Twisting the Truth Without Telling a Lie

0:00This audio is brought to you by Muslim Central. Stop worrying about who said what? That's not for you, that's for me. They've not committed a crime against you. They've committed a crime against me, Allah SWT. Allah is taking documentation of everyone who will put somebody participated for five seconds. Somebody participated for 30 minutes. Somebody went around and made this their entire identity, their entire profile. Somebody did this, that Allah is keeping record of all of it and they will get their exact share, don't you worry about that, I am taking that off your plate. Yeah, the fact is verifiable, how you twisted the fact, however. That's literally the term twisting the facts. That's what if is. You take facts and you twist them and you manipulate them and you do this very gently. You don't do this in a way that gets noticed. You brought it back to life. You initiate, you further the flame. And when someone else hears you say that, they may not be careless, they may be careless and evil. They may do that. You're furthering the flames. Your job in my job is to crush those flames.

2:54To be able to accept a degree of hope and a degree of hope, namely, to signra. If you could hear the last name and families from beautiful and beautiful animals, say this in your eye can be seen. And if you can do so, but have it hither kin, If you didn't see it then a sign will appear. And you pray for Allah, you are cátib maximum. May you complete your journey with a cup of feminine sun and hope for a good安 for me, may you follow this path. God almighty appointed us with intention, My team and I are currently engaged in a study of Surat An-Nur, the 21st Surah of the Quran. And there are an incredible compilation of profound lessons, very heavy lessons for the Ummah inside of the Surah. And the more we engage in the study of the Surah, for me personally, I start seeing for myself and everybody around me that some basic lessons of the Quran that were so important

3:55when it was revealed are all but forgotten. They're just openly ignored by people. I'm not trying to blame any one of you individually, but I want us myself and all of you to look at ourselves deeply in the mirror today and think about what it is that Allah, as the Wajal, is telling us in these ayat. These revelations are related to a massive scandal that was created against our mother, Aisha, Allah wa-Anaha, in Medina. And of course, she's our mother, she's the wife of the Prophet, Allah wa-Alihu, and people are talking about her in a way that is completely undignified. And everybody, the conversation has spread so far and wide that it's even, you know, the Prophet himself is hearing about it, so Allah wa-Alihu. And eventually, when he, the word gets to Aisha, Allah wa-Anaha, who will sick herself, she almost died. Just hearing the news, she almost died. This report is from Aisha herself, Allah wa-Anaha, who, you know, this report becomes

4:56the longest Hadith in Bukhari. And it's the most exhaustive report of her own experience, what happened when people were talking about her and she eventually discovered it. Allah wa-Alaha. My focus in these few minutes is actually just how Allah talked about it. Everything happened. The Prophet's life is suffering. Imagine somebody talking about your wife, the whole city talking about your wife, right? Like it's not, it's not something easy to go through. On top of that, it's, you're the leader of that community. So every time you come out, everyone around, you don't know who's been hearing what? The pain of that, because our families are, especially the women of our families, they're a sonat. We're called masinin and they're called mas-sanat. We're people who bring women into the fort and they are supposed to be inside our fort. And part of that is protecting their privacy, protecting their dignity. And now, their dignity is being challenged. It's being questioned, the hard dignity is being challenged and questioned openly. And we don't know who's saying what and who started it, nothing. It's widespread. So in this kind of an environment, this is a kind of torture, you know, in psychology,

6:00we learned that sometimes psychological pain is much more than physical pain. This is a kind of psychological pain that can, it's devastating. In fact, humiliation is so powerful that in the Quran, Mariam Salamun alayhiha was going to be accused. Yeah? She was going to be accused. And this is the only time in the Quran we find some, a statement like this, before she can face those people that are going to say things to her, she's wishing she could be dead. Yeah, I wish I would be dead. Humiliation is that powerful. Humiliation is so powerful that Musa alayhi salam was speaking directly with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala on the mountain. And Allah told him, go to Farahun. Go to Farahun. Well, if you go to Farahun, what's the first most dangerous thing that's going to happen? He's going to kill you. That's the most dangerous thing. The first fear Musa alayhi salam mentioned is not that he will kill me. That's the last fear he mentioned. The first fear he mentioned is, Arabic, Arabic, Arabic, I am afraid my Lord, they're going to call me a liar. They're going to humiliate me.

