hat the ayah says. We never anticipated or thought that such a solution was even possible. And here Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala makes it easy for us. This happens to people every day. There's people who can attest to this, but they were in a very difficult situation, but Allah gave them a way out. So, Alhamdulillah, and in safety, right? So again, similar themes here, but safety, we saved those who believed in us and had been people of taqwa. So safety can come in, I mean, the context of that can be, there's so many different ways to interpret that, but if you want to feel safe, insha'Allah, this is increasing in taqwa and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will give you safety or that feeling of safety. Because right now, I was just looking at some research yesterday actually on anxiety disorders. You know, that's the most common mental health issue in the world globally. And especially here in the U.S., plaguing, you know, more than, close to half a billion people worldwide. So a lot of people are suffering from the feeling of unease, the feeling of anxiousness, the feeling of instability, just not feeling safe. So Alhamdulillah, this can, just increasing our taqwa of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala can give us that, can restore that feeling of peace in our hearts and that feeling of safety in our hearts. And the next is the divine presence manifested as Allah's protection. Again, surely Allah is with those who have taqwa and who beautify with excellence.  It's like subhanAllah, they're just, they're walking around with, these spiritual bulletproof vests or something because the world, things can happen, but they just seem to be really composed and they don't get shaken up. And it's likely because Alhamdulillah, Allah has just given them the state and it's from Him obviously, because they have that taqwa and they're working so hard on themselves that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protects them from falling apart in the event that something happens, subhanAllah. Victory, right? Whoever obeys Allah and His messenger, oh, that's the next slide, one second, let me go to the next slide, Bismillah. So whoever obeys Allah and His messenger and knowingly has awe and consciousness of Allah, those are the victors. I mean, who doesn't wanna be the winner, right? Who doesn't wanna be successful in the sight of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala? We all do, so this is it. If we want to inshaAllah be among those who are victorious on the day of judgment and we show up inshaAllah with good news, then this is how we do it, knowingly having awe and consciousness of Allah. So being aware of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala but also being in that state of truly just having, I've talked about awe and it's so sad because when you think about children, we were all children at some point, but even if you ever spend time with children, it's like subhanAllah we have, all children have an awe, they have wonder and the slightest thing can impress them and put them in this state of just being amazed by very simple things, that we as adults often take for granted and even with my own children and I teach them, I'm around children a lot and I just love to see how something that, again, I may have maybe desensitized too because I've seen it so many different times but for them, they are just in awe of, one of the things my kids have recently really grown to love is to stargaze. So we have these apps, you can get these apps like I think it's one of those, it's called like Sky View. There's a few different apps, but they've been just eager every night and now that it's getting darker earlier, it's actually even more time for them to do it but we restrict it, we don't let them on that there for too long but they enjoy going out and just looking at the stars through this app because if you aim it to different directions, it'll tell you which constellations, which planets, whatever's going on at that time and so they're, they just love it, they're so in awe with outer space and the mysteries of the universe and then I think about, I've seen much of my share of documentaries and I've read different facts here and there but I think because the adult brain can only maybe juggle so many thoughts at once or responsibilities kick in. We sometimes just tend to, oh yeah, mashallah, subhanallah and then we move on to the next thing but if you actually take time to pause and to deeply allow yourself to reflect on a lot of things, the all will enter your heart, which is why it's so important to disconnect, to take a break, whether you love the ocean or love the mountains or love the desert. There are people who like to go to, I mean, we have in Southern California anyway, there's a Joshua tree. There's places that are apparently really beautiful. I have not yet been, maybe one day, inshallah, but I've heard really amazing things from even places like that, you know, that people feel spiritually connected because you can go out there, it's so empty and there's no light pollution so that you can actually see the stars and you can appreciate the universe of all of Sparta but it's so important to connect in some way to be out in nature, go on a hike, even walking in the grass without your shoes on can have immense benefits, just physiologically, there's research that shows just touching, grounding, being grounded to the earth is very healing but it also makes you marvel and appreciate the things that we take for granted, the simple things, the feeling of the texture of grass. I mean, of course, unless you have an allergy, you don't do that, but touching sand, things that are, as children, we loved to do.  I've been guilty of that. We lose awe and this is the problem with the modern world is that we're so distracted by so many toys and gadgets and things that sparkle and shine in front of us. And then, of course, obligations and work and all the serious stuff that we lose awe. So I love that it was mentioned here that part of having taqwa is knowingly having awe, like really consciously trying to bring those feelings back into your heart and really reflecting on things that are just pausing and taking a minute to think about the blessings that we have that we take for granted. I mean, I know Anisha Hamza has talked about, for example, the blessings of eyelashes, something that, sad enough, it didn't occur to me anyway to think about the blessing of eyelashes until I heard him mention that. And so it's like, oh yeah, I've never actually sat and thought about the function of my eyelashes and what a blessing it is and how, Alhamdulillah, I can see and do so many things because these little tiny hairs are able to capture dust particles and protect my eye from drying out when they're open for too long and all of the other amazing functions of the body. But the point of reflecting on those things is that it leaves you with that just beautiful, pure, unadulterated love for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. That's just, from a simple exercise of reflection or a purposeful expedition seeking awe when we go out and we're trying to have those moments of awe, that the outcome of that, inshallah, is that you're really our subhanallah, Alhamdulillah, Al-Khalik. Thank you, y'all for this beautiful creation that you've left us in and given us the experience of, thank you for existence. Those are the thoughts that really fill your heart instead of complaints and all the other negativity are so often for consumers. So, the next benefit here is a goodly end to life. Again, we all ask, inshallah, for khusna khatama, we all want a beautiful end and inshallah, an end where we're not compromised, in some way, our faith is intact, inshallah, we die in a state of, we'll do in a state of ibadah.  I mean, how amazing of a death is that, as opposed to other ways where people can be humiliated. Some people all the blood are who are not obviously on the path or doing what they should be doing. They die in really horrific, but also humiliating ways. So, we ask all of us to always, for protection from that and to be taken from this life in the best of states, but that's one of the benefits of having taqwa, that inshallah, he will give us then. Here's the ayah, surely for the people of taqwa is a beautiful end, inshallah. Paradise itself, I mean, that's the ultimate prize, right? We all want, inshallah, Jannah, we all want to, I mean, that's why we're here, that's why, or that's what our objective is, is that we pass the tests of this dunya, inshallah, and we are sincere in our faith, and that we, inshallah, receive the ultimate reward of being with those we love, and of course, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, the process of them, and finally having the beatific vision of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, that's the ultimate prize that we all should be seeking and making our objective in this world, that that is what we want. Every prayer you do, every fast, every vikr, every good charity, or every charitable act, every good deed, it's all for that. I want the final prize, inshallah, to be in the highest of Jannah. So these are the benefits of taqwa, of attaining and really working on taqwa. So now, let's see here. So the text now goes into, how do we achieve taqwa? The only way to achieve taqwa is through spiritual struggle, mujaheda, okay? Oh wait, did I skip, yeah, here, sorry, this is the correct slide. Now in the text, it mentions here, that spiritual struggle is not something that miraculously just comes into one's life. So it starts somewhere and the starting point is the heart. So when you have a stirring, a movement of the heart, that leads to the limbs, right? So there's this feeling of remorse maybe, of guilt, of grief, of fear. There's a lot of motivating factors for why people suddenly wake up from their spiritual slumber and wanna get right back on track. There's many life events that can put people in that place, right? Of rethinking their choices and their life trajectory and really wanting to renew their faith. And so the movement starts in the heart. For me, for example, I was raised in hamdudana Muslim family and I always had a strong Muslim identity, but that didn't necessarily translate in actions. I did not wear hijab, I was not consistent in my five prayers. But yeah, if anybody ever dared say anything about Islam or Muslims, I was very vocal and not afraid to defend my faith or my people for my cultural background. I just had strong cultural and religious identity. So it took actually a few different events, but for me, one major event was the loss of my grandfather, seeing someone that you love slowly decline and finally leave this world and then seeing their body. I mean, it was the first death for me, a personal death and the first body that I ever saw, which is really, I think, proof of the wisdom of the remembrance of death and of making sure that we don't fall for the just the modern, obsession with running away from death. There's this fear, immense fear of, because when you have habad dunya, which is one of the diseases of the heart, the attachment to the world, then obviously the last thing you wanna be thinking about is death, disease, all those things that make you uncomfortable. So what you do is you start to obsess over youth, obsess over, just maintaining anything that erases the thought of death. And so when you look at in our society, where the elderly, it's really sad, but because of our obsession with youth, you don't see the elderly out and about and walking the streets in America like you do when you travel in other parts of the world. In Europe, when I went to Spain a few years ago, so like everywhere, somehow they were everywhere, they're a very big part of society. They're sitting in their little cafes or restaurants and, but they were there, they were part of the city life. Turkey was one of my favorite things when we traveled to Turkey a couple of years ago. I think it's been, gosh, time just seems to have stopped since this year, but yeah, it wasn't last year, I think the year before, but Turkey was also subhanallah, something really amazing when I observed how many elderly people were in the squares or in the restaurants or in the shops. Sometimes they were behind the counters working.  I mean, they were not hidden. And so we have to think about our own, like I said, obsession with youth and not remembering death because it takes us away from the remembrance of all the subhanallah. And so for me, that was it. As soon as I saw that dead body of my grandfather and I realized like, whoa, that's gonna happen to all of us, it started really making me think seriously about my faith. And then there were other events that eventually led me to really just making a commitment. Like I need to start being more honest of a person. I cannot claim to be Muslim, but I don't dress like a Muslim. I don't behave like a Muslim. I don't do my prayers, like what kind of Islam was that? That was for me, my own journey, right? So that stirring of the heart, Allah chose for me for that to happen in my early first year of college. Alhamdulillah, we'll show you that. It's, Alhamdulillah, he's guided me throughout, but it can happen like that for other people, car accident, near-death experience for themselves, or maybe they just had a really tough relationship that they came out of. So there could be multiple, multiple paths or experiences that give people the awakening, but it starts in the heart, moves into the limbs, and that's when the struggle really takes in. And then it's also from an awareness of the distance, that you've had between you and God, which leads to Toba. So when you start to realize like, wow, I have really not been doing what I should be doing, and there's this remorse and guilt that enters the heart, that Toba, it has a lasting effect. It's not just a passing, fleeting thought. Sometimes we may feel bad about something, but it doesn't really stay with us. When we're repentance or Toba's really feeling the heart, the guilt, it's an agitation to the soul, right? It's like you're not comfortable in your own skin. You don't feel good about yourself. You could be the most successful, accomplished person, beautiful person, come from a great family, in all of the material, from the material lens, but because you internally feel guilt for maybe sins that you committed, a lot of people, that's another path. They commit terrible sins that they feel so horrible about that it makes them yearn for Allah's purification, right? Like, I want to be cleansed. So then they turn to Allah in Toba. So all of these things are where the Mujahidah, how it manifests, right? And it's like I said, it has that lasting effect. And so he says here that the Mujahidah is a move of the heart that affects the limbs and results in repentance in which we seek to purify ourselves of prior wrongs and remove them from our present activities and make a strong commitment to a future free of the mistakes of the past. So that is true Mujahidah when you feel again remorse, but want to never turn back to what you were doing, the person you are. And the best example of those really are people who convert to Islam. Mashallah, they're amazing because you see a lot of them come from completely different backgrounds and then they make a 180 and are fully committed and you would never in a million years associate them with their past. That's Tawa in practice, that's faith in action. It's like I don't ever want to be reminded of or remind anyone of the person I used to be the one who drank alcohol, who had illicit relationships, who cursed, who smoked, who cheated people, who lied to people, people have backgrounds like that. And so then when they take their faith seriously and they take their Shahada and they commit, you see such a departure that you would never in a million years think that that was the same person. That is true Thakwa, right? So on page 16, which is where