Lesson 4- Thrown in a Well - Tafseer Surah Yusuf - Ustadh Asim Khan

Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

Thrown in a Well | Lesson 4 Last time we got to the point in the story where Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬has told his father about this dream that he had. The father has given him an amazing piece of advice. The brothers are now having a huddle, a discussion amongst themselves, speaking out of envy to their own brother, and they suggest that in fact their father is in error. Why is he in error? Because they are an ‫عُصْ بَة‬, despite that the father loves the other brothers more than them. They spoke to each other and said why is the case that Yusuf and his brother are more beloved to our father than us whilst we are an ‫عُصْ بَة‬. They expressed envy against the two brothers, but did not mention the second brother by name. They mentioned him as Yusuf’s brother. And when they mentioned Yusuf’s ‫ عليه السالم‬name, they had a laam before it, which is the laam of ibtida, which is for the purpose of emphasizing it. It is really to do with Yusuf. In fact they don’t like Binyameen because he is Yusuf’s ‫ عليه السالم‬brother. Not just because he is from another mother. The other thing is they said they are an ‫عُصْ بَة‬. Imam ash-Shawqani and Zamakhshari said it refers to a number of people. A group which is around 10. But the other side of it is that it conveys that they are in amazement about their numbers. And they think they have the right to do whatever they want with other people, and other people are smaller and less in number and cannot do anything. This is the kind of mentality. Ibn Ashur mentions a very nice lesson. He says Allah taught them a lesson for thinking that their numbers really mean something, that because of their large number, that they are a force to reckon with. In psychology, we see that people think if they are a large group they are strong and can defeat others. Allah taught them a lesson. Their numbers did not help them in any way, shape or form. Allah also taught the sahabahs the same lesson in a battle when they thought they could win due to their large numbers. This was the Battle of Hunayn.

‫ص َر ُك ُم ه‬ ْ ‫ت َعلَ ْي ُك ُم ْاْلَرْ ضُ ِب َما َر ُح َب‬ ْ ‫ضا َق‬ ‫ت ُث هم‬ َ ‫ْن ۙ إِ ْذ أَعْ َج َب ْت ُك ْم َك ْث َر ُت ُك ْم َفلَ ْم ُت ْغ ِن َعن ُك ْم َش ْي ًئا َو‬ َ ‫َّللا ُ فِي َم َواطِ َن َكث‬ َ ‫لَ َق ْد َن‬ ٍ ‫ِير ٍة ۙ َو َي ْو َم ُح َني‬ ‫ين‬ َ ‫َوله ْي ُتم م ُّْد ِب ِر‬ Allah has already given you victory in many regions and [even] on the day of Hunayn, when your great number pleased you, but it did not avail you at all, and the earth was confining for you with its vastness; then you turned back, fleeing. [9:25] They were marvelling over their numbers and thought no one was a match for them. Because of that they were taught a lesson.

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[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan

ْ ‫ُف أَ ِو‬ ً ْ‫اط َرحُوهُ أَر‬ ‫ضا َي ْخ ُل لَ ُك ْم َوجْ ُه أَ ِبي ُك ْم َو َت ُكو ُنوا‬ َ ‫ا ْق ُتلُوا يُوس‬ ‫ِين‬ َ ‫صالِح‬ َ ‫مِنْ َبعْ ِد ِه َق ْومًا‬ •9. Kill Yusuf or expel him to some land so that your father will look to you alone and then you can be people who do right.’ They are talking amongst themselves. They expressed envy and anger that dad loves Yusuf and his brother more. Then they come up with a plan. What’s the plan? Someone says, let’s kill Yusuf. Their own brother, their ُ َ‫ ْطر‬of him. Tarh means to toss something to a side. And younger brother! They think of killing him. Or to do ‫ح‬ they don’t say al-ardh, they say ‫ أَرْ ضًا‬- ‫نكرة‬, meaning, let’s toss him to any land, another other land, just not here. So the first plan is to either kill him or toss him to another place. Now they say something that gives us some insight about why they want to do this to Yusuf ‫عليه السالم‬. They want the father’s face to have ‫( َخ ْل َوة‬khalwah = in private) for them. They want the fathers face to look at them and them alone, to be exclusively for them alone. The plan is quite bad, but after we do that, we will become righteous people. We will sort ourselves out after that. People do that sometimes. They plan to do a bad deed and intend to do tawbah and sort themselves out afterwards. For example, they will get a license to sell alcohol and then intend to do hajj. We are all guilty of this. We do this with ourselves all the time. This relationship is haram. It’s okay, we are going to get married. The justification is being presented. Is it good to think like this or bad? Is it good to say that I will ask Allah to forgive me later?

