The Young Mage

Season passed, the birds gathered again. But, this time, they gathered in a learning cyrcle. As usual, the Parrot acted as a moderator, and this time, the White-rumped shama acted as a volunteer who shared a story. The Shama began the story by saying, "O my brothers and sisters, verily, any government is in charge of the end result of all dimensions of society; it forms the basis of its customs and the framework of its manners and etiquettes. So what would be the end of this society, the basis of its customs and the framework of its manners, when it all stemmed from subjugation and sorcery?
Such a government reprents tyranny, because all types of government are a form of control over the human state of affairs. If the government is sound, it will strive to build and form the human structure, and the ruler himself will benefit if his people are sane, intelligent and strong. But if the government is ignorant, it will try to fragmant the human structure and disperse the society, because an ignorant government is after nothing more than continual control, even if it causes the destruction of society. In this situation, the ruler will benefit if the people following him are foolish, ignorant and weak.
Insofar as magic is a form of deception and falsehood, it can help achieve the goals of a tyrannical ruler. Any methodology that is not from Allah and where the people do not submit to Him, will also achieve the same results as magic; the only difference is in name and form, but what both have in common is that they desire for there to be no rational force or strong mind in society. This end can be achieved either through magic or through any man-made system of government. Magic presents itself by instigating fear and exploiting ignorance. Any man-made system that leads a person to believe that he is safe, by instigating fear that imposes the desired methodology upon him through his ignorance and weakness, has achieved the same results as magic.

And so is my story. It was said, in a land, in an earlier age, there was once a king that had employed a sorcerer. When the sorcerer grew old, he told the king, "I have grown old. Send a young boy to me so that I may teach him sorcery," so the king sent a boy to him for training.
Everyday on his way to the sorcerer, the boy would pass by a monk. One day, he decided to sit with the monk and listen to what he had to say. After sitting with the monk, he became greatly impressed by his words. From then onward, it became his habit to sit with the monk on his way to the sorcerer. However, whenever he arrived late, the sorcerer would beat him. When the boy complained about the beatings to the monk, he told him, "When you feel afraid of the sorcerer, say, 'My family delayed me.' And when you feel afraid of your family, say, 'The sorcerer delayed me.'"
While he was in that routine, a huge beast blocked the people's way, and the boy said, "Today I will know whether the sorcerer or the monk is superior." He picked up a stone and said, "O Allah, if the way of the monk is dearer to you than the way of the sorcerer, kill this animal so that the people can pass." He threw the stone at it and killed it, and the people were able to pass. The boy then came to the monk and informed him, and the monk said, "Son, today you have surpassed me. I see that your affair has reached a stage where you will soon be put to trial. If you are put to trial, don't tell them about me."

The boy then began to treat the blind and lepers, and by the permission of Allah, he began to cure people from all kinds of illnesses. One of the king's courtiers who had gone blind heard about him. He came to him with many gifts and said, "If you cure me, all of these things will be yours." He said, "I do not cure anyone by myself. It is Allah Who cures, and if you believe in Allah, I will pray to Allah to cure you." The courtier affirmed his faith in Allah, and Allah cured him. He came to the king and sat by his side as he used to do before. The king asked, "Who restored your sight?" He replied, "My Lord." The king said, "And do you have a Lord beside me?" He answered, "My Lord and your Lord is Allah." The king seized him and had him tortured until he told him about the boy.
The boy was brought and the king said to him, "O boy, you have become so proficient in your magic that you cure the blind and lepers, and you do such-and-such and such-and-such." He said, "I do not cure anyone; it is Allah Who cures." The king seized him and had him tortured until he told him about the monk. The monk was brought and told, "Renounce your religion!" but he refused to do so. The king called for a saw to be brought, had it placed on the middle of his head, and had him sawn in half. Then the courtier was brought and told, "Renounce your religion!" but he refused, so the saw was placed on the middle of his head, and he was sawn in half.

