True Oaths in Islam
And when My servants ask you concerning Me, then surely I am very near; I answer the prayer of the suppliant when he calls on Me, so they should answer My call and believe in Me that they may walk in the right way. [Al-Baqarah, 2: 187]
Islam teaches man to address
his Creator directly. There is no need to use any intermediary. There is no
need to go through creatures to join the Creator. It is on earth that man uses
this means to reach another person like him. For example, to join a Minister,
you have to make an appointment with his secretary and then later you join him
[i.e. the Minister].
This is the way [of doing] of man. But talking with Allah is so easy that you just have to call on Him, and He will answer your call. If someone offers a sacrifice (e.g. an ox, a hen etc.) to others besides Allah, he is committing Shirk. He has no right to say: “I am doing this sacrifice on the name of such Pir or such Saint.” It’s Shirk.
Hazrat Ali (ra)
narrated that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) said four things: “Allah cursed him
who sacrificed for anyone besides Allah; and cursed him who accommodated an
innovator; and Allah cursed him who cursed his parents and Allah cursed him who
changed the boundary lines (of the land possessed by him).” (Muslim)
Hazrat Tariq bin Shihab
(ra) narrated that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) said: “A man entered Paradise
because of a fly, while another entered the Fire because of a fly.”
They asked: “How was
that possible, O Messenger of Allah?”
He replied: “Two men
passed by a people who had an idol, which it was not permissible for anyone to
pass without making a sacrifice to it. They (the people) said to the first man:
“Sacrifice (something).”
He said: “I have
nothing with which to do so.”
They said: “Sacrifice
some-thing, even if it were only a fly,” and so he did so, and they allowed him
to continue on his way and so he entered the Hell-fire.
Then they said to the
second man: “Sacrifice (something).”
But he said: “I will
not sacrifice anything unless it be to Allah, the Almighty, the All-powerful,”
so they struck his neck (and he died) and entered Paradise.” (Ahmad).
The Shirk is like a
black ant on a black rock in complete darkness [blackness], which means we have
to take a lot of care that we don’t fall into Shirk. Many times we let
certain words come out without us thinking about its gravity and we can fall
into Shirk without realizing it. There are certain Shirk sayings
which are becoming customs among a good number of people in this Ummah.
1.
I
swear on my child’s head!
2.
I
swear upon the Messenger of Allah!
3.
I take
an oath; [see] the light upon my head!
4.
I take
an oath; [Look] matches are in my hand!
5.
I take
an oath; [Look] there is fire (cigarette) in my hand!
6.
I take
an oath; [Look] the sun is upon my head!
And then it’s good that
I bring out that there is a misconception that has been planted in this
community regarding taking oath on the Quran. When there is a dispute or
misunderstanding and mistrust among the people [i.e. the Muslims], they say: “Bring
the Quran, I will swear upon it!”
Quran itself is a book
sent by the Creator; a book that comes from Allah. So if anyone who has faith
has to take an oath, let him do it on Allah ALONE.
In the same way we have
no right to take a thing that He [Allah] created to make an oath, such as the
moon, sun, fire etc. Only Allah has the right to use anything He has created to
take an oath.
Example: “By the fig and the olive, and Mount Sinai, and this
secure city [i.e. Mecca]!” (At-Tin 95: 2-4)
A creature [of Allah]
does not have the right to swear [make an oath] on another creature. If he has
to take an oath, let him do it by [on] Allah only. The Arabs in the time of the
Prophet (pbuh) used to take an oath on their ancestors (their father, the
father of their father, the father of their grandfather, etc.)
The Holy Prophet (pbuh)
forbade you to do so but he taught you [us all] to take oath on Allah. Ibn Umar
(ra) narrated that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) said: “Allah forbids you to swear
by your fathers. If one has to take an oath, he should swear by Allah”. (Bukhari)
Hazrat Muadh bin Jabal (ra)
narrated that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) said: “O Mu’adh, do you know what is
the right of Allah upon His servants, and what is the Right of His servants
upon Allah?” I said: “Allah and His Messenger know better.” Upon this the
Messenger of Allah (pbuh)
said, “Allah’s Right upon His servants is that they should worship Him Alone
and associate nothing with Him; and His servants’ right upon Him is that He
should not punish who does not associate a thing with Him.” (Bukhari)
Hazrat Abu Said Al
Khudri (ra) narrated: A man heard another man reciting: Surat-ul-Ikhlas (The
Unity) ‘Say: He is Allah, the One’ (Chapter 112) and he was repeating
it. The next morning he came to Allah’s Messenger (pbuh) and mentioned the
whole story to him as if he regarded the recitation of that Surah as
insufficient On that, Allah’s Messenger (pbuh) said, “By Him in Whose Hand
my soul is! That (Chapter 112) equals one-third of the Quran.” (Bukhari)
There are companions of
the Prophet (pbuh) whose hearts were attached with this Surah (Al-Ikhlas) to
such an extent that they did not fail to recite this Surah in all their
prayers. And in this Surah, Allah let us know His quality. See its value [i.e.,
the value of this Surah]? A third of the Quran! See how much Allah rewards us
when we recognize His uniqueness and we do not commit Shirk!
