Gems from the Miracles and Manners of Jesus (as) | Khutbah
What do the miracles of Jesus, or Isa (as) indicate? What of his manners can we benefit from today?
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Dear brothers and sisters, obviously, as Sheikh Yassir Burjas had mentioned, you know, a few weeks ago when we did the Wednesday conversations, as the environment around us is an environment of a holiday, that obviously explains the large number of kids in the masjid today, alhamdulillah, that it's an opportunity for us to have discussions. And obviously, when it's Christmas season, there are multiple layers of that discussion. One layer of that discussion is to look at the origins of a holiday, right, and to see where it actually rises from. Another layer of that discussion is how do Muslims reconcile not celebrating Christmas with their professed love for Isa, peace be upon him. And then of course, the discussions about how Muslims can maintain their identity while still being friendly and good and kind to their neighbors, while still preserving their own religion, their own identity. And the conversations that start to arise about, well, what does Isa, peace be upon him, mean to you? You don't celebrate Christmas. You can explain that historically, logically. You can sort of, you know, go through the different reasons. But what is your version of Christ? What is your love of Jesus, peace be upon him? And how do you reconcile your belief in him and not attribute certain things to him? And so in the spirit of these conversations that we have with our co-workers and our friends and our neighbors, it's important for us to talk about who Isa, peace be upon him, is to us and who Isa, peace be upon him, in fact, was in his own words and what the miracles of Isa, peace be upon him are, that getting through the holiday, the commercialization of a holiday and everything in between to the man himself and to what his mission actually was.
Now for this khutbah, I want to focus on something very specific, which is his miracles and then his manners, with some emphasis on the second one, especially for Muslims, because neither of those two things are random. His miracles are not random. And he is a prophet, peace be upon him, with many miracles. A prophet who Allah speaks about his miracles in great detail. Some miracles found in the Quran and in the Sunnah of the Prophet, peace be upon him, that are not even found in Christian literature, right, or at least in the Bible and as it exists today, the interpretations and extrapolations of the Bible, right, these miracles that are upheld. But then the second part of that, his manners and some of the ways that the Prophet, peace be upon him, conveyed that to us and what that means for us. And so in that spirit, obviously, Islam does not see that the existence of such incredible miracles is a sign of a man who was divine himself. So his miracles are not a proof of divinity, but they are proof of divine mission. And his manners, just like the other prophets, when Allah gives us a window into the manners and into the character of the prophets that came before, they're not merely to be admired, but to be absorbed, to be lived in our own lives so that we can draw from the wisdom of Isa, peace be upon him, this noble and mighty prophet that the Prophet, peace be upon him, said that there is no person who is closer to Jesus, the son of Mary, peace be upon him, because there is no prophet between he and I. A prophet who is mentioned in the Quran over 25 times. A prophet that some of you are named after. And subhanAllah, if we look around the Muslim world, you find the name Isa present throughout the Muslim world out of love and out of reverence for this man, peace be upon him.
And it starts with the miracle of his birth. And obviously, Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala, explains that while we uphold the miracle of Isa, peace be upon him, being born to his pure mother, a virgin Mary, peace be upon her, who was mentioned her own right, has an entire surah named after her, that the very first words that came out of the mouth of this man when he was a baby in the cradle were, I am the servant of Allah. And there's of course in that a testimony of tawheed, of monotheism and upholding monotheism, but also honoring his mother and immediately clearing his mother's name from the accusations that will come towards her, peace be upon her, when people accuse her of different things, that Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala, allows the baby to speak immediately from the cradle and say, inni abdullah. And that is actually a form of honoring him. That is actually a form of upholding his honor as Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala, says, لن يستنكف المسيح وأن يكون عبداً لله ولا الملائكة المقربون. That Isa, alayhi salam, is not too proud to be a servant of Allah and not even the closest of the angels to Allah. They see it as a form of honor and it is indeed a form of honor to be abdullah. The Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, of course, taught us to say what? To say, أشهد أن محمد عبده ورسوله. Do not just say he is the messenger of Allah, but rather say about me, أشهد أن محمد عبده ورسوله. Testify that Muhammad, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, is the servant and the messenger of Allah. Because when Allah takes you as a abd and you have a rab and you have a lord and a sustainer that is who he is, then that is a form of honoring and elevating the person.
