9/24/1978
IWDM Study Library
The Purpose of Angels

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Dear beloved Muslims, as salaamu alaikum! All praises due to Allah, the guardian and evolver, the sustainer, keeper and cherisher of all the worlds. We pray that He blesses us with His protection so that we stay in the right path. We ask peace and blessings be upon Prophet Muhammed, upon his descendants, upon the righteous servants of G-d, all of them and upon us here in America and all over the world. Dear beloved Muslims, I'm very pleased that I'm here in Chicago today to be able to address the World Community of Al Islam in the West over a national hookup.
I would like to begin with the words of the Qur'an, that is the words of Almighty G-d, to Prophet Muhammed, the peace and blessings be upon him, regarding the fall of the human being or the fall of man. Allah tells us in the Qur'an that the devil caused Adam and his wife to take off the clothes they had been wearing. Now we know in the Christian language we are told that the man and the woman were naked and they became aware of their nakedness and started to make themselves clothes to wear, to hide their nakedness.
And in the words of the Bible, Genesis, G-d says, "and who told you were naked?" And they replied that they had been beguiled. They had been tricked by the devil or they had eaten of the forbidden fruit. Allah revealed to Prophet Muhammed these words that give us better understanding of what is meant in Genesis about man and woman being naked and being deceived by the devil. G-d says that Satan caused them to take off the clothes, to strip off their clothes that they had been wearing and Allah says in the Qur'an, in very plain language, so that there is no question left as to what the clothes really means. He says, the best of clothing is righteousness.
The best of clothing is righteousness. So what did Satan cause or take away from Adam or cause Adam and his wife to leave off, or the man and his woman to leave off, to strip off, to take off? It was their righteousness. (Arabic) means righteousness. (Arabic-Taqwa) is the reverence, fear of almighty G-d. Love, worship, fear of almighty G-d or the awareness that Allah is ever present, that no matter how hid we may be, we are never hid from G-d. Then the desire and the person to always please G-d knowing that G-d sees him all the time. Desire to please G-d. So this is Taqwa and (Arabic) Arabic word meaning righteousness. This is what the devil caused Adam and his wife to take off, (Arabic)
(Arabic- wa Taqwa) righteousness and fear of G-d. Has that changed today? Not at all. It is still the devil that tempts the human being, the leadership and the society, the leaders and those that follow, to strip off the fear of G-d and leave off righteousness. The fear of G-d and righteousness goes together. Where there is no fear of G-d, there's every opportunity for evil to grow or corruption to grow. But where there is the fear of G-d, there is consciousness, moral consciousness, a spiritual awareness of what man should be, the decent life that he should live. These things go hand in hand, righteousness and the fear of G-d. In religion, we cannot accept, pardon me, we cannot separate righteousness from the fear of G-d. Righteousness without fear of G-d is no righteousness in Al Islam. It's just a selfish kind of philosophy. Self-worship. Many people live very strict lives when it comes to rational and moral discipline.
But those people don't have the fear of G-d, so they become oppressive when they get power, they become oppressive. They enslave people. They will turn the people into a field of exploits or human exploits. They exploit the weaknesses of the people, and these people claim to be righteous people. What is wrong with their righteousness? There is no fear of G-d in it. So we see that fear of G-d and righteousness goes hand in hand. We cannot separate them, and this is the precious dress of the Muslim. The Muslim must clothe themselves for clothing is what it's for. Clothing is to protect us. In cold weather we need heavy clothing, but in hot weather we still need clothing because we have shyness. We don't like to show all of our intimate and private matters to the public. So the Muslim clothes himself, whether it's hot or cold, whether it's for protection against the physical environment or protection against moral corruption, he clothed himself. The clothing is a protection, and to give the right protection, we must fear G-d and accept righteousness.
We speak of the path of G-d. Why do we speak of the path of G-d? Because we are free as human beings with human intelligence to conceive many methods, many ways for human progress. We come up with this philosophy, with this ideology, with this prescription and that prescription for human progress. The human being's mind is free. He has intelligence. Intelligence. He's able to devise ways of achieving his end, of accomplishing what he wants. G-d says to us in the Qur'an that there is one way that is salvation and all other paths lead the human being astray. Only one path leads the human being to true success, to true progress, the lasting progress. The path of success is the path of G-d. He says to us, Allah says to us, do not follow other ways and be led astray from the right way.
Then the path of G-d is the path of faith. To follow G-d, we must have faith. To follow yourself, you don't have to have anything but to follow G-d, you have to have faith. Why? Because G-d is so much above you that He will lead you in directions that you don't have any knowledge of. G-d is so much above you, He will give you directions that you have no knowledge on. So to follow G-d, you have to have faith. But to follow yourself, you don't have to have anything because you are always equal to yourself. You're never above yourself.
Then the path of G-d is the path of faith, path of faith. The Muslim is the one who has faith, who believes in G-d. We have knowledge. Certainly we have knowledge, but that's not enough. We also have faith and shouldn't knowledge increase faith? Knowledge increases the faith of the believer and faith earns the believer, the reward of knowledge. If he gives his whole heart and mind to all mighty G-d, if he comes with complete faith, then G-d will reward that with knowledge. He will give him knowledge and if he follows the knowledge, obedience to the knowledge will earn him greater faith.
