1. Why the Hypocrite Takes the Longest Passage

Two reasons. First, there are different types and levels of hypocrite. Second, and more telling, the munāfiq is simply hard to define. The person of taqwā is clear — good within, good without. The kāfir is clear — bad within, bad without. But the hypocrite is neither here nor there: good on the surface, corrupt underneath, and forever shifting between the two. Ambiguity needs more words to pin down than clarity does.

2. The Word Munāfiq: The Tunnel of the Dabb

The word comes from nafaq — a tunnel. But the image turns on the difference between a burrow and a tunnel. A rabbit’s burrow has one opening: one way in, one way out, a door the animal must stand and defend because it has no other. The dabb, the desert lizard, digs a tunnel with two openings. When danger comes from one end, it bolts out the other. It never has to commit to a position; it always keeps an escape route.

That is the hypocrite exactly. When the Muslims are winning, he says, “We are with you — one of you.” When the tide turns toward the Quraysh, he slips out the far exit: “We are your friends; we’ve been helping you all along.” A bestie to both — though the word best can only ever have one.

There is a fitting detail in how the Arabs still hunt the dabb. Because the tunnel has many mouths, it is never a one-man job. A group drives into the desert, finds the holes, and floods them with water from a hose. Not knowing which exit the animal will take, they watch every opening at once — and take it the moment it surfaces. The very feature meant to keep it safe is what exposes it. (A note in passing: the dabb is ḥalāl, though the Prophet ﷺ did not eat it himself, as it was unfamiliar to his people.)

3. How the Hypocrites Came to Be

When the Muslims made the Hijrah, they were not yet strong. In that first year Madīnah held three groups: the Muslims — some 300-plus men, perhaps close to a thousand souls with their families, in a city of six or seven thousand, a ruling minority; the Jews, in three tribes (the Qaynuqāʿ, the Naḍīr, and the Qurayẓah); and the pagans, still free to worship their idols. There were no Christians in Madīnah.

Here a point of definition matters. When the moment of decision came, the pagans faced a choice the Jews did not — because being a Jew is a matter of ethnicity as well as religion. You can change your religion; you cannot change your lineage, any more than a Malay can decide to be Chinese. So the religious conversions that followed came from the pagans, whose religion put no such barrier in the way.

The decisive moment was the Battle of Badr, in the second year of Hijrah. 313 Muslims, badly equipped — not all of them even had swords, and those they had were feeble, because they had never set out expecting war — faced roughly a thousand Quraysh, armed to the hilt, one of the largest armies Arabia had yet seen. And the Muslims won decisively; the leading men of Quraysh were killed. The politics of the peninsula turned in a day. Islam was here to stay.

Badr is also a lesson in how planning and reliance on Allah fit together. The Muslims were aided by angels — but you do not put angels in your plan. You make du’ā for help and Allah sends it however He wills, but you prepare with the means actually in front of you. You cannot study three chapters of ten and expect an angel to whisper the rest in your ear during the exam. Do your utmost; then trust Him for what lies beyond your reach.

After Badr, the pagans understood there was no future on the losing side, and no ethnic wall to shelter behind as the Jews had. Their only way to keep standing and influence was to profess Islam outwardly. For many, the profession was hollow — and this is the origin of the hypocrites. There were none in the first year of Hijrah; they appeared only in the second, once outward Islam became the price of relevance.

4. The Leader of the Hypocrites: ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy

The munāfiqūn had a head: ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy ibn Salūl. To understand him, return to pre-Islamic Madīnah, then called Yathrib — home to Arabs and Jews. The Arabs were two main tribes, the Aws and the Khazraj, locked in a feud that had run for decades and killed off the senior leaders on both sides. It was exhaustion with that un-winnable war that finally led them to invite the Prophet ﷺ from Makkah to lead them.

Ibn Ubayy was the most senior figure left standing, and he had expected the leadership of Madīnah to fall to him by default. But the rival tribe would never accept a ruler drawn from the enemy they had fought for a generation — so the people reached past their own factions for a neutral leader, and invited the Prophet ﷺ. Ibn Ubayy was left jealous and bitter: the leadership was supposed to be mine. He and his followers stayed pagan at first, betting the Muslims would soon be gone. When Badr proved otherwise, he “accepted” Islam with his tongue while nursing the grievance in his heart — and so led the hypocrites, later feeding the weak points of Madīnah to the Quraysh, telling each side what it wanted to hear.

5. Ayah 8 — “We believe” (but they do not)

وَمِنَ ٱلنَّاسِ مَن يَقُولُ ءَامَنَّا بِٱللَّهِ وَبِٱلْيَوْمِ ٱلْـَٔاخِرِ وَمَا هُم بِمُؤْمِنِينَ

Wa mina al-nāsi man yaqūlu āmannā billāhi wa bil-yawmi al-ākhiri wa mā hum bi-mu’minīn.

“And among the people are those who say, ‘We believe in Allah and in the Last Day,’ but they are not believers.”

Walking the words: wa — and; min al-nās — among the people; man yaqūlu — those who say; āmannā billāhi wa bil-yawmi al-ākhir — we believe in Allah and the Last Day; wa mā hum bi-mu’minīn — but they are not believers. They claim faith in Allah and the Hereafter, and Allah Himself overturns the claim: they never had īmān at all. The mouth says one thing; the heart holds another.

From this comes a principle worth carrying. The Prophet ﷺ and many companions knew the hypocrites — Jibrīl named them through revelation — yet Ibn Ubayy was never punished for his hypocrisy. Because we judge people by their outward actions, not their intentions. Intention is known to Allah alone; it is a matter between a person and their Lord. The Prophet ﷺ had revelation; we do not. So the lesson is a careful balance: take people at face value — do not accuse, do not presume to read hearts — but stay discerning. Where the signs of untrustworthiness are clear, you guard yourself accordingly, without ever making an accusation about what lies inside another person.

6. Ayah 9 — The Deception That Rebounds

يُخَـٰدِعُونَ ٱللَّهَ وَٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ وَمَا يَخْدَعُونَ إِلَّآ أَنفُسَهُمْ وَمَا يَشْعُرُونَ

Yukhādiʿūna Allāha wa alladhīna āmanū, wa mā yakhdaʿūna illā anfusahum wa mā yashʿurūn.

“They think to deceive Allah and those who believe, but they deceive none but themselves — and they perceive it not.”

They imagine they can slip their disbelief past Allah — that He does not see the pretence — and past the believers with Him. But the deception lands on no one but themselves; they are the ones who end at the losing end. And the closing phrase, wa mā yashʿurūn — “they do not even perceive it” — is the sharpest edge of the ayah: the trap has closed on them, and they cannot even feel it.

7. Ayah 10 — The Disease of the Heart

فِى قُلُوبِهِم مَّرَضٌ فَزَادَهُمُ ٱللَّهُ مَرَضًا وَلَهُمْ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌۢ بِمَا كَانُوا۟ يَكْذِبُونَ

Fī qulūbihim maraḍun fa-zādahumu Allāhu maraḍā, wa lahum ʿadhābun alīmun bimā kānū yakdhibūn.

“In their hearts is a disease, so Allah has increased their disease; and for them is a painful punishment for the lies they used to tell.”

Allah names hypocrisy a disease (maraḍ) of the heart — and rather than cure it, He increases it. A quick distinction of terms: nifāq is the hypocrisy; munāfiq is the hypocrite himself. For them is ʿadhāb alīm, a painful punishment, earned by their persistent lying.

The word alīm carries more than the translation shows, and it turns on pronunciation. ʿAlīm, opened with an ʿayn, means “most knowledgeable.” Alīm, opened with a hamzah, means “painful.” The whole meaning rides on that first letter — which is why precise recitation (makhraj) is a necessity, not a refinement.

The root of pain is alam; alīm is its intensified form. That extra yā’ — the -īm pattern — is a form of hyperbole: not exaggeration in the sense of something untrue, but intensification to the extreme. It is the same pattern as Ar-Raḥīm, which is not merely “merciful” but extremely merciful. So alīm is not just pain, but pain at its utmost.

And the pattern carries a second dimension: it is continuously increasing. A punishment that does not merely hurt but keeps growing worse. The reason Allah frames it this way cuts against something we know from experience — in this world, pain eases as we grow used to it. The first time you stretch into the splits it feels like torture; do it daily and the body adjusts until it is nothing. Walk fifteen kilometres in forty-degree heat with long stretches of no shade, and the five-minute walk to the masjid the next day feels like nothing at all. We adapt. The punishment of Jahannam is built so that no one ever adapts: each time the person thinks “I can bear this now,” it deepens; “I think I’ve adjusted,” and it deepens again — continuous, escalating, with no floor to settle onto.

