Lessons from a bird

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ونصلي على رسولھ األكرم ذي الشرف األشم و النور األتم و الكتاب المحكم ر بھ عیسى ابن مریم و دعى و كمال النبیین و الخاتم سید ولد آدم الذي بش

م فصلى هللا لبعثتھ إبراھیم علیھ السالم حین كان یرفع قواعد بیت هللا المحرعلیھ و سلم و على أتباعھ خیر األمم الذین بارك هللا بھم كافة الناس العرب �ϭ�ௌ�ΎϧΩϫ�ϥ�ϻϭϟ�˴ϱΩΗϬϧϟ�Ύϧϛ�Ύϣ�ϭ�ΫϬϟ�ΎϧΩϫ�ϱΫϟ�Ϳ�ΩϣΣϟΎϓ�ϡΟόϟ�ϭ�ϡϬϧϣ

Ϳ�ΩϣΣϟ الذي لم یتخذ ولدا و لم یكن لھ شریك في الملك و لم یكن لھ ولي من �ϭ�ϪΑ�ϥϣϧ�ϭ�ϩέϔϐΗγϧ�ϭ�ϪϧϳόΗγϧ�ϭ�ϩΩϣΣϧ�ϱΫϟ�Ϳ�ΩϣΣϟ�ϭ�έϳΑϛΗ�ϩέΑϛ�ϭ�ϝΫϟ�ௌ�ϩΩϬϳ�ϥϣ�ΎϧϟΎϣϋ�ΕΎϳγ�ϥϣ�ϭ�Ύϧγϔϧ�έϭέη�ϥϣ�ͿΎΑ�Ϋϭόϧ�ϭ�ϪϳϠϋ�ϝϛϭΗϧ

نشھد أن ال إلھ إال هللا وحده ال شریك فال مضل لھ و من یضلل فال ھادي لھ ولھ و نشھد أن محمدا عبد هللا و رسولھ أرسلھ هللا تعالى بالھدى و دین الحق �˱έϳΛϛ�ΎϣϳϠγΗ�ϡϠγ�ϭ�ϪϳϠϋ�ௌ�ϰϠλ ϓ�˱ΩϳϬη�ͿΎΑ�ϰϔϛ�ϭ�ϪϠϛ�ϥϳΩϟ�ϰϠϋ�ϩέϬ˶υϳ˵ϟ

كثیرا ثم أما بعد، لى هللا علیھ و سلم فإن أصدق الحدیث كتاب هللا و خیر الھدي ھدي محمد ص

و إن شر األمور محدثاتھا و إن كل محدثة بدعة و كل بدعة ضاللة و كل ضاللة في النار. یقول سبحانھ و تعالى في كتابھ الكریم بعد أن أقول أعوذ

@��ϡϳΟέϟ�ϥΎρϳηϟ�ϥϣ�ͿΎΑ یر فقال ما لي ال أرى الھدھد أم كان م ن وتفقد الط

,An-naml)]الغائبین 27: . رب اشرح لي صدري و یسر لي أمري و احلل (20عقدة من لساني یفقھوا قولي و اللھم ثبتنا عند الموت بال إلھ إال هللا و اللھم

اجعلنا من الذین آمنوا و عملوا الصالحات و تواصوا بالحق و تواصوا بالصبر. آمین یا رب العالمین.

InshAllah-u-tala today I want to share with yousome reflections from two places in the Quran.One of them is surah An-Numl, the 27th surah ofthe Quran and the other is surah Al-Qasas, the 28th

