# How Ya’qub (as) Knew Yusuf (as) Wasn’t Dead | Ramadan Reflections

**Author:** Dr. Omar Suleiman
**Series:** Ramadan Reflections (2025)
**Published:** 2025-03-13
**YouTube:** https://youtu.be/Hu_af387Elk
**URL:** https://yaqeeninstitute.org/watch/series/ramadan-reflections-2025/how-yaqub-knew-yusuf-wasnt-dead-ramadan-reflections
**Topics:** Acts of Worship, Sharia

## Description
“I know from Allah what you don’t know.” These were the words of Prophet Ya’qub (as) when everyone around him believed Yusuf (as) was gone forever. But how did he hold onto certainty when the world told him otherwise? And what does this teach us about faith in the Unseen—especially when the promise...

## Transcript
**[0:00]** JazakumAllahu Khayr. As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Audhu billahi min ash-shaytani r-rajim. Bismillahir rahmanir rahim. Alhamdulillahi rabbil alameen. Was-salatu was-salamu ala rasoolihi al-kareem wa ala alihi wa sahbihi ajma'een.

**[0:15]** We just finished the very beautiful recital of Surah Yusuf. And subhanAllah, there is no way that you can hear that surah without truly tugging at the heart. And subhanAllah, I wanted to focus on one element. Sometimes when there is a powerful verse, you focus on the most striking element of the verse

**[0:35]** and then you reduce the last part of the verse to extended commentary. And I'm going to talk about that in a moment inshaAllah ta'ala. But I actually want to talk about how the connection between Ya'qub and Yusuf relates to

**[0:51]** the series that we've been doing in Ramadan about the other side, about the barzakh and the connection of the souls. It's very clear from the onset that these two people, Ya'qub alayhi as-salam and his son Yusuf alayhi as-salam, have a supernatural connection.

**[1:06]** Allah azza wa jal has blessed them with a connection to each other and of course a connection to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that's very unique to them. Surah Yusuf starts off with a ru'ya, with a dream of Yusuf alayhi as-salam, a true dream,

**[1:21]** that he only shares with his father. And his father immediately knows the interpretation and says, لا تقصص رؤياك على إخوتك فيكيد لك كيدا. Don't share that dream with your brothers because they will plot against you. And for the next two decades, Ya'qub alayhi as-salam does not share that dream with the rest of the sons.

**[1:43]** He keeps it to himself. It remains the secret between Ya'qub alayhi as-salam and Yusuf alayhi as-salam knowing that something is going to come out of this that's extremely powerful and beautiful. When I say that these two have a supernatural connection to each other,

**[1:59]** think about the connection of souls. As Imam Ibn al-Qayyim rahimahullah mentions in Kitab al-Ruh that even the living souls can have a connection to each other subhanAllah that's very very unique. Sometimes a mother can feel something is wrong with her child thousands of miles away

**[2:14]** with absolutely no news that was given to her. Something that's there connects. Ya'qub alayhi as-salam smells his son from afar. Inni la'ajidu riha Yusuf I can smell him coming from far away. I smell his shirt.

**[2:29]** The garment is put on his eyes and he recovers from blindness. This is a very unique and special and powerful connection between a father and a son. But what did I mean in the very beginning here when I say that sometimes you omit the last part of the verse.

**[2:45]** We often talk about this moment where the brothers of Yusuf alayhi as-salam as they come back and they bring the news of the loss of Ibn Yamin alayhi as-salam. That Ya'qub alayhi as-salam turns from them and he says

**[3:00]** innama ashku bathi wa huzni ilallah I complain of my distress and my grief only to Allah. And we usually stop there. But the end of the verse is what? wa a'lamu min allahi ma la ta'lamun

**[3:18]** I know something from Allah that you don't know. What is that part of the ayah mean? And subhanAllah if you look in tafsir there is actually lengthy explanation of that part of the ayah. What is the secret that Ya'qub alayhi as-salam meant when he said I know from Allah what you all don't know.

**[3:37]** I know something from Allah that you brothers don't know. There is an obvious place that your mind goes to which is the initial dream. That that dream that Yusuf alayhi as-salam saw as a child he only spoke to me with it. And so I know that which you don't know.

**[3:54]** The scholars debated but he says wa a'lamu min Allah They said well the dream was from Allah to Yusuf alayhi as-salam so still yahtamel it could be that that's what Ya'qub alayhi as-salam meant when he said I know from Allah that which you don't know. The dream, the divine revelation of a dream to Yusuf alayhi as-salam that Ya'qub was aware of but sourced from Allah azza wa jal.

**[4:14]** That's one explanation. The second explanation, I'm not going in order of popularity by the way, I'm going in order of just the things that you'll find if you open in tafsir al-Baghawi and al-Qurtubi the different possibilities of this ayah. The second possibility is that Ya'qub alayhi as-salam recognized from the handwriting of the king

**[4:34]** what the brothers did not recognize. And subhanAllah sometimes a parent catches something, knows something from a child that no one else will catch including the siblings. So they say it could be and these are of course based many of them on riwayat that the Prophet (ﷺ) mentioned, narrations that come from Bani Israel

**[4:52]** that we can take to fill in a story but we can't confirm 100%. It could be that Ya'qub alayhi as-salam is looking at the exact same thing as the brothers of Yusuf alayhi as-salam but he sees something that he knows this is my son Yusuf alayhi as-salam, that Allah azza wa jal has given him that place.

**[5:10]** Another explanation that the scholars mentioned, subhanAllah this is very powerful. This surah is full of dreams. Do you really think the only dream Yusuf alayhi as-salam saw was that first dream? And so Imam As-Sudi rahimahullah says that Ya'qub and Yusuf both were shown a dream

**[5:30]** that acknowledged that the other one was okay. That Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala was assuring them and affirming them through their visions. And that was something that the brothers were not aware of.

