Uniting the Ummah in Love – Shaykh Faid Mohammed Said

Allah has told us in the Holy Qur’an that love is a condition of faith, so why, asks Shaykh Faid Mohammed Said, do human beings find it so difficult to agree on what Allah and His Messenger love and why do we struggle so much to love one another?

“Allah Guides to His Light Whom He Wills.”  (Surah An-Nur)
Bismillah-ir Rahman-ir Raheem
Allah Most High is not worshipped more than by loving Him. Allah Most High warned us in the Qur’an in Sura al-Tawba (24):

If your parents, your children, your brothers or sisters, your wives or husbands, your tribe, the money that you have earned, the business that you are worried that you might lose, and the most beautiful home you are comfortably living in are dearer or more beloved to you than Allah Most High, His Messenger and in striving in His path, then wait until Allah’s command comes. Allah does not guide the corrupt and misguided ones.

In this verse, Allah Most High is speaking about the love for Him and His Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) to be the loftiest and greatest of things that we can achieve.  Not only this, but the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) said in a Hadith:  “You will never enter the Garden until you believe, and you will never believe until you love each other.  Shall I tell you something that if you were to do it it would make you love each other?  Spread peace (greet one another)”
So if loving each other is a condition of faith, so what about loving Allah Most High and the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace)!  And loving Allah Most High and the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) is loving what they love!
In a Hadith narrated by our master Abdullah ibn Abbas (Allah be pleased with him), the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) said:  “Love Allah Most High for all the blessings that He has bestowed upon you. Love me out of love of Allah Most High, and love my family out of love of me”  (Tirmidhi 3789, Bukhari  “Tarikh al-Kabir”, Hakim).

Don’t be Divided in Your Love

It is very unfortunate that we as Muslims are divided in our love of what Allah Most High and the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) love.  In saying this we mean we are divided upon our love of the family of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) and the Companions (Allah be well pleased with them). We love the family of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) because Allah Most High wanted us to love them, as Allah Most High said in Sura al-Shura‘a (23):  “Say [Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace)], I wanted nothing from you in return for me guiding and teaching you other than for you to love my family.”
The Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) did not say to obey his family, look after his family or respect his family, but he said to love his family!  This is a sign of faith.
Allah Most High said in Sura al-Tawba (100), speaking about the companions of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace):  “And the first forerunners [in the faith] are the Emigrants (al-Muhajirin) and the Helpers (al-Ansar) and those who followed them in good conduct – Allah is pleased with them and they are pleased with Him, and He has prepared for them gardens beneath which rivers flow, wherein they will abide forever. That is the great attainment.”

Love of the Companions

We love our master Abu Bakr (Allah be please with him), our master Omar (Allah be pleased with him), our master Aisha (Allah be please with her) and all the Companions because our master Ali (peace be upon him) loved them, our master Husayn ibn Ali (peace be upon him) loved them, our master Hasan ibn Ali (peace be upon him) loved them, our master Mohammed al Baqir (peace be upon him) loved them, and our master Jafar al-Sadiq (peace be upon him) loved them; but most of all, Allah Most High and the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) loved them!
So the love of Ahl al-Bayt and the Companions should unite the Ummah, and we know that this issue is not new as even Imam Shafi‘i (Allah have mercy upon him) struggled with it in his time; when he expressed his love for Ahl al-Bayt or the Companions, people would accuse and associate him with the one group or the other:
If we were to speak about Ali (peace be upon him) and his virtues and our preference, people would accuse us of being the enemy of the Companions of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace), and they would be wrong in accusing us of such; and if we were to speak about Abu Bakr (Allah be pleased with him) and his virtues, people would accuse us of being the enemy of Ahl al-Bayt.  I live between these two accusations, and even so, I will love them both until I am buried in this world!

The Balance

The balance we need to establish is based in our trust in the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace), as Allah Most High said in Sura al-Najm:  He does not speak out of his own desire..”, as the words of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) are wahy and the actions of the Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) are wahy.
We love whom Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) has loved, and we beg Allah Most High to unite the Ummah of Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace), to forgive our sins, to guide us and to fill our hearts with His love, the love of Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace), love for the Qur’an, love of the Ahl al-Bayt, love of the Emigrants, love of the Helpers, love of the people of Bayt al-Ridwan, and the love of the Righteous.
Allahumma salli alaa Sayyidina Muhammad wa alaa Ahli Sayyidina Muhammad, fi kulli lamhatin wa nafasin ‘adada maa wa see-a-hu ‘il-muLlah.
O Allah send blessings, equal to the extent of Your Knowledge, upon our master Muhammad and upon the family of our master Muhammad, in their every moment and every breath.

Shaykh Faid Mohammed Said is a jewel in the crown of traditional Islamic scholarship in the United Kingdom and we at SeekersHub are ever grateful for his friendship, guidance and support. He was born in Asmara, Eritrea, where he studied the holy Qur’an and its sciences, Arabic grammar and fiqh under the guidance of the Grand Judge of the Islamic Court in Asmara, Shaykh Abdul Kader Hamid and also under the Grand Mufti of Eritrea. He later went to study at Madinah University, from which he graduated with a first class honours degree. In Madinah, his teachers included Shaykh Atia Salem, Shaykh Mohamed Ayub (ex-imam of the Prophet’s Mosque, peace be upon him), Professor AbdulRaheem, Professor Yaqub Turkestani, Shaykh Dr Awad Sahli, Dr Aa’edh Al Harthy and many other great scholars. Shaykh Faid has ijaza in a number of disciplines including hadith, and a British higher education teaching qualification. He is currently the scholar in residence and head of education at Harrow Central Mosque, United Kingdom.
Read his articles on the SeekersHub blog.

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Cover Photo by Motoshi Ohmori

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