06/04/2000
IWDM Study Library
Community as Focus for Life that Allah Wants for Human Beings 
PT. 2

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
As salaamu alaikum. We praise G-d, (Arabic - Al hamdulilah hi rabbil ayl ameen) The praise and the thanks is for G-d, the Lord, sustainer, the keeper of the worlds. We witness that He's one ,Arabic) that He's alone. (Arabic -La shareeka lahu) that there's no partners with Him in the rule and run of the heavens and the earth. We witness that Muhammed is His seventh and His messenger and a mercy to all the worlds. (Arabic) and a mercy to all the worlds, as Allah says in His book, the Qur'an,, the Last Revelation, final book to the people of the world. Again, we are happy to be here in Newark for this occasion. Sorry, we had engagement in Atlanta. We weren't able to be with you last evening, last night. And I heard that the spirit was good and enjoyment was great and we're usually with you for the two days, for both the days. Atlanta had their graduation and I'm committed to be with them for their graduation, every year. And I have done that for years, and ............................... for nine years. The ninth annual graduation ceremony was yesterday.
Today for this occasion we want to address community as the focus for life, the life that Allah wants for His people, for human beings and as the focus for production. Production, or growth or production, G-R-O-W-T-H, growth or production. Allah says in the Qur'an, (Arabic) a Muslim, Muslim Imam, leader, my references should be from Qur'an and not from Bible. But if I was a Christian addressing you, I know the Bible well enough to give the same lecture, same speech and come from the Bible. So G-d says He created us for growth, for growth that we should grow.
And He says He has treated us like a plant or a parable of human life in the Qur'an is the parable of plant life, of a plant. And when you look at a plant, a plant is rooted in the earth, in the ground, the land, it's rooted in the land and it really gets its first growth or start beneath the surface, under the land covered and hid under the ground, under the surface of earth covered and hid from view. It gets its first start. The seed gets its moisture and it responds to the moisture and it swells up, swells because of the need to grow, inside of it. The need to grow pushes outwardly, breaks the covering like the egg. Newborn baby comes, she comes, breaks the egg, come out and like the human being, swells up the mother's stomach, out of view, we don't see what's happening. Swells up the mother's stomach and then the ninth month comes delivering and there the baby comes out, comes from the mother.
So the material world is the first womb of life, the material world. For animals and human beings, it’s the flesh material. For plants, i's the ground material, the earth, the land, soil. Earth. Returning to the parable of our human life, in the plant life. The seed breaks open and the life wants to free itself from encasement, from encasement, from imprisonment. It wants to free itself from restrictions. It's restricted and if it stays inside the womb, the first womb, the material womb that gave it its first life, it will die. If it stays there, it has to come out of there to live. So it's struggling for freedom so it can have its life and have its growth.
It breaks free and a shoot comes up from the ground. If you dig under, you'll see that the beginning of life for it was white, but as it comes out into the air, it turns green. It comes green. If it's more than grass, if it's more than just a simple structure like a tree or bush or something, it may bare fruit or flowers, a variety of colors, a variety of colors, but the leaves will be green most likely. Sometimes they are of another color too, but most likely the leaves will be green and the life seeks beauty. It wants to be beautiful. The grass that grows together. It's beautiful ,to the eyes, pleasant to the eyes, almost the simplest, maybe the simplest form of things that grow out of the earth, the plant life, perhaps the simplest form except that that grows in the water.
That blade the grass is beautiful and it seeks the stand up straight. It seeks balance. It wants to be balanced. It doesn't want be limped over here or limped that way. It wants to be balanced straight up. And the more complex plants branch out, have branches branching out and they branch out in such a way to give that grass and stability, balance, plant and stability. If one of them comes out here on this side a heavy and it doesn't balance with another one out this side, it will pull it to this side. It will be pulled to the side. It will lose its beauty, its symmetry, its beauty, et cetera.
