Forgiveness

For GIVE ness..

The other day, Asraf Ismail shared with me a beautiful story of a sahabah, named Abdullah Ibnu Umar, the son of the 2^nd Caliph, Umar Al Khattab about he was robbed in the market. When people realized he was robbed, people started to pray for destruction over the one who robbed the son of the Caliph. But then, Ibnu Umar raised his hand and ask for forgiveness from Allah to that person who robbed him. Then, everyone was astounded. That’s the beauty of forgiveness.

Then, today I read a story about Matthew Henry in a book I’m reading. Matthew Henry lived in the eighteenth century. When he was robbed, he wrote the following in his diary: “ Let me be thankful first because I was never robbed before, second, although they took my purse, they did not take my life, third, because although they took my all, it was not much, and fourth because it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed”

Matthew Henry wasn’t a Muslim, but he sees everything in the light of hope and positivity. When only 1 bad thing happened to him, he listed 4 positive things out of it. Isn’t that wonderful? That’s how we should act. In the hardship and trials laid upon us, we actually can list as many as good things out of it. It just a matter wanting to see it from different angle, different light.

Today, in the afternoon, I watched my favourite talk show, Oprah Winfrey show. The topic of the day was very interesting Murder by Family. There was a story of a murder of a family, the mother and the younger son was shot dead, the father and the elder son was injured. The family was just finished having a celebration of the coming graduation of the older brother ( Bart ) and when they reached home, they were shot dead. The father and Bart was saved. The moment he realized his family was shot dead, the father was very determined to forgive the murderer who shot his beloved family dead. Can you imagine that? You just came to a realization that your wife of 28 years of Marriage was shot dead, and so did your son, how come you have the gut and the will, and the kindness to forgive the cruel murderer?

Surprisingly, after a thorough investigation by the police, the one who planned for the murder was the older brother, Bart, his own son. Bart was planning the killing since two years ago and he managed to convince his partners in crime to kill his own family. He was actually living in a lie. He’s been lying about his graduation when he never pass the first year of his study. He was never a student of the university he mentioned he will be graduating. How shocking the reality is. How painful it is. What’s more to a father? Having to witness his own son, killing his mother and brother, and out of love and compassion, came to forgive his son. When he thought he had a loving and happy family, a dark reality hit him, his son wasn’t happy at all. When he thought he and his wife were a proactive parents, they actually failed to recognized the hatred Bart secretly harbored in his heart.

Oprah’s journalist, Lisa Ling, went to interview Bart in his death parole. Bart looked normal but in fact, he is a sociopath. He held a grudge to his family because he cannot forgive his mother and father for bringing him to life. He loves his family but at the same time he hates them. He envied his brother for being always better than him in everything. He blamed his father and mothers for his birth into the world. The deep-well conceived hatred turn out very bad. A son killed his own mother, his own brother.

That’s a bitter reality. Hatred. Hatred.Hatred. We live in a world full of hatred when the cure is simply forgiveness. Forgiveness is the only cure for hatred. Sometimes we don’t realize what kind of hatred we harboured in our heart. When we feel dissatisfied with a friend or people close to us, we tend to keep it deep in our heart, hoping it to heal soon, without the effort of forgiving. The next thing we realized was the hatred was growing and growing. Then we tend to step back, distance ourself from that person. Worse come to worse, we were in a hot-tensed situation with that person. Most of the time hatred is just so invisible that it hides deep within our heart, without us acknowledging it as hatred. We don’t think it as hatred, or we tend to us a softer word to it, ‘dissatisfaction’. Too much dissatisfaction over people and over life, makes us people of grudge. There’s just too much hidden anger, hidden dissatisfaction and hidden hatred in our hearts. It’s time to learn the word Forgiveness.

We might think we will never kill a friend because of dissatisfaction; only a psychopath would do that, that might be true, but think!!! There’s thousands more of negative and bad things we might do out of dissatisfaction. From the very small bad things up to things that we will never thought of doing it. Sabotage is the least I could think frequently occurred. Talking bad things about people behind them is the commonest thing we did.

See, the hatred and dissatisfaction always lead to bad behavior. The cure is Forgiveness. A word that very simple and easy to say, but very hard to comprehend and to apply.

In his interview with Lisa Ling, Bart told her that he regretted killing his family. He said it’s easy to forgive others, but you can never forgive yourself. Then, Oprah questioned his sincerity because if he was able to forgive his mother and family, he would not kill them. Oprah might be true indeed.

Forgiveness does not only come out from the mouth. When people ask forgiveness from us, we usually said “ It’s ok..no hurt feeling” or “ Takde halnyer lah”. Is it true the heart is sync to the words the coming out from the mouth. It’s your heart who forgives. Not your tongue.

ForGIVEness. It has the word GIVE. It’s for us to GIVE UP the anger, dissatisfaction and hatred. Then, it is for us to GIVE OUT Love, Hope and Peace.

Learn to Forgive. Learn to Forget.