Fun Fact #1

According to Wikipedia, there are a total of 30 Muslims in the Canadian Province of Nunavut and 60 in the province of Yukon.

On the shortest day of the year, Iqaluit (the capital of Nunavut) experiences about 4.5 hours of daylight. Islamicfinder.com lists the dhuhr prayer to begin at 11:30 am and end at 11:55 am. That’s only 25 minutes to pray!

On the longest day of the year, Iqaluit experiences about 21 hours of sunlight. The ‘isha prayer enters at 11:45 pm, while the fajr prayer enters at 2:20 am. I’ll remember that next time I complain about having to wake up early in the morning for fajr!

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Tune in this evening for my 6 pm post where insha'Allah I will be discussing my other writing, my fiction!

The Importance of Sunnah

All throughout their life, the average Muslim hears how important it is to follow the sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salallahu alayhi wassalam. We know the various benefits of doing so and we know following the sunnah is what Allah subhana wa ta'ala has commanded us to do. This past fall, I took part in a class offered by SunniPath that focused on the essentials of Islamic worship: how to pray, how to fast, how to pay zakat, etc. In one of his lectures, the instructor, Sheikh Sohail Hanif, presented the importance of the sunnah in an interesting way. That’s what I would like to share with you today.

Before I begin, I must first ask a question: what is the most important thing in your life? What is the single thing most precious to you? What is the one thing that you could never, ever give up?

If you’re a practicing Muslim I can guess the answer would be your religion, your deen, your iman. In truth, that should be the only answer. With this faith, everything else in life becomes bearable. But without out, nothing in this world would be of any value and in the next life our faith alone is what will guide us to our eternal abodes. A lack of iman in the heart means only one thing: the Hellfire. May Allah protect us all from the Fire and grant us all Paradise!

As with anything of value, there is someone out to steal that faith from us. Shaitan, may Allah curse him, knows there is nothing more valuable than iman. His tricks and whispers are all done in the attempt to separate us from our iman. He wants to remove the iman from our hearts and fill them with disbelief.

Thus, we must protect our iman from the wiles of Shaitan. But how? What can a Muslim do to hold on to their faith?

Allah subhana wa ta'ala in His mercy and kindness gave us a protective sphere of sorts to surround our iman and protect our faith. This protective sphere consists of what Allah has made obligatory for us, such as fasting during Ramadan or praying five times a day. If a Muslim is doing everything which is obligatory, then their faith is much more stable than a Muslim who does not do that which is obligatory. Hence the second most precious thing in the life of a Muslim should be what Allah subhana wa ta'ala has made obligatory upon us.

So what is Shaitan going to do now with this protective sphere? Just as he does with iman, he will try to take the obligatory away as well. He will bombard us with his tricks and whispers. He will do so in the hope of breaking a whole in our fardh, thus granting him access to the iman within.

We find ourselves in the same boat as before. We must protect our fardh from Shaitan. But how can we do that? What can a Muslim do to persevere in the obligatory?

Again, in His infinite wisdom and compassion, Allah subhana wa ta'ala has given us another shield for our use against the evil of Shaitan. This protective sphere is the sunnah of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wassalam. This is the recommended prayers, the sunnahs of ablution, the sunnahs of fasting, and so on. This is what the Prophet salallahu alayhi wassalam brought to us and taught us. This is what protects the fardh and as a result the iman. Therefore the third most precious thing in the life of a Muslim should be the sunnah.

With the addition of the sunnah, there are now two layers of protection surrounding the faith. When mixed with the adab, or proprieties of the deen, it becomes near impossible for Shaitan to sway us and thus find his way to the iman within. If a Muslim remembers his Lord always, will he forget the sunnah? If he performs the sunnah always, will he forget the obligatory? If he remembers the fardh always, will his iman be in danger?

Therefore, we must keep in mind that nothing the Prophet salallahu alayhi wassalam brought to us was unimportant. Nothing was insignificant. Everything he brought has worth. Everything has guidance in it. Everything has a light. Only those who adhere to it faithfully, seeking Allah’s pleasure, will experience that light.

May Allah protect the Ummah and keep us on the straight path!

Weekly Update: Mar 6 - Mar 12

Assalamu alaykum!

There are times when I would love to throw my computer out the window…ever get that feeling yourself?

Now, I never had any troubles with my old laptop, a refurbished thing bought from a hole-in-the-wall store about five years ago. The only reason I purchased myself a new computer was because the wireless card was on the fritz. My grandma (not the one from Oil and Water…the other one) wanted me to have a well-functioning machine for my first year of college and a faulty wireless card just wasn’t going to work…of course, the wireless card didn’t work in my new one for half the year anyway and I never used wireless…Ethernet is where it’s all at! Oh, and my mom uses my old laptop and the wireless has never given her any troubles…figures *sigh*

Anyway, back in November of 2009 this new laptop crashed, or suffered a fatal error, or something…it was that dreaded blue screen of doom…or death if you want to be more dramatic. So, I had to spend my Friday evening restoring my computer with the back-up CD’s…that was probably the most exciting Friday night of my freshman year. Of course all the settings changed, and this was when the volume bar began. Every time I change the volume, this annoying bar pops up in the middle of the screen before disappearing as quickly as it came. For the most part, this bar is of no consequence…it comes, it goes. But then there are times when it causes my computer to freeze. That is irritating. What’s worse, it comes and goes. There will be three months of no problems, then a month of volume-bar freezing. Two weeks ago, I had to restart my computer ten times in six days. And now? The problem is no more, at least for a couple months or so until it decides to become a problem again.

