THE STREET MIMBAR – Khutbah (18 November 2005)
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They want to extinguish the light of ALLAH with their mouths but ALLAH will complete and perfect HIS light, it doesn’t matter how averse the kaafirs and the mushriks are there-to 	
Bismillah Ar-Rahmaan Ar-Raheem. 
Alhumdulillah. Peace and blessings on Muhammad, his Noble Companions and Family. 

Brothers and Sisters of the Islamic way

Allah speaks to us through the Qur’an, a book that cannot be approached by any fault from any direction, hence, a book in which there is no doubt. In this book, Allah told us
Behold, you have in Allahs messenger (peace be upon him), a prototype, someone whom you can adopt as your role model,
But, for whom?
For those who are intent on wanting Allah and the final day, and
In whose conscience Allah is embedded.  (Surah Ahzab verse 21)

Since we are in the reference of the Qur’an, these guiding words from Allah are directed to us. There is no space for indifference here. If we claim to be Muslims in the footsteps of Allahs messenger (peace be upon him), it is binding on us that we endorse his character as well as his will and determination, and not just his cosmetic features.

The issues, I in a humble way want to explain is the essence or the meanings of the five pillars of Islam…

When we state our article of faith: 
ASH HADU AN LA ILAHA ILLALAH WA ASH HADU ANNA MUHAMMEDAN ABDUHU WA RASULUH
The practical meaning of that is that we have liberated our mind and our conscience (in theory at least) from those powers that want to enslave the mind and pollute the conscience. The muslims article of faith begins with a denial. The word “la” which is the first word uttered by any muslim as a break with the prevailing anti-Islamic condition and circumstances. It is not a theoretical vote of no confidence in an anti/un-islamic status quo, it is a word that follows the attitude and intention to destroy mans will in an anti/un-islamic status quo and replace it with Allahs will. But these days, people interpret La Ilaha Illalah as an automatic and in some cases a free ticket to Al-Jannah just by verbalising it, and it doesn’t matter what happens after that.

Allah says:
Do people figure that they will be left at ease if they say We believe, and they will not be tested? Lo, we tested those before you, so that We may know those who are sincerely committed from those who are phoney. (Surah Al-Ankabut verse 2-3)

Imaan is not a matter of lip-service or a wishy-washy mentality, it is that which settles in the heart and then, it is verified by work and labour and deeds.
When we make this statement, we attempt to break-away from the structures of kufr and shirk as manifested in the form of the UN, Governmental Structures, NATO, The World Bank, The International Monetary Fund, etc. Make no mistake brothers and sisters, the mushriks and kaafirs from the time of Allahs Prophet are still around. The only things that have changed are the names and the faces. Todays mushriks are not only those who say Allah has a son, or those who are simply pagans. Todays, mushriks are sitting in the corridors of power and they are claiming sovereignty over Allah’s earth and legislating all sorts of things which makes the halaal- haraam and the haraam- halaal. Others want to solicit the help of the kaafir to have a piece of Allahs will legislated. Not only is the drive to have what has become known as Muslim Personal Law against the Seerah of the Prophet (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam), but by going to solicit the help of the kaafir it goes into the sphere of committing shirk. Allah says,
And praise be to Allah who did not beget a son, And who has no rival or partner in the sphere of sovereignty or dominion, And who is not so weak so as to solicit assistance, And magnify your Lord  (Surah Isra verse 111)

In other ayaat. Allah says:
And the decision is for Allah only  (Surah An’am verse 57)
and
And Allah has no rival or competitor in regards to legislating or Allah is the sole legislator. (Surah Kahf verse 26)

This should be a clarion call to all Muslims to ensure that they do not contradict their verbalisation of the shahadah by furthering the usurpation of Allah’s attributes of being Sovereign and being the sole legislator.
 
When Allah orders us to perform salaah, He doesn’t say to us “pray”. You read the Qur’an, we all read the Qur’an, has anyone seen a direct order from Allah saying to us “pray- Sallu”? In the overwhelming majority of ayaat about salaah, He says: AQI MUS SALAAH
Make your salaah tangible, construct it.
Practical, that’s what our salaah is supposed to be. But today, Salaah has become a habit that doesn’t carry with it an obvious standard of life- we say one thing in our salaah, and we come out and life strikes us with the opposite direction because the standard of life is not the salaah.
Proclaim what has been revealed and Establish Salaah, verily salaah is a barrier against committing the fahsha ie. Great sins and the munkar, shirk, dhulm etc. and have Allah embedded in your conscience is greater in preventing the fahsha and the munkar. (Surah Ankabut verse 45)

In the Qur’an, Allah says:
Condemnation on those who offer their salaah, but are neglectful of its time and who are seen praying, but are neglectful of the duties that come with this salaah.  (Surah Ma’un verses 3 to 6)
In Egypt, if Mubarak makes salaah at the Azhar, its front page news, but they’ll not report the maasacres of the government on the mujahidin who are fighting for Allahs word to be supreme. The cameras are ever rolling with the presence of the Saudi Royals in the Haramain, yet you have starving populations in close proximity to this oil rich land- in Africa and South east and Central Asia.