Now its growing. if G-d says He made us like a plant, continue to listen and see what we should be seeing in ourselves. The plant, most plants, even the blade of grass, simple blade of grass, it preserves the composition of the earth, the soil, the land that it came out of. It gives the land a covering that preserves it against erosion, drying out ,erosion, wearing away, becoming sand, et cetera. So it is a protection. It's a covering for the mother ground or mother that it grew out of. It's a protection for it. And as I said, as Qur'an says, say see how He has created growth and spread it over the earth, plant, and spread it over the earth like carpet. And that's what the grass looks like, a nice beautiful carpet. Especially when it's mown nice, mown nice. It looks like a beautiful carpet. That grass, we don't know it, but it's also giving support to small life,
Small life. Where there's grass, you'll find earthworms and the earthworms, they also work the earth to keep the earth nice and they give it food. They also eat, but also what they give is nourishment to the earth that they live upon. So G-d created us like a plant. He created us for beautiful growth. He created us firstly for freedom. Freedom from restriction. Our growth should not be restricted. If you restrict the growth and don't permit it to come out of the wound from where it was put for life to form, you will kill it. You will kill it. It will die without that freedom. It has to have that freedom to have its life, to grow and have its life in the free air of the free sunshine created by G-d. So it needs this, and if it gets this, then it also renders a service.
It gives, it receives and it gives. The grass gives the covering. The covering invites little creatures to grow beneath, to live beneath, the little creatures, creatures. There are many kind, but the earthworm is perhaps the best example for this particular picture I'm trying to paint for you now. Earthworms feed on the rich earth made rich by the living thing, plant or grass or whatever growing in it, grass and it feeds on that rich earth. What it gives out, what it gives back is nourishment, richness, and for the earth, and it works the earth like plowing. Like plowing the ground. It works the earth and keeps it manageable but also loose to breathe air and to support other life. This is wonderful, like a plant, feeds us like a plant. Now that blade of grass, it can't hold birds. Birds can't come and make nests in it like they can in the tree.
They can't give that much support. But that blade of grass is giving great support, support for its size. It is giving great support. In the Qur'an, grass is mentioned, I think for mainly for the beauty to get us to see the beauty in it, how it makes the blanket or carpet like over the earth. But in the Bible, even man is described as a blade of grass. Says what is the son of man, but grass? What is the son of man, but grass? The tree gives support for birds. Birds can have their nests in, for squirrels and other small animals. It even gives support or rescue a hiding place for some larger animals in some areas, some areas of the earth or world, in the hot belt jungle environment, it gives support to even bigger animals or protection for them and hiding places for them. So here is this big tree, grows up out of the earth and supports life. It supports life. It leaves are not just there for it to have breathe and it breathes. Science tells us it breathes. Its breathing by the leaves, it breathes, but it's not only so it can have its breadth of life. Those leaves are also to serve as small shelters, umbrellas for birds, when it rains. The birds can seek refuge. They go to the trees and they get up under the leaves to protect themselves from the beating down of the rain.
We should not just want life and growth selfishly for ourselves. If we are going to be like a plant, our growth is also going to be a contribution to other life, to others. What kind of growth is this? The earth is material. The earth is material, the land, material. The life, the living things that grow out of that have responded to, they were dead. Earth without water is dead. Land without water is dead. So these living things were once dead. They were dead matter, but they became living things because of them being the life of living things. So dead so died, but ............. is dead.
It came from the life of something living. It came from life, though its dead. So when it's put back into the earth in the right time and the conditions are good for it, not harmful to it, it will survive for a time, and when the weather climate gets good and moisture hits it, it swells. Like we've already said. It responds to the moisture, the earth and opens up and release the light that was in it. The water is ...................... Water is very ............... The least little touch on the surface of the water makes ripples all through the surface, ................. You're dead. If we touch the surface of the water, it ripples. It shows that it has been touched. It touches you and nothing happened. You're dead.
That that came from life, though it be dead, when the right sensitivities come and touches, it opens up and release the life potential that was in it, dead. It releases the life potential so it can have its freedom to become itself and enjoy the world that G-d created for it. The world of air and sunshine. Praise be to Allah. G-d is telling us a beautiful thing when G-d says to us, the parable of our life is the life of a plant. He's telling us a beautiful thing and He doesn't go into destructive detail. G-d knows that He has created us with intelligence to take the idea and think on it and draw out all the beauty that G-d gave us in that idea. He created us to do that. And are we to do that? Yes. Allah says in His book that these are signs, but most of the people go along unmindful, not giving these signs any attention, and then G-d tells us, don't be like that. G-d says (Arabic). Think, ponder on these things for surely pondering on the thinking on the thing gives you profit, you'll profit from that.
Who wants to take dirt and eat it. Who wants dirt at the table for dinner this evening? They give me a plate of dirt. Give me a plate of lamb, brother. That's what I love. Give me a plate of lamb for dinner. None of us want to do that. That's death. But that that you do not want to consume within is the environment for you to have your first life. Isn't that something? Yes, the world without life is the environment for you to have life and its role is only to support life. That's what its role is, to support life. Now let's look at this land as money.
