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Khutbahs
Do Not Abandon the Masjid After Ramadan | Khutbah by Dr. Omar Suleiman
In this khutbah, Dr. Omar Suleiman emphasizes the importance of making and keeping the masjid central to our lives, even after Ramadan. He explores how regular attendance and active participation in congregational prayers strengthen our faith and help us stay aligned with the Sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ. This khutbah is also a reminder to continue seeking Allah’s guidance year-round inshaAllah.
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings.
Dear brothers and sisters, taqwa, piety, God consciousness, is what is a lived reality on a daily basis, every moment.
But taqwa has a season, and that is the season of Ramadan, that is the season of fasting. كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الصِّيَامُ كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَىٰ ٱلَّذِينَ مِنْ قَبْلِكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَتَّقُونَ
Fasting was prescribed upon you as it was prescribed on nations prior to you, so that you could become more God conscious, so that you could become more aware of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala.
And so taqwa is a daily reality, but it has a season in which it dawns upon us in a very special way,
and we hope that it carries us well throughout the rest of the year until we live out the rest of our lives and meet Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala hopefully as people of taqwa.
But taqwa also has a place, a place where it's generated, and that place is the masjid.
And it's always very interesting to see salatul jumu'ah get more crowded on the Fridays of Ramadan, because jumu'ah is fard inside of Ramadan and fard outside of Ramadan.
And it's interesting to see how full the masjids are for fajr and isha' for the different salawat outside of Ramadan,
realizing that what Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala has put in the reward of these prayers inside the masjid, outside of Ramadan, is greater than what you would find in a voluntary prayer like salatul taraweeh, but still it doesn't translate into that connection.
And what I want you all to sit with for a moment, connecting the moments that we are in as we bid farewell to Ramadan over whatever is left of it, to the moments of uncertainty that we feel outside in the world, the challenges to our faith in these moments,
the very real problem that many people have, or conundrum, where I don't know if I can raise my kids to be Muslim in this environment because of all of the pressure and everything that's going to happen, the question that we all ask ourselves, will I die as a Muslim?
Will I die upon a good death? Will I have a good ending? May Allah Azza wa Jal give us a good ending, husnul khitam, not just in Ramadan, but outside of Ramadan.
It's deeply connected to what Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala has put in these places, the place that you are sitting in right now.
Abdullah bin Mas'ud (رضي الله عنه) says, and this is the narration I want to sit with and I want you to sit with and play it through your mind over and over again, especially in the days that follow Ramadan.
It's in Sahih Muslim that Abdullah bin Mas'ud (رضي الله عنه) said, من سره أن يلقى الله غدا مسلما فليحافظ على هؤلاء الصلوات حيث ينادي بهم.
He said, whoever wants to meet Allah tomorrow as a Muslim, it's a powerful language, whoever wants to meet Allah as a Muslim, whoever wants to die as a Muslim, die as a believer,
then let him meet Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala by preserving the prayers in the places that they are called.
If you want to meet Allah as a Muslim, then keep coming to meet Allah in the masjid, spiritually through your prayer. If you want to die as a Muslim, then live in the masjid, in the figurative sense.
Obviously we work and we go about our days, but there's a direct connection with how your ending will be and how frequent you are in the masjid, how attached you are to the masjid.
And he continues (رضي الله عنه),
قال من سره أن يلقى الله غدا مسلما فليحافظ على هؤلاء الصلوات حيث ينادي بهم. فإن الله الشرع لنبيكم صلى الله عليه وسلم سنن الهدى وإنهن من سنن الهدى.
ولو أنكم صليتم في بيوتكم كما يصلي هذا المتخلف في بيته لتركتم سنة نبيكم صلى الله عليه وسلم ولو تركتم سنة نبيكم لضللتم.
He says that Allah Azza wa Jal has laid down for your prophet the ways of guidance, the means of guidance, the paths of guidance.
And he said these prayers that you have in these masjids, in these houses of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala are from the pathways to guidance, are from the ways that you stay guided.
And he said if you were to pray in your homes the way that this man, and he's talking about al-mutakhallaf here, someone who stays behind, someone who stays behind in their homes.
If you were to pray in your homes like this man, then you would leave off the way of your prophet (ﷺ) and if you abandon the way of your prophet (ﷺ), then you will abandon the pathways to guidance.
And he goes on to say, وما من رجل يتطهر فيحسن الطهور ثم يعمد إلى مسجد من هذه المساجد إلا كتب الله له بكل خطوة يخطوها حسنة.
He said, and no one, no man purifies himself and gets himself ready for the masjid and then approaches one of these masajids of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala after having perfected their purification.
Except that Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala will write down with every single step a good deed ويرفعه بها درجة and Allah will raise him by a rank as a result of every single step he takes to these masajids ويحط عنه بها سيئة and Allah Azza wa Jal will remove a sin as a result of every single step that he's taking.
