The first reaction that we show to a tragedy is the one that is the rawest, but it’s also the most true and the most real. This shock reaction that comes straight from the heart is also a good indicator for us of what state our heart is in.
And Allah Knows, while you know not. (2:216)
This particular verse extinguishes something that creates this negative reaction in it; it extinguishes the word ‘if’, “if I had done this, if I had done that, what if…”
If we’re living by this verse, anything that we lose we rely on Allah. We’re human beings, we feel sad, when something goes or a person we love goes, even that is a sort of lost. Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) felt this loss and felt this sadness.
Having Acceptance
With acceptance comes Sakinah (serenity) in the heart, and this is what we’re looking for.
Often when we lose something or someone, we look back and we see in a chain of circumstances that have led up to that lost. It could be family issues, it could be an illness that has maybe been there for a long time that was triggered by something… But still we wonder sometimes, “Why did that happen?” “Why me?”
What we’re doing here is we’re failing to look for the goodness in the situation because the situation feels completely negative.
But in this verse, Allah says:
Allah knows and you do not know.
Imagine if we were able to live by this verse, we can choose to accept or not to accept. So, what we can do is to work towards making that choice.
How?
It’s not just going to become an automatic thing that we react in that way, it takes building up this taqwa, this closeness to Allah, this Iman and trusting Allah and leaning on Allah in the good times and also in the times that are difficult for us. And Allah knows better what is good for us.
Sometimes we lose somebody or something, or we might lose money or a business deal or whatever, but actually you might look back ten years later or even a few months later, and think, “I know why Allah did that, I understand, I see now what I couldn’t see at the time.”
This is relying on Allah at the time rather than looking back retrospectively at what Allah has done for us.
