THE LIFE OF MUHAMMAD PART I...SHAIKH ANWAR AL AWLAKI 22 October 2014 at 15:19 Bilal Shariff wrote a new note: THE LIFE OF MUHAMMAD (PART - 1) | Imam Anwar Al Awlaki. Assalamu allaikum , Dear brothers & Sisters , This is the first part of Life of Muhammad Lectures Series by Imam Anwar Al Awlaki (may allah have mercy on him). Please Everyone give it a read. will not take more then 8 minutes. Hope everyone will get benefit from it. Inshaallah next part will be uploaded soon! PART - 1 = Meccan Period - Introduction: In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate,the Merciful. O Allah Open my heart, ease my task and remove the impediments from my speech so that they may understand what I say. We ask Allah Subhana Watala to bless this gathering, We ask Allah Subhana Watala to benefit us from what we learn,we ask Allah Subhana Watala to teach us that which will benefit us, we askAllah Subhana Watala to make us of those who follow the way of Rasool Allah saw and love him and we ask Allah Subhana Watala to make us of those who will bewith him in Jannah.(Ameen) Definitionof Seerah The word Seerah has a linguistic meaning which means a path. Walking is called Sair, when you walk from one place to another it iscalled sairtu Ful an is walking. So it is a path which a person takes during his life time. The Hansdictionary gives the translation of Seerah as conduct, comportment, demeanor,attitude, behavior, way of life, attitude, position, reaction, way of actingand biography, all of these are meanings of Seerah. Seerah could be the biography of any person, not just prophet Muhammad (saw), however we have used the word so much with Muhammad (saw), that when we say Seerah, we almost all the time are referring to the life of Muhammad saw. However, we can say the seerah of Abu Bakar , Seerah of Omar(ra) and so and so. So Seerah is a biography of a person, their life. In this situation we are studying the life of the greatest, Muhammad (saw) Importanceof Studying Seerah Whatis the importance of studying Seerah? No1: History of Islam The life of Muhammad (saw)is the history of Islam. You are studying the concisehistory Islam. By studying the life of Muhammad (saw). In his Seerah you would find situations and incidences that would help us in everything that we would need to know in our life of dawah. So we are not just studying the biography of a person, we are studying the history of our religion. Muhammad ibn Saad ibn waqas, -Saad ibn Waqas is one of the ashra-e-mubasharah, he is one of the 10 given glad tidings of paradise. His son Muhammad would say that our father would teach us the battles of Rasool Allah, he would teach us the seerah of Rasool Allah and he would tell us that these are the traditions of your fathers, so study them. They used to refer to Seerah as maghazi. Maghazi means battles. The latter part of life of Rasool Allah was spent in maghazi. So they would use the word maghazi to refer to the whole life of Rasool Allah. Ali bin Hussain ibn Ali bin Abi Talib- the grandson of Ali ibn Abi Talib would say we were taught the Seerah of RasoolAllah like we were taught Quran. That is how important Seerah was for them. They would study it like they studied Quran. Andvthat makes sense, because if you want to study the life of Musa (as) where do we go, where do we study It from? From Quran! If we want to study the life of Isa (as) we go to Quran, but if we want to study the life ofMuhammad (saw), his life, even though there are bits and pieces of it mentioned in the Quran, but we don’t have that many details about Muhammad (saw) in the Quran as we have about Musa (as). So the life of Rasool Allah saw ,for us, to study it we go to Seerah. All of the anbiya, their lives were recorded in the Quran with the exception of Muhammad(saw). So to study the life of Muhammad (saw) we go to Seerah. When we want tolearn about the anbiya, we go to the Quran. But when we want to learn about Muhammad saw, we go to Seerah, again even though there are some references about him in the Quran. No2: Love Thesecond reason to study Seerah is to develop the proper love of Muhammad saw inour hearts. Loving Muhammad saw is Ibadah. Its part of our religion to love Muhammad (saw) Love for Muhammad saw Muhammad saw says: “None of you will attain true faith until you love me more than your parents, your children and the whole world” (Bukhari, Book of Belief, Hadith14) We don’t really become true believers until we love Muhammad saw more than anything else. So it is part of Islam to love Muhammad (saw). Omar bin Khattab (ra) he came to Rasool Allah saw and said…. He was a very honest and a straight forward person. So went to Rasool Allah saw and said O Rasool Allah I love more than everything except myself” I love you more than anyone except my self” Rasool Allah saw told him “until you love me”,meaning