| THE STREET MIMBAR JUM'AH KHUTBAH (18 December 2009) webpage: http://www.facebook.com/The.Street.Mimbar http://groups.yahoo.com/group/the_street_mimbar/ PLEASE e-mail Suggestions & Criticisms to khutbahs@yahoo.com It is in such a manner that We make plain Our signs so that the course of the Criminals may become clear. | Bismillah Ar-Rahmaan Ar-Raheem. Alhumdulillah. Peace and blessings on Muhammad (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam), his Noble Companions and Family. Committed Muslims… Audio on http://www.islamiccenterdc.com/khutbassermons.htm (12-11-2009) TAQWA AND ITS AFFINITY WITH SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER Allah says to us Oh you who are firmly committed to Allah: avoid Allah's corrective inevitable power presence and say/state/verbalise what is accurate, precise and correct. (Surah Al Ahzaab verse 70) We want to observe this ayah/sentence and detect that, (generally speaking), it has three parts. The 1st part is (that) it is Yaa Ayyuha Alladhina Aamanu not Yaa Ayyuha An Naas or Yaa Bani Adam or Yaa Bani Isra'eel or any other social components that comes after the article that call upon different types of people in the course of the Holy Qur'an. The designation that comes after Yaa is Ayyaha Alladhina Aamanu. Allah expects from us, Alladhina Aamanu,(and our prayer is that we be included among them), an accurate, practical, behavioural, psychological and social embodiment of the meanings that are going to follow. The 2nd segment of this sentence is ittaqu Allah. Remember, Fridays is a day of taqwa. Jum'ah is a heightened hour of a heightened day of taqwa. Allah, here, is telling us … to avoid Allah- His punishment, His power presence- as it will turn against you if you disobey Him… (Surah Al Ahzaab verse 70) The 3rd portion of this sentence (says) … and express a statement that is accurate/factual. (Surah Al Ahzaab verse 70) With our God-given capacity to think, we observe that we have some of those who in the world of talk belong to us- they conveniently place themselves under the title of Alladhina Aamanu- but they don't say/express the truth or what is accurate and factual. Allah knew that we are going to have human beings who have a tendency which becomes policy which gains an argument or a sort of justification for them not to say what is actual/factual/truthful, so Allah prefaced the last portion of the sentence with two reminders Al Iman and At Taqwa. So if we come across individuals who paint themselves as Alladhina Aamanu and then they are unable to express what is accurate and precise, then we realise they have a flaw in their Iman and a gap in their taqwa. You can't combine Iman and Taqwa and be incapable of expressing the truth! OK- now we have some what of a healthy understanding of Allah's word. The Prophet of Allah says the best form of jihad is expressing the word of truth/facts in the face of a tyrannical ruler/oppressive governor. How many of these mascara Muslims who decorate themselves with the words of the Qur'an and the Sunnah have you seen recently in your lifetime who had enough backbone to express the truth in the face of those who administer injustice, who systemise oppression towards their subjects/populations/citizenry? It is in this tradition, with this understanding and with this freedom of mind and conscience that we have those who were educated and raised by Allah's Prophet express some statements that have fallen within the cracks of officialdom's history books. We want you to pay close attention to a couple of these statements that are in the mould of the ayah and hadith. The reason why these statements that you are going to listen to verbatim i.e. as they were said and then their meaning in English is because those who have been in power and continue to be in power do not want an Islamic vibrant conscience and an Islamic throbbing mind to express themselves. They carry meanings that we should have learned from. We mentioned earlier that Umar (radi Allahu anhu) the 2nd successor to Allah's Prophet had applied, (what amounts to), an overall policy to continue in the direction and orientation of Allah's Prophet after Allah's Prophet passed away. As a reminder, those three elements of his policy (were): (number one) the newly acquired territories belong to the Islamic territory and not Muslim individuals. The 2nd feature of his policies was that the Muslims who had gained status by living with and by struggling with Allah's Prophet should not go to the other areas of the Islamic domain fearing that they will acquire unnecessary power for themselves i.e. power centres that may gain breakaway tendencies. The 3rd policy that he administered was that those who were given authority or placed in positions making decisions for the Muslims should be austere i.e. they should have a personality and a character that does not indulge either in power nor in wealth. These