The Ship of the Poor

He said: I will tell you first about the ship. That ship belonged to some poor sailors; it was their source of living. They used that ship for transport or for fishing, but it was their only source of income. And there was a king on the way, who was attacking the area, and that king was going to take every ship that seemed to be in good condition. The king was going to come into that area and take by force — confiscate — every ship that seemed to be in good condition.

So al-Khaḍir wanted to break this ship, so that it would look like an old, damaged ship and the king would leave it alone. And so these poor sailors would not lose their ship; they could fix it after the king left. That is why I broke a panel off it. At least the sailors will have their ship, even though it is not working; they will have it. But if I had not done this, the king would have taken the whole thing away, and they would have lost their source of income. So Allah (swt) brought a blessing to these poor sailors through the hands of al-Khaḍir.

And by the way, this ayah has been used as supporting evidence for the issue of fiqh al-maṣāliḥ wa al-mafāsid. The scholars derived the rule from this ayah that if you are confronted with two evils and you must choose one of them, you choose the lesser — or, as they say, a necessary evil. If you have to choose between two evils, choose the lesser. There were two evils here. One evil: the king takes away the ship. The other evil: I break a panel. Which is the lesser evil? Breaking a panel, breaking that slab. Al-Khaḍir had this fiqh of choosing the lesser of two evils. Allah (swt) says: as for the ship, it belonged to poor people working at sea, so I wished to make a defect in it, as there was a king behind them who seized every ship by force.