Ethical Lesson from the Quran, part 12

Ethical Lesson, part 12

دۡعُ إِلَىٰ سَبِيلِ رَبِّكَ بِٱلۡحِكۡمَةِ وَٱلۡمَوۡعِظَةِ ٱلۡحَسَنَةِۖ وَجَٰدِلۡهُم بِٱلَّتِي هِيَ أَحۡسَنُۚ إِنَّ رَبَّكَ هُوَ أَعۡلَمُ بِمَن ضَلَّ عَن سَبِيلِهِۦ وَهُوَ أَعۡلَمُ بِٱلۡمُهۡتَدِينَ

16:125 “Call people to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good teaching.  Argue with them in the most courteous way, for your Lord knows best who has strayed from His way and who is rightly guided.”

The general meaning of the verse can be extracted from the translation.  There are several sections covered in this verse that we will study one by one.  The first section is to call people to the way of your Lord.

1. What is “the way of your Lord”?

The word “sabeel” is used here for “the way of your Lord”, but there are also other words used in the Quran such as “tareeq“, “shari’a“, “siraat“, “minhaaj” all of which have the meaning of “way” in general. However, all of them have different nuances according to the different contexts presented in the Quran.  I must ask, why is the word “sabeel” used here?  For example, “siraat” is mostly used in general terms, where everyone is traveling on their lane parallel to other lanes, which is protected from the sides; and you are safe as long as you are on one of the lanes.  The word “tareeq” means that many feet are stepped on, as in many people went there, which is a bit challenging and not as comfortable and wide as the “siraat”.  That is why certain schools of mysticism, i.e. the Sufi schools say that our way is “tareeq”,  it is hard, which means that you must work steadily.  The word “sabeel” is to have a private way for yourself to reach God.  Here the Quran says to call people to the “sabeel” of your Lord according to their capacity. 

For example, I am calling John to the way of his Lord, specific to his character.  Similarly, I am calling Jane, specific to her capacity, characteristic and interest area.  There is a relationship between calling with wisdom and the word “sabeel”.  If the word “siraat” was used instead, then the relationship between calling someone to the way of their Lord with wisdom and “siraat” would be too general, not specifically addressing the person’s need.  The word “sabeel” means fitting to the addressee’s characteristic, questions and interest areas.  

Why is it “sabeel-e-rabbika, and not “sabeelillah”?  The name of “Allah” is the general proper name for the Creator of the universe.  The name “Rabb” is the One who takes care of you, maintains your existence and provides for your needs according to you.  We must understand under different contexts,  the word “Allah” is used generally as “the Creator of the universe”, whereas, sometimes, the word “Rabb” is used as the title or name of God who is the One who treats you specifically.

We must be careful that we are special and unique in the eye of our Lord.  For example, there are two ways of manufacturing clothes.  One is mass production, produced for everyone of all shapes and sizes, where you go to a store and get the outfits, however, it may not fit you well.  The other is tailored made that fits you perfectly.  Every human spirit is tailored made i.e.  God specifically created you.  For example, God says, “Jane, in this world you will be called Jane, but your spirit is specifically designed for you”.  Everyone is specifically created and meant to be.  Human species are not mass produced, because everyone is completely different.  Jane is different from Mary and other humankind.   Everyone is unique.  It means that we are very precious to God for having individuality and uniqueness.  The Owner of the universe meant to create me specifically as I am.  Hence, we must know that we are so precious in the eye of God.  It is as if God says that I created you from my own hand, as the verse 74:11 ذَرۡنِي وَمَنۡ خَلَقۡتُ وَحِيدٗا alludes that God alone has created us, and the translation is “And leave to Me the one I specifically created all by Myself” .  The phrase “rabbul-alameen” is  the One who takes care of the whole universe.  Your Lord means the One who created you specifically, dealing with you specifically, taking care of you according to your specific needs, only the Creator of the universe can do it, no one else.  We must understand that everything happening to me is designed specifically for me.  Therefore, I am so precious.  As a result, when I am speaking to others, I should bear in mind that this person is not like me, rather is specially tailored by God to their unique being.  So, I must deal with this person delicately and watch out for my treatment with him/her.  

