الحمد لله رب العالمين والصلاة والسلام على رسول الله و على آله و صحبه أجمعين
Islam is a religion of great virtues, etiquette and manners. One such quality that is enshrined in the history of Islam amongst the pious predecessors of the distant past and the times near us is the quality of courage and bravery.
Courage and bravery are qualities required of every Muslim, male or female. The Islamic meaning of these terms as summarized from what we read from Imam An-Nawawi and Imam Ibn Hazm would be that: Courage(and bravery) means to stand up to defend the truth even in the face of possible oppositions, and to call people to goodness and forbid evil and racing to do good deeds, it also means to be steadfast upon following the religion of Islam and being steadfast in fighting the enemies of Islam and the Muslims with the pen, the tongue and the sword, and doing all of this whilst expecting a reward from Allah.
Allah’s Messenger ﷺ said in a Hadith narrated by Abu Hurairah (رضي الله عنه):
A strong believer(Qawi) is better and is more lovable to Allah than a weak believer… (Portion of a Hadith from Sahih Muslim,2664)
Imam An-Nawawi said explaining this Hadith that: ‘ The meaning of Quwwah (strength) here is the greatness of the self and being alert in the matters pertaining to the Akhirah (the afterlife), and the ones who have this quality race towards the enemies(of Islam) during the battle and are quick to leave (march from their homes) for it (matyrdom), and are firm and strong in enjoining good and forbidding evil, and (they) bear with patience and endure all the troubles encountered in this path…’
The Quran, the Sunnah and the history of Islam from the Khulafa-Ar-Rashidoon till date, is replete with various incidents of bravery and courage, and discussing each of those incidents in detail would require a great research which would fill tens of volumes. And I swear upon Allah that I am not exaggerating in saying this.
Courage and bravery, in Islam, have many facets to it. Our beloved Prophet Muhammad ﷺ and his Sahaba (رضي الله عنهم) and the Muslims who came after them, showed valour on and off the battlefield, they displayed exemplary sacrifice and faith in all forms charity and good deeds, they raced to please Allah and serve His religion Islam, which is the only true religion accepted by Allah.
One of the greatest acts of courage and Jihad I would like to pen down for all of us now, is to face a powerful tyrant who thinks that he is an undefeatable god and tell him on his face that he is just another human being who is positioned as a king or emperor by Allah.
It was narrated from Tariq bin Shihab that:
a man asked the Prophet, when he had put his leg in the stirrup: “Which kind of Jihad is best?'” He said: ” a word of truth spoken before an unjust rulers.” (Sunan An-Nasai,4209, Hassan)
Allah has recorded such acts of courage in His Speech, The Quran, as a reminder for the believers, that no matter who the adversary is we will not stop preaching the truth and commanding goodness, and the greatest of the truths is to proclaim that Allah, The One Almighty God, is the only one to be worshipped and sought assistance from. We will always proclaim that acts of polytheism and atheism are acts of evil and rebellion against The Almighty Creator, Allah.
I would like to mention,In sha Allah, a few examples of this courage and bravery, shown when the odds were high up against the believers in One God, and the powerful foe did everything within his capacities to suppress the truth.
When Khaleel-ulllah (The friend of Allah) Ibrahim (عليه السلام ) was standing infront of the king of Babylon (Iraq), whose Biblical name was Nimrod, and Nimrod was one of those who claimed godhood for himself, Ibrahim (عليه السلام) shut his mouth and defeated the disbeliever Nimrod.
Ibrahim (عليه السلام ) said to the oppressor Nimrod, “My Lord is the one who gives life and causes death.”
The king said, “I give life and cause death.” And the foolish king killed an innocent man and claimed that he gave ‘death’ and he pardoned someone who was to be executed for a crime and claimed that he also gave ‘life’.
Ibrahim(عليه السلام ) continued his argument with the disbeliever saying,”Indeed, (my) Allah brings up the sun from the east, so bring it up from the west.”
Thus the disbeliever was defeated, as he knew that he couldn’t bring out the sun from the west and his weakness was exposed.
(See the Tafseer of Sura Al-Baqarah, Ayah 258)
And then we know that Ibrahim (عليه السلام ) was thrown into the fire and Allah saved him from that.
Throughout The Quran we have the mighty Messenger of Allah Musa (عليه السلام ) conveying and preaching The Oneness of Allah to the king of Egypt, Firaun (Pharoah Ramseis). Well, he (عليه السلام) and his brother Haroon were courageous like all the messengers, but what astonishes me is the bravery and sacrifice of the magicians of Firaun.
