How To Keep Our Hearts Away From Sins
Date:
Channel: Yasmin Mogahed
File Size: 17.53MB
Episode Notes
Sister Yasmin explains in this talk/lecture what we can do and how we can keep our hearts away from sins.
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AI Generated Transcript ©
Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim
Allah
May
Allah
we acidity, Omri 170. of cold calling
Allah subhanaw taala says in
bad
shape,
Adam Newman hire to dunia live while I was in.
So it was kind of either says, No. So the idea begins with Phil Hadid, verse 20 beliefs, know that it's a life of this world. And Allah subhanaw taala is not as telling us to think it is not telling us to, you know, kind of, you know, know it, but knowing.
So he's telling us in a very fatty way of fact, so that is why he's saying no one as a fact, a number and a number higher to dounia
and then a number of high end to dunya line. So, when you look at this a a is actually so amazing the order in which
lists the descriptions of this life.
I listened to a lecture A few years ago, and it was one of those really major turning points for me, it was kind of an aha moment. And it was a lecture by Sheila Naaman icon when she talks about this side. And when he went on to explain the order in which Alesis kind of betta uses in this in this description of the life of this world, he begins by saying, that the life of this world is not this play. Now, when you reflect on the lifetime of a human being, at every stage of our life, dunia means something different. So dunia for a child is something dunya for a adolescent, something else dounia for a teenager, something else. So the focus of what makes up my dunya the focus of what my
life revolves around, evolves as we grow, what is important to me changes as we grow. What is that when you're first born, and when you get the beginning entering into this life? What is your dunya about?
Play, your dunya is about play a child, the whole world, all that really matters to a child is playing. If you want to get a gift for a child, you give them the nicest suit as a citizen, and they couldn't care less. You could have spent $1,000. If they even made that I'm sure they do some disposable income.
A suit for the two year old that costs $1,000. Is that childhood care? No. Because all when a child cares about his toys. If you want to make the child happy, give them a toy, even if it's 99 cents. Because all that matters at that point in time is all about the planning.
And then as the child grows up, now we're talking maybe more middle school age. Now the idea goes on and says what
level is
entertainment basically.
When you get a little bit older, it isn't just about playing with toys. But now it's entertain me. You know, the most common phrase you hear from a middle schooler is on board.
Right? Like entertainment constantly entertaining me I can't not be stimulated for two seconds. I need to constantly simulating entertain me and this is the world we live in. Unfortunately we don't always grow out of it.
Live and
then we get older in our in high school.
Now what's the most important thing in high school? Well, this is the age where you start to take two hours to get ready in the morning.
And you know, there is like if there's a reflection you have to check how's your hair and, and or hijab or whatever.
Xena, Allah subhanaw taala. Next third in the list is Xena and none of us hyah dunya live on Walla Walla, Xena, Xena is decoration. adornment, looking nice things
be looking nice externally, then when you're at that stage, you know, the kind of the height of high school or teenage, what's your opinion about what you look like what that other person is looks like. And, you know, the status symbols are very important. But here, it's about what you're wearing, and how you look. And this is your dunya.
And then you get a little bit older and you graduate now you start to apply for schools start to apply to different colleges and programs. And now your focus is a little bit different once you know you get into college, it's not as important what you're wearing anymore. But now something else is more important. What?
Now, it's all about boasting the fashion bainer who means boasting between one another? You know, it's it's all about? What program did I get into what university did that person get accepted to? Now it's really about showing off, it's no longer about playing with the toys, it's no longer about, you know, the entertainment as much, it's no longer about what I'm wearing as much now it's about boasting. Now, you're trying to prove yourself to the rest of the world, that I am doing this, and I have this program and I have this degree. So you're trying to prove yourself at that point.
And there's so much competition,
there's so much competition at that point to prove yourself and to boast of your accomplishments.
What
what
boasting between one another than one time capsule and fill in the way when Oh land, then you know, you settle down, you get married. And now you have kids. Now what's dunya about? Well, it's no longer relevant what toys you played with, when you were a child, or you know, the movie theaters and the you know, the entertainment, or what you wore in high school, or necessarily what program you went to, or what degree you got in college now, it's about competing in wealth and children.
