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How to Use the 15th of Shaʿbān to Prepare for Ramadan | Khutbah by Dr. Omar Suleiman
Sha‘ban is a time to prepare the heart. Tame the ego now, before Ramadan begins, because the ego is what clouds judgment and pulls us toward what harms us instead of what heals us.
Listen to the full khutbah by Dr. Omar Suleiman to learn how to check your ego.
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings.
We begin by praising Allah and bearing witness that none has the right to be worshipped or unconditionally obeyed except for Him. We bear witness that Muhammad is His final Messenger.
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. We ask Allah to make us amongst them. Allahumma ameen.
Dear brothers and sisters, in two nights or three nights, depending on what part of the world you are in, you reach the midpoint of Sha'ban, which means that we are officially
only a couple of weeks away from Ramadan. May Allah allow us to live, to see Ramadan, to be forgiven in Ramadan, to be granted the full reward of Laylatul Qadr, Allahumma ameen.
I wanted you to remember a very simple rule, bi-idhnillahi ta'ala, from the very beginning of this khutbah that is not specific to the moment that we are in right now, but should
especially be highlighted in a time when we are seeking to turn a page with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and be forgiven. It's a simple sentence, and I'll explain it throughout the course of the khutbah, but
so that you don't forget the sentence, remember the sentence as you try to do the laundry of the heart, as you try to wash yourself before Ramadan starts.
Crush your ego and cause your desires to conform. Crush your ego and cause your desires to conform. You see, each and every single one of us right now should be looking at themselves and seeing
what needs to go out the drain so that we can come back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and be purified. Every single one of us should be in an intense state of muhasabah right now, an intense state
of accountability, because you are coming upon, if you live, the greatest month of washing
away the effects, the stains that you have accumulated, that exist in an entire year. But there should be an intense moment of self-interrogation and self-diagnosis right now.
Crush your ego and channel your desires. Let me explain what I mean by that. I'll give you two ahadith from the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, and this entire
khutbah I want you to be thinking about the category of your sins, two categories of sins and sinful behaviors. The companions asked the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam when he said
that when a person approaches their spouse, when they are intimate, there is a charity in that.
They said, Ya Rasulallah, would a person really approach their desires and then be rewarded for that?
The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam said, wouldn't it be if you were to approach your desires with haram, that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala would punish you for that, that there would be a burden, a wizr? He said, yes.
He said, likewise, Allah 'azza wa jall rewards you when you channel your desires towards that which is halal. Channel your desires. Ramadan is a month in which you learn how to govern and channel your desires.
You leave off the desire of food, drink, and shahwah, the desire of food, drink, and intimacy, feeding the soul and pursuing Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and learning how to discipline those desires.
And so there's an entire category of sinful desires or desires that are acted upon in a sinful way. And I want you to bucket that and ask yourself, how much of my behaviors fall into this bucket?
If you were to open a book like Madarij as-Salikeen, or Ihya 'Ulum ad-Deen, or the summary of Ihya 'Ulum ad-Deen, Mukhtasar Minhaj al-Qasidin, the summary of the summary, or ad-Da'wah ad-Da'wah,
all these books of tazkiyah, you will find a category of these things. People pursue their desires and sometimes their desires get out of hand. The problem is not the desire, the problem is that they didn't govern the desire.
Ramadan is a month in which you are taught to govern that desire. Now compare that hadith where the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam is telling the companions you will be rewarded for channeling your desire in a halal way, whatever that
desire may be, because the rule is being established here, to the hadith of the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam, man kana fee qalbihi mithqalu dharratin min kibr
lan yadkhulil jannah, or lan yadkhulil jannah, a person would not enter paradise if they have even an atom's worth of pride in their heart.
I was reflecting on these two ahadith side by side as we approach the month of Ramadan and I'll tell you exactly why. Because it is important for us to remove from our minds that there is any healthy implementation
of pride that exists in this dunya on the side of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. That kibr is nasty on the side of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, no matter what it is.
That when you hear people say go conquer the world, instead you conquer your nafs, forget about that. Because the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam is saying there is no manifestation of that that is positive in the sight of Allah 'azza wa jall.
Don't try to repackage pride. You have to crush your ego. You have to crush your pride and channel your desire. Now why am I talking about this in the month of Sha'ban before we go to Ramadan?
