A Ramadhan Message from Imam Zaid Shakir

In The Name of Allah, The Most Merciful, The Mercy Giving

Ramadan Mubarak!

A Brief Message From Imam Zaid Shakir

The Month of Ramadan is upon us. During this special time, we should all reflect on the many blessings God has bestowed upon us. Those of us who live here in the West have been blessed with many material bounties that are unimaginable to many of our coreligionists in the East. The amount of food we enjoy and unfortunately the amount that many of us waste, the expansiveness of most of our homes, our ready ability to own cars, trucks, and vans, our easy access to higher education, our ability to marry at a young age, all of these blessings and many others are incomprehensible to many Muslims in faraway lands struggling to live from day to day.

Perhaps the greatest blessing we enjoy is the blessing of security. This is a great blessing that many people take for granted. The ability to be safe in ones home, to walk the streets without fear of assault, to travel freely down the highways and byways without fear of brigandage or harm to our person or loved ones, the ability to rest comfortably at night without fearing a sudden deadly intrusion, or a violent explosion as a projectile tears through the roof or walls of our dwelling visiting us with hell on earth. This is a great, expansive blessing.

God mentions that security is one of the great blessings He bestowed upon the Quraysh, the people of our Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings of God upon him. He mentions in the Qur'an:

Therefore, let them worship the Lord of this [Sacred] House; he who has fed them, warding off from them hunger; the one who has made them secure from fear. (106:3-4)

This latter blessing, the great blessing of security, the blessing that allows us to enjoy all other blessings, should never be taken for granted, for it can be taken away at any moment, and we could be cast into the throes of terrible tribulation with sudden swiftness. One of the ways to perpetuate the blessing of security and the many other blessings we enjoy is to express our deep thanks for them. That expression of thanks lies in our being good productive citizens, it lies in our faithful devotion to our Lord, and it lies in our demonstrating to people the good of our religion through our actions before we endeavor to do so with our words. It lies in our endeavoring to share our blessings with those who are less fortunate that ourselves.

The details relating to how we do these things are known to all of us and are as numerous as each and every one of our individual lives. Those details are revealed to us by God when we endeavor to be sincere in our service, true in our devotion, honest in our conviction to assist our fellow human beings. Ramadan is an excellent time to start for those of us who have been limping down the road of life oblivious to the blessings we enjoy; lacking any consciousness of the obligations those blessings impose on us. Ramadan focuses our appreciation of the food and other material blessing we enjoy by allowing us to experience at a personal level the reality of deprivation. Ramadan focuses our devotion to God by facilitating heightened levels of devotional acts by couching them in a communal manifestation. Ramadan focuses our sincerity to God, for it is centered around fasting, the one act of worship it is impossible to "show off" with before other human beings, for at the end of the day, God alone knows if we are truly fasting.

Ramadan, if we allow it to do so, focuses our spiritual energies by reintroducing the great blessing of the Qur'an into our lives. Finally, Ramadan focuses our attention on the centrality of charity in our lives, by encouraging us to greater levels and acts of charity during this time, a time when our beloved Prophet, peace and blessings of God upon him, the most generous of all people ordinarily, was excessively generous.

Let us translate that heightened focus on God, and our appreciation for His blessings into heightened levels of servitude to Him and to our fellow human beings. If we can do that as an entire community, with ample conviction, God will continue to shower His blessings down upon us and to He will bless us to be secure in our lives and property, just as He has blessed us to be secure from material want. Such blessings are commensurate with "the best community raised up to serve humanity (3:110)." However, for the manifestation of those blessings to be real, our service to God and to our fellow humans has to be real. So let us proceed through this blessed month with consciousness, willing devotion, and sincerity. By doing so we will express our appreciation to our Lord, and work to perpetuate the many blessings He has bestowed upon us.

Ramadan Mubarak!