The Muslim has to believe in G-d, Allah, the Almighty. He has to believe that this G-d is his creator. They say, oh, do you believe in your personal savior? Do you believe in the personal Savior? What Savior is more personal to me than the one who created me? You can't get more personal than that. The G-d that made me, that created me. Not only my physical being, but He created my senses. He created my human faculties, the faculty of reasoning. He created all of these, the faculty of compassion, ........ of sympathy, of compassion for people. G-d has created all of this, the faculties of the heart and the faculties of the brain. G-d has created it. He has created me. No one was together with him when he created me. No one took part in his creation of me. He did it by himself.
This is Judaism, this is Christianity and this is Al Islam that when G-d created the world, He did it by himself. He made the whole world in six days, so they say and completed it all, human beings and everything. Then He decided He would start all over again, according to the Bible. He said," let us make man Let us make man in our own image and likeness." But he had already made the whole world human beings, men and women, male and female according to Genesis. But after He had made the whole world, everything, then He said, now let us make man in our own image and likeness.
The reason that G-d, when He said that, He was addressing the angels, He was speaking to the angels, telling the angels, now let us make man in our own image and likeness. This is Christianity and Judaism, this is not Al Islam. Allah says in the Qur'an that He is the creator of everything. (Arabic) the creator of everything. Nothing created anything else. Not only is he the creator of everything, says that He is the one who gave everything its creation, it's character, its mate and then gave it its guidance. He is not only the one who created us, He's also the one who gave us our guidance. So, if the people who follow the Bible, who follow the Bible, if they want to say that G-d, when He said, let us make man in his own image and likeness was making man the new man, the ideal man that with creation came this common man, and when G-d said, let us make man to the angels, he was talking about making the ideal man. The Qur'an says that Allah is the creator of both, the common man and the prophets, the common man and the ideal man. He creates them both. He gives the man his creation and everything else, his creation. Then He gives it His guidance. He is the G-d, the author of both.
This is the path of G-d, this is the path of G-d. This is the way of Al Islam. It differs from many other ways. Some say there's one G-d, but they say that one G-d does different jobs, gives different jobs to different people. That one G-d creates the creation, but then when it comes to making the man right, that has to be done by something or another associate, an associate and a partner G-d with him. Or they say there's one G-d, but they say there are two are creations. Two creations. Well, where there are two creations, there are two creators. In Al Islam we don't accept, but one creator, G-d is G-d, and to be creator, you have to be G-d who can create anything. I was looking at television and they say that the scientists have found a way to create, they have created a life, a form of life from cells. They've created this form of life and it eats protein. They've created a form of life that eats protein. They think they can design a form of life to eat oil. So when there's danger of oil spills into the sea, that hurts the life of the sea, the lake, river, they can have this created, artificially created life in there, so it will eat it up, eat the oil flick, eat the oil slick away. Well, we don't know if they can do this or not, but we do know one thing. They cannot create anything.
They might call it creation, but that's their proud term. That's their proud term that they give to it. That's their proud language. If you study what they did, they didn't create anything. They only followed the direction of the creator and they used His creation and His method, His knowledge, His creation and His way of doing things, and they come up with something. Instead of giving G-d credit, they say, we ought the maker, we are the creator, create nothing. My wife, she asked me, she said, what if that happen then wouldn't that change things? I said, oh, it wouldn't change anything. Said, what do you think about that? I said, I think it's good. It's good that man is finding a way to improve upon life. How has G-d improved upon life? He has improved upon life by affecting changes in man in the environment and everything. That's how He improves upon life. If G-d had wanted it perfect, He would've made it perfect. He wanted it so that it could grow to more and more and satisfy us more and more so that it can be enhanced by human effort. He wanted it that way. If He had wanted it perfect, He could have made it perfect. He could have made it so man couldn't imagine any improvements,
but man can imagine improvement. Man doesn't like to see the human being suffering from a disease that comes every spring or one that comes every winter. This bothers man, so he wants to find a cure so that disease when it comes, it won't hurt the human being. If he finds a way to stop this germ, he has made an improvement, hasn't he? Yes. So G-d wants that improvement. What does Allah say again? Says, if G-d had wanted people believing all the same, He would've made them that way. If Allah wanted to establish truth, plain and clear so that no one would have a doubt, no one would be guided astray, G-d says, I could have done it that way if I had wanted to. So He could have made the creation perfect so there would be no room for improvement, imagining improvement. He could have made faith so clear, faith, so perfect and so clear to all of us that there would be no room for any doubt and everybody would be going on in the same faith, believing exactly the same. He said He could have done that if He had wanted to.
But if He had done that, would there be any opportunity for us to grow? Would there be any opportunity for us to achieve something and feel an achievement? No. So G-d made the creation so that man can find some room, to enhance some room for improvement. G-d has made faith so that people have to earn G-d's blessing. If He had fixed it perfect, there would be no room for earning His blessings, but He made it so you have to earn it. You have to come wondering, doubting in some parts, and the more you believe, the more He rewards your faith with knowledge. Pretty soon you come to the point where you do not have doubt. Could you get that just by looking at the religion and say, oh yes, I'm convinced. No, you look at it and say, yes, it's got a lot of truth in it. I believe it's good. I believe it's right for me. When the test come, you say, I don't know.
