I was writing the book on nature connection when I felt called to write this book, “Qur’anic Wisdom for the 21st Century.” It collates some of my reflections on the Qur’an and state of the world in the past two decades. With the current state of the world, it is imperative that we, the ordinary people, resist against the corruption and injustices that is being perpetuated. I hope that this book will help inspire others to not only reflect on the Qur’an but act accordingly.
I will be taking a break from writing in the blog next week as part of my rewilding week up in Glen Affric. I wrote about my experience last year in this post here.
Snippet from Surah Al-Mulk
Say: “[God is] He who has brought you [all] into being, and has endowed you with hearing, and sight, and hearts: [yet] how seldom are you grateful!” Say: “It is He who has multiplied you on earth; and it is unto Him that you shall be gathered [on resurrection].” But they [only] ask, “When is this promise to be fulfilled? [Answer this, O you who believe in it,] if you are men of truth!” Say thou, [O Prophet:] “Knowledge thereof rests with God alone; and I am only a plain Warner.” Yet in the end, when they shall see that [fulfilment] close at hand, the faces of those who were bent on denying the truth will be stricken with grief; and they will be told, “This it is that you were [so derisively] calling for!” Say [O Prophet]: “What do you think? Whether God destroys me and those who follow me, or graces us with His mercy – is there anyone that could protect [you] deniers of the truth from grievous suffering [in the life to come]?” Say: “He is the Most Gracious: we have attained to faith in Him, and in Him have we placed our trust; and in time you will come to know which of us was lost in manifest error.” Say [unto those who deny the truth]: “What do you think? If of a sudden all your water were to vanish underground, who [but God] could provide you with water from [new] unsullied springs?” (Surah 67:23-30)
This section deals with the dialogue with the disbelievers but it is a lesson for all of us. I am struck by the link this section has to the first section. Remember that in the first section, God said He created death and life in order to test us which among us are best in conduct. Here in verses 23 and 24, the address to the disbelievers starts off with life – that He created us, given us the faculties that we need to truly reflect and understand, and the multiplicity indicates how we lived and procreated. Then in verse 25, He alluded to death in the following words of resurrection وَإِلَيۡهِ تُحۡشَرُونَ for the reality of death is our needing to account for our deeds before God. By that time, it is too late to regret what we have done, our ingratitude, and our self-delusion.
As this pandemic spreads around the world, here in the UK, it has affected over 40 thousand families whose loved ones died of Covid-19. Amongst them are a disproportionate number of the Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities, those lower wage workers that are part of the frontline like in transport or retail and those living in deprived areas (Public Health England, 2020). Death has been made very real for those of us in these categories but so is the injustice and inequality. Part of the problem is that the capitalistic nature of our economy means that the wealthy who are mostly the shareholders of the large corporations are being rewarded with increasing shareholder values while these corporations are cutting costs and jobs are being lost, affecting the working class. So the wealth is increasingly concentrated at the top and not widely circulated within society.
If God is testing us as to who is best in conduct, can we truly say we have excelled in our conduct and actions when we are not addressing these issues of social and economic injustice and inequality? These are the same issues in which some of the earliest verses in the Qur’an addressed and subsequent verses continue to emphasised. For example, God addressed the hoarder of wealth in Surah al-Humazah. Similarly, the concept of purification of wealth through zakat and voluntary charity is basically to open up the wealth that God has given to some to be accessed by all. It is our self-delusion and our ingratitude that our wealth belongs to us because of our hard work that does not allow us to see our responsibility to ensure the rights of others on our wealth.
Another type of injustice in line with the last verse of this surah is the environmental injustice. The issue of the increasing severity of drought due to climate change is under active research and more recent studies have identified the role of climate change (Carbon Brief, 2018). The lack of water gives rise to many challenges such as food insecurity, health and sanitation issues, population displacement etc. In this pandemic when sanitation is of the utmost importance, the areas currently experiencing drought are at an even more disadvantage. The verse reminds us that the power to provide water belongs to Him and so we should be questioning ourselves as to why ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ has allowed the Earth to withhold this provision.
I see climate change and its effects as a sign of our ingratitude and spreading corruption on land, sea, and air through our excessive pursuit of material wealth, consuming portions that are not ours but those of future generations. Coupled with the socio-economic injustice, we note that the consumption of the Earth’s natural resources by a small minority elite class in order to hoard their wealth is disproportionate to the increasing number of the disadvantaged and oppressed class. We see this same scenarios again and again throughout history starting with the people of Noah a.s. and perhaps we should take heart the lament of the people who were thrown into Hell in verses 9 and 10 earlier. We should take stock as to whether we fall into the category of disbelievers by virtue of our ingratitude.
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