Belief In The Unseen

Faith comes effortlessly to born Muslims unlike those who really strive hard to know the true path and follow the same against all odds in life. We tend to take things for granted that come easy to us.

This blog is going to be about life. However, I cannot separate life from religion (in fact I see religion as the whole framework of life), thus there will be often talk of religion in it.

The title of my blog is from one of the begining verses in the second chapter in Quran. The first five verses of the second chapter Sura Bakra are as follows:

In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.

2:1 A.L.M.
2:2 This is the Book; in it is guidance sure, without doubt, to those who fear Allah.
2:3 Who believe in the Unseen, are steadfast in prayer, and spend out of what We have provided for them;
2:4 And who believe in the Revelation sent to thee, and sent before thy time, and (in their hearts) have the assurance of the Hereafter.
2:5 They are on (true) guidance, from their Lord, and it is these who will prosper.

These verses so beautifully describe the whole philosophy of life. They tell us that Quran is a guide for those those who fear Allah (Muttaqun which means the people that have taqwa, which is love and fear of Allah, you do good deeds for the love of Allah and shun bad deeds out of His fear). Thus, if you don't have love and fear of Allah, you will not be able to appreciate the guidance in Quran. These verses also talk about 'Belief in the Unseen (Ghaib). This belief, or 'iman' as we call it, is the foundation stone of our being a Muslim. Iman has six components i.e. Allah (Oneness of Allah), His angels, His books, His Prophets, Qiyama and His Qadr. Then these verses describe that the people who are Muttaqun, have Iman, offer prayers and spend (on themselves and in the way of Allah)from what Allah has provided are truely 'Guided' and 'Successful (or prosperous as translated here, the Arabic word is 'falah' which also means success).

Sadly often our definition of being 'Successful' includes degrees, position, money, assets and social recognition, because we can see the worldly paramters of success. We never consider the poor 'imam' of our neighbourhood mosque to be a successful person because we cannot see what he has earned as a result of his piety and patience. This is why the 'Belief in the Unseen' is so important because it is above reasons. It enables us to see beyond what is apparent.

I named this blog 'Belief in the Unseen' because this belief is such an important guiding tool in our lives. Often we tend to believe that whatever we are earning is because of our talents, capabilities, good performance at work and good relations with the boss. There is a famous couplet in Hindi, ' Ajgar kare na chakri, panchi kare na kaam, Daas manuka keh gaye sab ke daata raam'. (A python isn't servant to anyone, nor do birds go for a job, yet God provides them all) Allama Iqbal also wrote a famous poetry in which eloquently says that Allah gives rizk even to the insect that is hiding beneath stones. But we tend to attribute our success to ourselves, the same way the success of our children on our upbringing.

This is not to say that we don't have to put efforts. In Islam you don't get anything without efforts. You have to put efforts for prayers, fasting, zakah, hajj or any other act of worship. Nothing comes without efforts. But rewarding those efforts is with Allah. We can only put efforts and we have no control over results. For example you may have prepared excellently for the exams but fell sick or had accident on the last day. We call it 'kismat' but in fact this is 'qadr' of Allah, one of the six components of 'iman'. Allah is capable of doing all the things and this is His Qadr.

When we start believing truly in the Unseen, a lot of things become easy. We will not hesitate sharing our income with the poor, because we believe that it is given to us by Allah and His creatures have a right on it. We will not be disturbed by the ups and downs of life because we know that Allah has power of all the things, thus whatever we are going through is because of the Will of Allah and we must accept it.

During my last visit in India I was travelling and we saw an accident. My driver Shankar slowed down the speed and continued at the same pace. After a while he said, 'God is smart, he doesn't take blame of anything wrong and creates an excuse. Now these people died but we will say they died because of the accident'. I replied, 'That's fine, but we do not complain to Him when good things happen to us why should we complain when something wrong happens to us. When He gives life in the form of children in our family we rejoice and never say to Him 'why you gave this to us', so why should we complain when he takes a life away?'

So this is the overall thought behind the title 'Belief in the Unseen'. May Allah strengthen our Iman and guide us all.