Website: www.aaiil.uk

Abraham and his devotion to the One God

Friday Khutba by Dr Zahid Aziz, for Lahore Ahmadiyya UK, 29 May 2026

“And recite to them the story of Abraham. When he said to his elder and his people: What do you worship? They said: We worship idols, so we shall remain devoted to them. He said: Do they hear you when you call (on them), or do they benefit or harm you? They said: But we found our fathers doing so.” — ch. 26, Ash-Shu‘arā’, v. 69–74

وَ اتۡلُ  عَلَیۡہِمۡ  نَبَاَ   اِبۡرٰہِیۡمَ ﴿ۘ۶۹﴾  اِذۡ قَالَ لِاَبِیۡہِ  وَ قَوۡمِہٖ مَا تَعۡبُدُوۡنَ ﴿۷۰﴾  قَالُوۡا نَعۡبُدُ اَصۡنَامًا فَنَظَلُّ لَہَا عٰکِفِیۡنَ ﴿۷۱﴾  قَالَ ہَلۡ یَسۡمَعُوۡنَکُمۡ اِذۡ تَدۡعُوۡنَ ﴿ۙ۷۲﴾ اَوۡ یَنۡفَعُوۡنَکُمۡ اَوۡ یَضُرُّوۡنَ ﴿۷۳﴾  قَالُوۡا بَلۡ وَجَدۡنَاۤ اٰبَآءَنَا کَذٰلِکَ یَفۡعَلُوۡنَ ﴿۷۴﴾

With the days of Ḥajj this year still continuing, I will mention some aspects of the mission of Abraham. Abraham arose among a people who said that they were devoted to their idols. He preached against idol-worship in the strongest terms, most openly and loudly. They could not reply to his arguments that their idols cannot hear them, cannot answer their prayers, cannot do any good to them for believing in them, nor punish them for disobedience. The only reply his people and their leaders could give was that they were simply copying the practice of their forefathers. The argument presented by Abraham only works if he could show people that Allah does all these things which their idols cannot do. Otherwise, his people would reply that the One God Whom you worship also cannot hear you, nor do to you any benefit or harm.

Every prophet had to demonstrate to people that God hears prayers and answers them. And after the time of the Last Prophet, the Holy Prophet Muhammad, those who carry forward his mission, especially the mujaddids who are appointed by Allah, have to demonstrate the same thing. This was why Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad laid so much stress on this point that there is real communication between humans and God, and that it is most clearly observed in the lives of those sent by God for the reform of people. Some of us have witnessed many incidents in the lives of the elders of the Lahore Ahmadiyya Jama‘at in which their prayers were answered by Allah. They were even informed by Allah as to whether He was going to accept a certain prayer or not. In some matters they realised that prayer about it would not be liked by Allah, and that His will was against it. So they refrained from praying in those matters. As I will show later, it is in the Quran that Allah can tell His chosen ones not to pray for a certain outcome in a particular matter.

Abraham then explained to his people what are the works of God which make Abraham obey and love Him. He said that God is the one:

“Who created me, then He shows me the way, and Who gives me to eat and to drink, and when I am sick, He heals me, and Who will cause me to die, then give me life, and Who, I hope, will forgive me my mistakes on the day of Judgment” (26:78–82)

He presents God as the One Who meets human needs, as the problem-solver rather than the problem-creator. God created humans with the capability to choose between right and wrong, but He also showed them the right way. Again, humans need to eat and drink and be healthy, and God provided those means for them. Abraham does not say that God makes a human hungry, thirsty or sick. He says that God brings them relief from these condi­tions. He also says that human life does not come to a futile end, but that God raises humans to life after death. It is as if, like food and drink and good health, life after death is a human need. The famous British astronomer, Sir Patrick Moore, told an interviewer about a year before his death in 2012:

“I don’t believe life ends here. When I die, my body will die, but what’s me, won’t – it will go on somewhere else.”

When asked why he believed that, he said:

“It seems logical to me. I can’t prove it. Ask me again in 10 years. My body will not be alive, but I will be.” (See link.)

Abraham then says to his people that he has hope that God will forgive him his mis­takes on the Day of Judgment. He was one of the greatest prophets of God, and is revered by Jews, Chris­tians and Muslims, which is the majority of the world. Accord­ing to a hadith in Sahih Muslim, when a man addressed the Holy Prophet Muhammad as Yā khair-al-bariyya, “O best of creation”, the Holy Prophet replied: “That was Abra­ham” (book 43, hadith 2369a). Yet this great man is conscious of mistakes he may have made, and he expresses his “hope”, not certainty, that God will forgive him.

