B for Barakah

باسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Barakah :- (Arabic) Translation: Blessings.

تَبَارَكَ اسْمُ رَبِّكَ ذِي الْجَلَالِ وَالْإِكْرَامِ

          "Blessed be the Name of your Lord, the Owner of Glory and Honour." (ٍSurah Rahmān:78)

In the last ayah of Surah Rahmān, Allah says that the Name of Allah, who is full of jalāl (glory), is filled with barakah. And which Name is He talking about? The Name that the Surah began with: Ar Rahmān الرحمن. What we should also note, is that Allah, here, is not talking about Himself, although He Himself is full of barakah. He is talking about His 'Name'. The Name itself is filled with barakah. That's what Allah is telling us. 

So about the word barakah.

Barakah, in Arabic is said to be النَّمَاءُ وَ الزِّيَادة فَوقَ التَّوَقُّع. Something that a)grows (الزِّيَادَة), and b)progresses or continues (النَّمَاءُ) above expectation (فَوْق التَّوَقُّع). If you put a seed in the ground, you expect one tree. But you put a seed in the ground, and you get ten trees or even a whole forest, that's not expected. That's what you call Barakah. The result has barakah in it. 

Barakah is also described in the Arabic language, as to how when the camel sits down into the sand, it doesn't move. It doesn't move at all. This is beautiful because when something grows, and you grow it too much, it is expected to be unstable. For example, you pile some Legos, one atop the other, to make a tower, and you keep piling one after the other, and obviously, the more its height increases, the less stable it becomes. But this is not the case of barakah. Barakah means when something grows, and it is stable, like a camel sunk in the sand. In other words, Allah is saying, 'Don't think that this increase will go away.' It will grow, and the growth is here to stay. 

Now Allah says that His Name is full of Barakah. What does this mean? This means that whenever we do something good in the Name of Allah, saying His Name Ar Rahmān, calling upon the barakah of His Name, then whatever we do, it will produce good, but produce good beyond expectation, and the good will continue and not disappear. It will keep growing and growing and growing. And according to Ustadh Nouman Ali Khan, because of this ayah alone, every Muslim is supposed to be an optimist. We can never be pessimists. 

What you see when you do something maybe little, but the barakah in doing one good deed, no matter what it is, after saying بالسم الله الرحمن الرحيم Bismillah 'arRahmān' arRaheem (keyword Ar Rahmān), the result you get from it you cannot calculate because it is from Allah. It will grow and grow beyond human expectation. Common sense or logic or Mathematics cannot encompass it. Because a teacher might teach Alif Bā Thā to one student, but he doesn't know that that student might be the next Mujaddid of the Ummah, from whom millions of people will take the Shahādah from, and the teacher himself is the one who started him on his journey. He doesn't know that. 

And that's why, when we do something and Allah decides to put barakah in it, it will be beyond our scope because it's from Allah. It's upto Him, not us. So don't underestimate the value of the things that you do. Whatever you do, whenever you do it, say بالسم الله الرحمن الرحيم and do it. Because it will produce good beyond your expectation.