Friday Sermon 25 Feb 1983 By Dr Rashad Khalifa
Transcript
0:11 Alhamdulillah. Ash-hadu an la ilaha illa Allah. Wa ash-hadu anna... The old habits come back sometimes. The days of ignorance and idle worship.
0:27 Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala doesn't want any other names mentioned in His mosques.
0:34 And all messengers of God want us to say La ilaha illa Allah.
0:39 Period.
0:42 I'm going to spend this first khutbah reading a talk that Imam Warith Deen Mohammed gave.
0:55 Imam Muhammad is one of the rare people that I believe knows the truth, believes in the truth, and his heart believes in Allah alone.
1:04 He is having a hell of a time with his people, trying to make them worship God alone.
1:10 and he's really a model, he's really a project, and if you read his writings or khutbas, you can see the truth in there.
1:22 Someday, insha'Allah, he will be as adventurous as I am, and he will come up with, come up against Hadith, insha'Allah,
1:32 and hear nothing other than the Quran.
1:37 This talk could be written by me,
1:41 but I'm going to read it without comment.
1:45 You know, when I see Muhammad as one person,
1:48 I'm very happy to get to know him.
1:51 I consider him as a friend of mine,
1:53 and I have his picture in my office.
1:57 That's how highly I think of him.
1:59 And insha'Allah,
2:02 God will guide him. There is no way he will fail.
2:08 With all the opposition against him,
2:12 he has been always victorious and he is guaranteed victory.
2:15 For as long as he upholds, La ilaha illa Allah.
2:19 As you know, once you see the truth, there is no going back.
2:23 There is no way you can go back after you see the truth.
2:26 Here is what, what Warith Deen Mohammed is saying.
2:29 Let us look at reality. Not only here, but all over this country.
2:35 Anytime you come together to do some good, you're going to have problems.
2:40 Especially if you're going to make your good spread.
2:43 If it's just going to be your private good, maybe you'll last for a while.
2:48 Maybe you'll last until you die.
2:50 But if you are doing good, and you're committed, and you're going to pass that good on to others,
2:57 so it will grow in numbers, you're in trouble. If you want to get together and
3:03 do some wrong, you're in the best situation, even the good people won't
3:07 bother you. But if you want to do good, you're in trouble. We have to understand
3:13 that, and that's the price that the righteous must pay in the world. You must
3:20 pay that price, accept to pay it. I knew people wouldn't like me when I made a
3:27 stand, and when they knew what I stood for. Now, Warith Deen Mohammed not only changed
3:33 the Elijah Muhammad system, but he changed it not to Islam as it is known
3:38 around the world, which is called Islam, but he changed it to the true Islam, which is a
3:43 big jump, I mean, it's a severe jump. So he says, I knew people wouldn't like me when I
3:50 made the stand, and when they knew what I stood for. I knew they wouldn't like me.
3:55 I knew I was going to have a whole lot of enemies. The more people knew what I
4:00 represented, I knew the more enemies I was going to get. But that's the price I
4:05 accepted to pay. That's the price all of us who want to do good have to accept to
4:11 pay. People aren't going to like you. People are going to make trouble for you.
4:16 People are going to try to undermine your work.
4:20 They are going to try to make you lose faith in each other.
4:23 They try to break your trust.
4:26 They do anything to defeat your efforts.
4:28 We have to accept that.
4:33 We don't have to have the CIA, the FBI, or the intelligence office of your local police department.
4:39 You don't even need that.
4:41 There are people out there in the society who will give you enough help
4:45 without those agents. On top of that, you have bad elements in the government. Some
4:51 Catholics are so prejudiced against the religion that they would
4:56 sacrifice their time and even their life to see this religion stop in America. And
5:02 Protestants who will do the same. Then you have some other Islamic groups that
5:09 do the same because they don't want to see me grow either. So you have the FBI,
5:17 the CIA, the Israeli intelligence, and the false Muslims, and even internal
5:23 infiltrations. I'm not going to name any, but there are some narrow-minded
5:30 Islamic groups that will work to defeat you too, because they don't want to see
5:35 you prosper either. We have to understand that we have enemies coming at us from
5:40 all directions who will do their best to undermine us. A lot of Muslims are not
5:45 satisfied with my leadership. I'm talking about Muslims of the world. This is an enemy within
5:50 I am talking about. I do believe the great majority of Muslims on this planet love
5:56 my leadership. They thank Allah for my leadership. But we have enough who are
6:00 hateful and jealous and dislike us enough to make trouble. Some of them are
6:06 here in America and some overseas too. We have to understand these things. We have
6:10 to accept reality. Don't think that everybody who comes to you in this name
6:15 or in these clothes is your friend. It may not be the case. Your friend is the
6:21 one who is truthful, who is open. Anybody who has to work with you behind closed doors,
6:26 anybody who has to tell you something secretly in your ear, you shouldn't trust them.
