08/30/1996
IWDM Study Library
Jumu’ah Convention White Plains NY

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Alhamdulillahi rabbil alamin [Arabic language] We praise G-d the one and only. We worship none but Him. We worship only the one G-d. We ask Him for assistance. We witness that Muhammad the last, the seal of the prophets is G-d's servant and messenger the prayers and the peace be upon him and what follows of that tradition. We praise G-d [Arabic language] Praise be to G-d, the one who created the skies and the earth.
[Arabic language] The one who began the darkness and the light. [Arabic language] He is the one who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. We praise G-d the one [Arabic language] The one who created the skies and the earth and all that is between the two of them in six periods of time, or in six days. G-d, whom it is said in the Quran that he began the creation [Arabic language] And he began the creation of the human being from clay.
Following that, we add again from the book of G-d from the Quran. G-d saying [Arabic language] G-d said to the Angels, "Surely, I am creating a mortal person from clay." From clay, (Arabic) from clay. Allah says to us in his book [Arabic language] Say that G-d is the creator of everything. Allah is the creator of everything. [Arabic language] He is the unique, the one and only, the Subduer.
Allah, G-d that is. [Arabic language] G-d is the creator of everything, and he is the manager of everything. He manages everything. And further [Arabic language] How can it be possible that he has a child, a son? There never was for him any female companion. He is the creator of everything. The creator of everything [Arabic language]
The one who created the death and the life [Arabic language] The one who created the death and life to test and to manifest who among you is best in his deeds, in his works. Again, from Allah's book. Allah says, G-d says [Arabic language] That G-d has obligated us to respond and accept the messenger of G-d when he has sent the messenger from among the believers. He has sent the messenger from among the believers. He is one of the believers. He has come from the believing people, from the people of faith.
Not the people who reject faith. That he is from our own selves. He's from the from the believers, from themselves, from their own souls, from their own natures, from their own persons. He is like them in his nature. He is like them in his personality. He is like them in his soul. They should recognize their kindred believer when they see him or when they learned of him.
[Arabic language] Oh, believers. Oh, you who believe. Respond to Allah, respond to G-d. Don't be negligent. Don't be absent-minded. Don't be insensitive. Respond to Allah and to his messenger. When it is that you are called to what gives you life. When you are called to what gives you life [Arabic language] and know that G-d, that Allah is so close to the person, to the human person, that he is as though operating between your body, yourself, your own mortal life, your life, your lifeline, and your heart [Arabic language] Between your moral self. Your lifeline and your heart.
[Arabic language] Know that it is to him. You shall be gathered again one day [Arabic language] And believe in what has been sent down to Muhammad, the seal of the prophets upon him be the peace. Prayers and the peace. It is the truth. [Arabic language] It is the truth. [Arabic language] From your Lord, from their Lord. It takes away. [Arabic language] It takes away, moves away, skims all, gets rid of the defects. Makes sound and pure their state, their condition.
This is his Islam. This is the Quran. Al Islam that was given to Muhammad The Prophet, a little bit over than 1,400 years ago. Continuing from the book of Allah, the Quran, Allah says [Arabic language] Highly glorified is he [Arabic language] Of a certainty you have in Muhammad The Prophet, the most excellent model for any who desire Allah, and the last day, and who remembers Allah, much [Arabic language] Again, Allah, the Most High, says in his book, the Quran, of the same perfect model in creation for human beings.
[Arabic language] Did not send Muhammad except to be a mercy to all the worlds. To all the worlds, not the one world. Not to the west, not to the east. Not to one nation and not the others [Arabic language] To all the worlds. Allah makes it clear to us that he is a witness, he preached among us, he taught among us, he led us, he made us an ummah by the grace of G-d and the guidance. He made us an ummah. Now one billion strong on this Earth or more. Muhammad did that by the grace of G-d with the G-d's word. Praise be to Allah.
