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How Allah Repays You For Your Honesty | Virtual Khutbah
Dr. Omar Suleiman speaks about how Allah rewards our honesty during a difficult situation, including financial uncertainties in the COVID-19 era.
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Bismillah walhamdulillah wa salatu wassalamu ala rasulullah wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa man wala So inshallah ta'ala as we continue and Insha'Allah, I know that some people are probably still logging on from the previous stream You know, I wanted to talk about this subject of how Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala rewards our honesty when we're in a difficult situation And I wanted to take a very particular angle to this So let me frame it inshallah ta'ala in sort of a personal discussion that I was having this morning with someone that's experiencing an extreme amount of financial difficulty and Obviously many people in particularly the COVID-19 era are experiencing financial hardship for the very first time or at least for the first time in a very long time in in this way and as People start to experience financial hardship and it's actually a paper that inshallah I'm working on side sister Najwa and sister Sara Sultan With the mental health as well as the faith element to it as how we deal with financial uncertainty as people start to experience financial uncertainty like many forms of uncertainty Certain options become available to them and certain things open up for them that might not have been open to them before and I want to preface this by saying that there are legitimate fatwas for example legitimate scholarly opinions For example that if a person finds themselves in this situation, then they're able to you know out of necessity engage in this particular type of financial transaction which otherwise would be prohibited a lot of lots of people my brother Necessity makes things that are ordinarily prohibited permissible in a restricted sense, right? And one of the problems is that people usually go beyond the restricted To the moment and they just kind of go far into it And this is this is you know
Very much so embedded in our legal reasoning as Muslims that there are certain hardships that make things permissible That ordinarily would be prohibited but I want to take this beyond that and I want us to just sort of think about it as an attitude as a mindset a Person who has this quality that is referred to in our texts as if as modesty modesty typically when discussed in the spiritual sense refers to modesty in regards to Probably the way that that many of us think of it if and protecting oneself from Zina and everything that leads to Zina protecting oneself from adultery fornication and guarding one's chastity But it also refers to staying away from haram money and not finding ourselves in a situation where we are engaging in prohibited forms of transaction and So just as when a person is in a place of affluence and they're gaining a lot and they have a lot of money For example, and they're in a place of luxury and there they see that there is a way to do extra to gain extra And so they'll engage in some prohibited transactions because they've tasted the sweetness of wealth and prosperity and so I might as well keep increasing Likewise, there's a unique hardship a unique way of a person Finding themselves in a in a way that they could be tempted to haram when they're in a difficult situation And so typically when we talk about a Sarah what the law when we talk about hardship and ease we talk about it from the perspective Of giving Sadaqah for example in hardship and ease Allah praises the people that spend both in times of adversity and in times of prosperity But there's there's something to be said about a person who holds on to their principles and does that does not lose them in a situation of hardship and in a situation of
particularly the pinch of financial hardship and This is where we find so much in our text about this idea of Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala rewarding a person for their honesty ومن يتق الله يجعل له مخرجا ويرزقه من حيث لا يحتسب That whoever is mindful of Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala will make a way out for them and Allah will provide them from places and with things both يرزقه من حيث لا يحتسب Will provide him or her from places that they would not have expected before Okay, so it refers to the source. So you don't know where the khair where the good is going to come to you You don't know when it's going to come to you and you also don't know how it's going to come to you. So both the source of the rizq and the output of the rizq the the source of the sustenance as well as the output of the Sustenance are unknown to you when you choose to practice taqwa When you choose to practice piety and God consciousness even in a tight situation even in a difficult situation ومن يتوكل على الله فهو حسبه And whoever entrusts Allah with all of their affairs Then Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala will be sufficient for that person in regards to everything. Okay in regards to everything now again I'm gonna say this one more time. There are situations where a person finds himself in a darura in a hardship and There is a legitimate fatwa and a pathway where a person has to engage in something that is ordinarily prohibited for the sake of getting themselves out of a difficult situation and so, you know, you'll find that this is gradual and you'll find that it is both on the basis of how difficult your situation is and whether or not you've exhausted the permissible means to Deal with the situation without having to engage in haram. All right. So how much have you exhausted the permissible means?
