God's Prescription for Anxiety - Podcast S1-E06

i'm here again with another sacred text message today it's going to be from surat
al-maharaj in that chapter allah says
[Music] verily or surely the human being and
insane in arabic is the word for a human being in fact there's a khilaf a
difference of opinion amongst the lexicographers most of them actually say that there is no
feminine for this because it includes the male and the female it probably is related to the word
uns which is intimacy but it could also be from nicia there's a difference of opinion again
amongst scholars of the language so the human being here really means the human being
has there ever come a time upon the human being that he or she was not something remembered
so in san in the arabic language also interestingly enough means the pupil of the
eye because the human being was created for the vision of god and so the actual what's known as
also in arabic is insane it's the pupil of the eye and just an interesting side note about
that ibn al-jozie who wrote a book tanwir al-rabash unfather al-habish removing
the darkness on the virtues of the blacks actually mentions because at that time
in his country of iraq he saw that the black people were being denigrated so he wanted to write a book
about the virtues of blacks and one of the things he said is that the most extraordinary part of the human
being is the pupil of the eye because vision is the greatest of all blessings and god made it pitch black
so he said that shows you the virtue of the color black so in this verse allah says
that he created the insane the human being in arabic is very interesting word
because it sounds hella it just sounds anxious just to say it
like somebody so it means to be created in a state of angst but also interestingly enough the quran
defines it in the next two verses so in essence in english we would say
surely the human being was created and then have a colon and then that would follow jesus
when evil afflicts him he panics he's distraught so he loses it he loses
his center his equilibrium and when good befalls him he withholds
he becomes stingy he becomes miserly and so in arabic hula is stinginess or
miserliness but hella is anxiety so
has both those meanings and that's why the what follows in the verse is an explanation of what halua is that
the human being is created in this state innalinsana verily so this is a tokido it's a strong
statement and this is the mustena in the arabic language except for those who pray
that muslim those are the people that are exempt from this state of hella so when you look at the human being when
we first come into the world the very first thing that the human being does is it just starts to scream
a baby is completely anxious and what settles the baby down is the halama is literally the halama in
arabic is the name for the breast the nipple and you give the child the helema and it
becomes haleem it just calms down and the word in arabic for intellect one of the words there are
many the arabs have many words for intellect one of them is so the intellect only functions when
you're in a state of equilibrium and so when you lose it when you panic you go into fight or flight or freeze
and so you lose it so the people of prayer are people that don't panic in other words they're always reasonable
their intellect is with them and they have akal and so al-ladino allah salah
those who are constant in their prayer and it's very interesting it says even i
takes an ishara or a type of esoteric interpretation here is that this is the prayer of the heart
this is when a person is in constant prayer with god but most of the mufasiron say it means that they do the
five prayers every day and they do them on time fulfilling their obligations and then
those who in their wealth is a loom a fixed and known
right this so this is a right that the one asking and the one who's deprived has
in your wealth if you've been given wealth so this is a very interesting aspect of a believer is that those who
are given wealth know that that wealth has a hak it has a right that others are entitled
to but what's interesting about this i mean obviously at the face value of it it's zakat so it's the tax that we pay the poor tax
it's not really a tax but the tithing that we give that god has demanded of us
we give for the poor people that's 2.5 percent of your standing wealth if a lunar year passes
over it and also there's a whole set of zakat obligations in harvest and also in livestock
but what's interesting about this is that there's also a hak in wealth that goes beyond zakat
a sadaqatub charity is a proof of your faith so to pay the zakat simply without
having more than the zakat is something that really is dangerous for a person just
like a person who who never prays nafila who only prays the fat because all the shortcomings in
in the prayer on the day of judgment are going to be corrected by the nafida prayer so whatever deficiencies you have in the
far the nephilia is going to help you with that so this idea of you know i've thought a
lot about this and one of the things that struck me most for years i'd been waiting for this book
it's called siraj and murideen it's a book by the great andrusian
sixth century scholar he was the last student of imam zali and that's called the abu
a brilliant man just had an incredible intellect he said at the age of 13 he'd completed the 13 books of euclid and had
made an astrolabe that he was able to determine where he was so he was also a master of chess
even though he condemns chess he actually writes about his experience showing
an egyptian aristocrat certain moves that would improve his chess game in any case he was a polymath knew many
many sciences but is known in the maliki madhhab for being one of our greatest fukaha and he was also a muhaddit
when he went to meet imam razadi he had just an incredible description of coming in he said when he
first laid eyes on imam razadi he said it was as if the sun had rose before him that he had been in
