Hadith 29 & 30 — The Paths of Ascent and the Limits of Mercy
[Arabic,إِنَّ الْحَمْدَ لِلَّهِ، نَحْمَدُهُ وَنَسْتَعِينُهُ وَنَسْتَغْفِرُهُ، وَنَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنْ شُرُورِ أَنْفُسِنَا وَسَيِّئَاتِ أَعْمَالِنَا، مَنْ يَهْدِهِ اللَّهُ فَلَا مُضِلَّ لَهُ، وَمَنْ يُضْلِلْ فَلَا هَادِيَ لَهُ، وَأَشْهَدُ أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ، وَأَشْهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبْدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ.]
Indeed, all praise is for Allah. We praise Him, seek His help, and His forgiveness. We seek refuge with Allah from the evil within ourselves and from the consequences of our wrong actions. Whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide; whomsoever He leaves astray, none can guide. I bear witness there is no deity worthy of worship but Allah alone without partner, and Muhammad ﷺ is His servant and Messenger.
Part One
Brothers, last week we spoke of the two compasses — the inner one of the heart and the outer one of the Sunnah. Today we continue. Hadith 29 is the staircase — the acts that carry a man up to Paradise. Hadith 30 is the shape of the ground — what Allah commanded, limited, forbade, and left in silence as mercy.
Hadith 29 is narrated by Mu'adh bin Jabal, may Allah be pleased with him. He said:
[Hadith,Sunan al-Tirmidhi (hasan sahih),"I said: O Messenger of Allah, tell me of an act that will take me into Paradise and keep me away from the Fire. He said: You have asked about a great matter, yet it is easy for him for whom Allah makes it easy. Worship Allah, associating nothing with Him; establish the prayer; pay the zakat; fast Ramadan; and make the pilgrimage to the House. Then he said: Shall I not show you the gates of goodness? Fasting is a shield, and charity extinguishes sin as water extinguishes fire, and the prayer of a man in the depths of the night. Then he recited: 'Their sides forsake their beds' until he reached '...as a reward for what they used to do.' Then he said: Shall I not tell you of the peak of the matter, its pillar, and its topmost part? I said: Of course, O Messenger of Allah. He said: The peak of the matter is Islam, its pillar is prayer, and its topmost part is jihad. Then he said: Shall I not tell you of the controller of all of that? I said: Of course, O Messenger of Allah. He took hold of his tongue and said: Keep this in check. I said: O Prophet of Allah, will we really be held to account for what we say? He said: May your mother be bereft of you, Mu'adh. Is there anything that throws people on their faces into the Fire other than the harvests of their tongues?"]
Subhan'Allah. In one conversation the Prophet ﷺ laid out the architecture of the whole religion — the pillars, the gates, the peak, and the controller. And look at Mu'adh's question. He did not ask for theory. He said akhbirni bi-'amalin — tell me of a deed. Tell me what to DO. Knowledge is not for arguing; it is for acting.
First: "You have asked about a great matter, yet it is easy for him for whom Allah makes it easy."
Two truths in one phrase. The matter is great — do not treat it lightly. But the doing is easy for the one Allah helps. Some of you say: I cannot do this. I have been too far gone. The Prophet ﷺ is telling you your own strength was never the question. Allah's help is. Turn to Him and He makes the heavy light.
Allah says:
[Quran,65:2-3,"And whoever is mindful of Allah, He will make a way out for them, and provide for them from sources they could never imagine. And whoever puts their trust in Allah, then He ˹alone˺ is sufficient for them."]
Taqwa first. Then the help comes.
Second: The five pillars — the floor of the religion.
The Prophet ﷺ then listed the five pillars — we covered them in Hadith 3 and 4. But look at the order here: the first one is not salah. It is tawheed — worship Allah, associating nothing with Him. Everything else sits on that foundation. A man who prays five times a day but takes something else as a partner with Allah has missed the door before he entered.
Allah says:
[Quran,98:5,"They were commanded only to worship Allah ˹alone˺ with sincere devotion to Him in all uprightness, establish prayer, and pay alms-tax. That is the upright Way."]
