Chapter Humazah – Part 2

Humazah, part 2

Recap: People who keep counting their property in quantity, by definition, such people value property as a quality.  What type of qualitative benefits are these properties giving me is what we should ask? That depends on how a person defines himself.  If a person defines himself in the form of a body, he inevitably will define everything in the universe in the form of a body or material.  It means that the universe also consists of matter and I am just my body and the property is also like a body.  That is, the property will benefit my body and the material side will produce the property for me to benefit from.  That way of understanding is consistent for some people which is why they keep counting their property.  Example: This amount of wealth accumulated from this source is enough for me for a luxurious vacation property and if I have 100 years of life, this should be more than enough.  But I must invest some money in other places just in case my body may need some recovery expenses.  That is how they see the world from the outer appearance, an understanding of the world for temporary pleasure and gains only. Such people do not use their human qualities and feelings and they do not use the qualitative aspect of things because they don’t see themselves as something more than body.

These people think that the material experience and relationship with this world will suffice their needs. Their understanding of life and existence is this and they keep counting the amount of property they have by regarding people’s value according to the amount of property they have.  Sadly, they don’t look at human virtues, moralities, and qualities.  If someone becomes famous, they will value him based on his wealth of fame/not worth!

There are many examples in the Quran about the conflict between believers (followers) and non-believers (opposers).  Who is following the messengers?  In the Quran, they were mostly poor people with no property, materially lower standards of living, and have no status in the society, so how can I join them is the main problem?  If the intellectuals and leaders of the society follow the message of the Prophet, they will take his message seriously.  The man of truth follows the Prophet because he has no arrogance in his feelings.  The comparison between the qualities of human beings is presented in the Quran.  The way it is repeated in the Quran means that we must be careful about how to value people and how we see who is right/wrong, not in terms of their material status, rather human status.

We may say that Islam is followed by so many rich, famous, and influential people.  That is not a right criterion.  Rather, we need to see who is modest, does not have any arrogance, is not self-centric or selfish.  Are they following and supporting the mission of the Prophet?  This is the criterium we may use to take notice of the qualities to be influenced by for our personal development.

104: 4 “No indeed!  He will be thrown into the Crusher.”

Crusher means everything is knocked down and crushed or to grind something into small pieces, like a grinder that grinds coffee beans, for example.  They will be thrown into a state of being crushed down and humiliated.  This is mostly taken as the description of life in Hell, which must take place into another form of existence (akhira, the result of the end of everything we do here).  At the end, we will be left with what we have produced in this world, out of the material things, which kind of values, understanding and attitudes we developed; accordingly, we will be treated in another type of creation because this type of creation is just transient and temporary where everything gets old and dies in a short lifespan.  Every created being living or inanimate, are subject to death (coming to an end) in their existence or in this form of being.

Our feelings are different from what these temporary living conditions may offer and they never change.  We can learn new things and change the directions of our feelings, but the expectation of our feelings never changes i.e., we want the best ones and keep away from the worst ones.  We always seek the best form of everything that we desire, and this desire never changes.  

Our spirit is not subject to change and the qualities manifested in the universe are not subject to change.  The transient nature of the universe is continuing, but the power manifesting in this transient universe never changes and it is always the same and perfect.  Creation showing wisdom, justice, balance, and mercy is always present in the absolute sense and does not change, these qualities are always infinite.  My feelings are always infinite.  What does it mean?  They are permanent and my desire for eternal perfection doesn’t change.   In other words, the qualities manifested in the universe and in me do not change i.e., these qualities are Absolute, and my needs are permanent.  It means that I cannot direct my permanent needs to a transient being, I can only expect the Eternal Being to be the addressee of my permanent feelings.  That is why I must look at the universe and see the constant qualities manifested here (Qur’an mentions them as “Names of God”).  

 

• If I acknowledge this and turn my yearnings to this Owner of the universe, then this One who created the universe can satisfy my utmost needs. This is appropriate and fitting, i.e., the way I am created and what the universe displays.  

 

How can I expect the transient universe to satisfy my permanent needs?  We must be rational and realistic people.  If I don’t direct my needs to the Creator of the Universe (COU), whose qualities are manifesting in the universe and is the Source of Existence (SOE) of this universe, I will be left with this transient world.  If I ask the transient world to satisfy me, it will say that I cannot satisfy you.  Very true, after instantly satisfying you, it disappears and leaves you all alone into despair.  As a result, you will be crushed into pieces every moment, and you are left in complete despair.  That is the crushing that I experience here if I direct my feelings to the transient world. The consequence will continue into the new type of creation which is called “the hereafter.” Otherwise, this life on earth which is a training place will come to a nonsense end.    

