A Special episode in the occasion of the Prophet’s Birthday

Translated by: Dar al-Tarjama – The English Convoy



This episode's guests: Dr. Muhammad Hidaya, and Sheikh Abdullah Al-Saadi



The host starts displaying the topics discussed by the doctor in the previous episode regarding the acceptability and non-acceptability of celebrating the Prophet's (Peace be upon him) birthday memorial, mentioning the names of the Prophet (PBUH), the incident of ripping his chest, the moon split and other issues. This week we will discuss the issue of mediation and the pond and the Kawthar pond in Heaven. But first, I will ask a question that many people as: “Why did Allah send more than 120 thousand prophets and 315 messengers and many divine messages from Adam's (AS) time until the Prophet's (PBUH) time and why did people need all those prophets and messengers?” Moreover, why was there such a big time gap between Isa (“Jesus”) (AS) and the Prophet (PBUH)? And why was the Prophet (PBUH) the last prophet and messenger?



This question is one of the most important of questions that come to people's minds especially to Muslims', who have fully surrendered to Allah's will, the Lord of all mankind. That was, in brief, what has been happening since Adam's (AS) time and until the end of time; that is Allah's wisdom in His creation. There was no nation since Adam's (AS) time until Judgment Day that hasn't had a prophet. Allah's wisdom was sending messengers that were human beings who have succeeded each other throughout the nations. There may be many prophets in one nation as was the case with the Children of Israel; this is all a part of Allah's wisdom. There are many things we as Muslims must understand since we are the recipients of Allah's Book and Message.



As for your question of why Muhammad (PBUH) came at that time and no other prophet came or will ever come after him that is the issue at hand. Before saying that prophecies and messages have succeeded each other (and there's a difference between prophecy and message) we must look back at earlier times, at the age of instinct as Allah says “And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from their loins, their seed (or from Adam’s loin his offspring) and made them testify as to themselves (saying): “Am I not your Lord?” They said: “Yes! We testify,” lest you should say on the Day of Resurrection: “Verily, we have been unaware of this.” (Al-A'raf, 172).



The issue that must settle in people's minds is that the human instinct has fully surrendered to Allah before creation that is, in the world of atoms. Hence this is the wisdom of Allah. Why did Allah say {from the Children of Adam} and not Adam? It’s to prove that his posterity has descended from him during one moment, as our Lord orders things to take place immediately: “Verily, His Command, when He intends a thing, is only that He says to it, “Be!” - and it is!” (Yassin, 82). He did not say Adam’ so that it wouldn’t be restricted to Adam’s children (his twenty sons from Eve), nor to his descendents from the prophets. He said the children of Adam to include all mankind. What must be understood is that during jahiliyya (The pre-Islamic period), the K’aba had a special sacred place in the hearts of people. Thus, they placed statues for worship and this House had certain sanctity from Adam's (AS) time until Judgment Day. Life is difficult and we must understand it with respect to Ibrahim (“Abraham”)(AS) for which the K’aba had special symbolism and sacredness, and with respect to Muhammad (PBUH), it had a higher degree of symbolism and sacredness. Here we must draw attention to a verse from the Qur'an we usually forget and only remember after Ramadan when the season of Hajj approaches, “And Hajj (pilgrimage to Makkah) to the House (K’aba ) is a duty that mankind owes to Allâh, those who can afford the expenses (for one’s conveyance, provision and residence); and whoever disbelieves [i.e. denies Hajj (pilgrimage to Makkah), then he is a disbeliever of Allâh], then Allâh stands not in need of any of the ‘Âlamîn (mankind, jinn and all that exists)” (Al-'Imaran, 97).



The phrase “owes to Allah” implies an obligation as Allah says in the following verse: “And no moving (living) creature is there on earth but its provision is due from Allâh. And He knows its dwelling place and its deposit (in the uterus, grave). All is in a Clear Book (Al-Lauh Al-Mahfûz - the Book of Decrees with Allâh)” (Hud, 6).



This verse relieved people who thought that our sustenance was a duty Allah owes us and that He would grant us sustenance, so that we become lazy, saying to ourselves that Allah will bless us because it's His duty. One linguist said: “if the son of Adam ran away from his sustenance, it will follow him wherever he goes, and if he ran away from Allah's fate, he will only be running towards it.”



We knew the meaning of “owes to” in the sustenance verse but we didn’t understand what it meant in the Hajj verse when it made Hajj a duty but seeking one's sustenance not. When we hear the verse, we must understand that Hajj is a duty made for a purpose. We pray five times every day and after ablution we turn towards the K’aba, which is innate in us in prayer; turning towards the K’aba is Hajj itself. It's as if we're occupying our hearts with this duty; here let us remember the Prophet's (PBUH) Hadith about “Al-Tashahodd’s supplication in prayer. When you reach “Ash-hadu alla ilaha illa Allah” (I testify that there's no god but Allah), look in front of you as if you’re looking at the K’aba,” for one's heart must be in the K’aba, which is the Kiblah, when you reach Hajj. The wisdom is in performing tawaf (circumambulation of the K’aba) seven times. It's not right to say that we rotate around the K’aba, and many Muslims do not perform tawaf correctly; one person may be talking on the phone, another may be looking left and right, a third may be making supplication in such a loud voice that people may repeat after him, even if he mistakes a mistake because their hearts are not moved. If we feel that tawaf is performed in an anti-clockwise manner, so that the heart will be turned towards the K’aba, then we must look at the K’aba so that our sights get attached to it the same way our hearts do during tawaf. At the end of every stage, we see the struggles on the black stone and this all proves that we're missing the goal of Hajj. In a medical conference, science proved that before the fetus is formed, the sperm rotates around the ovum in seven cycles before fertilization as if declaring its monotheism and this implies that instincts have surrendered to Allah's orders, and the more people grow distant from the message, the more is the deterioration in values. If we look back at Adam's (AS) time all the way to Prophet Muhammad's (PBUH) time, we will find that people's morals have deteriorated tremendously after each prophet. Thus was the need for another prophet to correct and reform people. The longest period between two prophets was the between Isa (AS) and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).