policies were implemented strictly and forcefully upon everyone, the 1st of whom was Umar himself. This wasn't a person who was ruling saying "I'm going to apply some policies upon someone else and I'm going to be exempt from these policies." He 1st of all applied these policies to his own self, something of which we cannot say applies of those who rule the Muslims today. We have those who rule in Saudi Arabia who apply policies, (for example), they say "they are applying the shariah to a Nigerian, Bangladeshi or some other impoverished Muslim if he steals something…" Who knows, he may be "stealing" to support a family, so they bring that victim of circumstances to what they call their Shariah court and they chop off the person's hand or in extreme circumstances they chop off the person's head! They, themselves, steal the resources of the Muslims- they are not petty thieves; but that petty thief they bring to the execution square, but these who are mega thieves steal the natural resources belonging to the Muslims and the Shariah does not apply to them! Where are they from Umar? And they evoke the name of Umar a lot with sectarian undertones. They don't do so with a rational mind because if they did and if they knew what they were saying the sword would come down on their necks/hands. In one of these instances in which we had a thinking personality from around Allah's Prophet, he says this statement that pertains to governance and rulership to Abdullah ibn Abbas (radi Allahu anhu). Those are his exact words, now what is he saying in the language that we all understand? Umar is speaking to Abdullah ibn Abbas who is the cousin of Allah's Prophet and these words have to do with government, authority, decision making, officialdom and running the affairs of state issues (that) no one wants to talk about because when Umar speaks about these issues, they don't even want to quote Umar?! He is saying to Abdillah ibn Abbas people do not favour you- ibn Abbas, your family, your extended family, the family of Allah's Prophet. If we wanted to bring it in today's language, public opinion does not favour that you combine both An Nubuwa and Al Khifalah. You had a Prophet from among you and public opinion disfavours that because the Prophet came from among you, that you yourselves should also become rulers. They can't reconcile these two things in their social/public/collective minds. This is a very important observation of the way people at that time were politically thinking and today's mu'adh as salatin i.e. the court clergy Ulema' or the establishmentarian scholars. They don't want us to quote political statements of the Sahaba (radi Allahu anhu)… "Oh no. You can't do that because you are going to be planting seeds in the Islamic public mind." That's why probably many of you may have not heard this statement. He said Quraysh chose for itself, and in its own measure or way of seeing things, it shows what was right. We know the differences that had existed between the Prophet of Allah on one side and the people of Quraysh in the other side. Then, Umar is saying to ibn Abbas, (listen to this because it is a political statement that has been deliberately taken out of political discourse, text books and the public mind, never to be mentioned from the Mimbar on Fridays with the element of Allah's taqwa in the public mind of the listening Islamic congregations of the world), and I have seen/observed/watched the Prophet/Messenger of Allah who deputised other people and left you, meaning the Prophet of Allah was not giving/employing in government positions or as decision makers his own tribe/extended family i.e. Bani Hashim. He wasn't doing that. Why can't we observe that? Why can't we see that? And then, he comments on this By Allah, I don't know. He dismissed you from these positions and excluded you from this type of status while you are qualified for it or was he afraid that you are going to gain supportive influences from society just because you are his relatives or your status/positions vis-à-vis the Messenger of Allah and when you, yourselves, begin to have these power centres around you, you are going to be criticised by public opinion and there's no way out of this. This is one of the most sensitive statements that indicate how the public political mind of that time was thinking. For those of us who come from the Shi'i tradition, (which unfortunately has become a tradition in many cases), have you ever thought (that) if people from that time, (being who they are, and we've covered this territory many times in the past and we tried to get a feeling for the public- Alladhina Aamanu as opposed to those who were nominal Muslims as opposed to those who are hypocritical Muslims. We've visited this subject i.e. what the make-up of that society was, during the Prophet's time in Al Medina, during the battles of the Prophet with his enemies at Uhud, Hunayn, and on other