Friday Nasiha

Living The Quran

Lord's Provision
Saba (Sheba) Chapter 34: Verse 39 (partial)

"Say: Verily, my Lord grants provision abundantly to whomsoever He pleases and straitens it for whomsoever He pleases."

The extent of livelihood that a person receives depends entirely upon God's will. However, this does not necessarily indicate that those with whom He is pleased receive a greater portion of it whereas those with whom He is displeased receive less. As part of God's dispensation, those who believe in God as well as those who do not believe in Him receive their livelihood. A person's affluence, therefore, does not indicate his proximity with God. By the same token, a person's stringent circumstances do not necessarily indicate God's displeasure with him. It is common knowledge that wrongdoers and dishonest people often amass heaps of wealth even though God disapproves of their wrong-doing and dishonesty.

Those who consider attainment of material possession and benefit to be the criterion of a person's goodness have completely missed the point. What really matters is the attainment of God's pleasure and the way to attain it is to cultivate those good moral qualities that please Him. If one has these qualities and, in addition to this, enjoys an abundance of worldly bounties, this certainly signifies God's favour upon him. Anyone who is so blessed should thank Him.

Compiled From:
"Towards Understanding the Quran" - Sayyid Abul Ala Mawdudi, Vol. 9, pp. 195, 196

Understanding The Prophet's Life

Reliance on God

The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, was neither fatalistic nor reckless. His trust in God was absolute, but that had never caused him to drift with the tide of events. Revelation had reminded him that he must never forget to say "insha Allah" (if God so wills) when he planned to act, and that the memory of God must be associated with humility (especially in regard to his own powers as a human being). Still, this by no means implied that he should forget to show responsibility and foresight in his choices in the world of human beings. Thus, Muhammad had been planning an emigration to Medina (hijrah) for almost two years, and nothing had been left to chance. Only after making intelligent and thorough use of his human powers had he trusted himself to the divine will, thereby clarifying for us the meaning of at-tawakul ala Allah (reliance on God, trusting oneself to God): responsibly exercising all the qualities (intellectual, spiritual, psychological, sentimental, etc.) each one of us has been granted and humbly remembering that beyond what is humanly possible, God alone makes things happen. Indeed, this teaching is the exact opposite of the temptation of fatalism: God will act only after humans have, at their own level, sought out and exhausted all the potentialities of action.

Abu Bakr had enlisted the services of a non-Muslim Bedouin, Abdullah ibn Urayqat, to guide them to Medina by an inconspicuous, unfamiliar route. The Prophet and his Companion had entrusted themselves to God, yet they had not hesitated to enlist the help of a Bedouin who, although he shared their enemies' polytheistic beliefs, was well known to them for his trustworthiness. Such an attitude is present throughout the Prophet's life: the women and men he surrounded himself with might not share his faith, but they were known to him for their moral qualities and/or their human abilities. Muhammad, like those who came after him, would not hesitate to rely on them.

Compiled From:
"In The Footsteps of The Prophet" - Tariq Ramadan, pp. 81-83

Cool Concepts

Kinds of Remembrance

There are two general kinds of remembrance. One of them is to mention the names of the Lord and His attributes, praising Him by them, exalting Him and sanctifying Him above all that is not meet with Him. This type is of two kinds. One sort is for the invoker to recite the praises of God by His names and attributes, as mentioned in the hadith, [with phrases] like 'Glory to God', 'Praise to God', etc. The second kind of [remembrance for praise] is to speak about the Lord by uttering what His names and attributes designate. An example of this would be to say: 'He has power over all things, and when His servant repents, He is more pleased with that repentance than a man who has lost his mount in the desert and then finds it.'

The second general type of remembrance is the remembrance of God's commandments, prohibitions and laws. And this, too, is of two kinds. One kind consists in mentioning the fact that God has commanded this or prohibited that, loves this or is angered by that and is content with this or that. The other kind is to remember that something is commanded and then to hasten to it; or to remember that something is prohibited and to abstain from it.

When these kinds of remembrance combine, the invoker's remembrance is most meritorious and offers the highest and greatest benefit.

Compiled From:
"The Invocation of God" - Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, pp. 117-119