Gratitude Part 1
Section 10 of 10 · Faraid in Islam · Ustadh Mahmud Kurkcu
Gratitude and Patience, the Two Halves of the Faith
The faith is made up of two halves: shukr and ṣabr. A person's qadar cannot be controlled: every day Allah (swt) tests a person with something; every moment of life, every minute of life, Allah (swt) gives something that lies outside one's control. What a person controls is how he deals with it. Recognising the niʿmah as a niʿmah, in whatever form, whatever shape it comes, and saying alḥamdulillāh, showing shukr in the way already explained — that alone is fifty per cent; the class has been passed at fifty per cent. But recognising the trial, the affliction, the balāʾ that comes, as coming from Allah (swt), and responding to it with ṣabr, patience, makes a person the greatest servant of Allah (swt).
Rasūlullāh (peace be upon him) said: if the niʿmah of Allah (swt) is seen coming toward a person, he should increase his ḥamd toward Allah (swt) — alḥamdulillāh, alḥamdulillāh, alḥamdulillāh yā Rabbī — increasing praise of Him, recognising Him as the Giver. And when difficulties come a person's way, troubles and concerns, he should immediately ask forgiveness from Allah (swt), increasing his istighfār. And when a person's sustenance, his earning capacity, feels restricted — when he is not getting what he wants, when it becomes difficult to earn, when Allah (swt) is withholding or delaying his rizq — he should increase, Rasūlullāh (peace be upon him) said, the number of times he says lā ḥawla wa lā quwwata illā billāh.
A Muslim has to be grateful; it is impossible for a Muslim to be ungrateful. Ṭughyān, utter disobedience, the greatest form of disobedience toward Allah (swt) — kufr and shirk — stems, at root, from ingratitude toward Allah (swt). Children should be taught to say thank you each time something is given to them, or each time they receive something, because thanking a human being is in truth thanking Allah (swt): the human being only gives as an agency; the real Giver is Allah (swt). Rasūlullāh (peace be upon him) said: he who cannot thank people, fellow human beings, can never thank Allah (swt). This is the faith, as simply as it can be put. Shukr is one half of it; the other half is ṣabr.
What is asked of Allah (swt)? Gratitude — the ability to make shukr. A person who makes shukr is called a shākir. Allāhumma jʿalnā min al-shākirīn — O Allah, make us among the grateful. Allāhumma jʿalnā min al-ṣābirīn — make us among the patient. Allāhumma jʿalnā min al-dhākirīn — make us among those who remember Allah (swt) constantly. May Allah (swt) make His servants among those who are sincere, ṣādiq, and purely devoted, mukhliṣīn.
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* Kept as heard. What was said of the heart, the tongue and "our other jawahir, our limbs" names the limbs with a word that properly means jewels, not limbs, in the same breath as glossing it "our limbs" — almost certainly jawāriḥ, the classical term for the bodily limbs used throughout this chapter's discussion of shukr bi'l-ḥāl. Rendered here as jawāriḥ.
** Kept as heard. The hadith on looking at "his father's mother's face" / "the face of your father's mother" is given twice in these words, each time immediately followed by the companions' question about looking at one's parents a hundred times a day. Read literally, "father's mother" would mean a paternal grandmother, which does not fit that exchange about parents; it is rendered here as "his father's face, or his mother's face," which fits the well-known ḥadīth on the reward for looking upon one's parents, but the underlying wording could not be confirmed with certainty and is flagged rather than silently assumed.