بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ
The Qur’an as mentioned by many scholars can be summarised through one tiny Surah – Surat Al Asr. In this category “Thematic Overview” we will go through a complete overview of what the Qur’an is portraying.
“[I swear] By time,
Indeed, mankind is in loss,
Except for those who have believed and done good deeds and advised each other to truth and advised each other to patience.”
These 3 short ayahs make up 1 sentence; let us break these down.
[I swear] By time,
وَالْعَصْرِ
Wal’Asr
Allah begins the surah by declaring an oath by time. Why does Allah take oaths in the Qur’an? In our world, people usually take oath for 3 reasons:
- Out of anger.
- If they’re not being believed.
- To testify in court.
In traditional Arabic, people used to take an oath to catch people’s attention – they swear by something and everybody will know that something serious is about to be said.
Allah however has His own reasons:
- In order to describe a witness:
- Allah will bring time forward as a witness to the following Ayah, in this case it is time itself.
- Time is a witness to the people who were and are in loss from history; time has been there through the ages when people did not take their time seriously, following their desires and forgetting Allah; it has seen this people come and go.
- Time being the witness gives us a sense of urgency. It will kill the fallacy that “we still have time to change” and “live your life now, you can fix up later”. Visiting the graveyard we see various ages, some old and some young – we are not promised a long life. It will make us think about the time we have wasted in our lives, think about what if we only had one day to live, how would we comprehend that?
- In order to give us evidence
- Time here is given as proof that we are in loss – we must understand that true loss is losing something that we cannot get back.
- Every single day, the time that we lose is increasing; the days, hours and minutes that go by will never come back, they are lost forever.
- Time takes everything away. Beauty degrades with time; wealth means nothing when one is old and ill, barely able to enjoy even a simple meal – it all loses value with time.
Indeed, mankind is in loss,
إِنَّ الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ
Inna al-insana lafee khusr
“Inna” at the start of the ayah is used to remove any doubts, translating to “for sure..”. “Al-insan” in Arabic grammar is singular for person – this makes the reader understand that we are individuals. The purpose of this to highlight the reality that at the end of the day we will be alone; we will be alone in the grave, and we will stand alone in front of Allah on judgement day; as Allah mentions in another ayah:
“And all of them are coming to Him on the Day of Resurrection alone.” 19:95
This reality is a dark reality but it is one of the most important in our deen especially at young ages when the shaytan plays with our minds making us believe that we still have the rest of our lives. We must internalise the great loss of time.
There are 3 words for loss in Arabic:
- “Khasar” – the kind of loss that only increases.
- “Khusran” – the absolute worst kind of loss.
- Allah uses “Khusr” in this ayah meaning “some loss” – some more than others, but it means that we can overcome these losses – this gives us a sense of urgency to change now and not to be a sense of hopelessness.
Since Allah is talking about loss here as failure, let us distinguish between failure and success in the Qur’an. The norm for a human being is to assume that the person with the most wealth and power is the most successful. We know in the Qur’an that many of Allah’s prophets were not wealthy at all e.g. Ibrahim was was portrayed as homeless, yet he was one of the most successful people to ever walk the earth.
Look at the story of Fir’own (one of the pharaohs of Egypt), he is recorded as one of the richest and most powerful people in history, yet he is one of the biggest failures to have ever lived.
However, the Qur’an is not saying that being poor is a success and being rich is a failure, the Qur’an is saying in essence is that power and wealth has nothing to do with success or failure – it does not determine anything. The point to be made is that the ultimate failure is losing time – if one uses time wisely then that is the true success.
We must understand that these ayat are not saying that we are in total loss – the Qur’an is not preaching depression. These ayat do not mean that we simply abandon our worldly life and simply look at our watches telling ourselves that “I am losing time, I cannot enjoy anything in this life”. Allah says in Surat Al A’raf:
“And We have made for you therein means of living and [for] those for whom you are not providers.” 15:20
Allah gives us this life to enjoy in return we must be grateful – Allah promises to give more:
“And [remember] when your Lord proclaimed, ‘If you are grateful, I will surely increase you; but if you deny, indeed, My punishment is severe.’” 14:7
Allah here does no mention what He will increase us in; scholars mention that this means in all matters; worldly and spiritually.
