My Mom - My Role Model by Imam Omar Suleiman

[Music] dear brothers and sisters with everything that our beloved uh brother Imam shib said about the virtue of the messenger sallallahu alaihi wasallam I want you for a moment to imagine the scene of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam death when you had Abu Bakr Omar Ali and these type of people there and the people were in such trauma that there was a bedwin Arab who was running around back and forth in the Masjid saying oh Allah take away my eyesight because I don't want to lay my eyes on anyone after the prophet sallallah alaihi wasallam and you know Subhan Allah the death of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam being the greatest tragedy that this um has ever faced was it was so great that after the prophet Sall alaihi wasallam passed away for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years the way to console a person who had lost someone beloved to them was to say to that person remember the death of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam remember the tragedy your disaster your tragedy and the death of the Prophet sallallah alaihi wasallam but in essence he said something extremely powerful he said wall even though he passed away sallallah alai wasallam he was still alive in the actions and in the character of the people you could look at people and you could find the exact demonstration of the life of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam they were trying to smile like him sallallahu alaihi wasam they were trying to act like him they were trying to walk like him sallallahu alaihi wasallam he was alive in the umah until eventually people moved on to other things and you know Subhan Allah this talk would be different from any other talk that I've ever given because I'm not going to do uh what our beloved Sheikh did in mentioned many sources and mentioned different stories and different T and things of that sort because many times we look at the lives of these Great Men the sahab of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam we look at the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam and there's this idea that we can't be them so we might as well not try to Aspire but there are people that have lived amongst us that tried to follow their example and that succeeded in becoming tremendous this people because the prophet sallam said talked earlier about the one person at the head of every 100 years but also in an authentic AB in every single generation of my Muslims of my nation there are people that are foremost that are and today I wanted to talk about the person that I met the person that I knew that inspired me more than any other human being ever has I have a person that was not a Sheikh that was not a scholar in fact if you were to ask this person what maab she followed if you were to ask this person uh about some of the terms that we see floating around on Facebook today she would not even know what they were she's the most inspirational human being that I've ever met and it's my mother may Allah subhana wa tala have mercy on her cuz many times we look for role models we look look for Heroes and we try to find them in books or we try to find them you know as great Scholars that live halfway across the world that we would never meet but we neglect the role models and the heroes that are in our homes how many of us would not even be here if our parents did not teach us yes alhamdulillah Allah subhana T guides people to Islam but at the same time how many of us are here because our parents cared enough about us to teach us the meaning of Muhammed so I wanted to share with you my dear brothers and sisters for the purpose that you of you making Dua for her and understanding that wall there are PE there are people that live and lived amongst us that are truly extraordinary and amazing people and I just wanted to talk about her upbringing for a moment my my mother was the granddaughter of the of in the Ottoman Empire the only Arab scholar in the the the court of high scholars in the time of the in in the later part period of the Ottoman Empire if you're thinking to yourself I'm saying that just so everyone can say mashallah that's why she's such a great person her grandfather was the F of ftin you're wrong because Allah subhah tested her family and the people the children some of the children of hash actually left Islam in festine they were part of the royal families my mother was the first cousin of the mother of queen alyia of Jordan and they were from Beni Hashim benu Hashim the direct descendants of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam and I know that that doesn't impress you if you're Daisy because every Daisy thinks that they're from the lineage of the Prophet wasallam I know all of you are SS all that kind of stuff doesn't impress me either but with all of that her family were not a people who used to pray they used to drink my mother grew up in a totally Catholic School in Jerusalem next to the church of nativity run by nuns and when she grew up in that school she did not understand what it was that Allah subhana wa tala wanted her to be the granddaughter of the fak of festine she didn't know she grew up confused but at the same time she always had this inclination to spirituality so although her family was extremely religious and upright she used to sneak out of her house as a seven eight nyear old girl and go pray Sal in the Masid just asking Allah subhana wa tala for some form of guidance even as a young baby even as a child as a toddler she had inclinations her F was always calling out and then Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala blessed her after she finished her schooling not to take the path of becoming a nun or anything of that sort she graduated with a degree in Arabic literature she became a teacher she was caring compassionate she loved to teach so she taught in rala she taught in festine and then whenever she came to America the irony of it was is that she taught some of the daughters of her students in festine love to teach Arabic love to be compassionate kind towards her students loved to raise people L to see other people smile was always smiling