Now, it's about what did my child do compared to what did your child do? What University is your child in? versus what university? Is my child? And, and and how much money am I spending on my child's wedding compared to how much you are spending on your child's wedding? And is this competition now in wealth and children?
One can feel and while you went out and now it's about what your house looks like, as compared to what someone else's house looks like, and what kind of car you're driving. So that becomes your opinion.
After telling us that this is this is all kind of, we're all at a different stage in this timeline. We sort of fit somewhere in there. Allah is telling us after all of that, he gives us a parable.
He says know that the life of the world This world is these things in this order, and then almost a penalty to give us a parable. You know, you have a good teacher, if your teacher can explain concepts using a parable that you can relate to a loss of panel that is the best teacher, and the best would be the best one to raise us.
Canada the life in
Canada life. So here a law makes a terrible it is like a garden.
The farmer becomes very pleased with it. These things that we listed our toys and our entertainments and our competition and our boasting. It's It's beautiful for a moment. It's like the example of a flower. When you take a flower and you look at a flower when it's in full bloom it is you can almost call it perfect.
But there is a sign in the flower because Allah subhanaw taala one of the signs of Allah is what happens to the flower over time and it doesn't take long for it to happen. What happens to a flower that you're very pleased with for a moment someone gives you a flower and very pleased for a moment, but what happens over time, can Bethany life in our
photo.
It makes the farmer really happy for a moment, but then it starts to turn starts to wilt.
starts to crumble it starts to turn yellow. This is the natural This is the natural life cycle, it starts to turn yellow.
And then after that, it just becomes like if you take that flower, the flower that is perfect. And it after it dries up and turns yellow,
it can become Performa, which is just debris you can take and you can crumble it in your hand.
A lot has made a parable, we have to pay attention, Ally's saying that the life of this world is like that, that it is all these things that we run after
different stages of our life. But at the end, what happens is just like that flower just like that garden, it blooms, but then it becomes yellow, and then it crumbles away.
And at the end, what happens within 21 months.
After that crumbling away happens, all that is left is one of two things, the severe punishment of Obama,
or the mafia, and then in one or forgiveness and the pleasure of the last
woman.
And what is the life of this world except has meant
the deceptive pleasure
and want to take a moment and look at this word Minitab because I also found it very fascinating when you look at the root of this word, Allah describes this life as a metallic metallic.
It is a metallic and it is deceptive. Metallic deception. But what is the metallic? Well, metallic normally is translated as something pleasure. But if you go to the root of the word mentality, this is what I found very fascinating, you find that it is essentially a resource or a tool. And
some of the teachers that said that in you know, the old Arabs use and refer to like, something like a fork, as a mentor. It's, it's something you use.
But let me ask you this question. If I were to give you a box full of tools.
And I tell you that I'm giving you this box full of tools so that you can build a house.
How many people are going to open up that box, see the hammer, see the nails, see the screwdriver, and pick out the tool and fall in love with the hammer
and forget what they're supposed to do with it.
You pick up a hammer and you just look at it like Wow, look at the shape of that hammer.
That is an awesome hammer.
And you become so distracted by the shape of the hammer that you forget what the purpose of the hammer is. And what we have done in this life is exactly that. A lot has given us a box of tools, mentality.
And the purpose of those tools is for us to build our home and gentlemen.
But what we do is we take out the hammer, we take out the nail, and we fall in love with the tool and we forget the purpose. We fall in love with the money and we forget the purpose. We fall in love with the people in our life and we forget the purpose. We fall in love with status we fall in love with Well, we fall in love with all power. And we forget that all of these things are just a tool.
We have a destination.
This life is the vehicle. It's again like someone who gets in a car. Here we are in
you know near DC. And suppose you want to drive and I'm from where I'm living right now in North Carolina. Suppose that you know want to get in get it back to North Carolina and I'm driving. My destination is Raleigh. If I get in the car, the purpose of my getting in the car is what to take me to Raleigh to take me to North Carolina. But what happens if I get in the car and I look around and I'm like wow, look at these leather seats.