Money. I mean big money, not little money. See, little money is probably like corn kernels, grains. That's little money. Land is like big money. The purpose of big money then is to support life, not to be taken into your body and to become part of your life system. It's not to feed your heart. It's not to feed your brain with life. No, it's to give gift support to growth, and then the growth feeds your body. It's the gift support to growth, and the growth feeds the body. The things that grow from the earth feeds us. We eat and it tastes good. They're meant to go into our body. G-d made us, made them to taste good to us, to tell us this is good for your body, to take this in. We love those things. Greens or whatever that grows out of the earth.
The fruits, many fruits, but also to give beauty. They feed our spirit. They feed our soul because they're beautiful. The beauty feeds our soul, our sensitivities. The sensitivities for beauty are fed by the beauty of these growing things, and its said that they've created the man and put him in a garden and put him in a garden, and charged the man and held that man responsible for attending the garden. Now the garden needs help. If you want to see it in its best beauty, then work the garden, although it's beautiful, just as a natural creation, it's beautiful, but if you use your intelligence, man, you can even realize it's more beautiful gardens. So you tend the garden. Trust the garden. This is both Bible and Qur'an. Trust the garden. What am I talking about? Some of you might be asking that question. What's he talking about? I'm talking about the biggest matter that will ever come into your life - what you are here for and how you are to live, so you will have growth and prosperity.
That's what I'm talking about. If yet that's not interesting to you, then you are dead and water won't help you because I'm pouring the water down right now. This is the beauty. This is the beauty of life, being given life from the dead. G-d says, and He's the one who made you, brings you out of the dead, the dead and gives you life, then returns you again to the dead and gives you another resurrection, another growth, another earth and another growth. The baby that's born today, this minute, this second from its mother, nothing gave it that life, but the creator, G-d, that designed life to be that way.
That baby has been given a good life, not a bad life. The baby is not born a criminal. The father could have been criminal. The father and the mother both could have been criminal. That doesn't mean the baby is going to be born criminal. The baby is not going to be born bad because the parents were bad. The baby come here good, always a fresh page for life, ready to have his own record from a clean slate. Isn't that a wonderful G-d? If we care for that baby with our human concern for it, mother or whoever the parents may be, that's taking care of that baby, that baby is going to have a beautiful growth, beautiful life, most likely, unless something gets it from the bad influences of the world, this baby will have a beautiful life. Muhammed the prophet, prayers and peace be upon him, G-d says of him, says, he has already lived among you for a lifetime, speaking of Muhammad the prophet. For 40 years he lived and had not known revelation. He did not belong to any religion. He rejected the religion of the idol worshipers because he was of the group of thinkers in Arabia they were called (Arabic)
It means they believe that human life in its real purpose is excellence is excellence, that it aims for excellence. So they in their life were aiming for excellence just to live the best motivations that they had, the best aspirations that they had, the best sense of beauty that they have. They were just trying to live the best that they saw in a human being's life. They would reject that in the bad stuff in the human being life and go with all of the best stuff in the human being's life. For that reason, they called (Arabic), means what they are, what they are is already in them. That's what it means. They live the best of their inborn, inherent excellence. They lived it to the best of their ability. So they were called (Arabic-Hunifah)) people. They're mentioned in the Qur'an, the (Arabic).Abraham was of the (Arabic). G-d came and told them, they had lost the knowledge of Abraham. They didn't know anything about Abraham, but G-d came and told them about the house that was in there in their land. They didn't even know what the house was for. The house was filled with idols. They had lost all of that knowledge and the proof that they didn't have revelation in the Qur'an. If we accept the holy book of Qur'an, if we are Muslims, we have to accept that. Says that the revelation has now come to a people that had not received revelation before. Speaking of them, the Arabs.
Although Abraham had been in that area. So, well, Abraham was in that area, so their ancestors must have received revelation before. No, but he didn't come to them as a messenger. He came because Sarah, his wife, peace be upon her and him, had rejected his wife that she asked him to accept and to have a child by. This is Bible. Sarah asked Abraham to accept her, handmade, her servant, her girl servant, and have a child by her since "I'm too old to have one." And the Bible story goes on to say that as she began to show life, pregnancy, life growing new life growing in her, the old lady got jealous. And Abraham, naturally, if he was a good man, naturally, he's starting to give that woman more attention now because she is bearing child and she is carrying a burden. So this made her even more of a burden.
