Friday Sermon by: Alban Fejza, Online Congregation Director
Summary:
In this Friday sermon, Alban Fejza explains that the consultation commanded in verses 42:38 and 3:159 belongs within the Friday congregational meeting, the only official meeting of the submitters, shows how this prevents divisions, and announces the format of the first online Friday Consultation Meetings.
Video Transcript:
Praise be to God. There is no other god except God.
As you know from the video clarification titled “Limits of Organized Religion,” the Friday congregational meeting is the only official meeting through which submitters organize and strive in the cause of God. On the other hand, God mentions in verses 42:38 and 3:159 that the believers decide their affairs after due consultation, and that the messenger also consults the believers. This means that, since the Friday congregational meeting is the only official meeting of the submitters, the consultations mentioned in verses 42:38 and 3:159 must happen within the Friday congregational meeting.
This idea, that consultations and orderly two-way communication between submitters are best done within the Friday meeting rather than outside of it, seems like a new idea. But if we look carefully at history, we can see that it has been said before; we just failed to pay careful attention. For example, here is what Rashad Khalifa says in the video titled “Principles of Friday Prayer”: that the Friday congregational prayer is an obligatory duty upon every Muslim man and woman, a social function decreed by God for the Muslims to get together, to know each other, and to be familiar with each other’s problems and joys.
Also, here is one example where Rashad Khalifa engages the congregation in a discussion within the Friday sermon.
[A short clip is played in which Rashad Khalifa, during his sermon, asks a couple in the congregation how long they were engaged before their marriage, and they answer him.]
As you can see, Rashad Khalifa opened a discussion with members of the congregation. In this case, someone might say, “Well, that was allowed only for a short time.” Well, if it was allowed for a short time, then it is also allowed for a longer time within the allowable sermon time, because the Quran does not put a limit on that. The limit is what the congregation director finds reasonable to allow, to open this discussion within the Friday sermon, which in this case is better called a Friday meeting, because “Jumu’a,” which is mentioned in the Quran, translated from Arabic, means meeting, or congregational meeting.
Ironically, this idea is also supported by historians, regarding what happened in the past during the Friday congregational meetings. According to them, just before his death, Muhammad gave a final Friday sermon, known as the Farewell Sermon, and in Book 15, Hadith 159, the historian named Muslim reports that Muhammad said to his congregation in his last Friday sermon, “You will be asked about me on the Day of Resurrection; what will you say about me then?” And the people in the congregation responded, “We will say that you have delivered the message, fulfilled your prophethood, and given us wise advice.” So, as you can see, in this case Muhammad allowed the people in the congregation to speak, within reasonable limits, within the Friday meeting.
I know that we don’t believe in Hadith as a religious source, but I’m treating it here simply as a historical source, and it’s reliable in this case as a historical source because about 100,000 people were there when this happened. It was a public event, with about 100,000 people present. This is not a Hadith about a private event, where someone could make up a lie and others were not there to expose it. This is an event which was witnessed by about 100,000 people all at once, and had this statement about past events been wrong, at least some of those 100,000 people would have disputed that it happened. But there’s no dispute that this event happened, which makes it a reliable source from a historical perspective. Of course, we don’t use history for religious conclusions, and here I am not using it for religious purposes. I’m just showing what reliably happened in the past. It’s a historical event, but of course we have the Quran to make decisions about what we ourselves should do now. And the Quran does not prohibit consultations and internal discussions within what the congregation director finds reasonable. On the contrary, the Quran orders the leaders to consult with the congregation, and given that the Friday congregational meeting is the only official meeting between submitters, that consultation, or open discussion, should happen within the Friday congregational meeting.
Here is why this is important: it prevents divisions. Let me give you an example. My brother Arland and Robert were among a few others who gave Friday sermons at Masjid Tucson a few years ago. When they decided to preach at Masjid Tucson some of the things which I preach in my videos, here is the scheme which the other, half-submitters there came up with. The half-submitters held a meeting outside of the Friday congregational prayer, knowing that my brother and Robert were not obliged to attend and very likely would not be there, and then they unanimously decided, according to them, to exclude my brother and Robert, and effectively two other submitters, from preaching in that masjid. So they reached a conclusion while those four submitters were not present, and then claimed that they had made a unanimous decision. Well, you can always reach a unanimous decision if you decide to hold an alternative meeting with only the people who agree with you. Had they held that meeting within the Friday congregational prayer, which is obligatory for every submitter, they could not have reached a unanimous decision, because my brother and Robert, of course, would not have voted to exclude themselves from preaching.