we now come to the end of this first chapter, or let me see here, this is repeated. Yeah, at the top of page 16, he says here, this is our purpose for being here. We must simply start, not tomorrow or the day after but today, right now at this moment. The heart must make a firm commitment and never turn back. The rewards are immense, the pleasure of mastering the self is second only to the subtle knowledge and pleasure of intimacy with Allah that is a result of that mastery. So again, wherever you are, when we go back to that, to those other, to the initial slides, right? The five stations that we describe, wherever you are in that list, you want to think about what is it going to take for you to move to the next level, you know? And then, this text is a transformative text, so the advice is very clear. It's telling us, if you have a desire to change yourself and it's true and it's sincere and you want to be better, then don't postpone that, Nia, don't make false promises and procrastinate later. At the end of this year, once COVID is over, I'm going to start doing my prayers on time. A lot of times, that's just, West Wisa from Shaitan, he knows that we're forgetful and that when the moment is gone, we're just going to get distracted by something else and that's why, how many people have that experience where they have high hemma, maybe in Ramadan, for example. A lot of amazing openings happen to people in Ramadan and they start making all these promises. I'm going to start doing this, this and this and this, but if you don't strike when the iron is hot, you will lose the momentum, you're going to lose it and it'll just then be a memory and watch. It's happened to myself, I've certainly, this has happened to me many times, but I know others as well, is that when that hemma is there and it's strong and it really feels like it's a new leaf or you're turning a new chapter to turning a new leaf in your life, then you want to seize the day, right? Seize the moment and say, I need to do this now. And for every view that's different. Some people, once they, their word is their word and if they say they're going to do something, they'll do it. For other people, they need to be accountable to someone. So maybe you share this noble intention with your spouse or someone that you're really close to who's a support system for you spiritually, but you kind of externalize it, you verbalize it because holding good thoughts also is a problem. There's an internal battle constantly happening where our rule, the part of us that is always yearning for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala may have really great lofty ideas and goals, but then the nafs and shaitan battling it out against the rule will use all the tricks possible to just destroy our momentum or distract us. So the best way sometimes is to verbalize it so that you can hold yourself accountable and maybe talking to someone about, you know what I really want to start? The most important place, starting point really for all of us, if we're thinking about making some lasting changes or permanent changes to our worship is to look for, first and foremost, at our prayers because those are the first things that we're going to be asked about on the day of judgment. So we want to think about the timeliness of our prayers, right? The sincerity with which we come to the prayer. Are we coming, dragging our legs, frustrated and tired and exhausted and just not really wanting to be there and doing it because we have to? Or are we doing it because we realize that we owe so much to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and this paltry act of praying, which will never be enough to show our gratitude should be done with at least a present heart, you know? And of course we're humans, we're gonna get distracted but it's the intention, right? If you get to the prayer intending, y'all, I wanna really have khushu on this prayer, I wanna be present and you want that, like it's a true yearning, it's a true desire and you keep coming to the prayer with that. Insha'Allah you'll get there, you know? Some people have this really crazy notion that unless they have that feeling, what's the point of praying? That's pure waswasa, okay? You can't get that feeling if unless you put the hard work in, you know, it's not like you're gonna stand, you know, it could be at Allah Huwaka but then all of a sudden you're gonna see a light and angels are gonna descend around you and you're just, you know, you're gonna see visions of jannah. Like is that what you're expecting that should happen before you pray and then you'll commit to prayer? If so, then Shaitan's just deluded you. You have to say the prayer is the debt I owe, which I'll never be able to repay for existence. It's the reason why I'm created. And so I need to really prioritize my prayer, Fajr, Vahar, Asr, Maghrib, Isha, all of them.  Fajr is so hard for me.  That's, I'm sorry to say, it's just another trick of Shaitan because we're all in this, you know, world for the same reason. We're here to worship Allah, the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam who had been guaranteed Jannah is the beloved of Allah, not only prayed all of his prayers on time with excellence in every which way, but he did additional prayers. It's because we should be humble, we should be grateful and we should be, we should feel the weight of how much we should be grateful to Allah, subhan Allah, for. And nobody gets exceptions to that, you know, people of course who are ill and who have other circumstances, Allah of course makes things easy, but the prayer for even the ill, even the one who's laying flat on their back and cannot move is still further upon them to do when it comes in and Allah of course makes it easier for them with the wudu and it may, you know, facilitates all of that, but you could even do it with your eyes if you're paralyzed, for example, you know, there's always something that for each person's circumstances that will, that are acceptable, but the bottom line is, is that everybody prays who is of sound mind and who is able to, we pray.  A lot of people, that's what they do. They convince themselves it's okay. Allah knows my intentions, I wish I could, but I can't. Don't do that. Commit, say Allah, I know that this is gonna be hard for me. I'm probably gonna have really tough days ahead of me, maybe because it's my routine. I've just gotten a routine. I've never really committed like this before. I might have headaches. I might be grumpy at work. I might just not be happy because my sleep was interrupted, but you matter more. So if I have to set five alarms, I have to call my friend or, you know, do something to get myself out of bed, that's taqwa, that's realizing that I cannot make excuses for myself because Allah, who Akbar, he is greater than anything that I can bring, you know, to justify why I'm not worshiping as he deserves to be worshiped. And so make those commitments and do them now. Don't make, don't put them off. And this, for every single person, it's gonna be different. Maybe, Alhamdulillah, you're doing your prayers on time and you're really committed in your prayers. Then you look to the next level. You know, what can I be doing additionally? What can I take away, right? Avoid, that's blame worthy. And what can I increase? That's praise worthy. And you just start evaluating yourself on such a deep level that your mind is constantly preoccupied with what?   This is the definition of Ahsan. And for some people that might be like, wow, wow, that's so amazing, you know, that people can be in that state. Well, if you spend your day trying so hard to take inventory of your actions and find where you can improve and you're really guarding yourself against those things that are harmful, in many ways that is, that is a Ahsan, right? That's a display of Ahsan because what are you doing? You're mindful of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la throughout your day, right? You're always thinking about what I, the choices before you. And if you think about every single choice that we make, every choice, especially in our transactions with other people, but also with ourselves, there's always a right way and a wrong way to do things, you know, from the most subtle things, like just basic etiquette, you know, when you're eating, let's say, you know?  Are you saying this, madame?  I mean, people will sit at the dinner table over a meal where Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has just given them a beautiful meal and it could be hand, you know, it could be made by their own hands, but even that is still a gift from Allah.  To be able to create these meals. So is it not, you know, does he not deserve to be thanked with at least something in the beginning? Bismillah, right? But how many people jump into their meals? No remembrance of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la.  So you're watching the haram while you're, you know, you're, you're taking in this nourishment that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has given you. Those are things you have to watch for, but if you're conscious of your decision, decision of choices, what you do is you bring awareness to your mind. That you know what, this is wrong. I shouldn't do this, Safaullah and you start to change your behavior. That is the process of taqwa. Anything that you do, you're thinking, would Allah be pleased with me or not? And you start to change in that way, right? That pleases Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. And so here, and the last pages of this chapter were reminded that Allah has commanded us to turn to Him with sincerity. Oh, you who believe, turn to Allah, all of you together with sincerity in order for you to have success. And then this last ayah is with Baqarah, right? It is, This is Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, the first command that Allah is telling us, right? We have to worship Allah as He deserves. And to remember constantly that everything that He has given us, every action we're able to do is by His grace that we're able to do it. And if we just have that awareness, you know, of those things in the moment, or even as an afterthought, you know, and you're lying in bed and you're thinking about your day and you're just re-evaluating things.  You start taking account of things. That's taqwa, that's bringing awareness and mindfulness of Allah and having gratitude in your heart, inshallah. So may Allah's power that increases in taqwa, I'm going to, I think I may have to check the time. Ooh, very close. Okay, Alhamdulillah, almost at the end. Let me exit out of this so we can check the chat here to see if there are any questions, inshallah. If you give me just one moment. I'm gonna go to YouTube as well, because I think there's, I know Mashallah there's people on YouTube who are tuning in and that's where a lot of our questions do come in. So let me check YouTube. Okay, Alhamdulillah. So I don't see any, oh, actually, hold on, let me do live chat. Okay, so I don't see any questions on the thread here, but inshallah, we do have a few minutes or a couple of minutes left. If you would like to ask a question, you're more than welcome to. But yes, we are at the end of chapter 60. I'm just gonna make sure I didn't miss anything here. Oh, he mentions here that, well, follows next, so chapter two, the next class we'll do is a series of exercises designed to help us set out on the path. They're difficult, but earning paradise was never meant to be easy. All things of worth are only obtained through great effort, whether the pearl at the bottom of the ocean or the skill of the master craftsman. The pleasure of our Lord is infinitely greater than the material gains of this world. So much of the next chapter, chapter two is on the heart and its treatment. So now we're gonna get into some more practical exercises and reflections on how we can do this. Achieving taqwa is of course, something that we know as part of that mojaheda, but how do we battle it out with our nefs? Literally, what is the, how can we fight our own nefs and shaitan and overcome our weaknesses? So Insha'Allah, we'll look to that in the next session. But I thank you again for your time. And if you don't have the text, please do. Get it, you can get it from sandala, s-a-n-d-a-l-a dot org. Agenda to change our condition, check it out. But thank you so much for being here this evening with us. Insha'Allah, if you have any further questions, you're more than welcome to communicate me, excuse me, communicate with me directly. I'm on Facebook, I'm on Instagram, so you can message me there. But thank you again. We are ending right on time. So Insha'Allah, we'll see you next time and have a wonderful rest of your night. Okay, oh, before we forget, we should do our da'a. Alhamdulillah. Bismillahirrahmanirrahim wa-l-a'asir. Inna l-insana la fi khasir illa ladina aminu wa amin iswalihaati wa-tawaseb wa-l-haqi wa-tawaseb wa-sabr. Subhanak Allahuma wa bi hamdika shadu an la ilaha ila anthina astaghfiru kuna tubu ilaik. Allahumma salam wa salam wa barakala Sayyidana wa maulana wa habibana Muhammad. Sog Allah wa alaihi wa salam. Wa ala li wa sahbihi wa salam tasliman katira. Alhamdulillah. Jazakum Allah khaydan. Thank you so much. Have a great evening everyone. As-salamu alaikum wa-rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alright, Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Alhamdulillah wa-salatu wa-salam wa-ala as-shif al-anbiya'i wa-l-mursaleen. Sayyidana wa-maulana wa-habibana Muhammad. Sog Allah wa alaihi wa salam. Wa ala li wa sahbihi wa salam tasliman katira. As-salamu alaikum wa-rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Again, welcome everyone for being here. Thank you so much. We are covering a text that was written by Sheikh Hamza Yusif and Imam Zaid Shakir. It's called Agenda to Change Our Condition. I have the book here in front of me for those who are first-time viewers. I like to just preview it right in the beginning so that you can bring you up to speed about what we're doing here. I do have a presentation that I've also prepared to go over the chapter that we're gonna talk about today. So again, if you don't have the text, you can follow along with the slides. I do highly encourage you to get the text just because there's so much great content and it's really a wonderful resource to have for just reference and to look it over and we should review this text as maybe once a year or more often than that, whatever we need. So Insha'Allah, let me go ahead and screen share. But just to, while I do that, last week, sorry, one second. Okay, I apologize. I need to quickly message to get my screen share going. So just give me a second. So last week, what we did was, we talked about the chapter on taqwa, how to attain taqwa, the benefits of taqwa. So you can, and all of the recordings, by the way, are available.  And so again, just to kind of give those of you who may be tuning in for the first time a quick summary, the text is quite, I mean, it's not very lengthy, but there's several different sections. But what I did is I started at the back of the text. So we covered the appendices and then we did the introduction in chapter one. So today we are doing chapter two. And today's chapter is on the heart and it's treatment. So I'm really excited to get into that discussion with you today. So let me go ahead and screen share. And inshallah, I will bring this up in just a moment. Bismillah, one second please. One of these technical things we have to do, inshallah, it'll be worth it. Okay, so Bismillah, we're gonna present here. And hopefully you guys can see everything. So yes, today we're gonna talk about the heart and its treatment. So if you're following with the text, you wanna go to page 18, inshallah, and you'll be able to read along. So let's go ahead and jump into the discussion. It starts off and tells us that facilitating action is based upon true knowledge and action has two modes. So the first mode is the action of the heart and then the second is the action of the limbs. As for the heart, there are two concerns. So what are the concerns of the heart? First and foremost, belief, aqida. We have to have a strong aqida, the creed, the belief. What do you believe in as a Muslim? What are the points of aqida that we should all know about Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la about the universe, about our place in the universe? So that is all taught to us by our aqida. And then the second concern of the heart is sincerity of faith because people can claim to have faith, but only those who are sincere will have tawfiq with Allah, right? Because there are many people who are munafiqin and they're the worst of people, the hypocrites, those who claim to be believers, but then their actions say otherwise. So the sincerity of faith is also a very serious concern and a primary concern of the heart. So let's talk about belief and sincerity a little bit more. In the text, right here, that sound belief is accomplished by removing any doubtful matters from the heart. This is facilitated for us. Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la, by His grace, He makes it easy for us to remove doubtful matters. And Alhamdulillah, this is why it's so important for us to be reflective, to think, to try to look at the universe and just the awe that we should feel when we contemplate everything in creation. Again, from the cellular level, atomic level, just small particle level to the astronomical level when you look out into the universe and you see things that are beyond our imagination, are very difficult for the human mind to conceive. All of these things are signs, are ayat that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la has put for us to really remember or to reflect on the fact that this is not by chance, it didn't just happen. Stuff like there are people who, again, from with no basis, that that's what they claim, that this all just was some big, large accident. But of course, that couldn't be further from the truth. This is not an accident, this is all intentional, there's design, and that's why you see design in everything, you know, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la. So we have to look out into the world and really think about this. And when you think about these things deeply and of course you seek answers from proper sources, from knowledgeable people, from people who know, they will be able to help you to go, whatever doubts you have or issues that you have to just work through those things. But the answers are there. We don't shy away from asking, but we also accept that we can't answer everything. There's many things that we will just simply not know in this lifetime, but inshallah, we have high hopes that inshallah, in the next world, we will have answers to those things. So, but inshallah, that's been facilitated, right, belief. Sincerity, however, as they written in the text here, it's more difficult to achieve sincerity of the heart through the actions of the limbs. And this is really, you know, a lifelong process. When we talk about Mujahid enough, so when we talk about the struggle of the human being to just fulfill all of their obligations, a large part of it does have to do with actually perfecting our deeds and making sure that we have the right intentions and that we do them with sincerity, because many people accumulate deeds, you know, you could do a lot of good deeds in your life, but we don't know and we likely won't know in this life whether or not those deeds are accepted, right, we don't know. And that's the challenge is that throughout our lives, we're always doing that internal check to make sure that we are sincere when we do things, when we give sadaqah, when we pray, when we recite Quran or when we give nasiha or when we do any good act that our intentions are always in the right place. And that is why it's not, that's not very easy to do. And that's something that is going to be, for most of us, a very, you know, part of our struggle, part of the lifelong struggle that we all have. And so even in the Quran, right, here they say that the entire creation was at a standstill when it heard the words of the Creator. So when Allah SWT revealed these verses, everything in creation was just, you know, it's an amana, it's a huge trust, right? They were only commanded to worship Allah sincerely, muqlisin, with the religion solely for him, right? And then Allah SWT also challenges us here to this question, is not the sincere religion, ad-din al-khada solely for Allah SWT? So we have to think about, you know, this is part of our mind or our, you know, every day, we have to have this presence of mind to know that it's not enough that I'm doing, I have to be doing them sincerely.  Many people who are practicing, you know, their faith, ritualistically, they're doing everything, you know, they do their prayers, they do all of the obligatory acts, they may, you know, fall into self-righteousness because they think that it's enough that they do them, not realizing, well, it's from Allah SWT that you're doing them, but the sincerity with which you do them, that's where you, you know, you make your mark, whether or not you're truly sincere or not. So that's the part that you have to focus on more because the fact that we get up to pray is from Allah SWT. We don't attribute that to ourselves. Guidance is from Him, right? Guidance is the, you know, when you have faith, you know that that's from Allah, he's inspired you, but how well you show your faith, right? How well you, the ihsan that you put into your actions, that's on us. So this is where sincerity becomes more of a challenge. Now, on page 19, they go into a longer explanation of this word, purity, and really trying to understand why this is such an essential part of our struggle.  This is the milk taken from the animal before it is contaminated with anything else. So just giving you a visual of something that's pure, free of contaminants, right? In that state that's preserved, right? That's pure. And then immediately they go into the heart. The heart's purity is contaminated by what? By wrong actions and can only be purified by repentance and remorse, okay? So purity, now another analogy here, comprises a great station. So someone who's reached this station of being a person of ikhlas, right? Of sincerity in the religion, it's a high station to achieve. And they've given you sort of like the contrast to say that just as fornication, for example, is a precipitous fall into wrong action, right? Someone who engages in that act of something clearly haram, it's like a decline. So in the same way, a person who's achieving or who's achieved ikhlas, it's gradual. It's something that's, it's elevating them, right? So it's kind of the contrast between the elevation of the mochles and the downfall of the one who engages in a sin like fornication. So just to show you, this is a really heavy thing, a very important thing. Then they go on to say that scholars of the heart have identified both corrupting and purifying actions that affect the heart state. So this text, now the remainder of this text and particularly this chapter, this text focuses on what facilitates the path to purity and how to draw near the way of struggle with the commanding soul, right? Moreover, it clarifies matters that edify the way to free one's intention from any contingencies that cause one to act for the sake of anyone other, for anyone or anything other than Allah. So inshallah, this is what we hope to achieve going through this text, right? That we are able to facilitate the path to purity and to free the intention to make sure that our intention is not contaminated, that we're not in any way doing things for other than the sake of Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala. And they go on and say that the likeness of the one who acts for the sake of anyone or anything other than Allah is described in the following example. A shop owner hires a laborer and then says to him, this is my shop and this is my work. Therefore do all your work in my best interests. Despite this decree, the laborer performs his work in the best interests of someone else or himself rather than those of the owner. As Muslims, we cannot do Allah's work and bidding when we have only our own worldly interests at the forefront, right? And this is where again, purity of intention is so important because there are in many cases where people may be outwardly presenting themselves as doing things for the sake of Allah but their intentions, they have ulterior motives and it's not for Allah, it's for something else. It's for status, it's for maybe to gain some worldly benefit here, reputation. There's many benefits in certain cultures, certainly in certain positions in society. There's many benefits of presenting oneself as a religiously committed serious person, right? So there's could be, someone could have many agendas, right? But this is why it's so important to have purity of intention. So then the question becomes, well, how can we remove worldly motivations from our actions? How can we make sure that our actions are truly for the sake of Allah and it's not that we want attention? And this is a very relevant question more so maybe now than any time in human history. When you think about how the world is turned into a giant fishbowl in many ways, everybody's lives are, I mean, there's obviously people who are not participating but there is a great number of people, billions of people who are in fact participating in this experiment of social media where every part of their life is documented and throughout the day you get updates about everything that someone's doing or what they eat, where they're going, who they're with, where they work. So this idea of getting attention constantly and seeking attention is certainly one of the ways that one's intention can be compromised because it's very alluring to have people watching you fame and all of that that comes with it or just even notoriety or people knowing that you're doing something, that reputation that you get from that, even if you're not necessarily of a celebrity status, you could be within your own community or social circle or family even, there might be something that you gain from sharing your life with everyone else but if this becomes part of the way that you are and you live, then you can imagine how potentially every deed that you do that you're saying is for the sake of Allah could be compromised because is it really if you needed to show everybody, when you went to volunteer at the soup kitchen and you're taking a selfie and showing everybody what you're doing, can you make that claim that was truly for the sake of Allah or was it what they call virtue signaling where people do things of virtue and they just like to get that attention for it. So this is a very deep issue that I think a lot of us have to really think about but this question is something that the text is gonna help us understand and it says right away answering that question, how can we remove worldly motivations from our actions? The answer lies in the rectification of our intentions. Actions are only in accordance with intentions, right? In the Malamanu biniyat and thus starting with the intention behind an act is the beginning of achieving a state of living for the sake of Allah. So the process of actually asking yourself and knowing within your heart of hearts, you cannot, we cannot deceive Allah so we cannot try to hide what's really in our hearts. So you don't have to necessarily verbalize or articulate these things to anyone else but certainly to yourself, you should be at that level that where you can honestly say why you did something, was it so that someone could hear that you did it? You could get status, you'd get praise, you'd get likes, follows, like again, bringing it back to social media but that process of questioning all of your actions, especially those actions that are you claim or you are trying to pass off as for the sake of Allah. Go back and do that inner work of really questioning but they go on to say that if one applies perfume it can be done in order to follow the sunnah of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and also as an act of charity for others. When it is intended to be for the angels of my Lord and an adherence to the tradition of my Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam we take a permitted act and elevate it to a recommended or obligatory one. Likewise, food should not be eaten merely for pleasure. We should intend the energy derived from the food to be used for the strengthening of our bodies to better serve Allah. So in this case, you can go and, as we said, question what you've done to ask yourself is it really for the sake of Allah but the flip side of it is actually acting with intentionality on this deep level where every single thing that you are doing even just regular everyday acts like eating or putting on perfume, that you are trying to find the way for it to become an act of where you're seeking the pleasure of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So aligning yourself with the sunnah, for example as was mentioned with the perfume, right? Or looking back at something like the blessing of food as not being just this automatic process that we have to do because we have to survive but rather elevating the intention to say, insha'Allah I'm eating this food because it nourishes my body and from that nourishment my body can be strengthened so that I can pray more, I can go and help people more. Do you see, it's like you're elevating the niyah with which you're doing actions by instead of just like robotically automatic processes that we've all sort of developed where we just wake up and just, this is our routine, right? And we're not really thinking about how can I gain more reward for even those things that aren't necessarily worship? We don't equate basic things, meeting our basic needs, for example, as being worship but it could be in fact a form of worship when you take the time to apply this beautiful intention to it, right? And then they go on again, we're still on page 19 and they say here that the following hadith emphasizes the importance of intending our actions for the sake of Allah. So this is the hadith. The first people to be judged on the day of resurrection are the following, a man who was martyred, who was brought into the divine presence and shown his blessings, who admits to them and who has asked, what did you do with all of these blessings? He will reply, I fought for your sake and was martyred. Now look at Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala's response.  It is then ordered that he be taken to the fire.  You got it, therefore you were rewarded for what you did, you see? The reward was given to you already. And then Audhu Billah, he sent into the fire. Then someone who studied the Quran and taught it is brought into the divine presence and shown his blessings. And he again acknowledges them and is asked why he did them. And he responds, I studied knowledge and transmitted it and I recited the Quran for your sake.  