you don’t really attain the complete faith until you love me more than your own self. So Omar bin Khattab came back and said” O Rasool Allah, Now I love you more than my own self” Rasool Allah saw said “Alaan eman ” “ Now you have attained the complete faith” The Ummah today loves Muhammad saw. If you askany Muslims Do you love Muhammad saw, they would say yes. But the love can not be very deep and sincereunless you know the person. If you have shallow information about someone, you can’t really love them a lot. To love a person you need to know them more. And this is especially true with Muhammad saw. Because the more you know him, the more you would be impressed with his personality, the more you would love him.So even though Muhammad saw, among the Ummah today with the shallow information that the masses of Muslims have about him, even though they still love him, butwe can not truly have deep love for Muhammad saw unless we know him. You knowthe Sahaba ra, the more they knew him, the closer they got to him, the morethey would love him. Amr bin Al As, for example- He was one of the staunchest enemies of Muhammad saw. He was one of the top plotters against Islam. Amr bin Al As, he later become a Muslim, and when he was passing away,Amr bin Al As started weeping, he was crying on his death bed, so his son Abdullah bin Amr told him Oh My Father, Dint Rasool Allah saw give you the gladtidings of this, didn’t he give you glad tidings of that. It is reported in the hadith that Rasool saw said “Aamana amr” That Amr bin Al As has attained faith.So this is a witness from Rasool saw that Amr bin Al As is a momin. Not only a Muslim, but he is at the higher level of Momin. So his son was trying to give his father the glad tidings that you are a true believer. Rasool Allah saw has given you all of these glad tidings, how come you are crying now before yourdeath. Amr binAl As- he turned around and said: I have gone through 3 stages in my life. At the first stage, the most despised man to me was Muhammad saw. And my desire was that I could gethold of him and kill him. That was my desire. That was my wish, my aspiration-to kill Muhammad saw. He said that if I had died at that time, I definitely would have been in the hell fire. He said that then Allah put the love of Islam in my heart and I went to Muhammad sawand said O Muhammad , I want to become Muslim. Extend your hand so I can pledge allegiance to you. Amr bin Al As says Muhammad saw extended his hand forwardand I pulled my hand away. So Amr bin As, he had Rasool saw extend his hand and when Rasool saw was ready to put his hand in his, Amr bin Al As pulled his handaway. Rasool Allah saw told him “Whats wrong” Amr bin Al as said, I have acondition to make. Rasoolallah saw asked him, what is your condition? . He said, my condition is that you pardon me, you give me clemency. Because Amr bin Al as knew, the things he had done in the past, the great crimes he had committed against the Muslims, is sufficient for his execution. So he wanted to make sure that Rasool saw would not hold him accountable for what he did in thepast. So Rasool Allah saw smiled and he said: Ya Amr “Arabic” Don’t you know that Islam erases everything before it and Hijrah erases everything before it and Hajj erases everything before it.” Amr bin Al said so I became a Muslim. He said that at that stage, Muhammad saw, who was my worst enemy, became the most beloved person to me in this world. He said that I loved him so much, I respected him so much, and I couldn’t even get a full glimpse of his face. Whenever I would see him, I would stare downwards. He said I had so much love and respect for him that I couldn’t even get a full glimpse of his face. And if you would ask me today to describe him to you…I couldn’t. He said that if I haddied during that stage, I would have hoped to be in Jannah.…There are other parts of this hadith, but what concerns us now is that Amr bin As, when he gotto know Muhammad saw, when he became close to him, Muhammad saw, who was his worst enemy became his most beloved friend. Sohail bin Amr was sent by Quraish, to negotiatewith Muhammad saw before Sulah Hudabiya. Sohail bin Amr was an internationalnegotiator; he had been to the courts of the Persian emperor, the Romanemperor, the emperor of Abyssinia. He was a well connected man. And now Quraishsent him to negotiate with Muhammad saw. So he went into Madina and he came in and he had first hand experience with how the Sahaba ra treat Muhammad (saw). So Sohail binAmr went back to report to Quraish. He told them, he said I have visited theRoman emperor I have visited the Persian emperor, iv visited najashi(Negus), the king of Abyssinia, but I have never inmy life seen a leader that is so loved by his followers , so much respected by his followers, likevMuhammad saw. I have seen nothing like