َ‫َو َت ُكو ُنوا مِنْ َبعْ ِد ِه َق ْومًا صَالِحِين‬ Qurtubi says that it means they say they will ask Allah to forgive them. But the other tafseer is that what they are saying is that we’ll sort things out with dad afterwards. Meaning dad will be unhappy, but we will sort it out and make him happy. Ustadh Asim feels that it seems like the second view is stronger, that they are not speaking about it from a religious perspective, but that they are speaking about it from a dunyawi perspective, meaning dads going to be so upset when we get rid of Yusuf, but it is okay, after we do it, we will patch things up with dad. And Allah knows best which is the stronger opinion. We need to consider both.

Lessons Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬was an amazing father to his children. Allah wanted us to focus and pay attention to how he gave tarbiyah (upbringing) to his children. The question arises, the brothers envied Yusuf ‫عليه السالم‬, they really didn’t like him, and they said that the reason we don’t like him is our father loves him more. The question arises that why was Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬dealing with the children in this way that led them to become more envious of

Sirat Initiative | Activity

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

Yusuf ‫ ?عليه السالم‬Why was he showing favoritism to Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬when this is something that we shouldn’t be doing as parents? Looking at this ayah here, As-Sa’di has something to say. They say kill him or toss him to one side in order for dad’s face to be brought us into our attention exclusively. This was interpreted by Sa’di to mean that they desired the heart and mind of Yaqoob to be free from thinking about Yusuf ‫عليه السالم‬, and instead be thinking about them. What is interesting about this particular wording is that they never said that they wanted Yaqoob to spend more time with them. They never said this. They said they wanted his heart to become free of occupation from Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬and instead be focussed on them. So what is the difference between saying we want dad to spend more time with us and saying we want dad to only think about us, or to think about us more and not to think about Yusuf ‫ ?عليه السالم‬What is the difference between the two? It is established that they were envious, and they felt that dad loved him more than them. However, on the other side, Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬could be said to be blameworthy because dad spent more time with the other two, dad bought the other two more things. However, we said that the tafseer of Sa’di ‫رحمه َّللا‬ was that they wanted dad’s heard to be less preoccupied with Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬and rather to be preoccupied with them. Which is different to saying they wanted dad to spend more time with them. They are not saying that they want dad to spend more time with them. That’s not the interpretation given by Sa’di. Had the case been that dad had been spending more time with another child over this child, then that would be unjust. However, if dad thinks about this child more than that child, and loves this child more than that child, is that injustice? Didn’t the prophet ‫ ﷺ‬love Aishah ‫ رضي َّللا عنها‬more than any other wife? He did. Is that unjust? No, of course it is not. In terms of behaviour and spending time, this is behaviour. This is where there needs to be an element of justice. As for what the heart feels and the mind thinks of, that is not the same thing. Sometimes, you can’t help that you love one child over the other. Here, many scholars of tafseer like Ibn Ati ‫ رحمه َّللا‬said that the reason why Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬loved the other two more is because they were younger, and feel for them more. And also they said that the mother of these two passed away when they were young 3. However, we could also say that there is a third thing, the way that Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬spoke to his dad, he said ya abati, he spoke in such a nice, kind, respectful, affectionate way, and he was humble as well and smart, all of these things would also cause a parent to feel about them in a particular way. But it is about how he felt, not how he behaved. If you understand it like this, then there is no questioning Yaqoob ‫عليه السالم‬. The Prophet ‫ ﷺ‬said, in a hadith in reported in Bukhari and Muslim, fear Allah and be just amongst your children. Now, to say the opposite is to say that Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬wasn’t doing this, and we can’t say this. So this is the way that we understand this. Once a man came to the Prophet ‫ ﷺ‬and said, I got a gift for one of my children. Can you bear witness to that/ approve of that? The prophet ‫ﷺ‬, in one narration, he said, did you get it for every one of your children? 3

