God Has Blessed Us in So Many Ways

On November 14^th, 2016, during our meeting in NYC, we discussed Chapter 36 from the book, The Quran and the Life of Excellence.  Our discussion was based on the following ayas:

Sura 16; Ayas 78-81

And God has brought you out from your mothers’ bodies not knowing anything – but He has given you hearing and sight and feelings, so that you may be grateful.

Have they not seen the birds flying in the air?  None but God holds them up.  In this surely there are messages for people who have faith.  

And God has given you houses as places of rest, ad tents from skins of animals – easy  for you to handle when you travel and you camp – and furnishings and goods for temporary use from their skins and their wool and their hair. 

And God  has made for you, in what He created, means of protection:  thus, He has given you places of shade in the hills, and garments to protect you from heat and cold, as well as such garments that protect you from danger.

In this way, He bestows blessings on you, so that you might acknowledge Him. 

 Looking at the ayas above, we can see the emphasis God places on acknowledging Him and His favors as we contemplate the world around us through the senses which have been given to us.  It is clear that we are not responsible for having the bodies we have and for sensing what we sense.  It is all created to serve one God and He is asking us to help ourselves by simply taking heed for a few minutes every day.  To the extent we think about Him regularly, we will come to the conclusions expressed in the Quran. 

 Focusing more specifically on how we can help ourselves, we need to make sure that we acknowledge many gifts we have in our lives.  Even if we are facing great problems, there are some things we can think of which are helping us and for which we can feel grateful, such as: we have a room or a home to rest in, we have clothes to protect us from hot or cold, we have the ability to her and speak, etc.  Changing our focus from what is bothering us to what is helping us, shifts our spiritual energy from negative to positive. 

 We clearly can’t ignore our problems because we have to protect ourselves as that is our inherent need.  It is the mindset with which we approach our thinking and doing anything about our problems that makes the difference.  Talking about our problems continuously prevents our minds and bodies from getting out of the negativity which we have attracted within and without ourselves, but when we look to see how else we can approach the predicament we are in, will, in time, bring some ideas that we can use to resolve our problems.  God is here to help us go through everything we face in life, not to constantly intervene and remove problems from our lives. If we think about it, we will, in time, realize that no strength of spirit or of body can come without significant amount of work.  

 Summary by Alma Subasic

Banish Satan When You Read the Quran

On September 12th, during our regular meeting in the NYC, we discussed chapter 40 from the book by Dr. Abdulhameed. The chapter is based on the following ayas:

Sura 16 Ayas 98-100:

When you read the Quran, seek refuge with God from Satan, the accursed. Behold, he has no power over those who have developed faith and place their trust in their Lord. He has power over those who take him as their master, and who thus ascribe to him a share in God’s divinity.

We are all aware that both good and evil reside in us and that we have a tendency to express compassion and love as much as we have a tendency to express arrogance, envy, and deceit. Our honest efforts to lessen the influence of evil tendencies through genuine asking for help with it and to increase the influence of divine tendencies within us will eventually inform how far we come in our efforts to live a happy and fulfilled life, to the extent we understand that the life in God’s presence is the only truly fulfilled life. 

 

We have all experienced and continue to experience difficulties and sometimes feel that our good intentions simply fade away no matter how hard we try to eradicate it from ourselves. When we read the Quran, we see that God reminds us regularly that shaytan’s work to obstruct and oppose us is never-ending and that he is a true enemy to us. That reminder should help us understand that we are actively being opposed in our efforts and that we need to continue our good work of purifying ourselves patiently and the help from God will come.

