MULTIMEDIA-ENGLISH
Open your eyes (Maher Zain)
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4:20
Video page URL
https://multimedia-english.com/videos/music/open-your-eyes-maher-zain-3640
Description

Muslim Swedish R&B singer, Maher Zain, was born in Lebanon in 1981, but his family moved to Sweden when he was 8 years old. He sings mainly in English. This song is from his first album "Thank You Allah".


Enjoy the sweet melody and also the beautiful relaxing video packed with wonderful images of a wonderful planet we call our home.


 

Transcript

Look around yourself
Can’t you see this wonder
Spread in front of you
The clouds floating by
The skies are clear and blue
Planets in the orbits
The moon and the sun
Such perfect harmony

Let’s start questioning ourselves
Isn’t this proof enough for us

Or are we so blind
To push it all aside
No

We just have to
Open our eyes, our hearts, and minds
If we just look bright to see the signs
We can’t keep hiding from the truth
And let it take us by surprise
Take us in the best way
(Allah..)
Guide us every single day
(Allah..)
Keep us close to You
Until the end of time

Look inside yourself
Such a perfect order
Hiding in yourselves
Running in your veins
What about anger, love and pain
And all the things you’re feeling
Can you touch them with your hand?
So are they really there?

Let's start questioning ourselves
Isn’t this proof enough for us?
Or are we so blind
To push it all aside?
No

We just have to
Open our eyes, our hearts, and minds
If we just look bright to see the signs
We can’t keep hiding from the truth
And let it take us by surprise
Take us in the best way
(Allah..)
Guide us every single day
(Allah..)
Keep us close to You
Until the end of time

When a baby’s born
So helpless and weak
And you’re watching him growing
So why deny
What's in front of your eyes
The biggest miracle of life

We just have to
Open our eyes, our hearts, and minds
If we just look quiet we’ll see the signs
We can’t keep hiding from the truth
And let it take us by surprise
Take us in the best way
(Allah..)
Guide us every single day
(Allah..)
Keep us close to You
Until the end of time

Open your eyes, your heart and mind
If you just look bright to see the signs
We can’t keep hiding from the truth
And let it take us by surprise
Take us in the best way
(Allah..)
Guide us every single day
(Allah..)
Keep us close to You
Until the end of time

Allah..
You created everything
We belong to You
Ya Rabi! we raise our hands
Forever we thank You
Alhamdulillah

Explanations

THIS WONDER= A wonder is a wonderful thing, something extraordinary and amazing.

SPREAD= Spread-spread-spread (irregular verb). If something spreads (or is spread) in front of you, it is exhibited, displayed, or visible in broad or full extent.

FLOATING BY= Moving on air towards you, and then away from you. If something is passing by, they move while you're still, or they move faster than you, so they approach you and then, as they keep moving, they move away.

THE SKIES= The usual word is "the sky", but we can also use it in the plural to make it sound more poetical or to give a more metaphysical meaning to it.

CLEAR= Without anything. A clear sky is a sky without clouds. Yea, he said the clouds were floating by, but he can contradict himself if he wants, it's his song.

ORBITS= The figurative ring which marks the circular pathway a planet follows in space around the sun.

QUESTIONING OURSELVES= Wondering; thinking that there is a mystery there.

ENOUGH= /ɪnʌf/ Sufficient; adequate.
We use it before nouns and after adjectives:
- This box is not big enough, I need a bigger one.
- I have enough money to buy it.

But in this sentence we see "isn't this proof enough for us", and proof is a noun, so? Well, the units of this sentence are not like this:
Isn't this / proof enough / for us? (as for example: isn't this big enough for you?)
The units go:
Isn't / this proof / enough for us? (as for example: is this money / enough to buy a house/ or I need more?)

BLIND= A blind person is a person who can't see. We also use blind (like here) in a metaphorical way to talk about someone who can't understand, who can't see the truth when it's in front of him.

PUSH IT ALL ASIDE= Push it away from you (towards one side). This sentence is also metaphorical. If you push the evidence aside, you ignore it and don't use it in your reasoning, so you'll probably come to the wrong conclusion.

