Three Stages of the Soul: Which One Are You?

Allahbar. Allahbar. Allahbar.

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Shah, a shadow Muhamad.

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Madam.

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Heat. Heat.

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Hal Father. Yeah.

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Allah Akbar.

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Allah.

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Oh, alhamdulillah.

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Abdul Allah subhana wa tala.

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Regime. Was.

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My dear brothers, respected elders, beloved youth, mothers and sisters, we thank Allah subhana wa ta'ala for keeping us alive one more day on the path Islam in allowing me and you to enter his house and worship him in the manner that pleases him. I ask Allah subhanaa tala except for me and except from you that little do his path. Amen. And I bear witness there is no deity worthy of worship except for Allah subhana tala and prophet Muhammad sallallah.aii wasallam is his last and final messenger. For surely Allah subhanaa tala choose to guide can misguide and whoever he chooses to misguide nik can guide him back to the path and we seek refuge in Allah from darkness of ourselves and evil of deeds for Allah is all knowing and allseeing what his creation does indeed from the wisdoms of Allah subhana tala that Allah subhanaa tala almighty has ordained three types of inner selves that influence people at different times throughout their lives depending on how much control a person allows them to have the self that commands evil, the self that blames and the tranquil self. To clearly understand one's own state and determine where one stands among these three inner selves, it is essential to open an important door. A door that should never be closed or worse yet locked entirely and forgotten about it. This is the door the door this door is the principle of self-critique being honest and candidate candid with one's self so that one can recognize points of deficiency and correct them with the blaming inner self and identify those points of correctness and enhance them with the tranquil self. Thus initializing both of these inner self, they tighten the reigns on the inner self that commands evil so that it cannot reach what it would otherwise have reached without self-scrutiny and holding themselves accountable with complete impartiality. As such, scrutinizing oneself is one of the most noblest and courageous tasks despite its b despite its burden on one's soul and breaking of its pride to compel it towards what is right. Through self-examination, we confront our shortcomings and strive for self-improvement. Through it, mistakes are corrected. The ugly is replaced with beautiful and the bad with the good. And no one person knows no one knows a person's fault and mistake better than themselves. No matter how many excuses they make is Allahh has reflected that in Allahh says but a man will be a witness against himself even if he pre he be pre if he even if he presents his excuses. So a day, the day, the greatest day where the eyes will not have the ability to lift up and the heads will be down and people will be in fear is the day of the day of judgment. We're all the limbs that we have that has forced us, me and you, to do evil and seek evil for a pleasure that may last for 5 minutes or 5 hours or an entire lifetime. And we will have to answer for that. And that day, regardless of what we have and how many locks we put on our tongues, Allah will make us speak. Our our limbs will testify against us. The same people that we did evil for and we did all these things and transgressions and we stole money and we took people's property and we lied and we cheated and we stole everything will be turned against us in an instance. We ask Allah subhanaa tala from that time we are all in a dire neon gates in self- scrutiny without hesitation fear or pro or pro or pro procrastination by focus focusing intently on examining and cleansing and cleansing ourselves we overlook others faults and instead recognize the flaws within ourselves indeed Allah Almighty's words are true when he said I swear by the self reproaching soul, a soul that blames yourself. And at times when talking to folks and I mentioned this during the month of Ramadan, we are more aware of our constant struggle with our nefs in the month of Ramadan because we are more focused of all the bad that exists. So controlling my naps when I have 50,000 options driving to work to pull into a gas station to get a cold drink or eat whatever I want and nobody's looking at me where I work in a workplace where there's no Muslims around and I can eat and fill my belly up with whatever I want to. But we stop ourselves. So we are more focused in that blessed month and we're more focused. You know if you think about it a lot of times the conversation