Luqman’s Wisdom

A wise man gives his son the most important lessons of life—and they fit in just a few simple sentences.

There once lived a man named Luqman who was not a king, not a prophet, not a warrior. He was a simple man—some say a carpenter, others say a shepherd—but he was known for wisdom so deep and practical that people travelled far to sit in his company.

His greatest student was his own son.

One day, Luqman sat with the boy as the sun set over the desert, and he began to share what he knew.

“My son,” he said, “never associate partners with God. This is the greatest injustice a person can commit—against truth itself.”

The boy listened.

“My son, be good to your mother and your father—they carried you before you could walk and fed you before you could ask. Their rights over you are great.”

The boy nodded.

“My son, even if a thing is as small as a mustard seed, hidden inside a rock or buried in the deepest earth or highest sky, God knows it. Nothing is too small for truth to find.”

The boy was quiet. Then he asked: “But how should I act with people, Father? With strangers, with friends, with those who are difficult?”

Luqman thought. “Do not turn your face away from people in scorn. Do not walk about the earth in arrogance—God does not love the proud. Speak at a moderate pace. Lower your voice—the harshest of all sounds is the braying of a donkey.”

The boy laughed—then remembered the lesson inside the joke.

“And my son—when something troubles you, pray first and then do the work. Don’t pray instead of the work. Pray and then work.”

The boy grew up and had children of his own. He passed these lessons on exactly as he had received them. They are still being passed on today.

The wisest thing Luqman gave his son was not a tool or a trade—it was a way of being in the world.