Ahsan Hanif – Quran Tafseer – Page 85 – Gender Roles And Responsibilities
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Welcome to another episode of our tafsir page
by page. InshaAllah ta'ala. Today we are on
page 85,
which is in the 5th juz of the
Quran
in Surah and Nisa. In the previous episode,
we mentioned a number of instructions that Allah
gives concerning the role of the husband and
the wife and the relationship between
these two very important members of our community,
every husband and every wife being the building
blocks of the family because essentially they will
then become parents.
Those two people have a very important role
in Islam and that is why the Sharia,
whether it's in the Quran or through
the sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam mentions a number of instructions, guidelines, recommendations
for these two people.
Their rights that they have are important,
their role and function that they play in
the community is also extremely important.
From the issues that Allah 'Azza wa Jal
mentioned, as we touched upon in the previous
episode is that men have a certain responsibility
that Allah has given to them. And we
spoke about how that responsibility
should be understood
in the correct context and always when Allah
gives instructions like this, the best way to
understand them is simply to look at the
example of the Prophet and
that is from the mercy of Allah and
from the wisdoms of sending messengers
with revelation, not just revelation by itself but
a Messenger that brings that revelation, understands, explains
and applies that revelation.
So when Allah speaks about the husband being
the head of the family, what does that
mean? Let us look at the Prophet and
the way in which he showed this. And
the prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam is as
we know the best of examples. And so
that is one of the issues that Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala mentioned in the previous verse.
The role of the husband and wife therefore
is extremely pivotal because those two people,
once they have children by Allah's decree, they
become parents, the mother and the father,
their children essentially become the future of the
community. They are the next generation.
And so every
group or every pairing of husband and wife
that then become mother and father did their
duty, upheld the responsibility that Allah has placed
upon their shoulders to the best of their
ability because no doubt guidance is from Allah
and Allah is the one who ultimately
guides and misguides, but the parents can only
do what they can that is humanly possible
in terms of fulfilling their responsibility,
then Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala will honor and
bless our communities. And that is something that
you found
and still find in certain communities.
But you it has become especially
in many societies now in the west and
even to be fair in in the rest
of the world, it is becoming the case
now with those bonds are becoming looser, and
that structure is becoming more fractured. And so
we don't find that same level of due
diligence and dedication that's been given now
to our family members. And that's because sometimes
people don't think that that's as important as
perhaps getting money and earning an income and
being able to buy certain things, comforts and
so on. Whereas before, people considered families to
be extremely important. And so sometimes, if I
have to sacrifice
a level of comfort, but ensure that I
can give my children the education, the upbringing
that they need, we would do so. But
people now have certain different priorities.
And so for us, as Muslims,
we know that from the greatest means of
sadaqatil jariyah, of continuous charity, is righteous children
by Allah's permission. So therefore, if something looking
at it from an Islamic point of view,
a viewpoint of the akhira and reward, then
note that those people, those children of ours,
in terms of the time, the commitment, the
effort,
the the love, the support that we show
to them, the education and tarbri that we
give to them, they have an extremely important
role not only in terms of societies and
communities
but in terms of our own legacy, what
we leave behind and InshaAllah the reward that
we can accumulate.
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala also mentioned
the issue of differences between spouses and how
they should appoint judges from their families to
come and arbitrate and try to reconcile between
them. And then Allah mentions to us the
rights of other people, those in the community
in general, from them are those people who
have rights over us because of their situation,
they are poor, they are orphans, they are
needy
and some of them have rights over us
because of their connection to us and their
relationship, their relatives, their parents, their neighbors and
companions.
So we begin Insha'Allah Ta'ala today from verse
38 and that is the statement of Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala is saying that he
also does not like those who spend their
wealth to show off,
those who do not believe in him for
the last day and indeed whoever has Shaitan
as his companion
has an evil companion.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says in this verse
remember at the end of the last episode
we mentioned those verses that Allah says that
he doesn't like the arrogant,
doesn't like those who are boastful, doesn't like
those who are miserly, don't spend upon those
in need and those who then order others
to become miserly and not to be charitable
and those who conceal the many bounties and
blessings that Allah has bestowed upon them. And
likewise from those people that Allah doesn't like,
Allah mentions in this verse are those people
who do spend but they only spend to
show off not because they believe in Allah
in the last day and that is those
people who feel like they should spend or
they want to spend to get the accolades
of other people and their praise and to
garner their affection. And so they will spend
to show off, they will spend to impress,
they will spend to show that they are
charitable, that they are not haughty, they are
not arrogant, that yes I have this money
but I will give, they are not sincere
in that sense.
