The Foundations And Concepts of Islam

Then He created you from a mixture of male and female discharge and made you hearing, seeing. Allaah says,

"Has there not been over man a period of time, when he was not a thing worth mentioning? Verily, We have created man from drop of mixed sexual discharge of man and woman in order to try him; so We made him hearer and seer."[326]

Then you moved gradually from a state of weakness to strength and you shall be returned to a state of weakness again. Allaah says,

"Allaah is He Who created you, in (a state of) weakness, then gave you strength after weakness, then after strength gave (you) weakness and grey hair. He created what He will and it is He Who is the All-Knowing, the All-Powerful"[327]

Then the end is death and you, through these stages, move from weakness to weakness; you cannot avert evil from yourself nor can you bring about benefit for yourself except by using that strength and provision that Allaah gave you. You are by nature poor and needy. Many are the things that you need to remain alive which you do not possess or which you sometimes have and sometime are deprived of. Many are also those things that are useful to you and you would like to have and which you achieve sometimes and do not achieve other times. Many are things that harm you, ditch your hope, waste your efforts and bring on you tribulations and calamity which you would like to avert; and which you sometimes succeed in averting and which you fail sometimes to avert. In view of this, do you not feel your helplessness and your need to Allaah? Allaah says,

"O you people! It is you who stand in need of Allaah. But Allaah is Rich (free of all needs) Worthy of all praise."[328]

You are exposed to a weak virus which you cannot see with your naked eyes, and that causes you painful disease which you cannot prevent and you then go to a weak human being like yourself to treat you. Sometimes, the medicine works and sometimes the doctor fails to cure you and both you and your doctor then become confused.

O man! What a weak creature you are when the fly snatches something from you and you cannot take back from it! Allaah says the truth when He says,

"O mankind! A similitude has been coined, so listen to it: Verily, those on whom you call besides Allaah cannot create (even) a fly, even though they combine together for the purpose. And if the fly snatches away a thin from them, they will have no power to release it from the fly. So weak are (both) the seeker and the sought."[329]

If you cannot take back what the fly snatches away from you, which then of your affairs do you have control over? Your forelock is in the hand of Allaah, so is your soul. Our heart is between two of His fingers which He turns round as He wills. Your life, death, happiness and misery are all in His Hand.