Wow look at the steering wheel. This is an awesome car and I become so in love with
The car
and so distracted by the color and material of the seats that I never even turn it on.
What am I done?
Have I missed the point? What's the point of the car
is to take me somewhere. It's a means
by so many of us, we have gotten into the car. And we have fallen in love with the seats and fallen in love with the steering wheel that we never even turn it on. And we aren't going anywhere.
donia is like a car
we are sitting in is so distracted, that we aren't moving anywhere, because we forgot that it's just a means your money is a means your job, your education, your relationships, but we get lost in those things.
And so we don't actually move
you know, there is a very powerful statement of demand. And it relates to this concept of duty. Because sometimes people in discussing detachment in discussing how and why not be attached to the slave, they take one extreme in which you know, that extreme of complete,
you know, like like a monk, right, totally not being involved not having any thing of this life.
But this is not the detachment that we are taught by the prophets of life. And there's a very powerful statement of value on the line in which he says that Zoho is not that you do not own anything,
but that nothing owns you.
So it is okay, as I said to own money, but the problem is when the money owns you.
It's okay to have these things. And to be involved in these things as little profits by selling them said that he gets married and he he sleeps some he prays some new fast, some eat some. But at the heart of all of the prophets I send them was not attached to these things.
And there's a very beautiful story
of Abu hanifa
that illustrates this. He was a man who owned property.
And one time while he was teaching, some people came to him and told him that your ships have some or some portion of your ship. So this is equivalent to basically someone finding out that they lost a lot of money in the stock market and
they just lost a lot. So Abu hanifa until it he pauses for a moment when he's teaching. And then he says that.
And then he continues to teach.
And then a little while later, they come back to him and they tell him Actually, no, it wasn't your shifts, we made a mistake. Your ships are fine. So again, he pauses and he says that.
And then he continues teaching.
And when he's asked about that, he explains that when I was first told that my shins have some pause, and examined my heart, and I found it unmoved. So I set out to do that.
And then again,
when I was told that it was not my ships, I paused and I examined my heart. And I again found it unmoved. And so I said
is
wasn't about the gain or the loss. His Alhamdulillah was about the fact that his heart was not attached to the gain or the loss.
This is our problem is not that we own or we don't own money. It isn't that we're involved or not involved. It isn't that we're in or we're not in relationships. It is that those things own us
see, there's two places that you can hold the gift all of these are given so but most of them alone gives us well for law gives us you for long gives us help. law gives us intellect. Love gives us family.
And there are two places you can hold any gift.
You can hold it in the hand, or you can hold it in the harder
and our problem is when we take the gift and you hold it in our heart.
There's nothing wrong with having the gift as long as it stays in your hand.
So as long as the money is
in your hand, as long as the status is in your hand, as long as the relationships with the creation are in your hand,
then you're fine. The problem is when they're in your heart,
because the only thing that's supposed to be in the heart is the last item. And I'm going to clarify what that means. Because sometimes people get confused. They think, well, we were supposed to love our families. And it's okay to love these things. Yes, absolutely. But when I say what is in the heart, I'm not talking about love. I am talking about absolute dependency.
I'm talking about absolute attachments.
I'm talking essentially about worship. Our problem is we take the gifts of Allah and we love them more than the giver. And this is a fact.
We love the gift more than the giver.
We love the money more than the giver.
We love the spouse more than the giver, we love the children more than the giver.
When we do that, something very painful happens.
Anything that you love, as you should only love the last panel data becomes the cause of your pain.
And that's how you'll know
when we look back at the story of Evel Knievel
his heart was unmoved by the gain or loss of his wealth.
But had his heart had been attached to those ships, then finding out that they had sunk would have devastated him.
This is the problem with having these types of false attachments and loving things as we should only love a loss is they start to control us. If it's a person, then that person starts to control us.
If they're pleased with us, if they praise us, then we're good.