In a hadith, the Prophet (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam) says,
Whoevers salaah does not prevent him from the fahsha, evil acts such as immorality, oppression etc., that salaah only drives him further away from Allah
Or in another rendition of the hadith
Whoevers salaah does not prevent him from the fahsha, evil acts such as immorality, oppression etc., he has no salaah.

Further, if we were to look at the life of Abdullah ibn Ubay ibn Sallul, who was the chief of the hypocrites in Medinah, he was a person who used to read Fajr salaah in the front saff behind Rasulillah (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam). But that did not disguise his reality. His reality was that he was a hypocrite because he verbalised his commitment to Allah and His Prophet (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam) but his agenda was to the construction of kufr.

Another incident occurred during the time of Allahs representative on Earth- Khalif Umar (radiallahu anhu), when a person came to him and requested to further the case of another person for a certain post. So, Umar (radiallahu anhu), who understood this deen, because he was a close student and companion of Rasulillah (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam) asked him three questions:
1.	Have you dealt with this person?
2.	Have you travelled with this person?
3.	Have you lived with this person? 
This person replied no on each occasion, To which Umar (radiallahu anhu) said to him, you’ve probably just seen this person go in and out of the masjid, but you don’t know him.

When Allah tells us to give of what we have, He makes sure that this becomes an institution in life. But Zakaah has been reduced to individual acts of charity. There’s no “Iqamah of salaah”, and no “It’a of zakaah.” Yeh, there are persons who pray and there are persons who spend of what they have, but these are individuals, and we no longer have the “Iqamah” and we no longer have the “Ita”.

An incident in the time of Abu Bakr (radiallahu anhu) comes to mind, when people during his reign as Khalifa- as Allahs representative on Earth, refused to pay the zakaah. He waged war on them, not withstanding that they were praying, fasting, verbalising their shahaadah etc. Why? Because he knew that their act of not paying the zakaah to the Islamic state was an act of treachery against Allah, which would undermine Islamic rule. He therefore forced them to subdue themselves to Allah.

When Allah tells us to observe the month of Ramadaan, He wants us to gain the pre-requisite of Taqwa, which is not some evasive spiritual quality. It is a practical behaviour that is supposed to be noticed and detected by everyone that is around. Yet, Ramadaan comes and goes, and there’s no trace of Taqwa around. Has anyone observed that Ramadaan has anchored a consciousness of Allahs power, and a behaviour that conforms to Allahs power? 
O You, who are committed to Allah, fasting has been declared a mandatory service upon you as it has been on those before you so that you may take heed of Allah, so that your awareness of Allah will become a barrier to the punishment and the penalty of Allah (Surah Baqara verse183)

In another ayah, Allah says
See to it that justice is done even if it be a person who is related to you.  (Surah An'am verse 152)
In yet another ayah Allah’s words
Let not bad feelings towards a people make you regress from justice, or let not these bad feelings superimpose themselves on you to the detriment of justice. Do; maintain justice because it is a forthcoming of taqwa, because it is near to taqwa, because it is the closest in proximity to taqwa. (Surah Maida verse 8)

In another ayah Allah speaks about His communication with man via His Apostles and Messengers saying 
We have commissioned our emissaries with clear evidence and along with that we have fortified them with scripture and criteria 
(and then what)
 so that equity becomes norm of life among people. (Surah Al-Hadid verse 25)

But these meanings do not belong on pages; they belong in peoples lives. If you take the way life is conducted around us, do you see any semblance of justice in it? We can point to many violations of justice- we can point to moral violations of justice, there are social violations of justice, there are also economic injustices that we may refer to. And, everyone speaks about peace, stability and prosperity. Well don’t we want justice? Why is this word avoided? Sometimes it is slipped in, but it doesn’t figure centrally in their statements. Now, the kaafir media is distorting reality and we even have some Muslims who want to silence other Muslims from shedding light on the truth that the whole world is crying out for, by abusing the power they think they have. Why? But to whom do these speak? Yes, administer justice because it is in close proximity to taqwa. 