• If I expect satisfaction from the universe itself, not the source of the universe, then I will be left with a crushing sequence of experiences in my life i.e.hope and pain of losing my hope at every moment. 

• But if I direct my relationship to the SOE, I will have constant, permanent, assuring, and appropriate qualities in front of me and I will say: “O the One who is the SOE of the universe, can be the only addressee and point of hope/support for my expectations so that I will not be experiencing the crushing of the transient nature of this universe.

God forbid!  We don’t want to be in the stupidity of this crushing position.  Some people are just leading themselves into the grinder where the wheat becomes powder.  If someone directs his hopes and expectations to this transient, material side of the world, his hopes will be completely crushed into the smallest pieces and he will not have any point of support and will always struggle between losing hope in pleasure and fear of the dead-end of life.  

104: 6 “A fire kindled by God.”

We need to be in between hope and fear of God’s Mercy.  I am fearful about my disconnection with the SOE of this universe, I may forget it and go against this reality and take it another way and it is possible that I may follow my egoistic expectations and become an arrogant man thinking that objects of this transient world are the source of satisfaction for me.  I am afraid of falling into this irrational situation.  The Absolute being is not the source of fear next to being the source of hope.  The Absolute being is the source of hope only.  Paradise is the result of Mercy.  Hell is not created to make me fearful, rather it is the result of human’s own choice.  Paradise is also the result of human choices but whatever we choose to be the best does not make us necessarily deserve Paradise, i.e. I may choose something good today and be happy whereas tomorrow I may choose something that makes me miserable.  However, on any mistake, I can choose to repent. I am hopeful for the Mercy of my Creator so that He will forgive my shortcomings and mistakes and give me endless and infinite happiness in the next creation.  

If I direct my hopes to an Absolute Being, will I be secure in my existence and receive the satisfaction of the expectations of my feelings?  In other words, if I keep contact with the Creator, the SOE who has Absolute qualities, I will feel secure in my being as far as His capacity is concerned i.e. I will admit that I belong to Him, and there is no room for fear here.  My fear is related to losing my connection with my Creator.

Example: My house has a connection with the electric power station.  If the connection is not cut off, my house is receiving the electricity permanently as the power station is stable and because I am connected with that main source.  Who can guarantee and claim that my connection with the power station never breaks and I keep it constantly connected?  In other words, who can guarantee that my feelings are always attached to its SOE? Who can make sure that I remember and never forget all my life experiences as provided by the Source of my existence?  Who can claim that I keep the connection with the SOE; I never get angry or disappointed, and I never think of the matter itself, rather, I always think of the aspect which points to its Creator? Example:  Whatever I am doing and dealing with, I am always remembering that this event is created by an Absolute Wise Creator. I never feel that I am interpreting the event in a self-centric way and there is no connection failure with the SOE.  Impossible to maintain such a constant connection!

The fear and hope that the Islamic literature talks about theoretically have nothing to do with what we are talking about here.  God is the source of hope and if I disconnect my wiring to the central station for some reason, it is mostly due to negligence and not denial.  For some people, if they don’t acknowledge the power source/station as constantly supplying power to the house, they don’t connect at all.  A believer says that I can get the power from the station if only I keep a constant connection with it.  The power station is symbolizing the constant source of hope, can it be a source of fear sometimes?  Does the Creator have any sign that sometimes He fails to sustain the existence of this universe and the order of the universe and sometimes He cannot sustain His wisdom and gets crazy?  No, everything is created with wisdom. For example, hurricanes are created and arranged perfectly within a perfect order.  

• The symbol of the power station/source is the SOE of this universe, God whose perfect names never fail.  That is why we look at the universe to see which kind of Creator this universe has, so we can direct our hopes and expectations to that Creator.  

God is the source of hope only.  A believer must be in a state of fear and hope constantly because I keep failing in terms of maintaining a connection with the source of existence, God. I forget it every now and then.  Who keeps a constant relationship with God?  The Prophet (peace be upon him) himself said that: “I keep asking 70 times for forgiveness because I fail with my connection to God temporarily. Even I who received the message, I myself experience the connection with the world of ghaib, i.e. I fail to maintain the connection with the source.”  These words from the Prophet (phub) show that he also faced the worldly life just like us in His connection with the Absolute Being”.  This shows that hope and fear lie on my side, not on God’s side, and is one of the most misunderstood concepts in Muslim literature.  Yes, believers must be in a state of hope and fear, however, as far as my connection between the COU is concerned, God is the source of hope only.

How about Hell?