If Ramadan is about disciplining desires, then a prerequisite to even getting to that point where you can discipline your desires is to eliminate your ego and to crush your ego.
Now we know that in the famous narration that is the most acceptable in regards to the midpoint of Sha'ban, that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam said that in two nights or three nights depending on what part of the world you are in, Allah 'azza wa jall looks out to the
entirety of His creation and Allah 'azza wa jall forgives all of His creation except for a
person who associates a partner with Allah 'azza wa jall or someone who carries in their heart
shahn, rancor, spite, malice, grudges, hatred that consumes the heart so that it cannot connect with Allah 'azza wa jall.
Self-inflicted diseases that disqualify you before you even get to Ramadan from being forgiven because this is a ledge that you have to be able to cross before you can even
make the claim to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that you want to be forgiven. And I know that for many people as you start getting to this point you're like yeah but
that person and how could I possibly apologize to that person or how can I possibly forgive that person or how could I possibly reconcile with that person.
No, I'm going to double down because I don't want him to think, I don't want her to think and in the process your shaytan is sitting there laughing at you before he goes to prison and saying look at you, you're missing out on forgiveness.
We think of the angels in Laylatul Qadr and indeed Laylatul Qadr is the greatest night of the year. Look at you, you're not willing to cross even this bridge to even get to shahwah, to even
get to disciplining the desires because the ego is holding you down. That pride remains. And subhanallah, Sufyan ibn 'Uyaynah, he said in a very powerful athar, in a very
powerful statement. He said, man kanat ma'siyatuhu fee shahwah, whoever sins out of desires, yurja lahu tawbah, then it's hoped that repentance will be very easy for that person.
It's easy for that person, why? Because Adam alayhi as-salam sinned out of desire. He disobeyed his Lord fee shahwah, in a desire. And Allah 'azza wa jall forgave him.
It was very easy. He had the desire, the desire got out of control for one moment, one moment, he slipped. But it was easy for him to come back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala because at no point
did Adam alayhi as-salam couple that desire with pride. Immediately returning back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, Rabbana zalamna anfusana wa in lam taghfir lana wa tarhamna la nakunanna minal khasireen. Not oh Allah, why did you put me in the garden in the first place?
Oh Allah, why did you put the tree there? Oh Allah, why did you create Iblis for me? No, right away, I messed up. And I had no reason to mess up.
It was shahwah, and he humbled himself to Allah in brokenness, in inkisar. It's literally called in our books of tazkiyah, inkisar, brokenness before Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
And I repent, oh Allah, wa ghufira lah. Sufyan ibn 'Uyaynah rahimahullah says, wa man kanat ma'siyatuhu fee kibr, akhsha alayhi al la'nah.
As for the person that sins against Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala out of a sense of pride, then I fear a curse on that person because Iblis sinned out of pride, Adam sinned out
of desire, Iblis sinned out of pride, fala'in, and he was cursed as a result of that. If you compare by scale what Adam alayhi as-salam did versus what Iblis did, at the action level, that's not the problem.
Allah 'azza wa jall commanded Adam alayhi as-salam, don't touch that tree, and Adam touched that tree. Allah 'azza wa jall commanded Iblis to prostrate towards Adam alayhi as-salam, not towards Allah 'azza wa jall, towards Adam alayhi as-salam, and Iblis disobeyed Allah.
He could have said, I just lost it for a moment, it was anger, it was just something. And he could have returned to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
But remember the initial premise, channel your desires, crush your ego. Channel your desires, crush your pride. There is no room for even an atom's worth of pride.
Allah 'azza wa jall actually has no problem with the desire that He put inside of you so long as you channel it towards that which is halal. You like to eat, you like to drink, you like to make money, make it in halal, spend it in halal.
Anything that you like to do, anything that you desire, just channel it towards that which is pleasing to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Make it conform. But when it comes to pride, when it comes to ego, Allah 'azza wa jall does not even allow
an atom's worth of it inside of you. And so now as you go into this month of Sha'ban and into Ramadan, and you're about to cross that midpoint, and you want to come into that threshold.