And so Isa, alayhi salam, immediately says, إني عبد الله. Hence his first miracle is documented in the Quran as such. And then you find the verse in surat Ali Imran, وَرَسُولًا إِلَىٰ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلٍ أَنِّي قَدْ جِئْتُكُمْ بِآيَةٍ مِّنْ رَبِّكُمْ أَنِّي أَخْلُقُ لَكُمْ مِّنَ الطِّينِ كَهِيَةِ طَيْرِي فَأَنْفُخُ فِيهِ فَيَكُونُ طَيْرًا بِإِذْنِ اللَّهِ And a messenger to the children of Israel, Indeed, I will have come to you with a sign from your Lord, that I design for you from clay that which is like the form of a bird, and then I breathe into it and it becomes a bird by the permission of Allah. Know by the way that in mainstream Christianity, as it exists today, the first miracle of birth and speaking from the cradle as well as this fashioning of a bird from clay is not something that's actually upheld, which subhanAllah shows you another form of honoring Isa a.s. And then Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala continues with the words of Isa a.s. in this regard and he says, وَأُبْرِئُوا الْأَكْمَهَا وَالْأَبْرَصَ وَأُحْيِيَ الْمَوْتَى بِإِذْنِ اللَّهِ And he said that, I cure the blind and the leper and I give life to the dead by the permission of Allah. وَأُنَبِئُكُمْ بِمَا تَأْكُلُونَ وَمَا تَدَّخِرُونَ فِي بِيُوتِكُمْ And I inform you about that which you eat and you store in your homes and in that is a sign from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala so that you may believe. So Isa a.s. mentions these miracles in every single time by the permission of Allah, by the permission of Allah, by the permission of Allah. Now these miracles are not random and there's something special about each and every single one of them that I want to go into for a moment. Number one, the scholars mentioned that Isa a.s. is the last prophet to Bani Israel.
And hence the miracles that were given to him were plentiful and comprehensive and so undeniable. As this is a proof for or against the people as their prophet highlights things for them. And so Isa a.s. is given all of these different types of miracles, miracles that are not necessarily unique to him. But in fact with Bani Israel you find prophets of the past that had similar miracles. So for example the prophet Elijah in the Bible raised hundreds from the dead. He raised entire nations of people from the dead. He healed the blind, he called for rain and it came. He stopped it all by the permission of Allah, brings fire from the sky. These are things that we find from the prophets of Bani Israel in regards to their miracles. And so it's not a sign of his divinity but rather it's actually something that you find with the prophets of Bani Israel that Allah gave them great miracles. Because Bani Israel was a nation of ajaab. They were a nation in which things appeared before them in certain ways and the prophet Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam mentioned some of those things to us. Now why a bird from clay? You start from that. Some of the scholars mentioned that of course as Isa alayhi sallam is coming to these people, his main audience is Bani Israel. But at that time you also have the Roman presence in Jerusalem. And as the Roman presence is now prominent in Jerusalem you start to have sculptures that are prominent. And Roman sculptures that are placed strategically by Herod around the city of Al-Quds. And of course we know that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala would challenge such people to say create on the day of judgment and they would not be able to create. And so Allah azzawajal gives a miracle to all of the people in that sense. That a bird is given life only by the permission of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
And then, I cure the blind. Now the more common word for the blind is actually someone who is a'ma. A'ma is someone who went blind later on in life. Okay. Here you're talking about a person who is actually born blind and known their entire lives to not be able to see. Why is that important? Because there was a lot of trickery that was carried out by those who claim to be healers in the time of Isa alayhi sallam. Right. It was commonplace that someone would pretend that he was blind. He'd walk up to the person and this person would heal his eyesight in front of the people and then people would throw money at him so that he could do the same for them. They'd go and they'd bring their blind so that he could do the same for them. So subhanAllah as a hujjah, as a proof against the people, Ubre'u al-akmaha, the one who was born blind and not known as anything but blind. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala made it so that Isa alayhi sallam would rub their eyes and they would suddenly be able to see. And the leper and leprosy was very common in the time of Isa alayhi sallam. Also a form of healing. And these people that would pretend to heal always had immediately after their fake healing a demand for money. We healed you now pay up. Throw us your gold. Throw us your silver. And so the problem is their attachment to dunya, their attachment to this world is causing them to cheat. And this was another way in which religion had become a product by which you could exploit the people. Similar to Quraysh in Mecca. They didn't care about these idols. They cared about the money that the idols gave them and the power and the authority that the idols gave them. So you had these people claiming to be able to heal and they immediately consumed the money from the people. Wa uhyy al-mawta, give life to the dead.