Abraham arose among a people who declared, as quoted above, that they were devoted to their idols. He preached against idol-worship in the strongest terms, most voci­ferously. In ch. 37 of the Quran, where his dream of sacrificing his son is described, it is stated, before this incident, how strongly Abraham condemned the idol-worship of his people. He said to them:

“What is it that you worship? [It is] A lie — gods besides Allah do you desire?” (37:85–86)

Then there are several short verses about how he sternly denounced and argued against their idol-worship. After these verses, this topic is concluded as follows:

“He said: Do you worship that which you carve out? And Allah has created you and what you make. They said: Build for him a building, then cast him into the flaming fire. And they designed a plan against him, but We brought them low.” (37:95–98)

Abraham was prepared to be cast into burning fire for the sake of preaching that there is only one God. Nothing could deter him from that mission. Allah saved him from the plan to burn him in that fire, just as He saved Jesus from being killed on the cross and the Holy Prophet Muhammad from being murdered by his many enemies. This verse is followed by the story of Abraham’s dream. Having no children, Abraham prayed to Allah:

“My Lord, grant me a doer of good deeds.” (37:100)

Traditionally, people wanted to have children because they could work with them to support the family, later on they could look after them, and continue the family name. They were their strength and their material and emotional security for the future. But what Abraham wanted Allah to bestow on him was “a doer of good deeds”. This should be the heart-felt desire of every Muslim as well.

Then the incident of the sacrifice is related:

“But when he became of age to work with him, he said: My son, I have seen in a dream that I should sacrifice you: so consider what you think. He said: My father, do as you are commanded; if Allah please, you will find me patient. So when they both submitted and he had thrown him down upon his forehead, and We called out to him saying, O Abraham, you have indeed fulfilled the vision. Thus do We reward the doers of good. Surely this is a manifest trial. And We ransomed him with a great sacrifice.” (37:101–107)

A question is often raised: how could Allah command a prophet to slay his son, even if it was for just testing him? The answer is that it is not stated here that Allah gave such a command, but that Abraham saw himself doing this in a dream. Had it been a command of Allah, Abraham wouldn’t have consulted his son for his opinion. We say that Abraham thought this was Allah’s command because human sacrifice was common in the world at that time, including in the area where Abraham lived. So Abraham thought this was what Allah required him to do.

But another question then arises: how could Abraham even think of carrying out a barbaric act such as human sacrifice. Was he a fanatical, unthinking, blind believer who was prepared to run a knife across his teenage son’s throat on the basis of a dream that he thought was from God? If we study other incidents of Abraham as related in the Quran we find that, quite the opposite of this, he was a very rationally-minded person who reasoned things out, he was unsatisfied with accepting anything blindly, he searched for the truth with his heart and mind, he presented arguments to people; and at the same time he was gentle and forgiving, so much so that he did not want even wrongdoers to be punished by Allah.

When his tribal elder told him to go away and stop preaching against the idols or he would punish him, Abraham replied:

“Peace be on you (salām-un ‘alaika)! I shall pray my Lord to forgive you. Surely He is ever Kind to me. And I withdraw from you and what you call on besides Allah, and I call upon my Lord. Maybe I shall not remain unblessed in calling upon my Lord.” (19:47–48)

Because of this, Allah says in the Quran: “Surely Abraham was tender-hearted, forbearing” (9:114). The word for “forbearing” is ḥalīm in Arabic. It means one who is tolerant and puts up with a lot from people with patience. On another occasion, when Allah informed him that He was going to destroy a certain people because of their excessive wrongdoing, Abra­ham began to plead with Allah to not punish them. Again the Quran says this was because “Abraham was forbearing, tender-hearted, turning (to Allah) again and again” (11:75). Allah said to him:

“O Abraham, stop this. Surely the decree of your Lord has gone forth and a punishment must come to them which cannot be averted.” (11:76)

What would a man of such a nature be feeling when he decided to go ahead and sacrifice a perfectly innocent boy, who was his own son and beloved? What we generally hear in speeches and read in articles about this incident is that Abraham was prepared to sacrifice what he cherished the most, in obedience to a Divine command. But I would like to add that he faced another obstacle to overcome: his own gentle nature, which prevented him from even wishing the destruction of the worst kind of wrongdoers.

So why would Abraham think of sacrificing his son physically? As stated in the verses I quoted at the beginning, his people told him that they were devoted to their idols and would always remain so. These were the kind of people who sacrificed human beings to please their idols, as they thought. Abraham felt that he needed to express no less devotion to the one, true God, than they expressed to the idols. There is a passage in the Quran saying:

“Yet there are some people who take for themselves objects of worship besides Allah, whom they love as they should love Allah. And those who believe are stronger in (their) love for Allah.” (2:165)

Abraham felt that he should have no less love for Allah than the idol-worshipers had for their false gods. So he was prepared to take the dream as a command, and after obtaining his son Ismail’s agreement he attempted to proceed with it. And as stated in the Quran, Allah stopped him since physical sacrifice of a human is not required for showing your devotion to God.

Let us pray that we try to create in our lives some glimpse of such an attachment to God as Abraham had, and reject the many idols of this world that are constantly before us, ameen.

 

Website: www.aaiil.uk