Friday Khutbah (June 11, 2004) delivered by Shaykh Muhammad Taher
DISCLAIMER: This reminder was originally delivered in Arabic. Any meanings lost in translation are not to be attributed to the speaker as reminders are translated by volunteers. The mosque has no official translater and volunteers often have no formal qualifications to translate on the day. Please forgive any errors as they are from our human weakness and any right guidance is from Allah.The Noble Qur’an is the Book of Allah. In it is news of what came before you, and tidings of what shall come after you. It rules amongst you. It is true and serious; not a joke. The ruler who neglects it Allah will destroy. Whoever seeks to be guided by other than it Allah will lead astray. It is the strong rope of Allah. It is the wise remembrance, and it is the straight path. It is that with which the passions do not deviate. The tongues do not make mistakes with it. The scholars never get enough of it. Its meanings never wear out. Its wonders do not cease. It is that which the jinn, when they heard it, they said:
“We have really heard a wonderful Recital. It gives guidance to the Right, and we have believed therein: We shall not join in worship any gods with our Lord.” (al-Jinn:1-2)
Whoever speaks by it is truthful. Whoever acts according to it is rewarded. Whoever rules by it is just, and whoever calls to it guides to the straight path.
Today, speeches, conferences, meetings, sittings, celebrations, broadcasts are opened with verses from the Qur’an, for the sake of goodness and blessings, or to sweeten the environment, or because of custom and habit, or perhaps it is to fool people and tickle their religious sentiments.
Indeed, we find that these people do not want to open themselves to the Qur’an, and their feelings, hearts, and beings in order to be brought to life by the life that is in it. They don’t want to open to the Qur’an their organisations and programmes and their ministries and their legislations and their courts in order for them to be filled with guidance, mercy and justice. They don’t want to open their societies and peoples to it in order for them to become messengers of goodness and callers to rectification and humane leaders and teachers.
O brothers and sisters!
Come today to learn about the fundamental goals of the Qur’an! Come to call
the Qur’an to teach us the goals that it was revealed for, and by which Allah
was pleased to have it as the seal of books. Come and call the Qur’an to have
its goals implemented in us, in our societies, in our reality and in our
lives.
The foundational goals of the Qur’an are four:
The first is guidance to Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala, true steadfast guidance, complete guidance for the individual in his entire being, his feelings and senses, and in all aspects of his life. It is complete guidance for the ummah, for its individuals, its facilities, its fields, its life, its reality, its transactions. It is all comprehensive humane guidance to its Lord:
“Indeed this Qur’an guides to that which is most right.” (al-Isra:9)
The guidance in this ayah is general and comprehensive, and the worthy life that it calls to is also general and comprehensive. Allah says:
“And thus have We, by Our command, sent to you revelation and you did not know before what was revelation and what was faith, but We have made the Qur’an a light by which We guide our servants as We will, and verily you guide to the straight way.” (Shuraa:52)
The Qur’an is a spirit and does not guide except the one who has spirit and the Qur’an is light, and Allah is the one who guides with this spirit and guides with this light, and He is the One who entrusted His Messenger, peace be upon him, to guide with this Qur’an to the straight way, and He is the One who entrusted every rightly guided believer to take guidance from this Qur’an and transmit it to others to guide them to what they were guided to.
The second goal is to create a balanced comprehensive Islamic personality (this is done by its commands and prohibitions, its manners and morals, its instruction and legislation). The Qur’an places the meanings of faith in the souls, and illuminates for them their lives with light and guidance and promotes in it goodness and righteousness. The Qur’an calls the Muslims in order for them to be benefited by what Allah has provided them, from gifts and talents and capabilities and for them to be given a good and beneficial responsibility to realise the goal and the purpose.
The Qur’an succeeded in realising this goal in the lives of the companions, may Allah be pleased with them. Each one of them was Qur’anic. They lived with the Qur’an and by the Qur’an. They knew very well that the Qur’an is the words of Allah. They were in harmony with the verses of Allah and they wanted to produce their fruits and be nurtured by the meanings of the Qur’an and they were living by the Qur’an, and they were upholding it and each one of them died following the principles of the Qur’an and carrying the message of the Qur’an.