The prayers and peace be upon Muhammad. G-d says that he is a witness. Muhammad [Arabic language] He's a witness. He's a witness that he gave this ummah the guidance as G-d revealed it and taught it well. Explained it very clearly into the ears of those who had the sense to listen, the soundness of mind and brain [Arabic language] An intelligence to follow. He recited it into their ears, and preached into their ears, and led them also by example.
He did the things that we are to do, or that they were to do, and we are to do [Arabic language] Did not send you to be except a mercy to all worlds. To all the worlds. He is a witness [Arabic language] Since the time of Muhammad The Prophet, there has formed the Christian sect that call themselves the witnesses, but who were first obligated to be the witnesses? We were. Muhammad is the witness in the Quran, and G-d tells us we are witnesses. We are witnesses, and be witnesses of G-d isn't that what G-d tells us in the Quran, and be witnesses for G-d on His justice. Standing up on justice. Upholding the justice.
He's also a [Arabic language] He's a good news bringer. Good news bringer. The good news that they thought they received when they got the gospel. They call what they call the gospel [Arabic language] It is really manifested and materialized in the [Arabic language] of Muhammad, in the form of the Quran and Muhammad himself. That's the good news.
[Arabic language] The good news. Now, look at the word good news, and see the connection with the human person, the mortal. [Arabic language] G-d says Muhammad is a [Arabic language] He's a human normal like you, and then, he said that he is a [Arabic language] He's a good news bringer. What is the good news? The good news is that we don't have to have angels to lead men, but a man, a mortal, a person who has flesh and blood, and sex and love for women and want wives and children.
That man should be your leader. Not the angel, but that man. But when G-d told the angels he was about to make that kind of creature and give him responsibility, they got very upset. They didn't think mortal flesh made from mud could be trusted like that with that heavy responsibility. But G-d made the human, but also with the capacity to be angelic in his nature and in his behavior, and Muhammad, though he was truly human, he was also angelic in his nature and his behavior.
His jinn was overcome, and his jinn was no longer jinn, but a Muslim. He was asked, "Muhammad The Prophet, do you have jinn too?" He said, "Yes, but my jinn has become a Muslim." Praise be to Allah. Good news for mortals, that you can be, in your behavior, angelic, and at the same time, in your true nature, human. That you, though troubled by jinns, can be devoted so sincerely, so completely, so consistently to G-d's will in you, that you will become angelic, and your jinn will become Muslim. Praise be to Allah.
Allah has given us the perfect model. The best of his creation, Muhammad The Prophet. the seal of the Prophets. G-d's servant and his messenger. Allahu Akbar. Again, G-d says of him in his book, in the G-d's book that's in the Quran [Arabic language] "And obey G-d, and obey the messenger." Again [Arabic language] Muhammad. G-d says [Arabic language] "If you," meaning all of us, [Arabic language] He's speaking to all of us, the ummah.
"If you love G-d, if you really love G-d," Then G-d told Muhammad to say to us, "Obey me. Follow me." That's what it means obey him. [Arabic language] Then all of us should follow Muhammad The Prophet [Arabic language] Then G-d will love each of us. This is a condition. Many of us say we love G-d, but we are absent-minded when it comes to the role of the prophet in our lives.
You love G-d? You want him to return love? Then you should follow The Prophet. You should follow Muhammad so that Allah will love you, and he will remove from you, all of us, our sins. He will forgive us our sins, our faults, and Allah is all forgiving and merciful [Arabic language] Again, Prophet Muhammad said [Arabic language] You will not speak to all of us [Arabic language] All of us he's speaking too [Arabic language] You will not enter the garden of paradise. You will not enter the heaven of paradise until you have faith. Until you do more than have faith. Until you practice faith. Until you practice faith.
The Islam is the religion of practice. We don’t just believe without practice. Everything we believe, we put it into practice. We must see that reflected in your actions. We must see that reflected in our behavior. I’ll speak to you sometime, but don’t think I'm not including myself. We will see that reflected in our behavior, belief, faith, in Allah and in Muhammad, and in the Quran, in Muhammad and the other things that G-d has given us as articles of faith.
