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I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed Satan.
In the name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful.
Indeed, Allah and His angels send their blessings upon the Prophet.
O you who believe, send your blessings upon him and give him your blessings.
O Allah, send your blessings upon our Master Muhammad and his family.
As you sent your blessings upon Ibrahim and his family.
You are the Most Glorious.
O Allah, bless Muhammad and his family.
As you sent your blessings upon Ibrahim and his family.
You are the Most Glorious.
My brothers and sisters, we are on the series of lectures on the Seerah of Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
With an idea of understanding how the Seerah can help us to be successful in this world and the next.
So today we talk about…
One of the most important elements of the religion.
Which brought about enormous change.
And that is the way we deal with money.
See, today people talk about how the world has changed.
How ethics and morals have gone down the drain.
And how we have so-called leaders who are…
I don’t even want to waste my time thinking of expletives for them.
But…
So we have all these things.
Now the question is, how did it get that way?
Just go back in history.
Think about this.
Imagine that you are listening to a conversation about…
Say, a conversation at the time of a Sahaba.
Or a conversation later on in Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
Tabi’in.
They are talking about people in their own families.
They are talking about their fathers, their grandfathers.
Maybe they are talking about people who are respected in their society.
Two things I want to look at.
One is, who are they talking about?
And what about that person do you think they are saying?
So the people they are talking about, who are those people?
The great warriors, great scholars.
When we read the stories of Salaf, so and so was a Zahid.
He prayed so many rakat of Salah every night.
So and so, with the wudu for Isha, he would pray Salatul Fajr, which means he didn’t sleep
the whole night.
Not on one day.
That was his routine.
So and so, when he was the Khalifa, that entire period of 10-12 years, he did not sleep lying
down.
Whole period.
He did not sleep lying down.
He would sleep, he would take a, he would hold a stick like this and rest against the
wall, standing.
Or he would sit and he would just doze like this.
Done.
Fumiliated.
Few minutes of that, done.
Back to work.
So what are the stories?
Sahawat.
Donating money.
And going there for the work.
And so on.
These were the stories, right?
These were the stories that we were told.
And believe me, this thing lasted for a long time.
I remember when I was growing up as a child.
I was a child.
We heard stories like this.
We heard stories like this about our children, our parents, our grandparents.
Today, for example, one of the biggest problems, one of the major, major problems is what is
called helicopter parenting.
Right?
The parents are whoring like this over the child 24-7.
Children are not left alone for one second.
They cannot get bored.
They’re constantly engaged.
They forget that brain was not created for this constant simulation, continuously, which
is what the phones are giving you.
And we think this is parenting, constantly, never leave the child alone.
When I was growing up, in my teens, I was 16, 17 or something like that, I would go
from Hyderabad where we lived to a place called Adilabad, district Adilabad, the actual village
was called Pembi, which was a journey of almost the entire day.
I had to change three buses, three different places, and last two miles I had to walk through
the…
fields.
Black cotton soil which sticks to the shoes, so I take the shoes off and walk barefoot,
two miles through the fields.
By myself, no phone, I couldn’t reach there and call and say I reached safely.
There was no question of writing a letter, it wouldn’t get posted, it wouldn’t come.
I would be gone for a month.
Living on the bank of a river.
No electricity.
No electricity.
No electricity.
No water supply.
No running water.
With this uncle of mine, friend of my father’s, and spend the whole day in the bush.
I’d leave in the morning, come back in the night.
And this whole period of one month, my parents did not know if I was alive or dead.
They didn’t know.
So what should I say?
They didn’t care about me.
I know how much they cared.
What’s the last thing?
Nothing.
But they let me do that, so I became independent.
My brother, same thing.
He did other things, not these things, but he became independent.
We learn to make decisions.
You think nothing happened to me?
Many things happened to me.
I’m not talking here, I’m not sitting here to talk about my life, but I’m saying that
today this is the problem of the parents continuously hovering.
One of our brothers here, his two sons, both of them are teenagers.
They went with us to that Lake George trip.
Continuously from here to there, the mother.
Phone call after phone call after, how are you?
How are you?
Hurry.
What will happen to you?
Really, I mean, just wake up.
You raise children like this, that’s what will happen.
So constant focus only is money.
How much money do you make?
Whether they’re money or money.
Whether that money comes to you, halal, haraab, makes no difference.
Only one focus, how much money?
Courage, not a focus.
Compassion, not a focus.
Kindness, not a focus.