7:01That's going to make my chest tight. But in the end, he mentioned they might kill me too. Arabic Human dignity is so powerful. Other animals don't need it like that. If you insult a cat, it's going to be fine. If you curse out of a pigeon because it did something on your car, it's going to be, it's going to have a good day. But if you were at work and somebody humiliated you at the office and you're in traffic and somebody used foul language towards you, or somebody set something towards your family, et cetera, et cetera. Experience that. You don't want to eat that day, you're upset. It disturbed you, you can't sleep. It immediately impacts you. Whereas strange species, Allah made us, just like we're made of our physical body, part of our spiritual being is it needs dignity. Allah says, Arabic One way to translate that is Allah fused, injected dignity into the children of Adul. We need dignity to survive. So when dignity is being challenged, it's not an easy thing. It's a form of torture.

8:02Now Allah is going to address all of this torture that went on for weeks. Allah didn't say anything. Subhanahu wa ta'ala. He allowed that to happen. He allowed that experience to happen for the Prophet, Allah, for all of the Muslims. They're hurt by it too. We love, and if we love our messenger, Alayhi s-salam, can you imagine the sahaba loving the messenger, Alayhi s-salam wa raha'ala, Allah an-hamwajma'in? How much does it hurt them to hear these things, right? To make this simple for the purposes of this Hothba, what I will tell you is, you can divide the population of Muslims, the people who were experiencing the scandal, this rumor, you can divide them into two categories of people. They keep things simple. And these two categories, I'm deriving them from the passage that Allah himself revealed. I'm going to make it simple and call them evil people and careless people. Two, evil people end, careless people. Who are the evil people? Evil people are the ones who saw an opportunity to create a conversation that will destroy the Prophet's life, someone's family, torture them, humiliate them, and demoralize the Muslims.

9:06They saw an opportunity to start something, to start a fire. That's those are evil people. And they're not that many. You just need one. You need two or three. That's all you need. You don't need thousands. Once they start that fire, that fire does not spread because of evil people. That fire spreads because of careless people. That's the second category of people. Allah begins this passage talking about the evil ones, the evil ones. But then He immediately switches and most of the emphasis is on the careless ones because these things humiliating someone, destroying someone's life with talk, doing these things, which has now become so much easier, you don't even have to talk, you can just tap, tap, tap. You can just do that and ruin someone's career, ruin someone's family, ruin someone's relationship with their children. You could destroy a life just with a few taps. Very easy, right? It didn't even hurt, and might even get more in clicks and engagement.

10:07It might go more viral because spicy content is more viral. It'll get more views. You might upgrade your profile in social media as a result. It's actually a form of currency. So this kind of salacious content is actually something that's been monetized now. It's a way to make money. It's a way to gain popularity. But coming back to the point, Allah talked about the evil ones in the opening ayah and He spent majority of the guidance on the careless ones. But let's talk about the evil ones first. Just imagine, put yourself in the pain of Rasulullah, Salafi sallam. People are talking. People are talking. You hear something. Where did you hear that? Where did you get that from? Oh, I don't know. Some people were talking. Who? Who was it? Where did you get it? I was at this wedding or I was at this gathering and these people were sitting there and they were having a, okay, what's their name? Give me their name. Give me their number. I want to talk to them. Then you go talk to them. No, no, I didn't say anything. I was just, I heard this from this other person.