ALL
PROPHETS PREACHED TAWHEED
All prophets whom Allah
has sent on earth have preached Tawheed. They all warned their people against
that sin, i.e. Shirk.
“And
indeed We have already sent forth in every nation a Messenger (saying), ‘Worship
Allah and avoid the Taghut.’ (i.e., Satan, false gods, all that is not Allah).’” [An-Nahl 16: 37]
If today we see people
falling into Shirk, in the past also it was like this. This is why Allah
has sent in every community a prophet to remove people from this sin which is
called Shirk. The prophets had great difficulty in preaching Tawheed.
But they all came with that same message to give to their people.
About Prophet Nuh (as)
on what he said to his people: “Indeed, We sent Noah to his people. He said,
‘O my people! Worship Allah—you have no other god except Him. I truly fear for you
the torment of a tremendous Day.’” (Al-Araf 7: 60).
About Prophet Hud (as)
on what he said to his people: “To the people of
'Ad We sent their brother, Hud. He said, ‘My people, worship Allah: you have no
god other than Him. Will you not take heed [be god-fearing, pious, take the
path of Allah]?’” (Al-Araf 7: 66).
About Prophet Salih
(as) on what he said to his people: “To the people of Thamud We sent their
brother, Salih. He said, ‘My people, worship Allah: you have no god other than
Him.’” (Al-Araf 7: 74).
About Prophet Shuaib
(as) on what he said to his people: “And to the
people of Midian We sent their brother Shu’aib. He said, “O my people! Worship
Allah—you have no other god except Him.’” (Al-Araf 7: 86).
About Prophet Ibrahim
(as) on what he said to his people: “And (remember) when Ibrahim said to his
people, ‘Worship Allah, and fear Him. This is better for you, if only you knew.’”
(Al-Ankabut 29: 17).
As for the Holy Prophet
Muhammad (pbuh), he came with the same message but for all humanity [not just
for one people].
In the Quran, Allah
commanded him to say: “O mankind, I am the
Messenger of Allah to you all, from Him who has control over the heavens and
the earth. There is no god but Him; He gives life and death, so believe in
Allah...” (Al-Araf 7: 159).
Now it is the duty of
every believer to preach the message of Islam, to teach others Tawheed. But
above all there is the need for that believer to understand well the meaning of
Tawheed and to stay away from all kinds of Shirk that people are
falling prey to [delving deep into Shirk], day by day.
TAWHEED is this very path that leads to salvation. Any
misconception we hold or hear regarding Shirk vis-à-vis Allah, we should
take great care so that we do not deviate [from Allah, from the right path].
Much falsehood has been said about Allah. There are some kinds of people who
say that Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) knew the Ghayb (the Invisible). To respond to
such a thought, I quote in front of you a portion of a Hadith found in Bukhari,
where Hazrat Aisha (ra) said: “…Whoever tells you that Muhammad [pbuh] saw his
Lord, is a liar.” Then Aisha (ra) recited the Verse: ‘No vision can grasp
Him, but His grasp is over all vision. He is the Most Courteous Well-Acquainted
with all things.’ (Bukhari)
Someone who commits
Shirk (in other words, a Mushrik) is someone who is has gone astray. He’s a
loser. See how Allah compares someone who has committed Shirk! So…
“Be true
[in faith] to Allah, and never assigning partners to Him: if anyone assigns
partners to Allah, is as if he had fallen from heaven and been snatched up by
birds, or the wind had blown him to a far-off place.” (Al-Hajj 22: 32)
Man should not forget the aim of his creation. Allah says in the Quran: “I have created jinns and men only so that they worship Me.” [Az-Zariyat 51: 57]
The Prophet (pbuh)
prophesised: “Indeed the Jews split into seventy-one sects, the Christians
into seventy-two sects and this [my] Ummah will split into seventy-three sects.
All of them will be in the Fire except for one sect.” He said: “And
which is it O Messenger of Allah?” He said: “That which I and my Companions are
upon today.” [Reported by Tirmidhi, Ibn Majah and Abu Dawud in several
versions]
The group that will
succeed is that group that will follow Islam like the prophet (pbuh) and his
companions lived it in the past. That is to say, they grabbed the rope of ‘Tawheed’
very firm. It is this same Tawheed which has been lived and preached by
all the prophets, Adam (as), Ibrahim (as), Nuh (as), Moussa (as), Isa (as),
etc., and Muhammad (pbuh).
Let us pray that Allah
will place us in this group that will be saved from hellfire, and cause us to
die on Tawheed. Insha-Allah, Ameen.
---Friday Sermon of 15 April 2022 ~12 Ramadan 1443 AH delivered by Imam- Jamaat Ul Sahih Al Islam International Hazrat Khalifatullah Al Muhyi-ud-Din Munir A. Azim (aba) of Mauritius.