In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.

 

 

Do you not see that all who are in the heavens and on Earth, the sun and the moon, the stars and the mountains, the trees and the beasts, and many human beings prostrate before God? And many have been destined to punishment. Whoever God makes lowly, there is none to give him honor. Assuredly, God does what He wills. (22:18)

 

KNOW, O FRIEND, that the Qur’an declares: Everything worships God and prostrates before Him, and praises and glorifies Him in its own specific way. We will point to only a few. For example, when a great king wants to have a vast city and a magnificent palace built, he employs four kinds of workers:

FIRST: Slaves who are not paid. They take pleasure in whatever they do by his command, always praise him, and are content with the honor of being attached to him and working on his behalf.113

SECOND: Ordinary people who are paid according to their task. They do not know what great purposes are intended. Some even think that there is no purpose other than their being paid.

THIRD: Animals belonging to the king. They are paid in terms of fodder and the pleasure they take in performing suitable tasks and thereby putting their potential into effect, which also gives them pleasure.

FOURTH: Workers who understand what they and others are doing, why it is being done, and why the king is doing it. They supervise the others and are paid according to their rank.

In the same way, the Owner and Builder of the heavens and Earth employs and causes angels and animals, inanimate objects, and plants and human beings to worship Him. He does not do this out of need, for He is the Creator of them and their acts, but because it is required by His Dignity, Grandeur, and His Lordship’s essential qualities.

Angels are not promoted because of their endeavors. Each one has a fixed, determined rank, and receives a specific pleasure from its task and a radiance suited for the act of worship it does. Their reward is in the service itself. Just as people are nourished with and derive pleasure from air and water, light and food, angels are nourished with and receive pleasure from the lights of remembrance and glorification, praise and worship, knowledge and love of God. Since they are created of light, light and things close to it (e.g., fragrant scents) sustain them. They feel great happiness in performing the tasks commanded by the One Whom they worship, in their actions for His sake, in the service they render in His Name, and in the supervision they exercise through His view. They find great bliss in the honor they gain through their connection with Him, in the “refreshment” they find in studying His Kingdom’s material and immaterial dimensions, and in the satisfaction they have in observing the manifestations of His Grace and Majesty.

Animals, which have an appetitive soul and partial will, do not work purely for the sake of God. Therefore, their Munificent Owner pays them for their work. For example, the All-Wise Creator employs the nightingale, renowned for its love of roses,114 to proclaim the intense relationship between plants and animals. The nightingale is an orator of the Lord among animals, which are guests of the All-Merciful One, and is charged with acclaiming their Provider’s gifts and announcing their joy therein. It announces the welcome offered to plants in return for the help they offer animals, and declares on beautiful plants the animals’ intense need of plants—a need in the degree of love and passion. It offers a most beautiful gratitude to the All-Majestic, Gracious, and Munificent Lord of all kingdoms, with a most pleasing yearning and in a most delicate form.

A nightingale performs this task for the sake of the All-Glorified One. It speaks in its own tongue; we understand these meanings from it, even if it does not know the meaning of its melodies. The nightingale’s ignorance of those aims does not mean that it is not employed for them. It is like a clock that tells you the time, even though it is unaware of what it does. The nightingale’s wage is the delight it derives from looking on smiling flowers, the pleasure it receives from conversing with them. Its touching songs are not complaints arising from animal grief, but rather are thanks for the All-Merciful One’s gifts.

Compare a nightingale with a bee or a spider, an ant or the “nightingales” among insects. Each receives a particular pleasure, included in their duties, as its payment. Like a private employed on an imperial vessel, they serve certain important aims and the Lord’s art. They observe God’s commands of creation and operation of the universe in perfect obedience, thereby displaying in the best way the purposes for their creation in His Name. They spend their lives fulfilling their tasks by His Power in the most wonderful fashion. In this manner, they present the gifts of their worship and virtues of their submission to their Creator, which are the true reasons why the Giver of Life created them.

As plants and inanimate objects have no free will, they are not paid. Whatever they do, they do by God’s Power and in His Name, purely for God’s sake, and to fulfill what Divine Will requires of them. We can see that plants derive some sort of pleasure from fulfilling their tasks but, unlike animate beings with free will, they do not suffer pain. The results of the works of plants and inanimate objects are more perfect than those of animals, because they are in complete submission to the Creator, with free choice having no part in them. Among animals having some sort of choice, the work of those like bees and others similar to them, which are equipped with a kind of inspiration, is more perfect than the work of those that rely on their partial will and power.

Human beings resemble angels in the universality of their worship, extent of their supervision, comprehensiveness of their knowledge, and their role as heralds of Divine Lordship. Indeed, they are more comprehensive in nature than angels. Since their drives are not restricted and their appetitive souls are disposed toward evil, they have a capacity for almost both boundless advance and decline. In their quest for self-pleasure in their work and a share for themselves, they resemble animals. So, they receive two kinds of wages: one animal (insignificant and immediate) and the other angelic (universal and postponed).

 

Said Nursi

113 This is only a comparison. However, for example, the sincere followers of a Prophet or a saint take great pleasure in serving them, for the Prophet’s or saint’s being pleased with them is enough reward for them.

114 In Eastern literature, a rose symbolizes a beloved woman and a nightingale is a young man who loves her. Its singing symbolizes the heart-rending songs sung for the beloved, especially laments of separation. In the Twenty-fourth Word, Said Nursi treats the nightingale as the representative of animals that offer God, on their behalf, their thanks for the flowers and other plants they consume. Every species has a “nightingale” doing the same task on behalf of its species. According to him, Prophet Muhammad is the nightingale of humanity who sings the praises of God on our behalf and conveys our worship and thanks to God. (Tr.)