04/30/1994
IWDM Study Library
Prescription for Life
Washington DC

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
This is a public broadcast of Imam WD Mohammed, Muslim American spokesman for human salvation. The following lecture by Imam Mohammed titled Prescription for Life was recorded on April 30th of 1994 in Washington DC.
As-salaam Alaikum.
Audience: Wa-Alaikum-as-Salaam.
That is peace be upon you. We praise G-d, we trust G-d. The G-d of all and we witness that He is one alone. And we witnessed that Muhammad to whom the Quran was revealed, is the servant the messenger of G-d. We salute him with the traditional salute, the prayers, and the peace be upon him. We are addressing today a prescription for life and we invited the public. So, my address, Inshallah, G-d willing, will be in a language that is understood also by non-Muslims. But I will be coming mainly from an Islamic foundation or my Islamic base.
I want to say before beginning that last night, last evening at the banquet for Sister Clara Muhammad school, I heard words of wisdom from the speakers there and particularly the keynote speaker for the evening. I made note and I really questioned my own self and my relationship with my children as I was listening to him speak, suggesting that tough love, that was the expression, tough love is what we should practice. And he made it clear what he meant by tough love, tough love meant doing what's best for our children, even though at that time it hurts them and us to do that.
I know that that helped me out as a child, I had a mother that really believed in tough love. And what caught my attention also, was that he connected that position also with the need to have self-esteem. I thought that was wonderful because I do think there's a problem for self-esteem if we are not able to stand up and do what is right for ourselves, for our loved ones, even though at time it’s not pleasant for us and not pleasant for those that we are putting pressure on.
With that, I now would like to just elaborate on this language prescription for life. Usually, a prescription is for a disease, a prescription is for some problems. So, I want to start up by saying the life that we are going to be talking about is not a life that comes with disease or problems. We are not talking about this physical body, I don't think we need a prescription for this physical body from any particular speaker, we'll go to medical doctors and get a prescription for this physical body, I will too, and other speakers up here will too, we'll go to a medical doctor if it's for something in the physical body. But if something within us, if a life is within us is not constituted in a right way, or not situated in the best way, that life within us, can also affect this physical body and we can be going to the doctor needlessly.
All we have to do, is come back into the right frame of mind, have a right attitude toward our own selves and our own life and we might not have to be going to even the medical doctor. Although this is not a talk on the biological life, the physical life. It doesn't have importance for our physical life and for everything, every aspect of life. I have read scripture, not just Quran, I have read also Bible, I've read some other scriptures and it’s interesting to note that scripture, in my opinion, it tries to give us a picture of our life, not in the physical form, but in the spiritual form. As I understand, spiritual from scripture, it includes, I would say everything that is abstract in our makeup. By abstract, we mean we don't see it with our eyes, we can't touch it with a hand, we can't smell it with a nose, taste it with a tongue, hear it with ears. The abstract part of us, it is saying to us that the real-life is the abstract form, the abstract form. We are not just spirits, spirit is really life, that is the life spirit, because without spirit we have no life, but it's more than that. Spirit is, I think, a term in scripture that includes all the abstract components, all the abstract features of human life.
So, my intelligence is operating right now, if it wasn’t, I couldn't speak clearly to you, or speak in a way for you to understand if my intelligence was gone, and that's abstract, that's an abstract part of me. You can't see it with your physical eyes, you hear it but not directly, you hear its influence on my physical body or my tongue and everything, so it's coming through the instrument we call the physical, but it is not physical it is abstract.
I also have a devotional life in me that determines my behavior, determines what I do, determines my behavior and that devotional life in me too is registered on my mind, it expresses itself through my intellect or through my mind, but it too is abstract. So, really, the life that really counts is abstract. And we think we know each other physically, we don't know each other physically, you may meet another person that looks exactly like the person you know physically, you might not need to tell the difference until they express themselves.
They don't have to speak most of the time, if you just say something the way they respond you'll say, "oh, no that's not him, or that's not her." Sometimes you don’t even have to speak to them, you can just observe them closely and something internally registers externally say, "It really look like him but I know that's not him, I know that's not that person." Most of us, we think of each other in the physical, in the concrete but really our real self is not in the physical, it is in the abstract.