They don't do it for Allah and they
don't do it for the last day. And
often you will find that one of the
major differences between those people,
and I am speaking about Muslims here obviously,
those people is that those people who spend
sincerely for the sake of Allah azza wa
Jal it doesn't make a difference to them
whether they are known or unknown
whether their names are mentioned or not mentioned,
whether people acknowledge them or don't acknowledge them,
whether people thank them or not because their
main intention is the praise of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala and it is the reward of
Allah
whereas those people who know they need to
be known, their names need to be mentioned,
they need to have a record, it needs
to be photographed, documented, spread and shared. Often
you find that those people have this internal
maybe issue that they that they're struggling with
between the sincerity aspect and between God willing
the praise and the accolades of people and
their and their affection. And so that is
something which a person has to be wary
of because we know that riya shaming off
is something which destroys and nullifies deeds. Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala only accepts that which is
purely and sincerely. 46 subhanahu wa ta'ala, may
Allah
give us
sincerity and sincerity is one of those issues
that needs constant
struggle and fighting. Constantly you have to battle
with your heart because Shaitan is ever present
trying
to take a person's intention and sincerity away
from Allah
and to dilute it by adding into it
these other means and
other paths that lead to dunya and so
on and so forth.
And
so here Allah says that these people who
show off and they spend in the way
of Allah showing off then Allah Subhanahu wa
ta'ala accepted from them, but rather they have
followed the path of Shaitan, and whoever Shaitan
becomes their companion, then what an evil companion.
And so all of us have as we
know, as the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, a
devil that runs through us, he is constantly
whispering to us, constantly
commanding us and encouraging and prompting us to
disobey Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. And then we
have also our fitra and our conscious that
tells us to worship Allah Azza wa Jal,
our Iman that points us towards Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala.
And if we choose
as a companion Shaitaan,
then that is a sign of evil, but
rather we have to battle Shaitaan and his
temptations and within that there is a great
reward and a great honor from Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala because Allah knows how difficult that
can be especially at certain times, in certain
cases, in certain circumstances, it can be extremely
difficult and that is why Allah azza wa
Jal praises those people who are able to
overcome the whisperings of Shaitaan and Allah azza
wa Jal has opened the door of forgiveness
and tawba for those people who sometimes fall
into the temptations of Shaitaan, but then they
regret what they did and turn back to
their Lord seeking his forgiveness Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Allah says in verse number 39.
And what harm would it do to them
to believe in Allah in the last day
and to give charitably from the sustenance that
Allah has given to them. Indeed Allah knows
them well.
These last couple of verses, the last verse
we took in the previous episode
and the verse that we took before this
verse 38 and now verse 39 speaks about
these attributes of these people and they are
primarily disbelievers.
But these verses that speak about the disbelievers,
those attributes can apply to the believers as
well. The difference is that the person has
already committed shirk, they don't worship Allah ajaw
and then they have these other attributes that
are evil.
The believer who does worship Allah, believes in
Allah, has the Tawhid of Allah Azza wa
Jal has to be wary lest some of
those attributes apply to them. So you can
be a Muslim and you can show off.
You can be a Muslim and you can
be arrogant. You can be a Muslim and
be miserly and order others or encourage others
to be miserly. You can be a Muslim
and you can do certain things that Allah
is mentioning in these verses such as boasting
and so on. And so the Muslim has
to be careful. They have to be mindful.
Why? Because if that becomes your norm and
that's something which becomes your, you know, part
and parcel of your character,
then either it will lead to you sinning
and disobeying Allah
or your good deeds being nullified because of
certain things like showing off taking place or
you may at the extreme level even lead
towards rejection of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and
some of his Sharia. And that's why arrogance
is so so, pride and arrogance is so
dangerous. That's why showing off is so dangerous.
That's why the prophet
told us that there are certain signs of
hypocrisy.
