From Conveyance to Witness: What Remained for the Community after the Messenger?

The Conveyance That Did Not End with Conveyance What if the problem was never that the message had not arrived? What if the Messenger had conveyed what was sent down to him, and that conveyance had reached the people, but the real struggle concerned not the message’s arrival, but its remaining alive within the human being after arriving? Imagine someone digging a hole to reach a specific objective. He digs and keeps digging, and whenever he approaches his objective, someone comes up behind him and begins filling in what he has dug. Is the problem that the digger does not know how to dig? Or is someone continually working to undo the effect of what he has accomplished? This reflection begins here. For the Qur’an does not present the Messenger to us merely as a transmitter of words, but places him before a clear command: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الرَّسُولُ بَلِّغْ مَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ مِن رَّبِّكَ ۖ وَإِن لَّمْ تَفْعَلْ فَمَا بَلَّغْتَ رِسَالَتَهُ ۖ وَاللَّهُ يَعْصِمُكَ مِنَ النَّاسِ ۗ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يَهْدِي الْقَوْمَ الْكَافِرِينَ﴾ (O Messenger, convey what has been sent down to you from your Lord. If you do not, you will not have conveyed His message. God will protect you from the people. Indeed, God does not guide the disbelieving people.) [المائدة: 67] The verse does not merely say: convey. Rather, it connects conveyance to the message itself: ﴿وَإِن لَّمْ تَفْعَلْ فَمَا بَلَّغْتَ رِسَالَتَهُ﴾ (If you do not, you will not have conveyed His message.) Then, in this same context, the Qur’an reveals to us a struggle against revelation, the distortion of words, and the forgetting of a portion of what people had been reminded of. It then reveals the project of Iblis and his declaration: ﴿وَلَأَتَّخِذَنَّ مِنْ عِبَادِكَ نَصِيبًا مَّفْرُوضًا﴾ (I will surely take an allotted share of Your servants.) [النساء: 118] Here the question becomes larger: Was conveyance merely the delivery of the message? Or does complete conveyance require that the community know the message, and also know what stands in its way and who works to strip it of its effect? From my perspective in this reflection, the two cannot be separated. The person digging a path needs to know how to dig, but he also needs to know who stands behind him to fill the path back in. Here begins the relationship between conveyance and witness. The Messenger conveyed. As for the community, it remained incumbent upon it to bear witness. 1. The Messenger Conveys What Has Been Sent Down to Him The Qur’an clearly defines the Messenger’s function: ﴿وَمَا عَلَى الرَّسُولِ إِلَّا الْبَلَاغُ الْمُبِينُ﴾ (The Messenger is responsible only for clear conveyance.) [النور: 54] And it says: ﴿فَهَلْ عَلَى الرُّسُلِ إِلَّا الْبَلَاغُ الْمُبِينُ﴾ (Are the messengers responsible for anything but clear conveyance?) [النحل: 35] The Messenger does not produce the message himself. Nor does he add anything to it of his own accord. Rather, he receives revelation and then conveys it. And it says: ﴿إِنْ أَتَّبِعُ إِلَّا مَا يُوحَىٰ إِلَيَّ﴾ (I follow only what is revealed to me.) [الأحقاف: 9] The starting point, then, is clear: Revelation → Messenger → Conveyance. But the Qur’an does not leave us at this point. 