The same -īm pattern, turned toward mercy, gives Ar-Raḥīm — and here the contrast is worth holding. Ar-Raḥmān is the mercy Allah extends to everyone in this world; Ar-Raḥīm is the mercy reserved for the believers in Jannah. And like alīm, it is ever-increasing, but toward the good. In this world even what we love grows stale; we get used to it and it becomes the new normal. In Jannah the delight only ever improves — better, and better, and better, without end.

8. ʿAẓīm vs Alīm: Whose Punishment Is Worse?

Set the two endings side by side. Ayah 7, of the kāfir, closes: wa lahum ʿadhābun ʿaẓīm— “a great punishment.” Ayah 10, of the munāfiq, closes: wa lahum ʿadhābun alīm — “a painful punishment.” Note that ʿaẓīm, “great,” is a neutral intensifier: one can be greatly foolish or greatly brilliant. It magnifies without saying good or bad.

So whose is worse? On the strength of the language, the munāfiq’s. ʿAẓīm describes a punishment that is great; alīm describes one that is painful and continuously increasing. The hypocrite’s does not merely match the disbeliever’s in scale — it deepens without end. And fittingly so: the hypocrite knew the truth, professed it with his tongue, and betrayed it in his heart.

Next week, in shā’ Allāh, we continue into the hypocrites’ passage — and our quiz will cover up to Ayah 10, including the characteristics of the People of Taqwā and the definitions of the kāfir, so keep them memorized.

There is a small episode in the sīrah that we rarely dwell on, and yet it teaches us almost everything we need to know about how to live as Muslims in a hostile world.

Just before the Battle of Badr, the Messenger ﷺ sent a small group of companions on a reconnaissance mission — to track a Quraysh caravan making its way back towards Mecca. It was not a military expedition. They were sent only to observe. But when the Ṣaḥāba followed the caravan, they saw that it was a rich one, lightly guarded, and easily taken.

You have to understand what that caravan meant to them. Much of what those caravans carried had been stripped from the Muslims during the hijrah. When they migrated, their homes and possessions were seized by the Quraysh. So to the Muhājirīn, every passing caravan was a reminder of what had been stolen — and a chance to take it back.

But as they drew closer to Mecca, they fell into a dilemma. It was the last day of Rajab, one of the sacred months, in which — since the time of Ibrāhīm ʿalayhi s-salām — no violence was to be initiated. Wait one more day, and the caravan would slip into the sanctuary of Mecca, untouchable. Attack today, and violate the sanctity of Rajab. They chose to attack. Some of the Quraysh were killed, the caravan was seized, and it was brought back to Medina.

The Messenger ﷺ refused to accept it. This had been a reconnaissance mission, he said; they were not to kill; this was the sacred month. And the Quraysh, seizing their chance, made a spectacle of it: Look at these Muslims. They claim to inherit the way of Ibrāhīm, and here they are shedding blood in the sacred month.

So how did Allah teach us to read this event? The Muslims had done something wrong — but they were of us. Do we defend our own at all costs?

يَسْأَلُونَكَ عَنِ الشَّهْرِ الْحَرَامِ قِتَالٍ فِيهِ ۖ قُلْ قِتَالٌ فِيهِ كَبِيرٌ ۖ وَصَدٌّ عَن سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ وَكُفْرٌ بِهِ وَالْمَسْجِدِ الْحَرَامِ وَإِخْرَاجُ أَهْلِهِ مِنْهُ أَكْبَرُ عِندَ اللَّهِ ۚ وَالْفِتْنَةُ أَكْبَرُ مِنَ الْقَتْلِ

“They ask you about fighting in the sacred month. Say: fighting therein is a great sin — but barring people from the path of Allah, disbelief in Him, keeping people from the Sacred Mosque, and driving out its people, that is greater in the sight of Allah. And persecution is worse than killing.” (al-Baqarah 2:217)

Notice what Allah does here. He says two things at once, and He holds on to both.

First: “Qul qitālun fīhi kabīr” — say it plainly, it is a grave sin. The wrongdoing is named, and it is named even though the wrongdoers were Muslims. We call a spade a spade, no matter who holds it. When it is our own family, our own community, our own religion — it makes no difference. Justice comes before tribe. What is wrong is wrong.

But in the same breath, Allah refuses to let the Quraysh get away with their selective framing. Look at the Muslims, they kill in the sacred month — yes, but look at the fuller picture. Why did the Muslims retaliate as they did? History did not begin with that expedition. It began long before, with a people persecuted, tortured, robbed, and driven from their homes. What do you expect when you oppress a people for years?

Both truths, together. The wrong is a wrong. And the wrong did not fall out of a clear sky.

Twenty-five years

Today, twenty-five years ago, a group of Muslims attacked the World Trade Center, and they did it in the name of our religion. This āyah could not be more relevant to us.

Qul qitālun fīhi kabīr. Killing civilians, killing non-combatants, is ḥarām. When Muslims go to war, we are bound by the rules of engagement the Messenger ﷺ himself laid down: the innocent are not to be harmed. People going to work; strangers boarding a plane — that is mass murder. It is ḥarām, and we condemn it without hesitation and without qualification.

But we do not read the event in a vacuum. History did not begin twenty-five years ago. Al-Qāʿida did not appear from nowhere. Its founder, Osama bin Laden, was among the mujahideen the United States itself armed and funded through the CIA in Afghanistan, when Afghanistan was a proxy battlefield against the Soviets. When that war ended, the fighters remained — and a superpower that had defined itself against one enemy went looking for another.

Noam Chomsky, writing in the very year the Soviet Union dissolved, said America would need a new enemy, and the Muslim world was the convenient one. Instil fear of Muslims in the public, and the public will accept an almost limitless spend on war. And follow the money: Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate in economics, put the cost of the “War on Terror” at somewhere between four and six trillion dollars — of which a huge share went to a handful of private companies.

Three thousand people died on that September morning. In the wars that followed, in Afghanistan and Iraq and beyond, the dead numbered in the millions. This was not the doing of ordinary Americans, most of whom wanted no part of it. It was the doing of a small circle who understood one thing: fear is profitable.

Because that is what Islamophobia is. It is not just a prejudice sitting in people’s hearts. It is an industry — a multi-billion-dollar one. Billions are spent on it on purpose: on films, on news coverage, on think tanks and media campaigns built to keep the fear alive, because as long as the fear is alive, the spending continues and someone, somewhere, keeps getting paid. We are not imagining the hostility. It is manufactured, it is funded, and it turns a profit. And we still live inside that campaign today.

The anger is real. And it is justified.

The anger is real. And much of it is justified.

When we saw the photographs from Abu Ghraib — prisoners stripped, hooded, piled on top of one another, dragged on leashes, made to stand on boxes with wires at their fingertips; women among them abused, some raped — that anger was not irrational. It was what any human heart feels in front of something monstrous. When we learned of Guantánamo Bay — men held for years without charge, without trial, without a court to answer to; force-fed, tortured, some of them entirely innocent, released two decades later with an apology from no one — that anger was not a sickness in us. It was our conscience doing exactly what Allah made it to do.

Islam does not ask you to feel nothing in the face of injustice. The Prophet ﷺ taught that the one who sees a wrong and does not even hate it in his heart has reached the weakest edge of faith. To be unmoved by cruelty is not piety. So do not let anyone shame you for the anger. The anger is a sign that your heart is still alive.

But the anger is real — and what we do with it is everything.

The same anger that can build can also burn. Channelled rightly, it becomes patience, resolve, service, truth spoken to power, a community that will not be broken. Channelled wrongly, it becomes the very thing our enemies are praying we become — and when a handful act wrongly out of real grievance, it is not they alone who pay. It is the whole ummah. It is the woman in the hijab spat at on the train the next morning. It is the child at school who now carries a name that frightens people. It is the masjid firebombed, the visa refused, the checkpoint, the watchlist. One reckless act, born of real pain, hands our persecutors the exact story they have spent fortunes trying to write.

So the question is not should we be angry. The question is the harder one: what do we do with it?

There are three things we need to do — and we can, and should, begin with them now.

The first: establish the salah

The Islamophobia industry is not new. Using entertainment and influence to smear Muslims and turn people against them was done to the Prophet ﷺ and the earliest Muslims. Abu Jahl paid singers and poets — he funded the “Hollywood” of his day — to drown out the message of the Prophet ﷺ and to spread fear and contempt for the Muslims of Mecca. And later, in Medina, the Ahl al-Kitāb ran their own smear campaigns against the Muslims. The first generation knew exactly what it was to be lied about, laughed at, and hated by people who had never met them.

So what is Allah’s response to that? When the Qur’an speaks of the deep hatred some harboured towards the believers — “wadda kathīrun min ahli l-kitāb”, how many wished to turn you back from your religion, out of envy — look at what Allah tells us to do:

وَأَقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ وَآتُوا الزَّكَاةَ

“And establish the prayer, and give the zakat.” (al-Baqarah 2:110)

Two commands, and the first is wa aqīmu ṣ-ṣalāta — establish the prayer. Prayer centres us. It gives us purpose. When we pray, we are holding on to something far greater than us — greater than all of the worlds. We are doing it for the Lord of the Worlds. We are talking to our Creator.