It is in order that he is taken and he's dragged along the face and thrust into it. It continues and there's another narration about a generous man who also did the same. And he said that his generosity was for the sake of Allah but it was for people to praise him for being generous and the same, he had the same fate. So this hadith is such an important hadith to reflect on because this is clearly telling us, as I said in the beginning, that we may never know if our intentions are sincere in this life and we will know in the next life but revisiting the Nia and constantly questioning and really being real with the fact that you cannot in any way, trick Audhubillah or lie or deceive to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. We should know that, that's just basic common sense that he knows what's in our hearts and there's no way that we can try to defend any other position than the truth when we're being asked about it. So we should do that internal process in this life instead of God forbid facing a similar fate where we end up on the day of judgment being called into question. May Allah protect us from that. But the point is, if we do that in this world, we are really clear about our Nia inshallah, we will make sure that our intentions are actually aligned with the pleasure of Allah's prophet and not for anything else. So let's go ahead and go to the next slide. So the next section now we're on page 20, the next after they related this hadith, now we're talking about achieving sincerity. Okay, so as we said, belief inshallah and getting rid of the doubtful matters, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala facilitates that for us inshallah and many people have been able to overcome those whisperings and those doubts but achieving sincerity is a different thing. And this is where the struggle begins. So some of the ways, effective ways to achieve sincerity are here, we have guarding the tongue, right? So very important that we focus on the things that can potentially harm or as an inroad to the heart, right in the tongue certainly and the limbs can cause spiritual ruin. So we guard our tongue, right? We speak truthfully and we maintain discourse in private and public gatherings. So this is one of the first advice that they give is it's very important to do these three things. Watch how you speak, what you say, make sure you're a truthful person and also make sure you're consistent, that you're public and private person, that it's not that you're wearing masks or you behave one way in your home and then in public you're a total different person or vice versa, but did you have consistency? And of course, there's certainly just to make that clarification, everybody has a certain degree of private behavior that would not be something they share publicly. We're not talking about that. We're talking about just your character. If you are praying and you don't do foul things and you don't speak of foul things, that should be consistent. Those types of things should not change based on whether or not you're home or out in public, right? So think about that, like are you the same person or would people not recognize you? May God protect us from that, right? And so the first step towards sincerity of the heart is to protect our tongues from these things and then to specifically protect it from falsehood, dissembling, which is to conceal our true motives, feelings or beliefs and prevarications, which is to deviate from the truth. So this is what we're seeking to protect our tongue from these three things. And this is the first step to achieving sincerity. So then they go on and they describe for us the four sources of the destructive qualities of the tongue. Okay, very important. So there's four specific destructive actions or qualities that the tongue may do and we should know what they are and really how to avoid them. So the first of course is lying. And so right away we're on page 20 still, moving into 21. The first, just help us to understand that we all know lying is forbidden in Islam without valid reason, but what are the valid reasons? So across the board, lying is impermissible, it's haram, we're not deceptive, we don't lie. However, in certain situations, it may be acceptable. And so let's look at what those three situations are. First, as a means to rectify between people. So as we know, human beings, we don't, some of us struggle with our temperaments, with our anger, with our moods. And so sometimes disputes happen, things within families, within marriages. There's things that can really be very disruptive that happen. And so we can avoid sometimes things from escalating just by maybe slightly changing some, saying some half truths. For example, like let's say between a husband and a wife, if you are a family member who is involved in someone, maybe your sibling, maybe someone else in the family whose marriage is on the rocks and they're really having a hard time, and you are trying to soften the hearts towards one another and just really help them to appreciate each other more or to turn their negative feelings into positive feelings.  And maybe that's not true. Maybe they don't do things like that, but you're just trying to soften the heart, right? The hearts between these two people, these two spouse, this couple. Isha, that's a benefit. I mean, that's a praiseworthy thing to do because sometimes the ego gets to, the egos prevent them from seeing the truth about one another and all they see is their own anger and resentment and shape out of course there. So for you to be able to give them a different lens with which to look at their spouse with just through a few soft kind words about one another or just slight, as I said, half truths or white truths, white lies, excuse me, inshallah, that's okay. I'm sorry. And the next is, of course, in war, we know all is fair and love in war, right? And as an effective military tactic, sometimes you may need to deceive, and that's to save lives, thousands, hundreds of lives, you gotta do what you gotta do. So there's certain rules of engagement that would apply here when we're talking about military tactical situations. And then when an individual plays with his young children again sometimes, we may tell tall tales or kind of, just in a playful way, engage our children. And so if you're a Nia is to do those types of things just to expand their creative mind, imagination, be in a playful state, this would not be considered deception, right? Which is a total different thing. And there may be other nuanced situations too, but we get the idea, right? The Nia is good. You just are doing it for certain reasons, but they do also make the distinction here that the permissibility in the first two cases, right? Directified between people or war is through subterfuge and prevarication. It should never be through manifest lies, except in a case where the other party will clearly see through the stratagem. So you're subtly saying things. You're not completely being blatant with your lies, right? Because again, it would defeat the purpose. So in such circumstances, one may lie with the tongue but must reject it within the heart, okay? Again, this is only applicable in a scenario where one's well-being or provisions of those of others is endangered. Nevertheless, be cautious with the words because a lie might in some instances result in a binding obligation. So this is more just like, FYI, be careful that you don't go too far with this. Try to be very subtle because you could entangle yourself into a much worse situation. So just FYI extra cautionary advice there. And then they give an example. An example of a case where lying is permitted is that of an oppressor pursuing a just man. In that case, one should deceive the oppressor openly and lead him astray in this search, in his search. This is permissible because a lie is not prohibited for its own sake but rather for the harm that is implicit in lying. In such cases, when truthfulness causes greater harm, lying in its stead is preferred. So yeah, if there's someone who's after a totally innocent person and that person's innocent and you're trying to basically throw them off the hunt or the search and you lead them down a different path, your intention is to protect someone who's innocent from further harm and it's not about the lie that you're telling, right? So that's why it's permissible. And then they go on to say, for this reason, the notion that good is good for its own sake and evil is evil for its own sake is considered false. For example, a murderer committed by an aggressor may appear identical to an execution that occurred in compliance with sacred law in both its outward form and its characteristics. Someone who is unaware of what actually transpired might confuse one for the other. Therefore, killing may be just or unjust. It is neither good nor evil per se. So that's just again another clarification. So that's the first thing that's mentioned as a destructive quality of the tongue. The second is backbiting. And this is again something we all need to be very clear about because it's not always understood to mean what it is. Sometimes we, you know, people find these loopholes or they just don't have the correct definition of what is backbiting and they may think that it is when it isn't backbiting or it isn't backbiting when it is. So let's clarify what it is. So backbiting or ghiba is again, haram across the board in the Quran, the sunnah, scholarly consensus. There's really no dispute about that. And it's defined as mentioning someone in a manner that would upset that person should they hear it. So if you think about this could go in so many different directions, right? Speaking about a person's person, for example, their appearance, you know, things that they can't control. We know for the most part that, you know, whether or not a person may smile and kind of go along with the joke.  Most people will take offense to comments made about their appearance. Again, things that are just very, very personal, deeply personal, but we still find a lot of people passing these things off like it's no big deal. Like for example, coming up with a nickname, you know, about someone who maybe is, their stature is, you know, shorter than others or maybe than the average, right? Height. A lot of people will pass that off like it's not a big deal thinking, oh, well they don't seem to mind.  And so if you think, oh, it's not a big deal if I make a comment about someone just because they are that way or it's the truth. I'm speaking about, I'm describing someone, let's say you're trying to describe someone who is, you know, heavy set. And instead of trying to be careful with your words, you just kind of, that's the first word you use.  But here, right here, the definition is clear. Mentioning someone in a manner that would upset that person if they heard it. Would you say the same words if the person was sitting there? If someone asked you to describe the same person while they were in front of you, would you use a different set of words? If so, then you know that that form of, you know, describing or the words that you used to describe that person would fall under this category of riba. It's just not, it's not acceptable. And so you have to be more careful to know that just speaking matter of factly or stating truths, even if, yes, someone may be a certain size, it doesn't make a difference. The bottom line is, how would they feel if they heard it? If they heard it, it would upset them, it's riba, halas, you see, very simple. Then it goes on to say that even if, sorry, it would be upset that person should hear it, even if it is a true statement. So that's what we just said. Even if it's true, it doesn't matter, they're upset. Now, if the statement is untrue, so let's say now you are exaggerating something or literally lying about something just because you don't like them, right? The act is known as a calumny or a columny, I think. That's how you pronounce it, columny. And that would be namima, right, in Arabic. So this is where you're now lying and backbiting at the same time. And this is much worse. So there are some people who just out of their annoyance with a person, a hatred for a person, they may embellish things or just literally distort truth, I mean, just lie about them, al-dabilah, when speaking about them or if their name is mentioned. And that's completely haram. There's just no way to justify that at all.  So we have to be very, very careful. And of course, we know in Surah Al-Hajjadat, chapter 49, verse 12, this is the whole concept of backbiting is described very clearly, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says, neither allow yourselves to speak ill of one another behind your backs.  So be conscious of Allah for Allah is most relenting, most merciful. I really love this for so many reasons, first of all, because of course it's the Quran and it's Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la's words, but also because he is reminding us to not have, don't be hypocritical, don't have double standards.  So don't, because I know when I've, in the past, sometimes when we talk about these topics, people who engage in this, they may find or try to find ways to work around what they've done in the past, just the guilty conscience, right? And because some people just don't really think it's that bad or if they're speaking about someone who's wrong to them, they feel so justified that they don't really wanna hear you correct them or reprimand them for speaking about people behind their back, if they just don't like it. And I'm sure all of us have found ourselves in those awkward situations where we've had to shut down conversations and you get some attitude from people, right? But this is again, calling us out on our double standards because if you're gonna justify it, you doing it for on whatever basis you think is more in stat, then you cannot just be real with yourself. How would you feel if it was done to you, right?  You would likely hate it and it would bother you and you would never accept anybody's excuses if your best friend or your sister or someone else, you heard or speaking ill about you or mentioning even a slight, small, maybe blemish or problem or flaw that you have or bad habit, people sometimes, the spouses do this, right? I've certainly been in awkward situations where my spouse may unveil their partner in front of a group setting and you can see that it's so uncomfortable for the whole group and you know, there's gonna be a huge fallout once they get in the car. But it's like those little tiny words that are said when you're not ready for it or it's just not comfortable to have people know your business can set off such a strong reaction, right? So we all have that. Every person would feel hurt to know someone speaking about them behind their back. So if you know that it's true for yourself, then don't justify doing it for someone else. I mean, I love forgiveness because sometimes again, we work careless. And so here on the bottom of page 21, another reminder about this idea of Aldabla, eating the dead flesh, you know, that analogy is just so hard to stomach, literally Aldabla, right? Likewise, you should detest backbiting because it tears into a person's good name and honor.  And we see that now in our world of cancel culture, how devastating it is when people's entire lives are completely turned upside down based on sometimes a rumor. And we don't know, it's very difficult to verify certain things. We see it on, I'm talking about like high profile cases but it's like really tragic if you think about how sometimes people's lives have been completely destroyed because of this, just creating false stories or gossiping, backbiting, whatever, and then it just, it's like a fire that just gets acclaimed that it goes out of control. And at the end of the day, that person's reputation is smeared, it's completely dragged through the mud. It's very hard for people to recover, right? So we have to ask the last father for protection from that. And then on page 22, it says that in the above verse, Allah likens the absent one to a dead person. The dead person is gone and thus unable to defend himself. Just as the absent one being talked about is unable to defend himself or herself. Furthermore, biting off part of something causes harm to it. Just as speaking ill of people causes harm to them.  