Izzat Roslan

"Looks great, works even better." ;)

     I mean, that's the kind of shoe that people are looking for when they want to buy some sport shoes, be it basketball, football or anything. Especially to someone who is really a hard-core player of the sport, they will consider these two aspects. However, in today's entry, I'm not gonna talk about this new pair of kicks that I just bought not too long ago. Instead of seeing it as a great basketball shoe, it kinda like crossed in my mind and somehow this shoe have given a lesson of life, seriously. Looking it from the view of our hearts and soul, it's important to be like this shoe. Why? Maybe I should ask you again, don't you want to have a good heart and remarkable akhlaq (manners) at the same time? Isn't that what was thought by our beloved prophet Muhammad SAW? You want to look good on the inside and you want to look good on the outside.

     As a Muslim, that's the way it should be. We might say, I'm being good is enough for me. Why would I bother about solat, covering my aurat, etc. I'm good already. Well, that's good on the outside, but you're not being good with Allah, you are not fulfilling your syahadah. Once you're in Islam, you have to take everything, no patches. Allah has said in the Quran, in Chapter Al-Baqarah...

I don't know. People said it's all dunya stuff and you're wasting your time working on your game and playing.

SAY WHAT?! Are you serious? Yo, who that man telling you all those piece of crap?

Assalamualaikum, hehe

Well, that's a bit of intro to go about. In this entry, I'm just going to touch about Basketball or generally sports and how we can play with the pleasure of Allah for every shot that we take. I used to be a hard core basketballer and in fact, I'm still is. From top to toe, it has to be about basketball and this guy named Allen Iverson, has always been an idol for me to work on my game and play like him. Here's a photo of him...

Great basketballer with great personality. He might have some issue with his appearance but they way he look at his game and his memorable quote was "I play my game as if it was my last" drove me all the way in all aspects of life. Not just basketball, but it could be anything. When I do something, I try to do it as if it was last time doing it.

SOoooo... back to the issue. When I first got myself involved in da'wah and tarbiyyah with ISMA (Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia), I felt that playing basketball is doing me no good. I stopped for a while. It's all dunya stuff. It's not taking me anywhere and I stopped trying to be better at it. But after going through from one halaqah (sort of sitting down in a circle with some Quran recitation and Islamic knowledge discussion) to another and from one reading to another. I found out that working on your game was never wrong. Islam never prohibits someone to improve their game. In fact, it is a sunnah from our Prophet Muhammad SAW.

"It's a sunnah? FOR REAL?!"

Bingo. Yes it is! Working on your game is a Sunnah. Why won't it be a Sunnah if playing sports alone is Sunnah. Just want to bring you guys back into Prophet Muhammad's lifetime. He played sports, sports which are famous during his time. And we are all aware that he recommends three sports as narrated in this hadith by Bukhari and Muslim, "Teach your children riding a horse, swimming and archery." Well, Prophet Muhammad was the best of athlete during his time. Be it in archery, horse riding or even swimming. Prophet Muhammad is at the top of his game. In one the hadith that I want to highlight here is that Prophet Muhammad once said,