Deeper into Dhikr
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The Meaning of Astaghfirullah | Episode 5
Istighfar is the key to Paradise, the gateway out of difficult situations, and the source of unexpected sustenance in our lives. The power of astaghfirullah and all its variations, including sayyidul istighfar, the master prayer for forgiveness, cannot be overstated. Learn more about how to turn back to God whenever you find yourself falling short.
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Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. There's a narration that three different people came to an Imam Hassan al-Basri rahimahullah and all three of them had different complaints. One of them said, oh Imam, we're suffering from poverty. The other one said, oh Imam, we're suffering from drought. The other one said, oh Imam, we're trying to have children. And to all three of those people, Imam Hassan al-Basri rahimahullah said, say astaghfirullah, say astaghfirullah, say astaghfirullah, say I seek forgiveness from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And when his students asked him, why is it that you said to all three people, say astaghfirullah, he said, because if you look at the Qur'an, Allah azawajal says about Nuh alayhi as-salam, faqultu astaghfiru rabbakum innahu kana ghaffahara. I said to them, seek your Lord's forgiveness, for indeed, He is truly most forgiving. yursir al-sama'a alaykum idrara. If you do that, He will shower you with abundant rain. wayumdidukum bi amwalin wabineen. He will supply you with wealth and with children. wayaja'al lakum jannatim wayaja'al lakum anhara. And He will give you gardens as well as rivers. And so istighfar, seeking Allah's forgiveness, collectively is the key to all goodness in this life. But more than anything that we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for of this world, it's also our path back to paradise. When Adam alayhi as-salam, our father, and Hawa, Eve, left paradise, they turned back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in repentance. And Allah azawajal inspired them with the words, rabbana dhalamna anfusana wa in lam takhfir lana wa tarhamna lana koonana minal khasireen. Oh our Lord, we have wronged ourselves. If you don't forgive us and have mercy upon us, then we will certainly be amongst the losers. Now here's the thing, Allah gave them the words of forgiveness. And here Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave us the best way to seek forgiveness.
And that in and of itself is a sign that Allah wants to forgive you. And I want you to think about the most forgiving person you have ever known in your life. And think about how quickly they forgive you the moment that you apologize, how quickly they relinquish a grudge, even if they had one, as soon as you say, I'm sorry. And those people are nothing compared to al ghafoor, the off forgiving. All you have to do is say, I'm sorry, and know that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is always willing to accept your apology. Now istighfar, seeking forgiveness, is just one part of our wholesome package of turning back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. It's essentially an admission of shortcoming that is verbalized. So istighfar is specific to the tongue. Nadam, which is regret, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said, annadmu tawba, that regret is tawba, it is repentance. Nadam is how you feel, it's the true remorse that you have on the inside. Istighfar is what you say, astaghfirullah, I seek your forgiveness, O Allah. Tawba is what you do. It's the full repentance of turning back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. This basically forms not just the beginning of the history of mankind when Adam alayhi wa sallam and Eve leave paradise, but it forms the basis of your relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So at the very beginning, al-Fudayl ibn Ayyad rahimahullah was asked, what's more important? To do istighfar or to do tasbih? For us as human beings, is it more important for us to seek Allah's forgiveness or to glorify his perfection? Now obviously both are important, but he said that think about a garment that you have and there's a stain on that garment. So if you've got a white thobe and you've got a coffee stain on it, what do you do with that garment? The priority is not to embellish that garment. The priority is to remove the stain. And so he said, astaghfirullah, repentance, seeking Allah's forgiveness is removing the stain.
All the other forms of dhikr are embellishing the garment. And so they're both important, but you have to get back to your origin and remove the stain on your heart and then turn back to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam was so comprehensive. In one authentic hadith, when someone would embrace Islam, the first thing the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would teach him is salah. And then the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would teach him the following du'a. Allahumma khfirli warhamni wahdini wa'afini warzuqni. So it's such a comprehensive du'a, it's a simple sentence. Oh Allah, forgive me and have mercy on me and guide me and give me good health and provide for me. So the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said, this is a du'a that you should say to keep yourself busy with in the very beginning of your Islam with Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. But you never get past seeking Allah's forgiveness. There's always going to be a reason for seeking Allah's forgiveness. And that's not just because you are going to keep sinning. It's because you're never going to do good enough to meet what Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has done for you. And that's the istighfar of the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam himself. The istighfar of feeling naqs, of feeling deficiency. Now think about it in the capacity of everything that we've spoken about. You know how perfect Allah is. You've praised Allah for all of his blessings upon you. And you know that no matter what you do in return, you're never going to do quite enough. And so you always feel a sense of regret. And that's why when you finish salah, you didn't do anything wrong. You did the best thing you could possibly be doing when you prayed. But you say astaghfirullah, astaghfirullah, astaghfirullah right away. Why? Because perhaps some of my salah was lost. Maybe I was distracted. And even if I wasn't distracted, then surely I have not repaid Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la for his favors upon me. And so everyone is in a state of istighfar.