in order to not find yourself in a place of engaging in that prohibited transaction or in those prohibited ways and that's where That taqwa really comes in right? So taqwa Really refers to a sense of cautious being cautious and being safe Particularly when it comes to sins, you know the the famous narration of the companions who described Taqwa as a person that's walking between thorny bushes and holding themselves tight so that they don't find themselves being pricked by those thorns And so they hold themselves tight. So You know so that they can remain safe, right? And so that's an attitude. That's a mindset that That when a person finds themself in a situation where things become tempting Where it's easy to go a prohibited route They ask themselves have I really exhausted all of the permissible ways to get myself out of this difficulty? They ask Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala for help. They ask Allah for support. They exhaust their Permissible means to get out of that situation and then lastly they only engage the prohibited to the extent that is necessary To get them out of their place of hardship or dire need I'm gonna say that again They only engage it to a point that it is necessary to get them out of their hardship or their dire need Because sometimes what happens is that just as you have some people that will sort of skip over the permissible Exhausting the permissible to get themselves out of a hardship. You'll also have some people that will exceed under the Under the umbrella of a fatwa that was given in a very restricted way will exceed and will just go all the way in And so if this fatwa allows a person in this situation to engage this much They'll use that fatwa to justify engaging in this much, right? So where's the taqwa here?
The taqwa is not in a person having exhausted all permissible means and then finding themselves in deep hardship And and and perpetuating that hardship the taqwa is in whether that person really exhausted their permissible means and really tried really tried to To go about things in the in the purest way possible and ask the loss of Hannah to add for support in the process and then Engaging only what they had to of the doubtful or the what is ordinarily prohibited for that moment So that's where taqwa is in that regard, right? It's that a person holds back a person is skeptical Not of the the scholar that might give a fatwa for a situation but a person is skeptical as to whether or not they would qualify for some of the concessions and the exemptions that are given in a hard place Now, of course, there's the extreme the opposite extreme of that which is a person that's not even in a hard situation And a person that just cheats with their money a person that engages in prohibited transaction Maybe deludes themselves into thinking that you know, this is halal. It's okay for me to do You know, I I had a person who this is actually very recently who was cheating his customers and he said they're all kufar Anyway, it's like what since so you're strict here, you know, like, you know, you're strict on this idea of Of a PDA and you know Well, I'm Barack and we have to hate these people and so we could mistreat them and then you know You engage in all sorts of haram transactions because they're kufar anyway, you know, like what is that? Right? Like how do you have that? That that split personality and that that clear cognitive dissonance in regards to how you're gonna treat these two situations these true areas, right? These two areas so when it comes to the opposite of extreme extreme of that It's that person that cheats a little bit that person that adds a little bit a little bit of money
to the transaction that sneaks in a little bit to the weights and You know one of my teachers as he was talking about and will pop the theme Because one of the the first types of economic trends transgression that Allah subhana wants a Allah warned about was people that tip the scales and will pop the theme and and will pop the theme they they deceive in small amounts and and the way that they deceive in small amounts and tipping the scale and tipping the price is they add Just enough to the price or just enough to the weight to where they won't be caught by the other person All right So think about the mind mindset right of a person who cheats who cheats in their in their wealth and cheats in their financial Transactions, right? I'm gonna deceive and add just enough What's going to govern at what point my cheating stops my limit stops with my cheating is not if I think you know I've got my excess and I've crunched my numbers and you know, I would have had my full here No, it's how much can I get away with right? How much can I get away with because remember these are spiritual diseases from which these practices emanate How much can I get away with with that person without getting caught and without without getting exposed in a way that would rupture My business right or my transactions and so that's the motif right adds just a little bit there Adds a little bit to the weight You know what the prophets license saw of a person that would that would take grain that was bad and that would put the best part of it on the top right to deceive and That person, you know when that person is going to hide the bad part of the grain in the in the depths of it and Put the good part on the top what's going to cause them to decide how much of the good part is put on top and how Much of the rotten they allow to be in that particular container is what they can get away with and that's why I subhanallah
