My dear brother in Islam, Muslims are the only people in the world today fortunate enough to possess the word of God preserved in its original form, free from all distortions, and precisely in the wording in which it was sent down upon the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him. Paradoxically, these same Muslims suffer the misfortune of being denied the countless blessings and benefits which the word of God promises to those who believe in it. The Qur'an was sent to them for them to read it, understand it, act upon it, and, with its help, establish on God's earth the rule of His law. The Qur'an came to grant them dignity and power. It came to make them true vicegerents or khalifah of God on earth. And history shows that whenever they acted according to its guidance, it did make them the leaders of the world [1]. Allah has made clear promises in the Quran: Had they observed the Torah and the Gospel and the other Books which had been sent down to them by their Lord, abundance would have been given to them from above and from beneath their feet. Though there are some among them who are righteous, most of them are evil-doers." (Quran Al Maidah: 66) "Indeed, We have sent down to you [O mankind] a book in which there is your honour and distinction [to the one who follows it]. Will you not then understand? "(Quran Al Anbiya: 10) If the Muslims nowadays are deprived of the blessings, honor, and distinction, does Allah neglect His promise or do we neglect our part of the promise? My dear brother in Islam, But now the Qur'an's usefulness, for many Muslims, consists only in keeping it in their houses to drive away jinns and ghosts, in writing its verses on amulets to hang round their necks or washing those amulets with water and then drinking it, or in reading its contents without comprehending their meaning in the hope of receiving some reward. Or just to memorize it and be called hafidz. Or to recite it beautifully to win a competition. No longer do they seek guidance from it for their lives. No longer do they ask it to tell them what should be their beliefs, morals and actions, nor how they should conduct transactions, what principles they should observe while dealing with enemies and friends, what the rights are of their fellow beings and of their own selves. Nor do they turn to it to find what is true and what is false, whom they should obey and whom disobey, who their friends and who their enemies are, where honour, well-being and success are to be found and where disgrace, failure and loss are to be avoided. We Muslims have given up looking for answers to these important questions in the Qur'an. Instead, we now ask Kafirs, idolators, misguided, contemporary research, selfish people, even our own ego and desires and follow what they advise. What always happens to those who ignore Allah and follow the opinions of others has happened to us too. We are reaping only what we have sown everywhere in the world. See your own country brothers! See Syria, see Egypt, see Palestine, see Middle East, see Pakistan, see Indonesia and see many other places! The Qur'an is the source of every good: it will give whatever and as much as you ask from it. If you seek from it such trivial, frivolous and spurious things as how to scare away jinns and ghosts, how to cure coughs and fevers or ruqyah, how to succeed in litigation and how to find a job or how to get money- then you may get them, but only them. If you seek supremacy on earth and the power to rule the world you may get that too. And if you wish to reach near God's Throne ('Arsh), the Qur'an will take you there. If you receive only a few drops from the ocean, do not blame the Qur'an, blame yourselves. For the whole ocean is there waiting for him who knows how to take it. The cruel jokes, brothers, which we Muslims play with the Holy Book of Allah are so absurd that if we saw someone else doing such things in any other sphere of life, we would mock them and even brand them as crazy or lunatics. Tell me, what would you say if somebody got a doctor's prescription and hung it round his neck after wrapping it in a piece of cloth or just put it in beautiful frame and display it in their house ? Would you not laugh at him and call him a fool? Yet this is the very treatment being given before your eyes to the matchless prescription written by the greatest of all doctors to provide a cure for all your ailments - and nobody laughs! No one even reflects that a prescription is not meant to be hung round the neck nor are its words just to be displayed at someone’s home just as what you would do with pictures. Tell me, what would you think if someone who was ill picked up a book on medicine and began to read it while he did not understand any words in it? And yet he was believing that this would cure him? Would you not say that he was irrational? Yet this is how we treat the Book which the supreme Healer has sent for the cure of our diseases: diseases in ourselves and diseases in our society. We think that just by flicking through all its pages, or finishing one khatam in Ramadan, our diseases will disappear without our following the directions given in them or abstaining from the things which they pronounce harmful. Are we not in the same situation as the man who considers that reading a book on medicine will cure his illness? If you for example, fell in love with a woman not from your country, and you receive a love letter from her in a language you do not know, for sure you will go to a man who knows the language to find out what she says. You remain anxious and restless until you have found out what the letter says, even though it will bring only some trivial worldly profit. But the love letter sent to you by the Most Merciful which can bring you all the benefits of this-world and the Eternal Life is carelessly set aside. You do not show any uneasiness at not understanding its contents. Is this not astonishing? "O mankind, there has come to you the Admonition from your Lord: this is the remedy for the diseases of the heart, and guidance and blessing for those who believe in it. O Prophet, say, "It is the bounty of Allah and His mercy that He has sent