Hannah’s Daily Note

I’ve just come to the end of a beautiful 4 week course on the Tafsir of Surah Ur Rahman, and this week, a question came up from one of the participants about how to navigate current world events and the evils we are witnessing.

The response from our teacher, Dr Sofia Rahman, was beautiful, and I wanted to share the gist of a little of what she said.

We are reminded that lessons from the Quran teach us that for the tyrants of this world, their tyranny only increases before their power comes to an end. That is, to be witnessing such an escalation of evils that are beyond our comprehension indicates that these oppressors are soon to lose their power and meet their end.

And this made me think of some reflections I’ve been having recently about justice. We will not see justice here, in this life. But we know that Allah is the ultimate Judge, and perhaps this is the only way we can settle ourselves in these times. I, for one, could get easily trapped in a cycle of feeling helpless – I’m still working on how to balance knowing enough to be reminded of my own blessings, but protecting my own wellbeing. Certainly restricting the time spent on social media is supporting me with that.

So this is to those of you who have felt the weight of the world this Ramadan: step onto your prayer mat and let it all out to Allah there. Cry, complain, talk to Him. And when you return to daily routine, give yourself permission to enjoy normal life; to enjoy your blessings.

I hope the final few days of Ramadan feel peaceful for you – no matter what you have or haven’t managed to do so far – it’s never to late to begin again with one small step.