In the Quran in sura Al-Baqarah in verse 41 God says: “Do not trade my revelations of great value for something which is cheap”.

If you saw someone in the Bazaar who was selling a gold ring worth £100, for £10 your first thought will be that the ring does not belong to him and is stolen. This is why he is selling it for a cheap price. Stolen goods are never priced at normal rates. They are sold at whatever price the buyer is willing to pay.

Even if you are convinced that the ring is not stolen but belongs to the seller, then you cannot arrive at any other conclusion but that the seller is not in his right frame of mind. No sensible person and no person with his senses in his control would sell something worth £100 for £10. Whoever you ask will say without hesitation that such a person must be mad.

But the people who say such a person is mad, have they not seen their own state and not thought about it? They, from dawn to dusk, many times a day take part in similar eccentric behavior. Every day they sell their precious possessions at ridiculously cheap prices. Perhaps you are surprised and wonder who are these people acting with such insanity. Where are these people who would do this?

If it is said that these people are among us and that they are in our midst then perhaps you may not believe this. But this is the truth. There is no room for doubt.

Listen to how this is true.

There is a proverb, and there is hardly anyone who has not used this at one time or another or at least not heard of it. The proverb is this: Property to be sacrificed for Life and Life to be sacrificed for Honour.

Do you understand what this means? The meaning is quite clear. Money and property are good things. In this world they have many uses. They satisfy our needs. With them people buy food and drink. It can be used for treatment when we fall ill. A doctor can be paid his fees. Medicines can be purchased. Clothes can be bought. Children’s school tuition can paid for. All this can be done on the strength of money. It has been said that without money a person is swept around by the winds of time.
 

This is why wealth is greatly valued. The person who keeps his money safe considered by all as wise. A fool and his money are soon parted.

But in life there are times that when a person does not spend his money and keeps it safe, yet everyone considers him a miser. For example a child is sick and its condition is worsening. The child’s father is wealthy but does not spend anything on the child’s treatment. Sometimes he takes the child to the village herbalist hoping that he can do something without much expense. Sometimes he takes the child to the local priest for a healing prayer. Daily the child’s health is becoming worse. Everyone says that the child should be seen by a doctor but the father is not prepared to spend any money. In the end, the child gives up its life. Who would not curse such a wealthy yet miserable father?

Everyone will say to him, money is a good thing and should be valued and should be kept safe but in comparison with the child’s life money is nothing. It is for times like this money is saved. Your money should have been used to save your child’s life. A person who does not spend his money to save his own child’s life indeed a person with an unfortunate outlook in life. He is not a human being but an animal. What status has money when compared to life?

Have you noted what has happened? It is quite clear. Money and property have their own value but life is worth far more than money. The person who safekeeps a thing of lesser value such as money and wastes a thing of much greater value such as life can never be considered a conscientious person.

And a person who sacrifices something of lesser value to save something of greater value is commended by all. This is the person who is wise.

Now we can advance.

Where a person’s own life is under consideration there will be very few people who would not do anything to save it. Humans aside even animals would be prepared to make every effort to preserve their own lives.

Look at an ant. What a lively little creature. Put your finger in its path and look at what it will do to avoid the danger it thinks has come before it. To save ones life is a passion within every living creation.

No living things want to lose its life. Suicide is only committed by those who are not in power of their own reasoning or by those whose minds are blinded by lunacy. Animals never commit suicide. Life is such that a person will sacrifice everything to survive.

It is apparent that life is very valuable. With life is the world. Despite life being so precious there are times that a person who saves his own life is despised by all and the one who gives his life is celebrated.

For example, if a lecherous man were to assault an innocent young girl and she died fighting in the struggle to save her honour. The young girl would be praised for her bravery and attempt to fight off her assailant. Everyone would associate her name with esteem, respect and courage. Her story would be told with pride. This is honour and virtue.

If a man was travelling with his daughter and some perverse fiend made obscene advances towards her. Then an honourable father would pounce like cheetah to save his child and not fear in the least that such an action may lead to his own death.

Forgive me, I will repeat it again. An honourable father would pounce like cheetah to save his child and not fear in the least that such an action may lead to his own death. If, to save his daughters honour, the father gives his life then people will remember him with admiration and respect.

Why is this? Because he acted upon belief that, Life to be sacrificed for Honour. To preserve honour by sacrificing life is an act of high principles.

Where we will find fathers ready to defend their daughter’s honour with their lives, we will also find heinous people who for the sake of a few pounds will willingly take their daughters to men of evil intent. These people can counted among the unscrupulously wicked. They are immoral and debauched. In a corrupt environment, they can even situate themselves in a position of high society. However, no person with any degree of self-respect would associate with them despite the wealth they may procure from their promiscuous life-style.

But the world will never look upon them with any lasting respect. Why is this? Because they have traded something of high value like honour in place of wealth which even the most dishonest can accumulate.

The person who sacrifices something of high value for something of low value falls from esteem. This is the reason why a soldier who shows a clean pair of heals on the field of battle would never wish to show his face. Instead of giving his life for truth and justice, he chose life. He chose a lower value instead of higher value. He deserted instead of choosing death before dishonour. In the eyes of the people, he commands no respect. His name is dirt. He never acted upon the rule, Life to be sacrificed for Honour.
 

But where a saving life is concerned no person anywhere has any difference. Whether you are living in Pakistan or reside in England, a dark skinned African or a fair haired American, a jungle living pygmy, or civilised city dweller. Everyone will agree that survival and preserving life is vital.

But, where honour is concerned, not only is there a difference in people but also in cultures. In our community if unmarried women falls pregnant, she may become so dejected with the shame that she takes her life but in England such situation is never considered to be serious even to the extent that if the child’s father to marry her, the child become legitimate in law.

Deep consideration needs to be given to Honour. In England it is said that because in English society this is not considered immoral, this is why it is not immoral. They say in your society it is cosidered immoral, that is why you consider it immoral.

The question is this, is this the way to evaluate good or bad. That the thing which society decrees as good becomes good and which it proclaims as bad becomes bad.

This criterion is in reality no criterion at all.

True criterion should be that something which is good should always consider good and that which is bad should always be considered bad even if the whole world at large comes to consider it to be good.

For those who submit to God, the criterion is His revealed Book, the Quran. It tells us the things which are of greater value and the things of lesser value. And the lower value things which can be sacrificed for those of higher value. And also those things which cannot be sacrificed under any circumstances.

Those things which cannot be sacrificed for anything under any condition are called Permanent Values. The Quran tells us which are the Permanent Values. These are called Unchangeable Principles or God’s Laws.

The person who accepts the Quranic decrees is called a Muslim. A governing body which preserves these laws and rules and judges according to them is called an Islamic Government.
 

This is a translation of a lectured by G.A. Parwez available in Urdu on audio cassettes from Signature Publications Price UK £2.50. Overseas £4.60 Inc. P&P