When it comes to general announcements to the people, the Qur’an employs words such as “mu’minoon” (believers”),  “annaas” (human beings) addressing the public as in the Friday sermons. However, when it comes to the treatment of people, each is addressed one by one.  We must call people to their way unique to their fitting  so s/he will recognize who their Lord is.  We should not make a general statement that fits everyone as they are unique when it comes to calling people to their Lord according to their living conditions and their general cultural level.  The word “sabeel” means to call people to use their human qualities as it is given to them by their Creator, so they will use them as tools to go back to their Creator.  It means to help them connect their feelings to the Source of their existence.  We must know what the best way for a certain person is to connect their feelings to their Lord.  Therefore, whatever happens to that person such as fear, anxiety, pain and pleasure, help them understand and realize that this event is created for them specifically. Help them to try to connect themselves to their Source of existence.  

For example, when I get angry, I must realize that God created this event and feelings for me specifically.  What does it mean?  How can I utilize this creation so that I can connect my feelings to their Lord, specifically dealing with me?  (using the word “Lord” as opposed to “Creator” which would be in the general sense):  “O my Lord, you are teaching me specifically through this event how can I connect with You”.  

If I am giving someone advice, I must give it to the people based on their capacity and expectations by trying to help him/her recognize his/her Creator and connect his/her feeling to his/her Lord.  It means that He is my teacher, He is teaching me, and I am going to return my feelings to Him, not to someone who annoyed me for example, (that is worldly affairs), but to the Creator of this event.  As far as the purpose of our existence is concerned, I must communicate with my Lord: “By creating this event, what do you mean by it, my Lord?  What are You teaching me? “ The person who is trying to connect himself to the Creator, He must focus on the event to see what lesson s/he is going to get out of this specific creation that s/he finds himself in.  Everyone should be able to say that this event is for me, and our instinctual impulse will be that a certain person, for example, annoyed me and caused me the problem, which is a temporary worldly thing.  As an immediate response, without being captured by your anger, you may say something back to the person who annoyed you, but your mind and feelings must be directed towards God,  to connect yourself with God alone.  That is how we should give advice to people and especially to ourselves.  Hence, call them to the way of their Lord according to their conditions. 

2. How do we define “wisdom” and “good teaching”?

Speak wisely in a way that it makes sense to the person i.e. if you are speaking to someone who is a certain age, capacity level or profession lower than yours, then you must speak accordingly.  When you call people to God individually, you cannot make the general statement as used in the sermons.  Be vigilant with what you understand from God and what the person understands from God.  Take notice of his/her position before God, not yours, because you cannot expect the other person to be like yourself.  Just as when a teacher tries to teach something to his/her student, what does s/he do?  The teacher teaches the students according to their capacity.  Similarly, when it comes to religious advice, we must apply the same principle.  However, we are not attentive towards that, and we make general statements.  

For example, if you come across a person newly acquainted with Islam, you cannot tell them to stop working instantly at a place that is inappropriate according to Islamic principles.  How can we advise a newcomer to this Islamic practice when this person is not yet acquainted with the fundamentals of Islam yet?!  To that person, Islam is very attractive, it makes sense that everything needs to be created by a Creator, “Allah”. Usually, people who come from Christian background, at the age of 15-16 years of age, start questioning the concepts of Jesus as the son of God or the one who has some sort of divine nature. They wonder, what is this son of God or adopted son of God concept about?  All of us are the same created being, aren’t we?  So, when they hear that in Islam, everything and every human being with no exception needs to be created, and only the One who creates the universe can be our Creator, this understanding makes sense to them.  To understand the description of God, having belief in God, in Islamic teachings is very appealing and easy to understand as it makes sense, unless someone insists that matter is acting and choosing. The truth cannot be complicated, it must be simple and straightforward to the point. This is called in the Qur’an’s teaching “the Straight Path” reaching from the created world to its Creator.   Example: the cells are evolving to become a man, but if the cells do not know what is going on with its counterpart, then how can they communicate to form a perfect human being?!  Physicists understood that every single being is in direct communication with each other, and the universe cannot be separated and disentangled, impossible!  You cannot disassemble the universe as everything is perfectly connected with each other in harmony.  Nowadays, they notice that particles of stars are communicating with other particles in the stars.  The Quran says that everything relates to each other by an Absolute One, who knows everything at the same time. You cannot disassemble the universe, by taking one part and individually studying it.  For example, you cannot study the human eye without connecting it to the human heart, lungs and digestive system.  If you are studying a cell in the eye, how can the cell adapt itself to the environment?  The cell must know the heart, the lung, the stomach and liver… everything is so perfectly refined from each other such as the blood is pure, meat is soft, and nutrients go there.  For example, if your eyesight starts to deteriorate, the nutritionist advises you to eat carrots.  But how does the intestine know which vitamin needs to be deposited to the eye cells?!  How will the cells arrange to make sure that the delivery should be done perfectly in time? The materialist mentality applied here is that I do not know but my cell knows!  This is such an illogical way to interpret things in a literal sense, like when you are using a laptop, you do not say that the laptop happens to be, rather the Engineer of the laptop must have built the laptop as he consciously arranged it.  