When the prophets I some talks about the signs of hypocrisy when a person speaks They lie when a person makes promises. They break their promises and when a person is entrusted and way that to mean a Han really refers to a lot of a lot of contractual matters, so yeah, you a little bit of a new awful bill or code Well, the Nihon Lee Amanati him wahdi him wrong Oh what Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala tells us in certain marriage people that honor their transactions that are honorable in their business Honorable in their contracts They keep the amana of secret gatherings or secrets that are given to them But they're people of amana people of trust all the signs of hypocrisy of a person who speaks and lies a person who breaks promises and a person who Cannot be entrusted in their affairs. All of them are found in a person that is dishonest With their financial transactions all of them right all traits of that hypocrisy. And of course these there's the other hadith We the Hassan Fajr Which are you know, which I'm not gonna get too far into right now But a person exceeds the bounds of anger and things of that sort. So This is what I want us to think about what we get used to and just like with any sin with any sin And the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam warns us from Hakkara to the noob this idea of belittling sin It's the small drops that corrode the entire heart and that lead a person to a complete place of fujoor a complete place of rebellion with Allah subhanaw taala and transgression with Allah subhanaw taala Okay, so just like with any small sin It's those small things that you start to cheat with with your money small things that you start to cheat with with your financial transactions The small things that you start to get away with the small forms of deception that you start to allow to be accepted as practice
That corrode a person's taqwa and that excel their nifaq excel their hypocrisy Okay, and so what's the opposite of this Allah? rewards honesty and Just like with sins Sins tend to yield a temporary short-term benefit Okay, like they're very immediate in the type of pleasure that they yield usually when a person is in a bad mood that they yield usually when a person sins they do it because of They're coming at it from place of a jadid of being a jadid, right? They're they're hasty and I had to mention a bomb there. They're hasty towards it So they want to experience the taste of that desire in that moment and they are impatient with their desires They don't have suburb with hapsiness with holding themselves back with their shahwat with their desires and so they will engage in something that gives them an immediate sense of pleasure only to be followed by a Lifetime of regrets and even worse without Toba a hereafter of regret without repentance a hereafter of regret But it's I've got to have it at this moment I'm not patient enough till Allah subhana wa ta'ala makes the permissible means for me to where I will either taste the benefits of engaging in only that which is permissible in In just the hereafter or Allah subhana. Ta'ala reward me with an element of reward For engaging only in the permissible in this life and the next and so I give you an example someone says Look, I want to quit my business. I want to quit my I want to get out of this huddle Okay, and for some people what this means is removing a haram product off the shelf removing something forbidden off the shelf So think of a person that sells alcohol right or sells, you know pork or whatever it is, right? But I want to remove something harmful from the shelf and that person's crunching the numbers and says well this much of my money
comes from alcohol sales and if I stop selling liquor then I'm going to I'm going to feel You know this this great You know pain because 30 40 percent whatever it is of my sales are going to go to waste now And it's very hard to reason with that person say when you talk a lot I guess I'll have a much larger we are just a human hateful I tested Allah will provide you in ways that you did not know because they're only able to see to the extent of what the numbers read and That's actually the problem, right? That just like with sin you're only able to see what's right in front of you and you're not able to see what's behind it Okay you are hasty the same thing is true when it comes to our financial sins and The lack of integrity or honesty that we might show in regards to our transactions in regards to what we engage in the financial sense Okay, why because if I'm talking to that person I say listen if you're you know You don't know the risk that you will see in your life through other business opportunities that Allah will decree that come your way because of You abandoning that Haram You don't know the blessing the baraka that Allah will put in the money that you earn from Halal So if you lose out on 30% the baraka that Allah will put in the 70% to where its benefits is expanded Its blessing is expanded. You can't quantify that You cannot determine the risk the sustenance in your life That you will have in how Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala then blesses your children because they're now nourished on Halal income as opposed to Haram Income the blessings that are put in your family, right as a result of that There is no way for you to be able to quantify all of that And so just like Sabr patience when it comes to the Haram in terms of sin
