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Bismillāh ar-Raḥmān ar-Raḥīm. Alḥamdulillāhi Rabbil ‘Alāmīn. Wa salātu wa salāmu ‘alā ash-sharafi al-anbiyā’ wal-mursalīn, Muḥammadur Rasūlullāh ﷺ. Rasūlullāh kathīra kathīra. My brother and sister, Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā comes under us and said: “Yā ayyuhal-ladhīna āmanū, wata’simū bihawli Allāhi jami’an, wa la tafarraqū.” Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā said, “Hold together firmly to the rope of Allāh and do not create divisions.”
Today, if we look at the Muslim Ummah and our situation, what is the single biggest problem? The answer is divisions. The problem is *ikhtilāfāt*, the conflicts between Muslims. This is global; it is not only in India but everywhere. This shows our vision and perspective.
I spoke some time ago about the global mandate. Allāh has given us where He said: “He selected you as the best of people for the benefit of all humanity (*an-nās*).” But if we simply think about this without action, consider these questions I noted down when thinking about this. What do we argue about in our meetings or between groups? What are we most concerned about—personally or collectively? Are we concerned about ourselves or others? What problems are we solving? In this world, if you look at Muslims individually or collectively, something we should ask ourselves is: So what problem am I solving? The reason to ask this question is because people who solve problems are valuable. The world society values those who solve problems, not otherwise. And obviously, there is the opposite question: What problems are we creating? You are either solving something or creating something. Which one is it? Now, all of these questions need data to answer them; meaning we can’t just say something—we should say it with proof.
Supposing you say, “We are solving problems.” What are those problems? Individually, what problem did you solve? Collectively, what problems are we solving in the world? In our society, in our country, internationally, what are we solving? And similarly, what problems are we creating? What are we really concerned about? What do we argue about? Somebody told me a story. There was a couple who came to a Darul Iftar, an office of Fatawa (religious rulings). They asked a question. The husband said his wife wants to cut her hair. She has long hair and she wants to cut it. So, how short can she cut it? He doesn’t want her to cut her hair, but she insists. This is the question being asked.
So, there were Muftis there—three or four people. They sat there and debated this question: How to get this proof? How short should her hair be? Finally, they came to a decision and gave a fatwa saying she can cut her hair short, but not so short that her husband does not recognize her. Maybe he thinks now she is the second wife or something. God knows. How can the husband not recognize his wife if she cuts her hair? It is very strange. But anyway, he says she should not cut it so short that the husband no longer recognizes her.
Now, the question to ask is: What was the real issue there? In this particular case, what really was the issue? Tell me, what do you think? Think about it. What was the real issue there? The real issue there was that here is a couple whose marriage is wrong; their relationship has collapsed or is about to collapse. Because if they come to a Darul Iftar to ask about how short her hair should be, what is it really showing? It shows that these two cannot function together; the marriage is not working. There is something seriously wrong with the marriage. So the issue is not the hair; the issue is the marriage itself. If anybody has any vision or understanding in that situation, they should say, “Look, forget about the hair. Let’s talk about your marriage.” What is your problem with each other? Your communication has broken down. You don’t seem to agree with each other. Something is wrong in the marriage. Instead of addressing that, they asked a question and got a fatwa. Now they have the same problem with the fatwa stapled to the end of it. This is the problem with us: we do not go to the root of the issue. So our conflicts are like this.
Where have we heard that the Muslim Ummah has a think tank? It is worth checking out how many Muslim think tanks are there in the world. Literally, countries have thousands—not one hundred—thousands of think tanks. All kinds of issues that people are thinking, reflecting on, and doing. How many Muslim think tanks are there? So, if we say that we have problems, of course we have problems. Nobody can deny that the Muslim Ummah has problems. We have big-time problems. But there is no effort to think about them collectively. There is no effort to put our minds together and say, “Here is a problem; how do we solve it?” Here is a problem for the whole world; how do we solve it? Poverty, for example. India has, in terms of absolute poverty, more than sub-Saharan Africa. Now, we talk about GDP. That is the worst number to talk about because it doesn’t indicate anything useful. If you literally assess nations not by how their most wealthy live, but by how their poorest live, what will happen to the indices? Instead of counting how many billionaires are there in India or America, count how many millionaires or poor people there are. What will it show? In terms of the Gini Index, which shows wealth distribution, India is below sub-Saharan Africa in terms of absolute poverty. Does this concern us or not? Because a big chunk of that poor population are Muslims. We are supposed to be concerned about everybody, not only about Muslims. Even if you say, “Okay, let me start with our own people,” your people are sitting there. If I was talking to a bunch of Parsis, for example, I would not have to say, “You should be concerned about poor people.” But I am talking to you as people who have money. You should be concerned about others. There are probably no Parsis in the absolute poverty index—probably zero. If I was speaking to Jains, for example, I wouldn’t worry about that; probably nobody. But Muslims? A big chunk of absolutely poor people. And at the same time, we are famous for our ostentatious weddings. Literally, people are spending not lakhs, they are spending crores (millions) on ostentation. Pure ostentation. So what does that indicate about us as an Ummah?
