Today my (ustadh) reading was tafseer Al Manar, Rashid Ridha; Imam Al Alusi (رحم الله), Rooh ul Ma'ani his commentary; and also Ibn Ashoor (رحم الله); and I (ustadh) had a long chat with Sheikh Sohaib Saeed – our head of research at Bayyinah, who is in Scotland – we talked about the ayah that we are going to discuss today. There was a lot to talk about and I (ustadh) decided after taking all of those notes and grasping all of it that the subject is so important that I cannot be geeky with you when I talk about it. I am trying to simplify it as much as I can, because I believe that the concept that we are covering today is one of the most important and one of the most asked about concepts in our religion that people are generally confused about.
Today we are going to discuss ayahs 113-115 of Al e Imran, and these are a pretty comprehensive view of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى)'s stance on good people from those that are not yet Muslim. What about them? Let me (ustadh) translate these ayaat first briefly.
Ayah 113
لَيْسُوا سَوَاءً ۗ مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ يَتْلُونَ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ
They are not [all] the same; among the People of the Scripture is a community standing [in obedience], reciting the verses of Allah during periods of the night and prostrating [in prayer].
لَيْسُوا سَوَاءً ۗ – they are not all the same; مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ – from among the People of the Book, there is an upright group, and upright nation within them; يَتْلُونَ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ – who recite the miraculous Word of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى); آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ – in the odd hours of the night; وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ – and they engage in prostration.
Ayah 114
يُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ وَيَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ وَيُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْخَيْرَاتِ وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ
They believe in Allah and the Last Day, and they enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong and hasten to good deeds. And those are among the righteous.
يُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ – they believe in Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and in the last day; وَيَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ – and they command the decent and the known good values and they prohibit alien or evil values; وَيُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْخَيْرَاتِ – and they compete in doing good deeds; وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ – and those are from among the righteous.
Ayah 115
وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ ۗ وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ
And whatever good they do - never will it be removed from them. And Allah is Knowing of the righteous.
وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ – and whatever they might do of any kind of good; فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ – then it will not be denied of them, or it will not be deprived of them.وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ – and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is fully aware of those that are conscious; meaning conscious or aware of Him.
Some have translated that last part as pious, which is an implication of taqwa, it's not directly taqwa itself.
So, first and foremost in classical commentary, when Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: among the People of the Book, there are those that are upright - most mufassiroon think this refers to Abdullah Ibn e Salam (رضي الله عنه). He used to be Jewish and then he became Muslim. So Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is saying that among the People of the Book, there are those that have come towards Islam. And therefore, they read the rest of the ayah: they are an upright people; meaning they became Muslim. Now they recite the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), meaning the Qur'an; آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ meaning tahajjud prayer; وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ – and they make sajdah, meaning part of their tahajjud prayers that they do sajdah. They believe in Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and the last day, (their comment about it is:) of course the Muslim do; and they enjoin the good and forbid the evil, (their comment about this part of the ayah is:) look, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) said about the ummah, the Muslims: they enjoin the good and forbid the evil. وَيُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْخَيْرَاتِ – and they compete in doing good deeds; وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ – and they are among good.
Their explanation is these are the converts basically, from Christianity or Judaism to Islam, and the examples are given of several companions of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه و سلم) who used to be Jewish or Christians and became Muslim. And there is no doubt that that is one possible application of these ayaat. But the ayaat are also open ended and there are some who have raised criticism of that interpretation, so there are opposing views classically also. I (ustadh) am going to summarize the opposite view like why would somebody disagree with that interpretation.
First and foremost, already in a couple of ayaat before, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) said: you are the best of all nations; and you are the Muslim ummah. So why would He call us from among the People of the Book? Anybody who joins this ummah is no longer from the People of the Book. And if anything the wording should have been: they used to be from the People of the Book; but it's not using the past tense, it's using the present tense. Then it's saying: they are an upright nation; well, that's actually a downgrade because already we were told that you are the best nation, "you are best of all people", and now it's an upright people. Being upright is a good quality but it can't compete with the best nation, so clearly it's saying that there is some good here, but not as good as that, or some kind of don't dismiss some other people; it's almost talking in those term, so some say: no, no, this can't be referring to the Muslims.