The first question you ask yourself is, am I willing to do that part first? يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا ادْخُلُوا فِي السِّلْمِ كَافَّةً وَلَا تَتَّبِعُوا خُطُوَاتِ الشَّيْطَانِ
The ulama of tafsir, they mention, if you look at the two ayat where Allah 'azza wa jall says don't follow the footsteps of shaytan, or two of these verses. Oh you who believe, submit yourself entirely and don't follow the footsteps of shaytan.
That is speaking about the insistence upon kibr, the insistence upon abstaining from submitting yourself to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. But also, وَلَا تَتَّبِعُوا خُطُوَاتِ الشَّيْطَانِ In regards to zina, don't follow his footsteps in regards to adultery.
Don't follow his footsteps in regards to desires. He lays traps. You know if you lay traps in a house because you're trying to catch a particular animal, there's a particular type of poison that you put in the trap, a particular type of sticker,
depending on how big the animal is or what type of animal it is. This one catches raccoons, this one catches rats. Shaytan lays the footsteps tailored and customized towards you. He's had your algorithm since
you were born, before TikTok and all these other things. He knew you and he lays traps for you. But the khuṭuwāt of shaytan, the footsteps of shaytan in regards to pride are
far more severe than the footsteps of shaytan in regards to desire because the turning back is easier. Now here's what I want you to also think about, building upon this concept. Someone
might say, well, wait a minute, that's not fair because I can't control my heart. So what is this pride that's being spoken about? Is Allah going to punish me for something
that I'm struggling with on the inside? لا يُكَلِّفُ اللَّهُ نَفْسًا إِلَّا وُسْعَهَا Right? Allah 'azza wa jall does not burden a soul beyond its scope. So they said to the
Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam, Ya Rasulallah, what is kibr? And the two things that the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam defined it are quantifiable things that you choose whether or not to act upon. Not things that
linger on the inside that you struggle with, that you choose whether or not to act upon. غَمْطُ النَّاسِ وَبَطَرُ الْحَقِّ غَمْطُ النَّاسِ وَبَطَرُ الْحَقِّ
To condescend people in a very specific way, to believe that you are fundamentally better than someone to look down upon them, to pass judgment upon them in a way that only Allah
'azza wa jall can, their final destination. هَذَا فِي النَّارِ وَهَذَا فِي الْجَنَّةِ Who told you this? To look down upon, which is Iblis' one half of Iblis' characteristics
here when he said أَنَا خَيْرٌ مِنْهُ I'm better than him. So to manifest the devilish pride of I'm better than him. Don't ever look at your brother or sister and put yourself
on a pedestal that Allah has not given to you or send them to a hell that Allah 'azza wa jall has not given you control of. None of your business. Now, does that mean that if I have some سُوءَ ظَنّ inside of me and some sinful feelings and I look at a person
and I'm disgusted by them and I think this person is low, that that puts me in the same category? No, but if you don't check it from now and start removing even that سُوءَ ظَنّ and how you look at people in the first place and cleaning the lens by which you look
at people, then you might one day fall into that. So that's one. بَطَرُ الْحَقِّ, the rejection of truth. Very, very clear marker. Very, very clear threshold.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when He tells us about those who seek forgiveness from Him. قَالُوا سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا غُفْرَانَكَ رَبَّنَا We hear and we obey, now forgive us, O our Lord. It is similar as the ulema mentioned to when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says
وَإِذَا سَأَلَكَ عِبَادِي عَنِّي فَإِنِّي قَرِيبٌ أُجِيبُ دَعْوَةَ الدَّاعِ إِذَا دَعَانِ فَلْيَسْتَجِيبُوا لِي You want Allah to answer your call? You have to answer His call. So before you can approach Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and ask Him for forgiveness,
before you say غُفْرَانَكَ رَبَّنَا, are you saying سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا We hear and we obey. Not like Bani Israel that said سَمِعْنَا وَعَصَيْنَا
We hear and we disobey. And this is a challenge to each and every single one of us. And I want you to hear it and it might sting a little bit.
If you do a hundred khatms of the Qur'an in Ramadan but you reject a single ayah of that Qur'an then those hundred khatms will do you nothing on the Day of Judgment.
Will mean absolutely nothing for you on the Day of Judgment. You could read the Qur'an over and over and over again because you're just doing the سَمِعْنَا part even Bani Israel did the سَمِعْنَا part. But سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا We hear and we obey.