It is, therefore, important that we approach Quran as the book that is here to explain to us what is taking place within and without ourselves so that we understand ourselves and by extension, the world around us, better. We should not approach Quran with impatience expecting to immediately understand everything it is saying given that God had been preparing Prophet Muhammad for years so that he might understand it properly. We must not approach it with arrogance expecting it to support us as we are or expecting it to support our views of superiority over other people, and we must not approach it with a rebellious state of mind because we are angry with what it is saying. If we think about it seriously, we will realize that the consistent and the patient seeking for the truth is the only way to receive true answers. Of course, it is not easy, but as we all know, anything worth our while requires patience and considerable effort on our part. We only must want to do it.

Summary/Commentary by Alma Subasic

Advice on Food

On October 17^th, 2016  during our Quran study session in the New York City, we discussed  chapter 41 which is based on the following ayas:

Sura 16, Ayas 114-115:

So eat what God has provided you, lawful and wholesome, and be grateful for the favors of God if it is God that you serve.

God has forbidden to you only what has died of itself, and blood, and the flesh of swine, and anything offered up to other than God. But if anyone is compelled by necessity, without wanting to or being excessive, then God is very forgiving, very merciful.

Eat the wholesome things We provided for you, but not to excess, lest My anger descend on you.  And whoever My anger settles upon has already fallen.

Most of the food practice in the Muslim culture has been around prohibitions.  It is, however, equally  important to focus on the other information in these ayas and understand the deeper message behind God’s words.  We now understand a lot about food compared to generations before us and we can easily understand that the above prohibitions were articulated to us to keep us healthy. 

In addition, God specifically indicates that when we eat, we must be careful about how much we eat.  This is something that we now understand is important for our health given all the problems that come from over-eating. 

We will also notice that every aya concerning food specifies that we eat what is wholesome.  That is clearly because by eating wholesome food, we keep our bodies healthy.  When we are healthy, we can do whatever we set our mind upon, while illness, especially prolonged illness, causes pain and we depend on others and are unable to do much. 

Therefore, it seems very clear after we break these ayas down that living healthily and making that our priority – that being the absolute basis of our being able to do anything else in life – should be a matter of common sense.

The exercise accompanying this chapter states as follows:

1. Think of a habit you have that you know is bad for your health.  Write a paragraph in your journal on how your future life will be damaged if you continue this habit.  Make a plan to get rid of this habit as soon as possible.
2. Think of a healthy habit you would like to add to your lifestyle. Write a paragraph in your journal on how your future life will be improved if you succeed in adopting this new habit.  Make a plan to change your daily routine to include this habit.   

Summary by Alma Subasic

Make a Lasting Contribution

On July 25^th, 2016 during our Quran study meeting in New York City, we discussed Chapter 38 from The Quran and the Life of Excellence,  by Dr. Sultan Abdulhameed. The chapter is based on the following aya:

Sura 16, Aya 96

What is with you passes away, whereas that which is with God is enduring.  And We shall give to those who patiently persevere their reward according to the best they did.

A human being is good by nature, but it is up to each one of us to uncover those characteristics within us that will help us live a life of lasting significance as opposed to satisfying the most immediate needs and wants and living in the moment. 

We make that choice for ourselves.  We either make a choice to strive in God’s cause to make a lasting contribution while on Earth, or we follow blindly what others around us do.  While enjoyment, rest, and relaxation are needed for our well-being, this aya reminds us indirectly that persevering in our effort to uncover our true goodness is a path to making a lasting contribution in this world and at the same time, a path to uncovering one’s purpose in life.

 This process of uncovering divine values within ourselves in an effort to make a lasting contribution is a hard one, which is why it is mentioned in the Quran.  It requires consistent prayer and self-evaluation and above all, perseverance during the long periods of apparent stagnation.  Here is where the divine characteristic of patience becomes extremely important, which is the reason why patience is mentioned on almost every page of the Quran.

 

We won’t be able to successfully go through the tests of life, the burden apportioned to us, and achieve lasting peace as well as a life worthy of God’s agent here on Earth unless we learn the lesson of patience.  So, while we look to uncover the divine characteristics within us as we work to make a positive influence on people around us, we are uncovering our own purpose and finding that we are slowly but surely becoming who we have always wanted to become – God’s friend and an example of how we should be living our lives. 

