A Thousand Years Before Hobbes: The 7th-century divine warning Nigeria is ignoring in 2025, by Abdullahi Adam Usman
Over a thousand years before Thomas Hobbes penned his prominent masterpiece, ‘Leviathan’ (1651 AD), which outlines the conditions for safety and stability between a people and their sovereign authority, the Almighty had already set forth those very conditions in Sūrat Quraysh (Qur’an 106) to the people of Mecca.
This was not because the Almighty must offer something in return to be obeyed. Rather, by reminding the Quraysh of His overwhelming favours, He removed any excuse they might have for disobedience. He compelled them to worship the Lord of this House (the Kaʿbah)—the One who had granted them protection, secured their trade routes, fed them against hunger, and made them safe from fear.
The Almighty established economy, food security, and protection from both internal and external threats as the foundational pillars of legitimate sovereignty. Throughout civilisations and across modern history, failure in any one of these three domains has proved a delegitimising force. No government or society has ever survived or sustained a collapse in each individually, let alone all three simultaneously.
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The brilliance of the verse lies in the simple conjunction “wa” (and). It does not present these blessings as optional or separable choices; it presents them as a single, compound obligation. They cannot be isolated from one another: Hunger breeds poverty, and poverty breeds hunger. You cannot restore security without addressing poverty. Also, you cannot eradicate poverty in a war zone. Thus, they form the unbreakable base of the pyramid of human needs.
Therefore, for any government to demand patriotism or earn the genuine trust of its citizens, it must first demonstrate an unwavering commitment to removing these twin scourges. This is not merely one school of thought among many that a person may choose to accept or reject. It is a natural, universal societal ordinance written into the very nature of human beings and confirmed by the unrelenting verdict of history.
Abdullahi Adam Usman is a student of International Studies at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. abdallahnangere@gmail.com.
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