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Monday, August 12, 2013

Surah Baqarah ayah 22-25


2:22
Sahih International
[He] who made for you the earth a bed [spread out] and the sky a ceiling and sent down from the sky, rain and brought forth thereby fruits as provision for you. So do not attribute to Allah equals while you know [that there is nothing similar to Him].
Ja-ala means placing for our service or furnishing for us. It is used for a favour because Allah facilitated for us the Earth as a firaash(something that is laid down, soft and easy and firm to walk and live on). Firaash is like a bed, because people used to sleep on the floor in old times so Allah has made the earth comfortable for everyone to sleep and live anywhere.Then Allah sent down water and brought out fruits for us, so Allah is reminding us of the sustenance he has provided us with. Allah could have given us grass to eat like animals, but Allah made food so beautiful and attractive and delicious for us. Every fruit has its own flavour and its own wrapping. Allah went out of the way to provide us with blessings but we often fail to acknowledge them.

So don't furnish competitors for Allah. NIDD means an equivalent and competitor. Tandeed is to raise your voice against something. It means we shouldn't live our life in opposition of Allah and we shouldn't challenge or disobey Allah in any way. We can't put Allah's and our will together because Allah is above us. We make our desires, our nafs, our greed, our relationships a competitor to Allah.


2:23
Sahih International
And if you are in doubt about what We have sent down upon Our Servant [Muhammad], then produce a surah the like thereof and call upon your witnesses other than Allah , if you should be truthful.
For 10 years, the prophet constantly tried to convince the mushrikeen to believe in Allah, but they kept rejecting it, he tried every possible means, only THEN did Allah say that why dont you produce a surah like this one, this shows that the dawah doesnt BEGIN with this challenge but it ends with this challenge..we are not supposed to begin dawah with this.Allah said this to the most obnoxious people who rejected the best daee as a last resort, this left them stumped. Dawah begins by inviting people to their good nature and calling them to their fitrah. When people do not accept the truth, then Allah gives them miracles and even if they reject clear miracles, then Allah challenges them.

Allah calls our Prophet SAWW abd in this ayah, and Allah always calls him SAWW abd whenever Allah mentions his highest status. e.g. Allah also calls him SAWW abd when mairaaj is mentioned. In this world, there is no station weaker than slavery, but in our deen this aboodiyat is a position go ultimate pride and it is the highest rank we can have. Slavery to Allah frees us of the slavery of the whole world, the cultural trends, relationships, peer pressure, fashion and what not. If we are not Allah's slave, we become slaves of all these things.

SURAH comes from Soor. Soon means the large outer walls of a city. The purpose of the walls is to protect the city. These walls were unusually high so that nobody could scale them and they were unusually thick so that nobody could dig through them. These walls were the property of the king and not of the people. So when we say surah, our mind goes to Allah, the king of the kings. Arabs did not have such walls because they never had such construction, and it was only a feature of Roman and persian and other such great empires. So whatever is inside a soor is of a very high value. If somebody tries to scale those walls, it is an offence against Allah himself. These walls go from the bottom above because walls are constructed from the earth. Allah's surah is sent NAZZALNA down from the sky. Your surah can never beat this surah as it is from high up and is matchless.  It is called Surah because it protects the timeless guidance contained in the Surah.

Allah challenges people multiple times to produce Surahs like in Quran. When we study the ahadith, we see a clear difference in the type of language used by the Prophet SAWW in hadith and the Quran. The speech pattern is totally different and easily distinguishable. It is not from the same person. Even if all humans and jinns combine, they can't produce anything similar to the Quran.  This is the 6th time Allah has challenged the people in the chronologically order of the Quran. Bring me something min mislihi(even something remotely close to the surahs of the Quran). Allah says IF you have any doubt and IF you are truthful about having doubts then try and produce a Surah like this. Through this, Allah exposes the people that they in fact know this is is haqq and their pride is preventing them from accepting imaan.

There was Tufail, he was the leader of his tribe and an important person, some people warned him not to come into contact with Prophet SAWW because his words are magical and he might deviate you..but he decided to go anyway..then they told him to put cork in his ears as soon as he sees the messenger SAWW..then when he sees the Prophet reciting the Quran, he puts the cork in his ears and runs away..but as he was running he thought that im the leader of my tribe and an excellent poet, why cant i make a text like this..so he came back to listen to the Quran and ended up taking shahadah instead


Utba bin raiba was the worst enemy of islam, he was an excellent debator, he used to debate and insult the other party and make a fool out of them, so his people sent him to argue with the messenger, he came to the prophet SAWW and said what do you want?women money power what? when he was done the Prophet SAWW starts reciting from surah fussilat, then utba starts crying and he grabs the mouth of Prophet SAWW, he put a hand on his mouth and asks him to stop because he cannot listen anymore, then he bows and then he returns and says that i dont know what that is but its not magic, but i guarantee its going to be a huge event..so his people said he has done his magic on you too..

One of the final accusations against Quran was that its magic but magic is something you see, NOT something you hear, yet they called the words magic because they had an amazing impact on the listener, by calling it magic they acknowledged the overwhelming power of the Quran, they would start crying when they heard it, but look at us, all we are thinking in salah is that when is the ruku coming?

