Surah 1-2 - YasSarNal QuR'aN

Al-Baqarah (The Cow) | A TIMELESS MESSAGEwhich God’s will comes to pass. They are His servants, with little power of theirown, chosen to perform a certain predestined role in the universal divine scheme.Believers are granted this privileged status through the grace of God and as a resultof their sincerity, their determination to serve God and their unstinted devotion toHim.“David slew Goliath, and God bestowed on him the kingdom and wisdom, and taught himwhatever He willed.” (Verse 251) At the time of these events, David was a young manand Goliath a powerful king and a fearful commander, but God wished todemonstrate to the Israelites that they should not judge matters at face value, andshould look deeper into the reality of things. Their side of the bargain was to keeptheir pact with God and prepare themselves for battle, leaving the rest to God whoknows the essence of all things and how they come about. The outcome would bedecided by God, in accordance with His will and wisdom. It was God’s will that ayouth such as David should slay a powerful giant-of-a-man such as Goliath as proofthat physical power by itself is not the decisive factor. The other divine objective, notobvious at the time, was that David was destined to inherit the kingdom of Saul, andthat David would be succeeded by his son, Solomon, who reigned over what becamethe golden era in the whole history of the Israelites, a period of great religious revivalwhich came after their return from the wilderness.Different Manifestations of God’s FavoursDavid was a king and a Prophet, who excelled in the craft of making iron toolsand implements of war, as the Qur’ān tells us elsewhere (21: 80). The purpose behindrelating this story is revealed in the closing sentence of the verse: “Had it not been forthe fact that God repels one group of people by another, the earth would have been utterlycorrupted. God is limitless in His bounty to all the worlds.” (Verse 251)This powerful statement takes us beyond the limited narrative and itspersonalities and events to reveal the fundamental divine wisdom underlying theconstant contention, power struggles and battles among the multitudes of mankindin the tumult of life. It depicts the incessant strife and the spirit of competition andrivalry that drive human beings to their various ends and objectives in this world,according to the overall divine scheme under God’s wise hand which leads them alltowards progress and higher standards of life.Were it not for this spirit of struggle and competition, life would be dull and stale.The conflict of interests and the variety of objectives that people seek in this worldare the means by which human talent and energy are released and brought into playto reinvigorate and revitalize the human experience for the good of mankind. Thisdynamic movement produces the true human force of goodness, brings truth to the330