Captioning provided by MUHSEN (www.muhsen.org)
When you came into this world,
you came in with Adhan and no Salah
When you leave this world,
you leave with Salah and no Adhan.
And it's as if to say that your entire life
is like the time between Adhan and Salah.
And SubhanAllah when you were in the womb
of your mother with the same stroke
the angel wrote your date of death and your lifespan.
And so, as you were coming into this world
you were already on your way out of it.
And it is a profound reminder
for us to constantly pray until we are prayed upon
as we come into the short life and we leave the short life.
Salat Al-Janazah is a right of the Muslim upon the Muslim.
It is a way of us to bid farewell
to our loved ones and to remind ourselves
that we too, will follow that same path one day.
And the wise person is the one that puts
their own Janazah in front of them and lives their life
in accordance with that Salat Al-Janazah.
The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam taught us to pray the
Janazah with a very unique formula.
We go into Salat Al-Janazah and we read four takbeerat.
After the first takbeer, we recite Surah Al-Fatiha.
After the second takbeer, we recite Salawat
on the Prophet Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam.
The way that we would in Salat al-Ibrahimiya
is a preferred way
Allahuma salli ala Muhammadin wa ala aali Muhammad
Kama sallaita a'la Ibrahim wa ala aali Ibrahim
Innaka hamidum majid
until the end of the salawat and the prayer.
And then you do the third takbeer,
and you recite Dua for the deceased.
And one of the ways that is legislated
from the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam is the du'a.
Allahummaghfirli hayyina wa mayyitina, wa shahidina,
wa ghaeebina, wa sagheerina, wa kabeerina,
wa dhakarina wa unthana
O Allah, forgive our living ones, our dead ones,
our present ones, our absent ones,
our elderly ones, our young ones,
our male ones, our female ones.
allahumma mann ahyaytahu minna fa'ahyihi alal islam
wa mann tawaffaytahu minna fatawaffahu alal imaan.
O Allah, whoever you have decreed to live amongst us
then let them live upon faith.
And whoever you have decreed to take from us,
then let them die upon faith.
So we make this du'a that the
Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam
taught us to make, and then we make du'a
on the deceased in a heartfelt way, in a sincere way,
in this short takbeer to takbeer.
After the fourth takbeer,
you make du'a for yourself, for the ummah
And if you'd like,
you could even continue to make du'a for the deceased,
one of the ways that some of the scholars mentioned.
Allahumma laa tahrimna ajrahu wa laa tudillana ba'da
O Allah, do not forbid us of the reward
and do not let us go astray after him.
And then there is a tasleem,
either one tasleem or two tasleems
which we'll talk about In Shaa Allah in a minute.
But I want us to just think about this,
why do we recite what we recite in Salat Al-Janazah?
And the scholars mentioned a few reasons.
One of them is that if you pay attention,
it is basically the Salah shortens,
the way you begin your Salah is with
Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen
and then Surat Al Fatiha, the way you end your Salah
is with salawat on the Prophet Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam.
So that's one way that the scholars mentioned the reasoning
for which we pray Janazah in this way.
Another thing that the scholars mentioned
is that what are the ingredients of an accepted du'a?
An accepted du'a has what?
Hamd: Praise of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala
and then it ends with salawat
on the Prophet Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam.
And so, the Salat Al-Janazah has the perfect formula of du'a
by assuring that we have praise and that we have prayers
upon the Prophet Sallallahu Alayhi Wasallam
before we pray upon our loved ones and the ummah as a whole.
So you have that.
And that's also why some of the scholars mentioned
that there is one tasleem, according to some of the schools,
because it is not a complete Salah.
Now, obviously if you're praying Janazah behind someone,
then you will do what they do In Shaa Allah.
So it's not a problem if they do one tasleem
or if they do two tasleems.
Now, I wanna speak about Janazah
as a right of the Muslim on the Muslim, okay?
Because this is a community right.
And we often don't think of it that way.
The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said,
"The rights of a Muslim upon the Muslim are five."
He SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said,
to respond to the salaam. And what did
the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam say is one the signs
of the day of judgment, that people only say Salaam
to those that they know.
Okay, so it's no longer a greeting between the Muslims,
it's a greeting for the cliques amongst the Muslims.