That is where our strength comes from. Without Allah we are nothing, and nothing brings us closer to Him than the salah. A community rooted in that connection cannot be goaded into losing itself — because what matters most to it is not the headlines. It is the sujūd.

The second: give the zakat

Wa ātū z-zakāh — and give the zakat. If salah is how we hold our relationship with Allah, zakat is how we hold our relationship with everyone else. And this — not violence, and not even argument — is how the smear is actually defeated.

We cannot out-spend the Islamophobia industry. Billions go into it; we do not have billions to counter it. But if each and every one of us becomes a torchbearer of the prophetic akhlāq — so that at your workplace, when someone is in trouble, short of money, facing an emergency, the first thought in the room is: find the Muslim, he’ll help. So that on your street, the neighbours simply know: that household is always ready, always going out of its way. So that when your colleague reads something ugly about Muslims online, a quieter voice answers inside them: that can’t be the whole truth — the Muslim two doors down was the one who showed up when we had nothing.

There are seventy thousand Muslims in this city. If each of us leaves a real impression on just four or five people, there is scarcely a soul in Perth who has not had a good, first-hand encounter with a Muslim. And that one real experience will do what no argument can — it cancels out the billions spent to make us into monsters. We change one mind at a time. One house at a time. Door to door, we carry the prophetic torch, and no smear campaign, however well-funded, can outlast it.

The third: know the seerah

The third thing is that we must know the sīrah of our Prophet ﷺ — well enough that when a colleague or a neighbour repeats the old line that Islam is a religion spread by the sword, we can answer it.

There is a book worth knowing here, written by a non-Muslim: the American historian Juan Cole, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace Amid the Clash of Empires. His argument is that the Prophet ﷺ was not a prophet of war or of terror, but a prophet of peace, and that his whole life bends towards that end.

Look at the world he was sent into. Arabia was lawless, war and raiding everywhere, the wider world locked in the clash of two superpowers, the Romans and the Persians. He did not bring war into that world; he inherited it, and he spent his life trying to end it. Victorious at Badr, he pardoned prisoners. Defeated at Uhud, he forbade the mutilation of his enemies. Master of Mecca at the height of his power, he looked at the people who had tortured his companions and driven him from his home and said, “Idhhabū fa-antum ṭulaqāʾ” — go, you are free, there is no blame upon you today.

And look at what peace did for this dīn. At Badr there were 313 believers, and the growth was slow. By Ḥudaybiyyah, perhaps 1,400. But in the two years of peace that the treaty of Ḥudaybiyyah bought — a treaty so lopsided against the Muslims that the companions could barely accept it, and which the Prophet ﷺ signed anyway because he wanted the fighting to stop — Islam grew from 1,400 to 10,000. And in the years after the conquest of Mecca, it grew again, to 120,000. Islam grew best in peace, because our Prophet ﷺ was, as the Qur’an names him, wa mā arsalnāka illā raḥmatan li-l-ʿālamīn — and We did not send you except as a mercy to the worlds.

So today, twenty-five years on from an event that changed the world, we come back to where we always come back to.

Feel the anger; it means your heart is alive. But do not let those who profit from your rage decide what you do with it. Bring it to Allah in the prayer. Then take it out into the world as mercy — the generosity, the kindness, the compassion of the Prophet ﷺ, who knew, better than any of us, what to do with the anger.

Wa aqīmu ṣ-ṣalāta wa ātū z-zakāh.

Where we are in the story

Last week we finished the first story of the surah — the Aṣḥāb al-Kahf, the people of the cave — and drew out its lessons. Through that story Alla…

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This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 34 - 44.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

We are in Part One of Surah Al-Baqarah, which deals with the types of people. Recall that the division of the surah into parts is not divine — these are scholarly aids to help us navigate the terrain of the surah. At a glance the Quran can seem to move from theme to theme without order, but beneath the surface lies a coherent, beautiful s…

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Where we are in the story

Last week we finished the story of the Aṣḥāb al-Kahf — the people of the cave. Who were they? A group of young men who fled a comfortable life in the city to save their īmān. There was a king, a tyrant, forcing the people to abandon the worship of Allah. So these youth escaped, and Allah made the cave safe and comfortable for them for 309 years.

When they woke — three centuries later — the first thing on their minds was hunger. Let us send one of us into town for food. But the man who went was dressed in a fashion three hundred years out of date, so a shopkeeper called the palace guards, who arrested him and brought him before the king. And this was a new king altogether — a pious ruler who worshipped Allah and had heard the story of these courageous young men. Curious, he asked to be taken to them. The man led the king and his entourage to the foot of the hill and went up ahead to reassure his friends. And there the story of the cave closes.

The first great lesson of the surah runs through all of it: īmān comes first. That Allah alone is worshipped is our non-negotiable line — a matter of faith we never bargain over. And this is one of the very tests of the Dajjāl, who will come near the end of time claiming to be god, forcing people to worship him. Obey him, and you are promised wealth, comfort, a full stomach. Refuse, and you may have to flee to a cave, away from the luxuries of the world. The Aṣḥāb al-Kahf show us the answer: choose Allah, and Allah will facilitate your affairs. They left the city, and Allah made the cave comfortable — bending the sunlight from their faces, turning them as they slept, placing the dog at the entrance to keep others away. Comfort, safety, and security are with Allah.

The surah still holds four more stories, and this was the first lesson: the test of faith towards the end of time. When you sacrifice everything for Allah, Allah takes care of you.

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Ayah 27 — the Qur’an is our cave

وَاتْلُ مَا أُوحِيَ إِلَيْكَ مِن كِتَابِ رَبِّكَ لَا مُبَدِّلَ لِكَلِمَاتِهِ وَلَن تَجِدَ مِن دُونِهِ مُلْتَحَدًا

“And recite what has been revealed to you from the Book of your Lord. There is no changing His words, and you will never find any refuge besides Him.”

Why does this āyah — now recite what has been revealed to you — come immediately after the story of the cave? The mufassirīn mention two things.

First, it is the answer. Remember why the surah was revealed: to answer a challenge from the Quraysh, who had taken their questions from wise men among the People of the Book. They were told that only a true prophet would know this story, so they came and demanded: tell us about the people of the cave. Allah revealed the surah, and its opening is the answer to that first question. And because the story as transmitted through generations of the People of the Book may differ in places from the truth, Allah now says: stand firm. This is the truth. Allah knows what happened. Tell them, and do not worry whether they accept it. Your duty is only to convey — tablīgh, to recite. There is no changing the words of Allah, because this is the word of God Almighty — not fickle like human speech. This is the truth of what happened.

Second — and this is for us. Some of the mufassirīn read it this way: today we do not need to find a cave and hide in it. Our cave is the Qur’an. Now that we know the challenges out there — the trials of faith, the fitnah of the end of time — where do we take refuge? Recite what has been revealed to you. The Qur’an is our cave. It is our protection. And the āyah tells us plainly: you will never find any refuge besides Him — no protection except the protection of Allah, and the best of that protection comes through our attachment to His Book.

So the first shelter from every trial — from the Dajjāl himself — is to attach ourselves to the Qur’an. This is crucial: daily recitation, memorisation, understanding, a life guided by the Qur’an. This is number one.

Ayah 28 — keep good company

وَاصْبِرْ نَفْسَكَ مَعَ الَّذِينَ يَدْعُونَ رَبَّهُم بِالْغَدَاةِ وَالْعَشِيِّ يُرِيدُونَ وَجْهَهُ وَلَا تَعْدُ عَيْنَاكَ عَنْهُمْ تُرِيدُ زِينَةَ الْحَيَاةِ الدُّنْيَا وَلَا تُطِعْ مَنْ أَغْفَلْنَا قَلْبَهُ عَن ذِكْرِنَا وَاتَّبَعَ هَوَاهُ وَكَانَ أَمْرُهُ فُرُطًا

“And keep yourself patiently with those who call upon their Lord morning and evening, seeking His face. Do not turn your eyes away from them, desiring the adornment of worldly life. And do not obey one whose heart We have made heedless of Our remembrance, who follows his desire and whose affair is ever in excess.”

Here is the second protection: surround yourself with good people, good company.Be steadfast with those who worship Allah and call upon Him morning and evening, seeking nothing but His pleasure.

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This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 32 - 36.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

1. About the Text and Its Author

Matn Abī Shujāʿ is a short treatise (not a poem) detailing the rulings of fiqh according to the Shāfiʿī school. The English poem used in class is a translated rendering; the original is prose.

• Author: Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Iṣfahānī, known as Qāḍī Abū Shujāʿ.

• Origin: Isfahan, in Persia (modern Iran).

• Death and burial: He passed away in Madinah and is buried in al-Baqīʿ, the graveyard beside Masjid al-Nabawī.

