Welcome to our weekly program “Path towards enlightenment” in which we present you a fluent and easy-to-understand explanation of the ayahs of the holy Qur’an.

We start from where we left you last Friday and here are ayahs 8 and 9 of Surah Ankabut:

وَوَصَّيْنَا الْإِنسَانَ بِوَالِدَيْهِ حُسْنًا ۖ وَإِن جَاهَدَاكَ لِتُشْرِكَ بِي مَا لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ فَلَا تُطِعْهُمَا ۚ إِلَيَّ مَرْجِعُكُمْ فَأُنَبِّئُكُم بِمَا كُنتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ

وَالَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ لَنُدْخِلَنَّهُمْ فِي الصَّالِحِينَ

“We have enjoined man to be good to his parents. But if they urge you to ascribe to Me as partner that of which you have no knowledge, then do not obey them. To Me will be your return, whereat I will inform you concerning that which you used to do.”

“Those who have faith and do righteous deeds, We will surely admit them among the righteous.”

In the time of Prophet Mohammad (blessings of God upon him and his progeny), when some persons of Mecca embraced Islam, their infidel mothers became furious and decided not to eat food nor drink water until their sons would renounce monotheism. However, none of these mothers kept their promise and all of them ate food. It was then that God Almighty revealed these ayahs to the Prophet to show a clear way to all for the proper conduct towards their parents concerning belief and disbelief. To do goodness to parents is a humanitarian matter, not a mere subject of any religious creed, and it has no condition, irrespective of ethnicity, age, region, class or creed. Children must be grateful to parents, even if the parents happen to be ignorant disbelievers. But if these disbelieving parents force the children to follow their polytheistic ways of ascribing partners to God, then the monotheist children should not obey the polytheist instructions of such parents. Since the eventual return of all is to Allah the Almighty Creator, Who has knowledge of everything, only those who have faith and do good deeds will be raised in the ranks of the righteous on the Day of Resurrection.

From these ayahs we learn that:

1. Kindness towards parents is a humanitarian act and part of innate human nature, which means whether Muslim or non-Muslims the parents should be treated with respect.

2. Invitation to polytheism is actually invitation toward ignorance, evil and sins, in view of the fact that idol-worship and refusal to believe in the One and Only Creator has no intellectual and scientific basis.

3. Those who have faith, tread the right path, and do good deeds, will be entitled to the bliss of paradise in afterlife.

Now we read ayahs 10 and 11 of Surah Ankabut:

وَمِنَ النَّاسِ مَن يَقُولُ آمَنَّا بِاللَّـهِ فَإِذَا أُوذِيَ فِي اللَّـهِ جَعَلَ فِتْنَةَ النَّاسِ كَعَذَابِ اللَّـهِ وَلَئِن جَاءَ نَصْرٌ مِّن رَّبِّكَ لَيَقُولُنَّ إِنَّا كُنَّا مَعَكُمْ ۚ أَوَلَيْسَ اللَّـهُ بِأَعْلَمَ بِمَا فِي صُدُورِ الْعَالَمِينَ

وَلَيَعْلَمَنَّ اللَّـهُ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَلَيَعْلَمَنَّ الْمُنَافِقِينَ

“Among the people there are those who say, ‘We have faith in Allah,’ but if such a one is tormented in Allah’s cause, he takes persecution by the people for Allah’s punishment. Yet if there comes any help from your Lord, they will say for sure, ‘We were indeed with you.’ Does not Allah know best what is in the breasts of the creatures?”

“Allah shall surely ascertain those who have faith, and He shall surely ascertain the hypocrites.”

These ayahs neither refer to the firm-of-faith believers nor to the infidels, but to a third group who claim to have faith when they are in comfort, but whenever they face problems they turn away from faith. These are the hypocrites, whose expression of faith is only verbal and not from the depth of the heart. Once the problems are solved or if the faithful are in power, they again call themselves friends of the faithful, only to turn away from faith in adverse circumstances. True faith becomes manifest in times of afflictions. The Prophet’s First Infallible Heir, Imam Ali (AS) has said: “The reality (and essence) of man will be known in the change of circumstances.”

As is evident by this and the next ayah, it is only Allah Who knows the true believers and the liars. He knows who are prepared to sacrifice their life for preserving faith and who will give up their faith. If some simple-minded people think that they can conceal the facts from God, they are in a manifest error. It is true that the subject of hypocrisy usually appears after the victory of a group and forming of government when the opponents change their features and form hidden organizations, but, as it was said before, hypocrisy has a vast scope of meaning and it envelops the persons of weak belief who change their faith by a little pressure.

From these ayahs we learn that:

1. Some pretend to be believers, while their hearts are full of disbelief, and these are the hypocrites.

2. True believers are ready to endure hardships, even at the risk of life and limb, while the weak of faith consider any hardship as punishment from God and begin to lose faith in the All-Merciful.

3. Hypocrites are opportunists. They leave the scene when they are in danger, while in times of ease and comfort, they pretend to be with the faithful, for the obvious reason of favours from others.

Now we read ayahs 12 and 13 of Surah Ankabut:

وَقَالَ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا لِلَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّبِعُوا سَبِيلَنَا وَلْنَحْمِلْ خَطَايَاكُمْ وَمَا هُم بِحَامِلِينَ مِنْ خَطَايَاهُم مِّن شَيْءٍ ۖ إِنَّهُمْ لَكَاذِبُونَ

وَلَيَحْمِلُنَّ أَثْقَالَهُمْ وَأَثْقَالًا مَّعَ أَثْقَالِهِمْ ۖ وَلَيُسْأَلُنَّ يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ عَمَّا كَانُوا يَفْتَرُونَ

“The faithless say to the faithful, ‘Follow our way and we will bear [responsibility for] your iniquities.’ They will not bear anything of their iniquities. They are indeed liars.”

“But surely they will carry their own burdens and other burdens along with their own burdens, and they will surely be questioned on the Day of Resurrection concerning that which they used to fabricate.”

The faithless tell the faithful to give up faith and follow their wicked ways, while in turn they will bear the iniquities. It is obvious the faithless are lying. In other words, in order to invite and encourage others to do mischief and wrong, the deviated persons often say: if it has any sin we carry the burden of that sin, while it is obvious no one can undertake the sin of another one. This very ayah points to one such example of the weak and baseless reasoning of the polytheists which exists among a vast group of society, even in our age. Today, we see many seductive persons that at the time of invitation to a wrong action say if it has any sin they bear its consequences, but we know that none can bear the burden of any one’s sin. An important point to note is that God is Just and never punishes for the crimes of another.

As the next ayah says, the deviators carry the burden of those who have been deviated, too. The important thing is that they also share the sin of all those who commit it while these sinners have their own sin without decreasing anything of it, and we know that whoever is effective in the preparation of an action, he has a share of that action, though the preparation is simple.

From these ayahs we learn that:

1. The enemies try every trick to deceive and seduce the faithful, including false promises.

2. Islam says God is just and fair, and knows very well as to who is the culprit.

3. The one who misleads others shares the burden of the sin and is responsible for the consequences of the sins of the misled, but this does not mean that the one who was misled in committing the sin will be absolved of the consequences of the wrong act he/she committed.

FK/AS/ME