Tafakkur, the Forgotten Worship Assalamualaykum wa rahmatullah wa barakaatuh نَّ اللَّهَ وَمَلَائِكَتَهُ يُصَلُّونَ عَلَى النَّبِيِّ ۚ يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا صَلُّوا عَلَيْهِ وَسَلِّمُوا تَسْلِيمًا اَللَّهُمَّ صَلِّ عَلَى مُحَمَّدٍ وَعَلَى آلِ مُحَمَّدٍ كَمَا صَلَّيْتَ عَلَى إِبْرَاهِيْمَ وَعَلَى آلِ إِبْرَاهِيْمَ، إِنَّكَ حَمِيْدٌ مَجِيْدٌ. وَبَارِكْ عَلَى مُحَمَّدٍ وَعَلَى آلِ مُحَمَّدٍ كَمَا بَارَكْتَ عَلَى إِبْرَاهِيْمَ وَعَلَى آلِ إِبْرَاهِيْمَ، إِنَّكَ حَمِيْدٌ مَجِيْدٌ Indeed, in the creation of the heavens and the earth and the alternation of the night and the day are signs for people of understanding. Who remember Allah while standing or sitting or [lying] on their sides and contemplate on the creation of the heavens and the earth, [saying], "Our Lord, You did not create this aimlessly; How Perfect are You; then protect us from the punishment of the Fire. (Ali Imran 190-191) My dear brother in Islam Our Prophet SAW is soft-hearted, he usually cried when he SAW heard Quran verses. However, do you know which verses made our Prophet SAW cry the most? Is it verses about the challenge and hardships of dawah? Is it verses about jihaad? Is it verses about war? Or is it verses about delight of paradise, or the punishment of hell-fire? Let us listen to this very amazing hadeeth to find the answer. Ibn Marduwyah recorded that `Ata' said, "I, Ibn `Umar and `Ubayd bin `Umayr went to `A'ishah and entered her room, and there was a screen between us and her. She said, `O `Ubayd! What prevents you from visiting us' He said, `What the poet said, `Visit every once in a while, and you will be loved more.' Ibn `Umar said, `Tell us about the most unusual thing you witnessed from the Messenger of Allah.' She cried and said, `All his matters were amazing. One night, he came close to me until his skin touched my skin and said, `Let me worship my Lord.' I said, `By Allah I love your being close to me. I also love that you worship your Lord.' He used the water-skin and performed ablution, but did not use too much water. He then stood up in prayer and cried until his beard became wet. He prostrated and cried until he made the ground wet. He then laid down on his side and cried. When Bilal came to alert the Prophet for the Dawn prayer, he said, `O Messenger of Allah! What makes you cry, while Allah has forgiven you your previous and latter sins' He said, وَيْحَكَ يَا بِلَالُ، وَمَا يَمْنَعُنِي أَنْ أَبْكِيَ، وَقَدْ أُنْزِلَ عَلَيَّ فِي هذِهِ اللَّيْلَة (May Allah be Merciful to you O Bilal! What can prevent me from crying, when this night, this Ayah was revealed to me,) إِنَّ فِى خَلۡقِ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٲتِ وَٱلۡأَرۡضِ وَٱخۡتِلَـٰفِ ٱلَّيۡلِ وَٱلنَّہَارِ لَأَيَـٰتٍ۬ لِّأُوْلِى ٱلۡأَلۡبَـٰبِ (Verily, in the creation of the heavens and the earth, and in the alternation of night and day, there are indeed signs for men of understanding.) وَيْلٌ لِمَنْ قَرَأَهَا وَلَمْ يَتَفَكَّرْ فِيهَا (Woe to he who recites it but does not contemplate it.) My dear brother in Islam, The verses that makes our Prophet SAW cry the most is the verses that tell us about the sign of Allah reflected in the creation of the Heaven and the Earth. The verses that makes our Prophet SAW cried in his qiyam, sujud, and lying down is the verses that commands us to do tafakkur, or contemplation. The verses that command us to think. "Our Lord, You did not create this aimlessly” Hadzaa, meaning “this” in this phrase also means closeness, in the sense that those people really observe in close Allah creation, scrutiny it, and contemplate over it. “Subhanak,” Glory to You yaa Allah. You are free from any imperfection. Everything you create is perfect. [And] who created seven heavens in layers. You do not see in the creation of the Most Merciful any inconsistency. So return [your] vision [to the sky]; do you see any breaks? Then return [your] vision twice again. [Your] vision will return to you humbled while it is fatigued. (Al Mulk 3-4) Which one weights more? Hundred tasbeeh merely uttered by tongue or this one tasbeeh expressed after contemplating Allah creation? Subhanallah. My dear brother in Islam, This contemplation that everything is created with purpose, including themselves, make them ask, “Why am I created in this world? For playing and partying? For only living to wait my death? Do I really come and go without anything to do?” Their answer is “No,” because nothing is created in vain. Then they contemplate, “I am created with certain purpose, and I am also created with free will to choose what I do, and in this world I don’t see direct consequences of my action. But if I am created with a purpose, and I have free will, then it is very fair and logical that in some point, I will be asked about what I choose.” “If I only see this world, I see injustice and imperfection of the consequences of actions. And this injustice is contradictory to the perfection