And he's saying it's not just the blessing that's found inside the masjid itself, it's the blessing in the entire process, the process of getting ready at home, the process of making your way to the masjid, all of that you're indulging yourself in a spiritual exercise of consciousness, of taqwa, where you're connecting to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala the way you hope to connect to him in a time like Ramadan.
And he said, وَلَقَدْ رَأَيْتُنَا وَمَا يَتَخَلَّفُ عَنْهَا إِلَّا مُنَافِقٌ مَعْلُومٌ نِفَاقٌ He said, you have seen us or we have come across a time, I have seen a time where no one avoided the masjid except for a known hypocrite, a hypocrite known for his hypocrisy.
وَلَقَدْ كَانَ الرَّجْلُ يُؤْتَى بِهِ يُهَادَى بَيْنَ الرَّجُلَيْنِ حَتَّى يُقَامَى فِي الصَّفِ He said, and I remember a time where a man would be brought and he was so weak that he'd have to be placed behind two people in the row but he wouldn't miss his salah in the masjid.
He's talking about a time that he witnessed and a time that he sees right now. So he's living in a time where he's saying, you know, the distance from the masjid is becoming obvious, the centrality of the masjid clearly is being de-emphasized in our religion.
And I remember in the time of the Prophet (ﷺ) where the only person who wouldn't be seen coming to the masjid regularly would be a known munafiq, would be a known hypocrite. And I remember a time when a person would be so haris, would be so diligent and dedicated to these prayers in the masajid that imagine they'd have to be carried and put between two people, situated between two people in the rows.
And you ask yourself, what's your excuse? What is he saying here? Ramadan is a season to indulge taqwa. It's a season to indulge God-consciousness. It's where you take that taqwa, you have a practice of taqwa, a practice of thinking about Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala and being conscious of Allah.
That transcends every space because you're thinking about everything that you're putting inside of you. You're thinking about your consumption, you're thinking about what you're putting out there. But the place to generate that spirituality, the place to immerse yourself is this masjid.
And if you want to die as a Muslim, you need to live in these places by coming here daily, by having an attachment to it regularly, by making sure that you don't leave off the obligatory and that you indulge the gift of an attachment to it outside of the obligatory.
If you want to stay Muslim, if you want your family to remain upon Islam, if you want the next generation to remain upon Islam, there is nothing that is greater that you could be doing for your kids than bringing them with you to the masjid and exposing them to that reality on a regular basis.
I leave you with two narrations because of the time and I know that we're fatigued these days because of these last days of Ramadan. SubhanAllah I was looking at the rasa'il, the letters between Abu Darda' (رضي الله عنه) and Salman al-Farisi (رضي الله عنه).
They were brothers. The Prophet (ﷺ) paired them off when Salman (رضي الله عنه) came from Persia and went through his deep struggles to convert to Islam. He was put in the home of his brother Abu Darda' (رضي الله عنه) and they became lifelong brothers.
And they used to write these letters to each other. Abu Darda' (رضي الله عنه) in Palestine, may Allah liberate it. And Salman al-Farisi (رضي الله عنه) sometime in Iraq, sometime back in Medina. And they write these letters to each other in their old age. And of those messages they send to each other are nasa'ih, are advices.
And one of the advices that Salman (رضي الله عنه) wrote to Abu Darda' (رضي الله عنه), and it's an authentic narration. Qala ya akhi, O my dear brother, alayka bil masjid. Upon you is to stay connected to the masjid. Falzamhu, attach yourself to it. Fa inni sam'itu rasoolAllah (ﷺ) yaqul al-masjidu baytu kulli taqi.
Wa fi riwaya al-masjidu baytu kulli mu'min. I heard the Prophet (ﷺ) say that the masjid is the home of every pious person. And in one narration the masjid is the home of every believer. It's your home. When you abandon it you become spiritually homeless.
And no, jum'ah is not enough. It's really not enough to generate that spirituality and to maintain that spirituality. You become spiritually homeless when you abandon it. Every single person has to have this as a place. SubhanAllah, even when the Prophet (ﷺ) would come back from a safar, when he'd come back from a journey, when he'd come back from travel, before he entered into his actual home he'd go to the masjid and pray two rak'ahs.
This is your home. This is your attachment. This is the place where you will continue to generate what you've been trying to find in Ramadan.
And Allah Azza wa Jal has taken it upon Himself to guarantee for the one whose home is the masjid comfort, tranquility, mercy. And when will you need that most?
The Prophet (ﷺ) said that Allah will guarantee for the one who made the masjid his home safe passage over the Sirat until he reaches the pleasure of Allah, until he reaches his place of Jannah.
I want you to think about all of this. Ibn Mas'ud says you want to die Muslim, stay in the masjid. The Prophet (ﷺ) is saying you want safe passage over the Sirat when people will be pulled off of the path that takes a person to Jannah, attach yourself to the masjid.