11:09And you start, you go in your basement and you make a whole chart of people and you make a hit list. And because I got to find out where this started. Because I need to know where this came from. And nobody's taking responsibility. Like I didn't say, I just heard. I wasn't, no, no, no. I wouldn't, you know, everybody's backing off. You cannot know where something like that begins. You don't have the evidence and it can take over your life. I need to know who's saying what? What did they say? What did you hear? What did they comment? What did they write? What did they message? Did they talk to you? Did they talk to them too? Did they do this too? And guess what Allah says? Allah says, Ibn Al-Athinajah, the ones that are evil. He says those that came up with this allegation. This deviation, I'll talk about that in a second. We'll simplify the translation. Those who started this lander, those who started this scandal. They are an organized, focused group within you. They're not all of you. There's a small group within you that have an agenda.

12:11They're a Rasbah. They're tightly wound together. They did this with a mission in mind. When most people talk about these kinds of things, they don't have a mission in mind. They don't have an agenda. Don't just, it's just entertainment. It's just, you know, you have some food and the food doesn't have extra masala, so you have masala in the conversation. That's what this is. But there's a group of people. Very small. You don't even know who they are. But they started this. But then Allah talks to the rest of them. That are suffering. The Ummah was suffering. When Rasulullah, Allah, Alaihissalam, his family is being attacked. All of us are being attacked. By the way, she's our mother. Somebody's talking about your mother. She's talking about you. That's you. So all of us are suffering. Allah says, that is a bad thing for you. How is this not a bad thing? This is one of the worst experiences in the Madali Qur'an. Right? And Allah is saying, by the way, these people started it. Don't think this was a bad thing.

13:11But he will say, this is good for you. How is it good for us? How can this be good for us? You see, Rasulullah, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, is put on the front line. Usually, the general is in the back. And the foot soldier is in the front. So the first people who get hit with the arrows and the spears and the axes are the fruits. And the one you protect the most is the general in the back. What Allah does in his Qur'an is he puts his, our general, our leader, our messenger. So, Allah, he puts them in the front of the battlefield. He will take the first hits. His family will take the first hits. He will experience it. And because he will pay the price. So all of you will realize the power of this lesson. You will realize that these ayat that are coming did not come cheap. Our messenger himself, Aleyhi s-salatu wa s-salam, had to pay a massive price before these ayat could come down. What will this do? This will make you realize the power of this lesson. Because if this lesson was giving to you casually, you wouldn't realize how valuable it is.

14:13Right? So now when we read these ayat, what we'll put weight on these ayat is actually the pain of the messenger, so Allahu ala wa s-salam, and what was paid for us to receive this guidance. What experiences had to happen before we could get these words from Allah. So we can't take them lightly. Interestingly, in this passage, Allah also says, You think this is light? This is massive with Allah. This is something easy for you. Easy to talk about someone. Easy to ha. That's interesting. What a surprise. I'm not even surprised. There's a little comment. Just that. You think it's no big deal? Wahooa an-d-Allah ya al-dame. It's huge with Allah. It's massive with Allah. Okay, so it's not bad for you. It's good for you. But then remember that basement list I was making of people that I want to go after? Need to find out who said what? Allah says, Every one of them that participated, they will get their fair share of the sin.

15:15Every one of them. You don't have to have the recording. You don't have to have the screenshots. You don't have to have the verifiable reports. Allah is taking documentation of everyone who participated for five seconds. Somebody participated for 30 minutes. Somebody went around and made this their entire identity, their entire profile. Somebody did this that Allah is keeping record of all of it. And they will get their exact share. Don't you worry about that. I am taking that off your plate. You don't worry about that. Just not worrying about who said what? That's not for you. That's for me. That's not committed to crime against you. They've committed to crime against me. Allah is panahu ta'ala ising. And that comes up later in the passage. That comes later in the passage. That actually tarnishing or commenting on the dignity of a fellow believer is a crime not against a believer. It's a crime against Allah. That's why the ayah says Subhanaka Ma'yakunulana anna taqallama biha'a later on in this passage. Ya Allah we committed a crime. We were not gonna violate your rights again. We shouldn't be talking about this. We turn immediately to Allah and be here something like this.