it in the world. The Roman emperor, thePersian emperor, Najashi of Abyssinia, even though they have all the powers,strength and empires, I have never seen a people love their leader so much likethe Sahaba ra loved Muhammad saw. He said I saw amazing things. Muhammad sawwould be making wudu, and the Sahaba would be watching, to grab the waterdripping from his body. So he told them, do what ever you want, these are thepeople who would never give up their leader. The Sahaba, they would never givehim up. They would give their lives first. They would sacrifice everything forhim. So if we want to love Muhammad saw, we need tolearn more about him. I have already said that even though, among the masses of Muslims, we know people don’t have much information about Muhammad saw, they don’t know a lot about his Seerah, coz its not part of the curriculum that schools in the Muslim world teach, never the less even though, we are ignorantabout him and his life, he is still the most beloved figure that ever lived inhumanity. His name is the most common name in the world. How many people in the world are naming Muhammad? There is no other person that ever lived in history who had so many people named after him like Muhammad saw. When I was in college in the US, we had an imam,he was from Nigeria. And he was a hafiz and he was our imam in the small townin US. His name was Muhammad Al Ashr. The word ashr means the 10th.So for a long time I assumed that Al- Ashr is his last name. Muhammad Al Ashr.One day I went up to him and asked what Al Ashr is? Is that the name of thetribe or the clan? He said no. He said my father would name every male boy thatwas born as Muhammad. All of this children, he would name Muhammad. So to distinguish between us he had to number us. So there was Muhammad the first,Muhammad the 2nd, Muhammad the 3rd, I am Muhammad the 10th.So his father doesn’t want to deal with any other name. All of his children aregoing to be Muhammad. And in Pakistan and India you would have Muhammad Haroon,Muhammad Suleman…every body Muhammad. There is No one in history that had an Ummah love him so much, like the Ummah loved Muhammad saw. He is the most beloved figure in history. So what would be the situation if we studied his life. I mean how much love would we have then for Muhammad saw? His name was the most frequently mentioned names. Around the clock, there will be minaret that is calling to prayer and is mentioning the name of Muhammad saw. Around\the clock. Coz Muslims now are world wide. So in every time zone you have Muslims. So every minute of the day, there will be a Moaazan saying “Ashhadu Lailaha il Allah, Ashhadu ana Muhamamadar Rusool Allah” His name is mentioned around the clock. And by the way, the name Muhammad means the praised one. And there is no one who is praised like Muhammad saw. I mean hisname really fulfills its meaning. He is the praised one, he is always praised.When ever we hear his name, what do we say? “Sallalahu Alihe Wassalam” So we want to develop love for Muhammad saw, and the way we can do it is by studying his life, we will love him more, the more we study about him. Allah tala says “Say:If your fathers, your sons, your brothers, your wives or your kindred, the wealth that you have gained,the commerce in which you fear a decline, and the dwellings in which youdelight … are dearer to you than Allah and His Messenger, and striving hard andfighting in His Cause, then wait until Allah brings about His Decision(torment). And Allah guides not the people who are Al-Fâsiqûn (therebellious, disobedient to Allah) (Surah Taubah: 24) So the ayah is stating that our love for Allah andhis messenger and striving in the cause of Allah and his messenger should be paramount to everything else. Our fathers, our sons, our brothers, our mates,our kindred, our wealth, everything. To love our messenger and Islam should be the dearest thing to every one of us. No3: to follow the Best Example Ibn Hajar says who ever seeks the preeminence of thehereafter, the wisdom of this life, just purpose, and the embodiment of morality and character, let him follow Muhammad (saw) the Prophet of Allah. So Muhammad saw is the embodiment of “Khuluq”- The perfect character. And by studying his Seerah, we will be more able to follow his way. No4: Understanding Quran There are some ayats in the Quran that are independent of the circumstances of revelation. Like for example, the ayats about the Akhira, Ar-raqaik . These are independent of the circumstances. But then there are some ayats that aredealing with events that were happening in the time of Muhammad saw. So youwould have some ayats revealed prior to an event, some ayats revealedconcurrent with an event and some ayats revealed after an event. Seerah would give us the explanation of these ayats. Like for example Surah tul Ahzab. Many ayats