Every single ayah in the Qur'an is binding upon me. I submit. ادْخُلُوا فِي السِّلْمِ كَافَّةً I crush that pride. I crush that ego. Now someone might say بَطَرُ الْحَقِّ بَقِيَ فِي نَفْسِي مِنْهُ شَيْءٌ
Something inside of me doesn't feel right with this ayah. Something inside of me doesn't feel right with what Allah 'azza wa jall is saying here. Something inside of me that's human. That's not what the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam is talking about.
But if you're starting to show that you better crush that from now before it materializes in outward rejection of what Allah 'azza wa jall says. Bani Israel didn't say that Allah didn't say it.
No سَمِعْنَا Allah said it but I don't want to do it. عَصَيْنَا I disobeyed. It was pride that ruined them and devastated them. How do we operationalize this at a very practical level?
And we come back to that with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Dear brothers and sisters, as we go into the month of Ramadan, especially as we're about to pass through the midpoint of Sha'ban, I need to clean your heart.
Because the greatest place where pride will reside is in that relationship with people. That refusal to apologize, that refusal to forgive, that maintenance of a grudge
that corrupts the heart to where Allah 'azza wa jall will not even look towards you in Ramadan. Because Allah 'azza wa jall says, the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam says if three people don't talk to each other, right? Or two people don't talk to each other for three days,
the gates of paradise are not open to them. Leave them alone until they fix what's between them. Notice one part of pride involves your relationship with Allah سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا We hear and we obey. The other element of pride involves your relationship with the people.
Here's what I want you to think about, dear brothers and sisters. Desire causes you to slip. Pride causes you to stay down. Adam 'alayhi as-salam slipped, he got right back up.
Iblis slipped and he has been falling down ever since. The root of those two things comes back to this. Here's what I want you to think about, dear brothers and sisters, two examples.
When 'Umar ibn al-Khattab radiyallahu 'anhu went in to that house of his sister Fatimah and was ready to kill anyone on his way to the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam before he would kill the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam himself.
And I want you to imagine the walk of 'Umar in the street. If you saw 'Umar radiyallahu 'anhu visually, walking to the house of his sister with all that pride inside of him, his face, his tone, what his eyes look like,
how heavy was the mashi, the walk of 'Umar radiyallahu 'anhu, banging on the door of his sister, walking in, acting like a lunatic.
Until Taha.
Until the end. Those few verses of Taha. If you could visually see 'Umar radiyallahu 'anhu when he walked out of that house, his humility, the transformation,
then going to the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam and his companions. And when he gets in the house, Hamza radiyallahu 'anhu grabs 'Umar down. The 'Umar that walked into the house,
his impulse would have been to get up and punch Hamza in the face. Get off of me. But 'Umar radiyallahu 'anhu made a decision to break that barrier between him and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. أَسْلَمْتُ, أَسْلَمْتُ.
And no one of us has more pride than what 'Umar radiyallahu 'anhu had before he walked into that house. That's one. The second instance I give you is not as rigorously authenticated, but the report of Abu Dharr radiyallahu 'anhu, the second part of the report,
that after he made the racial remark, the racist remark and the Prophet ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam told him that inside of you is some jahiliyyah. That he was willing, he put his face on the ground. This man that had some pride inside of him
that caused him to throw a racist remark, put his face in the ground and said, step on my face and I won't raise this cheek from the ground until you step on it. Why did he do that?
Because that's the only way that you tame pride. You crush your ego. You remove it altogether. You don't give it an atom's worth of your time or in your heart. When it comes to your desires, you channel it for the sake of Allah 'azza wa jall.
So dear brothers and sisters, as we now pass the midpoint of Sha'ban, may Allah 'azza wa jall make us of those who are forgiven on that night. May Allah 'azza wa jall allow us to enter into Ramadan ready to be forgiven
and ready to tame and control our desires for His sake. I want you to do an internal muhasabah of yourself over the next two days. And categorize your impulses, categorize your sins.