Then the boy was brought and told to renounce his religion, but he refused to do so. The king handed him over to a group of his courtiers and told them, "Take him to such-and-such mountain and climb to the top of it with him. When you reach the top, he either gives up his religion or you throw him off." So they took him to the top of the mountain, and he said, "O Allah, save me from them by whatever means You like."
The mountain then began shaking and they all fell off the mountain except the boy who came walking back to the king. The king asked him, "What happened to your companions?" He replied, "Allah saved me from them." He again handed him over to some of his courtiers and said, "Take him on a boat into the middle of the sea. Then he must either repudiate his religion or you throw him off." So they took him, and he said, "O Allah, save me from them by whatever means You like."
The boat overturned; they were drowned, and the boy came walking back to the king, who asked him, "What happened to your companions?" He replied, "Allah saved me from them."

Then he told the king, "You will not be able to kill me unless you do as I instruct you." The king asked, "What's that?" He said, "You gather the people on open ground and hang me on the trunk of a tree. Then take an arrow from my quiver, put it in the bow and say, 'In the name of Allah, the Lord of this boy,' then shoot me. If you do that, you will be able to kill me.
So the king gathered the people in an open field and hung the boy from the trunk of a tree. He took an arrow from the boy's quiver, placed it in the bow and said, "In the name of Allah, the Lord of this boy." He shot the arrow, which hit the boy in his temple. He laid his hand on his temple where the arrow had hit him and died. The people said, "We believe in the Lord of this boy! We believe in the Lord of this boy! We believe in the Lord of this boy!" The courtiers came to the king and said, "You know what you feared? By Allah, the very thing you were afraid of has just happened! The people have believed in Allah!"
The king commanded that ditches be dug along the roads. When the ditches had been dug, fires were lit in them. The people were told, "Anyone who does not repudiate his new religion will be thrown in the fire or told to jump into it." The people did just that, until a woman came with her child, and she wavered about jumping into the fire. The child told her, "Mother, be steadfast, for you are upon the Truth."

And verilly, Allah is the One Who cures. Allah is the One Who saves. Allah is the One Who gives life and death, truths that were not repeated by the boy for the sake of dialectics and words. But rather he mentioned them as eternal truths established in reality in such a way that none is able to reject or argue with them.
The King tried to remove the esteem that the people had for the boy, by trying to attribute his ability to cure them to the magic that he had learned from the King's sorcerer. This is always the reaction of those who refuse to acknowledge the truth — they try to interpret it in others ways."

The Parrot said, "Interesting story!" then he said, "O my brother and sisters, are there any of you could grasp the moral lesson of the story?" The Sparrow asked, "It was like the story of Moses and the Paraoh with the sorcerers. O Shama, was it a real story?" The Shama replied, "Yes, actually, it was a story from our beloved Prophet (ﷺ), reported on the authority of Suhayb, it was transmitted by Imam Ahmad, Imam Muslim and An-Nasa'i from the Hadith of Hammad Ibn Salamah. According to Ibn Kathir, some scholars claimed that the incident of the ditch was recurred or repeated in the past more than once. Ibn Abu Hatim said: I was told by my father after Abul Yaman after Safwan Ibn 'Abdur Rahman Ibn Jubair as saying: the incident of the ditch took place in the Yemen during the lifetime of Tubba'. And, it took place in Constantinople during the lifetime of Constantine who set the fires in which he threw the Christians who were sticking to the religion of Isa in Islamic Monotheism. It also took place in Iraq, in the land of Babylon during the lifetime of Bikhtinassar who erected an idol and ordered the people to prostrate themselves before it. Hananiah, 'Izrya and Mashayl refused and thereupon, he set a great fire and threw them into it. However, Allah saved them from the fire and caused the nine men who transgressed over them to fell into the fire they themselves made.
Ibn Abu Hatim narrated that concerning Allah's Statement that reads: "Cursed were the people of the Ditch" in Surah Al-Buruj[85]:4, As-Sadiy said: There were three ditches: one in Sham (Syria), another in Iraq, and the third in the Yemen."

