oppressors

Pearls of wisdom 246

1. Do not burden yourself with what has been guaranteed you.

2. Do not fall short pursuing what you have been entrusted to seek.

3. Pardon those who oppress you, and give to those who deny you.

4. For God’s sake join relations with those who cut you off.

5. Give preference to those who love you for God’s sake.

6. Freely extend your soul and your wealth to your brothers.

7. Be careful to fulfill the religious rights owed to your Lord.

8. Do not consider any good deed you perform to be great, nor any bad deed your perpetrate to be insignificant.

9. Beware of hidden guiles of the heart.

10. Beware of dissemblance with your knowledge just as you are cautious not to become conceited with your actions. [Above quotes by Imam Harith al Muhasibi]

Got the blues? *S-u-b-h-a-n-A-l-l-a-h*

Five reasons why Allah uses problems

by Shaykh Salih al-Fawzaan

The problems you face will either defeat you or develop you – depending on how you respond to them. Unfortunately, most people fail to see how Allah wants to use problems for good in their lives. They react foolishly and resent their problems rather than pausing to consider what benefit they might bring.

Here are five ways Allah wants to use the problems in your life:

1. Allah uses problems to DIRECT you.
Sometimes God must light a fire under you to get you moving. Problems often point us in a new direction and motivate us to change. Is God trying to get your attention? “Sometimes it takes a painful situation to make us change our ways.”

2. Allah uses problems to INSPECT you.
People are like tea bags…if you want to know what’s inside them, just drop them into hot ever water! Has God tested your faith with a problem What do problems reveal about you? “When you have many kinds of troubles, you should be full of joy, because you know that these troubles test your faith, and this will give you patience.”

3. Allah uses problems to CORRECT you.
Some lessons we learn only through pain and failure. It’s likely that as a child your parents told you not to touch a hot stove…. But you probably learned by being burned. Sometimes we only learn the value of something… health, money, a relationship. .. by losing it. “It was the best thing that could have happened to me, for it taught me to pay attention to your laws.”

4. Allah uses problems to PROTECT you.
A problem can be a blessing in disguise if it prevents you from being harmed by something more serious. Last year a friend was fired for refusing to do something unethical that his boss had asked him to do. His unemployment was a problem – but it saved him from being convicted and sent to prison a year later when management’s actions were eventually discovered. “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good…

5. Allah uses problems to PERFECT you.
Problems, when responded to correctly, are character builders. God is far more interested in your character than your comfort. Your relationship to God and your character are the only two things you’re going to take with you into eternity. “We can rejoice when we run into problems…they help us learn to be patient. And patience develops strength of character in us and helps us trust God more each time we use it until finally our hope and faith are strong and steady.”

Here’s the point:

God is at work in your life – even when you do not recognize it or understand it.

But it’s much easier and profitable when you cooperate with Him.

“Success can be measured not only in achievements, but in lessons learned, lives touched and moments shared along the way”

Allah Knows Best…

Forgiveness

Forgive all who have offended you, not for them but for yourself. Forgiveness is the economy of the heart, it saves the expense of anger, the cost of hatred, the waste of spirits. When you forgive, you in no way change the past, but you do sure change the future.

Ounce of prevention, pound of cure

Repel the thought, for if you don’t, it becomes an idea. So repel the idea, for if you don’t it will become a desire. So fight against that (desire), for if you don’t, it will become a determination and a passion. And if you don’t repel that, it will become an action. And if you don’t replace it with its opposite, it will become a constant habit. So at that point, it will be difficult for you to change it.
– Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyyah [from al-Fawaa’id]

5 Ingredients…

“The medicine of the heart is five things:

Reading Qur’aan and pondering the meaning,
Having an empty stomach,
Praying qiyaam al-layl,
Beseeching Allaah at the time of suhoor,
And keeping company with righteous people.”

-Yahya Ibn Mu’aadh

Lessons of the Day

Ayahs of the Day:

By the scattering of winds, and those that bear burdens, and those that blow gently, and those that apportion their action, what you are promised is true; and judgment will come to pass.  By the sky, with its orbits, you are involved in a contradictory doctrine by which the deluded are deceived.  Doomed are those who conjecture, those who wallow in emotion distracted.  [1 to 11]

Hadith of the Day:

Do not do evil to those who do evil to you, but you deal with them with forgiveness and kindness.  [Bukhari]

Wise Quote of the Day:

There are two evils, having which, an abundance of good works is seldom profitable——–discontent with God’s decree and wronging God’s servants.  [Shaykh Abu Hasan al-Shadhili]

Guidance of the Day:

If each of us lives up to our highest ideals, we will be giving the best teaching there is.  The most powerful teachings that I have received have come through my ignoring what people say and observing what they do.  Words are the last and most superfluous elements of teaching.  Real change comes only through example.