Q. How is it possible that the mother of these two passed away when she was either the sun or moon, and therefore when the dream was realized she would also be with Yusuf and the rest of the family that day? A. It is a strange point but it is there. See if you can research more on this. 46

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[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan And the man said no. And in that narration, the prophet ‫ ﷺ‬said, then either you get it for all of them, or you take this one back. What we learn from this hadith is that the fuqaha first of all, they said this gifting one child something over the other, either it is haram, or it is makrooh. But all of them agreed this is wrong. However, they made a distinction. There is a difference between looking after your children and meeting their needs, and gifting them. For example, you have 4 children. You are all sitting around the table eating breakfast. You are giving them all cereal, and then you say, Oh, I have more in that plate than the other. But one is 2, one is 3 and one is 10. So do you have to fill up the bowl equally for all of them? Is that what we are saying here? One child goes to university. You are paying the fee, thousands of pounds. The second one is in secondary school. So you think no, I need to take nine grand out and spend it because I am spending on this child, because the prophet ‫ ﷺ‬said be just. Is that correct understanding? So how do you understand this? There is a difference between maintaining your children and gifting them. When it comes to gifting your children, be just and equal. Eid day comes, dad is going to give money to everyone. He tells one kid, you’re not that smart, I am only going to give you 10 pounds. The other one, you are smart, 50 pounds. This is wrong. This is gifting. This is where injustice is taking place. It is either haram or makrooh. As for looking after the child, one child is ill and you need to spend a lot of time, money looking after this one because of their need. And if it is based on their needs and looking after them, then that is according to their need. If they need more, then give them more. If they need less, then give them less. And if you give more or less, it doesn’t mean you’re being unjust. As for gifting, you need to be equal.

My Reflections

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

ِّ‫ت ْالجُب‬ ِ ‫ُف َوأَ ْلقُوهُ فِي َغ َيا َب‬ َ ‫َقا َل َقائِل ِم ْن ُه ْم ََل َت ْق ُتلُوا يُوس‬ ‫ِين‬ َ ‫هار ِة إِنْ ُك ْن ُت ْم َفاعِ ل‬ َ ‫َي ْل َتق ِْط ُه َبعْ ضُ ال هسي‬ •10. One of them said, ‘Do not take Yusuf’s life but throw him to the bottom of the well, so that some travellers may discover him, if this is something that you have to do.’ How many brothers are there? Ten. One says let’s kill him or toss him to another place. Another says no, lets not kill him, let’s throw him at the bottom of a well.

ّ‫ ا ْل ُجب‬vs.‫البِئْر‬

Bi’r is a more common word for well than jubb. Sharawi ‫ رحمه َّللا‬mentioned in his tafseer that the difference is that the jubb is like a flat type of well. It has no brick work going around it. It is a flat type of well, like a ditch. As for bi’r, it has the brick work around it. So what does that show us? It shows us that they had in their minds the idea to throw him into a well which is like a ditch, which you can’t even see that there is a well over there. It shows how evil their intentions were.

‫َغيَاب‬ Ghayaab from ghayb means unseen. They wanted to throw him inside a place in that ditch where no one could even see had they come across that ditch-like well.

‫لَ ْقط‬ Laqt is to pick up off the floor. So some caravans travelling through that area will come across, perhaps, this jubb, find him inside, a boy, and take him as a slave. So don’t kill him, throw him in a well, put him into slavery, maybe some travellers will come and take him away. So we can reach the same objective by doing lesser evil. This lesser evil will still achieve the same objective which is to get rid of Yusuf out of our lives. Do this one instead. Don’t do that one.

My Reflections

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[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan

‫ُون‬ َ ‫ُف َوإِ هنا لَ ُه لَ َناصِ ح‬ َ ‫ك ََل َتأْ َم هنا َعلَ ٰى يُوس‬ َ َ‫َقالُوا َيا أَ َبا َنا َما ل‬ •11. They said, ‘Our father! What is wrong with you that you refuse to trust us with Yusuf when in truth we only wish him well? Plan B has been accepted. They’ve all accepted it. Now they go to execute the plan. What do they do? They go to dad. Imagine the father is sitting there minding his own business, and the ten brothers come along. They say, oh father, why don’t you trust us with Yusuf? All of a sudden they come and ask this. We are well-wishers. We only want what’s best for little old Yusuf, especially when it comes to Yusuf. All of a sudden all the ten sons come and say this. It is quite strange and weird that they would talk like that. Now they butter up dad and then come with the attack.

