Khutba on Husn adh-Dhann
الحمد لله، الحمد لله الذي جعل بحسن الظن به النصرَ والرحمة، وجعل بحسن الظن بخلقه الألفة والمحبة، نحمده تعالى ونستعينه، ونشكره تعالى ونستغفره ونستغيثه، نعوذ بالله من شرور أنفسنا ومن سيئات أعمالنا، من يهد الله فهو المهتد ومن يضلل فلن تجد له وليا مرشدا، ونشهد أن لا إله إلا الله وحده لا شريك له، له الملك و له الحمد، يحيي ويميت، بيده الخير، وهو على كل شيء قدير، ونشهد أن سيدنا و مولانا محمداً عبده ورسوله، وحبيبه وصفيه، بلغ الرسالة وأدى الأمانة ونصح الأمة، النبي الأمي الذي أرسله الله بالهدى والدين الحق، بشيرا ونذيرا بين يدي الساعة، صلى الله عليه وسلم وعلى آله وأصحابه ومن تبعهم بإحسان إلى يوم الدين.
أما بعد! فيا عباد الله اتقوا الله حق تقاته ولا تموتن إلا وأنتم مسلمون. يأيها الذين ءامنوا اتقوا الله وقولوا قولا سديدا يصلح لكم أعمالكم ويغفر لكم ذنوبكم. ومن يطع
الله ورسوله فقد فاز فوزا عظيما. اتقوا الله فيما أمر وانتهوا عما نها عنه وزجر.
قال الله عز وجل في كتابه العزيز: قُلْ يَا عِبَادِيَ الَّذِينَ أَسْرَفُوا عَلَى أَنْفُسِهِمْ لَا تَقْنَطُوا مِنْ رَحْمَةِ اللَّهِ إِنَّ اللَّهَ يَغْفِرُ الذُّنُوبَ جَمِيعًا إِنَّهُ هُوَ الْغَفُورُ الرَّحِيمُ
Allah says in His mighty Book, the translation of which is, “Say: ‘My slaves, you who have transgressed against yourselves, do not despair of the mercy of Allah. Truly Allah forgives all wrong actions. He is the Ever-Forgiving, the Most Merciful.’”
If you are with Allah, then Allah is with you. Allah has not and will not abandon you. He is closer to you than your jugular vein, looking over you at all times, never for one moment leaving you to your own devices. Allah says,
Inna-llaha kana alaykum raqiba
The translation of which Is, "Allah watches over you." Allah is control of everything and He wants the best for the believers. That is the reality of existence. This world was created for them and they are His vicegerents on the earth. To Allah belongs the power. There is nothing that is beyond Him and there is no one who can stand in the face of His Power. wa laa ghaliba illa-l-lah – there is no conqueror except for Him.
So do not despair of the mercy of your Lord. Do not think that your cause is hopeless or your position is untenable. Do not think that there is nothing to be done to change your circumstances and the circumstances of the umma. Do not think that your enemies have all the power and you are powerless and oppressed. Stop thinking of the Muslims as downtrodden victims, and stop looking to everyone other than Him for relief, but rather look to your Lord and have a good opinion of Him. And know that if you return to Him, He will return to you. And He will raise you up and raise up the umma and return the land and the authority to us. Allah says,
وَعَدَ اللَّهُ الَّذِينَ آَمَنُوا مِنْكُمْ وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ لَيَسْتَخْلِفَنَّهُمْ فِي الْأَرْضِ كَمَا اسْتَخْلَفَ الَّذِينَ مِنْ قَبْلِهِمْ وَلَيُمَكِّنَنَّ لَهُمْ دِينَهُمُ الَّذِي ارْتَضَى لَهُمْ وَلَيُبَدِّلَنَّهُمْ مِنْ بَعْدِ خَوْفِهِمْ أَمْنًا
the translation of which is, “Allah has promised those of you who have iman and do right actions that He will make them successors in the land as He made those before them successors and will firmly establish for them their deen with which He is pleased and give them, in place of their fear, security.” The Companions knew this and placed their full trust in Allah. They did not doubt for a moment that His Promise was true. If they had relied on themselves, they would have been lost – next to their enemies, the two great empires of the day – the Persians and the Byzantines, they were badly equipped and few in number. But they had full confidence in the support of the One in whose hands all might resides. Allah says,
مَنْ كَانَ يُرِيدُ الْعِزَّةَ فَلِلَّهِ الْعِزَّةُ جَمِيعًا
the translation of which is, "Whoever wants might, all might belongs to Allah." They put their hope in Him and their trust and He gave them support. He strengthened their arms, filled their hearts with bravery and resolve and augmented their armies with ranks of angels. And He weakened their enemies and filled their hearts with fear and doubt.
