You know, when we read the books of Islamic history, they all focus on the righteous, committed and heroic Muslims…and I think that gives us a bit of a distorted view. I am pretty sure that we are not the first generation of Muslims who are lazy and materialistic.
I mean, I get it. Our history books are intending to inspire us to be better by highlighting the stories of the best people this Ummah produced….but it also may tend to skew our view of ourselves. Sure, we have to try to improve, to be more pious, try harder, etc, etc…But I guarantee you that millions upon millions of Muslims have been totally unmotivated slackers throughout history.
In other words, I don’t think that our Ummah has declined nearly as much as we like to say it has. We may not be as spectacular as the best of us were, but most of us have never been the spectacular ones. Everybody is just struggling, and we always have been