that happens is the is the shaitan really locked up? Yes it is locked up because that's why you're recognizing your own flaws. You're more cognizant of what's happening. You're co- cognizant of your eyes wandering. You're more cognizant of your tongue wandering off. You're more cognizant of your limbs that are acting against you for the will of Allah subhana tala and you have that inner thing that constantly tells you you didn't pray salah today it's month of Ramadan you just fasted all day without drinking food and water and theam reminds us is that a person who just refrained from water and drink all day. He has nothing but give himself hunger and thirst all day. There is nothing else for him. I didn't I didn't I didn't make myself busy with the Quran. I didn't engage in myself with I didn't engage myself doing good deeds. I didn't engage myself. And that's the that's the that's constantly mocking you and telling you and we have to say at times alhamdulillah for that because if it wasn't that for that naps will be gone completely. So if you have that nef of that's constantly mocking you and reminding you thank Allah subhana wa tala because the the the crit the the critical point comes into our lives when that nef stops telling us then the nef is so dead that it doesn't even speak up. And there is clear evidence of importance of self-critique, critique, self-lame, and self-correction given them constant attention without neglect. Allah does not swear by his book except by something great significance in and and in his interpretation in the Quran cited saying by Allah we do not see the believer except blaming himself and what is intended with my word. What did I intend by eating? What did I intend my with my thoughts? Whereas a transgressors pro proceeds without blaming himself we ask Allah's protection from that time that condition when you see folks they eat they drink whatever without accountability. It reminds me of a beautiful story that we have mentioned as some of the some of the narrators of the Quran have mentioned the story. There was a man a long time ago and it's not the time of but in the previous nations who was a murderer who was a murderer. So he went to he he he he Allah subhana t put in his heart he had killed 99 people 99 people he had taken the lives unjustly. So one day his finally woke up and blamed him and said, "You are such a filthy person. You have killed 99 folks without anything." And then he goes into a spiral and inshallah if we have time we'll talk about it because that's one of the issues that we get into is that how do we hap handle that because if we don't control it then you go into a deep spiral within yourself of a self-lame and hatred that you cannot climb out of from but he has this talk with himself. He says I'm such a bad person I need to go ask for forgiveness. So he travels and you know he asks some folks and they say look we're not educated folks but if you travel further down there's a small town there's a there's a sheh and there and there somebody can help you. So this man travels down there he meets somebody me and he asked them he's I have 99 cents what's going to happen he said you're in jennam door closed. So the man thinks about himself he said look I already have 99 let me kill one more make it 100. So he kills that guy too. He makes a 100 even after he kills that guy. Now he goes back into that same process. Now he's blaming himself again. He's his inner self is calling him out. He's saying, "Look what you have done." And then he has that trigger again and he says, "Okay, I need to I need to to do something." So he then asks some more folks and they say, "Look, we're we don't know anything about what Allah can do and not do, how Toba works. you need to go ask somebody who is a really good scholar, but that person is further down in another town. You need to go see this big scholar. We we cannot help you. As this man is traveling, the time of death is written for him. And he dies on the way to ask this person how to make Toba to Allahh. A toba, a sincere Toba to Allah. So the angels descend from both sides, the good and the bad because they want to take the person to hell or they take the person as Allahh says in the Quran, right? If you are a good soul, pure soul, the angel will come down and say, "Oh beautiful soul, come back. Return to your Lord with your own willingness. And a soul that is dirty and filthy, it's dragged out. May Allah subh protect us. It's literally dragged out out of that human being and then taken for brothers, if you can move forward with a spot in front of you. Just move forward, please. We're getting a little crowded in the back road there. So now the angels have a fight amongst their hand. The angels who are saying this is we'll take it. There's an angels were saying no no no this is a a soul. This is a soul that's not worthy. We take him and there's a fight. So eventually Allah subhana t you know has to be the judge and he says what's going on. Gabriel is asked what's going on. Jabra is requesting ya Allah this is the matter. We