darkness all of his life up to that point he actually writes this in his relation this was a time when imam al-khazadi was
in halwa he was in retreat he wasn't really taking visitors and things but anyway one of the things that he says and this
really for me was a great relief he talks about how there was a period of time
there was famine and an epidemic a waba and during that time a lot of people were suffering
and so in siraj murideen he said he helped certain families he could help
two families and he used to give them loaves of bread every single day to help them during that time
but he had a dream and he mentions he said when him to leilatan
i fell asleep one night and i saw as if i was sitting at a table and around me were all of my
students and there was one of the men amongst my teachers he was sheikh
from my teachers who had had already passed away sometime before that and we began to eat and we began then to
talk to ja'deb hadith then one of the students
said here we are eating and satiating
ourselves and yet there are needy people everywhere how could this be so he's feeling guilty
about sitting at a banquet when people this isn't a dream he's seeing this in a dream but he's feeling guilty about
being in a banquet when people are out in this famine and in this epidemic and so
ibn arabi said in the dream i said out of some modesty given that my
teacher was there but i knew that he would not give the
right response to this question because he had surpassed his teachers and he said
he would make a mistake because he didn't have the requisite knowledge to answer this question so here's what
he said he said to the the students
it's not possible for us to give our wealth to all the people we couldn't do it even if we gave all of
our wealth we would not be able to do that
and also it's not necessary that we are in their condition that they're in
this is the nature of the world that there's times when people are in good times and difficult times and then he says this is what really
struck me but he said but if each one of us could do what was possible to help one
person so if you took every wealthy person and he took it upon himself to help one or
two people from the needy people that would be enough to fulfill the obligation that they have
and then he said and my proof this all in his dream these are the dreams of the awliya and
he said my proof is that during the time of the prophet sallallahu alaihi during the time of the prophet the
sahaba were the companions of the prophet were in such difficulty that they were tying stones
to their stomachs because of the hunger in fact
said that he spent 20 nights without food and he said one night he was riding and
his animal whatever it was a donkey or a mule or a camel crushed something
and he said he ate it without even looking to see what it was that's how hungry he was
and he said he was just fulfilling his necessities that's how hungry he was so then he said
at the time the harvest of the ansar was on their
their roofs it was drying the date harvest and he said and they and they had meat in their homes
men and muhajir in mankind and some of the muhajireen were like that also but very few
and the prophet sallallahu alaihi said this says the prophet saw i sent he did not take their money away from
them in other words it's not like a socialist state where they take the money away and force you to give it to
other people because there's no test the test is whether you're going to fulfill your
obligations or not that's how allah is testing you he's testing the poor people with the wealthy people and the wealthy people
with the poor people are they going to fulfill their obligations or not if the state comes in and forces it upon you
then where's the test there's no test this is a very different understanding
and then he said that the prophet sam was constantly telling
the wealthy people and then he was reminding constantly the
poor person to be patient
and he would tell them what a greater place they had because of their patience
in the afterlife for eternity and this is something again in a materialistic world people don't
understand this this is where they say oh this is just piety in the sky you know there's a old union song but that the communists
said it was a song that said you know you'll eat by and by
you know that pie in the sky so they were making fun of the religious people telling people to be patient
we're actually believers and the thing about the the prophet isaiah the prophet isaiah went through
the most difficult time they said sallallahu alaihi said he would never
go to bed without making sure that people were were taken care of and i actually
did a my own calculation and i worked out that the prophet saw i said i'm
fed over 500 000 meals to the homeless people of uh of um of the sofa because i worked
out 70 there were on average 70 and i worked out the time that he was in medina
and feeding them every single day he fed at least 500 000 meals to homeless
people and when he was asked what is the best islam he said that you feed people
this is what the muslims did we should have food banks at this time we should be helping people in their
need these are the things that muslims do and this is how also that people
recognize by their fruits you shall know them the christians know that and so when they see muslims doing
things like this really helping people and people there's a lot of good people doing
this and i know that there's free clinics there's other things but these are the things that muslims should be doing
if they want to really help and that's what that's what this verse is saying that in their
wealth they have madum so if you've been given the benefit of wealth you should be helping
people we have a wonderful sister asthma in baltimore one of the most beleaguered
cities in the united states of america but we have this wonderful lady who has a shelter
for people she takes in all these battered women and people that have to and she
struggles these are the people that we should be helping these are the people that really need