Summary by Alma Subasic

Be Fair and Generous

Be Fair and Generous

During our meeting in New York City on June 27^th, 2016, we discussed Chapter 37 of The Quran and the Life of Excellence book by Dr. Sultan Abdulhameed.  The chapter is based on the following aya:

Sura 16, Aya 90

Behold, God enjoins justice and the doing of good, and generosity towards people and He forbids all that is shameful and that runs counter to reason, as well as envy; and He exhorts you repeatedly so that you might bear all this in mind

These ayas indicate a series of characteristics that should manifest within believers as well as a series of characteristics that believers should work on eliminating within themselves.  We are constantly being asked by God to exert ourselves in the cause of justice by being just ourselves first of all, and then by demanding justice of and for others.  We are constantly being asked by God to do good deeds and if we read the Quran carefully, we will notice that every time God lists characteristics of those who can hope for His kindness and forgiveness, He lists belief in the first place, and then He lists the characteristic of doing of good deeds before He continues to list any other characteristics. Doing good is therefore extremely important.

Then we are told of the negative traits that we should work on discarding because they stand in the way of spiritual growth and attainment of a purer state of ourselves, which is every believers aim.  We should avoid acting shamefully, which means that whatever our conscience considers to be shameful, we should avoid because sooner or later it will degrade us and cause us mental suffering.  We are also asked not to do things that are counter to reason, one of the most important exhortations in the religion of Islam.  It should be viewed as an exhortation to free our minds from oppressive thoughts and ideas as they are most likely oppressive because we haven’t consciously examined their source and reasoned our way through them.  This is also one of the most important exhortations precisely because using our reason means applying our thinking process.

 Our process of thinking leads us to examine ourselves and our beliefs and through it, we discard superstitions and cultural influences and stand firmly in our faith before God who is now showing us the faith that He contemplated for us and is making us His agent here on Earth.  We will also notice that God mentions envy often and that He would like us to resolve that issue within ourselves because there will always be people who will have more than us and people who are better than us.  Envy, like any other negative human characteristic, spreads “toxins” throughout our bodies and we “emit” the same energy around us. By its nature, it stands in the way of our continuous work of self-improvement. 

While we all know that it is easier to say things than to do them precisely because we all come with our own deep-rooted set of beliefs and ideas as well as our subconscious which has been absorbing much of what we have been experiencing throughout our lives, God is here to remind us and encourage us to keep working on ourselves to discard as much of what is bad for us as possible, knowing that it is one of the hardest things to do.  Some of the hardest things we will ever do in our lives is continually monitoring our thoughts and keep asking for forgiveness and guidance in removing what’s shameful and envious but as we all know, nothing that will benefit us in the long run and is worth  our while is ever easy to do.  Only those who actually go through the process achieve permanent success and change for the better.  We need to genuinely want to do this. 

Some of the thoughts expressed by those present during this class state that we decide that we will start behaving differently but there is inner resistance which is where the difficulty lies – breaking through that wall of resistance through genuine desire to change is the key; Spiritual growth means that we were in a certain way, living under the influence of inferior choices but we consciously decided to change ourselves and live under the influence of better choices.

  Spiritual growth occurs when we learn what is taking place inside of us and we decide to change; The Prophet spent a large part of his day in contemplation; We need to spend some portion of the day sitting quietly in order to notice what patterns run through our minds and then we become aware of what we think;  Once we are aware of what we are thinking we should decide to change those thoughts that we want to change; We need to be aware of our rules of living and choose what we want/don’t want;  This is a central struggle in a lot of people’s lives;  People want to be certain way but they are not able to do it easily because of their inner patterns;  In a state of low self-awareness, people look outside of themselves and blame others for what happened to them.  We learn the best and the most lasting lessons from the most difficult people.

