The holy Qur’an is a book of Hikmah as well as the book of Furqan. In addition to the do’s and don’ts that Allah commands you to observe, it also contains stories of previous people or nations. But these stories are not there simply as bedtime stories to put your children to sleep even though you are recommended to read it to your children in bed. Allah narrates those stories to prophet Muhammad PBUH as ibrah or lesson from which we can learn.
The first story narrated was in verses 30 to 34 of al Baqarah about the creation of mankind. But I want to focus particularly on verse 34, when Allah Azza wa jalla said,
وَإِذْ قُلْنَا لِلْمَلَـئِكَةِ اسْجُدُواْ لاًّدَمَ فَسَجَدُواْ إِلاَّ إِبْلِيسَ أَبَى وَاسْتَكْبَرَ وَكَانَ مِنَ الْكَـفِرِينَ
34. And (remember) when We said to the angels: "Prostrate yourselves before Adam.'' And they prostrated except Iblis (Shaytan), he refused and was proud and was one of the disbelievers (disobedient to Allah).
We are very familiar to this story. We learned that in previous verses Allah inform the Angel His intention:
وَإِذْ قَالَ رَبُّكَ لِلْمَلَـئِكَةِ إِنِّي جَاعِلٌ فِى الأَرْضِ خَلِيفَةً
30. And (remember) when your Lord said to the angels: "Verily, I am going to place (mankind) generations after generations on earth.''
The Angels question Allah's intention (Which is a lesson for those who are easily offended when being critised). Allah then taught Adam the names of everything and asked the Angels if they can name them. When the Angel reply in negative, Allah asked Adam to name them, which he did. That's how Allah made His point to the Angel that He knew better with His plan. Allah then commanded the angels to make prostration to Adam as a sign of respect. All of the angels followed that commandas verse 34 above suggested, except Iblis.
What is the lesson we learn from this narration?
The angels’ attitude in responding to Allah command is very clear. They did it straight away without questioning. Even though they had a doubt about this new creation before (remember they questioned Allah's intention), even though they were well aware of the degree of the iman and ibadah which is second to none, they had no hesitation whatsoever to obey the command, because it came from the Almighty.
Iblis on the other hand ‘abaa was takbara’ he refused to obey and he was proud of himself. Even though he knew that this was the command from Allah, before following it he tried to make sense of the command. And his pride told him
قَالَ مَا مَنَعَكَ أَلاَّ تَسْجُدَ إِذْ أَمَرْتُكَ قَالَ أَنَاْ خَيْرٌ مِّنْهُ خَلَقْتَنِي مِن نَّارٍ وَخَلَقْتَهُ مِن طِينٍ
12. (Allah) said: "What prevented you (O Iblis) that you did not prostrate, when I commanded you'' Iblis said: "I am better than him (Adam), You created me from fire, and him You created from clay.'' (al A'raaf)
His rationalisation of Allah’s command then prevented him to follow it. Why shoud he prostrate to someone who is lower in status than him? His common sense and pride overtake his iman and taqwa despite the act of prostration to Adam was 'idza artuka'.
How often we try to find the reason why we should fast and why we are not allowed to eat pig. I am not saying that we should not do this, but that should come only after full sincerity that we do it as an act of obidience to Allah. We do it because Allah tells us to.
While fasting and eating pig are quite simple and often we find satisfying reason why Allah required us to observe, there more complicated commands that we failed to obey because we try to rationalise it.
How often we see a son or a daughter deter from being respectful and dutiful to parents, which is decreed by Allah in surah al Isra verse 25, because he or she thinks the parents do not deserve that respect and kindness. It may be the case that the parents did not do their parenting job well but it should not stop the children to obey the instruction of Allah to treat them with respect and to be kind to them. Or what about a wife who refuse to obey her husband because he is not a good muslim or did dot do a good job as a husband.
It is important to understand that to obey Allah in respecting your parents or husband is an act of ibadah. A failure to do so will result in a failure to follow the command of your Lord. We can not use the weaknesses from our parents of husband as an excuse. If they failed to do their parenting or head of family job, Allah will deal with them later about it.
The second lesson: Iblis refused to follow the command not because he did not believe in Allah. He met Allah physically in the paradise. He used to be the teacher of the angels because of his piety as several hadits narrated by Ibn Abbas suggested. But when he refused to follow Allah's instruction because of his arrogance, and Allah labelled him as 'wa kaana minal kafiriin', and he is one of the disbelievers.
What we learn from this is very clear. It is not enough just to believe in Allah. To be a believer, you have to use that believe as a drive to carry out the commands of Allah. If the believe is not accompanied by amal, Allah will still categorise you as one of the disbelievers as the case of Iblis shown.
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