08/03/1979
IWDM Study Library
The Value of Community Cooperation

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
That's not religion. Religion doesn't say people need this, people need that. The religion first says, what is reality? Who is over it? What is His purpose? And for what are you existing and how are you to live to please that one that's over all of it. Now, that ain't no Black Nationalist movement. That ain't no American movement. There ain't no Western movement. That's the truth. Yeah. You see? So in the Prophet's dream, he says, he came upon these two companions, led him upon a place that had growth, plant growth of rich, deep green.
And he said that they led him on. And he saw there the evidence that it was a paradise and over it was a cloud. The cloud was pure white. And there was a mansion there in the cloud. And he was told by the two companions, say, that's your home in paradise. He said, Prophet Muhammad, Peace be upon him. He said, let me enter. They said, not yet a while. Wasn't for him to enter then. They said, not yet awhile. But it is yours. Meaning that he had to live his life out, complete his work among us. And then he would return to that paradise.
What is the paradise? What is the paradise? He was a protestor. Prophet Muhammad was a protestor. He protested the wrongs in the world. He protested the evils in the world. But he was not a Jacubite protestor. He was not a Nationalistic protestor. He was not the protestor of the kind as we know in human history. He was the kind of protestor you hardly ever see or recognize. One coming purely from what is right. What his race was had nothing to do with it. What his nation was, had nothing to do with it. He came purely from moral sincerity. Purely from moral sincerity. Therefore, his cloud was white. A cloud is what? A protest. Isn't a cloud a protest? Some protests are silent, right? But even a silent protest, if it starts getting thick, it's going to make some noise. And when it gets real thick, it might even lightning and thunder, right? Yes. Lightning and thunder come in the clouds. So a cloud is symbolic of many things in our emotional makeup. Symbolic of emotional makeup. It also means protest. Cloud is protest. How do we know? Allah says in the Qur'an, "The clouds are driven like slaves." Like slaves. Slaves are servants. Protesters are serving something. That's why they're protesting, right?
Yes. And He says that. And they give warning of what? Of good things or bad things. A protest either give us a warning of something good, right? Or it brings bad. Some people protest and what is the motive? A bad motive. So behind that cloud come what? Trouble. And then some people protest is for the sake of goodness. And behind it comes goodness, good results. The benefit of serving what we needed. Like the rain come, serves the needs of the farmer, brings fresh water to the people who don't have fresh water, right? A lot of time it wash and even clean the atmosphere. The air smell better after the rain. Yeah. Protests, moral protests. Moral protests. But everybody don't have the same moral protests. Some people have corrupt moral protests. They attack the morals of another person and their morals are bad. They let their hot head blind them to what's right. And they come and they say, well, we are moralists.
But when you really examine what they're doing, what they're doing is morally corrupt. All right. So Prophet Muhammad is told in a dream that he had a place in paradise and it was in the cloud. A white cloud, white cloud. White cloud. White cloud means pure. Pure emotions. Pure emotions. Clouds are stirred up by the what? Agitation in the atmosphere. Conflict in the environment. That's what brings about clouds. And they thicken up and the pressure gets too much. And then you have sometime violent storms. Great destruction comes, right? That's right. Yes. And it's just like a war going on in the heavens.
Flashes from the gunfire and the loud clap, the peal of thunder, like the cannon went off in the heavens, right? Yeah. It's like war. Like war going on upstairs. Yes. And then sometime it comes so nice and peaceful, hardly no noise at all. And a nice sweet shower. So, I know my cap is going to grow now. And then have to have no problem with it. Sometimes the rain come, the cabin got water, but it knocked down the hen house. Wind knocked down the hen house. It did a whole lot of other things. That's how these worldly leaders are. They was going to help you blacks out. Come on, we'll help you blacks out.
And when it's all over, we got a little rain all right. But good G-d almighty. Where's the chicken house? Where's the chicken coop? Sometimes a tornado come down and take the cow. The cow went up in the tornado, dropped her out somewhere. We don't know where our cow is. What happened to our cow? We sorry we even followed that person. Praise Be to Allah. Dear beloved Muslims, let us rejoice because we have the best, we have the best. The best in the form of religion and the best in the form of people. The Muslims that believe in this religion, they are the best people. Allah says, you are the best raised up for the benefit of humanity. You are the best. That's what Allah says in the Qur'an. So let us understand that and appreciate it. And don't go selling yourself cheap listening and looking to other sources for guidance. Shouldn't do that. You're wasting your time. Muslim who go shopping for ideas to guide his life is wasting his time
As a businessman. Now look what the economist is saying. Here's what a economist told me recently. This is a qualified, recognized international economist. We were having a little conversation and he told me, I said, yeah. I said, when I was in prison I had a lot of time on my hands and the government had some government books there on economy. So I read 'em. I said, I got interested in it. And since then I've been picking up books occasionally as a hobby. reading books on economics. He said, look, he said, I am a graduate of economics and I head an institution, international institution. He said, but I do not follow economics that I was taught in school, the economics I was given in college. That's what he told me. That he doesn't follow it. Now those are the people, those are the people that's on top. They the ones on top. They're not even following it. They have now insight into what they were given. And they see that even that can mess them up if they follow that blindly.
