Mohsin Aziz

Bakkah. Around 2000 B.C.

The land is barren. Not a blade of grass. No sign of life. Nobody has ever lived there. It is inhospitable and is rightly called wadi ghair zee zara ì.e. valley where nobody lives and nothing grows.  From distance, one can see three silhouettes. What are these three people doing there? Who are they? An old man, a woman, and a newborn baby boy. The baby is still nursing.

The old man puts some dates and water in a water skin near the women and the infant and starts walking away. The woman gets worried and calls him asking ‘where are you going, Abraham, leaving us in this barren valley?’ Abraham kept quiet and kept walking. The women repeated her question but again did not get any answer. Abraham kept walking silently. When after repeatedly asking the question and not getting any answer, the woman understood that her husband is not acting on his own initiative but on divine instruction. Finally, she asked him: ‘Did Allah command you to do so?’ Ibrahim replied in affirmative. After confirming from Ibrahim that he was leaving his wife and child in the barren, lifeless valley at the command of Allah, Hajar, at that moment, said the famous sentence dripped in faith ‘ We are not going to be lost, since Allah Who has commanded you is with us‘ (Sahih al Bukhari, 3363 and 3364).