I am the source of punishment and Hell.  The attitude (described in verse 1 of this section of the Quran as the backbiter and slanderer) which always expects hope from material things of this universe would end up in a crushing position.  How do I know this?  I experience this feeling within myself i.e., if I disconnect myself from the COU, I find myself in despair; matter is going to leave me alone and I am going into death, physical separation from this world, so there is no hope. 

To make it clear, I can easily say that:

• God is the source of hope.
• The universe is the source of despair if I direct my hopes to it seeing that it is the creator of itself.
• My failure is the source of warning.
• The representation of Satan in the Quran as being the denier, rejecter disobedient to God is the source of hopelessness.  

The word iblees means despair.  Every vocabulary that we find in Islamic literature must have a different place where it is used.  Example: Iblees is the source of complete despair.  Satan represents it in me, which is when I am disobeying my spirit i.e.,Satan disobeyed God’s command by refusing to accept the reality and regarded Adam as consisting of the body only.  Whereas the Angels regarded Adam in the form of a spirit that has been breathed into the body of Adam from the spirit of God.  “Your Lord said to the angels, ‘I will create a mortal man out of dried clay, formed from dark mud and when I have formed him fully and breathed into him of My spirit, fall down before him in prostration [ready to serve him]! So the angels prostrated – all of them together, save Iblis: he refused to be among those who prostrated themselves.” (15: 28-31)  The Angels prostrated before Adam, not to the body of Adam, but to the spiritual side of Adam, which is coming directly from God and breathed by God. That is why our expectations have a nature of permanence and eternity because my spirit which has been breathed from God cannot be satisfied with anything transient.  Even if I am given billions of years, at the end of the billion years, I still would want to exist because my expectations are eternal coming from an eternal source, God.  

• These expectations are not manifesting themselves in the form of transience but in the form of permanence.  We must understand this and use our reasoning seriously.  

If we take belief in God at a simple level, we will not understand what we are talking about and believing in.  Belief is either a matter of gaining eternity or losing it.  Whatever we do in this world, we must always see the aspect of the action that we are performing which demonstrates the qualities of God manifested in them.  That is how we are expected to educate ourselves.  Unfortunately, we are being educated with our relationship with the material side of the world such as Physics, Chemistry, Accounting, Sociology…  In Accounting, you keep counting money and numbers.  In Physics you keep counting the numbers of the sub-particles of an atom.  In Chemistry, you keep counting the combination of the electrons and protons.  In Sociology, you keep counting the relationship between human individuals.   In Philosophy, you try to understand how this universe works within itself as far as the material structure of the universe is concerned.  In secular studies, the material structure of this universe consists of countable atoms and sub-particles and they are individual components.  We must be careful not to keep counting, rather look at the qualitative side of it i.e., which kind of meaning it has as if reading a book.  Otherwise, I am wasting my time.  When I read a book, I do not count the words and the letters in it.  Rather, while looking at the words, I extract the meaning and the message that the sentences carry so that looking at the book should benefit me.

Materialist people are reading the book of the universe by counting the atoms, things, and material sides of the structure of the universe.  We spent 23-25+ years studying secular sciences to benefit from them and looking at the material side of it, rather than investigating the meaning side of it.  

Do we get any training from reading the universe, i.e., get an existential satisfactory meaning by studying the universe?  Parallel to secular sciences, religious education mostly trains us in the historical counting of the Qur’anic teaching, rather we should get trained on how to get meaning from our existence and the universe in order to satisfy our human expectations.  Unfortunately, this type of training was not the essence of the teaching of “secular religious” education. 

Comment: What is the meaning of “secular religious” education?

It means to count the grammar rules and see how many meaning a particular word has, rather than getting the message, applying it to your feelings, and connecting your spirit to the Speaker through the Quran and submitting your existence to Him, and using Him as the Source of your hope (not wishful hope, but the expectations that you have in your feelings).  If one does not end up with this kind of relationship with the revelation, the universe, Prophetic teachings, and training with the people who received the revelations and apply them in their living and get their values accordingly, then we all die as happy people here with no result, that is it.   

 

• Example: You look at a person who is praying and you say: “let me see how many prayers he is going to perform, how long does he sit, how many verses he recited in one day?”  This is just counting irrelevant numbers.  When you go to Cairo, you end up with learning numbers such as how many prostrations are you going to do in one prayer?  They are necessary but they are just the cups or shells.  Just like without the skin of the orange, the orange will die soon.  The skin of the orange is not to be eaten but is needed to preserve the juice. It is the inside of the orange, the juice that we enjoy.  What the cup contains is the juice that your spirit needs?!  This necessitates connection with the SOE by using the prayer in the right form, but the purpose is to keep a constant relationship with your Creator and communicate with Him.  This communication needs training and is not taught in religious education; it is a personal choice.

