Limit the Usage of Phones

Bismi Llāhi r-Raḥmāni r-Raḥīm

“لَاهِيَةً قُلُوبُهُمْ ۗ وَأَسَرُّوا النَّجْوَى”

(Qur’an 21:03)

“Lāhiyatan Qulūbuhum; Wa ‘AsarrūAn-Najwá”

“With hearts preoccupied. And they confer in secret.” Ṣadaqa Llāhu l-‘Aẓīm.

The hearts of people are somewhere else. Their thoughts are somewhere else. People are often heedless. And in this time, heedlessness is more than the old times. There weren’t many things like this to keep people busy. Everyone minded their own business. Those who will study, studied. Those who won’t study, worked. Now, they are all the same.

Allāh ‘Azza wa-Jalla created people differently, but these people want to make them uniform and of one type according to their own minds. They want to put them in a mold. They put them in a mold, and after that the mold is useless. What will happen to all these people then? Nothing. They want to put in that mold people who don’t fit into it so that nothing good comes out of them.

People of old times – now there is no intelligence left, there is no mind left. They handed it all over to the tools. Artificial intelligence, they say. “It will do our job for us. Let’s play and just have fun; that’s enough for us. Let’s enjoy ourselves. We don’t want anything else. The tools would take care of us anyways. We don’t need to use our minds anymore. That machine takes care of us.” The children, the old and the young all have this nuisance in their hands. They play around with it the whole time and don’t look at anything else.

The same applies to those who study. So they neither understand nor learn. Years pass in vain. And then they strive to see goodness. When this issue happens to the student, the student should focus on his own lessons. This machine should not think for you. If it does, it will be useless for you. You will be useless. Children have been possessed by this thing. They’ve taken them captive.

That machine must be limited. They haven’t set any limits or boundaries. Everything has its limits, it has its boundaries. You mustn’t exceed it. If you’re going to benefit from something, there’s a limit. If you exceed that limit all the time, you’ll be controlled by that thing. You will either be controlled by your ego or by these machines.

Therefore, you must be careful. People of old times were very different. Students would go to school, to a place far from their families. Not like today, their mother would call every minute. Every minute, their sibling, friend or this and that would call, “What happened? What’s there?” In that time, when they went there were no cars, no planes. It took six months for the letters to arrive.

One of the greatest scholars, one of the Awliyā’ was Imām Ghazāli. He says, “I went to study. Six months later a letter came from my family. I didn’t open this letter. Then, another came and another came.” He put them all on top of each other. He opened the letters seven years later. A letter came saying, “Your mother died.” “If I had opened it, I wouldn’t have received this knowledge anyway. My mind would be confused. I wouldn’t have benefited from anything.” Imagine that he didn’t even open the letter that came every six months! And look at the state of the people now! How will they study? How will they benefit? May Allāh ﷻ protect us.

People are completely captives. They cannot leave them. The same goes for children. So at least set a limit for them. Especially for these students studying in madrasah. Do you want the phone or madrasah? “I want the phone.” Come brother, take your phone, go home and play as much as you want. If no, if you want madrasah, you will leave the phone. No more phones from now on. You can have the phone once a week for 15-20 minutes if you want to talk to your family, if you want to talk to this or that person. It should be given on that condition. This is for madrasah, and it should be the same for other students. Not once a week, but ten to twenty minutes a day is enough. Don’t feel sorry for them. If you feel sorry, it’s not mercy, it’s you that will be pitied; it’s your state that will be pitied then. You must be careful about that.

Surely, families should do this to their children. This limit is important. “Freedom is unlimited. There is no freedom.” When there is unlimited freedom, it becomes bad. You will be trespassing on someone else’s rights. You will be trespassing on someone else’s boundaries. Therefore, you must set limits on everything to control your ego. You should set limits for your ego as well. Your ego has rights, and things that are not its rights. We must be careful about that. May Allāh ﷻ help us.

We are living in very difficult times indeed. Everywhere is danger. Everywhere is evil. Especially in those machines. There is a lot of filth appearing in front of the children. People used to know only those things when they were going to get married. Now they show it to 2 and 3 year-olds. May Allāh ﷻ help us. May Allāh ﷻ protect them. May He ﷻ send the Sāhib, in shā’a Llāh. Wa min Allah at-Tawfiq. Al-Fatiha.

There are recited Qur’an Khatms, Ayāt, Surahs, Tasbihat, Salawat. May Allāh ﷻ accept from those who have recited them. We gift them firstly to the great soul of our Holy Prophet ﷺ, his ﷺ Ahlu l-Bayt and ṣaḥābah, souls of all Anbiya, Awliya, Asfiya and Mashayikh, to the souls of all our passed ones, to Mawlānā Shaykh Nāẓim, Hajjah Anne, Hala Sultan, all Anbiya, Awliya, Asfiya, to the souls of all late Muslims and Mu’mins. May they reach them. May whatever goals those who recited have be reached. For happiness here and hereafter. For strength of īmān. May Allāh ﷻ protect our īmān. Li-Llahi Ta’āla.

Al-Fatiha.

• Mawlana Sheikh Muhammad Adil ar-Rabbaniق

18 April 2025/ 20 Shawwal 1446

Fajr Prayer – Akbaba Dergah, Istanbul