Lecture
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How Islam Addresses Grief - Dr. Altaf Husain | ISNACON 2019
Dr. Altaf Husain introduces the topic of grief through an Islamic lens. This session took place at ISNACON 2019 in Houston, Texas.
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Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. In the name of Allah, the most merciful, the most compassionate. Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen, wassalatu wassalam, ala ashraf al anbiya wal mursaleen Sayyidina Muhammad wa ala alihi ashabi ajma'een. My dear respected brothers and sisters and my fellow panelists, assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi ta'ala wa barakatuh. Because the speaker draws energy from the crowd. So if you get a really good salam, I can give that back to you. Ali, are we going to have a Q&A? Okay, so time-wise? 15? Alright, save recording? Inshallah. So Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gathers us, alhamdulillah, at a time when it seems like there are so many trials and tribulations impacting the average individual. And yet, Muslims are not immune to facing those difficulties, not only in our individual lives, but also and especially as a collective, as a community. In our earlier session, we talked about trauma and this notion of how we're just learning as a community to understand and to accept the fact that it's okay to get help, to seek assistance. It's okay indeed, and to get rid of, if you will, the stigma from seeking mental health and other sort of services. It is important, I think, for us to keep going back to this notion that I had mentioned in an earlier lecture, that we're talking about this and connection with faith really at a time when there's such a very systematic attack on the concept of faith, on the concept of being connected with God or of being spiritual.
And so it should not be lost upon us that our children, and indeed we ourselves, may actually be impacted by that level of spiritual arrogance that essentially says that I am everything, I don't need anyone else, especially not prayer, especially not a connection to any religious community, I can manage this on my own. The reality is, and the research shows this and some of it was mentioned earlier, the reality is you're not actually going to be able to get over a major crisis, or to get over a collective crisis, if you will, without actually processing what occurred, without actually allowing space for you to process what occurred. Much of the conflict we see in families, especially as the children grow older, and then also when younger folks are getting married, and then issues arise, it sometimes has less to do with the husband and wife or the parents and children, and more to do with unresolved trauma, unresolved crises that nobody bothered to acknowledge, let alone address. And so when we get together, and when we start to reflect on these topics, especially from the side of Yaqeen Institute, our focus is to say, nothing should come between you and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and to create in you a spiritual crisis if there are sufficient resources to be able to help you to indeed rise above that. The title of this talk is very interesting, because if you think about that, it makes it seem as if what? It makes it seem as if the scientific method and everything to be quantified actually exists. So the idea would be that you have an app, you go to the app, you launch the app, and you say, onset of crisis.
So you say, for example, Sunday at 3.53, right? And then you say, approximately how long it's lasted, and you say, it's been a week, and it says, you're over five days. You should have been over this in two days, right? There's no formula for this. There's no formula for actually how long it would take for someone to get over it. Now, the beautiful thing is that we are within a religious framework, a theological framework, whereby the Quran, the teachings of the Quran that ingrain such tawakul, such trust in the qadr of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, that as things are being ordained, that we accept that which occurs, not necessarily justify it. Because then people say, well, how do you counselors and folks talk about stuff like, you just accept the fact that that was destined, so you mean abuse was destined? Like somebody was destined to be challenged with this level of difficulty, if you will, the politest way to say it, within a family structure, between husband and wife? The notion is, it occurred. We are not saying it didn't occur. It occurred. But what do you make of it? What do you do about it? How do you in fact process it? The system within the religion is very interesting. When you talk about people who are necessarily obsessive compulsive, for example, over certain things, there are amazingly quantifiable things within the religion that start to tell you, maybe grief, for example, maybe cleanliness, for example, can be assisted if I have a framework. So for example, if I ask you, typically speaking, we are taught in making wudu, right, to repeat the same act in terms of washing different parts, how many times? How do you all know that? How do you all know that? You should say it's from the Yaqeen app. You know that because the Prophet s.a.w. said, just do it three times.
A person who suffers from doubt, doubting themselves about cleanliness, is now liberated. Is now liberated. Cleansing blood off of clothes. And then he says, do this this many times. You are liberated because after that, leave it. After that, leave it. Grieving. Grieving. Three days. And you are thinking about this and you realize, subhanallah, people are shocked when I tell them so and so passed away. Especially at my university because then I have to leave the campus and go to the janaza. I say, so and so passed away last night and they are going to be having the burial at like, you know, dhuhr time. They are like, I'm sorry, what? No wake? No memorial? No, like, no, you know, viewing? Like where you come and wait? No, because Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and His Prophet s.a.w. within the mercy of the system was, things will occur. As you process it, as you deal with it, there is a framework, if you follow it and you trust in Allah, there is a reward for being able to do so. And then leaving that doubt out of it, if you will. So, we can't say with certainty how long it would take someone to get over grief. To get over trauma. We can't. But we can say there are certain signs and my fellow panelists will indeed discuss this at length. But what we can say is, the scholars have taught us how to deal with or think of grief. The Prophet s.a.w., you know, upon losing his son, his infant son, Ibrahim, you know, three things come out of the way the interaction occurs between him and those observing him grieve. His was one of the most public lives, if you will.
