You Should Have Broken Her Head!
The principle of moral purity which once existed has been wiped out with the passage of time; mankind has abandoned their high ethics, buried all notion of honour, and turned towards the search for ways to help him achieve his contemptible base desires.
He has used the gifts God had given him to enjoy fleeting pleasures and wasted these same gifts for the sake of ephemeral vanity and excessive pride. This will inevitably result in suffering because he has failed to realise that the Godly Purpose in making these gifts available to mankind was simply to help him promote his ascension to the heavenly abode.
Man has decked the earth with all manner of beautiful things and allowed women to appear unveiled and dressed so as to display their attractive appearance, and as a result they have said goodbye to virtue and hello to vice.
This is the state of mankind in this age. A wise man once summed up this dreadful situation in just a few words, saying, ‘The times are like the people, and the people are as you see them.’
Mankind has missed an important reality due to his lack of thought. He has forgotten that Al’lah imprinted yearning and desire on the surface of his spirit to be used as a means to help us in our advancement and not to be lost in a spiritual wilderness and exhausted in the fruitless quest for temporary delight which is ultimately associated with pain. If people were to abstain from fulfilling their every wish and desire through illicit ways and seek, rather, God’s Satisfaction, the Almighty will allow them greater appreciation through correct ways, and then, on Doomsday, He will allow them to enjoy great pleasure in Paradise.[23]
The Almighty promised His servants that if they prevent their spirit from indulging its whims and worldly desires, their eventual reward will be the Gardens of Eternity, and they will remain there forever. God says, “Those who kept in mind that the day would come when they would have to face their Lord’s Tribunal and, with this in mind, had controlled the base desires of their spirit, would find their ultimate abode in His Garden.”[24]
At that time, more than seventy years ago, the social situation had not deteriorated to the depths that it has sunk to now. In those days people abided by the Godly Laws and followed the religion outwardly in their external acts and appearance, and inwardly in their thoughts and hearts, and both inside the home and outside in public. Their adherence to applying all aspects of God’s Statute influenced the followers of other religions, such as the Jews and Christians, to the extent that no woman, whether Muslim or non- Muslim, would be seen with her face uncovered in public at that time. There was no lowering of moral standards and no contravention of the Legislation of God, the Almighty.
The story we are going to tell now presents a perfect pattern of the state of affairs during that period and epoch of our history. It recounts a new exploit of the compassionate young master, Mohammad Amin, whereby he was the very personification of Islamic ardour and zeal in their true, Godly Meanings, which swept away the evil powers of spirits which had been debased by the devil causing their spiritual fire to die down.
Let us, dear reader, go back to the time of this story, when master Mohammad Amin was nine years old. He had just finished playing in the neighbourhood and started on his way home along with his friends who were happily chatting as they walked alongside him.
The boys had reached the turning which led to Mohammad Amin’s home opposite the al-Ward bathhouse in one of the quarters of the Sarujah Market in Damascus.
While passing in front of one of the houses in this street, master Mohammad Amin noticed that its door was opened cautiously and a twelve year old girl had stretched her bare head through the narrow opening, her glowing young face on view to all outside while she pretended to look for her little brother in the street. At that moment, feelings of high principles and honour began to surge in the chest of the young boy, for such unveiling was absolutely forbidden in Islamic society in the late nineteenth century. So, when he saw this sight, he picked up a big stone and threw it towards the girl’s head, but she quickly closed the door for she knew well that she was the target due to the serious breach of behaviour she had committed, and the stone hit the door of the house causing it to split .
Then, the honest and faultless lad continued on his way home having frightened the girl as a deterrent to prevent her from repeating such an infringement of proper behaviour or, indeed, doing anything else that is prohibited. She had realised that her disobedience would be on everybody’s lips, and public opinion would see her action as scandalous.
A few hours later the girl’s father arrived home on horseback. He was one of the resolute men of the neighbourhood. When the man saw the crack in the door of his house he asked some of the local boys if they knew anything about it. They told him how master Mohammad Amin saw his daughter poking her head through the opening of the door with her face unveiled, and therefore he had thrown a stone at her but it had missed its mark and hit the door instead. On hearing this the man quickly tied his horse to a tethering ring fixed to the front door of his house, and heading straight to the home of our young master Mohammad Amin he knocked at the door.
It was God’s Will which brought the young boy himself to open the door to the girl’s father who embraced him and kissed his forehead, saying, ‘I pray that no harm will ever come to your hands, for you are like a young lion, the champion of the neighbourhood! But why didn’t you hit her and break her head?’
It may seem strange for a father to speak this way but, rather than condemning the boy’s action, he praised him;
in fact, when he went to the coffeehouse where the local men used to gather to discuss their affairs, he stood where he could be seen by everyone and said in a loud voice:
‘Gentlemen! Praise is to God, we are still living in a proper way and in good times, for when we are away, our children protect our honour.’
Then he related to them the full details of what the young master Mohammad Amin had done.
This story brings to mind the poetic verse which serves to illustrate this story:
Nations will survive alongside their morality, but if their morality fades, they too will fade away.