Answer
Dear Masitah, Salaam Alaykum
Thanks for your question sent in details about what is giving you concerns, we appreciate that.
Your question revolves around a faith issue, ie, man’s faith vs Allah’s justice and fairness; to put it in a more clear context, let me break down your question into the following pointers:
Firstly, Is it not logic that those whom Allah blessed are in a better position to believe in Him, observe His rules, while the “have-nots” of society can be excused given their precarious situation?
Secondly, is it fair that those who belong to the category of “have-nots” are doomed for Hell in the Hereafter because of not being able to abide by Allah’s teachings, while those whom He blessed are the ones destined for Paradise? Where’s Allah’s fairness in that?
So I will address your question based on the above two points, but first of all, let me start by saying that Muslims believe in the divine attributes of Allah, the Almighty, one of which is “Al-ʿAdl” (The Just) which means that the bearer is inherently incapable of injustice or oppression.
This attribute also implies that all the commands of Allah are rooted in fairness in the sense that people are not burdened beyond their capacity in adhering to His commands. The same applies to His rewards and punishments, as they are all subject to Hie attribute (of fairness and justice).
Coming now to those two points mentioned above:
Your question tends to assume that worshipping Allah and obeying His commands must be based on what Allah does to you, how kind is He to you, right? That’s, if He is neither kind nor generous to you, He doesn’t deserve your obedience, hence it’s not fair if He throws you into Hell in return. Such reasoning is flawed, brother, for the following reasons;
1- The essence of creation is to worship Allah the Almighty, and this is command to all, humans and Jinn, as the Qur’an says: “I did not create Jinn and humans except to worship Me” (Qur’an 51:56); and this obligation is not based on whether you are rich or poor, whether you look good or you have issues with your skin and completion, no matter what condition you are in, man owes his lord an obligation to worship Him, because that is why he was brought into this life( from nothing, He made him into a being; from non-existence into existence, so man owes Him a duty of gratitude through devotion and seeking His pleasure.
2- Scale of fairness of Allah is not measured by materialism because wealth and all what relates to it is a means not the ultimate goal in itself and it does not weight an atom of significance in the eyes of Allah in terms of who is entitled to His Paradise or who deserves to be thrown into Hell-Fire. But rather it’s only piety (taqwa) that weighs always in the scale of Allah, even when carrying out His commands, as the Qur’an says (with regard to slaughtering as an act of worship): “Their meat will not reach Allah, nor will their blood, but what reaches Him is piety from you” ( 22:37). So it’s your heart, the state of your consciousness of Allah in all what you do that matters, neither the amount of your wealth or the level of your poverty that will determine your fate in the Hereafter.
3- Also the fact that Allah makes some people rich (or very rich) while others are poor does not make Allah unfair in any sense or being biased. As I said earlier, wealth or any material gains in this world is nothing but a blessing and a trial which the person will account for on the day of judgement. So being rich does not earn a person any rank in the scale of righteousness as we have seen several examples of rich people who are neither believers nor even Muslims; so it’s not true that they are the ones favored by Allah because of their wealth which has no connection with worship, belief or disbelief.
4- By saying that some people “don’t have anything to be grateful for” simply because they are not rich or they are deprived of worldly gains is quite erroneous as it narrows the concept of Allah’s blessings, confining the neemat (blessing) to a mere material gains, thus ignoring the other aspects of blessing which are even wider in scope and higher in significance (such as blessing of health, blessing of sight, hearing, breathing…etc.) Tell me, those people that you describe as “not having anything to be grateful for”, don’t they enjoy freely any of these blessings I have just mentioned? How much do they pay daily in return for breathing fresh air, compare to thousands of people who incur high costs for artificial oxygen in hospitals and health centers across the globe? You don’t pay any monetary amount for breathing fresh air, ability to speak and hear, walk around…etc because this form of neema is a gratuitous gift Lord.
And those you describe as having everything, live a perfect life, do you know what they are going through in their lives? Many of them spend a great portion of their wealth to buy health, either for themselves, their kids or their wives…etc; they are also suffering. Because you see them in opulence does not mean they don’t have their own paining shoes. Life is never a bed of roses, brother, and not everything is all about wealth.
Hope this answers your question, and keep in touch