The Qur’an is still equipped and able to, by the permission of Allah, grant and give and produce for the generations that live by it and believe in it and uphold it and its principles on the condition that the Muslim realises this ability and turns to it and that he improves his interaction with the Qur’an and his study of the Qur’an and that he is in harmony with it in everything from upbringing and education and other than them, and Allah spoke the truth when he said:
“Can he who is dead, to whom We gave life, and a light whereby he can walk amongst men be like him who is in the depths of darkness from which he can never come out?” (al-An’aam:122)
People, without the Qur’an, are dead in their hearts and in their senses and their feelings and their lives. And Allah says:
“The blind and the seeing are not alike nor are the depths of darkness and the light, and nor are the shade and the heat of the sun.” (Faatir: 19-22)
The third goal is the creation of an Islamic and Qur’anic society. The Qur’an builds an Islamic society and it builds it on the foundations of the way of the Qur’an and its principles and instructions, and when we proceed with the lights of the Qur’an, our society is revived with great and noble life, pure and happy, otherwise our society will be dead mulling over its grief and tragedies and it swallows its humiliation and cowardice in every moment.
The fourth goal is to lead the Islamic ummah in the battlefields against
its enemies and opponents.
The Qur’an takes the ummah by its hand and guides it and gives it the means of
victory and informs it of the reasons of animosity that others have towards
it. It shows them their goals and ambitions and their use of whatever they are
able to destroy it. It shows their methods and conspiracies and their
trickery. Allah says:
“And they ill-treated them for no other reason than that they believed in Allah, exalted in power, worthy of all praise.”…..”Until they turn you back from your faith if they can.”
“If they overcome you they would behave to you as enemies and stretch forth their hands and their tongues against you for evil and they desire that you should reject the truth.”
The Qur’an takes the ummah by its hand to show it the tool of victory and the provision of the path and strengthens its connection to its Lord and its Islam.
This is what the Qur’an did with then noble companions in their jihad with their enemies, this is what the Qur’an did with the Muslims when they devoted themselves to the Qur’an, and this is what the Qur’an will do with us if we consider it and adhere to it and follow its rulings. Therefore, Allah says:
“Listen not to the unbelievers but strive against them with the utmost effort, with the Qur’an.” (Furqaan: 52)
This is a divine instruction for the messenger, peace be upon him, and for the Islamic ummah that comes after him, to make the noble Qur’an an instrument and a means by which to seek help in its jihad. Indeed, what causes the heart to bleed and saddens the soul is that we see leaders, presidents and influential people, writers, thinkers and researchers in the Islamic world, approving of the procedure in the plan of war on the Qur’an and the teachings of the Qur’an. We see them today cooperating and expending their efforts in alliance with the leaders of the powerful world to obliterate the guidance of the Qur’an and put out the light of the Qur’an. But all these people forget that they are waging war against Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala, and the fate of everyone who wages war on Allah is known in history, and their destruction is narrated in the Qur’an to warn and give an example:
“Remember also the People of ‘Ad and Thamud. Clearly, will appear to you from the traces of their buildings their fate: Shaitan made their deeds alluring to them, and kept them back from the path, though they were keen-sighted.”
“Remember also Qarun, Pharaoh, and Haman; [We still have these archetypes today] Moses came to them with clear signs, but they behaved with insolence on the earth, yet they could not escape our punishment.”
“Each one of them we seized for his crime: of them, against some we sent a violent tornado (with showers of stones); some were caught by a mighty blast; some we caused the earth to swallow up; and some we drowned. It was not Allah who wronged them, they wronged themselves.”
“The parable of those who take protectors other than
Allah is that of the Spider, who builds a house; but truly the flimsiest of
houses is the Spider’s house, if they but knew.”
(al-Ankabut: 38-41)
Indeed, in our present age, we are in great need to be with the Qur’an, to recite it and reflect upon it, to understand it and explain it, to be revived by it and interact with it, and to extract more of its treasures and be moved by it, to fight our enemies with it and rectify ourselves and our societies with its guidance, and straighten the ways of our lives on its foundations, principles and its instructions. Today we are witnessing a vicious Zionist crusader attack, godless and full of hatred, on this ummah. We must seek refuge in the Qur’an, and devote ourselves to it, and face our enemies with it, and strive with its guidance. Indeed there must be men who carry the banner of the Qur’an and act and strive under its banner, so be, O Muslim, from them, and act with them, and struggle in their ranks:
As Allah says:
“And those who strive in Our cause, We will certainly guide them to Our paths, for verily Allah is with those who do right.”
“And this is a blessed Book which We have revealed, so<follow it and be righteous so that you may receive mercy.” (al-An’aam: 155)
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