More Intentions Than Hours — Learning to Prioritise when Serving the Deen

A few days ago, I sat listening to a clip of my dear teacher, Mufti Shabbir of Blackburn, addressing a gathering of ulama, students of knowledge and people involved in serving the community. He sounded more passionate than we’re accustomed to, and with good reason. Those who serve the deen, he said, must give greater priority to our children and to the protection of iman.

He was not dismissing all other types of service. It is excellent to lead masjids, to teach the senior books of hadith in our Darul Ulooms, to deliver tafsir lessons, to speak publicly, to travel in tabligh and to serve adults. These are noble forms of service, and the Ummah cannot do without them. His concern was what can slip beneath them. While we are occupied with all of this, we cannot overlook the grassroots work of preserving the iman of children in our homes, our schools, our maktabs and our masjids. I have been turning that reminder over ever since, since it opened a question in me that goes far beyond children, though children are where it begins. I have the unfortunate personal experience of having to support youngsters who are drifting from their Deen, and some who have taken a step too many.

Why we teach at all

When I teach hadith, I would like to think my purpose is not simply to complete a book, explain a chain of transmission and pass information to students. I want the words of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ to become alive in people’s lives. I want people to live with iman, follow the Sunnah and develop love for the Prophet ﷺ. The same applies to teaching Qur’an and tafsir. The purpose is for Allah’s guidance to enter people’s beliefs, their homes, their habits and their relationships.

There is nothing wrong with these ambitions. The concern is actually more subtle. Visible and prestigious forms of service can gradually reshape our idea of what service is. We may begin to believe that the pinnacle of khidma is to reach a senior position, teach Sahih al-Bukhari, deliver major tafsir lessons, lead an institution or address large audiences. There may be great virtue in all of this. Yet much of the blessing may lie in work that receives almost no recognition at all.

The teacher of alif, ba and ta

I remember hearing Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani explain that those who teach the senior books of hadith and tafsir may naturally feel they have reached the summit of teaching, while the person sitting patiently with small children, taking them through the qaida and helping them recognise alif, ba and ta, may take an extraordinary share of the reward.

The more I consider it, the more sense it makes. That teacher lays the foundation upon which every later stage of Islamic learning depends. Nobody studies Bukhari or tafsir without first being taught to recognise and recite the words of the Qur’an. Teaching children demands extraordinary prophetic values: repetition, patience, emotional intelligence and sacrifice, and it usually receives less status and less appreciation than almost any other role in our institutions. A child’s first experiences of Islamic learning may shape their relationship with the Deen for decades.

We would not give the foundations of a building to the least skilled builders, yet we sometimes do something similar with the iman of our children. We reserve our most experienced teachers for advanced students, and we hand the youngest children to whoever happens to be available. If the foundation matters most, that arrangement deserves questioning.

What our children experience

We should also be honest about something uncomfortable. Some young Muslims become distant from Islam partly because of negative experiences within maktabs, madrasas, masjids and Islamic schools. This is certainly not the only cause. Young Muslims face secular culture, social media, intellectual doubt, peer pressure, pornography, drugs, gangs and deep confusion about identity, and it would be unjust to blame our institutions for all of that.

But we cannot avoid our share of responsibility. Some children associate Qur’an learning with beating, shouting, humiliation, fear or constant criticism. And historically, the trauma can be caused by behaviours even worse than those mentioned above, that are difficult to put into writing. Some experience the masjid as a place in which they are treated as a nuisance rather than as future members and custodians of the congregation. Some learn the rules of Islam while experiencing very little of its mercy.

The way we teach is itself part of what we teach. A teacher may explain mercy while showing little mercy. A parent may speak about the beauty of Islam while making religious practice feel unbearable within the home. Many of our teachers and parents serve with remarkable love and patience, and I have seen it with my own eyes. The question is whether we treat that love and patience as essential to the work, or as an optional extra.