Charity, giving is not a focus.
Even the giving, while it is being given, you’ve got a Facebook page which is updating
that and you’ve got some other social media where the whole world must know what you are
giving.
So whatever reward you are supposed to get for that, you’re not giving.
You’re not giving.
So whatever reward you are supposed to get for that, it’s gone.
Halas.
In Riya.
Islam says the ends and the means, how you get something and what you get, both must
be justified.
Both must please Allah .
So you can’t make money in any way.
The way has to be correct.
And?
Must be morally correct, must follow the Sharia and socially responsible.
Now this is what the Quraysh fought.
Because their system, and that’s why I keep on saying this over and over again.
The reason to study the Seerah today is because of the similarity between the systems of that
time, the political system, the economic system, the social system, the similarity
of those systems to our systems.
It’s absolutely uncanny.
It’s 1500 years.
This year is 1500 years since the message of the Prophet .
In 1500 years, we have the exact same system.
The only difference is scale.
Today that system is worldwide.
Those days that system was in one place.
In the Hejaz.
But same system.
And why we study it?
Because in that system, we are looking at what worked to change that system.
And my contention is, if you apply the same method, inshallah, we will get the same results.
That’s logical.
That’s the logic.
If it works here, it will work there.
Given the conditions are the same and the conditions are the same.
So, that’s it.
Thank you.
So, this is what people did.
So, making money, nothing wrong with that.
Islam is not against making money.
There’s nothing romantic about poverty.
You should be wealthy.
You should be influential.
You should be powerful.
But the way you get there is equally important.
If you become that wealthy and powerful and so on using means which are prohibited in
Islam, then this is not good.
Then you become punished.
As I mentioned, the whole banking system and the banking system of the Quraish was not invented
by them.
This was the Roman banking system and the Persian banking system which they used.
And those worked in the same way.
Right?
The قARTED PAYMENT system which said below that people have not paid andfil Tuohy ل� biased
data.
In those days, those were not allowable.
Also, we have our houses, our occasionally on Taxi.
Everything.
In those days, they can control theondoes.
ント.
Businessmen, if you brought them here to the Fed or to, you know, any of the big banks,
the only thing they would find new and surprising is, of course, obviously the computers and
the technology and whatnot and air condition.
But the system itself, they would understand it in two seconds because that’s the system
they used.
There’s nothing new about that.
And they were very, very wealthy people.
In today’s terms, they were billionaires.
So we’re not talking about some small mom and pop shop which was run.
These were big multinational businesses because they were buying things in Arabia and selling
them in Rome.
Right?
Where is Italy?
Where is this?
They were buying in Italy.
Rome is where the heart of the empire was, but it came down all the way to Iraq.
Iraq and Syria.
And similarly, they were buying and selling here and doing that in Setastifon, which was
the capital of the Iranian Empire, the Persian Empire.
And that came all the way north up to Yemen.
So how did they do that?
Now what did Islam bring?
Islam.
Islam did not bring another way of charging interest in some other shape or form.
Islam brought ethics into the system.
Look at this.
Look at some of these rules.
I mean, just think about this.
Whoever lets a person off in a transaction, Allah will relieve him of his distress on
the day of resurrection.
What does it mean?
It means if I borrow money from you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I don’t have to pay you.
I’m not talking about lying and cheating.
I’m saying if I borrow money from you, and I’m supposed to return the money.
And I’m not able to do that because my business, I borrowed money from you to start a business.
I started the business.
Unfortunately, my business failed.
I lost the money.
So I come to you and say, my brother, I am unable to pay you back.
Now, do you have a claim on me?
Of course.
I borrowed money.
You have a claim on me.
I don’t have to pay you back.
So what is Allah saying?
Allah is saying, let him go.
If you let him go, I will let you go on the Day of Judgment.
You might say you know what, this is a nice principle, but how am I supposed to run a
business like this?
If I’m a banker, I’m lending money to people, zero interest.
I’m not talking about bank.
I’m saying I’m an Islamic banker.
I’m lending money on a zero interest basis.
But you are telling me that the guy doesn’t even need to return the money to me.
So am I a banker or am I just giving it away?
Does it look like a business model to you?
So how does this work?
Think about that.
I’ll tell you the answer, but think about this.
Similarly, Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says, Allah is, am I in Muslim?
Whoever waits for somebody who is in financial difficulty to pay a debt.
So I borrow money from him.
I borrow money from him.
I borrow money from you.