The religion of Islam is very consistent in its main teachings.  The first foundation of Islam is that God is the only Creator who is not of the nature of this universe but is the Creator of the universe.  It is not difficult to call people to Islam by introducing the concept of God, that is appealing and attractive.  Afterwards, the problem starts.  For example, a newcomer to Islam is all excited to start practicing the rituals, and if someone warns him to roll up his trousers, then the newcomer starts questioning which kind of religion is this and what does it have to do with my trousers being rolled up?!  This is so ridiculous!  We make Islam look foolish!  How can you reduce prayers to rolling up your trousers, as if not doing it will prevent you from “sabeel”, i.e. walking on the way to your Lord.  The hadith narrations have nothing to do with the relationship between trousers and “sabeel”; the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) never wore trousers anyways.  Unfortunately, the problem of helping people with “sabeel” is from our side, not from the Quranic scholarship being abstruse. We must be able to present properly according to the person’s capacity.

Good teaching means disseminating and advising people in a sympathetic and friendly way.  When the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was disappointed at someone, he would just frown and then give him/her good advice.  That is an example of good teaching practice, which manifests peace.  Unfortunately, we love to frighten people by saying that if you do not roll up your trousers, for example, then Hell is terrible.  Tell people nicely, so they will understand things in a positive way for themselves i.e. If I do not perform my ritual prayers, then I will not be in a good position and my feelings will suffer, for example.  Can you imagine that I have no meaning in life, and I will die and disappear?  This is the most important subject to reflect upon.  We are not in this universe as accidental beings in development and rot away at the end.  What kind of pleasure do you enjoy while living and entertaining here with such a mentality of accidental beings?!

Therefore, good teaching refers to advising according to the needs of the people.  People need encouragement.  Can you tell something by threatening people?  It does not work, and it just repels the message.  Again, good teaching means reasonable, sympathetic, appealing, appreciating, and understanding others.  If a person is struggling to understand something, you should empathize with them by imagining yourself in their place and considering what kind of help you would  need and appreciate?  If you inject on people’s mind that God will punish you if you do not do something, for example, then the first image that we get is that God is a punishing and angry God.  However, God says that I have created everything out of my mercy.

3. Presenting your understanding to other people and defending your belief is encouraged.  But “in the most courteous way”.  What is the difference between “wisdom”, “good teaching”, and “courteous way”?

We must communicate with people and respond back to their questions and disagreements, but not in an argumentative way that I am going to defeat you.  A Muslim should never debate to win an argument.  As per the verse, arguing in a courteous way is encouraged in the Quran, which means not to get into debated arguments, rather engaging in a friendly educational dialogue.  Wisdom means that whatever you share with others, it must make sense intellectually.  For example, you cannot present someone a case by saying that they must just believe, like in Christianity, people say it is a matter of faith.  But where is the reason?  How can I believe in something without reason?!  If I am not to use my wisdom here, then what is the use of wisdom then?  Hence, we cannot do the same thing if we are talking in the name of Islam. The Quran encourages reasoning (“ya’qiloon”, “ulul-albaab”, “yatafaqqahoon”, “yatafakkaroon”) (all of these words have the different shades of meaning of deep, reflective thinking and reasoning with evidence.)

To offer reasonably good advice is wisdom which is one element.  Calling people according to their needs and characteristics is good teaching, a second element.  Presenting and defending your belief must be in a kind and respectful way, which is the third element.  Never tell someone that whatever they are saying is non-sense and never start attacking them verbally, let alone physically.  We must be mindful not to stereotype people, otherwise we have learned nothing from the teachings of the Quran.  If someone attacks you ideologically, then respond back in a kind way so as to gain their attention.  That is what “hiya ahsan” is, whatever is better than what the other person is doing to you.  For example, if he shakes your hand, then you reach out to give him a hug.  If he speaks to you in a peaceful face, you must use a smiley face, always aim for a better way.  Again, we must be respectful to people.  For example, John is an elderly person traveling on a crowded bus, and Jane is a young person who sees John standing and quickly offers him her seat.  As a result, John’s heart melts because he sees that he is related to the rest of creation and sees that everything is so lovely in creation.  This is what it means to carry our interactions with others in a courteous way.

