Golden Advice From An Old Hāfiz
The Diary of A Hāfiz - Issue #108
Bismillāh al-Rahmān al-Rahīm
Assalāmu ‘Alaykum!
Hope you’re all doing well. Allah grant ease and blessing.
Today I bring you advice from an old Hāfiz, someone who has been teaching his entire life. Let’s see what he says…
Requesting your prayers,
- Qāri’ Mubashir
How Did You Memorise The Qur’ān? An Answer From An Old Hāfiz.
“Recite by looking first. Always. You need to be able to recite by looking first. You need to get comfortable with the passage in every way possible.”
“When I used to memorise, we would always do this first. We had to recite the passage first and read it to the teacher. Nowadays, we are witnessing students recite themselves and to themselves without having someone listen to them. I am aware that there are new ways and technology now but nothing is the same as reciting to someone in person.”
“After reciting the passage, we would memorise it. You can memorise it in any way possible for you - but it must be as strong as you get get it. When I used to memorise, I would have to recite in the mornings before breakfast. Not after eating. After eating breakfast, we had to recite our revision. Our revision was set at doing 1 Juz’.”
“Not only that, we had to give an exam from the back too (daily). If you were memorising from the first half of the Qur’ān, you would recite your revision from that half and your exam would be in the reverse order. So say for example, you were memorising from the 1st Juz’ onwards up till the 16th, your revision would be Juz’ 1, 2, 3, 4 up until the 15th Juz’. But your test would be from the 16th, and then 15th, 14th, 13th, 12th, all the way back. In this way, we would cover both sides daily. It was an amazing method.”
How did you do all of this?
“We had to recite our new passage by looking. Then memorise and then recite it during the morning hours, if we made a mistake, we would be corrected. After dhuhr, whatever we would learnt in the morning, we would recite to the teacher. Then we would recite the previous seven passages we memorised. After Maghrib, we did our revision. The next morning, whatever we learnt at dhuhr the previous day, we would have to recite that first thing. Meaning our new memorisation had to be recited at least twice. Our teacher used to say, ‘whatever mistakes happen in your new memorisation, if they are not corrected, they will reappear in your revision, and whatever remains in your revision, will remain with you for life.’ This is why, if we made a lot of mistakes, our new lesson would be rejected.”
“Also, keep in mind, after reading our revision, we had to stand and recite it from memory once, the morning new passage we memorised, we had to stand and recite that three times from memory, and whatever we learnt again later, we had to recite that by standing seven times. If you memorise anything, try to repeat that eleven times after memorising standing (in prayer or outside prayer), your revision at least once.”
“Also, every Thursday, we had to recite everything we covered over the full week. And whoever didn’t know this (as in without a mistake), we would not get the weekend off. If this was perfect, only then that weeks portion would go into the revision phases. So we’d do the new lesson, the previous seven lessons, a full juz’, a test on the previous (random testing), and then the full weeks memorisation.”
What should someone that has forgotten Qur’ān do?
“Make sure you use the Qur’ān that you used to use when you memorised before. Take that and start to recite 3 Juz’ a day by looking. Every 10 days, complete a Qur’ān. This is the minimum, if you can do more then this then that is better. What you will find is that after 2 or 3 months, you will find your memorisation returning. Look at old people who recite Surah Yasin, Surah al-Waqi’ah or Surah al-Mulk daily, they haven’t memorised them formally, they only recite them habitually - but when they listen to someone reciting it, they can follow it. They can correct the other person. This is the benefit of consistent recitation. You will be able to re-memorise very easily.”
“There was a Hāfiz that memorised and forgot everything. So much so that all he remembered was Surah al-Fātihah and Surah al-Ikhlās. That is all that remained. So he got the same copy of the Qur’ān he used to use and did the same process. Today he is from the most well known Imām’s. This only requires some effort.”
Advice for teachers
“There are students that don’t listen, we try doing things and the students don’t succeed. People ask what to do. There is an incident that I became aware of when I used to teach a long time ago. There was a student that went from institution to institution, teacher to teacher, and he was never successful. Until he got to one teacher under whom he was able to memorise Qur’ān but also learn all the other Islamic Sciences from. When it came time for him to graduate, his teacher called all of his previous teachers to the graduation ceremony. Some teachers recognised the students and some didn’t. He asked the teachers to test him according to their respective expertise. The student was able to answer the questions well. So his teacher explained that this young man used to learn with such and such a teacher, and went to another, but Allah sent him to me where He gave him success. So the teachers asked, “How? We couldn’t do anything with him.”
The teacher said, “I used to give him time during the day but during the nights, I would make du’ā’ for him. I used to ask, “O Allāh, you have sent him to me. I am not capable but You are the One who guides. If he is not successful with me, where will he go? Allāh open his heart, open his mind, open his faculties so that he can receive. Make him consistent, obedient, and successful.”
Lessons
Recite by looking (well and consistent).
Memorise well.
Make sure you repeat your new memorisation many times after you’ve done it even till the next day (ensuring it’s error free before starting a new passage).
Make sure you’re testing yourself from the back [probably the key ‘tip’].