2. Conveyance Took Place in Confrontation with People In His words: ﴿وَاللَّهُ يَعْصِمُكَ مِنَ النَّاسِ﴾ (God will protect you from the people.) There is a clear indication that conveyance did not take place in a vacuum. There were people. There was a stance toward the message. And there was something that called for divine protection of the Messenger as he carried out the conveyance. The Qur’an says: ﴿يُرِيدُونَ أَن يُطْفِئُوا نُورَ اللَّهِ بِأَفْوَاهِهِمْ وَاللَّهُ مُتِمُّ نُورِهِ وَلَوْ كَرِهَ الْكَافِرُونَ﴾ (They wish to extinguish God’s light with their mouths, but God will bring His light to completion, though the disbelievers detest it.) [الصف: 8] And it says: ﴿يُرِيدُونَ لِيُطْفِئُوا نُورَ اللَّهِ بِأَفْوَاهِهِمْ وَاللَّهُ مُتِمُّ نُورِهِ وَلَوْ كَرِهَ الْكَافِرُونَ﴾ (They wish to extinguish God’s light with their mouths, but God will bring His light to completion, though the disbelievers detest it.) [التوبة: 32] The message, then, does not move in a vacuum. It enters a world containing resistance, desires, interests, inclinations, and attempts to extinguish God’s light. From here, conveyance becomes more than merely delivering a text. It is delivering the truth in confrontation with whatever seeks to extinguish it. 3. What Happened to Revelation among the People of the Book? In the same context in Surat al-Ma’idah, we find a discussion of the People of the Book: ﴿وَلَوْ أَنَّهُمْ أَقَامُوا التَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنجِيلَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْهِم مِّن رَّبِّهِمْ لَأَكَلُوا مِن فَوْقِهِمْ وَمِن تَحْتِ أَرْجُلِهِمْ﴾ (Had they upheld the Torah, the Gospel, and what was sent down to them from their Lord, they would have eaten from above them and from beneath their feet.) [المائدة: 66] Then: ﴿قُلْ يَا أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ لَسْتُمْ عَلَىٰ شَيْءٍ حَتَّىٰ تُقِيمُوا التَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنجِيلَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكُم مِّن رَّبِّكُمْ﴾ (Say: O People of the Book, you stand on nothing until you uphold the Torah, the Gospel, and what has been sent down to you from your Lord.) [المائدة: 68] Between them came the verse of conveyance: ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الرَّسُولُ بَلِّغْ مَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ مِن رَّبِّكَ…﴾ (O Messenger, convey what has been sent down to you from your Lord…) Then the Qur’an reveals something else: ﴿فَبِمَا نَقْضِهِم مِّيثَاقَهُمْ لَعَنَّاهُمْ وَجَعَلْنَا قُلُوبَهُمْ قَاسِيَةً ۖ يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ عَن مَّوَاضِعِهِ وَنَسُوا حَظًّا مِّمَّا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ﴾ (For their breaking of their covenant, We cursed them and made their hearts hard. They distort words from their proper places and have forgotten a portion of what they were reminded of.) [المائدة: 13] Thus, the Qur’an does not merely mention the Book. It reveals what can happen to the Book when human beings enter into confrontation with it. Distortion. Forgetting. Breaking the covenant. Displacing words from their proper places. These are not incidental details in the history of revelation. They are part of the Qur’an’s disclosure of the struggle over the message. 4. The Allotted Share Then we come to the declaration of Iblis: ﴿قَالَ فَبِمَا أَغْوَيْتَنِي لَأَقْعُدَنَّ لَهُمْ صِرَاطَكَ الْمُسْتَقِيمَ ۝ ثُمَّ لَآتِيَنَّهُم مِّن بَيْنِ أَيْدِيهِمْ وَمِنْ خَلْفِهِمْ وَعَنْ أَيْمَانِهِمْ وَعَن شَمَائِلِهِمْ وَلَا تَجِدُ أَكْثَرَهُمْ شَاكِرِينَ﴾ (He said: Because You have led me astray, I will surely lie in wait for them on Your straight path. Then I will come upon them from before them and from behind them, from their right and from their left, and You will not find most of them grateful.) [الأعراف: 16-17] Then he says: ﴿وَلَأُضِلَّنَّهُمْ وَلَأُمَنِّيَنَّهُمْ وَلَآمُرَنَّهُمْ فَلَيُبَتِّكُنَّ آذَانَ الْأَنْعَامِ وَلَآمُرَنَّهُمْ فَلَيُغَيِّرُنَّ خَلْقَ اللَّهِ…﴾ (I will surely lead them astray and arouse vain desires in them; I will command them, and they will slit the ears of livestock; and I will command them, and they will alter God’s creation…) [النساء: 119] Immediately before that: ﴿وَلَأَتَّخِذَنَّ مِنْ عِبَادِكَ نَصِيبًا مَّفْرُوضًا﴾ (I will