surah of the Quran. And Allah az zawajal organizes

lessons in His Book in very unique ways and thereare lots of parallels between these two beautifulsurahs. They talk extensively, for example, both ofthem about Musa Alayhi salaam and one fills indetails that the other doesn’t have. But what Iwanted to highlight today is something relevant toour appreciation of the month of Ramadan andhow we take from this Book that we are supposedto be so attached to in this month. A lot of timeswhen we think of the concept of taqwa تقوىbecause the fasting of this month was given to usLa allaqum tattaqun قون [ ]لعلكم تت (Al- Baqarah, 2: 63), so thatyou can be grateful and the first cognizance thatwe are supposed to have this month is that we aresupposed to get closer and closer to the Quran. Fanaqrauhu, فنقرأه أكثر , we read it more; نحفظھ , we tryto memorize it as much as we can, we try to listento it’s recitation of course we spend longer timesin prayer, listening to the recitation of the Quranevery night also. More people show up to fajr solatin this month than they usually do in the entireyear. So it is a time that we try to get closer andcloser and closer to the Quran and as a resultbecome more and more cautious and aware ofAllah and that’s what Taqwa is. But there aredifferent kinds of proofs and different kinds ofmanifestations of taqwa.

Taqwa means you are in recognition of Allah’spresence, which means it changes your behavior.To make it very straightforward, its simple if youare working and you’re used to working with yourboss is never in the office. He is always gonesomewhere, flying somewhere else and you arekind of doing your own thing. After one monthwhen your boss shows up and he sits right next toyou, the way you are gona behave is gona bedifferent. You are gona be aware of this personwho you have to report to and he is sitting thereso the next time you are about to just check youremail casually, you’re gona stop yourself and say “no, he is still sitting there. When he goes for acoffee break maybe, then I’ll go check my email”.You’re gona be cautious. Its gona change yourbehavior. It’s gona change the way you makejokes. Its gona change the way you casually speakbecause you are in the presence of a higherauthority. Children do that with their parentssometimes. Students do that with their teacher,teacher walks in and they behave differently. Youguys have all some experience with taqwa whenyou are driving a little bit over the speed limit andyou see a police officer on the side and every bodyjust kind of recognizes the authority and slowsdown. That’s really you are trying to protect

yourself from getting in trouble. قایةو , the origin ofthe word taqwa is to try , is to protection. اتقاء is toprotect yourself. So you’re trying to watch outbecause you know a higher power is there, that’swhat taqwa is. And usually, when we think oftaqwa, we think of our attitude towards Allah azzawwjal in matters of halal and haram. But what Iwanted to highlight today is an aspect of taqwathat has to do with our dealings with each other.Taqwa is also manifest on our conscience andconsciousness of Allah is also manifest in how weinteract with each other. How humble, howrespectful, how courteous we are towards eachother is also a sign of what kind of taqwa we haveof Allah az zawwjal.

You know the ayat in which Allah az zawwjaltold us that he created all of us from one man andone woman ھایا [ قوا الناس أی كم ات ن خلقكمالذيرب وخلق حدة وانفس م

]زوجھامنھا (An- nisa, 4: 1), it began with taqwa. The ayat ofsurah An Nisa begins with taqwa and immediatelythen He talks about how we come from one origin,we are supposed to be, you know treated equallyeven. Even in the ayat in which عند أكرمكم إن [ ]أتقاكم هللا

( Al- hujurat, 49: 13) in Surah Al Hujarat, “ the most nobleamong you are the ones that have more taqwa” isthe ayat in which we are supposed to all treat eachother equally. The idea is if people have taqwa

they will treat each other with respect and ifpeople don’t have taqwa they will not treat eachother with respect. The ayat I read to you fromsurah An Numl in the beginning, very strange partof the Quran. It is the story of Sulayman Alayhisalaam. And Sulayman Alayhi salaam was givenmany gifts, an expansive kingdom. Perhaps even,pretty much the entire known world. The entirecivilized world was under the khilafat at onepoint, of Sulayman Alayhi salaam. Expansivepower, if you’re talking about, we talked nowabout, nowadays in the media we talk about howpresident of the United States may be the mostpowerful man in the world that compares nothingto the khilafat of Sulayman Alayhi salaam. And ontop of that Allah had given him extensiveknowledge. Not only is he the, you know from thelineage of prophets, meaning he is from Dawudalayhi salaam but also on top of that Allah gavehim the ability to speak with animals and tocontrol jinn. So he has massive armies in theworld of human beings obviously, but he hasentire armies of birds, entire armies of horses, andthe horse don’t have to have horsemen for him tocontrol them. He can talk to the horses directly. Hecan command the birds directly. So you canimagine he has an endless, endless, endless army