Requires you to trust Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala that what Allah has in store for you is better and that you don't need to Compromise on what is better for you that is in store from Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala or with Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala Because of the immediate temptation of the prohibited the same thing is true with all of our financial temptations Money is a it is so Tempting towards Haram, right and a person can find themselves falling over and over and over and over again When it comes to these things and these financial transactions So I want to actually give you you know, two incidents of those two stories of this one of them, you know I'm the love no Omar or the Allah. Oh, I know one a B he wanted to Test now I'm the love no Omar or the Allah on whom I used to free slaves a lot He was known for expiating slaves and I'm the love no Omar or the Allah. Oh, I know used to free the enslaved so much so that that People knew you know those that were enslaved knew how to catch his heart and how to catch his eye and so one of his companions told him he said that you know because You will push yourself to free righteous these righteous people that are enslaved by some people that are enslaved Will you had the owner they'll deceive you by pretending to be more religious than they actually are because they know that that will Cause your heart to incline more towards them and then you'll even push yourself further to free them, right? so to purchase their freedom and to let them go from from those that That that are their owners. So you will you will do whatever you can to push them and he said look you had the Unan if Allah they deceive me for the sake of Allah meaning, you know The reward of freeing these people is blessed regardless Whether they're righteous or not and you know, if I'm being tricked into doing more good deeds than alhamdulillah, right? So he was happy when he would do that
so I'm loving the Omar will be a lot hotel and Huma he was one time passing by a sheepherder and This this Person that had these sheep. He was watching the sheep for his say it he said to him He said, you know, give me one of those Sheep and I'll give you a price right? I'll pay you for it You know just give me one of them and don't tell don't tell your say it So the man responded and said animal look when what time and he said listen, I am Mamluk I you know, I'm enslaved and what time and I'm interested I'm enslaved and I'm interested I can't do that I'm the love no, I'm a little auto on an Huma he responded said cool in Malik Akala of that tell the the say it then that A wolf ate one of the sheep Right tell him that just one of them got lost you can get away with it He won't notice if he notices one of them missing just say that it was attacked by a wolf the man's response was One other a cool Lila and what will I say to Allah? What will I say to Allah? What will I say to Allah am I gonna say to Allah that it was lost? Am I gonna say to Allah that a wolf ate it? What will I say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? SubhanAllah, so the honesty of that man the righteousness of that man Look where his mind went right away because that's significant. This is a beautiful story in and of itself But look where his mind went. Yeah, if I can deceive him, how am I gonna deceive him? How am I gonna deceive Allah? Right that's where his mind went right away because that's who his heart was connected to this entire time as he was herding those sheep Now that I call it a lot. What am I gonna say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? Right and I'm the love no Omar will be a lot of time on Huma. He said Kareem atun I took a fit dunya He said that word that you just said has caused you to be freed in this world
And I asked Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala that it will free you the day that you meet him Meaning the day that it will free you from any punishment in the hereafter as well SubhanAllah just that one word of maada aqoolu lillah. What am I gonna say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? Now his rizq His rizq though he had no expectation of it, right? That man's honesty His honesty would have got him his reward from Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala regardless And when he's speaking to Abdullah ibn Umar radiallahu ta'ala anhuma, he's not telling him that to impress him He's telling him that because that's where he is. That's where his spiritual state is maada aqoolu lillah. What am I gonna say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? You have an excuse. I might be able to deceive my Sayyid But what am I gonna say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? maada aqoolu lillah maada aqoolu lillah What will I say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala in the midst of all of