Then there's another one. When the test come, he says, I don't know, but I have a strong belief that G-d is G-d and the truth has been revealed. So while doubting, they doubt you, while doubting and fearing that maybe they might be wrong or maybe it won't happen, like I think it would happen, they go on trusting G-d and those are the ones that G-d rewards with the great blessing. G-d tells us as Muslims, we have to believe in almighty G-d that He is a creator of everything. He has no partners, no equals no associates. He needs no help. He needs help from no angel and He needs no help from a human being. He is independent needing nothing. Allah, most high says, He does not ask his creatures to feed him.
He needs nothing from his creatures. He does not sleep. He does not slumber. He does not get tired. Time does not affect Him in any way. Time affects creation. Creation grows old, creation wears out. But Allah says that time affects Him in no way. Also, He tells us that He cannot be influenced by this creation in any way. You get real sad. Do you think you can make Allah sad? No. You do a great good. Do you think you make Allah happy? No. Oh, but brother, we are told to please G-d. Yes, to please G-d. But we are told also that Allah cannot be influenced by the creation and aren't you creation?
Do you think you influence G-d to change His decision? Do you think you can stand and pray for 50 hours and that that will influence G-d to change His decision? No. The decision has already been established by G-d. You can't influence G-d to change the decision. The decision has already been fixed before you were born. This is the teachings of G-d and the teachings of his prophets and especially His last prophet Muhammed. You pray and you pray, but it has already been decided. When the results come, you say, oh, Allah had mercy on me. He had mercy on you before you were created.
Yes. Well, how come we are taught to pray like this? Because it is established in creation His way, His law is established in creation and you are creation. The more you pray and do good, the more His will. His judgment, His law in creation favors you. The less faith you show and the less work you do, the less you are favored by His law and will in creation. But G-d is no G-d that sit up somewhere sad because you are acting bad and when you start acting good, He starts getting happy. No, that's the G-d of the Old Testament one who gets sad when the people are doing wrong. Get so sad that sometime He doesn't even rise up. Oh G-d, why slumbers thou, rise up out of your sleep.
Allah neither slumbers nor sleeps. Fatigue nor years touches Him in no way. Say Allah is (Arabic), the eternal who does not allow anything to make a donation to Him or a contribution to Him. This is wisdom. If G-d would allow us to give Him something that helped Hm in some kind of way, eventually we could influence the shape of G-d Surely. we could because we would learn what He likes best and keep giving Him what He likes best. And pretty soon He'll be in our hands. Oh, you don't have to weep G-d, just straighten up and we'll give you some more of what you like.
That's the human nature. That's not G-d's nature. G-d says we have to believe in almighty G-d. We have to believe also in revelation. We have to believe in the books of G-d. G-d has revealed to human beings. G-d has blessed the human being to see on a level that he was not able to see on with without divine guidance or divine inspiration. So we as human beings, believing in G-d, we have to believe also in G-d's power to reveal to the human being and we have to believe in the messengers of G-d that they received this.
We find your books. People say these books were revealed by Almighty G-d, the creator to a man. So this is great knowledge. Some of this is good, some of this I don't know. No, the Muslim has to say, yes, G-d has the power to reveal knowledge to the human being. We have to also believe in the angels. We have to believe that there are medium or agents that are beyond human ability to comprehend fully and master. We have to believe in this. This is the way of Almighty G-d. This is the path of Almighty G-d. We have to believe in his angels. How do the angels come? We are told that the angels come in different ways. Sometimes you don't see any visible appearance at all, but we have also been told that sometimes the angel appear in every respect as a human being, the angel looks in every respect to be a human being.
How are we to understand this? Some people say, oh, the angel has the power to take on whatever form he needs to perform the role. The angel has no power to take on any form. I'm not speaking from my knowledge, I have no knowledge. I'm speaking from the revealed knowledge that G-d blessed Prophet Muhammed with. The angel has no power to do anything except the power given to the angel by G-d. The angel has no power to get himself out of a predicament. If he has to deliver a message on Michigan Avenue North and he's already on Michigan Avenue North and something happens to the street and block the street, he can't go north. The angel has no knowledge to go around and come back to Michigan Avenue and deliver his message..
The angel has no knowledge except what G-d gives to him. The human being has knowledge and the human being has no knowledge except what the knowledge G-d gave to him. The human being has, but the human being has the freedom. Freedom to choose other routes, to choose other ways to take other steps. The angel has no freedom to make different decisions. The angel can only follow order given to it, has no freedom of thought to question or to make different decisions. Now don't you see why Allah says to the prophet Muhammed, that He has made the human beings a degree above the angel.
The angel is not equal with us. We are above the angels. The angels serve the human being and the angel does not have the potential that the human being has. The human being has the great potential given to us in this freedom. The angel does not have it. We have to believe in the angels. Can you be convinced to believe in angels if you've never had experience? No. You have to have some experience or you have to have faith in G-d, either experience or faith in G-d. Many of us have experience, but we don't know how to identify it.