So again, just really important reminders for all of us to reflect on and inshallah to take ourselves into account for. So now we go into, well, are there circumstances where backbiting is permitted? And believe it or not, yes. There are specific circumstances where the act of speaking about someone's potential flaws or just things that they've done that's harmful wouldn't fall under the same category as what we just talked about. Because again, it's about the harm that not speaking up about or disclosing some knowledge that you have about a person may cause further harm than the actual harm of disclosing that knowledge. And so let's look at those situations. So here we have backbiting is permitted only in the following circumstances. One, when appealing to an authority to remove an injustice. So maybe sometimes you have to unveil, speak about something or someone in a situation like this where you're again speaking to an authority figure and it could apply to many different circumstances but you are trying to prevent further harm to remove an injustice. So you might have to disclose certain information, right? When seeking help from others to change a wrong or to stop an oppressor from his wrongs. So again, there's sometimes context is needed. You need to give context for something that context may involve speaking about someone when they're not present. And so in those cases again, if the intention is to prevent further harm it would be permissible. When seeking a legal opinion, there are people who may be going through some business issue with a ex-partner, business partner and they need to get consultation. And in that consultation, they may have to unveil unethical business practices or other things that are private knowledge but you need to know what your rights are. You have to protect your interests, right? Or some, there may be again another issue that you're trying to avoid. And so you seek legal counsel or this would likely also apply to seeking a counsel from for other situations as well. Maybe you need to speak to a therapist or a counselor about certain things in a relationship, for example, right? When warning others concerning commerce, marriage, neighbors and companionship, okay? For example, it's acceptable to mention the violent temperament of a man to his prospective wife. So if you have knowledge about someone and then you find out that they are being asked about for the purpose of marriage, maybe someone asks you directly, hey, I'm thinking of so-and-so for my daughter. What do you think of him or so-and-so for my son? What do you think of her? And you have knowledge that you are convinced or that you have evidence of, you have proof of and you really do think it would potentially cause damage to this person, you know? I mean, there's a lot of people out of the below who are, they do this, they trick people. There's a lot of fraud that happens in our community, unfortunately, around marriage, you know, where people will present themselves as being a certain way, but then you find out later that they have a whole family or have children that they never spoke about or health conditions or debt or all these other problems because they concealed those things and they were not upfront and honest and truthful. So if you have knowledge that you think is actually could potentially help people avoid being hurt or being scammed or being, you know, and somehow abused, it's your, it's obligation to warn those people, right? So those are situations where it'd be principle. When one mentions a man by a nickname, he's known by such as the lamented one. So this is, you know, again, if you're gonna, if you know of someone who has a nickname that might not necessarily sound like really nice, but that person is not being mocked or teased or you, it's not a nickname that's necessarily used to disparage the person, but, you know, it kind of doesn't have the most nice connotation or meaning to it. If you're using it, in that case, it would not be considered Riba, right?  And if they don't have a problem with it because, hey, it's not a big deal, you know, it's kind of what I've always known and you've just, you know, gotten to the habit of referring to that person by that name, that's not an issue. But if you specifically create nicknames or use nicknames that you know for a fact are actually to mock that person, belittle that person. It could be anything, a totally original nickname that someone came up. It could be a play on words, maybe that has to do with their name. I mean, sometimes people get really, they can get very crude when speaking about other people that they will speak in code, you know. It's like, in order to justify, or not even justify, but to not reveal who I'm speaking about, I'll use this code name. This is the person's name. So every time I say this, you know who I'm talking about. And that nickname you know is to totally belittle that person, to disparage them, it would upset them. This would not be permissible, this would be prohibited. So the distinction is very important to understand. Nicknames that are, the person themselves has no problem with and it's kind of, you know, just everybody calls them that, it's okay. But anything done to mock them would be impermissible. The next one would be mentioning innovation. Someone's innovations in terms of their religious practice, right? So if you know that someone is doing something with their, or they have a, you know, practice or a belief that is considered, you know, again, outside of what are the acceptable differences of opinions, right? There's valid difference of opinion on certain things. Those things are not what we're talking about, right? We don't, you don't mention that. But if you know for a fact, they have an idea about let's say, and there are people in our community who have their own ideas about a lot of things, you know, prayer, you know, you don't need to do this. You don't have to always do this.  And they just kind of speak from their own ideas. And you know that that's not consistent. There's no room for that in our tradition.  You can certainly mention that in a context that it would apply because it's important for people to know, you know, who people truly are. And especially, for example, in the case of marriage, you know, that's really important. Also, when mentioning the wrongs of someone who openly commits those enormities, right? So if someone is openly committing sins, but that person's name is mentioned in some context and everybody kind of knows that they do that. If they drink alcohol, for example, or they gamble or they, you know, have relations outside of marriage, and it's kind of something that everybody is known, knows about and for some reason, maybe you're discussing that person for some context, maybe they are in the community and they're, you know, someone needs their services for something. And so mentioning someone who their public, their sins are public and you're just kind of warning maybe someone or mentioning those things is okay. Again, with the right intention, but speaking about their sins and unveiling people about what they do, what others don't know is completely forbidden. You can't, we're not allowed to unveil people just because, you know. And so if you are even in the context of marriage, for example, if there's a specific issue or business, like if you're, you know, know that someone's about to go into business with someone and you want to warn them that, oh, did you know they went into business two years ago with so-and-so and it didn't go very well and you can have, you have details, maybe very private knowledge that you know about, that is fine because your intention is clear.  The context was, I'm warning you because of the business fallouts that they've had in the past, for example. And so the extra information you can't share, okay? So that's really important to remember. And so let me check time. Oh, wow, wow, that hour went fast, ma'am. I still have a couple more. Let's see if I can do these. Oh, no, I don't think I can do these. There's a lot more context. Okay, content I mean. So let me, I'm going to stop here at point number two, which was backbiting. And I'm going to get to the question and answers because the rest of the sections, they need more time and I'll just cut them off. So we'll have to continue with chapter two for in two weeks, inshallah. And yeah, I think it'll be a good discussion, inshallah, because there's a lot more commentary. Again, if you don't have the book, highly recommend because I love like to just peruse this book. I'll just go over sections I've read before because they're just really good reminders, you know, for all of us. We all have, this is our jihad. May Allah give us sincere intention, you know. And of course, may Allah give us, make our actions in line with our intentions, but give us sincere intentions. We want to have the Nia, but we also want to follow up the Nia with actions, inshallah. So alhamdulillah. Let me go ahead and stop the screen share right now. And then I will, inshallah, come and check the discussion or the comments. Let's see, alhamdulillah. Just give me one moment. I'll check Facebook as well as the MCC page just to see if there's anything going on. Okay, so if you have any questions, again, please feel free. I just see some nice comments, just some salams and mashallah, which are always lovely to hear. But if you have specific questions, let me go on to the YouTube page. Let me know. Alhamdulillah. Okay, I'm logging on. Oh, sorry. Okay. The best of you is someone who feeds others. Mashallah. Yes, some nice comments here. What about oils, sister? I'm not sure if that question was for me or someone else because we did not discuss anything like that. So I don't see any questions pertinent to our discussion here, but we still have a couple of minutes, like two minutes. So if you wanna ask, please feel free. But other than that, inshallah, I hope you guys are benefiting from this class because I really do enjoy putting together the slides and having this discussion. I wish it was more interactive. I wish we were doing this in real time, in person instead of the virtual. Alhamdulillah. We have to be grateful to Allah, SubhanAllah, for the opportunities He gives us. And we all remember what happened when the quarantine started and it was Ramadan very shortly after. And I think a lot of us were really worried for a good reason too because it was our first Ramadan like this. But then SubhanAllah, how many of us had probably the most exceptional experiences? I know many people did. I had a really amazing Ramadan this past year. So sometimes we think things are a lot worse than Allah, SubhanAllah, shows us the opposite. So always have a good opinion of Allah, SubhanAllah. Yes, it's a difficult time for most people and it has been for a while, but Allah, SubhanAllah, His promise is true and we have to hold on to that always, no matter how intense things get, never forget, because that is what gives our heart life. Like we believe in the promise of Allah, SubhanAllah. If He says, after every difficulty, there's ease, we believe in that. And inshaAllah, this too shall pass. So may Allah keep all of you safe, your family safe, inshaAllah. And may what's to come in the next few months, again, may Allah give us strength and hold us together and protect us, inshaAllah, from the fitna and just, yeah, make all of this, I mean, help us to come out of this with a renewed, inshaAllah, understanding of our place and our purpose and to really just see the world with a different lens. Because I think if we are being honest with ourselves, likely why we're in this situation is because we fell into heedlessness, we became forgetful, we lost our way. And so sometimes we have to learn the hard way to come back and to remember who we are. So inshaAllah, we ask Allah to provide that for continued guidance and patience and may Allah provide that. Bless all of you. Thank you for spending your Sunday evening with MCC East Bay, inshaAllah. Please make doh for the organizers, all of the volunteers and the staff, inshaAllah, and support MCC. They didn't ask me to say that, but it is an organization. If you are in the Bay Area, they absolutely deserve our support, maybe more so now than before because it is tough times, even for organizations to just make their overhead costs and all the other things still are happening, even though we're doing a lot of things virtually. So anyhow, that's just my little short spiel for MCC, but do keep all of them in your doze. And thank you. Thank you again for being here. We will go ahead and end, and I'll see you then, inshaAllah, in two weeks. So Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim. Wa al-A'asir in al-insana la fi khusir illa aladheena amin wa amin as-salihati wa tawasub al-haqi wa tawasub al-sabr. Subhana Allahumma wa bi hamdika shadu an da'ilah ilaha ila al-adham, astaghfiruq wa la tubu ilayk. Allahumma as-salam wa s-salam wa barakah ala sayyidina wa maulana Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa s-salam wa ala ani wa s-salam wa s-salam Alhamdulillah. Jazakum Allah wa khayran. Have a wonderful evening, you guys. InshaAllah, take care. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. As-salamu alaikum. Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim. Alhamdulillah wa as-salatu wa as-salam wa ala as-shif al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen. Sayyidina wa maulana wa Habibina Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa s-salam wa ala ali wa sahbihi wa s-salam. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Welcome everyone. InshaAllah, you all are doing well. You're all safe in your homes, comfortable with your families and everybody's in good spirits. We just had a holiday break, so I hope you got some chance to rest and relax. I know tomorrow is back to the grind for many of us, but inshaAllah, we've had a good time off. And so I'm so happy to be spending this evening with all of you. Jazakum Allah wa khayran for spending it with me. Now, for those who may be tuning in for the first time, I am covering a text in this session or in a series, in the series called Agenda to Change Our Condition. I have the text here in front of me. It is written by Imam Zed Shaker and Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. And this text is really, as the title says, about changing oneself and working with practical steps on how to do that. And so we've been covering several different sections of the book, but currently we are on the second chapter, which is titled The Heart at Its Treatment. We didn't get a chance to finish this chapter. It was two weeks ago that we last met. So we are going to finish the second chapter and possibly, if we have time today, continue into the third chapter. So with that said, I'm going to go ahead and share my screen, inshaAllah. So just give me a second. Bismillah. Let me present. All right. So now I'm going to do a quick review because the second chapter, we just started at the last session. So let's just quickly go over this. It'll be a summary, but of course, if you want to get the more in-depth reading of this text or of this chapter, please look at the previous recording from two weeks ago. So we started off with talking about, first of all, the title, as I said, was The Heart and Its Treatment. This is the beginning of the chapter. And so right away we talked about the, that action has two different modes, the heart and the limbs. And then what the concerns are of the heart, which is establishing a strong glee for Al-Qaeda and then purity of intention, sincerity, right? Iqlas, as we say in Arabic. So we describe those two terms in detail here. What is belief? What is sincerity? And then we further expanded on this concept of purifying the heart and rectifying our intentions. And then we talked about achieving sincerity and how we can be more sincere. Because of course this is, for all of us, the most important thing. It's really about the quality of what we do. Like the quantity, there's many people, even the monotheistic one, right? They can amass a lot of deeds, but if there's no sincerity in the heart, then that's, it's all for nothing, right? So the most important objective for us is to have sincerity when we do anything for the sake of Allah, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. So how can we achieve sincerity? Well, first and foremost, we guard our tongue. We make sure that we are truthful speaking people. We're honest people. And then we maintain discourse in private