help people that are oppressed

[31:19]believe that just because I help them then I have the right

[31:24]to dictate for them or to them how to live their lives

[31:26]so these are just a few thoughts that we should maybe think

[31:29]about and try to understand that the Islamic message transcends these limitations

[31:35]it tries to go beyond the individual and to focus on the

[31:42]more Divine cause I ask Allah subhana wa ta'ala to allow the

[31:48]Believers and human beings in total in totality to unite with one

[31:56]another to remove the injustices that are practiced upon each other whether

[32:00]it's between the Muslims or the non-muslims at the end of the

[32:03]day we are all the creatures of Allah subhana tal we all

[32:07]belong to him we've been created by Him and we should respect

[32:10]that this this Humanity comes from the Divine what we do not

[32:18]respect or do not tolerate is when wrongness is is occurring between

[32:20]them what if someone belongs to a different Faith or belongs to

[32:24]a different belief system or doesn't believe at all it doesn't give

[32:27]me any right to practice oppression or Injustice towards the individual so

[32:35]we ask Allah subh to elevate us beyond our limitations and allow

[32:38]for uh peace and Harmony to spread against uh amongst human beings

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