Slander, Backbiting, and Fear on the Brink of Success

Slander, Backbiting, and Fear on the Brink of Success

Due to the fact that we are in a time of crisis, some of us, or certain people, have said wrong things regarding their friends, in order to get out of this crisis.

They were obligated to sign the papers that were presented in front of them.

The oppressors said, ‘jail cell’, ‘sticks and stones’, ‘special medicines’, and ‘If you don't sign this paper...’

In this regard, there were those who made the wrong choice.

The choice that should have been made despite everything was the ‘jail cell’, maybe the ‘special medicine’, or the ‘breaking of the nose’ and the ‘splitting of the head’, or even ‘death’.

These things rewarded those who made the right choice.

However, talking behind a believer, signing papers that wrote lies, slandering, and vilification were all a major sin.

If they did this knowingly, and did not have any feeling of objection while doing so, they became unbelievers on the path of Islam without being aware of this.

Because, a major sin is erased with repentance; however, if a human is continually sinning, backbiting or slandering, and doing so without having any kind of objection; even if they add five Prayers on top of their current five, and pray ten times a day, they are unbelievers, unbelievers, unbelievers!

Disbelief sweeps away the deeds that that a person has once done.

If he dies in that instant, there are no good deeds that he can carry to the Hereafter.

At times of crisis like now, ‘accusation’ occurs a lot.

Some people have a complex to accuse others by means of getting out of the crisis:

Accusation.

‘If we cross someone out, we can get out of this crisis.’

The opponents, as a matter of fact, desire this outcome.

Backbiting occurs a lot in a time like this, may God protect us from it.

Especially when they have a wretched media that gives its all for backbiting.

Their ‘radioactive impact’ infects the whole of society.

If it doesn’t have an alpha, then a beta; if it doesn’t have a beta, then a gamma; it dirties and corrupts the heart without you even knowing it.

A lie, if told by everyone, if it has been a topic spoken in cafes, if it is spoken by the locals, if it is spoken by the bakers, if it is spoken in the yard of the mosque, and if also spoken by people waiting for Prayer, May God protect us from it, if they say, “Such and such people, traitors, betrayers, mean ones”, the society has, without knowing, started seeing the issues normal, without having any objection.

Hence, the society in its totality will be poisoned.

This is called ‘the poisoning of emotions’ and ‘the poisoning of thoughts’.

One who is poisoned like this has no relation with God or the Messenger of God, peace and blessings be upon him.

Those who mention such a relation are essentially Machiavellists.

For example, they say ‘Islam’, but they use it for their own interests.

They know very well that people will buy their lies.

Do you know what Lenin and Trotsky, and then Stalin used?

They used Karl Marx and Engels’ theory of ‘struggle between capital and labour’, in their world; because the society was sensitive and responsive towards it.

They said, ‘If we urge people who work so much but are not able to attain what they desire, it will be against the others’.

In an orthodox world, this was a valid ‘material’.

They evaluated this material from a Machiavellist point of view in order to achieve their goal.

The hypocrite Machiavellists have been using sacred values for their worldly ambitions, considering that religion and Islamic values score points before the masses today.

They didn’t know Islam but some day in some place in the world, if hypocrisy, deceiving others, lying, looking not like oneself became popular, this time these ‘experts’ would make use of such trends.

In places where Islamic zeal has developed in communities, the number of practicing Muslims has increased in mosques to a certain degree.

At a certain period, this rate had increased; now it is decreasing, people are saying, ‘It has been decreasing from forty percent down to twenty percent’.

They say, ‘Students in primary schools have started using drugs’.

But that feeling didn’t diminish. If you ask a person, who engaged in drugs, crawling on the ground, he or she would say, ‘I’m a Muslim’.

If you ask a person leaving a bar, he or she would say, ‘I’m a Muslim’.

If you ask a non-practising person when he or she was passing by the mosque, that person would say, ‘I’m a Muslim’.

Since this feeling adds value to one’s existence in the current climate, some people abuse it.

