Sorry for the delay...
As-salam alaykum folks!
I'm so sorry (especially to the anonymous commenter!) for the delay in posting anything up. SubhanAllah this weekend has been busy, but also enjoyable with a lot of great company mashaAllah. I'm currently working on a post, but I haven't been able to finish. I have to go right now to another gathering to watch a hajj documentary insha'Allah. (Please pray for me as my family and extended relatives are planning on going for hajj this year insha'Allah. May Allah grant us ease with our journey, patience in handling the trials that will come along, and may He accept our pilgrimage for His sake alone! May He grant us all the means and tawfiq to perform `umrah and hajj over and over for His sake alone! Ameen!)
As for now, I'd like to share an interview my brother shared to help us in some post-Rihla advice...
Here's a brief interview by Shaykh Hamza long ago (full text link: http://www.icna.org/tm/hy_interview.htm ):
"RH: What do you say to Muslims who seem to glorify the past when they were at their peak?HY: This is all pathetic nostalgia for returning to the glory of the past and its romanticism. The past has nothing to do with us. That was them. We are a whole other people. It's not our past, it was their present. Now it's over. That's why the Quran has this concept ofletting go of your fathers, and not being proud of your fathers because they are not you! You have to create your own future. Don't belike an old war veteran. However, it is important to have some historical continuity because the Qur'an says "Look at the people whowent before" as the way of learning lessons.One thing that is wrong with some modern Muslim mentality is the idea of "if we do what they did, we will be glorious." Someone asked me, "How can we get an empire back?" There is this idea that Islam is all about glory. No! It's like you exercise to maintain your health, but the exercise is not your goal. It's just the means to achieve your goal.
of the side effects of that is that Allah elevates you and gives you "tamkeen," but that is not the goal. It's just a side effect. Now you don't hear people talk about Allah very much, just about Islam.The Quran says, "To your Lord is your goal." The path of coming to know God results in victory because of your struggling for truth. One of the things about sincerely struggling for truth is that Allah gives you\nvictory by the nature of the struggle. It follows that by the nature of the struggle itself, you gain worldly success. You see, worldly success has nothing to do with the intentions. Because if those are your intentions, then you will never gain worldly success. In fact, Allah will give the "kafiroon" success over you. If the people of truth are not seeking truth, but instead the benefits of truth (merely the side effects), then they will never achieve them.
RH: Then how should Muslims look at life?
HY: Life is mundane. Life is praying, getting up for Fajr and day-to-day chores. All this "glory" some aspire to is just an abstract\nin the mind. And the reality of it is even the kings of the past had to get up in the morning and go through daily routines. Life is by its nature perfunctory and Islam is just to harmonize it, put it into\nperspective, and make its goals dignified goals, instead of low,worldly goals."
I'm so sorry (especially to the anonymous commenter!) for the delay in posting anything up. SubhanAllah this weekend has been busy, but also enjoyable with a lot of great company mashaAllah. I'm currently working on a post, but I haven't been able to finish. I have to go right now to another gathering to watch a hajj documentary insha'Allah. (Please pray for me as my family and extended relatives are planning on going for hajj this year insha'Allah. May Allah grant us ease with our journey, patience in handling the trials that will come along, and may He accept our pilgrimage for His sake alone! May He grant us all the means and tawfiq to perform `umrah and hajj over and over for His sake alone! Ameen!)
As for now, I'd like to share an interview my brother shared to help us in some post-Rihla advice...
Here's a brief interview by Shaykh Hamza long ago (full text link: http://www.icna.org/tm/hy_interview.htm ):
"RH: What do you say to Muslims who seem to glorify the past when they were at their peak?HY: This is all pathetic nostalgia for returning to the glory of the past and its romanticism. The past has nothing to do with us. That was them. We are a whole other people. It's not our past, it was their present. Now it's over. That's why the Quran has this concept ofletting go of your fathers, and not being proud of your fathers because they are not you! You have to create your own future. Don't belike an old war veteran. However, it is important to have some historical continuity because the Qur'an says "Look at the people whowent before" as the way of learning lessons.One thing that is wrong with some modern Muslim mentality is the idea of "if we do what they did, we will be glorious." Someone asked me, "How can we get an empire back?" There is this idea that Islam is all about glory. No! It's like you exercise to maintain your health, but the exercise is not your goal. It's just the means to achieve your goal.
of the side effects of that is that Allah elevates you and gives you "tamkeen," but that is not the goal. It's just a side effect. Now you don't hear people talk about Allah very much, just about Islam.The Quran says, "To your Lord is your goal." The path of coming to know God results in victory because of your struggling for truth. One of the things about sincerely struggling for truth is that Allah gives you\nvictory by the nature of the struggle. It follows that by the nature of the struggle itself, you gain worldly success. You see, worldly success has nothing to do with the intentions. Because if those are your intentions, then you will never gain worldly success. In fact, Allah will give the "kafiroon" success over you. If the people of truth are not seeking truth, but instead the benefits of truth (merely the side effects), then they will never achieve them.
RH: Then how should Muslims look at life?
HY: Life is mundane. Life is praying, getting up for Fajr and day-to-day chores. All this "glory" some aspire to is just an abstract\nin the mind. And the reality of it is even the kings of the past had to get up in the morning and go through daily routines. Life is by its nature perfunctory and Islam is just to harmonize it, put it into\nperspective, and make its goals dignified goals, instead of low,worldly goals."
posted by Ruby at 4:12 PM
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