BRIGHT= Happy; intelligent; full of light.
Here, "bright" (intelligent) is an adjective used as an adverb, so the sentence says "if you look at the signs in an intelligent way...". This is very common in English, especially colloquially, to do this:
- I feel good (= well)
- Don't drive so slow (= slowly)

THE SIGNS= Things that suggests the presence or existence of a fact, condition, or quality. In this case, "the signs" refers to all the beautiful and marvellous things in creation, which suggest the existence of a Creator, God.

TAKE US BY SURPRISE= Surprise us, take us unawares, come suddenly when you don't expect it.

ALLAH= (Arabic) God. (this word is pronounced /ælə/or /ælɑ:/ when used in English, but here it is pronounced as in Arabic, so they say lɑ:/.
THE PROBLEM WITH ALLAH: This word is simply the Arabic word which means "God", but in English (and most other languages) we often use it to refer to God in Islam, so when a Muslim person talks of God, his word for God is not translated, and remains as "Allah" (e.g. "I believe in Allah"), that's why many non-Muslim people think Allah is the name for the Muslim god, as if it was a different god from the Christian/Jewish God. That never happens with other languages, nobody says that French people believe in Dieu, Romanians believe in Dumnezeu, or Jews believe in Adonai, as if they were all worshipping different gods. But we do often say that Muslim people believe in Allah, which is confusing, because Allah is simply the Arabic word for God, not a different god, so saying that Muslims believe in Allah sounds like when we say that the Aztecs believed in Quetzalcoatle. That's why we should simply say that Muslims believe in God. To be quite frank, this misunderstanding has been reinforced ,and probably generated, by Muslims themselves, since they usually use the Arabic word "Allah" even when speaking or writing in a different language. They do so because they believe Arabic is a sacred language, so it feels the right thing to do, using the sacred word when referring to God (for many Muslims, "Allah" feels like a sacred word, while "God" or "Dios", etc. feel like normal words, not appropriate when referring to the Most Holy)

HELPLESS= Without help; unable to protect himself.
The suffix "-less" means "without" (often metaphorically)
heartless= (without a heart) with no feelings
mindless= (without a mind) foolish, without a rational purpose
restless= (without rest) agitated, unable to relax
legless= (without legs) very drunk

DENY= Contradict; refuse to believe.

BELONG TO= If A belongs to B, A is part of B or B possesses A:
- This car is not mine, it belongs to Joseph (it's Joseph's)
- This wheel belongs to that toy car (it is part of that car)

YA RABI= (Arabic) Oh God!

ALHAMDULILLAH= (Arabic) Hallelujah; Praise to God.

Meaning

What this song says is that if we look around us at all the things that exist, we'll find many things so beautiful, so perfect and so amazing that it is impossible not to believe in a Creator who has designed all that: God.

Most people who believe in God also believe in evolution and the Big Bang, but believers think God designed the laws of physics, the laws of maths, the laws of biology, evolution, etc. to create this universe, this life, and us, the ultimate aim of all Creation. So you can look at a sunset, a flower, a forest, a mountain or a baby, and while you know that all that is the result of an evolutionary process under the laws of physics/biology, etc. you can at the same time marvel at how God managed to create that beauty and perfection through the laws that He designed.

So this song is valid for everyone who believes in God, it is not necessary to believe in a God creating everything in an instant act of creation, like a magician doing a magic trick. We know that a sunset is the result of the light coming from the sun passing through a much thicker layer of air than when we see it high up in the sky, and that makes the red light in the spectre get to us while other frequencies of light are trapped in the air, and the star we call "sun" looks bigger than usual because the greater thickness of the air has the same effect as a magnifying glass and... Yea, right, all that is true, but still, all those things create in us a sense of beauty which can only come from a thrilled soul which recognises there the presence of its creator. Beauty speaks right to our soul and it can't be contained in any equation describing this physical world. Beauty exists outside the boundaries of the physics, outside the scope of science, outside this material realm. Beauty comes straight from God, so it is a sign to God. Look at the beauty, and you'll find yourself looking straight in the eyes of God.