I’m supposed to pay you back in one year.
Now one year, 12th month I come to you, I’m very sorry.
I need more time.
Okay, take more time.
I take two years pass, three years pass, 10 years pass.
And on top of that, he says, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, and whoever waives it, he says,
okay, it doesn’t matter.
Take it away.
Allah will shade him with his shade on the Day of Judgment.
Okay?
He said, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
He said, he took the promise.
Do you see the promise?
He said, he said, he’s comfortable with the promise?
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
He said, he’s comfortable with the promise.
He said, he’s comfortable with the promise.
As I said, the promise is good and so it’s not.
But does this look like a viable business-banking business model to you.
It’s not, simple as that.
It is not.
Even if you don’t say it, I’ll say it.
It is not.
So why is Allah promoting this?
Why is Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam promoting this?
They want your business to fail.
Yes.
This is the biggest indicator that money is not business in Islam.
Money is not a commodity in Islam.
The biggest mental thing that needs to change the system.
In the modern world, money is a commodity to be traded.
You trade in futures, you trade in currencies.
You lend money on interest, you get a return on the investment.
Right?
Money is something which is used as a commodity.
In Islam, money is not a commodity.
In Islam, money is something that is used to help somebody else in need.
It’s not a commodity.
Money is used to help somebody in need.
And that’s why the pure Islamic banking model in the sense of lending money doesn’t work.
It’s not a commodity.
It’s not a commodity.
It’s not supposed to work.
That’s not a business model in the first place.
So what is promoted in Islam is actual business.
Buying, selling, working hard, producing, creating content.
Two or three examples of this, let me explain to you very quickly.
One was when Rasulullah s.a.w. said on, this was part of his final khutbah in Hajj.
He said, Allah s.w.t. has,
prohibited interest-based dealings and I forgive all the money that is owed to my uncle,
al-Abbas bin Abdul Muttalib.
Whoever owed money to him, I forgive all those loans, the interest on those loans I forgive.
You need to only return the principal amount.
Right?
I don’t know.
I don’t know.
I don’t know if anyone has actually done a calculation in terms of what that did to
al-Abbas bin Abdul Muttalib’s, to his accounts receivables in his balance sheet.
Right?
The bottom fell out of it.
Your accounts receivables, which is an element in the balance sheet, would have gone from
God knows how many billions to zero.
Just like that.
Did he say to Mr. As-Sanam, excuse me?
Hello?
This is my business.
Where do you come into this?
You’re not my business partner.
I own the business.
Did he say that?
He said, this is the Rasool of Allah.
His word is law.
Does he have a right to forgive or make some, you know, something inside my business?
Of course.
Of course.
Does he have the right to make tasarruf?
In my business?
Yes.
Now Mr. As-Sanam says, I forgive.
He says, yes, forgive.
Second example.
Medina was a place, the economy of Medina was based on, unlike the economy of Mecca
was based on trade.
So they had the caravans going back and forth.
Leela fi Quraish.
Leela fi Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
Rehalatas Shitae Wasayf.
The Rele of the cold time and the summers.
But Medina was a agriculture.
It was Oasis.
So it had two main crops.
One was dates and the other one was grapes.
Now, anywhere in the world, if you are growing something which has a high sugar content,
what do you do with that?
You convert that into alcohol.
You make wine.
Take anywhere.
Take Spain.
Take France.
Take the Cape in South Africa.
Take any place in the world.
If you are growing crops which are high in sugar content, you convert them into alcohol
because how many dates are you going to eat?
How many grapes are you going to eat?
What will you do with dates and grapes?
The only way you can deal with that and convert that into a cash asset is to make that into
alcohol.
Now, you have converted this commodity into a cash asset.
The cash asset, you sell it, you make money.
Anywhere in the world.
And that’s what the people of Medina did.
Winemaking in Medina was not for fun.
Winemaking was not so that we have a party and, you know, we have a toast or something.
Though winemaking was business.
And out of the blue, Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala has revealed in the Qur’an,
Ya ayyuha allatheena aman,
al khamru wal maisir wal ansar,
wal anasabu wa azlabu,
rijusun min amalil shaitani fachtanibu,
la’alakum tuflihur.
Oh, you believe?
Al khamr, alcohol, and by inference, everything which is intoxicating.
Wal maisir, gambling.
Lotteries, roulette tables, blackjack, MGM.
Huh?
Huh?
The works.
