Eid
Khutba for the Eid Al-Fitr 14th November 2004
Given by Imam Hajj Imran Ebrahim
Cape Town
AAllahu
Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
La ilaha illa Allahu
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Wa Lillahil Hamd.
Muslim Men and Women! On this illuminated day Allah has covered
the faces of those who have fasted with joy and made them issue
forth from their homes with raised voices praising and glorifying
Him. He has made them hurry to His obedience, in giving the Zakat
Al-Fitr from what He has favoured them of wealth, to the orphans,
bereft and needy. He has made this a day of collecting the reward
and completing the obedience and worship to Him in the prescribed
time of the month of Ramadhan. Rejoice in the fact that, part
of His favour is that He has, in the month of Ramadaan and by
the act of fasting, opened a door to the attainment of Taqwa.
He, tabaraka wa ta ‘ala, says in His Noble Book ,
‘Ya Ayyuhalladhina amanu kutiba alaykummus siyama
kama kutiba alalladhina min qablikum la’allakum tattaqun.’
‘O you who have iman! Fasting is prescribed for you,
as it was prescribed for those before you – so that hopefully
you will have taqwa.’
Then, as a further bounty Allah has sent in this very special
month, the Qur’aan. He, tabaraka wa ta ‘ala says:
‘Shahru Ramadana lladhi unzila fihil Qur’aanu
hudal linnaasi wa bayyinaatim minal huda wal furqaan.’
‘The month of Ramadaan is the one in which the Qur’aan
was sent down as guidance for mankind with clear signs containing
guidance and discrimination.’
About the merits of the Qur’aan the messenger (SAW) has
said, “Allah sent down this Qur’aan to command and
prevent, and as a Sunnah to be followed and a parable. It contains
your history, information about what came before you, news about
what will come after you and correct judgement between you. Repetition
does not wear it out and its wonders do not end. It is the truth.
It is not jest. Whoever recites it speaks the truth. Whoever judges
by it is just. Whoever argues by it wins. Whoever divides by it
is equitable. Whoever acts by it is rewarded. Whoever clings to
it is guided to a straight path. Allah will misguide whoever seeks
guidance from other than it. Allah will destroy who judges by
other than it. It is the Wise Remembrance, the Clear Light, the
Straight Path, the Firm Rope of Allah and the Useful Healing.
It is a protection for the one who clings to it and a rescue for
the one who follows it. It is not crooked and so puts things straight.
It does not deviate so as to be blamed. Its wonders do not cease.
It does not wear out with much repetition.”
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
La ilaha illa Allahu
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Wa Lillahil Hamd.
In the month of Ramadaan, Allah has placed in it The Night of
Power. A night that is better than a thousand months. Allah says
in the Qur'an in Surah Al-Qadr:
[ Inna anzalnahu fi laylatil qadr ………]
"Truly We sent it down on the Night of Power. And what
will convey to you what the Night of Power is? The Night of Power
is better than a thousand months. In it the angels and the Ruh
descend by their Lord's authority with every ordinance. It is
Peace- until the coming of the dawn.”
It is for this reason that the Prophet, salla'Llahu 'alayhi wa
sallam, chose it for his retreats before his Prophethood began.
Then on that night the great opening occurred; the beyond time
and the in time intersected; the Revelation of Allah's Book began.
As several mufassirun have pointed out, a thousand months is 83
years, more or less the life-span of a human being, in other words
all the experience of time that any of us can have. So what is
being indicated by the description in the Qur'an of the Laylatu'l-Qadr
is that it is out of time, a moment in the year when a window
opens for us onto timelessness, when we somehow have access to
the very presence of Allah.
It is this moment which permeates the whole month so that in it
the Gates of the Garden are open and a faint resonance of the
soft and fragrant breezes from them waft down to us in this world;
and the shayatin which usually crowd in on us, poking at us and
making it difficult for us to remember Allah and act rightly,
are chained up, giving our hearts a welcome taste of ease and
freedom.
Take delight in the words of the the Messenger of Allah, salla'Llahu
'alayhi wa sallam, who spoke on the last day of Sha'ban and said,
"O people! A great and blessed month has come to you –
a month in which there is a night which is better than a thousand
months; a month in which Allah has made it obligatory to fast
and in which He has made standing in prayer during the night a
voluntary action. Anyone who draws near to Allah during it by
means of a voluntary good action is like someone who performs
one of the obligatory actions outside it and performing an obligatory
action during it is equivalent to performing seventy obligatory
actions at any other time. It is the month of sabr and the reward
for sabr is the Garden. It is the month of generous giving and
the month in which a believer's provision is increased, If someone
gives someone who is fasting something with which to break their
fast, that will bring him forgiveness for his wrong actions and
remove him from the Fire, and he will have the same reward as
the one he feeds without that diminishing their reward in any
way."
And in another hadith, "Every good action of the son of Adam
is multiplied by ten to seven hundred times. Allah says: 'Except
fasting. It is mine and I repay it Myself. The one who fasts abandons
his food and drink for My sake.' The one who fasts has two delights:
delight when he breaks his fast and delight when he meets his
Lord."
