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Feeling Helpless While Watching Oppression | Khutbah
Dr Omar Suleiman revisits one of the most painful episodes of the Prophet ﷺ as we witness the painful torture of the people of Gaza. How do we deal with watching oppression and feeling helpless due to our inability to save our brothers and sisters?
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. We begin by praising Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and bearing witness that none has the right to be worshipped or unconditionally obeyed except for him. And we bear witness that Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam is his final messenger and we ask Allah to send his peace and blessings upon him, the prophets and messengers that came before him, his family and companions that served alongside him, and those that follow in his blessed path until the day of judgment. And we ask Allah to make us amongst them. Allahumma ameen. Dear brothers and sisters, imagine being in Mecca in the early days of Islam without any place of strength, any place where we could collectively come to worship, but the only open collection of Muslims that exists is a particular location on the outskirts of Mecca where your weakest and most vulnerable are gathered together on a regular basis where there is a display of torture taking place. One of the moments that I wanted to take us back to in the seerah of the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam as we've been talking about Badr and Uhud and Khandaq and so many of the lessons that took place after or that we learn after Medina was a very specific episode in the seerah of the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam which might be one of the most painful and obviously you read about painful episodes in the life of the prophet Muhammad peace and blessings be upon him and they all have their set of lessons. But this one stuck with me for a reason. The prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam was subjected to all sorts of harm. He was physically harmed. He was emotionally betrayed. They tried to psychologically torture the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam. He is rahmatan lil alameen. He's a mercy to the world.
You imagine as we sit and as we watch the images of the people of Gaza, the innocent children, women and men, elders and people of all backgrounds and we feel a great sense of helplessness and maybe we even cry a little bit more than we used to and that's with the little mercy that Allah has put in our hearts. Imagine rahmatan lil alameen, a mercy to the world, the most merciful human being that has ever walked the face of the earth walking around Mecca and seeing people tortured in front of him because they believe in him and not being able to do anything about it. And so I wanted to actually pull from this very particular episode. About five years into the revelation of the prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam where Abu Jahl who is the pharaoh of this ummah, the fir'aun of this ummah decided to escalate his aggression against the Muslims because he saw that despite all of the tactics that were being used to delegitimize the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam to call him names, to deter the Muslims, cutting them off from their families none of that was working and so he decided to take it to the next level and just like every pharaoh in every era, he did so by starting off with the most vulnerable of society. يُذَبِّحُونَ أَبْنَاءَكُمْ وَيَسْتَحِيُونَ نِسَاءَكُمْ They always target the children, they target the women, they target the downtrodden, they target those who are defenseless in society, they target those who they don't fear consequence from. And so Abu Jahl decides to put on this display and it's very interesting as Ibn Abbas sallallahu alayhi wasallam describes the scene that he heard of later on as he grew up, the experiences of the people that lived that moment. كان يُعَذِّبُونَهُمْ بِرَمْضَاءِ مَكَّةٍ There was an area of Banu Makhzum which was the tribe of Abu Jahl, the pharaoh of this ummah, the fir'aun of this ummah
where he used to take them to the outskirts of Mecca and he picked an area that had the hottest surface, no trees, nothing to protect the people from as he tortured them and he took a group of the early enslaved Muslims out there and decided to make an example out of them so that the Muslims in Mecca would walk by that area and they would see their brethren tied up, starved, prohibited from drinking any water and they were completely unable to physically intervene. So imagine living in Mecca and we talk about the pain of social media and watching this from afar, you walk by and there's an area where the people are tied up and being tortured regularly, you can hear their shouts and you can see them barely hanging on and you can't do anything about it. And our Prophet ﷺ did not used to ignore that group of Muslims. كان يمر بهم رسول الله ﷺ He used to actually go to them and all he had ﷺ was words. He couldn't physically intervene. The messenger of Allah was restrained and as he walks by and he sees the family of Yasir, Sumayya, the Abyssinian woman Yasir, her husband, and their son Ammar, he walks by them and Abu Jahl reserved his worst torture for them, his own slaves. And the Prophet ﷺ could only say to them, صبرًا آل ياسر موعدكم الجنة صبرًا آل ياسر موعدكم الجنة Be patient O family of Yasir. Paradise is promised for you.