Brothers, four of the five pillars are within your reach right now. Tawheed. Salah. Ramadan. Zakat if your wealth requires it. Only hajj waits for its time. Do not let the one you cannot yet do become an excuse to neglect the four you can.
Third: "Shall I not show you the gates of goodness?"
Beyond the obligations, the Prophet ﷺ named three extra doors.
Fasting is a shield. Ramadan and voluntary fasting alike — a shield from sin in this life and the Fire in the next. A fasting man's appetite is quieter, his tongue slower, his anger easier to hold.
Charity extinguishes sin as water extinguishes fire. And remember from Hadith 25 and 26 — charity is not only money. A good word, a step toward prayer, every tasbeeh is charity.
And the prayer of a man in the depths of the night. The Prophet ﷺ let the sentence hang. Then he recited:
[Quran,32:16-17,"They abandon their beds, invoking their Lord with hope and fear, and donate from what We have provided for them. No soul can imagine what delights are kept in store for them as a reward for what they used to do."]
Hidden delights, saved for men who stood in the dark while everyone else was sleeping. The Prophet ﷺ elsewhere said:
[Hadith,Sahih Muslim,"The best prayer after the prescribed prayers is the prayer in the depths of the night."]
Brothers, you have hours at night when you cannot sleep. That is the moment the Prophet ﷺ is talking about. Two rak'ahs in the darkness of your bunk, nobody watching but Allah. Start with two. That is your ladder.
Fourth: "The peak of the matter is Islam, its pillar is prayer, and its topmost part is jihad."
Now the Prophet ﷺ gives the structure. Ra's al-amr — the head — is Islam itself, submission to Allah. 'Amuud — the pillar, the pole that holds the tent up — is prayer; pull it and the whole tent collapses. Dhirwatu sanaamihi — the topmost part — is jihad.
Brothers, the word jihad needs care — it has been twisted. In the language of the Prophet ﷺ it means striving in Allah's path, and it has conditions, rules, and authorities. It is not self-appointed, and it is not the caricature the news has made of it. The scholars also speak of the greater jihad — al-jihad al-akbar — the struggle against your own nafs, your desires, your anger, the pull of your past.
For the man in this room, that is where your jihad is right now. Standing for prayer when your body says sleep. Holding your tongue when someone provokes you. Walking the straight path when everything around you is pulling sideways. That is a high station.
Allah says:
[Quran,22:78,"Strive for ˹the cause of˺ Allah in the way He deserves."]
Learn this word from the Quran, the Sunnah, and the scholars. Do not take one verse and act on it alone.
Fifth: "Shall I not tell you of the controller of all that?"
Now the last move — the one every man in this room needs. The Prophet ﷺ took hold of his own blessed tongue — the tongue that carried Allah's revelation to mankind — and said: Keep this in check.
Mu'adh's reaction is priceless: will we really be held to account for what we say? He could not believe words could weigh as much as the acts just listed. The Prophet's response is sharp: May your mother be bereft of you, Mu'adh. Is there anything that throws people on their faces into the Fire other than the harvests of their tongues?
Hasaa'id alsinatihim — the harvests of their tongues. You reap what you planted. Gossip reaps burning. Insults reap burning. Lies reap burning. Every word leaves your mouth and goes to a field, and on the Day of Judgment you walk through that field and see what grew.
Allah says:
[Quran,50:18,"Not a word does a person utter without having a ˹vigilant˺ observer ready ˹to write it down˺."]
Every word. Not the big ones only. Every word. Written down. And the Prophet ﷺ gave the simplest rule for it:
[Hadith,Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim,"Whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day, let him speak good or remain silent."]
Good speech, or silence. Nothing in between.
Brothers, we walked this ground in Hadith 15 and 16. But the Prophet ﷺ came back to the tongue here because it is not one branch — it is the controller. A man can pray five times a day and lose the reward through one night of backbiting. A man can fast Ramadan and lose the fast through a single slander. In this place, the fastest way to lose a whole week of worship is to let your tongue go for ten seconds.
