Twelve ways to get active in your Local Masjid
There are countless ways to be and be involved in your Masjid. An active Masjid where God-fearing believers pray, teach and learn is the absolute best place to be.
1. Be a Visitor: First of all, visit your Masjid for salah (prayer) regularly at least once or twice a day. While all prayers are more virtuous in the Masjid than at home, the Fajr and Isha salah (morning and night prayer) are particularly important, according to the Sunnah (Tradition of Prophet Muhammad (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam). Experience also shows that most people are free from other engagements at those times, and so these gatherings, especially the Isha salah, is the largest. If you are not regular at your Masjid, it may be advisable to start with daily Isha salah at the Masjid, then add Fajr, and then the next convenient salah, and so on.
2. Be a Minaret: An extremely charming and beneficial role you can play at the Masjid is to be a minaret: a minaret of the light of smiles, politeness, cordiality and concern for other visitors. This is the most important yet unassuming role one can play. Make your Masjid a beloved place for the rest of your Muslim brothers you meet there. Believe me, people sometimes would be encouraged to come to the Masjid if they know such minarets are there who will make their day, and bring happiness and friendship to their lives.
3. Be a student: The next role after becoming a regular visitor is to be a student. There must be more knowledgeable people than you in the Masjid in one or more areas of Islamic knowledge. If you are lucky, there are one or more study circles for this knowledge already. If not, start them. Then do not be shy to be a student of whoever knows something valuable.
4. Be a Teacher: Being a teacher is even more beneficial role, because now you both give and take from other people. Of course, this requires that you have sufficiently mastered the subject or area you teach or speak about.
5. Be a Follower: The congregational salah are the best spiritual and mental exercise to teach us how to follow with discipline. Even if the Imam (leader) makes a mistake, there are rules to correct him. Similarly, when it comes to organizing all other educational, social and even political efforts at the Masjid, join the efforts you see best for yourself, and be a good, thinking, positive and constructive follower of the leadership.
6. Be a Leader: If and when you learn to be a good follower and listener, you can also begin to learn how to be a good leader. All those Masjid committees, outreach groups, open houses, initiatives for major projects need good leaders. If you are fully confident that you can do a good job as a leader, do not deprive your community of your skills. But be extremely careful of selfishness, self-aggrandizement, or arrogance. Leadership is not everyone's job, and this does not have to do with piety alone. The Prophet (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam) had advised Abu Tharr, a very righteous companion, to never accept a position of leadership.
7. Be a Brother: When praying in congregation, the people praying with you are your brothers. You are with them in the company of Allah. They are beseeching Allah for the same things as you. In fact, you collectively say 'Ameen' upon completing Fatihah (the first chapter of Qur'an). If Allah accepts any ONE of them, ALL of the people praying with him are blessed and forgiven. A scholar used to say that the congregational salah is dear to him for this very reason. Praying in the company of the righteous is, therefore, an immense blessing. Would you not love those brothers whose salah coincide yours, and whose acceptance with Allah may be your acceptance?
8. Be a Helper: Masjid is the best place to remember and practice the teaching of the Qur'an:
"Help you one another in benevolence and piety, and do not help one another in sin and hostility." [5: 2]
Where else could you find more acts of righteousness and piety?
9. Be a Cleaner: Cleaning the Masjid is a great honor in the sight of Allah. The Prophet (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam) insisted to pray upon the grave of a Companion who used to clean the Masjid when he heard that the former had died.
10. Be a Donor: Donate regularly to your Masjid, even if it is little and even if you donate in many other causes. This increases your love for Allah and for the house of Allah, and decreases love of this world. There is hardly any cause you will see the result of your donation more immediately than in your Masjid.
11. Be a Listener: On Friday, we listen to Khutbahs (orations) and yet our life seems unaffected. This is so because listening and taking lessons is a skill to be learned and earned, as much as, if not more than, speaking and delivering lectures. Sometimes, a bad listener may get nothing out of a great speaker, and sometimes a good listener may benefit a lot from an unskillful speaker. So, be a good listener, for that is much more important and beneficial than being a good speaker. Your being a good speaker benefits others, while your being a good listener benefits you.
12. Be a Speaker: Last but not least, if you feel you have learned enough to share with others, and have good speaking skills, don't hesitate to benefit others from your skills. Your Masjid always needs people who are skillful and confident in public speaking. While the Friday sermons require more training and knowledge, beginning with introductory speeches about Islam to non-Muslims, and talks at the study circles may be the right places for you to start.
