رَبَّنَا مَا خَلَقۡتَ هَـٰذَا بَـٰطِلاً۬ سُبۡحَـٰنَكَ فَقِنَا عَذَابَ ٱلنَّارِ Tafseer for the verse

 رَبَّنَا مَا خَلَقۡتَ هَـٰذَا بَـٰطِلاً۬ سُبۡحَـٰنَكَ فَقِنَا عَذَابَ ٱلنَّارِ (١٩١)

This is the second half of ayah 191 of Surah Al-Imran. Its meaning is: “Our Lord! You have not created this without a purpose. Glory be to you! Give us salvation from the torment of the Fire!”  

First, let’s break it up. The beginning of the ayah (Our Lord! You have not created this without a purpose) refers to the fact that Allah has created nothing in vain. The word baathil literally means ‘in vain’. Everything He has created is with a purpose, and they all fulfil that purpose. Also, our very own lives have a purpose, and those who abuse their life will be punished and those who use it to do good will be rewarded.

In the previous ayah Allah says that this is a statement made by ‘men of understanding’ who are conscious of the reality of things. To understand who they are, we need to look at all the types of people there are in the world;

1.    Non Muslims who don’t believe in Allah, and don’t think about a Creator when they see the creation, they just go about their lives.

2.    Muslims, like us, who believe in Allah, and know that he is the Creator, yet don’t praise him when we see His beautiful Creation.

3.    Non-Muslims, like Richard Dawkins, Charles Darwin and David Attenborough, who spend their lives learning about Allah’s creation, yet never, ponder whether there is a Creator.

4.    Muslims, who believe that Allah has created everything, and praise Him every time they look at his Creation.

It is this last group of people that are making the statement in this ayah, and it is this group of people that Allah praises in the previous ayah.

They see the creation and at once they know that there is an All Powerful Creator behind all this. These are the people that, when learning about Allah’s creation, remember Allah. In Science class, Astronomy, Geography; if you’re a doctor, when you see the complexity of the human body; if you’re a chef, when you cut up the vegetables from the Earth. These are the people that Allah praises in this ayah.

This is a contradiction of what atheists believe; the world was made for a purpose and not a random chain of events that lead to the world we see around us today.

As we move on with the ayah, we see the word subhanaka, which has meanings but the most relevant is: Glory to you! This is a way of praising Allah, or doing Dhikr. The people who are saying this are praising the beauty of His Creation; every time they lay eyes on it (which is basically all the time) When we look through a telescope, and see the extent and Greatness of Allah’s creation, the beauty which we can’t even comprehend, we realise how Powerful and Mighty and Majestic Allah is. If we can’t even comprehend his Creation, how will we comprehend HIM? Seeing the universe around us makes us realise just how small and irrelevant we are compared to everything else.

Now we move on to the next part of the ayah (Give us salvation from the torment of the Fire.) This part shows us that the men of understanding know that the afore mentioned purpose of life is to ultimately go to Jannah. They also understand that no matter how many good deeds they think they’ve done, it’s up to Allah’s mercy and forgiveness whether we ultimately go to Jannah, so they ask for Allah’s protection and mercy on the Day of Judgement.

So, how can we live up to this ayah in our daily lives? How can we be the people that Allah praises in the Quran? First, we need to humble ourselves, and realise all that is around us. We need to praise Allah for what He has given us and His other Creations. We need to recognise Allah’s absolute Might, Power and Wisdom. Also, Allah has told us many, many times in the Quran to take some time to reflect on this world and Allah’s Creation, to look back on our life, to plan our future. Only then will we be truly successful and only then will we acquire our life’s purpose and go to Jannah.