And then the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) has revealed revelations before to the People of the Book, and the argument that Rashid Ridha has given is very interesting: imagine a Muslim who lived in the second century, third century, some time; and because you know we have Bukhari, Muslim, and six famous books of Ahadith, and we have Qur'an and tafseer, all of that is accessible to us; but in the third century of Islam or the second century of Islam, if somebody lived in China or somebody lived in some remote part of India and became Muslim, they wouldn't have Al Bukhari, they wouldn't have all of the body of Hadith, maybe they only have ten or seven hadith that they know, they don't know nothing else about the Sunnah, maybe they know five or seven surahs, maybe they don't know anything else, they don't have access to all the commentaries on the Qur'an like we do. Now whatever they do have, whatever this farmer has, he is doing his best, he is following it genuinely, he doesn't know the difference between hadith saheeh, and dhaeef, and munkar, and mutafiq ilaih, and which one is Muslim and which one is Bukhari and all of that stuff, he doesn't know any of that stuff. Imagine even a time of a Muslim living a thousand miles away from where Imam Bukhari lives. So Bukhari hasn't been published yet and there are Muslims that are living at that time. Do they have the same access to information about the Prophet (صلى الله عليه و سلم) that we now have? No, they don't. They have very limited information, and some of it might also be inaccurate information, it's possible, but they are doing the very best that they can within what they know. Are they still good people? Or should we say that you don't know all the sahee ahadith, you shouldn't be considered a good person, how can you be a good person? That doesn't work. They are still good people, even though they know very little, and even though they may not know the difference between what's authentic and what's not authentic; they are still considered good people, that's only a fair assessment.
Let me (ustadh) give you yet another example before we go further. This is very important actually, I (ustadh) should have started with this psychological experiment. This is a social psychology experiment and you are now for the next thirty seconds subjects of this experiment. When I (ustadh) say: one; you say: two; when I say: three; you say: (audience said four, but ustadh said:), but I didn't say 'four', I was going to say 'one' again, what did you just do? You assumed that if 'one' was going to lead to 'two', then 'three' must lead to 'four'. So you assumed my trajectory of thought before I completed my thought. Sometimes when you listen to somebody before they finish talking, you assume that you know what they are going to say; and you actually tune out what they are actually going to say because in your head they have already said it. I (ustadh) wanted to do this experiment because some of you might be thinking that you know what I am going to say today, and I want you to turn that off. You don't know what I am going to say, and don't assume what I am going to say.
There are two extremes; one who say that only Muslims are going to heaven, and the others who say that everybody is okay. And those who say that only Muslims are going to heaven; the moment you start saying something positive about the People of the Book, they are like: I know, what he is going to say, he is sending everybody to heaven. You are already assuming the trajectory of my thought. The Qur'an presents an incredibly balanced picture.
One of the most beautiful lessons that I (ustadh) learned about the Qur'an, I learned from Dr. Akram Nadwi actually. There were some parts of the Qur'an that I just was always confused about. I was studying twelve, fifteen years, there were some portions of the Qur'an when I studied the interpretation and when I discussed it with different scholars, I just could not wrap my head around it, it just wasn't sitting with me, and I went to Doctor Akram after a long exhaustive kind of (search). I've stumbled upon him some years ago, and I discussed those questions with him, and he just sort of started untying the knots, one after the other; and he is so adorable while saying: "it's simple really"; and then he just kind of does it, and I am sitting there bewildered (expression showing "what just happened"). And even though I could say: where did you get this from, and what's your exhaustive evidence, what are the sources it is based on; you know immediately from the inside that it resonated – that that's the right way to look at it. Because this is the religion of human nature. There is something preprogrammed inside us, there are some decency or values inside of ourselves that Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) put, we don't possess them, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) gave them to us, and this religion is supposed to synchronize with those values that we have inside whether it is spiritual or ethical or moral, some compass is already inside, and this connects with it. So when I (ustadh) came to this ayah and its interpretation before, there were parts of it that I was struggling with. I mean, I have read it, I have studied it, this is the orthodox view or a good number of scholars hold this view, I get that, but there's got to be more to the picture. Alhamdulillah, people like Imam Al Alusi (رحم الله), and classical, very accomplished scholars like Ibn Ashoor (رحم الله), and (even) Rashid Ridha have really opened this up, and it opened the door to some very interesting discussion that I find myself content with what I understand of this ayah.
So in order to explain that to you, one I (ustadh) said: can you blame someone who doesn't know much about Islam because they didn't have any access, so they did whatever Islam they knew, whatever Islam they had access to, they followed, and you'd say: yeah, that's a good Muslim. They can come before Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) won't ask them: why didn't you know tafseer ibn e Katheer; well, because ya Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), ibn Katheer was born four centuries after me, I didn't know about him (ustadh laugh); that's a valid excuse. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is not going to ask him which tafseers you knew. I didn't have access, so whatever I had, I followed. Let's add another dimension to this problem; it is possible that somebody knows a lot of information about the religion, and there is another Muslim who doesn't know anything, like they don't know Arabic, they don't have memorized much of the Qur'an, they don't know anything, they have not memorized any duas or anything, but whatever little they do know, they know that you should stay away from haram, they know that you should pray five times, you should be honest and they do their very best to live a simple, clean, sincere worshiping life. And a person who knows a lot more doesn't live up to what they know. Is that possible? Can you imagine that a person who didn't know much, some taxi driver, some farmer, some construction worker, who didn't have access to higher education, whatever little they knew of the faith, whatever they heard in khutbah, they followed, and they followed to the best of their ability; and another person who studied and learned and then they didn't really have that kind of genuine sincerity; who is more valuable to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) on Judgment Day?