Yes, in a certain period, labour and capital were evaluated; this was the driving force behind the social struggles in Europe for centuries.

This struggle urged Karl Marx and Engels; Das Capital was written by this urge, and people evaluated this as a matter of ‘labour and capital’ as the years progressed.

One day, if it appears as though people have embraced Islam, then the Machiavellists will strive to use it to achieve their goals.

One could substitute the word Machiavellists with hypocrites; these types of people are hypocrites and hypocrites are much more harmful to religion than the unbelievers.

Those who fabricate religious arguments for their hypocrisy, such as renaming bribery as ‘receiving gifts’, who try to justify slander and defame by saying, ‘This is a war. In war, it is permissible to plot and deceive’, share the same position as the unbelievers.

The Funeral Prayer should not be offered to such people.

If you pray for them at their graves, or at their funeral, God will call you to account for this; even if they were a religious scholar, imam, caller to Prayer or head of Religious Affairs, you will be required to account for what you do.

Why?

For, they considered the hypocrite’s bribe as ‘gift’, their outright lie as ‘deception’, and their cheat and plot as ‘War is deception.’

In an attempt to make the illicit and fraudulent acts to appear legitimate in a Machiavellian manner, they clouded the judgments of many, who are following something like a herd of sheep.

Yes, today,

‘Lies are favored, betrayal required, right is out of sight.

What an outrage, O Lord, what a terrible upheaval,

No religion, no faith left; religion destroyed; faith razed to the ground.’

You called the Crusaders ‘infidels’.

You associated yourself and were in unity of feeling and thought with Kılıçarslan, Alparsan, Melik Shah, Nuraddin az-Zangi and Shirkuh; you fought against the Crusades with these people.

The enemy was evident, and you were evident; you had a line, a red line; they too had red lines; there was less danger.

At the same time, they didn’t do as the hypocrites of today do, they didn’t separate couples, or children from their parents; they didn’t leave orphans or expose innocent people unaware of anything to such atrocities by a simple pretext.

Being exposed to persecution just because ‘using the same mobile app’.

Believe me, neither Richard the Lionheart, nor Philip II, nor Frederick Barbarossa resorted to such atrocities.

These atrocities are incomparable, may God protect us, even Abu Jahl, or Amenophis has not committed such atrocities.

To follow them thinking they are Muslims, may God protect us, may result in being resurrected with the disbelievers in the Hereafter.

‘Do not backbite against one another.

Would any of you love to eat the flesh of his dead brother?’

The main issue is this:

That slandering and defamation becomes a disease and pervades even among the communities of the believers.

Consider the following.

‘What could we have done wrong for us to experience the oppression against us today?

The wrong of this person, the wrong of that person, or the wrong of another person.

I wonder if we would have experienced these kinds of things had we thrown some bones at the feet of some.

I wonder if we would have experienced these kinds of things had we named our schools in their names. This is the question we must ask in a self-accusatory way.

And being involved in slandering the ones who are leading this cause in service.

In some way, backbiting is equivalent to adultery, and is regarded as one of the great sins.

The Qur’an, with its gentle form of expression states, ‘Do not eat your brother’s flesh’; for this reason, the Qur’an is actually equating that to a form of cannibalism.

“O you who believe!

Avoid much suspicion.

For, some suspicion is a grave sin.

And do not spy on one another.

And neither allow yourselves to speak ill of one another behind your backs.

Would any of you love to eat the flesh of his dead brother?

You would abhor it!

Keep from disobedience to God in reverence for Him and piety.

Surely God is One Who truly returns repentance with liberal forgiveness and additional reward, All-Compassionate (particularly towards His believing servants)’ (Al-Hujurat, 49:12).

Now, the radioactive effect of this situation is that when its gamma rays hit mindless masses, they say something like, ‘Let us do some gossip’ and start to reproach their genuine sisters and brothers.

The ones who put it forward and make an appropriate system for it and express certain arguments accordingly, influence the ones in the cafes, clubs, restaurants, mosques, the ones who take ablution, the ones who respond to the call to Prayer by saying, ‘God is the Greatest’.

