“Alone protects me.”
Sherlock Holmes · BBC Sherlock, Series 2, Episode 1: A Scandal in Belgravia, 2012
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O my son, do not associate anything with God. Associating others with Him is a tremendous wrong.
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About this quote
Meaning
This verse records the first and most fundamental piece of advice that Luqman gives his son: to worship God alone and to assign no partners or equals to Him. The warning against associating others with God, known in Islamic theology as shirk, is described here not simply as forbidden but as a tremendous wrong, language that signals the gravity of the matter. The framing as a father's counsel to a child gives the instruction an intimate, personal quality, making a point of theology feel like an act of love as much as a statement of belief.
Context
This verse is part of Surah Luqman, the thirty-first chapter of the Quran. The chapter takes its name from Luqman, a figure described in the Quran as a man granted wisdom by God. Several consecutive verses in this chapter present Luqman's advice to his son, covering core principles of faith and conduct. Islamic scholarly tradition regards Luqman as a wise and righteous man, though his precise historical identity has been a matter of discussion among commentators across the centuries. The passage is widely cited in discussions of parenting, moral education, and the foundations of Islamic belief.
About the author
Luqman is the figure to whom this wisdom is attributed within the Quranic text. He is identified as someone upon whom God bestowed wisdom, and his counsel to his son forms one of the Quran's most studied passages on ethics and upbringing. Beyond what the Quran itself states, detailed biographical information about Luqman is not definitively established, and scholars across Islamic history have offered varying accounts of who he was.
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“I am the most unpleasant, rude, ignorant, and all-round obnoxious arsehole that anyone could possibly have the misfortune to meet. I am dismissive of the virtuous, unaware of the beautiful, and uncomprehending in the face of the happy. So if I didn't understand I was being asked to be best man, it is because I never expected to be anybody's best friend.”
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