The people of Sham

Mufti Shabbir also spoke about the people of Sham. He described the immense suffering they endured under Bashar al-Assad’s regime, the torture, the imprisonment, the displacement, the loss of homes and family members, and the years of insecurity. Despite all of it, so many remained firm upon their faith. Their oppressors could take their homes, their wealth and their safety, but they could not easily remove the iman rooted in their hearts.

The Prophet ﷺ said:

«طُوبَى لِلشَّامِ» فَقُلْنَا: لِأَيٍّ ذَلِكَ يَا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ؟ قَالَ: «لِأَنَّ مَلَائِكَةَ الرَّحْمَنِ بَاسِطَةٌ أَجْنِحَتَهَا عَلَيْهَا»

“Glad tidings for Sham.” We asked, “Why is that, O Messenger of Allah?” He said, “Because the angels of the Most Merciful spread their wings over it.” (Jami’ at-Tirmidhi, 3954)

The greatest protection is not always protection from worldly hardship. Sometimes the greatest protection is that Allah preserves a person’s iman through hardship. That thought should unsettle us as parents. We work hard to protect our children’s education, careers, safety, confidence and financial future, and rightly so. But our greatest concern must be whether their iman will survive.

Allah says:

«يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا قُوا أَنفُسَكُمْ وَأَهْلِيكُمْ نَارًا»

“O believers, protect yourselves and your families from a Fire.” (Qur’an, 66:6)

And He says:

«وَأْمُرْ أَهْلَكَ بِالصَّلَاةِ وَاصْطَبِرْ عَلَيْهَا»

“Command your family to pray, and remain steadfast upon it.” (Qur’an, 20:132)

The Prophet ﷺ said:

«كُلُّكُمْ رَاعٍ وَكُلُّكُمْ مَسْئُولٌ عَنْ رَعِيَّتِهِ»

“Every one of you is a shepherd, and every one of you will be questioned about his flock.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 893; Sahih Muslim, 1829)

Service begins with our own souls and with those whom Allah has directly placed in our care. So far, the reminder is clear. But it opens onto something much larger, and this is where my difficulty really begins.

So much that could be done

The problem for anyone who wants to serve the deen is rarely that there is nothing useful to do. The problem is that almost every form of service appears necessary.

I want to teach hadith and help revive the words of the Prophet ﷺ in people’s lives. I want to teach tafsir and help people understand the Qur’an. I want to serve through an Islamic school so that Muslim children receive a good education and are not unnecessarily exposed to material that conflicts with the values of their homes, including inappropriate or ideologically loaded elements of RSE. I want to counsel married couples and preserve Muslim families. I want to support children and teenagers so that they are protected from drugs, gangs, pornography and the other harms circling them. I want to help people become financially stable so that desperation does not push them towards interest, unlawful income or compromising ways of life. I want to teach children Arabic and the foundations of Islam. I want to travel in tabligh and carry concern for the iman of others. I want to write books that teach the religion and may become sadaqa jariya.

And the doors keep multiplying. There are janazas to lead and the deceased to wash and bury with dignity. There are sick people to visit, in homes and in hospitals, and prisoners who may never meet a scholar unless one comes to them. There are new Muslims who take their shahada and are then left to work everything out alone. There are elders whom nobody visits, widows managing without a fuss, orphans to sponsor, refugees arriving with nothing, and families who need food parcels and zakat before they need lectures. There are Islamic wills to be written, inheritances to be distributed correctly, disputes to be mediated, marriages to be arranged and marriages to be rescued. There is da’wa to neighbours and colleagues who have never once heard Islam presented properly. There are masjid committees to serve, safeguarding to put right, charities to run honestly, and public bodies where a Muslim voice is needed on education, poverty, housing and discrimination.

All of these intentions are good. Many of these needs are urgent. Each one can reasonably be described as serving the future of Islam. The question then becomes: where does a person begin, and where does he stop?

