02
(Essay)
Wish Him Well
Envy, your brother's blessing, and the prayer an angel says back to you.
By Mike Rashid King • Allah's Humble Servant
The tightness
Your brother calls with good news. The business closed. The baby came. The house is his. You say congratulations, and you mean most of it.
Under the congratulations, something in your chest goes tight.
That tightness has a name. The Arabic word is hasad: envy. Lane's Lexicon defines it plainly. The envier dislikes that the other man should possess the blessing, and wishes that it might depart from him.
There is a second word, ghibtah. It is wishing for the like of another man's condition without wanting him to lose it. The lexicons take care to say it is not hasad. One man wants a lamp of his own. The other wants his brother's lamp put out.
I have written about the tongue, the temper, the promise, pride, the eyes, your parents and your company. This one is about the heart in the moment another man is given something.
Lane's Lexicon on h-s-d · Lane's Lexicon on gh-b-t
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What Allah says about envy
Allah taught you to seek refuge from it by name. The last thing you ask protection from in Surah Al-Falaq, after the darkness when it settles and the blowers in knots, is this:
وَمِن شَرِّ حَاسِدٍ إِذَا حَسَدَ
Wa min sharri hasidin idha hasad
And from the evil of an envier when he envies. (Surah Al-Falaq 113:5)
Then He shows you where envy led between two brothers. Recite to them the story of Adam's two sons, in truth, when they both offered a sacrifice, and it was accepted from one of them but was not accepted from the other (5:27). The one whose offering was refused said: I will surely kill you. His brother answered: Allah only accepts from the righteous. If you should raise your hand against me to kill me, I shall not raise my hand against you to kill you; indeed, I fear Allah, Lord of the worlds (5:27 to 28). His soul permitted to him the murder of his brother, so he killed him and became among the losers (5:30).
Ibn Kathir names the motive: he killed him out of envy and transgression, because of the bounty that Allah gave his brother. The brother had taken nothing from him. Allah had accepted something from the brother.
Quran 113:1-5 · Quran 5:27-31 · Tafsir Ibn Kathir on 5:27
The brothers of Yusuf, ʿalayhi as-salām (peace be upon him), said it out loud: Yusuf and his brother are more beloved to our father than we (12:8). Kill Yusuf or cast him out to another land; the countenance of your father will then be only for you (12:9). They put him into the bottom of a well (12:15).
Years later they stood before him in Egypt, and he said: no blame will there be upon you today; Allah will forgive you, and He is the most merciful of the merciful (12:92). When he told the story at the end, he did not blame them. He said Satan had induced estrangement between me and my brothers (12:100). Envy opened that story. Forgiveness closed it.
Quran 12:8-15 · Quran 12:92 · Quran 12:100
Allah gives the cure in the same ayah that names the wish: do not wish for that by which Allah has made some of you exceed others; for men is a share of what they have earned, and for women is a share of what they have earned; and ask Allah of His bounty (4:32). The answer to another man's portion is a request of your own.
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What the Prophet ﷺ said
He tied it to faith itself. None of you will have faith till he wishes for his brother what he likes for himself. The title of this essay is that sentence, cut short.
He named envy among the things that break brothers apart: do not hate one another, do not envy one another, do not turn away from one another, and be servants of Allah, brothers.
He showed where the wanting belongs. Do not wish to be like anyone except in two cases: a man whom Allah has given wealth and he spends it righteously, and a man whom Allah has given wisdom and he acts by it and teaches it to others. The Arabic opens with la hasada, no envy, and then names the two exceptions. Want what those two men have. Neither of them loses anything when you do.
He dealt with the eye that admires too hard. Amir ibn Rabi'ah saw Sahl ibn Hunaif bathing, praised his skin, and Sahl fell to the ground. The Prophet ﷺ asked: why would one of you kill his brother? When you see something you like, pray for blessing for him. Darussalam graded it sahih (authentic).