 

Comment:  One can also look at what these numbers mean?  That is, you can extract the quality from the quantity.

A person’s choice and getting the meaning as a result of one’s own effort is not the point here. An education system (regardless of religious or secular) does not teach you how to utilize yourself for your purpose of existence.  It is not that they cannot teach you this, rather they don’t aim to teach you this.  They say that your belief is personal to you.  I say: How am I going to utilize this?  They do not teach you this.  Does a science class ever teach you how to connect with the Source of this wonderful act of creation?  They don’t mention this, and it is taboo to talk about creation, let alone the Creator.  God forbid!  If you use “God” in the science education system (regardless of anywhere in the world), you would be fired from the job.  That is what secular education is all about.  If one has experienced the religious and secular education system at the same time, one can say that the secular system focuses only on the material structure of the universe, whereas the religious education system, don’t teach you the meaning of the Quran as it should be taught.  They only teach you the literature quality (mushaf or book as it is), historical quality and information side of the things that you read about.  Have you seen anyone taking secular religious education telling you on how to connect with the Source of Existence of the mushaf, the Speech of whom is manifested in the universe?  What we do in our private life, how we fill the cup is a personal choice.  Religious education is like the cup which we need to fill in.

Comment: In some religious seminaries, talking about God is also taboo because they are not trained to talk about anything external.  They give information not real knowledge.

In some prominent Muslim countries, they offer religious scholarships consisting of mainly two flavors.  The “Madrasa” that deals with the knowledge of religion and the “Tekke” that deals with the spiritual side of how to connect with God for religious knowledge.  If one studies tafseer, it deals with the grammar and the literary value of the Quran.  Only those people who say that the Quran must be read in terms of your spiritual experience of how to connect with your Creator through His teachings here have the spirit of education.  That is what we try to study in these classes, whereas the secular religious institutions study the mushaf.  If you say that I have a teacher within the education system who taught me how to communicate with my Creator and put my trust in Him, how to experience my life going to eternity rather than transience, that is excellent but this is his personal choice, not the curriculum of the education system. You were subject to the mushaf training within the education institution (not within the personal relationship which we are trying to do here), please speak up and share your experiences!

104:5 “What will explain to you what the Crusher is?

I am trying to see what is right and wrong to benefit my life.  What can the Crusher be?  

Comment: When my ego gets disappointed and when I see no hope from the transience of this universe, that is the Crusher.

The Quran will teach me, but I will ultimately experience it within my own feelings.  If I follow my egoistic side, I will find myself crushed into pieces with a feeling of hopelessness.  Have you ever thought about how can you experience this crushing thing and event?  You are losing your consolidation in your existence, and you cannot make sure that your life is secure, and your hopes are secure.  Who can tell me all this?  My consciousness!

Quran is telling me to look at myself and listen to myself.  Don’t you have your feelings, why don’t you turn to your own inner being rather than to your material being?  The material side of your being cannot do any justice to you.  Your spiritual side is your reality whereas the material side is going to the grave and rot away.

• Experiences must be realized within our own consciousness and our own realization.  

104:6 “A fire kindled by God.”

How can I have “fire” from a source of hope?  This is the wrath of Mercy.  As a result of Mercy, He is giving me this severe warning.  If you leave the relationship with Me and disconnect yourself from the power station, you will be left in complete darkness.  This creational side of the matter is “narullah” (fire of God,) which is the source of Mercy for me otherwise I will never become aware of what the reality of being disconnected from my Creator is.  Otherwise, I will not feel it. Just like the pain of darkness that forces me to search for light. Without thunder, would I know and appreciate sunny days?  The thunder in creation looks like narullah, this fire is an invitation to me: “Come and have blessings from My banquet, why do you deprive yourself of light, enjoy it and help yourself by making the connection?”  That is the invitation from narullah.  

 

• The opposite of hope is also created by God as a result of Mercy, so that I will wake up and not stay ignorant in my falsehood.

 

104:7 “which reaches above the hearts.”