Summary by Alma Subasic  

Self-Evaluation in Ramadan

Self-Evaluation in Ramadan

June 13, 2016, New York City

During this meeting, we discussed Self-Evaluation in Ramadan.  We were contemplating a hadith by Prophet Muhammad which states, “Anyone who fasts and engages in self-evaluation in Ramadan will find heaven.”

The practice of fasting is widely followed in the Muslim community, but the practice of self-evaluation has been forgotten.  Self-evaluation is the spiritual component of Ramadan and it is something in which the Prophet engaged on a daily basis.  Regular self-evaluation helps us realize at the intellectual level that God and everything He said to us are things that really touch our lives and aren’t ideas that stay outside of us because we are busy and need to go to work and this is not the same time as when Prophet Muhammad lived.  If we think about it, we will realize that we can live our lives without once contemplating why we are doing what we are doing and that we are doing it because our family has been doing it for decades.

Self-evaluation helps us identify aspects of our lives that we would like to make better and then ask God to help us make them better. There are four aspects of our lives that are important to most people:  Spiritual growth, personal relationships, health, financial freedom, and professional success.  We want to see ourselves change for the better every day and when we feel that we are stagnating, it causes frustration.  Making sure that our prayer (salat) is personally meaningful to us by first making sure we understand the words we are saying and then by contemplating ideas behind those words we are saying regularly in the prayer should help us make our prayer more meaningful and in time, we should see the change in ourselves.  We need to make sure that when we fast we attempt to realize that it is a method of self-discipline and among many of its facet, one important one includes proving to ourselves that we are not subject to our bodies cravings but that we can and will do what is required of us in order to help God guide us where we want to go.  Our satisfaction in life also depends on the health of our personal relationships. Criticizing or blaming the other person for an unhappy relationship will not make it better, but finding out positive ways by which important relationships will become better is what will, in time, make them better.  It goes without saying that we can’t do much of anything unless we are healthy.   A good number of us lives in the world today where we can find healthy food and facilities for exercising.  Deciding on a healthy habit and keeping it is the way to achieve our goal of remaining healthy and avoiding diseases of our ancestors.  Poor financial situation is one of the main reasons for unhappiness for a good number of people.  Making plans for saving a portion of our income and giving away a portion of our income to worthy causes are the ways of increasing our wealth.   Finally, many people are unhappy with their jobs so finding ways to change our profession or make certain adjustments if a total change is not needed, can only come through thinking about, that is, evaluating what we can do to make this change or adjustment take place.  Setting up a plan with a career counselor as to the steps to follow to change our profession or make whatever adjustments may be necessary is one concrete way to see a positive change in this respect.

Overall, none of the above is possible without our first taking the time to think through what is making us unhappy and then attempt to see what we can actually do about it.  This is one of the purposes of fasting:  Self-evaluation to understand where we have been and where we are going so that, in time, when we ask ourselves (before we are asked by God), we can say to ourselves that we didn’t waste a life given to us for a particular purpose.  That purpose is what we are getting at when we engage in the practice of self-evaluation. 

Some of the ideas that came to mind to those who were present during this class include a notion that with self-evaluation comes planning – what is it that we want to see happen?  The aspect of thanking God is extremely important.  All Prophet’s duas (supplications) start with giving thanks to God.  Prophet also said that saying thanks to God is the best prayer.  Person who lives in a state of gratitude is in a stream of benevolence.  God clearly said that if we are thankful, He will give us more. A person becomes what he or she thinks about most of the time.  If our thoughts constantly revolve around what is going on at present, we become trapped in it. The present is constantly becoming a thing of the past so we should focus on what we want to see a week from now.  Dua means that we are unhappy about certain aspect of our life and that we are thinking about our lives, so we formulate an idea in our minds about what we want.  What is very important is that we need to realize what we are thinking of.  If we think about what is bothering us all day long and spend 2 minutes on dua, that isn’t going to help us.  We may pray for certain things but it is good to think through what we are asking in order to try to understand why we feel certain way.  In thinking about future, it is much better to utilize writing because it forces our minds to concentrate and think with specificity.  Being healthy was a huge part of Prophet’s religious practice.  “Fast, so you shall be healthy,” is also what he said. 

