04/28/1991
IWDM Study Library
Ta’aleem 
Baltimore MD

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Prayer Leader: Al-Fatiha, the opening chapter.
Audience: Ameen.
Prayer Leader: I'll translate it into English for the benefit of those who maybe visiting with us. With the name of G-d, Most Gracious, Most Merciful, Praise be to G-d, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the worlds, Most Gracious, Most Merciful, Master of the Day of Judgement. Thee alone do we worship, and your aid we seek. Show us the straight path, the path of those on whom you have bestowed favors, not those who incur your wrath, nor of those who go astray. Ameen.
Audience: Ameen.
Prayer Leader: At this time, I would like for Imam W. Deen Mohammed to come before you for an important announcement. Thank you very much. As-salamu alaykum.
Audience: Wa ‘alaykumu as-salam.
IWDM: As-salamu alaykum.
Audience: Wa ‘alaykumu as-salam.
IWDM: I don't know, I guess money is getting to be more and more serious with me. It’s so serious until I asked permission to make this appeal. You might see baskets. I don't know how it’s coming, bags or whatever. Please put something in it for the MACA Fund. That's the fund. M-A-C-A, Muslim American Community Assistance Fund. That's the fund that we depend on, and we have very dependable donors donating to that fund.
They have been consistently doing it for the all the number of years that we have had that fund. We depend on them. Allah has blessed us through them to survive and manage our needs, but we have people employed. We have to employ people. I wish I could employ a staff of secretaries. I need about five secretaries. Then, I could answer your mail and I could do a lot of things I want to do. Please remember that we have more needs than you perhaps know about. Do what you can, but don't hurt yourself and your family. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: With us this afternoon in our city of Baltimore, we pray Allah that he won't make this his last visit, that he'll come see us again real soon. I present to you Imam Warith Deen Mohammed, spokesman for human salvation. Takbir.
Audience: Allahu akbar.
Speaker 1: Takbir.
Audience: Allahu akbar.
Speaker 1: Takbir.
Audience: Allahu akbar.
IWDM: alhamdulillah. As-salamu alaykum.
Audience: Wa ‘alaykumu as-salam.
IWDM: Peace be upon you. We praise the one Lord and creator, Allah. Give Him thanks, we ask Him for forgiveness, for His mercy. And we pray that He guide us always. We witness that there is but one Lord, worthy of worship, Allah, the creator of everything. And we witness that Muhammad ibn Abdullah, to whom the Quran was revealed, is the last prophet. And Allah's messenger to all who will heed, or who will listen and follow.
We know that in our holy book, our Prophet Muhammad, he is called the mercy to all the worlds. That tells us that Allah intended all people to have freedom, access, a way to gain from the message of Al-Islam. It is not for a particular part of the world, it's for the whole world. It's not for one people, it's for all people. We as Muslims, if we understand that, then we are in a better situation to benefit ourselves from our religion, which is called by the name Islam, but we know properly in Quran is Al-Islam.
In addressing peace, how Al-Islam promotes peace, we're going to bring some references from Quran to introduce this talk. G-d says in our holy book, the Quran, to those who would doubt the way of truth. And would impose upon man that, that would cripple him, or that, that would deny him the life that G-d intends for him. G-d says, “He did not create this great, vast world that we see, or witness, for any purpose except justice”.
G-d also says, “that the creation of the skies and the earth, this vast world that we see out there and know about everywhere, is a bigger creation than the creation of man”. Now, I'm going to start with those two quotes from Quran, but I'm tempted to give another, and I think I will. G-d said, “He offered to charge the responsibility for managing all this to the angels, and they refused to accept it.
But man, fool hearted and hasty, he rushed and grabbed that responsibility. He's going to carrying the whole world on his back”. We have to understand from the quotes I've given you from Quran, first of all, that the Allah, the G-d, the Allah, that we are to worship, serve, and obey, is creator of everything, has existed always as He is, will exist always as He is, He is G-d in the best sense, or the best perception, that human beings have on this earth. He is the G-d.
And all of this creation is His. The power of the universe is greater than our power. We live on this earth because of this system Allah created. We could not be born if it was not for the system that Allah created, the system of the universe. It is possible for us to come to birth and exist because of this system. We are born of this system and this system takes us back. We die and we go back into the system as dust, or whatever. Eventually, we become nothing but dust.
No matter what we have on our mind that we want to do, we only have a limited time to do it. This system is going to outlive us. No matter what we want to establish on this earth, we will not be around long enough to watch it and protect it. Eventually, this system will take it into itself. It will go into the system, the system of the universe, the system of matter, however you want to describe it. The creation is a bigger matter of importance than man.
