Nur, check this out

[BiLaaL]

Brother Nur, have you come across the idea, that hiding behind a mask developed after Adam's Son Cain killed his brother Abel. Ofcourse this was the first time a human being killed another. And so the idea goes that Cain, filled with sorrow, regret and fear from his brother's soul, Cain sought to hide behind a mask.

 

The following Surah's of the Qur'an mention this incident. In this Ayats Allah(A'za Wa Jallah) advises Cain and gives him a solution. Some say that this solution was to hide behind a mask. The ayats talk about the disposing of the remains of Abel, there is no reference to a 'mask'. And also knowing that Allah does not protect those who brake his law, why did he advise Cain and give him the solution mentioned in the Ayats.

 

There is great wisdom to be gained from the story of Cain and his brother. So many areas of wisdom, so can you expound on this story, its significance etc. I'm sure other SOL members will find some benefits from it, inshallah.

 

Here are the ayats of the Qur'an regarding this story.

 

Surah 5(27-31)

 

27. Recite to them the truth of the story of the two sons of Adam. Behold! they each presented a sacrifice (to Allah.: It was accepted from one, but not from the other. Said the latter: "Be sure I will slay thee." "Surely," said the former, "(Allah) doth accept of the sacrifice of those who are righteous.

 

28. "If thou dost stretch thy hand against me, to slay me, it is not for me to stretch my hand against thee to slay thee: for I do fear Allah, the cherisher of the worlds.

 

29. "For me, I intend to let thee draw on thyself my sin as well as thine, for thou wilt be among the companions of the fire, and that is the reward of those who do wrong."

 

30. The (selfish) soul of the other led him to the murder of his brother: he murdered him, and became (himself) one of the lost ones.

 

31. Then Allah sent a raven, who scratched the ground, to show him how to hide the shame of his brother. "Woe is me!" said he; "Was I not even able to be as this raven, and to hide the shame of my brother?" then he became full of regrets-

[Nur]

Bilaal Bro.

 

Brother, I read these verses many times over, referred to the earliest interpretations available ( Al Tabari), but I could not find the faintest suggestion of the idea of hiding behind a mask. It is the first time I have ever heard such a version, could you please enlighten me of your sources?.

 

 

Bismillah wa bihi astaciin.

 

The story of Habil and Qabil as you've noted has many lessons to be learned that are valid to this day, before we expound on their significance in detail, let us go back to analyze historical developments that led to all sins being committed on earth throughtout the ages. The first recorded sin ever commmitted by any creature was driven by Pride and Envy , these double headed sins took place when double horned Satan, an envious creature of man's place in the eyes of Allah SWT, refused to obey Allah SWT by bowing down to Adam as ordered by Allah SWT in recognition of Adam's higher position in the hierarchy of Allah's creations. It may also help to go back to visit the second sin driven by Desire of Glory that was committed by Adam aleyhi Salam and his wife Eve ( Hawwaa)in Jannah. The eating of the forbidden fruit.

 

If you carefully read on that story you'd get the idea that the tree in Jannah represented all evil that humans will commit on earth, bundled in that fruit, literally in an nutshel. So, here you have two people created in heaven given all the goodness they can imagine, elevated to the highest levels of dignity compared to all the creatures inclduing the angels, and asked to observe a single commandment to STAY AWAY FROM THAT TREE , and yet, Adam and Eve fall from grace and go against the wish of their maker, thereby lowering themselves to a lower level, the level of a sinner, to suffer shame and regret and to cause themselves and their progeny to be sent to probationary period on earth to win back what they had for granted.

 

So, when Allah elevated man to the highest place in His dominion, One of His creatures became very envious of man's higher position and dignity, Satan vowed to influence man and bring him down.

 

So Satan in his special ways influenced man and gave him an edict ( Fatwaa) that the reason that this tree was forbidden to them was to keep them away from winning an everlasting glory. After Adam and Eve ate from that tree, they found the oppsite, nakedness, shame and regret and a feeling of subduedness, just contrary for what they have bargained for. This, efect of the lure of Satan and the subsequent feeling of regret is the essence of the struggle of man on earth to purify himself and elevate himself to his rightful place as the most dignified creature of Allah by simply surrendering to Allah SWT.

 

Satan, after committing his sin that was driven by Pride and Envy , failed to repent, thus missing the opportunity to make up for Allah SWT and fall in line with the rest of His creatures in obedience, But Adam who committed a Desire driven sin, regretted and their regret led them to repent and surrender their will to Allah SWT again hoping to win back their lost paradise. For the above reason, the sin of Pride is the greatest sin as it led Satan astray, and made him unrepentent forever,

 

That repentence represented a valuable lesson, that no matter how disgracefiul a sin we commit, Allah is always willing to take us back if we humble ourselves, admit our mistakes and resolve not to go back to it, albeit with a price.

 

To accept their repentence, Adam and Eve, and their progeny had to meet the following guidleines:

 

1. You are to serve a jail term on planet earth, you will live their for a while, the tree that you ate in Paradise, is found on earth in the form of many temptations, of wealth, desires, pride, envy and rebellion against the will of Allah SWT , so beware of these sins lest you fall from grace like your parents.