and in any military there are assemblies. You haveto, you know military gathers; they stand in frontof the general. There’s a parade, they stand youknow in salutation in front of the general and hekind of inspects the army. But you cannot imaginethat one general can keep track of everyone. Sothe general has to have commanders andlieutenants and battalion leaders and there’s ahierarchy, there is a chain of command, right? Soyou could have a small battalion of five or sixsoldiers and they have their commander overthem or they have their battalion leader over thembut, and he knows about them and he knows theirpersonalities and he knows their names but thegeneral doesn’t know their names, the general istoo big. And let’s not even talk about the militarybecause that’s one of the biggest organizationseven today, even in your company if you’reworking at your company and you are 500employees at your company, the CEO doesn’tknow your name. Unless you are like the senior VPor something if you’re like the guy at the door oryou just got one of 500 cubicles, he doesn’t knowyour name. But you know we learn in this ayat,Sulayman alayhi salaam in the position that he isin; is inspecting the armies and one bird ismissing. One bird is missing. Of all the armies, and

he says, Allah says یر [ ]وتفقد الط (An-naml, 27: 20) now iftiqadافتقاد in Arabic means to miss something, to misssomething. Tafaqqud تفقد is to feel sharpening, toimmediately get the sense and to make that, whenyou miss something and it hurts you; this istafaqqud. This is seeratul mubaligha. –صیغة المبالغة

ل تفع and Allah says that He felt the pain of the birdmissing. One bird. And its not like he was doing acount. Okey there’s 50 thousand birds, this is 49thousand 9 hundred and 99, one is missing. I ampretty upset about that. Actually, he says, Allah azzawwjal quotes in the ayat یر فقال ما لي ال أرى[ وتفقد الط

]الھدھد (An-naml, 27: 20) what is wrong with me?Something must be wrong with me”. And this isinteresting, he didn’t say something’s wrong withthe army, he says something must be wrong withme. He is in that position where the first thing aperson in the authority does is, blame thefollowing. But he says maybe I am countingwrong. Maybe I didn’t get it right. So he beginswith ninety that’s the most incredible example ofhumility, that he is in this position and he is saying“something must be wrong with me” أرى الھدھد ال “Idon’t see "الھدھد and there is an al on it, whichmeans he knows this bird personally. He knowsevery one of them personally. And he says I don’tsee that one, and I miss it. SubhanAllah. The

leadership of this man. If you are running abusiness and you have 5 employees and you cantremember their names and you don’t care howthey are doing or whatever. There’s a problem.You and I have a problem then. You’re themanager, you don’t care. When you walk into abuilding, there’s a security guard, you don’t evenmake eye contact. So what if he’s not muslim? Sowhat if he’s not muslim? You don’t even make eyecontact. Hey, how’s it going? How’s your day? Howare you doing? Just dignify the person. When youare going to the you know, the drive through atthe restaurant or something or you’re pulling upat the cashier; how do we treat these people? Wedon’t even look, make eye contact with them. likethey’re just you know, they’re basically machinesto us. They’re just service. They are not people.The people at the cash register, the person at thecounter at the bank or at the post office. How dowe treat these people? You know. And then howdo we treat people at our masajid مساجد , thepeople that are standing next to you. And this ismore even about the dua’at دعاة and the khateebخطیب and the ulema .علماء Because people comeand ask questions. People wana come and saysalaam afterwards. How do we treat those people?How did Rasul Allah salAllahu alayhi wasalam

treat those people? I mean serious. It’s serious.And then when you are in a position of authorityand some of us even if you are not the boss, andyou are not the CEO of 50 employees. You are atleast in charge at your home, right? You are atleast the older brother, right? The eldest sister,you’re the father, you have a family under you.You have people you are responsible for and thisis true even for the people who are serving themasajid ,مساجد people that are in the boards ofmasjids; they are the servants of the people. Theychose to be in this position. Out of taqwa of Allahthey decided they are gona spend time, time theycould have been using for their families, and timethey could have been using in making money; theydecided they are going to attend really boring longmasjid meetings, they are gona sit there trying towork on the construction project or this and theother. But if they have taken that position, theyunderstand that they are now more answerable toAllah, they have a مسؤولیة to every single personthat they know or they don’t know that walksthrough the doors of that masjid. That they are inservice to them. That’s an attitude change. This iswhat we are learning from the ayaat of Sulaymanalayhi salaam. These stories that are mentioned inthe Quran they are not just for our entertainment.

