On Reflection – When Moses (a.s.) asked to see.

On Mindfulness: Savouring and relishing moments in life.

In an age obsessed with quick and more, perhaps the Qur’an occasionally asks something different of us: stop, reflect, and ponder.

There is a peculiar temptation in religious and secular life today.

More.

Read more Qur’an, more Salah. Another certificate, another degree, another job, business, holiday. Before you finish the EC Council CISO qualification, CISSP is waiting for you, complete that – new AI safety courses. Learnt Azure, now AWS. Finish AWS, GCP. Finish that, Oh well what about the new Anthropic Claude Architect course. Working in tech, from personal experience, there is always the next programming language, the next framework, protocol, paper. It’s never ending.

And there is, of course, something beautiful in abundance. The Qur’an encourages us to compete in goodness. The Prophet Muhammad ﷺ worshipped abundantly. Generosity is praised. Prayer is praised. Recitation is praised.

I am certainly not making an argument for doing less good.

But I increasingly wonder whether our obsession with quantity can sometimes cause us to miss something equally important:

Attention.

We count pages while forgetting sentences.

We finish a surah without remembering what it said.

Our tongue reaches the bottom of the page while our mind is still somewhere near the top.

And so, when it comes to reading the Qur’an, I increasingly find myself taking an apparently opposite approach.

I savour it.

Sometimes I stop after a verse.

Sometimes after a phrase.

Sometimes after a word.

I read it again.

I let it sit.

I mull it over.

I allow it to replay in my mind.

I connect it to something I have read in psychology, physics, engineering, biology or philosophy. I connect it to something that happened to me ten years ago. I connect it to something I noticed that morning.

Sometimes the connection turns out to be superficial, and I discard it.

Sometimes it opens an extraordinary intellectual door.

And sometimes there is no intellectual connection at all.

There is simply:

SubhanAllah.

Perhaps this is one form of mindfulness we have forgotten.

Don’t gulp the caviar

Imagine someone gives you an exquisite tin of caviar.

You take a tablespoon, swallow it immediately and announce:

“Excellent. Finished.”

Then another spoon.

Then another.

You begin timing yourself.

Yesterday you finished the tin in twelve minutes. Today you managed ten.

Tomorrow, perhaps eight.

Technically, you have eaten more caviar.

But have you tasted more caviar?

The absurdity is obvious because certain things derive part of their value from the attention with which they are experienced.

A beautiful cup of coffee can be gulped.

A sunset can happen behind us while we stare at our phones. Nowadays it’s even worse – the dreaded selfie stick. Showing I was at the sunset is more important than I enjoyed the sun set over the horizon. For a while I was working in the Caribbean in Oil and Gas, and I distinctly remember being on a lush beach in Barbados – surrounded by Canons and Nikons. This is before the iPhone became common or accessible enough – around 2009. Nobody really was that worried about how beautiful the white sand is, how nice it felt between your toes, how clear the water is, the smell of the breeze, or the sound of the ocean- or pausing to enjoy the squid or the Octopus. Hey Mom – I am at the beach, Hey friends back home who didn’t make it – check out where I am.

And a verse of the Qur’an can pass across our tongue without ever properly arriving in our consciousness.

The Qur’an gives a striking instruction:

وَرَتِّلِ ٱلْقُرْءَانَ تَرْتِيلًا

“And recite the Qur’an with measured recitation.”

— Qur’an 73:4

The word Tartīl matters.

Measured.

Deliberate.

Not frantic.

Not a race against the clock.

The Qur’an can be in my mouth without yet being in my heart.

So the lesson is not that lengthy recitation is bad.

It is that speed is not itself a spiritual achievement.

There is a difference between passing through the Qur’an and allowing the Qur’an to pass through you.

Do they not ponder the Qur’an?

The Qur’an asks the question almost directly:

أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ ٱلْقُرْءَانَ

“Do they not then reflect upon the Qur’an?”

— Qur’an 47:24

And elsewhere:

أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ ٱلْقُرْءَانَ ۚ وَلَوْ كَانَ مِنْ عِندِ غَيْرِ ٱللَّهِ لَوَجَدُوا۟ فِيهِ ٱخْتِلَـٰفًا كَثِيرًا

“Do they not then reflect upon the Qur’an? Had it been from anyone other than Allah, they would certainly have found in it many inconsistencies.”

— Qur’an 4:82

The operative idea is Tadabbur.

Reflection.

Following something through.

Thinking about its implications.

This is different from merely moving one’s eyes across words.

And it raises an uncomfortable question.

What exactly am I trying to accomplish when I read?

If my target is twenty pages, I may naturally optimise my behaviour towards finishing twenty pages.

But the Qur’an does not merely ask whether I have reached the end.

It asks whether I have pondered.

Perhaps sometimes the appropriate unit of Qur’anic reading is therefore not a page.

Perhaps it is a thought.

Sit with a verse

Take Surah al-Rahman.

It begins almost impossibly simply:

ٱلرَّحْمَـٰنُ

The Most Merciful.

