In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate.
(2:30) And when your Lord said to the angels, “Indeed, I will make upon the earth a successive authority.” They said, “Will You place upon it one who causes corruption therein and sheds blood, while we declare Your praise and sanctify You?” Allah said, “Indeed, I know that which you do not know.”
I have been pondering about this Aaya for long time until recently I heard from Shaykh Al-Hameedy explained it so beautifully: “Since angels were created purely obedient to Allah’s orders, so when they knew Allah was going to create human beings and blessed us with free thinking, free mind and free choices, the Angels already knew there will be bloodshed and injustice (the consequences what our hands bring when one can choose to follow other than Allah) because Allah’s creation and orders are perfect. Everything is created with balance and harmony, nothing more, nothing less.” Imagine when the world just slightly increased 1 degree celsius, how much impact it has on the animals’ and insects’ lifecycle, and look at our bodies or land, ocean, etc.
Allah has blessed us with free mind, free thinking and free choice, but it’s the same human beings want to take away others’ freedom when Allah said no compulsion in believing in Him. Whoever wants to control others’ freedom of thinking is like declaring they’re more important than God. In history throughout, they are not lack of.
Allah has given women lots of rights. The first university in the world was built by a Muslim sister ( reference from 1001 Inventions Muslim Heritage in Our world) and the current universities are still using the same model. However, look what is the Muslim women’s literacy rate especially in Muslim-dominated area nowadays?
Allah has repeatedly reminded us Taqwa (conscience) and taught us how to deal with family, relatives, orphans, Muslims and non Muslims, how to deal with money, deal with calamity, being justice to everyone no matter their faith and background, even if it’s against our own self. However, look at how many women are suffering from domestic violence? Some even not allowed to call to parents after marriage. How Muslims are turning blind eyes, complicit in it or being biased to the injustice happening everywhere everyday? Besides blaming the work of Shaitan, what else? Why don’t we look into our intentions and actions? When Allah guarantee a real believer will have upper hand in the situation, besides blaming others, don’t we have responsibilities to fix our own root problems?
Allah has showed us His utmost Mercy and Forgiveness since He forgive all kinds of sins EXCEPT one worshiped other than Allah. When we witness groups introduced strange practice in Islam, majority of us remain silent because not want to offend the relationship or friendship, even worst is to justify the practice.
Allah has given us a guidance – the Quran, and Prophet’s (peace be upon him) teaching – the Hadith, if we follow through, we should be the person as He mentioned in the Quran that the best of the nation. However, we allow the culture of the surrounding eating away the real Islamic teaching. We let culture to trump Islam and confused many to believe the right is wrong, the wrong is right. We care too much physical appearance and ignore the real inner core teaching. We fear too much everyone, anyone but Allah.
When Allah gives protection, no one can be harm. When Allah give guidance, no matter what others say or do, no one can be misguided. Allah also guarantee that Shaitan has no rights over His followers.
This is a serious Aaya (verse) to understand, to realize. It’s not Allah created all these horrible human beings, it’s us, the human beings not follow His Teachings, also takeaway God given rights from others or consent to it, worst is Muslims who claimed to have the guidance but how much we follow and pollute the teaching, as a result to cause all these dire consequences. May Allah forgive all our weaknesses and shortcomings and guide us to the Right Path that Allah loves.