And this is perhaps where it becomes very interesting that Isa alayhi sallam, just like other prophets from Bani Israel, a few of them was given this ability to raise someone who had passed away. Now what they would do is, of course, they had a scheme here too. The scam was that someone would pretend to be dead and that at their funeral, the healer would come and he touched this person that suddenly died, right, or that died yesterday, and the person rises. That's a heavier price. Look at the menu board, curing leprosy, blindness, cure the person who died, bring them back to life. So Isa alayhi sallam, Allah gave him a miracle that was more decisive than that. Where he could raise people that had died some time ago and they even said to him, they said, innaka tuhyi man kana mawtu qareeb. You only bring life to those that died recently. Because that was their scam. They knew their con. They knew how they were scamming the people. So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala makes it so that Isa alayhi sallam could go to the grave of a person who died hundreds of years ago and say, Bismillah, and raise that person from the dead. An amazing miracle, subhanAllah, similar to when you say Musa alayhi sallam, the miracle Allah gave Musa alayhi sallam against the sorcerers of Pharaoh. The first people to recognize that this was truth was those who used to work the sorcery. That this is different. This is not the same. Just like the poets of Arabia were the first to recognize the miracle of the Quran, the healers at the time of Isa alayhi sallam were the first to recognize the miracle that was given to Isa alayhi sallam. After all of this, what did they say to him? Qalu hadha sihrun mubeen. Those healers, they said, no, no, this is just sorcery. He's just playing with people's eyes at this point. They still insisted on their disbelief.
And the last miracle, wa anabbi'ukum bima ta'kooruna wa ma taddakhiruna fee buyootikum. This was scary to Bani Israel. I tell you what you store in your homes. This is scary to them because of the corruption that exists in the midst of them. Right? And you think about what that means for Isa alayhi sallam. Wa anabbi'ukum bima ta'kooruna wa ma taddakhiruna fee buyootikum. That I inform you about that which you eat and that which you store in your homes. And so the miracles of Isa alayhi sallam, each one of them fit a particular goal and a particular hujjah, a particular proof. And all of them speak to the power of the one that sent him and sent the prophets before and sent the prophets alayhi sallam after him. And even his return alayhi sallam, the return of Isa alayhi sallam. All of it, every miracle that he comes with is one that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala unlocks great proofs and great blessings for the people through his return. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala send his peace and blessings upon him. Now when it comes to his manners, and this is something that's not as well known in terms of hadith literature from the prophets alayhi sallam describing the manners of Isa alayhi sallam. Isa alayhi sallam was an anti-dunya prophet. He was a zahid. He was an ascetic. That is the description of Isa alayhi sallam. One narration the prophets alayhi sallam called Abu Dharr radiyaAllahu anhu shibhi Isa ibn Maryam, the one who resembles Isa alayhi sallam. Because Isa is an ascetic. So when you read about his wisdom, when you read his beautiful words, however they come to us, whether it's a hadith of the prophets alayhi sallam or narrations from the pious predecessors or narrations that made their way into the book that do not undermine the thrust of his mission. They're all about the preference of the akhira to this dunya, the preference of the hereafter to this world.
Why? Because Isa alayhi sallam said to those who had manipulated the text, جَعَلْتُمُ الدُّنْيَا فَوْقَ رُؤُسِكُمْ وَالْآخِرَةَ تَحْتَ أَقْدَامِكُمْ You place the world over your head and you place the hereafter under your feet. Your addiction to dunya, to the material world, has caused you to abandon even the most sacred of revelation and to use it to hurt and to harm and to exploit. And so with Isa alayhi sallam, you find this to be a common theme in his descriptions. As he teaches the people zuhd, asceticism, and not to attach themselves to this dunya too much. Now when it comes to his manners, remember one of the miracles that Allah mentions? That he was able to tell people what they had in their homes. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam says in a hadith in Sahih al-Bukhari, from Abu Huraira radiyaAllahu ta'ala anhu, قَالَ عَلَيْهِ السَّلَاةُ وَالسَّلَامُ رَأَى عِيسَى ابْنُ مَرْيَمَ رَجُلًا يَسْلِقُ Isa alayhi sallam saw a man in front of him stealing. فَقَالَ لَهُ أَسَرَقْتَ So he said to him, did you steal? And the man said, كَلَّا وَاللَّهُ He said, no, by Allah. الَّذِي لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا هُوَ I swear by Allah, by the one by whom there is no God but Him. I did not steal. Isa alayhi sallam was given the ability to know what people were storing in their homes at times. What did the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam say that Isa alayhi sallam said? قَالَ عِيسَى آمَنْتُ بِاللَّهِ وَكَذَّبْتُ عَيْنِي He said, I believe in Allah and I will consider my vision, my eyesight to not be truthful in this regard. What is this a lesson of? His حِسْنَ ظَنْ The good assumptions that he had of people. You know, imagine the miracle that has been given to him. And in this regard, Isa alayhi sallam is teaching what? Do not let your eyes fall on the عيوب, on the faults of people.