Then it comes, and propagates like the gamma rays, the heart dies without realising; the spirit becomes paralyzed; the doors to the secrets close; the relation with God ends.

They become the unfortunate moving corpses.

For, the vitality of a person is dependent on his heart and spirit.

We cannot call a person ‘alive’ if he does not have a life of the heart and spirit.

For this reason, Bediüzzaman says, ‘This being the nature of the worldly, animal life and corporeal existence, be freed from animality, restrict your carnal appetites, and enter the level of life of the heart and spirit!’

That means that entering the level of the life of the heart and the spirit depends on keeping your heart and spirit alive.

Poisoned people, poisoned by the venom spread by the Machiavellists, are considered to be dead, moving corpses.

These people deserve only one thing; if God accepts, they only deserve the Chapter Al-Fatiha to be read on their passed away spirits.

This means that all these people who fill out the mosques are dead; if they are poisoned like this, it means that they are entirely dead; may God protect us!

This became the disease, the illness of the Islamic world [he spells this part to emphasise], especially some ‘leading’ Islamic countries.

Arabs say, ‘Ad-dau’l-udal’, ‘an incurable disease’, terminal phase of cancer, plague, pestilence that takes away anyone who it catches.

Where does it take them?

It takes them to ‘heartlessness’, to ‘spiritlessness’, to the ‘lack of the faculty of the Secret’, to the absence of the faculty of the Hidden, to the absence of the faculty of the Most Hidden, to the denial of God, to the denial of the Prophet; may God protect us!

In that case, it is our duty to be silent, or maybe we can express the following sentences to the ones who backbite and slander: ‘Be quiet.

May God dry your tongue.

Do not talk behind your believing brother and sister.’

It is the duty of those who committed to serving people, to adopt an attitude against backbiting and slander.

Even though the country is in an economic crisis, they proposed fifteen million dollars for the return of only one single person; even Amenophis did not perform such a terrible act.

To this day, God Almighty has allowed you to achieve many things; no one should attribute any of these achievements to themselves.

‘It is all from God.’

Thousands of thanks and praise be to Him that He assigned us, you and I, most of us, in such a blessed service even though it was beyond our capacity.

He could have assigned us elsewhere. We could have been an apprentice somewhere or a worker somewhere else.

But no; He assigned us in the service of exalting the Word of God and promoting and disseminating it.

You wished and sought, and still do so, the following:

‘My God, allow Your Exalted Name, Your Divine Speech, the religion of Islam to be exalted all across the globe; and allow all hearts to hear the right and truth once again.’

Did you or did you not say?

All across the globe, in all aspects of life and segments of society, from A to Z, and from the mayor of a town to the chief at the top.

‘Employ us in this quest.’ ‘Grant us love in the hearts of Your servants so that they may accept and appreciate this.’

Open up the hearts of whomever we encounter on earth and in the skies.

And did this happen or not?

Did the people of 170 countries around the world open up their hearts to you for 20, 25, 30 years, or did they not?

They had no doubt.

They watched your pulse, listened to your heart, and only received a rhythm of uprightness and steadfastness.

God did this.

You asked for it, and God granted it.

You were on a straight path, and this is what needed to be done.

You were determined to not own a single standing stone in this world.

You were not going to worry about owning an armored vehicle.

You were not going to worry about owning a villa.

You were not going to be someone that cars will be rushed back and forth to.

You never sought any of this.

You only sought one thing.

For the Exalted Name of God to be raised like a flag in all corners of the world.

For the Exalted name of the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, to be raised like a flag in all corners of the world.

For the target shown by him to be achieved.

‘My name will permeate everywhere on which the sun rises and sets.’

This is what you wanted, and to certain extend, God granted your wish.

From this point onward, you need to expend effort in order to fulfill this pursuit.

Those destructive people, who have lost command of their souls, their minds and their logic to Satan, will do everything in their power to sabotage and destroy what you have done.