When called for a contest of miracles versus magic, Musa (عليه السلام ) defeated the magicians of Firaun. His staff, which turned into a huge snake miraculously, by the will of Allah, swallowed the small but numerous serpents of the magicians. The magicians realised that this wasn’t magic at all, but the manifestation of a miracle at the hands of Musa (عليه السلام ).
They immediately believed in The Rubb (Lord) of Musa and Haroon (عليهما السلام ) and testified that they were Muslims submitting to Allah in front of Firaun. And Firaun threatened to mutilate and chop off their opposite limbs and crucify them alive, yet the new Muslims, magicians who were disbelievers some minutes and seconds ago did not surrender to the claimant of godhood.
They were no longer worried about their bodies and their lives as Allah’s Oneness and the disgust of polytheism filled their hearts.
Firaun said,”I will surely cut off your hands and your feet on opposite sides; then I will surely crucify you all.”
The magicians(Muslims now) said, “Indeed, to our Lord we will return. And you do not resent us except because we believed in the signs of our Lord when they came to us. Our Lord, pour upon us patience and let us die as Muslims [in submission to You].”
(Read the Tafseer of Surah Al-Araf, from Ayah 104 to 126)
The Ashabul-Kahf (people of the cave) mentioned in the beginning of Suratul-Kahf (Chapter 18), rejected the worship of their king Decianus (Biblical name), and proclaimed the oneness of Allah in his court.
Allah says in The Quran: “And We made firm their hearts when they stood up and said,
“Our Lord is the Lord of the heavens and the earth. Never will we invoke besides Him any deity. We would have certainly spoken, then, an excessive transgression.”
(Surah Al-Kahf, Ayah 14)
The seven Ashabul-Kahaf, Muwahhidoon (worshippers of One God, Allah) were tortured and they had to escape and hide in a cave to save themselves, where they slept for 309 years. Allah loved these seven young men and their act so much that He recorded this brave endeavour of theirs in The Quran and made it a reminder for us till the Day of Judgement.
In the Tafseer of Surah Al-Buruj (Chapter 85), we read the story of ‘the boy and the king’ recorded in Sahih Muslim (3005).
Subhan Allah, Allahu Akbar, this story has hundreds of people, who accepted Islam, worshipped Allah Alone, and who bravely and courageously chose death over prostrating and worshipping a king from the kings of this transient world.
The young boy,the protagonist in this narrative, secretively learns Imaan-billah (Belief in The Oneness of Allah) from a pious monk who asks the boy to keep this knowledge hidden and undisclosed. The boy then, by Allah’s permission cures one of the blind ministers in ‘the god-king’s court’,and the minister accepts Islam.
And the secret soon comes out in the open, which leads to the torture of the minister who tells about who cured him by Allah’s Permission and Name, and then the boy is persecuted till he discloses that it was this monk who taught him this great knowledge of Iman-billah. Both the monk and the minister are given options to chose between being sawed into halves or leave Islam and turn to disbelief by worshipping the king. They courageously chose the saw, knowing that the saw is their way to the great paradise of Allah.
The boy who wouldn’t be harmed by the disbelieving army in anyway they tried to kill him , thus finally gets killed in a specific way, only after he asks the disbelieving king to assemble a large audience and shoot the arrow on the boy by saying ‘in The Name of Allah’. The arrow killed the boy instantly and almost everyone realised the power of Allah’s Name and the apparent weakness of the ‘god-king’. The great audience accepted Islam.
The Hadith then mentions that: “He (the king) commanded ditches to be dug at important points in the path. When these ditches were dug, and the fire was lit in them it was said (to the people): He who would not turn back from his (boy’s) religion would be thrown in the fire or it would be said to them to jump in that. (The people courted death but did not renounce Islam) till a woman came with her child and she felt hesitant in jumping into the fire and the child said to her: Oh mother, endure (this ordeal) for it is the Truth.”
Allahu Akbar, the people, the mother, and even her child, hugged death courageously and patienly, defying the false god only to please Allah Azza Wa Jall.
The examples from The Quran above were just a drop in the ocean of the glorious history of our pious predecessors, and these were just one aspect of the meaning of being courageous and brave.
May Allah guide all of us to study The Quran and The Sunnah and help us and assist us in being Islamically courageous and brave.
-Abu Muaaz Mohammed Manna
Saheehus-Seerah 