of surah tul ahzab were revealed regarding the battle of Al-Ahzab. Many ayats in surah Al Imran were revealed relating to an event that happened in the time of Rasoolsaw. So you have a major section of Surah al Imran, which was a dialoguebetween Muslims and Christians, based on the Christian delegation that camefrom Najran to visit Rasool Allah. These ayats were revealed to support Rasoolsaw in his dialogue with the Christians. And the latter part of Ale Imran isdealing with Ghazwa e Uhud. Now the details of the Ghazwa are not mentioned in the Surah. So how can we understandthese ayats? By going to the Seerah. No5: His life (Muhammad saw) illustrates the methodological steps of the Islamic movement. Rasool Allah saw went thru stages; he went through steps startedby a secret dawah. And then it became public. And then later on Jihad. So itwent through stages. These stages are important for Islamic movement to learnand study. Name missing He says.. “And we believe that thismethodological progression of the prophet’s life is divinely directed. ForAllah has guided his prophet and all of his steps, and it was not a result of areaction to an emerging circumstances. So these events that happened in thelife of Rasool saw were not haphazard. They were planned by Allah SubhanaWataala. So that they would be a guidance for us, in our attempts to establishIslam again. So it is very important for us to see the stages that Rusool Allahsaw went through and the progression of his dawah. Rasheed rida says that were it not for the education and training,verbal direction would not suffice. For the Seerah taught them how to be guidedby the Quran and trained them to be just and moderate in all matters. So, wehave Quran and Sunnah which are verbal teachings, but how do we apply theseverbal teachings? It is by looking at the application of Rasool saw and theSahaba (radiAllahu Anhum). So they took this verbal teaching into action andthat is something that only the Muslims have, I mean the followers of all otheranbiya have lost ____ of the Seerah of their anbiya, but with us we know how the Quran was being practiced, we knowhow the Sunnah of Rusool Allah saw was being practiced and applied. There is an ayah in the Quran which says that you can continueeating and drinking at night time of Ramadan until the white string isdistinguished from the black string. One of the Sahaba, he took this literally.What he did was that he had a string under his pillow… and he would eat and thenhe would uncover the string , he would pick up the pillow, he wouldn’t see thestring, so he continued eating … and he would keep on doing that and then hewent to Rasool saw and said this is what I have done. Rasool saw laughed and hesaid that it doesn’t mean you take a string in your room and you take a look atit. It means the white string which is the first emergence of light in thehorizon that is what is meant by it. So Rasool saw taught this Sahabi how toapply that ayat, because I could get a dark room with no windows alright and Ihave a string with me and it would be noon time and I still can not see it andI continue to eat. So the application of the ayats and the hadith of Rasool saware shown to us in the life of Muhammad (saw) and the life of theSahaba.(RadiAllahu Anhum) No6: Studying Seerah is Ibadah We are not doing this to entertain our selves. This is ibadat.There is Ajr, there is reward in studying this. We are worshipping Allah bycoming together and studying the life of Muhammad saw. This is the halaqa ofzikr. This is the session of zikr where we come together and talk aboutMuhammad saw , we are worshipping Allah Subhana watala. And we expect that thisis a gathering which is surrounded by angels, in which Allah subhanawatla willshower us with his mercy and tranquility and we be mentioned in a gatheringbetter than this. So it is ibadat and Allah subhana Watala says “Say if you do love Allâh then follow me (i.e. Muhammad saw) Allâh will love you and forgive you of your sins. And Allâh is Oft-Forgiving,Most Merciful.(Ale Imran 3: 31) No7: Developing a Muslim Identity Thereis a global culture that is being forced down the throats of everyone on theface of the earth. This global culture is protected and promoted. Thomas Friedman,he is a famous writer in the US, he writes for the New York Times. He says, thehidden hand of the market can not survivewithout the hidden fist. Mc Donalds will never flourish without Mc DonaldDouglas- the designer of F15s. Inother words, we are not really dealing with a global culture that is benign orcompassionate. This is a culture that gives you no choice. Either accept McDonalds, otherwise Mc Donald Douglas will send their F15s above your head. Itis very intolerant culture, that can not co exist with anything else. Ituproots every other culture on the face of the earth. Just cuts the roots