She said, according to the Bible, she said, take this handmade away from here. Take this woman away from here. Abraham accepted to do that and he took her out in the desert. He took her in a land of the nomads, land of the Nomads, people that didn't have established civilization. They just went from waterhole to waterhole, living, existing like migratory animals and birds. That's how they lived. So he left the child out there and he prayed to G-d that G-d would give her protection for her child and keep them safe. That was his prayer. Isn't this a wonderful picture of brothers who study the scripture? You ministers and preachers and Imams. This is a beautiful story. So here he is, he leaves her out there and a bird. She was desperate. She bore her child, but now her child needs water. She can't find water. And you had to go from water hole to water hole out there in the desert for water. The rain hardly ever come. She's desperate. So she runs between two hills, desperate, desperate, running, panicking.
And she looked and she saw a bird. This is how the tradition goes. She went where that bird was and the bird was pecking the ground and water started coming up from the ground. That was the beginning of the well of Zam Zam, that all pilgrimage who go to visit that spot, that sacred holy spot that holds great message for all mankind. Muslims. We go and visit that spot and we make the run, (Arabic - the saee), between the two hills, repeating her act of desperation, her panicking, repeat it. At one point we have to trot a little bit, act like we're desperate, like we're running. When it gets between those two points where she was running, we have to really run. We run, desperate. Right in about center of the distance, there a marking within about center distance that represented intensification of her desperation.
So we get to the signal, that, signal post that tells us here it is, starts trotting. So, the little bird pecks the dead surface and up come the sensitivity. A spring of sensitivity, water, fresh water, pure water for her child who was needing water. G-d gave her the water, G-d provided for her the water, out of the dead matter out of dead earth. As I said, who wants to put earth, ground, soil, dirt into its mouth for dinner? Nobody. Even if you put water in, we don't want it. Think of it as great wealth. Think of it as the great support for wealth as wealth, the land, the landmass as wealth that supports smaller production of wealth.
Isn't that the fact, the landmass is what support all the other smaller sources of wealth. or production? We don't want to put water. Oh, I'm going to give you some water, but there no, still don’t want it. I can't eat that. So some of us, we can romance materialism, but it's still not fit for consumption. You can put all the human sensitivities and beauty to your idea of materialism, but if you want us to live on materialism, it's still not fit for consumption. But if you see materialism as a basis to support life and not life itself, than it’s dead. It's not to be taken into my body as life or as something to feed my life. It's dead. It's to be seen as a support for my life. Then we can make all the money. We can become billionaires. The money is not going to kill us because we are not going to eat it. We are going to use it to support those things that we can take into our body.
Like better schools, like better equipment for our schools, like paid teachers, qualified teachers and paid teachers, hardworking servants in education paid a good price, that enable them to not worry about their meal today and not worry about that rent this month, not worry about that light bill, that phone bill. Isn't that life? That's beauty now. I can feel it, can't you? I feel it. Bills paid, ooh. I feel good! You see how the support comes from a dead thing first, and if you know that it's dead something and you're not supposed to give your life to it, it's to support your life, you're safe. Look at water, all of this supports plants. This is a fact. Look at the plant life. I've seen plant life beautiful as you have, but I've seen plant, especially trees, ghostly pictures, a ghostly picture. What was that ghostly picture? Trees that were inundated by flood. Water rose too high, came in where the trees were and didn't go back, didn't recede. Found a place there to stay, a sunken plain, and stayed there covering the trees too high. Trees standing in water.
Trees died. All the leaves died. The branches naked like skeletons, standing in the water, A ghostly picture because they got too much water. Now you want to make yourself a ghostly community? Just love crying preachers. Oh lord, oh lord. If he cry more than he educates, you're going to soon be a ghostly community. Too much water. Allahu Akbar. When you have land and water, you're going to have growth. Cabbage, collars greens. Oh, he knows we don't eat collard greens. Talk for yourself, buddy. I studied the Qur'an after the trial period, after trying to be upright. I studied the Qur'an. In the Qur'an G-d says that the people of the book imposed laws and restrictions upon themselves that G-d did not give them. G-d didn't authorize all that. They did that to themselves. I started seeing that we were really put to test to see which we prefer - freedom for the mind, from mental slavery in this world that had us thinking we were inferior? Which we prefer - the message of freedom of the mind from thinking we were inferior or collard greens, yams, sweet potatoes, pork, all that. Which do you prefer? That was a test for us, and we proved that we did not want the things for our stomach as much as we wanted the things for our brains, our minds, we proved that. By.......

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