A Hindu’s story which teaches us to value Imaan

A non-Muslim randomly entered the the Masjid a short while ago (Hazrat is speaking of Masjid-ut-Taqwa in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa). After some time, I took him to the side and asked if he was ok? He simply replied, “I just wanted to pray”. He was visibly distressed. I enquired about his situation, and he began to share his worries with me.

He told me that he is a Hindu. His girlfriend is Christian with whom he has one child. After 9 years of dating, he wants to now marry her. However, her parents refuse to accept unless he becomes a Christian too. On one hand, he wanted to remain a Hindu. Yet on the other hand, if he were to do so, she would refuse to marry him and deny him the right to see his child.
Upon hearing this all, I advised him to pray to God. He said to me, “Which God? How do I pray? I have no God in my life.”

This reply really hit me. The fact that we can speak to Allah is such a great blessing that we take for granted. We can always take comfort in the knowledge that He is omnipresent, the hearer of our duas and our unspoken thoughts and the observer of our struggles, both apparent and concealed. But non-Muslims do not have that understanding. We can always knock on His door and He will always open it and accept us into His court of mercy, whereas non-Muslims cannot find the door, let alone knock and seek His shelter.

He then asked me if he could watch us pray our Salaah, so I allowed him to sit inside. After Salaah I offered to drive him home. On the way he said to me that he appreciated watching our Salaah, and that it was peaceful. Once again, I began to wonder, that just seeing the prayer put his heart at ease but he cannot pray due to the lack of Imaan. Allah has gifted us with Imaan which allows us to actually perform Salaah and experience a greater level of peace, yet we leave it out over small reasons. May Allah guide him to Islam and guide us to gratitude. Aameen.

Extract from a Bayaan of  Hazrat Ml. Dawood Seedat حفظه الله