ofit. And you have a quote here by Alexander Sofzen.He is a famous Russian Historian writer. He says To destroy a people, you mustsever their roots. So its really a destruction of the people of the earthbecause every other culture is being demolished. So this is not a globalculture that will co exist with others, it will replace others. And the onlyideology that is standing up to this global culture is Islam. But still, asMuslims and especially Muslims living in the west, we are suffering from aserious identity crisis. I mean you would find that even though the brother orthe sister would be practicing Islam, but the identity it self, the Islamicidentity itself is lost. I mean person would have more in common with the rockstar or a soccer player then they would have with the companions of RasoolAllah saw. You would find that our youth know more about pop stars than they knowabout the Sahaba of Rasool saw . Infact even sometimes more than the Anbiya.How many of our youth know the names of all of the Anbiya of Allah? How many ofour youth know the names of the Sahaba ra. But ask the same person to name thesoccer players on their favorite team or their best basketball players and theywould go down the list. So there is a serious identity crisis that is going onamong Muslims. Andthe way we can counter that, they way we can develop the Muslim identity is: Steps to Develop Muslim Identity No 1: By having a strong study of Islamic history. Which is made up of thelives of Prophets of Allah. The life of Muhammad saw, the life of the Sahaba raand then learning in general, the Muslim history after that. So that’s No 1.You develop an identity, by having an attachment with history. Because ourhistory, is our umbilical cord. This is our life line. We are an extension ofan Ummah. We are not separated; we are not severed from our roots. We are apart of a glorious Ummah that we need to study about. No 2: By being part of the world wide Muslim Ummah. Our local identityshould not over ride our Muslim identity. So my identification with Britain orAmerica or Pakistan or Kuwait or any other country should not over ride myIslamic identity. See this “nation/state” concept is something that Islam cameto abolish. We have our loyalty to Allah Subhana Watala and to our religion.And we are part of a world wide Ummah. Therefore we need to study; we need tolearn about our Muslim brothers all over the world. What happens in Palestineshould concern every British Muslim. What happens in Kashmir should concernevery American Muslim. What happens in every part of the Muslim world, shouldconcern me as if it is happening within my own house. So these are the twoimportant elements in building an identity. No1: Having a deep understanding of your History No2: Being part of the Ummah and caring about the Ummah. Andagain the saying of Alexander ________ “Todestroy a people, you must first sever their roots” Wedon’t want our roots to be severed.We want our roots to be deep. Studying thelife of Rasool Allah saw is the most important thing we can read in ourhistory. No8: The Life of Muhammad saw is a Testimony of his Prophet-hood. Thegreatest miracle of Muhammad saw is Quran and Muhammad saw had many othermiracles. But just studying his life in itself is an evidence of his Prophethood. Herewe have a man, who for forty years was leading a normal life. The outstandingthing about the life of Muhammad saw in the first 40 years was his morality andcharacter. But Rasool saw did not show any signs of aspiration to power orinfluence. None of that at all. Rasool saw was leading a normal life and thensuddenly after the age of 40, Rasool Allah saw brings about the greatest changethat the world has ever seen. That’s an irony. That’s a miracle. Rasool Allahsaw was illiterate. He could not read or write. And then he presents the worldwith the greatest book, ever produced. And we could go on and on… the list ofironies of things that are only explained if Muhammad saw was a messenger ofAllah. Who had divine help. Otherwise its impossible. There is no way to explain the Seerah , except to admitthat he was a nabi from Allah. It is impossible for a person to achieve, whatMuhammad saw achieved without being assisted by Allah Subhana Watala throughrevelation. So it’s a testimony of his prophet hood. Thereyou have Muhammad saw leading a normal life for the first 40 years. Thensuddenly he becomes a political leader, military leader, religious leader, headof a large house hold, law maker, teacher, Imam and go on and on the list ofthe things that Prophet Muhammad saw used to do. All of this was done within aspan of 23 years. Impossible! Whichwould lead to the next point that No:9 We are studying the life of the Greatest Weare studying the life of the greatest man that ever set foot on this earth.Muhammad saw is the greatest. And what ever