Khutbah Review - 1

Today we went to Jummah…. usual stuff. 

VERY unusual khutbah. 

The Khatib was an old teacher of my dads… since in Guyana. His name is.. Sheikh Mohammad Safi? 

Even though he does not like to be called Sheikh. 

I’ve never heard him speak, or seen him before. Today I wasn’t expecting anything special. The particular Masjid we went too is known in my head for having very lame, overused khutbahs. But today, it blew me away. 

His topic was the Quran. 

Basic topic?

Nope. 

He talked about how people have left the Quran. We read and memorize, like parrots he said. Just reciting off the tongue. We don’t contemplate, study, learn from the Quran. Especially us non-arabs. He said how the ONLY reason Allah revealed the Quran in Arabic was for Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)’s people to be able to understand it. So that they couldn’t use the excuse that it was not in a language that they understood.

He said it is up to us non-arabs to read the Quran in English…and contemplate the meaning. Not only that, but we should learn Arabic. Not speech Arabic, Quranic Arabic. And we should read the Tafsir-ul-Quran. So we know what Allah is saying in each verse.

He was also talking about how all anyone worries about is what “Mathaab” your following. Or whether your Sunni or Shia or whatnot. No one goes back to the base of our religion anymore. No one studies Quran.  

He talked about the students studying overseas… in Madinah and wherever else. They memorize Quran and study Fiqh. There are no classes to STUDY Quran. Fiqh is based on Quran isn’t it? So why not study Quran? 

The whole thing just blew me away. Left me in wonder. Most Khutbahs are tedious reminders of prayer and zakah. Khutbahs should be like this… so that you actually leave with some new insight.