The remarkable thing about Judgment Day, two things are going to matter, according to the Qur'an – efforts and the heart – إِلَّا مَنْ أَتَى اللَّهَ بِقَلْبٍ سَلِيمٍ (26:89); straight forward, nothing will be of benefit on that day except people that will come with a good heart. People that will come with a good heart, not with degrees, not with exhaustive amounts of information, a good heart. إِنَّ فِي ذَٰلِكَ لَذِكْرَىٰ لِمَن كَانَ لَهُ قَلْبٌ (50:37) – in all of this revelation, there is only a powerful reminder for people that still have a heart. All of this is supposed to be to make people good hearted, that's what the point of it is. If somebody is good hearted and they don't know a lot, they are still valuable to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). So Rashid Ridha argues in tafseer Al Manar that what if there is a Christian at the time of the Prophet (صلى الله عليه و سلم), who has no access to Prophet (صلى الله عليه و سلم). He is living in another country, and he is following what he believes to be from the Messenger Jesus (عليه السلام) to the best of his ability. Or there is a Jew, living at the time of Isa (عليه السلام), who didn't have access to Jesus (عليه السلام), and he is following to the best of his ability what he knows of God from the Torah of Musa (عليه السلام), and he is doing whatever best he can, changes and corruptions have been made, but he doesn't know any of that, he is just trying to follow it as best as he can. If he is following it as best as he can, should you consider these people upright? Yeah, because uprightness, the goodness in them is actually a matter of the sincerity they have inside.
Now let's take this a step further, before we get into the ayah. Usually I (ustadh) take you through the text and then share a conclusion with you. What I (ustadh) hope to do today is share my conclusion with you first, so just everybody is clear where I am headed, you don't keep wondering, you don't take that step for me. It is my understanding, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows best, more than anyone Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says:إِنَّ اللَّهَ عَلِيمٌ بِذَاتِ الصُّدُورِ – Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is the one who knows the natures of the hearts. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows which Christians, Jews, by extension as we will see today even Hindus, Buddhist, Atheist, whoever, which of them are sincerely, genuinely committed to the truth, and want to find the truth, and had they come into contact with it, they would have immediately accepted Islam, maybe they haven't come into contact with it yet, maybe they will ten years from now, maybe they will tomorrow, maybe they will die before they ever come into contact with it; a lot of possibilities are there. But regardless of all of those possibilities who knows that their heart is so pure that if they came into contact with it that Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) would acknowledge the goodness of their heart; only Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows, and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) will not waste a good heart. Will we know who those people are? No, there is no way for us to know. But do those people exist? Yes. Is that a blanket endorsement of all Christians, Jews or non-Muslims? No. Is it an acknowledgement that Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) alone knows the nature of the hearts and He alone is in a position to judge where people will stand? Yes. The point of it is some people are fortunate enough in this life to come into contact with Allah (سبحانه و تعالى)'s Words and they humble themselves before Allah (سبحانه و تعالى)'s Words, and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knew that these people are so pure that when they hear they will just accept it. Then there are others who have the same exact heart but they never came into contact with it, or what they were presented with was such a distorted picture of the religion that they had no idea that the actual religion is not this, and they couldn't agree to something that just didn't sit with their fitrah, because there are mutated versions of Islam that can be presented to somebody and you can't blame them for rejecting a skewed version of the religion, there's no way that they can be blamed. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows what they were exposed to and not exposed to. So that judgment remains with Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and to say that human beings regardless, for our satisfaction, until they take the shahadah and say: لا اله الاّ الله محمد الرسول الله, it is only in that scenario that we can say that they are going to be saved, is an oversimplification - I (ustadh) would even argue inaccurate. And this conclusion that some may see as drastic, is actually entirely derived from this ayah, as we will dive into this ayah today In sha Allah, I hope to illustrate that to you.
The first thing is in the previous ayah, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) talked about how they were slapped with humiliation wherever they may be found except when the rope from Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and the rope from people, and they used to deny the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), and killed the prophets; Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is talking about the Jews.
Now He says: they are not all the same, then He started talking about good people. So you would say: they are not all the same, one belongs to group A, one belongs to group B; but that would have been: ليس مستويان – they are not equal; but it is لَيْسُوا سَوَاءً – they are not equal; meaning they as a whole are not even. There are all kinds of variations among them; not two groups, but all kinds of variations. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is mentioning two extremes – extremely terrible and extremely wonderful – and there is a bunch of different categories in between; a mix of those two things, just like us, no person is either the devil or an angel, we have a mix of those things, and some people are remarkably good people, and some people are unusually horrible, that happens; and then there is kind of people with both tendencies. Now, just like you wouldn't judge you and me or Muslims with a broad stroke, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: don't judge the People of the Book with a broad stroke.