bench mark you want to use forgreatness, he would still come out the greatest. Micheal Hart, he’s a USAuthor, he wrote a book called the The100 Most influential People that lived in history. After studying the livesof leaders through out history, it became clear to him that Muhammad saw is theundisputable greatest man that ever lived. Heis the greatest and in his introduction he feels compelled to respond to whatthe readers of the book might think because he is mostly writing for a nonMuslim audience. So many people would question his choice of Muhammad saw , sotherefore in his introduction he writes, he says “ My choice of Muhammad tolead the list of the worlds most influential persons may surprise some readersand may be questioned by others. That he was the only man in history who wassupremely successful on both the religious and secular levels.” And then hegoes on to say that it is this unparallel combination of secular and religiousinfluence, which I feel entitles Muhammad to be considered the most influentialsingle figure in human history.” SoMicheal Hart is compelled by the facts. I mean there is no doubt that Muhammadsaw is the greatest. Butthen he has to apologize to his readers, I mean he has to say that this is outof my hands. I mean there is no way I could put anybody else in front of him. Muhammad saw is the greatest.In fact, if we take Muhammad saw as a military leader, just that aspect of hispersonality, he would still come out the greatest. If we only take Muhammadsaw, only the religious aspect of his life. He would still be the greatest.Muhammad saw as a political leader, he would still come out to be the greatest.So even if you dissect the different aspects of life of Muhammad saw and takethem piece by piece, by just taking one piece alone, he would still be greaterthan anybody else that ever lived. So we are studying the life of Al-Mustafa.Mustafa means “the one who is chosen” Allah subhanawatala chose him. Al-Mustafa al khalqi He ischosen out of all the creation of Allah. There might be some other reasons, why studying Seerah isimportant. Sources for this Course Seerah ofIbn Kathir. Ibn Kathir, he did not write a book called Seerah. Ibn Kathir wrote an encyclopedia of history. Called bidaya wan niaya.Called The beginning and the End. And it is literally the beginning and theend. He started from the beginning of creation andwent all the way until people enter Jannah and hell. One of his volumes isabout the life of Rasool Allah saw. Another volume is about the Prophets andanother is about Khalifa Ar Rashida. Khilafa Muwaya , Khilafa Abbasia. And he went all the wayupto his times. The last volumes is called Al Fitan. Signs of the day ofjudgment and then the day of judgment and Jannah and hell. Sowe are going to be taking his part of Seerah as a primary source. We will talka little bit on why I have chosen ibn kathir to be our primary source. Sahiah AsSeerah ibn Nabawuya is thesecond book that I have used in compilation of these notes by Ibrahim Al Ali . Science of Seerah and Science of Hadith: The Difference Traditionally, Seerah was a separate sciencefrom hadith. Even though there are some areas where they cross each other,there is over laying, over lapping between them. But traditionally Seerah had adifferent set of rules compared to hadith. Scholarsof hadith were very stringent, very strict in their rules. While scholars ofSeerah, were more liberal, more flexible. The reason is, when they were dealingwith hadiths and drawing ahkam and drawing rulings, they wanted to make surethey were basing the rulings on hadiths that were sound. They do not want us toworship Allah based on weak sources. So that’s why they applied very strictrules to hadith. However,when it came to Seerah, they were more flexible in their rules, because theysaw this as history which does not affect ahkam. It does not affect rulings.There is no ahkam based on it. So imam Ahmed bin Hanbal, who is a scholar ofhadith, he says when we talk about history we are more flexible. So you wouldfind that writers of Seerah would accept narrations ,they wouldn’t normallyaccept if they were dealing with hadith.So that’s one track that was followed by our early scholars. TheSeerah of Ibn Ishaq was writtenaccording to these rules. The Seerah ofAl Maqraizi, ibn Saad, all of these early scholars of Seerah, they followedthese flexible rules in narration. Recently,there was a new trend among some of our scholars. They wanted to apply therules of hadith on Seerah. Why? Thesescholars said now we are living in a time when the history of Rasool saw isahkam for us. In time of imam ibn Hanbal, Khilafa was established, so when theystudied the life of Rasool saw, they were studying to learn general lessonsfrom it, but it wasn’t to guide them in methodology of a movement. BecauseIslam was already established. Butnow