Good Thing about Being Muslim
One good thing about being a Muslim is that you get to think about Allah – even though I'm sure everyone everywhere does think about Allah in one form or another.
Another good thing about being a Muslim is that you know for a fact that Allah thinks about you when you think about him.
Hear the Qur’an Say It
That is what the Qur'an says.
“Think about me and I will think about you,” says God Almighty in the Qur’an.
Udhkuroonee, Adhkurkum!
I just cannot get over this Aayat – this most miraculous passage of the Qur’an.
What a Gift from God!
What a glorious gift from a most loving God this Aayat is!
If Islam had given me nothing but this one Aayat; if the Qur’an had given me nothing but this one Aayat; and if my parents, and all my education, had given me nothing but just this one small part of an Aayat, I would have spent the rest of my life happily and giddily chanting and reciting and singing that Aayat: Udhkuroonee, Adhkurkum!
“I Will Talk about You”?
Think about me, I will think about you?
Talk about me, I will talk about you?
Mention me, I will mention you?
This is not human speech. These are God’s words.
These are divine words designed to console and comfort humanity in its most painful moments of distress and loneliness – the loneliness of distance and separation from God.
Flawed and the Flawless: A Seamless Continuity
And I want to say:
Thank you God Almighty, not just for this most gracious message of love and hope, but also for the sheer uninterrupted and seamless flow of your love and grace by even so much as an “And” or a “Comma.”
You did not say:
Udhkuroonee, (WA) Adhkurkum!
You said, instead:
Udhkuroonee, Adhkurkum!
You did not say: Think and talk about me “AND” I will think and talk about you.
Instead, you said: Think and talk about me I will think and talk about you.
As someone thinking and writing in English, I had to insert that “,” – that secret place-holder Comma – for “And.”
That silent separator of things – I had to work that in my English translation to make the English words make sense.
Otherwise, God’s Love spoke without the distance and without the separation of an “And” or a “Comma” – between him and us.
That means Almighty God, in his Infinite Love and Grace, did not draw a line of separation or demarcation between OUR thinking and talking about him and HIS thinking and talking about us.
It is one seamless and uninterrupted fusion of one with the other – of the finite and flawed into the infinite and the flawless.
Political Mass Murderers
And they are meant to be a beacon of hope even for lives steeped in sin and transgression.
And that includes all those who violate God’s Law, from political mass murderers of innocent civilians, and robbers of banks over which they have control, to those who have abandoned their God-given lives to debauchery and drunkenness.
Provided they will see the folly of their ways; own up their transgressions; make restitution to their hapless and often unsuspecting victims; and think about God.
And, conversely, if they do actively think about God, then God’s love and mercy will overtake them and guide them to do what they must to find grace and forgiveness from God.
Only When You Think about Him?
Did I say, Allah thinks about you when you think about him? Does it mean he thinks about you only when you think about him?
And not at other times?
Here let me let you in on a secret. Promise you won’t tell a soul?
Of course we take God’s word the way it is – the way it is given to us; the form and shape in which it came to us.
For, God is truth and his speech is nothing but truth. So, we do not second-guess God.
But here is a question all of us must answer – deep down in the innermost recesses of their hearts: Just when did God ever stop thinking about you?
Or when did he ever stop talking about you?
Or when did he ever stop acting in your best interests?
And when did he ever not reach out to you?
God, that is?
In other words, when were you ever not an active presence on his All-Sweeping Radar?
And when were you ever not a prominent and significant entry on his Timeless Calendar?
It Is Not Really Him, but You
So, it is not really him, but you.
It is you who limits the sweep of his Grace and his Love.
Not him.
It is you that are bat-blind that you cannot see what is right before your eyes: The unmistakable signs of his majestic presence in all their marked and unmistakable visibility.
It is you who are tone-deaf that you cannot hear and tune into that one supreme song with which the whole universe is reverberating.
Hearts Harder than Rocks
It is you whose hearts have calcified to stone. So much so that your hearts have become harder than rocks.
Your hearts have deadened and petrified to an extent that you have no feelings or regard for anyone, or anything, other than yourself – and your own perverted pursuits of sin and wickedness and transgression and selfishness and greed.
You think neither of your fellow-human beings, nor of your fellow-creation of God.
Nor of any aspect of planet earth that is home to you and your entire species.
Nor, for that matter, do you think of God himself.
To All Those Unfortunates
To all those unfortunates, and lost souls, this most beautiful Aayat of the Qur’an – Udhkuroonee, Adhkurkum! – the one that says: “Think and talk about me and I will think and talk about you,” should have a great deal of relevance and resonance.
So, everyone everywhere, Muslim and non-Muslim, what does it take to think about God – and to talk about him?
And when do you plan to start? And does it matter whether you are a Muslim or a non-Muslim?
For, God is everyone’s God, right?
If you can’t figure that out, what else can you figure out in this world – and with regard to your life?
END
© 2012 Syed Husain Pasha
Dr. Pasha is an educator and scholar of exceptional
talent, training and experience. He can be reached at DrSyedPasha [at]
AOL [dot] com or www.IslamicSolutions.com.
