Worship and Prayer

Eid al-Adha Prayers

Prayer

Imam Dukuley discussed prayer and stresses its centrality to Muslim identity and practice.

There is no excuse not to pray

No excuse not to pray.

I was asking a group of Muslims on Sunday, who went to the [quoting in Arabic] naming ceremony of a baby. And I was challenging some of them, because some of them were too busy, they can’t even pray. They don’t perform their prayers. I asked them, I said, how many hours—unconsciously they would answer you—how many hours do we have in the day? “24 hours” 24 hours. She’s right? “Yeah.” 24. So, 24 hours. So now, what is the basic hour that people work for? Ranging from—8? 8 hours. That’s regular, right? [Yeah.] Okay, so you can go for double, they call that double? 16 hours. Okay? So, you see, like I said, we are witnesses for ourselves. And against ourselves, or for ourselves. Now, how can anybody in their rational mind tell me that they can go to work for 8 hours or 16 hours, and out of the 24, Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala is only asking you, as his servant, for 25 minutes, no more! 25 minutes. Your break time is more than that, 25! Each prayer time is less than five minutes, unless you want to read bakara. You don’t have to, you can read .... You can read.... “5.”... “4 minutes” 4 minutes, if you’re by yourself, it’s easy. “You’re right about that.” Yea. So, you need to just—I told them to look at this from that, then it would look so easy for you. Out of 24 hours, Allah says give me 5, 5,...25 minutes. And it’s not even together! So to say, “Okay, I can not do 25 minutes together,” it’s a problem for me, it’s just 5 minutes, 5. Fajr (dawn to sunrise prayer). or maybe 3 something now, or let’s say 4….all the way to 1:15 before you can make Zuhr (midday prayer). Another 5 minutes. Between there you have to do like 5 something before ‘Asr (late afternoon prayer) ….It is almost night now, now for maghrib (after sunset prayer). And then something for Isha (sunset to midnight prayer) 5 minutes each.

Out of twenty four [hours], Allah says give me… twenty-five minutes... You can’t call yourself a Muslim if you don’t perform your prayers.

Are you a Muslim if you don't pray?

The only difference between us, is the performance of - if you leave your prayers, you become one of them. When you abandon your salat, you become one of them. You can’t call yourself a Muslim if you don’t perform your prayers....And not only that, one who abandons his prayers is charged with a very serious crime in Islam....One who abandons his or her prayers is charged with a very serious crime in Islam.

Worship

Imam Dukuley talks about righteous deeds and different kinds of worship.

Acts of Worship

Acts of worship

Yes, we are our own witnesses. You don’t accept that. If you have an employee, and you employed that employee for a specific job and the person can’t do it, you keep them and pay them? Can you do that? Sister. All of you. Can anybody, you know? So you can’t do it. So you think Allah wants that. So you will dismiss yourself from the fold of Islam, from the fold of Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala if you don’t do what Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala asks you to do.

Above the Angels

Above the angels.

Any act of obedience to Allah is an act of worship...If you worship Allah they way He wants you to worship Him, ...and don’t do mischief….your position with Allah will be higher than the angels…They don’t have desires. They are programmed only to worship Allah… you have the choice.