Self-Reformation: Resolve, Faith & Rehabilitation

Last Friday sermon was a discourse on the impediments in reformation of practices that repeatedly pull us backwards and the need to remove these impediments. It was mentioned that if strength of resolve, knowledge and capacity to implement matters is instilled, then bad practices can be reformed. This is because impairment occurs in the absence of strength of resolve and lack of knowledge as to which practices are good and which are bad and how should the good ones be attained and the bad ones shunned and when the capacity to implement matters is weak and cannot contend with badness. Thus, it is very important to fortify strength of resolve, remove lack of knowledge and instil capacity to implement matters. Capacity to implement matters can be inculcated through personal effort but if the person is very weak then external help is required. These were the aspects mentioned last week and today the matter was further elucidated.

As we have established, the first thing needed for reformation of practices is strength of resolve. What is strength of resolve? Many will say strength of resolve is self-explanatory, it is obviously the strength to resolve and conclude something, then why the question! Let it be clear, as Hazrat Musleh Maud (may Allah be pleased with him) has beautifully explained, that the connotation of strength of resolve alters in accordance with the action it is about. With this basic point in mind, we can appreciate that in religious matters strength of resolve is iman (belief). When seen with this angle, we will understand that the capacity to implement matters is enhanced with iman and every difficulty is eased with the help and support of God and troubled situations are diminished due to iman.

These are not mere words; we see practical examples of this. The difference between the lifestyle of the Companions at the time of the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be on him) before and after they believed is astonishing. What was the lifestyle of those who believed in the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be on him)? Among them were thieves, robbers, wicked men who married their own mothers or bequeathed their mothers away, who killed their daughters, who gambled and who drank excessively and considered it an honour that none could compete with them in drinking! Poets would express their pride and greatness in terms of repeatedly awaken during the night to drink alcohol and gamblers would boast that they lost all their property in gambling and as soon as they acquired more property, they would lose it again! And then, after they believed in the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be on him) they instilled an incredible revolutionary change and inculcated an astonishing strength of resolve. As soon as they believed they decided that they were going to strengthen their hearts to put every commandment of faith in practice, they decided that they were not going to do anything contrary to the commandment of God, they decided that each instruction of the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be on him) would be the last word. Their determination was so strong and so robust that weakness of practices became a non-issue! Their strength of resolve demolished their weakness of practices just as strong surge of gushing water washes away a piece of straw!

The Companions used to drink alcohol and we know what alcohol does to people. Those living in these [Western] countries often see drunks out and about. There is a drunk who roams the streets around our Fazl Mosque. He carries nothing but cans of alcoholic drinks and his clothes are filthy. Huzoor came to know that he is an educated man who perhaps once was an engineer. He does not work now, is perhaps of pensionable age. Whatever benefits he is given from the state he uses to get alcohol and spends his life on the streets. The situation has made him mentally unstable and the poor thing is