03/27/1988
IWDM Study Library
Detroit, Michigan

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
[applause]
Imam: Thank you very much. Thank you. As-Salaamu Alaykum. As-Salaam Alaykum.
Congregation: Wa-Alaykum Salaam.
Imam: Peace be unto you.
[pause 00:00:41]
Imam: Dear beloved people, our life is for worship. For Muslims, every act of life is worship. What we do when we're alone, what we do when we're with our family at home, what we do when we're out in the public, what we do in any and every situation is worship. Ours is a religion that requires the total life to be devoted to God. This is the religion of the native human being. The human being, that God created.
That is to say it is natural for the human being when he realizes that he has a Lord over him, a God, to be concerned for every act in his life, the smallest to the greatest because he wants the approval from his Lord. He wants his Lord to accept him. He wants his Lord to love him. Therefore, for this occasion, for this day, and for this address, we ask the blessings of Allah.
We began always with his name, with Allah’s name, the Merciful Benefactor, the Merciful Redeemer. We chose today to select from holy books of Quran, the chapter Surah, titled Al-Lail. Our brother and my friend, Imam Danielle Karim, beautifully recited this chapter for us today. Before I go into the context of my address, I would like to introduce that context, what I have to say today, by reading or by giving to you.
I would say in essence in the English language what is given in the chapter Surah, titled Al-Lail, meaning the night. Al-Lail means the night. Our interest for this address today, is very broad, is the total life of the human being as he has to live in his own policy, and as he has to live in the public with others.
Our Lord, the Most High, says to us in the holy book Quran, that He is the one who began night and day. He tells us also that night is a cover. The night is a cover for our rest, and day is made for our activities. He also tells us that darkness oppresses and the light liberates. He Himself is the one who created both darkness and light. He says to us also in the [Arabic language], "Surely with difficulty comes the ease."
We find that where people have been put under the greatest burdens, eventually, there come the greatest people. [Arabic language] "Surely with hardship our difficulties comes to ease." We know the message is that man should not try to escape difficulty, that he has to face sooner or later. He should know that even God is Lord and Creator intended for him that he should not live without trial. That he should not live without a challenge because God intends that his muscles be developed.
In developing his muscles, he has the strength for a greater and better life. I used to read anything without glasses.
[laughter]
Imam: That time has gone. The night with it and [unintelligible 00:08:45], and it just covers everything. The day when it makes everything bright, pleasant, magnificent. A bright sunshiny day is a magnificent day. By the creation of the male and the female, surely, your efforts and struggle are diverse. Diverse means different. What you're struggling for, different from what I may be struggling for. For the individual person, there many things pulling on him or her.
The man know that he or she make an effort, a forward-moving effort to accomplish something, to attain something, etcetera. It's not only true for us who differ because we are separate individuals, but it's for us singular too. Surely, the things we are striving for have diverse ends. Sometimes we are having great difficulty with the responsibility of personal life, simply because we are not aware of this fact operating in the life of man and society. We don't get a desire or an interest to really question our own life, our own motivations, our own aspirations, to see if there might be possibly a terrible conflict going on in our own private world.
The words of the Lord Most High says, "But for him who is charitable and regardful." Two words, bringing our attention two possibilities, two properties, two principles in the life of man and society. The principle of charity, the principle of respect. Serious deep respect, regardfulness. "Then as for whoever is charitable and regardful and who gives the truth or who says the truth." As an emphasis here, on how the truth is operating in this person. [Arabic language] means gave the truth. [Arabic word] means stress. Great stress, on how that is operating for that person.
[Arabic language] "He gives the truth, according to excellence." Many people will give the truth, but not according to excellence. They will give the truth as influenced by their concerns. Their concern may be for something cheap, not expensive. Something low, not high. Something of base value, not high value. Something of little consequence for human life and happiness, not of great consequence. They will be speaking and giving the truth, but the way they give the truth will be influenced by their concern at the time. This is the one who gives the truth according to the demand for excellence and God has created us for excellence. He has created us for excellence.
We come into the world not able to stand and God has given us the nature to stand up and we get old or we get lazy or we get hip and we don't stand well. "Hey, baby, what's happening?" The stand that God brings us to from the cradle, is always a good stand. That baby is not satisfied until he manage to stand erect. Excellence. The spirit of excellence operating in the natural life, to bring that stand to perfection. What is our religion all about? The stand of Abraham, the upright.
For that person who is charitable and regardful and who gives the truth according to the demands on his life for excellence, God says, he shall be eased on to a state of ease. He shall be eased on to a state of ease. That tells us philosophically, many wonderful things. That is what the secular world also tells us. That man is naturally motivated toward the happiness, towards pleasure. Life is created for happiness, for pleasure, but there's a great, great trial, without vision. A great, great trial without the help of God, whose name for us is Allah. Highly praised and glorified is He.
"As for him who gives the lie," [Arabic word] same thing, according to excellence. How is now a person telling lies or giving lies according to excellence? We want to tell the most effective lies if we are a person given to lying. We want to be most effective with our lies, so we are aiming for excellence too. The worst of all liars is Satan himself, the devil, who tries to identify excellence and then give the lie to it. "We shall certainly ease him forward to hardship." His destiny is not happiness. His destiny is not good life. His destiny is more burdened, as God eases him forward, according to his own posture, according to his own disposition.
As God moves him on forward, He will be moving him on forward, easing him on. He goes easily too, into greater and greater hardship, greater and greater difficulty, greater and greater misery. Don't we see lies and falsehood in the world, moving those who champion that into greater and greater misery, greater and greater difficulty, greater and greater hardship? They have to tell a bigger lie the next day or bigger lie still the next day. They have to work harder to cover it up the next day and harder and harder the next day. They are working themselves deeper and deeper in hell and they think they have us in hell. He shall not be enriched, he shall not be made comfortable by his wealth, he shall not find his wealth to be of profit for him when he's made to return, he has to return everything has to return. "Surely upon us," this is God speaking, "Surely upon us, “God says, "Surely upon us is the responsibility to guide," surely upon us is the responsibility to guide. If you understand Arabic language grammar and effective speech, affective and effective speech in Arabic grammar in the context of the mechanics of language, you understand that the '-na' here meaning us does not at all indicate that there's any god with God, or another helper with him, no, no, no.
It means only that when God speaks, He speaks as a sovereign for the sovereignty that means He speaks as the king for the kingdom, He speaks as the absolute ruler for all that has to be ruled over. When He says '-na' that's what he's saying, whatever the operating over you, whatever man, respect as being a force or a power with him it all belongs to God. It is in the hands of a single lord. For that reason the -na is using, they're used like things, they don't say I they say we, they say we. "We make this decree," it's the king making the decree.