Now what's also really interesting is, the immediate previous ayah was talking about the Jews specifically. So when He says that they are not all the same, you would assume that this means that Jews are not all the same, and this no longer includes the Christians, they have been excluded. But if you look at the next wording: مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ – from among the People of the Book; now the moment Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: the People of the Book or those versed in the Book; who does that include again? Jews and Christians. Instead of saying (something like): "they are not all the same, among them are good people"; if the word 'them' continued, then the word 'them' can refer only to the Jews, but Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) opened it up again by saying not منهم أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ, but مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ. Now We are talking about everybody, all the Jews and all the Christians, at large; spread out within them is what?
Now let's talk about this word أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ – an upright nation; an easy translation. The word قَائِمَةٌ is one of those loaded terms, so we have to spend a little bit of time understanding what this description means. First of all, this is an echo from something said earlier on in this Surah –
شَهِدَ اللَّهُ أَنَّهُ لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ وَالْمَلَائِكَةُ وَأُولُو الْعِلْمِ قَائِمًا بِالْقِسْطِ (3:18) – Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) testifies, nobody is to be worshiped except He is, and the angels testify, and the people of real knowledge testify, standing upright with justice; the word is قَائِمًا. And here the word again occurs أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ. It's picking up from where Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) placed His standards, the angels and the people of real knowledge. He bunched them all together and said; they are all testifying قَائِمًا, and this is an ummah that is قَائِمَةٌ. So these people are being validated by Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) with the word قَائِمَةٌ, they are good people in the sight of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), just from the word قَائِمَةٌ. The word قَائِمَةٌ also gives us the word قِيَم (qiyum) which means values or قِيمَة (qeema): value.
These are people of ethics, morals and values, these are moral people. So when I say: upright; I mean morally upright people, that's part of the description. Within the People of the Book, there are people that are morally sound, upright. قَائِم also refers to when you stand up for the truth, no matter what the consequences are. Like when you say something unpopular; if you are going to say something unpopular, you think twice about whether you should say something or not. You are at a party, everybody is talking about somebody, they are all backbiting, you are just kind of like: we shouldn't be doing this, this is backbiting. You are going to think like a hundred times before you open your mouth, because to be قَائِم is not easy. He says: among them are people that are قَائِم, when something is wrong they speak up, when something they know to be true, they don't hide it inside, they said: yeah, no, that's true, I agree with you.
This is a direct contrast from all the criticism of the People of the Book that has been going on for so many ayaat where they hide the truth, they know the truth and they hide it. They don't stand up for it. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: what's wrong with you, you read the book, and how come you don't speak up. And here Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: no, no, no, among them are those that have the quality of standing up, of speaking up;إِذْ قَامُوا فَقَالُوا رَبُّنَا رَبُّ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ; the young men of the cave stood up, stood tall, even though there was adversity in front of them.
So Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is saying: among them are those who are not just interested in being part of their own group, or they are going to hate on you because you are the other, you are the Muslim, so how can they agree with you on anything; no, they are upright. If you say something right, they will join you, they will stand with you, so أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ. This is a very powerful phrase, they stand up for justice, they stand up for the unpopular, they have morals and values and ethics, they are upright people. What about them? He says: يَتْلُونَ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ – they recite the revelations of Allah - آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ – in the middle of the night.
Imam Alusi (رحم الله) was inclined towards fiqh. He discusses a lot of legalistic, juristic sorts of things when discussing this ayah: okay, they recite the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in the middle of the night. He interprets it as: First, this must be referring to the Muslims who pray tahajjud, but the problem is, it says: وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ – while they are in sajdah. He says: wait a second, the Prophet (صلى الله عليه و سلم) forbade the recitation of the Qur'an when you are in sajdah. So it can't be them, because they are reciting the Word of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in the middle of the night while they are in sajdah, so that doesn't add up. So this sajdah must mean something else. And it actually does here mean something else. I (ustadh) am not denying that interpretation, we will get to sajdah in a second, but I (ustadh) am saying that first we are going to talk about how this may refer to those who are not yet Muslims. Whatever revelations and prayers they have, they stand in the middle of the night reciting it and praying.
You may be familiar with different denominations of Christianity and Judaism. The institution of sajdah in Aramaic is called 'sagt' which several denominations of Jews and several denominations of Christians still have and some even have them in their daily prayers. But their sajdah has changed because the Bible says that Jesus (عليه السلام) fell on his face and prayed, which sounds like sajdah. And there are so many other prophets that are talked about in the Bible that say that they fell on their face and prayed. So they literally fall on their face meaning they lie flat on the ground, head down, completely flat, and that's their sajdah. There are occasions in churches where you know they have chairs and they have the aisle. The aisle is full of people just lying flat on the ground. And some denominations have three, four times a day, they have that kind of a prayer or they have night tahajjud prayer that include that kind of sajdah. So it may even be a reference to them.
