The Diamond of Iman.........

The Diamond of Iman......... by Babar Ahmad

Allah says in the (Quran 12:5): "Indeed Satan is to man a clear enemy."

If someone was to ask you to write down the name of your most precious possession, what would you write? Your body? Your car? Your family? Your jewelery? Your house? Your hair? Your job? Your money? Your clothes? The reality is that all of these will not benefit you in the Hereafter and nor will you take them with you into your grave. However, there is one possession of yours, that not only will benefit you in this life, the grave and the Hereafter, but if you were to put it on one side of a scale, it would outweigh every other possession that you have or could ever wish for. That one possession is your Iman.

Iman is what Musa (AS) had so Allah parted the sea for him and saved his people. Iman is what Dawud (AS) had when he slew Jalut. Iman is what Isa (AS) had when he asked Allah to send down for his people a tablespread from the sky which thousands of them ate from twice a day. And Iman is what the Messenger of Allah (SAWS) possessed, which made him and his Companions the leaders of the world at their time.

How do you protect your possessions from theft, evil, harm, damage? How do you protect your possessions from those who seek to take them from you? You would surely exert your utmost effort to protect your possessions with your life. Yet how do you protect your Iman, which is the most precious possession that you have?

Imagine that your Iman is like a huge, precious, priceless diamond. How would you protect this diamond from thieves, criminals and enemies? How would financial institutions and museums etc. protect such an expensive diamond? They would place the diamond in a locked metal box secured by an unpickable padlock. The box would be inside a locked, sturdy compartment surrounded by strengthened iron members. The compartment would be situated inside a fire-proof safe with a multiple lever locking mechanism.

To get to the safe one would have to enter a vault reinforced with concrete-cladded walls and a sophisticated alarm system. Outside the vault would be invisible infra-red beams linked to an automatic CCTV camera surveillance circuit. And so on with increasing levels of security and protection, to make it as difficult as possible for a thief to penetrate the cordon.

Similarly, consider your Iman in place of this diamond. The metal box is your salah and the padlock is wudu. The sturdy compartment represents Allah's commandments and the iron members are the various obligations that He has ordained upon you. The safe represents the Sunnah of the Messenger (SAWS) and the multiple levers of the locking mechanism are the different actions of the Sunnah such as the Sunnah salah, morning and evening supplications, duas throughout the day, etc.

The vault takes the place of optional (nafl) supererogatory deeds such as tahajjud night prayers, sadaqah (charity), extra remembrance duas etc. and the alarm system is there to maintain regularity of these deeds. And so on with the outer layers representing higher and higher types, quantities and qualities of good deeds.

Shaytan is your biggest enemy. He is trying every hour of the day to destroy your Iman and make you renounce your faith. However, he knows that he cannot reach your Diamond of Iman instantly: he has to penetrate several layers of protection and security before he can reach that precious jewel. He patiently awaits a lapse in security that occurs when you fail to perform a regular deed which comprises a layer of your protection. Whenever you commit a sin, it is an indication of Shaytan's success in penetrating your cordon. The size and severity of the sin represents the seriousness of the breach.

The more layers of protection you have and the stronger those layers are, the less likely Shaytan is to make a hole in your security cordon and approach your Iman. If you have allowed him to affect your salah, so that you are either not performing it five times a day, or you are delaying it past its time, or you are rushing it, then it is a sign of great danger that you are extremely close to the point between Iman (faith) and Kufr (disbelief).

Your Iman is the most valuable thing that you possess. No human being or jinn or any power in the world can snatch this away from you without your consent and your permission. The worldly powers can take away your freedom of movement, your money, your family, your house, and the limbs of your body. But they can never take away your Iman if you do not allow them to.

Build your Iman. Build it, strengthen it, and reinforce it. And once you have built it, protect it and maintain it. Every security system requires maintenance. If you fail to regularly keep your protection cordon in optimum condition, you will leave it open to attacks by your avowed enemy, the Shaytan. And if he succeeds in snatching away your Iman, don't blame him. Blame yourself.

The Diamond of Iman.........

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