Heartwork The Messenger #15

So from the time that we've started, when we covered, of course, uh, you know, the, the, the initiation of the sirat always begins with Prophet Ibrahim because of the connection, the lineage, and then you go through his childhood with all that tragedy, all that loss.

And then you go through some of the unique, almost, like, strange, peculiar miracles that occurred to him as a young boy, and then you go into the moral development, who he was, his integrity, his character as a, uh, preteen, as a teenager.

And then you keep going throughout that entire process and see now he's climbing into the ladder of social leadership, that people see him as this person who's not just a normal guy who's trying to do business and make money, right? He has this ethical framework that is beloved to everybody, so beloved that it's how he meets his wife, Khadija, radi Allahuanha, and they get married.

So all of these steps are occurring, and the last thing that we covered last session was the time in which all of these things gathered together, and as a result of them, the Prophet, alayhi salatu wa salam, peace be upon him, was chosen, uh, somewhat, you know, coincidentally, right? Serendipitously, he was chosen to solve a tribal clash, something that was gonna cause a lot of issues, which was the renovation and the rebuilding of the Kaaba.

And he solved the problem of who was gonna be putting the last and final piece, the most important piece, called the Black Stone, Hajar al-Aswad, back into the Kaaba.

He solved that issue, demonstrating his wisdom, his intelligence, and also his character and his ability to understand what is at stake, what's the real question that's being asked, the real problem that's happening.

So we talked a lot about how we could reflect some of that wisdom and that intelligence in our own life, that you might be dealing with something, a problem, that looks on the front of it like one thing, but you have to be able to develop the ability to read what's actually going on, what's actually frustrating this person, what's actually confusing them, and so on.

So because of all of this, because of every single piece that we just briefly covered, you can imagine, right, almost like in, in politics in America or elsewhere, that when someone is so beloved and when someone is so, um, proven over time, the conversation that starts to come up in society is the conversation of leadership, right? Politics.

So when somebody establishes a good reputation for themselves and when they're beloved by somebody, people start to say things like, "You should be our leader," right? "You should run for office." And that kinda then swirls, okay? So in America, because there's, like, a electoral, uh, cycle, it swirls usually right around midterms when people start to think, "Oh, who could win?" and this and that.

But of course, in the time of the Prophet, alayhi salatu wa salam, there's tribal leadership.

It's different, right? It's not that they elect somebody every four years.

It's more s- uh, it's more so, like, the readiness of the individual, okay? And their age and their wisdom.

And admittedly, he's very young for this conversation.

Normally, this space is reserved for, like, elders, you know, people that are much more senior.

But again, because he's somebody that comes from Banu Hashim, which is the, one of the noble tribes, the noble families in Quraysh, and because he's somebody that, again, from a young age, had the reputation of being upfront, honest, trustworthy, beloved, et cetera, they started to have this conversation with him about being a leader.

And they started to put in front of him, you know, the possibility, the prospect of what it would be for you to be our leader.

This is before prophethood.

He hasn't received a letter of Quran yet.

So this isn't because he's a messenger of God.

In fact, we know, right, that something is gonna flip, and in fact, because of that, he's not going to be the one that they want anymore.

But imagine being young, in your 30s.

I know for you guys it's like, that's pretty old, right? You're like, "Unc." Yeah, I'm 38, so this is still younger.

Ima- I still hoop, though, alhamdulillah, masha'Allah, masha'Allah.

[laughing] Imagine, imagine be- It might be half-court, but I can still hoop, all right? [laughing] Imagine being at that age, at that age, younger than everybody else, and they're talking to you about being a leader.

Right? There is something, there is something in the soul, right? The Arabic word here we'll use is nafs.