Islam vs. Iman: What's the Real Difference?

The narration of in the chapter regarding vigilance of Allah authored by that after he asked the prophet Sam what is Islam? Islam.

[Silence]

So he asked tell me about Islam. Define it for me. The prophet sallall.aii wasallam said Islam is that you testify that none is rightfully worshiped but Allah and that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. That you establish prayer that you give zakat. That you fast the month of Ramadan. and that you make pilgrimage to the house of Allah thea if you have the ability and means to do so. And so this man responded you are correct. And so Omar says we were taken aback and perplexed that he is asking the prophet sallall.aii wasam but then he is confirming his answers as if he already knows the answer. He said, "Tell me what is eman?" And the prophet responded saying that you believe in Allah, his angels, his books, his messengers, the last day, and that you believe in decree, good and bad of it, both the good of it and the bad of it. or that you believe in Allah's decree, the good that Allah decrees and the bad that Allah decrees. And so the man responded, "You are correct." Again, he is asking and then he is confirming as if he already knows the answers. When we look at this narration, we see that the prophet sallall.aii Wasallam here when he was asked about Islam he spoke about things that are outward things that are manifesting prayer everyone can see that this is an outward action right fasting which is an action that a person does it's an action of refraining but it's an action it's a conscious refraining giving zak going to make hajj testifying of a shahad and these are outward actions. And then when he was asked about emen, he mentioned a series of beliefs which are all inward, right? Belief in Allah, belief in his angels, belief in his books, belief in his messengers, belief in the last day, the day of judgment, and belief in the decree of Allah, the good of it and the bad of it. This is all belief. So what does this mean? Islam and eman are part of a group of words in the Quran and in the Sunnah. These words when they are mentioned together they separate in meaning and when they are mentioned separately they converge in meaning. Okay. These words are defined by the scholars very very curiously as.

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Okay, these words are very numerous throughout the Quran. Books have been written on these words. And these words are something that we need to go out of our ways to learn these words, these sets of words. There's many of them. These words, when they come together, they have different meanings. Meaning when they're mentioned together in the same context, in the same situation, in the same sentence, in the same paragraph this, Islam is mentioned and then iman is mentioned. They're mentioned together. They have separate meanings. But when they're mentioned separately, okay, just Islam is mentioned alone or just iman is mentioned alone for instance, they have the same meaning. these definitions here. Islam and Eman are two of those words and for instance they are of these words the names of Allah many of them when they're mentioned together they mean the same they mean different things when they're mentioned separately alman means ale as well and ale means man as well and so forth. There are many of them throughout the Quran. This is important. Why? Because in order for us to understand the Quran and not to misunderstand, we have to know these words im and Islam. When Allah mentions the believers, it is the believers that enter paradise. Inahkari and Muslim the prophet Sam announced to the people only a believer will enter paradise. This is easily confused by people as meaning just someone who believes in their heart. There's no belief. You know they don't pray, they don't fast, they don't do anything of Islam. They just believe that none is rightfully worshiped but Allah. Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. But it does not affect their actions at all. Can this person be a Muslim? Absolutely not. There is no such thing as iman without Islam and Islam without e. A person who is only Muslim but does not believe in his heart but he goes through all the actions. Is this person a believer? The answer is no. Because when these things are mentioned separately, they entail one another. When they're mentioned together, they add context and they enrich each other. Same thing when you read in the Quran, those who believe and work righteous deeds. Sometimes you'll find the people that enter paradise are the ones that work righteous deeds. Doesn't mention belief. Sometimes you'll see belief without righteous deeds. When they're mentioned separately, they mean both. When they're mentioned together, it's additional what? Addition additional detail, right? For instance, ms when it's mentioned by itself, it means as well. And al when it's mentioned by itself means ms as well. But when they're mentioned together, Now they have different meanings because they're mentioned together. This detail is so important because you see this start to give color to the Quran and to its meanings and you see how intentional and deliberate the wording is. So for instance, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala mentions in the Quran about loot and his family right and he mentions that there was only a household of Muslim right but Allah saved the m he mentioned them together so he mentioned muslim here outward word actions. When Islam is mentioned on its own, it means eman. And when eman is mentioned on its own, it means Islam. But when they're mentioned together, Islam is outward actions. But eman is inward belief. So if we were to look at the people of Medina, the prophet's time, sallallahu alaihi wasallam, it had believers and it had hypocrites. We would say these are Muslim and these are the m right so the hypocrites would be described as muslim in this context because it's mentioned together etc he said so tell me then about in the Arabic language if we say what does that mean linguistically. Huh? You said something, huh?

[Arabic recitation]

In the mind. That's not what it means.

[Arabic recitation]

To tell you something. Here's an exercise. This will help you. Whenever you are asked what a word means, the first thing you do is you search your archive of the Quran where that word is mentioned. for instance. Uhhuh.

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Allah describes himself now as the one who in a past tense everything that he created. Let's look for a similar meaning in the Quran.

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We could say, but it's the same meaning. So, and she.

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Is something that unfortunately Many people when they first become religious, if they were born Muslim, they first make a conscious choice to be a a believer or when they enter into Islam from disbelief. They are very excited. Their mind, their heart is a sponge. Anytime Allah's name is mentioned or his prophet's name is mentioned, their ears perk up. They're excited. And then what happens? And then time goes by and time goes by and time goes by and slowly slowly what happens? The novelty wears off. The hard the the heart becomes hard. Slowly over time and then 20 30 40 years will pass by and nothing has changed about them. Nothing. Here's a tip. The way that eman works is it never stagnates. Never. Eman never stays the same. With every single moment you are conscious, your eman is moving in one of two directions. Always. It's either increasing or it is what? Decreasing. There's no such thing as just being a sane. That doesn't happen. If you're not increasing, you are decreasing. Kind of how major corporations look at their money and business models, right? We have to what? We have to have exponential growth every single year because if we do not have growth, we are actually losing ground because someone else is growing. That's the way they look at it. That's greed, right? as greed which is not okay with the dunya which is absolutely acceptable with the and so your ean is never the same. My ean when I sat down here and when I get up is not going to be the same. It was not the same. I've either done something that increased my faith or I've done something that decreased it. The only time my eman will maybe stay the same is when I'm sleeping, when I'm unconscious. But as long as I am conscious and I am of age, my eman is either growing or shrinking at every moment. And so what is al is that you are able to gain more than you decrease over time to the point that you perfect. You are giving given mastery over your dean which is something we will discuss tomorrow inshallah subhanahu waala. for.

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Speech.