Stay away from them. The one who speaks
and he lies, the one who breaks his
promises, the one who doesn't fulfill his trust,
that doesn't mean that the Muslim who breaks
his promise is a monafiq, he's a hypocrite,
but it means that that's a sign of
hypocrisy. Be careful because if you do that
often and that becomes your norm
then you may lead it may lead you
to the greater hypocrisy which is rejection of
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. But even at the
smaller level, it is still hypocrisy because hypocrisy
is being 2 faced. So likewise, the Muslim
has to be aware of arrogance
because today you're just being arrogant in terms
of the way that you're looking down upon
someone, but tomorrow your arrogance leads you to
rejecting
certain parts of Allah's laws and that is
dangerous to say that Allah is a wajat,
I don't agree that that's obligatory, I don't
agree that that's from the religion of Allah,
I don't agree that that applies to me.
That's a very dangerous thing to have and
we see that in our time. We see
people saying, oh, I don't think I have
to wear the hijab. I don't think I
have to pray. I don't think I should
have to give the zakah. I don't think
that riba is haram for me or whatever
it may be. These types of assertions, these
types of it is coming from a place
in which there is also arrogance and that
is that a person doesn't humble themselves before
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala and know their true
place, that their place and and purpose in
this life is servitude, one of submission to
their Lord and creator Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. So
Allah says in verse number 39 that those
people who refuse to spend in the way
of Allah, those people who don't believe in
Allah in the last day, wama dhaa'arihi, wahaam
would he do?
Especially if a person doesn't think that there
is anything coming after this life, There's nothing
else anyway.
What harm would it do to you to
on the side of caution? Someone is saying
to you that if you go down that
road,
you may be punished.
Maybe there's a trap there, maybe there's some
harm there, maybe you'll die down that road.
But on this road, I know that there's
nothing that's going to happen to you. A
sensible person, if they had that choice in
this life, they would say, okay, let me
on the side of caution and I'll take
this path just in case on that path
there's some harm or some death or destruction
that will occur to me. Allah is saying
that there would have been no harm upon
them had they simply believed in Allah, believed
in your mumqiama, believed and given childably from
that which Allah has provided for them. Indeed
Allah
knows them well.
In verse number 4 2 Allah says
He does not wrong anyone by as much
as the weight of a speck of dust.
He doubles any good deed and gives a
tremendous reward of his own.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says that Allah does
not oppress.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala as the prophet told
us salallahu alayhi wa sallam in the hadith
al Qudsi that Allah said,
haram upon myself, Allah made it prohibited upon
himself
and therefore I have made it prohibited amongst
you, so do not oppress one another.
Allah does not oppress and Allah does not
love oppression and oppression is to take something
from its rightful place and to put it
somewhere else, to not fulfill someone's rights, to
withhold someone's rights, to harm them in a
way or to oppress them in some other,
these are all types of oppression.
Allah ahsawwajal does not oppress
even in the smallest amount,
an atom's weight of oppression. Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala does not perform.
And so therefore what a person receives,
they receive either because of the good that
he did, in which case Allah
through his favor and his mercy and his
bounty increases and multiplies
or they receive because of the evil that
they did in which case from the justice
of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and his fairness
is that they received exactly that which they
did. So when you do a good deed
Allah multiplies it by 10 up to 700
and more if you wish. Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So for one deed, the least that you
will receive is 10 times its reward. But
when it comes to evil deeds, Allah only
gives you 1, Allah doesn't multiply,
Allah doesn't increase but Allah gives you exactly
what you have. And that is why in
the hadith al Qudsi the Prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam said that Allah said the old
child of Adam
O children of Adam, these are your deeds.
All I do is record them and then
I will recompense you for them on the
day of judgement. Reward or punishment.
Allah just records and then he will judge
and he will give you your dual recompense.
So Allah ajd then says in the hadith
al Qudsi, so
if you find good, then praise Allah. Why?
Because Allah has multiplied,
Allah has increased, Allah has given you more
than that which you deserved.
And if you find other than good, meaning
evil, then don't blame anyone except yourself
because Allah gave to you exactly that which
you did in terms of evil deeds. And
that is what Allah azza wa ji says
in verse number 40 and if it is
a good deed, Allah
will multiply
it. Allah will multiply it.
And he will give to you a tremendous
reward of his own. And that is why
the prophet told us, salallahu alayhi wa sallam,
showing to us how this works in terms
of good and evil deeds. The prophet said
that if a person has
a a,
a serious conviction, a sincere intention to do
a good deed, Allah records it as a
good deed even if they don't do it.
