Surah Yunus: The Source of Happiness | Divine Reminders | Mufti Abdul Wahab Waheed

Surah Yunus: The Source of Happiness

أسلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم، والحمد لله ونصلي على رسول الكريم

Today the Qurrā' began and completed recitation of Surah Yunus. Yesterday we spoke about Surah Tawbah — there was a small passage which was remaining, the first quarter, and that was also completed. Today I will speak about Surah Yunus and a specific verse that I was researching, and I enjoyed reading and I enjoyed researching it as well.

The Central Theme of Surah Yunus

Just before we get into that — Surah Yunus, one of the themes that we find that is consistent within it is that Allah is explaining to the Prophet ﷺ that these challenges are coming your way. This is not the first time these challenges came to Prophets. This has happened many times in the past where Prophets would come and they would be challenged by their communities and their nations, and they did not accept the Wahy that came to their Prophets.

So the theme of the Surah is actually the beauty and the importance of Wahy — how this is what creates a difference in our life if we have it, and how this disgraces us or humiliates us if it's not in our life.

So Allah starts with an ayah where He says:

That our people are surprised that we gave Wahy to someone from amongst them — a man, he's not an angel. And Allah ends this Surah off with the same exact idea:

The same word is being used — make sure you follow and you apply that which is being revealed to you, and be consistent in it, and be patient within that ṭā'ah, within that obedience, until Allah's command comes. That is, the challenges will be there for you to practice upon the Qur'an. The challenges will be there for us to be proud in being Muslims. The challenges will be there in school, in our workplaces, in different platforms, in different places in our life. But Allah is saying no — this is something that happened before as well.

And throughout the Surah, Allah speaks about this — where He gives the example of the people of Musa, then He gives the example of the people of Yunus, and He gives the example of Fir'awn, where he himself at the end realized that "I should have just believed," but it was too late for him.

The Key Verse: Surah Yunus, Verse 58

And in the middle of this Surah, Allah shares a very powerful, powerful verse. After speaking about the idea of:

There are some people who believe in you, and there are others that don't believe in you. And the ones that don't believe in you — they think that they're equal, they actually think that they're better off not believing in you. Allah then in the next passage says:

Tell them, O Muhammad ﷺ — tell them, tell those people who did not believe and they thought they were better off not believing — well, on the Day of Judgment, Allah explains in the same passage:

That on the Day of Judgment, if every single person who transgressed had the entire world's wealth to get a moment of relief, they would do it — but there is no relief on that day for them.

So Allah says: tell them — بِفَضْلِ اللَّهِ وَبِرَحْمَتِهِ — and tell the believers as well, for us, that it is from the blessing and the virtue of Allah, through the blessing and through the virtue of Allah and through His mercy, tell them to be happy.

What Does Faḍl Allah Mean in This Verse?

When we read this ayah — what does فَضْلُ اللَّهِ mean in this ayah? What does the virtue of Allah mean? Because faḍl just means virtue — which blessing? Which virtue is being reflected in this ayah?

So the mufassirūn — Ibn al-Qurtubi رحمه الله shares the opinion of Ibn Abbas, where he gives one opinion. Then Imam Fakhruddin al-Razi رحمه الله shares a different opinion. But we can take from the predominant opinion of what بِفَضْلِ اللَّهِ means — and the mufassirūn say: tell them, O Muhammad ﷺ, بِفَضْلِ اللَّهِ — meaning through the virtue of Islam, because they are Muslim — وَبِرَحْمَتِهِ — and because of the mercy of Allah. And some translate وَبِرَحْمَتِهِ over here as the Qur'an — as Wahy. Tell them: because of Islam and because of the blessing of Qur'an, they should remain happy.

The Only Command in the Qur'an to Be Happy

فَلْيَفْرَحُوا — this is very interesting. This is the only ayah in the Qur'an where Allah commands believers to be happy. There are ayahs in the Qur'an where Allah speaks about contentment and peace of mind and serenity — but to be happy, where Allah says فَلْيَفْرَحُوا — tell them they should be happy — that they have Islam in their life. They have Islam, بِفَضْلِ اللَّهِ, and they have the Qur'an. This is enough for them to be happy. They don't need anything else.