Allah says bring your witnesses,call upon your witnesses, this is done to mock their false Gods, the 2nd witnesses are their experts, the poets , the intellectuals etc who could testify for them whether Quran is legitimate or not , so Quran says why dont they bring their people as witnesses?
The disbelievers had no answer to the Qurans challenge so they started calling it magic to keep people away from Quran

Ghayra means OTHER THAN..doon means to be inferior..here Allah uses DOON to show that all the witnesses are inferior to Allah
2:24
Sahih International
But if you do not - and you will never be able to - then fear the Fire, whose fuel is men and stones, prepared for the disbelievers.

Amal is something done consciously. Fail is something done without conscious thinking, it might be something we are doing subconsciously without intention e.g. doodling. Amal is doing something with constant effort.   Allah is saying forget bringing a Surah, you can't even do anything close to it consciously or subconsciously.  LAM TAFALU means you haven't been able to do it in the past and the present, and LAN TAFALU means that you will never be able to do it.  Allah defeated the Quraysh with His kalam and words, and they could not come up with a literary response so they responded with war and aggression.

You hadn't been able to do so and you wont be able to do so, then protect yourself from the fire. Allah tells them that they hadnt been able to do it ever and they wont be able to do it ever. In the beginning of surah Allah told the believers to have taqwa of Allah and now Allah is saying to the disbelievers to have taqwa from fire. This is out of sarcasm:How are you going to protect yourself from the fire?this sarcasm is appropriate because those people used to mock Allah and the Quran
-Allah goes on to say that the fire is fueled by people and stones:people includes the disbelievers and stone refers to the gods/idols they used to worship other than Allah, so they will be burned along with their stone-idols,or refers to their hearts which had turned into stone, OR it also means that the lava which consists of stone has extreme intensity of its flame.

Kafir comes from kafara which means to bury the seed in the ground and its also been used for a farmer because he plants a seed. It is used to show that the kafir had the seed of imaan inside him when he came to the dunya but he buried that light and didnt let the light of the revelation penetrate it and he buried the truth.



2:25
Sahih International
And give good tidings to those who believe and do righteous deeds that they will have gardens [in Paradise] beneath which rivers flow. Whenever they are provided with a provision of fruit therefrom, they will say, "This is what we were provided with before." And it is given to them in likeness. And they will have therein purified spouses, and they will abide therein eternally.

The Quran was being revealed through the messenger SAWW so denial of Quran included denial of the Messenger, so now the messenger is told to congratulate those who believe and acted righteously. This is the first direct command given to the Prophet SAWW in the order of the Quran, so it is a sign for us to begin dawah with good news. Prophet SAWW never overburdened people whenever they asked him questions but he always dealt with every sahaba individually according to their nature and advised them regarding their character. People are always at different levels and we need to deal with them appropriately, not everyone will go all out in deen and strive to be the best, some people are average and we need to guide them accordingly.

Allazeena aamino includes those who have strong faith and those who have weak faith and even the hypocrites who claim to believe, but the congratulation here is only to those who believe AND do good deeds.

Especially and only for them there are multiple gardens underneath which rivers flow. Think about it..picture it..even in this modern age, the highest price of real estate is the land which is at an elevated location..especially with a view of the sea..so Allah is trying to offer us what appeals most to us..greenery is another thing that really appeals to us..these desires are innate within us..most people want to buy a house when they grow up..they dont like to live at rent..they want stability in life, to be settled..Allah put these desires within us so that we could learn to long for paradise..Allah is giving us permanent real estate custom-made for us,without any cost. Allah gives us multiple gardens and all of them are different from one another and extremely beautiful.

Allah is talking to sahaba who have left their homes for islam,who are bankrupt, and they are in the middle of the desert, so Allah is saying that I will give you homes and gardens and rivers..with beautiful water..they will be given a lot of fruits..they will be given the fruits again and again..and they will not complain..they will be excited like a child when you give him his favourite dessert and will say hey thats my favourite fruit, i had it yesterday, they cant wait to have it again..and it doesnt end at that, when they taste it they will find it even tastier than yesterday..each time it tastes better. This doesnt even happen in the best restaurants in the dunya. We will never get bored of it.

They will have purified spouses. That shows that if we get a good spouse in the dunya,it will be a glimpse of jannah,a gift from Allah..they will reside in there forever. Zauj is used for both the husband and the wife. Zauj refers to perfectly matched counterparts e.g. sun and moon are zaujain, day and night are zaujain, life and afterlife are zaujain, body and rooh are zaujain, males and females are zaujain. Everybody in jannah will have at least one wonderful spouse.  Purified spouses means that the spouses are purified inside out and perfected for you. We will never get bored of our spouses unlike in this world and the relationship will always be fresh and beautiful and new for people, just like the fruits will taste beautiful every time.
Azwaaj does not only refer to spouses but also refers to companions and friends so it means that we will have a lot of wonderful friends to hang out with and they will all be purified and best in character. 


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