When A Morsel Of Food Falls

Jaabir Ibn ‘Abdullah (ra - may Allah be pleased with him) reported that the Messenger of Allah (saw - may the peace & blessings of Allah be upon him) said,

“If a morsel belonging to one of you falls down, then let him take it, remove any dirt that is on it, and eat it - and let him not leave it for the shaitaan (devil).”

In another narration of the Hadeeth, the Prophet (saw) said,

“Verily, the shaitaan is present with (each) one of you in all of his affairs; he (shaitaan) is even present with him when he is eating. So if a morsel falls from one of you, then let him remove any dirt that is on it and then eat it, and let him not leave it for the shaitaan. And when he (i.e., one of you) finishes (eating), then let him lick his fingers, for he does not know in which part of his food there is blessings (Barakah.) “ 1

Let us point out some of the lessons we can learn from this Hadeeth. First, the shaitaan is ever present with every human being, looking not only for opportunities to inflict harm upon a person, but also for a chance to share with him his food and drink. Second, we should remove any dirt or foreign object that attaches itself to a morsel of food that falls down. Then we should eat it, realizing that we are preventing the shaitaan from eating it. Shaitaan is our enemy, and as such, we should not only protect ourselves from him, but we should also make sure that he does not achieve any benefit through us. Third, the blessings of a meal might be in the portion that falls down on the ground, so we should pick it up and eat it, and not lose out on the chance of eating the particular part of a meal that has blessings in it. Fourth, we must believe, as the Hadeeth informs us, that the shaitaan is always present with us; we cannot and must not, therefore, follow the way those who use their defective minds to reason and interpret, until they end up claiming that it is not possible for shaitaan to be with us at all times. Fifth, we must avoid wasting food as there are many people in the world today who do not have any food to eat, let alone to waste any food that they have.

1) Related by Muslim (2033) and Ahmad (14218)