Think about it:

For the extradition of just one person, a mentality that offers 15 million dollars.

Amenophis did not do this.

Those who did this are, without a doubt, infidels; believe me.

In order to arrest an innocent person, they are using public funds, which was collected through taxes, at a time of economic crisis, and for the extradition of an innocent person they say, ‘Take this and do it’.

‘If your aircraft falls, we are ready to reimburse you’ they say.

Here, these issues are discussed in court.

Our nation has never been disgraced to this extent, not even when Istanbul was occupied.

‘O my God!

Fill our hearts with Your love, the desire of meeting with You and let us spend our lives in the path of spreading Your Majestic Name to humanity in all over the world.

Now it is completely normal for the radioactive impact of this to affect you as well; some of you are accusing people without realising.

‘If we accuse other people, we may get out of this crisis’ they say, without realising.

Some of them commit this sin due to oppression, some do this to hold those at the forefront to be responsible for the state that they are in.

Committing a major sin such as ‘gossip’ and ‘slander’.

May God protect us!

In a way, it means associating partners with the Divine Acts and thus falling into polytheism.

Even trying black magic so such and such might die.

They tried to engage in black magic twenty or thirty times so such and such person dies.

When the major sins are listed first and foremost comes ‘associating partners with God’.

‘Calling angels the daughters of God...’ Someone who says this is a polytheist.

Then comes engaging in ‘magic’ even before ‘murder’.

They see that as favourable and do it twenty, thirty times.

So that people that they don’t like can die and they will be the only dominant voice.

Without realising at all, they become infidels and those who follow infidels should take care of themselves.

You, with God’s permission and grace, are people who look after themselves in the positive sense. Look, it was written on the electronic screen:

My God!

Put in our hearts the love, desire and eagerness to meet with You to the degree that we go mad.

Let us die and then die once again and then be resurrected in order to repeat our duty of making Your Majestic Name be heard in the four corners of the world.

Let us die once, let us die again and then be resurrected to repeat this duty.

Let those who want to destroy what you are trying to build do as they wish, remember there is a Day of Reckoning.

Not everything is specific to the present day; there is tomorrow, and the day after and the day after that.

There is a day whereby, ‘Who ever does an atom’s weight of good or evil will certainly see it.’

For this reason, those who have devoted themselves to God’s path, do not have concerns, without indulging yourselves in backbiting, nor accusing others to console yourselves, walk on the path you have set yourself, thanks to God’s consent and beneficence.

Brace yourselves with ‘active patience’, patience while still actively keeping busy, moving steadily with patience and asking yourselves, ‘What can be done now?

What can be done now?

Repeating to oneself, ‘What can be done now?’

They chained my feet, but I see I still have my hands.

They handcuffed my hands, but I can still move my head.

They chained me by my neck, but I can still speak using my tongue.

They sealed my mouth and tongue, and so I used my eyes, my pupils, to express my thoughts.

If I have nothing else, I can always express my thoughts simply by remaining silent.

This is the path one can take; the path of the believer is this.

Let them do as they wish, on this correct path that you take, on the path of the Truth, the path of the Prophets, the noble Abu Bakr’s, Umar’s, Uthman’s, Ali’s path, may God be pleased with them, may God keep you steadfast on this path.

The path He has allowed you to walk in steadfastness, and so from now on, may God not allow the slightest stumble.

‘O my God!

Allow us to be a symbol of forbearance so that we may withstand any type of humiliation, be freed from any hopelessness and despair.

May God allow your strong hearts remain this way until the Last Day.

‘Almost anybody with the surname Gülen has been arrested; even those who have no affiliation with the Hizmet; 80-year-old women have even been chased down.’

Going back to square one:

There have been individuals who have reported the names of hundreds of innocent people in order to save themselves.

After all, it was sufficient to say:

‘I know that person.’ Simply ‘knowing’ someone was enough.

For instance, let me tell you something:

Almost everyone with the surname ‘Gülen’ is behind bars.