I promise you paradise is around the corner. Be patient O family of Yasir. Paradise is promised. You have an appointment with Allah ﷻ. It's coming. صبرًا آل ياسر And he would go by them and Abu Jahl would increase the torture. He'd take it up a notch. When the Prophet ﷺ was around and inflict a greater sense of torture and at that point there had not yet been a casualty. There had not yet been a shaheed of Islam, someone who was actually taken to the point of death. But Sumayyah ﷺ would respond to the Prophet ﷺ saying that we will be patient Ya Rasulullah. We're not going to exchange our religion in the midst of this torture. And the Prophet ﷺ has to walk by that and the Muslims have to walk by that and you're either in it or you're walking by it. And Abu Jahl is gathering a larger group and increasing the torture. And there are many Sumayyahs and many Bilals. There are people whose names that we don't know and people whose names we get a glimpse of the torture that they faced and it was very similar to them but they're all being lined up. And there is an ayah in Qur'an that speaks about this. Sa'id ibn Jubair said, I asked Ibn Abbas ﷺ that those people when they used to torture that group of Muslims, when Abu Jahl was carrying this out on them, did they used to get anything out of them? Would they get them to say anything? And Ibn Abbas ﷺ, he says that what they used to do to them is that they would lay them out. And he said that they would hit them and strike them. And at the same time, they would starve them and they would prohibit them from water. So they would inflict on them,
al-ju' wa al-'atash, hunger, thirst. And Umar ibn al-Hakam, he says that particularly about Ammar ibn Yasir, qala kana Ammar ibn Yasir yu'adhdhab hatta la yadri ma yaqool. Ammar would be tortured until he wouldn't know what he was saying anymore. And so the torture that was inflicted on them would lead them to a point that they didn't even have words. They didn't even know what they were saying. And in that process, once they got them to a point where they couldn't even sit up straight anymore, Ibn Abbas ﷺ says, they were unable to even seat themselves. At that point, they would say to them, qul al-'at, qul al-'uzzah, say the names of your idols, al-'at, al-'uzzah. And one of them would say, as a person was shaking their face, al-'at, al-'uzzah. They would say the names of those idols in the midst of that torture. And Allah ﷻ revealed about those people, مَنْ كَفَرَ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ بَعْدِ إِيمَانِهِ إِلَّا مَنْ أُكْرِهَ وَقَلْبُهُ مُطْمَئِنٌ بِالإِيمَانِ That those who disbelieve after faith, except for those who spoke words of disbelief, but their hearts were filled with faith. They didn't mean it, but in the midst of all of that, they were forced to say things that their hearts did not agree with. One of them would be Ammar ibn Yasir رضي الله تعالى عنه himself, whose parents would be martyred. And in the midst of that torture, the severity of that torture, where he didn't even know what he was saying anymore, he said something. And he was so embarrassed from the Prophet ﷺ after that. And the Prophet ﷺ goes to him and he says, Ammar, what is it? What's wrong? And he tells the Prophet ﷺ that I said what I said, and I don't know how to reconcile with that. And the Prophet ﷺ, he says, was your heart at ease with faith? Was your heart at ease with faith? And Ammar رضي الله تعالى عنه says yes.
And the Prophet ﷺ says, So if they do it to you again, it's okay. Do it again. It's fine. You didn't do anything wrong. He has to actually walk him through the guilt of having supposedly crumbled in the midst of that torture that was being inflicted on him just because he was a Muslim. Now dear brothers and sisters, I can't think of a more fitting time, a more fitting moment for us to revisit this episode of the seerah when we're watching what we are seeing and we feel completely maqloob, completely overcome and unable to help our brothers and sisters. Imagine what it was like for your Prophet ﷺ. And you know the heart that he has. Every single time the Prophet ﷺ has to walk by, do you know what it was like on his heart to hear the crying of Sumayyah رضي الله عنه. Can you even imagine for a moment what it was like for him to hear her last shout knowing that she's the first martyr of Islam. It's not that he has any doubt about that. But hearing that woman as Abu Jahl inflicts the worst type of punishment and in his frustration because he can't get her to say anything bad about the Prophet ﷺ. He can't get her to renounce the faith. He takes that spear and he puts it through her midsection and the Prophet ﷺ has to hear her last shout. Imagine what it was like on his heart ﷺ. And I would say with certainty that it was more difficult on him than it is on us right now. He's seeing it. He's experiencing it. Muslims had to walk around for a whole decade in Mecca. After that with those that did that to their people. Imagine being Ammar walking around Mecca with the man who killed your parents for six years. Walking around and strutting with a sense of arrogance and a sense of victory
