So I have been doing a lot of thinking [shocker] after Brother Shiekh Abbas Virgee came to our masjid; specific to his lecture on Taqwa. For those of you who are not familiar with the concept Taqwa is being God-conscious. So one may think, "Okay, I believe in God, so obviously I'm performing Taqwa… but it goes much deeper than that. What does it mean to be conscious of God... to know that He is watching you. Now I feel that some may take this as “We need to be afraid of God”, but I look at it completely the opposite. I see it as yet another means to help build you’re relationship with God.
If we are ever in the middle of an unjust act and all of a sudden we think, “God is watching me” it will have some effect or another on us. I for one will definitely be stopped cold in the middle of whatever I was doing. Although that is a good thing, we shouldn’t be basing our relationship with God on fear. To base ones faith on a fear of God is a paradox. Where there is fear there is no faith. In order to really grasp Taqwa we must understand that our relationship with God should comprise of love and trust…
The love for God is where we are able to excel in our spiritual growth. Think for a moment, if our heart is not filled with love for God, then it is the playground for hate(work of the devil). This entire creation comes from God and when He created these things he instills in them a piece of him self. So if we really want to love God, we must learn to love His creation. Sounds simple enough, but it gets pretty hard. How do you love that person that stands for everything that you feel is wrong? How do you love that person who is always trying to find a way to put you down? That is jihad. That is love.
“For real Akbar… what the heck are you talking about? How are you supposed to love someone who just smacked you across the face?”
We are able to do this by being able to live in the present moment. This doesn’t mean that I won’t A) Stop him from doing it again OR B) Run. The thought is that we must live in the present moment and not let the past (albeit is only a few seconds ago) define us or what we are to do in the future. The only thing that we have is the present moment. You’re life will not be lived yesterday or lived tomorrow; it will only be lived right now. This is really opening a whole different can of worms that I will have to fiddle with later. (If this paragraph catches your interest I suggest you read this book called The Power of Now)
Throughout our lives we will come into situations where we will have the instinct to hate a person at one point or another. It is because of this that it is important to remember that we do not live here for this world but the next and by that it means that we are here to purify our souls. So often we will know what is right and what is wrong but we won’t go through with it. Our mind tells us to stay away from the bad act while our soul goes through and does whatever it pleases. The soul wants comfort and when the soul is uncomfortable is when its being purified. It is through the tough decisions in life that we are able to truly grow spiritually. My buddy 50 cent said it best “Sunny day’s wouldn’t be so special, if it wasn’t for rain.”… I don’t really like 50 that much incase you were wondering.
I will end with a quick synopsis about a incident that involved Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). He used to travel through a road every day, and every day a lady would dump her garbage on him. He never said anything to her but he would still keep going about his way. One day there was no garbage dumped on the Prophet (PBUH), and so he decided to go check on the lady to make sure she was in good health. He went into her house to find that she was ill. She on the other hand was completely surprised that some person on whom she would dump her garbage on, came to check on her health.. This is the type of love we should all strive for, to love our fellow human beings in such a manner is a great goal to work to.
Take care and let me know what YOU think.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Well said...
thank you akbar. "Although that is a good thing, we shouldn’t be basing our relationship with God on fear. "
What you said above might have been said too definatively. Fear is not merely a station that a believer passes and never again experiences, but instead he should integrate the Fear of God into his Love of God.
Props for the rest of the post.
I really enjoyed reading this, especially the antecdote on the end about the prophet.
I too have found that my personal relationship with God is not based on fear, although you make a good point about "God is watching", but it is more a relationship based on understanding.
Post a Comment