All of us, as created human beings, have been given a monumental charge. It is the remarkable, sanctified, honored, and yet challenging charge of being God’s representatives on this earth (khulafa’ fi-l-ard). It is stating the ABCs of Islamic theology to remind ourselves that this earth and everything in it, on it, and around it, both the seen and the unseen, belongs to God. It is not yours, nor is it mine. It does not belong to a nation or a people. It does not belong to a clan or a kind. It belongs to God. But we have been given a remarkable deputyship, a remarkable license, a legal and moral instrument of sorts. We inherit this earth not on our own behalf. Not to do our own will. Not to discharge what we want or wish. Not even to serve ourselves, but rather to serve the will of the Owner as agents and deputies. What a wondrous challenge. What a blessing and an honor. For if you are the deputy of a principal, you reflect upon this principal in everything you do as the duly authorized agent. This is the case for every single human being, rich or poor, healthy or ill, Muslim or non-Muslim on the face of this earth.
For those who study history, it becomes readily apparent that it often takes centuries to properly understand and assess the performance of an agent of God. In the moment in which an agent lives, whether this agent is an individual or a part of a collectivity, how well they have performed their role, the impact of their agency, how truthful and valuable they have been to the principal, the extent to which an agent has done the principal justice in performing their duties—-the truth of the matter is that most assessments done in the moment turn out to be so short-sighted, so incomplete, that they are often incomplete and remarkably partial. For the information we receive as we are living through the moment is so partial that any assessment of our own agency is exactly that: partial. It is so incomplete, so partial, that it is difficult to evaluate.
It takes centuries to start understanding the quality of the agency and the relationship between the agent and the principal. From an Islamic point of view, the only way we can really assess this agency is to have an understanding of what the principal, the Owner of creation, wants. What is it that the principal, God, actually wanted from the agent? What were the purposes, the objectives, and the moral and legal charge? Only then can we assess if the agent has succeeded or failed.
This is particularly important in the periods in which the agent, the human being, is born in a historically challenging moment, just like our moment today. In our current historical moment, if you are even half-alive, if you have any consciousness whatsoever, then you are immediately struck by the overwhelming sense of tragedy and trauma. The procession of mutilated, broken, destroyed lives is overwhelming. It is soul-numbing. Every day, we witness new victims of Israel in its bombardment of the Palestinians, whether in the West Bank or Gaza. We see the unending slaughter in Lebanon, even the destruction of Al-Bak in the historical city of Baalbek in Lebanon. It is truly overwhelming. We see the news of ships carrying weapons and ammunitions for the Israeli army passing through the Suez Canal, and we see the spineless and useless Egyptian government letting these ships pass through so that Israel can continue its genocide against Palestinians. The Egyptian government is, as always, entirely useless. A supposedly Muslim government is entirely complicit in the genocide of their Muslim brothers and sisters. Of course, we are fully aware of the flow of goods through Jordan to Israel, as the Jordanian government is no less complicit in the genocide unfolding in Palestine.
As you sit in this historical moment, remember your agency. Remember that you are on this earth not to exercise your own will, but to give effect to the will of the Owner, God. Remember that you are not here to serve your own interests, but to serve God's interests. As you sit in this historical moment, reflect upon the fact that it is not just the Egyptian government that has shown itself to be complicit in the genocide by letting these ships pass through the Suez Canal, loaded with arms, missiles, bullets, and whatever else to perpetuate the genocide. Reflect upon how an entire people, the Egyptian people, over 100 million people, are in deep slumber. Look at the non-reaction, which I am sure is born of fear and terror, of the Egyptian people. Over 100 million people are so terrorized as to live in such gripping fear that they do not dare say a single word of protest. They do not dare question anything. They dare not voice any type of objection to the complicity of their own government in the perpetuation of an ongoing genocide.
One other snapshot. There have been civil disturbances in the Netherlands and France because there are European soccer matches going on and, for some reason, Israeli teams are allowed to participate. There have been protests against the participation of the Israeli team, in the Netherlands and France, and there have been ensuing clashes and violence between the supporters of the Israeli team and these protesters, who have been objecting to the participation of Israeli teams because of the genocide. You are fully cognizant, of course, as you sit with your agency, your khilafah, of the fact that if an Israeli team came to play in Egypt, the UAE, Jordan, or most Muslim countries, we would not even have the protests that we see in Europe. People would not dare.