Except for those who have believed
إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا
Ila allatheena amanou
Allatheena translates to “those who”, but it is used for a specific group of people. This suggest that these people are exceptions and exceptions are always a minority, which tells us that it is not easy to become part of this group.
The first attribute is “amanou” which means “believed” without specifying what exactly is being believed. It follows on from the previous ayah – believing that one is in loss and also that we do not have a lot of time left. The sense of urgency mentioned before is linked to this belief that Allah is mentioning in this ayah.
What we believe can essentially be broken down into 3 parts:
- Belief in Allah:
- Saying the word Allah is not enough.
- Understanding:
- Who is Allah?
- What does he want from me?
- What is okay to say about Allah and what is not?
- What is okay to believe about Allah and what is not?
- People in general have an idea about God, but He is so beyond this world that we as individuals must be taught about Him; there is no way to understand God by ourselves.
- Exactly what we know about Allah must be given by Allah Himself – this is “allatheena amanou”.
- Belief in the message:
- Most people never take this seriously; many believe that as long as there is a holy book, they all have good things and are to do with God, thus they are all sufficient – this is merely casually believing in a book, not in what God is telling us.
- It is a human’s responsibility to be fully convinced that the words printed in the book are the exact words from Allah without alteration from a human being.
- We must believe that the book is the absolute perfect truth – if this is not the case then one must build this belief through study.
- Belief in the message is not merely with faith but with proof; Allah did not expect mankind to simply change their lives through only faith, but through the proofs that He provided us with – that is what must convince us.
- One of the biggest crisis of faith is not just the fact that one may just lose it, but the most common state of mind, something one feels deep down even if it is not said:
- If I believe this book, then it is going to tell me to stop doing certain things, it will tell me many things are haram.
- It is going to manage my life – how I eat, sleep, live life
- It will put brakes on what I consider as fun.
- It will make me do other things without a choice.
- It will put rules on me.
- If I don’t believe in this book then I can do whatever I want, there will be no limits.
- It boils down to a life of restriction compared to a life of freedom.
- Allah has given mankind the “fitra” which is the need to go back to Allah; but one must fight oneself when it comes to stepping away from desires and seeking the truth.
- Some people are able to fight these temptations; others are able to bury that need and live a lie – they are able to tell themselves that they are not in loss and ultimately this is Kufr.
- To have real imane we must have real evidence; Allah is not asking us for something small; to give up a life of freedom for His sake takes absolute conviction, to know that Allah knows what is best for us more than we know ourselves.
- This surah is really about asking oneself “am I truly convinced that this book is the truth?”
- Belief in the afterlife:
- This can be broken down into 2 questions:
- How badly does one not want to punished? How scared of the punishment are we?
- How badly does one want to be on the good side of Allah? How badly do we want the reward and gifts of Allah in the afterlife?
- If these questions are real to us, we as humans will have a different kind of motivation when it comes to the deen.
- Most of the world nowadays sees these as stories, that religion has nice myths and stories as they make many movies, cartoons, art and even music these days about hell etc. – it is like a joke.
- The stance that the Qur’an places is that hell is real and it not a joke at all; the Qur’an has graphic descriptions of what jahanam really is – it is not to be taken lightly.
- Why does Allah describe hell in such a manner? It is so mankind should be so disturbed by it as to not even want to be close to it – it is a gift of Allah that we understand the true hellfire.
- Then there is paradise, which is also seen as a fictional story. Sort of like hovering above the clouds with wings etc.
- Qur’an’s description of paradise is much more real and beautiful; the waterfalls, rivers, scenery, food and drink and much more, all way beyond what we have here on earth, leading ultimately to meeting the creator Himself which is considers the best gift in heaven.
- This is what the afterlife essentially comes down to; eternity in heaven or hell; we must understand in depth what is being offered in these places and what takes us there.
- This can be broken down into 2 questions:
We must understand however, that the surah is not about wanting paradise, it is much more to do with not wanting hell i.e. do not be in loss.