Stop.

We are already tempted to continue.

But don’t.

What does that mean?

What would happen if I spent five minutes simply thinking about that Name?

Mercy.

Where have I experienced mercy?

My eyesight?

My children?

Water?

Food?

Life itself?

The fact that my heart continued beating while I slept?

The fact that after committing a sin I was still permitted to return to God?

The fact that repentance exists at all?

Then comes:

عَلَّمَ ٱلْقُرْءَانَ

He taught the Qur’an.

Stop again.

Teaching itself is presented as mercy.

Knowledge is mercy.

Revelation is mercy.

Being corrected is mercy.

Perhaps even discovering that I am wrong can be mercy.

Then:

خَلَقَ ٱلْإِنسَانَ

He created the human being.

And then:

عَلَّمَهُ ٱلْبَيَانَ

He taught him expression.

Now I can disappear down another rabbit hole.

Language.

Speech.

Symbols.

Writing.

Human cognition.

Think about what is actually happening in conversation.

One nervous system formulates an internal idea.

Muscles manipulate air from the lungs.

The vocal tract turns it into vibrations.

Those vibrations travel through the atmosphere.

They strike another person’s auditory system.

There is a tiny bone in the ear called stapes. The smallest bones in the human body. Research it. Just that one little bone would be enough to spend a lifetime in prostration.

And somehow, inside another consciousness, meaning reappears.

Something I use every day without thinking about it suddenly becomes astonishing.

That is what slow reading can do.

It turns the ordinary back into a miracle.

Then comes the refrain

Surah al-Rahman repeatedly asks:

فَبِأَيِّ آلَاءِ رَبِّكُمَا تُكَذِّبَانِ

“Then which of your Lord’s favours will you both deny?”

Thirty-one times.

That fascinates me.

Because perhaps the repetition is teaching us something about how to read.

The impatient reader encounters the verse again and thinks:

I already read this.

The reflective reader encounters it again and asks:

Why am I being asked this again — here?

The words have not changed.

I have.

Another divine favour has been described.

Another feature of creation has entered my awareness.

Another warning has appeared.

Another promise has been made.

Then the question returns.

Which of your Lord’s favours will you deny?

The first time, perhaps I think about existence.

The next time, water.

Then language.

Then balance.

Then fruit.

Then the heavens.

Then justice.

Then mortality.

Then Paradise.

Same sentence.

Different consciousness.

It asks.

Then shows you something.

Then asks again.

Look.

Which of your Lord’s favours will you deny?

Look again.

Which of your Lord’s favours will you deny?

Look more carefully.

Which of your Lord’s favours will you deny?

Perhaps recognition is not permission to rush past the verse.

Perhaps recognition is the invitation to go deeper.

The Qur’an and the mountain

Then there is one of the most arresting descriptions of revelation anywhere in the Qur’an:

لَوْ أَنزَلْنَا هَـٰذَا ٱلْقُرْءَانَ عَلَىٰ جَبَلٍۢ لَّرَأَيْتَهُۥ خَـٰشِعًا مُّتَصَدِّعًا مِّنْ خَشْيَةِ ٱللَّهِ

“Had We sent down this Qur’an upon a mountain, you would have seen it humbled and splitting apart from fear of Allah.”

Then the verse concludes:

وَتِلْكَ ٱلْأَمْثَـٰلُ نَضْرِبُهَا لِلنَّاسِ لَعَلَّهُمْ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ

These examples are presented to humanity so that they may reflect.

— Qur’an 59:21 (Quranic Arabic Corpus)

Pause there.

A mountain.

One of the most obvious natural symbols of solidity available to the human imagination.

Mass.

Stone.

Weight.

Permanence.

And Allah asks us to imagine the Qur’an descending upon it.

The image is not of the mountain casually receiving revelation.

It is humbled.

And then comes the uncomfortable contrast.

I can receive the same Qur’an while checking my notifications.

The mountain splits.

I swipe.

The mountain is humbled.

I wonder how many pages I have left.

That contrast should trouble us.

We know sound can shatter objects. I don’t know the inner meaning of this verse. This is an invitation to more research – Tafsir, The Physics of sound, it’s effect on matter and physiology.

If revelation is represented as weighty enough to humble a mountain, perhaps I should hesitate before treating it as content to be processed as efficiently as possible.

Musa and another mountain

There is another mountain in the Qur’an.

Musa عليه السلام asks:

رَبِّ أَرِنِىٓ أَنظُرْ إِلَيْكَ

“My Lord, reveal Yourself to me so that I may look at You.”

Allah tells him that he cannot see Him, and directs him towards the mountain.

If the mountain remains in place, Musa will see.

Then:

فَلَمَّا تَجَلَّىٰ رَبُّهُۥ لِلْجَبَلِ جَعَلَهُۥ دَكًّا وَخَرَّ مُوسَىٰ صَعِقًا

When his Lord manifested to the mountain, He made it crumble, and Musa fell unconscious.