He perhaps wrote it with his own hands and nobody helped him but when he gives it he doesn't say I he says, "We make this declaration," meaning that he has a party for whoever else you may be respecting or for whoever else may have an interest in the matter, he speaks for all. When Allah says we, He is in the greatest of best position to say we because nothing else can operate without him. He is the one entitled most to say we.
Now I heard people say, "Well, I don't want you speaking for me, brother Imam." Yes, I met some people they look at me one sided and they don't like me and they have told me to my face, "Well, you don't speak for me brother Imam."
That's okay but occasionally I say we.
[laughter]
Imam: We indicates authority. When Allah says we, it indicates authority but understand we shouldn't be caught up in the problem of not understanding the oneness, the singleness, the unity of God, we mustn’t. Even though we came through an experience that pluralizes the idea of concept of God. I'm talking about our experience on the teachings of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad our great leader of the past. Yes, under him, we were given an idea of Allah that made us think that he exists by taking on many persons in a long line, on a long trail of history. We were told that in some sense, all of us are gods.
When we heard we, we thought that that meant in the Quran the gods in one single Godhead. Now thanks to Allah and thanks to our sincerity and the Honorable Elijah Muhammad sincerity, don't forget I'm not here by myself, I wouldn't be here. I don't think if the Honorable Elijah Muhammad had not welcomed me in my attitude and in my belief that I had then that I have now that he knew of. He wasn't in the dark, he knew my belief, he had put me out twice when it was brought to his attention that I didn't believe Fard Muhammad, a W.F. Muhammad, a W.D. Fard, a Wallace Fard Muhammad a lot of names.
When it was brought to his attention that I didn't believe that person was God, he confronted me and I had to answer and I answered truthfully, I said, "No daddy, I don't believe he's God." I didn't say it to him like that though, I'm a psychologist. I said, "Daddy, I respect your position," I said, "I understand your savior." He said to me in anger, "He's your savior too," I said, "Daddy, you are more important to me than he is," that's what I told him, I said, "That's what I meant when I said your savior."
My father eyes dropped and his whole confidence dropped and when he lifts his face back up he said, "Well, you know what this means son?" I said, "Yes, sir," he said, "You have to be put out, there's no communication with myself or your mother." I accepted it and I was put out. He did that a second time, I came back in I returned and was there for a few years until somebody again brought it to his attention. The condition to come back never was that you submit to that idea, never. He accepted me back without even bringing up what I was put out for.
The second time he did the same thing, this time he asked for me to give my position on the idea of God, the concept of God and I did. When I did, my oldest brother was present in the room Emmanuel, this was in his bedroom where he ran business, usually, he didn't have me out in the open when he was doing these things. Emmanuel was there and Emmanuel got angry when I began to state what my concept of God was. I told him first I said, "Daddy, this is the Holy Quran the book that you have, the book that you gave us." I began to give him my understanding of the concept of God and my father was not pleased with it or if he was pleased with it, it was hurting him to hear it. My brother Emmanuel as always ready to the rescue. He's going to rescue my father now from the agony of my explanations. He said, "Wallace, shut up or I'm going to throw you out of here." Now that was really his spirit talking-
[laughter]
Speaker: - because all of my brothers are pretty good fighters and all of us know it isn’t easy to throw one of us out. My father, he couldn't stomach this artificial show of bravery. He looked at our brother Emmanuel he said, "You shut up."He said, "You're not going to throw him out of here," that was the second time. The third time was just almost days or so, just a few days after the assassination of the great Malcolm Shabazz, Malcolm X.
I laid contact on my own because I refused to obey that law of his that said no correspondence, no communications, no contacts whether he was replying to me or not and I knew he wouldn't because he had to obey his own law. On his birthday, I would send him birthday greetings, on his Saviors' Day, I would send him Saviors' Day greetings, whether he replied or not. He accepted me the third time and I told him that I wanted to join him on Saviors' Day. I said my purpose to want to join you is to help keep the community, the Nation as we called it back then, looking at the right thing and that is that we have a great nation. No matter who's killed or what kind of confusion comes up, we can't allow the clouds of that confusion to block our view to what we are all about.
I felt that my presence though not perhaps as great in its power or in the power to influence or affect the spirit of the following as Malcolm’s law, it would be a great contribution to a equalizing of what was going on. After bringing a lessening, a great lessening of tension, excitement, nervousness et cetera in the body of the following of our Elijah Muhammad that was my interest in coming back. I know some of you are saying, "That was your interest, you were only coming back for that?"
No, that was not what I only came back for the day I came back for that, that was my main reason for coming back that's what moved me to come back. If that hadn't happened, I wouldn't have come back not at that time, maybe something else would have occurred eventually to bring me back but I wouldn't have come back at that time. Why would Elijah Muhammad again accepted me and did not question me again, he did not question me about would I believe anything he just accepted me back.
Before he passed at the table where we would be on Sundays after the meeting, he asked to hear a tape that someone had brought him on me again attempting to get me out. Now I had made this tape already on radio show, I had given this tape as were his words while I was in back in the community. My father listened to it and at one point, he just couldn't contain himself. He [unintelligible 00:36:18] at his face first, he [unintelligible 00:36:23]. His face flushed and got pink, real red as pink and he said, "Clara, isn't this what we've been waiting for?" He's talking to his wife that's my mother he said, "Clara, isn't this what we have been waiting for?" She was smiling with her bright smile, she was black and her teeth were white and big when she smiled that face had lit up, she was smiling with that big bright smile of hers and she said, "Yes, honey." Boy did I feel good. I don't think I ever felt better in the presence of my mother and father when they both were there at the same time looking at me, I don't think I ever felt better.
When it was all over, I guess you say, "Well, he must have been talking on the messenger and on our savior and on the Nation of Islam." No, I wasn't talking on anything that we knew in that organization or in that Nation of Islam, no I was talking on the burden of mythological gods on man. My father told my mother, "Isn't this what we've been waiting for?" There must be something that they kept secret, there must be something they kept secret, I'm sure I know what it is.
What they kept secret was this, the fact that Elijah Muhammad and his order was not in the African American life to stay it was here for a time, given certain conditions and circumstances. They didn't know what the next order would be but they had some idea of it that was given to them by the mystic who gave the teachings to Elijah Muhammad. They had some idea that it would be a different order, a completely different order and if I had said things that were based in the Nation of Islam teaching my father wouldn't have been satisfied. I based my new belief and my new idea and my perception of reality in something else.
My father was satisfied that the end of this will not be the end, something new is coming. Allah Akbar. Now that's the fact. You can listen to others who think they know what's happening but that's the fact and it should be good news especially to you who have lived for 30 years in this, 50 years in this for my whole life, I'm 54 close to 55. I was born in this city, Hamtramck, Michigan which is part of Detroit isn't it? Yes, this is part of Detroit I think, I was a baby when they took me from here only 11 months. I don't know much about it.