Every single person living in this world has the same goal, the same objective — regardless if they're Muslim or non-Muslim, young or old, male or female. The goal is the same, and that is to live a life of happiness. People want to be happy. That's why we hope to have good jobs. That's why we have children. That's why we get married. That's why we have families. That's why we have friends. That's why we do what we do — so we can see happiness from it and we can gain happiness from it.

Allah says that regardless of whether you have anything else — waking up in the morning and walking out of your home with the understanding that "I have Islam and I have the blessing of the Qur'an" — this is enough for me to be happy, and I should be proud of that.

Allah then finishes this verse off by saying:

This — meaning Islam — هُوَ, Islam, is better than all of that which they have gathered. Everything that they have gathered, everything they have brought together and accumulated — Islam is better than that. There is nothing better than that. There is nothing better than the fact that you have Islam in your life.

So Allah is giving counsel, and He is reminding the Prophet ﷺ — and these people who are saying that "we have more wealth than you, we have more children than you, we have a better following than you, we have strong backing":

On the Day of Judgment it is said: what did your following help you? It didn't really help you, because it never brought you towards Islam. Allah says: all of that aside — since you have Islam and you have the Qur'an in your life, what you have is far more valuable than that which they possess.

And we don't just say these words — we actually believe them. Allah says on the Day of Judgment, if these individuals had the entire world's gold they would hope and they would ask and request: "O Allah, take all of this, just give us some relief" — because they don't have the blessing of Islam.

So in this blessed month of Ramadan, and throughout, we should keep reminding ourselves that there is nothing more valuable to us than Islam.

The Statement of Umar in Baitul Maqdis

Umar رضي الله عنه, in a beautiful statement — I'm going to end with this — when he entered Baitul Maqdis, Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah and Khalid ibn al-Walid were there, and the Christian priest told Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah, the general of the army, that "if your leader comes, we'll give you Baitul Maqdis in peace, and there will be absolutely no difficulty in this transfer — no battle, no one's going to get hurt."

Umar رضي الله عنه comes and he has patches on his clothes. And Abu Ubaidah says to Umar رضي الله عنه: "O leader of the believers, why don't you just change your clothes? It doesn't suit you. It doesn't look good right now."

And this happens to us a lot too — "it doesn't look good on me," "it doesn't suit me to make wudu at work," "it doesn't suit me to look like this or look like that," "it doesn't look good to pray in an airport," "I'm a manager of a company," "I'm a 4.0 GPA student — it doesn't look good if I say I believe in mi'raj or I believe in things like that." It's not about looking good. It's about these things making us feel valuable.

Umar رضي الله عنه said to him:

(Reported by al-Hakim in al-Mustadrak, and narrated by Umar ibn al-Khattab رضي الله عنه)

"O Abu Ubaidah, we were the lowest of people" — and this was not a statement which was exaggerated. This was true to every note of that statement. These were people that were living in the deepest ditches of ignorance — of burying their daughters, of not giving inheritance to the women, not taking care of the orphans, stealing the money of the orphans, fighting over the most petty and feeble of disagreements. He says: "Allah gave us honor through Islam. And O Abu Ubaidah, if we were to search for respect and honor in anything other than Islam, Allah will once again bring this down and disgrace us."

So our honor, our value, our respect lies within believing in Allah and having the Qur'an with me, on my side. So if we are able to identify that — the other things that come and go should not make us lose our value. But if this diminishes, if this is weathering away, that is what takes value away from us.

May Allah make us feel confident, proud, and make us realize the value that we have — that we are blessed with naturally, without anything in return, with this beautiful religion and the Qur'an. And this entire Surah discusses that concept of Wahy — Wahy is what makes you special, Wahy is what makes you valuable.

And we believe that Allah gives us the ability to bring this in and keep this consistent in our mindset, and teaches it to our children to make them feel confident and make them feel proud. And everywhere we go, we identify ourselves as believers and as Muslims.

May Allah bless you all for joining. JazakAllah khair. Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.

Once again, please do join our 6pm session today — Shaykh Abdullah Waheed will be discussing the life of Abu Bakr رضي الله عنه. And also join the 9:30 session with Shaykh Abdullah and Mufti Abdul Rahman, where they have a beautiful discussion on the reflection of each Surah, each juz. I touched upon one small portion — they will obviously go into more detail. I encourage all of you to join that as well.

JazakAllah khair. Thank you so much for continuing to be consistent, and we hope to see you soon. Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.