And done good deeds
وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ
Wa amilou a’salihat
What is proof that we truly believe? What is the proof of any claim we make in this world? It is one’s actions; without the actions the claim is empty.
“A’salih” is derived from the word “asalo’a” which means “to fix”; the idea of “amilou a’salihat” is deeper in meaning than just “to do good deeds”, it is more in the lines of “to do what fixes” i.e. “the deeds that fix”.
If something is wrong with one’s life e.g. the way one spends their time, one’s prayers, one’s earning and spending of wealth, one’s friends/company etc. then one is fixing it – that is “wa amilou a’salihat”.
Thus this ayah is saying that we as humans are not perfect and Allah is not expecting perfection – we will continuously fix and mend aspects of our life, striving to do better. An exercise of “amilou a’salihat” is to figure out what we do in our day that is no good to us and work on fixing them.
The word “salihat” in Arabic is an adjective not a noun – Allah did not mention the noun “al a’mal” which means deeds. This adjective is also mentioned in plural which in Arabic is known as “jam’ al’khila” which means less i.e. Allah is saying “few goods deeds”. This tells us that:
- There are not an endless amount of restrictions – just a handful of things we must stay away from.
- There are not endless actions we must do every single day – just a few to take care of e.g. our prayers.
- There are a few things we must take care of with the people around us and a few things with Allah.
And advised each other to truth and advised each other to patience
وَتَوَاصَوْا بِالْحَقِّ وَتَوَاصَوْا بِالصَّبْرِ
Wa tawaso bil’aq wa tawaso bi’sabr
After mentioning the good deeds, the fixing of oneself and one’s own situations, Allah mentions the caring of other people. Islam inherently calls on one to call on others – we must care about others and it starts with the family. We are not expected to fix the world, but the minimum is to work on fixing our families and friends, the people around us.
To preach uncontrollably is not what this means – it is our responsibility to find ways to advise our family that works for each one individually, this is the task. Everybody has a different context and way to talk to correctly; the term “tawaso” is derived from the word “tawasiya” which is “advice given that is heart-felt”. Which means one wants to soften the listener’s heart, not agitate them, not make them feel bad or judge them; one must choose the right time and method and for each their own.
“Tawaso” is also a mutual verb in Arabic (“tafa’ul”), meaning one is ready to give advice and immediately ready to take advice too; one is never to consider oneself as better than the other. “Bil’aq” means “to the truth” – the truth in a lot of cases is uncomfortable for the adviser and the one taking the advice.
One must overcome these uncomfortable situations and speak the truth anyway in the correct time and context of course; just out of love or care for someone one still must not hide the truth. The advice to truth must be sincere as to simply get a point across and not to up one’s ego. A lot of the time people give advice simply to make themselves feel better than the other; giving advice is not a competition, it is to better each other.
“Bi’sabr” briefly means “with patience” – speaking the truth requires a lot of patience and perseverance; both to say it and to be constant as one may fear there will be consequences – loss of relationship etc.
“Tawaso bi’sabr” is to constantly remind each other to be patient and persevere through life. Imane goes up and down – we must encourage each other to stay strong.
The beginning of the surah mentions each person as singular (“inna al insana lafee khusr), Allah here at the end switches to plural “ila allatheena amanou” because we as an Ummah must hold on to our faith together – we cannot give up on each other.
Between the 4 mentioned attributes in the surah Allah uses “and” not “or” to combine them all – meaning in order to not be in loss, we must meet all 4 of the criteria. This one small ayah is the entire formula for survival as a believer.
The language of this surah is past tense and for good reason:
- No human being should think that they survived “all people are in loss” – the only people that have are already dead.
- We can look back at the people who are passed away and say they have met the 4 mentioned criteria, but until we pass ourselves, we better be working on these.
This surah applies to everyone differently based on their own circumstances; everyone’s role in these attributes is different; a public figure, an imam, a mother, employer, father etc. An imam will give council to the community while a mother will prioritise council to her children. We must figure out who we have influence over, who we can give advice to. The whole message here is that we can save the whole of humanity, if we start worrying about the people around us.
May Allah make us all of the people with these 4 attributes.
Allah knows best.