"The journey of transforming from bad to good".
Hijrah is mentioned in one of the compendium of the 40 Hadiths which goes:
"Actions are but by intention and every man shall have but that which he intended. Thus he whose migration was for Allah and His messenger, his migration was for Allah and His messenger, and he whose migration was to achieve some worldly benefit or to take some woman in marriage, his migration was for that for which he migrated."
However, I am not going to discuss about the contents within this particular hadith. What I’m trying to bring forward is the mentality of today’s people upon those who are intending to make a change, generally from bad to good.
For years, I have been presented with roughly the same type of question,
“Why is it that people mock me when I want to make a change?”
My answer would be,
“Because they have not seen the changes occur.”
“But, I am making changes.”
“I know you are, but do they know? No sir, their focus is on the change.”
That is the fact today; people judge others by means of what they produce, not on their effort to produce. Such a fact takes place anywhere; in organisations, in politics, and even on an individual.
Hijrah itself requires a journey that has to be endured. When you want to go from Kuala Lumpur to Alor Setar, you have to endure the journey along the North-South Expressway. Everything in this life requires some sort of journey. Why, even the flicking of a switch has its own microscopic journey. How’s that?
From the view of a normal person, a switch has only two conditions; ON and OFF. However, in the knowledge of Power Electronics, switches have another condition, known as the TRANSIENT condition. This condition is where the journey from OFF to ON occurs and vice versa. This is only visible on a microscopic scale.
Viewing from a general distance, the ON-OFF transition is viewable from a scope, and is shown to be in the form of a square wave, where the change between the two conditions happens abruptly. But if the scope is zoomed in, as microscopic as possible, it will be shown that there are waves between the two conditions. These waves represent the ‘journey’ from one condition to the other.
In relation to the issue brought up, many would assume that when someone wants to make a change, the change would take place abruptly. And when no change occurs, the assumption would be that the person is a hypocrite, because the change was not seen.
What many failed to consider, were the steps/efforts taken to make the change. What many did was to judge from a distance, and not to the extent of a microscopic level.
Weren’t we all taught that Allah judges a man not by what he can produce, but by the effort he has made to produce? Why so? Because it is by His will, and His only that man can produce.
If Allah does not judge a man by what he produces, then who are we to judge a man by what he produces???
We know of a man who is on a journey from Kuala Lumpur to Padang Besar. By Allah’s will, he did not arrive because his car broke down somewhere in Changkat Jering.
Do we call him a hypocrite for not arriving in Padang Besar?
No.
Why?
Because we know that he has already executed his intention by noticing that he is headed for Padang Besar. So, what difference does it make compared to those who say they want to make a change, but their ‘journey’ is not visible to the naked eye?
So, never judge a man by what he produces. No one has the power to produce. It is only by the will of Allah that man can produce. Man can only work to produce, and pray that Allah will see fit for him to produce.