I was born in this city on Neumann St that's where I was born, my mother gave me my birth certificate showing that my father insisted that his name Elijah Muhammad is put on my birth certificate as my father not Elijah Poole. Back in those days you know that must have been hard because even as a young man I've had problems getting them to accept my name and it's on my birth certificate Muhammad, ain't nothing else ever was on there, Muhammad. Yes, the same telling me where I was born in [unintelligible 00:40:25] Michigan which is Detroit in the year 1933, the month October, the day 30. Not 31st, I wasn't born on All Saints Day as some of them have gotten confused. They tell you, "Yes. I know your birthday. You born on Halloween, wasn't it?" No just before the mask and the masking up. Praise be to Allah. And since we're joking like this, just before we came out, I had on a nice tie which you know what it makes you.
You can't play it down, a tie really makes you look nice but I took it off and I explained it to our honorable congressman, John Conan. I told him that "I'm taking this off because in the Islamic world the men do not wear ties, they wear collars but no ties." I'm glad to say that I'm collared by God and I won't accept any ties. Not in that interest, now when it comes to that interest, no ties. Ties mean to put your religion in jeopardy, to compromise your faith. To put your religion in jeopardy.
How are we going to have a tie with politics or with the secular world when it comes to our interests and serving and worshiping God, we can't. We may have an association but no ties. Ties means he's gone- whoever I'm tied with is going to affect what I'm about. I have to accept that's what a tie means. A tie means that whoever I'm tied with going to have a part in this. There's going to be a sharing of this concern and I'm going to have to yield when the partnership demands it and he will have to yield or the other party will have to yield when the partnerships demand. Well, we don't accept that kind of thing when it comes to our worship of Allah and demands on us as Muslims.
We don't accept that. It doesn't mean that we're not any less anxious or any less eager to cooperate with the good motives and the good objectives of the political society of America or the world for that matter. No, we're just as eager and just as ready to join the good forces for the good advance of man's life. Yes. But no tie. To tell you the truth, I used it like a collar but after I got to know my Lord better and saw what it was all about, I said, "Mama was right. I shouldn't go out before the people without buttoning up my collar." She said, "Son. Button up that shirt. Don't go out like that with your collar open."
Now I appreciate it more. This chapter goes on explaining the destiny and inevitable end for the ones who champion lies in falsehood and it concludes again addressing the one who takes the position to be truthful honorable and upright, be Godful. Whoever gives of his wealth in charity and the word here is charity excludes any possibility that something tainted. Something unlawful, something gained by unlawful means. Something having a lawful purpose is accepted in this charity. This is a pure charity
[00:46:00] [END OF AUDIO]
Speaker: [unintelligible 00:01:08] his wealth in charity. Goes on to say and who sits-- pardon me, who gives in charity-- pardon me, who gives up his wealth in charity and can be assured or that person is assured by God, he can be assured, that his giving or his charity is going to be rewarded, but only if he gives seeking the face of his Lord the Most High. What does that mean? That's metaphorical or symbolic expression. The expression he gives seeking the face of his Lord Most High means he gives for the sake of having his effort, his gift accepted by the Most High God, the Lord of all.
He's not working just to please the pressure of the demand on himself except that demand is the demand to serve his Lord, Most High. He's not doing it to please his children, his wife, his friends except that that concern includes the concern to please the Lord Most High. That's what it means. Now for that person, the Lord Most High says, for that person he says [Arabic language] and inevitably, ultimately he must come to his own satisfaction. A state of satisfaction, pleasure, relieve, happiness, paradise. It is inevitable. Now, in concluding my comment on this chapter and I hope I don't stay too long today. Concluding my comment on this chapter I want a tie in that inevitability and inevitableness.
I don't know which word would be better with also what God says about the order of the creation out of all of the material world, the universe that extends out beyond the ability of material man, secular man, godless man to see, go beyond his ability to see. No man no matter how much he tells us what he knows about this world and that there is no God can tell us what's out there in the end of it. They're still looking. The biggest and best telescopes are still seeing more. The Lord that did all of this according to the people of faith, Muslims, Christians, Jews and many others, the Lord that did all of this, he says, that in doing all of this, he also created an [unintelligible 00:05:06]
Something that can't be at stake and that is justice. Congressman, we know that, don't we?
Participant: That's right.
Speaker: That's why he works tirelessly and so hard for justice because he knows that it is an inevitability that the world cannot escape. It's coming and all of us must do whatever we can in the time allotted to us to serve that in knowing our efforts are not in vain. It's coming. Now let me address the context of this message today, which I consider to be a mission, my mission. I don't know if you're aware but I think I should take this occasion to inform this special audience.
I say this audience is special because of the dignitaries here, but more importantly because of the striving poor who really believe in the Lord and who have been here under experience and didn't sit down before the next experience but stay with it because they know too, in their soul, they know that the Lord's justice will come and no matter what happens it shouldn't darken the vision. We got to keep going day or night, good, well or bad. We are happy all the time, aren't we? We may be crying but inside we are still happy. In fact, I was looking so sad once. A person sitting near me said don't look so sad.
I said, "I'm sorry." I said, "Don't think when I'm looking sad that I'm experiencing something bad. I'm having bad feelings or hurting." I said, "My sad look means I'm thinking seriously and I'm thinking way off." We start thinking about the miseries and hardships and the burden and the ignorance that make the mission so much harder. I'm talking about the universal mission now, not just our mission. That makes the mission so much harder, it causes our life to leave. The life seems just leave the outer person. The life goes out of their face. We are in deep thoughts and we are far away but if we really love our life and are righteous in our intent, that mean I didn't do wrong today.
Some of us don't know human righteousness. Human righteousness is not a righteousness that has no spots and blemish. Human righteousness has spots and blemishes. It has defects. I don't like this term [unintelligible 00:08:49] nothing but ballpoint pens. We weren't made for existence like that. We make mistakes, all of us except the dumb ones dead, dead, dead in their dumbness and thinking they are wise. They don't make any mistakes because they made that one big mistake that makes it impossible for them to see any other mistake. For us, we have righteous intent.
We may have the whole world, our whole world crumbling in on us. It's falling and crashing down on us, tearing us to bits and we may be crying, moaning, groaning and screaming, but deep within, way inside of us there, in the pool of the life, we are yet happy. We are yet happy. We are yet in a good condition. That enables us to get past that part of nightmare, terror, whatever, or to weather the storm as people say. We ain't weary. Allah says for those who believe in him and do good deeds, there shall be no fear, no anxiety. That's what Allah said. I know it. I usually didn't understand it but now I know it. I say, "Hey, I know that I have fear. Always afraid of something, but how am I to understand this?"