and public gatherings, right? So we maintain our way of behaving publicly and privately. And then we went on to talk about specifically how we can protect the tongue from falsehood, dissembling, right? To conceal one's true motives, feelings or beliefs, and perverications, to deviate from the truth. So how can we do this specifically? And so this is all from the text. I hope you have the text in front of you, but these slides are just meant to guide us in this conversation. So Bismillah, sorry. It's sometimes we get a little delay there. So here we are. So after we talked about that, we went into the four sources of destructive qualities of the tongue. And so we talked about lying and in what situations they are permissible and what, when they are not permissible and then backbiting, which of course we know is haram, and the difference between riba and namima, kalamni, right? And so we talked about that distinction. And then this is where we, we ended on this particular slide, the slide about backbiting. And you know, this is an important topic because unfortunately it is so common. It's, you know, human beings are, are prone to certain things more than others. And I would say that in our time of really being able to know so much about people's private lives, maybe more than ever before, we have access to information about people, right? Just with a click of a button, you can know a lot about how people live. You can see their family life, their home life, their relationship status. You can see their work sometimes, their vacations, the events that they go to on the weekend. So because we have so much access to people's private lives and their choices, the way that they live, their lifestyle, it does give us fodder, right? To, to speak about them and to judge them. And so unfortunately this is a very common problem that we have in our community and, you know, within the world, I would say. Because, you know, there's the whole, there's a whole industry, right? That thrives off of gossip. The tabloid industry, we see it from, I mean, when I was a kid, we saw the magazines when we would go into the supermarket stores or even the television shows, right? Shows like Entertainment Tonight. What were they, but gossip shows. They were just there to, you know, speak about what's going on with different celebrities, but really give a lot of information, scandals, anything that was going on. And then throughout the years, of course, that's changed as mediums have changed. And so now there's TMZ and there's different websites that people will go to just to get access to gossip. So it's definitely a big part of our society to talk about people to gossip. Even if the, we don't know, you know, I mean, these are people removed from us often. We don't know them personally. They're celebrities or politicians, athletes, singers, but still the fact that it's such a acceptable thing and nobody really thinks twice of how grotesque it is, how despicable it is to spend your time judging other people, then it's normalized.  So really we want to talk about why this is such an important topic of guarding the tongue from backbiting. So we did distinguish though, in some cases, it is permissible because the harm of not mentioning certain things could be greater, right? So that's the wisdom of our Dean, is that it helps us to discern when certain behaviors are acceptable and when they're not. And so we talked at length in the last session about the situations where backbiting would be permissible. So again, if you wanted to get more on that, check out the previous recording. All of it is available on the MCC YouTube page, inshallah. So now there's four, right, sources. So we only got to number two. So the third one is where we're going to talk about next. I'm just going to wait for the slide to kick in here on this delay. Okay, and I went ahead. Okay, here we go. So argumentation for its own sake. To dispute using sophisticated reasoning, right? Sophistry, what is that? It's people who just like to argue, even though their arguments are fallacious, they're all based on fallacies. There's really no truth to them, but they just like to argue. They like to wind people up and get people angry over whatever it is, whether it's politics or some other issue, religious debates. There are people that do this and they enjoy it. They thrive on it. They love it. They love to prod people, just annoy them. And so this is definitely something that is harmful and destructive to the tongue to engage in this type of behavior. So when you know that you are arguing a point that you really, there's no substance to it. There's nothing really serious in your heart. You're not really invested in it, but you just want to argue for the sake of arguing. You just like to, like I said, rile people up. This would apply to you. This is something you really have to watch, contentiousness. You know, there are people, like I said, who enjoy this. They may just part of their personality type. They like to pick fights or pick arguments. So we really want to watch our behavior. If this is something that you have been told that you do, that you just argue a lot, and this doesn't necessarily have to be verbal.   And then they move on. They go to the next person, the next person because they likely have, you know, something that's going on personally with them or they're not happy in their life. They're not, you know, they're not content with their own circumstances. So it gives them some relief to go and bother other people. And unfortunately, of course, this would be a disease of the heart, right? To go and harm people just because you can, or because you can't contain your own emotions. Of course, it's unacceptable, right? This is definitely a disease of the heart. But again, we have people who do this. So now a days it's not just verbal argumentation, but it can be behind a screen with a complete stranger that you don't know about. So you want to think about that. Or here, for example, to defend a religious innovation intentionally. So sometimes people just because they, again, don't want to lose an argument, they may defend a position that they know is not true just because they don't want to look embarrassed maybe in front of a group or another person. So they will, you know, again, advocate for something or push for something, defend something without, while knowing that it's not the correct position to have. So there are unfortunately, again, people whose pride and their egos get in the way. And so argumentation just becomes a defense that they use to protect their own pride and ego. But it is destructive. It's destructive to the spiritual heart. It's destructive to the tongue. So here are the problems I said and reminds us that disputation with the Quran is disbelief. So for anybody who, for example, will come and refute a clear position in the Quran. This is kufr, right? We cannot do that. If Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says something, we accept it without any question that it is Haq. It is true. But there are, again, people nowadays anyway, who believe, unfortunately, that Islam needs a reform and that the Quran needs a reform.  And they still call themselves Muslim. So we have to be very careful of these people because they may claim to be Muslim, but if they are assuming to know better or to think that their interpretation of something that has clearly been as a consensus about is correct, we have to be very careful of people like that. May Allah protect us from becoming people like that and may Allah protect us from being influenced by people like that. We have to do our best to guard our heart and our Eman, which is why it's so important to make sure that we take from the correct sources from teachers who have been trained, who have the chain of transmission that you know that they have gone through the proper training because nowadays anybody can claim to be a teacher or a scholar or a sheikh just because they can read Arabic or they just claim it. And unfortunately this is very common. I know people, public figures who this is what they do and they are very controversial in certain community groups because they will for example say, the hijab is not something that is far from women. And then they'll interpret the verses of hijab in their own way and it causes a lot of problems in families and marriages because one person may take this person as an authority and so it just causes a lot of problems. But the clear sign for all of us is that when someone goes against the hijab of our scholarship in Islam and goes against the majority opinion on things, we should definitely see that as a red flag. No matter what they assume in terms of their credentials, just know that right away that is a sign of some serious problem because again, our Dean has been protected and preserved over all these centuries because of the Senate because we have respected this chain. And so to break from that chain and to think that you know better and to presume that again Islam needs some type of reformation all the blah is just kufr. So we stay away from that type of thinking and we ask Allah's Father to protect us from that. So that was the third destructive quality of the tongue. Now the fourth is mirthful jesting on serious occasions, right? Gesting, making light of, joking around of a serious matter. And this is something again very problematic in our society at large, in our world at large. We live in a time where you know it's a time where people really take things that are very serious lightly and it's you know, memes for example, you see all this joking inappropriate mockery which is haram in Islam. All of this is very common now, very normalized behavior. You see it every day. If you open up your email or your browser to check news, likely you will see some form of this of just not really taking things seriously or taking a very serious matter and then as we said, making a joke of it, making light of it. So we have to ask Allah for protection from that that there is a time and place for everything and we do not lose comportment, lose our adab in different environments or with different people in different scenarios just because we have this internal sort of impulse to joke around and so we have to regulate and this is why it's so important to learn to regulate yourself so that you're not caught in those moments where you're being wholly inappropriate in a situation and this is unfortunately again very, very common. So here the Prophet Sallam reminds us a beautiful quality in someone's practice of Islam is minding his or her own business. So beautiful hadith that we should all internalize to really try not to get involved in other people's business, not to ask or probe or pry into the private personal affairs of other people because it's those questions that open the door often times for the gossiping, the backbiting argumentation for the inappropriate joking, teasing, taunting, mockery of other people, right? So sometimes it's just best to, again, to take yourself seriously and to take the discussions that you engage in seriously to take the gatherings that you have or the people that you're with and those times where you're speaking or just engaging with other people to take those moments very seriously and to be aware of yourself so that you don't, again, fall into all of these really destructive behaviors. So these are the four sources of destructive quality. So let's go ahead and look at what's next. We're still on, by the way, chapter two. Let me just look at the book here to let those who do have the text know where we are. Oh, there are actually some other hadith here. Let me mention. Qadi Abu Bakr said, and this goes back to the previous slide here where we talked about mirthful justing. He said, I once heard Imam al-Tertushi say that the Joker is an ignorant fool because Allah revealed to us a dialogue between the children of Israel and Moses upon him be peace. Do you take us as the brunt of a joke? Ask the children of Israel? And Musa al-Aislam replied, he said this, right? So he said, I seek refuge in Allah that I should be of the ignorant ones. So he took this accusation from the Children of Israel that it was such an insult that he was seeking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for protection or refuge in Allah from being amongst the ignorant ones. So this was the commentary of Imam al-Tertushi. And this was on page 23 again of the text. And then Qadi Abu Bakr also said, it would seem to me that if the answer concerns a matter related to religion, then it is ignorance. But if it was some other concern, then it is merely speech. It's ruling as it's ruling and it's characteristic is defined by what it contains. So again, just discussing how to distinguish between something that is stated out of ignorance or otherwise. And then the text continues and it says, after we purified our hearts from other than Allah and our tongues from the aforementioned faults, then we have established firm foundations for divine protection. The next step. So now, again, this is a process, right? So we're looking at all the different steps. So the next step on the journey towards sincerity is developing concern for the rest of our responsibilities. Among those we should focus on ensuring the following two essentials. The five foundations of religion, the five pillars of Islam and avoiding mortal sins that combat it vigilantly. So again, once we've done this work, this deep internal spiritual work where we're really trying to look at our behavior and change our behavior, then this would be the next step, is that we are focusing on the five pillars and avoiding the Qaba'ir, which are the enormities, the large sins, right? Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la says, if you avoid what has been prohibited for you from the enormities, then we will cover over any wrongs. So inshallah, if we are vigilant in protecting ourselves from doing any of the major haram, then inshallah, Allah will protect us and cover us from other wrongs. And so then the text goes on to say, None truly knows the mortal sins with any certainty except Allah. Indeed, He has concealed them among the prohibited matters. However, some of the masters of knowledge have gathered them and codified them for us. They tally 17 in number. Abandoning the major sins makes it easier for one to leave lesser wrongs. And that's a really important point. I mean, if you think about it, if you're working so diligently and vigilantly to protect yourself from the 17 major sins, then you will inshallah, as a byproduct of that vigilance, guard yourself from the lesser sins. So it's really a two for one in many cases. Just be vigilant about your heart, protect your limbs, protect your tongue, protect yourself, and inshallah, the frivolous or the smaller deeds, misdeeds, mistakes, sins, those will kind of just go away as well, right? So then He says, likewise, the lesser wrongs that one commits will be removed from one's record through ritual prayers, washings, the Hajj, and the lesser pilgrimage. Subhanallah. And that's out of the generosity and rahmah of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala that just by doing some of these ritual acts that we do in order to do other acts, for example, we'll do, right? We know that when we make wudu, that our sins are falling as the water drops, right? That is the mercy of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala but how many of us really take that into account every time we make wudu that we're actually imagining that happening, right? So some of these things are just given to us without us even being aware of it or having it in the forefront of our minds, right? But it's still happening. So Allah, out of His generosity, gives us all of this mercy and forgives us of so many sins just by doing these things, right? And in the Prophet's life said, one daily prayer to the next and one Friday prayer to the next remit wrong actions as long as enormities are avoided. Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So every single day that we are able to successfully complete our prayers one after the other after the other after the other. And in between, we're not engaging in any of the larger sins or the heavier, weightier sins. And again, as the text says, most of those things are known only to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. Some of them have clearly been stipulated for us but truly only Allah would know, right? So if we protect our hearts from doing those major, major sins from prayer to prayer, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala is removing our sins for us and in the same vein is from jama to jama if we do the same thing, right? So Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala Again, out of the generosity of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So now the next section here is on the enumeration of the enormities, okay? So this is where we now talk about what these major sins are that our scholars have put it, you know, codified for us and put it in this list. So the very first one, the most important one, of course we know is Shirk, is associating any partners with Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala This is according to one narration, the one sin that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala will not forgive and there are other narrations, of course that speak also to the heaviness of the sin and that it is at the top of the list, right? It's the greatest sin that we can make is to in any way attribute a partner as well as Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala So that's right away, we know this, inshallah we all know it because it is part of our creed, inshallah we all understand this clearly. The next is perseverance in wrongs even when lesser ones. So this is important because when we commit sins habitually, even when they're small they turn into enormities, right? So they pile up you want to think about that, that smaller sins like grains of sand can eventually turn into mountains before us if we're not careful. So we have to be careful of habituating to sin and to making becoming heedless and reckless and not taking ourselves into account when we do sin. Toba should be part of our every single day experience. Because we should, even if we don't actively sin, we should remember that we sin sometimes passively, we sin when we're unaware of it. So we make Toba regularly every day, we are mindful of ourselves and inshallah that will prevent us from engaging in sins especially when we know that it's sinful behavior. So really important to make sure that we don't habituate to sins even if they're small. Despair of the mercy of Allah Despair is a really important one because, you know, again we live in a time where anxiety disorders, mental health issues are on the rise and a lot of people struggle with their circumstances and trying to just find peace in life. A lot of problems are happening and it's because of the nature of our world. If you look at the world, it's become an increasingly difficult place for people to find some semblance of peace. So all of these things are understandable given the intensity of our world. There's a lot of evil in our world a lot of darkness in our world. So with that though there is something that has happened in terms of this concept of despair and, you know, it's a term that is thrown around lightly but we have to understand that as Muslims, we do not despair and it's actually considered great it's a haram to have despair because we should never lose hope in Allah SWT. So again, people who struggle with really serious mental health issues we're not speaking about that but people who kind of go through grief or stress or some problem in life and they immediately default into losing hope we would say this would be something that you don't want to normalize and you certainly don't want to make acceptable just because you're having a difficult time you don't want to challenge that and, you know, be bothered by it and want to remove it that I don't want to feel this way I want to always have the best opinion of Allah SWT not to think that my circumstance is hopeless in dunya or in afshara some people for example sin and they do major sins and then they lose hope that they will ever be saved and nobody should feel that way and that's why we have so many hadith where Allah SWT is reminding us over and over and over again not to put limits on his mercy, you know, if he can forgive a man, a mass murderer you know, then we should not assume anything about Allah SWT and it's in his decision alone, right but to have hope because that is a better position than to lose hope, right so be very careful about that and then also a false sense of security from the design of Allah this would be, you know, the opposite issue of people just assuming that everything is going to go in their favor just because right, self-righteousness is a really serious disease of the heart, arrogance, self-righteousness assuming that you kind of have it and, you know, you haven't made and that, you know it gives you this false sense of security with Allah we always have to you know, find that balance of hope with Allah but also fear and awe and maintaining that respect and that uncertainty because we don't see our our deeds as being good enough as worthy, right, it's a humility it's humility before Allah SWT recognizing that no matter what we do, we could spend our entire existence worshiping Allah SWT perfectly but it will not ever be enough to show gratitude for all of the blessings He's given us when you have that understanding then you don't assume that you are special or that you have some special rank with Allah but you always, you know, kind of are walking between those two states, right, or hanging in the bounce between those two states of hope and fear so those are the four enormities of the heart, right, this is why it's so important to have those really deep internal conversations with oneself to question and check in these don't have to necessarily be verbalized to anybody, it's really about ourselves holding ourselves accountable and being truthful with ourselves, right so the four enormities of the tongue are the false testimony so this is very serious if you ever testify against someone or in a situation you find yourself but you are not being truthful and you potentially ruin another person's life or livelihood many scenarios would apply to this, this is huge it's absolutely haram it's people of truth and honesty we cannot make claims about other people and this is why it's so dangerous because there have been several public cases, right of people making allegations against someone and then later on it turns out that they were untrue and it was false report we have to seek protection because this is something that people fall into sometimes because of greed or they have some other ulterior motive and they think that they can justify doing it because it'll serve a better purpose, I'll be able to do good but you could put so many different spins on it but at the end of the day it's haram you cannot bear false testimony accusing others of adultery so this would kind of fall into the same category you are lying but also if you're basing it on just suspicion, right you may see a situation and presume something but without evidence and without really following the the rules I guess of a situation like that in Islam we know there has to be a certain number of witnesses it has to be done a certain way before you make an accusation publicly about someone doing something like that but you'll find people again making light of these things and they don't think twice they look their emotions, get the best of them they'll pick up the phone call and I saw your husband, I saw your wife or I saw somebody, whoever it's either a gossip train that continues or it's actually getting involved and meddling in another person's relationship all based on suspicion not true facts or anything that could be verifiable by another witness or other witnesses, right so we have to be very careful of ever making those accusations sinful oaths again if you're promising or vowing to do things that are haram, making oaths you want to be very careful this is totally impermissible first of all be careful with how we use our tongue in this way but also what our hearts are aligning with so you want to be careful that you're not being loyal to or showing some allegiance to something that you know is clearly haram, so not making oaths and vows and promises that are not that are simply haram and wrong, right and then magic we know seeing people who are promising to look into your future or reading cards or tea leaves this is very popular in some cultures more than others to go to people like that and unfortunately in many of our cultures there's a presumption right away that if something isn't going your way in life maybe you've missed some opportunities some things haven't worked out for you that it must immediately be seher magic and then that leads in some cases ironically it leads people to seek out people who do seher or who are known to dabble in black magic to seek revenge or to you know it's just it's really mind-boggling but we have to seek protection from Allah's path for ever engaging in things like that so those are the the four enormities of the heart and of the tongue so let's go to the next slide here I want to get through this list because I'll leave some time for questions but okay so the next are the three enormities of the stomach and so again look at the sections and how they have separated each section inshallah to get to this total of 17 right so right away of course we know intake of alcohol or intoxicants of any type if you are intentionally digesting or consuming something that you know has been spiked or is haram or is in any way just not permissible because there's some level of intoxicant in there you should seek refuge from Allah it's definitely haram to do that willingly knowingly that's the first one consuming the wealth of an orphan how many ayahs in the Quran does Allah warn people of doing this but unfortunately it happens there are many people who are caught up in this type of behavior in countries and in places where there are actual orphans and they may have something of their own but also if you think about inheritance disputes and you know other matters that get into family politics there are people who are may Allah guide them and forgive them but they let their greed get the best of them and they will scam sometimes their own family members in those scenarios so it can be in both ways you know actual taking the wealth in other ways just scheming and plotting to take the wealth of someone who again would be categorized as an orphan taking interest on wealth so I'm not going to get into all the debates about this because there are different opinions on that when it comes to minority Muslims living in non-Muslim lands and there's just a lot of different opinions on interest in general but for the most part we all know that we should avoid it we have some of us have credit cards you might have take a loan here and there and that's when you have to just follow the positions of whichever scholars that you listen to or that you follow they may have different opinions on that but most of the scholars regardless will always advise that it's best to avoid any type of interest and because it will you know eat away at the barakah of our wealth so it's best to always try to avoid it there are specific of it again you can defer to the scholars that you follow and see what their positions are the enormities of the genitals so this is again another one that we should be very mindful of because it's everywhere it's happening we live again in a time where everything's inverted in terms of what's normal in society is often times haram you know it's just it's a very strange time but these things having illicit relationships outside of marriage premarital sex is so normalized in this society nobody very few people think of it even as an issue and if you are on the opposite side and you have conservative values they will look at you like you're crazy and there's something wrong with you and this isn't just with adults but you find even I work with teens and I see what's going on in teen culture and it's even pervasive in teen culture that if you haven't had sexual relations by the time you're a senior or even a junior maybe it's changed and now it's even a freshman or a sophomore I don't know how early the pressure is to be sexually active but I I know certainly that there is a lot of pressure and that you are considered weird or you're treated as if there's something wrong with you if you choose not to participate and you want to be just protect yourself and be chast people will look at you like there's something wrong with you so this is very common and that's why we can't have this attitude that oh Muslims don't do these things no Muslims are absolutely doing these things and that's why a show like Rami this show that got very popular and won an Emmy I think and probably other awards it's it's very open about you know young Muslim singles that are engaging in this type of behavior as far as I know I haven't seen the show but I heard enough to know that that is a very popular ongoing theme in the show and so a lot of Muslims are fans of the show by the way it's not that it's just non Muslims watching Muslims do these things or you know depicting Muslims doing these things it's actually very popular with the younger Muslim American or Western Muslim generation because they likely identify with it or they have also adopted the same attitude about these behaviors so we have to take it seriously that these are very you know they're enormous are harm and we know just looking at Sharia and the rules and the positions about you know these matters where what's acceptable what's not we know that premarital sex is forbidden of course adultery is a whole other topic but that would also be included because it's illicit relations and so illicit is premarital or adulterous and then of course homosexual acts this is now also very common and very it's increasingly becoming normalized in society just yesterday on a group that I've read that I'm on someone posted that a sister was inquiring about how to navigate a situation in which a young Muslim girl has come out as gay and wants to introduce her partner to her family and you know this is we hear these stories now more and more with the younger generation because their generation has accepted the idea that gender and you know and sexuality are fluid and they don't believe that there's a binary that you know this is what unfortunately they've been conditioned to think in you know it's indoctrination it starts sometimes very young but we have to just open our eyes and accept the reality that we live in a time where this is part of the progressive social movement the left the liberal movement to normalize these things as far as gender and sexuality is concerned and therefore that becomes the you know resounding message to everybody that it's not a big deal you know you kind of just go with the flow do what you feel why do you have to apply some moral lens to it you're born this way these are the messages that our youth are hearing so what that does when you hear that throughout school and I working with teens I have had to intervene in situations where junior high school students have had a conflict with their gender or sexual identity because of these discussions happening around them with their friends or just with the celebrities they follow or the singers and the different shows and programs they're watching it's so normal if you really are paying attention they had I think it was 2015 that they call the year of the trans it's like the transgender year where a lot of transgender celebrities were coming out like Caitlyn Jenner and then I think it's Laverne Fox or Cox I can't remember her name but there are others as well who are