An-Nisa · Madani · ayah 36 of 176

An-Nisa 4:36

۞ وَٱعْبُدُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ وَلَا تُشْرِكُوا۟ بِهِۦ شَيْـًٔا ۖ وَبِٱلْوَٰلِدَيْنِ إِحْسَـٰنًا وَبِذِى ٱلْقُرْبَىٰ وَٱلْيَتَـٰمَىٰ وَٱلْمَسَـٰكِينِ وَٱلْجَارِ ذِى ٱلْقُرْبَىٰ وَٱلْجَارِ ٱلْجُنُبِ وَٱلصَّاحِبِ بِٱلْجَنۢبِ وَٱبْنِ ٱلسَّبِيلِ وَمَا مَلَكَتْ أَيْمَـٰنُكُمْ ۗ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَا يُحِبُّ مَن كَانَ مُخْتَالًا فَخُورًا

“Worship Allāh and associate nothing with Him, and to parents do good, and to relatives, orphans, the needy, the near neighbor, the neighbor farther away, the companion at your side,[186] the traveler, and those whom your right hands possess. Indeed, Allāh does not like those who are self-deluding and boastful,”

Saheeh International

Essence

The ayah opens with Allah alone and closes with the strutting boaster; between them stand ten kinds of people owed kindness.

A reflection

Allah at the start, the arrogant at the end

Look at how this ayah is built. It opens with Allah alone: worship Him, and associate nothing with Him. It closes with the one Allah does not love: the strutting boaster. In between stand ten kinds of people.

The order is the lesson. One classical commentary notes that the word shayʾan, 'anything', is left indefinite. One reading takes it as belittling: associate with Him nothing, however slight. Beside His endless greatness, everything else is the smallest of small things. Another commentary defines worship as humbling oneself, and showing need, before the One who holds all judgement and choice.

That is where the ego shrinks. If He alone is great, I am not. And if every person on this list stands before Him in the same need, none of them is beneath me. The parent, the orphan, the stranger next door, the worker under my hand: all equally His.

Picture a man who has not missed the front row at Fajr in six years. Every morning he steps round the caretaker's mop bucket without a word. He has bowed to the Greatest thousands of times. He has not yet seen that the bow was meant to reach the caretaker too.

The ayah will not let worship stop at the mosque door. It makes the oneness of Allah the root, and kindness the branches.

Does Allah need to command worship of Himself? He needs nothing from anyone; if people disbelieve, He is free of need of them (39:7). In Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim, the Prophet ﷺ asked Muʿādh what Allah's right over His servants is. It is that they worship Him alone. Then he asked what the servants' right over Allah is, once they do. It is that He will not punish them. Even the right He asks becomes a promise He gives.

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.