It catches our attention that in another ayah in the same surah Allah says:
Fighting has been made a mandatory service upon you (Surah Baqara verse 216)
The same choice of words was used:
Fighting has been made a mandatory service upon you and  fasting has been declared a mandatory service upon you
Both of these have been made compulsory or as an obligation upon you.
In the second instance, for what reason, fasting has been placed as a mandatory, a fardh upon you, so that you may gain this taqwa. This taqwa that was referred to in the earlier ayah as being the most in close proximity to justice. That quality of Taqwa, that stands as a barrier between anyone whose observing this fast and whatever shaytaan has to offer of indulgence, attractions, pitfalls and what the carnal desires of man always gravitate towards.

Allah’s guiding words:
Ramadaan is the month in which the Qur’an was caused to descend as a matter of guidance and as a criteria. Those of you who are present in this month should fast it, those who are ill or travelling should make up by an equivalent amount of days later on. Allah wills ease for you and does not will to burden you.  (Surah Baqara verse 185)

These sequence of ayaat on fasting have the potential of developing a crystallised human being in our behaviour, our feelings and our thoughts. There are people who are fasting today in the physical sense of the word, they withhold consumption of food, liquids and the partaking of sex during the daylight hours. That is the outward manifestation of the fast, but there is a significant expression of fasting, and that is that our internal thoughts and feelings are moulded to conform to the standards of Allah. 
The Prophet of Allah (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam) to this effect said
Whoever does not abstain from false statements, and false actions during any time of fasting, then Allah has no need for this person to abstain from food and from drink.
So, it is the parting in our feelings, our hearts, deep down inside of our mind and our psychology with false expressions, whether they are verbal, or whether they are physical. If we don’t part with these false expressions then Allah doesn’t mind if we are parting from the food and the water that is available to us. This is the area that has to be worked on during Ramadaan, so that everything any Muslim says and does will not reflect any tendency towards whatever is false, untrue, artificial and not substantial. Now, take this criteria and look at the multitudes of people that are fasting in this month. Probably the overwhelming majority of us fast at least in the outward physical sense. But are we doing it in the prescribed sense, not in the mechanical qualifications of fasting, but in the more intrinsic meanings of fasting. Are we meeting that qualification and that standard?

During Ramadaan, when we are abstaining from a couple of meals a day, we should notice that there are people in this world who don’t have any meals during the course of the year. To them, if they happen to be Muslims, Ramadaan in the physical sense is no challenge at all, because, most of the time they find themselves denied of the food and the nutrients that to many of us are available. What is the meaning of fasting as far as Muslims who are stashed? Ramadaan comes and goes, and we don’t see a very significant amount of resources given to these people who are in need. So those of us who embarked on this regimental course of Ramadaan and then do not gain a sense of proximity to justice, we haven’t gained very much from our fasting. The purpose of this is taqwa, the common ground between fasting and doing justice and not some type of physical torture and then some type of ingestinal indulgence at the end of the day. If Ramadaan didn’t bring about an awareness and a consciousness of these facts, then it was a mechanical and a physical Ramadaan. What is intended of Ramadaan is not a mechanical and a physical Ramadaan, even though obviously abstainance from food and drink is part of the process, but that is not all of the process and that is not the objective of fasting.

Allah Exalted and Almighty says:
And if my subjects and servants question you concerning me, I indeed am near to them, I respond to those who solicit me, so they should call upon me, so that they may reach a level of maturity and understanding.  (Surah Baqara verse 186)