 

2. You have Satan as your enemy, who has access to your inner source files where your decision making process resides. So, take him as an enemy by drawing close to Allah SWT and protect yourselves from him through the rememberance of Allah and the day of Judgement (dhiker).

 

3. To stay in the right course and not to succumb again to Satan's temptations, You will hear from Allah through Messnegers of your kind who will show you the way to worship me inorder not to fall in the traps of Satan, your enemy again.

 

4. Life on earth is a probation period for mankind, a period of redemption and worship, a period of showing that you indeed believe in Allah and His Messengers, and are willing to sacrifice your earthily pleasures to win back your Lost Paradise.

 

5. Your salvation is in following Allah's commandments, Do not Kill being an important message in this story.

 

 

As Adam and Eve dwelled on earth and started a family, the promised test and our human struggle beagn in earnest, to test our conviction and actions driven by conflicting motivations from Allah and Satan, our arch enemy.

 

Each of Cain and his brother Abel were born with a twin sister, Allah's decree was that each twin can only marry from the other pair, to keep genetic distant apart. Cain's twin sister was prettier than Abel's twin sister, so, Satan again whispered into Cain's ears, " hey, you shouldn't allow Abel to marry your twin sister, you are the rightful spouse for her, after all she is your own twin " just like he whispered to his father and mother before, and just as he is doing it to Somalia and the world at large at present.

 

Cain, gave in to Satan's temptation, against Allah's covenant, and rejected the Devine order insisting that he will marry his twin sister. Abel and Cain asked arbitration from their father Prophet Adam who ruled that they should both offer a sacrifice to Allah SWT, and depending on whose sacrifice is accepted by Allah will have their wish in marriage.

 

Cain was a farmer and Abel was a shepherd, Cain is said to have offered a lot of his farms product as a sacrifice and likewise, Abel offered one of his sheep as a sacrifice. When the sacrificial lamb and grains where thorwn into the fire, the fire consumed Abel's lamb and did not consume Cain' s grains, signalling that Allah SWT accepted Abel's offer and as a result Abel had the right to marry Cain's twin sister, hence winning the marriage of disputed bride.

 

Cain became angry at this ruling, envious of Abel's sacrifice being accepted while his sacrifice not beeing accepted, so in anger Cain askes Abel why did Allah accept your sacrifice? Abel answers with dignity that Allah only accepts from those who are keen in winning his satisfaction through obedience ( Mutaqeen)

 

Cain becomes even angrier that Abel is fovored by Allah, just like Adam was favored buy Allah over Satan, so we see a rerun of an old movie again, the story of Adam who was given a higher place and Satan who was asked to bow down to Adam. Cain was also angry that he did not win the marriage of his much desired beautiful twin sister, this again will become a driver of the a sin similar to that of Adam, a sin driven by Deseire of glory.

 

So, in that sitaution, Cain decided to take away the life of his brother Abel inorder to marry his twin sister and get the envy out of his chest. But Abel, who was obedient to Allah decided that he will not lift his hands to kill his brother even if Cain did so, thereby winning Allah's pleasure of not committing murder.

 

Cain goes ahead with his threat, and kills his brother. Cain now is stuck with the cadaver of his dead brother, carrying around until it started to rot and smell, he had no idea of what to do with it, since that murder was the first death in the family, the human family.

 

It was in these circumstance that Allah SWT, as a mercy, sent two crows ( labo tuke) while Cain was pensive thinking of how to dispose of his brothers remnants ( li yuwaarii Saw-ati akhiih )that these crows gave him a hint of what to do with his brothers remains, upon seeing the show of the crows, in which they fight in his full view, one of them getting killed and the other digging the earth and burrying the dead crow, Cain, burries his brother and regrets his shameful demise.

 

The story, in Suurah Al Maidah has a far reaching meaning and lessons if we rise up to have a look at the entire message of the Suurah.

 

Al Maedah laid the ground for the mission of Dawa( invitation to surrender to Allah ) of Jews and Christians to follow Islam, Allah SWT throughout this Surah stresses on several themes fundementall importnat to relay the message of Islam to Jews and Christian, and each group are addressed in a language they can understand. So, these versus of Cain and Abel came as prelude to the story of Moses and his followers the Children of Israel who were behind the murder of many of their prophets, the last of which was Jesus Aleyhi Salaam, and as a warning to the Jews who conspired to murder the Messeneger of Allah SAWS, to reflect on the regretful ending of the story of Cain and Abel.

 

The significance of these verses to the Jewish Muslim relations is great, as Allah SWT equates all humans to the two brothers, one of them being greedy, Proud and envious, while the other brother is humble, peaceful and willing to share ( He will not attempt to kill his brother even if his brother attempts to Kill him ) because Allah SWT categorized the crime of killing a single soul without an equivalent crime as a genocide of all of mankind, and rightfully so, because today, if Abel lived, we would have had a linneage of people from a good guy to balance the common aggressive gene we alll inherited from our aggressive, envious and Proud father, Cain ( Qabiil).