**[5:45]** And so Ya'qub alayhi as-salam saw something in his dream that he knew his son was alive. And Yusuf alayhi as-salam saw something that put him in ease and knew that his father still knew that he was alive. That there was some connection that was happening there. And Imam Al-Baghawi rahimahullah the first explanation he mentions of a'lamu minallahi ma la ta'lamun

**[6:01]** he says that it was narrated that Ya'qub alayhi as-salam saw Malika al-mawt, the angel of death. And he asked the angel of death, subhanAllah, he said to him, have you taken the soul of my son yet to the realm of souls?

**[6:18]** Did Allah command you yet to take the ruh of my son Yusuf, the soul of my son Yusuf, to the realm of arwah, to the realm of souls yet? And he said no, and that was it. So Ya'qub alayhi as-salam was put at ease.

**[6:33]** That my son is still alive. All of these things speak to the idea, wa'a'lamu minallahi ma la ta'lamun they're all possibilities. I know from Allah that which you don't know. That there's a secret, that there's something that Allah has given me that you can't understand.

**[6:49]** Now why do I think subhanAllah it's extremely relevant for us in this day and age? You have to think that if you were in that room, Ya'qub alayhi as-salam was looked at as the delusional one. The crazy man. So deceived. How could you be talking about your son being okay?

**[7:07]** How can you still be talking about Yusuf being alive when the wolf ate him two decades ago? How can you still be talking about your son in this way? How can you still have this hope? You're delusional. And I want us to just appreciate for a moment that when we talk about Palestine,

**[7:26]** people around us think we're crazy. This promise from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala of the liberation of Palestine. You know what's interesting subhanAllah, you meet anyone from Gaza and they still talk about Palestine is going to be liberated, everything is going to come back,

**[7:41]** Gaza sata'ud, everything will be back and opened and liberated. When? We don't know. How? We don't know. What we know from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that it will happen. And someone who's not Muslim might look at that and go, you guys are not following the politics of this very closely, are you?

**[7:57]** You really don't see what's happening, do you? And subhanAllah our position to everyone else in this regard is, na'lamu minallahi ma la ta'lamun. We know from Allah what you don't know. That when Allah or the Messenger of Allah sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam

**[8:12]** tell us that something is going to happen, it will happen, even if it's so far out of the realm of material possibility, because the one who controls the material and the immaterial and the possible and the seemingly impossible and the seen and the unseen is the same God Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

**[8:28]** Alhamdulillah, we're okay. Now keep in mind, Ya'qub was crying, cried himself blind. But at no point was there a contradiction between his grief and his trust in the promise of Allah azza wa jal.

**[8:45]** And so when we cry over the pain that's immediate, that doesn't mean that we've lost hope in the promise that is assured. There is no contradiction between those two things. Even a nabi of Allah, a prophet of Allah,

**[9:00]** was able to reconcile those two emotions. And so how is Allah azza wa jal connecting the soul of Ya'qub alayhi salam to Yusuf alayhi salam? How many dreams were shown in the process? How many times did Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala assure the heart of Ya'qub alayhi salam

**[9:16]** when no one around him was assuring him? All of that is not known to us. That's the beauty. You know I often say subhanAllah, sometimes like you want to ask the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam about these moments in seerah and say, hey what happened in this part? Ya Rasulullah, can you tell me about this year?

**[9:31]** Because like if you think about Mecca and seerah, how much of it is lost? We don't have narrations, much narrations from the Meccan seerah, compared to the Madani seerah. You can ask the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam about some of the further details. You can ask Khadijah radiAllahu ta'ala anha, who we don't have a single hadith from,

**[9:47]** because she passed away in Mecca, to give us some details of her life and what it was like to behold the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam, also with these anbiya of Allah. May Allah azza wa jal give us the opportunity to talk to them, and to have those moments where, imagine asking Ya'qub alayhi salam in Jannah,

**[10:04]** to go through those moments from his perspective, وَأَعْلَمُ مِنَ اللَّهِ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ I know from Allah what you don't know. We know from Allah what they don't know. When we see the pain that's in front of us, and the quote unquote hopeless,

**[10:20]** we have hope, more hope in the word of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala than we do in anything that we see in front of us. So when we say that it will be free, that al-Aqsa will be free, that Palestine will be free, that Allah azza wa jal will restore glory to this ummah, all of that, we say it with our hearts full of tawakkul.

**[10:39]** When, how? نَعْلَمُ مِنَ اللَّهِ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ We know from Allah what you don't know. You depend on the material, possible. We depend on the Lord of material and immaterial, possible, impossible,

**[10:54]** tangible, intangible. We believe in Allah azza wa jal, and we trust Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And just like Yusuf alayhi as-salam, when he was in the well, when he was in the prison, when he was in slavery, when he was going through these phases, you couldn't, if you were doing a political analysis

**[11:10]** of Yusuf alayhi as-salam's state, at no point in those moments could you draw a parallel between Yusuf alayhi as-salam in that state and becoming the king. You couldn't draw it. But Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala already had it written in al-Lawh al-Mahfuz. We ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to allow us

**[11:26]** to see that victory, to be a part of that victory, to comfort the souls of those that have departed, and to comfort the souls of those that remain amongst us. And we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to join us all together in the realm of righteous souls with the person of our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam

**[11:42]** in al-Jannat al-Firdaus. Allahumma ameen. JazakumAllahu khayran. Wassalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh. Al-Fatiha.

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