not feeling accountable to anyone. Plotting his next victims. What was it like for Ammar ibn Yasir رضي الله عنه? Six years to be able to do that and to not be able to physically intervene and do something to the one who did that to his parents. What was it like for Bilal رضي الله عنه? To have to walk around and see what he saw and know what he went through and not be able to do anything. And in the midst of all of that Allah ﷻ sends down these little things that let you know صبراً يا آل ياسر موعدكم الجنة Be patient O people of Islam your place is Jannah. As we watch our brothers and sisters in Gaza and we see these little clips sometimes in the midst of the gore sometimes in the midst of the people that are being pulled out from the rubble sometimes in the midst of the horror you see a scene and you go يا الله what a miracle. There was a woman that was being tortured next to Sumayya her name was Zinnira رضي الله عنها And Abu Jahl was nasty in his torture of her as well to the point that he beat her to blindness. And when he beat her to blindness you know sometimes Abu Jahl went a little too far and even his friends nudged him you know the way that the United States puts out a statement about Israel every once in a while they just nudge him and they say hey you went too far calm down settle down a bit when he beat the woman blind they told him settle down you went too far and he laughed and he said قَدْ أَعْمَتْهَا الْآلِهَا he said the idols made her blind I didn't do that to her اللَّةُ الْعُزَّةُ the gods made her blind and as she could barely speak while she's tied up to a stick she responds and she says
اللَّةُ الْعُزَّةُ لَيْسَ لَهُمَا قُوَّةٌ they have no power no power and Allah عز و جل gives her back her eyesight in the middle of that a miracle where she could see again and Abu Jahl said that's the sihr of Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم that's his magic his sorcery because in the middle of all of these things Allah sends these signs that even though it feels like these people are abandoned they're not abandoned صَبْرًا يَآلَ غَزَّةٌ مَوْعِدُكُمُ الْجَنَّةُ be patient O people of Gaza your place is paradise but then it comes back to us watching this feeling a sense of guilt feeling a sense of helplessness رَبِّ إِنِّي مَغْلُوبُ فَانْتَصِرْ and this is where we find that lesson in the prophets Ya Allah I'm overcome فَانْتَصِرْ and I beseech you for help I don't know what to do at this point know that your prophet he's been through that know that the prophets of old have been through that know that the companions have been through that but what's the silver lining of this all what comes out of this what after this you know what happens Abu Jahl made the mistake that every single pharaoh every single pharaoh ever makes that they think that with brute force they can break a people down they can break them down psychologically and if they increase the force they can ruin them and they can completely devastate them and what ended up happening is while Abu Jahl thought that he was breaking the people of Islam he was actually breaking his own image all along everything that he was trying to portray of himself as a man of generosity who cared about his people and who was doing this because he had to protect people all of that was going out the window
his own brothers his full brother became Muslims they were disgusted by him the people that he was trying to convince that he was protecting Mecca for saw him for what he really was and moved away from him and he lost his claim to any sort of morality or any sort of generosity or any sort of ideal that he claimed to stand for and the other slaves that watched that torture and weren't Muslim yet saw the strength of their brothers and sisters and they found something inside of them and the passerbys those that were passing by and watching Abu Jahl do this and the Muslims being tortured they saw that and if they weren't convinced as to which group was on truth and which group was on falsehood before that they certainly were convinced after that and so while he was trying to break the people of Islam he only broke his own image and it would be so decreed that one of those that he tortured would one day stand on his chest in the battle of Badr and Abu Jahl would ask him to whom does victory belong and he would say victory is to Allah and to his messengers O enemy of God it would be poetic that that's what would happen to him dear brothers and sisters as we're living in this time and we connect with our messenger Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam in that moment of pain and we feel that sense of helplessness there's something from the from the understanding that the mentioned the way the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam was talking to his own people that he didn't speak to them when he spoke to them in these difficult moments he spoke to them not with the license to do what they had to do to escape that torture but with a sense of Azimah with determination
