Ummah First

Auto-generated transcript:Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. My dear respected brothers, sisters, elders. Alhamdulillah this year we celebrated Eid al-Adha as one community. Everyone coming together for the pleasure of Allah SWT in fulfillment of His command where He declared Which means the believers are but one brotherhood. So make peace between your brothers and be mindful of Allah so that you may be shown mercy. The result was beautiful where for the first time in the history of Western Massachusetts almost 5,000 Muslims prayed Salatul Eid al-Adha together. I ask Allah SWT to always keep our hearts together and enable us to resolve any differences that may arise from time to time respectfully in the light of the Quran and Sunnah alone. More concerned about guarding the Prophet and the Prophet's family and the Prophet's family and the Prophet's family. The fact that Allah SWT mentions making peace and reconciliation means that conflict is always a possibility. I remind you that conflict is never the problem. It is how we deal with it which can either help us to draw closer or fall apart. It is our choice and we are accountable for it. Allah SWT commanded us to be united and remain together. And He said وَاَتَصِمُوا بِحَبْلِ اللَّهِ جَمِيًا وَلَا تَفَرَّقُوا وَاذْكُرُوا نِعْمَةَ اللَّهِ عَلَيْكُمْ إِذْ كُنْتُمْ عَادَاءً فَأَلَّفَ بَيْنَ قُلُوبِكُمْ فَأَسْبَحَتُمْ بِنِعْمَتِهِ إِخْوَانًا وَكُنْتُمْ عَلَى شَفَى حُفُرَةٍ مِّنَ النَّارِ فَأَنْخَذَكُمْ مِّنْهَا كَذَلِكَ يُبَيِّنُ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ آيَاتِهِ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَهْتَدُونَ Allah SWT said in Surah Al-Imran And hold firmly to the rope of Allah SWT together and do not be divided. Remember Allah SWT's favor upon you when you were enemies. Then He, united your hearts. So you by His grace became brothers. And you were at the brink of a fiery pit. And He saved you from it. This is how Allah SWT makes His revelations clear to you so that you may be rightly guided. I remind myself and you that Allah SWT commanded us to remain united and not to create divisions and enmity between each other. He did not tell us not to have different opinions or not to disagree. It is about unity, not uniformity. Allah SWT commanded us not to allow such differences to form the basis of dividing the ummah of Rasulullah SAW. He called being divided as being on the brink or edge of a pit of fire and said that it was, He, Jalla Jalaluhu, who saved us from falling into it. We ask Allah SWT to save us from enmity towards one another and thereby falling into the pit of fire. To ensure our material and spiritual safety, it is essential to develop emotional maturity and to be able to keep the collective welfare of the ummah as the goal of all collective decision making. This is not an impossible or impossible. It is an idealistic goal. To encourage us, we have examples of the conduct of the Sahaba, Ridwanullahi Alim Ajmain, who always put the ummah ahead of themselves. Let me quote just one of these finest of examples from the early history of Islam and the Muslims. When Sayyidina Abu Bakr al-Siddiq passed away and Sayyidina Umar ibn al-Khattab succeeded him, almost the first act, that he did was to send a Farman, to send an order relieving Khalid bin Walid of supreme command of the Rashidun Khilafah's army and appointing his assistant Sayyidina Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah in his place as the commander. This order reduced Sayyidina Khalid bin Walid from being commander in chief to private, in one sentence. Imagine you are broken from being the commander in chief. In today's language, you would say, general, of course, maybe field marshal. One stroke, you are now private. You're an ordinary soldier in the army. There's no instance to my knowledge in military history to compare with this. This never happened. You might ask what Sayyidina Khalid bin Walid al-Anu had done to deserve this treatment. The answer is he did nothing. He had not done anything to deserve this treatment.