I 've said so often because, we let the noise die out a little bit. I have said this so often because I feel that it's very easily understood to explain or to illustrate the angel, the evidence of the existence of the angel. Some of us have experienced aids coming to us by a medium on an individual that had no knowledge of us needing that aid, no knowledge of the need, no knowledge of the time, no knowledge of our location. But they suddenly appear and they say, "Hey, you know I've been looking for you." Hadn't seen you maybe in two years, didn't know where you live, but hey, I've been looking for you. Say, man, do you remember I borrowed $10 from you? Say, yeah, I remember. So man, I've been looking for you to give it back. Said, well look, I appreciate that. Give you your $10 back. Didn't know he was going to see you, didn't know you were in the same town, but you needed $10.
That's exactly what you needed, $10. and he so happened to be there at that time to give you $10. Now at that time, wasn't he an angel? Yes. I don't care if he committed adultery 50 times, theft a hundred times. I don't care if he just murdered an innocent man, at that time he was an angel. Where was the angel? The angel was fixed. G-d had fixed the angel and this human being was just a vessel, a medium. That's all. The angel was working through that individual and because that individual had no power over what G-d wanted him to do, no knowledge of what G-d wanted him to do, no power to influence the decision at all. He was helpless, .......... in a force that he had no knowledge of. And when he knew anything he was doing a job that G-d wanted him to do, he goes away. He said, oh man, I ran into so and so and so. I hadn't seen him in two years, but it's been on my mind. I didn't want that dude to think I had cheated him, so I paid him. I gave him $10. He still, he's talking about it. He goes on talking about it maybe for 10 years, never knowing that he was an angel.
He didn't know he was an angel, and many times the person who got the aid through that individual never knows that he was an angel. We say, thank G-d, oh Allah help me. The Christian might say, oh Christ, help me, or G-d save me. But we don't think that the person, the medium by which we got the age was an angel. We don't think of it that way, but that's exactly what it is, its an angel. It serves you without its own knowledge or influence. It cannot help but just obey G-d. G-d can use anything. Don't we all belong to Allah? The creation, the angels, the creation. over everything belongs to Allah. So if Allah wants to use us without our knowledge, He can use us without our knowledge. And if Allah used me without my knowledge at that time, I'm in the role of an angel, without my knowledge. I haven't stopped being a human being. I'm still a human being. The person is at the same time human being and angel, he's human being in his own true form, but in his role, he's an angel.
He hasn't changed his nature. He hasn't changed his life. I said he could be a sinner, but at that time he has no power over the role that is given to him or forced on him by G-d. So he becomes the angel. Oh, how can G-d, oh that's so terrible that G-d would take a sinner and use him as an angel. G-d usually picks the good person. But believe me, I've had angels come to me in the bodies of sinners. G-d has helped me with angels that came to me in the bodies of a sinners and the sinner came with one intention, but the angels came with a different mission.
 I don't say nothing to you until first I see it verified or supported by Qur'an and hadith. If I don't see it getting support from that, I don't even express it. What is better than self experience to prove faith? The faith so that the faith will be really solid in Allah and in His messenger. Prophet Muhammed, (Arabic-peace and blessings be upon him . We have to believe in the angels that G-d can reach us through mediums, through agents, and in such a way that the human intelligence cannot completely understand or master it. We cannot influence it. No one can interfere with an angel. You think you can interfere with an angel? Impossible. The angel can't interfere with you. He can only do his job and you can't interfere with the angel. They're completely separated. They're human being an the angel. Some people think that human being can become an angel. The human being cannot become an angel. The human being stays a human being. He never changes from human being to angel.
Allah can use you for whatever He wants to use you for, but you can't change, even while you are being used, you are still what G-d made you. You're a human being. IG-d used some people as stones, some people as a whip. You know G-d whips us with people? Or G-d beat us with some, with the people. He picks up a whip and at that time the man is being used as a whip to whip you. But as far as the man's own knowledge and nature's concerned, has the man changed? He's still a man but the function at that particular time in its relationship with you and your problem is that of a whip.
G-d says also that we have to believe in His messengers, in His prophets, His messengers. Why is this necessary? I believe in G-d, I believe in His angels, and I'm told that G-d never comes to a man direct. Isn't that what we are told, that G-d never comes to a man direct. He always reaches a man by revelation, either through an angel, through visions or through some medium. Well what about Moses? He met G-d face to face. Yes, that's right. He met G-d face to face, but he didn't see a face until he got a message from a bush.
There was a medium bringing him face to face. First he noticed a fire and he said, oh, what is that there, he got curious and he went pursuing the fire. I wonder how come that fire is burning in that mountain there. So he went, following his curiosity, and there he saw a fire and a burning bush and the fire was burning the bush and the bush was not being consumed by the fire. The bush was remaining as it was, unchanged, and the fire was burning in the bush. So this was enough to make Moses see something face to face.
