Friday, February 27, 2015

Lesson of the day 1373

Ayahs of the day:
Heed God, and heed the messenger, and be cautious; if you turn away, know that the only duty of Our messenger is clear communication. [5: 92]

Hadith of the day:
Part of the excellence of a  person's Islam is in leaving alone what does not concern him. [Tirmidhi]

Wise quote of the day:
Keeping the company of those who are intimate with the Divine is the best of affairs. [Sahl bin Abdullah]

Guidance of the day:
Marriage requires patience in treating women with kindness, fulfilling their rights, and providing for them and the children. There is great merit in this, in addition to the merit of being the cause of procreating righteous offspring that will worship God the Exalted, pray for their parents, and ask forgiveness for them during the latter's lifetimes and after their death. Some of the children may die before puberty, which attracts immense reward for the parents.

He who wishes to marry should do so intending it to be of assistance to him in both his religious and worldly affairs, while he who abstains should intend thereby to protect his religion and opt for caution so as to be safe. Thus should both marriage and abstention be according to righteous intention that will draw one nearer to God. God is the One to grant success and assistance, there is no Lord other than He. [Counsels of Religion by Imam al-Haddad]

Food for thought:
War destroys men, but luxury destroys mankind -- at once corrupts the body and mind. We live in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities. A simple and unassuming life is best for everyone, best for both the body and the mind.

Monday, February 23, 2015

Pearls of Wisdom 369

1. How strange is the one who claims to know death's reality and yet can go on enjoying himself heedlessly.

2. How strange is the one who recognizes the evanescence of the world yet longs after it tirelessly.

3. How strange is the one who believes in destiny yet cries over the loss of that which is fleeting.

4. How strange is the one who knows Reckoning to be true and yet goes on hoarding ceaselessly.

5. Silence -- the best remedy for anger.

6. Wanting more when sufficient sustenance and well-being has been given is also a form of complaint.

7. Seek not to burden anyone of God's creature with it be something large or small.

8. null -- Any action undertaken without Allah's pleasure as its goal.

9. This world is merely a way station which Allah has placed on the road of those traveling to Him.

10. Put your hopes in no one except your Lord, have fear of nothing other than your sins.
[Othman radi Allah anhu]

Friday, February 20, 2015

Limitless Praise due to the One and Only (part 2)

Oh Forgiving! Grant a turning away (from the wrong action) to which will undo
what happened in early years.

Increase us in blessing, light and unveiling, and strengthen us in guidance,
with idhn (permission) and secret.

Support us in words and deeds, and make our provision easy for us from
where we know not!

Here are we standing at the door of favor, waiting without hardship for the
Beloved to turn to us.

Swiftly, send us Your ease, oh Answerer, for You are the possessor of
generosity, liberality and goodness.

Your Bounty exists without existence, and Your Generosity pour down on
us, undenied.

Give us success in the thankfulness which is our duty and which itself
calls for increase from You without loss  to us.

Free us from the prison of our bodies and raise us up to the  presence of
the spirits as a reward for our gratitude. [Shaykh Muhammad ibn al-Habib]

Monday, February 16, 2015

Lesson of the day 1372

 Ayahs of the day:
Satan only wants to sow hostility and hatred among you with wine and gambling, and to hinder you from remembrance of God, and from prayer. So will you refrain? [5: 91]

Hadith of the day:
Be in the world as a stranger or a passer by. [Bukhari]

Wise quote of the day:
The heights of a person's wisdom are commensurate with his nearness to the Divine. [Sari Suqati]

Guidance of the day:
Marriage has many merits, advantages, and benefits, both in this life and the next. There is much encouragement toward it in the Book and Sunna. There is no reason for not marrying save incapacity or debauchery.

Marriage frees the heart from the whisperings of the Devil concerning women, such as may occur to a man during ritual prayer as he stands before God. Marriage helps keep one's gaze down and protect one's private parts. The merits of such benefits have been detailed in the Book and Sunna in such a manner as not to escape the notice of any knowledgeable, insightful person. [Counsels of Religion by Imam al-Haddad]

Food for thought:
The best use of life is to spend it for something that outlasts life. Life is like a cash register, in that every account, every thought, every deed, like every sale, is registered and recorded. Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by day dragging, in all the thousand small uncaring ways. We are here to add what we can to life, not to get what we can from it.