16:17Now, then Allah says, And by the way, the one who has the lion's share, the one who started it, Allah did name him. He will have major punishment. Allah knows exactly who started it. Remember the evil ones? Allah knows the evil ones. Allah knows the careful ones. Careless ones. Allah knows who was a little bit careless. Allah knows who was much more careless. Allah knows all of it. But they're all been bunched together. Everybody will get their share. And the one who started it is gonna get the lion's share. Now we know from the narrations and the reports and the verifiable accounts that this is about our mother, Aisha, Allah, Duhu Allah, anha. But do you notice she was not mentioned? Notice the Prophet said, I said, I was not mentioned. Allah did not say the people who started a deviation, a slander against the wife of the Prophet, nothing. Just the slander. Alifq. Alifq. Fali manqara, haithi ilayat. The awalmara. Layat alifq. Mahwaliq. Someone who reads these ayat for the first time, you'll look, what's the slander? What are you talking about? What are you talking about? Why wouldn't Allah specify it?

17:18Because that's the first guidance Allah is giving you. Don't worry about it because this is your curiosity that Allah is crushing. If Allah wanted to tell you, he would tell you. Allah is teaching the Muslims. There's some slander. It's none of your business. And that's actually your policy. That's none of my business. Ben Hussani Islamil Mari. Tarkuhum alayaniihi. The beauty of the Islam of a person, the Prophet's life, Allah tells us, is they leave what doesn't concern them. It's not my life. It's not in my family. Why am I, I don't need to know. Can you tell me more? Is there any new tea? Can you spill some? No, not concerned. Allah disconnects the ayat from the specific incident because number one, their universal. And number two, that is actually what we're supposed to do. Not even talk about it. There's actually, it's an interesting case of once Ahabi who heard these things about our mother and he was very disturbed. And his wife heard about them too. And his wife, when she heard about these things, she wanted to talk to someone about it because when you hear something disturbing, you want to share.

18:19Not because you're enjoying it, because it's bothering you. When something bothers you, you'll talk to someone you trust. So she went to her husband and she said, a Samir ta fiqhila ya fi'aisha. Have you heard what they're saying about Ahisha? And she wasn't saying it for fun. She was saying it because it was bothering her. And he said, nahm, he said, I've heard it. Yes, with Ali Kalkadib. And it's wrong, it's a lie. Afa'ntia, umayyuh. She said, would you do that too? Because the thing that she's being accused of are you guilty of that? Should I suspect you? She goes, well, la wa la, I swear by, no, no, no. So he says, ahisha, I swear by Allah is more deserving than you. Like if you want benefit of, and she wasn't saying this to spread a rumor, she was just talking about it. What did we learn from this? You don't even talk about it. You'd let it die. Carelessness is not that you enjoy talking about it. That's actually a mix of careless and evil.

19:19Carelessness is this, I can't believe what they're, I can't believe what I found out. I hope it's not true. I pray it's not true. See, you're bringing the conversation back to life. You brought it back to life. You initiate it, you further deflaim. And when someone else hears you say that, they may not be careless, they may be careless and evil. They may do that. You're furthering the flames. Your job in my job is to crush those flames. That's what Allah gave us. Now, Allah in the next ayah says, Why wasn't it the case that the moment you heard it, if semi-atomou, the second you heard it, now heard what? And I have a couple of minutes left, so I'll just focus on if and tell you something. The word if, they commonly talk, just talk about the same English like the slander of our mother. They use the word slander. Well, let me tell you, the word affika in Arabic actually means to turn gently. El motatafika, for example. Right?