And if they do it, then Allah multiplies
it by 10 to 700 and maybe much
more.
And if a person does an evil deed,
meaning they have the conviction to do it,
then Allah records it as 1 and they
do it. And if they have the evil
conviction and then they stop,
they turn away, they turn back to Allah
azza wa Jal, Allah doesn't record it and
Allah forgives them for it. And so therefore
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is all merciful and
all just subhanahu wa ta'ala.
In verse 41, Allah aza wa jal then
says,
Allah
says that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
what will they do when we bring a
witness from each community with you or Muhammad
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam as a witness against these
people. Allah will draw from every nation witnesses
that will testify against them as to whether
they worship Allah alone, whether they obeyed their
Prophet and Messengers that Allah sent to them.
And from all of those witnesses then that
are grown, the
Prophet will be witness over them. And so
this hadith shows to us the level, the
station, but also the responsibility that was given
to the Prophet
and responsibility.
We were speaking in the last episode about
the responsibility of the husband. We said the
best of people in positions of responsibility whether
it's the husband
or for example the the the employer
or the leader
of a of a of a state or
someone, the best of them are those who
understand that responsibility
and it humbles them and makes them serve
others. Look at this example here, from all
of Allah's creation, the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam
will be the one who will witness over
all of them. In the hadith of Abdullah
ibn Mus'ud radiAllahu an, the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wasallam asked ibn Mus'ud to recite from the
Quran. And ibn Mus'ud said, oh, messenger of
Allah, should I recite when the Qur'an was
revealed to you?' The Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam replied that indeed I love to hear
others reciting it. And Ibn Mus'ud was known
to be from the most fluent and
most profound reciters of the book of Allah
Azzawajal.
So he started to recite from Suratul Nisa,
and he continued to recite until he reached
this verse, verse number 41 and recited this
verse and the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
said, too, enough. When Ibn Mus'ud raised his
head and he looked at the Prophet he
saw tears
from his eyes
because here the Prophet is being told that
this is his responsibility.
But look at what he does to him,
it humbles him, makes him fear Allah
makes him understand the gravity of the responsibility
that Allah has placed upon his shoulders.
So likewise should be the leader, likewise should
be the employer, likewise should be the teacher
and the husband and the father and the
mother. Allah is placed upon you a responsibility.
Don't think that gives you the right to
be a dictator, the right to be a
despot, the right to be a tyrant. What
it should do is humble you and make
you understand that just as Allah gave you
that responsibility,
that means that you have more scope to
do wrong and
oppression and as a result of that Allah
may punish you. And so this is something
which humbled the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
In verse number 42, Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
then continues and says,
On that day, those who disbelieved and disobeyed
the Prophet
will wish that the earth could swallow them
up.
They will not be able to hide anything
from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. An yumul qiyama,
when the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam and
those witnesses are drawn from every nation and
they will testify upon those people and from
those witnesses as we know and as we
mentioned at the beginning of the second juz
of the Quran in Surat Al Baqarah, from
those witnesses also will be us, the Muslim
Ummah, the Ummah of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi
Wasallam because Allah
says that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala will make
us witnesses as well. We will testify to
the truthfulness
of the Prophet and Messengers and what they
brought
as a result of what Allah revealed
to us in this Quran and what the
Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam brought to us. Allah
will say that those people then on the
day of judgement on yomul qiyama
who refused to believe, who rejected their prophets
and messengers,
rejected for example, in this time our Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says that,
those people will wish that they would be
destroyed,
that the earth would simply swallow them up,
that they will not be in existence and
that is because they will know the reality
of that day that they will now have
an eternity of punishment.
They would rather die and be destroyed.
That is why the Prophet told us that
when all of the people of Jannah enter
into Jannah and are settled therein
and all of the people of the fire
are in the fire and are settled therein,
Allah
will bring out death in the form of
a ram, an animal,
and it will be slaughtered. And then it
will be said to the people of Jannah,
for you is eternity and no death. And
it will be said to the people of
the fire, you ahlanaar or people of the
fire,
there is for you also eternity and no
death.
And so those people will want to be
destroyed as Allah Azzawaj will mention in the
forthcoming surah and verse that they will call
out the people of the fire to the
guardian of the fire, the angel that is
in charge
or charged
with the, guardianship of the fire. His name
is Madik. They will say
They will call out to Malik saying, Malik,
oh, Malik, let your Lord destroy us in
this fire. We would rather be destroyed than
this
incessant punishment that we are suffering. And he
will say, you
will remain therein forever. May Allah save us
from that punishment.
The final verse that we will take
in today's episode, verse number 43, Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala then says,
Oh, you who believe do not come anywhere
near the prayer if you are intoxicated,
not until you know what you are saying,
nor if you are in a state of
major ritual impurity, though you may pass through
the masjid, not until you have bathed, if
you are ill on a journey, have relieved
yourselves or at * and cannot find any
water, then find some clean sand and wipe
your faces and hands with it. You need
Allah is always ready to pardon and forgive.
In this verse, we have a number of
points that Allah 'azawajal mentions to us. The
first of them is one of the stages
in the prohibition of intoxicants and alcohol.
So in the time of the prophet as
we know before Islam came, it was very
rampant and very common place that the people
would drink intoxicants.
Islam then came and eventually prohibited this, but
it was prohibited in 3 stages. The first
stage
is, as as we mentioned in the previous
verse, that people asked concerning intoxicants and Allah
said that there is sin in it but
also some benefit but the sin at which
outweighs the benefit.
That is simply Allah
saying that it is better to stay away.
That's not a prohibition, that's the first stage,
better to stay away. The second stage is
this verse
that Allah
says, don't come to the prayer in a
state of intoxication.'
Meaning now 5 times a day Fajrulullahuhur Asa
Madri Bin Isha, stay away from it. So
the majority of the day and night, stay
away, but there's still times in which people
can drink and so on because the time,
for example, between risha and fajr is a
number of hours and so on. But generally
speaking, stay away from it. This is the
second stage and the third stage is the
one that we will come to inshaAllah ta'ala
in Suratul Alaihaam where Allah prohibits it outright.
So this was now the 2nd stage and
that is that Allah Azzawaju said don't come
to the prayer in the state of intoxication
that you're worshipping Allah and calling upon Allah
and you don't even know what you're saying.
Likewise, a person who is in a state
of major ritual impurity
which is either through intimacy,
sexual intimacy or it is for example a
woman that's been on her monthly cycle or
postpartum bleeding after childbirth,
those people should not enter into the Masjid.
In the state of major ritual impurity,
there are certain things that you can't do,
like for example praying, like for example making
tawaf and so on. And from those things
that you cannot do is you cannot sit
in the masjid.
You can't stay in the masjid unless you're
simply passing through.
So if someone is passing through, they need
to pass through, it is permissible. But for
them to come and sit in the Masjid
in that state, it is not befitting because
of this command of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
and because that person is in a state
of major, major ritual impurity
unless they make Ikhdisat, unless they take that
ritual bath that will then cleanse them.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala then says and if
you are ill
or you are sick
or one of you has now relieved yourselves
or you've had *
and you can't find water. This is now
the verse of Tayamu.
So we know that the way that you
come out of the state of minor or
major ritual impurity
is that you must cleanse yourself. For minor
ritual impurity, it is wudu. For major ritual
impurity, it is ghusl or the ritual bathing.
However, if a person is in one of
those 2 states, minor or major ritual impurity
and they can't access water, either they don't
have water or they're not able to use
water. Some people because of the illness or
an ailment that they have, to use water
would make their situation worse. So they must
avoid water for a temporary period of time
or they don't have access to water. Maybe
they're travelling and they don't have access to
any water. Then the sharia says that you
can make tayamum. What is tayamum? It is
to strike clean earth the ground and to
wipe over your hands and your face as
Allah
commands in this particular verse to wipe over
the face and the hands and Allah
is always ready and pardon to ready to
forgive and to pardon and this is from
the mercy of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala that
Allah
opened for people this door of Tayamun and
this is something which will be repeated again
in Surah Al Maidah InshaAllah Ta'ala when we
get to that particular verse we will speak
about one of the or the reason and
the cause of this revelation, which is the
incident that took place with our mother Aisha
radiAllahu anha inshaAllah ta'ala. We will mention it
there. There is one verse that is left
on this page, but we will inshallah delay
that to the next episode because it is
connected with the verses that will come on
to the next page. So inshallah with that
we conclude
today's particular episode.