What is the good of seeing G-d face to face? Does your faith help you see Him? Face to face. The face is the identity is a symbolic of the identity. Face is symbolic of the identity. You can show a lot of bodies, but the best part of the body for identification is the face. You see a person's hand that looks like John's hand, but the best, the strongest identifying feature is the face features. So it's only symbolic in scripture. Seeing G-d face to face, meaning that we are going to see the strong identity, strong signs of G-d's identity, that's all. Seeing Him face to face, meaning that He will also see your best identity. He will see the strongest marks of your identity.
You won't be hiding anything from Him and He won't be hiding anything from you. As a man sat with his friend, man doesn't hide anything from his friend. He opens up to his friend. His friend opens up to him, meaning that G-d would not hide His identity from His messengers and His messenger would be purehearted. He wouldn't be coming with sin with weak intention, hiding some of his intentions from G-d. No. They would be open before each other, like friends, face to face. That's simple understanding. You want foolishness? Go on, get it. There's plenty of it out there.
We have to believe in G-d's messengers. Shouldn't it be enough just to believe that G-d is G-d and He has power to reach us by any means or by any medium He chooses? Should that be enough? Why does G-d want us to believe also in His messengers? The messenger should say, look, G-d revealed it. Don't you believe in G-d? Say yes, I believe in G-d, then G-d revealed it. Don't you believe that G-d has the power to reach me through mediums, through angels? Yes, I do believe it. Shouldn't that be enough? But you also have to believe in the messenger.
Look like that's some strong support to me. If I believe in G-d and I believe that G-d reveals on a level that human beings can't totally grasp, I believe that He reveals the man. No, I have to believe in the messenger. I have to believe in a human being. Its not enough to believe in G-d and in Revelation and in angels. What has been our mistake in the past, when the human being gets revelation from G-d, we make him something above a human being. We say oh, he is the deity, he is a divine. Or he is a witch. He has some supernatural power. He's different from the human being. So that's why it's necessary to believe in G-d's messenger. No, he's no witch. He's no divine, he's no deity. He's nothing supernatural. He's a plain common mortal human being.
And that's what the Muslim has to accept. Believing in the messenger of G-d as a Muslim means to believe that that almighty G-d, the eternal divine, the only divine, the only eternal G-d, the only eternal being. We have to believe that that great being above human comprehension, outstretching the human vision, frustrating the human sight and vision to comprehend. That that powerful being reach a common mortal, a common human being. He doesn't have to go into no trance, meditate himself out of his form, G-d comes to him in his own true natural form. When you believe in the messenger of G-d, you have the best belief and the dignity of man. Don't you know that? The belief that G-d's mission and messenger who's a mortal, a common human being, not a angel, not a witch doctor, not a magic worker, a common human being that G-d has made that human being His messenger and have blessed him to be the receiver of revelation for His highest plane, on His highest plane!
To believe that is to believe in human dignity. What greater image could we have of human dignity in that. Almighty G-d has chosen a common mortal, a human being to receive revelation on the highest plane. He has chosen the common human being to be the greatest tool for divine work. Greatest tool for the divine work. Have G-d aided creatures any more than He aided the human being through His prophet? No. The other creatures, they received their blessings, their creation, and even their social order was established and fixed. They hardly get out of it. They stay in it sometimes for millions of years. Same social order, having babies and mating and doing everything in the same way. No change in the way they live, the way they build houses or the way they do anything, stay the same way all the time.
Wear one dress all the time. The roach has been wearing his roach colored garments for millions of years. But look at you. You just change your clothes. You just do anything you want to do. The human being, G-d has favored him with the greatest reward, but has also put a responsibility on you that is the heaviest of all responsibilities and that's the responsibility for your own actions. Freedom of thought, freedom of action, freedom to think out of the pattern that G-d puts you in and go into other patterns if you like. That's a heavy responsibility. Says, and Allah was about to create the world.
Allah says in the Qur'an, that He offered the responsibility of custodian, custodian, the responsibility for keeping the order to every creature, and no creature came up and accepted the offer, accept man. The human being rushed up. Yes G-d, I accept it. It speaks for his greatness and also for his weakness. Human being is quick to rush up and say, I'll do it. No matter how hard or impossible the job look to be. "I'll do it ." Without thinking. His weakness is, not giving enough thought to serious matters. That's his weakness. His greatness is his courage, that he has great courage, great faith that he can do almost anything as the human being.
We have to believe in the message of G-d. We also have to believe in the promise of G-d. We have to believe in the judgment. As a Muslim, I can't believe everything else and say, oh, the judgment, I'll pass that by. No, I have to believe in the judgment. Not only the judgment or the physical matters of my life or the present matters of my life while I'm living creature in this physical form, but also judgment after this physical form has passed away and even the earth and all things have passed away, I have to believe in the judgment.
Why? Because it is a requirement, a necessity for justice, for justice. We are told by G-d in the Holy Qur'an, the message of words of G-d to Prophet Muhammed, peace and blessings be upon him, that it is not only a promise, but it is a necessity that G-d raise you up. Say, tell them that they are bones or something less. If they have become dry bones or something less than that, dust or something less, they shall be raised. They shall be raised. It has meaning both in this life and in the life after physical creation, has meaning both in both. The Jewish people and other religious people, they have used language in a symbolic way to hide the real knowledge.