cannot decide what's going what the angels are are fighting amongst themselves. They say measure the distance that where he killed the last person to where he was going to make Toba. If that distance is shorter, he will be forgiven in Jenna. If that distance is greater, how far is it for him? Allahh ordains the earth to shrink a little bit. and the earth is shrunk on the side. That distance between the person where he died and where he's making Toba is now shorter and Allah forgives him. Now don't come to me and say she I don't think that's a true story or not. The the the idea and the mentioning of these stories is not to tell you it's true or not. is to teach a lesson for us is that that's that guy had a self-laming soul that we're talking about the self-critiquing soul that urged him to do better. And through that nia and through that intention, he continued on a journey that became the way to for him to enter the paradise. Even though he's killed how many folks? 100 folks. has killed 100 people without any justification. And that's the soul that we required to reach. That's the soul we want to reach. Let me finish the third stage. the time is running away from me as as always. The third stage is being cautious not to repeat the same mistakes for the believer is not stung from the same source. Twice that hadith reminds us. This means learning from one's errors to prevent future missteps. Also, one should be aware of falling into what others have fallen into. For the happy are those who takes heat from others and the wretched are the those who fail to learn from others and persist upon their mistakes. A self-critiing soul does not make ex does not mean excessively reproaching oneself to the point of stifling or psychological burnout or becoming consumed or among the doom. There's a difference between conservative criticism which is which moves one from pursuing from purging to adoring from bad to good from good to better and self-destructive criticism that leads to despair. And one of the best tools that Shayan has amongst his arsenal is coming to one and telling them that you are worthless. There is nothing left for you. So I mentioned this and this is by the way very common example. I mentioned it just to close out the first part of the sermon. A person misses a salah or does a sin. A person commits a sin. Now it's time for salah. You know so a person is not you know fully connected with the dean. Suppose they had a night out and they're coming back from a party and now it's early morning, right? And it's a fudah and they're just leaving the club and the adan is happening for now even though he can go make and enter the masid and he thinks about it and the shaitan comes and starts whispering the waswas and he says look at yourself or you want to go pray salah now all night you were partying in there but now you want to go pray salah Allah does not need salah from you You're a filthy person. Allah does not need anything from you. And the person thinks, "Wow, subhan Allah, I'm such a pious person now that Allah does not need me out of selfrespect, out of respect for Allah, I'm not going to go read the salah because I don't want to be that dirty person going to to to pray salah in the in the masid." We understand this concept, right? And then fud is gone. Vhar comes along. He's still in that cycle. He leaves the second salah, the third salah, the fourth salah, the fifth salah. And then same thing happens again. He's out again with his buddies. He misses. He misses. And then the cycle starts again. Fud comes along and he's I don't want to do it. I just was outside. I was hanging out. I was doing this. I don't want to read salah. All the while thinking that he is preventing him himself the dirty person that he is the filthy human being he is from entering the masid. Nothing could be opposite from the truth or the facts is that Allah subhana t is waiting for that person to come back. Allah is waiting for this person to come back to the masjid. But what happens at the end is that person spirals further and further and further away from his dean constantly because now he's in hopelessness. He cannot bring himself to face his lord where Allah subhana t says if you come I will forgive all the sins. As the hadith mentioned, if you prayed, everything that happened between and minus the major sins, Allah forgives. From whatever sins might be committed, Allah forgives minus the major sins from whatever you committed, Allah forgives. Minus the major sins from to anything you've done is forgiven. So we have to be careful when we turn back to Allah subhana tala. We ask Allahh we ask Allahh to grant us wisdom in his dean. We ask Allahhat and before he takes from takes us from this earth. We ask Allahh not that he does not take us from this earth until Allah himself is satisfied with us. And that when he takes us from this earth when in the form of submission to Allah subhana tala in the best form may Allah take our souls from this earth when we are in the to Allah subhana tala and the words that come out of our mouth. left.