No matter what we have in our mind as a vision for ourselves and society, if it is going in conflict with what Allah intends, eventually, the system itself will swallow it up. It'll be gone and nobody will see any traces of it. We may want to go against the grain of what Allah want for us. Morally, socially, politically, we may go against the grain of that. We may fight it, but if we are wise men, and if we have the patience to study history, Allah tells us over and over in Quran, "Look back, you're not the first one that tried this. Look back and see what happened to those before you. See if you can find any trace of their existence." Some of them, you can't find a trace of their existence. If they're not dusty, they're mummified.
No matter what we do to go against the grain of what the creator intends for us, eventually we'll be overcome. If not by the championship, or the work of an obedient servant of G-d working against what we are doing, the universe itself, the dynamics of nature, is going to do away with our opposition to the Creator. If we can understand that, I think we can submit to G-d. It's hard for us to submit to each other.
But we are already submitting to matter, whether we like it or not. G-d says, He said, " He created the world and the world was in a state of chaos. It was unordered. It was not ordered yet. He said, "Come willingly or unwillingly." Whether we like it or not, we have to conform to what Allah intends, what Allah wants, what Allah orders. We have to conform to it. Some of us are coming unwillingly. But we don't know we're coming, we're coming still. Though it's unwillingly.
You won't have the same look on your face when they bury you. It might be similar to the one you got now but it'd be changed quite a bit. It's going to be changed quite a bit.
That's the first thing we have to recognize. That we are not as important as sometime we think we are. I'm not talking of us individually so much now. I'm talking about the powers. We think of powers, political power, as being so great and so powerful. We think they're going to be here eternally. They come and they go. The United States of America is a very young nation when we think of nations that have lived before this nation.
It's a young nation. 200 years and little better. There was a Muslim rule in Spain that went 500 years. A great rule lasted for 500 years in Spain, 500 years. We have about 300 more to go in the United States to match that. You think you're going to make it? I hope so. Not like you're going. Now, another point we want to bring out, require that I quote again from the Holy Book.
Our Lord, Allah says, "Your death and your resurrection is like that of one person." Like that of one person. Now, here we find the attention is on one person. Not many, one person. Ka nafsen wahida, is as one person. What should that tell us? That Allah want us to have our attention both on the state of the individual person and the state of the society. When you find society in a lot of trouble, most likely it's because it has overlooked, or been negligent in its responsibility to keep some attention on the state of the individual person.
You don't know how important you are in this religion. Each of us as individuals are very important in this religion. I don't think that this is the only that places that kind of importance on the individual. Each of us are very important. The message I'm giving you here is coming from our knowledge because after all, I would be ignorant to stand here and come from something that I don't know that well.
I know my religion better than I know the other ideologies that I've studied. And I have chosen my ideology to be Islamic ideology, not those other ideologies I've studied. I would ignorant to come here and try to address you from some other ideology. I address you straight from Quran. I was asked too. When I came here, brother said, "Do you need a Quran?" I told him I have one right here.
Audience: Allahu akbar.
Sometimes, I need it for quotes. I need to quote something, but the best place to carry the Quran is right here, right in your heart. What is the prophecy that G-d made? Say, "He will write it upon their hearts." The Muslim community fulfills that promise because of their love for it and how dear it is to their heart. We have thousands, and hundreds of thousands of Muslims around the globe, that have the Quran recorded right here.
They can recite it to you. That's how we get it on tapes. Those cassettes you get, come from men. You think he had to go to the library and say? "Give me a copy, so we can make another copy." No, a human being with no machine stands and give it, and they record it. Then, you get it. They call them Hafiz. They have remembered the whole of the Quran perfectly. Our religion promotes peace by first addressing the need for peace in the establishment of the individual.
If you look at the early Surahs that came to the Prophet. Study the early surahs that came to the Prophet, those Surahs, though they address universal things, their appeal is to the individual person. One of the earliest Surah that we have is Surah Ihklas. “Say. He, Allah, is the one alone. He is eternal, needing nothing, and everything needing Him. He never fathered any child and He was never fathered by any. And there is nothing to measure up to Him”. That's one of the earliest Surahs.
Who is it talking to? It's talking to everybody but doesn't that come right home to the individual? To us, the individual person. For us to know Allah, for us to know the G-d that we talking about. We're not talking about a G-d like us, a G-d that's dependent like we are. We're not talking about a G-d that's creation. We're talking about a G-d that is not creation but Creator, existing before, and also after creation. He existed before His creation and He will exist after His creation.
That's the kind of G-d we're talking about. Can you measure up to the human maturity that's required to accept that kind of G-d? Don't you know that concept of that G-d? When we're little, we see mom and dad. When we're real small, we see mom as nothing but a mammary gland. Mommy is a mammary gland. I've read books by psychologists and they say that the to the infant, the whole world is nothing but that mammary gland." Then later on, you begin to see momma is just not a titty, excuse the expression. I was trying to keep it to mammary gland, but somehow that ain't reaching everybody. The little child grows up and say, "No, Momma is bigger than a titty."