They recite the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) to the best of their ability, that's what sajdah is, آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ – in the middle of the night, وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ. Let's talk about sajdah for a second. In the Qur'an sajdah is not just used as the act of putting your head on the ground. Actually the etymology or origin of the word sajdah is, it refers to a camel. When a camel does sajdah - it puts his head down so you can climb on it. So putting the head down literally is actually considered the act of sajdah. But figuratively it also meant the idea of humility, الخضوع. So the idea of someone being saajid is actually someone being humble, someone being meek. The Bible says: the meek shall inherit the earth. So one reading of this is actually they recite the Word of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in the middle of the night as they are meek, they are in that humble state.
The word sajdah is used in that way to describe the heavens and the earth, وَالنَّجْمُ وَالشَّجَرُ يَسْجُدَانِ (55:6) – the star and the tree are both doing sajdah, meaning they are humbled before Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), it's not literally, physically they are doing sajdah necessarily.
وَلِلَّهِ يَسْجُدُ مَا فِي السَّمَاوَاتِ وَمَا فِي الْأَرْضِ (16:49) – everything in the skies and the earth does sajdah to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). He describes shadows that do sajdah to Him day and night. The idea being things remain humbled before Him and they stand as Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) commands them to stand whether the sun comes up or the sun goes down, they remain humbled before Him. So one possible interpretation of the word 'sajdah' here is yes, it can include the prayer, but it can also mean the idea of them being completely humbled before Allah (سبحانه و تعالى).
The other interpretation of it is sometimes you take something and you describe the whole by a part. For example, "Man! nice wheels," somebody describes your car and says: nice wheels. They are not just talking about your wheels, they are talking about the entire car, but the entire car is being referred to as just wheels. So, similarly in Arabic the institution is prayer, now prayer includes standing, making rukoo', making sajdah, sitting, all of those. But sometimes the whole is referred to as just a part, and they do sajdah meaning that they do the prayer which is now being embodied by the phrase sajdah. And Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is actually highlighting one portion of the prayer over all the others, and He is highlighting in this case the most humble part of the prayer.
Now let's ask ourselves some interesting questions; Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: among the People of the Book, there are good people basically of upright values. He already said that, then the first quality He described of them is that they pray in the middle of the night. Do you know any Muslims who pray in the middle of the night? Do you know if I do or you do or anybody else? Are you going to know? No. The first quality He described of these remarkable people is a quality you will never have access to. It's not like they are going to come to you and say: By the way, I am one of those people in your book that prays in the middle of the night, (points to himself, in partial pride etc.) right here. You know why they won't do that? Because the ayah ends وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ – they are humble.
How many people don't do that? (There are some who say:) Alhamdulillah, I have done five Hajj, I am going again this year, make dua for me. Dude, you are going to Hajj, you can make your own dua. You are only saying that because you want me to be like: ohh, Ma sha Allah, oh Hajj times five. So, people who actually do that don't talk about it, and the only One Who needs to know is Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). And Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is the One telling you, because He is the Only One Who knows. He is telling you that you can see these people on the outside, but you don't know how connected to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) they may be on the inside within the best of their capacity. They are doing the very best that they can, and they are praying to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) with whatever revelations they have. Yes the Bible has alterations, it has things in there that don't belong, but it also has beautiful prayers, it has got remarkable spirituality. It has got some incredible calls on to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). Read the book of Mathew, it has got some incredible spiritual sermons that will shake you, I (ustadh) mean they'll resonate with your fitrah, that's the truth. If you have ever had the opportunity to meet devout Christians that are involved in helping villages in difficulty or humanitarian causes or setting up shelters for the homeless, whoever else, they are not just doing that to convert people to Christianity, some of them are proselytizing, but a lot of them are just: they are God's creation, God wants us to spread love, and that's all we want to do. And you meet people like that and you'll see something in them, you'll see a softness in them, and that softness comes from certain portions of the Bible that they are attached to. Not all of it, because when the Muslims go to them, they say: look at this contradiction in the Bible, look at this, look at this, this doesn't add up; what about your trinity, huh? When we do that to them then you are trying to argue logically, and they are actually not moved by the logical or theological arguments. They are connected to the spiritual passages that have moved their hearts, and that's what they resort to when they call on Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in the middle of the night when they are humbled, يَتْلُونَ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ.
Ayah 114
يُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ وَيَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ وَيُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْخَيْرَاتِ وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ
They believe in Allah and the Last Day, and they enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong and hasten to good deeds. And those are among the righteous.
