Gratitude | The Review of Religions
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Jamal Sononam Jnr. Lambon, Ghana
The Memory Card
A few weeks ago, I lost something the size of a fingernail, and for several days, I grieved as though I had lost ten years of my life. In a way, I had.
The object in question was a micro SD memory card I had relied on for almost a decade, never backed up, holding photographs, audios, books, videos, and fragments of writing that existed nowhere else. Before taking my phone in for repair, I removed the card and tucked it into my shirt pocket. At home, distracted, I hung the shirt up without a thought for what it still held. When I went rigorously looking for it a day after, it was not in any pocket I could find. For days, I reached for memories that were no longer there.
The sadness that followed was far deeper than I expected from losing a piece of plastic. It was not disappointment. It was grief, the kind that sits in the chest rather than the head, as though a genuine part of me had gone missing along with it. I found myself replaying moments I could no longer see, replaying moments I could no longer relive, and mourning a version of my own past that I suddenly had no proof of. The days that followed did not feel like my own.
Quietly, I prayed to find this memory card and made myself a promise: should the card ever resurface, I would be grateful to Allah, the Almighty, and back it up without delay. Never again will I then allow a decade of anything to rest on one small, unguarded object.
A few days later, on what seemed like an ordinary Saturday morning, the card turned up in the laundry basket, having fallen from somewhere without my noticing. Only later would I realise that the morning had been anything but ordinary. I felt a rush of genuine relief, almost disbelief, and put it straight back into my phone.
Then, within hours, the urgency of that promise began to fade. The card was no longer a symbol of everything I had nearly lost. It was simply a card again. Noticing that shift unsettled me more than the loss itself had, because it revealed something plain and a little uncomfortable: my gratitude was never truly about the card. It was about fear, and fear has a short memory once the danger has passed.
That discovery sent me looking through scripture, out of embarrassment, to see whether this flaw was mine alone. I then realised, it was not.
What The World’s Religions Say about Gratitude
This forgetfulness can be pictured vividly in the Gospel account of the ten lepers. Jesus heals all ten, yet only one turns back to give thanks: “Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” (Luke 17:18) [1] The other nine receive exactly what they had begged for and simply walk on, healed but seemingly unmoved. Paul’s later instruction to the church at Thessalonica reads almost like a correction to that very scene: “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus”. (1 Thessalonians 5:18) [2]
Jewish tradition takes a different route entirely, building gratitude into the architecture of the day itself rather than waiting for loss to summon it. The first words a religious Jew is taught to say, before even rising from bed, are those of the Modeh Ani prayer — “I give thanks” — offered before the day has given any reason to. [3] The Torah, in turn, attaches thanks to the moment of fullness rather than hunger: “You shall eat and be satisfied, and bless the LORD your God for the good land He has given you”. (Deuteronomy 8:10) [4]
In Hinduism, a similar warning runs through the Bhagavad Gita, where Krishna likens the forgetting of God’s gifts to a child who stops thanking a parent simply because the parent’s care has become familiar: “We have received so many priceless gifts from the Lord… we must at least feel deeply indebted for all that he has given to us. This is the sentiment of gratitude. The reverse of this is the sentiment of ungratefulness”. (Bhagavad Gita, Ch. 18: V.62, commentary) [5]
Buddhist teaching pushes the same point further still, treating genuine gratitude as something close to rare. The Buddha is recorded as placing it beside one of the highest acts imaginable: “These two people are hard to find in the world. Which two? The one who is first to do a kindness, and the one who is grateful and thankful for a kindness done”. (Anguttara Nikaya 2.118, Dullabha Sutta) [6]
The Holy Qur’an names the same pattern with striking precision, describing how affliction draws out a person’s prayer only for relief to erase it just as quickly: “And when trouble befalls a man, he calls on Us, lying on his side, or sitting, or standing; but when We have removed his trouble from him, he goes his way as though he had never called on Us for the removal of the trouble that befell him.” (Surah Yunus, 10:13) [7] Gratitude, within the Qur’anic framework, is bound directly to constant remembrance rather than held back as its reward: “Therefore remember Me, and I will remember you; and be thankful to Me and do not be ungrateful to Me.” (Surah al-Baqarah, 2:153) [8] The Holy Prophet Muhammad (sa) in this same regard said: “How wonderful is the affair of the believer, for his affairs are all good, and this applies to no one but the believer. If something good happens to him, he is thankful for it, and that is good for him. If something bad befalls him, he bears it with patience, and that is good for him”. [9]
An Echo from Hadeeqatul Mahdi
This same idea was echoed a few days ago. On the second day of Jalsa Salana UK 2026, the 25th of July, the very day I found that card on the laundry room floor, Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, Khalifatul Masih V (aba), addressed the ladies of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community and recalled something the Promised Messiah (aba) had said about prayer and gratitude.
