When I think I know better than Allah

One of the things that’s been affecting me is wanting something so much that I start thinking I know what should happen.

I’ve wanted something very specific. I’ve made dua, prayed istikhara, and asked Allah to make it easy for me if it’s good for me. I’ve tried more than once, and it still hasn’t worked out.

But I keep thinking about how good it would be. How happy it would make me. I keep trying to make it happen in the exact way I imagined.

That’s what I want to look at honestly. At what point am I thinking that I know better than Allah?

I’m talking about myself here. I’ve written before about wanting something and trusting Allah with the outcome. This is another part of that struggle.

The arrogance I want to notice in myself

What worries me is thinking that I know better. That because I want something, it must be what’s best for me.

That makes me think about the hadith in which the Prophet ﷺ gives a severe warning about entering Paradise with even the smallest amount of pride. In the same narration, he explains what pride means:¹

Rejecting the truth and looking down on people are two things I need to watch for. It isn’t enough to think of arrogance as someone showing off their clothes or possessions. In that same hadith, the Prophet ﷺ distinguishes liking beautiful clothes and shoes from the pride he is warning against.¹

Another narration warns about an elderly adulterer, a lying ruler, and an arrogant poor person.² The last example makes me stop and think. I don’t have to be wealthy to look down on someone.

The commentary I was reading in Riyad as-Salihin discusses why those examples are especially serious. It also distinguishes pride that rejects faith from the arrogance of someone who disdains others, explaining the warning about Paradise accordingly.³ Those are explanations in the commentary, separate from the Prophet’s words.

I want to learn to recognize arrogance in myself, including the kind that hides inside something I really want. May Allah forgive us and remove even the tiniest bit of it from our hearts.

What I cannot see yet

The story of Musa and Khidr in Surat al-Kahf made me think about how hard it is to be patient when you don’t understand what is happening.

Khidr tells Musa:

Musa sees Khidr damage a boat and kill a boy, and he objects. Later, after a town refuses them hospitality, Khidr repairs a wall, and Musa says he could have asked for payment.⁴

The explanations come afterward. Damaging the boat protected it from a king who was seizing boats. The account of the boy concerns what he would bring upon his believing parents. The wall protected treasure belonging to two orphans until they could recover it. Khidr explains that he did not act on his own authority.⁵

There is a detail here I wanted to understand. Did Khidr know more than Musa?

In the narration in Sahih al-Bukhari, Khidr explains that Allah had taught him knowledge Musa did not know, and had taught Musa knowledge Khidr did not know. The narration does not give a list of the subjects Musa knew that Khidr did not.⁶

Ibn Kathir explains their different knowledge and responsibilities before Allah. He also explains that Musa would understandably object to actions that appeared to go against his law.⁷

In my situation, after repeated attempts and istikhara, it feels like the door is closed for now. Maybe it will open one day. I don’t know. I’m describing where I am, rather than making a rule that anything difficult must be wrong for us.

The dua of istikhara asks Allah to make a matter possible and bless it if it is good for us, to turn it away if it is harmful, and to grant us good and contentment with it.⁸ I want to take that last part seriously too.

Returning to Surat al-Kahf every Friday

This is also a reminder to read Surat al-Kahf every Friday. Abu Sa’id reports that the Prophet ﷺ said:

The narration is graded Hasan by al-Albani in the linked source.⁹ I want to make time for that reading each week, and to keep reflecting on what this story reminds me about patience and the limits of my knowledge.

Praying more, but sometimes feeling less trust

There’s something else I want to be honest about.

When I was interested in manifestation, there were times when I felt more relaxed about what would happen. Looking back, I feel like I was trusting and relying on Allah more than I realized, even though I wasn’t keeping up my prayers then.

Now I’m praying my five daily prayers, but sometimes it feels like my faith is lower. It’s strange to admit that. I’m describing how it feels, and I don’t fully understand it yet.

What I want to recover is that trust. I want to keep praying and have a heart that relies on Allah with more sincerity. I want to remember Him throughout the day, rather than spend the whole day trying to force one outcome.

The Quran tells believers to remember Allah often.¹⁰ It also brings remembrance and gratitude together:

And Allah promises an increase to those who are grateful.¹¹

When I relax and become grateful for what’s here now, I feel like I notice more. Things happen that I wasn’t paying attention to before. When I’m fixated on one way things have to go, I can miss what’s already in front of me.

For me, that is where dhikr and gratitude belong in this reflection. I want to thank Allah for the good I recognize and for blessings I haven’t even noticed. I want to trust Him with what I cannot see, without pretending I know what every event means.

Asking Allah to reassure my heart

I also thought about Ibrahim and Zakariyya asking for reassurance.

In Surat al-Baqarah, Ibrahim asks Allah to show him how He gives life to the dead. He affirms that he believes and explains that he wants his heart to be at rest.¹²

In Surat Maryam, after the good news of a son, Zakariyya asks Allah for a sign. Allah gives him a specific sign concerning his ability to speak. Ibn Kathir explains his request as seeking reassurance about Allah’s promise, and explicitly connects it with Ibrahim’s request.¹³

That matters to me because sometimes I need reassurance too. I want to ask Allah to strengthen my trust and keep my heart firm.