The Eagle said, "This indicates that the King had employed a sorcerer to use sorcery as a means by which to maintain his rulership. Sorcery was not simply a phenomenon that happened to be present in society, but rather it was a force that presided over and ruled the society. This factor can lead us to understand the reality of that time - it was a corrupt reality founded on oppression and ruled by desire, at the head of which was a King who believed in magic and whose power lay in subjugating his people.
There is a new dimension to light here: after the sorcerer had become old and had lived out his life working to make the state of affairs advantageous to the King, he was no longer interested in personal benefits. Rather, he himself wanted his work to continue through the young boy - he had been a sorcerer all his life, and had to keep his work alive through a new life, so he requested a young apprentice. But our analysis should not stop here - we can also see that what propelled him to make this request was the shaytan that presided over all the ages of ignorance; the shaytan has experienced all stages of human existence from the beginning of time, thereby enabling him to link together all the generations of ignorance one after another so that he may utilise them in his propagation of evil and corruption."

Woodpecker said, "In this story, Allah selected the boy to be the reason his people found true faith. The divine message had become marginalised in that society and was only taught secretly by the monk. Through the boy's efforts and martyrdom the True Religion, Islam, became known to the people and many of them accepted it.
The plans of the forces of evil are not greater than Allah's plans. The evil king selected the boy to be his master sorcerer who would further strengthen the foundations of his kingdom, but Allah wanted him to be a righteous servant who would destroy the evil kingdom and guide its inhabitants to Islam.
The lesson in this is that Allah prepares people for the defence of His religion who may even grow up in the homes of tyrants. Prophet Moses is a classical example of this principle. Pharaoh was aware that an Israelite was destined to destroy his kingdom, so he had all new-born Israelite males slaughtered. Moses' mother was inspired by Allah to put her new born child in a basket in the Nile River, and Pharaoh and his wife found him, adopted him and raised him in their own home."

The swallow said, "It could not have been easy for the boy, for he was learning magic from the sorcerer at the same time as learning religion from the monk, and there is a clear contradiction between the two: religion is about clear realities and ordered thought, while magic is about deep deviancies and concocted lies; religion develops the mind, while magic murders it; religion is a cure for the illnesses of the time, while magic causes one to deviate from them; and religion builds life, while magic destroys it. Thus, it was very difficult for the boy to continue learning both religion and magic with peace of mind, and we should note that he would sit with the monk as a matter of choice, but with the sorcerer as a matter of compulsion."
The Crow said, "The boy explained to the king how he could be killed in order to disprove the king's claim to divinity, to make belief in the true God, Allah, known to the king's subjects and to provide living proof of its reality. In the story, some of the believers from the town were thrown in the fire, while others rushed into it on their own. However, their rushing into the fire was not suicide; rather it was open confirmation of their belief in Allah which enraged the king and his supporters and pleased the Lord of all the worlds.
Although, the incident of the boy and his followers has been used by some modern movements to justify suicide bombing in certain parts of the Muslim world, the circumstances are completely unrelated. The reasons are different and the lives of innocent non-combatants were not destroyed in the process."

The Owl said, "Strong faith does not necessarily take a long time to develop. Firm belief can settle rapidly in the hearts of those who accept Islam or awaken to Islam and revive their souls.
True patience is itself the product of complete trust in Allah at the time of calamity. Trust in one's Lord is the natural consequence of real faith. Since belief in Allah means accepting that nothing takes place in the universe without His permission, then only Allah deserves humankind's complete trust. For, it is only Allah's promise which is never broken."
The Stork said, "The believer should not deliberately expose himself to hardships and trials. It is somewhat extraordinary that the monk asked the boy not to reveal his name when he is tortured. He apparently did so because he was afraid that he would also be exposed to the same trial. However, when his turn came, even though he was sawed in half, he did not turn back from his religion. So, why did he request the boy not to expose him in the first place? The answer is comprised of two points: firstly, one must try to keep himself away from trials, since he cannot be sure about the outcome; and secondly he should not hope for trials because, in hoping for trials there is an element of arrogance which may invalidate his good deeds. And that is why the Prophet (ﷺ) discouraged people from hoping to meet the enemy, as stated in the following hadith: "O People! Do not wish to meet the enemy. Instead, ask Allah for safety from trial. And if you meet them, then be patient and know that Paradise is beneath the shade of swords. "