If it's of the nature of ego and pride, I need to get rid of this before Ramadan even starts and not give the shaytan an atom's worth of it. If it's desire, how do I take this desire
and channel it in a way that Allah 'azza wa jall will be pleased with me? May Allah 'azza wa jall allow us to take everything that He has given to us to take everything that He has given to us
and cause it to conform to that which is pleasing to Him. May Allah 'azza wa jall allow us to be forgiven in Sha'ban, forgiven in Ramadan and most importantly to meet Him amongst those that are forgiven. May Allah 'azza wa jall allow us to be amongst those
who hear and obey, sami'na wa ata'na, when He gives us what He gives us. And may Allah 'azza wa jall allow us to be amongst those who look to the Messenger of Allah ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam as an example in Ramadan and outside of Ramadan.
And may Allah 'azza wa jall grant us all husnul khitam, whether it is inside of Ramadan or outside of Ramadan. Allahumma ameen. Aqoolu qawli hadha wa astaghfirullah li walakum wa lis'ilmuslimeen fastaghfiruhu innahu huwa al-Ghafoor ar-Raheem
Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salamu 'ala rasulillah wa 'ala alihi wa sahbihi wa man walah Dear brothers and sisters, before I make my du'a, I remind you as I always do about your brothers in Gaza, your brothers and sisters in Gaza. And you might wonder,
isn't what they did standing in the face of an enemy pride? And the answer is absolutely not because they did it only for the sake of Allah 'azza wa jall, seeking nothing but the pleasure of Allah 'azza wa jall. There is a difference from 'izzah in this deen,
from having not pride, but feeling the honor of this religion and the weight of its responsibility to stand up to the oppressor and inflating yourself. May Allah 'azza wa jall reward our brothers and sisters in Gaza
who stood and stand like mountains in the face of a Zionist enemy and do it in a way that they show the people the greatness of Islam. And in the process, Allah 'azza wa jall continues to dignify and honor them.
And may Allah 'azza wa jall alleviate the suffering of our brothers and sisters throughout Palestine, throughout Sudan, in every single part of the world, in Yemen and beyond.
وَاجْعَلْنَا لِلْمُتَّقِينَ إِمَامَا اللَّهُمَّ انصُرْ إِخْوَانَنَا الْمُسْتَضْعَفِينَ فِي مَشَارِقِ الْأَرْضِ وَمَغَارِبِهَا اللَّهُمَّ انصُرْهُمْ فِي غَزَّةَ وَفِي السُّودَانِ وَفِي كُلِّ مَكَانٍ اللَّهُمَّ عَلَيْكَ بِأَعْدَائِكَ أَعْدَاءِ الدِّينِ اللَّهُمَّ أَرِنَا فِي الظَّالِمِينَ عَجَائِبَ قُدْرَتِكَ
اللَّهُمَّ أَهْرِقِ الظَّالِمِينَ بِالظَّالِمِينَ وَأَخْرِجْنَا وَإِخْوَانَنَا مِن بَيْنِهِمْ سَالِمِينَ عِبَادَ اللَّهِ إِنَّ اللَّهَ يَأْمُرُ بِالْعَدْلِ وَالْإِحْسَانِ وَإِيتَاءِ ذِي الْقُرْبَى وَيَنْهَى عَنِ الْفَحْشَاءِ وَالْمُنْكَرِ وَالْبَغْيِ يَعِظُكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَذَكَّرُونَ فَاذْكُرُوا اللَّهَ يَذْكُرْكُمْ وَاشْكُرُوهُ عَلَى نِعَمِهِ يَزِدْكُمْ
وَلَذِكْرُ اللَّهِ أَكْبَرُ وَاللَّهُ يَعْلَمُ مَا تَصْنَعُونَ وَأَقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ

































































































































































































































































































