Continuing the discussion on the third millennium and the ruling on believing in it and what it contains.

The Shaykh : I return to the issue of the third millennium, which the Christians are now agitated about. Yes, it is a bogeyman for them. We ask Allah to make us a bogeyman in their faces. Yes, they are now afraid of it and claim that such and such will happen and such and such will happen. And Isa will descend. But we say, praise be to Allah, if Isa descends, what will he do? He will break the cross they worship and kill the pig, and he will not accept anything but Islam, even the jizyah that we used to take from them and impose on their religion—he will not accept anything but Islam. So if he descends, will it be a salvation for them or a punishment for them? It will be a punishment for them. It will be a punishment for them. But we do not know when he will descend. If one of us does not know what he will earn tomorrow, how can we know what Allah Mighty and Majestic will do tomorrow? I ask you, my brother, do you know what you will earn tomorrow? How not? La ilaha illa Allah. When you get up from sleep, what do you do? You don’t know? The suhur that is boiling on the stove now, you might not eat it for suhur, or the bread in the tannur might not be ready. If you are one of those who bake bread, maybe. Well, okay, fine. Rest. He says, and if you have prepared the suhur, I do not know, perhaps I will die and not eat it. Yes, and perhaps you will change your mind; it is not necessary for a person to leave a thing when he dies. Perhaps he will change his mind, his companion will invite him, and he will eat something else, or he will find himself heavy, his stomach heavy, and leave the food. In any case, a person estimates that he will do such and such tomorrow. But he does not know this with certainty. For this reason, Allah said to His Prophet: . Do not be certain of what you do not know, O human. Glory be to the Turner of hearts. It was said to a Bedouin, “By what did you know your Lord?” He said, “I knew my Lord by the abrogation of resolutions and the turning of desires.” Glory be to Allah! A Bedouin, my people! Fitrah by the abrogation of resolutions means that a person resolves to do a thing, and then, what happens? He leaves it while he was resolved to do it. The turning of desires: he directs himself toward a certain direction, and then he directs himself toward another. The One who directs this heart is Allah Mighty and Majestic. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: . Then he says: . O Allah, Turner of hearts, make our hearts firm upon Your obedience, O Lord of the worlds. And how many are the people who were deviant and then became committed! And how many are the people who were committed and then, what happened? They became deviant! Because the hearts are in the hand of Allah. Therefore, it is obligatory upon us, my brothers, to ask Allah for steadfastness always, and not to be deluded by what our hearts are upon, such that a person always says, “I am, if Allah wills, committed; I will not go astray. That’s it, I have known the truth and it is impossible [for me to go astray].” No, ask Allah for steadfastness always. Ask Allah for steadfastness always. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said regarding the Dajjal—if you sit here and do not interrupt the discussion—he said: So let him move away, what? Let him distance himself from him meaning by what he sees of himself this hadith or its meaning. Do not expose yourself to fitnah, my brother.
In any case, first, regarding the third millennium.
First: It is not permissible for us to do an act that indicates celebrating it, or that we have made it our concern, or that it has ever worried us. It is not our history. It is the history of disbelieving nations that forced the Muslim community in many Islamic lands to date by the Gregorian calendar. Why? Because they colonized the lands; they colonized the Levant, Iraq, Egypt, and the other colonies you know of. And they forced their people to date by the Gregorian calendar. Otherwise, we have the history before us now. All the scholars from those lands before the wicked, treacherous Western colonization all dated by the Hijri calendar. They say, “Such a scholar was born in such a year and died in such a year.” Such a conquest happened in such a Hijri year. And they do not know these years; their months are also not based on a principle, my people. We do not know a basis for them; a month is twenty-eight days. And a month is thirty-two or thirty-one days. Where does this come from? This is also contrary to what Allah Mighty and Majestic established for His servants. Listen to the words of Allah Mighty and Majestic: From the people? From the people? O Arabs, from the people? All people? Yes, as the Exalted said: . All people. Appointed times for the people, not for the Arabs alone, for the people and for Hajj. He specified it because the Arabs in the pre-Islamic age of ignorance sometimes made Hajj in Dhul-Hijjah and sometimes in Muharram. So He said: meaning do not exceed its month, okay. And the Exalted said: When? . So what are these months? Who knows them? Please. Yes, Muharram, Safar, Rabi' al-Awwal—wait—Rabi' al-Thani, or Rabi' al-Akhir? Well, Akhir, Akhir. Okay. The second, Jumada al-Awwal? No, Jumada al-Ula; the feminine form is Jumada al-Ula; the other is wrong, masculine; this is not Jumada al-Akhirah. Okay, Rajab, Sha'ban, Ramadan, Shawwal, Dhul-Qa'dah—with an open qaf—yes, Dhul-Hijjah—with a kasrah on the ha—okay, rest.
These months are twelve; this is the number of months with Allah by the consensus of the exegetes. So why do we date by imaginary things when we have tangible things that everyone knows and are not hidden in any part of the earth, but in the sky, where everyone sees them? A man from among the people said to me: “O so-and-so, these months are more organized for the farmers because they are fixed in the seasons. When is August? What? Summer? In the summer they plant the summer crop. December, what? In the winter they plant the winter crop. And so on. But the Arabic months move through the seasons.” We said, praise be to Allah, if this is what is intended, we have something more organized than this; we have the constellations. Allah the Exalted said: These constellations are perfectly fixed. And they are twelve constellations, the first of which is Aries and the last of which is Pisces, and they are known. So let us date by them for the sake of the farmers. As for making this appointed time, which has no basis as far as we know, the basis upon which people build their documents and the history of their dead, so that a woman is held for four months and ten days and so on. Where does this come from? So I say: It is obligatory upon the Muslims to be proud of their religion, their history, their language, their methodology, and all their affairs, and not to pay any attention to this at all. How can we be proud? Allah has made us proud through Islam, and then we weaken ourselves and become followers of others? Is this fitting, O people? No, by Allah, it is not fitting. It is never permissible for us to follow them in this celebration. This is one point. As for Christmas, it is more severe, more severe, and more abominable, more abominable. It is not permissible for us to congratulate them on it. Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allah have mercy on him) said in his book *Ahkam Ahl al-Dhimmah*: “As for congratulating them on their religious festivals, whoever congratulates them, if he is safe from disbelief—pay attention to this word—if he is safe from disbelief, it is greater than congratulating them on drinking intoxicants and prostrating to an idol and the like”. And his Shaykh, the Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him), said: “As for congratulating them on their festivals, that brings joy to them”. And he mentioned a long passage in his valuable book, *Iqtida' al-Sirat al-Mustaqim Mukhalafat Ahl al-Jahim*, which I advise every Muslim to acquire; it is *Iqtida' al-Sirat al-Mustaqim Mukhalafat Ahl al-Jahim*.