— Qur’an 7:143

I find the juxtaposition extraordinary.

The mountain becomes almost an instrument for calibrating the human imagination.

We think mountains are substantial.

Allah shows us what substantial really means.

And perhaps that is why approaching revelation deserves more than speed.

The age of metrics

This matters particularly today because almost everything has become measurable. I remember seeing some people have a “counter” they often use to read “Tasbih” glorification of Allah. It becomes almost like a competition. Oh yours just shows 300 today. Mine shows 1400. Nothing wrong with keeping track – like people count their steps, reps in the gym, calories, how many minutes did I meditate today, timer for flossing or brushing.

The point here is the mindset.

Pages today: 40.

Juz completed: 2.

Rakʿahs prayed: 20.

Dhikr repetitions: 1,000.

Charity given: £X.

Again, none of those numbers is inherently bad.

Numbers can motivate us. Habits matter. Consistency matters. Quantity matters.

But metrics become dangerous when the metric quietly replaces the purpose.

We begin optimising the proxy.

Engineers, economists and social scientists know this problem well: once a measurement becomes the target, people can become very good at improving the measurement without necessarily improving the underlying reality it was intended to represent.

Religious life is particularly vulnerable because many outward actions are countable while the deepest inward transformations are not.

How many pages did you read?

Easy.

How deeply did one verse change your understanding of God?

Hard.

How many rakʿahs did you pray?

Easy.

For how many moments were you genuinely conscious that you were standing before Allah?

Hard.

How much charity did you give?

Easy.

How much attachment to wealth left your heart?

Much harder.

Quantity is visible.

Transformation is often invisible.

One verse can be enormous

There are verses I cannot simply read and move beyond.

Take:

كُلُّ مَنْ عَلَيْهَا فَانٍۢ

“Everyone upon it will perish.”

Then:

وَيَبْقَىٰ وَجْهُ رَبِّكَ ذُو ٱلْجَلَـٰلِ وَٱلْإِكْرَامِ

“And there will remain the Face of your Lord, Owner of Majesty and Honour.”

— Qur’an 55:26–27

How quickly should one read that?

Three seconds?

Five?

Or should we stop?

Everyone.

Not most people.

Everyone.

The billionaire.

The president.

The general.

The professor.

The celebrity.

The homeless guy at Liverpool Street with the empty Greggs coffee cup with a few coins in it, a sandwich from Marks and Spencer someone left, and the psychedelic blue sleeping bag he is using to cover himself smeared with black dirt. As if he is saying, leave me alone. My life is destroyed, I am just happy to curl up in a ball today.

The person whose photograph appears on every billboard.

The person with twenty followers.

Me.

You.

Every civilisation eventually becomes archaeology.

Every fashionable argument eventually becomes history.

Every possession changes hands.

Every human body returns to the earth.

Everyone upon it will perish.

Pause.

Let it hurt slightly.

Then read the next verse.

God remains.

Suddenly your unanswered email seems slightly less catastrophic.

The insult you have been replaying for three days shrinks.

The object you desperately wanted becomes an object again.

The status competition looks faintly ridiculous.

One verse has recalibrated your internal scale.

But only because you gave it time.

The caviar principle

And so I return to caviar.

You do not need very much at once.

That is partly the point.

A tiny amount sits on the tongue.

You notice texture.

Salt.

Temperature.

The first impression changes.

Another flavour emerges.

You wait.

The experience develops precisely because you have not immediately buried it beneath the next mouthful.

Perhaps we occasionally need to read revelation like that.

One verse.

There is no need to gulp caviar. Savour each spoon.

Author’s note :-

I am not a “scholar” of religion, I have no vested interest or am I affiliated with anyone – political group or otherwise. This is simply a “conversation” and heartfelt “advice”. This is not a “religious” position – it’s an invitation to reflect and something I choose to do. Why do I say this? Because I have no material vested interest, neither do I want something material from writing this. Cross check everything with Tafsir, Hadith, Fiqh – ask someone of knowledge in Quran and Islam – someone trained to give you a better understanding.

Tamim al-Dari reported: The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “The religion is sincere good will.” We said, “To whom?” The Prophet said, “To Allah, His Book, His Messenger, the leaders of the Muslims, and their common people.”

Source: Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 55

Grade: Sahih (authentic) according to Muslim

Qur’an 21:107 – “We have not sent you (O Muhammad) but as a mercy to all the worlds”

The mercy is for all people of all faiths and inviting them to the truth. My “religious” journey didn’t start with any formal religion – it started with a simple question. “Why”.  The existential crisis. Go to university. Why? So you can get a job. Why? So you can get married and have kids. Why? Then you get a few nice holidays and a retirement fund. Why? What’s the point. I will be dead one day. That led from a Yoga Ashram in Palakkad, South India to a Buddhist Monastery in Guwahati, India to Rabbi Emmanuel Beck in Stamford Hill, London and many other stops in the middle. Seeking is natural to the human condition. I am a mainstream Muslim.