And nobody can tell me how to get rid of it.

By now, the list of what’s wrong with my laptop is about as long as the list of what’s wrong with my parents’ fifteen-year-old Nissan that’s literally falling apart. The left-click button is loose and wobbles all over the place, the E drive won’t play CD’s or CD-ROM’s, the wireless decides not to work sometimes, and I could go on. The only advantage this laptop has over my old one is that it doesn’t run slower than molasses in January.

Well, enough about me and my dysfunctional thinking machine…I’m sure I’ve bored you in my attempt to be half-way funny. What’s on the schedule for this week?

Monday – The Importance of Sunnah

Tuesday – From Behind the Mask

Wednesday – Keepin’ it Halaal

Thursday – Muslims: The New Consumer Niche

Friday – Adventures in Fiqh

Again, as I said a week ago, this is not set in stone. Anybody who read last week’s update and then the following posts throughout the week can tell you that. Only Monday went as planned. But insha’Allah I’ll stick to what I have here this week.

For those of you who missed Friday’s update, I decided to lose the ‘Resolution and Reflection’ series simply because it wasn’t getting very many reads. I thought about it and figured my time might be better spent writing something else. Instead I’m replacing it with a post on Friday that’s like the Monday through Thursdays. Hopefully that will bring more readers to my site insha’Allah!

Otherwise, nothing has changed in the last week. I’m still posting at 6 pm Monday through Thursday. Every day at noon (12 pm) I will still post a verse(s) from the Qur’an and a hadith. Nothing new there.

Another thing I want to start is taking suggestions from readers. If you want to see a post on a certain topic, or if you have a questions, or whatever, email me or leave a comment and I’ll see what I can do. I can’t promise anything because it’s hard for me to write something simply because someone tells me to. But insha’Allah I’ll try to figure something out!

Oh, and if you know anyone who can help me with my rebellious laptop, please let me know. I’d love to be able to fix it, and if you can do that, I will be your friend forever and ever :D

Well, it’s Sunday, cleaning day, and the house isn’t going to clean itself (sadly). I better get to it!

Ma’asalama

Iman

The Chance to Serve

This time last year I was probably sitting in a dorm room, hurrying to finish those last minute assignments before spring break began a week from now. Either that or I was watching a movie or writing. I always managed to get my homework done by Friday so I could spend the weekend lazing around and doing absolutely nothing. But now, I’m at home, studying Islamic creed instead of psychology, studying the history of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wassalam instead of college writing.

Currently I am enrolled in an Islamic academy that goes by the name of SunniPath (or Qibla as it is now known). SunniPath is not a normal, traditional Islamic academy; rather, it is based completely online. Each course is constructed of weekly live sessions as well as other learning activities, such as pre-recorded lessons, journaling, quizzes, and so on. The instructors, some of which are well-known scholars, can interact with their students during the live session through an instant-messaging type text chat. This online approach allows scholars to reach students from all over the world: Pakistan, Indonesia, Australia, Jordan, the United Kingdom, the United States, Columbia, and the list goes on.

But this post is not to advertise SunniPath. Instead, this post is about one of the classes I’m involved in with this semester, which started today. This course is unlike other courses. Rather than simply being a student, I am a teacher’s assistant. I help the students in their learning as well as helping the instructor in her teaching.

Every single Muslim should work to teach people – whether they teach hundreds of students or their four children. Teaching has much reward in Islam. Unlike other deeds, teaching is one of the deeds that keeps on giving. The Prophet Muhammad salallahu alayhi wassalam said: ‘When a man dies, his good deeds come to an end except three: ongoing charity, beneficial knowledge and righteous offspring who will pray for him.’ [Sahih Muslim: 3084] The knowledge a Muslim learns and then passes on to others continues to give him reward despite his death. So long as that knowledge continues to pass from generation to generation, the reward continues.

Of course my list of duties does not really include teaching. All I really do is answer administrative questions, field academic queries to the right person(s), help the instructor grade papers, and truthfully that’s about it. Plus, the class is not very tough; in fact it’s probably the very first class most SunniPath students take. So in truth, there probably is not much reward in that respect.

However, I am still serving my fellow students. I am still answering their questions and I am still helping them out however I can. In some ways I am making their learning easier, taking some of the instructor’s burden so that she might spend more time actually teaching and answering the students’ academic questions. Insha’Allah I will receive a reward for even this minor assistance. And while today was only the first day of the course, insha’Allah I would like to serve as a teacher’s assistant in the future as well.