What makes me myself and you yourself is really the abstract, you see, not to say that this physical is not very important, it most certainly is. Because we know if we break the light bulb no more light.
It's the medium that has to carry that electricity and design to make the fire, make the heat and light, same thing for this physical body, we break this and no more communication maybe you see, but it is not the life, it is not the life. The life is abstract, and we may say spirit and separate spirit from consciousness or separate spirit from mind or intellect, we may do that, but scripture does not, scripture does not do that. G-d says in scripture that He breathe into His creature He made the breath of life. And that creature became a living soul. He breathed into the creature the breath of life, and that creature became a living soul. Why has G-d said breath? And in Arabic it's another term that's used is Ruh, and it really means wind, air. Why has G-d made it like that? Because when a baby is born, the doctor will help the baby if necessary. Shock the baby's biological body, for what reason? So, the baby will start breathing. When the baby start breathing the baby is conscious, before it starts breathing it's not conscious. This in scripture, where G-d says, "He breathed into the creature the breath of life," is to say to us He is the one that first turned on our mind. He is the one that first generated the mind. G-d did it. Now, I want to now, again, say that prescription suggest that something is wrong with life.
For Muslims in our religion, and believe me I read the Bible too, and those Christians who believe that G-d created a human being in sin, you are incorrect. Your scripture says otherwise but your scripture also says that the conditions that the life is put into causes the problem, not the creature that G-d made. For Christians in the audience, people who follow the Bible, I'll give you this and I hope that this will be enough. G-d says, He made things on the first day, second day, third day, fourth day, fifth day, sixth day, and it all was good. And then He rested and it all was good. If you read the Bible, in Genesis there is two stories of the beginning of man, Adam. The first one, he made everything and everything was good. The second one is another making and trouble comes.
Now, I'm not here to explain Bible, but I will give you our scripture. Our scripture says that He made man in the best mold, in the best mold. And man did not go wrong until Satan seduced man. And that man repented for his wrong and G-d forgave him. So, what our scripture is saying is this, that we are not angels, we are not gods, we are human. And that G-d made us to make choices and gave us not G-d intelligence but human intelligence. We can be deceived by a shrewd, subtle creature like the devil, like Satan, we can be deceived. But He has also given us a nature that can't feel comfortable in the wrong.
And eventually, that nature is going to register that something is wrong and the human being will eventually repent his wrong. We look for perfectness and we don't know we have perfectness. A human being that repents his or her wrong is a perfect human being. A human being that never does any wrong doesn't exist and never did exist. We are human, we are not G-d and we are not angels. We are human.
If G-d didn't test us by right and wrong, by obedience, and disobedience, if G-d didn't test us by that, we wouldn't even grow. We grow because we see the wrong way and it punishes us and makes us anxious to abuse it, exert ourselves to strive a little harder for the right way. Man has been struggling. And G-d says He created us into toil and struggle, created us into toil and struggle so that we may grow and become better. We're thinking of human beings in the wrong way, we're not gods. We're not gods, we're not angels, we're human beings. G-d has given us sunshine, but we don't want sunshine all the time, and that's what we prefer, sunshine, but after a while we get tired of sunshine. You say, “I haven't seen a cloud in five years.

G-d, let me leave this island or wherever it is.” So, G-d has made us creatures of change and we love change. Now, imagine if we didn't have no cause to do something wrong, somebody eventually will make a cause to do some wrong. Act the fool or something, just to break the monotony. And we'll learn the lesson and the lesson will advance us a little further in the direction G-d wants us to go. A prescription for life is what we are talking about. Well, we should understand that though this life, the essential life, is the abstract human being, the abstract human being. The human being in his qualities, the human being in its intelligence, in its emotionality and in its intelligence, et cetera, this is the real human being. Because all of us are independent life with independent minds, in separate opinions and thoughts, et cetera, we have an independent sensitive body, soul and flesh and everything that register things separately from each other. We are not registering what's happening right now all together, each one of us is registering it for ourselves.