6:33 The person who comes out boldly before the community and lets them know,
6:38 "I am your friend, I am a friend of this community,"
6:42 those are the people we should be inclined to trust.
6:45 But those persons who stand behind, in the back,
6:48 but never want to be seen up front,
6:50 who claim to be with us, but are whispering things in our ears,
6:54 don't trust those people. I don't care who they are, I don't care what kind of
6:59 clothes they come in, you can't trust people like that. We have many masjids all
7:05 around the country, and all of our masjids are going to be visited. Our enemies are
7:09 already there. Every masjid is infiltrated. Right now, I'm talking to people who are
7:16 not here to help us, they are here to hurt us. He was talking in the masjid of Kansas
7:21 City, by the way. They are working for somebody or some agent or some agency, or
7:31 they are just part of the group of prejudiced people who are against
7:35 Muslims. They are here just to see that you don't succeed. Every masjid has them.
7:40 Don't think your masjid is going to be any different. We're talking to some of them
7:45 right now here. They are here in case there's an opportunity where they will
7:50 be able to take that advantage to set us back. That is their only purpose in coming.
7:56 We have to accept that, but we don't want to become paranoid,
8:00 alarmed to the extent that we're going to say, "I'm going to find him." No, don't try to find him.
8:07 Forget about him. Just know that he's here. But don't worry about him. Hope he keeps coming.
8:14 Maybe he'll hear a khutbah that will change his heart one day. I keep saying that
8:20 to them. Accept that he is here and he is a troublemaker, here to see if he can
8:28 upset you, or take you back, or throw a monkey wrench in your operation. Sometimes
8:33 they just ask a question after the good talk. They don't like to see the good
8:37 spirit of Iman. We had a good talk, the spirit is high, good, everyone is going home
8:44 in a good spirit. "May I ask a question, brother Imam? What about so-and-so and so-and-so?"
8:52 Now I did witness this myself. Just to—"What about so-and-so and so-and-so?"—just to
9:02 throw a damper on the good spirit. If you read the history of the people who worked
9:07 against Prophet Muhammad. The kinds of things they did, they were able to come
9:13 in and pretend to be Muslims. The Holy Quran says they would come in and
9:18 pretend to be the best of the Muslims. They would establish that they are the
9:22 most enthusiastic Muslims. They would say let us go in among them and establish
9:27 ourselves as the most enthusiastic Muslims. And then at a certain time let us
9:33 just quietly withdraw and then that will make everybody wonder and will break the
9:38 community of Muslims. The Quran tells us of this scheme they use and there are
9:44 many many other schemes and tricks they use to hurt the community, make you doubt,
9:50 make you not trust the community, be aware of the many schemes they work. Read the
9:55 Quran more, you have it in English. Abdullah Yusuf Ali, a good translation,
10:00 Pickthall, another good translation, read it in English. I haven't read my translation yet.
10:07 Someday maybe. Don't wait until you learn Arabic. Now this is very important, I agree with this.
10:18 Don't wait until you learn Arabic. Some of you will never learn Arabic. You will die
10:24 trying to learn Arabic. So, that's right, and it's a diversion from the Quran.
10:33 So keep trying, but in the meantime, read the good English translation of Quran.
10:38 Read it daily. Don't wait until Ramadan. Read it daily. Become more acquainted with
10:43 your holy book, so you will know the tricks that the world pulls to set back
10:48 the good work of the righteous. Isn't that so? You see how? And here in green,
10:53 we read it here in green, saying read Quran more. Don't wait until Ramadan. Read it
10:59 daily. Become more acquainted with your holy book, so you will know the tricks
11:03 that the world pulls to set back the good work of the righteous. He knows the Quran very well,
11:08 and this is exactly, precisely why he is guided, Alhamdulillah. We never see him
11:14 talk about
11:15 worldly affairs,
11:23 what is going on,
11:33 what's this, or what about the Middle East
11:36 commotion, this is what the
11:46 Alhamdulillah, wa ashadu an la ilaha illa Allah, wahdahu la sharika lah.
