In the record of human tyranny, the despot does not stand alone; for every Pharaoh there is a shadow, and for every tyrant a mind that adorns falsehood for him and worships it in the form of a project, power, and building. Among the most present models in the Quranic stories stands out the name ""Haman""
Not merely a passing minister in the Pharaoh's court, but as a solid pillar in the architecture of tyranny, and a full partner in the manufacture of illusion and defying the heavens. Haman was the second tyrant, and the executive mind that gave despotism its architectural form, its political color, and its arrogant voice.
Haman is not mentioned in the Holy Quran casually or separately, but his name is associated with Pharaoh almost everywhere, indicating deeply the nature of the role he played. He was not a mere executor, but a planner, and not a silent follower, but an active partner in building a system of oppression. He represented the deep state’s arm, its technical mind, and its executive treasury, possessing the power of decision in urbanization and construction, a power no less dangerous than the power of the sword, for it bestows upon tyranny a material façade that deludes people with immortality.
Here the Quranic image revealing the essence of this criminal alliance is clear, when the divine text decisively states the scene:
''Indeed, Pharaoh exalted in the land and made its people sects, weakening a group among them, slaughtering their sons and sparing their women. Indeed, he was among the corruptors''
This exaltation was not the rise of one person, but a system’s rise, and it was not an individual act, but a complete project in which Haman took part in its crafting, planning, and embellishing, until corruption became policy, and murder a tool of governance, and weakening a steadfast method.
When Pharaoh faced the call of Moses, peace be upon him, he did not suffice with denial and falsehood but resorted to a show of cognitive and constructional power, and here Haman came to the forefront. The construction of the tower was not merely a king's whim, but a political and intellectual project carrying the symbolism of challenge, a tower with which arrogance climbs to the heavens, thinking that burnt bricks can penetrate the unknown. In that scene, Haman’s danger is manifest; he transformed disbelief into engineering, delusion into a plan, and arrogance into towering architecture.
The Quran in this place reveals a deep truth, that knowledge when detached from values, transforms from a blessing to a tool of tyranny. Haman was a scholar in construction techniques, an expert in management and execution, but he employed all of that in a losing battle against the truth. He did not use his knowledge to populate the earth with justice, but to construct illusions of power, and did not turn his abilities into a bridge for salvation, but a ladder to the abyss. Herein lies the tragedy of the mind when it puts itself at the service of despotism.
Haman's role did not stop at stone and mud, but extended to the manufacture of psychological illusion, where he allied with magicians and masters of deception, to enshrine a false dignity around Pharaoh's authority and convince people that tyranny is a fate that cannot be repelled. He understood that control is not completed by physical power alone, but also requires the subjugation of minds before bodies, being a partner in misleading consciousness, falsifying the truth, and dressing falsehood with the guise of absolute power.
The character of Haman presents a dangerous model repeated in every era, the model of the intelligent person who betrayed his intelligence, the scholar who sold his knowledge, and the engineer who built a tomb for his values with his own hands. He was not ignorant of the reality of what he was doing, but he chose absolute allegiance to the tyrant, becoming part of the machine of injustice, unable to detach from it, nor possessing the courage to stand against it. Thus, the person transforms from a decision-maker to a tool, from a free mind to a follower robbed of will.
When the reckoning came, neither the towers, nor the intercession of knowledge, nor the engineering of arrogance, availed. Pharaoh drowned, and Haman fell, and with them fell the myth of power they thought was invincible. The entire project shattered before a wave from the sea, for falsehood, however cohesive it appears, carries within it the seed of its demise. Haman did not fall because he was weak, but because he stood on the wrong side of history and faith.
The story of Haman is not a tale of the past, but a present mirror, reminding us that tyranny does not live by the sword alone, but by the minds that adorn it, by the experiences that justify it, and by the pens that polish it. And how in every era there is a new Haman, who builds the structures of injustice in the name of progress, justifies oppression in the name of benefit, and thinks that knowledge protects him from the laws of God.
Yet the conclusion remains unchanged. Falsehood disappears however high its buildings, and truth remains however hard it is besieged. The structures fall, and the truthful word remains, tyranny collapses, and the laws of justice remain evident. Glorified be He who seized the tyrants with a mighty capture, and glorified be He who made the lesson not in the height of the building, but in the truthfulness of the stance, not in the power of tyrants, but in the survival of the truth, even if falsehood veers momentarily, its end is to vanish.!!
By: Professor Ahmed Saad Al-Hajjaj
