The Friday Lesson and Spiritual Counsel
Regarding the interpretation of the Exalted One’s saying:
“There has certainly come to you a Messenger from among yourselves. Grievous to him is what you suffer; he is deeply concerned for you; and to the believers he is gentle and merciful.” (Qur’an 9:128)
Allah the Almighty has spoken the truth.
Allah, the Chosen and Exalted, has given you intellect so that you may reflect upon His dominion and thereby come to know that which leads you to His worship. Do not occupy it with thinking about matters other than that. Why exhaust your mind with things that bring you no benefit?
Do not try to manage affairs alongside Allah, the One who arranges all things. He, Exalted is He, said:
“He directs the affair from the heaven to the earth.” (Qur’an 32:5)
Leave the matter of your wife and children to Allah, who created them. Your duty is only to do what Allah has obligated upon you. Allah, Allah! Indeed, Allah, the Most Merciful, is more merciful to His creation than a mother is to her child.
Among the greatest manifestations of this mercy is that He sent to us our master and protector, Muḥammad ﷺ.
We must persevere in gratitude (shukr), just as the righteous predecessors (the Salaf), may Allah be pleased with them, used to do.
Among the shaykhs whom I used to attend his gatherings were Shaykh Salāmah al-ʿAzāmī, one of the scholars of al-Azhar, Shaykh Muḥammad Ibrāhīm al-Samālūṭī, and others from the students of Shaykh ʿIllaysh. Whenever one of them would say, “Our master and protector, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ,” his body and soul would tremble at the mere mention of his noble name ﷺ.
Ya Salam! May the mercy of Allah be upon you, O our shaykhs and may Allah reward you the best reward.
In these days, the Islamic nation celebrates the birth of the Best of Creation. Someone once asked:
“What benefit is there in celebrating the Mawlid? What does it bring to the Ummah?”
We reply to him:
As al-Busiri, may Allah have mercy upon him, says:
دَعْ مَا ادَّعَتْهُ النَّصَارَى فِي نَبِيِّهِمْ
وَاحْكُمْ بِمَا شِئْتَ مَدْحًا فِيهِ وَاحْكُمِ
Leave aside what the Christians claimed regarding their prophet,
and then praise him (Muḥammad ﷺ) however you wish and judge as you will.
The Christians say:
“ʿĪsā is the son of Allah”; and Allah is exalted far above that.
As for the Islamic nation, after centuries, it celebrates the Prophet ﷺ while affirming that he is Allah’s servant and messenger, that he was born, that his mother was one of Allah’s maidservants, and that the Prophet ﷺ was born and is a created being. Yet at the same time, it acknowledges his immense honor before Allah and his rank as the noblest of Allah’s creation.
When we celebrate his birth, we do not celebrate anything else. Rather, Allah, Exalted is He, willed that he be born as a small child, and nurtured in Mecca, emerge among people as a bearer of glad tidings and a warner, and that his community be protected from falling into what the Christians said regarding ʿĪsā, peace be upon him. This is because he supplicated to Allah, as it is narrated from Abū ʿAbd Allāh Imām Mālik, may Allah have mercy on him, that he said:
“O Allah, do not make my grave an idol that is worshipped after me.”
Allah answered his prayer. Therefore, this nation will never worship him until the Hour is established.
Thus, until the coming of the Hour, the Ummah will continue to affirm that he is the servant of Allah and His Messenger, due to the blessing of the supplication of our master, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.
Al-Bukhārī narrated that he ﷺ said:
“I do not fear for you that you will worship anyone after me besides Allah.”
May Allah bless you, O Messenger of Allah. You have spoken the truth.
He also said:
“I do not fear that you will associate partners with Allah after me. Rather, I fear that the worldly life will be opened up before you, and that you will compete for it as those before you competed for it; then it will destroy you as it destroyed them.”
The Messenger of Allah ﷺ has reassured us that, Allah willing, we will not associate anything with Allah.
This is among the tremendous blessings of tawḥīd (affirming the oneness of Allah): that this Ummah will remain upon tawḥīd until the Day of Resurrection. It does not worship a prophet, a messenger, an angel, nor does the Muḥammadan Ummah worship a stone. Nor does it associate anything with Allah. We honor this Prophet ﷺ and recognize his lofty rank before Allah.
Allah has honored this Ummah through His mercy by preserving it from associating partners with Him.
When he ﷺ was born, extraordinary signs contrary to the normal course of events appeared, indicating that he would call people to tawḥīd. Tawḥīd is light, and he would call people to the worship of Allah, and the worship of Allah is light. Thus, light radiated from him, signaling that he had come to call people to the light. As Allah says:
“There has come to you from Allah a Light and a clear Book.” (Qur’an 5:15)
The Light is the Prophet ﷺ, and the Clear Book is the Qur’an.
-From Vol 4 of the Friday Lessons