The first book of the treatise is the Book of Purification (Kitāb al-Ṭahārah). It opens with the seven waters — waters that are fit to purify.

2. The Four Categories of Water

Water is divided into four categories, each with its own ruling.

Category 1 — Muṭlaq (Pure and Purifying)

Muṭlaq water is both pure and purifying. A useful comparison: soap is clean and cleansing — “clean” means it is not dirty, “cleansing” means it can clean something else. In the same way:

• Pure means the water itself is not filth (najis).

• Purifying means it can be used to purify something else.

Muṭlaq water is naturally occurring — it comes either from the sky or from the ground. From it come the seven waters:

• Rain falling from the clouds

• Sea water

• River water

• Well water

• Spring water

• Snow (from mountain summits)

• Hail

Note on tap and bottled water: These are not listed by name, but they are still pure and purifying because they originate from these seven sources — rain collected in a dam, sea water processed through desalination, river water, spring water, or a bore drawn from a well. The summary principle: water that comes from the sky above or from the ground below is naturally occurring, pure, and purifying.

Category 2 — Mushammas (Sun-Heated Water)

Mushammas is water left in a metal container and exposed to intense sun. The metal requirement is essential — water heated in plastic, clay, or other non-metal containers does not become mushammas. It also requires genuine heat: a mild warm day does not qualify, but extreme heat (for example, 40°C+) does.

• Ruling: Still pure and still purifying, but its use is makrūh (disliked).

• Once the water cools, the dislike (karāhah) ends and it returns to muṭlaq.

Category 3 — Mustaʿmal (Used Water)

There are two types of mustaʿmal:

• Water that has already been used for wuḍūʾ or ghusl — it cannot be reused for purification.

• Water mixed with something pure that changes its properties — for example, coffee. It can still be drunk, but it cannot be used for wuḍūʾ.

Ruling: Pure, and may be drunk, but no longer purifying.

Category 4 — Mutanajjis (Impure Water)

Water that has become contaminated — for example, a bird droppings falling into a container of water.

• Ruling: No longer pure and no longer purifying. It may not be drunk, cooked with, or used.

The exception — Two Qullahs: If the water is a large volume — two qullahs, roughly 200 litres — then a small amount of impurity does not affect it. However, if the water’s colour, smell, or taste changes, it becomes mutanajjis regardless of volume.

Illustration: Sea water is far more than two qullahs. But in places where large numbers of animals are killed and the sea water visibly turns red, the change in colour means that water has become mutanajjis — because a defining property has changed.

3. Skins of Dead Animals (Maitah)

Maitah is an animal that dies without being properly slaughtered.

• Base ruling: Maitah is najis — the entire animal, including the meat and the skin.

• The exception (dibāgh / tanning): When the skin is tanned and turned into leather, it becomes pure. This is why leather goods (a belt, a bag, a boot) do not need to be checked for whether the animal was slaughtered — turning skin into leather is itself the tanning that purifies it.

How tanning works: The fat and any parts that would decompose are removed using a sharp tool and treated with acid, chemicals, or certain plants. Once tanned, the skin is no longer najis.

Exception to the exception: Two animals whose skins remain najis even after tanning — the dog and the pig.

Definition of “dog” in fiqh: a canine that barks. This is a precise definition:

• Wolves are canines but do not bark — so they are not classed as dogs here.

• Foxes are canines but do not bark.

• Hyenas do not bark.

• Cats are not canines at all (they are feline).

4. Why This Order? Process and System Thinking

The sequence of chapters is deliberate. Once you have found water, you need a way to carry and store it — and the most common container historically was the leather pouch. So the chapter on water is followed directly by the ruling on skins.

The traditional scholars are training a way of thinking: disciplined, ordered, systematic. We do not think haphazardly; we arrange ideas into a process that is beneficial and useful. This applies well beyond fiqh — it is a life skill.

Example — brainstorming. An undisciplined brainstorm drifts from the actual goal into unrelated tangents. Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats method disciplines the process: you deliberately wear one “hat” at a time (for example, a green hat for all possibilities, then a red hat for risks), each for a set time. Structured thinking is more productive. Reading traditional texts (turāth, meaning “traditional”) trains this same disciplined, step-by-step approach.

5. Bones and Hair

Since the discussion is already about dead animals, the text settles their bones and hair as well — because when you come across a dead animal, you find not only skin but bones and hair too.

• The bones and hair of a maitah are najis. Tanning (dibāgh) cannot be applied to hair, so they remain impure.

• If the animal was properly slaughtered, there is no problem.

• Exception: the remains of a human being. Because God has honoured the children of Adam, that honour extends to human bone and skin — they are not najis.

6. Gold and Silver Vessels

Continuing the theme of containers: some wealthy people would use vessels of gold and silver.

• Ruling: It is not permitted to use vessels made of gold or silver.

• Reason: Gold and silver are a medium of exchange — currency that holds value. Using them as everyday vessels is a sheer display of excess, which Islam discourages.

• Vessels of any other material are permitted.

Bone china: Some of the most expensive plates are made of “bone china” — bone of certain animals crushed and mixed into a fine porcelain. Recall the ruling on bones: if the animal was not slaughtered, it is maitah, and therefore najis.

7. The Siwāk

The Siwāk is anything coarse enough to clean the teeth and mouth — it can be a toothbrush, a cloth, or even a finger. The Prophet ﷺ used a stick from the arāk tree.

Its importance and reward:

• The Prophet ﷺ said that were it not for the fear of making it difficult for his ummah, he would have made the siwāk obligatory — at every wuḍūʾ (in one narration) or at every prayer (in another).

• Oral hygiene is emphasised in Islam. Eating foul-smelling food and then going to the masjid is makrūh; one should clean the mouth first.

• Praying with a siwāk is reported to carry many times the reward of praying without one.

When to use it — general: The siwāk is praiseworthy at every time and everywhere. The Prophet ﷺ would use it before entering his house, so that his family would be comfortable in his company.

Exception — the fasting person: For someone fasting, using the siwāk after midday (around Ẓuhr) is no longer sunnah.

Three times it is especially recommended:

• When the mouth’s odour changes — for example, after being silent for a long time or not having eaten or drunk for a while.

• Upon waking from sleep.

• When rising to pray.

That concludes this lesson. Until next week, in shāʾ Allāh.

We are working through Surah Al-Baqarah, and by now the introduction should be second nature.

• Meaning of the surah: The Female Cow

• Number of ayat: 286

• Place of revelation: Madinah — this is an early Madani surah, one of the earliest revealed after the Hijrah

Surahs are classified by when they were revealed, not simply where:

• Makki — revealed before the Hijrah

• Madani — revealed after the Hijrah. A surah can even be revealed physically in Makkah, but if it came after the Hijrah, it is still Madani.

Virtue of the surah: On the Day of Judgement, Surah Al-Baqarah and its “twin,” Surah Aali ‘Imran, will come like clouds to protect those who used to recite them.

2. The Nine Divisions of the Surah

Surah Al-Baqarah can be organised into nine broad sections:

1. Types of people

2. First command

3. First human

4. First nation

5. Prophet Ibrahim

6. New nation (and all its laws — prayer, fasting, hajj, family, and so on)

7. Politics

8. Finance

9. Conclusion

3. Recap of Category One: The People of Taqwā

• Taqwā = mindfulness of Allah. This definition comes from the well-known exchange involving Ubayy ibn Ka’b and the imagery of walking carefully along a thorny path.

• The traits of the people of taqwā are described in Ayat 2–5.

• The final word of Ayah 5 is al-Muflihūn — “the successful ones.”

4. Understanding “Success”: Fā’iz vs Muflih

Arabic has more than one word for success, and the distinction matters.

• Fā’iz — the one who wins a competition. There is a single winner; everyone else, however well they did, is not the fā’iz.

• Muflih — comes from the root falāḥ, which we hear every day in the adhan and iqamah: “Ḥayya ‘ala al-falāḥ” (”Come to success”).

The imagery of falāḥ is agricultural — it is the success of a farmer at the point of harvest. This carries two lessons:

• It is not a competition with others. If one farmer harvests 100 kilos and another 200 kilos, both have still had a genuine, good harvest. Everyone can be a muflih by their own effort and criteria. It is a competition with yourself, not with your neighbour.

• It requires delayed gratification. You plant today but do not harvest tomorrow. You nurture the plant and wait, putting in the work in the interim.

5. Delayed Gratification in This World and the Next

Success in the akhirah comes much later — you plant now and harvest then. But the same discipline that earns success in the akhirah also brings success in this world.

• The marshmallow test: children who could wait for a larger reward tended to be more successful later in life; many who could not delay gratification struggled.

• Delayed gratification is what lets a student study now and play later, or read Qur’an now and read for leisure afterwards. Sometimes you have to grind and do the less-fun things in order to succeed.

Taqwā trains this exact characteristic in us.