This ayah in the context of the Qur’an has been placed almost in the dead centre between the ayaat which speak about fasting. In the middle of this discourse on Ramadaan, and fasting, Allah presents us with this particular ayah, where-in He is saying “If my servants query you concerning me, then I am near to them. How many moments in life does a person contemplate the idea that “Where is God? If there is a God, he would have responded to me! If there was a God, he would have shown more compassion to us! If there was a God, he would have acted in a more forthcoming manner!” These are questions that cross the minds of individuals, whether they are Muslim or whether they are not Muslims. If we take a look at the individual position of a Muslim or whether we take a look at the broad existence of 1,6billion Muslims in the world, whatever condition we are looking at, sometimes the question knocks on our minds, “Why are we left up to this plight or this predicament? Why doesn’t Allah come to help us when we are encountering hard times as an individual, as a family, as a community, as a society, as a congregation, as a collective presence in this world?” There are many times when this question entertains our feelings. Look at the plight of the Muslims in the Balkans, in the Caucuses, in North Africa, in the Nile valley, in the Middle East, in Central Asia. It’s only a thinking mind that will pose the question “If we are so obedient to Allah, then why isn’t Allah here?” And Allah responds to this question, not when our stomach is full, Allah doesn’t respond to this question when we are the object of class materialism, Allah responds to this question when we are ready to receive his response, and Allah knew that if we were observing Ramadaan correctly we would be ready for his answer. For those who persist in posing this type of question when they look at the condition of the Muslim, the Prophet (sallalahu alaihi wa sallam) explained when Allah is responding, when He is nearby and when He is at a close proximity.
You will indeed make the ma’ruf the legal order in life, and you will indeed make the munkar illegitimate and illegal in life, or, you will call upon Allah and He will not respond to you.
Now, do you understand why at times we wonder where is Allah. Do we want Allah to respond without us doing our bit to get Him involved? And, for those that are involved, the response of Allah doesn’t necessarily mean a detectable response, or something that we will immediately notice with our senses. If we say that we want the oppressive powers to expire, how do you think that is going to happen? Is it going to come about in an action similar to Moosa, when Pharoah was trailing him and the sea parted and then Pharoah and his administration drowned? Or is the response going to be that Allah will approach these types of dictators in His own way and in proportion to our involvement? We are sure and we are confident that Allah is responding to the Muslims within depressed conditions. He’s not responding to some idle Muslim who is withdrawn from reality, who is isolated from other Muslims, and who is cut-off from current events, much less those who claim to be Muslim but who are involved on the other side of the issue, and who are participating in trying to undermine this growing and vital and vibrating reality that emerges from those committed Muslims who are steeped in Ramadaan, schooled in Ramadaan, and dedicated to this course of Ramadaan, and who listen to Allah. So we understand from this,  that our brothers and sisters who observed the month of Ramadaan where there is pressure placed upon them and who are living in the mountains where there is snow and where physical conditions are life threatening, and not only that, where there is a military regime at work against them- they were fasting Ramadaan, and they experienced FA INNI QARIB. Our complementation of theirs is that we stand in a position that will represent their cause, that is on cause to Allah – FI SABI LILLAH. With this, we make this connection between us and the rest of those whose future by Allahs promise is theirs.
Allah has promised those who are committed to Him and who do As-Salihaat, ie who do his will on Earth.  (Surah Nur verse 55)
If you are in that position, you receive Allah’s promise. What is His will? And what is His promise?

His will is :
Lo, I am about to place on earth my deputy.  (SurahBaqara verse 30)
Allah didn’t say Inni Jaal ilun fil ardi musalliyaat or muzakkun or Hajji. Simply because, being Allahs deputy incorporates these along with other obligations- obligations which people conveniently neglect. 
In another ayah, Allah says:
Allah created mankind and jinn only so that they may conform or adapt or agree to Me.  (Surah Zariyat verse 66)
The word word ya’bud for the word worship is so meaningless, it takes away the active component and almost automatically triggers the elemant of ritualism. The closest we can come to the word ya’bud is we conform or we agree or we adapt to Allah. Which is why, even when we walk and eat, if we conform to Allah, it is considered ibaadah. We can worship Allah for a few minutes a day in the masjid, and then we can come out and adapt and conform and agree to everything else, and then we think we’re included in the ayah and we will receive Allahs promise.
His Promise is:
He will have you become the heirs, the inheritors of this World. (Surah Nur verse 55)
This is not a local issue, neither a self-centred issue, this is a universal issue. Allah’s promise is inheritance of World affairs. This is quite an ambition from where some people are to where this statement is taking them.
 
In another ayah on Ramadaan following this ayah, a couple of ayahs beneath it
Through this, cultivation of Taqwa, Allah makes clear to mankind His ayaat, ie. His traces of involvement in human affairs. (Surah Baqara verse 187)
It is a sad comment, that Ramadaan would have come and those that are making decisions for the Muslims will not have gained the privilege of fasting this month of Ramadaan. We ask Allah (SWT) to offer us that privilege by extending ourselves to those in the human condition around us. If, we cannot in any physical sense do so, at least in our thoughts and in our minds. The Prophet of Allah (may Allahs peace and blessings be upon him) says
Fasting is a protection, is a protective layer for this human being.
Is that the case when these decision makers are fasting, and when they make decisions impacting the lives of Muslims? Have they been fasting? How can anyone be fasting, if there is an administration that tells some Muslims they cannot have access to something that belongs to this ummah, like a Masjid or a media resource etc. with no shar’i basis. Is this the meaning of Taqwa? But this is only a small presentation of the large scale policies and decisions that impact the lives of many other Muslims in this world. Remember, when Allah started speaking about Ramadaan he addressed Alladhina Aamanu, and now, He is saying that through Alladhina Aamanu, His ayaat ie. Traces of his Power presence is made known to mankind. If Ramadaan comes and goes and there is no manifestation of Allahs power presence in human affairs, then Ramadaan was, once again, a physical and mechanical Ramadaan.