Muslim Unite Shia and Sunni KHUTBAH : DIFFERENCES FOR AND AGAINST COEXISTENCE

 

THE STREET MMBAR JUM'AH KHUTBAH (13 December 2013) webpage: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=182501078290&ref=ts 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.

Dear committed Muslims…

Audio on http://www.islamiccenterdc.com/apps/podcast/podcast/330638 (12-06-2013)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiJU6GWPRbQ

DIFFERENCES FOR AND AGAINST COEXISTENCE

We have been on a journey of many months trying to tackle, with the light that comes to us from Allah and the love that connects us with the Prophet, this very difficult issue of sectarianism that has been virtually and literally killing us. It's not a topic of choice. Some people tune in to this khutbah and they realize there's too much emphasis placed going through Sunni and Shi'i issues and they think this speaker, (somehow in their minds), likes to deal with this issue or he specializes in this affair and that is not the case, obviously. We, and yours truly here, are more or less forced to speak about this issue because this issue has been forced upon all of us and is claiming the lives of hundreds of innocent people almost on a daily basis. So it's not a first choice to speak about this issue but to try to take something of a break from the many khutbahs that were dedicated to unraveling the tensions, shedding the light on the ignorant areas of our minds pertaining to what is called the Sunni-Shi'i division and being that we live in a society that to one degree or the other identifies itself as a Judeo-Christian society, (whatever that may mean to any person or any people), we'd like to visit a couple of ayaat before we begin to try to open up this subject of what you may call a part of Muslim history and a part of Christian history. Allah says (and we think we mentioned this previously), this is in Surah Hud

Had Allah decreed it He would have rendered all the people that we see one Ummah... (Surah Hud verse 118)

Many people read this ayah and because we read it with a very weak intellect we don't pick up on the refined meaning of this ayah. Allah didn't say wa law sha'a Rabbuka la khalaqa an naas ummatan wahidah or had Allah decreed He would have created people as one Ummah. There's a difference between khalaqa and ja'ala. The difference is when Allah creates something in a certain fashion it is subject to the laws of physical creation. If Allah had said khalaqa that means by the very nature of peoples creation they would have been one Ummah but He didn't say that. He said

If Allah had willed it His involvement in our lives would have been such that we would have become one Ummah... (Surah Hud verse 118)

Allah is involved in what we do. This is an area that pot many people concentrate their minds on. Allah is involved in what we do. So His involvement in what we do, had He willed it, it would have meant we would have been one Ummah which means Allah's involvement in what we do is in such a way that we are not one Ummah! People in this world are not one Ummah.

They, meaning people, will continue to be at odds with each other except for he or those who Allah has endowed with His mercy and that is why Allah created them… (Surah Hud verse 119)

So if we merge one ayah into the other we realize our conformity to Allah is done regardless of our differences (or) in spite of our differences because of the way we act, because of the way we behave, because of the way we socialize, because of the way we carry on. The nature of this makes us into different (or) a variety of people.

… and even if He were to render them one Ummah (or) one conglomerate of people they still would have had their differences … (Surah Hud verse 119)

Even when Allah becomes involved in our will we are still going to be at odds with each other.

… except for He who Allah has graced and it is for that purpose that Allah created them… (Surah Hud verse 119)

You see- at the beginning of the ayah la ja'ala and at the end of the ayah khalaqahum. Allah didn't say wa li dhalika ja'alahum. It is for this purpose that Allah has created us. He created us with differences. Can we come and settle on this fact as is outlined in this ayah. From day number one we have to concede, per the meaning of this ayah and per the nature of things, that we are going to be different.

There are other ayaat, (we'll just choose the shortest ayah).

Had Allah willed it He would have rendered you … (Surah Al Maa'idah verse 48)

Rendered is different from created. Created is khalaqa, ja'ala is rendered. Created is exclusively Allah's work, ja'ala is Allah's work in addition to our work together.

… rather Allah's will is to test you with what He has given you; compete then in doing al khayraat and to Allah is the return of all of you together so He's going to at that time when we return to Him, appraise us (or) inform us of the affairs on which we differed. (Surah Al Maa'idah verse 48)

OK. There's so many ayaat here (and) we're going to, for the nature of the day and for the sake of time, skip that.