They are not just interesting history of the birdthat was called hud hud. Who asked for the bird?When did he ask for it? What position is he in andwhy would he have to worry about a bird? Who isgona ask him about that? Why would he even haveto care? But this is humility at it’s best. This ishumility at it’s best. And it gets even better. Thebird showed up late, and when an employeeshows up late, it’s not a matter of arrogance. If theemployee shows up late you are supposed to beangry. You are supposed to be upset; you aresupposed to take disciplinary action. Why?Because if you are okay with one being late andthe second one being late and the third being late,you cant have an organization anymore and thestrongest kind of organization in the world is themilitary. There is no tougher organization. Right?So you have to have serious ramifications formessing up the discipline of a military. Why is thediscipline of a military so tough? It’s so toughbecause when they go into the battlefield and thecommander says, “go” and you are two secondslate, it might cost people their life. Other soldiersmight die; you might lose the entire war becauseof one soldier. Discipline is everything to an army.Sulayman alayhi salaam is the leader of an army.So he does show anger. ھ [ بن ]شدیدا عذابا ألعذ (An-naml, 27: 21)

“ I’m gona punish that bird, I’m gona come at it ifit’s late. Where, why don’t I see it?” What is hedoing that for? Not because of arrogance, becausehe wants to make sure nobody else thinks aboutbeing late. And you guys have responsibility. Nowthe bird does show up late and he needs t hear anexplanation. “ What were you doing?” and one ofthe words, I wont give you the entire dialogue, butI wana just highlight some things from thisincredible dialogue. The bird shows upSubhanAllah, and it says ]بھ تحط لم بماأحطت [ (An-naml, 27: 22) Ihave come across knowledge that you don’t have”.The bird says to Sulayman alayhi salaam “I knowsome thing, you don’t know”. “Actually you’re,before you get mad at me let me tell you, you don’teven know what’s going on” and talk about, thisbird is gona be delicious lunch, you know, likethere is no… , this, this bird is talking back, itschirping back at Sulayman alayhi salaam andsaying “ hold on a second before you get mad, Igot something you don’t even know”. Now you tellme, the general of an army that has humansoldiers, that has animal soldiers, that has jinnsoldiers, that gather all of that intelligence andreport back to him and one bird is late and thisbird is speaking to him in front of who?Everybody. Everybody. The bird is speaking back

to him and says I know something you don’t know.You want me to tell you? subhanAllah. And youknow, does your employee talk back to you likethat? What do you do? Your child talks back to you“ dad I know something you don’t know. Let metell you, you don’t even know what’s going on” “Ohreally? I don’t know what’s going on. Come herelet me teach you a lesson first, let me tell youwhat’s going on first and then we’ll talk later.”Who is going to talk to an authority like that? Whois gona talk to a judge like that? For judge, the guywho is standing on trial says, “ By the way youdon’t know everything, let me tell you what’sgoing on”. The judge is gona throw you out of thegates, he’s gona throw you in jail for disrespectingthe position. You know, and Sulayman Alayhisalaam isn’t just a king, isn’t just a khalifa, he is aprophet. So you’re apparently disrespecting aprophet. What’s his reaction gona be? What’s hegona say?He said “ let’s see, lets see what you have to say.

