Day 10
Guidance to the Straight Path
After praising and thanking our Compassionate and Merciful Master, we turn to Him and ask, “Guide us on how to be Your slave, O’ Allah.”
Our Quest today is to start being active in a Muslim community. A wolf would never attack a sheep in its herd.
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Welcome to day 10 of Be Quranic where we take short passages from the Quran every single day. We extract practical lessons from it and apply it into our daily life so that we can be more Quranic.
InshaAllah today we will continue our study of Suratul Fatiha and we have reached Ayah number 6 which is Ehadina Al -Siratul Mustaqeem which translates to guide us to the straight path. This is our dua in Suratul Fatiha.
We are asking for guidance from our Master, from Allah, Rabbul Alameen. And this is the most important isti 'ana that we are asking for continuing from the previous ayah, only you we enslave ourselves to and only you we ask for isti 'ana, we ask for help.
And the first help that we ask for is guidance. We have admitted that Allah is our Rabb, our Master and this Master of ours is Ar -Rahman and Ar -Rahim. And out of gratitude we obligingly declare that we are His slaves and only He we turn to for help.
So now we ask Him, O Allah we are Your slaves, what do You want us to do? O Allah, how do we become Your slaves? The ayah that Allah taught us is Ehadina Al -Siratul Mustaqeem. There are two ways that we can ask for guidance.
We can ask Ehadina ila Al -Siratil Mustaqeem or Ehadina Al -Siratal Mustaqeem. The first one would translate to guide us to the straight path. The second one would translate as guide us the straight path.
The particle to is missing. In the Arabic language, let's say you get lost somewhere and you don't know how to get to a destination and you see someone and you ask him, Ehadina Al -Siratul Mustaqeem. Guide us.
to the straight path, guide us to the straight path with the particle ila too. This person would then tell you alright go straight, turn left, then when you see a traffic light turn right, you just continue until you see around about do this, that and this and that and then he leaves you to execute the instructions on your own.
If we were to guide us to the straight path, we would mean that we are asking O Allah send us an instruction manual on what to do and then we'll do it ourselves. But when you ask, if we were to guide us to the straight path, this person would then guide you, not only tell you how to get there, but he will take you to your destination.
This is our dua. We are asking Allah not only to give us a set of instructions on how to get to the destination, on how to be a good slave of Allah. But we are asking Allah, be in this journey. Because being on the straight path involves making a lot of decisions, taking actions, and moving can be hard.
So we are asking Allah to give us the strength to always choose the straight path. And this is why we ask for this guidance. Adina as -Sirat al -Mustaqib, at least 17 times a day, if not more. If it was just a set of instructions, then asking once would be enough.
Allah gives us the Quran, this is your manual, go take it and execute the instructions. But we are asking for Allah to be with us, to continuously guide us in every step of our life, in every juncture, in every decision that we have to make, so that we continuously remain on the straight path.
We can never have enough of guidance. We can never have enough of hidaya. For as long as we live, we continuously need Allah's guidance. Another aspect of this ayah, when it comes to guidance, Allah did not say, Idhdini, guide me the straight path.
He said, Idhdina, guide us the straight path. It shows us the importance of being in a Muslim community. Even the ayah before, iyaka naabudu, not aabudu. Allah says, to only to Allah, we enslave ourselves.
It's not only to Allah, I enslave myself. Or, wa iyaka asta 'een. No, Allah says, iyaka nasta 'een. We are not taught to say only you I ask for help from. No, we ask for help. It's always we, it's always in the plural form, telling us the importance of being in a Muslim community.
Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam in one hadith he said, al -mar 'u' ala dini khalili, a person is on the religion of his closest friends. So look around us, who are the people that we spend most of our time with?
So be very careful and choose how and who we spend our time with. The ideal situation is you've got a masjid close to your house and you pray five times a day at the masjid. So this is your community that you stand shoulder to shoulder to in a straight line 17 rakah a day, five times every single day.
During the time of the Prophet, everyone would be praying at the masjid. Someone missing the Prophet would realize that where is this person? Male, female, they all would meet and congregate at the masjid.
Just like a wolf that would not attack a sheep in a herd, shaitaan would struggle to attack a human, a Muslim in his jama 'a, in his community. So our quest today and this is not something that you do short term, you do in one day.
This is something that you have to start today and continue for the rest of your life. Find a Muslim community and be active in that community Contribute to that community grow together with the community This is really crucial in terms of our guidance in terms of maintaining on the straight path Remember the concept of Isti 'ana in order for you to qualify for Allah's help Isti 'ana requires that you have taken the necessary steps You have taken the necessary actions for you to start Moving towards the direction that you're heading to then you ask for Allah's help and in the surah in this few ayats Allah is telling us the importance of remaining in a community Forming a Jamala so find a community and be active Contribute grow together if you do not have a masjid near you start one find a few friends Read one or two ayat of the Quran and discuss study together.
At least once a week these friends of yours will hold each other accountable Making sure that we are all together on the straight path so the quest find a community and Contribute and grow together with that community.