11:49 The second khutba will deal with what happened last Friday.
11:58 Last Friday we had a group of people come in this mosque and ask me to translate verse 2:239 right or wrong.
12:07 That was the biggest issue. They asked some other questions. But you can
12:17 know right away that the object was not to find the truth, which is our
12:23 objective. Our objective is to find the truth. Now if they were
12:28 sincerely seeking the truth, they would call and say, brother Rashad, we're coming
12:34 in a couple of weeks, and we want to discuss this issue of Quran and Hadith
12:39 and translation, and we'd like you to prepare and go to the library, do whatever you
12:45 want, so we can all help each other find the proof. But they wanted to come
12:53 secretly. They were telling everybody, hush, hush, don't tell anybody, because we
12:58 want to go and embarrass Rashad Khalifa. We want to go, their whole objective was to
13:03 harass me, embarrass me, and to use the quotation, catch him with his pants down.
13:10 That was the whole objective. It was not to reach the truth. So they come and say is
13:17 the translation of 2:239 right or wrong? Which is a silly question. I mean it's
13:22 not important if it's right or wrong, we have the Arabic text. Also, they were
13:29 comparing my first edition with the final edition of some other translation,
13:34 which is what we're going to do right now anyway. You don't ask a question like, why
13:41 were we created? Now that's a good question. That is a doctrinal question. Why are we here?
13:49 What is the purpose of our life? These are significant questions, not if 2:239 is
13:55 translated right or wrong. Do they know why they were created? Do they know why we are here?
14:04 Because very quickly, you know from the appendix in our translation here, that
14:11 initially there was God, nothing else, God created the angels, one of the angels had
14:16 rebellious ideas, he wanted to be a partner with God. This is where the whole
14:21 thing started. Satan wanted to be a partner with God, a God with God. And this is what
14:27 we're here for. We're here to prove that we worship God alone, without a God with him,
14:33 without any other partner with him. So that is an important question. So they
14:38 didn't come here to say, why are we created? Why are we here? What is the
14:44 purpose of our life. They came to ask, 239, verse 239, was it translated right or wrong?
14:55 Now what happened last Friday with all the rubbish things that went on, is
15:02 history repeating itself. You know very well they went to the Prophet Muhammad
15:07 and they said, what do you know about the phases of the moon?
15:14 Now, did they go? Why did they go to the Prophet Muhammad to ask about the phases of the moon?
15:20 Now, Muhammad grew up in a society that was idol-worshipping,
15:23 they were Muslims according to the religion of Ibrahim,
15:27 but they deviated from the true Islam to idol-worship.
15:32 They worshipped God perfectly, they prayed the five prayers a day perfectly to Allah.
15:40 But they also had Allat and Manat and Uzza, the other gods with God.
15:45 And Muhammad grew up in that society. And then Allah chose Muhammad, guided him
15:52 to the worship of God alone, and he gave him the message. So Muhammad started to
15:59 utter the message, worship God alone. What did they do? They were up in arms, they
16:04 attacked him, they persecuted him, and now they want to prove that he is fake, that
16:10 Muhammad is wrong. They don't want to know anything about the doctrine of the
16:15 message. They said let us go and prove that he doesn't know anything, he is not a
16:18 prophet, he is fake. That was their purpose. So they go to him and they say
16:24 listen Muhammad, how do you explain that the moon comes out at the beginning of
16:28 the month, thin, and rising early. And then every day gets bigger and later.
16:35 You know, they didn't know about the moon going around the earth or any of these things that we
16:39 know today. But every day in Saudi Arabia, in Mecca,
16:42 they wake up every morning and then at night
16:44 there comes the moon, and every day it's different. Until it becomes a full moon,
16:49 then it becomes smaller and later. And they went to Muhammad and said,
16:55 How do you explain that? What is their objective?
17:00 They didn't want to know about the phases of the moon.
17:03 They didn't really want to know if 239 is right or wrong.
17:07 They want to embarrass somebody and harass somebody and prove that he is fake,
17:11 he is fraud. They wanted to prove that Muhammad is fraud.
17:17 They didn't know about the phases of the moon.
