One of the wisdoms of the stories in the Qur’an is that the believer, regardless of his situation, will recognize part of his personal circumstances in the Qur’an. The believer will question himself where he is (or rather his nature, characteristics and personality) within the Qur’an. The tale of Habeel and Qabeel describes the first major sin on earth, what led to the events, their implications, and how to avoid taking the same path. We are taught the lessons to be learnt, what Allah is teaching us and what key points Allah emphasizes for our own personal understanding and development.
We travel back to the beginning of Mankind’s presence on earth, after Adam AS and his wife were banished from Paradise. Eventually, Adam AS and Hawwa (or Eve) started to bear children, giving the earth its first inhabitants, and from there, earth was filled with mankind. It is believed that Hawwa bore sets of twins, and in each birth there was a male and a female child. In the first generation of mankind, they were commanded that each son would marry the sister of his brother with whom she was born, in other words, no one was allowed to get married with his sister with whom he was born.
Life was simple, with agricultural roots. Adam AS was taught certain basic skills such as grazing, farming, milling flour and baking bread. It was not a life of luxury, and there was no material wealth to be obsessed with, yet before long, jealousy sparked the first crime in humankind.
It was a crime of murder and was motivated by the jealousy of Qabeel, one of the sons of Adam AS, against Habeel, his brother.
Although born of the same womb, Habeel and Qabeel had opposite personalities. Habeel had an energetic and hardworking disposition, and carried on his affairs in a humble manner. He was in constant remembrance and thanks to Allah, and loved to sacrifice in the way of Allah. He had a kind and compassionate personality, and never complained. He lived his life in complete reliance on Allah, and was extremely generous by nature.
Qabeel was the opposite. Apart from being lazy, he had no gratitude towards Allah. He was constantly discontented with whatever Allah had given him and never spared the time to thank Allah for the bounties bestowed on him. There was little, if any, remembrance of Allah in his heart, for he was constantly blaming, complaining and comparing his circumstances to those of others. He looked on life through the eyes of jealousy and envy, blaming everyone – Allah and his parents included – but never himself.
According to some reports from the Companions, the incident was sparked when Qabeel refused to marry the twin sister of Habeel who was designated to him, preferring instead his own twin sister who was younger and more beautiful.
The matter was referred to Adam AS. Being a fair parent, he did not take sides or encourage sibling rivalry by judging in favour of one son, but rather asked Habeel and Qabeel to consign the affair to Allah, where each son was to sacrifice a gift to Allah and let Allah decide the outcome.
In the early days, retribution for sins was swift and obvious. Similarly, when sacrifices were made to Allah, the evidence of whether the sacrifice was accepted was immediately apparent, for a fire would descend from the sky and claim the superior sacrifice.
Due to his generous and God fearing nature, Habeel was keen to offer only the best to Allah. Being a shepherd, he sacrificed the choicest of his lambs. Qabeel, on the other hand, offered a bundle of his most inferior crops. Instead of displaying humbleness and generosity towards Allah, he rationalized that Allah was in no need his offerings, and thus gave seeds and crops of the worst quality. There was no element in sacrifice in Qabeel’s behaviour.
The Acceptance of the Sacrifice
Both offerings being presented, a fire devoured the sacrifice of Habeel, leaving Qabeel’s meagre offerings untouched.
“And recite upon them the true story of the two sons of Adam. When they offered a sacrifice, it was accepted from one them and not accepted from the other.” (Al Qur’an 5:27)
Invariably, Qabeel was angry and jealous that his offering was not accepted by Allah. True to his nature, he was upset by Allah’s decision. Some reports mentioned that he accused Adam AS of supplicating in favour of Habeel for his sacrifice to be accepted.
What was to prevent Qabeel from accepting and being contented with Allah’s decree? What stopped him from seeking Allah for the wisdom behind the events? What was to restrain him from making repentance to Allah for his substandard offerings, or from seeking Allah’s guidance in why his sacrifice was rejected?
It was jealousy and arrogance. Here we can see how Satan’s game repeats itself – Qabeel was discontented, and this discontentment bred envy and jealousy, and from such jealousy, Allah blinded Qabeel and made him arrogant.
Qabeel set out to confront Habeel, whereupon he told his brother: “I will kill you”. Habeel, not intimidated, responded, “Allah accepts only from those who are pious.” (Al Qur’an 5:27)
Although Habeel was the stronger of the two, instead of retaliating against Qabeel’s threatening behaviour, Habeel continued: “Yet if you stretch out your hand against me to kill me, I shall not stretch out my hand to kill you, for I fear Allah, the Lord of the worlds. (Instead) I would prefer that you bear the burden of my sin and your sin, and so become an inhabitant of the Fire, that is the recompense of the transgressors.” (Al Qur’an 5:28- 29)
Habeel’s reaction demonstrated his self-restraint, piety and noble character. Qabeel on the other hand, allowed himself to succumb to the whisperings of Iblis instead of seeking Allah’s guidance. Enraged by the reply, Qabeel killed his brother with an iron rod (and in some other accounts, hit him on the head with a rock), thus committing the first ever murder in mankind’s history.
Burying a Mistake
Once the haze of anger cleared, Qabeel realized that he did not know what to do with his brother’s corpse. He was paralysed. Arrogance gave him another disease, which was ignorance, leading him to become a slave to his inner shaitan. Qabeel did not feel this agony with humbleness, for if he had done so, he would have turned to Allah for repentance. Instead, he regressed into a deeper mistake, which was to be arrogant towards Allah. The cycle of Iblis in Paradise against Adam AS and Hawwa was repeated.