A little here, a little there

I look first at my own situation. I am the headteacher of an Islamic primary school. I serve as an imam. I teach a weekly evening class for adults and another 3 days-a-week for teenagers. I teach hadith, deliver talks, write blogs, author books, and try to spend time in tabligh. I counsel people, mediate between relatives and families, and have recently found myself trying to reconcile rival groups and prevent conflict. There is a little here, a little there and a little almost everywhere.

From the outside this may appear admirable. I hope there is sincerity and benefit in it, and I ask Allah to accept whatever good exists within it. But there is another side. When a person is present in many places, he may struggle to be fully present anywhere. He may spend his life fire-fighting, responding to what is urgent, without giving enough attention to what is most important. He may be available to the whole community while the people closest to him receive a tired, distracted and impatient version of him. I suspect I am not the only one.

Breadth or depth

Underneath all of this sits a question I have circled for years without naming it plainly. Should a person who wants to serve the deen aim for breadth or for depth? Should he reach many people through public teaching, writing, institutions and community work, accepting that his effect on each person may be light? Or should he concentrate on a small number of people, institutions and responsibilities, and give them his time, his attention and his personal investment?

Both have their case. Breadth can reach thousands, build institutions, spread ideas and answer several needs of the community at once. Depth can transform a handful of lives completely, build foundations that hold, form students who become teachers, and leave work that outlasts the person who did it. And both carry their dangers. The danger of breadth without depth is that we may touch everything and transform very little. The danger of depth without breadth is that we may protect what is close to us while failing to share its benefit with others. I do not offer either as an answer. Together they mark out the ground on which the whole question stands.

Nor is this a dilemma reserved for imams and teachers. The mother with three children and two free hours a week faces it when she chooses between the maktab rota and her own son’s reading. The doctor faces it when he weighs one free clinic run properly against sitting on four committees. The donor faces it when he spreads his zakat across twenty causes or funds one piece of work completely. The student of knowledge faces it when he decides whether to specialise deeply or remain useful across many fields. Anyone who has more good in front of him than time in his hands, which is to say almost everyone, stands somewhere on this line between the wide and the deep.

The mission of the Prophet ﷺ

When I look for a model, I look at the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. He was the Messenger of Allah, imam, teacher, judge, leader, counsellor, husband, father and guide. He addressed large gatherings, but he also noticed individuals. He transformed a civilisation, yet he would sit with one person, answer a private question and follow the condition of a single heart. None of us can reproduce that breadth, balance and perfection. The Sahaba would mention how every person would feel he was the closest to them. His mission was unique, supported by revelation and guided directly by Allah.

Allah describes that mission:

«هُوَ الَّذِي بَعَثَ فِي الْأُمِّيِّينَ رَسُولًا مِّنْهُمْ يَتْلُو عَلَيْهِمْ آيَاتِهِ وَيُزَكِّيهِمْ وَيُعَلِّمُهُمُ الْكِتَابَ وَالْحِكْمَةَ»

“He is the One who raised among the unlettered people a Messenger from among themselves, reciting His verses to them, purifying them, and teaching them the Book and wisdom.” (Qur’an, 62:2)

He was first the servant and Messenger of Allah. Allah came before everything. He recited Allah’s verses. He taught the Book and wisdom. And he purified people. This tazkiya is vast. It covers beliefs, intentions, character, habits, relationships and the diseases of the heart. Before we attempt to rectify everybody else, we must stand beneath the message ourselves. Before asking how many people the Qur’an can reach through me, I have to ask whether the Qur’an is reaching me.

There is something instructive in the relationship between Surat al-Muzzammil and Surat al-Muddaththir. In al-Muzzammil the Prophet ﷺ is called to stand before Allah in the night and recite the Qur’an with care. In al-Muddaththir he is told to rise, warn, magnify his Lord, purify himself and remain patient. Authentic service requires both movements, a private standing before Allah and a public rising to serve people. If the public work becomes disconnected from the private relationship with Allah, service becomes activity without spiritual substance. A question worth asking in every classroom, minbar and meeting is this: am I still being changed by the things I teach?

