¶ Welcome and Muharram's Significance
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وإن خير الأمور عوازمها وشر الأمور محدثاتها وكل محدثة بدعة وكل بدعة دلالة وكل بدعة دلالة في النار أما بعد Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And he said in another place, Insha'Allah in today's khutbah, I will talk about the subject which is... relevant to the month of Muharram that we are going through. Even in case you have heard the topic that I'm going to talk about, we understand as Allah Azzawajal says, وَذَكَّرْ فَإِنَّ الذَّكْرَةَ تَنْفَعْ لِلْمُؤْمِنِينَ تَنْفَعْ مُؤْمِنِينَ
benefits the believer. So even if we have heard some time, inshallah, it can benefit us in many ways. So the 10th of Muharram,
¶ Ashura: Musa, Pharaoh, and Fasting
which is referred as Ashura as well, or the 10th, it has significance from two angles. I'm just talking about this, at least from the history of Islam, what we see. One of them is when Allah Azza wa Jal saved Musa Alayhi Salaam and the Bani Israel who was with Musa Alayhi Salaam, the believers, from that tyranny of... And Firaun and his army was destroyed by Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. As Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, Now here, when Fir'aun was...
following Musa alayhi salam and the Bani Israel. Allah azzawajal made the path, made the way for the believers to cross the Bahar, the sea. While Fir'aun and his army was drowned. And at that time when he was drowning, he started saying that he believed in Allah. And that was too late for him to believe in Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, save Musa alayhi salam and Bani Israel.
And about that, when Rasulullah ﷺ, when he was entering in Medina, there are many hadith on the subject that talks about that. When he entered in Medina, قَدْمَ الْمَدِينَةَ فَوَجَدَ يَهُودَ سُيَامًا يَوْمَ عَشُورًا When Rasulullah ﷺ was in Medina, he entered Medina, he found the Yahud, they were fasting for the Ashura.
فَقَالَ لَهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ مَا هَذَا الْيَوْمَ الَّذِي ذَسُومُونَهُ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّهُمْ So they said that... This was a great day. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala saved Musa alayhi salam and Bani Israel and destroyed, drowned Firaun and his army. So Musa alayhi salam. He fasted for thanking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And so we fast.
So when Rasulullah S.A.W. heard this, Rasulullah S.A.W. said, We have more right over Musa A.S. Hence, we will fast. We have more right to fast. And Rasulullah S.A.W. commanded the other Sahaba to fast as well the recommended fast of Ashura. And about this very same fast, the hadith that Rasulullah S.A.W. talks about when he was asked about the song of the Yom Arafah, he said, that it will eradicate or wipe out the sins of the previous year and the sin of the coming year.
When he was asked about the fast of Ashura, Rasulullah ﷺ said, it will forgive or it will clean up all the sins of the previous year. We ask Allah Azza wa Jal for all the brothers and the sisters. who fasted, whether it was Yama Arafah or the Yama Ashura, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala accept their fast, and may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala give us...
the forgiveness for all our sins from the previous year, in the following year. And we ask Allah SWT, the ones who were not able to fast, Allah SWT, give them the tawfiq to fast in the coming years, inshaAllah. Now...
¶ Karbala: Lessons Beyond Rituals
Talking about Firaun, one of the things about the Firaun was, Firaun was a taghi. As Allah Azza wa Jal, when he sent Musa alayhi salam towards him, he said, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala commanded Musa alayhi salam that go to Firaun where he has transgressed. He is a tyrant. Go to him. And similarly, we find from that perspective a similarity. in the life of Hussain, Imam Hussain radiallahu anhu as well. Because these both the incidents, whether it was the saving of Musa alayhi salam and his people,
from the tyranny of the Fir'aun. And on the other hand, when we talk about Imam Hussain who was martyred on this... Very same day with the temple of the Muharram. And so we remember the story of Hussain radiallahu anhu, that how... He struggled against another tyrant of his time. It was the Yazid. Because he took power by illegitimate means. So now when we talk about this story of...