Summary by Alma Subasic

Chapter 35, Make Yourself Strong and Resourceful

On May 16th, we discussed chapter 35, "Make Yourself Strong and Resourceful," which is based on the following Ayas:

 

Sura 16; Ayas 75-76:

 

God gives an example - someone enslaved, owned by another, has no power over anything, and someone else whom We have given good resources from ourselves and who spends from it at will, both privately and publicly. Are these two equal? Praise and thanks be to God:  but most of them do not understand it.

 

And God gives the example of two men - one of them dumb, powerless, and a burden on his master:  to whichever task is he directed he brings no good.

Can such a one be considered the equal of someone who commands justice and is on a firm path?

The ideas expressed in these ayas convey an important evolution in religious thought:  seclusion and constant praying without doing much else, thought of as a mark of true religiosity/piousness throughout history, isn’t what God meant.  Those who understand where their resourcefulness comes from, work to use it to improve the future of humanity, and command justice are the ones who are on the right path and are truly pious.  This is where it becomes very important how we understand and interpret religion or what God is looking to say to us.  If we interpret it in a way where we are bogged down by following others’ (“authoritative”) interpretations involving endless rules and regulations as to how we are to behave, that interpretation leads to constriction and lack of productivity.  If we focus on the spirit of what God is looking to explain to us and dig deep within ourselves, then we start to focus on our own resourcefulness and  to see how we can join the forces of our fellow human beings who have made and continue to make this world a better place for all.  There are, of course, plenty of negative examples stemming from narrow-minded interpretations, but that is precisely why we are asked to first work to understand what the ayas say, then be generous in all our dealings, professional or private, and command justice.  On the face of it, it seems that these ayas also suggest that God gives someone less than others, but if we focus on His repeatedly telling us that He does not deal unjustly with a single human being, then we must see that the majority of people in this world are given the resources and that the majority’s job is to improve the conditions of the minority.  The truly enlightened understand the spirit of His message and are constantly finding ways to use their resources, everyone according to his or her capacity. 

Some of the thoughts that came to mind to those present during this class include the notion that we can be enslaved by our own mind patterns.  A good number of people want to feel accepted by their society (through cultural conditioning) and therefore feel that permission has to be granted for them to do anything.  Respect and  love are important but value of our life is also important.  We need to do things to make life better for us and others and we must learn to strengthen ourselves so that we don’t run away from life’s challenges.  A successful person is one who demands justice and is on a firm path.  People are not using their tremendous potential to change things.  It is not enough to pray - we must pray and act. What is happening in our lives is the direct result of what we are thinking.  Everybody should spend at least a year trying and really looking to understand the words of prayer.  It seems as though Islamic societies tend to discuss social rules that restrict people.  There seems to be a general narrowness of focus among Islamic societies and a focus on the wrong things.  We rarely hear an imam say to a woman that learning is mandated to all  by Islam, but we hear them all too often say that a woman should cover herself.   An interpretation of Islam that doesn’t inspire us to uplift people in whatever capacity we can must be the wrong one because it contradicts pages and pages of Quran that focus on doing good.  

The exercise developed by Dr. Abdulhameed for this chapter states:

 

Look up the names of Prophet Muhammad.  These are the attributes of strength for which he was known.

 

a) Identify three of these attributes you already possess.  What can you do to manifest these traits consistently so that people will know you through them? Write down your answer to this question in your journal.  

b) Identify three other of these attributes that you would like to develop.  In what ways can you change your behavior to manifest these attributes?  Write down the answer to this question in your journal.  

 

Summary by Alma Subasic