So ours is a historical moment that is resoundingly defeating. So defeating, in fact, that you may be tempted to say, "Well, there is very little that I can do." In embracing the idea of your ineptitude and inability, however, the very idea of your agency, the very idea of your khilafah, will become diluted beyond recognition. For if the agent tells themselves, "I have these marching orders given by the principal, but I do not see myself as able or capable. In fact, I do not see myself as having much power or ability," then the agent fails. But they do not fail because of malfeasance. They do not fail necessarily because of negligence. They fail because of defeatism. They fail because the agent is convinced that there is little, if anything, to do in serving and discharging the agency.
I have said so many times that history is a great educator. History often speaks to us and educates us. But history is also capable of liberating us, if only we become humble students of history.
So, in the midst of this defeatist moment, I was reading the poetry of a most fascinating figure from Islamic history, Ahmadu Bamba, who is also known as the Servant of the Prophet. Ahmadu Bamba was from Senegal in West Africa. He lived in the late 19th century and passed away in 1927. He, too, was born in a very historically challenging moment, in one of those historical moments in which the temptation is strong to give up on everything and say, "Well, I do not know what the meaning of this agency is, so I am just going to do what is good for me and forget all else.” Ahmadu Bamba was born during French colonialism in Senegal, a time when France had occupied Senegal and was deliberately eradicating all nativist culture in West Africa. This included anything to do with Islam. Ahmadu Bamba belonged to a well-established Sufi order and went on to found his own branch of Sufism that still exists today. In fact, he founded an entire city where he is buried now, the city of Touba. Every year, over a million people perform pilgrimage to his grave site and his mosque in the city of Touba. In fact, I have even read that followers of Ahmadu Bamba have an annual day of celebration in his honor in New York City.
There are so many fascinating things about Ahmadu Bamba and his historical moment, and one of them is that he was a pacifist. He knew that if he were to take on the French militarily, they would eradicate him, so he adopted nonviolent opposition to the French, who ended up exiling him for many years. But the part that I want to focus on is his poetry. I was reading his poetry, trying to understand a little bit of what this man did in his historical period, a time when so much of Islam could have been lost in Senegal. But through his message and his character, not only did he preserve Islam in Senegal, he created a lasting movement that rooted Islam in West Africa even deeper in opposition to French influence. And he did it so powerfully. What was it about this man?
Reading his poetry, I was struck by something that I want to share with you. Most of his poetry is love-homily for the Prophet. His poetry is not incidental to his message. It is, in fact, at the core of his message. Ahmadu Bamba's followers recite his poetry regularly in dhikr. His poetry, and the impact of his poetry, far exceed any of his other writings, and his poetry is inextricably intertwined with his entire message. And so much of this poetry is, at heart, a love poem to the Prophet.
Pause and think about it. At a time of great historical challenge and tribulation, the key that provided Ahmadu Bamba with the power of his agency was to love the Prophet Muhammad. Is it that simple? Is it that straightforward? God tells us in Surah at-Tawbah: “God has sent you a prophet, one amongst you” (Q 9:128). The verse goes on to say that the Prophet is worrying about your welfare, living with your problems, literally from one minute to the next. It means that what you are burdened by burdens this Prophet. It is as if saying that your well-being is part of his well-being. He carries your problems on his back because there is no difference between his problems and your problems. And the verse then adds that the very nature of this Prophet is that he is merciful with believers.
Let us pause for a moment here. Rahma is kindness, compassion, gentleness, tenderness, and mercy. What, then, is the character of this Prophet with the believers? His deliberate due course is gentleness, care, and giving compassion. Your problems are his problems. He is constantly with you as a source of mercy and compassion. And this level of care and mercy cannot exist without love. So, the Prophet cares so much about you that he is in a constant mode of generosity, kindness, mercy, and compassion.