My Reflections

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

ُ ‫أَرْ سِ ْل ُه َم َع َنا َغ ًدا َيرْ َتعْ َو َي ْل َعبْ َوإِ هنا لَ ُه لَ َحاف‬ ‫ون‬ َ ‫ِظ‬ •12. Why don’t you send him out with us tomorrow so he can enjoy himself and play about? All of us will make sure that he is safe.’ They say let us take him somewhere tomorrow in order that ْ‫ َيرْ َتع‬is from the root ‫ َمرْ عَى‬, and it is a strange word to be used here because it refers to cattle when they graze. So they are saying send him with us tomorrow, we will make him feast. We will feed him so well, and we will play loads of games. And when it comes to him did, indeed, to him exclusively, we are protecting and preserving him. That kind of talk is crazy. Coming to dad, why don’t you trust us. Dad is going to be suspicious and one expects him to refuse. But he says i don’t want you to take him but eventually they take him. How come Yaqoob ‫ عليه السالم‬allows them to take him when they are clearly talking in a crazy, sinister way? This is important because later on something strange happens, Binyameen is asked for again and again dad lets them. Both times, how come he lets them? In the second instance it is a different reason, at that point he sees that in fact the brothers now aren’t as evil as they were some 40 years ago. But today, when they speak to him, why doesn’t he say no, you can’t take him? He knows the dream and knows Yusuf will ultimately prosper, but at the same time, you wouldn’t want to put your son in a difficult position or harm’s way, would you? So that’s not the reason. He already told Yusuf that he doesn’t trust them and he shouldn’t either, so it is not because he wants to trust them. He doesn’t want to lose his son, so it isn’t that he doesn’t want them to suspect he doesn’t trust them. It is a difficult question, but a reasonable one. From the wording it is clear that the brothers are not just acting suspicious, but they are acting psychotic. They are acting crazy. When someone is acting crazy, it doesn’t matter what you say to that person. If the person is hell bent on killing someone, and the way they are acting is crazy, what you are going to say to them is not going to stop them. When someone acts crazy, saying they want to kill him, they have reached a level of crazy. Dad can see this when they come and say oh we will take care of him. He knows they will do whatever they want anyway. It seems like this is the reason why.

My Reflections

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Activity | Sirat Initiative

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan

Activity They sought to make tawbah before the crime, to make doing it easier on them, and yet Allah- as Qurtubi saidُ , / Sinners Allah did accept their Tawbah...? What does that teach us about Tawbah / Allah ‫س ْبحَ ا َن ُه َو َتعَالَى‬ They said this and Allah did not condemn or censor them for saying it even though what they said was wrong. The story just continues on. In the Qur’an, when someone does or says something wrong or evil, then whatever follows or the context shows that Allah disapproves of what they said. However, here there is no indicator whether it was right or wrong for them to say that. Is it better for a person to say before he sins that I want Allah to forgive me, or I will ask Allah to forgive me, or is it better if he doesn’t even intend to seek forgiveness? The first one. Even though that is wrong, it is better than not having an inclination or intention to make tawbah. Tawbah is very powerful, even when it comes from a corrupt intention. Allah is Most Merciful. Allah looks into the hearts of the people. If the person, even though when doing evil wants to eventually change, inwardly, desiring it, Allah will help him change. Even though they were planning evil, they also mentioned a desire to ask Allah to forgive them. And Allah saw that. We see Allah did not censor what they said. From one perspective it is wrong, and from another perspective, it is far better to be like this than to say I am going to do evil, I would be a hypocrite if I ask Allah to forgive me.

My Reflections

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

Tajweed point ‫اإلشمام‬ There is one unique tajweed point that you don’t find anywhere else in the Qur’an. It is called Ishmam. Qurtubi mentioned this in his tafseer. This ayah here (11), where the brothers say

‫َقالُوا َيا أَ َبا َنا َما لَ َك ََل َتأْ َم هنا‬ The tajweed rule in fact doesn’t impact on the pronunciation or the way you would hear the recitor say it.