of Your creation, yaa Allah. This means You must put the justice not in this world, but in the world after. The questioning and compensation day is not in this world, there must be a day after this, when everybody gets recompensed for what they do.” On the Day when every soul will come debating for himself, and every soul will be fully compensated for what it did, and they will not be wronged (An-Nahl: 111) On this day the justice will be perfect, as perfect as Your Creation of the Heaven and the Earth, yaa Allah. Their realization that judgment day truly exists, is reflected in their duaa then protect us from the punishment of the Fire 2nd khutba Alhamdulillah. Wassalaatu wassalaamu ‘alaa ‘ibaadihilladziina sthofaa Muhammadin wa ‘alaa aalihii wa ashabihi wa man tabi’ahu ilaa yaumid diin. you who have believed, fear Allah and be with those who are the truthful (at-taubah: 119) My dear brother in Islam, Do you know which worship is first commanded to our Prophet SAW? Do you know which sunnah that our Prophet SAW do in the beginning of Islam? Do you know what was our Prophet SAW doing in the cave of Hira, in the night of Ramadan, when the first revelation came down? The first revelation that will change the world forever Read! in the name of your Lord who created (Al Alaq : 1)
My dear brother in Islam, The sunnah which our Prophet SAW did in the Ramadan, in the beginning of his prophethood is none other than “tafakkur” or “contemplation”. He SAW thinks about Allah creation, he thinks about the purpose of life, and he thinks of how to change oppression and injustice spread among his people and the world. And in the serene night of Ramadan, under full moon of 17th, in the darkness of the night, came the first revelation, and the first command of Allah to mankind. Read! Learn! Is the first command of Allah to mankind. It is the first worship that Allah commands us to do. In the revelation “Read! in the name of your Lord who created” Allah also gives us subtle command to read onto everything that He created. Allah asks us to observe, examine, and scrutiny His creation like we can examine closely the writing in a book. And this is exactly what we are doing now in this university. My dear brother in Islam, The wording of the verse, “Read! in the name of your Lord who created” also implies the entanglement or close relationship between contemplation (fikr) and remembrance of Allah (zikr). In fact, this entanglement already can be traced back from history when Muslim built libraries and universities alongside a Mosque. See the mosque in Baghdad! See the mosque in Damascus! See Mosque Al-Aqsa! see the Mosque of Cordoba, Granada, and Seville! In fact, old university like Oxford and Cambridge copy pasted the building structure and education system from the muslim world! In the very same place where people pray and remember Allah, you can always see the scenery of discussion, learning, and research. See this close relationship between learning and remembrance of Allah. Dear my brother in Islam, The very purpose of learning is to remember Allah. It has the same purpose of Salah. That’s why our predecessors don’t separate between the two. The separation between the two has led to secularism in the West, and Sufism in the East. And none of them achieve the science and moral culmination like the Golden Muslim Era, when learning and praying is like two side of a coin. Because the purpose of knowledge is to remember Allah, it does not matter if you study fiqh or tafseer or you study history, astronomy, or physics. In fact, the people of understanding as mentioned in Surah Ali Imran come to believe after contemplation about the world, in other word, after contemplation of natural science. If you learn and research something, don’t forget that your purpose is ultimately to remember Allah and Glory His Perfection, so that your learning will have the value of worship of Ulul Albab. Dear my brother in Islam, Ramadan is coming closer. We have less than two weeks left. Let me remind myself and all of you that the worship of tafakkur is also the sunnah of our Prophet SAW. And he SAW usually does it in the night of Ramadan. Take your quran, read and memorize one or two verses, and then contemplate upon it deeply. Remember what you study here in the university, and how it can relate you to the Perfection of Allah’s Creation. Let us revive this first worship revealed to us from Allah, let us revive this worship that once makes Islam the Leader of the World, and insya Allah in the future bi idznillah. May Allah make us among ulil albab, people of understanding Let us pray together for our goodness, Ya Allah, Iyyaka na’budu wa iyyaka nasta’in. Only to You we worship and only to You we ask for help. Ya Allah, make us, our parent, our children, our wives, and our brothers among the people of understanding, and make us among the dwellers of paradise.
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