RuPaul we know right people who are transgender and they became very popular during that year of 2015 so since then if you are paying attention you'll notice that there is much more representation of the LGBTQ community in popular television popular shows music cartoons now there's you know pressure to make sure that there's representation even if it's just a character in the background you'll see sometimes you know two moms you know pushing a stroller or something like that in the backdrop of a scene in a cartoon so the messaging is there it's quite prevalent and it's continuously increasing so you can see why people are accepting this as being normal even though it conflicts with their faith values and I have actually worked with groups including teens who have a really difficult time reconciling what the faith says and then having friends who are part of the LGBTQ community or just hearing the messages that come from the left or the social movement that says it's all fine and respect people and of course we should respect people regardless of their orientation regardless of their faith that's just a principle of our faith is just to treat people well and be always civil so that's not nobody's arguing that but I think they have a hard time trying to reconcile you know how the faith is very clear about these things and then society says no there's nothing wrong with it so people are having a hard time with this issue but we have to be strong as Muslims and be confident to stand up for our values and our principles without getting swept into or pulled into any types of traps that may be set up for us it's unfair I think in my personal opinion that someone who chooses to practice their faith as a Muslim Christian Jewish or any other faith tradition that doesn't accept these acts as being permissible that they are treated as though they're bigots and that there's something inherently wrong with them because they don't agree with that particular lifestyle I don't accept that and I don't think we should I think we should just be people that say we reserve the right to practice our faith and to hold on to our faith values without having to compromise or capitulate to political agendas and movements and yet in the same you know breath we can say we respect all people's rights to live and to exist in peace and harmony and not to be harmed and that's it leave it at let's just have mutual respect you live your way I'm not going to bother you and you do the same for me don't dictate to me what I should believe in and don't label me as being someone who is a bigot or prejudice just because I have my beliefs no because you know as Muslims we treat people inshallah based on the content of their character how you know whether or not they're good people and just basic civility we're not looking at personal choices and lifestyle choices and we should that should be extended to us as well you know just have mutual respect for people but going back to the topic of is it an enormity yes we believe that those acts are haram and that's it I mean that's just there's really no dispute about it from the orthodox position of Islam you might find other people who claim that there's other positions but orthodoxy is pretty that's it it's it is what it is so that's the two enormities of the genitals then we move on to the enormities of the hands of course these are pretty obvious right killing and theft we know our kebab are haram so may Allah protect us from ever falling into those behaviors human beings of all stripes and backgrounds have unfortunately found themselves in these situations so we should never think that we're above it we should always ask Allah for protection right from ever falling into scenarios like that or situations like that where our emotions lead us to do something so heinous as to as to kill take a life or to take property that's not ours or something that's not ours so may Allah protect us from that um the remaining enormities are let's see here just give me a second some of that uh oh one too far so the enormity of the feet is just one fleeing from battle right so we know that you know the deflectors that's what compromised the Muslims and at Uhad and other battles so we know that it's over time this is unfortunately it has happened where people have deflected they've gotten afraid or some other reason so this would be definitely a haram and then of the whole body this is you know a really serious one for us all to think about the disrespect of parents uh so so important again because it's so relevant in our time when we see that uh this idea of parental authority being constantly undermined and parents being presented as just fools, buffoons easily gullible this is what a lot of our films are cartoons even the characters and the cartoons you know the Simpsons you look at the parent parent uh you know characters they're usually very dull you know just not very bright um and there's a lot of undermining of the authority that happens so it's very common and this is one of the signs of the end of time as well right there are also some more in this about so we have to look to how we treat our own parents if they are living inshallah one or both if they're still living how do we speak to them right do we what tone of voice do we use with them and it's understandable that because I know several friends and people who are my age who are caring for elderly parents or parents with you know just really difficult uh uh circumstances and tough personalities and you know they're not they're set in their ways you know some of our parents are just really set in their ways and they're not always willing to compromise with their uh young adult children and so I've had to in many uh many times in my life help my friends or other people I know deal with calming their themselves down when they're talking with their parents because they get so angered easily and so frustrated you know it's it's a time where the uh generational gap um really is common uh you see uh not just you know um because of the different uh or times that that each uh the parent and the child were raised in but also just the age you know the the with age comes uh a lot of challenges right you have health challenges our parents are oftentimes taking medications um or they have their own long history of trauma PTSD God knows you know and a lot of our parents if we're coming from cultures and backgrounds where they saw a lot of hardships and strife they likely do have residual um emotional baggage from all of that and so we have to bear in mind that you know the to just be more as patient as we possibly can and to um to know how to deal with those situations by regulating our emotions because that's really the only thing we can control right so anyway that's like a larger discussion but the point is is just to be very mindful of how we speak to our parents and the um and also how we teach our children to respect us um always in my opinion it's very effective to always attach the you know the respect that our parents give excuse me our children give to us as parents to Allah SWT that it's really kind of that that's the the the trajectory right it's not that we are um that all of their all their respect should just stay with us but it's more it's like a conduit right if they can respect us and treat us um well and be mindful of our rules and obey then it will make their spiritual path easier and so framing it that way I think also keeps us accountable as parents so that we make sure we don't you know go over the boundaries because there are parents who certainly um you know are excessive and and can be uh too harsh or just take advantage of the relationship with their kids and because they think that they have that right but when you look at parenting the prophetic examples what parenting in Islam is all about it really is about Allah SWT our objective is to raise strong moral agents you know servants of Allah SWT we can't get in their way we shouldn't get in their way we're just a means to an end inshallah that they have uh strong and we can give them that in our homes and as long as they're with us so that should be the objective inshallah okay so the final comments here one should avoid all the wrongs that relate to or affect any of Allah's servants because those wrongs can be possible can be impossible to rectify as for what remains between an individual and Allah is less harmful to others and is much easier so this is an important distinction too that any of these sins that have to do with wronging other human beings or another person are far heavier on the scale than the things that we do where we wrong ourselves we shouldn't do either as best as we can we should always guard ourselves from either but to know that when we engage in behavior that harms other people this will be much heavier on our scales against us so may Allah protect us from all of this inshallah I mean so I'm going to stop here we didn't we did this is the end by the way I'm pretty sure I don't think there's any more after this of chapter two so our next session we will yeah we'll do chapter three here which is practical steps to change our condition okay so let me go ahead and stops the screen and I will now look to the comments to see if there's any Bismillah I usually don't see any so I don't know if you guys are just shy but I'm going to look anyway Mashallah I see some people thank you for your comments on the facebook page anyway and now I'll check YouTube as I always do I try to cover both so that I don't miss anything um just give me a second here here we go see if there's any questions sorry okay so let's see I see comments where they maybe okay okay good comments here some very nice comments thank you I see I just see some nice comments and salams and other things but I don't see any questions so thank you all for tuning in again it's always an honor that you spend your evenings, Sunday evenings with us here at MCC so thank you so much two weeks from now we will continue the discussion with Chapter 3 I look forward to seeing you guys there we'll go ahead and end in Dua SubhanakAllah Bismillah Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Salam Have a good evening. Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Bismillahir rahmanir raheem. Alhamdulillah wa salatu wa salamu ala asheb al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen. Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habib al-Muhammad. Sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, wa ala alaihi wa sahbihi wa sallam, Tasbeeman katira. Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh, dear brothers and sisters. Alhamdulillah, it has been a few weeks since our last meeting and I want to first apologize for anyone who may have been online last week waiting for the class to start. I just got my schedule mixed up completely. So please forgive me for that. My responsibility. But Alhamdulillah MTC was kind enough to accommodate us this week. So inshallah it kind of works out because this will be the last session for the this year and then we'll resume inshallah ta'ala when we come back. But we know that a lot of people have already begun their holiday break. Maybe they're traveling, maybe they're not, but they might be just spending time with family. So inshallah you'll enjoy a nice break before we come back. But for today, Alhamdulillah, we're going to go ahead and kind of pick up from where we left off last time. And so I do have the presentation. Let me pull it up for those who may be joining us for the first time in case you've never been or have never attended before. We've been covering a text that is called Agenda to Change Your Condition. And it was written by Imam Zed Shakir and Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. So Alhamdulillah I have the text with me and I'll show you in just a minute actually before I screen share. I should do that since the camera is nice and big so you can see it. So this is the text. So Sheikh Hamza Yusuf and Imam Zed Shakir wrote this and it is really a life altering transformative text that just covers so many different topics. And so I'm really excited to jump back into it because we kind of, we almost closed out chapter two last time. There is a couple more things to talk about, but we're going to begin chapter three, which is on the practical steps to change our condition. So if you don't have the text, I definitely advise you to get it because it's just something that everybody should have at home. But also it will bring you up to speed so that, you know, what we're going to talk about moving forward. So look into that in the next week or so. If you again are new to the class and you'd like to stick around, inshallah, I think it'll be a great thing to do to prep you before we come back after break. So with that said, I'll screen share. Bismillah. And we'll pick up where we left off. So just give me one second here. So this is the presentation, but we are quite a little bit ahead here. So we almost, yeah, we were on this last slide here. So actually the last slide, if you go back by the way, MCCLHUM.com records all of these sessions. So there are recordings available. You can go back and watch them just kind of follow along. But the last slide that we talked about actually was a slide. It was on the different enormities, which are of course, you know, the sins that we do with the different limbs that we have. And so we ended on this slide. And then the very last slide for chapter two were recommendations on how to achieve or reach sincerity. And so these are just general advices, but again, very important for all of us to reflect on. The recitation of the Quran first and foremost, that is the first advice, you know, if we really, truly want to be sincere and we want ikhlas, inshallah, all of us want ikhlas in our Ibada and in our relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, then we cannot underestimate the importance of really committing to daily practice of reading the Quran and really thinking about its meanings, inshallah, if we're able to. And then if we're not able to contemplate its relevance, then to at least recite it. You know, some people, maybe because of language limitations, they're, they don't, they can't really, you know, go beyond the recitation. They may be, I mean, I know I have family members who don't read the Quran from the text because they were never taught and they're much older and it's very difficult for them or they have vision problems. So there could be many, many reasons why someone can't commit to actually doing more in-depth, you know, reflections on the meanings. But if they're not able to, if you're not able to do that, then the least that we should be doing is reciting the Quran and really finding a routine and a rhythm that is, that works for us. Everybody's schedule is different. Everybody's abilities may range based again on, on your experience or how much you've studied. But, you know, it's important to note that learning to Jweed is one of the farghain. It's one of the obligatory deeds or actions that we must all do as Muslims. And so, you know, in this day and age with so many opportunities online to learn, you know, once upon a time it may have been much harder for people because they didn't have access to knowledge. But now that we are in this very, you know, connected world and we have all of this access, we should take it very seriously to learn the book of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and make sure that our recitation is done correctly. Before, you know, we leave this world, it's one of the, again, the farghain that we should commit to doing or at least make the intention and start looking around, shopping around as they say, you know, ask around. You might find friends or, you know, community members that have, that know someone. Maybe there's someone in your community who is willing to teach you. Maybe, of course right now we're all in quarantine so they could do Zoom sessions. They could somehow figure it out and be wil