The more I gave myself to the mission of trying to advance righteousness in the world, the more I experienced anxiety. I said, "Well, I know God's word is true, but I have to understand this." Then I say, "Wallace, there's the answer." It's your concern that is burden, that's what making you miserable. Your faith, your conviction, your soul is not disturbed. Why? Because your fear has become singular. The fear of God. Yes, the fear of God, so you have no fear really, though you are afraid at the moment, you have no fear. When fear is not a cause so it's defeat. Then that's not really a fear. It's natural for us to fear, it's natural for me to be afraid to put my hand in the fire.
When they threatened or the devil tempted the messenger of God to jump from the tower. If you really are a person of faith, then prove that, jump from the tower. See if God will save you from death when you hit the ground. Don't tempt the Lord in vain. Don't tempt the Lord in vain. We know that's Islamic teachings too, just put in a different language or different ways. Don't tempt the Lord in vain. Again, we know that as much as man fears the fire, we know that Abraham was put in the fire. Is that all right? Abraham was put in the fire and when they looked in the--
Those who put him in the fire came to see how he was faring, how he was doing there, whether he was ashes or no, actually they found him there unaffected. The fire hadn't touched him, the fire hadn't bothered him a bit. Instead of him experiencing heat, God made the flames cool on Abraham. Now we know that's metaphorical. That's symbolic. We don't need anybody to tell us that really. I learned it in the following of religion. When they are sincere, they know better what is really the thing that's happening. Then most of the scholars, yes, they do. Their faith tells them, "Don't bother with that that you can't handle."
Before realizing or before ever having a curiosity to see if this language has another form and if this form that I'm looking at is is not just a provision, a necessity and really that there's something else behind it that's the real. Before they get that kind of intellectual curiosity, they just accept things that God says that they can handle without bothering it. Say, "Hey, I [unintelligible 00:15:19] I'll leave that alone." I'm not to bother that. If I can't handle that, I'm not to bother that, but they go on believing it just as it is. If Allah says that Abraham was put in the fire, then they believe, they accept that Abraham was put in the fire and they accept he was put in the Fire.
Light the match, light the cigarette, turn on the jet, cook the beans. They believe that God saying to them, "Abraham was put in the fire." It doesn't hurt them. It helps them, it doesn't hurt them. It helps them. Don't need to fear with that progress. It supports them. What you are saying is that we can believe in non-reality and yet be in a good condition. "Yes, Allah says that this whole material world is non-reality." We have to believe in it in order to make progress here. [laughs] Now, that's a little above the head of even some of the scholars.
[laughter]
Speaker: But we have to accept it. Yes. Then all of this we're looking at it is non-reality. The only real is God. That's what Allah says. All of this is non-reality. The only real is God. What is the notion behind man's belief that this is real? Because the notion is that this will be here, that this will survive, things that are not real. Allah says that nothing will survive. Nothing will survive. Everything is perishable. Everything is moving toward its end and will pass away, except him and him alone. Therefore, he is the only real. Isn't it wonderful that he has put in us a hope, and not only a hope, but a spirit for eternity? I know I have it and I'm convinced that most human beings got it.
There's a hope and a spirit in us for eternity. I have doubted to how I will exist in the afterlife. I've doubted it. I've come a long and experienced that most people come along who are curious. I was made curious by my father. He touched me. It was his finger that touched my head as he touched most of your heads that followed him. It's his finger that touched my head and turned the clock on. The clock of curiosity that frees us in time. I'm sure he knew what you didn't know, some of you. I'm not talking all of you. That eventually Wallace was going to even suspect the foundation of the Nation of Islam, his ideas and everything.
Well, getting back now to what I was saying, Abraham was put in the fire and Allah says that when they came to see how he was faring in the flames, they found that the flames had been made cool for Abraham. Oh, that's so beautiful. I don't need to tell any of you all that are righteous and have righteous intent what that means. You know in your heart better than most of the scholars know. If they don't have your same heart. If they've got your same heart, then they know too.
[silence]
Speaker: What is here today has improved ability in us for the business of life itself. Many people, they will go to the psychiatrist when they got a problem, a great burden on them. They will go to a psychiatrist. Educated people will go to a psychiatrist, it doesn't mean they got a mental sickness. They go to a psychiatrist because they know he has more knowledge of the mind and the way it behaves under pressures and things than they have, so they will go see a psychiatrist. If they do, they'd better be careful because if they're running for public office and it is ever brought out, they might be terribly damaged.
[laughter]
Speaker: Which is not fair, that's not right. That's not right. No, it's not right at all. To judge a man by his qualifications for the job, not by what's bothering him, what's his sickness was, what happened to him. By his qualifications for the job. Is he performing well, has he performed well over the years that he's been doing this kind of work, has it interfered with his performance in that office or that capacity? It hasn't. Then why should we even disclose it? This is a dirty world, you know. Sometimes the man was perfectly in perfect mental health but he saw a psychiatrist because a psychiatrist has help for everybody, not just the chronically ill in the mind. Now I'm not telling you to go see a psychiatrist.
[laughter]
Speaker: In fact, I'm telling you that most of us waste our money going to see a psychiatrist. That's what I'm getting there to tell you. People pay psychiatrists $50 [unintelligible 00:21:42] and all they have to do is be serious about worshiping almighty God. That's the condition for the human being's mind and spirit that enable him to go through great trials, hardships and terror in the household and in the world without going crazy. That's right, yes. Many people come to my lectures or my addresses and they say "Well, what good is this? What is the benefit of this? He's not telling me anything. I'm not being informed, I'm not being educated. What is the good of going out there to hear him talk?"
The first help that comes and the best help that comes is a climate for life. The world with all of its complexity and confusion is the worst climate for life in the history of man. I'm talking about present world. When you come to hear my address, you're going to hear a person addressing you from a condition different from that of the world and its life. You hear a person addressing you with a sensitivity that is different from the sensitivities of the world and its life. A climate is going to be curious while he's speaking. A climate if you favor what he's saying. A climate is going to be created for you that's going to put you in a good situation again.
Whether you see the philosophy, whether you see the wisdom or not, whether you see the methodology or not, it is working in you and for you. You will leave here and perform better tomorrow, better next year, and better for the rest of your life as a consequence of being here. Sometimes I feel great pressure on me, say, "Wallace, [unintelligible 00:24:27] imam you forgot. [unintelligible 00:24:27]" No, I didn't forget. "Wallace." They're growing tired of just hearing you. Appeal to their good nature. They want you to give them a step by step logical pen for them to execute so they can have better home life, better school, better mosque, better occupations and better access to the blessings of liberty.
Money, good homes, friendships, et cetera. I feel that burden on me and I go and I write a logic and I come up with a logical paper. You all see I'm loaded with paper, I've been working. I don't take these matters lightly. See all those papers? Those are just notes. Every time I do it when I feel this great pressure on me. As I near the time for the occasion I cannot help it. The spirit to bring about the climate for life and prosperity just overcomes all of my interests in giving you a step by step plan. That's the responsibility of religion. That's the responsibility of propagation Da'wah.