We're speaking about people. Remember in these ayaat Allah's speaking about humanity, different societies, different communities, different cultures, civilizations- past, present (and) future. The whole range of it. Out of all of this we're going to take two. We're going to take those who say "they are Muslims" and we're going to take those who say "they are Christians." If we take a look at the differences that exist between these two blocks of people we'll find in the Bible references to "the God of Israel" or "the Lord of Israel." That's what we'll find. When we come to the Qur'an we will find a reference to

… The God of the worlds" or "the Lord of the different milieus" or "the Sustainer of all the habitats. (Surah Al Fatihah verse 1)

This is some of the meaning of Rabb al alamin. Everyone who if you perform your salah you say this. No one says Alhamdulillahi Rabb Muhammad or Alhamdulillahi Rabb Ibrahim as you will find many times in the Bible- "the God of Israel" "the God of Israel". This is one of these areas that begins to become an area of difference (or) something that were are living with. Rabb al aalamin is mentioned in the Qur'an forty two times. It's not only in the Fatihah that you read. (If) you trail it in the Qur'an there's an emphasis on Allah being an inclusive Sustainer. Then you'll see Rabb An Naas, you'll see Rabb As Samawaati wa al ard wa ma baynahuma, you'll see Rabb kulli shay, So we begin to detect that there is a specific type of God as understood by many; not everyone who's in the Judeo-Christian context is like that but many are. That we compare and contrast with what we have. We have Rabb al aalamin, RabbAn Naas, Rabb As Samawaati wa al ard wa ma baynahuma, Rabb kulli shay. So there's two different type of mentalities that begin to develop here. (There's) a difference between these two and all of this is instilled in a small Surah that we think every thinking Muslim has memorised.

Say: It is He, Allah, the Singular, the Unique; the Independent, the In-defatigueable, Who has not given physical birth and Who has not received physical birth; And Who is not matched by anything or anyone, and is not similar to anything or anyone. (Surah Ikhlaas)

Now we just take a step back to pre-Judeo-Christian times and we find that we have a Europe, (Europe has a lot of influence in the world in history and today- that had a concept, actually it's a Greek concept), that there are Gods out there. There's the god of thunder, there's the god of the ocean, there's a god of the sun, (there's) the god of the Sun, the god of "beauty" and different types of Gods. They had in the assembly of god or where these gods meet (or) where these gods meet. It's called the pantheon, all inclusive. You say pan (or) pan-American, etc. It's a word that's used (and) in this context and in this case pantheon. Theo means divinity (or) the gods- the inclusiveness or the coming together of the God's. This was before Judeo-Christian history. Then you have the gods that you are familiar with. There is those who have these names: Zeus, Jupiter, Neptune and then you have Mount Olympia, (this is in their history). We're not creating anything, we're just reading history. Then you have Mount Olympus where one of these gods used to come and play with his children in the plane of Olympia, From that up until today we have the Olympics. When the gods used to play and compete in the plain of Olympia competition has carried over and live on after Judeo-Christian came to the Bible humanity and still exists today. So you have Apollo, you have Neptune, you have Jupiter; even into the sciences they say "they have purged themselves of paganism, of mythology of pre-Biblical times"; well why do we have heavenly bodies in the solar system, why do we have Neptune and why do we have Jupiter when these were the labels of the gods that existed prior to the Torah and the Injeel? Why do they still exist? It's an area probably not many people want to think about and obviously the way the information system is run they give you an area to think in and this type of area is off limits. They don't want people really to dwell on what exists today compared to what existed in their type of jahiliyah, (so to speak), and then to compare all of that with Islam and the Muslims. And similar concepts in history existed among Indians, Egyptians, Babylonians and all of this. They all had something in common that you begin to think why did they understand that and we don't understand it today? When they designated something as a god that god was related to power. A certain god has power of nature, over thunder, over the oceans. You see in some of their imagery that god that's condemned to the bottom of the sea. He has a pitchfork, he has this long white beard and he's condemned to live there at the bottom of the sea! He's a god! That imagery still exists today.

Now we go back to the ayah

If Allah had willed it He would have rendered you as one Ummah... (Surah Hud verse 118)