Early in Islamic history, there occurred a dispute of some relevance here. This is shortly after the Prophet died. In the same chapter, Surah al-Tawbah, God instructs the Prophet to collect the zakat from people “so that you will purify them.” God then adds, telling the Prophet, "Pray for your followers because your prayer is a source of tranquility, goodness, and well-being for them." It is well known that after the Prophet died, during the khilafah of Abu Bakr, whole tribes refused to give alms to the central state, to the Khilafah Abu Bakr, because the circumstances had now changed. “The raison d'être for paying these taxes was because the Prophet prayed for us, and that does not exist anymore.” This, in part, led to the wars known as the “Apostasy Wars.” But I am not interested in the political controversy and dispute. This conflict raised the theological issue of the prayer of the Prophet, which is a source of goodness and tranquility for his Ummah. Does this end with the death of the Prophet? Or does it continue beyond his death? Let me put the issue in a different way. God tells us in the Qur'an that those who die as martyrs in God's path are not actually dead. They continue living with their Lord (Q 2:154). Muslim theologians raised the very logical and common sense question: if this is true for martyrs, what about the Prophet? Does it make sense that martyrs continue living with their Lord while we believe that the Prophet is dead and gone? Would it make sense that the Prophet is no more while those who witnessed in his cause continue living? This was part of the theological debates about whether the Prophet continues to exist, or is living with the Lord in other worlds, and if he continues to be capable of praying for us in intercession to God.
I then come back to Ahmadu Bamba and his poetry. Sadly, Wahhabi/Salafi Islam, in its typically reductionist mode, reduced the Sunna of the Prophet into a set of textual normative commands about what he used to wear, whether he used the miswak, and outer external things. But what they de-emphasized in Muslim consciousness is a direct relationship with the Prophet as a living example. It is impossible to write the type of poetry that Ahmadu Bamba wrote, poetry that created a movement of millions that defeated the French in Senegal without firing a single shot, without a deep love for the Prophet. Not just a deep love, in fact, but an actual personal relationship, which is so very evident in his poetry.
What is the issue here? In one word, it is modeling. Imagine the owner of a company gives you a charge. This owner says, "I want you to be my legal agent. You are in charge. Here, this folder has all these instructions for you. Go and make sure that these instructions are carried out." I, as an agent, then read over the instructions. Maybe, if I am diligent, I will spend years studying the instructions before I then go off. If I do not have a living model for that agency, however, then the chances of failure are enormous. Modeling is the way we learn. It is how we understand the living example of the Prophet. And what was that? The model of the Prophet is that he did not live for or worry about himself; he worried about you (Q 9:128). He carried on his back your problems as if they were his problems. And the Prophet’s philosophy of existence among you was that he was constantly kind, giving, compassionate, and merciful (Q 9:128).
I look at the example of someone like Ahmadu Bamba, at how he managed to have millions of followers, to defy the imperial power of France in Senegal, to create an entire city, one visited by millions of people each year to honor him. I look at his legacy, and his legacy among his followers is precisely modeled after the Prophet’s. Amongst his followers, what distinguished him was his kindness, his giving nature, his compassion, and his selflessness in service.
When the Sunna of the Prophet becomes reduced to superficial prescriptions that we imitate without a soul or spirit; when it becomes about what we wear, how we cover, how we clean our teeth, or what musk we put on; all without modeling that philosophy of agency in life, then our agency in turn becomes as if a walk in the wilderness. We are lost. We are without an anchor. We have this agency, but we do not know what to do with it, because it is an agency without a model. We have a book of instructions, but our minds can recast these instructions in a million different ways. So, when God tells us, “What I need is that the way you interact and relate to others is through mercy and kindness,” without a model, our minds can philosophize that in a million different ways. But I submit to you that if you have a personal relationship with the Prophet, if you love the Prophet, if you relate to the model of the Prophet like Ahmadu Bamba did, then your agency starts creating a pathway that is far more clear and precise.
And, indeed, I do believe that the Prophet lives with his Lord, like the martyrs. I do believe, as God tells us, that the intercession of your Prophet and the prayers of your Prophet are a source of good for you. When we abandon these prayers, when we abandon a relationship so that we are not the recipients of this blessing anymore, we do so only to our own detriment. And the consequences are the type of uprootedness and the loss of spirit and soul that we witness all over the Muslim world today.
