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In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the honourable Prophet Muhammadﷺ and the Messenger of Allahﷺ, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and his companions. My brothers and sisters, all praise is due to Allah. We have been talking about the three gems of advice that are given by our Shaykh and our teacher, Hazrat Sayyid Abu’l-Hassan Ali Nadwi, may Allah Ta’ala raise his darajat and fill his qabr with noor, and may Allah Ta’ala be pleased with him and forgive his sins. We ask Allah Subh’anaHu Wa Ta-A’la to give us an ending like the ending He gave him.
He died on the 27th of Ramadan, which was a Jumu’ah, and he had a shower, and after that, it was his practice; he used to sit on a takht, on a mat, on a cot, in his house in Takya Kalan, in Raibareli, in UP. The house is on the river Jamna, and on the bank of the Ganga. And his practice was that he would take the shower for Friday, and then he would sit on this takht; he would get dressed up for Jumu’ah, wear his shirwani, and so on, and then he would go to the mosque. Afterward, he would sit on this takht again, and he would recite Surah Al-Kahf. He was, of course, a hafiz of the Quran, so he would recite from memory.
Now, his grandson, who was his khadim and served him towards the end of his days, was 97 or 98 years old at that time. His movement was impaired, so he used to be in a wheelchair. So on that day, he sat on this takht and said to his grandson, “Give me the Mushaf.” His grandson said, “I was surprised because he used to recite from memory; why is he asking for the Mushaf?” Anyway, when he turned to pick up the Mushaf from the cupboard where it was kept, he heard him start reciting Surah Al-Yaseen. As he turned with the Quran in his hand, the grandfather said, “I saw him come to the ayah,” and he leaned back against the bolster, and he passed away. He asked Allahﷻ to give us, when our time comes, an ending as beautiful as that, insha’Allah, where we die with the name of Allahﷻ, with the Quran al-Kareem on our tongue, insha’Allah.
The three pieces of advice that he gave us, Alhamdulillah, we ask Allah to help us remember and follow them. The first piece of advice he gave is: do not be an oppressor. He said, “Oppress nobody.” Rather, be the oppressed. It is a beautiful piece of advice that we need to think about and say, “What is it?” He is saying, “Do not be the oppressor. Even if you have to be the oppressed, be the oppressed, but do not oppress anybody.”
The second thing he said was: always ensure that your wealth is halal. He said, “Shun the haram. Stay away from the haram. Ensure that your wealth is halal.” To the extent, do not even touch something which is doubtful. We know that this is from the hadith of Rasulullah s.a.w., narrated by Al-Hassan ibn Ali, who said, “I heard my grandfather, that is Rasulullah s.a.w., saying, ‘Leave the doubtful for that which is not doubtful.'” He asked Allah s.w.t. to help us always earn halal and eat halal.
The third piece of advice that he gave us, which I want to share with you, is: always be good to your relatives, especially those related to us by blood (silatul raham), to maintain the relationships of the raham. This advice generally applies to everything and all people, but especially in this case, to close relatives related by blood. He said, “Always be good to them, even when they are not good to you.” Be good to them even if they are not good to you. People used to say humorously regarding Hadhrat Abul Hassan Ali Nadir Haftul Ali that if you wanted to get some sweets from him, then be nasty to him. If anyone came and was angry or whatever, he would send them off with sweets. So people used to say, “Mithai khana hai, toh wahan jaake kuch baat karo” (“If there are sweets at home, go talk to him”). Similarly, we have the case of Mababu Hanifa Rahuntilale, who also followed this advice. Because this is the sunnah; Mababu Hanifa Rahuntilale was following the sunnah of Rasulullah SAW, which is the same thing. There was a neighbor who used to be very nasty to him, abusing him verbally and so on. Mababu Hanifa Rahuntilale always sent him gifts. Obviously, when you keep getting gifts from somebody, your heart inclines towards them. Eventually, that man corrected himself, became nice, and stopped his abusive behavior. Then, to his surprise, the gift stopped. He was very surprised and asked Mababu Hanifa Rahuntilale, “What happened? You know, you stopped giving me gifts.” He said, “Well, I used to give you gifts because you were helping me build my jannah by being abusive and so on. Now, alhamdulillah, you have stopped. So I have also stopped giving gifts.” He asked Allahﷻ to help him. He asked Allahﷻ to help us follow the sunnah always.
The biggest and best example of this is from Rasulullah SAW himself, from his seerah, where for 13 years in Mecca, he and his companions and his relatives were brutally persecuted by the Quraysh—his own people, his own family. The Quraysh, as we know, he was from the Quraysh himself. His own family brutally persecuted him. They did everything possible; they tried to kill him, persecute him. Eventually, he had to leave Mecca and migrate to Medina, leaving behind his wealth and property, which was never given to him. It was usurped, confiscated, and illegally acquired by his own relatives and family. But when he came back after eight years as the conqueror of Mecca at the head of an army, having the opportunity to take revenge, get everything back, or seek compensation, he chose not to take anything. On the contrary, he forgave everybody. He forgave all of them.
He said, “There is no blame on you today.” And Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala may forgive you and forgive us. Now, this is the finest example of being good to those who are not good to you. I cannot think of anything superior to this in the history of humankind: being good to somebody who is not being good to you.
It’s easy to say these things, but when you go to demonstrate it, you find that it is not so easy. But the beauty is that when you take the trouble and do demonstrate it, initially it might feel difficult, but believe me, once you have forgiven people, the biggest beneficiary of forgiveness is the forgiver himself. Where it takes a whole load off your shoulders. You no longer have to feel bad about that person; you no longer have to bear a grudge; you no longer have to do anything because you have forgiven that person, and that is the end of the story. You are relieved. Of course, obviously, this also helps in making relationships better, helping other people too, because whatever bad feeling they were carrying cannot be carried anymore. In the case of Rasulullahﷺ, and the same thing applies to all of us, when he forgave those people, he actually took the wind out of the sails of all his enemies. Nobody could be his enemy after that; nobody could say anything negative to him or about him afterwards, because if they did, then the first thing people would say is, “Look, he forgave you, and you are still carrying this in your heart; how is that possible?” So thereby, he eliminated all opposition to him and to his mission. That would never have happened if he had taken revenge. If he had taken revenge, it would have opened up a new saga—a new story which would never have ended. Because revenge breeds revenge, hatred breeds hatred, and hatred does not solve anything.
So I remind myself and you: let us learn from these beautiful lessons, let us try to practice them in our lives, and let us forgive anyone who has done anything. It’s not worth carrying that garbage in our hearts. Let us forgive anyone who has done anything for the sake of Allah. And we ask Allah thereby and therefore to forgive us, because we are the most in need of forgiveness.