Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 110 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:110

فَٱتَّخَذْتُمُوهُمْ سِخْرِيًّا حَتَّىٰٓ أَنسَوْكُمْ ذِكْرِى وَكُنتُم مِّنْهُمْ تَضْحَكُونَ

“But you took them in mockery to the point that they made you forget My remembrance, and you used to laugh at them.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Mocking the people of prayer became such a full-time occupation that it crowded Allah Himself out of the mockers' minds.

A reflection

So busy watching them, you forgot Him

A man in his thirties follows a young woman's account where she cooks and recites the Quran. He cannot stand it. He checks it before bed. He screenshots her posts for a group chat, where his friends add their jokes. Over a year he has watched more of her videos than she has of anyone's.

The ayah says something precise and strange: ḥattā ansawkum dhikrī, until they made you forget My remembrance. Grammatically, it is the believers who 'made them forget'. The commentaries explain why. The believers did nothing to them. It was the mockers' own preoccupation with them, their busy, absorbed scorn, that pushed Allah out of their minds. So the forgetting is attributed to the ones who occupied their attention.

That is a very modern psychology. Contempt is absorbing. It feels like distance, but it is actually a kind of attachment. The person who sneers at religious people often thinks about them far more than the religious people think about him. He knows their habits, their phrases, their dress. He has watched them closely enough to mock them well.

And all that attention has to come from somewhere. The hours spent watching, mocking and sharing are hours not spent in any remembrance at all. One commentary sums up the sequence plainly. You busied yourselves mocking them until you forgot the remembrance of Allah, and so you stayed in your denial.

The lesson is not only for scoffers. Anyone can be consumed by people they dislike. A colleague, an ex, a public figure, a relative. You may follow them, discuss them and rehearse arguments with them for years.

So check where your attention goes. If someone you disapprove of occupies more of your mind than Allah does, the ayah has described you as well. Unfollow, mute, look away. Give that attention back to the One it was made for.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.