Bismillah wa -Alhamdulillah wa Salaatu wa Salaam ‘alaa Rasulillah ‘amma ba’d
The Noble Shaykh Muhammad ‘Awaaji al-Madkhalee (May Allah Preserve Him) from the mashaayikh of Jeezan, Saudi Arabia delivered a LIVE tele-lecture with Muwahhideen Publications on Saturday 13th September 2014. The Shaykh is a student of Shaykh Ahmad an-Najmi (rahimahullah) andShaykh Zayd al-Madkhalee. He is a teacher at the Salafi Institute in Jeezan, and is recommended by Shaykh Fawaaz al-Madkhalee, Shaykh Zayd al-Madkhalee and others.
This lecture event was translated LIVE into English.
• This lecture is based on the aayaah:
“So, when they forgot (the warning) with which they had been reminded, We opened to them the gates of every (pleasant) thing, until in the midst of their enjoyment in that which they were given, all of a sudden, We took them to punishment, and lo! They were plunged into destruction with deep regrets and sorrows.” [al-An’aam 6:44]
• When the people of Eemaan hear this verse their skin trembles out of fear because they are living and enjoying the blessings of Allah and they do not know if they have truly thanked Allah for those blessings. So we fear that this aayah might apply to us for not giving thanks for those blessings bestowed upon us.
• Istidraaj refers to when Allah continuously bestows blessings upon a person in order to lead them further into sins due to them not being thankful. Allah performs this action to whomever He wants, whenever He wants and the worse type is that which incurs Allah’s anger. This is when the person does something to incur the anger of Allah, despite the fact that He is the One Who brought him to life and He is the One who will cause him to die.
• The greatest type of Istidraaj is a person falling into shirk, which is without doubt the greatest of all sins. Allah continuously pours out blessings upon His servant to the extent that he cannot enumerate them, yet he takes these blessings and uses them for the purpose of other than pleasing Allah.
• “So, when they forgot (the warning) with which they had been reminded” – evidence that Allah has established the burden of proof and clarified the message to the creation but some were caused to forget the message due to their own sins.
• Allah punishes His servant with whatever He wishes and He has a great wisdom in doing that. The greatest punishment is causing the heart of the servant to be negligent and forgetful of the remembrance of its Lord. Allahpours out His blessings upon His servants and despite that many of them are forgetful of these blessings and they do not remember their Lord so they live in a state of heedlessness, just like an animal. O my blessed brother, you should know that if a person falls into a state such as this, he has fallen into the greatest and worst type of Istidraaj.
• How does a Muslim know if the blessings he is enjoying is actually Istidraaj? The answer: If a person uses the blessings of Allah to worship and be obedient to Him and to do what is permissible, then he is giving thanks for the blessings of Allah. However, if he uses these blessings for other than worshipping Allah and they distract him from the remembrance of his Lord, then he should know that these blessings are Istidraaj.
• Just as Istidraaj is a punishment that befalls some individuals, it likewise befalls groups of people and can in fact befall the entire Muslim nation. This is the case if they busy themselves with the blessings that they have been given and in doing so they forget their Lord and do not practice the Sunnahof His Messenger (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) and they do not practice the Divine Law that Allah has revealed for them to make the source of ruling.Allah says:
“Such is the Seizure of your Lord when He seizes the (population of) towns while they are doing wrong. Verily, His Seizure is painful, and severe.” [Soorah Hood 11:102]
• Allah does not punish these nations, villages and groups of people when they initially start committing these sins. Rather, if they continually engage in sin and fail to command the good and forbid the evil, this is when Allahpunishes them as a group.
• Allah informed us about the conditions of the nations of the past and what happened with the Prophets and Messengers He sent. Allah clarified the proofs and showed them the right way and sent to them Prophets and Messengers who came with miracles. But these miracles increased them in nothing but arrogance and turning away from their Lord. Thus, Allah seized them with a painful punishment. This was the case with the people of Nooh, Hood, Saalih, Shu’ayb, Moosaa, Ibraaheem and many other nations to whom Allah sent Prophets and Messengers.
• The Prophet (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) clarified that the servant would be in a condition where Allah gives him plenty of time and does not punish him hastily. Rather, He gives him health and well-being and continues to give him an opportunity to repent from his sins and seek forgiveness.
• It is found in a Hadeeth Qudsi that the Prophet (sallAllah ‘alayhi wa sallam) said that Allah said: “I am according to the servant’s opinion of Me. If he mentions me to himself, I will mention him to Myself and if he mentions Me in a gathering, I will mention him in a gathering better than it.”
• In another hadeeth, the Prophet (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) said: “Allahextends His Hand out at night in order to accept the repentance of the one who sinned by day. And He extends His Hand out during the day in order to accept the repentance of the one who sinned by night, and He continues to do this until the sun rises from the West.”
Allah (Subhaanahu wa Ta’aalaa) says:
“And nothing prevents men from believing, now when the guidance has come to them, and from asking Forgiveness of their Lord, except that the ways of the ancients be repeated with them (i.e. their destruction decreed by Allah) ,or the torment be brought to them face to face? And We send not the Messengers except as giver of glad tidings and warners. But those who disbelieve, dispute with false argument, in order to refute the truth thereby. And they treat My Aayaat and that with which they are warned, as jest and mockery!”[Soorah al-Kahf 18:55-56]
• The following aayah sums up the topic of Istidraaj and how the people are punished for it:
“And who does more wrong than he who is reminded of the Aayaat of his Lord, but turns away from them forgetting what his hands have sent forth. Truly, We have set veils over their hearts lest they should understand this (the Qur’aan) and in their ears, deafness. And if you (O Muhammad) call them to guidance, even then they will never be guided.” [Soorah al-Kahf 18:57]
• This aayah clarifies that whoever turns away from the remembrance ofAllah will be punished by having a seal placed over his heart such that he will not understand the truth and he will not benefit from his sight or hearing.