Mu'adh asked for an act for Paradise. The Prophet ﷺ gave him the pillars, the gates, the peak of Islam — then pointed at the tongue and said: all of it falls if this is loose. Guard your tongue. It is the controller.
Part Two
If Hadith 29 gave us the map of what to climb, Hadith 30 gives us the map of the ground itself. Narrated by Abu Tha'laba al-Khushani, may Allah be pleased with him, the Prophet ﷺ said:
[Hadith,Sunan al-Daraqutni and others (hasan),"Verily Allah has prescribed obligatory duties, so do not neglect them. He has set limits, so do not transgress them. He has prohibited certain things, so do not violate them. And He remained silent about certain things, as a mercy to you — not out of forgetfulness — so do not ask about them."]
Subhan'Allah. In two short sentences, the Prophet ﷺ laid out the entire structure of Allah's law. Every ruling in the whole Shari'ah fits into one of four categories. Imam Ibn Rajab said about this hadith:
[Quote,Jami' al-Ulum wal-Hikam (Ibn Rajab, Hadith 30),"This is one of the comprehensive hadiths that gathers up the whole of the religion. It divides the rulings of Allah into four: obligations, limits, prohibitions, and what He left unmentioned. Nothing in the religion is outside these four."]
Let us take them one at a time.
First: "Allah has prescribed obligatory duties, so do not neglect them."
Faraa'id — what Allah has MADE OBLIGATORY. Not recommended. Required. The five prayers at their times. Ramadan. Zakat when your wealth requires it. Hajj when you have the means. Treating your parents with excellence. Honoring a trust. Fulfilling a contract.
Do not neglect them — falaa tudayyi'uuhaa — do not let them go to waste. Every obligation is a debt Allah placed on you. Unpaid, it follows you. Beyond the pillars there are other obligations — rights of parents, spouses, children, neighbors, debts, promises. Know them. Do not neglect them.
Allah says:
[Quran,2:43,"Establish prayer, pay alms-tax, and bow down with those who bow down."]
Short, direct, repeated many times in the Quran. These are commands, not suggestions.
Second: "He has set limits, so do not transgress them."
Hudud — limits, fences, boundaries. Allah's sanctuary is walled.
Allah says:
[Quran,2:229,"These are the limits set by Allah, so do not transgress them. Whoever transgresses the limits of Allah, they are ˹truly˺ the wrongdoers."]
And He also says:
[Quran,2:187,"These are the limits of Allah, so do not go near them."]
Two phrasings for two kinds of lines. Some lines Allah tells us do not cross — the edges of what is permitted. Marriage has limits. Halal wealth has limits. Go up to the line and no further. Other lines He tells us do not even approach — the walls around what is absolutely forbidden. Do not walk up to zina, khamr, or ribā. Stay far. A man who says "I will do everything halal right up to the edge" is a man about to cross.
Third: "He has prohibited certain things, so do not violate them."
Muharramaat — the explicit prohibitions. Things Allah has said clearly: do not. Zina. Theft. Intoxicants. Usury. Unjust killing. False witness. Backbiting. Slander. Consuming an orphan's wealth.
Do not violate them — falaa tantahikuuhaa — do not tear through them. The word intihaak carries the sense of violating a sanctuary. Allah's prohibitions are not arbitrary rules; they are the walls around your soul's sanctuary. When you break them, you are breaking into yourself.
Allah says:
[Quran,7:33,"Say, ˹O Prophet,˺ 'My Lord has only forbidden open and secret indecencies, sinfulness, unjust aggression, associating ˹others˺ with Allah ˹in worship˺ — a practice He has never authorized — and saying about Allah what you do not know.'"]
Know this list. And when your heart tells you what we spoke about last week in Hadith 27 — when the wavering comes, when shame rises — that is Allah's alarm that you are at the edge of a muharram. Step back.
Fourth: "He remained silent about certain things, as a mercy to you — not out of forgetfulness — so do not ask about them."
This is the part most important for every new Muslim and every man still learning. Listen carefully.
