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S3 E1: The 7 Rivers to the Heart | DoubleTake Ramadan Special
Note: The quote Ustadha Ieasha mentions at 8:00 (“Allah says…”) is not a verse from the Qur’an, but a quote from the Israa’eeliyyaat, a narration from the people of the Book. It means that Allah (SWT) puts love and knowledge of Himself in the heart of His slave.
In verse 183 of Surat al-Baqara, Allah says, “O believers! Fasting is prescribed for you—as it was for those before you—so perhaps you will become mindful of Allah.” Every Ramadan is full of reminders that the purpose of fasting is to gain taqwa, meaning mindfulness of God, or God-consciousness. But how exactly does that work? What is the relationship between what our bodies physically consume and the states of our hearts? What should be mindful of throughout our fasts so we can achieve the goal Allah intends for us? In this episode, Ustadha Ieasha Prime joins the show for a special presentation about how fasting protects and cleanses the heart, followed by a personal reflection by host Mohamad Zaoud.
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This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullah. In Surah Al-Baqarah, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, O believers, fasting is prescribed for you as it was for those before you, so perhaps you will become mindful of Allah. Every Ramadan is full of reminders that the purpose of fasting is to gain taqwa, meaning mindfulness of God or God consciousness. But how exactly does that work? What is the relationship between what our bodies physically consume and the states of our hearts? Welcome to a very different episode of Double Take, a podcast by Yaqeen Institute about the questions and ideas around Islam and Muslims that give us pause. We're in our third season. Thank you so much for sticking around. We're starting our season with four Ramadan specials and for our first one, we're joined by Ustadh A'ishah Prime. Ustadh A'ishah is a fellow at Yaqeen Institute. She's also the director of women's programming at Dar Al Hijrah Islamic Center in Virginia, and she's the founder of the DC Muslim Women's Conference. She converted to Islam more than 20 years ago after being a youth ambassador to Morocco and Senegal. She studied at Fajr Institute in Cairo, Egypt, as well as at Dar Al Zahra, an Islamic university for women in Hadhramaut, Yemen. We weren't able to record our sit down interview as we normally would because my wife was giving birth Alhamdulillah, but Ustadh A'ishah was generous enough to record her thoughts for us about how fasting protects and cleanses our hearts. Enjoy the episode. As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh. Jazakumullahu khair for joining Yaqeen during this Ramadan series. This is a wonderful opportunity for us to elevate our fast to the next level.
We ask that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala increase us in insight and understanding, and that He expand our hearts and elevate us. As we look at, subhanAllah, the verses of the Quran that we're all familiar with, right, that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala reminds us bin ma'ina that fasting is prescribed for you perchance that you may learn taqwa, right? And for so many years, year after year, we hear this statement, fasting is prescribed for you perchance you might gain taqwa, right? Which means perchance, la'allakum, like perhaps, meaning that if we, if there's a secret in it that we understand, right, that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam, he reminded us that many will fast but only attain thirst and hunger. So what is it that's going to elevate our fast and deepen it? What is it that's going to give us the kind of fast that we're going to get taqwa? First we gotta understand what's the goal? If the goal is taqwa, then what is taqwa exactly? Taqwa is oftentimes translated, of course, as fear of Allah. It's often translated as this kind of, you know, feeling that we have or hope for also this kind of, you know, modesty or shame in front of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. But in reality, taqwa is something so much greater and larger and bigger than that, but also inclusive of that. Taqwa is to be so in love with Allah, so aware, so conscious of not only His presence and His greatness and His mercy, that one then becomes afraid to disobey Allah. They feel too shy in front of Allah to disobey Him while at that very moment He's blessing them with so much. It brings us to the story of Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Adham, Rahimahumullah, who one of his students,
SubhanAllah, came to him and approached him and asked the Sheikh for permission to commit zina. And as he asked him for permission to commit zina, he said, yes, I will give you permission to commit zina under one condition. Of course, he was so shocked that his own Sheikh would give him permission to commit zina. He's like, whatever, whatever the condition is, I'm ready. What is it? Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Adham, Rahimahumullah says, you can commit zina as long as you do it outside of Allah's dominion. The student immediately, of course, is stumped. He's like, there is no place outside of Allah's dominion. He said, OK, OK, the Sheikh says, OK, I recognize there's there's no place outside of Allah's dominion. All right, then I'll give you another condition. You can do it if you can meet this next condition. He says, OK, Sheikh, what is it? He says, do it while not sustaining yourself on the food and drink that Allah gives you. The student says, how is that possible? If I don't eat or I don't drink, of course, I'm going to starve to death. And Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Adham, of course, recognizing MashaAllah and his beautiful teaching says then to his student, if you can't go outside of his dominion and you will be sustaining yourself on the food and drink that he gives you, meaning out of his mercy, then don't you feel too shy to do it in his dominion while you're sustaining yourself by what he gives you? This, of course, is the meaning of taqwa. This is the embodiment of it. The recognition that subhanAllah, Allah has literally given me more than I could ever ask for, ever pray for.
Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala is literally taking care of us at every 100th millisecond of every second that there isn't a blink of an eye, not even the twinkling of the eye, that Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala isn't taking care of us, that he isn't providing for us, protecting us from harm, planning for us. That subhanAllah, Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala is literally always connecting to us, even by the fact of our very breath. And of course, we're inside of his dominion, inside of his sovereignty, then there should be this kind of awe. There should just be this kind of like subhanAllah, Ya Rabbi, as busy as you are, as magnificent and great as you are, as you're taking care of the greatest matters as it relates to the cosmos and the universe, you're also taking care of me. There's also a concern about what I will eat and what I will drink and whether or not I have love and protection and care and concern in my life. SubhanAllah. Even after all the sins that I've committed, even after all the things that I've done, Ya Allah, you still give me another chance. You didn't smite me blind after looking at something haram. You didn't smite me deaf after listening to something that was haram. So okay, we understand, we've got that aspect of taqwa. Now let's look at what does fasting do? Literally fasting quarantines the heart. The heart is literally the ocean of our spirituality. It is the place by which we connect to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. It's the place by which we're even able to experience love.
While we're able to experience love for Allah or love for the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam or experience any bit of purity or light. So this ocean, meaning that it's vast, subhanAllah, it's so vast that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says that he's too vast to fit inside the entire universe, yet he fits comfortably in the heart of the believer. SubhanAllah, the one who is al-kabir al-wasi' can fit in the heart of the believer. This how great then must be the heart. But subhanAllah, that ocean of the heart has multiple rivers. There are seven rivers to the ocean of the heart, the eyes, the ears, the mouth, the hands, the stomach, the private parts, and the feet. All of these are rivers to the ocean of the heart. And what we know subhanAllah is that if you actually stop any impurities, right, from traveling through the rivers, then it would never reach the ocean of the heart. So one of the ways in order to keep that heart pure so that it can attain taqwa is that we've got to be able to control the rivers, right, that flood into that ocean. So when we look at the aspects of fasting, whether it be fasting in Ramadan, which should spring us into fasting during the radiant days, the 13th, 14th, and 15th, right, or whether it be, you know, fasting Mondays and Thursdays, or fasting the days of Dhul-Hijjah, or the days of Muharram, whatever it is, right, that fasting is meant for us to be able to attain that high level of consciousness and awareness of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala by
which we're magnificently in awe, hype, and too shy to disobey Him. Now, so that fasting does what? It literally quarantines the heart by shutting down those rivers. The first thing that we understand that becomes shut down is the mouth, right? You gotta shut down the mouth. You've got to control that which you're putting into it. Now what's so significant about controlling what you put in your mouth? SubhanAllah, the very first wrong, right, that we know of that was committed had to do with what we put in our mouth. Is it only that, subhanAllah, you know, that Allah is obsessed with the concept of food? No. It's about either the consciousness or the ghafla, meaning the lack of consciousness that comes as a result of what we put in our mouth. That before, you know, either, there are two things that are happening. Either we eat unconsciously, right, because we're just so used to overindulgence that the thought that has to come with saying, I'm actively going to stop eating, requires a level of consciousness. It requires some, it requires some thinking. I've got to bring my soul forward in order to stop my involuntary physical actions. The other aspect is that just as one controls what they put in their mouth, should we do it anytime? I don't have to be fasting to say, I'm not going to smoke weed, or I'm not going to drink alcohol, or I'm not going to eat pork. That already that's in place, right? That these are things I'm going to refrain from to make sure that I stay away from them out of obedience to Allah.