He says [Arabic language] He says [Arabic language] Then he goes on to give the second part of this saying [Arabic language] And you will never believe or never practice faith [Arabic language] Until you practice love. Until you practice love. The proof of one’s faith is the love that we see expressed by that person. "I believer in G-d" is first seen as a lover of G-d, a lover of what G-d approves of and a lover of humanity.
Certainly, the fraternal group should love one another, and should practice love among one another. We should be practicing love. See, practice is more than just believing or having. To practice love`, you have to be conscious of your obligation to love your brother, love your sister, love the old among us, love the children. You have to be conscious of that so that it strikes your heart, and make your heart respond, and you act. You're doing act of love. You're doing act of love.
Do true friends love each other? Do true friends love each other? They do. False friends may not love each other, but true friends love each other. Yes. Muhammad said that we are to help our brother whether he's in the right or in the wrong. Well, how do you help your brother who is in the wrong? [Arabic language] He said, "You help him by trying to hold him back from wrong." That’s the way you help him. By trying to hold him back from wrong. Now, we don’t want to be the untrue or the false friend. See a brother with a reefer going up to his mouth, and we want to keep his friendship, so we don’t say anything.
Or see him doing something much worse, and we want to keep his friendship, so we don’t say anything. We pretend like nothing was done improper. That’s a false friend and that’s a false brother. Believers shall love each other. Muhammad The Prophet said believers are fraternal brothers. We are brothers. Fraternal brothers. We are brothers. He said, "Whether it’s your brother or not, if you're a Muslim, if you're one of his followers, you shouldn’t sleep well knowing that your neighbor is hungry." Are we a revolutionary group? Yes, we are.
The Muslim ummah is a community that should be constantly in evolution and revolution as long as the world is not what Allah wants it to be. We should be constantly in evolution., and until the world becomes what Allah wants it to be, we should be constantly revolutionary. Revolutionary. That means doing the thing that brings about change. We are not to tolerate the state of affairs. The state of affairs is against the will of G-d, the word of G-d, in the Quran, and against the leadership of Muhammad The Prophet. We are not to tolerate the state of affairs being as they are.
No. We’re supposed to rise up and try to change it. Now, G-d knows that sometimes, it’s difficult. It may take your life, or risk your life, your mortal life, your physical life. So, he says it by way of instruction to our prophet, through our Prophet, Muhammad. Muhammad says, "If you can’t correct the thing with your hand, then correct it with your tongue. Speak out against it." If you can’t do that, if you can’t muster the power of faith to do that much, then he said, "Resist it with your heart." He said of that Jihad it is the weakest form. It’s the weakest.
Now, I was born a male, and like it. My masculinity tells me never choose the weakest way to perform. That’s beneath my manhood. It’s beneath my male dignity to do the weakest duty or to perform in the weakest way, the most sissified way when I can perform in a stronger way. If I can’t speak out against it with my-- If I can’t extract it with my hand or change it with my physical forces, then I'm going to speak out against it with my tongue. If I can’t speak out against it with my tongue, I'm going to go to the drawing board and work on it. Now, I'm going to come up with a way to speak out against it with my tongue. I’ll never accept that I don’t say anything. Allahu Akbar. I’ll have to devise a way to do it.
Now, concerning the obligation, again, to one another, Muhammad The Prophet said that we should feel safe among each other not fearing that one of us is going to backbite the other, going to talk about us and slander us, discredit us before others, or going to do some act, some deed against our best interests. The Muslim is the one who keeps his brother safe. His brother can feel secure. He’s not going to hurt him with his tongue or with his hand. Not with speech or with an act.
It we will live up to what we have been given in the Quran and in the sayings and teachings and life examples of Muhammad The Prophet. We will be what Allah says [Arabic language] You are the best of the communities, evolved, raised up, or brought up for all people. We will be that. All people will look to us and say, "They are model people for the whole world, for the whole of humanity. Look how they respect G-d. Look how they love G-d. Look how they respect their sacred interests. Their book, their religion, their mosque, duties."
[00:29:28] [END OF AUDIO]