Different metals, different gifts

Allah has not created every person with the same temperament, capacity or form of influence. Some people are naturally gifted educators. They can explain complex matters simply, recognise why a student is struggling and remain with him until he understands. Some are powerful orators who can awaken concern within large gatherings. Some are writers who may never command a stage but can leave behind work that influences people for generations. Some are organisers who can turn a vision into systems, policies and teams. Some have the patience and emotional intelligence for counselling, or the presence to reconcile people in conflict. Some connect naturally with children or teenagers. Some understand finance, business and professional life and can help Muslims stand on their own feet. Some have the temperament for quiet, consistent service that very few people ever notice.

The Prophet ﷺ said:

«النَّاسُ مَعَادِنُ كَمَعَادِنِ الذَّهَبِ وَالْفِضَّةِ»

“People are like mines of gold and silver.” (Sahih Muslim, 2638)

In its context, the hadith teaches that the best of people in one condition remain the best in another when they gain understanding of the religion. It is not a slogan about personality types. But it does affirm that people carry different substance, and that this substance must still be refined through learning, discipline and sincerity. Natural aptitude removes neither the need for training nor the duty to work on our weaknesses.

The Prophet ﷺ also said:

«اعْمَلُوا فَكُلٌّ مُيَسَّرٌ لِمَا خُلِقَ لَهُ»

“Continue to act, for everyone will be facilitated towards that for which he was created.” (Sahih Muslim, 2647)

I do not read this as a modern invitation to discover one permanent personal calling. I read it as a reason to keep working, watching honestly for where Allah grants facilitation, and accepting that He places different abilities, opportunities and relationships within different lives.

Here the role of elders becomes essential, because a person does not always see himself clearly. Someone may think he is an orator when his deeper gift is teaching small groups. Someone may want to write, while others recognise in him a rare ability to counsel young people. Someone may underestimate himself entirely because his work is not glamorous. We need people of wisdom, trustworthy teachers and mentors with spiritual concern and sound judgement, who can observe us over time and help us distinguish a genuine strength from a passing enthusiasm, a door Allah has opened from a role our ego wants, a responsibility we should carry from a task better entrusted to somebody else, and healthy ambition from the desire to be seen. This is part of what shura protects us from. Such elders are not infallible, and age alone does not grant wisdom. But those who serve can become too close to their own lives to judge their priorities accurately, and a spouse, teacher or elder may see our exhaustion, our neglect or our neglected strengths long before we do. Good elders do not simply tell everybody to do more. Sometimes they give a person permission to hand something over.

An Ummah that completes itself

The complete Prophetic mission belongs to the Ummah collectively. It has not been placed in its entirety upon every individual. Allah says:

«فَلَوْلَا نَفَرَ مِن كُلِّ فِرْقَةٍ مِّنْهُمْ طَائِفَةٌ لِّيَتَفَقَّهُوا فِي الدِّينِ وَلِيُنذِرُوا قَوْمَهُمْ إِذَا رَجَعُوا إِلَيْهِمْ»

“Why should a group from every community not devote themselves to gaining a deeper understanding of the religion, so that they may warn their people when they return to them?” (Qur’an, 9:122)

Everyone does not leave for the same task. Some devote themselves to deep knowledge and return to benefit others. In the same way, the community requires scholars, teachers, parents, writers, counsellors, organisers, youth workers, political advocates, funders, administrators and people who quietly keep institutions alive. There is a difference between recognising that something is important and assuming that it must personally be done by me. One person may identify a need without being the person best suited to meet it. Sometimes service means doing the work. Sometimes it means finding, training, funding or supporting the person who can do it better.

«وَتَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْبِرِّ وَالتَّقْوَىٰ»

“Cooperate with one another in goodness and righteousness.” (Qur’an, 5:2)

Cooperation allows the Ummah to carry work that no individual could carry alone. The various forms of khidma are not rival businesses competing for the same customers. They are parts of a shared religious responsibility.

I have seen one useful expression of this in the method of many people involved in tabligh, and I offer it as a principle rather than a defence of any organisation. A person concentrates on a form of work he knows, understands and can carry consistently, and he encourages others towards good, helping create an environment in which further good becomes possible. Do your part, and facilitate other people doing theirs. A man who focuses on inviting Muslims towards prayer, remembrance and concern for the hereafter does not need to simultaneously become a school leader, a political advocate and a specialist teacher. But if his work is sound, the person he brings back to the masjid may then enrol his children in Islamic education, seek knowledge, repair his marriage or support a charity. One form of service prepares the ground for another. A wholesale business of sorts, as the late Hafiz Patel sahib rahmat-Allahi alayh used to mention. The mature question is whether our work makes other forms of good easier or harder. If carrying out our own work requires us to belittle or obstruct every other effort of deen, we may not have understood our role.

Complementary, not competitive

The Muslim community already possesses an enormous capital: people who believe, families who identify with Islam, children attending maktabs, congregations filling masjids, communities that still carry love for the deen. Da’wa is not only about reaching those who are absent, who are not Muslim. It also means preserving, teaching, deepening and strengthening those who are already present. It is important to bring new wealth into a system, but it is equally important to protect and invest the capital already there. This is the lesson we can learn from the first few verses of Surah Abasa.

If everybody focuses only on outreach, who teaches the people who respond? Who answers their doubts, protects their children, helps them build stable families and provides institutions in which their faith can grow? And if every teacher in a madrasa believes that only formal education matters, who will reach the man too ashamed to attend a lesson, or awaken concern in someone who has not prayed for years? If every youth worker believes youth work alone is solving the community’s problems, who will challenge the policies, poverty and policing that shape those young lives? If political advocates believe policy is the only meaningful change, who will sit with the individual teenager who is grieving, angry or addicted? If marriage counsellors believe family work is the only work that matters, who will teach the Qur’an and hadith that give the Muslim family its meaning? If scholars think knowledge alone is sufficient, who will build the institutions through which knowledge reaches people? If institution builders trust in systems alone, who will work on the hearts of the people inside those systems?

Every effort answers one part of a much wider need. A healthy Ummah does not require every person to agree that one method is the only meaningful method. It requires people to talk to each other, to understand their own and other people’s strengths, to know what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how their work sits alongside the work of others. Yet each form of service carries a temptation. Teachers may look down on speakers, speakers may dismiss teachers, those in tabligh may see institutional work as a distraction, advocates may see spiritual work as passive, and school and masjid leaders may each believe everything should run through them. Once our method becomes part of our identity, criticism of the method feels like criticism of us, and we begin protecting territory rather than serving Allah. A form of khidma that can survive only by declaring every other form useless has probably become more attached to itself than to the deen it claims to serve.

This does not place every method beyond evaluation. Some approaches genuinely need correction, and not every project is effective, wise or Islamically sound. Complementarity means that criticism should aim to improve the work of deen, and never to establish the superiority of our own group, institution or personality.

It also means that facilitation is itself a form of khidma. Someone may recommend a capable teacher, provide a room, fund a youth worker, refer a struggling couple to a qualified counsellor, introduce a writer to a publisher, encourage a gifted young person towards scholarship, help a maktab understand safeguarding, give another person public credit, or step aside when someone else is better suited. The Prophet ﷺ said:

«مَنْ دَلَّ عَلَى خَيْرٍ فَلَهُ مِثْلُ أَجْرِ فَاعِلِهِ»

“Whoever directs someone towards good will have a reward like the one who does it.” (Sahih Muslim, 1893)

A person loses nothing by enabling another to carry the work. Sometimes the most sincere sentence a servant of the deen can say is: this work matters, but I am not the person who should lead it.