And if they are not, then we are not able to continue where we break. This is called the orbit of the creation. It's an orbit that has a currency. Every orbit has a currency you can revolve your life around the creation, you can revolve your life around the Creator.
And each has its own currency. And you'll notice that the currency of the orbit of the creation is praise and losing that is criticism. So that's why we start to covet these things, because that's the currency. But the amazing thing about this type of currency is it's like Monopoly money.
How many people have ever played Monopoly? Probably everyone at some point? Monopoly money feels really good.
to like, be rich for a moment, right? I have a million dollars. I have like 50 houses I you know, like, you feel really good while you're playing the game that I I have all this money, and I have all this property. But
what can you buy with Monopoly money?
This is the this is really the the way that Schumann praises. You know, it's like, it's like, the people are happy with you. Okay, what are you going to buy with that?
The people are crazy, or the people are criticizing you have been really would have been really lost? If Allah subhanaw taala is pleased with you, then what have you lost? And if all the people in the world are praising you and allies not pleased with you, then what have you gained?
How do you know?
When you're holding the gift in the heart instead of the hand? There are certain ways in which you can know. And I'm going to list just a couple of things. indications of that. One of them is just ask yourself.
What do I think about all day?
What occupies my mind? Most of the day, we're always thinking about something. Unless we're like comatose.
We're always thinking about something. What do you think about all day?
What do you think about while you're praying?
We get distracted, what's distracting you in your prayers? What's the first thing you think about when you wake up in the morning? And what's the last thing you think about before you sleep?
What keeps you awake at night?
What makes you cry?
What are you most afraid of losing?
What makes you most angry?
What causes you the most pain in your life?
When you examine these few things, you start to realize a lot of times the answer
All these questions is the same thing. Or it's related to the same thing or it's my job. Or it's my children, or it's my spouse.
Or it's what people think of me. Now what do these questions tell us about ourselves? These questions tell us what is really filling our hearts.
Because so many of us say with our Thomas that we love Allah and His Messenger most.
But the truth is, we when you love something, think about it. When you love something, when you're in love, you are always thinking about what you love.
You can't be in love with something and not think about it, it's impossible.
So when we say I love Allah Most, but we need a reminder on our phone to remind us to remember him.
There's a problem in my claim of love. Because sada doesn't need to put a reminder in her phone to think about
if she loves him,
we have to examine our claim of love of Allah subhana wa Tada. Alo warns us
in the end,
he says, say, if your father's or your sons or your spouse's
or your business which you fear decline, or your dwellings which you rejoice, you know, we love a nice house.
In any of these things that allow lists a number of things and note, every single one of them is have
every one of them is headed and in fact, we're supposed to love these things. our parents, our spouse doesn't say boyfriend, girlfriends and our spouses, our children, our our nice houses, our business, if any of these things I have when a fundamental law what
where do you have an fy sabini fentanyl bustle? A law here tells us that he's telling you the prophets, I send them to tell us that if any of these things are more beloved to you than Allah and His messenger and striving in his cause, than just wait,
this is to me very scary. Because you know, when your mom wants to threaten you,
you did something wrong. And sometimes she'll be like,
if you don't stop doing this, you're gonna have this punishment, and it is specific, can kind of handle that. But if she really wants to threaten you, she'll say, just wait and see.
Just wait and see what happens.
A lot is telling us and it was high above any analogy, just wait and see. If you love any of these things, which are all hell and a lot
more than Allah and His Messenger in striving in this cause and just wait and see.
Because the pain of that love will come in this life before the next life, I guarantee it. And it will be that very thing that you love, as you should only love a love that will be the cause of your greatest pain.
Because I asked you when you think about most all day, and I asked you what makes you cry. And I asked you What's the greatest cause of your pain? And what's the cause of your anxiety? And what's the cause of your fear? And it's all that same thing that you love that you should only live alone.
The question then is well, then what I realized this now, well, actually, what do I think about most has nothing to do with Allah and His messenger and striving and his causes. It's my job. It's my money. It's my house is my car. It's my children.