Gambling on dog races, greyhound races, gambling on horse races,
gambling on football, gambling on basketball.
Everything is gambling.
Gambling on your, what are those, mixed martial arts fights?
You think those MMA things are, people treat the MMA thing as if it’s like worship.
How do you think they pay those people those millions of dollars from their pockets?
They pay them those millions of dollars because those people are making them multiple millions of dollars because of their fighting.
Not because of the fighting, but because of the gambling on the fighting.
As far as the gambler, as far as the bookkeepers are concerned, they don’t care who wins.
They win anyway.
They win anyway because they’ve got bets on both.
So whoever wins, I don’t care who wins.
And here you are yelling your guts out, oh, I want Khabab to win.
Mental cases, I’m telling you, we have lost our brains.
Allah said no gambling.
Any form of gambling.
Al-Maisir.
All forms of fortune telling.
And Allah said,
The deeds of Satan, anyway, are haram, they are filthy, they are dirty, they are something not to do.
Allah said, this is the worst of the deeds.
Stay far away.
If you are, if you do that, you will be successful.
So what happened?
You know the story, right?
People who were at that time when the Munadi, when the announcer, Navisahasana had this thing,
when the ayat was revealed, somebody would go and call that ayat out in all the streets of Madina.
So somebody was, and there are actual narratives of Sahaba.
One of them said, I had my uncles, young Sahabi.
He said, I had my uncles who were sitting there.
I was pouring wine for them.
It was halal.
I said, halal they used to drink it.
I poured wine for them.
We heard the Munadi.
We heard the man calling out his eyes of the Quran.
He said, I was pouring like this.
I moved my hand away.
So it was going into the cup.
He moved his hand away and he poured the whole thing on the floor.
The one who had it in his cup, he threw it.
The one who had it in his mouth, he didn’t say, take a quick swallow.
This is the last one.
No.
He spat it out.
And then what they did was, and this is the amazing thing.
This is why the Sahaba, the Sahaba.
Then what they did was, they took the vats, the huge containers of wine which was there
in their houses and in their storehouses, in their warehouses.
They took them.
They emptied them in the drains of Madina.
And then they smashed the containers.
Did you ever think about this?
How many times have you read these stories?
And they say, wine flowed in the streets of Madina like water.
You heard this, right?
How can wine flow unless there is that quantity of wine?
Somebody’s got two bottles in the house.
You can throw it.
What happens?
Nothing happens.
Wine flowed in the drains and the streets of Madina because winemaking was an industry.
And there was that quantity of wine.
And then they smashed the container.
Somebody came to his house and said, they are smashing the containers.
He called them.
He said, why are you smashing the containers?
It’s fine.
Just go wash it and use it.
He said, no.
They said, we do not even want to be reminded of a time when we used to disobey Allah.
Now, logically thinking, when they were doing this, they were not disobeying Allah because
the law hadn’t come.
So, they were not disobeying Allah.
They were not disobeying Allah.
Still, this was a level of taqwa.
Even though when I used to do it, it was permitted.
Now, it is not permitted.
I don’t even want a memory of that.
That’s why they were successful.
They didn’t argue with Allah.
Why is this?
Why is that?
Why can’t I do this?
Can I do a piece of it?
No.
So, think about this.
I asked my senator, he said, the Untuk officers inside the congress section said about leaving
people behind.
He said no.
Now I asked, why didn’t I do this?
Because when the deal is made, it is going to happen.
Because if we do this again, Muslims are going to have a blow over, and then the government
is going to have to investigate it.
We have to measure.
We have to do this increase, and if we say, oh, please drop by 4 million people, and we
will only do this.
How will we do this?
The relationship comes out, that’s it.
We are going to do this.
It will be treated as we head into on feedback.
See, I think the Y purchaserеньishes those who are just like it interview, I think they
would have like the same accordance with the Y purchaser.
And we have the hadiths, we have several hadiths.
We have the hadiths of Hasan ibn Ali,
who said, I heard from my grandfather,
he said, leave that which is doubtful
for that which is not doubtful.
Inshallah.
All right, so we’ll wind up for today
because time for Maghrib now.
Inshallah, we ask Allah to help us and guide us
and to teach us about and help us to learn
about the sunnah of Rasulullah
and to practice it in our lives.
We ask Allah to fill our lives with khair and barakah
and to fill our lives with the beauty of the sunnah
of the Nabi and to make us obedient to Allah
and his Nabi .
May Allah bless you.
May Allah bless you.