I sometimes think of the Ummah, cautiously, as a football team. One person plays in goal, another in defence, whilst another carries the ball through midfield, and the striker puts it away in a way that few in the team can. If every player insists on being the protagonist all the time, the result is chaos, noise, disruption. The beauty lies in people understanding their part, developing it with discipline, listening to one another and entering at the right moment. Our score is not of our own composing; it comes from the Qur’an and Sunnah, and trusted elders can help us understand our part and our timing. The comparison should not be stretched further than that. But it captures something. Difference is not deficiency, quiet work is not inferior work, and playing one’s part well includes leaving space for others.

Virtues are doors, not burdens

Part of our confusion comes from the sheer number of virtues we hear. Teaching Qur’an, seeking knowledge, serving parents, feeding people, caring for orphans, spreading salam, reconciling families, travelling in the path of Allah, giving charity, building masjids, leaving beneficial knowledge behind. Every virtue can begin to feel like another personal obligation. But the virtues of Islam are doors of opportunity, and no believer is commanded to walk through every door at once.

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ himself gave different answers about the best deeds to different people. He described the best deed as prayer at its proper time, then goodness to parents, then striving in the path of Allah (Sahih al-Bukhari, 527). Asked which Islam is best, he answered: feeding people, and offering salam to those you know and those you do not know (Sahih al-Bukhari, 12). And he said:

«أَحَبُّ الْأَعْمَالِ إِلَى اللَّهِ أَدْوَمُهَا وَإِنْ قَلَّ»

“The most beloved deeds to Allah are those that are most consistent, even if they are small.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 6464)

The question is not only how much good I can begin. It is what I can carry consistently, sincerely and without violating the rights of others. When Salman al-Farisi رضي الله عنه saw his companion Abu al-Darda رضي الله عنه exhausting himself in worship, he told him:

«إِنَّ لِرَبِّكَ عَلَيْكَ حَقًّا، وَلِنَفْسِكَ عَلَيْكَ حَقًّا، وَلِأَهْلِكَ عَلَيْكَ حَقًّا، فَأَعْطِ كُلَّ ذِي حَقٍّ حَقَّهُ»

“Your Lord has a right over you, your soul has a right over you, and your family has a right over you, so give everyone who possesses a right their due.” When this reached the Prophet ﷺ, he said, “Salman has spoken the truth.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 1968)

This is a prophetic argument for justice. Even good deeds become unjust when they continually consume rights that Allah has given to other people.

Some people have absorbed this lesson so deeply that they have withdrawn altogether. They have seen ulama, imams and activists who served thousands while their own children drifted from Islam, and they conclude that their only priority is their family. The concern is legitimate. Public service must never be built upon private neglect. But Allah says:

«وَالْعَصْرِ ۝ إِنَّ الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ ۝ إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ وَتَوَاصَوْا بِالْحَقِّ وَتَوَاصَوْا بِالصَّبْرِ»

“By time. Surely humanity is in loss, except those who believe, do righteous deeds, encourage one another towards truth, and encourage one another towards patience.” (Qur’an, 103:1–3)

Faith begins within us but does not remain locked within us. It moves into righteous action and concern for other people. Not everyone has to establish a school or carry a community. Someone may teach once a week, mentor one teenager, visit an elderly person, wash the deceased, support good work financially or offer a professional skill to an institution that needs it. Children should also see their parents serving others; they should learn that Islam produces generosity rather than isolation. Where possible, a family can carry service together, preparing food for somebody who is ill, welcoming guests, giving charity as a household. Khidma need not always take parents away from their children. Sometimes it is one of the means by which parents form them.