But the little people, they go to college, they don't get that knowledge and they just come here with laws. Oh yeah, oh yeah, okay, you want me to handle this for you Brother Imam? I got my degree in economics. And he come here with all the books and he's just a mechanical tool of the book. Yeah, well here it says right here on page 35, paragraph 68. You know if it's paragraph 68 on one page, it must be just one line statements, right? Nothing but a law, nothing but a cut and dry law. You going to come in here with all these cut and dry laws and apply them to your situation. And you wonder how come you can't make progress. Cause those people haven't been given insight. They have been given nothing but the materials of the colleges and university. But understanding, insight, to know how to apply it to human situations and human problems, no. Average one, they don't know. And in this country, it look like even the top ones don't know or either the top ones won't work for the country. Because look at the mess they're making of the country. And they don't impress me. I see 'em on TV discussing. They don't impress me. These people are just fumbling in the dark. Isn't that how they appear to you? Like people are fumbling in the dark. It's pitiful. And you going to come here and say you believe in Allah and believe in the Qur'an and believe in Prophet Muhammad and accept this Umman of Al Islam and accept the Imam here in Chicago. And then you go and shop for ideas.
You shopping for ideas to see how you going to work out your life. You crazy. You put everything they give you under the spotlight, under the glass of Qur'anic teachings. Search it out good with the light of the Qur'an. And measure all these so-called leaders of the world in the light of what Prophet Muhammad is. That's how we decide where they stand, what their worth is. Measure them in the light of what Prophet Muhammad is and that will tell us how high they stand and what their worth is to us. And if they don't come like he come, they don't have any worth to us.
Praise be to Allah. We thank Allah for His guidance and we pray that He increase our hearts and faith. Protect our hearts from bad inclinations, temptations to go wrong, make our heart sound for His pleasure, direct our feet in the path that is straight, Siratal Mustaqim. The path of Al Islam. We pray that Allah help us to establish our life, the Muslim life. That's the big job. Pray Allah help us to establish the Muslim life for ourselves, for our families, for our community. And it's impossible to do that working so far apart from each other. To do that, we have to come together. We have to come together. I pray Allah that soon we'll come into an agreement with each other. I'm talking about the good ones among us. We don't need the bad ones. Pray Allah soon the good ones among us, we'll come together and vow support to each other. That "Brother, your circumstances shall be my concern." And the brother says to his brother, "And your circumstances shall be my concern." "In your absence, I'm going to look out after your children in your family." And the brother say, "In your absence, you can count on me to look out after your children." This is what we need. We live in a hell of a world. And another thing-We need to protect our investments. Use the community. The community is a means for the life of the Muslim.
Allah, obedience to him, following the Prophet. It must be carried out in the community. You don't practice that in the sky somewhere. That's a community idea. And it's a community reality. It has to be realized in the community. Look how many of us lose our cars back to the people that beat us out our money when we bought it. We paid too much for it. Look how many of us lose our cars back to those people. Look how many of us lose even furniture, nice furniture. Because we are in a terrible strain financially, they come back and get our furniture. Some of us lose our homes. If you become a Muslim community, then you want for your community. You then see yourself in your community. You see the future for yourself in your community, and you are not jealous of your community. You don't feel bad if your community grow and you don't grow. No. Because when your community grow, you are growing. Yes. What do I mean by that? We all are going to be victims of these misfortunes.
Yes. Why lose to the people who are robbing us on our side? If we got something we're going to lose, why don't we come together and say, look, can the community purchase this? Can the community purchase this mortgage before I lose it to the outsiders? Yes. You going to lose it anyway. And you'll lose it to the outsiders. That's what they want. They have a system plan so that the poor people lose what they get to the robbers. We should come up with this idea and accept it. You have a piece of property you're about to lose, say, look, rather than go take a mortgage out on this and take a chance on losing it to these stick up people, you take the mortgage. But don't be like one fellow was who came to me, and he wanted a lot of money. I say, well, you have any property, you have any collateral?
He said, no. I said, what about.....I knew something. I said, what about so and so and so? What about this? What about that? Well, that has mortgage on it already. What about.....Couldn't come up with anything. Well, when it comes to the outsider who doesn't care a thing about him or his religion or nothing, all he see is an opportunity to get richer. That's the outsider. That's most of the outsiders. A hundred percent of the outsiders just about. Okay. All that outsider sees is an opportunity to get rich. Now he will sign his property, he will sign his wealth over to that outsider. But when it comes to his own brother who will use his wealth if he loses it to help his whole lot, he doesn't want to sign nothing over to his brother.
That's why I need that army that I want. I'm going to get it. And we'll drive him away from here. That type will tell you, Hey, where you going? You don't come this way sucker. Go find your own people. If he don't move, put some fire behind it. That's right. Yeah. We got to firm up this community. We have all that we need to have an excellent society, a progressive, strong and excellent society. The only thing we don't have is strong people. That's right. That's the only thing missing strong persons. So let us who are strong, and there's a number of us who are strong. I know it. A number of us that are strong. Let us come together and let us start it. Yes, I tell you how I feel about it. I'll go beyond that and do something that I wouldn't allow you to do. I will put my house right now into a pool, into a collective fund, that my house goes to that fund.