If we want to get another person——or the world——to do something, we must do it first.

If we want people around us not to fight, we must be peaceful ourselves.   If we want our kids to clean up their room, we must be willing to keep our own room clean.  And if we want the government to not make radioactive nuclear reactors, we cannot afford to radiate poisonous waves of angry emotional reaction.  [Cohen,  The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore]

Food for Thought:

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.  It has been shown that most of what we worry about never comes to be.  And no problem is solved by worrying about it.  So take care of what the world needs now: love, sweet love. Taking care of what needs doing now leaves little time for fear and worry.

When you purify your hearts just as you purify your raiment, union with God will follow. If you sincerely seek union with God, then seek Him inside your hearts and leave the world alone. [Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani]

[Source: “Lessons of the Day” by Mrs. Iffath Hasan]

Pearls of Wisdom

1. By forgiving the person who hurt us, we strengthen our souls.

2. Generosity goes hand in hand with compassion. If you have no compassion you cannot have generosity.

3. All adversity is really an opportunity for our souls to grow; all adversity is really a form of growing pain.

4. A truly wise person will have the wisdom to know what he can do, accept what he can’t do, and have the generosity of spirit to extend himself in ways that can make a difference.

5. To hold a grudge against anyone is like carrying the devil on your shoulders.

6. Two things, at minimum, are needed——-an ability to appreciate the positives in our life, and a commitment to action to do good..

7. Peace of mind has nothing to do with the external world; it has only to do with our connection with God.

8. The fact that you are praying and meditating is not as important as how much good you bring back from your prayer and meditation.

9. Often it is the lowest points in life that we learn the most. Those low moments are the magical moments. They are the beginning stages of our journey to our Lord.

Pearls of Wisdom

1. Let not obedience make you joyous because it comes from you, but rather, be joyous over it because it comes from Allah (SWT) to you.

2. Whoever is not thankful for graces runs the risk of losing them, and whoever is thankful fetters them with their own cords.

3. Be fearful lest the existence of His generosity towards you and the performance of your bad behavior towards Him not lead you step by step to ruin.

4. He made the Hereafter an abode to reward His believing servants only because this world cannot contain what He wishes to bestow upon them and because He deemed their worth too high to reward them in a world without permanence.

5. The real journey is when the world’s dimension is rolled away from you so that you see the Hereafter closer to you than yourself.

6. Far be it for our Lord to recompense with credit the servant who deals with Him in cash.

7. Suffice it is a recompense for you for obedience that He has judged you worthy of obedience.

8. When He gives, He shows you His kindness; when He deprives, He shows you His power. And in all that, He is making Himself known to you and coming to you with His gentleness.

9. Deprivation hurts you only because of the lack of your understanding of Allah (SWT) in it.

10. When He loosens your tongue with a request, then know that He wants to give you something.

[Above quotes by Ibn Ata’Allah]

Pearls of Wisdom

1. A friend cannot be considered a friend until he is tested on three occasions—- in time of need; behind your back; and after your death. [Ali radi Allah anhu]

2. One of your sins should seem weightier to you than a thousand of your virtues. [Imam Ja’far al Sadiq]

3. There can be no good in excess, just as there is no excess in good. [Imam Abu Hanifah]

4. If there is a good deed which is difficult, hold on to it, for in the end, the good deed will remain and the difficulty will perish. [Ali radi Allah anhu]

5. To be humble is to accept the truth and submit to it even if you heard it from a child or someone who is uneducated or ignorant. [Fudhayl ibn Iyaadh]

6. Even if you studied for a hundred years and collected a thousand books, you would not be eligible for the mercy of Allah except through action. [Imam al Ghazali]

7. Live as long as you want, but you must die; love whatever you want, but you will become separated from it; and do what you want, but you will be repaid for it. [Imam al Ghazali]

8. Allah loves the voice of the one who recites the Qur’an, and the voice of the one who seeks forgiveness before dawn break. [Sufyan al Thawri]

9. Knowledge without action is madness and action without knowledge is void. [Imam al Ghazali]

10. Know that the knowledge which does not remove you from sins today and does not convert you to obedience, will not remove you tomorrow from the Hell fire. [Imam al Ghazali]

…so true!…

“If you want something in your life and you aren’t praying tahajud for it then in reality you don’t really want it.” Shaykh Yasir Qadhi

some more quotes by the shaykh:

“Judging someone else’s intentions only shows your own insincerity.”

“Allah won’t judge them [other Muslims] according to your knowledge. Allah will judge them by their own knowledge!”