And pretty soon, the child grows up a little bit to know daddy, to know something about daddy. Now, daddy is one of these people that go with the trash. He never knows daddy. But if he is one of those who goes against the trash, one of the men that go against the trash. Well then, he knows daddy, he's beginning to know daddy. He'd say, "Daddy is more than just a disciplinarian. Daddy keeps lights on. Daddy keeps the phone so we can use it. He's pretty important here. Daddy keep the heat on in the house."
Daddy becomes very important. "Daddy will fix the door if the locks break." Daddy becomes very important. Then, "Daddy got a car." You ain't got a car, I'd say, "Daddy would take us to the store, or, daddy would take us downtown on the bus." You got a daddy, you got somebody. You begin to see that. You're growing up, and you're growing up direct. Now, the same way a child grows up to see more and more of the worth of their parents. We as human beings, are given the good sense and intelligence to grow up more and more to see the worth of our Creator, our Lord, Allah, one G-d.
Now, are you mature enough, grown up enough to accept the G-d as the G-d is presented in Quran by Muhammad, and in Quran? You can't be a little baby sucking a ninny now all the time. That won't work. This religion is a religion that satisfies all levels of society, but you have to be well-meaning. You have to mean right, you have to be sincere, you have to intend to be right.
If you're crooked, no. It ain't for you. Allah says that. Said, "It is guidance for the Muttaqeen." Hudan lil Muttaqeen, guidance for the Muttaqeen. It means guidance for those people of conscience. Those people who respect and regard the Lord Creator as He should be respected and regarded. They love Him. They fear Him. They fear to disobey Him. They're ashamed when they do wrong. They're ashamed before their Lord Creator. Hudan lil Muttaqeen. It is guidance for those type of people. Now, if you are not that type of person, then we understand your behavior.
If it is against what we're asking as Muslims of our Muslim community and our Muslim people. We understand it. With the importance, focus, on the individual, let us see how al-Islam promotes the peaceful establishment of that individual. When you believe in one Allah, one G-d, and you don't associate any gods with Him, you have the first, biggest, and best help in your life, for establishing peace in your own personal life. That's the biggest help you can have.
If you truly believe that there is one G-d responsible for everything, that you are accountable to, you have taken the first step to establish your own self in peace. Now, where do I get this idea from, that Al-Islam wants an establishment of peace? The call to our service is, " Come to prayer, or come to worship, prayer." But when we come to prayer, we are not coming to just say our own prayer.
We don't have a do-it-yourself prayer service. We have a follow-G-d's-word prayer service. Follow-G-d's-revealed-word-in-the-Quran prayer service. You got to follow the Quran when you lead a prayer. You can't come and do your own thing. If you see Muslims doing this, they're just doing Du'a. Du'a mean they holler, "Oh Lord, help me." But we're supposed to control our emotions. We are not supposed to be [imitates cry for help], "Help me."
We're just crying. This is crying, Du'a. That's crying. Some people cry in a very dignified way. Al-humdulila hirabbil aalameen, but we're crying. That's crying. That's calling G-d. When we say prayer, we mean an established system, that will not allow us to alter it or influence it. We can't change it. We have to recite Quran in our established prayer. It's the established prayer.
How do we know it's an establishment? We say at the point when it is time to actually take our lines, form our lines, and begin the prayer, we say, “qadqama tis salat”. It means now is the time to be standing for prayer. What is standing? Establishment. That's what it means. Iqamah means to establish yourself. Our prayer is a system, an established system. Everybody knows this that studies the religion. The prayer is an established system.
G-d has decided how it is to be done. It was demonstrated through His Prophet; peace and the blessings be upon Muhammad. It has remained that way and will remain that way. That's how we do it. It's an established system. While we are praying, what are we doing? We are hearing Quran. Our prayer is Quran. We're hearing our holy book, Quran. The Quran is a book of enlightenment. The Quran is an educator.
We're praying but we're being educated. We're hearing the knowledge and education from Quran. It is also disciplining us in every way. Spiritually, morally, mentally, intellectually, in every way, physically. It is disciplining us. It is a total discipline for us. That discipline comes under one supreme authority, Allah the Creator, that created us and the universe, and gave us the discipline of prayer and everything else.
Here, if we follow, if we come and understand that when I come, though I'm joining a group, I'm responsible personally, individually, for carrying out my share of that responsibility.
If we don't understand it at this point, then understanding at the second point. We are also obligated. Though it is not a strong obligation as the Fard prayer, we are obligated to do what we call, Sunnah prayers.
Sunnah prayers. We have to do that. If we don't, we won't be regarded as followers of Muhammad. Somebody will think we're rebelling, not accepting the Prophet, if we refuse to do the Sunnah prayers. And the Sunnah prayers are so important to us. The Sunnah prayers says symbolically, by symbol, it says that this is not just a community responsibility. This is an individual responsibility. Because nobody can lead you in Sunnah prayers, you have to lead yourself. That's the prayer of the Prophet.