They make comparison between the spiritual life and the promises that G-d makes to us and the physical or the material world and the promise that Satan makes to us. So they say, oh yes, the bones shall be raised. But there are many of them that don't believe that when a human being dies physically, that G-d can restore him to life or that G-d can give him a higher creation. No, they don't believe it. When they say that G-d will raise the bones up, they're not talking about human bones. They're talking about the lost principles of their faith.
The law structures that hold up society, knowledge structures that hold up to society. They're talking about those bones are going to be raised up again. And when they say they're going to be closed with flesh, they're not talking about this flesh. They're talking about with the flesh of knowledge that the fundamental principles will be erected again and there will be knowledge teaching to bring back the education to the society. And when they say, oh, G-d is going to breathe into him the breath of life, they have a double meaning. G-d is yes, they're going to be given desire again. They're going to be given inspiration to do things, to get the work again for the betterment of the society. So we have inspiration and inspiration. We 're inspired by the world and we're inspired by G-d. Inspiration and inspiration. So human beings talk in these two veins and they talk on these two different levels using symbolic language, but it's very clear in Allah's book the Qur'an, that yes you are right, but you are only talking about the signs that point to a higher reality.
The Muslim has to also believe in the signs of G-d, the promise of G-d, what G-d hints to us, what He promises us. There hints, strong hints in creation that suggests to us that there is something existing on a higher level than this. What does Allah say of this creation? The whole creation is nothing but a mirage, mirage. The real reality is not what you are looking at. The real reality is somewhere else. And what did Prophet Muhammed, peace and blessings be upon say of this whole life, he says, while we're in this life, while I'm in this life, I'm a traveler.
The whole life is nothing but a trip in a journey. It's not home, it's not the destination. If this wasn't right, if there was some different way to interpret this, like the old Jacobite Jews says that no, there is no resurrection. The only resurrection is social resurrection. The only resurrection is political resurrection. The only resurrection is moral resurrection. There is no resurrection from physical death, once you come to physical death, that's the end of it. That kind of belief keeps the Jew performing two jobs at the same time. He works as a missionary for G-d and he works at Satan at the same time because he thinks that once he dies that's the end of it, but with the Muslim, that's not so. That's not the end of it! Allahu Akbar.
In the words of Allah, in the Qur'an, it says, "now truth has come as plain as seen with the eye ". That's the seeing, with the eye. Oh, I want to see my savior one of these days. Believe in the Qur'an and you'll see your savior right today. Oh, I'm going to see G-d one of these days because scripture says we are going to see Him, every eye shall see Him. Believe in the Qur'an and you have the opportunity in this life right now to see Allah. Seeing Allah is not seeing something biological. Allah is not biological. Allah created the biology.
The words in the Qur'an tell us that now, Allah says, now the message, the truth has come as clear, as plain as seeing with eye to tell those Jews and those Christians who have confused the people and had them thinking that you are going to see G-d face to face like a human being. Say tell 'em no, that's not the way. The best seeing is not the seeing with the physical eye. The best seeing is the seeing with the spiritual eye. The spiritual eye of faith in G-d, while well balanced, well not tippy turvy, a man when he is in his drunk state, can't see with his eyes so well.
The eyes can be looking at the object, but if the man is in a drunk state, we don't know whether he will report what he saw or not. Likewise, for spiritual sight, you can see G-d, but if your balance, you're out of balance, you've been taught to believe in things that are not real. You are superstition. You're not connected with rational knowledge, you are spooky and superstitious. When you look for G-d, you still can't see because your eye is under the influence of intoxication. The intoxication of falsehood, of superstition, lies. But if you follow G-d's guidance that has been designed to bring out the best in man's rational, understanding, the best in his complete form, the knowledge has been designed to bring the best of the man out, whether it be rational or spiritual. If you stand on that particular ground that is rational as well as spiritual and follow the words of G-d in the Qur'an, you'll come to see G-d plainly. Seeing G-d is being able to distinguish the workings of G-d from the workings of devil.
When we can distinguish the presence of G-d in our life from the presence of the devil in our life, when we are able to distinguish the blessings of G-d from the, what you call it, the pride of the devil, we are seeing G-d.
When we are able to know that this is revelation and this is false revelation that G-d is in this book and the devil is in this book, we are seeing G-d. When self-righteousness becomes an evil before our eyes and we know that all the good works count for nothing if the heart ain't right. You are seeing G-d. Seeing G-d means being straight. Seeing G-d means being right. Seeing G-d means being in that nature and that form and that mind and that particular mental disposition that enables you to recognize truth without the clouded vision of spiritual or mental drunkenness or without being upset by our passion. Sometimes the low desires, the lust for the base things of life, cloud the vision, and we say, oh, I would believe in that if I could understand it. How can you understand it if you're drunk with passion? Does the drunk go to the college and say, teach me? The drunk gets sober first, then goes to the college and say, teach me. The drunk knows he can't be taught in the college is under influence of alcohol or some other numbing, intoxicating things.
So how do we expect G-d to guide us while we are giving ourselves to the drunken lusts of the world or to superstition, to magic and all these other evils that make us drunk? Some of us are so proud of our own knowledge and in our drunken foolishness, we laugh at the message and the messenger of G-d. If you only open your eyes, you'll see how foolish you are. Yes, we believe in the judgment. We believe in the resurrection, not only in this life, but also after this life. G-d says, do not follow other paths because they will lead you astray from the path of G-d.