and Allah we look at the ofam and one of the descriptions of him Sall wasallam he was always smiling and laughing and making other people smile or laugh I cannot recall a single picture of my mother as a child with her not smiling and I remember all of the moments where she would smile at every single person that she would see and it was that that character that won people's hearts but Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala did not send her true guidance until she met my father not in festine but in Houston in the University of Houston and at that time they got married at the Islamic Center on Richmond Avenue the only Masjid that was in Houston which was just a house and she didn't understand where her life was going but at the same time she trusted Allah subhanahu wa taala enough that Allah subhana wa T would dri her to the straight path she started wearing hijab later on in her life she started to draw close to Allah subhana tala she started to pray and then in the 1980s 1981 to be exact she developed a disease called myia gravis which is Latin for grave muscle disorder she lost her ability to walk freely she started feeling like her muscles were weak she wasn't as mobile as other people then she developed another blood disorder she had to go through 17 blood transfusions in two years after my brother my older brother Jamal was born whenever she sat with the doctor the doctor told her that she would never be able to have kids again and W their brothers and sisters this woman who had just started practicing Islam just a few years she laughed at the doctor and she said you're not God and Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala allowed her to get pregnant a month later and she was pregnant with me and whenever she became pregnant with me the doctors told her that you're not going to survive and your or your baby's not going to survive because all of the blood transfusions at that time there was the aid scare all of these diseases that probably came in with this blood it's not going to happen Allah subhanahu waala proved them wrong once again with her faith in Allah that was no obstacle to her she never doubted for a moment she never said why is Allah subhana T doing this to me in 1990 she had her first stroke and it was discovered that it was because she had throat cancer she came out of that stroke and she said alhamdulillah Allah subhanahu wa taala through this stroke has Puri purified me from the sins that I had before then a few years later another stroke 1993 and they discovered that the cancer was getting more severe she had to go through chemotherapy the doctor said the chance of her survival is 40% or less Allah subhana wa tala proved them wrong she never complained she said alhamdulillah he not once complaining not one saying why is Allah subhana doing this to me I just started wearing hijab I just started praying and her family members actually told her that this is God punishing you because you wear hijab and she said no you're wrong this is Allah purifying me for my past she kept going in 1996 she had another stroke a third stroke and with this stroke she went into an unresponsive coma for 14 days the doctors told us she has no chance whatsoever she's just a vegetable she's not going to wake up from this while the doctor was speaking to my father on the 14th day and telling him she has no chance she opened her eye and she said Ahmed I'm thirsty my dad's name Ahmed get me a cup of water and she drank from that water she said alhamdulillah Allah subhana is purifying me can you imagine with all of that half of my childhood she was in the hospital she once had a detached retina we were walking on in the mall and her retina fell out and she couldn't see anymore she had to have thyroid her thyroid taken out she had osteoporosis all I remember is my mother going to the hospital Time and Time and Time time again and while she would go she would make Dua to Allah subhanahu wa taala she would say oh Allah purify my sins and allow me to see my children grow all she wanted was to see her children grow up and every single time she was in the hospital she would make that Dua and the interesting thing about her is that when people would visit her in the hospital she would make it a point to host them she could barely move but she would still make it a point to host them with the 1996 stroke she lost most of her memory she forgot our names she forgot and in one year after 1996 within one year she memorized four ju of the Quran back now she's not a sahab and someone's going to say well four ju that's not much for a woman who barely has memory to be able to sit there and pound four ju into her head over an entire year was something that Subhan Allah I don't think many of us could have achieved after that she lost her speech and she could barely talk and once she would talk it was hard to understand her but she would still try and the only people that could understand her were the people that were always around her she would have to repeat herself two three four times and she also had bad hearing all she would say was and I and I'm and I'm telling you to the point that W when I think of my mother I don't even remember her or actually I remember her without hijab but when I have images of her I remember her walking around in her hijab she used to sit there during her cooking and read tap the entire day memorize the Quran the entire day and she used to say alhamdulillah Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala saved me from hearing the type of things that people talk about in Gatherings and saved me from speaking because I might backbite with that alhamdulillah no one understands me except for Allah she used to say that to us when she was angry no one understands me except for Allah but she said alhamdulillah because that stops me from getting the sins of backbiting continued forth with her life and she was so Subhan Allah so passionate that even though she wasn't able to speak she used to write poetry about festine poetry about Bosnia she used to put her words on paper and I found one of her old poems one of the most beautiful poems she wrote about about the rock the stone in Philistine she said that was from her