20:20And in the desert, when the wind blows, the sand gently moves and makes different shapes and patterns. That's also if, a kind of if, right? When something gets completely turned over, it's also called the nations that got turned over al motatafika in the Quran, for example. And affika is again to bend something. Someone sees true information, true information, a fact. And then they bend what it could mean. They bend it. So, you know, facts are not enough to understand reality. Facts are, is a point of data. Then you can take that data and you can talk about it in a way that twists the narrative, this way or twists the narrative that way. Did you or did you not make that phone call? Yes, I did. You see? And then the lawyer can go in this direction. Because all he needs is one data point and then he can bend it to his narrative. And the other lawyer can say, no, no, no, let me take that same point. Some say and bend it in the other narrative,

21:20bend it in the other direction. You understand? So you say the fact is verifiable. Yeah, the fact is verifiable. How you twisted the fact, however, that's literally the term twisting the facts. That's what if is you take facts and you twist them and you manipulate them. And you do this very gently. You don't do this in a way that gets noticed. You say something like, you know, I don't like talking about people, but you know, they were, I mean, we did see them together. There was a verified report. I'm not saying anything. I hope it's not true. And when you just say that, what did you just do? You just dropped a little nugget and you pushed people in a certain direction. And also at the same time, you get to say, I didn't say anything. What would I say? I was just stating the facts. I was just stating the facts. That's why Allah didn't use the word gezeb here, which is straight alai. It's actually bending the truth towards alai. Now, what did Allah, as it was just give us as a policy, I'll end with this.

22:20And I wanted to share this with you because as social media has just become a normal part of our life and as content creation has become almost a religion. It's a form of worship now. I need to feed the, you know, put my, put my devotion, my ethic off before the algorithm to feed it for people and people need more and more content. And the most, what are the kinds of things that feed the best content? Well, one thing that people are is cannibals towards each other and each other's dignity. So let me create salacious content and put more of these things out there towards someone or the other and it'll pick up and it'll, it'll gain steam. And I'll just get the views out of it. Good attention, bad attention. Any attention is good attention, right? Any press is good press. So let's just do that. This policy that Allah gave, listen to this carefully. Lohla ja'u alaihi bi arba'at shuhada. How come when they even suggested it, when they even suggested it, how come they didn't bring four witnesses, four witnesses of what?

23:23Not of the suggestion, four witnesses of what you're trying to say without saying it. Why didn't they produce four witnesses of the act itself? Fa il lam ya tubhi shuhada. And if they cannot produce such witnesses, if they didn't come for lo time, Fa ulaihi ka'ind Allahi humul ka'di-bun dan as far as Allah is concerned, they're the ones that are lying. No, no, no, but I saw it with my own eyes. Yeah, but did you produce four? No, then as far as, not I'm concerned or the authorities are concerned or your webcam is concerned or your data is not as far as that, as far as Allah is concerned, those are the liars. When it comes to this, instead of saying, let's conduct an investigation and find out what really happened. Let's dig more. Allah stopped it by saying, if you didn't begin this with four witnesses, not only has the investigation stopped, the person suggesting such an investigation is a liar before Allah. Is a liar before Allah?

24:23That's how important dignity is to Allah. That's how Allah protected society from itself, from the cancer within itself. Now I have to ask myself, and you have to ask myself, how casually do we talk about other people? How easily do we talk about something we just heard and just kind of mentioned it? Just pass it along. You're just running your mouths about things you don't actually know anything about. You're just running your mouth about it. You're just saying, oh, well, if they're smoke, there's fire. Just that much. I mean, what else can you, what else could it be? Right? Let me bend it in that direction. This is a passage that needs to be reviewed and carefully understood by our community, by the Ummah at large, because the world is heading in a direction where these things that go directly against Allah's book are being normalized, and when things get normalized for the larger world, guess what? The Muslim is normalized too. If we're not careful, this becomes normal for us too.

25:24And we have to be people of Allah's book and the son of his messenger, SayAllah Allah, may peace be upon you. BarakAllah, may Allah be with you, in the Qur'an, in the right way, and in the right way, in the right way. Almost 300,000 souls have already been gifted a bayyana TV sponsorship, and the impact has been immense. But over 50,000 eager students who can't afford it are still waiting to begin their journey. You can help visit bayyana.com forward slash gift, to share the gift of the Qur'an, so that another soul can explore the depths of Allah's words. Their access lasts a year, but its impact may last a lifetime. I want you to help me, help them, and give the gift of bayyana TV today.