The Prophet to us is a symbol of a man who accepted personal responsibility. When he started out, there were nobody but him. He was accepting the responsibility alone. There was nobody, no converts. He had to challenge the world and risk his life, to say to them what G-d had inspired him to say. He started out as one person, and because of him being obedient, chosen, and perfect for the job, the result is now one billion people. In Asia, in Europe, excuse me, Africa, America now, all over the world.
la illaha illa Allah. There is but one worthy of praise, one worthy of worship. Muhammad rasul Allah. Muhammad is the Messenger of G-d. All around the world now, one billion people. From that one man, one person. Now each of us, we have to follow that one person. We have to accept too, personal responsibility. If there're no believer in your house, you're responsible to tell them, invite them, to come to Al-Islam.
If there are no believer in your city, one person, Muslim, is responsible to invite people of that city, to Al-Islam. If there're nobody that will heed you and paying attention to it, that one person is responsible for establishing Al-Islam in himself and living it, whether anybody respond or not. At least, there'll be one Muslim in that town. This personal responsibility. If there're nobody at the masjid to lead the prayer, no brother, a sister should come to that masjid and face the Qibla, Allahu Akbar, and say the prayer.
At least, do a prayer there. Once there are two people to speak to, speak to them and invite them to be better Muslims, or invite them to Al-Islam. Personal responsibility. But that kind of faith, you need strong faith to carry out that kind of responsibility, cannot be had unless you're sincere and right in your mind, in your heart. If you're crooked, you aren't going to have that. Crooked people can't do that.
Crooked people can't do nothing but do crooked things. That's all we can expect from crooked people, crooked things. Personal responsibility. If you accept Allah, one G-d, and if you know 
G-d as He is revealed in Quran, you will love G-d. And the more you love G-d, the more peace you're going to have in your life. The less you love G-d, the less peace you have in your life. You care nothing for G-d, you have no peace.
Show me anybody that cares nothing for G-d. They do not have any peace. You cannot have peace, if you don't care for G-d. No peace will come to you. We know that there are so many things that help us to keep the establishment of peace for ourselves personally. But the first and most important, I repeat, is that you accept the one G-d, and you love that G-d. That's the first and most important.
But also, that G-d requires of us that we don't do certain things. That we don't lie to anybody, that we don't steal from any body, that we don’t have in our hearts a desire to harm others, to cheat others. That we don't envy another, that we are not jealous of another. Now, we know its human nature to sometimes be envious, to sometime be jealous, sometime want to lie. Sometime lie and often maybe. But G-d doesn't want us like that. We, if we know G-d, if we accept G-d, and we love G-d, we don't want to be like that.
And as long as that kind of disposition is in us, we're going to check ourselves, and not give ourselves to extreme disobedience, where we become notorious, and people point at us, and say, "There go a lying Muslim." And when we can face Allah, face each other, and know that we do not like to lie, doesn't mean that I know that I never lied, no. I know that I don't like to lie. And I know I don't like to steal. I know I don't like to be jealous of another person. I know I don't like to cheat another person. I know I don't like to harm another person. When we can face Allah and know that, we have peace.
We might have lied many times, but we don't like to lie. We might have cheated somebody somewhere at some time, but we don't like to cheat, so we can face G-d and have peace. We can face each other and have peace. You see, how our religion provides for us to have the establishment of peace in us personally, in us individually? There's much to be said on that. Understand responsibility, individual responsibility.
You're not to wait for an Imam to read to you the Quran. If you don't know how to read, you should be trying to learn how to read. You're supposed to read the Quran for yourself. If you don't know how to, you should look first in your household. See if there's an uncle, a husband, a wife, or somebody to help you read Quran. Or even a child that's going to school that knows how to read, have that child read the Quran for you in your house.
You're supposed to go to the Quran, to hear it with your ears, and accept it into your heart, your mind and let your life conform to it. Obey it. This is an obligation on all of us. So, we should understand that. If we have the establishment of peace in individuals, don't you know we are going to have establishment of peace in the society? We cannot have the establishment of peace in the society, without the establishment of peace being in the individual.
Must be in the individual. A man can come up here and preach his tongue out. If it isn't in you all, he isn't going nowhere and you are not going nowhere. You're not going anywhere. Just going to keep repeating the same notes forever. But if there come a hunger, a desire, in the individual, to establish what G-d offers in himself, or in herself, we're on the way. The human being, the individual person in our religion is supposed to be a responsible establishment.
And G-d has given us the light, the guidance, that enables us to have peace in that establishment. How can you have peace in that establishment if you're going to have a desire to do wrong in that establishment? I'm not saying you have to be perfect. I want to drill that in, I want to make that that part very clear. I'm not saying we're preaching that people; individuals are supposed to be perfect, no. Only one is perfect. Allah is perfect.