Hussain radiallahu anhu, it's one of the horrific incidents of the history of Islam. When we become sad, when we talk about this story.
This incident that happened to Hussain and the family of Hussain. But at the same time, this very same incident that happened, it is very important for us... to get the heat from it, to learn lessons from it, instead of it becomes a strange ritualistic thing, whether it is the morning... in the way that Islam condemns, or it becomes more of a thing where people think of this as just another holiday for us.
Go and the Desi community go and make halim or khichra, whatever they make. Distribute that. Or they make those small places where they make sure the people get enough to drink. different kind of drinks they are serving to the people. So, instead of learning the lesson, it has become some strange kind of ritualistic day, and...
we are losing the real essence of that day when we are remembering. Whether from the context of the Ashura when Allah Azzawajal saved Musa Alayhi Salaam and the people following Musa Alayhi Salaam and destroyed Fir'aun or... When we talk about the incident that happened between Hussain and the army of Yazid. So let's talk about what exactly was the incident. So at least we learn from it.
And we think about it and apply in our life. That's the idea for us. We don't learn about Islam to just think of it as a bedtime story. And then go to sleep after you're done with the story. Rather... The purpose of the story is whether it was the time of... Before Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, Allah Azza wa Jal has mentioned many stories in the Quran of the good people and the bad people. There is an Ibrah. For the people who think.
When these stories of the previous people have been mentioned, whether those stories were prior to Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, or whether those stories are after Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, we are supposed to get the ibrah out of it. We are not there to get the ahkam out of it, but we have learned the...
¶ Yazid's Usurpation of Islamic Leadership
we have to learn the lessons out of this. So when we read about Imam Hussain, and the story, when the incident happened, we have to think about, what is the lesson for me? So number one thing. Why Imam Hussain he had to go towards Kufa? Why he was traveling to Kufa? The purpose, the reason was that there was... One of the rules of Islam was broken. One of the rules of Islam was broken. What was the rule? The rule was how the Khalifa is supposed to be appointed in Islam. This is what happened.
We know after Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam and he passed away, Abu Bakr Suddiq radiallahu anhu, he was appointed as the Khalifat al-Rasul, the successor of Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam. How was he appointed? He was appointed by, he took the Ba' from the people. Because Ummah has the authority to appoint the ruler to rule by Islam. That's the idea.
And after that, we see Umar رضي الله عنه, he was nominated by Abu Bakr. It was not Abu Bakr who had the authority to make an ex-Khalifa by the way. He only nominated... And after the nomination, Umar رضي الله عنه, he took the Bay'ah from the people again. أهل الحل الواقع. Meaning the people of power, people who have authority to give, pass on the Bay'ah. And after that, Uthman took the Bay'ah.
After that, Ali took the bayah. And after that, Hasan radiallahu anh took the bayah and he became the khalifa. And then he stepped down from Muawiyah and he took the bayah and he became the khalifa. Now after that, Muawiyah is the one who broke the rule. The rule which is established by Allah Azza wa Jal from the Quran and the Sunnah, we can establish that from the Ijma'ah of the Sahaba. The rule was, the power, the rule is in Islam, that the power is supposed to be transferred by the Bay'ah.
The Ummah passed the authority to the ruler. That's what's supposed to be done. And now in the case of Yazid, Muawiyah in his lifetime, he forcefully took the Ba'ah in the favor of Yazid. And that is not enough. For the one to become a ruler in Islam. To be a ruler, he has to get the bay'ah from the people. From the Ahlul Halal Waqarah, the people who have power, the people who can do and undo the things. They are the one who give the power. And then...
There is the Ba't al-Am, a general bear on the neck of all the people. When this was, this rule, one rule was broken. Because Muawiyah, he had the center of power during his time in Bilal-Sham. And he was able to get the Ba'ah from the people of Sham, but there were three centers of Islam at that time. One was Sham, one was Kufa, and one was Medina. And Yazid was not able to get from the Kufa and Medina.