Make sure you’re revising at least a Juz’ a day.
The lesson for teachers is that we need to pray for our students. We have stopped doing that. The difference between the Qur’ān teachers of today and the past, is that those of the past lived what they preached, they were those who stood up in the nights and they lived sincerity such that you would find them crying and making du’ā’ for their students who they saw as a trust from Allāh. Who they saw as a gift from Allāh. Who they saw as a honour for them.
The lesson for students is that you should always ask your teachers (and the pious) to pray for you - it can turn things around for you.
📖 THE DIARY OF A HĀFIZ
This is where we try to learn by watching others memorise. A roundup reporting the progress of two brothers and a sister in their pursuit of memorising the Qur'ān:
👳🏼♂️ Muhammad, 36, founder
Background: After forgetting what he memorised (half the Qur'ān) and kept struggling to start again. So he decided to share his diary and mission with us. After 19 weeks of struggle, he finally started. It took him a few months to do a few Juz’. He’s a few months away from having a years diary complete.
What he accomplished last week (1 year, week 34):
“I have been doing a page a day from Juz’ 7 completing the first 9 pages, Alhamdulillāh, yet I face the same issue with revision. A few observations:
(1) I feel sleepy when reciting after half an hour. This has an impact. I recite after Isha and so instead, I moved it to after Maghrib but the same thing still happened. I will now adjust to recite while walking.
(2) I have been missing Fajr lately and waking up late. This has an impact. To adjust this, I moved my clock from near my bed to across the room onto my desk.
(3) Even reducing the amount of revision, still makes me avoid it for some reason. I tried to tell myself to even do as little as three ruku’ but still not consistent. I will now look to create a new habit where I can do revision at another time and have accountability in place.”
🧕🏿 Halima, 47, school teacher
Background: A 47 years old Black American Muslim school teacher. She has 3 adult children who are in university and grad school, Alhamdulillāh. She began memorizing the Quran about 5 years ago. It's been on and off with different teachers and motivation levels. She was inspired as a child to memorize Quran but my family lacked the access to a madrassah due to financial costs. She is the oldest of eight children. As a child she had never read more than the last ten surahs. Later in life, she rekindled her connection with Allah swt, and began taking tajwid classes in 2011, then finished her first reading of a khatam of Qur'an to her teacher in tajwid, from then her hifz struggles eased a bit. Currently, she is memorizing Surah al Maidah with Ustadha Sofia.
Week 22:
"And the word of your Lord has been fulfilled in truth and in justice. None can alter His words, and He is the Hearing, the Knowing."6:115
Alhamdulillah, the sacred act of reciting Quran with intention for it to be held in your heart, sealed and memorized, we pray that Allah makes it easy for us on this path of seeking. We just keep going and striving. Although, it's been a few months on the same section of Quran. I'm reflecting that every time I come to the Quran, the experience is not the same, although it may feel the same and look the same, except for there's the unseen. I feel like I'm not making much progress but I have to remind myself these acts of servitude never go unnoticed, no matter if you feel like it's a hardship at time or easy at time. I'm looking for the joys in the moments of struggle and to remind myself that Allah loves me. I love Allah and His Divine words. Memorizing feels like I'm holding on to something sweet at times and hot and sour at times. I just return with a renewed patience because it feels slow, and yet I don't know what it looks like on the other side. I can only anticipate something radiant. Allah grant us success. Amin
🧑💻 Hasan, 27, busy full-time engineer
Background: Hasan memorised the Qur’ān when he was young but unfortunately he forgot it. Just over a year ago, he tried to resume his memorisation and managed to do up to 7 Juz’. But then life threw it’s challenges and his memorisation came to a stop. He got in touch last week with Qari’ for his time and has resumed his memorisation with a new plan.
Week 8: Having lost his voice, he hasn’t been able to read but I expect him to return today or tomorrow. Allāh grant shifā’!
👉 If you have any questions, just drop a reply to me and I'll feature the questions and answers in relevant issues.
Allāh grant us all success and ease on this path!
⭐ COMMUNITY HIGHLIGHTS & UPDATES
🎉 What’s new / recent 🎉
Hifz Camp: Something is coming.
Finding My Half has now around 30+ profiles and there have been a few people that have connected.
Check out Impact and share your thoughts.
I’ve had some feedback from the collection of tools - in particular the Hifz Tester. I’ll working to make that even better with further works in the pipeline.
The community groups (WhatsApp / Telegram, etc) are growing and if anyone wants to get involved as admins/mods please let me know.
The Hifz Buddy Finder now has over 120+ people and it’s growing fast. Get your profile. I have further people in the waiting list and I’ll add them onto the database soon.
📢 📢 Requests
1️⃣ My request is also on-going, share your usual hifz schedule with me. Please fill in the Form. (I have had several which I will add online soon)
2️⃣ Those of you that are teaching or have an institute can get listed on the Teachers directory.
3️⃣ Finding My Half has now around 30+ profiles, it needs a push, would you mind sharing it?
If you have anything to add, have hifz stories, want to share your own journey, have tips, have teachers, have anything you want to add to the weekly emails, do let me know.
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