It’s On Us
“Do not bring your excuses this day!”
So we were doing tafseer of Surat Qaf last night, ayah 27.
“His companion will say ‘Our Rabb! I did not mislead him. He himself has gone far astray.’”
We were discussing the concept of sinning; what leads us to do it, and whether or not people are correct when they say “Shaytaan made me do it.” ‘Companion’ here is the arabic word qareenuhoo. This companion is not a friend or an angel. This companion is the shaytaan companion that every human has with them, the workers of the big Shaytaan (note the capital S). These shaytaan are the ones that whisper to us to try to convince us to sin, and tempts us to do things that we shouldn’t. Everyone has a qareenuhoo that is evil except Muhammad[saw] - he converted his to Islam. In reference to another ayah, but still pertaining to this, Ibn Masood[r] explained why Shaytaan is referred to as the ‘retreating whisperer’ in the Quran. The method that shaytaans use to get us to sin is to plant the seed of desire to do the sin, then he goes away from us once we consciously make the decision to do it. Therefore, it is actually us, ourselves who are doing the sins; shaytaans do not ‘control’ anyone.This ayah, then, is drawing us the picture of what will happen on Yawm al-Qiyamah. We’ll have our books, and we’ll be shown all the deeds that we’ve done. When we’re asked about our bad deeds we’ll try to pit the blame on our qareenuhoos, our shaytaan companions. Subhan Allah, we even try to do that today, and we’re not even being judged yet…imagine how desperately we’ll be passing off the blame on that day. Our shaytaan is then gonna say the ayah above, telling Allah ‘I didn’t make them do anything, I only suggested it.’Pretty intense stuff, huh? Nowhere to hide, no one else to blame.An ayah that shows the idea of us controlling our actions beyond any temptation is in a surah we all know [hopefully]. In Surat An-Nas, Allah[swt] says in ayah number 5
“[Say ‘I seek Refuge in Allah from the one]who whispers into the chests of Mankind,”
In this ayah, Allah[swt] doesn’t say quloob, or ‘hearts.’ He says sudoor, a word in arabic which literally means ‘chests.’ Ustaadh Ehab Sha’er mentioned that it’s interesting that Allah[swt] says chests instead of hearts, because this shows us that Shaytaan does not have direct control of our hearts, enough to force us to do an action. Rather, he only can surround it and whisper evil things to it, at best.
Subhan Allah man, the Quran is so cool.
The practical lesson that I learned is that no matter how tempting the desire of Shaytaan may seem to us, we control our own actions, so it’s time to take control of my life and stop this stupid sinning, insha Allah.
NEXT POST: Wouldn’t it be sweet to have the characteristics of someone that Allah[swt] calls his ‘abd (worshipper)? How cool would that be, for Allah[swt] to refer to you as someone he LOVES? Check out the next post to find out what we need to do to get there.
Baraaku Allah Feek,M’a Salaam
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