We grow into a special, unique personality that's you and me and Wallace and John, Yahya and whoever. You see, isn't it beautiful? I love the way G-d made things. I wouldn't have it any other way. And I love that I have appetite for a woman. I don't care if I get to be 150 years old and no life in me biologically, that abstract body going to still want a woman.
Yes, I never get that holy. Good G-d, I swear, I'll commit suicide before I get that holy.
And the worst thing you can do to an old man is take away his dreams.
And understand this, all dreams are made of what's real. Just like fiction, you want to make good fiction, I don't know if there's any fiction writers in here, but if you don't know this, I'm going to improve your ability to write fiction. Never go to something that doesn't exist to create fiction, go to that that exist already and turn it into fiction. Even fiction has no real life in a civilized society, a learned society, unless those who read it or observe it, can see the reality in it. They have to see the language of reality, in order to appreciate that fiction. Fiction must speak to reality and it must be based or rooted in reality. It can twist itself and distort itself or whatever, but it must be working with reality. You all should make some comic books or something. Black man got to become productive.
Prescription for life is not just a prescription for that abstract life, but it's a prescription for the whole life. When you read the scripture, you'll see this. G-d approves of everything good in our life. When G-d made us, He said, “He made us good.” He made us good. And we should understand this too, that G-d is good and G-d doesn't accept anything but good. Though He allows this freedom for our human growth, He won't approve anything but good. Just like a good parent. A good parent will allow the child to bump his head against some tree or something, get the knots, right? But that is not what the parent wants for the child. The parent doesn't want the child to get a knot on his head. But the parent says, "Well, I can only teach this child so far and nature going to do the rest." The good parent has nature working with them, as a partner to help them raise that child. They say, “They keep on getting up on top of that thing and I know he's going to fall, but I've been telling him I had told him 10 times not to get up. I'm going to let him fall.” He falls and come to you crying, snot and carrying on.
You let him do that. You let him do that now, you see? Can't we then next step that G-d loves us but allows us to hurt ourselves and we have to do it, if we’re just intent on doing it. And the majority of us, we have mercy in the lesson. The lesson is a mercy to us. It makes us better, makes us more careful, it makes us appreciate our parents more, appreciate life more.
Prescription for life, prescription for life has to be also a prescription for the life we call the business life. Now, I know sometimes you think, “that's out of the context of religion. That's out of it, you shouldn't put that interest in the context of it.” No, it's there. It's there, it's in the Bible and in the Quran. G-d wants us to have good business. Thriving business, but He wants everything that we have to respect and regard the one, the cause that made it all possible, and that is G-d.
And as long as me regard the Lord, creator of the heaven and earth, as being the cause for all the blessings, all the opportunities that we have, then we can do everything and feel that what we are doing is approved by G-d and not only approved by G-d, wanted by G-d. Now, we go to prayer because He said G-d wants us to go to prayer. But if we understand our religion, G-d also want us to go to work. And if we really understand our religion, people, G-d says, your whole life is prayer when you are obeying Him. Your whole life is prayer. When you're going to school to improve your mind, so you'll have a better job in the world, a better job in your city, and a better opportunity for your children, for your family, et cetera.
When you're doing that, you are making prayer.
I know we have that philosophical statements sometimes strains the brains of the concrete people.
Let me tell you just believe the scripture. Scripture says, “that every creature knows, its mode of prayer.” That's telling me that the bird prays. The lion prays. If I believe the scripture, every creature knows his mode of prayer. In fact, the scripture even suggests to me that the stars, the moon, and everything is praying to G-d. Making salah to G-d. So, all that we do in obedience to the Lord creator. And how do we know what is in obedience to the Lord creator?
If we are people of scripture, the scripture will tell us and approve what we are doing, but when the scripture is not there for me to refer to for this particular thing, that may be small or just in my life and I can't find it in the context of scripture. It's there, but I can't find it. What does G-d say? If it bothers your soul, don't act on it. If it just hangs in your soul and bother your soul, don't act on it, but if it does not, do it. Isn't that wonderful? So, what is G-d saying to us? Though we are fallible creatures, human beings, fallible human beings, will make mistakes, will make bad judgments at times. Will do sins. There is something in our core, something in the human core, center here, that if you listen to it, it will be right and it will guide you right. Something else? I want to say but I'm not going to do it because it may cause somebody some trouble. It digests well with me, but I don't know. No, I'm afraid. We got teeth, but there are some babies here with nothing but gums.