Yes, ‘Since your surname is Gülen, God knows, you must think like them as well’.

But within my family, I think, there are people who haven’t read five sentences of what you have read.

They are even putting women behind bars.

Even 80-year-old women are hiding to avoid persecution, with the fear that ‘The devils might catch us’.

This is the current situation.

May God forbid! Thus, some individuals thought that by reporting the names of others they might be able to avoid persecution.

Let me make a parenthetical point here:

A little while ago, a man I knew as a hero since I went to Izmir, the grandfather of some people here, called me over the phone.

Although they are hiding to avoid persecution, instead of me consoling him, he said, ‘Dear sir, please, do not worry; everything is okay here’.

I expressed my sorrow as I said, ‘There was an issue here with your grandson, you weren’t able to be here’.

He replied, ‘So be it, dear sir, so be it’.

I saw that a man I met fifty years ago has not changed at all; he hasn’t taken half a step back.

There are thousands of people like this all around the world, tens of thousands, thanks to God’s consent and beneficence; they will continue what they have started.

May God increase their numbers.

May God keep them steadfast and upright.

But not everyone may share that character when asked, ‘Who else do you know?’ in order to save themselves from afflictions.

Or they put it on paper and say, ‘We are suspicious of this person, as well; he used this system or application for communication’.

For God’s sake, the contents of the communication should be examined, not what they used to communicate.

What they spoke about is clear, the issue is using that system or application.

And with a decision not based on any law, rule or reasoning they say, ‘Arrest him and put him behind bars’.

When some individuals become afraid of this treatment, they give the names of the people whom they ‘know’, and fifty innocent individuals get arrested.

They give them special medicine.

Many of them were like so, they were given special medicine, made them talk, and then took them into the forest leaving them to die.

There are still people whose names aren’t mentioned, people who have been abducted three years ago by people still unknown.

There are traitors, Nimrods, Pharaohs, who hire private planes and hire people, whom they pay with abundance, to abduct people they oppose in different parts of the world.

They are scared; other people are scared, too.

There are some who have been close to you until today, in your friend circle.

So there have been times when they gave in names as well.

But I can say this with sincerity: The total number of all of them will not reach four percent.

Well, that amount was also among the people saw the Pride of Humankind, peace and blessings be upon him; there were apostates.

Even those among the Companions like Tulayha, even women like Sajah who later proclaimed being Muslim, even they got involved in apostasy events; then they realized it was a useless path, they turned back.

May God grant this understanding and comprehension to the hypocrites and apostates of today.

It is necessary to not be wasteful even during speech; the most important opportunity to be safe from wastefulness and backbiting is the talk of the Beloved.

Against the disease of wastefulness and backbiting, being proactive, anywhere we get the chance, we should engage in such talks of the Beloved.

Some of our friends, by God’s permission, are like experts on this.

By no means do I see myself on their level.

Yes, on the matter of knowing The Treatise of Light, they are the ones who will teach me about the things written in them.

There are friends who publish newspapers and journals.

By utilizing these holidays, they went to different places and reassured our companions in other regions; and rehabilitated those who were in need of rehabilitation.

Now the first task for people at such levels, friends of high standing eloquence in speech is to engage in such contemplative dialogues about the Beloved.

The mouth was created to say nice remarks.

Every limb should be used for the purpose of its creation.

In the gatherings that we sit in, the people who are able to talk of the Beloved should talk of the Beloved.

Talk of the Beloved, is the rhythm, the crown of all talks.

‘I wish all the people of the world love Him Whom I love.

If only all of our words could be talk of the Beloved.’

While there is God to be the topic of our discussions, our Prophet, the noble Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, Ali, Hasan, and Husayn, may God be pleased with all of them thousands of times, may millions of peace and blessings be upon the Pride of Humanity...

While there is the opportunity to speak of them, to facilitate the locking of hearts to them, speaking of other matters, should be counted as wastefulness in words.

Even in speech one should not be wasteful.