6. Category Two: Al-Kāfirūn (Ayat 6–7)

Having covered the people of taqwā, we now turn to the second category of people: the kuffār (disbelievers), described in Ayat 6 and 7.

Two Layers of Meaning

Words carry at least two kinds of meaning: a literal meaning and a technical meaning.

Literal meaning: The root kafara means to cover, to bury. Literally, a kāfir can describe a farmer — the one who takes a seed, digs a hole, places it in, and covers it over with soil.

• When the farmer is planting (covering the seed), the action relates to kufr(covering).

• When the farmer is harvesting, that is falāḥ.

This gives us the picture behind the word: a kāfir is someone who receives something good (a seed) and chooses to bury it, cover it, and ignore it — “if I don’t see it, it’s not there.”

Technical Meaning

The technical meaning splits into two:

• Qur’anic meaning — someone who receives something good (guidance, Islam) and deliberately buries and rejects it.

• Fiqhī (legal) meaning — simply a non-Muslim.

7. The Qur’anic Kāfir: Al-Ghazālī’s Conditions

When the Qur’an describes the kāfir being punished in the Fire eternally (khālidīna fīhā), it is not speaking about every single non-Muslim. It refers to a very specific person: one who was properly shown Islam and knowingly rejected it.

Imam al-Ghazālī, in Al-Iqtiṣād fī al-I’tiqād, outlines the conditions for someone to be a kāfir in this Qur’anic, punishment sense:

1. He receives the da’wah in a reasonable manner — presented properly and appropriately, not through yelling, insults, or a careless “become Muslim or burn” thrown at someone.

2. His doubts and questions are answered.

3. He is given time to think and consider.

4. After all of this, he still rejects it.

A key point on condition one: in a world where the media so often portrays Islam in a bad light, many people have never genuinely encountered it in a reasonable manner. Simply living near a masjid does not count.

This is why our conduct matters so much as a minority. We are ambassadors of Islam.When a person behaves badly — parking carelessly at the masjid and blocking a neighbour, for example — people don’t blame the individual; they blame “the Muslims” and assume it reflects Islam itself.

8. Fiqhī Definition vs Qur’anic Definition

These two definitions do different jobs:

• The fiqhī definition is black and white. You are either a Muslim or a non-Muslim. A Muslim is someone who affirms the shahādah — belief in Allah and in the finality of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. It determines legal rights and responsibilities in this world.

• The Qur’anic definition concerns the akhirah and rests on reasonableness — which is subjective and known only to Allah.

A note on the sinful Muslim: a Muslim who does not pray is still a Muslim — a sinful, bad Muslim, but a Muslim — so long as he does not deny that prayer is wājib. Denial of what is clearly obligatory is a different matter from laziness or weakness.

Why the distinction matters in practice

Because reasonableness is subjective, we deal with people according to the fiqhī definition, and we leave the akhirah to Allah according to the Qur’anic definition.

• When a Muslim dies, there are four obligations upon the community: wash, shroud, pray over, and bury.

• For a non-Muslim, this checklist does not apply.

9. What We Cannot Say

We cannot point to any specific individual and declare he is going to the Fire — because we do not know whether al-Ghazālī’s conditions were met, whether his doubts were answered, or whether he accepted Islam at the very end. These are matters of the unseen, left to Allah.

• We may speak in general terms: as a group, those who do not believe in Allah and His Messenger ﷺ will not enter Jannah.

• We may not specify a named individual, because that person may not have met the conditions.

On making du’ā: we may make du’ā for a non-Muslim while they are alive, but once they have passed away as a non-Muslim, we draw the line and do not make du’ā for them. This does not mean we insult or condemn — we remain neutral and respectful.

Two real examples make the point. Telling a grieving friend that his deceased father is “going to Jahannam” is wrong both in manners and in belief. Likewise, when a convert grieving his non-Muslim mother was told at the masjid that “she died a kāfir, she is in the Fire,” that statement was wrong on both counts: disrespectful, and theologically presumptuous, because no one knows her final state.

10. The Only Exceptions

We only declare a specific person to be in the Fire when the Qur’an itself tells us so. The clearest example is Abu Lahab, named in a whole surah as bound for the Fire. Others, such as Fir’aun, are also identified in the Qur’an.

The reverse holds too: we do not guarantee Jannah for any specific person unless the Qur’an states it. In both directions, the final judgement belongs to Allah.

Our real concern should be our own standing before Allah — not passing verdicts on where others will end up.

In shā’ Allah, we continue with Ayat 6–7 next week.

Where we are in the story

Last week we stopped with Allah describing the comfort the Aṣḥāb al-Kahf — the people of the cave — were given as they slept. These were young men who fled the tyranny of a king forcing every citizen of the town to worship idols. They chose to obey Allah and gave up a comfortable life in the city to take shelter in the cave.

And Allah made that cave comfortable for them: the sunlight bending away from their faces, Allah turning them from side to side, the dog stretched at the entrance so any passer-by saw only its paws and kept their distance. When they woke, hungry, they asked one another how long they had slept. Some guessed a day, or part of a day. Others said, who cares how long — let us find food. So they sent one of them into the city, dressed in clothes now centuries out of fashion, carrying coins now centuries old. Of course he would be noticed.

He expected the worst: to be killed, or dragged back to idol worship. Instead, to his surprise, the palace held a different king, in a different time altogether. So much time had passed that the whole civilisation had changed. This is where ayah 21 begins.

Ayah 21 — the discovery, and the arguing

وَكَذَٰلِكَ أَعْثَرْنَا عَلَيْهِمْ لِيَعْلَمُوا أَنَّ وَعْدَ اللَّهِ حَقٌّ وَأَنَّ السَّاعَةَ لَا رَيْبَ فِيهَا إِذْ يَتَنَازَعُونَ بَيْنَهُمْ أَمْرَهُمْ

“And thus We caused them to be found, that they might know the promise of Allah is true, and that the Hour — there is no doubt about it. When they disputed among themselves about their affair…”

The king and his people worshipped Allah now — the tyrant was long gone, and a just ruler was in his place. But there was a live debate in that town: is there life after death? Will we be resurrected, body and soul, or soul alone while the body decomposes — or is there no ākhirah at all?

Into that debate walked this young man, in his ancient clothes and ancient coins. He explained who he was — that he and his friends had fled a persecuting king and taken refuge — though he was still cautious about saying exactly where. And the king understood at once: this settles it. Here is a man they had heard of, a courageous youth who abandoned comfort to save his īmān, standing before them centuries later. If Allah can do this, surely Allah can raise the dead. The living proof of resurrection had walked into the room. The argument about the ākhirah was over.

But then a second argument began. The king asked to be shown the cave. The young man, now safe, agreed and led them there — then went up ahead to tell his friends the news, and never came back. When the people climbed up, the cave was empty. Now a new dispute: what do we do with this place? Some said, build a structure to commemorate them. Others said, build a masjid.

And this is the running theme through these ayat: arguing about things Allah is about to criticise.

Ayah 22 — guessing in the dark

سَيَقُولُونَ ثَلَاثَةٌ رَّابِعُهُمْ كَلْبُهُمْ وَيَقُولُونَ خَمْسَةٌ سَادِسُهُمْ كَلْبُهُمْ رَجْمًا بِالْغَيْبِ وَيَقُولُونَ سَبْعَةٌ وَثَامِنُهُمْ كَلْبُهُمْ

“They will say three, the fourth of them their dog; and they say five, the sixth of them their dog — guessing at the unseen; and they say seven, the eighth of them their dog.”

Now the debate turned to numbers. How many were they? Three, and the fourth their dog? Five, and the sixth their dog? Allah describes it exactly: rajman bil-ghayb — throwing stones at the unseen, shooting in the dark. They had no idea what they were arguing about, yet they argued. Then Allah closes it:

قُل رَّبِّي أَعْلَمُ بِعِدَّتِهِم مَّا يَعْلَمُهُمْ إِلَّا قَلِيلٌ

“Say: My Lord knows best their number. None knows them except a few.”

Allah — who knows the exact count — chooses not to tell us, because the number was never the point.

The heart of these ayat: don’t get distracted

Why all this arguing — build a structure or a masjid, three or five or seven? What Allah is teaching us is this: stop debating unnecessary details.

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This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 27 - 31.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

• Meaning of the surah: “The Female Cow.”

• Number of ayat: 286.

• Nickname: The peak (summit) of the Quran.

• Virtue: On the Day of Judgement, Al-Baqarah and Ali Imran will come and shade their companions.

On dividing the surah: We are studying Al-Baqarah in nine parts. This division is a teaching aid created by scholars to help us navigate the surah — it is not divine. The order of the surahs themselves (Al-Baqarah, then Ali Imran) comes from Allah, but splitting a single surah into portions is a human tool. Others divide it into five, twenty, or a different number; none of them are “wrong.”

Part 1 covers the groups of people. We are almost finished with the first group: the people of taqwa.