A prescription for the whole life. We believe G-d gives us the prescription also for the governmental life, the civic life, the political life. That G-d gives us the prescription for the whole life. G-d gives us a prescription for our institutions of learning. They get sick. Recently we've been told that the whole system of education in the West is sick in bad repair. They're working all on it. Our educators, our men and women of insight and knowledge, they are working on it to make improvements. We hope to one day recover. But they're saying that the system of education needs an overhaul. That's what they're saying. G-d gives us a prescription for the whole life in all of its important aspects.
Now, just like we speak of the physical body and its health. Now, we say psychology, they don't want, modern psychologists, they don't want to use terms like normal. They say, “anything is normal.” If you grab the toilet paper and put it on your eye to wipe your back, they say that's normal. You missed what was really needed and what needed to be wiped. But they say, “that's normal”. That's modern psychology. I think they say the greatest percentage of mental illness is among the psychologists.
That's what they say. I haven't done any research or anything.
Now, when I go to a doctor and I say, "Doctor, I'm sick." First thing that doctor wants to do is ask me some questions. Isn't that doctor smart? That doctor is smart. No matter how much he's been told about the nature of diseases and all that, he wants to know from me, as much as he can, because he's not inside me. He doesn't feel what I'm feeling. He didn't experience what I experienced last night, that woke me up in my sleep. He wants to know all that. Then after I talked to him, he still ain't got enough information.
He takes out his own gadgets and then he puts here, then say, “open your mouth.” And what is he trying to figure out? He wants to know how abnormal is this body. “Oh, your temperature is not normal. This is not normal”, so thank G-d that some part of the health world is still using the language normal.
The prescription of life is this, that you use it to maintain the normal condition for the human being G-d made. He wants it to stay normal. It's not normal when he's shooting dope into his veins. Mama didn't put that into your vein buddy. She didn't put a needle in there, when you came, she put some milk in your mouth. It’s not normal, you see? It's not normal to sit up and watch TV for six hours. That's not normal. “That child hasn't done anything right in the last 10 years. All he does this sit there and watch that television.” It’s not normal. It's not normal to drink two liters of pop when you're thirsty.
That's not normal. It's not normal to fill up on potato chips. That's not normal. Nobody normal was doing that. Somebody became abnormal and then that's when we start seeing that. All right, so let's appreciate the normal condition for the human being and let us work to maintain the normal condition for the human being.
And question these habits that we have, that we've gotten into, and look at them and say, "Is this normal?" If it's not normal, we should be fighting those habits and if we do this, we are going to be administering a cure to our life. We will be respecting the prescription that G-d give us. The prescription that G-d give us is keep life normal as G-d made it and intended it to be. You got somebody listened to records and they danced all day long, that ain't normal. And you wonder how come they're not helping you with the house? That ain't normal. You wonder how come you can't get them to follow a simple instruction? It ain't normal, they're not living a normal life. The best condition is the norm for the human life, the norm established by G-d when He created us. Now, you know this language is familiar to you. Keep the proper fluid levels. Don't overheat the machine G-d created. When you give yourself to rage, you're risking burning up your engine. Prophet Muhammad, he gave good advice to a person when he asked for advice, peace be upon the prophet. He said, "Avoid anger." Avoid anger. Resist anger. Don't just give in to the passion to be angry and violent. You give in to that passion eventually, that's life.
Every aspect of you, every part of you is life, and if you give any part too much freedom, that part becomes you. Eventually, it's going to take over you. It becomes you. Can't you imagine a man doing nothing but working this arm, he doesn't work this one. Every day he doesn't work anything but this arm. After a while that’s all he’s going to have is this arm. All these muscles going to be gone, everything gone, even his hair is going to be.