Every word of the Quran supports each other and gives another perspective to the whole sentence in a sequence, step by step.

4. We do not know who deserves to be “rightly guided”, but God does.  Do not be judgmental and do not stereotype people.

The most sensible companion of the Prophet (pbuh) was Abu Dharr al- Ghifari, although the famous ones that we hear of are mostly Abu-Bakr, Ali and Umar.  The most honest one on the way to his Lord, only for the sake of God was Abu Dharr al- Ghifari.  He has an interesting background.  The tribe Ghifar was between Mecca and Damascus Area, back then, that area was called Diyar-ush-Shaam (The area of Shaam- Damascus) and comprised Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, North Jordan, West Iraq.  The trade center was in Diyar-ush-Shaam, and the road that would reach there was through the tribe of Ghifar.  The tribe of Ghifar were known to be highway robbers, and Abu Dharr al- Ghifari was one of them.  Since he was angry with the situation of the tribe with how the chieftains were handling events and exploiting people’s ignorance, he took on robbery as a profession.  One day he heard from someone that there was a man in Mecca who was opposing the idea that some people should have a superior position because of their powerful family background, rather than their virtues.  He further hears that this man is challenging the whole society alone, with a few slaves and people around him in the early Meccan period.  He is insisting that this way of life should come to an end where slavery should be abolished because everyone is equal before God, the Creator.  After hearing this, he set off to Mecca where the tradition was that if someone comes with no protection, then they would be captured and enslaved.  Therefore, when he came to Mecca, he made sure to disguise himself, so no one recognized him.  The Caliph Ali, who was a teenager at that time, realized that someone was not showing his face and so he approached him asking, who are you?  He replied, I am Abu Dharr, and I am from Ghifar.  To which, Caliph Ali replied, that the Meccan should not see you here, otherwise, you will be in trouble.  “Why did you come here?” inquired young Ali.  To which Abu Dharr replied, “I heard of someone trying to end slavery. Who is that person? I want to meet him.”  Ali replied, his name is Muhammad, and I will take you to him, however, you must follow me from behind, otherwise they will catch you.  Long story short, Abu Dharr followed Ali to where Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was having a discussion with the companions on the newly revealed verses of the Quran.  However, Abu Dharr could not identify who Muhammad is because he was indistinguishable from the rest of the companions i.e. there was no special dress code or chair that the Prophet of God (pbuh) wore.  When the Prophet (pbuh) identified himself, then Abu Dharr asked him about what he was teaching?  They had a small talk, and Abu Dharr embraced Islam, and became the most pious companion. He went from the worst bandit to the best man that the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) acknowledged his piety.  On one occasion, the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) mentioned to Dharr that no one can be as pious as you, therefore, you will die alone accompanying the prayer performed for your funeral. He died 20 years after the death of the prophet alone in the outskirts of the  city. Long after his death they found his body.That is how Islam transforms the person.  Hence, we cannot pass judgment on behalf of others, only God knows what He creates and who is rightly guided. 

For example, you may see someone as the worst bandit who steals, drinks and commits all sorts of wrongdoings, but we cannot say that he is going to Hell.  Again, only God knows who is rightly guided.  Similarly, we should have a positive opinion of John to be the most pious person , although he may be the most arrogant person to his wife, we do not know.  We should not be judgmental towards anyone;  that is what the Quran is teaching.  For example, can you say that the people of a certain nation are merciless?  No.  Most of the people living in a nation have no idea what is going on inside their government.  They only listen to the media which is manipulated by lies. People are mostly innocent, and they do not know what is going on in the political arena.  Therefore, do not stereotype people!  Do not generalize attitudes!  Everyone is a candidate to acknowledge God by taking the way of his Lord.  Since they are created by the Most Wise Creator, He must have created them with a purpose and respect the person for the sake of His Creator’s Wisdom. Treat everyone as the most perfect person, peacefully and nicely!  May we follow this advice!!  Ameen, a thousand times!!!