poetry where she wrote who will carry me meaning the stone I am a rebel inside of my chest my conscience is alive the secrets of The Young and the old the determination of a people that was unable to find other than me to fight for them they're saying that I'm unable to fight wronged me they wronged me when they said that I was a silent Stone I feel I hurt I beaten I struggle may Allah bless the living Stone may Allah bless the homeless child for I was planted in the land of festine but I was grown in every land and for the greatness of Allah I fell in suud I remember her dear brothers and sisters and all I think of was that anything that happened to her she always said alhamdulillah when there was any Gathering she would always be the person to look for the one sitting in the corner to take them out there was someone that was unknown to try to talk to them and laugh with them even though she could barely talk and I remember that even as a young boy she used to actually come and apologize and this is probably bad parenting but you know what it shows you that Heart of Gold Subhan Allah she used to come to us and apologize whenever she would yell at us she would wake us up at 2: 3:00 a.m. to say I'm sorry do you forgive me we were children and it was kind of like Mom I'm trying to sleep you know Subhan Allah do you forgive me and then I remember on one night and this was August 30th of 2007 she walked into my room at 2:00 a.m. she sat me down and she said I just wanted to let you know I'm pleased with you and that if Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala takes me away for some reason I want you to continue and go ahead with your wedding which was just in a few months my was right before that and Subhan Allah she started to give me her was I said Mom what are you talking about can you stop I don't want to hear all of this she started to give me her wasia because she knew the next day I was going to a youth camp in the Masjid and I wasn't going to be home for 3 days nothing was wrong with her she was fine and Subhan Allah Ramadan was right around the corner and my mother was a pro at Ramadan my father mother-in-law he used to make a challenge he used to say let's have a competition let's see who can read the Quran the most times in Ramadan and I remember that previous Ramadan a woman who could barely read and probably didn't have the best tajid in the world who only Allah subhanahu wa taala could understand and she finished reading the Quran 14 times in Ramadan it was her life it was everything about her and my father father told me that Subhan Allah those three days of her life were the happiest days of her life she was just smiling uncontrollably laughing uncontrollably saying alhamdulillah uncontrollably and nobody understood why until Monday morning when I was on my way to pick her up she had another stroke in the closet and this time she wouldn't get back up and Subhan Allah I remember that week being the most unreal week of my life I remember at the janaza thinking to myself how was it when the prophet sallai wasallam was buried how is it that someone that's so amazing in your eyes and she died on the night of Friday alhamdulillah another blessing upon her and her janaza was after Salat and I remembered how was it that they buried the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam and I remembered that alhamdulillah she didn't have a single enemy in the world she did not know much she didn't have much knowledge but it was her character it was her character and if you're wondering how I could put myself through that I remember when I was sitting there and I was watching her being buried and I think anyone who lost their parent understands and I remembered asking how did you put dirt on the face of my father sallallahu alaihi wasallam how could you bring yourself to a point where you could put dirt on the face of said we denied our hearts we pretend our hearts weren't there we had to eliminate our hearts to be able to do that and I think about her all the time for 5 years now I've waited for the moment where I could tell her life story a woman who had a possibility of becoming a nun or just a secular person who would drink alcohol just like everybody else in her family but instead she Drew close to Allah subhana wa tala and she never complained and she understood that whatever came to her was a means of elevation and whatever Allah subhana wa tala gives you and I is a means of elevation it's a means of bringing us close to him and W there are legends that live amongst us and there are role models and heroes in your house thank your parents if they brought you up in Islam you better thank them for bringing you up in Islam and I always Subhan Allah say that anything good that I've ever done is only from her hassat because I know that at the end of the day Allah subhana T would not have allowed me to be here not everybody can convert to Islam and come back to Allah subhana tala so dear brothers and sisters look for those heroes in your home look for those people that you love look for the people that have that amazing character that exalted character that are always smiling that have never harmed anyone and try to emulate that it's easy to emulate the other stuff and remember your parents in your Dua do not ever forget them and remember the favor that they did for you if they brought you up in Islam we ask Allah subhana tala to have mercy upon our parents we ask Allah subhana wa tala to forgive them we ask Allah subhana wa taala to grant them Al we ask Allah subhana wa taala to elevate them to the status of the messenger of Allah sallallah alaihi wasallam in the highest level of jat f we ask Allah subhana T to reunite us with our parents and we ask Allah that if our parents are not Muslim we ask Allah to guide them we ask Allah subhana T to open their hearts to Islam and we ask Allah subhana wa tala to forgive them as they brought us up and they went through all of that burden we ask Allah subh not to allow them to suffer in the Hereafter not even for a single moment

Channel: Young Muslims

Views: 284,009

Keywords: mother, YM2012

Id: BWbxW2_xzSs

Length: 22min 54sec (1374 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 11 2012