Maybe you are telling the truth. Maybe you’re not.I don’t know but I’m not gona punish you yet. Letme find out” and it turns out it was telling thetruth so we see no more angry language towardsthe bird, its gone. The anger was why are you late.It’s a legitimate anger. He is supposed to have that

anger because he is a disciplinary. But when thebird talks back, he says “ lets just see, lets verifyyour story ‘coz you know somebody who comeslate may have a lame excuse. So, you know inIslam we give benefit of the doubt right? We givebenefit of the doubt but not when you’re inauthority. When you’re in authority, you aresupposed to verify. That’s part of theorganizational principles of a, that’s why you haveto have excuses when children miss school orcome late they have to have a slip, they have tohave some doctor’s note or some thing. Even inIslamic school the kid can’t say “hey teacher this isan Islamic school حسن الظن a personal one. I don’thave a doctor’s note. No, no, no, no, no, it doesn’twork like that. Our personal dealings aresomething else, organizational principals aresomething else. We are learning both of them fromSulayman alayhi salaam. That’s on the one hand.That’s on the one hand. And this is something verypowerful. It’s proof of taqwa. What your reactionis going to be when you hear things from peoplethat are beneath you. That are, that you don’tthink are at your level and they say something toyou that is news to you, you didn’t know. I meanthey said it in front of everybody. Makes it feel likethey undermine your authority. “How dare you

speak to me this way?” but we have to maintainour composure. So it’s an incredible balancebetween, coz you know if you’re just too humble,then you can’t run an organization. But if you aretoo arrogant then you cant run an organization.You are not gona have a following that loves youand follows you.

Now the rasul of Allah, صلی هللا علیہ وآلیہ وسلم quick,quick example, even the entire khutbah couldhave been about RasulAllah himself SAW, when itcomes to this issue. RasuAllah SAW is talking to aleader of Quraysh and a blind sahabi صحابي showsup. You know the story. And the blind sahabishows up Abdullah ibn maqtum ,عبد هللا بن أم مكتوم andhe interrupts the prophet صلی هللا علیہ وآلیہ وسلم . now heIs blind but he is not deaf. Which means he, and bythe way blind people have extra sensitive hearing.So when he walked up to the rasul of Allah صلی هللا

علیہ وآلیہ وسلم he very well knew there’s aconversation going on. He knew that, RA رضي هللا ھعن . He knew. And he knew that he is interrupting

a conversation. So from the story we already knowthat the rasul of Allah صلی هللا علیہ وآلیہ وسلم is not atfault, it is the person who interrupts theconversation, they are at fault. They are beingrude. I am talking to somebody, somebody justjumps in the middle and starts talking to them and

ignores me completely it’s rude. It’s notacceptable. But the rasul of Allah صلی هللا علیہ وآلیہ وسلم

could have told the sahabi “ listen I am in aconversation right, and he could have told himsoftly, I am in a conversation right now, just wait,just give me a minute, I’ll get to you in a secondand I’ll give you all the time you need. Let mefinish this one conversation”. The rasul could havedone that لیہ وآلیہ وسلمصلی هللا ع but he refused to dothat. Because he thought that might be too harsh.That might be too mean. Abdullah ibn maqtummight get really sad if I say even nicely to him “justwait”, he might think “I’m not that important”. Theprophet told me to wait, I cant believe, I must havemade him, I must have offended the rasul صلی هللا علیہ

.وآلیہ وسلم All these feelings are gona go in Abdullah’shead so he says I’m not even gona say anything.But he is frustrated because he is trying to talk tosomeone and he keeps getting interrupted. So theforehead bulged like this, like the bulges on theforehead just a little bit of a bulge that is justcalled عبس in Arabic. And his face turned a littlelike this, when you get frustrated, your face justturns a little bit. Like, not even a sound, just afrown, and a little turning of the face. And the ayatcame down ])1(وتولىعبس [ ( ‘Abasa, 80: 1) “he frowned andhe turned away ])2(أن جاءه األعمى[ ( ‘Abasa, 80: 2) that the

blind one came to him كى[ ])3(وما یدریك لعلھ یز

(‘Abasa, 80: 3)what – do you have? He might wanacleanse himself. What is Allah doing? Allah isteaching the messenger of Allah صلی هللا علیہ وآلیہ وسلم

that he has to be, even though he is so humble andso courteous; he has to hold up to even a higherstandard of humility. And if he has to hold up tothat, where do you and I stand? He, rasul صلی هللا علیہ