And as he grieves the loss of his son, infant son, and you realize the death of Ibrahim, the death of Ibrahim was his father, a parent, losing a child. But in the realm of the thinking of the Quraysh and all of the people around him was what? It was the end, in their minds, of the progeny that would carry on the dawah of Islam. And so they actually mocked him. So it wasn't just that it wasn't sufficient that he had lost a child. He was trying to grieve. He was also then subsequently having to deal with the fact that they were saying things about him. So let me go back to the first thing. How did he grieve? The eyes. The eyes do shed tears. Immediately normalizing the fact that it will be okay, brothers especially, for us to cry. And our younger boys, as they're coming into their teen years, it will be okay for us to let them cry. The other panelists will remind you, and they'll inshallah address this, that how long we keep crying. How long we keep crying. How intense the crying sessions are, that's where you start to say something is now not right. And we have to seek help. The eyes will shed tears. The eyes will shed tears. The heart does feel the pain. The heart does grieve. But, but the tongue does not say anything about what occurred, displeasing to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. How often and how long will I stay grieving? Here we're trying to say, let the natural part of it happen first. Let the crying happen. Let the heart, you know, to be able to feel the grief. But let the tongue monitor itself. Or at least those around saying, don't question or say something displeasing to Allah. Things like what?
Often times we hear saying, the most common things that people say is, why me? Why me? Why us? Why us? And remember when I said about the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam, why me would have been the most obvious thing. Because what were they mocking him about? Abtar. That you are now cut off. The loss of this son has cut you off because in their minds it was every king married as many wives as possible so that he could have in those days as many sons as possible. So that one of them would live to carry on the throne of power. And in that moment of despair when he's being mocked and said you are abtar, you are cut off. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala revealed, which is why you go back to using the Quran also to realize and say, maybe I should seek guidance not only from the Quran as was mentioned earlier, but also the professional help and make it a combination. The Quran is revealed saying, The one who mocks you, the one who makes fun of you, the one who says they are cut off, look at their lives, they will be the ones cut off. And believe me, believe me, there is not a single part of the world where Islam reached, or at least the news of Islam reached, that people do not say the name Muhammad salallahu alaihi wasalam. That they don't utter the name Muhammad salallahu alaihi wasalam. People who have never met, centuries away from his existence. So brothers and sisters, I ask you, and Muhammad Sharif, a beautiful lecturer who founded Al-Maghrib, said in one of his sessions, he said, you know how you know that? That Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, we will make indeed your remembrance, that indeed nobody, nobody goes to ancestry.com and says I want to see how related I am to Abu Jahl.
But everybody says, even in the heart of Africa, we are Sayyid. And people say, are you serious? I don't want to question that, it's between you and Allah. But nobody says I'm related to Abu Jahl, mashallah, we just found out over Thanksgiving. We're going to celebrate that we're related to Abu Jahl. So to close, inshallah, I have my own mental clock, mashallah. To close, what we're saying is, that it will be natural to grieve. There will be some instances when the grief goes on and persists or lingers longer than expected. But Ibn Qayyim has a very beautiful saying about this. He says that when Allah tests you, when Allah tests you, it is never to destroy you. Because one of the reasons grief lingers and people don't get over things is because they think they are done. They are destroyed, they are done, there is no hope for them. Why would I try to improve? But he, Hafidhullah says, that when Allah tests you, it is never to destroy you. When he removes something from your possession, when Allah removes something from your possession, it is only to empty your hands for an even greater gift. It is only to empty your hands for an even greater gift. Now think about how powerful that is. Because you and I, you and I take everything we have as ours. And so we actually grieve over sometimes property, sometimes belongings. And he is saying, even if you lose a human being, a relative, a loved one, how do you know among all the losses that Allah is not emptying your hands for an even greater gift? I mentioned in another lecture, and I'll stop there, a couple in Indonesia after the tsunami, or during the tsunami actually in the mid 2000s, had lost nine of their children, which was essentially all of their children. And when President Clinton had gone back to meet them through the Clinton Foundation work,
they had brought that couple to meet him. And he found them smiling, and he thought it was strange, so he asked them, he said, is this the same couple I'm trying to meet? Because he expected them to be what? Like completely overwhelmed with this traumatic event that had occurred of disastrous proportions. And then when they approached, the translator said they're smiling because she has received the news that she is expecting again. She is expecting again. The other nine, Allah has taken them. But now he has given a new sign, a new hope for that family. And so they accepted it and they smiled. Brothers and sisters, a lot to be hopeful for. The Qayn Institute inshallah is dedicated, dedicated to make resources that are not only practical and relevant, but authentic. Authentic in a way that practitioners, I'm an academic now, I teach, that's what I do, but our practitioners, our beloved sisters, they are in the field. So when they're writing this, they're writing from direct experience. Direct experience saying, here are the best practices that are emerging, and yes, we may even change that and modify that. And so visit the Qayn Institute.org, subscribe to our listserv, and then of course download the app and inshallah benefit from that. All of the resources, inshallah, inshallah, inshallah, will always remain free. That's the commitment that Sheikh Omar Suleiman has made. And then he has charged the rest of us to go raise the money so that the community will benefit from those resources. May Allah bless us. May Allah indeed help those of us. Sometimes we treat these lectures as if it's just a lecture. Maybe there are those who are hearing these words, and for whom it's a very direct, direct touch to their heart. May Allah improve, improve your condition. May Allah indeed bless you and allow you to persist in that which you're experiencing and grant you inshallah an opening.
As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullah wa barakatu.
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