But he got a powerful arm, he got a powerful right arm. So, if you allow anyone single part of you to be exercised all the time to the neglect of the other parts, you're going to make a freak out of yourself. Now, let's come to the constitution, the essential constitution of this human body. Because the doctor has to know what is this helpless body, this physical body, essentially, those that are dealing with the mind has to know what is this mind? This human mind, essentially. He has to know the nature of that mind. The one that's dealing with the physical body has to know the nature of the body.
He has to know the causes of certain things, how the functions are going normally, and if something goes wrong with the functions, what most likely caused that. He has to know about the mind. We should know how our life is constituted. Our life is constituted mainly in two aspects. This is scripture. G-d said He made us in two. Now, we think of this male and female, but also, we should think of it in also as the design for every human being, whether male or female that we operate in two. Why these two that we that's so important for us? What are these two operations that's so important for us?
Emotionality, and the ability to think or to reason. These are the two main life pillars of the human being, of the human form. Emotionality and intelligence, but I hate to use that word intelligence because intelligence is in every part of the body. Emotionality has intelligence and we used to believe that. Foolish sentiments, huh? Foolish sentiment. Foolish emotions but now all emotions are good. As psychology, modern psychology would say everything is normal. We've even said foolish heat, but who said that now? Foolish heart? I think Nat Cole sang a song, and had the expression that, "My foolish heart, my foolish heart." But now anything the heart want it ain't foolish. “Oh man, let him have that man.”
He takes his dog out to the car and put it in the front seat. He leaves his wife or his girlfriend at home. He takes his dog to the dance, and he's on the dance, dancing with his dog. "Hey, man, leave the man alone, need to do it alone man. He's cool."
I guess some of us are talking to the dog. “Did you enjoy your sleep last night?”
We done cut ourselves off from every human being.
So, we should know how we are constituted. We’re constituted mainly in two, mainly in two. Now, here is a prescription from the Quran, which is the main prescription that I'm offering to Muslims, and to everybody else in the audience. Because I believe when you really see the light of truth in scripture, they agree. G-d says, the human person is lost, lost meaning he's lost from his life, he's lost. He's lost from help, lost from the right behavior, lost from even the life that G-d wants that person to have. Lost from that life. Says, surely the human person is lost, except for those who have faith.
It doesn’t means just have faith, but who exercise faith, who, practices faith. “Allathina aamanu”, that expression says not only they are people of faith, but they exercise faith. They practice faith. Now, how do we practice faith and exercise faith? When we come to a situation and we don't know exactly right at this moment or this instance, how to act upon this thing, but we recall G-d's word and we hesitate and we say, "No, I won't do it this way. I would do it another way, that way I was about to do it would be wrong.” So, that's acting on your faith, you're acting on faith. So, when our behavior says to the observer, that person doesn't have faith in G-d, then we're not acting on our faith. When, our behavior says to the observer, that person does not have faith in the principles of their religion. Then we are not acting on faith. G-d doesn't want us to just have faith. Faith without actions count for nothing in Al-Islam. But when our behavior expresses our faith, or when our faith is expressed in our behavior, that is the faith that G-d wants in the believers.
So, G-d says the true human person is lost, except for those who act upon faith, “Allathina aamanu, wa aamilus saalihat”. See the first thing, the first requirement is that we act upon faith. The second requirement, “wa aamilus saalihat” their deeds, their actions, their devotions are decent, innocent, honest, righteous. Then it comes to another. Now, that's one, two. We going to put these two on the emotion side. These are the emotionality, in the pillar of our emotionality. Now, here there's four, but we only two and then here comes a second two. “Watawa salbil haqq, Watawa salbis sabr.” And they promote support for truth and the seeking of truth, and they support promotion of patience and endurance, patience and endurance.
These two come on in the side of intelligence. Now, for us to promote truth and the seeking of truth, you have to use your brain, your reasoning power. You have to use intelligence not just faith. G-d says, “and there are people that argue and they have no foundation for arguing except “amaniya”, except just faith. Just faith, just faith alone. So, faith alone will not carry us the distance we have to go.