this thing: let the people rejoice over it for it is better than what they amass"(Quran Surah Yunus: 57) 2nd khutba O you who have believed, fear Allah and be with those who are the truthful (at-taubah: 119) My dear brothers! The Quran is still the Book of Allah, God's guidance for humanity, minutely preserved since the time of its revelation. If the Muslims would turn the Quran and receive its guidance, they would receive blessings in both this life and the Hereafter. It has become a very sad state of affairs, but for many of today's estimated one billion Muslims, there is a barrier between them and the Quran. It is not a physical barrier. Most Muslims are free to open the Quran and read its pages, as probably most do. No, the barrier is a much more dangerous barrier than a physical barrier because many Muslims do not perceive that the barrier even exists. The barrier is a barrier between the heart of the individual and the Quran, between the person's actions and the teachings of the Quran, between his aspirations and dreams in this life and what Allah is calling him to in both this life and Hereafter, between his way of life and culture and the straight path described in the Quran. Again, this is the most dangerous barrier because the person may not perceive it. He has the Quran in his house; he puts it in the most honorable place in the house; and he will even swear profusely to his belief in it. Yet the Quran does not guide him; he is not being moved by the Quran; when he leaves his house or the mosque, he does not act according to its commands nor does he judge and see things in its light. Many people lecture and write about what is wrong with the Muslim nation and what needs to be done. Many such people have even pointed out that "the Muslims need to return the Quran” or “live with Quran” but some of them fail to note or explain what is really meant by "return to the Quran." The individual Muslim who reads the Quran may not see why he is missing the guidance of the Quran and he might argue that there is no need for him "to return the Quran" because, he thinks, he has never strayed from the Quran. In reality, there is a need for the Muslim nation as a whole to return to the Quran. Any quick glance at the Muslim world will quickly reveal that the governments and the masses as a whole are not applying the Quran and, in fact, many of them actually have no idea what the guidance of the Quran is all about. For many, the Quran is simply a book to be read as an act of devotion or worship. Others see it as a book simply explaining the existence of a Creator or book about scientific facts and miracles and so on. [2] Among the greatest barriers of Muslim and the Quran is preference of secondary over the primary goal of the Quran. Although it is beneficial to use the Quran as protection against evil, and it is also a desirable deed to memorize and recite Quran in beautiful voice, the problem occurs when these goals are all what we want to get from the Quran. [2] Now we come to the most important questions: What are the major goals of the Quran? Let the Quran gives us the answer: Alif, Lam, Meem. This is the Book about which there is no doubt, a guidance for those conscious of Allah (Quran Al Baqarah:1-2) Light has come to you from Allah and the Book which guides to the Truth, whereby Allah leads to the paths of peace those who seek His pleasure and brings them out of the depths of darkness into the Light by His grace and guides them towards the Right Way (Quran Al Maidah:15-16) Look carefully at the ayah. We are reciting al-fatihah 17 times a day at least in our prayer. We ask Allah, “Ihdina as shiroothol mustaqiim” or “Guide us to the Right Way.” And in this ayah Allah tells us that this Book or Quran is the mean by which He guides us to the straight Path. So in one way, we can say that “Ihdina as shiroothol mustaqiim” means guide us to correctly applying Al Quran in our lives. This is the major goal of the Quran: Guidance. In old Arabic, the word Huda or guidance meaning a direction to someone who lost in a desert [3]. To someone who is lost in the desert, guidance is the most important thing he needs. He can survive with water and food, but does he really want his life to end in the desert? Nay, he must want to get into his destination. Humankind in a sense also lost in this world. Humanity needs guidance. But where to go? Where is the destination? If we do not know where we want to go, then every path and every guidance is the same. This is the prerequisite of receiving guidance from Quran. In Al Baqarah Allah states: Al Quran is guidance for al muttaqin. In Al-Maidah Allah says: Al Quran is guidance to those who seek His pleasure. Who is al-muttaqin? Who is the one who seeks Alah pleasure? Al Quran answers: “Who believe in the unseen, establish prayer, and spend out of what We have provided for them, And who believe in what has been revealed to you, [O Muhammad], and what was revealed before you, and of the Hereafter they are certain (Quran Al Baqarah 2-4) In the desert of this Life, Al Quran is the guidance to arrive at the destination which every believers strive: Paradise and Allah’s Pleasure. That is why Allah always mention Al-Quran as guidance only for specific people, which are the believers. The people that does not believe in Allah may take money as their destination, and will take materialism as their Huda. Other group may take sexual pleasure as their destination, and will take immorality as their Huda. Other group may take power as their destination, and will take politics and warfare as their Huda. But those group of people will realize that never will they reach their destination. When the grip of death is just upon them, they will realize that it is only a mirage in which they are chasing their entire life. Is there ever any success to those who never achieves their destination? Contrast this! Contrast this brother, with the believers who stand upon Al Quran, the only people who will achieve the true success. Those are upon [right] guidance from their Lord, and it is those who are the successful." (Quran Al Baqarah: 5)
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