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Hamza Yusuf

Hamza Yusuf Biography

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“İşte bu hal, değişmeyen bir gerçeğin etrafında şekillenir: Ne yaparsak yapalım Allah'ın bizi gördüğünün farkında olmak. Bu farkındalığı beslemek, insanı Hakk'ı gücendirecek ve edebe aykırı işler yapmaktan alıkoyar. İşte nebevi terbiyenin asaleti buradan gelir.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Allah seni bir zarara uğratırsa onu Kendisinden başka giderecek yoktur ve eğer sana bir hayır verirse bilesin ki O, her şeye kâdirdir" (En'am,17) Şunu bil ki, eğer bütün insanlar sana faydalı olmak için bir araya toplanacak olsalar Allah'ın senin için yazmış olduğundan başka bir şeyle fayda sağlayamazlar. Eğer sana zarar vermek için bir araya toplanacak olsalar Allah'ın snein aleyhine yazmış olduğu şeyden başkasıyla sana zarar veremezler" buyurmuştur.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“One of the major drawbacks of being severed from the heart is that the more one is severed, the sicker the heart becomes, for the heart needs nourishment. Heedlessness starves the heart, robs it of its spiritual manna. One enters into a state of unawareness – a debilitating lack of awareness of God and an acute neglect of humanity’s ultimate destination: the infinite world of the Hereafter. When one peers into the limitless world through remembrance of God and increases in beneficial knowledge, one’s concerns become more focused on the infinite world, not the finite one that is disappearing and ephemeral. When people are completely immersed in the material world, believing that this world is all that matters and all that exists and that they are not accountable for their actions, they effect a spiritual death of their hearts.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“A sound heart has knowledge and trust, not doubt and anxiety. Shubuhāt alludes to aspects closely connected to the heart: the soul, the ego, Satan’s whisperings and instigations, caprice, and the ardent love of this ephemeral world. The heart is an organ designed to be in a state of calm, which is achieved with the remembrance of God: Most surely, in the remembrance of God do hearts find calm (QURAN, 13:28). This calm is what the heart seeks out and gravitates to. It yearns always to remember God the Exalted. But when God is not remembered, when human beings forget God, then the heart falls into a state of agitation and turmoil. In this state it becomes vulnerable to diseases because it is undernourished and cut off, Cells require oxygen, so we breathe, If we stop breathing, we die. The heart also needs to breathe, and the breath of the heart is none other than the remembrance of God. Without it, the spiritual heart dies. The very purpose of revelation and of scripture is to remind us that our hearts need to be nourished.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Vücudumuzdaki hücreler oksijene ihtiyaç duyarlar, bu yüzden nefes alırız ve nefesimiz kesilirse yaşayamayız. İşte bunun gibi, kalbin de teneffüse ihtiyacı vardır ve kalbin nefesi Allah'ı "anmaktan" başka bir şey değildir. O olmadan manevi kalp hayatta kalamaz. İşte vahyin ve kutsal metinlerin varlık sebebi de, bize kalplerimizin beslenmeye muhtaç olduğu gerçeğini hatırlatmaktır.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Interestingly, the word munkasiran is translated as dejected, though literally it means broken. It conveys a sense of being humbled in the majestic presence of God. It refers to the awesome realization that each of us, at every moment, lives and acts before the august presence of the Creator of the heavens and the earth, the one God besides whom there is no power or might in all the universe. When one seriously reflects on God’s perfect watch over His creation, the countless blessings He sends down, and then considers the kind of deeds one brings before Him—what possible feelings can one generate except humility and degrees of shame? With these strong feelings, one implores God to change one’s state, make one’s desires consonant with His pleasure—giving up one’s designs for God’s designs. This is pure courtesy with respect to God, a requisite for spiritual purification.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“apportionment in the world. Thus, one is opposing how God meted out sustenance in concord with His wisdom. Therefore, one must oppose his own ego's desires and seek treatment for this disease with the healing force of acceptance of the divine decree and prayer on behalf of one's enemies in a way that suppresses the ego [nafs].”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“On the Day of Judgment no one is safe save the one who returns to God with a pure heart. (Quran) Surely in the breasts of humanity is a lump of flesh, if sound then the whole body is sound, and if corrupt then the whole body is corrupt. Is it not the heart? (Prophet Muhammad ) Blessed are the pure at heart, for they shall see God. (Jesus )”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“The believers are described as people whose hearts are alive and full of light, while the scoffers are in darkness: Is one who was dead and then We revived [with faith] and made for him a light by which to walk among the people like one who is in darkness from which he cannot exit? (QURAN, 6:122). According to commentators of the Quran, the one who was dead refers to having a dead heart, which God revived with the light of guidance that one may walk straight and honorably among human beings. Also, the prophet Muhammad said, “The difference between the one who remembers God and one who does not is like the difference between the living and the dead.” In essence, the believer is someone whose heart is alive, while the disbeliever is someone whose heart is spiritually dead.