Your Brother in Islam

Imam Zaid Shakir

Love for the Holy Prophet (saw)

And know that the loftiest of exemplars, the most noble and the greatest and the most binding to all Muslims is the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and grant him peace: verily he is by unanimous agreement the Greatest Exemplar. And the obligation due to him is the greatest after that of Allah; and the adab with him the most emphasised of the adab and obediences. For whosoever loves him and immensely esteems him, he has indeed loved Allah and whosoever obeys him has indeed obeyed Allah. Says Allah, the Exalted: "Say, if ye do love Allah, follow me: Allah will love you and forgive you your sins. For Allah is the Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful" (al-'Imran: 31). And says the Exalted: "He who obeys the Apostle, obeys Allah" (an-Nisaa: 80). And says the Exalted: "So take what the Apostle assigns to you, and deny yourselves that which he withholds from you. And fear Allah; for Allah is strict in punishment" (al-Hashr: 7). And says the Exalted: "Then let those beware who withstand the Apostle's order, lest some trial befall them, or a grievous Penalty be inflicted on them" (an-Nur: 63).

And says the Exalted: "Verily, those who plight their fealty to thee do no less than plight their fealty to Allah: the Hand of Allah is over their hands: then anyone who violates his oath, does so to the harm of his own soul, and any one who fulfils what he has covenanted with Allah, Allah will soon grant him a great reward" (al-Fat'h: 10). And says the Exalted: "So it is those who believe in him, honour him, help him and follow the light which is sent down with him - it is they who will prosper" (al-A'araf: 157). And says the Exalted: "O who believe! Raise not your voices above the voice of the Prophet, nor speak aloud to him in talk, as ye may speak aloud to one another, lest your deeds become vain and ye perceive not. Those who lower their voice in the presence of Allah's Apostle - their hearts has Allah tested for piety: for them is Forgiveness and a great reward" (al-Hujurat: 2-3).

And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "One of you does not believe until I become dearer to him than the soul that lies between the two sides".

And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "One of you does not believe until his desire follows what I have come with". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace of Allah: "Were Musa and Isa alive, they cannot but follow me". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "Whosoever obeys me, has indeed obeyed Allah and whosoever disobeys me has indeed disobeyed Allah". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "All of you will enter paradise except those who refuse". And they said: "And who refuses?" And said he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "Whoever obeys me enters Paradise, and whosoever disobeys me has indeed refused". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "Who annoys me, annoys Allah and whosoever annoys Allah, He puts him into Hell".

And what goes to perfect love to him and high esteem and beneficient adab towards him, blessings and peace be upon him, is love for the people of his house and his companions, esteem for them and respect. Says Allah, the Exalted: "Say (O Prophet): no reward do I ask of you except the love of those near of kin" (ash-Shura: 23).

And says the Exalted: "The vanguard (of Islam), the first of those who foresook (their home) and of those who gave them aid, and (also) who followed them in (all) good deeds - well-pleased is Allah with them, as they are with Him" (at-Tawbah: 100).

And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace of Allah: "Love Allah for such of His bounties as He nourishes you with, and love me because you love Allah and love the people of my House because you love me". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace to 'Abbas, may Allah be pleased with him: "Iman does not enter the heart of one until they love you for the sake of Allah and for your nearness to me". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace, to Fatima and 'Ali and al-Hassan and al-Husayn, may Allah be pleased with them: "I am at war with those you are at war with and at peace with those you are at peace with". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace, in the hadith of Zayd bin Arqam, may Allah be pleased with them: "And my issues are the people of my house. I remind you, in the Name of Allah, about people of my house". And says Abubakr, may Allah be pleased with him: "Have a conscientious regard to Muhammad in the people of his house". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "Uphold me in my companions; do not take them as targets after me; whosoever loves them loves them because of my love; and whosoever is disaffected against them is disaffected against them because of disaffection against me; and whosoever molests them has indeed molested me; and whosoever molests me has indeed invoked the wrath of Allah and whoever invokes the wrath of Allah risks penalty from Him". And says he, upon whom be blessings and peace: "Do not abuse my companions. Verily, in the Name of Him in Whose Hands my soul is: were one of you to spend the like of the mountain of Uhud in gold he would not attain the rank of one of them, not even half of it".

Let a Muslim who is solicitous about his religion therefore beware of hating a member of the house of the Apostle, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, or one of his companions because that harms his religion and his Hereafter. And because of it, he gets counted among those who offend His Prophet and annoy him, Allah bless him and grant him peace. Let him love them and praise them on account of good (in them) in the same manner as Allah has praised them as well as His Apostle.

Source:
Imam 'Abdallah Ibn 'Alawi al-Haddad, An All Out Call to Islam and a General Admonition Ad-Da'wah at-Taammah wat-Tadhkirah al-'Aammah