My Favorite Mind Food

BismIllah wa as salaamu alaykum.

This is a page I set up to share ahadith and quotes that I find myself strongly moved by. This is the "mind food" I like to chew and chew on. I return to them. I think about them in depth. I make connections between them and the life examples around me. These are the things I believe are worth sharing...

Nothing, and I mean nothing, is worth compromising for Islam and obedience to Allah, subhaana wa taala. I read this saying of one of the Salaf and it gripped my heart and brought tears to my eyes, as it is the very essence of what I hold on to wa al hamdul'Illah. I pray we will all be able to live it - ameen! No poverty after Paradise and no wealth in the Fire It is reported that Jundub b. ‘Abdillâh Al-Bajalî – Allah be pleased with him – was once asked for advice and instruction. He said: I advise you to fear Allâh and obey Him (taqwâ) and I advise you to adhere to the Quran, for it is a light in the dark night and a guidance during the day, so implement it no matter how much struggle and poverty you have to face. If a calamity befalls you, put your wealth forward to protect your religion, and if the calamity continues, put forward your wealth and your life to save your religion [but never risk your religion], for the ruined is he whose religion is ruined, and the looted is he whose religion is taken. And know that there is no poverty after Paradise, and no riches after the Fire. Al-Dhahabî, Siyar A’lâm Al-Nubalâ` 3:174. _____________________ 

I have been very teary and emotional lately. Subhaan Allah, one ayah keeps coming into my mind and out of my mouth at the behavior around me. "Inna al insaana la fee khusr!" Verily mankind is in a state of loss! We let ourselves down day in, day out. Something very real that I have absorbed My signature below all my e-mails is the ayah 60 in surah al Ghafir (quoted in this narration), which just about summed it all up. Ibraheem ibn Adham, may Allaah have Mercy upon him, was a third century scholar, a teacher and a companion of Sufyaan ath-Thawree, and he was asked about the saying of Allaah – The Most High: “And your Lord says: ‘Call on Me, I will answer your prayer.. “ [Soorah Ghaafir, 40:60] “We supplicate and we are not answered.” So he said to them: “You know Allaah, Yet you do not obey Him, You recite the Qur’aan, Yet you do not act according to it, You know Shaitaan, Yet you have agreed with him, You proclaim that you love the Messenger of Allaah, Yet you abandon his Sunnah, You proclaim your love for Paradise, Yet you do not act to gain it, You proclaim your fear for the Fire, Yet you do not prevent yourselves from sins, You say: “Indeed death is true”, Yet you have not prepared for it, You busy yourselves with finding faults with others, Yet you do not look at your own faults, You eat that which Allaah has provided for you, Yet you do not thank Him, You bury your dead, Yet you do not take a lesson from it.” Khushoo fis-Salaat (p.62) of Ibn Rajab al-Hanbali – rahimahullaah

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On taqwa...may we always increase in it - ameen!

A man once asked Abû Hurayrah – Allâh be pleased with him, ‘What is al-taqwâ?” He replied, “Have you ever taken a path filled with thorns?” The man replied, “I have.” Abû Hurayrah asked him, “What did you do?” He replied, “When I saw a thorn I would dodge it or pass over it or behind it.” Abû Hurayrah said, “That is al-taqwâ.”

Al-Baihaqî, Al-Zuhd Al-Kabîr p351. 

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 I read this hadith in Sahih Al Bukhari, Vol 9, Book of Fitan. It was so deep, so disturbing...

7114
Narrated Abi Ash-Sha'sha':
Hudhaifa said, " In fact, it was hypocrisy that existed in the lifetime of the Prophet, but today it is kufr (disbelief) after belief."

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I'm not the one to compromise anymore. The concept of expecting good when one is being disobedient to Allah, is just absurd to me. It took me my years to understand that even if you think you are getting good while being disobedient, you are not really. When I read this hadith this morning it made me cry.

38- 1012 – Abdullaah bin Mas’ood from the Messenger -sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam-:

‘Verily there is nothing that brings you closer to Paradise except that I have commanded you with it. And there is nothing that brings you closer to the Hell-Fire except that I have prohibited you from it. Indeed Jibra’eel breathed into my soul.

Indeed a person does not die until all that which is to be provided to him will be given to him. So fear Allaah and make your request for that which is good and lawful, do not delay your provision by requesting it by disobedience to Allah, since you cannot achieve what is with Allaah except with obedience to Him.’

No. 2866 Silsilah Ahadeeth As-Saheehah

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Something inside me is really struggling with the disobedience and fitnah of mankind. Oh, Allah Knows I'm always making mistakes and lack refinement and good adhaab in many areas, but I dread being disobedient intentionally. That is just too much. Although we must live with disobedience, and deal with it as best we can, personally I have become an emotional wreck about it - particularly in close proximity.Well, here is a hadith about it...

18- 317 – On the authority of Anas bin Maalik in a narration ascribed to the Prophet: ‘Beware of everything you have to make an excuse for.’
No. 354

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“Know that the greatest of losses is for you to be preoccupied with one who will bring you nothing but a loss in your time with Allah – the Mighty and Majestic – and being cut off from Him; wasting your time with the person, a weakening of your energy, and the dispersing of your resolve. So, if you are tested with this – and you must be tested with this – deal with him according to how Allah would wish, and be patient with him as much as possible. Get closer to Allah and His Pleasure by way of this person, and make your getting together with him something to benefit from, not something to incur a loss from. Be with him as if you are a man who is on a road who was stopped by another man, who then asks you to take him on your journey. Make sure that you are the one who gives him a ride, and that he is not the one giving you the ride. If he refuses, and there is nothing to gain from travelling with him, do not stop for him, bid him farewell, and do not even turn back to look at him, as he is a highway robber, regardless of who he really is.

So, save your heart, be wary of how you spend your days and nights, and do not let the Sun set before you arrive at your destination.”

Ibn al-Qayyim; ‘al-Wabil as-Sayyib‘

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‘Abdullâh ibn Mubârak (rahimahullâh) would say,

“The world is the believer’s prison. The best action in the prison is patience and control of one’s anger. The believer has no country in the world, His land will be there tomorrow in the Afterlife.”

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Verily never will Allah change the condition of a people until they change it themselves (Quran 13:11) 

This verse has two sides. Allah will not change a situation from bad to good without the people making sincere effort for that end and vice versa. Alla will not change a situation from good to bad, unless the people insist on continuing along the wrong path. Subhaan Allah! May we all remain on the Straight Path and may Allah guide us to the best of conditions in this life and the next - ameen!

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It is reported that ‘Umar b. ‘Abd Al-‘Azîz once wrote to Al-Hasan Al-Basrî to get a brief exhortation from him, so Al-Hasan wrote back , “The dunyâ distracts and preoccupies the heart and body, but al-zuhd (asceticism, not giving importance to worldly things) gives rest to the heart and body. Verily, Allâh will ask us about the halâl things we enjoyed, so what about the harâm!”

Al-Bayhaqî, Al-Zuhd Al-Kabîr, article 26.