Huzoor (aba) highlighted that most people turn to Allah only once trouble arrives. He quizzed, “Had they been following Him before that moment?” If the answer is no, one cannot expect God to answer demands that were never preceded by devotion. Before rushing to claim what is owed to us, Huzoor (aba) said, we must first remember what is owed to God. [10]
It was a coincidence of timing that struck me to the core once I noticed it
Conclusion
None of this was really about a memory card. It reveals a human tendency that many faith traditions have warned about: gratitude often awakens only when something is at risk, while fear fades quickly once the danger has passed.
There is a second, quieter lesson. The card had remained safely in place for almost ten years, yet it became precious only when I thought it was gone. It made me wonder: how many things has Allah preserved for me all this time without my ever noticing? A blessing that never leaves us often goes unrecognised. A healthy body, a sound mind, a disaster that never reached us, or a sin we were protected from are all gifts. We rarely feel grateful for them, not because they are less valuable, but because Allah’s protection has been so complete that we were never given reason to see it.
I eventually backed up the SD card, but the greater lesson was not about protecting a file. It was about learning to appreciate what is quietly held together for us every day. Perhaps gratitude begins when we stop waiting for something to disappear before we realise its value. The card returned to me, but it left behind a question I hope we can ponder over together. How many blessings are we holding today that we have not yet learned to notice?
Peace.
Endnotes
[1] Luke 17:11–19: bible.org, “The Thankful Leper”: https://bible.org/seriespage/5-jesus-heals-ten-lepers-luke-1711-19
[2] 1 Thessalonians 5:18: biblehub.com: https://biblehub.com/1_thessalonians/5-18.htm
[3] Modeh Ani and Jewish morning practice: Sefaria, “Gratitude”: https://www.sefaria.org/topics/gratitude
[4] Deuteronomy 8:10: legratitude.org, “Rediscovering Gratitude”: https://www.legratitude.org/post/rediscovering-gratitude-through-the-qur-an-bible-and-torah
[5] Bhagavad Gita, Ch.18: V.62, commentary: holy-bhagavad-gita.org: https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/18/verse/62/
[6] Anguttara Nikaya 2.118, Dullabha Sutta: dhammatalks.org: The Lessons of Gratitude | Head & Heart Together | ebook on dhammatalks.org
[7] The Holy Qur’an, Surah Yunus, Ch. 10: V.13 https://readquran.app/10:13
[8] The Holy Qur’an, Surah Al-Baqarah, Ch. 2: V.153 https://readquran.app/2:153
[9] Sahih Muslim 2999: sunnah.com: https://sunnah.com/muslim:2999
[10] Paraphrased from the Address to Lajna Imaillah (the ladies’ auxiliary of the Community) on the Second Day of Jalsa Salana UK 2026, delivered by Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, Khalifatul Masih V (aba), at Hadeeqatul Mahdi, Alton, 25 July 2026. https://www.alhakam.org/huzoor-addresses-lajna-at-jalsa-salana-uk-2026