occasions. We now have a sense of how strong/weak that public opinion was towards Allah's Prophet himself.) Let us say that Allah's Prophet's family, (however way you want to define/describe them), were to assume positions of leadership given the facts of life that were around- what would have happened to them? Were we to expect miracles from them? Allah's Prophet was there. Was he able to change public opinion or was there always Munafiqin i.e. those who had other loyalties besides and in contradiction to the loyalty of Allah's Prophet around? The Harakat Al I'tidad i.e. those who denounced, (what is today called), political/ideological/official Islam once the Prophet himself passed away… imagine, what would have happened in these types of circumstances with not much of a solid base of what we call solid public support if then Allah's Prophet's family was going to assume responsibilities? Un-traditionalise yourselves and ask yourselves this question. But we don't have a culmination of a thinking Muslim mind and therefore these types of questions don't occur to us. Another very important political statement that was expressed by the person who was the closest person to Allah's Prophet- they say he's the shadow of Allah's Prophet- was Ali (radi Allahu anhu) speaking to Uthman (radi Allahu anhu). He says, (and we're going to say it to you verbatim, once again, and then we'll deal with its meaning in English.) When things began going in an un-satisfactory direction during the reign of Uthman, and public opinion was going against Uthman… what are these few sentences between Ali and Uthman? Uthman used to designate the Deputies and Governors who were going to assume positions in wealthy territories of the Islamic domain. Ali says to Uthman, it was the practise of Umar that he used to "step on the ear" of everyone he deputised. That's the literal translation of this, the English meaning of this is that Umar had every Governor that he appointed on his leash. He was in full control and if Umar was to sense that anyone of these Deputies or Governors was gaining even a fraction of what did not belong to them, he would inflict on them the most serious of punishment, but you're not doing that. You've become weak and sentimental towards your relatives. Remember Allah's words Oh you who are firmly committed to Allah: avoid Allah's corrective inevitable power presence and say/state/verbalise what is accurate, precise and correct. (Surah Al Ahzaab verse 70) And remember the words of Allah's Prophet the best form of jihad is expressing the word of truth/facts in the face of a tyrannical ruler/oppressive governor. These Prophetically educated individuals had these words in their hearts and minds. Then, Uthman turns to Ali and says but they are also your relatives. That's true. Banu Ummayyah, of course, were closer to Uthman because they came from the same grandfather, but they were the cousins of Bani Hashim, so they are also relatives. It's not that they are foreigners of some distant tribe. They come from the same clannish sources. Ali says of course. Their womb is close to mine/ours/me, but those who have the merits are others, meaning not them. They are not meritorious. They don't qualify for the positions that they are in. Then, when Uthman came to renew the tenure of Muawiyah, meaning he wanted to extend his governorship of Ash Shaam, Ali comes to Uthman and says I remind you of Allah. Do you know that Muawiyah used to fear Umar more than Umar's servant, (a person by the name of Yarfa') used to fear Umar himself? Then, Ali goes on to say, but now, Muawiyah is taking things into his own hand and doing these things without you and he is telling people "this is what Uthman wants" and you know that but you're not doing anything about it. (Do) you listen to these statements that have been withdrawn from public circulation? No one wants to mention this because no one wants the Muslims to think for themselves and learn from our ownselves. This is a learning experience. What they want us to do is to quote these things to become sectarians, i.e. I'm going to hate that other Muslim, and that other Muslim is going to hate me because the way we understand this is that there has to be animosity in this. No. There doesn't have to be any animosity in this. This is a learning experience. In their narrative there is a lesson- a moral lesson, a political lesson… (Surah Yusuf verse 111) This applies to Prophet's and those who follow Prophets. Brothers and sisters, Committed Muslims… Due to the fact that we have not had a learning experience from our own mistakes… If we consider ourselves the Prophet's Ummah and if we know that we are only human beings capable of making mistakes and correcting our mistakes- the Prophet of Allah says all the descendants of Adam are prone to making mistakes and the best of those who make these mistakes are those who repent and regret and repair