The Shama then said, "O my brothers and sisters, magic is real, and it is a science that has fundamental principles and rules. The boy went to the magician daily to learn the principles of magic. However, magic is among the forbidden sciences. Imam al-Dhahabl said, “Among the forbidden sciences are magic, alchemy, evil omens, natural magic, illusion, astrology, geomancy. Some of these are outright acts of disbelief.
In conclusion, the story includes an outcome that was actualised contrary to the means intended by man: Allah wanted the same boy that the people wanted to be a caller to evil, to be a caller to the Truth. And on the same road that boy took to the sorcerer, he met the monk, sat with him, listened to him, and was impressed by his speech.
The story includes a great outcome by virtue of simple cause: the boy killed the beast that blocked the path using a small stone. This is also the lesson we can learn from the King being defeated, and that what he feared to happen, happened due to this young boy.
The story also includes a variety of outcomes that happen by virtue of a single cause: when the boy and the King's men were on the mountain and the mountain shook causing them all to fall off, the boy went walking back to the King. Similarly, when the boy and the King's men were on the boat and it capsized causing them all to drown, and the boy again went walking back to the King.
From the sum of these truths, we can understand the saying of Allah, "Effecter of what He intends," because this verse is the Truth of all truths. And Allah know best."

"Cursed were the companions of the trench! [Containing] the fire full of fuel, when they were sitting near it and they, to what they were doing against the believers, were witnesses. And they resented them not except because they believed in Allah, the Exalted in Might, the Praiseworthy, to whom belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth. And Allah, over all things, is Witness." - [QS.85:4-9]

Bahasa

References :
- Shaykh Rifa'i Surur, People of the Ditch, at-Tibyan Publications
- Dr. Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips, A Commentary of Surah Al-Buruj, Al-Hidaayah Publishing

Two Men in The Cave

O Allah, send blessings upon our leader Muhammad (ﷺ);
and serve the oppresors with other oppresors;
and save us from their evil deeds;
and send blessings upon the family of Muhammad(ﷺ), his companion and his follower.

Shama said, "Happy New Hijri Year, my brothers and sisters. May Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala shower his blessing on the Muslim Ummah and all Islamic countries. May all the praises and thanks be to Allah to Whom belongs all that is in heavens and in the earth. Have a blessed Muharram.
Now, my borthers and sisters, we will listen to a story from our sister, the spider. Please, my sister, come forward." The spider came forward and said, "O my brothers and sisters, I will tell you a story from my mother's mother, from her mother's mother, and from my great-great grand mother. So, my great-great grandmother said, "I am a spider who is higher in rank than other spiders. With all humility, if all the spiders in this world were put in one hand and I was put in the other I would outweigh them in superiority. I am not one to make false claims and show-off, I am simply stating facts. I do not think that I need to introduce myself to the reader, for I am sure you understand that I am the spider of the cave that the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ), hid in. I am the one, who was responsible for the Prophet's deliverance. I am the one, who Allah sent to protect him.

My web is very flimsy and light and the slightest breeze can blow it away. However, despite the weakness of my web, I managed to ward off the iron swords of the atheists that went out in pursuit of the Prophet (ﷺ), and moreover, I was able to defeat them! The outcome of the conflict between the spiders' weak silk and the iron of the swords was the defeat of iron. My house is considered a parable of weakness, "Verily, the weakest of houses is the spider's house." I sat in my house protecting the noble house of Islam and guarding the Prophet of Allah, Muhammad ibn 'Abdullah (ﷺ).