Now we come to us, the Muslims and we take a look, (just like we did right now (when) we looked at a brief pre-Biblical history of those who call themselves Judeo-Christians), at what existed in our pre-Qur'anic and pre-Muhammadi history. We also had idols and configurations that are supposed to refer to god. It is said in our history that there is a person by the name of Amr ibn Nuhay, who went to Ma'ab or Mo'ab (in some of the religious literature out there), and he saw people who were showing reverence, (we don't want to use the word worship- that's what everyone says), to idols. Ma'ab is in today's geography Jordan. This person, Amr ibn Nuhay, went from Hejaz to Jordan and he was impressed by what he saw so he took some of these idols to Makkah. So we who belong to Islamic history (and) Qur'anic history (and) Muhammadi history had this major idol called Hubal. In some of the Semitic languages the word Hubal is an Arabisation of Habal or Haba'l meaning the. In Hebrew ha is equivalent to al in Arabic and ba'l is like saying master or the alpha. In today's language the alpha-man or the alpha-person. So Hubal is the alpha (or) the major embodiment of a deity and Hubal was placed inside the Ka'bah. Then the Qur'an tells us about other configurations that were revered by these Arabians- Nasr, Wud, Suwa', Yaghuth and Ya'ub. We want you to remember (that) we mentioned just previously in the Judeo-Euro context Jupiter, Apollo, Neptune, Zeus and these other gods. Those words live today. Whether it's through Hollywood or whether it's through academia, you still encounter these words. They're alive. Whether they're in planets, whether they're part of the solar system or whether they are some type of name used to market a product or whatever- they're still around, they're still alive. Then we had in our history before the Qur'an and before the Prophet Al Lat, Al Uzza and Al Manah. These were the three female gods in that type of religious atmosphere. But we ask you today- do you find these names any where around in the Islamic context or in the world just like you'll find these other names- Jupiter, Apollo, Neptune, the gods old (or) the gods of paganism- around? The Judeo-Christian context could not filter out its mythology and it's un-Biblical past. It still exists. The Muslims were successful, (at least, in this area), in purging that past and not polluting it with their current language. It doesn't exist. Have you ever heard of, (let's say), a product called Hubal? Have you ever heard of a planet that Muslims refer to as Al Lat or Al Uzza? It doesn't exist! This is an area in which we differ. We, meaning Muslims on one side (and) Christians on the other side, have our distance. Even though the Arabians had these types of gods were very primitive. It is reported that a simple Arabian would construct a little idol made of the palm dates that you eat and ask the idol for something or swear in front of this idol and then if he's not satisfied with the idol he'd just eat it. That's as primitive and as simple as these people were when it came to what to define as sanam or wathn. This also comes out sometimes- people ask "we hear these two words- there's the word sanam and there's the word wathn." As sanam is an embodiment, personification or characterisation of a god that resembles a man or an animal; that is called sanam. If in the Ka'bah or around the Ka'bah there were these idols and they had faces or they had a shape of a creature from the animal kingdom it's called sanam and it was revered (and) it was worshipped. Then there is wathn. Wathn is something that is revered and worshipped but doesn't have the imagery of a human being or animal. It could be made out of wood, it could be made out of stone or whatever. Just a rock! Someone could say "this is a holy rock. Let's pray right here and ask the rock for something." That's called a wathn. But when Allah revealed this Qur'an all of that was swept away. Finally when the Muslims entered the Ka'bah (and) liberated Makkah, they destroyed these images of powers. You see- this is what sometimes baffles the mind when you give this area a thought- some of these ancient people thousands of years ago understood that a god and power go together. In today's world when we speak, even we the Muslims, (whatever we did right we pat ourselves on the shoulder and say "fine, we did that right", and whatever we did wrong we should be critical of it and point it out), speak about a deity or a divinity (or) about a God we don't associate that God with power?! It's like He is a powerless God?! How come? We should learn from human history. When people wanted to define a god they defined a god with power. That's how a God becomes a God- because He has extraordinary, exceptional power. But today we say Allah as if Allah has no power. What happened to us?

If Allah had willed it He would have rendered you as one Ummah... (Surah Hud verse 118)

Committed brothers and sisters…

We hesitate to say, but the truth has to be spelled out, that we the Muslims with our mixed history winding up today as we are- you can look at us and see what has happened to us. Why are we where we are today? What happened? The simple fact of the matter is what happens when you withdraw your mind from Allah when He is speaking to you is what happened. We have gone off on tangents. Let us tell you (that) around this ayah

If Allah had willed it He would have rendered you as one Ummah; but people will continue to be at odds with each other except for he or those who Allah has endowed with His mercy and that is why Allah created them… (Surah Hud verse 118-119)

This ayah makes room for differences (but) look what happens when our minds are outside of the communication area that comes to us from Allah. You have some Muslims who want basically to make (believe) everyone in the world (is) a Muslim. You have those types of people. As if there is no difference between Muslims and those who worship and conform to anything and everything except Allah. You know- there are differences. "There are differences?! What are you talking about?" These differences don't mean that we become hostile to those we differ with. There are differences and to be friendly with someone else you don't need to say there's no difference. You can be friendly with others emphasizing the differences. But when our minds are absent this is what happens. That's one extreme. The other extreme is an extreme that makes these differences a matter of hostilities and wars. The first category with no difference want everyone to be one happy family and the others want even one family that's made up of five members to be enemies of each other. One of them are so inclusive that they spoil Islam and the others are so exclusive that they spoil Islam. Let's take the two extremes and lets be practical here- the first one (says) "oh- everything is fine and dandy and we're one family and all that" i.e. the Baha'is went off on that tangent. The others (say) "no one is a Muslim" practically except the person speaking i.e. the Wahabis. One extreme and the other extreme! This is what we have and when these types of things begin to grow they do so because we are conditioned from these Masajid to absent our minds. When we enter the Masjid (its) "close your mind" or someone had some type of monopoly on explaining to you what Allah and His Prophet are saying to you. You're not supposed to think. This is where we are. Some people ask "why are we where we are?" This is it. This has many answers and one answer to it is what you just heard.

This khutbah was presented by Imam Muhammad Asi on the occasion of Jum'ah on 6 December 2013 on the sidewalk of Embassy Row 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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