However, it is reported from the Prophet ‫ ﷺ‬that when he would recite the word ‫ َتأْ َم هنا‬he made a particular expression with his lips. It doesn’t make a difference to the pronunciation. However, the prophet ‫ ﷺ‬did this, and tajweed is to recite Qur’an as the prophet ‫ ﷺ‬recited it, and so it became a tajweed rule that the qurra know and still continue to practice. Qur’an, all of it, is preserved, the way it was revealed to the prophet ‫ﷺ‬. And the way it was recited, up to and including this subtle point is preserved until now.

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Tajweed point | Sirat Initiative

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan

Key Lessons [8-12] Insight into Bad Character & Behaviour [Ibn ‘Āshūr] This point was mentioned by Ibn Ashur. He said that this passage gives us an insight into bad character and behaviour. He said, look at the number of evil things they did here: 1.

Trying to take out a rival. They perceived Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬to be a rival to them, and what they tried to do is rob the rival of the blessing. They thought, Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬is beloved to dad, let’s rob that love of him by getting rid of him.

2.

On top of that, this eliminating a rival was mixed with hasad. The evil of envy.

3.

On top of that, it was going against the command of Allah to look after your younger sibling.

All these 3 things come together and become an ‘ibrah, they show us what bad character looks like and what behaviour is included in it, for example, looking at others through the lens of rivalry, and then wanting to act on that and take out the rival, and then envy, and then also going against the command to look after them. It was very evil the way they spoke about Yusuf ‫عليه السالم‬, and to think he was a brother.

Shaytan’s Trick of Tawbah [al-Sa’di] Sa’di ُ ‫ح َم ُه َّللا‬ ِ َ‫ ر‬mentioned this point. When the brothers said, and after we do our evil, we will become righteous people, there are 3 things that they are trying to say here: 1.

They were trying to justify the sin to themselves, by saying it’s okay if we do it, because we are going to do tawbah afterwards.

2.

They are trying to take the edge off the sin. Killing someone, murder, is a terrible thing to even plan, to think about doing. In terms of psychology, in order to bring yourself to do something, you need to do something to encourage yourself. And one of the ways to encourage yourself is to say, it’s not really that bad a thing if you look at it from this perspective or that perspective. Those people that caused the London riots, went to the sports stores and stole, and then they said they were from socially deprived areas, that’s why they did what they did.

3.

To build consensus. They are ten of them. Ten different minds, all planning. And the planning is so evil. And one of the ways you get everyone to agree to the plan is you encourage them. One of the ways of getting themselves to agree is to say, it’s okay, we will sort ourselves out afterwards. We will sort things out with dad, we will sort things out with Allah, no problem.

ُ ‫)والع‬, a person plans on This is from the trap of shaytan and he does this with every one of us. When (‫ِياذ باهلل‬ sinning, then they come up with justifications, or at least things to make it easy on their own nafs which is telling them that this is wrong, don’t do this. In order to make that voice go quiet you come up with your other justifications. An-nafs an ammarah bis su’ is coming, the other part of the nafs which entices us to do evil.

Sirat Initiative | Key Lessons [8-12]

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

Don’t Be Ruled By Emotion Here, the brothers are being ruled by their anger. These brothers are angry with Yusuf ‫ عليه السالم‬and also their father, how could he be like this towards us and not them. That is getting the better of them and they are acting on emotion, and look at the plan that they came up with.

Destructive Nature of Hasad Envy drove them to take the life of their own brother. The thing is, where are they living? Are they living in a socially deprived area, or parents that abuse them, or a broken home? What kind of home are they living in? A home of a Prophet of Allah! Imagine the influence that dad had over them. Imagine the environment they lived in. Despite that, they came up with this plan to kill their brother. And it shows us that envy can make us forget about everything. If you look at the first ever murder committed in mankind by Qabeel against Habeel, why did he kill him? Because of hasad. And Shaytan, we mentioned also, that one of the 2 reasons why he refused to bow down to Aadam ‫ عليه السالم‬was hasad. At-Tabari mentioned hasad in the verse of Surah Yaseen,

َ ‫أَلَ ْم أَعْ َه ْد إِلَ ْي ُك ْم َيا َبنِي آ َد َم أَن هَل َتعْ ُب ُدوا ال هشي‬ ‫ان ۖ إِ هن ُه لَ ُك ْم َع ُدوٌّ م ُِّبين‬ َ ‫ْط‬ Did I not enjoin upon you, O children of Adam, that you not worship Satan - [for] indeed, he is to you a clear enemy [36:60] Here, at-Tabari said, Allah is saying, what is the matter with you, how can you worship shaytan who refused to bow down to your very father Aadam ‫ عليه السالم‬out of hasad. So hasad is the root of many evils. Kufr here, and also qatl.