I looked into what scholars say about asking for a sign. Shaykh Yusuf Weltch says it is permissible, citing Zakariyya’s request. Shaykh Ilyas Patel also says it is not an innovation. He recommends seeking guidance, asking others for advice, and relying on Allah instead of making the decision depend on some random event.¹⁴

So I can ask Allah for reassurance. I can ask for a sign that helps my heart. But those accounts don’t give me a way to declare that every coincidence is an answer about the particular thing I want.

When disappointment starts to feel personal

Sometimes, when the outcome isn’t what I wanted, it feels like the world is closing in.

Then the thought comes: maybe I don’t deserve it. Maybe Allah is not pleased with me.

But another thought comes too. Maybe this particular thing isn’t good for me in a way I can’t see.

In a passage about the obligation of fighting, the Quran reminds believers that they may dislike something good for them or love something bad for them, and that Allah knows what they do not.¹⁵ That reminder about knowledge is what I keep coming back to.

The Prophet ﷺ described good in both sides of a believer’s experience: gratitude when something pleasing happens, and patience when hardship comes.¹⁶ He also taught that even sorrow and distress can be a means through which Allah removes a Muslim’s sins.¹⁷

There is also a narration that Allah tests people He loves.¹⁸ That gives me hope. Hardship by itself isn’t proof that Allah has rejected me. It also doesn’t mean I can claim to know the exact reason for this particular disappointment.

And when I need to remember Allah’s mercy, I think of the hadith where the Prophet ﷺ points to a mother holding her child and explains that Allah is more merciful to His servants than she is to her child.¹⁹

I want to hold on to that hope while asking for what’s best for me. I don’t know what that will look like, or when I’ll understand it.

When years of waiting feel long

Something else stood out to me while reading Surat Taha, chapter twenty of the Quran. In the passage about the Day of Resurrection, Allah describes what the people gathered there will say about how long they stayed on earth:

Imagine that. All those years, all the things we wanted, all the things we waited for, remembered as a single day.

The passage begins by describing the gathering of the guilty. So “the more perceptive of them” refers to someone within that group. Ibn Kathir explains that worldly life will seem very short to them on the Day of Judgment, compared with the everlasting life ahead.²⁰

That makes me think about how I experience waiting. A few months can feel long. Years can feel like so much of my life. But even those years belong to a life that will one day seem brief.

There is also a verse saying that a day with our Lord is like a thousand years by our counting. Its context is people demanding that punishment be hastened. Ibn Kathir explains that Allah does not hurry and that delaying does not mean He will fail to fulfil His promise.²¹

For me, these passages put my waiting into perspective. What feels so long now may one day seem very short. They don’t tell me when a particular dua will be answered, or promise that I will receive the exact thing I asked for. But they remind me how limited my sense of time is.

The Prophet ﷺ also described a person who had endured the greatest hardship in this world, then experienced a single dip in Paradise and said they had never experienced hardship.²² That gives me hope about how differently this life may look from there.

I want to ask Allah firmly while I wait. The Prophet ﷺ taught us to ask with determination, rather than asking for forgiveness or mercy with “if You wish.” Nothing we ask is too great for Allah to grant.²³

I can ask with hope and confidence in Allah’s ability to give, while still asking Him to choose what is good for me, as the dua of istikhara teaches.⁸ I don’t have to know the outcome to ask sincerely.

The Prophet ﷺ also warned against becoming impatient, saying that we have prayed without receiving an answer, and then giving up supplication.²⁴

Sometimes it’s been an hour, a day, or a week, and I already feel impatient. Even months and years belong to this short worldly life. Remembering the Hereafter helps me put that wait into perspective. I want to keep asking, without making my own deadline the measure of whether Allah has heard me.

What can I do while I don’t know?

The advice on tawakkul that I want to put into practice is to take the appropriate steps while relying on Allah for the outcome. Ustadh Farid Dingle recommends cultivating trust through obedience, hope, repentance, and turning to Allah. The Quran itself places consultation, making a decision, and trusting Allah together.²⁵

For me, that means keeping my prayers, making dua, remembering Allah, and asking people with knowledge for advice. It also means asking Allah for a firm heart and for contentment with what is good for me.²⁶

The Prophet ﷺ taught us to pursue what benefits us, seek Allah’s help, and avoid tormenting ourselves with what-ifs after something has happened.²⁷ That is something practical I can work on now.

There is another passage I was thinking about in Surat Taha. Allah tells Musa that the Hour is coming, while its time is kept hidden, so that each person will be recompensed for their efforts.²⁸

Later in the surah, people demand a sign, and the passage describes the excuse they would have made if punishment had come before a messenger: they would have asked why a messenger had not been sent so they could follow Allah’s revelations.²⁹

For me, those passages raise a question. While I’m asking for reassurance, what am I doing with the guidance I’ve already been given?

My choices and efforts matter. That doesn’t mean I earn Paradise independently of Allah’s mercy; the Prophet ﷺ explicitly taught that we need His mercy.³⁰ But it does make me want to take responsibility for the choices in front of me.

I don’t know what will happen with the thing I wanted. Right now, I want to stop treating my preferred outcome as the only good that could come to me.

May Allah remove arrogance from our hearts, make us grateful, and give us sincere trust in Him. May He grant us what is good and make our hearts content with it.

References

The Quran quotations and paraphrases use The Qur’an, translated by M. A. S. Abdel Haleem. The connections to my own experience are personal reflections. Hadith excerpts identify their translation and source separately.