Allah to Whom be ascribed all perfection and majesty knows his self, his name and everything he has got

No king would allow anyone from his pasture to be named after him although he is human, he eats, drinks, and sleeps as we do. He has a body, he gets thirsty, hungry, mad, sick and he dies.

There is no difference between him and any of his followers; nevertheless, his pride and dignity refuse to let anyone to be named after him. But, Allah, the Great and Almighty called us, after we had known Him and obeyed his order, “believers”, (mu’mineen). It is the plural form of the word “believer”, (mu’min), that is by Allah’s saying:

He is Allah, than Whom there is no other god, the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One, Peace, the Keeper of Faith, the Guardian, the Majestic, the Compeller, the Superb. Glorified be Allah from all that they ascribe as partner (unto Him). (Al-Hashr 59:23)

But this name needs a moment of thinking, Allah (the Great and Almighty) is a believer, believer in what? We believe in Allah, his messenger, the Day of Judgment, but what does Allah (the Great and Almighty) believe in?

Provider of Safety

It was said “believer” (al-mu’min) is an agentive derived from the verb “to become safe”. The verb “to become safe” has two meanings; the first one is ‘believing’.

When the imam reads Surat Al-Fatihah (the 1^st chapter of the Qur’an) and when he finishes, all the people in the mosque say “Amen” (Ameen), which means God, we believe what this imam said and we are with him, so the verb “to become safe” (amina) means believe on the one hand, and there is a verse which emphasizes this, Allah (the Great and Almighty) said:

They said: “O our father! We went racing with one another, and left Yusuf (Joseph) by our belongings and a wolf devoured him, but you will never believe us even when we speak the truth”. (Yusuf 12:17)

On the other hand it means ‘being safe’, Allah the Great and Almighty said:

(He) Who has fed them against hunger, and has made them safe from fear. (Quraish 106:4)

Allah’s name “the believer” (Al-Mu’min) is taken from believing or being safe! How do you understand this name with the first meaning?

The truth is that man may or may not understand his self. If he didn’t know his self and got involved in something beyond his level, he would have a great loss. We would say: ”If you had known what you have had, you wouldn’t have got involved”. He who does something beyond his level doesn’t know the essence of what he has or what his capabilities are. That person doesn’t know his self.

On the other side there is another who knows his self quite well, all his deeds are compatible with what he has. That example clarified some facts to you, the first meaning of “the believer” that Allah to Whom be ascribed all perfection and majesty knows his self, his name and everything he has got, that is the first meaning.

Believing

The second meaning: Allah the Great and Almighty believes His messengers. He sent Muhammad (peace be upon him) as a messenger, He believed him; that is He made people believe him through a miracle.

He sent Moses as a prophet and believed him; that is He made people believe him through a miracle. He sent Jesus as a messenger and gave him a miracle to make people believe him, so the second meaning is “believing”.

This means that Allah keeps His promises by His deeds, keeping Allah’s promises is a confirmation of His promises. He promised you the good life. If you have the good life, it means that He kept His promise. Keeping the promise is evidence to the truthfulness of His prophets.

That is He gives them the proofs that make people believe them. He gives the believers proofs. Dear brother, you read the Qur’an, what makes you cling to it and be attached to it? Because all the events you are living are confirmation of this Qur’an. If you buy and sell honestly, you will have great comfort and Allah will provide you with good income and draw people to you. If you are honest, Allah will lift your name among people.

So if you apply what you are asked to do, all the events come to confirm this promise or show you that this promise is true. It is one of the meanings of “the believer” that is; making His prophets as believers supported by miracles makes His Qur’an believable, that is if you believe in it and make good deeds, you will be granted a good life. What made you believe His words; this good life or the wretched life?

If you are rightly guided by Allah the Great and Almighty in all your aspects of life, you will see that all the events confirm what came in the Glorious Qur’an.

Therefore, Allah the Great and Almighty is a “believer”, that is He made his servants as believers, since all Allah’s deeds are confirmation of His promises and threats, Allah To Whom all be ascribed all perfection and majesty said:

Truly, Allah defends those who believe. Verily, Allah likes not any treacherous ingrate to Allah (those who disobey Allah but obey Satan). (Al-Hajj 22:38)

You must have felt in many incidents where Allah inspires someone you don’t know to defend you, when Allah (the Great and Almighty) says:

He (Allah) said: “Get you down (from Paradise to the earth, both of you, together, some of you are enemies to some others. Then if there comes to you guidance from Me then whoever follows My guidance he shall neither go astray, nor shall be distressed. (Ta-Ha 20:123)

You feel you are rightly guided, and have right vision, clear insight and your interpretation of events is right because you followed Allah’s order. Eventually, the events came as confirmation to what Allah said.

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Source: nabulsi.com

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By walking on the straight of God you will receive dignity in this world as well as in the Hereafter.

Brothers in Islam! I have frequently emphasized that ‘Islam‘ means total surrender to Allah and the Messenger, and that no one can become truly Muslim unless he gives up obedience to anyone or anything apart from God.