Ayah 1 — Alif Lam Mim

Three lessons drawn from the opening letters:

• 1. To attract attention.

• 2. A challenge to the Arabs. If you don’t believe the Quran is from Allah, here are the very letters it is built from — produce something like it. After 1400 years the challenge stands unmet. This is not accepted on faith alone; it is historically established, because the height of Arabic eloquence was during the Prophet’s ﷺ time, and no one then could match it.

• 3. A lesson in humility. Humans do not know everything; our intellect has a limit.

Ayah 2 — Guidance for the People of Taqwa

The Quran is guidance for the people of taqwa. This links back to our central dua in Al-Fatihah — Ihdina as-sirat al-mustaqim (”Guide us to the straight path”).

Working definition of taqwa: mindfulness of Allah

Where this definition comes from: the well-known image of walking a path lined with thorns and lifting your garment to avoid being caught. That image was given by the companion Ubay ibn Ka’b, in answer to Umar ibn al-Khattab.

Taqwa is internal — you cannot see it directly — but it shows through certain characteristics, listed in the ayat that follow.

Ayah 3 — Three Characteristics of the People of Taqwa

• 3.1 — Belief in the unseen (al-ghayb).

• 3.2 — Establishing prayer (yuqimuna as-salah).

• 3.3 — Charity: “and from what We have given them, they spend.”

Why “from what We have given them” matters: everything we own comes from Allah. Allah is Al-Ghani, the Most Rich, who owns everything. If you spend the way He asks, He can give you more — His wealth is unlimited and does not run out. The Prophet ﷺ said the one who gives charity will never become poor.

⚠ Arabic to verify before publishing: the Arabic for ayah 3 (belief in the unseen, establishing prayer, and spending) arrived with encoding errors in the transcript and has been rendered in English only. Paste in clean Arabic if you want it displayed.

Ayah 4 — Belief in Revelation

Two further characteristics:

• Belief in what was sent down to you — the Quran.

• Belief in what was sent down before you — the previous scriptures.

The previous scriptures

Four scriptures total, including the Quran — so three before the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, in order:

• Tawrah — revealed to Prophet Musa.

• Zabur — revealed to Prophet Dawud.

• Injil — revealed to Prophet Isa.

Understanding the Bible

Living in a globalised world, it helps to understand the landscape of the largest religion, Christianity — close to Islam in numbers. So: which of the three scriptures is the Bible?

None of them, exactly. The Bible is not a single book — it is a collection of books. (The word itself relates to biblio, “book,” as in bibliophile and bibliography.) It contains a changed and combined version of these earlier revelations.

The Bible has two major parts:

• The Old Testament — also known as the Jewish Bible. A Jewish person referring to “the Bible” means only this. Its three major sections are abbreviated Tanakh:

  • T — Torah (believed to be what was revealed to Musa).

  • N — Nevi’im (the Prophets).

  • K — Ketuvim (the Writings). Zabur = Psalms sits here, as a book within this section.

• The New Testament — mainly the Gospels plus letters.

  • Four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. These are gospels according to each name.

  • Letters: written by Paul to the early Christian communities (e.g. the Corinthians) — his written guidance in reply to their questions.

Injil = “good news.” “Gospel” also means good news. The Injil we believe in is the Gospel of Isa — which we do not have today. What exists are gospels according to Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John. The first three are called the Synoptic Gospels and broadly agree; John often tells a different story. Historically these were written well after the named figures, in Greek, while Prophet Isa spoke Aramaic — and several authors never met him.

Contrast: the preservation of the Quran

The Quran reaches us in two independent ways that reinforce each other:

• Unbroken chain of transmission. We recite exactly as the Prophet ﷺ recited — including points of articulation and the length of each sound (e.g. reading a madd at two, four, or six harakat). A reciter’s certificate can be traced back through an unbroken chain to the Prophet ﷺ.

• Archaeological evidence. The oldest known Quran manuscript, the Birmingham Quran, held at the University of Birmingham, was carbon-dated (announced 2015) to around the time of the Prophet ﷺ. It reached Birmingham via Iraq during the British occupation and sat unidentified in the archives until a PhD student recognised it.

Side note — early Arabic script. In the Prophet’s ﷺ time Arabic was written without dots or harakat, so words were distinguished by context. A famous (unverifiable) story tells of the governor Hajjaj ibn Yusuf receiving an undotted letter that could read either uqtul (”kill”) or aqbil (”receive”) — prompting the later introduction of dots. Even today dotting isn’t fully standardised: in the Moroccan script, for example, qaf takes a single dot and final noon is written without one.

How we relate to the Bible

We believe in the original Tawrah, Zabur, and Injil as revelation. Regarding the Bible in its modern form, we hold that it contains both truth and questionable material. The Prophet ﷺ guided us: you may narrate from the Israelite sources without sin — neither believing 100% nor rejecting 100%. Where it contradicts the Quran, the Quran is Muhaiminun alaih — it stands over and supersedes the rest, because its authenticity is guaranteed. This does not mean we disrespect the Bible; it still contains revelation from Allah.

Ayah 5 — Certainty in the Akhirah & True Success

The final characteristic: the people of taqwa are certain about the akhirah. Certainty is the operative word — not vague hope, but conviction.

This certainty changes behaviour. If you are sure Allah sees you and that there are real consequences in the akhirah, you act well in public and private alike, whether or not anyone notices — because Allah knows and will compensate.

The akhirah mindset = delayed gratification

We already accept short-term discomfort for long-term reward: you study now (even though games are more fun) to earn good grades, a good job, and a good life later. That is a long-term view. Now scale it up — life on earth is roughly 80–100 years; the akhirah is forever. A smart person accepts a little discomfort now to secure eternal good.

Just as someone serious about becoming a doctor takes biology and prepares deliberately, someone serious about Jannah does the actions that lead there. Saying you want Jannah while doing none of the work is only dreaming.

The Marshmallow Test. In a well-known study, young children were left alone with one marshmallow and told that if they waited about 15 minutes without eating it, they’d get a second. Some ate immediately; some resisted and doubled their reward. Tracked into adulthood, many who couldn’t wait struggled in life, while many who waited did well. The lesson: delayed gratification is a strong predictor of success. A Muslim, trained through prayer and charity to work now for reward later, should find this second nature.

The king in the masjid (an illustrative story, chain unverified). A hooded king prayed Fajr with only a handful of people, then rewarded every person present with a free Hajj. The next morning the masjid overflowed — but the king wasn’t there. The point: people chase instantreward. Prayer trains us for the opposite — to put in the work now and collect later.

The word for “successful”: muflihun

Allah calls these people al-muflihun, the successful — from the root falah. There are other words for success (fawz, fa’izin), but the same root also gives fallah, “farmer.” A farmer is the very picture of delayed gratification: plant, water, and protect the crop now; harvest much later. Placed right after prayer, charity, and belief in the akhirah, the choice of muflihun reminds us again: put in the work now, harvest it in the akhirah.

Summary — Characteristics of the People of Taqwa

• Belief in the unseen.

• Establishing prayer.

• Spending in charity from what Allah has given.

• Belief in the Quran and in the previous scriptures.

• Certainty in the akhirah.

These are the people of guidance, and these are al-muflihun — the truly successful.

Next week: a short continuation, then the second category of people. Come prepared to list the characteristics of the people of taqwa from memory.

Why Surah al-Kahf

Rasūlullāh ﷺ encouraged us to recite Surah al-Kahf at least once a week. It protects us from the Dajjāl and from the fitnah — the trials and systems — of the Dajjāl. The Dajjāl may not be here yet, but read the surah closely and you will see the signs of what he represents already around us.

If you cannot read the whole surah, read the first ten ayat and the last ten. If you cannot manage that, read the first ten. Better still, memorise the first ten — it is not long, barely a minute or a minute and a half to recite, yet it carries barakah, protection, and a meaning that is profound when you reflect on it.

Where we are in the story

Last week we stopped at ayah 15, with the young men of the cave — the Aṣḥāb al-Kahf. Allah tells us plainly that they were youth: a group of young men who, when the whole village gave up and submitted to the tyrant of the day and worshipped idols, refused. They would not obey the creation in disobedience to the Creator. They held their faith with Allah, and as they were about to flee, they made their duʿāʾ:

رَبَّنَا آتِنَا مِن لَّدُنكَ رَحْمَةً وَهَيِّئْ لَنَا مِنْ أَمْرِنَا رَشَدًا

“Our Lord, grant us mercy from Yourself, and prepare for us right guidance in our affair.”

They asked for two things: raḥmah — mercy, care, protection — directly from Allah; and that Allah would straighten and manage their affairs as they left the city.

Ayah 16 — Allah answers the duʿāʾ

وَإِذِ اعْتَزَلْتُمُوهُمْ وَمَا يَعْبُدُونَ إِلَّا اللَّهَ فَأْوُوا إِلَى الْكَهْفِ يَنشُرْ لَكُمْ رَبُّكُم مِّن رَّحْمَتِهِ وَيُهَيِّئْ لَكُم مِّنْ أَمْرِكُم مِّرْفَقًا

“And when you have withdrawn from them and from what they worship except Allah, retreat to the cave. Your Lord will spread out for you His mercy and make your affair easy for you.”