The Ba'ah. And Hasan radiallahu anhu, he was going towards the people of Kufa to take the Ba'ah. And now there, Ibn Ziyad, who was the governor there, he sent the army. And then there was a bloodshed happened because he was forcefully trying to take the bayah from Hassan radiallahu anh. And Hassan radiallahu anh was above 100 people. And then this sad incident of the history of Islam, one of the saddest incidents of the history of Islam happened.
¶ Hussain's Sacrifice: A Call to Action
where Hussain was martyred. So I'm not going into the detail of the whole of martyrdom. whether the water was available or not, or the food was available or not. Hence, we should start distributing the food and distributing the water. This is not the idea. The idea is to understand why Hasaf Hussein had to go towards Kufa. Why was he against Yazid? Because he broke one of the rules of Islam. One. Today, many rules are broken. People are not implementing Islam at all.
The Muslims in Palestine, they've been butchered. Every time the election time comes up, no matter which side of the party the Yahud have over there, they take this... opportunity every time around the election, go and kill some Muslim in Gaza. Or go and kill some Muslim in Madhu Laksa. Go and kill Muslims wherever they find in the land of Palestine. The land which is a blessed land Allah Azza wa Jal has declared.
And we don't find the one who's supposed to be protecting the Ummah existing today. For very same thing, Hussein r.a and his family gave their life. gave their life. Today we have lost the meaning of it. Today this has become a ritualistic holiday for doing strange actions that are not even aligning. with the sunnah of Rasulullah ﷺ, as a matter of fact, they are going against it. There are many people, we find, many rulers among the Muslim lands today, they are implementing kufr over the people.
Forget about missing one rule. Yazid was manipulating and trying to start this kind of idea of the power should be transferred from father to the son or the uncle or this or that without the bayah. And Hussain radiallahu anhu, he went against him and he did not hesitate to give his life and the life of his family members.
That's what the incident was about. That's what the history is about. So we have to get heed from this and think of it today when we look at the rulers of the Muslim ummah today. They're not lacking one rule. They completely have eradicated Islam. Not only they're not implementing Islam, rather they are going against the people who want to call for Islam. Take any example.
I don't have to go into detail of each and every ruler in the Muslim land. You will find all similarities all across. So when we say we love Hussain radiallahu anhu, When we say we love Hussain, we better mean it. Because Rasulullah ﷺ said, من أحب الحسن والحسن فقد أحبني. Whosoever loves Hussain, Hassan and Hussain. They love me. And whosoever have hate towards Hasan and Hussain, they have hate towards Rasulullah ﷺ. Another hadith says,
Hussain is from me and I'm from Hussain. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala loves the one who loves Hussain. So when we say we love Hussain We better put our actions towards our talk. Whatever we are saying, we better be translating. Not act like Yazid. or worse than Yazid, because Yazid broke one law, and unfortunately today, we are breaking all the laws of Allah, when it comes to implementing over the people.
¶ Emulating Hussain and Final Exhortation
So we love Hussein, we better act like Hussein. We better raise our voices against all the tyrant rulers in the world. And let the people know that the only way that justice can come to the people is through Islam. As Allah Azza wa Jal has said in the Quran, O you who believe, why do you say what you don't do? If we love Hussein, act like Hussein. Raise the voice for Islam. Raise the voice for Islam to be implemented as a whole. Even we will not.
We will not let people to rule by Islam and try to subdue some of the rules of Islam. It has to be Islam as a whole. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, the most hateful it is with Allah azawajal. For the people, what they say, but they don't do. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Make us among those who love Hussain radiallahu anha the way Allah wants us to love Hussain. May Allah make us love Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam the way Allah wants us to love Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
May Allah make us love Allah Azza wa Jal as Allah Azza wa Jal. Thank you for listening to this podcast. Podcasts on Current Events, Islamic Guidance, Quran, Tafsir, and Sira are available at islampodcasts.com as well as on iTunes. Rate, review, and comment and let us know how we can grow in our knowledge to better serve our community. Please subscribe. Share and tell a friend about IslamPodcast.com.