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Many in the West have long proffered that the brain is the center of consciousness. But in traditional Islamic thought – as in other traditions – the heart is viewed as the center of our being. The Quran, for example, speaks of wayward people who have hearts with which they do not understand (7:179). Also the Quran mentions people who mocked the prophet and were entirely insincere in listening to his message, so God placed over their hearts a covering that they may not understand it and in their ears [He placed] acute deafness (6:25). Their inability to understand is a deviation from the spiritual function of a sound heart, just as their ears have been afflicted with a spiritual deafness. So we understand from this that the center of the intellect, the center of human consciousness and conscience, is actually the heart and not the brain. Only recently have we discovered that there are over 40,000 neurons in the heart. In other words, there are cells in the heart that are communicating with the brain. While the brain sends messages to the heart, the heart also sends messages to the brain.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Islam provides the method by which our hearts can become sound and safe again. This method has been the subject of brilliant and insightful scholarship for centuries in the Islamic tradition. One can say that Islam in essence is a program to restore purity and calm to the heart through the remembrance of God. This present text is based on the poem known as Maṭharat al-Qulūb (literally, Purification of the Hearts), which offers the means by which purification can be achieved. It is a treatise on the “alchemy of the hearts,” namely, a manual on how to transform the heart. It was written by a great scholar and saint, Shaykh Muhammad Mawlud al Ya’qubi al-Musawi al-Muratani, As his name indicates, he was from Mauritania in West Africa. He was a master of all the Islamic sciences, including the inward sciences of the heart. He stated that he wrote this poem because he observed the prevalence of diseased hearts. He saw students of religion spending their time learning abstract sciences that people were not really in need of, to the neglect of those sciences that pertain to what people are accountable for in the next life, namely, the spiritual condition of the heart, In one of his most cited statements, the Prophet said, “Actions are based upon intentions.” All deeds are thus valued according to the intentions behind them, and intentions emanate from the heart. So every action a person intends or performs is rooted in the heart. Imam Mawlud realized that the weakness of society was a matter of weakness of character in the heart, Imam Mawlud based his text on many previous illustrious works, especially Imam al-Ghazali’s great Ihya’ Ulum alDin (The Revivification of the Sciences of the Religion). Each of the 40 books of Ihya‘ Ulum al-Din is basically about rectifying the human heart. If we examine the trials and tribulations, wars and other conflicts, every act of injustice all over earth, we’ll find they are rooted in human hearts.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“Dignity and honor are gifts: “[O God], You exalt whomever You will, and You debase whomever You will” (QURAN, 3:26). Proofs of this Divine law abound. There are many accounts, for example, of people who were once in positions of authority and wealth, who then find themselves paupers completely stripped of their former glory, reduced, in many instances, to wards of the state. God is powerful over all things, and all good, authority, and provision are in His hand, not ours.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“The cure for hatred is straightforward. One should pray for the person toward whom he feels hatred; make specific supplication mentioning this person by name, asking God to give this person good things in this life and the next. When one does this with sincerity, hearts mend. If one truly wants to purify his or her heart and root out disease, there must be total sincerity and conviction that these cures are effective. Arguably, the disease of hatred is one of the most devastating forces in the world. But the force that is infinitely more powerful is love. Love is an attribute of God; hate is not. A name of God mentioned in the Quran is al-Wadud, the Loving one. Hate is the absence of love, and only through love can hatred be removed from the heart. In a profound and beautiful hadith, the Prophet said, "None of you has achieved faith until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart
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“I think that's deeply rooted in Muslim consciousness, the idea of not submitting to anything other than God. "You can abuse me, but you're not going to win me over. But if you treat me with respect and dignity, I'm going to fall in love with you. I'm going to sing your praises all over the world because you're powerful and you treated me with human dignity."”

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Author:Hamza Yusuf
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“Muslims have been an almost entirely benevolent force in the 20th century. They did not wreak the havoc the Western powers wreaked on the world. They have not come anywhere near to the environmental degradation that we've done to the planet. So I think Muslims need to be seen in the proper light. They're mostly decent, hardworking people, people with deep family values, and they want to live in peace.”

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Author:Hamza Yusuf
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“What comes to a person in his or her life, however difficult it may be, perhaps will help a person move closer to God. The response to tribulation is abr, which is patience, perseverance, steadfastness, and resolve. Allāh loves the patient; part of the reason the tribulation comes is to draw the quality of patience out of them - He loves this quality.”

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Author:Hamza Yusuf
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“When paying charity, one should smile and be humble, allowing the hand of the indigent to be above the giver's hand.”

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Book:Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms, and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart : Translation and Commentary of Imam Mawlud's Matharat Al-Qulub
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