Muhammad: The Seal of Prophets

As a verse of the Qur’an reveals, “… Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah and the Final Seal of the Prophets.” (Surat al-Ahzab: 40), the Prophet Muhammad (saas) was sent to mankind as the last prophet. He was a living example of the sublime morality of Allah’s last revelation. He was a friend of Allah and inspired humanity by his nearness to Him. He was His representative, noble in His sight, and a friend to all believers.
As Allah has revealed in another verse, “We will impose a weighty Word upon you…” (Surat al-Muzammil: 5), he charged His last prophet, Muhammad (saas) with a heavy responsibility. Due to the Prophet (saas)’s strong faith in Allah, he fulfilled that responsibility in the best possible way, called mankind to the path of Allah and Islam, and illuminated the way for all believers.
Although we have never seen the Prophet (saas), we can still do our very best to come to know his exemplary behavior, his sayings and the pleasing morality he displayed, by means of the verses of the Qur’an and the hadiths (the sayings and teachings of the Prophet (saas). We can try to be like him, in order to be close to him in the hereafter. People today, and the young in particular, take many individuals as role models, imitate the way they behave, speak and dress, and try to be like them. Yet, since the great majority of thesepeople are not on the right road themselves, they lack proper morality and attitudes. It is therefore a serious responsibility to lead people to the truth and the best morality and behavior. A Muslim needs to try to emulate the behavior and the morality of the Prophet Muhammad (saas). Allah confirms that in a verse:
You have an excellent model in the Messenger of Allah, for all who put their hope in Allah and the Last Day and remember Allah much. (Surat al-Ahzab: 21)
Like the Prophet Muhammad (saas), the other prophets were also role models for believers, and enjoyed Allah’s good pleasure. Allah says in one verse:
There is instruction in their stories for people of intelligence. This [the Qur'an] is not a narration which has been invented but confirmation of all that came before, a clarification of everything, and a guidance and a mercy for people who believe. (Surah Yusuf: 111)

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Prayer: Life’s Forgotten Purpose

Man has taken many journeys throughout time. But there is one journey that nobody has ever taken. Nobody—except one.
On a vehicle no man has ever ridden, through a path no soul has ever seen. To a place no creation has ever before set foot. It was the journey of one man to meet the Divine. It was the journey of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) to the highest heaven. It was al-Israa’ wal-Miraaj (the magnificent journey).
On that journey Almighty Allah took his beloved Prophet to the seventh heaven—a place not even angel Jibreel could enter. In the Prophet’s mission on earth, every instruction, every commandment was sent down through angel Jibreel. But, there was one commandment that was not. There was one commandment so important, that rather than sending angel Jibreel down with it, Allah brought the Prophet up to Himself.
That commandment was Salah (Prayer). When the Prophet was first given the command to pray, it was to be fifty times in a day. After asking Allah to make it easier, the commandment was eventually reduced to five times a day, with the reward of the fifty.
Reflecting upon this incident, scholars have explained that the process of going from fifty to five was a deliberate one, intended to teach us the true place Prayer should hold in our lives. Imagine for a moment actually praying fifty times a day. Would we be able to do anything else but pray? No. And that’s the point. What greater way than that to illustrate our life’s true purpose? As if to say, Prayer is our real life; all the rest that we fill our day with… just motions.

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