wednesdays are for beautiful beginnings

bismillah, on the weekly anniversary of the creation of light

Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem.

In the name of Allah, the All-Merciful, the Very Merciful.

the “welcome” sign shot from the brooklyn bridge at sunset last summer (@jf.nila)

Wednesdays might have a reputation for being the exhausting middle day of a work week- but to me, they’re really special. For the past ~10 years or so, I’ve been practicing the idea that Wednesdays are meant for beautiful beginnings.

For context, I studied at a traditional Sunni - Hanafi madrasa and that’s where I learned the idea. Every single semester our teachers would try their best to do two things:

1. Start the book we’re studying on Wednesdays,

2. Complete the book on Friday (the holiest day of the week).

The whole idea comes from this hadith where

Abu Hurairah (May Allah be pleased with him) said:

The Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) took hold of my hand and said, "Allah, the Exalted and Glorious, created the earth on Saturday, the mountains on Sunday, the trees on Monday, the things entailing labour on Tuesday, light on Wednesday, He spread out animals of all kinds on Thursday, and created Adam in the afternoon on Friday, and it was the last hour of Friday between the afternoon and the night."

[Muslim].

And so this, coupled with the hadith about an hour on Wednesdays when duas (prayers, supplications) are accepted are why many scholars interpreted this as an opportunity to reap blessings on new ambitions, projects or plans. Of course, they acknowledge this isn’t a concrete practice in Islam to make a big deal out of (it’s not like you’re doing any wrong if you begin a project on a different day, nor is this entire practice a sunnah or have any extra special reward that is recognized in Quran or Hadith), but it is a beautiful metaphor that’s been carried over for many years and become some what of a poetic tradition.

My hope is that just like Allah created light, something so beneficial and beautiful on a Wednesday (many many MANY weeks ago lol), I pray that on this day, this random Wednesday- September 6, 2023, Allah puts blessing into this blog- my new project- and gives it the blessing to flourish and be as beneficial and beautiful as something like the creation of light. I hope it serves as a beacon to my life and maybe even to others as well in sha Allah.

To anyone starting anything today on this beautiful Wednesday, or any Wednesday, (shoutout to my sister who’s starting her yoga certification today in sha Allah!) I hope you can reflect on this beautiful metaphor and take Wednesday as an opportunity to pray for a lot of blessings and hope that it’ll be a beautiful beginning to a very successful ambition. May it be as close to successful as the creation of light as possible in sha Allah khair!

So here we are, on the weekly anniversary of the creation of light, and I bring to you a humble little creation of my own by Allah’s blessing: my new substack blog.

Welcome to “tears fall from jannah”, a place for my random ramblings, silly little musings, observations and public diary entries. As of now there’s no set niche audience that this blog is going to serve, aside from maybe really just curious (or respectfully nosy) minds, email hoarders, or anyone that just wants to read through my thought transcripts LOL, but I do hope anyone that stops by has a good experience.

In sha Allah. <3