11/04/1989
IWDM Study Library
San Francisco CA

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Imam WD Mohammed:
As much as they can take. And that's the problem. We don't shoulder the responsibility that we should shoulder and we are too weak in our hearts to make the children shoulder the responsibility that they should be shouldering. So everybody's on their own, the children on their own, parents on their own, everybody on their own. So we have allowed ourselves to come under the influence of the hellish environment of America and allowed our life to be taken by that hellish environment. We have to get it back. Take it from that hellish environment and put it under the disciplines of Al Islam.
The brother should be, every brother should know how to call the prayer. And he should let the son see him calling the prayer in his house. And pray so they see you pray and then pass the responsibility on to the son. Say, son, I'll be gone. I won't be able to be back here. But you see that the adhan is called at this certain time. Demonstrate your responsibility, that you accept responsibility, demonstrate it to the family and then put responsibility on the members of the family, especially your sons. The wife, work with the daughters, you work with your sons.
It is important too, brother, for your son to see you doing the work that you do to earn a livelihood. Many of us, the natural way was for the man, for families to evolve together and for the man to incorporate his family members in what he's doing. as many that could be in incorporated, but now that situation is gone. We all separated and everything and we pulled this way and that way we don't get that benefit. So you have to then have it in your plan. You have to organize yourself and your life and plan to bring your son in touch with you. Let your son see you. You a painter, let him see you painting sometimes. The day he's out of school, take him with you and let him see you paint. You a mechanic, ask your boss. If you're not the boss, ask your boss.
See, I got my son. I want, he's curious. He wants to know what I do. His mother's going to bring him to the job for about 15 minutes. Let him come see what you're doing. See that's the way Allah naturally makes the children to be inspired by their father and to be inspired by mother, to see what they do to bring income into the house. And the least thing we can do is make sure they're understanding the meaning of things. Don't just say this is a dollar. Say here, this is a dollar. Teach them the meaning of a dollar. I tell 'em, I say see this dollar. I say that's work.
 I say, you see that dollar, that's sacrifice. I say, you see that dollar? I say, that's beans, that's rice, that's butter, that's milk. I say, come on, I'm going to show you. Take 'em in the car, give a person a dollar, come back with some beans or butter or milk or something. I said, see, I had to give them that so I could get this. You see, exchange, teach 'em the meaning of exchange and that ain't just a piece of paper. So they grow up with no understanding of the value of money. We have to do a lot of work. And I think if we just understand that our life is to be lived Islamically, is to be guided Islamically, is to be structured Islamically. It should follow an Islamic plan. If it doesn't follow an Islamic plan, then it's not Islamic and it's not going to be a plus in your life. Your family will be a minus in your life. But if you follow the Islamic plan, your family will be a plus in your life. And if the family is a plus for us separately, it's going to be a plus for the Ummah at large. Look at the one thing that burdens many of us, race. Look how that burden of race consciousness has been taken off of so many of us. Many us who are sitting here right now are very comfortable with some of these white folks.
You couldn't be that comfortable five or 10 years ago. You would really be in trouble. Your spirit will be aggravated something terrible say. How come they're here? What are they doing here? What are we doing here? Yeah, that's the situation we came from. But look how the religion has just lifted that burden off us, cleansed us of ugly race consciousness. Cleansed us. We should still be conscious of our race. Don't forget your race, but understand race in the light of Islam, not in the light of the world, the world, but in the light of Islam. What am I saying? I'm saying this, that Allah created all of us and He created the white, He created the black, brown, yellow. He created all of us. And Allah says that He made us excellent, not one of us, all of us. And He gave us one common design, one surah.
It's not given in the plural for the many races. It's given in the singular meaning that one surah is a surah for all of us. And we know surah also means a picture, doesn't it? It means a picture. It's translated forms. The one who gave us our forms, our forms or our design. That all embracing or all-encompassing inclusive design or form for us is the form that Allah gave to all of us. And we know that's the most important form. Whether we succeed in the world, in America or in Los Angeles or in Chicago or some other place, is not depending upon us being African descent or European descent or Asian descent. It's depending upon us being in that form. In that form that includes all of us. My human form, my human intelligence, my human capacity, my human ability, my human potential. That's what decide how I'm going to succeed.
Now, we know many times we can be deceived into carrying an unnatural concept of ourselves. And that unnatural concept, a false concept of ourselves, can hinder us from progressing in society in spite of us having that form that would make a good future or a good way possible for us if we respected it, respected and used it, you see. We know that. We know that sometimes that can be an interference. And believe me, when we look at the state of the, what they call the underclass, the weak people of this society, I think the reason for that is because they have been made to believe things about themselves that are false and contrary to the real surah that G-d made. Yes, I do believe that. But you know this thing affects also the members of the white race too. The members of the white people who call themselves white.