One person may be enough

The Prophet ﷺ told Ali رضي الله عنه on the day of Khaybar:

«فَوَاللَّهِ لَأَنْ يَهْدِيَ اللَّهُ بِكَ رَجُلًا وَاحِدًا خَيْرٌ لَكَ مِنْ أَنْ يَكُونَ لَكَ حُمْرُ النَّعَمِ»

“By Allah, that Allah guides one person through you is better for you than red camels.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 2942)

One child whose iman is protected. One teenager pulled back from drugs or violence. One marriage preserved. One student who later teaches hundreds. One person who returns to Allah. Limited reach does not mean limited value. And yet the same Prophet ﷺ said:

«بَلِّغُوا عَنِّي وَلَوْ آيَةً»

“Convey from me, even if it is one verse.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 3461)

A person may share a beneficial verse or reminder with thousands without forming a deep relationship with any of them. The Sunnah appears to honour both movements, the deep and the wide.

Sometimes I wonder whether the resolution lies here: depth in the responsibilities that are directly ours, and breadth in the benefit that grows from them. A teacher teaches his pupils deeply, then trains other teachers. A headteacher builds one school properly, then shares what he has learnt with others. A scholar teaches a small number of students carefully, and they carry the knowledge elsewhere. Parents nurture iman within one home, and their children carry it into another generation. A writer gives depth to one book, and the book travels where he never will. A counsellor supports a limited number of people well while training others in basic pastoral care. A man in tabligh helps someone return to the masjid, then introduces him to the teachers and institutions that can deepen his knowledge. Breadth, on this reading, does not require our personal presence everywhere. It spreads through people, referrals, cooperation, institutions and sadaqa jariya. Depth creates trustworthy breadth. I believe there is truth in this. I am not certain it settles the matter.

The balance also shifts with the seasons of a life. There may be a season for study, for intensive teaching, for raising young children, for caring for parents, for building an institution, for writing, or for stepping back to train others. A person’s primary work at twenty-five may not be his primary work at forty-five. Changing priorities is not abandoning service. It may be recognising the trust Allah has placed in front of us at that moment, and it may mean moving from direct work into facilitation, as a man who once led every class comes to spend his later years forming teachers.

The question I carry

So I return to where Mufti Shabbir left me, holding principles I believe in and a dilemma they do not fully dissolve. Allah comes first, and public service must grow from a private relationship with Him. My family and dependants hold rights that voluntary work cannot continually consume, and yet family responsibility cannot become an excuse for indifference towards the Ummah. The complete work of the deen rests on the Ummah collectively, and Allah has distributed abilities, temperaments and opportunities among us so that we complete one another. Busyness is not automatically khidma, and a long list of Islamic commitments is not proof that a person is fulfilling the trusts Allah has actually given him.

But I still do not know how to weigh my own case. Should I narrow my work and give myself more fully to a smaller number of people, my children, my pupils, my students, the congregation in front of me? Or should I keep answering the many doors of service that Allah keeps placing before me, accepting that I will enter no life as deeply as I might? Am I building people and systems, or quietly making everything depend on me? Do I refer people onwards, or do I try to keep every need within my own hands? Which needs that arrive at my door are opportunities, and which are distractions? Where has Allah given me a particular facilitation, and where am I simply enjoying being useful? Which responsibilities would truly suffer if I stepped away, and which am I holding onto because I cannot bear to release them? When an elder tells me to concentrate, or to step forward, or to hand something over, how readily will I listen? Do I want to serve, or do I want to be needed? And when another effort of deen succeeds where I am absent, do I feel it as a victory for Islam or as competition for my own work?

I have sat with these questions for weeks now, in the school office, on the minbar, and most often, at home. I know the best of people are those most beneficial to others, and that the leader of a people is their servant, so I motivate myself one day after another. To be honest, if you have read this far, you probably carry a version of the same question, whatever your own work happens to be: whether to go wide or go deep, and what each choice will cost. Perhaps that is itself the point, that a servant is meant to keep weighing his trusts before Allah rather than settle the matter once and rest.

I do not know the answer, but i’d love to know if you do.