Often in the Qur'an we find that G-d says, ask the people of the book. Why does G-d say, ask the people of the book? These were words revealed to Prophet Muhammed, and Prophet Muhammed was speaking to the people in the Middle East Arabia and he was inspired to say, ask the people of the book. Dear beloved people, to have a sentence and a sentence represents a thought, a complete thought. If you take parts of the sentence away, you don't expect to get the complete thought. Our struggle for spiritual understanding, our struggle for religious understanding is a struggle for complete thoughts. We want to see the complete thoughts. We get parts of it, but we can't see the whole. To have a complete thought, you have to have a subject, a doer, a speaker. You have to have a verb, something showing action or something being done by the doer, the speaker. And you have to have an object, a predicate, something showing where that's going.
This world has given up subject and verbs, but no object, no predicate. Allah reveals to Prophet Muhammad, the whole sentence, the subject, the verb and the object, the verb with its object. So you have the whole thing, subject and predicate. That has been our problem. I have said that to ask the Muslim to be aware when you're reading the Qur'an, that the Qur'an is also speaking to Christians and Jews and other people. And if you don't understand what the Qur'an is saying to Christians and Jews and other people, you still lack valuable, essential understanding.
One of the names of the Qur'an is Al Bayan, The Clear Evidence. The clear evidence. Allah says, now has the clear evidence come! Evidence convincing, like the seeing with the eye, this is the message of the Qur'an. Should we knowing this, having this great knowledge, should we preach today like the man preached to the people in primitive time? Should we use the same language? Should we compose our text to satisfy the primitive, the Jinn, and the primitive people, when we live in a society that is enlightened, we live in an enlightened society. The society has the primitive nature. We are caught in the grip of primitive nature, but we are an enlightened society. To bring the man out of his primitiveness, shouldn't you appeal to his strength? You should appeal to his enlightenment. But if he has no enlightenment, you have to appeal to his common sense, to his good nature. But when the man has some enlightenment, shouldn't you appeal to his enlightenment to shame him, to let him know how he now has fallen beneath his own standard, has fallen beneath his own doctrine? Yes. Some people want me to stand up here and just quote Hadith. Some people would like for me to read the Qur'an letter for letter and quote Hadith and not bother referring or comparing the Bible with the Qur'an.
They're backwards. They're still in primitive days. They have allowed themselves to lose sight on the keys for success. The keys for success is to stay in tune with the time, with the nature and the demands of time. You don't come and preach to Christians like you preach to a heathen whose been worshiping sticks and stone. Even if you find Christian worshiping sticks in stone, you don't address him as though he's a heathen worshiping sticks in stone. If you find a man drunk, do you address him as a drunk or do you address him as a human being with intelligence? Say, man, you should be ashamed of yourself, getting in this fix, giving yourself to this weakness. Look what you're doing to your wife. Look how you're shaming yourself before your children.
We don't apply the same rules of intelligence in religion that we apply in our daily life. I'm here to tell you brother and sister, that much of the Qur'an is yet to be understood by the Arab! In order to understand the predicate and the subject, they need to study the Jewish people and their Christian people more. They need to study the books that have been revealed to those people so they can see what problems was the holy Qur'an addressing. What problems was Allah addressing through His prophet Muhammed that were existing in the text of the Jews and in the text of the Christians. Going to isolate yourself from this world that G-d was speaking to. G-d was addressing this whole world, a theist, Christian, Jew, and whatever they are. Allah addressed the whole world through Prophet Muhammed. And anyone who thinks he can come from Arabia and close his eyes to the whole world and teach us the Qur'an is a blind fool.
They cannot understand the Qur'an in any appreciable fashion until he first understands the environment that he's in. And when he leaves Arabia and comes to America, he's in a drastically different environment. So he should stop worrying about the superficial things, the rituals, the ritualistic thing. He should give up his fear of losing the things that are close to him in his Arabian environment, and he should become conscious of the things that have been lost from the Jewish environment, from the Christian environment that G-d intended for them. And He revealed the Qur'an to guide us back to the way not only Muslim Jews, Christians, all of us! We have to accept that Abraham is our father.
Adam is our father, also Abraham is our father. Adam represents the common man. The common man is our father, but also Abraham is our father. We have been raised by our common fathers and we have been raised by G-d's prophets. The first father is the common man. The second father is a prophet of G-d. G-d says of Abraham, (Arabic) your father, Abraham. Yes. So that's our father. Why He didn't say your father Moses? Moses was a prophet. Why He didn't say your father Jesus. Jesus was a prophet. Why He said your father, Abraham? Because Abraham is a prophet whose role was that of a parent, a father responsible for his children.
Abraham was raised up among Pagan people who had lots of ignorance, primitive ignorance. Abraham was guided to search for truth with a rational eye. He observed the stars and the sun and everything. And he saw in the movement of sky a sign that there is a creator, a planner, a designer behind all of this and that He's not three, pardon me, two, three, and four, He's not many, He's one. He saw one nature, one creation and one pattern, one design dominating throughout the whole creation. And he says, there’s one G-d. One G-d, and there is no G-d associated with that G-d. Everything else is servant. Everything else is creation and servant, only one G-d. Abraham said that. Then Abraham was moved to even share his own life, the life of his own loins, to serve people.