It affects them too. They're ignorant. If they're ignorant, they buy these unreal ideas about themselves as a race and it doesn't mean they're going to be successful. 30, 40, 50 years ago that ignorance wasn't quite as burdensome as it is today. The world has changed now so that a white person carrying those old racist ideas may be crippled as much as you crippled if you black by the same ideas. Doesn't mean that racism is favoring whites anymore. That's what I'm saying. Racism is not favoring whites anymore. Not on the whole. When we look at the situation from the whole, look at the whole people and the whole situation for life existence in this country, racism is hurting the members of the humanity that was designed to help as much as it's hurting the victims. Pardon me, those that it was designed to victimize.
Yes. And I don't think we have to worry too much about racism as such. Every now and then we see something flare up and somebody is doing ugly things in the name of the race. But you see how quickly it goes away? It goes away quick. I'm not worried about that. You shouldn't worry too much about racism. Don't forget it. But what I'm saying, that's not the big problem. The big problem now is not a threat from racism, white supremacy ideas. No. The big problem now is the working of that thing in the conscience and in the behavior of the people as what you call arrested poison. There's an active poison, an arrested poison. Well, the big thing to worry about now is the arrested poison of race, not the active poison of race. And the arrested poison of race comes from the idea that a white man on the cross is son of G-d and the only way you can see G-d is to look at him.
That's the arrested poison. See, they'll stop talking about racism and all that, but the arrested poison is still there. And later on when the situation change, that poison can fly up and we'll be in the same shape again. That's the poison that we should be worried about. When you talk about racism, I think the only racism we need to tackle now is the idea that a white man on a cross is G-d. Now some people get very nervous. "He shouldn't do that. That's un Islamic. That's un Islamic. He shouldn't do that." It is Islamic and I must do it.
That should be the movement of African-American people regarding racism. We should make our whole movement to destroy racism directed at the image on that cross. And we'll be answering the words of G-d in Qur'an when He says Let us come together on terms that respect us equally. That we do not raise up from among ourselves Lords other than G-d. We are not attacking the Prophet. Is that the Prophet on the cross? No sir. That's not the Prophet. We are attacking the white man. And when I was a boy, he was a blonde haired, blue-eyed, thin looking white man looking just like the ones that was doing the lynching and things down south. They made him look just like that because they want us to see that, "Yeah, you see who we are, don't mess with us. We the son of G-d. We survive crucifixion and everything. We come back."
And when we come back, we are going to be angry. We ain't going to be so nice. That's to spook you up, superstition to spook up the oppressed, spook them up so they're afraid to strike out. We are not fighting normal men. These are not normal men we are fighting. These are abnormal men, these super men, supernatural men. So that image put that kind of superstition and fear in us that we start to suspect that the white man may not be natural because after all G-d is in one of them. And one of them coming back to judge the whole world.
So we should be aware of that. And I'm asking you the don't give up attacking that idea, that a man on a cross is G-d. We have to attack that. And if we attack that enough, we will kill the subtlety of racism that keep the poison line dominant. Just waiting on a situation to come to the aid of white supremacy. Now I'll conclude this by pointing to what I believe would be really profitable, practical benefits for us if we live Muslim family life. I go back to the first thing that was suggested there is that we work to eliminate the single parent family among us.
That's one. The second was that we have orderly life at home, planned life at home, and that Islamic teachings be the guide for us, how to plan that life for ourselves. That life should be an organized life, it should be a governmental life. We should see our family life as a government. As a government. This home has to be governed by the Qur'an and by the Sunnah and the ones in charge here, the mother, the father in charge here. To carry out the responsibility of this government, this Muslim family government. It is supposed to be a productive government. We are supposed to become better educated, be like the slaves that were freed 300 or more years ago, pardon me, a hundred more years ago. Be like those slaves who were kept from access to knowledge, school, et cetera, and were so anxious to get it that they were seen resting on the plow in the field with a book in their hands trying to read something.
So we should be like that. Let us value knowledge as a Muslim. There's so many wonderful things said about knowledge. Let us get those things of the Prophet and let us give 'em to our children at home. What the Prophet says of knowledge, "Anyone who enters the path of knowledge enters a path that would guide him to paradise." Is that true? Yes. This is the saying. So look what kind of impact that saying would have on the youngsters in the family. And any man who will educate two daughters the Prophet said, Peace be upon him. If he will see that two of his daughters are educated, G-d will give him the paradise. Their so much we can offer from the Qur'an and from the life of the Prophet to make our children just feel so good and comparable and have so much faith in the future because of their appreciation for knowledge.
