When you are trying to understand an āyah and you know that there is a treasure trove right at your finger tips, yet you cannot seem to access it. When you are frustrated, you are upset, you have done all that you can, yet you end up at a closed gate–a figurative one, but one that keeps you from getting to that treasure. That block that you experience is the darkness of the heart that prevents you from understanding the āyāt…
For some weeks, I’ve been working with a classical book of tafsīr. I’ve been reading and re-reading and then repeating the process over and over again in order to understand and hopefully internalise the scholar’s words. It wasn’t until I reached a segment where he had listed some aḥādīth of Rasūl Allāh ﷺ that I found my self subconsciously evaluating myself. I found myself thinking, reflecting and then resolving. …
Our faith in Allāh dictates that we believe in His planning—from the major events to the minor details, we believe that they come to be as a result of a Divine decree and not by mere coincidence. As our īmān builds, we learn to switch our focus from the big events and the small details to the One behind these big events and small details. When a person makes us smile, we learn that they were only a means and…
In the Qurʾān we often see parallels between the sending down of rain and the sending down of waḥī (Divine Revelation). This parallel between the concrete and the abstract is common in the Qurʾān. It helps us visualise the effect of what we cannot see directly. Imagine rain water. What happens when rain falls? It washes the surface of the ground; it removes the dirt; then it given life to a barren land. When the words and the meanings of…
If you are memorising the Qurʾān, is there any sūrah that you especially love reciting? Perhaps sūrat ar-Raḥmān? That’s an ‘easy’ sūrah to recite, isn’t it? The key to what makes it especially easy is that you hear it and recite it so often that it’s well cemented in your memory. Now is there any sūrah that you find particularly difficult and that you don’t look forward to reciting? Maybe if your teacher was to test you, you would secretly…