That was not all that happened to me. Something even more wonderful happened; I saw the Prophet (ﷺ). I know that after the Prophet's death, millions will visit his grave to cry and pray. Moreover, each one of those who cry and pray will imagine the picture of the Messenger of Allah in his mind. But I saw him. I lived with him for three days. He lived as a guest under my cobweb for three whole days. Ah! My heart spins when I remember these days. They were magnificent. Before I saw him, I only loved spiders, food and life, but after I saw him I could only bring myself to love the truth. I changed after I saw him. Have you ever seen a spider cry before? I did. I, the spider, cried when he,peace be upon him, intended to leave the cave. He left the cave and headed towards the city.

I said to him, "O Messenger of Allah I will miss you." He, peace be upon him, did not hear me. I said to him again, "O Messenger of Allah! Give me your hand to kiss or let me kiss the tail of your Coat." He did not hear me and left. As he was leaving the cave, he was compelled to destroy the house that I had built for him. I did not understand why he did that '" I sometimes say that he had to destroy my house in order to get out. My house was the cave's door, and the door had to be opened. So the Prophet (ﷺ) extended his hand towards my home and gently pushed aside my silken web. I tried to get close to him and kiss his hand '" He did not notice that I wanted to kiss his hand for he pulled back his hand before I could bow down and kiss it. He left.

I bowed over the torn silk that had been my house and said, "The silk touched the hand of Allah's Messenger before I did." Then I cried. I continued to cry until my house dissolved in my tears and the cave went back to how it had been. Let me tell my story from the very beginning. I ask the reader to forgive me for I am not myself.

I was a mountain spider and mountain spiders are extremely unlucky. We feed mainly on flies and insects. I was born in a deserted cave in mount Thawr. It is a mountain in Makkah, a small city that I have never seen in my life. Sometimes we hear the doves glorifying Allah from which we understand that they live under the protection of the Sacred House of Allah in Makkah. I tried to imagine how Makkah or the Sacred House of Allah would look but I could not, for I was imprisoned in the cave of Thawr. It is a desolate cave during the day and scary during the night. The cave is in the direction of Yemen. Nobody visits us. Even the beasts flee from the desolation of the mountains and prefer more habitable places.

In brief, I am the mistress of this mountain and its queen. One day I was dangling by a silken string, which I had made from the cave's ceiling. It was a very hot day so I was swinging myself to and fro. Then I heard an unearthly voice ask, "Who of Allah's creatures inhabits this cave?" Spiritual boundaries were broken and I realized that I was hearing the voice of an angel. I stopped swinging, bowed my whole body and prostrated in greeting. I answered the angelic voice saying, "The spider of this cave Meme the daughter of Muma the granddaughter of Mamu is honored to speak with you." The angelic voice said, "Come out to the door of the cave." I moved the silken string to the door of the cave and came out. The voice said, "After awhile, two of Allah's men will come to this cave, Muhammad, peace be upon him, and his companion in this life and the Hereafter, Abu Bakr."

I asked, "And who is Muhammad, peace be upon him?" The voice replied, "He is the last of the Prophets of Allah (ﷺ) on the earth, the mercy of Allah that He sent to the worlds. You will be the servant of him and his companion for three days in the cave." I was filled with wonder and delight and my surprise increased with every passing minute. I said, "What brings him here to this desolate cave?" The voice again replied, "He has fled his home for the sake of Allah's religion and the atheist tribes want his blood. How much time do you need in order to build your house over the door of the cave?" As I was measuring angles, I said, "Four hours of constant work separated by two periods of rest."