our help another person is yusuf wylie who's down in southern california helping inmates who've been released
helping them transition and he's somebody who has great experience in that he himself went through immense
tribulation so there are lots of things that that muslims can do that that's in our
wealth is very important and we're going to be asked about it and that's why after that allah says
see it's immediately after that because the prophet isaiah said
guard yourselves against the fire even with half a date and once aisha was sitting with one of
her relatives and a beggar came by and she gave him half a grape she grapes were very
precious but they came from five if she gave him half a group she had a few grapes she gave him half a grape
and the person that was sitting with her said does that benefit and she said how many atoms do you think
are in that grape because on the day of judgment you won't do an adam's weight of good except
you'll see it and so even half a date just doing something and so they believe in
the day of judgment now this is really important because this is a hallmark of muslims
they believe in the day of judgment and fadi abu bakr going back to him
he has a chapter on yom al-hisab the day of reckoning the mohaseb
is like the accountant every business has an accountant and that accountant hopefully is making sure that
your your income is greater than your outcome and so the day of judgment is the day
when we have the tabulation of our life on earth and everything will be recorded it's all
being recorded and so we come on that day and that's why allah says they believe in the last day
and then it says that they have fear of their lord's
punishment so even though they're believers they don't feel secure
like abu bakr siddiq said that if i had one foot in paradise and
one foot out a pair i still would not feel secure until i was firmly in paradise
and so this is something that the believers have that they actually have a sense of the
momentousness the awe of that day and there's a hadith from abu hura where the prophet sallallahu islam
said that on that day allah will meet his servant
didn't i honor you didn't i give you a position didn't i leave you to enjoy life
indeed you did
did you think you were going to meet me
today i forget you just as you had forgotten me right
the quran reminds us that the the verses come to them and they forgot them so on that day
they're forgotten this is what allah says to him and then the second he says
didn't i honor you didn't i give you a position didn't i give you a spouse
didn't i give you wealth camels and horses
and i gave you this position and and let you enjoy your life
didn't you think you were going to meet me
i forget you just as you forgotten me
and then the next one comes and the next one and then allah he says
read your book the book of your deeds and suffice your own soul as your reckoner because the human being
knows in insane human beings know what they've
done even if he gives all of his excuses so then for the believer
right he gets the he sab and then when he sees his situation he thinks i'm
going to perish unless i get the sabika of the husna from allah the grace from god
and then woody and then his word is put in the other
scale so his deeds are in the scale and then it puts and it outweighs everything
is more weightier than heavens in the earth and so this is a great gift to the believers but this is what allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala says about that day that they believe in the last day they believe in the yom
and they're preparing for it the prophet sam used to do death remembrance every day
and he said that do much remembrance of the destroyer of
pleasure because much of life is mata it's in i mean we have our tribulations but we also have
a great deal of enjoyment and food and companionship and wealth and security and homes and
all these things that allah has given us these are great blessings but there is a reckoning there is a hiseb this so this is what
allah subhanahu ta'ala says and then he reminds us
they're not secure from that punishment nobody should feel secure i always marvel at
certain religions who believe they're saved they just say we're saved because first of all they don't know if
they're going to lose their faith there's people that lose their faith even in those religions there's people that were believers
and then they come out with a book why i don't believe in in god anymore there's even preachers that come out as
atheists or come out of their closet or whatever they were doing and they they say this i was once on an
airplane with my friend and brother fred and we sat next to a man who'd been a christian and then he said that he
realized that his own sexual appetites weren't consonant with his christianity so he
gave up his christianity that's what he told us he gave up his christianity and i just i
looked down i said i'm really sorry for you you know that you would give up the eternal for the temporal
so that's one of the tragedies of life on earth is that people do lose their faith and that's why nelinsen
that human beings panic when trials come to them they pant they lose it there's people that lose their faith but
then you have to question did they have faith in the first place because the whole purpose of faith is to get you through all those
difficulties i mean the word in arabic for for believers the one who secures
himself with god i mean if you took it literally is to
secure it to give yourself amen with god
they are secure those people are in a state of security who believe and don't commit shirk they're in a state of security and so
then allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says those who protect their private parts
and that means that they they protect their private property except in the confines
of marriage in lawful sexual relations because sexual relations
outside of what god has permitted it leads to terror
do not go near adultery or fornicatio