Then Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: those people within the best of their ability يُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآخِرِ – they believe in Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), they believe that they are going to meet Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) on the last day. Is faith something you can see? No. So their night prayers, we can't see. Their faith, we can't see, we can't see anything. So, so far they are invisible to us, we cannot ever tell who these people are except He adds:
وَيَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ; this is the third time this phrase is being used.
وَلْتَكُن مِّنكُمْ أُمَّةٌ يَدْعُونَ إِلَى الْخَيْرِ وَيَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ – you should be made up of an ummah that calls to the good and does امر بالمعروف و نهى عن المنكر, then later on:
كُنتُمْ خَيْرَ أُمَّةٍ أُخْرِجَتْ لِلنَّاسِ تَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَتَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ – you are the best nation for the service of humanity, you do امر بالمعروف, you do نهى عن المنكر.
And now Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: among them are upright people who have these qualities that you would never see because they are deep inside their hearts, but what you will see is يَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ, which means they are doing exactly what you are doing. There are so many powerful lessons here. Let's go through a couple of them; one of them is there is no difference between theirامر بالمعروف و نهى عن المنكر and ourامر بالمعروف و نهى عن المنكر, which means معروف and منكر are universal. There is not a Christian معروف and منكر, and a Jewish معروف and منكر, and a Muslim معروف and منكر.
معروف and منكر are known. Literally معروف means that which is known, and it doesn't mean known by who, actually assumes known by all. It includes justice, equality, helping orphans, helping the needy, bringing relief to people in disaster, uniting families back together, taking dispersed children and helping them, these are things that are known by all. Fighting against all kind of tyranny and oppression, that's منكر, everybody knows منكر when they see it, everybody sees terrible news and says: that's terrible news. Nobody looks at crime on the news and says: that's okay, that's pretty good, they only killed ten people. Nobody does that, and people that do that are highly evil, everybody knows that, people that endorse that kind of thing.
So the idea here is if Muslims were to stand by universal values of good and evil, and when they see others of other faith standing up for that, then you should give them the benefit of the doubt. Where did that come from; that must have come from, my assumption being they must be the ones that pray at night, they must be the ones who genuinely believe in God to the best of their ability, that's what is driving them to do this, they are actually standing up for what's right, regardless of the benefit or harm that comes to them, that's what they are doing, and we are doing exactly the same thing, so we end up in the same project. We may not have the text in common, we may not even have theological views in common, but something is common within our hearts. There is a sincerity and humility common within the hearts, those are the people that Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) considers the prime candidates for His religion, and if they are not accepting Islam, that must mean that we didn't do our job. At this point the script is flipped.
Let me (ustadh) tell you something; people ask: what's going to happen to them? Is Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) going to question them or not? Homie, I think at this point, we need to realize that the questioning is not something that we should worry about for them, the questioning is something we should worry about for us, because when they say: we never knew that the Qur'an had that, we never knew that Muslims stand for these values, because the Muslims we knew; I mean look at them, the worst of the Israelites would want their autograph, how did you guys do this. We had Torah, we could change it, Qur'an, you couldn't even change, and you are acting like this, that's pretty good. I mean pretty bad, pretty good. So we are worried about whether they are going to be questioned or not, the real question is where do we stand. And if you look at some of these qualities; first of them, they are morally upright, and when they see something wrong they stand up and say it, when they see something is right, they stand up and they have courage to say: this is the right thing to do. How many Muslims can say that about themselves in their own personal lives? Forget outside and politics or whatever. On social media everybody is mujahid fee sabeelillah, I (ustadh) am not talking about that. But in your family life, when something is wrong, when someone is doing something wrong, when someone is saying something wrong, when someone is backbiting, when someone is not giving somebody else their rights, when somebody is being disrespectful, when somebody is being abusive; do you not consider the consequences of opening your mouth, or do you become أُمَّةٌ قَائِمَةٌ? And then when you are going to open your mouth, where do you get the strength to do that, because you feel like if you open your mouth and you stand up for the right thing then you are going to lose the people you love, but that's okay for you, because at night you connect with the One you love more than anybody else, يَتْلُونَ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ آنَاءَ اللَّيْلِ; and you don't have to humble yourself before anyone because you are humbling yourself before Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), and that gives you the strength to stand up and command the good, and forbid the evil, يَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ. It seems Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is describing qualities that most Muslim should be jealous of, they should be jealous of this that we are worried about whether they are making it or not, where do our hearts stand when it comes to these values.