A few ayat earlier they were speaking to Allah. Now Allah speaks directly to them. Notice the word iʿtazaltumūhum — from ʿuzlah, which is to withdraw, to go on a spiritual retreat. People go on ʿuzlah to focus on reciting or memorising Qur’an, or on their adhkār. Allah is telling them: you have withdrawn from these people and from everything they worship besides Me — now take shelter in the cave.

When you imagine a cave, you imagine a tight, claustrophobic space — a group of young men crammed in with nowhere to go. But Allah says yanshur lakum — He will spread it out, make it wide and comfortable for you. The world sees a crowded, closed space. Allah makes it vast. And He says this comes min raḥmatih, from His mercy — the very thing they had just asked for.

Then yuhayyiʾ lakum min amrikum mirfaqā — and He will make your affair easy for you. They had asked Allah to manage their affairs; Allah answers with mirfaqā. From the same root comes rafīq — a close friend whose company you truly enjoy. It is one of the last words the Prophet ﷺ spoke as he was passing: ilā r-rafīqi l-aʿlā — to the highest companion. Mirfaqā means Allah will make their affairs not merely bearable but comfortable, something they would come to love, so that they would not feel the discomfort of their situation at all.

The pattern: plan, act, then trust

Look closely at how the duʿāʾ was answered. They made duʿāʾ — and then they moved. They got up and left. Only once they were moving did Allah manage their affairs.

This is the pattern for us. You plan. You take action. You make duʿāʾ and place your trust in Allah. Then you watch how things change. The duʿāʾ is not a substitute for effort, and effort is not a substitute for tawakkul. They come together.

Ayah 17 — the detail of the cave

وَتَرَى الشَّمْسَ إِذَا طَلَعَت تَّزَاوَرُ عَن كَهْفِهِمْ ذَاتَ الْيَمِينِ وَإِذَا غَرَبَت تَّقْرِضُهُمْ ذَاتَ الشِّمَالِ وَهُمْ فِي فَجْوَةٍ مِّنْهُ ذَٰلِكَ مِنْ آيَاتِ اللَّهِ

“You would see the sun, when it rose, inclining away from their cave on the right, and when it set, passing them by on the left, while they were in an open space within it. That is from the signs of Allah.”

This is striking, because in the Qur’an many historical stories are left without detail. Who exactly were the Aṣḥāb al-Kahf? Which city? How old? What were their names? We are not told. All we know is that they were young men. The point is not their biography — the point is: protect your īmān at all costs. But where a detail serves our guidance, Allah spells it out. And here the detail of the cave is spelled out beautifully.

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This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 21 - 26.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

Tajweed Tuesday is part of our Quran at Home programme. Every Saturday, our students meet in person with their teachers. But Quran learning shouldn’t be bound by madrasah walls, so during term we release two videos a week to support parents teaching at home: Tajweed Tuesday, and Tafseer Thursday.

That last point is where this week begins.

The problem the Quraysh had

The Quraysh did not struggle with the idea of a Creator. Something cannot come from nothing, and everything around us points to an uncreated Creator. When they were asked who created the heavens and the earth, they would say: Allah.

Their problem was Yawm al-Qiyamah.

Because belief in the Day of Judgement changes how you behave. It changes your priorities. If you believe in God but not in the reckoning, you can do whatever you want — you die, and that is the end of it. The rich and the powerful can steal from the poor, oppress the weak, bomb nations and schools, and walk away from it. If there is no ākhirah, what is there to worry about?

Belief in the ākhirah takes that away. It forces a change.

Ayah 9 — Do you find this the amazing part?

أم حسبت أن أصحاب الكهف والرقيم كانوا من آياتنا عجبا

Do you think that the people of the cave and the inscription were, among Our signs, a wonder?

Al-raqīm means inscription. The story of these young men was carved into stone — as the ancients would inscribe things — and so it survived. It was known among certain Christian communities, which is exactly why the Quraysh used it to test the Prophet ﷺ. Nobody in Makkah knew this story. They had to travel outside the city to find people of the book who could tell it to them.

So Allah puts the question back to them. You accept that a group of young men slept in a cave for centuries and woke up alive — and that you find miraculous. But death and resurrection you cannot accept?

This ayah is not saying the story of the people of the cave is no sign. It is a sign, and a great one. But it is not the greatest. Why is this the thing that excites you, while you ignore what actually matters — that you will die, be resurrected, and be held to account?

Ayah 10 — The duʿāʾ on the way to the cave

إذ أوى الفتية إلى الكهف فقالوا ربنا آتنا من لدنك رحمة وهيئ لنا من أمرنا رشدا

When the youths retreated to the cave and said: our Lord, grant us mercy from Yourself, and prepare for us right guidance in our affair.

Awā means to seek protection — to move behind something and shelter there.

Notice what the Qur’an leaves out. We are not told the city, the town, the house, or the cave. This is how the Qur’an teaches history: it omits what is not relevant to the lesson, because detail distracts. If Allah had named the city, people would argue about the city. What matters is that there was a group of young men.

And Allah highlights that word — fityah. Young men.

We tend to treat the youth as the weakest link in the chain of the ummah. Children come to the masjid because their parents bring them. The elderly come because perhaps there is nothing else. And the youth are absent. Allah is addressing exactly that.

Look at the early followers of the Prophet ﷺ. The Prophet ﷺ was forty; Abu Bakr al-Siddiq رضي الله عنه was around the same age. Those are middle-aged men. But Sayyidina Ali was in his early teens. Zayd ibn Harithah, another young man. Uthman, Zubayr, Talha — teens and early twenties. They were the ones actively carrying the daʿwah.

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This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 17 - 20.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

Tajweed Tuesday is part of our Quran at Home programme. Every Saturday, our students meet in person with their teachers. But Quran learning shouldn’t be bound by madrasah walls, so during term we release two videos a week to support parents teaching at home: Tajweed Tuesday, and Tafseer Thursday.

Subscribe to our Substack to follow along.

We are studying Al-Ghayah wa’t-Taqrib, a classical short-form manual of fiqh written by Imam Abu Shuja’. Despite its brevity, this small text has been memorised and studied for close to a thousand years — from Cairo to Java, West Africa to Hadramaut. We are now continuing that same chain of transmission here in Western Australia.

What Is Fiqh?

• Literal meaning: deep understanding

• Technical meaning: ma’rifatul ahkam al-shar’iyyah — knowledge of the rulings of the Shari’ah

• These rulings apply to the af’al al-mukallafin — the actions of a mukallaf, a person legally responsible before Allah

Mukallaf = someone the Shari’ah holds responsible. A child in a car who isn’t wearing a seatbelt isn’t fined — the responsible adult driving is. In the same way, the rulings of fiqh apply to those who are accountable (typically, those who have reached puberty and are of sound mind).

The Five Categories of Rulings (Al-Ahkam al-Khamsah)

Every human action falls under one of five rulings:

1. Wajib (Compulsory)

• Do it → reward. Don’t do it → sin.

• Examples: the five daily prayers, Hajj

2. Mandub / Sunnah (Recommended)

• Do it → reward. Don’t do it → neutral (no sin).

• Examples: washing three times during wudu, the two rak’ahs of sunnah before salah, fasting on Mondays and Thursdays, showering on Fridays

• Important: reward for a sunnah requires intention. Showering on Friday only counts as the sunnah if you intend it — and it must be done on Friday itself, not the day before.

3. Mubah (Permissible)

• Do it → neutral. Don’t do it → neutral.

• Examples: drinking water, eating, reading a book, breathing

• This is the default and largest category. The original ruling of anything is Mubah. To move something out of Mubah into wajib or haram, evidence is required.

4. Makruh (Disliked)

• Do it → neutral. Don’t do it → reward.

• Example: eating with the left hand (for someone able to use their right); eating something smelly like garlic or onions and then going to the masjid

5. Haram (Prohibited)

• Do it → sin. Don’t do it → reward.

• Examples: drinking wine, eating pork

Case Study: Rulings Can Change with New Circumstances

Two examples from the class discussion show how a ruling on the same category of item can shift as knowledge or context changes:

Smoking

Smoking was historically classed as makruh, on the same basis as garlic — an unpleasant smell. Doctors did not originally know with certainty that smoking was harmful to health; some even believed it had a calming effect. It was only in the past century, once it was conclusively established that smoking causes lung cancer, that many scholars reclassified it as haram — because causing harm to oneself is haram, and smoking was now proven to cause serious harm.

Coffee

Coffee has an interesting history in Islamic scholarship:

• Coffee beans were first eaten in Ethiopia before being ground into a drink.