we need to go through the Seerah and learn rules from it. On how to dodawah and how to establish Islam again. So it’s becoming similar to fiqhapplied to us. Therefore they say we should apply the same rules of hadith onSeerah. Thesecond book which is Sahih Seerah ibn nabawiyais based on the rules of hadith. So what these scholars did, they went intoBukhari, they went into Muslim, they went into Sunnan Abi Dawood, they wentinto these books of hadith and they gathered the bits and pieces that werereferring to Seerah. And they constructed the Seerah of Rasool Saw based onHadith. So rather than going to the book of Ibn Ishaq, they would go toBukhari. Rather than come to Maqrizi or other earlier scholars or ibn Hisham,they would go to Muslim. Saeed Hawa has writtena book based on hadith, its called the asas ul Suna. This book we mentioned byIbrahim Al Ali which is called Sahiah Seerah ibn Nabawiya. And there are few other books also following this line. Nowthe reason why I chose ibn Kathir as our primary source is because ibn kathir,he combined both in one book. So he would draw information from the books ofSeerah and he also draw information from the books of hadiths. So you wouldfind him narrating from Bukhari and narrating from Ishaq. That’s why you wouldfind the Seerah of kathir unique. Justone draw back with the Seerah of Ibn Kathir is that it is a bit complicated andcumbersome to use, because he would mention all of the chain of narration,sometimes he would not stick to a chronological order and some times he wouldbring in information that seems to be contradicting. But it is an excellentsource and Alhamdulilah, it is now present in the English language. Ithas been recently translated by MC Gothic. A professor in the US, it is a very good translation. Other books wemight not be using, some of them, I have got quotations from them. Wehave Manhaj Al haraqi by Moid Al Ghabban. The thing about this book isthat the author tried to draw movement lessons from Seerah. So hewould divide it into Secret stage, public stage, then he would go through theHijrah and then different stages of Jihad. So he tried to construct a movementwork line from Seerah. It is a recently written book. Thenyou have Fiqh as Seerah by Muhammad Ghazali. (rahimullah) This book has tarbiyalessons. Thereis another book by the same name Fiqh As Seerah by Al Buyti. Muhammad saeed Ramadan Buyti. And Al Buytiemphasizes on fiqh. He draws many fiqh lessons from Seerah. Andthen there is a book called Al Ghuraba by Sheikh Salman Auda. And it is dealing with Hadithsaw Tariiq Il Al Madina by Muhammad Al Abda, which is lessons drawn from Seerahand Fiqh As Seerah by Al Buyti.of the Strangers. And he tries to draw corelation with the strangers in the time of Rasool and the strangers now. AlAsas al sunna, we talked about this by Saeed Hawaand then At Arabic Terminologies SallalahuAlihe Wassalam: means May the peace and blessings of Allah be on him. This is what we say when we hearthe name of Muhammad saw. Now the Hukum of saying it : It is mandatory to sayit the first time you hear the name of Muhammad saw. Any other time after that,it is recommended. So in this lecture, the first time you hear the name ofMuhammad , it is mandatory to say Saw. Any other time after that as long as weare in the same gathering, it is recommended. So this is the hokum of Salatsalam ala Muhammad saw. Rasool Allah: The word Rasool Allah means the Messenger ofAllah. Jahiliya: Is the ignorance of the Pre Islamic era. SoJahiliya is a time period but it is also conduct. Whenever you have a time thatresembles the pre Islamic era, it is called jahiliya. And you will find thatSyyed Qutub uses this word a lot in reference to the times that we are livingin. he says that there is a lot of resemblance between it and the earlyjahiliya. So jahiliya comes from the root word Jahal, which is ignorance. So itis the time of ignorance. The absence of the message. Even if the message is there and the people are not followingit, it is a jahiliya. Eman: Faith Jannah: Paradise An Naar: Hell fire Thelast section is discussing the difference between hadith and Seerah scholars.We talked about this. Hadith scholars were more stringent in their narrationsbecause of basing their rulings. Seerah scholars were less stringent becausethey want us to get the stories, so they were flexible in their narrations. Wementioned that we are using a combined approach. So I will be using hadith andin the situations where there is no hadith, we will fill in the gaps byreferring to Seerah. So this is the introduction to the series. Inshallah o Tala the next session will start talking about some background history. SallalahuAlihe Wasalam Ala Muhammad waashabihe wasalam
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 13:20:31 +0000
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