Because if you let it constantly navigate the faults and the flaws of people, your heart will harden, you'll become ignorant of yourself and arrogant as well. The fact that even this Prophet of Allah is teaching us this. Before a world of social media, do not let your eye wander towards the faults and the flaws of people. Whether it's virtually or in front of you. Instead, purify your heart and look to the world with a different type of vision. That's one of the manners that we learned from Isa alayhi sallam. In another authentic hadith, Isa alayhi sallam was walking and he saw a pig. فقال له أنفذ بسلام. He said, go in peace. So someone said to him, Do you say to the pig, go in peace? So what did he respond? قال إني أخاف أن أعود لساني النطق بالسوء. He said, I'm afraid to make my tongue or accustom my tongue to speaking ill, to speaking bad words. This Prophet of Allah is trying to protect his eyes and protect his tongue. Two major lessons that we can learn from him alayhi sallam that are conveyed to us by the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam in this regard. And it tells us something about him. And it tells us something about not letting a superiority or a perceived superiority cause you to belittle and to harm. And to use the faculties that Allah gave you. This man, who Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave power to raise a dead person to life and to heal, is worried about how he's using his tongue in his eyes. So what about us? What about us with our vision and with our speech and ensuring that we use it only in ways that are righteous? And there are multiple narrations subhanAllah. I'll end with this one. This is not a hadith of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam to be clear. It's one of the things that comes to us.
And as the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam mentioned, that when we come across the narrations of Bani Israel, we affirm what is agreeable, but without a sense of certainty. We take the benefit of it and we deny what undermines the very essence of the mission of monotheism and prophethood. That Isa alayhi sallam was once asked, how are you able to walk on water? You know, all these miracles that you do, how are you able to do all of these things? And Isa alayhi sallam responded, qala bil yaqeen. He said with yaqeen, with certainty. And the Hawariyoon, the disciples responded and said, we also have it. And he said to them, are stone, clay and gold equal in your eyes? Do you see stone, gold and clay? In the same way? And they said, no. He said, they are in mine. Hubb al-dunya, the love of this world, ra'sa kulli khatiyah, is the root cause of every disobedience and every distraction and every delusion. Isa alayhi sallam is teaching us manners and he's teaching us as well, that while these miracles are given as a gift from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, there is a righteous vessel that encompasses those miracles. And that when it came to this dunya, dunya in the eyes of Isa alayhi sallam, the material world in the eyes of Isa alayhi sallam, was not anything that could possibly taint or corrupt. So we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to send his peace and blessings upon all of the messengers and prophets of Allah. We ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to allow us to follow in the footsteps of the prophets and the messengers and the martyrs and the truthful ones and the righteous ones. And we ask Allah to allow them to be our companions in the highest level of Jannat al-Firdaws. Allahumma ameen.
I say to you, and I seek refuge with Allah from the accursed Satan, that you may receive the message of the Muslims. So ask forgiveness. Indeed, He is the Forgiving, the Merciful. Alhamdulillah, salatu wassalamu ala rasulullah wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa man wala. Allahumma khfuru al mu'minin wa al mu'minat wa al muslimin wa al muslimat, al ahya'i minhum wa al amwat. Innaka sami'un qareebun mujeebu al da'wat. Allahumma khfuru lana wa arhamna. Wa a'fu a'na wa la tu'adhibna. Rabbana dhalamna anfusana wa in lam takhfur lana wa tarhamna. La nakunana min al khasireen. Allahumma innaka a'fuun kareemun tuhibbu al a'afu fa a'fu anna. Allahumma khfuru l walidina. Rabbir hamhuma kama rabbuna sigara. Rabbana hablana min azwajina wa dhuriyatina qurra ta'ayun. Wa ja'anna lil muttaqina imama. Allahumma nsul ikhwan al mustad'afina fi mashariq al ardi wa magharibiha. Allahumma ahlik al dhalimina bil dhalimin. Wa akhirijna wa ikhwanan min baynihim salimin. Ardhu allaha anna allaha ya'muru bil addi wal ihsan wa ita'i bil qurba wa yanha'a al fahsha'i wal munkari wal baghi. Ya'idhukum la'alakum tathakkaroon. Fathkuru allaha yathkurukum wa shkuruhu ala ni'ma'i yazid lakum. Wa la thikru allahi akbar. Wallahu ya'nul ma tasna'oon. Wa qeem al salam.
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