It's my spouse. So now what do I do what solution?
And I think that to talk about the solution, I'm going to give you an example.
When you're a child, you know a child's watching TV and sees a commercial. And on the commercial there's a there's a an advertisement for a toy Ferrari.
When a child sees that advertisement, that kid falls in love with that toy Ferrari and every day says here is to buy him that Ferrari eventually
He gets the car,
he will not want to let it go.
Try taking that car out of the hand of that child, it will not be pretty, it won't be easy.
But as that child grows up, now imagine that the child sees a real Ferrari.
Now, what happens to his love for the toy Ferrari?
Now, when you try to take that Ferrari away, it's much easier, because he sees the real thing.
What is our problem? Why is it that we are so attached to this life, we are so attached to the toy car, because we haven't seen the real car. That's the reason. We love this life so much and are not willing to sacrifice even a little bit, because we haven't seen the real part.
And we're so attached to the creation because we haven't really seen the Creator.
Once when
we have not measured or estimated all his true measured for estimation, we don't really know a lot.
Because if we really knew who all was if we really read his words, and reflected on and we really talked last time about it every day, like we talked to our friends, and we talked to our spouses and our children, then there would be no competition.
When you're on your way to needed a king and you see the servant of the king, yes, you know, you say send them to the servant. But how much effort Are you going to put into impressing the servant, and seeking help from the servant
and seeking praise from the servant and seeking love from the servant,
that should forget about the king. You don't do that. Because you know who has the power and you know that you're on your way to meet the king. So you treat the servant respectfully.
But you your focus is on the king.
We're all servants. Were all servants on our way to meeting the same King.
But we have to be able to see that without seeing the real car, you won't let go of the toy.
Lots of panel data when talking about the Hereafter, he asks us a very important question
bentall soon and
we'll ask him,
do we you prefer the life of this world? When the Hereafter is
it is better and more or less?
See there is dunya which is the lesser life it is the toy car.
It is that it is that means is that a vehicle? a box of tools. But there is a higher life. And Allah is asking us Do you prefer this life? When the Hereafter is better and more lasting? What is it about this life that hurts us? It's two things. One thing is it's never perfect no matter what you do, you can never make it perfect. No matter how much money you have. No matter how much status No matter how much power or beauty or wealth.
You can never make it perfect and second, it doesn't last. No matter how much money you have. And how much plastic surgery you you know, you pay for. You will never make it last forever. You cannot no matter what you do. Maybe the role is not a will eventually.
Your skin is always on a wrinkle No matter how much Botox you use.
Hi, Ron Paul, these are science telling us that the hereafter how do we prefer this light when the Hereafter is better and more lasting? It is better in quality. It is perfect. And it is better.
In quantity, it lasts forever. It doesn't end. We don't have to worry about getting old or wrinkled.
You don't have to worry about the two things that people suffer from most in this life.
Now hopefully,
there is no fear on them, nor will they grieve. What are the two things that we suffer from
Anxiety and depression, fear and sadness and it is those two things Allah says when describing Jenna there is no fear and there's no science. But yet we're still holding on to the toy car.
When Allah describes the hereafter and he says that
it is not just higher this life is higher to the dunya. This life is is the lesser life halen in Arabic This word.
It is not just life, but it's an exaggerated form of life is the real thing was telling us there is the lesser thing dunya that which is lower, and there's the real thing that which is higher. And that's
we need to start focusing and seeing the real thing. And when we do that, it becomes easy to let go of the toy car, it will become easy now to give up the home.
It will become easier
to hold on to fetch it on time, and piano and living those things because we see the real thing, and we know our destination around just sitting in the car and forget to turn it on.
Finally, almost a panel dialogue. I'm going to end with this because I think it's so comforting. Allah tells us about our relationship on a regime. Yeah. Are you concerned in
Iran because
here's the good news. Allah says
all mankind you are toiling ever painfully toiling towards your Lord, but you show me him pleading pony have missed it when I come in Navarre, Florida. He's
a shadow and
Lake wa salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato.