Everything Depends on Allah - Surah Ar-Rahman Commentary

The Face of Allah and Human Recognition

Last time in this Surah Ar-Rahman series. Why does God want me to pray to him so much? I've even heard some atheists say God is so egotistical. He wants me to keep praying to him. He just wants me to keep thanking him. What kind of person wants me to keep thanking them all the time? Anybody who does that is very self-centered and egotistical and all of it. Why does he need that? Why does he need this kind of validation all the time?

Then there's a subtle continuity of theme in this Surah. The name of Allah in this Surah is Ar-Rahman. If you think of Rahman, love and care. How do human beings know somebody is loving and caring towards you? From what? Actually their face. You can tell love and care. The first expression of love and care comes from where? The face.

Like if you come home, you can look at your wife and now you know which face you're dealing with. The face determines what person you're dealing with. Because your wife may be four different people and you don't know which one you're dealing with until you look at her what? You look at her face.

Now you can misread it because she just had a little bit of lemon or something. But generally the face gives it away. Husbands are just confusing. They look the same no matter what.

The Theme of Face Throughout the Surah

Then Allah created, He says He created the human being and the human being, how are human beings recognized? Fundamentally, by our faces. Then He mentioned Fakiha. Fakiha is not just a fruit, it's a fruit that makes you smile. Tastes so good it makes you smile. The smile happens where? On the face.

He says الريحان in this Surah. Wonderful smell. When you smell something wonderful, what does it impact? Your fingers? What does it impact? Your face. He says لؤلؤ ومرجان. Lu'lu, the pearls can turn into earrings and decorations that actually bring attention to what part of you? To your face. And then He mentioned earlier on that the sun and the moon do Sajdah. And the Sajdah is an image of what? Hitting the ground. The face.

So there's actually an undercurrent theme of the face through the Surah. And now you find the only thing that will in the end remain is the face of your master. Isn't that beautiful? So the wording in the Qur'an, there's a texture that's developed and then that emerges.

And it's also really amazing that embarrassment also shows where? On the face. Like if you came late to a class and your professor is super, and he knows you personally, then when you walk in, one thing you will make sure is not make facial contact, eye contact. This is what you're gonna do. Some kind of maneuver that you can hide behind someone and walk behind them and sit and just kind of be in half Ruku when you sit in your seat. Because you wanna avoid facial contact.

Now why is that important? Because a couple of ayat from now, Allah will say that you're going to be resurrected. And when we're gonna be resurrected, Allah uses the word, مقام ربه Like standing before His Rabb. Standing before His Rabb is مواجهة ربه Facing your Rabb. So the world will be gone, but the face of Allah will remain. Now you're gonna have to deal with facing Him. So there's this subtle, even it's foreshadowing what's coming. Us facing our Rabb, subhanAllah.

The Prophet Addressed Directly

And a subtle thing here is notice, ويبقى وجه ربك ربك The Ka refers to the Prophet ﷺ. So far the Prophet was not addressed directly at all. But now he's been addressed. And in it, not only is there a really nice consolation and honoring of the Prophet ﷺ, your master's face will remain.

As if to tell the Prophet, they can say whatever they want. But in the end, the victory belongs to your side. And why? Because your master who's giving you the Qur'an, his face is the only one that will remain. So it's kind of like the Prophet himself is being given comfort that his mission has to carry on. And no matter what opposition he gets, in the end, all of this is temporary. The victory belongs with Allah.

Allah's Independence from Recognition

So now, I talked about this, the sailing ships thing. Actually, I didn't talk about that. The ships when they sail and they reach a conclusion, they reach a destination, that's when they bring glory back with them. They bring the goods to sell. They bring the news of their victory and all of this stuff. And Allah is saying, you're heading towards the end but actually your end does not mark the end of Allah's glory. Allah's glory remains timeless.

And finally, this is an important feature of this subject that Allah is commenting perhaps on our need for recognition. Human beings actually need recognition from each other. It doesn't matter how you pretend you don't, you do. You need your dad to be able to... You want to hear your dad say I love you or I'm proud of you son. You need it. You need your teacher to be able to say good job on the homework. Your boss to be able to say that was a great job on the project. Thank you. Or you want to hear a thank you. You want to hear a, you know, you exist, I see you.

What happens to people they're in a stadium, they're going, and the athlete just goes like that. And he just pointed randomly at the Pepsi vending machine. But the guy in the stands, he's like, he just got recognized. His life has changed. You know, he pointed at me. There's a human need for recognition.

And Allah Azza wa Jal separates Himself from that. And He says, actually, I don't have that, you do. I don't have the need for recognition. That's one of the things that makes you mortal. That's one of the things that makes you khalq. The Khaliq doesn't have it. You have it.

And it's actually Allah's rahmah that He allowed Himself to be recognized. He allowed Himself to be recognized. He didn't need to create this universe. He didn't need to create us. This is all driven by a love inside of Allah and a rahmah inside of Allah that He allowed us to exist to be able to recognize Him. SubhanAllah. It's not out of His need. It's actually something that's done entirely generously for us.

It's interesting that the word ikram actually means generosity, by the way. Al-Jalal is glory, greatness. And we'll get into the etymology. But ikram means generosity.

There's a hadith of the Prophet ﷺ associated with these words, which is, "Hold on to Allah with calling on Allah with يا ذي الجلال والإكرام" In other words, that should be part of our, the way in which we address Allah is by calling on this name.

And it is a special name. It doesn't occur anywhere else in the Quran. It only occurs in Surah Ar-Rahman. So, that's something the Prophet ﷺ encouraged us to do.

The Deeper Meaning of Face (Wajh)

Another interesting subtle thing inside wajh. I'm gonna summarize what they're saying here because it sounds really, really cool. I hope I can do this in easy English. What Alusi and Qurtubi essentially are saying, both of them are saying, is that wajh, face, is also similar to the Arabic word jiha, which means direction. So, the face is similar to what? Direction.

Obviously, there's a literary connection when you see someone's face, that's because you turned in their direction. But he's saying something more. He's saying, everyone will die, but the fact that they turn towards Allah, the fact that they took the direction towards Allah, that act shall remain. Not just the face of Allah shall remain, someone turning to Allah, and that's the timeless part of us.

My wealth will be gone, my body will be gone, my memory may be gone, and my remnants on this earth may be gone. We're sitting here in this masjid right now, we don't know 300 feet underneath here, how many graves there are, how many people are dead and gone, and we don't know, nobody knows their memory anymore. We don't know that. But if someone down there turned towards Allah, then that turning towards Allah is forever recorded. Even when the world will come to an end, that will be brought back out. And that's timeless. Nothing else about them is timeless, except they're turning towards Allah. SubhanAllah.

ويبقى وجه ربك ذو الجلال والإكرام And in it, it's as if Allah possesses glory, and Allah possesses generosity, and He's now giving that generosity to those who turn towards Him. The only way we can have any glimpse of being honored and revered is when we honor and revere Allah azza wa jal. So it's a very subtle and beautiful thing that's happening inside.

Etymology of Jalal

Okay, now a little bit about jal and then we'll move forward. So jal is, interestingly, the sail of a ship is also called jal. And how is that, why is that so cool? Because we just read, وله الجوار المنشآت في البحر كالأعلام And now, ويبقى وجه ربك ذو الجلال والإكرام The ships He owns, everything shall die, but the only sail that shall remain is the sail of your Rabb. SubhanAllah. So there's a subtle literary connection between the two.

Jal also has to do with old age or something being age-old or ancient. Which is also interesting because fan means someone, remember fan means someone who gets old and dies? Now Allah is contrasting someone who gets old and dies with someone who is the most ancient and is the undying. So there's a contrast made between all else and the timeless glory of Allah azza wa jal.

Then, العظيم القدر في ذاته وصفاته وأقواله وأفعاله That's the more obvious meaning that jalal means greatness in all things, in His self, in His qualities, in His speech, in His actions.

The Meaning of Ikram

So now, ذو الجلال and then والإكرام. Ikram, in its origin, it comes from a necklace. Actually qaram is a gold necklace. It's also used for a piece of land. You know sometimes land has pebbles on it? But if you clear all the pebbles and it's perfectly clean land, perfect land with all impurities, that land is also called qaram. And qaram or تقريم الصحاب, clouds that are full of rain and are the perfect kinds of clouds are called qaram or muqarram.

So, what meanings lie inside ikram? Actually the generosity, something honorable, something pure, exquisite, and beautiful. These are the meanings of ikram. Allah possesses all of these things. And ikram is actually muta'addi. So, this is given. It's not given to Allah but Allah gives it to others. So Allah is generous towards others. Allah honors others. Allah purifies others. Allah beautifies others. Allah possesses the power to do so.

Why is this important? The first word ذو الجلال is about whether nobody praises Allah, Allah is still praised. The second word is even though you will die in this world, Allah will resurrect you and honor you and be generous with you and purify you and make you exquisitely beautiful. This second word is actually almost referring to the resurrection. And saying, yes you'll die here but something more beautiful is coming for you. So Allah is ذو الجلال والإكرام. SubhanAllah.

So, now this is why الإكرام المنعم على عباده like Ibn Ashur mentions. The one who gives gifts to his slaves. So, the death, we are gonna die in this world but that's not the end of Allah's generosity.

Everyone Begs of Allah

Now we reach the end of this life. So, everything Allah talked about now, He's going to summarize. But before I get to that summary, just rethink in your mind, what did Allah talk about? Allah talked about us enjoying food in this world in the most beautiful way. Then Allah talked about our sustenance. He talked about our ability to develop civilization by way of crop. Then Allah talked about our ability to travel different continents and develop the world and empire and civilization across the world. He addressed all of that and the treasures that we seek from this world.

Now, He's gonna summarize that with this one statement. This is like the summary of everything we've discussed so far in ayah number 29.

Every last one in the heavens and the earth begs of Him. Every last one in the heavens and the earth begs of Him.

The atheist could come along and say, I don't beg of Him. The Quran is wrong. I don't beg of Him. And we say, Yeah, you do. The fact that your voice box released sound waves that I could reach to my ear. Your voice box actually sent a begging request to Allah. Ya Allah, can I produce sound? And then the permission came from Allah and allowed this voice box to say words of kufr. And that process could not have happened if Allah didn't say كن فيكون

Every limb, every cell, every neuron firing in my body is actually seeking Allah's permission all the time, every time begging Allah. Every vessel of blood, every expansion of my lungs, every contraction of my lungs is constantly asking Allah, constantly asking Allah. In my sleep, I'm asking Allah. My heart is asking Allah for the next beat. And then the next beat, and then the next beat.

Our Body Parts as Witnesses

In fact, the way I should think about this and you should think about this is, my eyes can look at something wrong. And before they look at something wrong, the eye asks Allah's permission. Ya Allah, He's about to disobey you. Should I let him? Because I don't want to, but he's making me. And Allah says, let him. Let him. And then the eye looks. And the eye is tortured because the eye was designed, everything was designed to obey Allah. And now I'm using this thing that was designed to obey Allah to disobey Allah.

And when judgment day comes, these body parts of mine, Allah gives them each their own speech. In the hidden world, they were already talking to Allah all this time. But then, on judgment day, they start testifying against me. My hands start testifying against me. My feet start testifying against me.

And then I talk to them, you're my body, bro. Why are you testifying against us? What are you doing? And they say, أنطقنا الله الذي أنطق كل شيء The one who gave all things the ability to speak has today given us the ability to speak. Now we get to speak out.

You know how people talk about, I've been abused for so long, but I'm gonna speak out against the abuse. Well, you know what? Every limb in my body is gonna say, I've been abused for a long time. I'm gonna speak out against the abuse. You hurled against my Rabb. You made me disobey Him. I'm gonna speak out against you. SubhanAllah.

So يسأله من في السموات is actually the reality of things. All of us are constantly begging Him.

The Delusion of Independence

The other interesting thing inside يسأله is, if you look back, every one of those things that we benefit from, the sun and the moon in their position, the stars where they are so we can navigate, the tree, the fruit, the crop, every one of those things asks Allah before they can grow, asks Allah so they can stay in place. They ask Allah and we say, I don't need Allah. Yeah, you don't need the moon? You don't need the sun? You don't need oxygen? You don't need crop? You don't need nutrients? You don't need fruit? You don't need animals? You're just independent? Like this delusion of independence that we have. This delusion of independence.

Everything around us is begging Allah to exist and to serve us. And we are beneficiaries of it all the time. And even our ability to benefit from it. Just contemplate that. Allah says, I gave you a delicious fruit that you can taste. The taste bud has to ask Allah before you can taste. The stomach has to ask Allah before it digests. There are people who can't digest. There are people who can't digest. People, they're digest, they can go into surgery because they can't digest normal food. Their stomach doesn't have the ability.

My stomach asks Allah's permission to not let this food turn into death for me. How many bacteria are already inside me that can kill me right now? And every one of them Allah says, stop, no, not yet, not yet, not yet. Hold them back.

There's a profound statement Allah has made about whoever's in the skies, the angels, the jinn, us. But this again, the man refers to those that possess intellect. All of them are dependent on Allah.

Allah's Constant Activity

And then he says, كل يوم هو في شأن Through every moment and every era he's involved in works, only he can execute. This is wordy, but this is a way to describe the word sha'n. Works that only he can execute.

So the tough vocabulary in this ayah is actually the word sha'n which we'll get into in a little bit. كل باق محتاج إلى أسباب بقائه وصلاح أحواله فهم في حاجة إلى الذي لا يفنى وهو غير محتاج إليهم Like everyone depends on the one who depends on no one. That's what he's saying essentially. We all depend on him because he depends on no one. And if you rely on your company to give you a paycheck, that company relies on someone who relies on someone and they all rely on Allah in the end to survive and to exist.

He says, Ibn Abbas made a comment about this ayah. He said, رضي الله تعالى عنهما أهل السموات يسألونه المغفرة The angels are asking for forgiveness. ولا يسألونه الرزق They're not asking for sustenance. Allah has already sustained them. They just ask for maghfirah. وأهل الأرض يسألونهما جميعا And the people of this world, they should be asking for forgiveness, but they ask for forgiveness and sustenance. At least the ones that ask consciously, which actually leads us to the next issue.

There's two kinds of asking, conscious and unconscious. The atheist is asking, but asking consciously or unconsciously? Unconsciously. The believer is asking, but the believer is asking consciously. So there is a difference between the two. This ayah is actually talking about all asking, conscious and unconscious.

Now, for now, you're doing the asking, but pretty soon a day is coming where who's going to be doing the asking? Allah will be doing the asking. Right now is your chance to ask, and if you do the right kind of asking now, from the beginning of the Qur'an, we're asking, by the way. اهدنا الصراط is asking. اهدنا الصراط المستقيم is asking.

Right now is your chance to ask. If you become a person who asks now, asks for forgiveness, asks for guidance, asks for mercy, asks for, you know, to become better, asks for strength, asks for sabr, asks for those things now, then you're not going to have difficult questions to answer later. So we better become people of asking now, so we don't become the people that are being asked later on. So there's this contrast that's here.

The Meaning of "Every Day"

A little bit about كل يوم, which is translated literally every day, but in Arabic, the word yawm is like era or age or phase of your life. So the famous Arabic saying is الدهر يومان. يوم النعم ويوم البؤس. Like to say يوم لك ويوم عليك. It's very common in Arabic. So basically all of time is two days, a good day and a bad day. Basically your life goes through good episodes and bad episodes.

And when Allah says every day he is involved in something only he can do, your good days Allah is involved, your bad days Allah is involved. Allah is never absent. Because the weak in faith, they see Allah is present when times are good. Where was Allah when I was going through the... كل يوم هو في شأن. Like that's not where was Allah. Like we let our little baby tantrums turn into kufr so easily.

ومن يعبد الله على حرف Allah describes there's a kind of person who worships Allah at the edge of a cliff. Like when something goes wrong, I'm jumping, I don't wanna believe anymore. Like moody believers.

So then he says, Alusi adds, كل وقت من الأوقات ولحظة من اللحظات Like every moment, every second, every day, not every day refers to every moment, every second.

But actually there's another thing that I'm adding to this, this is my note at the bottom. The word day is important as opposed to waqt or sa'ah or thaniyah. Different words for time. Why use this word yawm? Because actually this life when resurrection happens, people will look back and they will say إن لبثتم إلا يوما You were just here for a day. Like this whole life is just gonna be one day.

And by the way, one day, here's what's really cool. One day basically means one sunrise and one sunset. And then there's another day coming the day of judgment which is also in a sense, if you think of the imagery of a day, a sunrise and a sunset. Well, if that's the case, when he said رب المشرقين ورب المغربين It gives you a whole new perspective now what he was saying. He's the master of two days. One day of the east and west of now and then there's the other east and west, the rise and fall of that day. SubhanAllah. So that's كل يوما the intricacy of the word yawm.

The Meaning of Sha'n - Allah's Delicate Works

Now we get to the word sha'n. Sha'n is a tricky word. It's tear ducts and sinus passageways are actually called sha'n. And sweat beads are also called sha'n. And sha'n is also for intricate thin branches.

So what it's referring to when sha'n means a matter like they use it for الخطب والأمر والحال. What it refers to is, you know how you do something that's very delicate like a good example would be surgery. Like if somebody is doing some very delicate kind of surgery and if they pinch the wrong kind of nerve or they cut the wrong kind of vessel that can be deadly. And they have to be laser precise because everything is connected to everything else and there's this intricate interconnection, this domino effect. So the one who's doing it has to be extremely precise because this one act has multiple consequences, a chain of consequences. Kind of like the butterfly effect kind of thing.

Allah is saying that He's involved in a sha'n. Why should this child live till 12 years old? Why should that one live to 100 years old? Why should this one have a miscarriage? Why should that one die of cancer? Why should this one survive after chemo? Why is someone losing all their money? Why is someone gaining money? We just see our own story. We don't see how it's connected to endless other things. There's a surgery happening in this world where one pain is saving a lot of other pains. And we don't know how that works. We don't know how all of those intricate connections work. We just see our part. Hey, why am I hurting? Why did you cut this?

Like imagine a surgeon who has to chop off a leg because the infection is spreading. Well, when he's cutting off that leg, what's he actually doing? He's saving the life. He's actually saving the life. Now, that's just one body. Now imagine all bodies and all species and all things on this world connected all at once like one gigantic living organism. And Allah is constantly performing these surgeries on every moment for everyone and deciding what to pull and what to expand and what to contract and who to give and who to take from. And He's taking not just one thing into consideration. He's taking everything into consideration. SubhanAllah.

The wisdom of Allah and the planning of Allah is beyond imagination. It's beyond imagination. We can't even do that for within ourselves. Within our bodies, we can't do it. You see a donut, you just want to eat it. You don't care about the chain reaction that's going to have. What it's going to do to you? It just looks good. I like a Boston cream. I like a Boston cream. I'm going to kill a Boston cream. What's the big deal?

We don't see the consequences of our actions. Allah does. And so He makes decisions and He executes things that only He can execute. He sees the grand picture like nobody else sees. And everybody's asking Him. And everybody wants things done on their terms. And if you had it your way, maybe it would be destruction for the planet. Because you got your way. And somebody else their way. And Allah decides who's going to get what. This is يسأله من في السموات والأرض كل يوم هو في شأن

The Classroom Analogy

But before I go further, I'll give you your first break. I'm just going to give you one little cool thing. Sometimes teachers have a very large classroom. You guys have been in a very large... Students, have you ever been in a very large classroom before? Have you been a teacher of a very large classroom before? If you're the teacher of a very large classroom, discipline is really hard. And the kids in the back, man. The kids in the back. Like there's... They're not all the way in the back because that's the obvious culprits. You're going to call the kids all the way in the back. There are always two, three rows from the back. That's like the perfect spot. I know this because I chose that spot all the time.

So you can put your head down and do all kinds of stuff. You can pass each other's notes. You can get your own game going on. You can beat the system if you're in a large class. And if the teacher is busy with so many other things, every time the teacher is having a conversation with one student, what are the 18, 20, 30 other students doing? Talking to each other. Doing other stuff.

And the teacher has to say, Hey, I'm talking to Frank over here. And then because when he's busy with one, everybody feels, you know, when the cat's away, the mouse will play. The mice will play. That's what happens. And if he's going to pay attention to everybody together, then he can't focus on an individual. Like one person says, I have a question. Hold on a second. I need to talk to everybody right now.

So like a khatib is giving a khutbah and one person has a confusion in the khutbah. And he's like, I have a question. But if I address that khatib, that person, what's everybody else doing? What am I supposed to do right now? That's not for me. And then, so if you pay attention to the individual, you lose sight of the whole. And if you look at the whole, you lose sight of the individual.

Well, right now he says, he's addressing everyone. He's addressing everyone. He's looking at the whole picture. So when that happens, what thought can come to somebody's mind? Well, he's so busy. He's doing so much stuff. He's got so much to do. And only he can do it. He can't even pass it on to somebody else. Only he can do it.

So I mean, if I do a little something, a little haram with a lowercase h here and there. Not a capital H. It's not like a font size 30 haram. It's like a font size 8 haram. He's not going to. He's got entire galaxies to run. There are black holes in the universe that have swallowed entire star systems. Pretty sure he's busy with that. And then there's so much going on in the world. Come on. My little discretion. A little bit of cheating on the taxes here and there. Come on. He's not going to be worried about that. Because even look, he said himself, كل يوم هو في شأن So you know, that's okay.

And what does Allah do? Allah will answer that question. Allah will answer that question. And He will answer it sarcastically that pierces through the heart. He'll say, سنفرغ لكم أيها الثقلان We shall free ourselves up for you then. That's what's coming next. He'll say, we're going to free ourselves up for you.

Because the thought can come in someone's mind, Ah, he's busy. You know, even if judgment day happens, I'll be in the back like, like a large crowd is going into Jannah, I'll just kind of, you know, sneak in. You know, this is something when I have these kinds of ideas in their head. Allah says, okay, I'll free myself up for you. And that's what we're going to be dealing with next.

And as I leave you, just, you know, فبأي آلاء ربكم ما تكذبان

The Beautiful Structure of the Surah

You know, because we reached the end, I know I've taken a long session with you. I want to show you something really pretty because I made it. This is, we've done three sections. The first, I call the first section just the word Ar-Rahman. So, it says section two right now. The second section was, he taught the Qur'an, he created the human being, and he taught Bayan. So, you see a little symmetry here? It opens with teaching and it closes with teaching. And we're in the middle. And which is remarkable because the human being is just supposed to be surrounded by learning.

So, now we go to the larger section that we just finished. This is section three. Ayah number five all the way to ayah number 28 what we just did. So, he talked about the sun and the moon and the cosmic order. Remember that? Then he talked about land. When I say from beauty to necessity, what am I referring to? Fruits to crop. Beauty to necessity. Then he talked about the start of human kind and jinn kind. خلق الإنسان من صلصال كالفخار وخلق الجان من مارج من نار Then he talked about the sky again, the sunrise and the sunset. And then he talked about the sea from beauty all the way to necessity like pearls and coral all the way to sailing ships which is necessity. And then he talked about the end of human beings and jinns. Everyone shall die. Remember? We just did that. And then at the end he says everyone is in the skies and the earth are asking of him. This is what we did so far.

Now I want you to notice something. I'll show you this again. The sky was mentioned twice. You see that? And then the land from beauty to necessity and the sea from beauty to necessity. And then human beings from start and the human beings to the end. You see that? And now there are three components here. There's three components here. There's sky meaning earth, sky and human beings. So he says everyone in the skies and the earth is asking him. The concluding comment.

And that's your... When I was telling you like how the Qur'an is organized, like how Allah organized the subject matter, you see how beautifully... It's not just the PowerPoint that's pretty. It's like this. The organization is incredible in the way Allah speaks, in the way He organizes our thoughts.

Coming up next time in this Surah Ar-Rahman series. The Qur'an uses humor. The Qur'an uses sarcasm. The Qur'an expresses emotion. And we cannot look at the Qur'an all the time literally. We can't. Allah for example will say hearts became hard like rocks. You cannot look at that literally. Allah says the sun was sinking into muddy water. The sun was not sinking into muddy water. That's how it looked. Like the... I love watching the sun drown into the Pacific Coast. The West Coast. The sun is not drowning into the coast. That's how it looks. This is the language of literature not the language of science.