We want to lead the world. If we say we should have Khilafah and Imam Mahdi should come, who will follow you? Tell me. If you say that we should have a Khalifa, who is that Khalifa today? Who can show the way to the world? Don’t tell me, “And you probably will want to tell me that there is even among other people, there is no such person who we can point out.” Maybe, maybe not. But other people are not in the *āyāt* of “Kuntum Khairat Ummatin” (You are the best nation). So if there is nobody there, okay, according to the Quran at least, that is justifiable because Allāh did not choose them as the best of people. Allāh chose us. We are supposed to be beneficial. But instead of that, our focus is completely inward. Fighting each other like cat and dog over completely useless, pointless issues. And there is no focus on society or solving problems for the world. Then we are surprised that the world does not respect us. The world does not care for us. Why will they care for what? So I remind myself with you: let us think about these things and do something about it. Just thinking is not enough; do something at a personal level and at a collective level. Start some project where we help people. Just go to one hospital. Pay the bills of poor people who are there struggling to pay bills. If you go up here on the way to KBR Park, you pass by the cancer hospital there. They have actually made temporary sheds on pavements for the relatives of cancer patients to stay. This is unique to India. You come, admit your relatives for cancer treatment in the hospital, and then you sleep on the street—literally on the pavement. There are people sleeping there. They have made those sheds. There are some kind people who go there and distribute food. I saw some Muslims also there, *alḥamdulillāh*. But most of them who distribute food are not Muslims; they distribute food to everyone. So they all stand in line and take food from those people. What else will they do? They may be wealthy; they may be able to afford to eat. But if you are staying on a pavement, what will you do? This is happening. This is happening within a stone’s throw of this budget. So we should be concerned, no? We should do something about it.
The secret to safety, the secret to personal security, is not armored cars. It’s not armed guards. It’s not super-secure, fortified camps and cantonments or catered communities. It is doing good for the people around you. You spread goodness around you, the people will stand up and fight for you. You don’t have to say anything. In my plantation days, there was a forest fire. So we all—I was the manager—ran. Along with me, a whole bunch of my workers also came. Communist union. So always some tension between the manager and the workers and all that. So we were trying to put out the fire. There were no fire engines, and it was all in the animal regions, the forest. The way you put out a fire is you light a counter-fire and create what we call a fire boundary. You burn some area and then stand there; as the big fire comes, you beat it down. You make sure that it doesn’t jump. You have this barrier. So you are doing that.
It was time around Maghrib. We didn’t realize, but we got surrounded by the fire. We saw the forest on fire from the back. The only way out was to go over the hill. That was like a 45-degree climb. It was literally climbing a wall—a very steep hill going up almost 2,000 plus feet. So very strenuous, going up. I realized that and shouted to the workers: “Go up this hill, nobody moves.” So I yelled at them, “Go up the hill.” They said, “You go first.” I said, “I will not go first; you go, I will come behind you. I want to make sure everybody is over the top first.” They said, “No, you go first.” So I thought maybe they don’t trust me and say, “You go first to see if you go.” So I used some language also. I told them, “What is wrong with you?” Their leader from Thinnaveri, a big guy, tells me, “If anything happens to you, who should go and tell your mother?” I said, “I will not tell her.” He said, “You go, I will come behind you.” He said, “If anything happens to you, who will go and tell your mother that you died?” I said, “We will not tell you; we will not go. You go ahead, we come behind you.” In the middle of the fire, in the night, they were not running for their lives. They wanted to make sure nothing happened to me. And I am the manager; they are the workers, communist union—we have got our own tensions and everything else. But somewhere they saw me as being beneficial to them. They didn’t ask them to help me protect myself; themselves, *alḥamdulillāh*.
Become beneficial. Ask yourself: How can I benefit people? Do something for one person. I am not saying take on the responsibility for everyone; do it for one person. Feed one person. Pay the hospital bill of one person. Our jails are full of people who are there because they don’t have money for bail. Nothing else. If they pay the bail, they will be fine. Poor people. They got thrown in by God knows what—the way we do policing and so on—no reason, whatever. Lots of people like this. Pay the bail. Get him out, get him back to his family. School fees: children cannot go to school because of the fees. Pay the fees of one child. Some good. If we do that, then *Insha’Allāh*, Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā will be well. Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā will open the hearts of people for us. And then you won’t have to worry about, “You know, country is like this,” or “Opinion of people is like this,” or “Muslims are doubtful.” Anything which is beneficial is valued. And Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā sent us to benefit people. We ask Allāh subḥānahu wa ta’ālā to help us live in a way that is pleasing to Him and to make us beneficial for all the people around us and to help us live in a way which is favorable for us. So that we might show the way to the world—that is why He sent us into this world.