17:22 They didn't want to know about the one God and the worship of God, and the Quran
17:33 was written before the creation of the heavens and the earth. But the Quran narrates that
17:40 story of the people who wanted the prophet Muhammad to prove that he is fake by asking
17:45 about the phases of the moon. What does this mean folks? This means
17:50 that these people are sitting peacefully somewhere and then God wanted them to do
17:53 something. And all of a sudden they were all picked
17:56 up and let's go prove that Muhammad is fake.
18:00 Actually God is doing that because the Quran is already written.
18:03 God was doing that because it serves the Muslim community.
18:08 It shows them who is who. And it brings things
18:15 It brings things to life, and forces certain issues.
18:21 Now I have repeated to them, I have talked to them...
18:31 What was I talking about?
18:38 Right, forces certain issues, that's right.
18:40 I have emphasized to them that my translation is an authorized translation.
18:45 And this of course burned them. And as you know I don't repeat this kind of
18:50 thing, I'm too embarrassed to say that. But this is the kind of thing that is
18:54 forced by these actions. What I'm saying is that God did it. Because it's
19:01 written in the Quran before they were born. So they were sitting in Mecca
19:05 somewhere, and all of a sudden they get the idea, let us go harass Rashad.
19:10 But it's not really their idea is it?
19:14 Of course they are good candidates for it.
19:17 So God wants to force different issues.
19:21 I am forced today in this khutbah to show you one reason,
19:26 one of the reasons why I think this translation is authorized.
19:30 And I wouldn't, I would normally be too embarrassed to mention it.
19:37 I mention it to a couple of you only.
19:42 But, it is this kind of confrontation that forces out certain issues.
19:48 I'm going to distribute this to you.
19:54 What I did is, I have examples of translations from their favorite translations, Abdullah Yusuf Ali's,
20:01 and Pickthall. Pickthall is one of their favorite translations.
20:05 And I'm going to compare one verse that they have in their translations and in my translation.
20:32 And then I will explain to you how I arrived at my translation, and why I think this translation
20:39 is authorized, and why it is. You know, I'm a chemist, I'm not an Al-Azhar graduate, I'm not an alim.
20:55 And my feeling when I started this project was, I have no business translating the Quran.
21:01 Does everybody have a copy? Share with each other.
21:04 There should be enough copies.
21:13 We're going to talk about the translation of verse
21:17 22:15, Surah Al-Hajj, verse 15.
21:21 And on the top you see the translation of Arberry.
21:24 He was a Harvard man, I think. Was he?
21:29 What's its... what's its name?
21:30 What's its name?
21:32 What's its name?
21:33 What's its name?
21:36 What's its name?
21:38 Cambridge.
21:41 He's a Cambridge professor.
21:42 And here's his translation of verse 15.
21:45 Whosoever thinks God will not help him in the present world and the world to come,
21:51 let him stretch up a rope to heaven, then let him sever it,
21:55 and behold whether his guile does away with what enrages him.
22:01 Okay? Now you know what to do.
22:05 If you don't think God will support you in this life and the hereafter,
22:08 you know what to do, don't you?
22:10 See, God told you in the Quran, and this is Arberry's translation,
22:15 just all you need is to place a rope to heaven,
22:19 and then sever it.
22:22 And then behold whether your guile does away with what enrages you.
22:27 This is Arberry's translation. Let's go to the next one. Yusuf Ali.
22:33 Next page is Abdullah Yusuf Ali. He says, if any think that God will not help him,
22:40 his apostle, in this world and the hereafter, let him stretch out a rope to the ceiling
22:47 and cut, parenthesis, himself, then let him see whether his plan will remove that which enrages, parenthesis, him.
22:56 See, now you know better.
23:01 This is what you do if you don't think, if you don't think that God will support him, his apostle, in this life and the hereafter.
23:10 Let's go to the next one. This is a very favorite translation.
23:15 Now we know what to do, right?
23:23 Is everybody holding the Pickthall translation?
23:26 It says, whoso, this needs some high intellectual pronunciation.
23:36 Whoso is wont to think, parenthesis, through envy, that Allah will not give him, parenthesis,
23:43 Muhammad, victory in the world and the Hereafter, and is enraged at the
23:49 thought of his victory, let him stretch a rope up to the roof of his dwelling and
23:54 let him hang himself. Then let him see whether his
24:05 strategy will tear away that which enrages him.