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Allahu
Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
La ilaha illa Allahu
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Wa Lillahil Hamd.
During
a moussem in Melilla a few years ago, in the early days of my
association with the community of Shaykh Abdalqadir I experienced
a tremendous moment that I would like to share with you. It was
a couple of days before the moussem and we were sitting in the
Zawiyya in Melilla. Suddenly from behind the Zawiyya came the
voices of approaching men singing qasida. At this some men became
very excited, leapt to their feet and headed towards the voices.
I followed to find a group of about fifty men heading towards
us. The fuqara from the desert had arrived to celebrate the moussem
of our Shaykh. When we settled back in the zawiyya, I sat down
next to a man from Morocco who drew my attention to something.
Look at this wonderful sight, he said. Look at the desert fuqara,
their illuminated faces, scarred with the marks of old age and
their backs bent from the frailty of their years. And then look
at the fuqara from over the sea, pointing to us. See how excited
they are, young faces with endless hope in Allah, the Master of
their destinies, and strong bodies ready for a lifetime of service.
In the fuqara from over the sea, I see hope and a future for the
deen of Islam, he said.
Yours, the very faces I see before me, are the fuqara from over
the sea. You are a young tree watered from an ancient spring of
Knowledge.
Allah, tabaraka wa ta ‘ala says in his Majestic book:
Idha wal fityatu ilal kahfi fa qalu rabbana aatina mil
ladunka rahmatan wa hayy’I lana min amrina rashada.
When the young men took refuge in the cave and said, ‘Our
Lord, give us mercy directly from You and open the way for us
to right guidance in our situation.’
It was reported from Abu Hurayrah (radhiya allahu anhu) that the
messenger said:
“There are seven whom Allah will shade with His shade on
the day when there will be no shade except His: the just ruler;
a young man who grows up worshipping his Lord; a man whose heart
is attached to the mosque; two men who love one another for the
sake of Allah and meet and part on that basis; a man who is called
by a woman of rank and beauty and says ‘I fear Allah’;
a man who gives in charity and conceals it to such an extent that
his left hand does not know what his right hand gives; and a man
who remembers Allah when he is alone, and his eyes fill up.”
Oh young Muslim men and women! It is said that when Allah wishes
to bring one of His slaves near to Him, He leads him to one of
his right-acting wali’s. You have been blessed with an exalted
company in which there is nothing but pleasure. Hold fast to this
company and you will attain success. Delight in the knowledge
that you will have the shade of the Throne of Allah on a day when
there will be no other shade.
In a time when not a day passes that the Muslims are insulted
by the arrogant kafirun with their falsehood all around us, take
refuge in the cave of knowledge and right teaching that our Shaykh
has called us to and from which he has dispelled all illusion
and doubt.
Be amongst a new breed of men who desire that the Deen of Allah
is uppermost. Who won’t be able to bear it any longer, until
they hear the name of the Khalif spoken in the Jummah Mosques,
until they hear the Zakaat assessors knocking at their doors to
take a portion of their wealth under the authority of the Amirs
and until the markets are vibrant with the exchange of gold dinars
and silver dirhams for goods. Want for all the Muslims what you
have. Take it to them. If you don’t, who will? In a time
where people have forgotten about love of rasul (SAW), teach them
the songs of love and tell them about it’s rewards which
the messenger (SAW) has indicated.
It is related in a hadith that the rasul, , said, "If someone
blesses me once, Allah blesses him ten times; and if someone blesses
me ten times, Allah blesses him one hundred times; and if someone
blesses me one hundred times, Allah blesses one thousand times;
and whoever blesses me one hundred times, Allah will forbid his
body to the Fire, strengthen him with a firm word in the life
of this world and in the Next in the questioning, and He will
admit him to the Garden. His prayers on me will come to him as
a light on the Day of Resurrection on the Sirat, visible at a
distance of 500 years, and Allah will give him a castle in the
Garden for every prayer that he prayed for me, whether there is
little or a lot."
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
La ilaha illa Allahu
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!
Wa Lillahil Hamd.
We ask Allah tabaraka wa ta'ala to bless His Messenger, the Best
of Creation, with a blessing which will raise him in the Praiseworthy
Station he has promised him and rebound back on us with an opening
for the whole umma. And we ask Allah to bless the Khulafa Rashidun,
Sayyidina Abu Bakr as-Siddiq, Sayyidina 'Umar ibn al-Khattab,
Sayyidina 'Uthman ibn 'Affan and Sayyidina 'Ali ibn Abi Talib
and the family and wives and all the Companions of the Prophet.
We ask Allah to bless our shaykh and our amirs and all our men,
women, and children and give us success in establishing his deen
in ourselves and around us and calling others to it and making
that the highest priority of our lives. We ask Allah to bless
those who will travel to the hajj and all the Muslims, especially
those who are fighting to preserve themselves and their deen.
We ask Allah to bless our youth and to bring from amongst them
leaders who seek nothing but His pleasure. We ask Allah to give
victory to His deen. By the baraka of this day we ask Allah to
forgive us and have mercy on us and all the Muslims and to give
us a seal which will ensure our entry to the Garden and grant
us the vision of His Face.
