In Him I Put My Trust

Five^***: ʿalayhi tawakkaltu, I put my trust in Allah. Always, whenever we do something, we have to put our trust in Allah (swt). What does tawakkul mean? Because it's a concept that is taken to extremes.

Somebody who takes the concept of tawakkul to the extreme — by thinking that putting my trust in Allah means that I will worship Allah (swt), and forget about rizq, and forget about tying my camel, and forget about preparing for war. Like, for example, one brother had the wrong concept of tawakkul. And we were talking about the Battle of Badr. So he told me — he said: the Muslims, 313 soldiers in the Battle of Badr — he said they went to fight the non-believers, and they didn't have any weapons with them, but two of them had sticks. I told him: they went to fight with sticks? He said: yes.

This is not — see, that's a wrong understanding of tawakkul. You think that the Ṣaḥābah would go and fight a battle with bare hands, without any weapons? How are they going to win? They would slap people around — and the other army has swords, and arrows, and everything — and they're going to be fighting with their hands? So that's a wrong understanding of tawakkul.

And these are the ones whom ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb hit with his stick when he came in the masjid. He told them: what are you doing? This was midday, in the official business hours; they were inside the masjid in Madīnah. ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb came and said: what are you doing in the masjid? They said: naḥnu al-mutawakkilūn — we are the ones who have tawakkul. He hit them with the stick, and said: you understand and know that the sky does not rain gold and silver. Who's going to feed you? You're going to stay here in the masjid and ask for ṣadaqah, when you're strong and able to go out and work? Because this is not the right understanding of tawakkul.