وآلیہ وسلم has a right to teach the sahabi discipline.He has that right. But Allah teaches him humilityinstead. Subhanau wa tala. And the other thingyou have to wonder is the sahabi is blind. So howwill he know that the prophet frowned? How willhe know that the prophet turned his face a littlebit? He won’t know. There’s no way for the sahabito feel that even. He can’t even see it. It’s not likethe prophet made a sound. لھ أفو لم یقل “uff” youknow. ه لم یتأو He didn’t say “ahh”. Nothing. He justfrowned. And even then Allah said “No, you needto be even more humble to the blind sahabi” andAllah didn’t call it ,جاءه أعمى he says ]جاءه األعمى[ ( ‘Abasa,

80: 2), فھ سبحانھ و تعالىالم التعری ف فعر . Allah az zawwjalmade him known” that person is important, hegets a lam, that the blind one came, you know.And by the way the leader, maybe no body knowsthis blind guy, but the leader of Quraysh,everybody knows, a famous person. Allah says

ا من استغنى[ ]أم ( ‘Abasa, 80: 5) not even الذي استغنى , من استغنى . The other guy who thinks he doesn’t needthis message, he doesn’t even dignify him inmaking him proper. He is like, indefinite,unknown. Whoever he was, who thinks he is a bigdeal. SubhanAllah. This is Allah az zawwjalteaching humility even to the rasul علیھم السالم andthis is in the most casual dealing. This is such ajust a small gesture. Just showing frustration andturning your face, and this is recorded in theQuran for a reason. I wanted to highlight the storyof Sulayman alayhi salaam to you on the one handand on the other hand the opposite I wanted tohighlight to you, because it’s the same subject. It’sbeing completed in the next surah, in surat-ul-Qasas. At the end of surat-ul-Qasas, we read aboutQaruun .قارون Qaruun who is a very wealthy manat the time of bani Israel, living under the rule offiraun and he was basically a snitch. He used tosnitch on the Israelites to the Egyptians and thegovernment used to pay him a lot of money, for allthe Israelites were bankrupt, they were all slavesand he is the only one that’s got like brand namehorse, he’s got big old cars like, he is the only richguy in the poor neighborhood. He is the only richguy. And Allah az zawwjal, look at the other sideon the one hand a bird is telling a rasul, a nabi, and

telling a nabi “ I know something you don’t know”and on the other hand this guy who is completelyignorant of the deen and is arrogant; he says

ما[ ]عنديعلم علىأوتیتھ إن (Al Qasas, 28: 78) “ I got all thiswealth because of knowledge that I have. I am apretty good expert. I am pretty smart. I am prettygood at business. I have a pretty impressiveresume, that’s why I have my job. I am a prettylean mean investor that’s why my business is sosuccessful, that’s why I have opened up five shopsand the sixth one is coming up. That’s why I saveda million dollars in a year. ‘coz I’m pretty smart.He said that. Now that’s offensive enough. That’soffensive enough but Allah az zawwjal takes it astep further and I just wanted to highlight how HeSubhanau ta’ala does that. How He puts people intheir place and the punishment usually that Allahdescribes in the Quran. In the Quran Allah usuallydoes not describe punishments for individualpeople. Allah usually, in this dunia in any way;that’s not the case. Usually Allah describespunishment for entire nations. Entire nations aredrowned, entire nations suffer an earthquake,entire nations get hurricanes and tornadoes,entire nations get fire raining from the sky, that’sentire nations. But this guy’s attitude was so bad,he was so bad and Allah describes what made it so

bad ]زینتھ في قومھ علىفخرج [ (Al Qasas, 28: 79) “he came out intohis people, he came to hang out to drive his carthrough the neighborhood, through the village,back in the day his horse, decked out, like if hecould put rims on his horse he would have, is whatI’m saying. You know he is blasting the stereosystem and he’s gona slow the car down, makesure everybody takes a good look, roll down thetints you know, that’s what he is doing and Allahsays, and he was definitely purposely doing that ina neighborhood where he knows everybody ispoor and Allah is so angry at him. ]األرض وبداره بھ فخسفنا[

