As-Saffat · Makki · ayah 35 of 182

As-Saffat 37:35

إِنَّهُمْ كَانُوٓا۟ إِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ لَآ إِلَـٰهَ إِلَّا ٱللَّهُ يَسْتَكْبِرُونَ

“Indeed they, when it was said to them, "There is no deity but Allāh," were arrogant”

Saheeh International

Essence

Their crime was not ignorance: they heard there is no god but Allah, and something in them refused to be smaller than it.

A reflection

Arrogance is not a swagger

At a family dinner, a sixteen-year-old gently corrects a guest about the date of a famous battle. She is right, and everyone at the table knows it. The guest pauses, laughs, and changes the subject. He does not raise his voice or boast. He simply cannot bring himself to say: you're right.

Most people picture arrogance as a manner. The loud man, the expensive car, the chin held high. This ayah defines it differently. Yastakbirūn: they grew arrogant. When? When it was said to them, there is no god but Allah. Their arrogance was a reaction to a truth.

The Prophet ﷺ gave the same definition in words that surprised his listeners. No one will enter Paradise who has a speck's weight of arrogance in his heart. A man asked about someone who likes his clothes and sandals to be fine. He replied: Allah is beautiful and loves beauty. Arrogance is rejecting the truth and looking down on people (Sahih Muslim).

So fine clothes are not arrogance. A confident manner is not arrogance. Arrogance is the moment a true thing is said to you and you push it away. You push it because of who said it, or because accepting it would make you smaller.

That is a far more searching test, and it catches quiet people as well as loud ones. The guest at the dinner table was modest in every outward way. But for a moment the truth arrived from below him, and his heart refused it.

Ask yourself when you last said, with no qualification: you're right, I was wrong. If it is hard to remember, the ayah is speaking to you. The cure begins with that sentence, said once today, to someone who deserves it.

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.