And so you neglect those.
It's as if, to say, if you don't have something added
to your being a Muslim, then you don't deserve my salaam.
The second thing the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said
is visiting the sick.
And I know that in the midst of a pandemic,
that becomes complicated,
but in regular times, I want you to think
about how neglected this Sunnah is,
a visiting sick people.
Not because you have to, not because they're your family,
not because you're expected to
because of some closeness that they have to you,
but just for the sake of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala.
Going and visiting the sick
and comforting them and making du'a for them,
that is a beautiful community practice.
That is one of the neglected Sunnah,
the neglected practices of our time.
The third thing, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said
is, following the Janazah.
Okay, so think of it in light
of the previous two that I mentioned,
that you pray Janazah and you bury the person properly,
that you attend the Janazah and you follow the Janazah.
Then the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said
that you accept their invitations.
Who do we usually accept invitations from?
Who do we usually invite?
Right, people of a certain class
or people of a certain connection.
The fifth thing, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam
said, that you respond to their sneeze.
When someone sneezes and they say, Alhamdullilah
you say Yarhamuk Allah, may Allah have mercy on you.
So it is a right.
And it is not something that should be deemed
only necessary when someone is significant.
And even if you move away
from the technical part of it, right?
Salat Al-Janazah is Fard Kifaya,
it has to be done by someone,
it's a communal obligation, not Fard Ayn,
not an obligation upon every individual.
But do you notice the discrepancy sometimes
between someone that was well-known
and someone that was not?
Someone that has a large family and a community
and someone that doesn't?
Think about that narration of the Abyssinian woman
that used to clean the masjid.
And we always invoke her example
about the virtue of cleaning the masjid
but let's look at it from another angle as well.
The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam comes to the masjid
and he notices this woman is missing right away.
It wasn't like a month later.
Right away the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam says,
"Where is this woman that used to clean the masjid?"
The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam missed her presence.
And they said Ya Rasul Allah.
"She passed away last night."
And the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam says,
"Well, why didn't you tell me?
"Why didn't you call me so I could come
"and pray the Janazah upon her?"
They said, "Ya Rasul Allah, we didn't wanna bother you.
"So we just did it ourselves."
They carried out her ghusl,
they prayed Janazah upon her
and they took her to the graveyard
and it was an inconvenient time.
So they said, "We didn't wanna bother you, Ya Rasul Allah."
The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam could have said,
you know la hawla wala quwwata illa billah. I missed out,
instead, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam says,
darun ya 'ala kabriha
"Take me to her grave.
"Take me to where you buried her." And they go out,
they follow the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam
and he prays Janazah on her again.
And he says, SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam,
that these graves are chambers
of darkness and they are lit up by my salah upon them.
There is a beautiful lesson there,
that no one should be treated
like they're too insignificant for Salat Al-Janaza.
And especially in a time when you have a lot of Janazas,
you see the discrepancy, right?
You see the discrepancy.
And if you move even beyond this idea
that someone is insignificant, not worthy of you,
just because they are brother or sister,
for you to make the effort
to go pray Janazah on them,
then the second thing is your own individual incentive.
Look how beautiful our deen is,
it incentivizes things that we should do anyway.
So the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said,
"The one who prays Salat-Al Janazah
"has the reward of Uhud in good deeds
"and the one who follows the Janazah has the reward
"of two Uhuds in good deeds.
If you've ever seen Uhud it's a huge mountain.
And so if you think the person's too insignificant,
then go for your own individual reward, your own incentive.
And the third thing Ibn Abbas RA,
when his son passed away, he said,
"I asked Qurayb to go out and to look to see
"who gathered for the Janazah?"
and Qurayb came back and said "Alhamdulillah
it's a lot of people."
Ibn Abbas said "Alhamdulillah I heard the messenger
of Allah Sallallahu alayhi wasallam say that,
"No Muslim dies and 40 people gathered to pray Janazah
"on that person, except that Allah would allow them
"to intercede on their behalf."
So let's try to have large Janazahs, sincere Janazahs,
because no one is insignificant.
There's plenty of incentive and we can be intercessors
for our brothers and sisters as we bid them farewell.