Introduction

We commence by praising Allāh  , sending blessings and salutations

upon Muhammad  . We ask the Almighty to bless him and his entire household; those who

supported him from day one. And we ask Allāh   to bless all his companions as well as
every single one of us and our offspring to come up to the day of qiyāmah. Not forgetting
those who have struggled and strove through the years, in order to preserve this deen in a way
that today it has come to us. May Allāh use us to do the same for the future generations?
Beloved brothers and sisters in Islām, this evening we will be talking about the purification of
the soul. The believer as you know is only successful if he develops his link with his maker and

cleanses his heart. We refer to the heart, we refer to the soul. Allāh   speaks about cleansing
oneself from the sins that are apparent as well as those that are hidden. So in the Qur’ān he says,
“ ‫[ ”وذروا ظاهر االثم وباطنه‬Surah Al An’am ; 120]
“Leave and abandon all sins whether they are outward or inward.”
And I’m sure we all know that the outward sins are quite clear for everyone to see. Those which
are inside are sometimes completely invisible to the rest. It is only through interaction that some
of them can be picked up and sometimes even with interaction some of these sins can not be
picked up. So it is up to us to purify not only the soul but the heart, knowing that some of the
scholars refer to the heart and the soul using the same term and some have separated the two.

If the heart is pure and good, the whole body will be pure and good
What we do need to understand is that the heart is described in
the hadith of halāl  and harām which appears in Sahīh Muslim, narrated by an-Nu’man ibn

Bashir   “Halāl is quite clear and harām is also quite clear”. And between the two there
may be a grey area where people may not know is this halāl or is this harām.” So
the hadeeth continues to say “Whoever stays away from that which is doubtful has protected
himself and his religion and whoever falls into that which is doubtful has fallen into harām.” 
Cleansing the heart of hatred

So my brothers and sisters, lets purify our souls for the pleasure of Allāh  . How does this
happen? We need to do something about it. Don’t think that I just make a du`ā’ “Ya Allāh
clean me, purify my soul” and it will. Du`ā’  is a part of it, definitely. “Allāhumma

yā muqallibal quloob, thabbit qulubee `alā deenik.”  The Prophet   used to

say “O Allāh in whose hands” or “O Allāh who is the owner of the movement of the hearts,
move my heart towards the deen –  on the deen. Keep it steadfast.” But that statement will be
of no use if you do not have an intention to purify yourself.
Work hard on matters like hatred. Remove that hatred for your fellow brothers in the deen and
have hatred for sin rather than the individual whom you are supposed to be looking at saying
“This is my brother in Islām.” If you are supposed to be hating people because of a sin they may
be committing, remember everybody will hate everybody because none of us can put up our
hands and say “We are sinless.” Can anyone now, here, put up their hands and say “I’m spotless,
sinless, I have not sinned?” Not one! Subhān Allāh. Not one! Not even myself because we are
human beings. So the reality, we will hate the sin, we will hate the shirk, we will hate
the bid`ah, but we will work on the brother or the sister in a way that we will try to help them
come out of that shirk, come out of that bid`ah, come out of that sin for example. But at the
same time remembering that this is a person who has declared the shahādah and I have as
well. They may have sinned differently to me, but in the same way I want to be helped, I need
them to be helped and I will try my best to do that or at least make du`ā’ for them.
Cleansing the heart with Thikrullāh
Cleansing of the heart is also done through what is known as thikrullāh because everything
has a detergent and the detergent of the heart is the remembrance of Allāh. But I’d like to
interpret the term thikrullāh in its broader context. Thikrullāh starts with understanding the
meaning of the Qur’ān. That’s where it starts. That’s the beginning of it. Because the thikr that
is mentioned in the Qur’ān so many times, it directly refers to the Qur’ān and at times it refers to

the Sunnah of Muhammad  . So remember you need to know the message of Allāh, in
order to have your heart purified. What did Allāh say to me? I always, always say it is a big
insult. Some of us, how old we are, how regular we are with our salāh, yet we have not made
an effort to understand the meanings of what we utter in salāh. Wallāhi it is an insult. We
don’t even know what is meant by
“Alhamdu lillāhi rabbi al`ālameen, Arrahmāni arraheem, Māliki yawmi
addeen” [Surah Fathiha ;  2-4]
Some people do not know the meaning and some people do not think of the meaning when they
are uttering these words. So what value do you have? How is your heart going to be impacted?

Look at the hearts of those who were the sahābah  . When they heard a single verse their
lives changed. When they heard one verse, their hearts were purified! `Umar ibn al-
Khattāb himself, who was an enemy of Islam, the opening verses of Surah Tāhā were read to
him. Not more than a few lines were read to him. He began to tremble. Immediately his heart
was cleansed because he had that sincerity in his heart. For a moment it was struck with sincerity

and he said “Take me to Muhammad  .” Guided from kufr to īmān  in a split moment

because of the Qur’ān. And this has happened to so many people. It has happened to people
around us in our midst, perhaps some who might be seated here. Reverted
immediately. Allāhu Akbar. Why? They read the Qur’ān and realized, this is the word
of Allāh.
I always tell people, you know I have an MP3 disc in my vehicle, given to me by someone
in Malaysia. A brother. Allāh grant him goodness. And on it, there is the entire Qur’ān just in the
English language. So the `Arabic has been, you know separated. Now we know the importance
of the `Arabic and the English and he says “This is extremely beneficial to those who speak the
language.” And I thought to myself, look, to me the `Arabic is powerful, the English is fair
enough trying to explain what the `Arabic is, but the word of Allāh is that particular `Arabic.
You can not compromise it. So I thought to myself let me put it in and try and listen to what is
being said. And I had a non-Muslim sit in my car once. One who had come to do some work and
I was taking him back to his place. I saw tears in his eyes. Four of five surahs were read within
a short space of time in the English language alone and he told me “What is this?” And I said
“What do you think it is?” He said “It’s something powerful!” He said “It has to be the book you
guys follow” I said “It is” “Can I come to your place of worship?” “By all means
brother.” Subhān Allāh. I think within a short space of time, may Allāh grant him guidance to
the deen. Ameen.
That’s when I realized, I said you know what? Sometimes when people are just going through
even the meaning of it, because they understand it, it impacts differently. Without reducing the
importance of the tilāwah in the `Arabic language. Because indeed that is on a level of its own.
But at the same time remember the impact of that, if you understand what you’re reading, is
totally different. You need that as well. So your purification will start when you have made an
intention to understand the word of Allāh. I said moments ago, they heard four verses of
the Qur’ān, they embraced Islām. We have read what we know
as khatmah upon khatmah  upon khatmah once a month, sometimes once a
week, sometimes once every two months. We’ve completed the entire mushaf, but brother you
can not give up your pornography. A`oothu billāh.