this? wa man yattaqil laaha yaja'al laahu makhruja wa yarzuqhu min haythu laa yihtasib That man did not imagine that he would be freed in this world, but he was freed in this world He was working and he was living his life in a way that he would be freed on the day of judgment from any of The hardship and any of the distress of that heavy day subhanAllah maada aqoolu lillah maada aqoolu lillah What will I say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? That motto if we were able to bring that into all of our affairs in life Would just change everything for us, right? What will I say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? And that's the process of muraqaba That's the process of observing Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala and everything that you do And it becomes so much harder to observe Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala with everything that you do when the excuses that are being given to you to To disobey Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala are so many and they come to you in a diversified uh sense of of uh You know a diversified sense of advices and whatever it is people that are well wishers that tell you it's okay
You can do this. You can do that when it becomes a situation where you know, everyone else is doing it this way So you can do it this way too. This is the standard practice. You can engage in the standard practice as well maada aqoolu lillah What will I say to Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala? And i'll just end with one uh with one thing in conclusion, you know when you look at the story of bilal radhi allah ta'ala anhum and Had bilal radhi allah ta'ala anhum kept his islam Secret had bilal radhi allah ta'ala anhum not, you know Taking that stance of ahad and ahad the way that he did one one one one the way that he did Which caused him to be tortured the way that he was Bilal radhi allah ta'ala anhum would have certainly escaped that torture or or likely escaped the torture that he underwent For expressing his islam the way that he did especially in the situation that he was He would have likely escaped that torture But he also would not have attained the blessings and high station that he did as a result of As a result of him putting himself in that situation By insisting on ahad and ahad even in the most difficult circumstances He you know would bilal radhi allah ta'ala anhum had found himself in a in the way that he's honored to be the muadhin The first person to climb up in medina and say allahu akbar allahu akbar The first person to climb on the kaaba and say allahu akbar allahu akbar The first person to do so in jerusalem and in quds would he have had all of that? Right had he not done what he did and so yes The immediate hardship that comes when a person Practices taqwa holds himself to a higher standard the immediate consequences are sometimes hard But you don't know what risk awaits you what sustenance of allah subhanahu wa ta'ala awaits you Afterwards And you don't know what source it will come from
And you don't actually even know the outcome or the way that that risk will be divided because one of the things that one of The mistakes that we make is that we define risk only in terms of money, right? So if I give up this haram money, then i'm going to have this halal money instead, right? We define risk we define sustenance only in times in terms of financial Instruments and that is not the way that allah subhanahu wa ta'ala defines risk And that is not the way that we should interpret things in our lives, especially in regards to risk So we ask allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to suffice us with the halal to To nourish us with taqwa to nourish us with ihsan to allow us to be in the process always of muraqaba So we ask allah to suffice us with halal only with that which is permitted so that we don't fall into that Which is prohibited and we ask allah to nourish us with taqwa and ihsan With piety god consciousness and striving for god's pleasure With a different standard in ihsan and the process of muraqaba always being present in our lives Where we observe allah subhanahu wa ta'ala even in situations Where it is so easy it is so easy to turn away from allah subhanahu wa ta'ala Other people make us more comfortable with turning away from allah subhanahu wa ta'ala We ask allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to allow us to observe him In all of our affairs in all of our states in hardship and in ease And we ask allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that as he observes us at all times that allah subhanahu wa ta'ala always finds us In a state that is pleasing to him and that allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make the best of our states The best of our affairs the best of our deeds the last of them And may allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make the best of our days the day that we meet him subhanahu wa ta'ala Allahumma ameen. Jazakumullahu khayran. I apologize once again for the Technical difficulties to get started
Wasallallahu wa sallam wa baraka ala nabiyyina muhammad wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajma'een Wassalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh
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