At all times, they trusted in their Lord implicitly and maintained a good opinion of Him. Their expectations of Him were high, because they knew that the degree of their success lay in the degree that they turned to Him and put their reliance on Him. Allah says in a hadith qudsi,
أنا عند ظن عبدي بي
“I am as My slave expects Me to be.” So if you have a low opinion of Allah and have little to no confidence that He will answer you when you call on Him, or that He will grant you victory and success, you will remain downtrodden, persecuted and oppressed. And your prospects will be bleak. But if you have a high opinion of Him, He will raise you up and accomplish through you what might have seemed impossible. We Muslims must stop being like the tribe of Israel who lost hope in the Mercy of their Lord when the armies of Pharaoh were almost upon them, saying,
إِنَّا لَمُدْرَكُونَ
the translation of which is, ‘We shall surely be overtaken.’ And instead we must be like their Prophet Musa who replied,
كَلَّا إِنَّ مَعِيَ رَبِّي سَيَهْدِينِ
the translation of which is, “Never, my Lord is with me and He will guide me.” To those who held a low opinion of Allah, all seemed lost. But through the good opinion and absolute trust of one man of Allah, the seemingly impossible was made possible and Allah split the sea in two, saved his people and drowned his enemies.
We must be like our own Prophet when he was hiding in the cave of Thawr and Quraysh had tracked him to the entrance of the cave and were standing mere metres away. Abu Bakr, his companion in the cave narrates the story,
قلت للنبي صلى الله عليه وسلم وأنا في الغار: لو أن أحدهم نظر تحت قدميه لأبصرنا، فقال: {ما ظنك يا أبا بكر باثنين الله ثالثهما}
“I said to the Prophet while we were in the cave, ‘If one of them were to but look downwards under his feet, we would be seen!’ He replied, ‘What is your opinion, Abu Bakr, of two when Allah is their third.’” He had absolute trust that Allah would veil them from the eyes of their enemies.
To have a good opinion of Allah means to have absolute trust in Him, to have certainty that He will answer your duas when you call on Him, that He will forgive you when you ask forgiveness of Him and and that He will grant you ease when you are in difficulty.
But such good opinion of Allah does not develop in a vacuum – one cannot spend one’s life unrepentantly engaging in wrong action and disobeying one’s Lord and then expect His Mercy and acceptance. The heart and the body are inextricably linked. You must fully turn to Him for Him to turn to you.
إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يُغَيِّرُ مَا بِقَوْمٍ حَتَّى يُغَيِّرُوا مَا بِأَنْفُسِهِمْ
the translation of which is, “Allah never changes a people’s situation until they change what is in themselves.” Good opinion and right action go hand in hand – without one the other is simply an empty lie. Allah says:
إِنَّ الَّذِينَ ءَامَنُواْ وَالَّذِينَ هَاجَرُواْ وَجَاهَدُواْ فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ أُوْلَئِكَ يَرجُونَ رَحمَتَ اللَّه
the translation of which is, “Those who believe and make hijra and do jihad in the Way of Allah, it is those who expect the mercy of Allah.” In other words, it is only those who believe AND act rightly who truly feel hope for the mercy of Allah. Others are just lying to themselves – theirs is but a false hope, they do not truly believe that it will come and instead look elsewhere for it.
Forget about your own perceived inadequacies, forget about your own powerlessness and the apparent helplessness of the situation in which you find yourself, and simply do what Allah commands you to do and leave what Allah commands you to leave. If you do that you will grow closer to Him and your trust in Him and good opinion of Him will grow. And with each step, He will take ten steps towards you. And those commands of Allah that seemed impossible to implement will come to seem possible and even easy, and we will be able to establish the deen in full. The izza, the might, will be with us. Allah says,
وَلِلَّهِ الْعِزَّةُ وَلِرَسُولِهِ وَلِلْمُؤْمِنِينَ
the translation of which is, “the izza is for Allah and for His Messenger and the believers." Maintain your good opinion of Allah and success will be yours.
أقول قولي هذا وأستغفر الله لي ولكم ولسائر المسلمين من كل ذنب فاستغفروه إنه هو الغفور الرَّحيم. الحمد لله الحمد لله رب العالمين، وأشهد أن لا إله إلا الله وحده لا شريك له وأشهد أن محمداً عبده ورسوله، صلى الله وسلم وبارك عليه وعلى آله وصحبه، والتابعين وتابعي التابعين ومن تبعهم بإحسان إلى يوم الدين.