• A Yemeni scholar, Sheikh Ali bin Umar al-Shadhili, repeatedly asked Allah for the strength to pray qiyam al-layl (night prayer) like the pious predecessors. He was inspired in a dream to grind and boil the coffee bean. It helped him stay awake for dhikr and night prayer — so coffee became strongly linked with worship.

• Imam al-Haddad of Hadramaut said the clinking sound of coffee cups would make shaytan flee — meaning that coffee became associated with gatherings of dhikr.

• As coffee spread to Mecca and beyond, some scholars observed young people becoming very animated after drinking it and grew concerned. Coffee’s Arabic name, qahwa, is also an old word for wine — which added to the suspicion. Some scholars declared it haram.

• The dispute was settled in a memorable way: scholars who held that coffee was haram were invited to a gathering where coffee was served without them knowing what it was. They enjoyed its effects — clarity of mind and energy — and once told it was the very drink they had prohibited, they retracted their ruling.

• Coffee was also banned for a period in parts of the Christian world. Coffee houses later became historically significant as centres of discussion and, in some places, political change — in contrast to pubs, where alcohol limited clear thinking and planning.

Lesson: Mubah is the default of all things. Mubah can shift to wajib (e.g. drinking water becomes obligatory if withholding it endangers life) or to haram (e.g. a permissible game becomes haram if it causes someone to neglect their prayers).

Revision: The Four Types of Water

Before moving on, we revised last week’s material on water, the subject of the first chapter of most fiqh texts — Purification (Tahara).

Why does every fiqh text begin with purification?

Purification of the body mirrors the deeper objective of all worship: purification of the heart. On the Day of Judgement, neither wealth nor children will benefit a person — only a sound heart returned to Allah, and a soul that has been purified rather than corrupted.

The Four Types of Water

• Mutlaq — pure and purifying. Naturally occurring water: rain, sea, river, well, spring, snow, hail (the seven natural waters).

• Mushammas — pure, but disliked (makruh) to use on the skin in specific conditions: water heated by the sun in a metal container in a hot region. It remains makruh only until it cools; a plastic container causes no such concern.

• Musta’mal — previously used water. Still pure and fine to drink, but it has already been used to lift a hadath (in wudu or ghusl) and cannot be used to lift a hadath again. The same applies to water mixed with something pure that changes its taste, smell, or colour (e.g. coffee, soap, lemon) — it stays drinkable, but can no longer be used for wudu or ghusl.

• Mutanajjis — impure water, contaminated by najasah (impurity). Cannot be used for wudu, ghusl, drinking, or washing — unless its volume reaches two qullah (roughly 200 litres), in which case a small amount of najasah does not affect it, provided the water’s colour, smell, or taste has not changed. If it has changed, remove the source of contamination and the water may be purified again.

This Week’s Practice: Polishing the Heart

The Prophet ﷺ said that everything has a polish, and the polish for the heart is dhikr (remembrance of Allah). This week’s homework is to recite the following daily, ideally before sleeping (roughly 10 minutes in total):

1. Astaghfirullah al-’Azim (”I seek the forgiveness of Allah, the Most Great”) — 100 times

2. Allahumma salli ‘ala Sayyidina Muhammadin wa alihi wa sahbihi wa sallim(sending blessings on the Prophet ﷺ) — 100 times

3. La ilaha illallah (”There is no god but Allah”) — 100 times, followed once by Muhammadun Rasulullah (”Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah”)

Students should track which days they complete this, ready to discuss next week.

Key Terms Glossary

• Fiqh — Islamic jurisprudence; knowledge of the rulings of the Shari’ah

• Mukallaf — a person legally responsible/accountable under Shari’ah

• Wajib — compulsory

• Mandub / Sunnah — recommended

• Mubah — permissible/neutral (the default ruling)

• Makruh — disliked

• Haram — prohibited

• Tahara — purification

• Mutlaq water — pure, naturally occurring water that purifies

• Mushammas water — sun-heated water in a metal container (makruh to use on skin while hot)

• Musta’mal water — previously used water; pure but cannot remove hadath again

• Mutanajjis water — water contaminated by impurity (najasah)

• Najasah — ritual impurity

• Qullatayn / two qullah — a measure of water volume (approx. 200 litres) above which small impurities don’t contaminate the water

• Dhikr — remembrance of Allah

Self-Test Questions

1. What are the five categories that every human action falls under?

2. Give one example each of a wajib act and a mandub act.

3. What is the default ruling (the category everything starts in) for any action or object?

4. Give one example of something that started as makruh and later became haram, and explain why the ruling changed.

5. List the four types of water and give one distinguishing feature of each.

6. How much water (in litres) is generally needed for small amounts of najasah not to contaminate it?

7. What three phrases of dhikr were set as this week’s homework, and how many times should each be recited?

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What al-Mulk means

Al-Mulk carries two meanings, and both are correct: kingdom, and dominion. We met the root already in al-Fatihah, at maliki yawmid-din — also recited maaliki yawmid-din. Malik is the king; mulk is the kingdom. So this is the surah of the kingdom.

Makki and Madani

Surahs divide into Makki and Madani — revealed before the Hijrah, or after it.

This is not a division of geography. A Makki surah need not have been revealed in Mecca, and a Madani surah need not have been revealed in Medina. Surah an-Nasr is the clearest case: idha jaa’a nasrullahi wal-fath, revealed in Mecca, about the conquest of Mecca — and counted as Madani, because it came after the Hijrah.

The two categories carry different characters, and we can tell them apart without knowing a word of Arabic.

A Makki surah rhymes. It is poetic in sound before it is anything else. Listen to Juz 30, which is almost entirely Makki — ‘Amma yatasa’alun. ‘Ani-n-naba’i-l-‘azim. Alladhi hum fihi mukhtalifun — there is a metre to it. Easy to recite, beautiful to recite, and harder to understand, because Makki vocabulary is higher-grade and does not recur much elsewhere in the Quran. These are words Arabs today do not use daily.

Madani surahs run to longer ayat, and the meaning is more accessible.

Al-Mulk is Makki. Beyond that we cannot be precise — we rarely know the exact year a surah came down. But the content leans heavily towards warning rather than description of Jannah, and many of the mufassirin read that as late Meccan, when the persecution of the Quraysh had turned violent and stubborn. Early Mecca encourages. When years of encouragement have not moved people, the warning comes.

What the Makki surahs are for

Two things, mostly.

Aqidah, which covers three areas. Ilahiyat — Allah and His attributes, and the ayat against shirk. Nubuwwat — establishing the truthfulness of the Prophet ﷺ, including the stories of the prophets before him, which follow an almost identical template: a man respected before prophethood receives revelation, begins to preach, and is opposed by the rich and the powerful. And sam‘iyat — what we can hear of but cannot see.

Why do our scholars separate that third category from the first, when we cannot see Allah either? Because the existence of the Creator and the truth of prophethood are established by rational necessity as well as by revelation. There is no equivalent argument establishing that Jannah must exist. What we have is this: reason and revelation together establish that He is our Creator and that He sent revelation to Muhammad ﷺ. So when the Prophet ﷺ tells us there is an Akhirah, we believe him. Everything of the hereafter sits in this category.

Akhlaq is the second, and the kind of conduct the Makki surahs address is the kind we recognise innately, through fitrah.

Some good is known only through revelation — we know salah is good because Allah revealed it. Fasting, the same. But charity needs no revelation to be recognised: receive someone’s charity and we feel it. The same in reverse. Nobody needs to be told stealing is wrong, because even a thief does not like being stolen from. Nobody needs to be told murder is wrong — a murderer will fight for his own life.

The Makki surahs strengthen that innate sense. They return again and again to feeding the poor, honouring the orphan, protecting the weak.

Which leads somewhere worth sitting with. More than sixty percent of the Quran is Makki — and the bulk of the Quran does not legislate. It does not discuss hijab, or Hajj, or the rulings we tend to treat as the measure of religiosity. The bulk of the Quran is about character.

This is why the Prophet ﷺ said: I was sent only to perfect noble character. The Sharia revealed later in Medina strengthens those characters — but the characters themselves were built in Mecca.

So a religious person is not measured by how many raka‘at he prays, though prayer is obligatory. Not by the length of his beard, though the beard is Sunnah. The Prophet ﷺ said the best of us is the one best to his family, and that the best of people are those most beneficial to people. That is akhlaq.

Read more

This term and next, we’re working through Surah al-Kahf. This week: ayat 11–16.

If the ayat feel too long to read in one sitting, break them down. Take one small portion and work it until it’s fluent. Then move to the next. Slow is fine. Stopping isn’t. Consistency beats intensity — every time.

Tajweed Tuesday is part of our Quran at Home programme. Every Saturday, our students meet in person with their teachers. But Quran learning shouldn’t be bound by madrasah walls, so during term we release two videos a week to support parents teaching at home: Tajweed Tuesday, and Tafseer Thursday.

Subscribe to our Substack to follow along.