Friday, February 13, 2015

Pearls of Wisdom 368

1. The strength in one's resolve is that one does not leave for tomorrow what one can do today.

2. Know that it is with ilm (knowledge) that you must speak, and that it is with hilm (forbearance) that you must remain silent.

3. Iman (faith) is that one recognizes the One True God in the depths of his heart, and that he confirms it with his tongue, and that he acts upon the Divine Prescriptions of the Shariah.

4. Covetousness itself is poverty regardless of how rich one is; detachment itself is wealth regardless of how poor one is.

5. Doing good for a good done to you is simply repayment, whereas doing good for an evil done to you is a tremendous virtue.

6. When both the lawful and the prohibited are present in a thing, it is its prohibited aspect which will always be most prominent.

7. Decrease in one's speech brings wisdom; decrease in one's food brings health; decrease in one's sleep brings worship.

8. Lofty stations are attained only through humility.

9. Worldly honor may be through wealth, but heavenly honor is certainly through works.

10. Death -- A single word which contains within it every goodly advice. [Omar radi Allah anhu]

Monday, February 09, 2015

Limitless Praise due to the One and Only....(part 1)

Praise is due to You, the possessor of serenity, forgiveness and veiling.
My praise is part of Your blessing, oh abundant Giver.

Praise is due to You, in number as great as the drops of rain, the grains of sand,
the pebbles, the plants of the earth and the fish of the sea.

Praise is due to You in number as great as the ants, jinn, men, in quantity as
great as the sky, the throne, and the stars like scattered pearls.

In quantity as great as space itself, and the tablet of forms, the footstools, the
moist earth, and the number of all created beings on the day of gathering.

Praise is due to You, oh my Lord, as You deserve it, for I cannot praise
You fittingly to the full extent of time.

Praise is due to You, oh endless Giver of gifts, the One who grants
opening and triumph to the people of Allah.

Praise is due to You with every breath with the body and the heart.
Look kindly on a slave who is perplexed by the command.

If my actions weigh me down, I still have a good opinion of You
that You will mend my broken spirit. [Shaykh Muhammad ibn al-Habib]

Friday, February 06, 2015

Lesson of the day 1371

Ayahs of the day:
Believers, Wine and gambling and idolatry and divination are nothing but abomination from the works of Satan, so avoid them that you may thrive. [5: 90]

Hadith of the day:
Whoever would like to have his provision increased and his lifespan extended (and to be remembered after he dies), let him uphold his ties of kinship. [Muslim]

Wise quote of the day:
The one who is distant from the love of this world tastes the sweetness of loving the Divine, and these are not attained but through His generosity. [Ma'ruf Kharkhi]

Guidance of the day:
These days, severing kinship bonds and lack of concern for helping and treating them kindly has become rife. It may be that this is why the land has become afflicted with poverty and scarcity of provision, for it has been handed down that preserving kinship bonds lengthens lives and increases wealth, and that God has increased certain people's provisions and accrued their wealth, although He has never looked at them since He created them, and this for their preservation of their kinship bonds. Severing bonds and abandoning kindness will have the opposite effect. And Allah knows best. [Counsels of Religion by Imam al-Haddad]

Food for thought:
The best portion of a good man's life is his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. Kindness is a language the dumb can speak and the deaf can hear and understand. You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late. Kindness is loving people more than they deserve.

Monday, February 02, 2015

Pearls of Wisdom 367

1. The heart is dead, but its living again lies in knowledge, knowledge too is dead, but its living again lies in the seeking after it.

2. Erase old sins with new virtues.

3. He who busies himself in the Lord's work, finds the Lord busy in his work.

4. That amount of knowledge which suffices the Believer is that which keeps him in awe of the Divine.

5. The sole root of man's misery is his talking in excess.

6. Man knows that he is weak, yet how strange that he continues to disobey the One Who is strongest of all.

7. Wretched is the one who dies, and his inequity lives on.

8. A people who have left the struggle in Allah's way have shackled themselves in the dark caverns of disgrace and utter loss.

9. Through his knowledge the seeker of the deen increases in action, whereas the seeker of this world increases only in information.
    [Abu Bakr radi Allah anhu]