Our responsibility is to fight the bad influences in the world by addressing the need for the climate in man's heart and in his life that God wants. When the climate comes into your life that God wants you will be prepared to deal with that out there. Some of you are more suited for political logic than I am, more suited for financial or economic logic than I am, business logic than I am. You're more suited for social logic even than I am. That's not my responsibility. In time I will write on these subjects and make a small or great contribution -- I don't know -- to the fields of logic. I know that that is not the answer. That will be a contribution but that isn't the answer.
There's a logic for that endeavor, for that concern. There's a logic for that and that's what I have been addressing in these last occasions, these last gatherings that I have been blessed and fortunate to share with you. I have been addressing the need to see a logic in that. God wills for us a climate in which we ought to live. That climate is spiritual. More than anything else it is spiritual, but is also moral. It is human. It is moral, spiritual, it's human. It's the core of the life for the individual in the society, it's the nucleus in the argon of life for the individual and the society. It is the sanctuary for man singular or in many numbers that's a sanctuary.
You need something in you, a disposition of spirit, an attitude in you. You need a position in your spirit. Man's spirit is free and it tends to just go everywhere. They're like air. If you don't have a container or something it's going to go everywhere. You can't tell air to walk down that line or walk down that street, you let air go and it's going to go everywhere.
Man's spirit is similar, the same, if it isn't contained it's going to go everywhere, so what we need is a logic for our spirit. The logic for our spirit is given to us also by God if we're faithful, if we're sincere, if we're curious, if we're devoted to the Quran and to the lifestyle of Muhammad the prophet, peace be upon him, we would eventually find it.
What we want is to improve our ability for the business of life itself and as I've just stated to you I don't think nothing puts us in a better situation than the word of Allah, the word of God and the power of the word of God to create the climate for us if we believe in the word, if we love the word, if we take the word into us in a sincere way, the word is going to be the most powerful nutrient in our system. It's going to influence the forming and shaping of our whole life. It's going to give a new climate to our existence within that will enable us to deal with the matters outside
Participant: Takbeer.
Speaker: Allahu Akbar. Then after we have done what we sooner or later we'll have to do if we are to extinct the burdens of the world by addressing that need in us as individuals. Next, we have to address that need in the society. That is, life in the community. Because I can't live by myself. Although we have to focus first on the individual and that's the mistake that nation and nation-mindedness created for us. We came to a point under the force and influences of the nation that made us give all energy, all attention, all priority to nation over person, nation over the individual. That was a great mistake. We have to give attention to the needs of the person first. Though we come from the person to address the community, we have to take the person along with us for our focus.
Believe me. That's what all wise philosophers have come up with. Philosophers on the nature of society and how a man evolved into a true democracy. They have all come to see that, that you have to begin with the person, individual himself, and though you go from the individual to the concern of the many, you have to still keep the individual in focus. The individual in focus, not the nation, not the many, individual in focus. Allah says, "Your death and resurrection is as the death and resurrection of a single person." I'm bringing the Islamic support to this. This is my scholarly ability, although I'm not a scholar. I don't know, I don't think of myself as a scholar.
I think of myself as Adam, and he was created to have good common sense. Believe me, that's what we need to advance in the masses. The health and good utility of common sense. That's an Islamic responsibility, I'm telling you. I don't have enough time to talk on that subject, but we will one day.
In fact, that's the duty of the nation, that's the duty of propagation, is to attend the need for advancement in the common senses of the people because the world is constantly growing more complex and never can we expect the common man to understand this complex industrial world in all of its complexity that crowds life, overburdens life, makes trouble for the soul, makes trouble for the moral nature of man, that he is not equipped to handle without God. We never will be able to educate people formally or on the basis of what is science, secular world knowledge to deal with that. Our mission is not that, our mission is--
Yes, we have to respect the need to establish good schools and high learning, all that. Certainly, it's a sacred value for us, but as preachers, our mission is to serve the needs of common sense in the masses of people. As the world steps up its pace, we have to step up the pace of common sense in the masses of the people because the devil is working hard. He's working hard to defeat common sense in the masses of the people. He can never get a hold of neighborhoods, homes, and cities until he first defeats the dynamic operation of common sense in the life of the individual, in the life of society.
Lastly, and of greater consequence, we have to address lies in our vision. That is our projection of the treatment. Our future vision, our vision that goes from presence to out there, to tomorrow. The focus that goes from here now where worse things are happening now and the road ahead, the mall, next year, 10, 20 years to come. We have to attend the need of that projection. The need to treat our concerns for the future. How are we going to treat those concerns? Man neglects his concerns for the future and it also destroys him.
I don't have to as a minister, as a imam, as a preacher, I don't have to come up, again, I don't have to come up with any secular world discourse, ideology or methodology on paper and put it into your hands and say, "Take this. This is the key. This is the book. This is the blueprint. This is the plan for the future to keep us on our concerns." No. Again, all we need to do is bring about the climate, and to bring about the climate, just bring the truth. Bring the truth into the minds and hearts of the people and the truth will do the rest. It's a potency. It will feed all of your needs.
We need to understand that the context of religion require also that we be aware of emphases in that context. Many people live religion and they live it without any idea of what are the emphases in the context of religious life for they go on happy with a simple, nonconsequential life. None of us should be small-minded. Allah has given us a message of a comprehensive religion to make us wiser as we live. Oh, yes, wiser as we live. To make us have big aspirations as we live. To make our vision grow as we live. To make our habitat grow as we live. No Muslim is supposed to be still wanting today what he wanted 10 years ago.
His appetite should have grown two years, 10 years bigger, at least, two years bigger. If we are small like that is because the climate hasn't yet been created, the truth as it should be given has not come yet into your minds and into your heart. Because when it does, you won't be satisfied to tolerate in the smallness on your part. You may bury it, you may suffer it, but you will not tolerate it. In concluding this talk, I'll mention three steps. With that, I'm going to also mention men, helplessness as we got time. The past, we can't change it. The present, we don't have it.
Some of us say, "Oh, we've got the present." You don't have the present. Before you can say the present, the present has gone, you're fraction of a second into the future from that point. [laughs] The present, you never have it. The past, we can't change it. The present, we never have it, we think we do, but we never really have it. The future is always in the hands of the Lord. Always in the hands of God. What are we to do as people walking the path of the Lord? We are to recognize this, that my path is important. I can't change it, but I can keep it from bringing its danger back and I can advance its good by knowing it better.
Now, the present is never really
in my hand because it's gone before I can really say it's here. I should not live in the present, I should always live in the future and benefit from the past. That's what I mean about emphasis in the context of religion. Man lives in tense; past tense. You thought I said tents.