(Al Qasas, 28: 81) Allah buried him into the ground alongwith his house, ‘coz his house was nice, his housewas nice, he used to be really proud of his house.Right? Now we learn one thing he said, “I know Ialready know bro. I don’t need to know. I alreadygot all the knowledge I need to be successful. Nowthat is his attitude. That attitude was offensive toAllah and second on top of that, when he, the wayhe exposed himself in the society the way he dealtwith people in the society, even if he didn’t openhis mouth, he made people feel like they don’thave anything and he has everything. He liked todo showy things. He liked to be a show off. Heliked to flaunt his money. You know. When heliked doing that Allah az zawjjal taught him a

lesson in this world. He buried him into theground. The same people the day before, that said“ oh I only wish I had what ما أوتي قارون Qaruun” “If Iwas given, if only I was given what Qaruun wasgiven, man I wish I had a house like that. That’snice. You ever do that? Drive by a nice house andwow that is nice” and even if you don’t say it inyour mind you go “I wish I had a house like that.That’s, that’s beautiful. Look at that driveway. Ohmy God, look at that finish. That’s their backyard!Oh that’s cray- that’s a sick house man and youjust get overwhelmed by the beauty of the house,people used to say that about his place, about hisride, about his money, about his car you can saynowadays. But the next day when people aredriving by that house, you ever drive by a housethat’s been hit by a tornado? By a hurricane? By anearthquake? And people look at that and they arelike “oh neighborhood”, so all the homes areintact, one went down. Tornado touched that onehouse; earthquake came to one house in theneighborhood. People are like “oh we’re so luckythat didn’t happen to us, we got saved. That was aclose one. Thank God what happened to him didn’thappen to us. The same sura, same people. Theyare looking at that and say “Oh my God, thank GodI didn’t live in that house. Thank God I didn’t go

over to his house that day. Look at what happenedto it. Allah taught him and the people around hima lesson. This is at the end of surat ul qasas, I urgeyou to read the ayaat yourself. But the thing Iwanted to leave you with as we enter these lastten days of Ramadan, as we enter this beautifultime; I want yourself, and myself to rememberthat we have to try to get closer and closer to Allahbut getting closer to Allah also means that ourattitudes towards people have to be different. Theway we lose our temper has to change, the way wetalk back to people, the way we look at people hasto change. You know. The way we, if we sayhurtful things we have to try to stop ourselves. Wehave to become more conscious of that and all ofus have improvements to do. I am not above youin that and my employs will testify to that. Youknow, there’s a lot of improvement needed. All ofus. All around, this is a reminder for myself firstbefore it is to any of you. But this is importantfolks, this is really really important. And it extendseven to those of you that have friends. A lot ofguys, I see a lot of young guys here. When youhave friends and you hang out with each other,you hurt the other friend’s feelings, or two, three,four of you gang up on one and you really take himto town. I’m guilty of that quite often myself. Make

sure that you square things away with yourfriends. Jokes aside if they have something in theirheart and they’re holding it against you and theynever told you coz they didn’t want to make thesituation intense. Believe me on Judgment daythey will open their mouth and say “yea I washolding back but right now I need your gooddeeds; you used to make fun of me, used to call mefatty or shorty, used to call me stupid and I used tolaugh at that time but I was actually reallyinsulted. So I’m just gona take all that, you knowyou caught layla –tul- qadr, that Ramadan, I’ll takethe credit for that because when you, your gooddeeds will be given to those you offended. They’lljust take them away. So don’t let your friends robyou on judgment day. Fix that today. Fix that now.This is the time to make the calls to people thatyou have been mean to. This is the time to go benicer to people that you haven’t been nice to. Thisis the time to forgive people that you haven’t beenable to forgive. To let your temper go. Toapologize, it takes a lot of humility to apologizeand you have to put yourself down when you haveto apologize. But when you recognize Allah’spower then you feel weak enough and it’s easierfor you to apologize. When you’re not conscious ofAllah its gona be hard to apologize. May Allah az

zawwjal make us truly a people of taqwa andmake us of those who are good to each other andsay good words to each other and may Allah azzawwjal soften our hearts so that we can giveforgiveness to others and others can giveforgiveness to us.

لقرآن الحكیم و نفعني و إیاكم باآلیات و الذكر بارك هللا لي و لكم في االحكیم.