Audience Member 1: Allahu Akbar.
Oh there, somebody say, “the Prophet is perfect”. Yes, certainly the Prophet is a perfect human being.
Audience Member 2: Thank you.
Perfect human being. Know the difference. All right. The establishment of peace. Al-Islam promotes the establishment of peace. When Al-Islam promotes obedience to one Lord, it is promoting the establishment of peace. When Al-Islam promotes the obedience to G-d morally, that you must obey Him morally in obedience to His commands. If He command you to not to eat, drink the liquors, he commands you to not to take intoxicants, to befog your mind or to drug your mind, the religion is promoting peace.
Allah, in giving that is promoting peace for our establishment. How come I don't have peace? Because I drink the liquors. I drink too much. I take narcotics. I gamble. I lie. I break G-d's laws. How can I have peace? If you want peace, you have to be like the universe. Isn't the sky peaceful at night? Doesn't it follow laws? Obeying the law. You ever see the sun wake up and do the shimmy? Do you ever see the sun wake up and say, "I'm going to boogaloo across the sky today”? It comes across the same way all the time, doesn't it?
Obeying law. That is important for establishing peace in us personally, in us individual. How does Al-Islam promote peace for the community, for the society? First, by promoting individuals to accept responsibility, not only for themselves, but for the society. We are to accept responsibility for ourselves and everything in our charge. The Prophet, the peace the blessings be upon him, he said, "We'll be questioned in the judgment, as to how we carried out our responsibility to those things that are in our charge."
First of all, the members of our own body, the members of our household, to those things that are in our charge. Not only that, the animal you own, or the automobile you drive. Whatever's in your possession, how did you carry out your responsibility? When we look at the begging need for peace in the life of individuals and the society today, what is their problem? What is the real problem? We are not accepting responsibility for what we have charge over. We are not accepting responsibility for our own personal life, for the room we live in, or for the house we live in, or apartment we live in. Or for the family that we are part of, for the block that we live on, or, for the possessions we have.
We use our possessions wrongly. We use our possessions to undermine another person, use our possessions as a weapon, as a war instrument to advance our power over somebody else's power. Our possessions are being used wrongly. We're not obeying Allah with ourselves in the things in our charge, so we cannot have peace. And the people around you suffer too. They are denied peace too.
Now, we know we cannot expect the broad society of America to come to our religion and accept to not use liquors, drink whiskey, drink strong drinks, to not gamble. But these are very serious, very strong commandments for Muslims. We are not to drink, take alcohol, or anything that alter our mind. No mind-altering drugs. It's a very great sin for us to give our mind onto the power, or influence or the charge of something that's not human, or to another human for that matter.
It's a big sin if we give our mind to another person. Your mind is to be given only to Allah. So, for us, we know that this is a big great sin. Can't we be serious then about working to make the Muslim community, what they call it wet and dry, a dry community, or whatever. A dry society, or whatever. I don't like that expression because it might be dry of alcohol, but we got some water, baby.
We should work hard because we know these things are very important. And look, if you cannot have peace giving yourself to drugs, alcohol, drugs, disobeying G-d in major matters, you cannot have peace. You will not have it personally; your family won't have it if you're there to influence them. You cannot have peace. We have to establish peace. To establish peace, we have to first, have Allah established in our heart over us as the supreme authority.
We have to accept and love also His messenger, Muhammad, to whom the Quran was revealed. And we have to make a conscious effort to live the life of Muslim. Read the Quran, recite the Quran, pray daily, and pray as Muslims pray. You can't pray your own way. We've got a lot of rebel in us. I don't know why. A rebel never got us anywhere. The only way we've made it is by peaceful means.
I don't know why that rebel just keeps staying in us. It isn't time to rebel now. It was time to rebel about 40 years ago. You should've been a big rebel back then. It's time for you to stop being a rebel. Some of us boast, "I'm a rebel. Yes, I'm a rebel. I want nobody telling me nothing, man. I don’t believe in nothing. Ain't nobody going to make me do nothing. I'm a rebel." Proud. Where is it getting you? If it is getting you somewhere. Then, teach me how to rebel.
Excuse me. How are Muslims to promote peace then for the society? I repeat. Our religion promotes peace in the society by way of established institutions. Allah want us to have established institutions. A masjid with full function. Schools to educate our children, businesses to keep the business life, the material life. Not just business that's something like a plant sitting up on top of the ground with no roots. For a business to have roots, it has to be tied to natural resources. The business has roots when it's tied to natural resources.
Never become satisfied to have nothing but just the on-the-surface establishment, no. No matter how bad conditions are now for poor people like us to have natural resources, we should never become satisfied with that situation. We should always want to have producing land and natural resources. And contact with people that are established in the same way here and abroad, overseas. Now, we're doing that a little bit, but we're far behind and it's going to have to do a lot to catch up. Understand the importance.