24:21 Now, this is a transgression against the doctrine. This is an invitation to commit suicide.
24:28 God is saying, according to Pickthall, "Go on and commit suicide."
24:35 This is my very favorite translation.
24:41 I must add here that this is the final edition of Pickthall's translation,
24:48 which they are comparing with our first edition of the translation.
24:53 This is the final edition. As you know brothers and sisters,
24:56 because we sit here every Friday to correct my first edition of the translation,
25:01 our first edition of the translation.
25:03 Which is by no means perfect, my goodness.
25:07 And we printed it cheaply and everything,
25:09 because we know that the final edition, if they are really fair,
25:14 they should compare my final translation with the Pickthall final translation.
25:20 Anyway, so this is what Pickthall says, now you know what to do.
25:25 The next translation is Sher Ali, published under the auspices of Hadrat Mirza Nasser Ahmed,
25:34 third successor of the Promised Messiah, and head of the Ahmadiyya movement in Islam.
25:41 There's idol worship right on the front page.
25:44 Whoso thinks that Allah will not help him,
25:48 parenthesis, the Prophet in this world and the Hereafter, let him, if he can, find
25:55 a way to heaven, and let him cut off the divine help. Then let him see if his
26:01 device can remove that which enrages him. So now you really know what to do.
26:10 Alright? Okay, now we go to, who's this? Muhammad Sarwar. Okay, another translation, the next page.
26:23 Those who thought that God would never grant victory to Muhammad, in this world,
26:30 Now, Muhammad is never in the Arabic text by the way, and it has nothing to do with the Prophet Muhammad,
26:36 but they translate everything in terms of Muhammad. He doesn't even bother to put it in parentheses.
26:43 But it is again from the beginning. Those who thought that God would never grant victory to Muhammad
26:48 in this world nor in the life Hereafter, parentheses, and now that he is victorious, parentheses,
26:55 should hang themselves by the necks from the ceiling, then cut the rope, cut the rope and see if this can do away with what has enraged them.
27:08 Enraged, why enraged?
27:11 Oh yeah, enraged them.
27:17 Now, now this is a, this is, we don't even, I mean, this breaks the doctrine of Islam,
27:23 of not committing suicide. Martha, can you tell me a little about this?
27:30 Okay, now let's go to the translation of Yours Truly here, and see if it makes sense.
27:38 If anyone thinks that God cannot support him in this life as well as in the
27:43 Hereafter, let him turn totally to God and sever his idolization towards anyone
27:49 else. He will then find out that this plan eliminates his worries. This is a solution
27:55 to any worries that you have in this world. And this should be consistent with
28:01 the doctrine of the Quran. If any one of us does not think that God can support us
28:07 here in this world and in the Hereafter, let us give Submission a trial. Let us turn
28:13 totally to God and cut out all idol worship from our lives. Then you will see
28:20 that all worries are gone. No more headaches, no more traffic tickets, no more
28:24 problems from the spouse, the wife, or the husband. Now how did I reach this translation?
28:38 And this is, well, I'm forced by circumstance to mention. I consider it one of the
28:44 signs that told me that this translation is authorized by God.
28:49 I do have permission to translate the Quran into English. What happened there?
28:56 It just happened that I started the translation back in St. Louis, and when I
29:03 came to this verse, I had finished the first 21 surahs, and it was 1971. And in my house I
29:14 had a huge table with all the tafsirs of the Quran and the translations. I had them
29:19 all on the table, spread open. I'd turn the page as I'd go with the translation.
29:25 I came to this verse, and I looked up the tafsirs, I found that the original mufassir, Ibn Kathir,
29:31 translated it, if you don't think that Muhammad would be victorious in this life
29:37 and the Hereafter, let him stretch a rope to the ceiling of his house and hang himself.
29:41 And everybody else took from him. And of course, it didn't make sense to me,
29:46 because it defies the doctrines and the laws of God that you shall not commit suicide,
29:53 you shall not kill anybody including yourself. So I left that verse blank. I am
30:01 saying this and God is my witness, I am saying it in a khutbah, a practice
30:08 of worship, and I'm responsible for it; every word in it is true. I left that
30:15 verse blank, and I went to verse 16. And I went on, and then I had to leave for
30:22 Hajj. Now, the title of this surah is Al-Hajj, The Pilgrimage. And I finished
30:30 like about 20 verses after that one.