 

Today, if we look at the significance of these verses to the problems in Somalia, we can easily see how we all fell from grace due to our inherent pride of our tribal lineage and envy of other people from other tribes getting ahead of us or killing more than we can kill.

 

Because many of our Somali people indeed believe that their tribal lineage matters when it comes to be good or bad, we have collectively committed mischief and evil unparalleled in the history of mankind since Hulako, Atila the Hun, Jenkhis Khan and the Fuhrer.

 

If Alcohol is the mother of all sins, ( Ummul Kabaa'ir ), then unquestionably, Pride is their Father, because Pride begets envy, envy begets, lies, stealing and finally murder.

 

In Conclusion, if there are any lessons that can be learned from theses verses I would say the following would be high on the list.

 

1.Pride and Envy are Evil, Pride is reserved for Allah SWT, and envy is a contempt to Allah's absolute justice, Allah alone has the right to decide who should be entitled to live or die, and if we all play on level terrain according to his laws delivered by His Messengers, then no soul will suffer injustice.

 

2. Murdrer is a grave sin by any yardstick, Allah gives life and causes death, no one should play God by taking others lives without the Law of God. These days we see a lot of killing in the name of justice and freedom, we see tribal vendettas in Somalia or internationally, government policies that trigger the death of many innocent people around the world who are just struggling to earn their daily bread. Why did these people die? because, a Cain and an Habel somewhere are settling scores, fighting over the marriage of some ( vital interests at risk ) with the rest of the populace held as expendable collaterals being slaughtered and their death justified due to the declared or undeclared motives and policies of the madness that is going on in this game of Pride and envy.

 

Anyone who kills any human without an acceptable reason to Allah, has committed a genocide of all mankind, clipping the branch of the tree of that person forever. And For that reason, in the eyes of Allah, as Abel said, it is better to be killed as a victim, then to be the a doomed killer, carrying the heavy weight of the value of a wasted human life that, potentially could have worshipped Allah on earth consumating its purpose of creation.

 

 

Nur

 

2004 e-Nuri Visions

Deep Diving Into Quranic Stories Expeditions .

[BiLaaL]

Brother Nur, may Allah reward you for you're efforts. I benefited immensely, and i'm sure other SOL members did.

 

As for any sources, i first came across this 'idea', reading a piece written by an Iraqi surgeon and historian Dr. Ala Bashir. He called it 'The mask of Cain', in which he states that every human being hides behind a metaphorical mask. Believing that the skill of hiding behind a mask from other people has been built inside humans ever since the killing of Abel.

 

He doesn't discuss this idea of his in detail, but after some research, i did come across a book written by Dr. Ali Shariati. Books authored by him include; 'Mission of a Free Thinker', 'Man and Islam' 'The Free Man and Freedom of a Man', 'A Glance at Tomorrow's History' and many more.

 

 

Here are some excerpts from the book 'Hajj'. The particular section is entiled 'The Last Message'.

 

"The three oppressors are the three faces of Cain, the "owner" who killed his brother Abel, a shepherd and became the guardian of Abel's orphaned children. The murderer became the heir of the victims!"

 

-There is one Cain who is the murderer and killed his brother!

-There is one Cain who made two enemies of two brothers!

-There is one Cain who changed two equals into unequals!

 

 

"He divided mankind into two races, society into two classes, made history bi polar and converted the unity into a duality, The Quran uses the term despising to describe the act of making people weak and vulnerable".

 

It is one "ruling class" that has three faces (or powers). There is one Cain who converts the unity into a Trinity! He employs many approaches - openly or secretly, belief or disbelief, unity or trinity, anarchy or law, dictator ship or democracy, slavery or freedom, feudalism or bourgeoisism, faith or science, spiritualism or intellectualism, philosophy or sufism, happiness or suffering, civilized or savage, regression or progression, idealism or materialism, Christianity or Islam, Sunnism or Shi'ahism!"

 

I haven't really had time to investigate any further on this 'idea', but i'm sure there are more references out there.

 

Dr Ali Shariat used to be the Professor of Mashad University, IRAN. His biography claims that he was under close surveillance by the security agents of Iran. Which prompted his departure for England. Shortly after arriving in England he was killed, in 1977 by the ubiquitous SAVAK.

 

I'm guessing that he must be a Shia, although i have seen some of his works being sold and promoted by Sunni Muslims. If he is Shia, then perhaps this 'idea' of the 'Mask of Cain' is something rooted in Shia tradition. Allah knows best.

[Nur]

Bilaal brother

 

Islam came to help people take off their false masks. We all wear the pride mask, individuals and states alike, what other explanation for the US slaughter of over a Million Iraqis , Somalis, Afghanis under false lies allegations and still unrepentaant to admit for their sin? Power and Pride are adangerous combination for human race.

 

Allah says in Quraan:

 

"Innal Insaana la yadghaa, an ra aahu istaghnaa

 

Meaninng: " Mankind ( always) transgresses, when he finds himself self sufficient (powerful), surely, (O mankind), You will return to your lord (after death for judgement)"

 

 

Nur