One of the most important aspects of da’wah today is to expose the evil of Western civilizational “progress,” because this notion of progress is one of the biggest obstacles to the establishment of jihad and sharia. The masses of Muslims don’t realize that the abundant food and entertainment of this system are cursed, and they don’t realize this cursed food and entertainment are used as weapons against them, to ensure their humiliation and subjugation, and to corrupt their religion. As such, they view Muslims that threaten to cut off their access to cursed food and entertainment as their enemies, while they view the ones helping them gain access to cursed food and entertainment as their helpers.

قَالَ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ سَيَأْتِي عَلَى النَّاسِ سَنَوَاتٌ خَدَّاعَاتُ يُصَدَّقُ فِيهَا الْكَاذِبُ وَيُكَذَّبُ فِيهَا الصَّادِقُ وَيُؤْتَمَنُ فِيهَا الْخَائِنُ وَيُخَوَّنُ فِيهَا الْأَمِينُ وَيَنْطِقُ فِيهَا الرُّوَيْبِضَةُ قِيلَ وَمَا الرُّوَيْبِضَةُ قَالَ الرَّجُلُ التَّافِهُ فِي أَمْرِ الْعَامَّةِ

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “Years of treachery will come over people in which liars are believed and the truthful are denied, the deceitful are trusted and the trustworthy are considered traitors, and the disgraceful will deliver speeches.” It was said, “Who are the disgraceful?” The Prophet said, “Petty men with authority over the common people.” [Sunan Ibn Majah 4036, sahih according to al Albani]

Many of the modern luxuries, which themselves come along with heavy dependence on the kuffar, result from decades of alliance and collaboration with the kuffar, in direct contravention to Allah’s command:

یَـٰۤأَیُّهَا ٱلَّذِینَ ءَامَنُوا۟ لَا تَتَّخِذُوا۟ ٱلۡیَهُودَ وَٱلنَّصَـٰرَىٰۤ أَوۡلِیَاۤءَۘ بَعۡضُهُمۡ أَوۡلِیَاۤءُ بَعۡضࣲۚ وَمَن یَتَوَلَّهُم مِّنكُمۡ فَإِنَّهُۥ مِنۡهُمۡۗ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَا یَهۡدِی ٱلۡقَوۡمَ ٱلظَّـٰلِمِینَ

“O you who have believed, do not take the Jews and the Christians as allies. They are [in fact] allies of one another. And whoever is an ally to them among you – then indeed, he is [one] of them. Indeed, Allah guides not the wrongdoing people.” [5:51]

It’s necessary to recognize that whatever we “gained” through submission to the kuffar was not truly progress, and that those who would fight to defend this “progress” are in fact fighting for the preservation of the dominance of the kuffar over the Muslims. This means reviving the tradition of zuhd which was practiced by the salaf, and which is integral to the sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ.

To this end, we must highlight the virtue and merit of simplicity. If you fear your enemy, your enemy will not fear you, and as long as we want what our enemies can offer us, we will fear them.

Sacrifice is the essence of worship; we sacrifice our time and our desires to offer salah, we sacrifice our wealth to offer zakat, and the highest honor we can attain is to sacrifice our souls and offer ourselves to our Lord.

As we increase in love for Allah, subhanahu wa t’ala, we must necessarily hate that which keeps us away from Him, which means that the sacrifices necessary to worship him cease to become a burden, and instead becomes a joy.

It is not enough to relinquish the attachment toward the luxuries that chain us to the kuffar; it is necessary to actually hate these things. For one who hates to see the kuffar spreading their corruption through the earth, it is necessary to hate the means by which they derive the power, wealth, and strength to spread their corruption through the earth. And a large part of this power is derived through their economic presence in the Muslim lands.

If we had followed the command to avoid taking the kuffar as awliya, we wouldn’t have cities which are constructed to accommodate the needs of cars rather than human beings. We would not have to purchase equipment for the construction and maintenance of the infrastructure to accommodate cars. We would not be going deeply into debt with riba to pay for this equipment and infrastructure. We would not need to send women to work outside the home to pay for expensive, car-based lifestyles and to cover the high taxes associated with high national debt.

And most importantly, if the Muslims collectively rejected this closeness to the enemies of Allah and the “progress” that comes with it, the kuffar would be deprived of their ability to even maintain their system. Their financial and industrial system is already near the breaking point, and a loss of the market share they enjoy in Muslim countries would push it over the edge, even if the loss of market share were the only effect. However, a true awakening of the Muslims would do much more than just reduce their market share; it would also lead to disruptions in strategic areas like the Straights of Malacca, Gibraltar, and the Suez Canal. This would further drive up costs, affecting the profitability of a cascading series of industries, resulting in mass unemployment and breakdowns in global supply chains.

It’s very simple; for the kuffar to reach the level that they are at required the colonization of the Muslim lands. Cutting off the neo-colonial flows of wealth from these lands would take them back to the level that they were at before.

When a Muslim country is faced with the hardship of sanctions, we must consider the fact that sanctions hurt the kuffar just as they hurt us. If awareness spreads about the myriad of harms hidden behind luxuries like supermarkets, consumer electronics, synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, automobile emissions, and other technologies which we have been duped into believing benefit us, then we will be better able to withstand the difficulties associated with breaking our addiction to these cursed and toxic products and the political arrangements that enable access to them.

Islam must be taught with understanding of the impact that the implementation of sharia has upon the world and our lives. We must wake up to the oppression and misery that man-made systems exert on all of us. To teach that Islam is a divinely revealed message, and then to quietly accept to live according to a system of law rooted in another set of beliefs – or even worse, to dive deep into enjoyment of that system – is a pure expression of hypocrisy which will teach the youth to have contempt for both Islam and the Muslims.

This is an instance of the meaning of the words of the noble Messenger ﷺ:

القُرآنُ حُجَّةٌ لك أو عليك

“The Qur’aan is evidence, for you or against you.” [Sahih Muslim]

May Allah make the poisoned sweetness that the kuffar use to control us bitter to us, and increase us in beneficial knowledge and guide us to implement it as much as we learn it. May Allah expose those from among the Muslims who have become like the Jews, about whom Allah, subhanahu wa t’ala, said:

أَفَتَطۡمَعُونَ أَن یُؤۡمِنُوا۟ لَكُمۡ وَقَدۡ كَانَ فَرِیقࣱ مِّنۡهُمۡ یَسۡمَعُونَ كَلَـٰمَ ٱللَّهِ ثُمَّ یُحَرِّفُونَهُۥ مِنۢ بَعۡدِ مَا عَقَلُوهُ وَهُمۡ یَعۡلَمُونَ

“Do you covet [the hope, O believers], that they would believe for you while a party of them used to hear the words of Allah and then distort the Torah after they had understood it while they were knowing?” [2:75]

And may Allah send abundant peace and prayer on the seal of the Prophets, Muhammed ibn Abdullah, and upon his family and companions and those who follow them in sincerity until the last day.

والحمد لله رب العالمين