those mistakes. But, they take away this vital information from our public mind and we become ritualistic, automatons, (and) cultural creatures and so, when vital/important life and death issues take place around us, our Islamic mind cannot relate to this. That's how they want us and that's how we allowed them to have their way; or else, if we did have an Islamic mind it would have shed Qur'anic and Prophetic light on the issues of our time. We can't comfortably speak and breach these issues as we should, but had we consolidated our historical experience, we would be able to look comfortably and confidently at such issues as what is happening in today's world. What is happening in today's world, which our institutionalized/government controlled Islamic preachers and Centres are incapable of addressing. Issues like the attacks on Masajid. We've suffered for 27 years from this. They attacked this Masjid and they took it over. They begin at the peripheries. OK- they can do this in Washington DC; Muslims are not the majority of people and there is no Islamic Movement of self-determination to speak about. There's a few enlightened Muslims around, but that's about it- that's in the best of descriptions. They take over and they get away with this. They took over Makkah and Al Medinah wholesale and institutionalised there dead-beat Islam there. There's nothing coming out of there. It's a dead area. (They) don't fool us with all of the media that they have. Now, in just the past day, they burn a Masjid in the West Bank. The Zionists, (these are also prohibited words from the Mimbar. Dare any of these speakers use the words Zionists and Imperialists from the Mimbar. That's another symptom of them taking away our political thought), go into a Masjid not far from Nablus on the West Bank and they torch it. What is this? They're taking the pulse for what some news items are saying is their plans to take over Al Masjid Al Aqsa sometime this coming March? There's been some words that have been leaked to that effect. There are these rabid/fanatical Zionists who want to physically control/occupy Al Haram Ash Sharif. What is this right now? This is a trial balloon- let's burn a Masjid near Nablus and see what are the Muslims going to do? This may be followed up by another act of aggression towards he Muslims while the Zionists are on their way to their final goal i.e. Al Masjid Al Aqsa, what they call The Temple Mount and the rebuilding on the ruins in that area. Along with that, just like they threw the words al qawl as sadeed and prohibited it from Makkah and Al Madinah, and Islamic Centers around, there are satellite TV stations around that they want to plug off the air. They began with Al Manaar and now they're trying to follow that up with Al Alam and Al Aqsa. These satellite TV stations are known for their outspoken, truth and support for the Palestinians against the Israelis. Then, word is circulating that the Shin Bet, that's the Israeli equivalent of the FBI, is now looking to recruit and employ Persian speaking individuals in their service to counter what they call the Iranian influence and penetration more closer to Israel than they ever were. As all of this goes on, we have the Palestinian Authority i.e. the Palestinian secular, un-Islamic Authority in the West Bank, (remember, all of these circumstances. We need not mention everything in detail, that is left up to your thinking mind, but put all of the pieces together), that is sponsoring a contest for a Palestinian pageant i.e. who is going to be Miss Palestine with her bathing suit and all of this other stuff that goes along with it. In these circumstances and conditions, why is all of this and much more happening? (Listening and thinking Muslims), the Egyptian government begins to bad mouth Al Barade'i who used to be the Head of the IAEA, for defending the Iranian nuclear program and for defending Syria against the Israeli attack of what was called the nucleus of a nuclear program in Syria. But all of this does not appear on our mental radar because they unplugged the necessary Islamic ideological-political-authority information that is included in the Qur'an and Sunnah and this is where we are and this is how we need the taqwa of Allah today more than any other time. This khutbah was presented by Imam Mohamed Asi on the occasion of Jum'ah on 11 December 2009 on the sidewalk of Embassy Road in Washington D.C. The Imam previously led the daily and Jum'ah prayers inside the Masjid. His speeches were revolutionary and thought provoking, and eventually irritated and threatened the Middle-East Ambassadors who control the Masjid. Finally, the Imam, his family, and other Muslims faithful to the course of Islam were forced out, into the streets. This khutbah originates from the sidewalk across the street from the Islamic Center, currently under seige. |
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