Breaking the Lute & Spilling the Wine

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ 

Imam Abu ‘Abd ar-Rahman ‘Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak (r.a.) was asked about the beginning of his quest for knowledge.  He said, “I was a young man who drank wine, loved wealth and rejoiced in those foul things.  I invited some brothers of mine to a garden when the apples and other fruits were ripe, and we ate and drank until we were overcome by drunkenness and slept.  I woke up at the end of the period before dawn.  I took up the lute which I played and composed: 

“Is it not time that you had mercy on us,

And defied the critics and censors?” 

Then, I could not make it rhyme as I wished.  When I repeated it to it, the lute spoke to me as a man speaks: 

سُوۡرَةُ الحَدید

۞ أَلَمۡ يَأۡنِ لِلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوٓاْ أَن تَخۡشَعَ قُلُوبُہُمۡ لِذِڪۡرِ ٱللَّهِ ... (١٦) 

Has not the time arrived for the believers that their hearts, in all humility, should engage in the remembrance of Allah ... (Surah al-Hadid:16) 

I said, ‘Yes, Lord.’  I broke the lute and spilled out the wine, and repentance came by Allah’s (s.w.t.) Favour with its realities, and I turned to knowledge and worship.”