Faith keeps us and preserves us for the bigger step that we have to make. And Abraham is typical of this kind of this energy and energizing in our core, in our human core. Abraham was observing the workings of the sky and everything, and trying to see where is G-d? He wanted to conceptualize G-d. Not quite like Moses. Moses just wanted to go up in the mountain to see G-d. But Abraham, he wanted to see G-d in the universal scheme of things, not just in the mountain one mountain. So, Abraham started his observation in the dark, in the night, and he questioned things in the night. What was causing him to question things in the night? What was causing him to reject certain images? And say, "No, that image in my reasoning is not G-d, in my thinking that's not G-d." His faith, his faith. This lasted until the morning and he saw the sunrise. The sunrise you know it has tremendous impact on our emotionality and weak mind, and intellect and everything, when we witness a sunrise. Even though we've seen many suns. Right now, if you go to a place where you could see the sunrise right out of the water, right on the island somewhere, it's something to behold, a splendid thing to watch. Has such great splendor.
Anyway, when the sun rose up, he said, "this must be the G-d." Now, understand this is a story. He said, "This must be the G-d." But it's a story with great wisdom, great message. He said, "It is the brightest, the most splendid of all, it must be G-d." He kept watching it, he didn't make no conclusion. In the night he watched things and made conclusions, and in the day, he watched things and made conclusions. He observed them patiently to see if they were going to disappoint him. He didn't make no quick conclusions. Sometime we see a beautiful man, a beautiful brother and right away we want him. I'm speaking for you sisters now.
Can I speak that way?
Audience: Yes sir.
You know my belief. My belief is that we have one common life.
Audience: Yes sir.
That my thinking ain't no different from yours.
Audience: Yes sir.
My intelligence is the same intelligence G-d gave you. I'm speaking of a human being, I say we, but I'm not looking at that brother now.
I made my point. I must stop saying we. You sisters look at the brother.
And right away you say, "Oh, I wish I had that brother. You see, you're not like Abraham. You ain't going to say, “let me watch him for a while and see if I might change my mind.”
Abraham, no matter how convincing the thing was, he had the patience to watch it for a while to see if it would disappoint him. And when the sun went up and he kept believing in it. It got up at noon day. He still believed in it. He was still excited. It started to decline and its light started to get dimmer, Abraham said, "Oh no, my G-d is not one to set," that was Abraham. You see how Abraham was? Abraham was a man of faith. Abraham was a man who didn't make hasty decisions. He watched things, observed things for a while to see if those things would disappoint him or make him change his judgment.
This is a kind of mind; this is a kind of exercise of intelligence or exercise of our mind that G-d wants in all of us. G-d want us not to be gullible. G-d does not want us to be hasty in judgment. G-d wants us to be intelligent and intelligent means don't take a thing on face value, but look at it, and study it, and examine it until your mind is satisfied. Except those who have faith, practice faith and they practice support for truth.
They practice support for the promotion of truth, the seeking of truth. Abraham, in that depiction we just gave you, that picture we just narrated, Abraham the prophet, peace be upon him, he was a man of strong extraordinary faith and also a man who practiced the exercise of intelligence. He had the patience to wait and see if the thing that he was accepting would disappoint his intelligence. If it disappointed his intelligence, he dropped it, he left it. And they promote, support for the practice of patience or endurance.
These four have been given to us as a prescription for our life. These four have been given to us, I repeat, as a prescription for our life. These four constitute a whole chapter in the Quran. Is that not correct?
Congregation: Yes.
Yes. It says, "Surely, man is at loss," and then the statements come, except for those who practice faith, and who practice decency or righteous deeds, and who practice support for the seeking of the truth, and who practice support for the promotion of patience and endurance in each other.
How many of us will see a tendency in our brother or sister that we know it's going to hurt them and say, "Look, don't give up now, don't change your good life that you had, don't rush into this that's going to hurt you, G-d is still the same. His truth has not changed. His love for you has not changed. Bear this out. Suffer, endure a little bit, wait. Don't do this thing, be patient." That's coming to our brothers or sisters’ aid and calling them to respect G-d's wish for us to practice support or promotion for patience and endurance. Prescription for life.