I go back to the vices that are very major for us, like taking alcohol, narcotics, and stuff like that. Allah says to us that such is of the works of the devil. Min ‘aminu shaitan fastabi oo. Those things are the works of the devil. Stay away from those such if you expect to be successful. This is Allah's word in the Quran. If I know that Allah has said in the holy book that liquors and things that mess up my mind, drugs and stuff are the works of the devil, then I go get this stuff and use it. I take a liquor, I sit and drink in front of another Muslim, I'm drinking liquor in front of a member of my family, I'm drinking liquor, and I know that Allah said that this is the work of the devil.
I'm telling Allah, "I'd rather obey the devil than You. Yes, I know you told me the devil made this liquor for me, but I'm going to drink the devil's liquor." You think Allah loves you and you're doing that consciously? If you're doing it in ignorance, that's another matter. If you're doing it consciously, knowing that Allah has said that such is the works of the devil. Min ‘aminu shaitan meaning, he made that, he did that.
The devil did it. Why did the devil do it? The devil did it to deny you establishment and to give himself establishment. By the means of intoxicants, the devil deny the victims establishment and he get the establishment. I passed through some areas in Chicago just recently. I saw in two blocks, about a half a dozen liquor stores.
Just in two blocks, half a dozen liquor stores. In that neighborhood, our people were thickly populated and that means that there were more people there without jobs. We have a serious job problem and not enough jobs for people. Certain people, they're too important to accept some domestic jobs, or some low-level jobs, servant jobs. They have to have a job on their level that's way up there out of their reach, but they say it’s on their level. “I ain't doing nothing, I don’t want to that, you know it. I ain’t going to do that.”
So, we got two problems. One is that there are not enough jobs. And two that too many people are reaching for something that is really above them and claiming that what’s on their level ain’t good enough for them. But many of them out there shouldn't be doing nothing but washing cars, sweeping floors and clean our toilets, unstopping drains, and wiping the sweat off me when they see me.
They should run up to me with handkerchief wipe the sweat off me. That'd be a dignified job for them. I'm serious. And I don't mean just me, I mean anybody trying to do something constructive, that's doing something very serious and constructive in the society, those persons they ain’t got nothing to do should run up their handkerchiefs at them, and wipe off somebody that's doing some good and something worthwhile.
Our religion, Al-Islam, promotes peace also by promoting establishment of societies, what we call a support system. See, the support system for us personally is different from the support system for us as a society. You need strong healthy establishments to make for the support system of society. Strong Mosque serving the purpose, strong schools serving the purpose, strong business serving the purpose, medical facilities, health facilities serving the purpose, information centers serving the purpose.
Cultural life that obeys the Quran and the Prophet serving the purpose, institutions that serve to provide and to preserve the culture of Muslims, serving the purpose. When we work for that, we're working for peace. Is that clear?
Congregation: It's clear.
When you don’t have that, how can you have peace and you don't have it? You can't have peace. Everybody is bearing a burden in his heart and a burden on his mind and those that not carrying the burden, they are heartless and an absent-minded and they’re going into the avenues of destruction. No peace.
Dear Muslims, diet is very important to peace. Diet. Keep pork out of your diet. Keep intoxicants out of your diet. Keep greed out of your diet. Don't eat like a hungry pig. We want established families. Allah tells us how to establish families. The obligation is first to your relatives. You are supposed to feel the needs of your relative first before you feel the need of somebody across the street, or across town, you're supposed to feel the need of your own relatives.
Allah says and there are prior rights. They’re reserved for our family members. That mean they have a right on you before others. That's just nature, isn’t it? Isn’t that common sense? Let us be aware of our obligation to our family members. That helps for peace. When you don't care about each other you can’t have peace. You may move from your family and move across town and never see relatives for months or for years, but you carry that burden with you.
You may think it's gone, but it'll be in your spirit. You'll be carrying a spirit that’s hurting you and denying you comfort and peace. When you go back and see your family members and you embrace them, you feel so good. And you realize that that's why you were feeling so bad, you had forgot your relative. Understand that because Allah want us to work and earn money and He want us to give a part of that money, to help our family members that are in worse situation than we are.
Help each other in your family first, and have that as an aim in your life. To make your family less and less dependent on others. This is just good nature, good common sense, but it is our religion. It is Quran and it is Sunnah of our Prophet. Peace and the blessings be on him. There's much to say on this subject, but we're going on and hope that we will not leave you, want to walk out and say, “I didn't get what I expected.”
Possessions and wealth, I mentioned them earlier. I’ll mention them again. This society, the way it is ordered permits almost any and everything imaginable to take place if it was. In this society, it is hoped that the good life always prevails over the bad life. I'm talking about American society. But this society will not come in your home and live with you to protect your moral life, or will not say, “We have so and so in their house. They have a moral problem. We have to go help them.”