Certainly I would. I don't know what's going to happen after me. I don't know what's going to happen. So if we find the right people among us to protect our interests, we would be better off having what you call a collective pool, a cooperative thing. Where it stands as what they call it, I can't think of right now. Yeah. Trust. A trust, a corporate trust where select people get together and they form a trust with their collective resources that they want to protect. And they put it in a collective trust. Say if anything happen to us, this is to always remain for the service of these specific needs, Clara Muhammad School, this, that, certain specific needs. That way we can rest in our graves. That's right. Believe me, I can't rest in my grave not knowing where this is going to go. Now, that's something I would love to do now. You know why? I don't have the people to protect it. Still looking for the people to protect it. We are finding a few good ones. They're coming. They're popping up slowly, but right now we ain't ready to do nothing like that, but we are ready to deal with mortgages. We can do that. And believe me, most of you be turned down because you ain't nothing but problems. That's why I say we got to get the few healthy minded Muslims that want this and they're intelligent, sensible disciplined people in their lives.
Those are the ones that should get together. We have to get together with those people and then make an agreement, make it legally binding, put our properties on it, that if anything happens such and such, that if this property falls in jeopardy, this property is to be rescued by this account. This account has authority, power attorney, et cetera, et cetera, to go and take this property and put it into this for this specific, for these specific needs. Don't just put it in there for any needs. For specific needs. And it will be protected. We have an account right now that you all are contributing to. And some time ago, I remember telling you that I really felt ashamed for Chicago where I'm the Resident Imam here. And you were hardly represented among the donors. Now, I don't know what happened. I don't know if you stopped donating to Brother Mustafa over there or not, but I know one thing. You sure getting a lot of responses. Yeah. Chicago now is the most represented, and that's the way it should be. That's the way it should be. You are the most represented in the contributions that are coming from around the country and outside the country. Do you know people mailing contributions from off ships? Yeah. Coming off ships, soldiers stationed out on the water on the high sea. In fact, this is amazing. From prisons, from the army, from Muslims and non-Muslims. Right. See, you'd be surprised. Everybody don't see me the way you do. Some of you see me the way the best of you see me. And the rest of them call you all nuts. They call you all crazy. Well there are a whole lot of crazy people out here according to there estimation. And they are sending their support.
Tell you what kind of situation we are in. Don't worry about Sedalia. They can't get that. We got enough to take care of it. We ain't got enough to pay it off, but we got enough to take care of any problem there. And that's what we are going to do. We are going to pay it up to keep the interest from choking us to death you see. They want so much in payments, we're going to double up on those payments. Give 'em four, five payments at once. That'll chop down the interest and then we start chopping down the principal. So Insha Allah, we gonna beat 'em. And we can do it. With Allah and the cooperation of the good people, we can manage in this day and time. Insha Allah we gonna do it. And we appreciate all of the support. Some of you should have gotten a reply, a thank you note by now from the account. You should have that by now. If not they in the mail you should be getting them soo. We mailed some a couple of weeks or more and we are mailing them everyday now. Thank you replies are coming to you. And Insha Allah we are going to be having letters mailed to you where it will be our own reply and you won't have to do anything but put a stamp on it. It will be our own letter with our address and everything on it and you won't have to do anything except put a stamp on it. Now we could have done that too but we don't want to make it that easy. Because charity is something that benefits the donor, the one giving it. And we don't want to be like business people who make business out of charity.
"No, we will send you the stamped envelope. All you have to do is put your money in it." No, we don't want it that easy. We want to know you're sincere. We want to know if you will go and put a stamp on it. We don't want no money from anybody that don't like what we are doing. Anybody that don't like Prophet Muhammad, anybody that don't like the religion as it's given in the Qur'an and the Sunnah of the Prophet. We don't want your money. We don't want anything from you. Give your money to people like yourself. Anybody that's in this that don't care about the main concern that we have and that is the Muslim life, respecting the Qur'an and the Sunnah of the Prophet, keep your money. We'll be successful. "Do not mix up corrupt things with what you give as charity." It must be pure. Zakat means pure. Sadaqa means pure.
Dear beloved Muslims, I would like to mention a couple of things. And mainly the occasion of the Prophet's birthday, Peace and Blessings be Upon him. Muslims, whenever their is any occasion focusing attention on Prophet Muhammad, we have to respect it. Reflect upon it in our hearts and pray for him more. Now we know we don't need no special day to remember Prophet Muhammad. The Muslim remembers Prophet Muhammad all through the day every day. We remember him five times a day and more. So we know we don't need a special day to remember Prophet Muhammad. That is why I am opposed to any celebration. Yet I identify with them. In my heart I appreciate him more. But the idea of a birthday or a particular calendar day, I don't particularly like it. Because that is how they took our leaders out of the reality they were in. And they give you a leader to remember once a year. Yes, that's their sin money that they offer the Prophet for neglecting him 364 days out of the year.