So Muslim perception of knowledge and the value of knowledge is unique. We should teach them the Muslim perception and instill the Muslim respect in our children and our family and ourselves for knowledge. Also for moral life. Moral life is quite confusing in the American society. What is moral here will be immoral there. Their is so much moral contradiction in the public life or in American life. You have to go to the separate groups, the religious groups, this church, that synagogue, this institution, this discipline, this discipline of knowledge to get a consistent idea . When you look in the public you can't get that consistent idea. Cause the behavior that is moral in the religion is rejected in the public. It's rejected in the public. They frown upon that behavior. They want us to approve anything and not call it immoral. This is a tendency in the public for you to prove any and everything and don't call it immoral. They got us afraid now to say homosexual in a criticizing way, they'll turn the wrath on you. The American people, Christians, I hope ain't no Muslim joining 'em. Hey, what are you doing discriminating. You're discriminating against these people, this minority. They'll accuse you, you see? So we can't take our sentiments and our values from this society, it will destroy us. Finish us off for good.
Another thing, even racism. Let us not just understand racism the way it is given to us in American society. It's given it to us in American society just to create emotional responses. That's all. Just to kickoff emotions. That's the way racism is fed to us in this society. We want to look at racism in its causes and in its effect, we want to look at it in its history, in its life, how that life developed. Now all of us can't do that, but we should have that as a concern. The Imams, the teachers and the educated ones, the intellectuals among us. We should be studying racism in its causes as well as in its effect, we should be studying racism in its life. It's a life like a germ. It has a beginning. What circumstances made it possible for it to begin?
And what has been the developments of racism? We should learn it that way and we have become more racially fortified. We have become stronger in our own sense of our own race and our own identity as a people of race. We become more fortified, more stable as people of race and we won't be likely to be set off emotionally by little brushes with people in the public because that can hurt you and set you back. In fact, racism is the way of entrapping you, the way of entrapping you to keep you from productivity, just burden you with race. See, this society has things to eliminate the weak. Racism is something out here in the air to eliminate the weak.
Vanity is something that's encouraged in this society to eliminate the weak. So this is the survival of the fittest. This is the jungle. This is a society where Darwin’s law is holy and sacred. Yes, the survival of the fittest, and they're going to make sure that the character of the society always remains that. That it is a test for the survival of the fittest. If we do something to make the science society more humane, believe me, it won't last but a few days, a few years, something is going to happen to make the society more burdensome. It always has to be a typical harsh, perilous jungle. They have to keep it that way. They think that's the natural order for men. So immorality, immorality, injustice, cruelty, homosexuality, perverts, drugs, liquor problems, violence, destruction to property. These things are not accidental.
If they're accidental, then how come certain societies are not having these accidents? There are other societies on this earth. They're not having all these accidents. Somebody is feeding these things in Western society. Somebody feeds these things to keep the society burdened so the process of elimination continues and only to strong survive. In my conclusion, if we will stick with Al Islam and don't be lazy. Learn about our religion and build strong family. Don't be satisfied with just a strong Mosque, with the Imam being strong. Don't be satisfied with that. Really the central focus of our life is social life. Social life. For Muslims. The central focus for Muslims is on his social life. And his social life is supposed to be a life of obedience to G-d as his whole life is. But where that obedience first starts, it first starts in the social unit, the family.
It starts in the family. So we should keep the social focus on our life and the family is the model of the social life for us. It's not the Communist idea of what is social life. The family is the model of what is social life for us. Let us build strong Muslim family life. Let us have a planned life and let us use the tools, the information, the guidance, the light of Qur'an and the traditions of our Prophet, and we will be successful and we'll impact wonderfully on the broad Ummah of Al Islam internationally and the effects on Western society will be so great and so welcome that soon this whole country will become Muslim. If we make strong Muslim families in this country, soon the whole family will become Muslim. We pray for G-d's guidance, ask for His forgiveness, A salaam Alaikum.
Speaker 2:
Just what we expected. Alhamduillah. You know he mentioned Darrin's law. When a creature moves from one environment to another, got three choices. Either migrate, change or die. So that when situations change, we ought to make our choice. So either we're going to die, we're going to go somewhere else or we're going to have to change to treat the situation. Well now it's dictated that we make some changes. What we're going to do now, we're going to make salat, and then we're going to come back for the other two presentation of our scholars, Dr. Qutabi And Dr. Ali. So Ins hallah we'll make the Zuhr prayer and then we'll come back. One note also, I should say, brothers and sister, if I can get your attention before you leave. Imam Warith Udin Mohammed was originally scheduled to be on program earlier and then flight schedules had to be rearranged in order for him to be able to accommodate us here. So we are grateful for his participation here, even though there was an adjustment for him. But he does have to leave most immediately and he intends no disrespect for anyone in not being present. A salaam Alaikum.
37