1. Be a Visitor: First of all, visit your Masjid for salah (prayer) regularly at least once or twice a day. While all prayers are more virtuous in the Masjid than at home, the Fajr and Isha salah (morning and night prayer) are particularly important, according to the Sunnah (Tradition of Prophet Muhammad (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam). Experience also shows that most people are free from other engagements at those times, and so these gatherings, especially the Isha salah, is the largest. If you are not regular at your Masjid, it may be advisable to start with daily Isha salah at the Masjid, then add Fajr, and then the next convenient salah, and so on.
2. Be a Minaret: An extremely charming and beneficial role you can play at the Masjid is to be a minaret: a minaret of the light of smiles, politeness, cordiality and concern for other visitors. This is the most important yet unassuming role one can play. Make your Masjid a beloved place for the rest of your Muslim brothers you meet there. Believe me, people sometimes would be encouraged to come to the Masjid if they know such minarets are there who will make their day, and bring happiness and friendship to their lives.
3. Be a student: The next role after becoming a regular visitor is to be a student. There must be more knowledgeable people than you in the Masjid in one or more areas of Islamic knowledge. If you are lucky, there are one or more study circles for this knowledge already. If not, start them. Then do not be shy to be a student of whoever knows something valuable.
4. Be a Teacher: Being a teacher is even more beneficial role, because now you both give and take from other people. Of course, this requires that you have sufficiently mastered the subject or area you teach or speak about.
5. Be a Follower: The congregational salah are the best spiritual and mental exercise to teach us how to follow with discipline. Even if the Imam (leader) makes a mistake, there are rules to correct him. Similarly, when it comes to organizing all other educational, social and even political efforts at the Masjid, join the efforts you see best for yourself, and be a good, thinking, positive and constructive follower of the leadership.
6. Be a Leader: If and when you learn to be a good follower and listener, you can also begin to learn how to be a good leader. All those Masjid committees, outreach groups, open houses, initiatives for major projects need good leaders. If you are fully confident that you can do a good job as a leader, do not deprive your community of your skills. But be extremely careful of selfishness, self-aggrandizement, or arrogance. Leadership is not everyone's job, and this does not have to do with piety alone. The Prophet (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam) had advised Abu Tharr, a very righteous companion, to never accept a position of leadership.
7. Be a Brother: When praying in congregation, the people praying with you are your brothers. You are with them in the company of Allah. They are beseeching Allah for the same things as you. In fact, you collectively say 'Ameen' upon completing Fatihah (the first chapter of Qur'an). If Allah accepts any ONE of them, ALL of the people praying with him are blessed and forgiven. A scholar used to say that the congregational salah is dear to him for this very reason. Praying in the company of the righteous is, therefore, an immense blessing. Would you not love those brothers whose salah coincide yours, and whose acceptance with Allah may be your acceptance?
8. Be a Helper: Masjid is the best place to remember and practice the teaching of the Qur'an:
"Help you one another in benevolence and piety, and do not help one another in sin and hostility." [5: 2]
Where else could you find more acts of righteousness and piety?
9. Be a Cleaner: Cleaning the Masjid is a great honor in the sight of Allah. The Prophet (SalAllahu Alayhi wasalam) insisted to pray upon the grave of a Companion who used to clean the Masjid when he heard that the former had died.
10. Be a Donor: Donate regularly to your Masjid, even if it is little and even if you donate in many other causes. This increases your love for Allah and for the house of Allah, and decreases love of this world. There is hardly any cause you will see the result of your donation more immediately than in your Masjid.
11. Be a Listener: On Friday, we listen to Khutbahs (orations) and yet our life seems unaffected. This is so because listening and taking lessons is a skill to be learned and earned, as much as, if not more than, speaking and delivering lectures. Sometimes, a bad listener may get nothing out of a great speaker, and sometimes a good listener may benefit a lot from an unskillful speaker. So, be a good listener, for that is much more important and beneficial than being a good speaker. Your being a good speaker benefits others, while your being a good listener benefits you.
12. Be a Speaker: Last but not least, if you feel you have learned enough to share with others, and have good speaking skills, don't hesitate to benefit others from your skills. Your Masjid always needs people who are skillful and confident in public speaking. While the Friday sermons require more training and knowledge, beginning with introductory speeches about Islam to non-Muslims, and talks at the study circles may be the right places for you to start.
From Selected Speeches [khutab Mukhtaarah] Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: General Administration for Research, Ifta’, Da’wa, and guidance, 1987, p 27, 31] Reproduced here from "Speaking for Change" by Wael Alkhairo. Amana Publications, Beltsville, Maryland, 1998
Source & credits: Mutmainaa
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