But why is so much stress laid on obedience to God and His Messenger? You may ask: Does God need our obedience so badly that He has to demand it so insistently from us? Is He, too, like the rulers of the world so power-hungry that He has to insist His rule cannot be sustained without subjugating us?

Let us try to examine these questions.

Our Well-being

Essentially, the demand for obedience to Allah is intended for the well-being and betterment of man himself. He is not like the rulers of the world. They subjugate people to benefit themselves, but Allah needs nothing from anybody.

He is not in need of taxes from you, nor does He require to build mansions, buy cars and amass luxury articles at your expense. He is not dependent on anyone for anything. Whatever is in the world belongs to Him alone and He alone is the Master of all treasures.

He demands obedience from you only because He does not want man – that creation of His whom He has declared to be the noblest – to be the servant of another man like him, or of Satan or bow his head before unworthy things.

He does not desire that His vicegerents on earth grope in the darkness of ignorance and, like animals, become slaves to their desires and thus degrade themselves to the level of the lowest of the low. Therefore He urges: You obey Me and walk by the light I have sent through My Messengers. You will find the straight path. By walking on it you will receive dignity in this world as well as in the Hereafter.

No coercion is there in religion. Distinct has become the right way from [the way of] error. So whosoever rejects false gods and believes in God has indeed taken hold of the most firm handle which shall never break. God is All-hearing, All-knowing. God is the Friend of those who have faith; He brings them out of darkness into the light. And the disbelievers their friends are false gods that bring them out of the light into darkness; those are the inhabitants of the Fire, therein to abide forever. (Al-Baqarah 2:256, 257)

Obeying Others Besides Allah

Why will a man plunge into darkness by obeying others besides Allah and why is it that only by obeying Allah can his life be illumined?

Let us look into this important question…

Our lives are made up of countless relations and transactions. Our first relationship is with our own bodies: these hands, these feet, these eyes, these ears, this tongue, this heart, the mind, this belly – all these have been entrusted to you by Allah to serve you. You have also been given freedom to decide to what end to employ them.

What to put in your bellies, and what to avoid. What to make your hands do, and what to keep them away from.

Where to let your feet walk, and when to hold back. What to let your eyes see and ears hear, and what to refrain from.

What to allow your tongues to say, and when to fall silent. What kind of thoughts to make your hearts and minds reflect upon, and what to shun. These servants of yours you can make do good work or bad, as you choose. In return, they can make you ascend great heights or plunge you into abysmal depths.

Then you have relationships with the members of your family; with your fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, wives, children and other relatives with whom you have to deal continuously.

You have to decide how to behave with these people, what rights you have over them, and what rights they have over you. Your comfort, your happiness and your success in this world as well as in the Hereafter depend very much on how correctly you behave with them. If you behave wrongly, you will make this world a Hell for yourselves. And in the Hereafter, too, you will have to answer to God.

You have relationships with many other people. They are your neighbours, friends and enemies. There are also many who work for you in various ways. To some you have to give something and from others you have to receive something.

Some entrust you with their works while you entrust Your works to others. You are in command over some people and others are in command over you. In this world, your happiness, your honour and your good names all depend entirely on your ability to maintain these relationships properly.

In the Hereafter, too, you can acquire places of honor near God only by scrupulously avoiding abusing the rights of others and doing them injustices. There, let no one charge you with having ruined his life or having illegally harmed his honour, life or property.

You therefore have to maintain these relationships in a proper manner; actions which may spoil or disrupt these relations should be avoided.

If you try to find this knowledge with the help of your reason and feelings alone, you will not find it.

Following One’s Desires

Now consider: in order to maintain proper relationships with your own bodies, with the members of your families and with all other people, you need the light of knowledge at every step.

You have to know what is right and what is wrong; what is true and what is false; what is just and what is unjust; what rights you have over others and what rights others have over you; in what there is real benefit and in what lies real harm.

If you try to find this knowledge with the help of your reason and feelings alone, you will not find it. Because yourself is overpowered by the urge to immediate gratification of desires. Your reason and feelings are therefore ruled by physical pleasure and immediate temptations.

They will tempt you to earn money by doing illegal things, drink alcohol and commit adultery. They will lead you to usurp the rights of others and withhold things due to them on the grounds that such behaviour will profit you: take everything and give nothing. They will also make you exploit others to serve your ends while avoiding the doing of any service to anybody, arguing that this will make life easy and comfortable.

If you allow yourselves to be led by a self which gropes in such darkness, it will drag you down to the level of selfish, depraved, and corrupt persons and your lives both on earth and in the Hereafter will be ruined.

Alternatively, instead of following the self, you may rely on other human beings like yourselves, and place yourselves in their hands to take you in whichever direction they like.

The dangers in such a course are obvious: selfish persons may make you slaves of their own desires, and ignorant men, who have themselves gone astray, may mislead you also. Tyrants may use you to perpetrate oppression and injustice on others.

From human beings like yourselves, too, you cannot get that light of knowledge which can guide you to distinguish between right and wrong, between good and bad, and direct you on the right path.

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The article is an excerpt from the author’s book Let Us Be Muslims.

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