[laughter]
Speaker: He lives in tense; past tense, present tense, future tense. If he wants to make good of his life, he better be a two-handed person and not a three-handed person. Past, future. Work with the past for the view on the future, the present will be taken care of completely. Am I right or wrong? That's the wisdom that God gives us in his holy books. If you accept that, won't you be ready to go home and do a better job, perform better there and go out in the streets and the world, all the jobs, wherever you have to go and do a better job of performing?
If you accept that, you have the energy, you have the power, you have what you need in terms of spiritual strength to handle whatever responsibility that God is going to place on you in his life. Know that it's all in his hand, the past I must benefit from, by not letting the bad of it come into my present and bring in a good moral with me as I keep a view to the future on the future. Allah says, "[Arabic language]" When I read that in the Quran for the first time, I got hot. Heat. For some, heat is good. Heat, you become a son. A powerful son. You just heat and go. You're powerful, you're glowing and you are hot. If it's something frightening the hell out of you, you get cold.
I wasn't frightened but I was excited to go far with it. I just became so hot. I just heated up in the going. Then I just felt like falling to the floor. I couldn't even make a decent prostration. Just fall as a rag to the floor. Recognizing the great power and great charity of the lord. So I said to myself it's a pity. We didn't read this and understand it when [unintelligible 00:44:56]. We could have saved him and us a lot of trouble. What I'm saying to you, it wasn't necessary. That mysticism, that mythology, that artificial idea to excite us and appeal to our needs at the time, was not necessary.
Allah has given the Quran for yesterday, today and forever and any sincere person can go through the Quran. I don't care what state you find society in, you can bring the newness and proper help to them without falsifying, without twisting the truth, without changing the word of God, without bringing up an artificial religion. We don't need it and it should never have happened. Since it happened, we benefit from it. We respect the good intent in those that did it. We don't accept that it was a necessity. It was not. All we have to do is bring what I'm bringing. What I am bringing to you now, it could have been brought in 1930 and it would have done a much better, greater job for us than what was brought.
Don't tell me it couldn't have been done then because the world was evil and the white man was mean. Don't tell me that. The white man that wants to keep a choke hold on us is just as mean now as he was in 1930.
[00:46:33] [END OF AUDIO]
Imam Warith Deen Mohammed: The circumstances checks him. He's working on a high-level of psychology. He's doing the same devilish things and what he's doing now is cooler. He's more cool in his oppression of us now than he was in 1930. We just don't understand the high level of psychology upon which he's operating and we are suffering. We are suffering oppression now in our souls, in our moral lives more now than ever before. The white man is benched who's evil like this, the oppressive white men, the oppressor. The white man who is an oppressor, he is destined and most determined to keep us down now as he ever was, but I'm doing what I'm doing and he is not stopping me.
Why? Because the truth given in his proper form hides up even the devil's hands.
[applause]
He can't see a way to come in. No way to come in, no way to attack, he is neutralized because his only weapon is falsehood. His only weapon is a lie and he can only use it against falsehood and against a lie. Once he sees something in which there's no falsehood, no lie, he is neutralized and that's the Quran. The Quran is without any defect. Why have the evil forces been able to discredit religion, Christianity, even Islam, and Judaism, and preachers, and even Muhammad, and even Christ Jesus? Why are they even able to discredit it? Why are they even able to make mockery of these sacred ideas and sacred concerns and get away with it?
They are able to do it because people in all of these great religions have propagated misconceptions, error in religion more than they have propagated proper conceptions and truth in religion. That's why they're able to do it. You don't hear anybody attacking me for what I believe in, for what I preach. Why? Because Allah has blessed one of you to have a spirit to devote himself totally to what is really approved by Allah or by God as the English people say. I have no mystic interest to take me off course. I have no material intake to take me off course. Why? Because I'm a special person, I'm great or something?
No, because I'm blessed by good circumstances in my life from the time of my mother and my father till today. Blessed with good circumstances in my life that make possible the strength of spirit to keep going in the right direction without compromising anything of what God has ordered. If I didn't have this, mysticism is a great temptation for those who seek the face of God, great temptation. When things get hard, they tend to go into mysticism and mysticism will take them again eventually out of the working fields of human life. Yes, but, again, I say I'm fortunate. One sister was angry with me, she said, "Imam Karim Hassan has great ability than you.
You were just blessed by opportunity and good circumstances." The first reaction in me was dislike for what she was saying. I felt a quick rush of heat in my body and it was gone in less than a 10th of a second and I started feeling really good. I told her, I said, "You're right." She was right. She spoke it from the wrong position, but she was right. Because of good opportunities and good circumstances in my life, I'm here where I am. I pray Allah always keep conditions around me that I can deal with because there comes a time in a man's life when miseries heat upon him that it becomes too much and he has to return to his Lord or either go to hell.
I'll rather return to Allah while am preaching, and while I'm walking, and while I'm talking to my family and driving my car, I'll rather return to Allah doing this life because I want Him to hold off that time return for me as long as possible because.
[laughter]
Because I'm doing my best to return all the time and I think on this side is where it really counts. Return on this side, you don't have to worry about the other side. In concluding this, I want us to look at certain influences that are really based in nature, part of the natural universe of order, of the dynamics or dynamism, whatever. The language is among the educated for this, there is something operating, it has its own laws. Our editor, he's here today, yes, Harry Muhammad, he mentioned that for the benefit of the readers that Imam Mohammed is not just preaching, but he is going about trying to find and identify laws that operate to determine the outcome of life.
Now, he didn't put it in just that language, but he put it in his language. I Put it in that language, I can't recall his words right now, but I do recall his message and that was his message, that the Imam is not just talking about concerns, but we have to understand in the concerns the Imam is identifying certain laws that are operating and he is correct. Sometimes, as I say, that it's more important for us to first create the climate by just giving the truth of God. The truth that Allah has given to us, give it to the people. Create the climate first and then in that timing will come perception in time.
Perception, which is understanding, the ability to identify with our mind, our intellect, our rational tools, to identify what is operating in this great, great miracle. I'm not hooking you up for nothing. Believe me, the working of Allah's truth in us as a climate is a miraculous doing. It has a great mystery about it too, and I'll never put on a dress of a mystic. I make it a point to emphasize my humanness even if I have to crack a joke or crush you out sometimes.
[laughter]
I take that risk. As Allah forgive me, I know my towel was not clean today, but I just wanted to keep them seeing a human being.
[laughter]
We can't carry that too far now because extremism is an evil in itself. If we approve that kind of behavior, it will open the door for extremes. I always tell you, I'm not happy with that kind of behavior. I don't like saying indecent words or using indecent language before you, I let you know that. I will never accept that. That's right and proper, but I say I take the risk and hope that when I get to the judgment, the Lord will say, "We have to penalize you 5¢, but don't feel bad, Wallace, because we rewarded you $5,000."