Now we say we live in America, when we say we live in America we saying something awful general and awful big. I don’t live in America. Now digest that. I do not live in America. You heard that? I'm going to say it one more time. I do not live in America. I live in Al-Islam. If you find a Christian succeeding in America, it's because that Christian does not live in America. That Christian live in something else. How did that grab you? That's the answer.
You have to have the strength to make up your mind that you going to live in Al-Islam and not live in America. Then we’ll stop having so much problem with possessions, so much problem with wealth. Wealth comes into the African-American community, but it never comes into our hands. All that great wealth in the "Black community." But it is not in our hands, where is it? We live in America, boy. I’m sorry, man, boy, girl, and woman. I’m sorry.
Now, I've come to something I believe that you expect me to talk on war. W-A-R, war. When I was following the honorable Elijah Muhammad, I refused selective service order and was sentenced for three years, and went and did my time. Or was taken. I didn’t go nowhere. They took me to the Federal Correctional Institution in Milan, Michigan to see the same wall, the same institution, that some of my elders had gone to doing world war II.
I followed them and I served my time. I made parole. I didn’t do my 14 months. Total about 15 months in all. I made parole. First time they turned me down, second time I made parole. I came back into what they call the society and I thought about that. I look back on it I said, "I was lying to those people," I said, "I'm no consciousness objective," but I told them. I said, "I'm a consciousness objective." I went to jail with the same classification that the Jehovah Witnesses had. We were in there together, all of us classified the same, "Consciousness objective." I look back on it after few years I said, "I lied to those people I'm no consciousness objective, I'm not opposed to war. I’ll put on a uniform or go out naked and kill somebody if I have to.
And I guess that was right, we say, “we are Muslims trying to be upright”. How many remember that language, raise your hand, trying to be upright? Look that's what got us this far we trying to be upright, don't give that up keep trying to be upright. We have to be able to see the facts of the matter and don't just give ourselves to certain emotions when emotions rise high because of a particular issue, and all of a sudden now you ain’t supposed to fight. Do you know a Muslim that I respected for a long time, a qualified Imam, some of you think of him as maybe a Jesus reincarnate or some?
Wrote me a letter and told me, he said, "When a war broke out over there," he said, "You should have been trying to use your influence with King of Saudi Arabia to get them to not to go to war, knowing the destruction that would come to Iraq, so you should have went on a hunger strike."
Now, that's just like me saying, "I'm a consciousness objective," Muslims don't go on a hunger strike to get things done in the society, we eat. If I accept that I go on a hunger strike, okay, a hunger strike doesn’t work, after a while, I'm going to douse myself with kerosene and set myself a fire, a Buddhist protest or something. I can't even blame it on the Buddhists I don’t know who did that. But someone it was said in the paper where they doused themselves with kerosene or flammable liquid and then set themselves on fire in protest. That's not Islamic. I'm not going to deal with the Gulf issue, that's not the purpose of this talk I'm talking about war. Muslims have to be prepared to war, to go to war, but our religion is the religion of peace, therefore no war is justified for Muslims unless its purpose is to defend the peace.
No war is justified by Muslims upon material needs, material needs. Many charged that the reason why America was over in Saudi Arabia was simply because of material need. Now I'm not saying that I agree with those that made that charge and I know it's not to be correct, there was many other reasons for America being over there not just material. But the point is that we cannot go to war for material needs. Because we're poor and they have it so let's go and take from them, no, it's not justified even though they are wrong to not to be charitable towards us, is not justified that we go to war and take what they got, that's not justified.
We must be right, morally right, we must be grounded upon solid basis in Al-Islam before we can act. The term Jihad, Jihad, which is translated by many especially in the West, holy war, for us, is simply stated, "Struggle to preserve and advance the good life, struggle to preserve and advance the good life," that's what Jihad is for us. If we have to, yes, we will take up physical weapons and we will fight, war, physical war to preserve and advance the good life, if we have to, but it must be a just war, a just war, it cannot be a selfish war, it cannot be something based upon material appetite.
Don't you know we're not even supposed to marry a woman or a girl based upon material appetite. If that's the main motive we're not supposed to marry her. If we marry her because we like her physically, her physical self, appeals to us, and we're going to marry her just because of their physical attraction, that's not a decent marriage in our religion. Allah says in the Quran, "Do not marry women out of desire for their bodies," we must marry them for other reason.
What has the prophet told us, "The best to marry is a believing woman who loves G-d, who loves 
G-d and the Prophet, obeys Allah and His Prophet," that's the best woman to marry. That's the qualification, that's what you should be looking for in the woman that you want to marry. You should be looking for a Muslim in that woman, you look for a good Muslim in that woman, one that believes in Allah and loves Allah loves and also obey Allah, and loves the Prophet and wants to obey the Prophet, that's what you look for in a woman. Then you have much better marriage and much better future for yourself and the children that may come, or that we hope will come.