Sin Gives Birth to More Sins [al-Sa’di] Sins beget more sins. Initial sin is that they are envious. It is already a sin in and of itself. Then to act on it, to plan to kill or throw your brother in a well. Then another sin is having to lie. They came to the dad and start to make up stories. Why don’t you send him with us dad, we will take him out, he will eat, drink, play. Lying. And those lies lead to more lies. They have to come back, forcing themselves to cry to tell the dad. So sins have consequences in dunya and in akhirah as well.

Not all Sins are equal > lesser evil [al-Sa’di] We learn that not all sins are equal. The fact that they considered qatl and then decided to leave him for dead in a well. Murdering someone is not the same as throwing him into a well. Building on top of that, another principle, which is choose the lesser evil. If you are in a position, where evil is going to be done one way or the other, meaning either way it is going to happen, you can’t say no I am not going to have anything t do with this. In this case, you should choose the lesser of the evils. If you are going to do this, then do the better of the 2 evils. Even that is not a good idea. 54

Key Lessons [8-12] | Sirat Initiative

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF] Ustadh Asim Khan

Rank/Position Precursor to Hasad [al-Qāsimi] Qasimi said that we learn something about hasad here. Rank and position are a precursor to hasad. He shows how envy builds inside a person. How Envy Works

Position/ Fame

Envy

Makar (Plotting)

Wealth

So he said there are 2 precursors to hasad. First of all, how do we define hasad? The generally agreed upon definition is that a person wishes that the blessing of another is removed. This is the definition. A worse type of hasad is that a blessing is removed and I am given it instead. Some said an even worse type is that a blessing is removed, I am given it and they are given something even worse instead. Levels. How did that even reach that point? How did the person start thinking and feeling like that? One of two things came before. 1.

Position or fame. They called themselves usbah, a gang, a strong group of individuals. They pride themselves that they are a sizeable force, they are like a gang. Now that is a position, a rank. So they said because of our position, dad should love us more. If he doesn’t love us more than whom does he love instead of us? He will now be the subject of our hasad. For example, in a workplace, people are in pursuit of a promotion. And the guy who can give the promotion, the boss/ supervisor/ manager, everyone wants to suck up to that person. The position is actually going to make you look at everybody else who is going for that position in a different way. the person who is going to get that position above you, you feel envious of them. So what came before hasad? The pursuit of the position.

2.

Pursuit of money, wealth, property. One of the reason why people suffer from envy is because they are so wrapped up in dunya, they can’t understand how come that person managed to get that car, that dress or something. It is not the person first, it was the hubb ad-dunya first.

Sirat Initiative | Key Lessons [8-12]

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Ustadh Asim Khan

[THROWN IN A WELL – TAFSEER SURAT YUSUF]

Then he said, the consequence of envy is makar (plotting). The hasad is one thing, but then the plot is the evil fruit of the hasad, and the hasad was a consequence of the pursuit of position or title or fame. Going back to what Yaqoob said to his son, don’t tell your brothers about this dream. The dream represents a blessing. Yaqqob is saying don’t show your blessing to people out there. People are really not going to like it. And that really teaches us a lesson in our times where we live in a culture of selfies. And not just any selfies selfies of what they are eating, wearing, where they are going, everything is on facebook – where he has been, the nice things he’s eaten, things he buys, even the way he looks, make up. You are airing out to the public all your blessings. All your blessings, money, wealth, good looks, all of it, you are airing out. The person doing the opposite of what Yaqoob ‫عليه السالم‬advised his son to do, which is, if you are blessed, don’t go about telling other people about your blessings, especially those that you think will not like it. So we should really take a lesson from this part of the story. A person should be careful about his blessing. Forget about the arrogance factor that comes with promoting yourself and sharing thing you do, look at it as preserving yourself from hasad. If you tell people, someone is going to hate on you. And if someone hates on you and as a result you suffer, you have no one to blame but yourself.

My Reflections

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Key Lessons [8-12] | Sirat Initiative