As you can see, how we set the stage before we meet is crucial, and it is the biggest determinant of what decisions and conclusions are reached in those meetings. This is why we should stick strictly to Friday meetings as the only official group meetings, within the Friday sermons. And given that those meetings are the only official meetings authorized by God, in verse 62:9, God will make sure that we are eventually guided to reach the right conclusions about the things which we discuss within the Friday meetings. If we scheme and try to have alternative meetings, those meetings are not blessed by God, and as a result, God will gradually let what is spoken in those alternative, unauthorized meetings go astray in its conclusions.
Now, of course, the leader of the congregation decides the reasonable limits of how much open discussion happens within the Friday meeting, or how many open-discussion Friday meetings he wants to have within a year, and that decision should be strictly respected. It’s not absolute free speech within the Friday prayer. It’s free speech within what the congregation leader allows or asks for. He can choose to interrupt or mute anyone whenever he feels that what is being said is not beneficial, constructive or helpful. Then the question is: what if the congregation director is wrong, and interrupts someone when he’s about to say something true? Well, if we stick to Friday meetings as the only authorized meetings, and do the Zakat properly, then the group as a whole is blessed and authorized by God, and God will make sure to guide us to choose the right congregation director, who would in general be less wrong than the congregation in general.
But back to the issue of allowing open discussion during Friday sermons, or Friday meetings. Allowing occasional open discussion will especially help us today, when we are still forced to hold the Friday congregational meetings online. Because we have been doing them online so far, the reasonable social need for more open communication and getting to know each other has not been fully fulfilled. I was aware all along that there was not enough interaction between us while being in different parts of the world. So, God willing, this is one of the big steps to fix that. God willing, I plan to have open-interaction Friday prayers from time to time, which I will call Friday Consultation Meetings. However, the majority of Friday prayers in the future will still remain one-way communication sermons.
There could be many modalities through which Friday Consultation Meetings can be arranged, depending on the specific needs for open interaction, the situation, time zones, different interests and things like that. But, God willing, next Friday, on November 17, 2023, let’s try one of those modalities and see how it goes, and whether it is beneficial. This is how we are going to hold next Friday’s meeting. Next Friday, the 17th of November 2023, I will be online during your local noon time, for each of your locations, and, God willing, we can have a friendly chat. I would simply like to get to know each of you more, and see how things are going in your lives, whether you have questions or issues which you would like to discuss, or maybe suggestions, or things like that. Don’t worry about whether you have enough to talk about. God willing, let’s just talk. I will be talking with voice only, no video, and I would appreciate it if you could also join with voice only. If any of you cannot join with voice, you can also just send chats in text form, and we’ll try to integrate your chats into our voice discussion or respond to them, and nothing will be saved. Or you can choose to just listen online, keeping your microphone muted, without talking or texting.
Because of our different time zones, God willing, I will be online four times during that day, so that we can have a Friday meeting with all the submitters from the different regions who have joined us so far. The first Friday meeting will be for Bangladesh, at 12:00 p.m. Bangladesh time. The second Friday meeting will be for the UK, France, Germany, Ghana, Kosovo and Macedonia, held at 12:00 p.m. UK and Ghana time, which is 1:00 p.m. in France, Germany, Kosovo and Macedonia. The third Friday meeting will be for eastern America, at 12:00 p.m. Kansas time, which is 1:00 p.m. Toronto and Montreal time. The fourth Friday meeting will be for western America, at 12:00 p.m. California time, which is 1:00 p.m. in Arizona and Colorado.
Everyone is obliged to join within the first 20 minutes of the Friday meeting for their own time zone, after which you may stay longer and talk, or just listen, and you are free to leave at any time after the first 20 minutes and do the Contact Prayer. If you wish, you may also join and listen to the Friday meetings of the other time zones, but that is optional. However, it is obligatory to join when the Friday meeting time for your own region comes. I will not record our voice chats, so feel free to talk, express your opinion, or raise issues in a constructive manner, and so on.
Here is the meeting agenda for each of the four meetings. First, I make the call to prayer and say “Alhamdulillah.” Then I give a one-minute sermon, to allow time for you to speak in the second sermon. I say, “We repent,” for a few seconds; I say “Alhamdulillah,” and I open the conversation for the second sermon, where we can all have a friendly chat, primarily to get to know each other more, and we may discuss an issue if there is interest in it. At any time after 20 minutes, anyone is free to leave the online meeting, make their own call to prayer, and do the Contact Prayer in their own space. Since more than 90% of us already have Gmail accounts, we will be holding the Friday Consultation Meetings through Gmail. I have already sent you the link to where we will be holding the Friday Consultation Meetings in your emails.