And Allah is so kind that He will even reward you for that obedience, which you don't do, right, out of obedience to Him. In this moment, Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala says, I want you to elevate that, eat nothing, drink nothing, just for this time, just for this short time, because what it's going to do, right, is it's going to raise your consciousness. It's going to cause you to think about how much you overindulge, or you do in excess, or how much you do without thinking about it. And then of course, we have to also recognize the second part of that is the recognition of that what we eat affects us. What we what we what enters into our body affects our spirituality. The same as if I eat too much sugar, it's going to affect my mood, right? The same as if I, you know, eat too much salt, it's going to even have an effect over time on the way that I'm able to perform ibadah. And whether or not I feel tired, which then is going to make me have a negative feeling towards the approach to longer ibadah. It's going to become worship of Allah is going to become heavy on my body. So Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala is saying, put some control over that, put some thought onto that. Then the next aspect, of course, SubhanAllah, has to do with the eyesight. Our eyes, the Prophet ﷺ of course, reminded us, right, that the eyes are the windows to the soul, they're the windows to the heart. Now we often think about that when someone we're looking at someone that we would be able to have some kind of insight into who they are and their soul based upon looking
into their eyes. But it also works the other way. When a window is open, wind can come in and wind can go out. So that which comes in, right, affects the heart, what you're watching. During fasting, of course, we always talk about refraining from food and drink. But as we know, we've got to control, the beginning of the control of desire comes from being able to control what we watch. So the Prophet ﷺ also told us that zina, that fornication, also happens with the eye. SubhanAllah, and shaitan, he takes the iman from your heart through your eye when you're looking at something haram, he literally takes the iman from your heart through your eye like this, as long as you're watching it. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala save us from that. So of course, Allah reminds us, lower your gaze, guard your modesty. Meaning subhanAllah, you are making sure to place some consciousness around even your eyesight. It raises your level of humanity, that you are concerned about protecting someone else's dignity as well as your own. Having a sense of modesty, haya, and haya, interestingly, comes from hayt, which means to be alive, comes from life itself. Why? Because if we're not consciousness of our haya, of our modesty, it will deaden our hearts. That begins with what we watch. And then of course, what we listen to. The ears are also rivers to the ocean of the heart. Be careful, not only am I talking about certain lyrics, but I'm also talking about what people say, right? What you allow yourself to participate in.
Literally subhanAllah, we know that sometimes the things that you hear can deeply poison the heart. It can poison the heart around what you know, what you think, your opinion of a particular person or what you think of a particular institution. It can actually harden your heart to the entire ummah, subhanAllah. Sometimes it can also, what you hear, right, can also then inspire the eye, I heard this now I want to go see it. So having a serious protection around your ears and what you listen to and what you allow people to have conversations with you about, or even subhanAllah, just passively allowing the radio to play, to play, to play, meaning they can fill your mind with this, fill your mind and your heart with whatever's on their mind and whatever's on their heart, no matter how poisonous it may be. So you have to say, no, in order to protect the heart, I've got to protect my ears. What I allow, right, to enter into it. And then of course your hands, our hands, subhanAllah, as we're conscious about not lifting a drink or not lifting food to put into our mouths, we're also very conscious about who we harm with our hands, right, or not harming someone with our hands. We're also conscious about not stealing, not taking something that isn't ours, right. We're also conscious about what we're, if we're paying in riba, right, paying in interest or paying in a way that is haram, we're also conscious about not receiving haram wealth, right, haram earnings. For the Prophet, salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, reminded us that the ones whose prayers is
not answered by the one who is al-Mujib, the one who answers prayers, the ones who prayers Allah subhanAllah refuse to answer, are the one of course whose clothing is haram, whose food is haram, and whose wealth is haram. So in this moment, subhanAllah, being careful about what you earn, right, what you bring to your family, being conscious about that. And then, of course, we've already talked about that which you consume. And then subhanAllah, your feet. Where are you going? Who's your company? Who's your sohba? The Prophet, salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, reminded us, ala dinil khalili, that you are upon the religion of your company, on your friends. And so that sohba, right, that you have is important. It's definitely going to affect your heart. I heard this really interesting fact from a doctor the other day. He said that every time you exhale, you exhale 10 to the power of 220 amount of isotopes. And then you inhale the same amount. Now when he said that, my mind immediately went to this beautiful story of the Prophet, salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, and Abu Bakr. That as they came back from Medina, and they were entering into Medina, no one could recognize one from the other. And people began to say it's because of the amount of time that Abu Bakr spent with the Prophet, salAllahu alayhi wa sallam. So meaning that if your companionship is righteous, even as you're inhaling as they exhale, if your companionship are those who are above you in knowledge, in spirituality, in purity,
in good character, as you inhale from them, subhanAllah, you also become better. So with that being said, the real goal, subhanAllah, of our fasting, of staying away from food and drink, is how do we maintain our consciousness, our relationship with Allah. Let that be our goal this Ramadan. Yes, read Quran. Fill those eyes with the Quran. Listen to the Quran. Listen to lectures. Listen to talk. Listen to good advice. Speak good advice. Recite the Quran. Go to the masjid. Be in good company. Do everything we can to say, Ya Rabbi, preserve my heart for you so that I could attain true taqwa and consciousness of you, Ya Allah. Jazakum Allah al-khair. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Ramadan Mubarak. As-salamu alaikum once again. Inshallah, we'll have Ustada Aisha in a proper sit-down interview in an upcoming episode. As I said, she was very generous to give that piece of advice. A word of advice from me as I listen to Ustada Aisha's reflections as we enter Ramadan, if I may. You'll hear a lot about how to prep for the month and all the great deeds that you can do. And there's one thing that I did a few years ago that really took my month to another level. And that is to have a couple of other people join on your journey. Building taqwa when you're alone is hard. It really is. Your back's against the wall. And as you heard from Ustada Aisha, it is a very enriching journey. It's all-encompassing. It requires your whole body to be attentive to this concept of taqwa. And one of those things that I did that really helped me solidify that concept of taqwa was to build that journey with other people.
