We worship something, one way or another

 As a Muslim, I try my best to put God my number one priority of worship. But frankly, I never find this easy. It is a constant struggle. The rivers of life have strong currents, and I often get drowned or washed away to places where I’m not supposed to be.

A Muslim’s basic belief is that there is nothing worthy of worship but God. Every Muslim knows this. But many, like myself, struggle to implement this consistently with no compromise in their actions. 

Idolatry, the worship of anything other than God,  is prohibited in Islam. It is usually understood as direct worship, in the traditional sense, when a person prays or conducts religious rituals for pleasing a deity. However, worshiping other than God has many different levels and forms. In a general sense, it can mean prioritizing anything other than God.

We put things ahead of God all of the time. We put work ahead of God. We put people ahead of God. We put fame ahead of God. We put wealth ahead of God. We even put play ahead of God. The most subtle, but equally dangerous is putting our ego and desires ahead of God. We put in so much dedication to those things as if we worship them.

In the end, we are all worshipers of something, at many different levels. We decide what we choose to worship, and is something that we need to think deeply about. We need to be critical of ourselves. Forget about judging others, as everyone is struggling with different issues. Life is short, and we are responsible to to make sense of it as best as we can. What is our purpose? What is our end game? We need to strive and put in the effort to answer these difficult questions. And we should do so before our time runs out.

God knows best.

Reflection of An Nisa verse 116

#quran #worship #idolatry #struggle #islam

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Divine punishment

We are sometimes mistaken about how Divine Punishment needs to be understood in the Islamic tradition. Condemning other people without understanding the whole picture, or seeing the Islamic creed as harsh and unforgiving, while the truth is far from it.

According to the Islamic tradition, people who will receive Divine punishment are those who fully understand the truth but choose to reject it because of his/her love for other things. If a person is given a wrong version of the truth, resulting in a wrong understanding of it, or does not have the ability to comprehend what the truth is (people who are mentally challenged or those who have not yet developed their intellectual and mental faculties), their fate is with God, and God is just.

At the time of the Prophet Muhammad PBUH, many of his opponents understood that his message was the truth but chose to reject it due to their egos and worldly interests. This is a recurring theme in the Quran. People who know the truth but choose to reject it.

Anyway, the truth of the matter is, we should not focus on other people’s divine decree. We should not be quick to condemn other people to be in hellfire, as in reality, it is God’s secret alone. We don’t know what will happen to anyone, including ourselves. 

What we should focus on is being the best versions of ourselves and having hope (and good estimation) that God has mercy on us when it really matters. 

God knows best.

Reflections from surah An Nisa verse 115

#islam #divinepunishment #mercy #intellect #selfawareness #truth

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Useless negotiations

When people commune, interaction is inevitable. Even the introvert inside of me recognizes the value and importance of interacting with other people in society. 

One such interaction that is quite common in society is negotiations with its many forms, which are usually carried out in a closed setting with limited attendees. The more advanced societies are, the more diversified the interests of everyone involved are, depending on the scale of the negotiation, negotiations become more complex, as each party will have different agendas and expectations from the outcomes of the negotiation. And the more complex negotiations are, the more effort, time, and energy will be needed to agree on something. 

There are many difficulties in reaching a consensus in negotiations, but the biggest hurdle is the ego and individual interests. Perhaps it is in our egotistical nature to plot for getting the best out of negotiations based on our personal interests, even though we know that there is a greater good. 

Anyway, when we talk about negotiations and secret talks, according to the Islamic tradition, all of those long hours and energy wasted can be useless, having no benefit whatsoever (from a spiritual perspective, which will be the default from hereon), if they are missing certain criteria and have mistaken orientation/purpose.

Every secret talk or negotiation, in order to be beneficial (in the spiritual sense, which is the only thing that really matters), needs to be for the purpose of establishing justice, enjoining charity, enjoining what is good, preventing evil, or establishing peace. Negotiations for anything other than those purposes, whether for money, power, or influence, among other things, will render negotiations useless.

So whenever we find ourselves being involved in negotiations in society, we need to ask ourselves whether the negotiation corresponds to one or more of the purposes mentioned. If it’s not for establishing justice, enjoining charity, enjoining goodness, preventing evil, or establishing peace, we should refrain from any sort of participation, as it will just be useless talk. 

On the other hand, whenever other people are indulged in useless negotiations, even when their purpose is to harm us, we need to understand that in reality, their plots have no benefit in the spiritual sense. Their plots have no weight whatsoever with God, and whatever effect that the results of such negotiations have, no one will truly benefit from them. 

God knows best.

Reflections from Surah An Nisa verse 114

#negotiations, #secret talks, #plots, #islam, #quran, #reflection, #society, #life 

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