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Alhamdulillah.

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Alhamdulillah. Part of what we talked about the week before is becoming mindful of our blessing upon us from Allah subhana wa ta'ala. And part of that blessing is having the vision and the view of self-critique of oneself. We have to we have to have that accountability. It is from the blessings of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and this is mentioned in narrations that if Allah decided that there will be a bad odor from us because of our sins a bad odor because of our sins not because we're in the sun outside or because I have too much sweating wall we would not be able to sit with each other and the dilemma for the wasallam majority of us today is not the sins that we do openly. It is the sins that we do privately behind closed doors. But remembering and connecting with Allah subhana wa ta'ala at a constant pace. Regardless of how low you think of yourself, you must return to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and seek his mercy. Ifam the best human being to walk upon this earth and Allah has forgiven his prior and his coming sins. Not that we are sayingatam had some sins. Allah has given him that much leeway that he has his previous and the and the the the future all forgiven. He is asking from to for Toba from Allah subhanaa tala 80 times plus a day. So what are we and you when our dealings are tainted and shaded where our eyes are wandering our tongues are not truthful our hands are committing sins. So what are we and who are we? So we need to connect with Allah subhana tala and we need to stop this disparity amongst oursel Allah subhanaa tala forgives it all. Allahh forgives every single you know transgression that we have done in a hadith the mention in authentic narration it's mentioned when a person comes to Allahhaala and he comes to return to Allahh and ask for forgiveness Allah subhana tala openly and cheerfully mentions to my servant has realized that he has a lord today he has come and asked for forgiveness I make you my witness I have forgiven him and whatever he does the person commits the second sin same person he goes back and commits a sin and he comes back to Allah subhanaa tala and he asks for forgiveness Allahh then mentions again to his angels my servant has realized that he has a lord and he's come back to me I make you my witness I have forgiven his sin the person goes on and again he commits more sin then he comes back to Allahh Allahh says to his angels my my servant has realized that he has a master he has a lord and he has come back and asked for forgiveness I make you my witness I have forgiven his sin and whatever he does I have forgiven. When there's such a loving Allah subhana tala, how dare we not return back to Allah subhana tala? What has brought us to this level of disparity? We ask every single person for everything. Yet we fail to ask Allah subhana tala who created us. Look, go and Google the odds of you being born. I just want you to Google those odds. What was the odds of you being born in this world and growing up to be today's age? Just look up the odds of being born. Forget about where you're at today. It's a million to one odds. But Allah subhanaa has blessed it upon us. I finished witham mentioned and mentioned Muslim Strive for what benefits you. Seek help from Allah subhana tala and do not be helpless. The aim of the was to bring an attention to ours the three kinds and there are three kinds of the the nees we talked about today. But it's nothing to be despared about. There's nothing to be in a in a in a in a in a stagnant pond and think Allahh has forgiven us or Allah has forsaken us. Allah never forsakes us. We are the ones who have forsaken Allahh. We ask Allahh to bring him back return him return us back to Allah in the best of the forms and not through his or we ask Allahh to make us in the divide that unites hearts and not divide hearts. We ask Allahh to make us from the people who unite not divide we ask Allahh to make us the flag bearsers and the flag carriers of theham. We ask Allahh to make us a lighthouse in the darkness of the dark night and guide those brothers and sisters around us to the better of the path. Amen. Fore become.

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For the Quran. Please move forward. There's a line behind you.

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Sh. Allah.

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Senior lines, please fill the gaps in between. This also applies to sisters too, by the way. It's just not for men's too. Please fill out the gaps if you have any gaps. If the chairs are not needed, please remove the chairs. We ask Allahh for his mercy and Allah. Alhamdulillah. Amen.

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Amen.

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Fore! Foreign! Foreign!

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For in.

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For them. Allahbar.

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Simulk.

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Allahbar. Allahbar.

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Alhamdulillah.

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Amen. Amen.

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Allahbar. Amen. Allahbar.

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Allahbar Allah.

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I just need a couple of minutes of your time inshallah and then you are free to go after that. just want to share some sad news that we got right before the jama. I immediat 17 is the pink looking masjid that you see right next to the freeway. A big a huge masjid that you see. He just passed away. Unfortunately most of us cannot make it because the salah is taking place right now. We ask Allah subhana tala that he elevate his statuses and forgive his shortcomings and grant him for we ask Allahh provide his family with and may Allah subh provide sheh in the hereafter with the family that's better than the family he had and the children he had better than this and all the sustenance that was better than this Allah. , as far as Aza, they have Aza scheduled today. , I just don't know. I think it's at ICC, , or sorry, , at the same place, Islamic Center, , Community Center of Phoenix, ICCP. I'm not too sure. Inshallah, we'll try to get those details and we'll push it out through WhatsApp chats that you have. , just a reminder, inshallah, Rahma Academy is currently enrolling for summer programs. Sunday school will have summer program announced as well. So if you have kids who possibly can go inshallah we'll be more than delighted to take it. we will offer u scholarships on Sunday school site inshallah. So if you are you know a need for it or eligible you know somebody who can use it let us know inshallah we can we can do it. there are a couple of few requests I want to I want to be sure my sisters upstairs can hear me. The the design.