“And these towns (population, ‘Aad, Thamood, etc.) We destroyed when they did wrong. And We appointed a fixed time for their destruction.” [Soorah al-Kahf 18:59]
• Allah destroyed them only after giving them ample time to repent from their sins, but they did not benefit from this time.
• There is a question I would like you all to pay close attention to, may Allahbless you: Is everyone who commits a sin fallen into Istidraaj of Allah?
• The answer: The human being will fall into sins and no person is safe from falling into sin. However, the sins we commit are not a form of Istidraaj until the person continues doing the sin and fails to repent from it.
• For this reason, Allah commands the human being to repent sincerely because He knows the human beings are going to commit sins. So it is obligatory upon us to fear the punishment of Istidraaj.
Allah says in His Book:
“Did they then feel secure against the Plan of Allah. None feels secure from the Plan of Allah except the people who are the losers.” [Soorah al-A’raaf 7:99]
“Draws near for mankind their reckoning, while they turn away in heedlessness. Comes not unto them an admonition (a chapter of the Qur’aan) from their Lord as a recent revelation but they listen to it while they play, With their hearts occupied (with evil things) those who do wrong, conceal their private counsels, (saying): ‘Is this (Muhammad) more than a human being like you? Will you submit to magic while you see it?’” [Soorah al-Anbiyaa` 21:1-3]
• It is obligatory upon us all to beware of the punishment of Allah and strive against our own selves such that whenever we fall into some sin we hasten to return to Allah and repent to Him. We should frequently make du’aaasking Allah to prevent us from doing anything that will incur His anger.
• If a person is to continually perform righteous deeds and is sincere in doing them only for the Pleasure of Allah and follows the Sunnah of the Messenger (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) in doing those deeds and asks his Lord for firmness upon His Deen, Allah will make easy his affair and expand this chest and guide him to all that is good.
• Let us take for example one of the many blessings Allah has given all of us, one of those physical blessings Allah has given us in our bodies. Do we use this blessing in order to obey our Lord such that we give thanks for this blessing as we should or do we use this blessing in order to disobey our Lord?
• This is the blessing of sight. If we use our sight to look at what is around us, we see the roads that we are walking on and we look at what we need to around us to keep ourselves safe, then we have used that blessing properly. And likewise if we guard our sight and lower our gaze from looking at anything Allah has prohibited. If we use our eyes to cry out of fear for Allahand we look at those beautiful things Allah has created and think about their beauty and tie that back to the Power and Omnipotence of our Creator, then and only then have we given thanks for this blessing of sight.
• On the other hand, if we use the blessing of sight to look at things that are prohibited such as looking at women who are not our relatives, looking at the private parts of the Muslims and entering into places that we are not permitted to enter into or looking at prohibited books such as the books of magic and other than that, in this case we have used the blessing of sight for other than what Allah has allowed us to use it for and thus we would be committing a sin. And we should fear in such a situation. We should fear that by using this blessing of sight and looking at things that are prohibited that we are incurring Allah’s anger upon ourselves.
• We ask Allah Al-‘Adheem, Rabbul ‘Arsh al-‘Adheem to make us amongst those who worship Him upon clarity and who implement theSunnah of His Messenger (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) and we ask Him not to make us of those who use His blessings to incur His anger by way ofIstidraaj. And we ask Him to grant us life and keep us all upon the Deen ofIslaam and upon the Sunnah of His Messenger as long as we live and to die upon them as well.
• We should not forget our brothers around the world who are being oppressed when we are making du’aa. We should ask Allah to rectify their affairs, to strengthen their weaknesses and to raise from amongst them people who will govern by the rule of Allah in their lands.
• We should spread the Deen of Islaam by our good character, by the good treatment of others and by being patient; this is something that we have been commanded by Allah to do. The Prophet (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) said: “By Allah, if Allah guides one man because of you, it would be better for you than the red camel.”
• We should also take a firm position in warning against the errors that take place at the hands of some of those who attribute themselves to Islaam from the deviant sects who are far away from the true teachings of Islaam such as ISIS, Ikhwaan al-Muslimeen, Jamaa’ah at-Tableegh and other than them from the deviant groups. These groups are ruining the reputation of Islaamin the non-Muslims countries. When the non-Muslims see their faulty actions they think that all of the Muslims believe and act as they do.
• Spread the Sunnah of the Prophet (sallAllahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) and teach it to the people and be patient with them and treat the people kindly in order to guide them.
Click here to Download / Listen
[audio https://salafiaudio.files.wordpress.com/2015/11/in-the-midst-of-their-enjoyment-they-were-plunged-into-destruction-shaykh-muhammad-awaaji-al-muhjari.mp3]
Wa Billahi Tawfeeq
Wa SallAllahu wa Sallaama wa Barak ‘alaa Nabiyanna Muhammad wa ‘alaa ‘Alyhi wa Sahbyhi wa Sallam
Also Read :
- How our Prophet thanked Allaah, and how Dawud thanked Allaah – Tafseer Ibn Kathir
- Oh Musa, Now you have Showed Gratitude – Imam Ibn Rajab
- Truely thanking Allah – Shaykh Ahmad Fareed
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