They say, “a justified war”. When is a war justified for Muslims? It is justified when we can prove clearly that peace is threatened seriously by this condition, and our purpose is nothing more than to serve peace. Now, many of us we hear about Muslim empires, the empires of the past. And if we are not careful, we will think that Al-Islam was an imperialist movement or a movement of empires, it was not. When the Prophet began, peace be on him, his mission, the order of that day was the order of imperialist powers, it was the order of empires. And the Prophet fought wars not to conquer empires, he invited imperialist powers and those that were not imperialist power, he invited the powers of that time to accept Al-Islam.
He didn't go and impose Al-Islam upon them, he didn't say, "Well, if you don't accept it, I'm going to be at your border or you can expect war from us." When the Prophet fought a war, it was because the peace was threatened, the peace of the Muslims was threatened by that particular power. Most of the time, it was because that particular power wouldn't give the right and freedom to their subjects to practice their religion. If they were going to dominate their subjects and deny their subjects the right to embrace Al-Islam, then the Prophet had the right to go in there and fight for their freedom to practice their religion. Especially when the people were calling for it, people calling for help.
And many times, the Prophet restrained and though his heart wanted to go to the aid, he weighed it out. He tried to use diplomatic means and everything to try to avoid war. So, don't think that our prophet was an imperialist leader, no, he was a leader for peace. And when we look at the international world, study the history of Al-Islam and see how many of the lands that now have Al-Islam in it carried the blood of war, where war was fought by Muslims. Indonesia is the largest populated Muslim country. No war was fought. People became Muslims because they liked the religion. They were impressed by the decent life and discipline of Muslims that migrated to Indonesia, lived among them. They were so impressed, especially by the Muslim businessmen, that they began to embrace the religion, accept Al-Islam, and now, that country is the most populous of all Muslim states, all Muslim nations. We should understand that. When I was in Chicago for the Eid al-Fitr, after the Ramadan fast.
The Imam that led the Eid, he called for an intellectual Jihad. That's the most important Jihad. If you want to say holy war, for Muslims, the most important holy war or Jihad is the intellectual Jihad. We should, as students and scholars in this religion, we should all the time be working to establish and defend Al-Islam. What did the prophet say? He said, “the pen is mightier than the sword”. Didn’t he put emphasis on the intellectual Jihad when he said, the pen is mightier than the sword?
And he said, “the ink of the scholar is more precious than the blood of the martyr”. Didn’t he put emphasis on the intellectual Jihad when he said that? It doesn't mean that we're not supposed to fight the physical battle. But if we start to see physical battle as more important than intellectual strategy and struggle in battle, we will become savages. Thank you very much. As salaam Alaikum. 
If I come three times, I won't take as much of your time as those that come to you and make one appeal. I'm making my second appeal. We have very serious needs.
You may think that I go over in Saudi Arabia in come back with sack of money or something. I'm telling you, if you think that you're wrong. I don't depend on anybody except Allah. I don't like to be dependent financially on anybody more than I'm dependent on my own people, my own close people. That's a better situation. That's how all of us should feel. If we accept finances from others, we should accept it because it's going to do great benefit, and it's practical to accept it.
It’s morally right to accept it and it is not going to be a long drawn out situation where we going to be receiver. Prophet Muhammad said the hand that puts the money in is more valuable than the hand that takes it. I hope for the day, when Allah will bless us with a situation in our Muslim life, that we will be the ones giving others in the United States and outside the United States some help. And we will get to that point if we never give up the dignity and the pride of doing for ourselves, and wanting to do for ourselves, and wanting to support our own community and our community needs ourselves. I have an independent ministry.
I hope you understand that. My ministry is not tied to anybody, any mosque, anybody and no nation, no nothing. When you see me, you see a person with no ties except one. My tie is to La ilaha illallah Muhammadur rasulullah. I work in nobody's employment, except Allah. I receive money from others, but I'm not employed by them. I want you to know that. I work with Rabitah, the World Muslim League. I work with the officials of the Saudi kingdom, who are wonderful people, in my estimation, especially when I look at the rulers in other kingdoms or other governments.
I work with them, but I have not asked any of them to put me on their payroll, will never ask to be on their payroll. Not that I'm not too proud. No, I'm not too proud. My wisdom tells me to keep myself independently established over here, and in the long run, you, because you value me, you're going to be more productive yourself. Yes, see, some of us don't even have families that motivate us. We don't have a relative to motivate us. We don't have friends to motivate us. Thank G-d many of you got Imam W Deen Mohammed to motivate you.
Because of that, you're going to be more productive and we're going to be more dignified. Thank you and help us please. Some of these you have to catch up with them, I got to whisper and say, "If you try to do it yourself, but Iman may not get that." You prove them wrong. Show them that you will answer my appeal. Thank you very much. As-Salaamu Alaikum