Allah solved Qabeel’s predicament, by sending a crow, which scratched the ground to educate him how to hide the body. Qabeel, realising the utter shame of his ignorance that even a crow knew better than he did said: “Woe to me! Am I not even able to be as this crow and hide the dead body of my brother?” (Al Qur’an 5:31) He then buried his brother in the earth – the first burial in mankind.
What eventually happened to Qabeel is not conclusively documented in Islamic tradition. There are a few Israelite accounts on how the remainder of his life was spent, but we shall not be examining it here.
Lesson learnt – Just Parenting and Setting a Precedent
From the reaction of Adam AS, we can learn a fundamental rule of parenthood – justice. Parents are required to treat their children fairly to avoid creating jealousy between the siblings. Unjust treatment of children creates confrontation and conflict within the family structure, and can create serious damage for generations to come.
Consider our roles as parents. The child absorbs every good or bad manner displayed by their parents. Parents are the core role models and set the main environment for their children. If parents are unjust to their children, they are accountable for those affected by such injustice – not just their children, but all the coming generations as long the cycle of mischief and injustice continues. This applies to all aspects – equality in love, manner, showing affection, anger, clothing, money, inheritance and even toys. Adam AS was aware of this, which is why he did not risk ruling unjustly in favour of one child, but instead asked them to turn to Allah to solve the dispute.
Despite Adam’s AS fair upbringing, Qabeel chose to depart from the path ordained by Allah. This makes evident that children have their own distinct personalities and individual destinies. The duty of the parent is discharged when they set the best role model and correct upbringing for their children within Allah’s guidelines. Guidance is only from Allah, and while the parents have the obligation of showing their children the right way of life, it is up to Allah to bestow upon such children His guidance.
The magnitude of Qabeel’s crime is illustrated by the following hadith: “No soul is killed unjustly but the first son of Adam bears a part of that sin. Because he was the first to initiate this tradition of killing.” (Bukhari). This hadith does not imply that the murderer is exonerated from his crime. Rather, whenever a murder is committed, Qabeel will also bear the sin of that murder, being the originator of such action.
Let us pause. Do we consider the consequences of our actions, not just in the immediate terms, but also the long term repercussions which can survive our death?
If our evil or corrupted actions are repeated by others, we bear the consequences of the sins that come attached with it. Similarly, if we carry out good deeds, every such act replicated by them will also earn us the rewards until the Day of Judgment. As long as our actions are imitated by others – whether a kind or harsh word, an act of oppression or kindness, a spiritually healthy or corrupted gesture, a generous or selfish act, caring or abusive behaviour, a good deed or a crime; we bear the consequences of such actions, even if these acts are carried out by those in the coming generations. We should think long and hard about this, for what we reap in this life and after our death depends on the seeds of the legacy we leave during our lives.
Are we Habeel or Qabeel?
The repeating theme of the tale of Habeel and Qabeel, is that when we live in a journey of faith. We should be content and thank Allah. We should show gratitude constantly. We should not falter in His remembrance.
We should learn to be happy with what we have, instead of looking at what others have. With whatever we have, we should be generous with it. If one was truly thankful, there is no need for comparisons, for example, how the neighbours decorate their houses, or the types of cars that friends drive. If you are looking at life with the eye of contentment, such comparisons are wholly unnecessary. Such comparisons lead to sleepless nights and misery. Wealth does not bring contentment, for a discontented person will always find a basis of comparison – if not belongings, then the number of their children, or the beauty of their spouses. The discontentment immerses the person in greed and sickness, and again, this is the cause of all our diseases, causing them to lose time and distract themselves from the advice of Allah.
We have seen consequences of the qualities hated by Allah – not being contented, comparing, blaming and complaining, not thanking Allah and not submitting to His qadr. The lives of Habeel and Qabeel clearly illustrate the path that takes us to the pleasure of Allah and the path that leads to the anger of Allah.
Which path should we take?
When Allah put them to the test, Habeel surrendered and had faith in Allah. He gave the utmost to sacrifice as commanded by Allah. The one who was not contented, Qabeel, had his heart packed by Satan with envy, jealousy and hate. From this story, we can grasp the mother of all evils – lack of thanks, lack of contentment, and constant blaming and complaining, which imminently lead to the majority of diseases of the heart. These were the diseases that infected Qabeel’s heart. On the other hand, we can see the opposite in Habeel. He carried within him the mother of goodness, contentment, gratitude and remembrance to Allah. He had faith in Allah and constantly surrendered and submitted to the decree of Allah.
This story contains the entrance of all evils to the heart. It also contains the keys of all goodness and happiness to the heart.
Let’s come to grasp the reality of our own personalities, and think, who am I? Some early scholars said that every one of us has elements of Habeel and Qabeel within us, good and evil, and it is up to us to strive for goodness and struggle against our evils to elevate ourselves. Every family has a Habeel and a Qabeel. Society contains components of Habeel and Qabeel. It is up to us to realize who we are and our contributions to ourselves, our families and our societies – and most of all, who we want to be. If we follow the advice of our beloved Prophet SAW, the choice is clear, we should strive to be the better of Adam’s AS two sons.