So other people would help me gain that taqwa. I'll never forget that Ramadan that we really pushed ourselves as a group of three or four people. We joined the local tahajjud program that started from the very first night of Ramadan. Usually they start at the last 10 nights. This was really intense from day one. But this was possible because I had a group of people pushing me through it. So this was about 12 years ago, slightly before WhatsApp. And the way we actually set this kind of program up was the old school knocking on doors or telephone calls at three o'clock in the morning, or sometimes 2.30 in the morning. And so number one, we had a carpool. So in order to build that taqwa and to get to the mosque at three o'clock in the morning in a cold winter in Sydney, we would literally give each other a phone call and go pick each other up. And then after that, and actually it was a pretty intense tahajjud as well, it was two raqas for about like an hour and a half or two hours. And afterwards we would all have suhoor together. Now we all had full-time jobs. It was difficult. And if I was left to my own whims, it probably would never have happened. But because we built that little community that really pushed each other, it was, we were able to really push ourselves beyond the boundaries that we normally go through during Ramadan. So with a combination of taraweeh, which would normally take two hours, and then iftar, which between prep and cleaning and eating would take another hour. And then this tahajjud, in addition to all of that, from day one, which is another two or three hours, including suhoor, you're literally left with a few hours to sleep. So we used to sleep at like 1 a.m.
and then sleep again at say, seven to about 9 a.m. And we'd still have work. And we still did it. But what it did for us was, it killed the cycle that we were in throughout the whole year. And it just built that brotherhood and built that foundation to continue deeds throughout the whole year. And alhamdulillah, since then, that group of people who were joined for the sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and were joined to improve our God consciousness has done such great things together. And honestly, without it, I don't know where I would be. So that was 12 years ago. I didn't have three kids, alhamdulillah. I didn't have many family responsibilities. It is a lot more difficult now. And so my God consciousness has kind of morphed in terms of the path to get to God consciousness. I do things alone now. I do things when I got a quick five or 10 minutes, I can't have three or four extended hours to myself. And so you learn to actually use a lot of the free time that you have in between other big commitments. So the five or 10 minutes in the car or waiting for things, you really need to invest in those. And that's what I'm doing at the moment. It's difficult and it's a very different journey to God consciousness. So Ustada Aisha was talking about the seven rivers to God consciousness. What she didn't mention is that sometimes those seven rivers are upstream. So now that I'm a father of three and I find it difficult to have time to just focus on my worship, it is difficult. It is very, very difficult to build that God consciousness consistently. And we need to find that time and find the ability within ourselves to actually push forward and get closer to Allah
when we're so consumed in day-to-day responsibilities. By now you'd probably hear a recurring theme in many of our episodes on Double Take. We heard it with Sheikh Mohammed Al-Shinnawi in the episode about connecting with the Quran. We heard it about smartphones with Dr. Zahra Khan. And the theme is that as we're becoming more addicted to our phones and to news feeds and swiping up, that is distracting us from God consciousness. It's distracting us from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and from that quality worship. So my commitment after listening to Ustada Aisha talk about the seven rivers and specifically the eyes is to limit what my eyes and be more conscious of what my eyes look at, especially when it comes to my phone. It's frankly, it's with me all the time and it's probably one of the first things that I look at in the morning. So that is my commitment. What's different now to say 12 years ago when I had that small community, they're still around, but they're all busy with their families as well, is that that community has now become more internal. It's become part of my family. So inshallah, I'll be heading up my wife with our three kids to focus on less screen time during Ramadan and actually focus more and be present more when we worship and when we reflect on our religion. Jazakallah khair for joining this very special episode of Double Take. It is a little bit different to our typical format and inshallah, we'll have Ustada Aisha join us for a sit down interview in coming months. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala help us benefit from this Ramadan, accept our worship, increase us in taqwa and protect our hearts.
Ramadan Mubarak.
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