Abraham is a symbol of charity. He was ready to kill his own son to please G-d. But G-d told him that having the desire was the same as affecting it. G-d didn't want him to kill his son, but he had shown faith because he was willing to kill his son, that even his own child could be sacrificed. He was going to please G-d. Abraham was moved by two strong influences, the search for truth, rational motivation, faith in G-d, a faith that did not weaken even when his own child's life was at stake. His faith did not weaken. And G-d told him to kill the, what is it, the ram, the sheep, kill the lamb. Let that be the sacrifice and feed it to the people. So he took one of his lambs and he shared it with his neighbors, with his people, with fellow men.
Instead of killing his son, he practiced charity. He practiced charity. This brought Abraham to be also the symbol of charity, of charitableness in our religion. He's the great symbol of charity and he is a symbol of rational searching for truth and the symbol of strong faith. He's all of these. Isn't that in every human being that really loves G-d sincerely, that really want to be right with G-d? Aren't those the things that's steering him, moving him on? A desire to be right by others? A desire to be truthful, a desire to be rational and not stupid or silly. We are not satisfied with a religion that's mystified and superstitious. We want reality. The human nature presses us to find the reality, to find the absolute truth, to find truth unveiled, separated from superstition. and mysteries. We are moved like that. Abraham is a symbol of that, the symbol of that thirst for naked truth. He wouldn't accept any superstition.
He wouldn't accept half truth. He wanted the whole truth, the plain rational truth. What brought him to seek it and not give up faith in G-d. The strength of Abraham was his faith in G-d. This shows you brother and sister, what will make the best scientist? The best force to move the scientists to his highest peak, to his greatest glory is faith in G-d. Right faith in G-d will lead you to truth and you'll never give up. You'll die on the path of truth, right Faith in Almighty G-d. Right faith in almighty G-d brings out the rational man and brings out the moral man and also brings out the charitable person. As long as we are short of truth, believing, having, faith in G-d, as long as we're short of truth, we are not satisfied. If truth say, oh, you still have to go a little bit more. Say, well, what is the next step I have to take truth? You have to give up your own son's life.
That truth that you will say, son, I'm sorry, but there has to be a sacrifice today. Abraham, he was weeping, but he said, son, there has to be a sacrifice today because I know G-d is G-d and I know that I have been inspired to do this thing and I'm going to do it because I believe in truth. He didn't say, well, this is my son. I can rationalize here. No, if you believe G-d is speaking, if G-d says, take the son's life, you have to obey if you are a man of truth. It says that Abraham, when he was about to take his son's life, G-d says, no. Abraham. Says the vision that you have, you've already fulfilled it.
Meaning that G-d only did this to test you Abraham. G-d was not wanting your son's life. G-d was wanting to bring out the full humanity, the faith in the human being, the love for G-d and the faith that the human being has in his G-d, that he will even slay his most beloved son If he think G-d asked that of him. Oh, isn't that wonderful? This is not G-d's nature. This a human nature. G-d is showing us the beauty of human nature, that this creature that we laugh at, we call him primitive, we laugh at him, that he carried his children up and sacrifice them to his G-d. He would take his 12-year-old son and sacrifice it to his false G-d. We look on it and say, oh, look at primitive man, how stupid it was. How he sacrificed his young son to a G-d that he believed in. But G-d wanted to show us that in that human being, in that ignorance that you laugh at is the power for social salvation. That if a human being can sacrifice the thing most dearest to him, while believing that G-d wants it of him, that same human being can solve all of our social problems and share the wealth of the nation with other people for G-d's sake. But he can't do it for his own sake.
So we look back in history and we laugh at the stumbling, the crawling and the stumbling of human beings trying to reach that destiny on earth. But G-d says, no. That's not anything for you to laugh at. That human beings sacrificed their sons, they believed in the G-d. The stone was not the G-d. The tree was not the G-d. The wind was not the G-d. The lightning was not the G-d. None of those things were the G-d. The earth in its fertility was not the G-d, but that individual believed that it was the G-d and he sacrificed his own child's life, sacrifice his child's life to please the G-d. A sign that if you have faith in G-d, there is nothing we can't accomplish in the area of human problems, nothing we can't accomplish in the area of human problems. Look how men lead the whole nation astray, corrupt the whole society, for love of self, for love of a woman, from love of a spoiled brat. But look how other human beings sacrifice the most beloved in the family, sacrificing for the sake of G-d.
G-d says He wants not burnt sacrifices. He wants no human sacrifices. That a sacrifice He wants is a repentant heart, a heart that regrets, a heart that feels remorse, a heart that cries because it sees its sins and confess. That's what G-d wants of us. Look how he showed us that in Abraham. The man was about to kill his own son. G-d says no. What we were asked for in the vision, you have already done it. The intention is there, Abraham. You had your intention. Your intention was to sacrifice your own son's life if it stood in the way of G-d.

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