Benefiting From The Quran

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم In the
Name of Allah, Most Merciful, Most Compassionate

There are two kinds of requirements for benefiting from the Quran.

First, is the academic which is anything you need to study like learning the Arabic language, understanding tafsir, understanding the linguistic analysis and traditons. Second and more important than the academic requirements, are certain psychological (or spiritual or the attitude requirements) for beneift from the Quran -- those are the harder ones. As a matter of fact someone who is intelligent can learn Arabic, tafsir, even memorize the Quran in no time, and understand and know a lot about Allah's Book in very little time. But the pshological requirements in really benefiting from the Quran is a lifelong struggle. They are something you can meet at some point in your life and you can lose at a later point in your life. They are not something you get to keep but they are something you have to fight to keep it. More than anything, you have to fight yourself to maintain those requirements. You maybe a knowledgeable person, scholar, a Quran teacher, a Quran memorizer, a niqabi or hijabi, etc, but you still have to struggle everyday to meet those psychological requirements. It's not like the prerequisites in college, that when you meet it once, you don't have to do anything more.

The first of those requirements is reminding yourself every single time...Why am I learning this; Why am I learning Arabic; Why am I reading the Quran; Why am I memorizing this ayat; What is the point of all of these? The cliche answer is, "so I can have guidance". The Quran is guidance but so often we don't understand what that term really means. What that means is on a given day you will be presented with choices--should I stay in bed or should I wake up; should I earn my money this way or should I find another job; should I look there or should I look down; should I talk back or should I stay quiet; should I pursue this friend or should I leave this friend; should I respond back to the text messages or should I ignore them?.

When we ask Allah for guidance, we are asking Allah for the strength to make the right choices. When you are ready and strong enough to make the right choices, you will change yourself. You don't wait till you are ready or wait ntil you have become a better person. There is not ever a day in your life that you will look in the mirror and say, "I am a better person today." That would mean you are self righteous and self righteous people are the worst kind of people. You and I will never be good enough to obey Allah, but you still have to do it (obey Allah). If you are convinced about something, learning Quran, putting hijab, etc, you have to do. You cannot put it off.

If you accept this Book as guidance, that necessarily means you have to change the way you make your choices. You don't think twice about it. Don't listen to the waswasa (whispers) of shaytan that comes into your head, "It's not a big deal!" "Why so hard on yourself!" "You have done enough!" Shaytan would say such things enough times that he will leave you on auto pilot and now you can tell yourself that. He is not doing waswasa to you anymore. That's why we have to recite the Quran and reflect on the Quran regularly in order to fight those temptations, those inclinations, the voices inside us that lead us to failure. This is going to happen to all of us. It doesn't matter if you are a student, a teacher, an expert, a novice, your age, the length of hijab, the color of your hijab, the size of your beard doesn't matter. Shaytan is not going to spare any of us.

Allah offers His protection against the shaytan. If you are going to recite Quran, seek Allah's refuge from shaytan. Otherwise shaytan will distract you and you won't get the benefit you need from the Quran. One of the reasons that you should recite the Quran is to get protection against shaytan. This is why Allah gives us His Book. The actual relationship we have with the Quran happens when we pray and it happens at least five times a day. If somebody's solat is good their Quran is good. If a person is not engaging with the Quran in solat, then his relationship with the Quran is entirely academic exercise and an artificial exercise.

Real Quran happens in solat. Everything you learn about His Book, whether it's tajweed, it's language, it's tafsir or memorize the ayat, all of it boils down to you will have a better solat. If not, all the study is in vain because solat is officially the time when you stop talking to everyone else and you start talking to Allah, in words that He taught you.

May Allah grant us closeness to Him, the strength to make the right choices, the companionship with the His Book, and make our solat better today than yesterday. Ameen.

Allahumma salli 'ala Muhammad wa 'ala aalihi wa sahbihi wasallam.

And Allah knows best and is Most Wise, and He alone grants success, and to Him is the final return of all.

Wassalaam