The Prophet (ﷺ) is saying you want safe passage to get into Jannah, then ask yourself how many times you are entering into this masjid seeking the pleasure of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala.
This is your home. And of all the resolutions that we're making after Ramadan, I plead with each and every single one of you to increase your attendance in the masjid on a regular basis.
If you can come at least once a day, keep it in your mind that I have to have some attachment to it, just fajr, just isha, whatever it is, some sort of attachment to it, then do so. And the more that you attach yourself, the more reward will come from Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala.
SubhanAllah when you look at the shaded under the throne of Allah on the day of judgement, one of those is a person whose heart is attached to the masjid. His heart is attached to the masjid. And what does a person whose heart being attached to the masjid look like?
They're thinking about attending the masjid. They're thinking about bringing life to the masjid with programming. They're thinking about volunteering in the masjid. They're thinking about building the masjid. They're thinking about cleaning the masjid.
They're thinking constantly about the masjid. It's central to them, the way that a person tries to decorate their home and keep their home in order. They're thinking about the masjid constantly. When they get sick, how can I get back to the masjid?
When they're not feeling well, how can I get back to the masjid? When they're traveling, when can I get back to the masjid? It becomes a home truly in your heart and for your heart. And the Prophet (ﷺ) mentioned the attachment of the qalb, the attachment of the heart to it.
And that's why on the day of judgement you can hope to be amongst those that's not just sitting under the ceiling, the roof of one of the houses of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. But shaded under the throne of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. May Allah Azza wa Jal grant us that shade on that day.
May Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala increase the love of all that is beloved to Him and attains His love in our hearts. And may Allah Azza wa Jal attach us to the times and the places and the deeds that bring about His love.
And may Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala allow us to stay consistent after this month of Ramadan upon that which is pleasing to Him. And may Allah Azza wa Jal forgive us for our shortcomings in Ramadan and outside of Ramadan. Allahumma ameen.
Allahumma inna nas'aluka ya kareem. Allahumma inna nas'aluka ya raheem. Allahumma inna nas'aluka ya rahman.
Allahumma inna nas'aluka ya wadood. We ask you O Allah to keep us attached to your homes. We ask you O Allah to keep us attached to your deen. We ask you O Allah to let us live and die as Muslims.
And we ask you O Allah to forgive us for any of our shortcomings along the way. Allahumma ighfir lil mu'mineen wal-mu'minat wal-muslimeen wal-muslimat. Al-ahya'i minhum wal-amwat. Innaka samee'un qareebun mujeebu da'wat. Allahumma ighfir lana warhamna wa'fu anna wa la tu'adhibna.
Rabbana zalamna anfusana wa in lam taghfir lana wa tarhamna. Lanakunanna minal khasireen. Allahumma innaka 'afuwwun kareemun. Tuhibbul 'afwa fa'fu anna. Allahumma ighfir liwalidina. Rabbir hamhuma kama rabbayana sighara. Rabbana hab lana min azwajina wa dhurriyyatina qurrata a'yun.
Waj'alna lil muttaqeena imama. Allahumma nsur ikhwanal mustad'afeena fi kulli makan. Allahumma nsur ikhwanal mustad'afeena fi filisteen wa fi sudan wa fi yaman wa fi kulli makan. Allahumma 'alayka bi a'da'ika a'da' al-deen.
Allahumma arina fi al-dhalimeena 'aja'iba qudratik. Allahumma ahlik al-dhalimeena bi al-dhalimeen. Wa akhrijna wa ikhwanana min bayni misalimeen. Ibadallahi inna Allaha ya'muru bil'adli wal'ihsani wa ita'i dhil qurba. Wayanha 'anil fahsha'i wal-munkari wal-baghi. Ya'idhukum la'allakum tadhakkaroon. Fadhkuru Allaha yadhkurkum washkuroohu 'ala ni'amihi yazidkum.
Waladhikru Allahi akbar. Wallahu ya'lamu ma tasna'oon. Wa aqimi al-salah.


































































































































































































































































































