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fa-ʾidhā massa l-ʾinsāna ḍurrun daʿānā thumma ʾidhā khawwalnāhu niʿmatan minnā qāla ʾinnamā ʾūtītuhū ʿalā ʿilmin bal hiya fitnatun wa-lākinna ʾaktharahum lā yaʿlamūna
When distress befalls man, he supplicates Us. Then, when We grant him a blessing from Us, he says, ‘I was given it by virtue of [my] knowledge.’ Indeed, it is a test, but most of them do not know.
— Ali Quli Qarai
Surah al-Zumar - Verse 49
49. When harm touches man, he calls to Us; then when We have granted him a favor, he says: “Only because of my knowledge [and plan of actions] I obtained it.” [It is not like that], it is only a trial, but most of them know not!
Experiencing hardships renders man to confess to his weakness and awakens man’s God seeking primordial natural disposition in him and flourishes the same. Thus, the blessed Verse says that whenever man is afflicted with loss and harm, pain, hardship, and poverty, he invokes God for their removal. He is the same man who disgusted at hearing the Name of the One God, now that he is entangled with vicissitudes, he seeks refuge in Divine Mercy. Yet, his refuge is also transient since when God Almighty grants him a favor, he says that it was solely out of his savoir-faire and competence:
An instance of such ingratitude is attested elsewhere in the Holy Qur’an24 uttered by Qarun (Korah) addressing the scholars of the Children of Israel providing him with admonitions:
Such ignorant people do not reflect in the least upon the fact that their knowledge is also a Divine Favor granted to them. Do they assume that the knowledge leading to gaining abundant possessions is their own? Is it their innate quality? Addressing such vain and incapable braggarts who forget their small capacity when the gain worldly possessions, the Holy Qur’an says:
The trial aims at making them reveal what they entertain in their hearts upon gaining mundane possessions. Are they rendered desperate upon experiencing afflictions? Do they become vain upon gaining worldly possessions? Do they invoke God or are they ensnared by mammon upon being afflicted with vicissitudes? Do they consign themselves to oblivion or they notice their frailties and remember God more than the past?
It is unfortunate that the majority of people are forgetful and do not attend to such facts. Qur’anic Verses reiterate the truth many a time that the Omniscient God entangles man with hardships and also bestows on him peace and other Bounties so as to test him, make him to comprehend better the true value of his existence, and make him acquainted with the fact that everything springs from Him. Vicissitudes basically pave the path for man’s primordial natural disposition to flourish; it is in the same manner that blessings serve as a prelude to gaining knowledge.
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