He doesn't even stop here, he says: وَيُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْخَيْرَاتِ – and they compete and rush to do whatever good deeds they can; all kinds of good deeds, الْخَيْرَاتِ. Ibn Ashoor (رحم الله) argues that this is actually imagery in the Qur'an; مُسَارَعَ is when somebody is late for work, or somebody is rushing to make a deal, if they don't get there, the competitor will get the deal. And if you see somebody in a hurry like that, "Man man, I have got a presentation", or "I got this delivery," that seriousness, that focus, I have to get this done, I can't talk right now; if you have that kind of laser focus, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: these people when they see an opportunity to help someone or do something good, this is the kind of focus they have, you see that in their eyes. Usually people have that kind of focus and that kind of honed in mindset, when some worldly benefit is on their way. And these people only see Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in front of them and they see Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) will be happy if I serve, and they are rushing or racing towards it. يُسَارِعُونَ actually means racing.
Now the problem is, If He said: يَتَسَارَعُونَ, it would have been they are racing each other, but He says: يُسَارِعُونَ – they are racing; the question arises 'racing whom', because you have to have a race with someone else. The only one left in the audience is me (ustadh) and you. They are the ones rushing to do whatever good deeds they can; what are you doing? Where do you stand? Are you even in this race?
Then He says: وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ – and those are from among the righteous, good. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) already described us that we are the best ummah because we stand by those values. But if we don't stand by those values, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) will replace us with somebody else who will. They are good enough, they are pretty good people. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) said about Ibrahim (عليه السلام)
(:وَلَقَدِ اصْطَفَيْنَاهُ فِي الدُّنْيَا ۖ وَإِنَّهُ فِي الْآخِرَةِ لَمِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ (2:130 – Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) chose him in this life, and in the afterlife he is considered among the righteous الصَّالِحِينَ.
These people, from within the People of the Book, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says about them: وَأُولَٰئِكَ مِنَ الصَّالِحِينَ; they are living up to Ibrahim (عليه السلام)'s legacy to the best of their ability. What an accolade!
Ayah 115
وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ ۗ وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ
And whatever good they do - never will it be removed from them. And Allah is Knowing of the righteous.
Then He goes further and says: وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ; because a Christian or a Jew who has been sincere in their religion, if they came to a Muslim and said: you people think that all of good deeds that we have are gone to waste, God didn't accept any of our prayers, He didn't hear any of our calls, all the good works that we have done, all the services that we did in sincere love of Him, because we don't agree with you, because we don't follow your religion, all of that has gone to waste. And maybe that may be the reason that they don't accept Islam because they think: how can it be, that all of the sincere worship meant nothing to God. What does Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) say about sincerity here? He says: وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ ۗ – whatever good they might have done or what they might do, will not be denied of them. My (ustadh) reading of this ayah الله اعلم is also, I told you: had they come in contact with Islam, they would have accepted it, because their hearts are so pure, and the revelation of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) – the Qur'an – is actually a confirmation of what they already have in their hearts, so there is no reason for the light to not hit the light, that's what going to happen. The thing is Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: whatever good they might have done, even if they didn't get a chance to do it, had they had the opportunity, they might have done it. Even that won't be denied of them, even the potential of their faith won't be denied of them. You see where my conclusion came from at the beginning, وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ; and what reinforces that conclusion is the conclusion of these ayaat: وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ – and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows the people of taqwa.
Where is taqwa? The consciousness of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), awareness of protecting yourself from displeasing Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), distancing yourself from Allah (سبحانه و تعالى)'s disobedience, where does that rest? In the heart, فَإِنَّهَا مِن تَقْوَى الْقُلُوبِ (22:32), as Rasoolullah (صلى الله عليه و سلم) said: التقوى ها هنا – taqwa is here (in the heart), التقوى ها هنا – taqwa is here (in the heart), التقوى ها هنا – taqwa is here (in the heart). Who gets to know who has taqwa or not? He says: وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ. That's none of your business. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is the one Who knows the muttaqeen, that's how He concludes the ayah.