In these trying times, the love homilies of Ahmadu Bamba are truly anchoring and inspiring beyond belief. A man just loving the Prophet. We then remember that this love defied the power of French colonialism and resisted French colonialism without firing a shot. May we always learn from the models and examples that God has set on this earth for us.
There is yet another Israeli illegal settlement in the occupied Golan Heights. This settlement is known as “Trump Heights,” honoring President Trump, in contravention of international law. As if international law matters. Trump has been in direct violation of every interpretation of international law known to humanity. In his previous presidency, Trump recognized Israel's annexation of the Golan Heights, which, of course, are part of Syria. It has always been a part of Syria. Trump rewarded Israel for illegally conquering it by recognizing Israel’s annexation of this territory, and Israel was so ecstatic that they named a settlement after Trump. Of course, Trump also recognized Israel's annexation of Jerusalem. It was also during the Trump presidency that Trump sent his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to wine and dine with MBZ and MBS to forget the Palestinians and create the “Deal of the Century.” This was all part of Trump's legacy.
So I cannot help but make a comment about the recent elections. I do not need to say much about the obscenity of voting for a representative of the administration that is entirely complicit in an ongoing genocide. “Genocide Joe” is not just a funny turn of phrase. He really is Genocide Joe, because his administration has fully enabled and empowered the Israeli genocide by opening up American coffers to Israel and replenishing all Israel’s weaponry, ammunition, and any other kinds of military aid, with no limits or questions. So I do not need to say why voting for Kamala Harris is obscene. But so is voting for Trump. It is no coincidence that the Israeli, Saudi, and Emirati governments have all celebrated Trump winning the elections.
I go back to the modeling issue as God's agent on this earth, as I am God's deputy on the earth. I am God's khalifah, and so are you. Not by choice, but this is the charge. And as God's deputy, we will eventually be questioned about how we have discharged this deputyship. So, if you have an awareness of the Prophet, you can easily imagine the question: “What would the Prophet have done?” Could you have imagined, if the Prophet was alive today, that he would have cast a vote in favor of Kamala Harris? Could you have imagined that the Prophet would vote for Trump? What is painful is that as many Muslim voters as there are in the United States, the candidate who had a Muslim running mate only got half a million votes. This is like a barometer measuring the temperature of the Ummah. This is a measure of our lack of solidarity and our disintegration as an Ummah. How could the candidate who chose a Muslim running mate have received only half a million votes nationwide? If the Prophet was among us, what would you imagine the Prophet would have told us about our relationship to power in a place like the United States? Remember that we have already established that the philosophy for the Prophet's existence was compassion and kindness (Q 9:128). What would be the position of a beneficent, compassionate, kind, and empathetic human being? Would that person vote for Kamala? Would they vote for Trump? What would they tell you about the fact that a fellow Muslim, an articulate and smart Muslim, is out there trying to cut a path in the dense forest of American politics?
Am I saying that your response to the trauma and misery that we are witnessing right now is to love the Prophet and to strengthen our relationship to the Prophet? Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. Sometimes, when the world is so full of hate, the only thing you can do is love, to feed your love, to nourish your love, and to love those who are worthy of love.
And the man who God told us was sent to this Ummah, the burdens of this Ummah are indistinguishable from his own burdens. He modeled for us a moral life and moral existence. He showed us what it means to live morally. God told him, “You are a man of great ethics” (Q 68:4). Can you imagine if Muslim rulers would have learned from the Prophet, and if the way they led was through kindness and compassion? If anything, we look at Muslim rulers and we see that they have no kindness and no compassion. When does it get through to our intellects and our hearts that the mark of the Prophet, not just as a leader in his community, but as a neighbor, a friend, a family man, a husband, and a father was always kindness and compassion?
It speaks volumes that Ahmadu Bamba looked around and saw that no one in West Africa was able to resist the military power of the French. The French dominated everywhere and were slaughtering, committing numerous genocides and numerous human rights violations, massacring countless numbers of people. It is remarkable that Bamba’s response was to say: “I will love the Prophet, and through that love, I am going to educate an entire Ummah and create an entire movement of Muslims.” At the time that France sought to erase Islam from Senegal, Ahmadu Bamba rooted Islam even deeper in Senegalese soil, and he did so through his love poetry to the Prophet.