Some are seeking forgiveness for the deficiency in their good. Some are seeking forgiveness for their sins. And Imam Sufyan al-Thawri, he said, that's why when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la praises al-mustaghfirina bil-ashar, those who are seeking Allah's forgiveness in the last part of the night, that he's speaking to two different categories of people who are both making istighfar. He said, you have those who wake up in the very last part of the night to seek forgiveness with a small prayer. And then you have the friends of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la who have already prayed a portion of the night and they're seeking forgiveness at the end of their worship. They're both praiseworthy, but he says their istighfar is not the same. You have the istighfar of the lovers and you have the istighfar of the sinners. And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, of course, is the most beloved to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. And after a long night of prayer, he would still seek Allah's forgiveness. And he said, SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, that, oh people, I seek Allah's forgiveness at least a hundred times a day. And Imam An-Nawwi Rahimahu Allah, he said, that's the minimum from the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. You can find the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam in a single gathering seeking Allah's forgiveness more than a hundred times. But he's saying that I seek Allah's forgiveness at least a hundred times a day. What does that mean for the followers of Muhammad SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam? And it wasn't just with one word or one phrase. You see, astaghfirullah. You see, astaghfirullah wa atubu ilayh. I seek Allah's forgiveness and I repent to Him. You see, rabbi khfirli, my Lord, forgive me. Or what Abdullah ibn Umar radiAllahu anhuma heard the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam saying throughout a gathering, rabbi khfirli wa tuba alayya innaka anta tawwabur raheem. My Lord, forgive me and have mercy upon me. You are the acceptor of repentance. You are the most merciful. And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said that whoever says astaghfirullah al-adheem
allathee la ilaha illa hu alhayyu alqayyum wa atubu ilayh. I seek the forgiveness of Allah, the most mighty, whom there is none worthy of worship except Him, the ever living, the ever eternal. And I repent to Him. The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said whoever says this form of istighfar, Allah will forgive him even if he had deserted the ranks of the Muslim's army. And that is of course one of the most severe sins, to flee the battlefield. And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam is saying that to repent to Allah wholesomely in this way forgives you even for that. He said SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, even when you sit together, he said when people sit and they speak in a gathering, and they end that gathering by saying subhanakAllahumma wa bihamdik ashhadu wa la ilaha illa ant astaghfiruka wa atubu ilayh. Glory is to you, O Allah, and all praise is to you. We bear witness that there is no God worthy of worship but you, and we seek your forgiveness and we repent to you. The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said, ghufira lahu ma kana fee majlisihi dhak. That anything that was said in that gathering will be forgiven biidhnillahi ta'ala. And he said the best form of istighfar, the best form of seeking forgiveness. It's called sayyidul istighfar, the master of seeking forgiveness. If you say it in the evening and you die, or you say it in the morning and you die, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said, you are certainly from the people of Jannah. Allahumma anta rabbi la ilaha illa ant, khalaqtani wa ana abduk, wa ana ala ahdika wa wa'dika mastata'tu, a'udhu bika min sharri ma sana'tu, abu'u laka bi ni'matika alayya, wa abu'u laka bi dhanbi, faghfir li, fa innahu la yaghfiru al-dhunuba illa ant. Oh Allah, you are my Lord. There is no God but you. You created me and I am your slave.
And I am abiding by your promise and your covenant to the greatest extent possible. I admit to you your blessings upon me and I admit to you my shortcomings. So forgive me because no one forgives sins except for you. So you have an admission of all the good that Allah has given to you and an admission of the times that you fall and shorten your response. And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said, if you say that and you die, you will be from the people of Jannah. May Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la make us amongst them, Allahumma ameen. So again, when it comes to istighfar, do it after you commit a sin. Do it even when you think about something that's sinful. Do it after you do a good deed out of feeling a sense of deficiency. Do it when someone praises you, as we learn as well, that when someone says something about you, seek Allah's forgiveness because you know that there are certain things about you that are not necessarily what others may think of you. And when you feel stress, Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam is narrated to have said, man lazima al-istighfar, ja'alallahu lahu min kulli dhiqin makhraja, wa min kulli hammin faraja, wa razaqahu min haythu la yihtasad. That whoever is consistent with seeking Allah's forgiveness, Allah will appoint for him a way out of every distress and a relief from every anxiety and Allah will provide for him from where he would have never thought he would be provided from. And you find from the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam something so beautiful. He says, innahu la yughanu ala qalbi, so you know sometimes my heart feels foggy. I feel like there's a fog over my heart. And so I seek Allah's forgiveness in a day, a hundred times. Istighfar is what removes the fog. It's what provides clarity. It's what removes all of the stress and the anxiety, and it's what connects us to the most perfect, even when we know how imperfect we are.
Astaghfirullahal azimalladhi la ilaha illa huwa alhayyul qayyumu wa atubu ilayh. Rabbi ghfirli, Rabbi ghfirli. Allahumma inni zalamtu nafsi dhulman kathira. Wala yaghfirul dhunuba illa anta. Faghfirli maghfiratan min indika warhamni. Innaka anta alghfurur rahim. Astaghfirullah wa atubu ilayh. Allahumma ghfirli dhanbi. Wa wassi'li fi dari. Wa barikli fi ma razaqtani. Rabbi ghfirli wa tuba alayya. Innaka anta attawabul ghafur. Allahumma ghfir lana. Warhamna. Wa atina fid dunya hasana. Wa fi alakhirati hasana. Waqina azaba annar. Allahumma ghfirli khati'ati. Wa jahli. Wa israfi fi amri. Wa ma anta a'lamu bihi minni.
Allahumma ghfirli jiddi. Wa hazli. Wa khata'i. Wa amdi. Wa kullu dhalika indi. Allahumma ghfirli ma qaddamtu. Wa ma akhartu. Wa ma asrartu. Wa ma a'lantu. Wa ma anta a'lamu bihi minni. Anta almuqaddimu walmuakhiru. Wa anta ala kulli shay'in qadeer.
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