أما بعد! فيأيها الذين ءامنوا اتقوا الله ما استطعتم واسمعوا وأطيعوا وأنفقوا خيرا لأنفسكم. يا عباد الله أوصيكم وإياي بتقوى الله وطاعته وأحذركم وإياي عن معصيته ومخالفته. مَا تَرَى فِي خَلقِ الرَحمَانِ مِن تَفَاوُت
Allah says in His Noble Book, the translation of which is, "You will not see any imperfections in the All-Merciful’s creation." Part of good opinion to Allah is having a good opinion of creation, and in particular, those parts of His creation upon whom He has conferred the greatest honour, the believers, the Muslims. It is absolutely essential that Muslims maintain a good opinion of their fellow Muslims at all times, for it is that good opinion that holds families and societies together. What does it mean to have a good opinion of one’s brother? It means to always assume the best of him, no matter how bad something he sees him do or hears him says appears to be, unless, of course, that thing is clearly a major wrong action. Umar ibn al-Khattab said,
لا تظنَنَّ بكلمةٍ خرجتْ من مسلمٍ شرا وأنت تجدُ لها في الخير محملا
“Do not think badly of a word that comes out of a fellow Muslim’s mouth when you can find a way to interpret that word favourably.”
And even when his action is clearly wrong, still you must look for excuses for him. Ibn Sirin said,
إذا بلغَكَ عن أخيك شيءٌ فالتمِسْ له عُذرا، فإن لم تجدْ فقل: لعلَّ له عُذرا لا أعرِفُه
“If you hear something about your brother, make some sort of excuse for him. If you are unable to find an excuse, then say to yourself, “Perhaps he has an excuse that I do not know about.”
We do not know what is in the hearts of other people nor the circumstances in which they find themselves, so automatically assume the best and not the worst. And, similarly, our own knowledge of what is right and what is wrong is severely limited – the deen is broad and not narrow. Just because you have never seen something done nor heard of it does not make it wrong. So, beware of disapproving of others simply because they do something differently to you, and always assume that what they are doing is right and correct unless you have definitive evidence to the contrary. And even if you do have definitive evidence that what someone is doing is wrong, you must only form a bad opinion of the action and not the man since, for all you know, that one wrong action you witnessed may be far outweighed in the eyes of Allah by his many other good actions, and he may have a high station with his Lord. Indeed, the best way for a Muslim to go through life is to think that every other Muslim he meets is better than himself. It is narrated that Muawiya al-Aswad said,
إخوانِي كلُّهم خيرٌ مني، قيل وكيف ذلك؟ قال: كلُّهم يرى لي الفضلَ عليه ومَن فَضَّلَني على نفسه فهو خير مني
“Every single one of my brothers is better than me.” “How is that?” he was asked. “They all see me as being better than them,” he replied, “And anyone who thinks me better than him is himself better than me.”
Beware of bad opinion. There are few things more destructive. It divides a community and erodes trust and good will. It rips apart the social fabric of any society. Allah says,
يَاأَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اجْتَنِبُوا كَثِيرًا مِنْ الظَّنِّ إِنَّ بَعْضَ الظَّنِّ إِثْمٌ وَلَا تَجَسَّسُوا وَلَا يَغْتَبْ بَعْضُكُمْ بَعْضًا أَيُحِبُّ أَحَدُكُمْ أَنْ يَأْكُلَ لَحْمَ أَخِيهِ مَيْتًا فَكَرِهْتُمُوهُ
the translation of which is, “You who believe! avoid most suspicion (opinion). Indeed Csome suspicion is a crime. And do not spy and do not backbite one another. Would any of you like to eat his brother’s dead flesh? No, you would hate it.” It is by bad opinion that lies and slander are able to get a foothold in society and spread with the speed that they do. And that leads to a society where everyone is a potential enemy and no one a true ally and friend. A striking example of this is found in the seera when the hypocrites starting spreading the false rumours about Aisha. In but a short time, the brotherhood the Aws and Khazraj felt for another through Islam was eroded and their pre-Islamic enmity had resurfaced. And they all but came to blows, whereupon Allah sent down the ayas in surat Nur exonerating her and taking the Muslims to task for their bad opinion, saying,
لَوْلَا إِذْ سَمِعْتُمُوهُ ظَنَّ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ وَالْمُؤْمِنَاتُ بِأَنْفُسِهِمْ خَيْرًا وَقَالُوا هَذَا إِفْكٌ مُبِينٌ
the translation of which is, “Why, when you heard it, did you not, as believing men and women, think well of yourselves and say, ‘This is clearly a lie’.”
