Beware Of Arrogance

[Ismail Dalbani]

Bismilllah Ar-RaHman Ar-RaHeem wa alHamdu lillahi rabil ^alameen waSalatu wassalamu ^ala sayyidina MuHammadin ashrafil mursaleen wa Habeebi rabil ^alameen. 

Dear brothers and sisters in Islam, The arrogant person will never be able to cause a crack in the earth as he is walking on it nor will he become equivalent to the mountains in height and strength.

The Prophet, peace be upon, him defined arrogance as rejecting the truth and/or treating people with contempt.

Arrogance is of two types; the first type is when one rejects what he is told while knowing it is the truth merely because of the teller's condition. He does not accept the truth because the person advising him might be younger than he is, or has a lower social status. It was the arrogance of Pharaoh that led to his destruction and made him not accept the truth even though he witnessed the miracles that happened to Moses. 

Also, the arrogance of the Children of Israel led to their destruction; they refused to follow Jesus, peace be upon him, after seeing his numerous miracles just because they thought they would lose their prestige.

Also, Abu Lahab and the leaders of Quraysh refused to believe even though they witnessed the miracle of the Qur'an and admitted that it was not like any of the poetry they had ever known. Their arrogance stopped them from accepting the truth.

The second type of arrogance is when one feels that he is privileged over others; he looks at himself as being superior while forgetting that Allah is the One Who bestowed upon him all these endowments. An arrogant person looks down on people just because they have less wealth or lower social status.

In addition, the ones who look at others with contempt are not only the wealthy and the ones with high social status. The arrogant person could be a husband who, without realising, has scorn in his heart for his wife because he thinks he knows and understands more than she does. An arrogant person could also be a father, who has scorn for his son because he thinks he knows more than his son does, or a teacher who looks down at his students merely because he has more knowledge than they do, and the like.

May Allah protect us and keep us steadfast. And Allah knows best