Understanding The Prophet's Life
From Issue: 862 [Read full issue]
Closed Doors
When we miss a plane, lose a job, or find ourselves unable to marry the person we want, have we ever stopped to consider the possibility that it may have been for our own good? Yet it is so difficult to look beyond the surface of things. It takes great strength to see beyond the illusions, to a deeper truth—which we may or may not understand.
As a result, we end up staring indefinitely at the closed doors of our lives, and forget to notice the ones that have opened. When we can’t marry the person we had in mind, our inability to look beyond may even blind sight us from someone who is in fact better for us. When we don’t get hired, or we lose something dear to us, it’s hard to take a step back and notice the bigger picture. Often Allah takes things away from us, only to replace them with something greater.
Even tragedy may happen in this way. One can imagine few calamities more painful than the loss of a child. And yet, even this loss could happen to save us and give us something greater. The Prophet said:
If the child of a servant (of Allah) dies, Allah says to His Angels: ‘Have you taken the child of My servant?’
The Angels reply: ‘Yes.’
Allah says to them: ‘Have you taken the fruit of his heart?’
They reply: ‘Yes.’
Then Allah says to them: ‘What did my servant say?’
The Angels reply: ‘He praised Allah and said: ‘To Allah do we return.’
Allah tells them: ‘Build a home for my servant in Paradise and call it Baytul Hamd (the House of Praise).’[Tirmidhi]
When Allah takes something as beloved from us as a child, it may be that He has taken it in order to give us something greater. It may be because of that loss, that we are admitted into paradise—an eternal life with our child. And unlike our life here, it is an everlasting life where our child will have no pain, fear, or sickness.
But in this life, even our own sicknesses may not be what they seem. Through them Allah may be in fact purifying us of our sins. When the Prophet was suffering from a high fever, he said: “No Muslim is afflicted with any harm, even if it were the prick of a thorn, but that Allah expiates his sins because of that, as a tree sheds its leaves.” [Bukhari]
In another hadith the Prophet explains that this applies even to sadness and worry. He says: “Whenever a Muslim is afflicted with a hardship, sickness, sadness, worry, harm, or depression—even a thorn’s prick, Allah expiates his sins because of it.”[Bukhari]
Compiled From:
"Reclaim Your Heart" - Yasmin Mogahed