This Mercy is in the form of fire whose flames reach the heart. If the heart is disconnected from its Creator, it receives the flames to warn about the disconnected state from the Creator.  If I cannot reconnect myself to the power station, I will remain in deep darkness and I will not be able to get out of it.  There will be no hope for me.  No one can show me a source of hope within the universe itself, only the Creator of the universe is the source of hope.  Everything comes and goes immediately, everything is transient.  I think that I got it but as soon as I get it, immediately, it disappears, and I do not get any satisfaction from it.  I may ignore its disappearance and think that I am getting some pleasure there.  Example: I take a bite of something delicious and swallow it – it is gone immediately.  My consciousness is constantly aware of it, I enjoyed yesterday like this, it is gone, I cannot get it back, that is within my consciousness.  I am enjoying it now and I am sure that it will go, and I will not get it back.  This is within my consciousness, unless I numb my consciousness, but it still disturbs me.  While I am eating, I keep myself distracted with activities by not thinking of this transient side of my reality and busying my schedule with another task.  Example: Today, I have this food for dinner, let me think about what I will have for tomorrow because I know that the pleasure that I experience today will go as well and leave me alone.  At every event I am hopeful, trying to overcome the despair and going into annihilation, until the moment of death.  That is, at the end comes the pangs of death and I leave everything behind, nothing is left with me, children, wife, husband, property, and the huge universe cannot give me any benefit.  I cannot schedule another task for tomorrow, it will not come forever.

That is the reality of the person who denies the real virtue of humanity and rejects his human side.  This experience is created by God and that is narullah, the Crushing, so that hopefully I will wake up and turn to God.  This feeling of despair covers up all my heart.  

The word al-qalb (heart) is different from al-fuad (plural “al-af’idah), that represents the feelings that go deep down into the reality of the heart.  Example: I may say that I have a heart for making lamb chops, I am hopeful about it and I will do that.  However, al-fuad can only be satisfied with the eternal Source of existence.  

104:8 “It will be covered down upon them.”

The fire is everywhere.  Wherever you look, the beautiful creation of the manifestation of God’s bounties is everywhere.  Example: Last year, you went to Hawaii and now from time to time you watch the videos.  It is going to go away anyways when you die. No one can escape from their reality at any moment, there is no hope for it in the universe.  

Can the most powerful military save you from getting old, aging, and dying?  No. But I am proud of being a citizen of a country that provides life insurance.  Can life insurance save your life?  It is impossible to get out of our reality!  What we experience, if we do not connect to the power station, within ourselves is narullah.  

If we contradict the expectations of our feelings, we will never get out of it, that is the warning we get from this verse.  As a result, I will be deprived of my connection with my Creator as if I have no connection with my Creator here and now.  That is the result of my choice if I am in a denial position.  I will end up with an existence with no connection to the power station and no opportunity to connect myself with the power station.  This state of being is represented in the Quran as the wrath of God, which is my own choice where I say that I am disconnected.  Did you try to connect to the power?  No. So, it is not the fault of the power station, but it is your own fault.  Symbolically, when we say “maghdoob”, we mean the people who disconnect themselves from the Creator while they have the opportunity of knowing that it exists. “Daalleen” are people who never think about connecting themselves to the Creator.  At the end of the day, whose fault is it?  It is my fault.  Please connect your being to its Source of Existence for it is free and you don’t need to struggle to make the connection.  Why do you deprive yourself from the source of pleasure then?  

104:9 “In towering columns.”

No way to get out of this situation.  Everywhere the flames are coming, i.e., from every aspect of my life, the human expectations will never leave me alone.  The more I have, the more I expect satisfaction from them and the more it will be difficult for me to leave the transient things.

Example: if I lose my wallet and there is only one dollar in it, how much pain do I feel?  No pain at all because it is not worth having sleepless nights over it.  However, if you have a card worth one million dollars credit limit, then you will go back and forth to the place to find it.  You will have nightmares and make calls to the police to help you and you will think how stupid you were to be so negligent.  That is the feeling that a person experiences on being crushed, or that is the feeling that the people in Hell will constantly experience with no way out and everywhere the flames are covering up.  In our example, you call the police to help but there is no hope, and you go to the place where you left it, another flame.  Now, the flame covers you up totally and you start sweating more.

Finally, there is no hope for human satisfaction in this world, you are not going to live here forever.  Why don’t you turn your hopes and fears to the One who knows everything at every moment and who is Powerful to find your wallet on the spot and give it back to you?  

• “O my Creator, the source of my endless limitless hope, you gave me the universe and I cannot get to the end.  My feelings are endless, and I am using it by attaching to You.  You are the never-ending power station for me, the power station with no end, possessing infinite absolute power.”  

That forms the covering of the heart from all aspects (right, left, front, back, down up).  There is nowhere to go for a person who does not connect himself to the source of this spirit.  May God protect us from falling into such situation!

Tags: Accept, Al-Humazah, Confirm, Death, Eternal Life, Hell, Humazah Series, Meaning of Existence, Paradise, Reality, Truth