The angelic voice ordered, "Work without resting, Allah has charged you with the responsibility to safeguard His Prophet (ﷺ). Divine Protection has put the seal on the fate of the final Message and the future of an entire civilization in your trust." I deepened my prostration and whispered, "I hear and obey!" The head angel left, and in an atmosphere of silence and desolation, I started working. I examined my seven glands that make silk and they were full. I closely examined the entrance of the cave. The door was wide and I started measuring the angles and quickly calculated from which angle I should begin. "I will need six solid pillars of silk to produce from them twenty-six strings that will act as supplementary pillars. Also, I will need ninety-five strings in order to support the walls," I thought.

After that, I started to make the silk, which looks so flimsy, but which is stronger than anything solid as it turns into a fine string that is one thousandth of an inch in diameter. That is the diameter of the string within my web. People do not know that spiders can measure angles and divide them, and that they can assess the durability of materials and the average of pressure. Moreover, they can calculate thousands of complicated architectural problems that people face in the building process. People do not know that spiders weave many kinds of silk to fulfill their all needs. We use our webs to trap a prey, as a dining table, a bed, a sheet, an alarm system, a getaway, a means of transportation and as a shield for protection. In other words, we spiders produce the most useful of material that can be used for many purposes.

The silk that a spider's gland secretes is undoubtedly like the silk produced by a caterpillar but there are some differences. It is these differences that make the spider's weave better, for it is finer, softer and more solid than any other silk. I was surprised to find the Messenger entering the cave with Abu Bakr, may Allah be pleased with him. I stopped working for a moment and looked at his noble and majestic face that looks like a sheet of gold and felt a deep sense of reverence. After that I said, "Welcome a Messenger of Allah." I had hardly finished my greeting to him when I began weaving my house over the door of the cave. I descended vertically from the cave's opening to its floor while weaving my silk. Then I pulled it and fixed it to the ground with an acidic substance that my gland secretes. After that, I climbed up quickly to the entrance of the cave and started to go up and down leaning to the right and to the left while I was weaving my house. The weaving took three hours, six minutes and twenty seconds. The atheists came to the entrance of the cave with their shiny swords standing face to face with my spidery web.

One of the atheists said, "If he had entered here then this spider's web would not be over the door." I smiled a wide smile inside my house and Abu Bakr said to the Prophet (ﷺ) in a low voice, "If one of them were to look under his feet he would find us." The Messenger of Allah, peace be upon him, said, "Have no fear for Allah is with us." The Messenger had hardly spoken these words when the place suddenly became full of angels, and it was filled with a voice saying, "If you help him not, it does not matter, for Allah did indeed help him when the disbelievers drove him out, the second of two, when theywere in the cave, and he, peace be upon him, said to his companion Abu Bakr, may Allah be pleased with him, "Be not sad or afraid, surely Allah is with us."

Then Allah sent down His Sakinah upon him, and strengthened him with angels which you saw not, and made the word of those who disbelieved the lowermost, while it was the Word of Allah that became the uppermost, and Allah is All-Mighty, All- Wise."
After the voice had subsided, once again the cave became full of angels. I was surprised to find angels standing in front of my spidery house and standing behind it. I asked the one closest to me, "What has happened?" He replied, "We have come by an Order from Allah to protect His noble Prophet (ﷺ)." I was screaming and I said, "But I am commissioned to protect him and guard him! Why are you breaking my heart? No one can transgress against him! He is my guest and I am his servant."
I cried because I was so emotionally worked up and I was surprised to discover that I could cry. I turned towards the Prophet wanting to complain to him. But I found him preoccupied with prayer. He was praying and his companion, Abu Bakr, may Allah be pleased with him, was praying behind him. When they prostrated, I prostrated with them.

"The example of those who take allies other than Allah is like that of the spider who takes a home. And indeed, the weakest of homes is the home of the spider, if they only knew. Indeed, Allah knows whatever thing they call upon other than Him. And He is the Exalted in Might, the Wise." - [QS.29:41-42]

Bahasa

Reference : 
- Ahmad Bahjat, Animals in The Glorious Qur'an, Islamic e-Books