Al-Furqan · Makki · ayah 43 of 77

Al-Furqan 25:43

أَرَءَيْتَ مَنِ ٱتَّخَذَ إِلَـٰهَهُۥ هَوَىٰهُ أَفَأَنتَ تَكُونُ عَلَيْهِ وَكِيلًا

“Have you seen the one who takes as his god his own desire? Then would you be responsible for him?”

Saheeh International

Essence

Look at the one who has made his own desire his god; and then let go, because you were never appointed his keeper.

A reflection

Not the pleasure-seeker: the devotee who picked his god

Most of us carry a picture with this ayah. The person who 'takes his desire as his god' is the hedonist. He lives for appetite, drink and lust, and has no time for religion.

Read the ayah where it sits, and that picture falls apart. One ayah earlier, these same men boast of their devotion. 'He almost turned us from our gods, had we not held firm to them' (25:42). They were not irreligious. They were loyal, ritual-keeping worshippers. And this ayah calls what they worshipped their desire.

The commentaries explain how. Whatever such a man found beautiful in his own taste became his religion and his way. One commentary says plainly: he obeyed his desire as one obeys God. The god was real to him, and the devotion was real. But the choosing was his.

An early scholar, a report preserves, was once asked whether there could be idolatry among people who pray towards the Kaʿba. Yes, he said: the idolater bows to the sun and moon, and the hypocrite worships his desire. Then he recited this ayah. A later writer on the inner life adds that desire spoils whatever it mixes with. In knowledge it breeds innovation. In worship it stops being obedience.

Picture a man who has changed mosques four times in six years. Each time an imam says something that cuts against him, he finds the sermon 'unbalanced' and moves on. At the fifth mosque he settles. The imam there says, every week, exactly what he already thought.

He is devout, and he is following his desire. The ayah's question is not whether you are religious. It is who chose your religion's every answer. A god who never says no to you is a horse with no bridle.

The full entry has 7 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.