Several realms of gratitude

Alhamdulillah, alhmadulillah, alhamdulillah, Subhahanallahi wabihamdihi, la ilaha illallah!

Now half this beautiful blessing of a month has flown by. How swiftly it goes. These precious hours, each more gracious than the one past, oh they come to us one after the other and leave us breathless. They raise us higher and higher as we go closer and closer to the divine. This training of the body, opens up vistas of the mind and soul, cleans the heart and purifies the ego. Oh, what a wise blessing this obligatory fast is. Praise be to God, praise be to God, praise be to God, there is no God but God and God is the most pure, sublime, worthy of all praise, to whom is due all thanks.

Everynight now, after a long day of heat, we are blessed with a sip of cool water to drink…and as the prophet (Allah bless and elevate him) said;

ذَهَبَ الظَّمَأُ وَابْتَلَّتِ الْعُرُوقُ وَثَبَتَ الأَجْرُ إِنْ شَاءَ اللهُ

Dhahab az zamaa’u wab tallatil urooqu wa thabat al-ajru Insha-Allah

The thirst has vanished, the veins have been wetted and the reward is established – Insha-Allah. [Abu Dawud]

indeed, the veins are refreshed by this. But oh, so many in the world are in an involuntary fast, and have no means of breaking it. Water is such a precious precious gift. Such a miracle. How easily we waste it. A few days ago I was hurrying to a meeting, having parked my car along a residential street. This was in the middle of a hot day and mashaAllah I was feeling the blessing of water, being thirsty with the fast. I noticed a water-sprinkler in full swing on someone’s lawn. It is a silly time to water one’s lawn, as in the mid-day heat, the water evaporates sooner than it can be absorbed and therefore it is not good etiquette to water one’s lawn at this time, rather it is better to water the garden/lawn early in the day or in the evening. So I was thinking of all this at the back of my mind while hurrying, and then forgot all about it. But it was very sad, for an hour and a half later, returning after the meeting…I saw the same sprinkler still working. This was very sad indeed! What a waste of a precious resource and so many in the world suffer so without water to drink. God forgive us all for the way we squander the resources of this precious earth. Now writing this out, I get to thinking about this wisdom I learned back home on what time is best to water the garden. It was always done either early after dawn or just before sunset. Since my home country is poor, it was always done by a person who doubtless did not want to toil in the hot sun watering the garden, so there was more than one benefit. I wonder though, had my country been rich and there was an automatic water sprinkling system…would the ancient wisdom of ‘do not waste’ have prevailed?

God knows best the condition of the human and our weaknesses. And indeed we are forgetful creatures. I know there is a thousand things I do that are wasteful now, that I did not do before when I had less. So Allah forgive me for my countless sins and mistakes and forgetfulnesses. Indeed, our real sin is that we forget. Even the great prophet Moses (may God bless and elevate him) forgot as is mentioned in the beautiful and profound story of his encounter with Khidr-

قَالَ لَا تُؤَاخِذْنِي بِمَا نَسِيتُ وَلَا تُرْهِقْنِي مِنْ أَمْرِي عُسْرًا

Sahih International translation

[Moses] said, “Do not blame me for what I forgot and do not cover me in my matter with difficulty.” (Quran 18:73).