Don't follow what you don't know about - Nouman Ali Khan
He (سُبْحَانَهُ وَ تَعَالَى) says,
(وَلَا تَقْفُ مَا لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ) QS Al Isra: 36
"Don't obsessively follow,
what you don't know anything about."
Don't become a follower of things,
you don't fully know.
Then He says,
"Hearing, seeing, and your exaggerated emotions,
your impassioned emotions,
are all going to be asked about."
(إِنَّ السَّمْعَ وَالْبَصَرَ وَالْفُؤَادَ)
(كُلُّ أُولَٰئِكَ كَانَ عَنْهُ مَسْئُولًا) QS Al Isra: 36
"And He makes a big deal all of them,"
-for those who are familiar with Arabic-,
even though they're ghaira 'aqil.
So, it's "Kullu tilka".
But He says, "(كُلُّ أُولَٰئِكَ)."
Tafkhiman.
He actually aggrandizes hearing is a big deal,
your perception is a big deal,
and how you feel is a big deal to Allah.
And He makes it a big deal by calling them,
(أُولَٰئِكَ كَانَ عَنْهُ مَسْئُولً) QS Al Isra: 36
So Allah is saying that this is a very important thing,
that will change your worldview essentially,
and how will you end up before Allah.
The beginning part,
don't follow what you don't know about.
There's some simple things
I wanna share with you about that,
besides our exposure to the Quran.
Of course in a religious sense,
we don't follow anything in the religion
unless we know about it ourselves.
Unless we can say with confidence
this is actually coming from Allah's own words,
or it's coming from the prophet's words (ﷺ).
The thing is,
just because something is in the Quran,
and you heard it.
You heard somebody says,
"This ayah's in the Quran. This is what it says."
Often times what we do nowadays
when we have discussions among each other.
The sad reality is,
the vast majority of us, including myself,
don't have much knowledge.
We don't know a lot.
We've heard snippets here and there.
We know a little bit of here, a little bit of there.
And we sometimes share things with each other
in order to advise one another.
And we'll quote an ayah,
we'll quote a hadith, and things like that.
But oftentimes,
we don't really know what the ayah and hadith
are actually talking about.
And we assume just because
we've heard a translation of the ayah,
or we kinda know what the ayah means.
It applies in this situation immediately.
Like for example,
somebody quotes a hadith at somebody else.
"You know, you should do this
because the Prophet (ﷺ) said this."
"Okay, where did he say?"
"Well, it's in Bukhari, it's sahih."
"Excellent, it's an authentic hadith, got it!"
"Who did he say it to?"
"When did he say it?"
"What else did he say about the subject?"
"How was this understood by the person he talked to?"
"What was their reaction after that?"
"Did they understand it exactly
the same way you're trying to make me understand it?"
"Or was there something you don't know?"
There are contexts,
there are larger stories.
You know, just like for example,
two of your friends are talking in the back,
and you walk by, and you hear one sentence.
One of the friends says to the other,
"I'm gonna kill you, bro."
And you just heard that part, "I am gonna kill you, bro."
And you walk away like this,
"I am gonna report this to the police
because this brother is gonna kill that brother."
It's a sahih, authentic recording.
It's true, he said it.
But he was just saying,
"I am gonna destroy you on the basketball court."
He was just saying,
"You better stop making fun of me before I push you, man."
He meant something else entirely, didn't he?
Context can change everything.
So just because you say,
"Look, it's there right there in the Book."
"That's what it says."
That doesn't mean you understand its context.
That's also speaking without knowledge.
That's also following something without fully knowing,
and that's dangerous.
That means you and I don't understand,
and that we're imposing it on somebody else,
and making their life more difficult.
So we should be careful, especially careful.
You know general advice about being patient,
or grateful,
and those kinds of things? Those are fine.
But then there are other things.
I'll give you one example of taking things out of context.
A mother came to me, very upset with her son.
Her son stopped praying,
and he was doing drugs, and drinking,
and you know, left the house,
and he was living with some girlfriend.
All kinds of sins, right?
So... and she's a very pious, religious woman,
and she is just traumatized constantly advising her son
until she gave up.
And she said, "You know, I told him, he is no longer my son."
"I find peace in my heart, that I said
that because... even Allah told Nuh (عليه السلام)."
(إِنَّهُ لَيْسَ مِنْ أَهْلِكَ ۖ إِنَّهُ عَمَلٌ غَيْرُ صَالِحٍ) QS Hud: 46
Nuh (عليه السلام), when he was on the ship,
and his son was still drowning,
and he said, "That's my family."
Allah said to him, "That's not your family."
He's no good basically.
So, she says, "Ya, well my son is no good."
So, I get to say what Nuh (عليه السلام) said.
"You're like my own mother,
sit down for a second."
"Have you been preaching to your son for 950 years?"
"And did Allah reveal to you
the license to say he's no longer your son?"
"Did He do that?"
"How long have you been having this problem?"
"For the last nine months."
"Oh ok, so you got about 949 years to go,
before you quote Nuh (عليه السلام)."
"Chill out Lady, that's still your son."
"You make du'a for him."
"It's frustrating but you don't get to do that."
"You don't get to pull an eye of the Quran,
and slap him with it, and say, 'I am done.'"
Nah, that's a crime.
That's, (وَلَا تَقْفُ مَا لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ) QS Al Isra: 36
Remember these words again,
(وَلَا تَكُونُوا كَالَّذِينَ قَالُوا سَمِعْنَا)
(وَهُمْ لَا يَسْمَعُونَ) QS Al-Anfal: 21
"Don't become like people who said they heard
but they didn't really listen."
They didn't really ponder.
This is why Allah says,
(أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ الْقُرْآنَ)
(أَمْ عَلَىٰ قُلُوبٍ أَقْفَالُهَا) QS Muhammad: 24
If you would remember nothing else from the khutbah,
just remember this part.
Allah (عَزَّ وَ جَلَّى) describes people who
don't think deeply about the Quran.
"Why don't they think deeply about the Quran?"
He says because they have locks on their heart.
Their own locks, (أَقْفَالُهَا).
Their own locks placed on their hearts.
Now, what does that mean?
That means you have a bias.
I have a bias.
There are some things that terrify me.
There's some things that make me really angry.
There's some things that I really wanna impose on my son,
or my daughter, or my spouse,
or my parents even.
I wanna argue with them and I wanna prove that I am right.
My heart is already locked,
that I am gonna prove them wrong.
Then I am gonna come to the word of Allah,
and find an ayah, find the hadith of the Prophet (ﷺ).
So I can quote it in their face,
so I can win their argument,
and get them to do things I want them to do.
I didn't come to Allah's book seeking Allah's pleasure,
I wanted to come to it to find the weapon
that I can use in my war of words.
This is a lock on the heart too.
That's a crime against Allah too.
Just because somebody's quoting ayah out of Quran,
or words of our beloved messenger (ﷺ),
doesn't mean they're not committing a crime.
This is also, (وَلَا تَقْفُ مَا لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ) QS Al Isra: 36
This is why Allah says,
your emotions will also be interrogated.
(وَالْفُؤَادَ كُلُّ أُولَٰئِكَ كَانَ عَنْهُ مَسْئُولًا) QS Al Isra: 36
Maybe because of your anger, because of your rage,
you started using the religious,
the secret words of Allah, for your own purposes.