In these ayahs, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: among the People of the Book, there are people of upright values, they recite the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), they command good, forbid evil etc. Now let's extend it a little further. Is it possible that there are people that don't have any book or have maybe one percent of what used to be a book left, but they also have values, and they are also trying to pray to God whatever way they possibly can, and they are just trying to do their best they possibly can. And had they come into contact with Islam, they would have accepted it. Wouldn't they also be righteous as far as Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is concerned? How are you and I (ustadh) to know what's inside somebody else's heart? There are so many people worried about Mother Teresa; where will she go? Really, you already got your ticket that you worried about her ticket. When people worry like that, I was like: first of all, the One Who is going to judge her loves her more than you'll ever care for her, and His sense of justice is far more superior than your puny little sense of justice. So for you to have this concern is actually an underestimation of Who you are talking about, you are talking about Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), قَائِمًا بِالْقِسْطِ, الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ. By the way, as I (ustadh) say this, some people will say: well, maybe Ustadh Noman is saying she is going to heaven. Let me tell you something, you know what I (ustadh) am saying: I have no right to know. Explicitly I am telling you that you and I have no right to know, because Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says:
وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ,وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ. These questions are not relevant for a believer. What is relevant for a believer is when they know Allah (سبحانه و تعالى), they know that Allah will judge hearts, and that's all that matters. Once you realize that all that matters, then the only heart left to worry about is your own. You are not to worry about anybody else going to heaven or hell after that, because when you know if they have a good heart then Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) will bring it out, then you don't have to worry about it. Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) doesn't have some arbitrary rules; you didn't say this that or the other, doesn't matter what you had in your heart, you can go out of my sight; no. The scariest thing in all of this is what the Jews did with their religion, the Muslims have done with their religion. What the Jews did with their religion is that the outside should look religious, and the heart can be in the most terrible place, like you don't care about anybody, you are selfish, you are greedy, you are condescending, arrogant, manipulative, backbiting, slandering, all of the worst qualities that a terrible heart has:
مَّنَّاعٍ لِّلْخَيْرِ, مُعْتَدٍ مُّرِيبٍ. مَّنَّاعٍ لِّلْخَيْرِ means that somebody is doing good, you have to say bad comments towards them, discourage them, poke fun at them, criticize them, mock them, sarcastic comments towards them, find someway of discouraging them; whatever lines you can cross, you cross, you put doubts into people, you don't let them ever feel reassured, مُّرِيبٍ; these kinds of qualities are supposed to be the qualities of those who don't have Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in their hearts. And then all those qualities are there but you are praying in the right way, and you are like: these people don't even know how to make sajdah, look at their line on the ground; they don't even put their hands like this, and their nose and the forehead touching proper, they know nothing, look at them.
Let me (ustadh) tell you a story relevant to this; this was in California at a masjid; in Southern California, there is a big Vietnamese community, they have different religions; a Muslim used to work at a store with a Vietnamese owner. The Vietnamese guy said: hey, you go every Friday, can I come to your temple; that's what he is going to call it; so he brought him to "our temple". So, he walked into the masjid, and he is like: where is the statue, and he explained to him that there is no statue, we don't worship a statue, we worship God, and He can't be reduced to a statue and he explained that to him. Vietnamese said: why are you praying in this direction; he said: because one of His prophets built a house in that direction, and we pray in that direction but we don't pray to that house, we just show respect to God in that direction. And he said: oh, okay, okay, okay, (and ustadh demonstrates verbally what he did, by joining his hands and bowing like a worshipper/devotee might bow in front of a statue), he did that in the masjid. Guess what happens next? Somebody next to him: Astaghfirullah, what is this? Shirk in the House of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). Ya Akhi Kareem, if you have to bring somebody here, they have to have manners, this is a masjid, and the guy kicked him out. Who is going to be answerable on Judgment Day? Whose heart was so connected to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) that whatever way he knew he fell into sajdah, and whose heart was so disconnected from Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) that the only thing that they can see is the flaws of someone's else. The masjid is called the masjid for a reason; the word masjid comes from سَجَدَ, سَجَدَ means to do sajdah, it also means to be humble, and masjid is a ظرف means a place and a time of great humility. Think about that, and think about our conduct in masjids; the irony of it. And Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: وَمَا يَفْعَلُوا مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَلَن يُكْفَرُوهُ ۗ وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ بِالْمُتَّقِينَ – whatever good they do will not be denied of them, and Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows the muttaqeen.
The last comment here is just a reminder observation. In the beginning Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) said: they have values, they recite the ayaat of Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) in the middle of the night and they are humble; these are all matters of the heart. They believe in Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) and the last day; those are matters of the heart. At the end, He says: Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows the people of taqwa; taqwa is the matter of the heart. Passage began with what they have in their hearts, and what they have in their hearts is where it ends. And in the middle, some of their deeds; enjoining good, forbidding evil, competing to do good deeds, all of that, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) is saying that it is stemming, that's the fuel for that what they have inside their hearts. So that's really Allah (سبحانه و تعالى)'s primary concern that He will be judging hearts, not labels. And that's His domain, we don't get to say. We know our religion is true, we know trinity is false, we know the beliefs, we are not endorsing anybody else's beliefs, but we also do not pass verdicts on people's hearts. Islam on the outside gave us the right to judge the correctness or the incorrectness of ideas, and it's unapologetic when it comes to that. When it comes to criticizing somebody else's false ideas about God, we just correct them. But at the same time, what is the matter of the mind, Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) says: أَفَلَا تَعْقِلُونَ – why don't you think; when it comes to the matter of the heart, only Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) knows. There is a difference; and we have to maintain that difference. Something that belongs to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) will always belong to Allah (سبحانه و تعالى). Some judgments human beings can make which are of ideas and evidences, that's our domain and that's where we can engage in a conversation. May Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) give us a correct understanding and really make us concerned about what we should be actually concerned about. May Allah (سبحانه و تعالى) make us people who share the message of this faith with sincere hearts with others. Because they are people that are waiting, and the only thing missing for them is us stepping forward.
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