Sunan Ibn Majah 3509, sahih per Darussalam
And he gave the prayer that turns envy inside out. When a Muslim prays for his brother in his absence, an angel says: and for you the same.
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Why envy eats the envier
Systems Thinking looks at what a belief does to a man's attention. Envy runs on the idea that blessings come from a fixed pile: if he got more, there is less for me. So the envier spends his hours watching another man's portion and none building his own. That is an inference about how envy works.
Allah broke the fixed pile in the ayah that names the wish: ask Allah of His bounty (4:32). And the Prophet ﷺ reported that Allah says: if the first of you and the last of you, men and jinn, rose up in one place and asked of Me, and I gave each one what he asked, that would not decrease what I have, any more than a needle decreases the sea when it is put into it. Your brother's share took nothing out of that sea.
Quran 4:32 · Sahih Muslim 2577a
Dialectical Thinking demands the objection. I do not want it taken from him. I just want it too.
Then it is ghibtah, and it has a place to go. Take it to Allah as a request of your own.
The harder objection stays unspoken: he does not deserve it. Allah asks: or do they envy people for what Allah has given them of His bounty? (4:54). The blessing came from Allah. A man who resents it has an argument with the One who gave it. That is my reading of the ayah, and it is why envy is more than a bad mood.
As for the feeling itself, the Prophet ﷺ said Allah has overlooked the evil thoughts that occur to the minds of his followers, so long as they do not act on them or speak them. The passing thought is not counted against you. What you do with it is: the word about him behind his back, the help you quietly hold back.
Quran 4:54 · Sahih al-Bukhari 5269
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The practice
The rules come from the Quran and the Sunnah (the example of the Prophet ﷺ). The order is mine.
- Let the thought pass. Allah overlooks the thought that occurs to you (Sahih al-Bukhari 5269). Do not sit with it, open his page or replay his news.
- Pray for blessing for him. When you see something you like, pray for blessing for him (Sunan Ibn Majah 3509). Say it to his face: barak Allahu lak, may Allah bless it for you.
- Pray for him where he cannot hear. An angel says: and for you the same (Sahih Muslim 2732a). Put his name in your dua tonight.
- Look at the man below you. When you see someone given more wealth and a better appearance, look also at someone who has less (Sahih al-Bukhari 6490).
- Say ma sha Allah over your own. Why did you, when you entered your garden, not say: what Allah willed; there is no power except in Allah? (18:39). A man who sees his own blessings clearly has less room for another man's.
- Ask Allah of His bounty (4:32). When the question why him comes up, answer it with a request of your own.
- End the night with the dua of the believers: our Lord, put not in our hearts any resentment toward those who have believed (59:10). Say it with his face in mind.
Sahih al-Bukhari 5269 · Sunan Ibn Majah 3509 · Sahih Muslim 2732a · Sahih al-Bukhari 6490 · Quran 18:39 · Quran 4:32 · Quran 59:10
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The quiet work
Envy works in secret, and so does its cure. The prayer you make for your brother in his absence is heard by Allah and answered for you by an angel. No one else knows it happened.
Allah describes the people of Paradise with their hearts already cleaned:
وَنَزَعْنَا مَا فِى صُدُورِهِم مِّنْ غِلٍّ إِخْوَٰنًا عَلَىٰ سُرُرٍۢ مُّتَقَٰبِلِينَ
Wa naza'na ma fi sudurihim min ghillin ikhwanan 'ala sururin mutaqabilin
And We will remove whatever is in their breasts of resentment, so they will be brothers, on thrones facing each other. (Surah Al-Hijr 15:47)
Brothers, facing each other. Envy turns a man's face away from his brother. Start turning it back here.
Your brother's good news will come again. Have the prayer ready.
Sahih Muslim 2732a · Quran 15:47 · Quran 59:10
Our Lord, put not in our hearts any resentment toward those who have believed.
By Mike Rashid King • Allah's Humble Servant