surely take an allotted share of Your servants.) [النساء: 118] This expression is deeply significant: An allotted share. Iblis is not speaking merely of a passing temptation. He is speaking of a share of God’s servants. Of human beings who enter into his project. Then the Qur’an says: ﴿وَمَن يَتَّخِذِ الشَّيْطَانَ وَلِيًّا مِّن دُونِ اللَّهِ فَقَدْ خَسِرَ خُسْرَانًا مُّبِينًا ۝ (Whoever takes Satan as a protector instead of God has surely suffered a manifest loss.) [النساء: 119-120] Thus, there is a project. There are those who work within it. There are those who take Satan as a protector. And there are those who work to lead people astray and strip the message of its effect. 5. Where Do the Jews Appear in This Picture? Here I do not read the word “Jews” as denoting a race. The Children of Israel are a people, a lineage, and a history. The Jews, by contrast, appear in the Qur’an in contexts concerning belief and a stance toward revelation and the message. The Qur’an mentions clear positions: ﴿وَدَّ كَثِيرٌ مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ لَوْ يَرُدُّونَكُم مِّن بَعْدِ إِيمَانِكُمْ كُفَّارًا﴾ (Many of the People of the Book wish they could turn you back into disbelievers after your faith.) [البقرة: 109] And it says: ﴿وَدَّت طَّائِفَةٌ مِّنْ أَهْلِ الْكِتَابِ لَوْ يُضِلُّونَكُمْ وَمَا يُضِلُّونَ إِلَّا أَنفُسَهُمْ وَمَا يَشْعُرُونَ﴾ (A group among the People of the Book wish they could lead you astray, but they lead only themselves astray, though they do not perceive it.) [آل عمران: 69] And it says: ﴿يَا أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ لِمَ تَلْبِسُونَ الْحَقَّ بِالْبَاطِلِ وَتَكْتُمُونَ الْحَقَّ وَأَنتُمْ تَعْلَمُونَ﴾ (O People of the Book, why do you mix truth with falsehood and conceal the truth knowingly?) [آل عمران: 71] Then it says: ﴿لَتَجِدَنَّ أَشَدَّ النَّاسِ عَدَاوَةً لِّلَّذِينَ آمَنُوا الْيَهُودَ وَالَّذِينَ أَشْرَكُوا﴾ (You will surely find that the people most intense in enmity toward those who believe are the Jews and those who associate partners with God.) [المائدة: 82] When I bring these verses together with the verses about the allotted share, a clear connection emerges for me through reflection: There are human beings working in the opposite direction to the message. Here I see the Jews as representing, in this context, the allotted share whose work against the message the Qur’an has disclosed; therefore, whoever follows them places himself in enmity toward God and His message. This is not a reading in terms of race. It is a reading in terms of belief, stance, and action. 6. Why Was Disclosing This Part of Conveyance? If Iblis declared that he would lie in wait for people on God’s straight path, and declared that he would take an allotted share of God’s servants, and if the Qur’an reveals to us human beings working to mislead, distort, and conceal the truth, can conveyance consist merely in communicating the path without disclosing those who work to close it off? From my perspective: no. Conveyance is not merely the delivery of words. It is delivering the message in confrontation with those who resist it. The Qur’an does not tell the human being only: This is the path. It also reveals to him: And this is who works to turn you away from it. Here I see the disclosure of the allotted share as part of the picture that a person needs to know in order to understand the nature of the struggle over the message. 7. The Endless Hole Let us return to the first image. Someone digs a hole to reach an objective. He digs. Then he digs. Then he draws near. But someone stands behind him, and whenever he advances, that person begins filling in the hole. The digger works. The other works. The first digs toward the objective. The second undoes what the first has dug. If the digger knew how to dig, but did not know