It claimed that some great scholar had a dream. While the letter lacked the oomph! of Dr. King’s “I have a dream”, it did contain certain magic phrases that made even the boldest, and most sensible, amongst us think twice about refuting its contents. These were: the Blessed city of Makkah, Prophet Muhammad (s) and the Curse of Allah (SWT).

It is no joke to be exposed to these three extremely evocative expressions in one address. Especially when the dream was beheld in the city; the visitor in this pseudo-death trance was the holy personality mentioned and the dire consequences of ignoring to pass on the contents of the parchment at hand, the Divine affliction.

By now you must have guessed that I am referring to the infamous chain letter of the time. I was recently able to view (with great astonishment at its survival skills) the same letter in almost identical state, kindly passed on to me via email. Apart from the varied font-sizes, the extra exclamation marks and the extremely long list of (gullible) people through whose inboxes it had traversed, it was an exact rendition of the thumb-marked, dog-eared missive that I had peered at over the shoulders of fellow scholars-in-training.

It then occurred to me that many of us tend to delete all lengthy forwards as soon as we see the dreaded ‘Fw:’ in the subject heading. And we all know (don’t we?) to immediately banish to the Junk folder, emails that promise you: a) the love of your life by 4.p.m. tomorrow; b) x cents (usually to save a baby) for every time you forward the mail - from Microsoft no less; c) a six figure lottery winning or d) any other such almost-plausible promises.

However, when it comes to religion, no matter how twisted the content, the inner critic is admonished to walk cautiously around the issue. Delete the mail? But it mentions (gasp!) The Prophet!! What if I get (gasp! gasp!) Cursed? Maybe I’ll just pick a few names from my Address Book and send it anyway. What’s one more mail in cyberspace? (Sometimes, quite a lot! Especially for those of us still struggling with dial-up connections.)

But the point isn’t convenience (or inconvenience), neither is it precautionary measures. It’s a matter of sense. And faith.

If you seriously believe that when you say in Dua-e-Mashlul or Sura-e-Rahman that Allah (S.W.T.) is ‘everyday upon some new labour’, it means He decided one of the ways to manifest His glory was through the Phenomenon of the Chain-mail then, and I say this with the best intentions, you need to re-work your perspective of Tawhid. Soon. Immediately, if possible.

A god who monitors cyberspace to see which of his net-minions passes on a specific mail is not a god worth worshipping. Allah (SWT)’s Will cannot be not confined to the Web and He manifests it with good reason only. Sending on a chain-mail may indicate a mindless servitude that would invoke His Wrath in the long run, rather than fend it off!

We have a glorious Lord. If we take as much care in obeying Him as we do to forwarding those (please, I have to say this) ridiculous mails, we may learn to write things that are worth forwarding.

If you’re still hearing a little voice whispering: “But what if…?” in your head, here’s my final proof: despite the fact that I have deleted every one of these mails with great, almost malicious glee, I still have the honour of being a Muslim, the blessing of being a Shia, a wonderful family, fantastic friends, all my limbs and the general bounties that God has promised even to ungrateful creatures like myself.

If I have a tendency to bump into things or an uncanny ability to put my foot in my mouth - these are traits I share with many worldwide. Thus, I am before you a tangible, living example of the Failed Chain-mail Curse.

One of millions, probably.

By Fatima Ali Jaffer