[laughter]
That's what I hope. I'm trusting, I'm believing that that's what's going to happen. In concluding this, I wanted us to see that there is a definite order to the spiritual life of the individual and the society that we should come into. There's a definite order for our moral sensitivities. We shouldn't be just completely loose with our moral sensitivities, we will come to the wrong moral conclusions. We have to find the proper context for our morals, for our spirits, for our emotions, for everything. Then once recognizing that proper context, which is to sensibly, not foolishly, not in a spontaneous way.
Some of us think the best expression of religion is spontaneous expression. "I'm just waiting for the Lord to touch me. Touch me, Lord and I will speak." Now, what did Paul say? He said most of that Holy Ghost testifying is nothing but nonsense. He said, "You must learn how to edify truth" and not just give verses a spontaneity and think that that's teaching or preaching the Word of God. I'm not knocking the church now, I have great respect for the church, even for those that do that, I still have great respect for them because just like they have their odd behavior, you go to some of the best Mosque and just stay there long enough, you going to see something there to point out too because we are all human.
[laughter]
Given to era and past times that have nothing to do with the context of truth in its purpose that is. Yes, so we have to understand that and don't have that disposition in religion that, "I don't worry about anything. When Allah want to, He'll tell me. When Allah want to, He will touch me." Look, that's the left hand and Allah says, "Those who come with the left hand in the judgment, gets hell. Those who have something to offer from the right hand, get's to paradise." I hope you're understanding what I'm saying, so don't give yourself to spontaneity. Spontaneity is a force in life. It operates, but we are not to give our life over to spontaneity.
It's a gear. You get in the car, the automobile of human life, your own body, your own biology, your own psychology, and everything, that's what I'm talking about, the car, you get in there and you take the gear out of neutral, you start from there, it's in neutral. You pull that gear and the first gear is spontaneity. You don't do it now, the Lord has created you just to happen all by itself. You pull that gear and the first gear is spontaneity. The force of spontaneous intellect, spontaneous curiosity, spontaneous morality, spontaneous everything is working for you from the very beginning, that's in the baby. That's for the baby and it will stay with you a long time, but don't carry it with you to the grave.
If you do, you will come to Allah with nothing but the left hand. Once you become responsible for your behavior, you don't depend on spontaneity, you try to get a job with the government or with the private world telling them, "I'm qualified, I depend on spontaneity."
[laughter]
You stay there long enough trying to convince them, you might have somebody put a white jacket on you.
[laughter]
If you go there saying, "I depend on rational perception, my rational tools, and I'm also benefited by spontaneity," they will accept you. They will accept you because in that case, your disposition is logic, your disposition is reasoning, your disposition is intelligence, rational behavior, but you are telling them that you are benefited in your mechanism by the creative power of spontaneity also, and they will accept that. What I'm saying is that we never leave the baby life, we never leave the baby form of spontaneity in this kind of focus that we are having right now. We never leave that, that always is with us. Some religions, they say that if we lose our life, we have to come back into it by way of the baby.
You see, but understand this, first gear, second gear is up here. Third gear is out there. You have to be conscious of purpose. I'm going to conclude right there because we could go on talking all day and all night. Purpose, understand that this religion stress purpose. [Arab language] and I said, "Me?" to let you know. God said, "I." He didn't say, "We." God says, "We created man." No, Allah says, "I." Why he says I? Because there is a misconception on this matter in the world. God says, "We." Yes, because it gives the message of thought for everything, absolute power, and authority, but in this instance, He does not say, "We," He says, "I" because there's a great era in the world regarding this concern or this matter.
Man thinks in many religions that God with the angels created man and did all these things. It comes from Greek mythology and other mythologies, whereas Zeus with the help of his children and everything populates the world and everything, populates heaven and earth, the family of God. That idea is there, so Allah clears it up. Where they will say, "We created man in our own image and likeness." Allah says, "No, I created man for the purpose of my worship. I created man for the purpose of my worship." What does that tell us? What scholarly perception should we have regarding that saying of God? It is this, that man must be guided mostly in his life by purpose. Be guided by purpose.
That wisdom can be used in every kind of situation and circumstance. You go get a job, brother, sister be guided by purpose. If you're not guided by purpose, your emotions are going to come into play, going to come into the picture, and eventually, you done did something stupid and lost your good job. You've done something stupid and lost your good job. I have to do my own corrections now because I see that people just like to publish my errors more than publishing my correct saying. Now, I'm not blaming on the editor. It's somebody in your paper, somebody in there, been in there all the time.
They love to present me in an ugly way. They love to embarrass me before my admirers. If they didn't love to do this, they would never put a simple error of grammar in the paper in my right name. They would never do that. They know it doesn't help me or help the spirit or the morale of the following to read that their leader that they respect as a intelligent leader, able leader, you're using that language, bad grammar that really good high schools, a good grade school student could correct. If they had good intent, they would change that and if they had any fear of changing it that for me, they would at least feel obligated to reach me and say, "Imam, this is an error in grammar.
I know you don't want that to go like that, we're going to change it." They know that I will say thank you. The fact that it's done tell me don't you know as eloquent as he is, sometimes he makes an error? I'm talking about the congressman. Now, I'm sure he wouldn't like it if his secretary published his error. I think he would be in a little trouble.
[laughter]
She will be in a little trouble I'm sure. Not only him, the president of the United States, the best one will occasionally make error. Now, what about a man whose circumstances behind him train him to make errors? I came up in a house when I was a boy, you he is, that was all common expression, you he is, but I had to overcome all of that.
Then I don't have enough time, disciplines, time under discipline upon me. Time under some discipline from this habit. I haven't had enough time in a formal education situation. I haven't gone to college, but just taking about two or three courses, I don't have a year in college.
I want to explain something for my enemies that I'm trying to win over to be my friends because they're ignorant. Nobody will do these things to me unless they're ignorant. They have to be ignorant. They're ignorant. They don't know that I'm not going to be blamed more than them. The fools are the real comatose for fools.
[laughter]
They will take the bid, they will be affected like they want them to be affected, but the great majority of the common people, they will pass over it and they will blame who? The paper. They will say they don't care enough about our leader to even make proper grammar or simple grammatical correction. You can bet the rise are going to blame you, the intelligent, the learned will never look at me. They'll say a man that's of that importance to those people, how can that paper print these simple grammatical errors in his name. Now, I consider myself a good C-plus student in the English language, a good C-plus. In most of your junior colleges, I think I will get a good B-plus, but I have to concentrate on it.
As I say it, the experiences behind me has forced certain habits that are strong, very strong, so when I get my spirit and everything worked up and after reaching a point, I'm not given that much concerned to grammar. Since I haven't formed the habit of good grammar, on a high enough level because of past experience, I will make those simple grammatical mistakes, but I do believe that somebody adds to it because you hear me here. You hear me here today, you heard me last year, and what you read is not quite what you hear. Not all the time, sometimes. Yes, I know. I know they do a caricature of me that is false.