If the businessman who invest in a business, if he doesn't have the patience to wait for that investment and work with it to produce for him, he can become a great loser, not because he didn't make the right investment, but because he didn't have the patience to see the thing through. "Hell, I'm going to take that money and put it somewhere else. It's taking too long for this." Maybe you'll never make it. It's the same for any other interest that we get into. At times, it requires patience and endurance. Patience, that we endure patiently, that we endure patiently. It requires that sometimes.
Believe me, there's no test for the human life any greater than the test of our private life. If most of us can keep that private life excellent by following these simple steps in the prescriptions for life, we will be able to manage the life outside very easily. Most of us. Believe me, when you, especially a man and wife, when man and wife makes a contract and they come together, and they don't have to be in their teens or early twenties or nothing like that, they can be 50 and 60. It's a great test to lay in that bed with each other and share the same bed up and under the same sheet and not change your mind. It's a great test, especially when you don't hurt the other one's feelings, and they wake up and their face just happen to be toward your face, and then [coughs].
You have to have a whole lot of patience to understand it, because right, away you want to say, "You, so and so."
You know worse things than that happen, I just can't say it all up here. I ain't going to say her because I've seen some of these brothers, they’re terrible. You invited him out to dinner and you told him, "I'm going to take you to dinner today, honey." You take him to a very nice restaurant. You notice that the meal you selected from the menu is excellent. He eats his and finishes before you, and you're enjoying your last bit, and he pulls out his handkerchief [blows nose]
He wants you to see that now. Most of us don't even know why we're doing it. Something hanging in the subconscious and we don't even know what it was, but we're punishing our mate for something hanging in the subconscious. We don't even know what it was, "Hey, what's wrong, what's the matter?" "Nothing."
I know some of the things we have to put up with living in close quarters like that. If we can manage that and keep these advices here, keep faith, practice faith, let your deeds be righteous, practice righteous deeds, practice support for the mutual seeking of truth, and support the practice of patience and endurance, or endure patiently is another way to put that, endure patiently. If we practice that, we are sure to have success.
Now, that's not all that G-d gives us. You may say, "Brother Imam, if you are talking about a prescription of life for giving advice, you go through the Quran." Let me speak, to some of you, wise saintly people high above the heavens. Someone came to the prophet and they asked for advice. They wanted to know what can preserve my life, what can keep me and serve me forever, always. "Don't give into the tendency to be angry." He could have said, “Surah Asr”. He could have said that, he knew it better than we do, but he said, "Don't give into the tendency to be angry. He is a sensible doctor. When he looked at that person, I'm sure he saw that that person had a passion problem. They were allowing the passion of anger to take over their life and confuse their intelligence. He didn't say, “Surah Asr." That's what some of you always say. Wal Asr dramatically!
And send the man deeper into his problem.
Praise be to Allah. The intelligent doctor that uses the tools that G-d has given him, he first examines the patient, he first asks questions. He wants to hear some exchange. The guy come up here, "Let me talk to him," and he says, "Give me some advice now that will serve for rest of my life." “Don't get into the tendency to be angry.” Another one said, "Tell me something that nobody can tell me but you." Now, I'm sure what you all would've done.
You would have said, "Do you know the principle of Fiqh? Let me tell you, you don't know it and nobody can tell it like I can, brother. G-d has blessed me with insight into Islamic logic above everybody else."
Look at the simple advice that Prophet Muhammad gave him. Prayers and peace be on our Prophet. He said, "Say," for him to express himself, give him a chance to express himself, use your own tongue, let your brain work. Say. Now, this guy is obligated to do something. He said, "Say," "I have believed." "Qul amantu, thummas taqim” and thereafter be upright." Thereafter be upright, that's what he told him. "Say." "I believe, I have faith, and thereafter be upright."
Some of us may say, "That was very simple. What did he tell him that nobody else could tell him?" He told him this; he gave him the understanding of faith in Christianity. That it is not enough to say, "I believe in Jesus Christ." You have to say, "I believe," and then thereafter be upright. Thank you very much. May G-d guide us, have mercy on us always, Ameen. As Salaam Alaikum.


