"Surely, the true religion in Allah's sight is Islam" (3:19)
A Musalli of a certain Masjid, who previously had been attending salaah in congregation regularly, stopped going.� After a few weeks, the Imaam decided to visit him. It was a chilly evening. The Imaam found the man at home alone, sitting before a blazing fire. Guessing the reason for the Imaam’s visit, the man welcomed him, led him to a big chair near the fireplace and waited. The Imaam made himself comfortable but said nothing. In the grave silence, he
Read moreThere was a farmer who grew superior quality, award-winning corn in his farm. Each year, he entered his corn in the state fair where it won honors and prizes. One year a newspaper reporter interviewed him and learned something interesting about how he grew his corn. The reporter discovered that the farmer shared his seed corn with his neighbours. “How can you afford to share your best seed corn with your neighbours when they are entering corn in the competition
Read moreLong ago in the city of Baghdad, there was a Muslim empire. On one side of the River Tigris were the royal palaces and on the other side was the city. The Muslims were gathered in the Royal Palace when an athiest approached them. He said to them, ‘I don’t believe in God, there cannot be a God, you cannot hear Him or see Him, you’re wasting your time! Bring me your best debator and I will debate this issue
Read moreOne night Sultan Mahmood Ghaznawi went walking among his subjects after taking off his royal clothes and putting on ordinary clothes. He chanced to come upon a group of thieves who were consulting amongst themselves. On seeing him they asked: “Who are you?” The King (Sultan) replied: “I am also one like yourselves.” They understood that to mean that he was also a thief like themselves and allowed him to join their company. They then continued the conversation amongst themselves
Read moreShaykh Sa’eed ibn Musfir narrates the following account: I was walking out of the Haram (the Ka’bah in Makkah) when I saw a man begging from everyone that passed by him. Just then a man who had parked his tinted Mercedes excessively close to the Haram in a designated VIP parking walked passed the beggar on his way to his car. As he pulled the keys out and the alarm did the ‘whup whup’, the beggar raised his finger to
Read moreby Muhammad Al-Shareef I was a teacher in the Qur’anic study circle at our neighborhood Masjid at the time. I would see this young boy after Maghrib prayers, you might say he was about fifteen years old. He held a pocket Qur’an and sat alone reading from it – no, he wasn’t actually reading from it, he was just trying to make it seem as if he was. Now and again, he would shyly steal a few glances at us,
Read moreAn incident once took place when a student of Knowledge was taking a walk with his teachers in one of the gardens of their Madrassah. During this walk, the student decided to address a problem he was facing and seek its remedy from his teacher. He began to tell his teacher, ‘I have a spiritual ailment; I am habitual of talking ill of others and mentioning matters about them behind their backs.’ The teacher carried on walking for a moment
Read moreA king was once passing along his way when he saw some animal droppings. And he saw some worms in those droppings. The thought came to his mind that there is no purpose behind the creation of these worms. They are useless, with no real job. Very soon thereafter he lost his eyesight. Being rich, he spent thousands of rands trying different treatments to restore his eyesight. All to no avail. Then it was mentioned to him that a certain
Read moreChuan and Jing joined a wholesale company together just after graduation. Both worked very hard. After several years, the boss promoted Jing to sales executive but Chuan remained a sales rep. One day Chuan could not take it anymore, tender resignation to the boss and complained the boss did not value hard working staff, but only promoted those who flattered him. The boss knew that Chuan worked very hard for the years, but in order to help Chuan realise the
Read moreZun-Noon relates, whilst I was walking the mountains of Intakia I saw a girl who looked insane, wearing a gown made out of wool. I greeted her with Salaam. She replied accordingly and then said, “Are you Zun-Noon?” I replied, “How did you recognise me?” She replied, “Through Allah’s recognition”. She then asked, “What is generosity?” I replied to her, “To give”. She added, “That is in regards to worldly things. What is it in regards to Deen?” I replied,
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