Not being wasteful in speech is possible by connecting the matter to the talk of the Beloved and by saying, ‘I wish all the people of the world love Him Whom I love’.

Well, you have a Beloved like God, a beloved like our Prophet.

How I wish to see the noble Abu Bakr, I would put my head under his feet like a paving stone, and he may say, ‘What a lovely stone this is!’, he may support me to that extent.

While we have sultans like this, following the path of other things is foolishness, madness, and insanity.

While there are things like looking for God, studying about God, being on the path of God, being on the path of the Messenger of God, that would not be exchanged for the treasures of this world, while there is the notion of ‘Thousands of years of blissful life in Paradise is not equal to a moment’s view of the sacred beauty of God Almighty’, in my opinion, those other things are worthless.

I believe that you can easily push it away with the back of your hand.

I believe that you can easily push it away with the back of your hand.

If they give you the whole of Turkey, I believe that you will push it away with the back of your hand.

You were spread to the four corners of the world like seeds and seedlings; tomorrow those seeds will shoot up ten to one, those seedlings will ten to one shoot up like a plane tree.

Secondly, there are works written on the topic of backbiting.

By reading and teaching them, it is essential to emphasize the ugliness and unlawfulness of backbiting and slandering.

It must be explained to others how abominable a sin this is according to the fundamental sources, the Qur’an and the traditions of the noble Prophet, with references made to footnotes, annotations and explanations written on the matter.

They will hang a person by their tongue if a person has unjustly backbitten, slandered another person, they will hang that person, zip their mouth in the Hereafter, may God protect us from such a thing; then they will tie their hands and arms, send them into the pits of Hell.

In order to not be in such a situation, one must take heed to the words of wisdom from the noble Messenger of God, peace and blessings be upon him, and the explanations of his representatives.

As such, people must be safeguarded and protected from these things with God’s permission and grace.

We should once again emphasize that this is a need that is a severe privation.

A third matter to take into consideration is to look at the past calamities from the perspective of Divine Destiny.

When looking at things in the past, one must look at the words that state ‘Goodness is in whatever God wills’.

‘It may well be that you dislike a thing but it is good for you, and it may well be that you like a thing but it is bad for you.

God knows, and you do not know’ (Al-Baqarah, 2:216).

Maybe those things that look like torture and calamity are glad tidings and truly desirable good deeds for you.

With the difficulties you have suffered, if you have any sins, these will be a means of purification, they will be wiped away.

You will enter the presence of God cleansed and purified.

Consider these aspects of trials and tribulations as well.

‘Whatever event comes, there is goodness in it.’

However the goodness comes, it is from it; you may not know it.

From the perspective of the Divine Will, you are just like seeds sprouting in the four corners of the world; you have been set like seedlings across the four corners of the word.

Those seeds will spike from one to ten tomorrow; those seedlings will grow and develop by ten like plane trees, with God’s consent and beneficence.

and the goal set by our noble Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him:

‘My name will be heard from everywhere the sun rises and sets’ then the ultimate goal will be realized.

One day, you will forego the lands you have ventured to; you will reach the North Pole where the penguins reside.

You will go to them and say, whisper:

‘Have you heard?

There is a Prophet by the name of Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him.

By the consent and beneficence of God, we have come to this snowy part of earth to raise his majestic name like a flag blowing in the wind for all to see.’

You still have much to do in order to be able to say this.

But as long as you walk on this path, if God says, ‘Come’ and take your soul when you are only just half way there, He will treat you as though you have reached that level.

He will treat you as He treats those who have already reached such an exalted level, because ‘The intention of a believer is more auspicious than their deeds’.

‘My God, enable us to perform and succeed in what You love and what pleases You, instead of acting for the satisfaction of our carnal desires.

Our request is Your forgiveness, Your contentment, and Your pleasure. Guide us to all that which You love and are pleased with.’

O God, we ask from You, the Most Divine and Gracious, to send peace and blessings upon the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, whom we see as the primary means by which our prayers find acceptance, and upon the purest of the pure family members and Companions of the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him.