Allah never forgets. When He is silent on a matter — when He did not command it and did not forbid it — that silence is mercy. It is space He left open for you to live in. Do not fill it with your own speculation. Do not invent rules He did not give. Do not pile hypotheticals on top of a religion He designed to be simple.
The Prophet ﷺ warned us directly. Sa'd bin Abi Waqqas, may Allah be pleased with him, reported that the Prophet ﷺ said:
[Hadith,Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim,"The greatest sinner among the Muslims is the one who asks about a matter that was not forbidden, and it becomes forbidden because of his asking."]
The man who goes digging for rules where Allah left space may be the reason restrictions come down on the whole Umma.
Allah says:
[Quran,5:101,"O believers! Do not ask about any matter which, if made clear to you, may disturb you. But if you inquire about what is being revealed in the Quran, it will be made clear to you. Allah has forgiven what was done ˹in the past˺. And Allah is All-Forgiving, Most Forbearing."]
Some things were left unasked out of mercy. Do not dig them up.
Brothers, this is critical for the new Muslim. Men around you will hit you with a thousand hypotheticals. What if X happened? What about this edge case? The Prophet ﷺ is warning you: do not live on the edges. The religion gave you the duties, the limits, the prohibitions. Focus there. The silent space is yours. Live in it freely.
Scholars call this al-baraa'a al-asliyya — the original state of freedom. Anything Allah did not forbid is, by default, permitted. You do not need to prove a thing is allowed; check whether it was forbidden. If it was not — it is open.
Fifth: The two hadiths together.
Hadith 29 gave us the acts of ascent — tawheed, prayer, zakat, fasting, hajj, charity, night prayer, jihad, and above all the controller of the tongue. These are the rungs of the ladder. Hadith 30 gave us the shape of the ground the ladder rests on — duties, limits, prohibitions, and the silence of mercy.
A man who knows the duties but never climbs stands safe on the floor, never rising. A man who climbs without knowing the limits stumbles into haram thinking he is obeying. A man who fills the silence with his own inventions has invented a new religion — and we spoke last week of what the Prophet ﷺ said about that.
Both hadiths require the same thing we have been saying for weeks: knowledge. You cannot perform duties you do not know. You cannot respect limits you cannot see. You cannot avoid prohibitions you were never taught. Every part of this requires learning the religion from authentic sources — the Quran, the Sunnah, and the understanding of the companions.
Brothers, if you are new to Islam, do not be overwhelmed. Start where the Prophet ﷺ started with Mu'adh. Tawheed. Prayer. Zakat when it applies. Fasting Ramadan. Stay far from the clear prohibitions. Guard your tongue. Ask when you do not know. The rest comes with time.
Allah says:
[Quran,1:6,"Guide us along the Straight Path."]
We ask this in every rak'ah. The Straight Path is the ladder of Hadith 29 on the terrain of Hadith 30, held together by a guarded tongue and protected by knowledge. This is the religion.
O Allah, make the acts of ascent easy for us, and teach us the shape of Your law.
O Allah, make us of those whose tongues plant good harvests, not fires.
O Allah, keep us far from Your prohibitions, within Your limits, diligent in Your duties, and grateful for the mercy of what You left in silence.
O Allah, bind our knowledge to our action, and our action to sincerity for You alone.
O Allah, let these two hadiths shape our climb and our ground until the day we meet You.
We ask Allah to make us firm upon His straight path, to guide us and not let us go astray, to have mercy on us and forgive us.
Whatever good was said in this khutbah is from Allah alone, and whatever mistakes or errors are from myself and from Shaytan. I ask Allah to forgive me and you for any shortcomings.
I say these words of mine, and I seek forgiveness from Allah for myself and you all. Seek His forgiveness—indeed, He is Most Forgiving, Most Merciful.
[Arabic,أَقُولُ قَوْلِي هَذَا، وَأَسْتَغْفِرُ اللَّهَ لِي وَلَكُمْ، فَاسْتَغْفِرُوهُ إِنَّهُ هُوَ الْغَفُورُ الرَّحِيمُ.]