there's Azimah and there's Rukhsah there's determination and then there is the license the excuse to remove yourself from that harm and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam always spoke to his community with Azimah spoke to them with determination and instilled in them that courage to move forward and when you had the situations where some people needed to be excused the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam excused them and he didn't make them feel bad so if you see some old woman being pulled out of her home in the West Bank and she shouts out a few statements saying I support Israel because she's about to go to jail in front of her kids for a year she has that Rukhsah she's our sister but we speak with Azimah we speak with determination the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam spoke to his community and told them to aim for something higher and so when the people of Gaza speak what are you hearing you're hearing Azimah determination in the midst of it all a refusal to be broken a refusal to be broken psychologically a refusal to succumb to that type of oppression then it comes back to us what are we witnessing happening right now dear brothers and sisters what we're witnessing is that anyone with half a heart and half a brain can see Israel for what it is right now can see the genocide for what it is right now despite all of the blinders despite everything that's been put in the way anyone with half a heart and half a brain can see this for what it is at this point so what does that mean that just like Abu Jahl made the mistake in thinking that if he increased the brutality he could suppress the voices that would call him out and challenge him he could suppress the resistance to his torture the same thing is happening insha'Allah ta'ala around the world where this pharaoh is increasing the brutality has no shame anymore in bombing hospitals
and schools doesn't even bother to deny it anymore and it's up to us as we're watching that to first and foremost take comfort that better than us the messenger once had to walk that path and he wasn't watching it on his screen he was watching it right in front of him and it was hard on his heart it was hard on his heart when Fatima had to come and take the guts off of his back when he was tortured when he himself was persecuted his own daughter in front of him crying cleaning up the guts from his back and he's shivering because of everything that was put on him he tells his daughter don't cry Allah is going to support your father you can imagine how difficult it was for him what we're in right now is not more difficult than that but the silver lining in this all and there are some that we can see and some that we can't see is that through this things will change through this things will change and insha'Allah ta'ala we're witnessing a shift even if we can't see it right now because when Abu Jahl did what he did to the early Muslims it was the shift in Islam it was a shift in Islam and right now this is a shift by Allah ta'ala and I want to end with this because it is something that we have to also take a step back and realize all of us all of us have had our priorities shift over the last month people's hearts have come towards this faith people that were already Muslim have found a reconnection and there are people that are witnessing this and saying I cannot understand how much faith these people have and how they're able to endure what they endure and still say what they say what is it that they have and you have people that are looking into this religion for the very first time today we have at least three people accepting Islam after
Salatul Jumu'ah if you are here and you're thinking about it be the fourth and the fifth but around the world we're seeing this where people are looking at that and saying these people are a miracle because in the midst of them we see the Zunirahs radiallahu ta'ala anha where a little miracle shows and if anything the collective miracle is the existence of the people of Gaza and we ask Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala that as we feel helpless watching them that we renew our intentions and that Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala guide us to the ways that we can tangibly help them while understanding when we cannot help them that Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala sees them and that Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala's help and victory is near. Allahuma ameen. Aqoolu qawli hadha washtagfirullah wa aliakum wa nisa' al muslimeen fa ishtaghfiru wa innahu alghafoor wa raheem. Alhamdulillah, salat wa salamu ala rasool Allah wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa man walah. Allahuma ghfirlil mu'mineen wa al mu'minat wa al muslimin wa al muslimat. Al-ahya'i minhum wa al amwat. Innaka samee'un qareebun wajeeb wa da'wat. Allahuma ghfirlana wa rahamna. Wa'afu anna wa la tu'adhibna. Rabbana dhalamna anfusana wa in lam takfir lana wa tarhamna. Lanakoonnana minal khasireen. Rabbana afriq alayna sabran wa thabbit aqdamana wa ansurna ala alqawm alkaafireen. Rabbana thabbit aqdamahum. Rabbana afriq alayhim sabran wa thabbit aqdamahum. Wa ansurhum ala alqawm alkaafireen. Allahuma innaka afuun. Tuhibbu al'afwa fa'afu anna. Allahuma ghfirli walideena. Rabbir hamhuma kam rabbuna sighara. Rabbana hablana min azwajina wa dhurriyatina qurra ta'ayun. Wa ja'anna lilmultaqina imama. Allahumma ansur ikhwan al-mustad'afina fi filastin. Allahumma ansur ikhwan al-mustad'afina fi filastin. Allahumma ansur ikhwan al-mustad'afina fi filastin. Wa fi kulli makan ya azizu ya jabbar. Allahumma alayka bi aduwika wa aduwihim. Allahumma ahlik al-dhalimina bil-dhalimin. Wa akhrijna wa ikhwanna min baynim salimin.
Ibadullah anna Allah ya'umru bil-adli wal-ihsan wa ita'idil-qurba. Wa yanha'a al-fahsha'i wa al-munkari wa al-baghi. Ya'idhukum la'allakum tathakkaroon. Fathkurullahi yathkurukum. Washkuruhu a'ala al-ni'ma yazid lakum. Wala dhikrullahi akbar. Wallahu ya'mu ma tasna'oon. Wa aqeem as-salah.
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