Living in London is not
the easiest thing to do. Life in London whizzes pass at a breath-taking
pace, especially if you are working somewhere in the central zones and
have to travel daily via the train or tube network, you realise how fast
life in London is.
I used to travel daily via Paddington and Circle Line down to South Kensington, and then after our office move, to Victoria. Nearly spent 13 months doing so, about 1-1.5 hours of daily commute from my house. Having spent my childhood and youth in a very quiet town of Pakistan, this daily commute was an extraordinary personal experience for me. I grew up normally walking or cycling to my school and college early in the mornings in a quiet and serene backdrop of high mountains and chilly breeze. At most the noise was of occasional car horns or me humming to myself, but here in London there were hundreds and hundreds of people going around with me at each station. All sorts of different characters, men in expensive sleek suits, women with loads of bags, tourists running around with maps and God know who else. Each one just walking around, waiting, reading or listening to music as such in a state of trans or something.
There were few regular commuters who struck up 'sort of friendships' with other regular commuters on their routes, whenever they saw each other they passed each other the iconic 'London Smile' which is normally nothing else than flexion of face muscles and even if a conversation took place up after months of smiling at each other, it always sounded highly 'manufactured' and focused around the journey, weather and front page news of the famous 'Metro'.
I was really blessed to have fabulous colleagues at my work, although I have never been the best person to spark conversations and jokes when I am at work, but the happy presence of many of my colleagues just kept me going through the ordeal of journey into work. The end was always the brightest part of my day when I can just forget about the past hour for the next 7-8 hours and enjoy the work and people around me. Gradually I got used to it and often found myself passing those empty smiles and chatting about the weather with people travelling with me, but I never for one day 'enjoyed' that 2 hours of time when I was moving around London with zillion of human souls around me.
And that is what just strikes me the most about the personality of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Isn't this thing plain extraordinary that there are nearly 1.6 Billion peopling in this world who loves him more than anyone else on this planet? Regardless of the religious beliefs or what fanatics have turned his teachings into, on simple human level isn't this remarkable that even after 1400 years of his death, many humans weep in love at a mere mention of his name?
As I said during my journeys I must have seen hundreds thousands of faces, and frankly some very beautiful ones, but none came close to be loved. Vice versa numbers must have seen me every day, but why is that a single Human being who died 1400 years ago, who wasn't ever captured on a picture frame neither was his voice recorded on a mp3 is still loved by nearly quarter of the whole population of humans on this land?
Hours of deliberation has leaded me to believe in one and only one thing. It was the beauty of that man, his personality, his character, his humbleness, his kindness and his relentless love for each and everyone around him that converted his fiercest foes into his strongest friends. We humans are incomplete without love, we want to be loved, and oddly enough readily give away everything for someone who treats us with love, kindness and care.
I am pretty dead certain that even only if I would have loudly shouted 'Good Morning' to everyone on every train/tube I took through those 13 months, today there would be people who would silently look forward to seeing me each morning. There will be people who will spark up with smiles by just watching me on the station (although few will be sniggering behind my back) but people start 'loving' only those who show love for others. This is natural human phenomenon.
That is why I believe that the beautiful Prophet (peace be upon him) loved each and every one of us more than anyone else as humans. Not muslims, but as humans because only the purest love for human kind has the strength in it to last decades and centuries to come. Only his love for humans regardless of race, culture, social status, nationality or gender converted him from a simple human being like me and you to the nucleus of a whole belief that draws millions of people just to visit the place where he once lived.
You may ask me why I don't I feel the same love from him? The answer is simple you don’t' find something if you don't look for it. Read his words, read any book about him, see a documentary about him, search Google about his life, search how he lived as a loving husband, as a caring father, as a closes friend, as a teacher to his students, as an economist for his society, as a judge for different cases and above all as a human amongst other humans. And then you will realise the beauty, the care, the kindness and above all the love he had for everyone around him and the millions who will follow him.
I used to travel daily via Paddington and Circle Line down to South Kensington, and then after our office move, to Victoria. Nearly spent 13 months doing so, about 1-1.5 hours of daily commute from my house. Having spent my childhood and youth in a very quiet town of Pakistan, this daily commute was an extraordinary personal experience for me. I grew up normally walking or cycling to my school and college early in the mornings in a quiet and serene backdrop of high mountains and chilly breeze. At most the noise was of occasional car horns or me humming to myself, but here in London there were hundreds and hundreds of people going around with me at each station. All sorts of different characters, men in expensive sleek suits, women with loads of bags, tourists running around with maps and God know who else. Each one just walking around, waiting, reading or listening to music as such in a state of trans or something.
There were few regular commuters who struck up 'sort of friendships' with other regular commuters on their routes, whenever they saw each other they passed each other the iconic 'London Smile' which is normally nothing else than flexion of face muscles and even if a conversation took place up after months of smiling at each other, it always sounded highly 'manufactured' and focused around the journey, weather and front page news of the famous 'Metro'.
I was really blessed to have fabulous colleagues at my work, although I have never been the best person to spark conversations and jokes when I am at work, but the happy presence of many of my colleagues just kept me going through the ordeal of journey into work. The end was always the brightest part of my day when I can just forget about the past hour for the next 7-8 hours and enjoy the work and people around me. Gradually I got used to it and often found myself passing those empty smiles and chatting about the weather with people travelling with me, but I never for one day 'enjoyed' that 2 hours of time when I was moving around London with zillion of human souls around me.
And that is what just strikes me the most about the personality of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Isn't this thing plain extraordinary that there are nearly 1.6 Billion peopling in this world who loves him more than anyone else on this planet? Regardless of the religious beliefs or what fanatics have turned his teachings into, on simple human level isn't this remarkable that even after 1400 years of his death, many humans weep in love at a mere mention of his name?
As I said during my journeys I must have seen hundreds thousands of faces, and frankly some very beautiful ones, but none came close to be loved. Vice versa numbers must have seen me every day, but why is that a single Human being who died 1400 years ago, who wasn't ever captured on a picture frame neither was his voice recorded on a mp3 is still loved by nearly quarter of the whole population of humans on this land?
Hours of deliberation has leaded me to believe in one and only one thing. It was the beauty of that man, his personality, his character, his humbleness, his kindness and his relentless love for each and everyone around him that converted his fiercest foes into his strongest friends. We humans are incomplete without love, we want to be loved, and oddly enough readily give away everything for someone who treats us with love, kindness and care.
I am pretty dead certain that even only if I would have loudly shouted 'Good Morning' to everyone on every train/tube I took through those 13 months, today there would be people who would silently look forward to seeing me each morning. There will be people who will spark up with smiles by just watching me on the station (although few will be sniggering behind my back) but people start 'loving' only those who show love for others. This is natural human phenomenon.
That is why I believe that the beautiful Prophet (peace be upon him) loved each and every one of us more than anyone else as humans. Not muslims, but as humans because only the purest love for human kind has the strength in it to last decades and centuries to come. Only his love for humans regardless of race, culture, social status, nationality or gender converted him from a simple human being like me and you to the nucleus of a whole belief that draws millions of people just to visit the place where he once lived.
You may ask me why I don't I feel the same love from him? The answer is simple you don’t' find something if you don't look for it. Read his words, read any book about him, see a documentary about him, search Google about his life, search how he lived as a loving husband, as a caring father, as a closes friend, as a teacher to his students, as an economist for his society, as a judge for different cases and above all as a human amongst other humans. And then you will realise the beauty, the care, the kindness and above all the love he had for everyone around him and the millions who will follow him.
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