A caricature is supposed to be true. If I got a big mouth, the caricature should make it big, exaggerated, be real big. That'll be true, that's a true caricature, but if I don't have a big mouth at all and they give me a big amount, it's a false caricature, and they do a false caricature on me most of the time. They've been doing it ever since I came in office.
I've got a love for God, a love for religion, they tried to project me in the early years of my leadership. They tried to project me as some kind of spiritualists who had no concern other than to get people to live under influences of church hymns. Angel singing and all that stuff.
They tried to say to the whole following, "This man has nothing to offer you. You wanted money, good homes, this man is all about heavenly interest. He has nothing to do with this Earth. That's what they tried to do and they were successful in projecting me that way to many people, but we're still here. We're going in the direction that Allah wants Muslims to go. We're going in the direction that Allah wants human beings to go. Now, again, talking about these laws operating. If we know the context, we find the context for our life. Also, we have to understand that man's potential is the greatest determinant in his life.
The greatest determinant. What is a determinant? It means a thing operating to decide your development over the period of your life. That's what I mean by that statement.
Potential, the potential. When God says He created man, it's important to understand that more than it is addressing or referring to this physical, this biological body, it is referring to the potential because the potential is operating in the line to eventually overcome all the influences, all the interferences, and make you arrive at the form or to the form God intends for you. He brings you to your destiny by the power of your potential. [Arabic language], He created then he gave balance.
He created first and then He brought about equality, balance, settlement. [Arabic language] Then He excited the potential and brought about the disciplines. Isn't that wonderful? [Arabic language] We have two stages for the potential then, right? the potential first come by spontaneity. As concerns spontaneity and the life of man, we are all equal. The white man is not capable of any more self-spontaneity than the black man. In fact, when you talk about race, no man is superior in any way than the other. Circumstances decide who will be superior and who will not. No man is superior, but I'm talking about this book, this potential now, this spontaneity in man.
If you are learned or stupid, of the poor class or the rich class, it doesn't make any difference, you have been given the potential that's equal to everybody else. Everybody's given the same potential. The same potential for righteousness, the same potential for sin. The potential for our industry in all of us. All of us have the same. Now we hear this, but how many of us really give serious thought to it and say, "I believe that." If you give serious thought to it and come to believe in it strongly, your life is going to be better if you just believe in that. That Allah gave me a productive atom or nucleus in my atom that makes me equal in potential.
You know what potential is? Power. Potential is power. Potential is a situation for future productivity. Potential. The future productivity is in the potential. The power to be express is in the potential. That's what potential is. Allah says that he gave all of us the same potential. If you believe that, if you accept that and believe that, how can you be intimidated by any society? White, black, yellow, any society. How can you be intimidated? Look, well I got the same muscles you got, the same ability to fight you got, how can you intimidate me? All right, so if you accept that you have the same potential that everybody else has, how can you be intimidated?
You're set back because of circumstances. You're set back, but you shouldn't be intimidated. The month should be better than the day. The next day should be better than that day. Yes, if you really believe that.
[00:31:24] [END OF AUDIO]
Male Speaker: If you really believe that. I'll say, "Allah, why don't you help us?" Allah gives us all the help we need. We only have to respect it. Respect Allah and respect the help that he gives and we will be not only living a good life, we will be leading a productive life. Yes, so it is important for us to understand the operation of potential in the human life, that inner life that God created. If there, it will not be killed. They cannot kill it. They can lie to you, they can corrupt you, but that potential will eventually rise up again.
That's your second life. That's your second life. The second life is possible for man because Allah has created the potential and nothing can destroy it. That potential is potential for the whole of your life. Not just for intellectual accomplishment, moral strength, moral accomplishment. Everything is in the potential. It's a devotional potential. That's what it's talking about. The devotional fuel, nucleus for the fuel of light, the potential is in that for your devotional life. Man's life, by definition, is more a devotional life than any other kind of life.
That's why Allah says, "The purpose of that life is his worship." Worship is an emotion, obedience to him is an emotion. We said earlier, for us worship and devotion includes every act of man. When you go and operate a good business, it's an intelligent business, it respects your customer, it shows ingenuity and foresight, you're advancing, your business is growing and it's not offensive, is not hurting anybody, but helping people, you're serving Allah. That's a great service to Allah. I'm speaking pure religion, pure El-Islam.
We ain't all about business. Prophet Muhammad says, "The believer is one that whatever he does, he seeks to perfect it." He doesn't say that if he prays, he seeks to make a perfect prayer. He says, "Whatever he does, he seeks to perfect it." How are we going to be preserving this religion properly as imams by speeches if we don't bring that knowledge, that understanding to our audience, that Allah intends for us to devote ourselves to whatever is needed in the life of the individual and the society.
The Prophet said, peace be upon him, [Arabic language] "The best of you is the one who best benefits man." That is, the people, society, everybody. That's one of his sayings. We have to aim for utility and not just utility in prayer. That is emotion to save the life. If saves us some indecency, bad deed, bad behavior. It saves us from leaving the path of God, prayer. We have to stay constantly in prayer. We have to turn to Allah daily in prayer, five times a day. If we miss a prayer, we should feel that we have neglected something.
Don't say, "It's not practical for me to pray five times a day in America, in this world." No, Allah didn't give us that kind of excuse. If it's not easy to do it now, we pray for the day when it will be easy to do and we're now satisfied with circumstances that make it difficult for us to do real work to bring about a situation in the city, in the neighborhood, in the town and the house, where it will be easy to do it.
Yes, that should be the spirit. That should be the spirit. Don't excuse yourself from it. If you're not doing it, don't think that I will be the one to say, "He ain't good Muslim, he doesn't pray five times a day." I will never be the one to do that. I don't like it if any of us excuse ourselves from the obligation and say, "It ain't practical to do that in America." Whatever Allah has ordered for us, we will work [unintelligible 00:04:53] If we can't do it today, we'll look forward to tomorrow or some day in the future. We will change circumstances so that we will be able to do it.
[Arabic language] Surely, with difficulty comes ease. Yes, so everything is on future, in the time progression. Our emphasis, the time progression relative to our personal responsibility in life. The emphasis is on future. All right? Now, regarding our potential, the emphasis is on useful productive work, service. Be active in a useful and a productive way. That's the life that best dignified a human person. If you do it with good intent, you are worshiping Allah.
Prayer is formal and prayer is the whole life of the believer. When you do that well, that's prayer too. Your prayers go up to God. I want to conclude here, since we have brought it right back to where we started. That worship is for God and the total life is for him. Our religion is comprehensive. It includes everything required or desired in the life of man and society. It has its emphasis and I hope we have said something about those emphases today that will be useful.
[00:06:51] [END OF AUDIO]