This must always be our first reaction when we see or hear something bad about our fellow Muslims. We must maintain our good opinion of them and always seek excuses for them. We must speak well of them in every company and never say anything bad. And we must remember that they are mirrors for ourselves. Whatever we see in them is a reflection of what is in us, so if all we see of them is bad, the fault lies in us and not in them. We must be like the faqir who entered the mosque and gave salams to the Shaykh and his students who were sitting there, but received no response. Despite it being obligatory in the deen to return the salaam, however, the faqir did not think badly of them, but instead thought the fault must lie within himself. So he began to weep and asked them to forgive him whatever transgressions he had committed. That is husn adh-dhann – that is the essence of good opinion.
We ask Allah to give us a good opinion of one another and a good opinion of Him. We ask Him to unify our hearts and support us with His help. We ask Him to forgive us, overlook our wrong actions and guide us along the Sirat al-Mustaqim. And we ask Him to give the promised victory to His deen.
إِنَّ اللهَ وَمَلَائِكَتَهُ يُصَلُّونَ عَلَى النَّبِيِّ، يَا أَيُهَا الذِينَ آمَنُواْ صَلُّواْ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلِّمُواْ تَسْلِيماً. اللَّهُمَّ صَلِّ وَسَلِّمْ وَبَارِكْ عَلَيْهِ وَعَلَى آلِهِ وَصَحْبِهِ أَجْمَعِينَ. وَارْضَ اللَّهُمَّ عَنِ الْخُلَفَاءِ الرَّاشِدِينَ أَبِي بَكْرٍ وَعُمَرَ وَعُثْمَانَ وَعَلِيٍّ، وعن خديجة وعائشة وسائر أزواج النبي، وَعَنْ سَائِرِ الصَّحَابَةِ أَجْمَعِينَ، خُصُوصاً اِلأَنْصَارَ مِنْهُمْ وَالمُهَاجِرِينَ، وَعَنِ التَّابِعِينَ وَتَابِعِي التَّابِعِينَ وَمَنْ تَبِعَهُمْ بِإِحْسَانٍ إِلَى يَوْمِ الدِّينِ.
اللَّهُمَّ اهْدِ وُلَاةَ أُمُورِ المُسْلِمِينَ لِمَا يُرْضِيكَ وَلِاتِّبَاعِ سُنَّةِ نَبِيِّكَ صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ، وَثَبِّتْ أَقْدَامَهُمْ عَلَى الصِّرَاطِ المُسْتَقِيمِ، وَأَصْلِحْهُمْ يَا رَبَّ الْعَالَمِينَ.
اللَّهُمَّ بَارِكْ عَلَى شَيْخِنَا، وَعَلَى أَمِيرِنَا، وَعَلَى جَمِيعِ أُمَرَاءِ وَزُعَمَاءِ المُسْلِمِينَ.
اللَّهُمَّ بَارِكْ عَلَى المُسْلِمِينَ فِي هَذِهِ المَدِينَةِ، وَوَفِّقْهُمْ لِمَا تُحِبُّهُ وَتَرْضَاهُ يَا أَكْرَمَ الأَكْرَمِينَ.
اللَّهُمَّ أَعِزَّ الإِسْلَامَ وَالمُسِْلمِينَ (3) وَاخْذُلِ الْكُفْرَ وَالْكَافِرِينَ، وَانْصُرِ المُجَاهِدِينَ فِي سَبِيلِ اللهِ. وَاجْعَلْ كَلِمََتَكَ هِيَ العُلْيَا وَكَلِمَةَ الْكُفْرِ هِيَ السُّفْلَى.
رَبَّنَا ءَاتِنَا فِي الدُّنْيَا حَسَنَةً وَفِي الآخِرَةِ حَسَنَةً وَقَِنَا عَذَابَ النَّارِ.
إِنَّ اللهَ يَامُرُ بِالْعَدْلِ وَالإِحْسَانِ وَإِيتَاءِ ذِي الْقُرْبَى، وَيَنْهَى عَنِ الْفَحْشَاءِ وَالمُنكَرِ وَالْبَغْيِ، يَعِظُكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَذَّكَّرُونَ، وَلَذِكْرُ اللهِ أَكْبَرُ وَاللهُ يَعْلَمُ مَا تَصْنَعُونَ. وَقُومُواْ إِلَى صَلاتِكُمْ يَرْحَمُكُمُ اللهُ.