I wrote this for one of the Fikrah Adni magazines...

As I see it…

In the April 2007 issue of Reader's Digest (Malaysian Edition), there is a sentence on page 123 that reads:

"Another man who was charged pleads to assault and gets a conditional discharge - on condition he participate in a reconciliation process."

This is a story of how a young man is filled with great remorse after committing a murder. More importantly, it’s a story with a lot of substance. It has many lessons for us to ponder: questions of humanity, conscience, morals, and values. All this makes it a touching and inspiring story to dedicated teachers-cum-educators.

I’m sure virtually everyone who has read the story shares the same feelings. So I’m not going to deal with it from a philosophical or moral point of view. As a matter of fact, I’m going to touch on something else.

When reading the above-mentioned sentence, I also thought about the subjunctive used, and it reminded me of how puzzling the subjunctive was when I was in school.

The use of the subjunctive really reminds me of what my English language teacher was saying when she taught how to use verbs-to-be when I was in Form Two. She said it was wrong to say “If I was you” or “If I am you”. According to her, the only correct expression was “If I were you” but she did not mention the subjunctive at all.

Now that I have learned from my religious teachers about how careful Muslims should be when saying such expressions as “If I were you…” or “I wish I were…” or something like that, I would like to remind everyone including myself that in terms of ‘aqeedah, it’s Islamically wrong to say such expressions if we forget about the qadha and qadar.

But what if we say them as Abu Bakr did as he feared Allah with true iman?

Everyone knows that Abu Bakr is the most exalted companion of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). The Prophet (peace be upon him) himself conveyed to him the glad tidings of his being the head of a group of persons in Paradise.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) once said that Abu Bakr's name would be called out from all the doors of Paradise, and that he would be the first of the Prophet's followers to enter it. (Sahih Bukhari: 1764)

With this divine privilege, Abu Bakr, with true iman and taqwa, used to say, "I wish I were a tree that would be cut down and done away with."

Sometimes he would say, "I wish I were a blade of grass, whose life ended with the grazing by some beast."

Once he went to a garden, where he saw a bird singing. He sighed deeply and said, "Oh, bird! How lucky you are! You eat, drink and fly under the shade of the trees, and you fear no reckoning of the Day of Judgement. I wish I were just like you." (Musannaf Ibn Abi Shaibah: vol. 7/ pg. 91)

Abu Bakr would say such a subjunctive expression because of his taqwa. Was he denying his raison d’être on earth as Allah’s vicegerent when he said it? Definitely not.

Let’s ponder over this in the daily context of life so that we will make every possible effort to act upon the Quran and Sunnah and thus improve our iman and taqwa.