In my formative years as a Christian, I was taught that some of the biggest sins were having intercourse before marriage, abortion, and… Well, I really can’t remember being told that anything else was a serious sin.

Disclaimer: This may be my own fault. I was never a good student as a child. This is in no way a comment on the Christian mores nor is it a statement about the religious education I was afforded.

Sure, I was taught the Ten Commandments. But, to me at least, most of those guidelines were not really set in stone (pun intended). To me, it was as if God was making polite and meek suggestions for people who lived thousands of years ago. And if you didn’t follow God’s rules, you would run the risk of hurting God’s feelings.

And in much the same way I thought of the Ten Commandments as mild-mannered suggestions for people who lived in the stone ages; I also thought that they were randomly thrown together in no particular order.

I was wrong on all accounts.

When I came to Islam, I learned, firstly, that God wasn’t joking about the laws He set forth for humankind in those ten laws. God was, in fact, firmly telling us to stay away from this stuff, otherwise… There are clear and obvious consequences.

I also learned that we don’t hurt God when we don’t follow His rules. We in fact hurt ourselves, and that God has created everything in such a way that when we do evil we will reap evil, even if it isn’t immediate.

Furthermore, I realized that the Ten Commandments were in a very particular order with the first being the most important:

“You shall have no other gods before Me”.

But what is the First Commandment talking about?

What is Shirk?


In Islamic terms, the command to have no other god is a firm injunction on us to steer clear of shirk.

Shirk, in English, is something you do. “To shirk” is to avoid or refuse a duty or responsibility. And to me this is the root of what shirk means. What could be a bigger way “to shirk” a responsibility than “to shirk” the responsibility to put God before all others?

Shirk in Arabic means ascribing or establishing “partners” above or beside God. In this way, Islamic belief goes one step further with monotheism, and doesn’t just say to have no false god above God, but to have no God next to, near, in association with, or in the vicinity of the one true God.

There is no duty more basic, more essential than the duty to not associate or put anything above God. Allah is our originator, the One who created, continues to create, and provides for all that is in existence. All other duties, even our responsibilities to each other and the rest of creation, come from this one major responsibility to the Creator.

And what could be simpler than a responsibility to NOT do something?

Most responsibilities involve action. Taking out the trash. Raising your children. Going to work to make a living. These are all examples of responsibilities that take effort.

How can we go out of our way to not do something?

We have to take action “to shirk”. It’s a responsibility that requires nothing more than remaining in our natural state of believing in our Creator.

Tawheed


As Muslims, most of us feel pretty safe from shirk because we hold tawheed as an important principle in our lives. It is, after all, the first step to becoming a Muslim. And shirk is the one thing that scholars agree voids faith and one’s Islam. But often shirk creeps into our lives in unassuming ways.

Sometimes we attach our hearts to people and things too much; we forget that they are just a part of God’s creation. As I stated before, not giving God His rights doesn’t hurt Him, it hurts us.

Shirk Destroys in this Life


With all the misdirection in my youth, I began searching for something to fill the void in my life that should on be filled with Tawheed. I was looking for something I felt missing, something to shape my identity, to anchor my life. And I clung to different things that seemed to fit the bill.

First it was popularity.

I thought that gaining the love and admiration of others was my purpose and my ultimate goal. I filled my life with making the right friends and playing the role of the cool kid. But I found that people are fickle when it comes to affection for others. Putting people and popularity in the place that God should be made me realize people are flawed and they will fail you.

So, in the place of love and affection from all, I decided that fitness or fashion would make me feel fulfilled. I obsessed, caused damage to my body; I spent all my money, and become very insecure. Finally, I realized I would never be able to attain physical perfection. And even if I could, it would never last. Putting appearance in a position only meant for God made me realize how temporary everything in this life is.

Read Also: Filling the Void Within Me


Going from one false god to the next, I started to feel like the little bird looking for its mother in all the wrong animals. I was lost and broken. But, Alhamdulillah, God guided me back to Him. And because of the memory of all the pain shirk caused in my life, I remain vigilant in avoiding it.

We were not created to be a slave to anything other than the one true God, the most merciful, the One who

…is not ever unjust to [His] servants (Quran 22:10).


And nothing will fill God’s place.

After bouncing from false god to false god, the following hadith rings true to me:

Whoever possesses the (following) three qualities will have the sweetness of faith (1): The one to whom Allah and His Apostle becomes dearer than anything else; (2) Who loves a person and he loves him only for Allah’s Sake; (3) who hates to revert to atheism (disbelief) as he hates to be thrown into the Fire (Al-Bukhari)

And I understand why the sin of shirk is really a big deal not just in the hereafter, but also in this life.

Even as a Muslim I don’t feel safe from shirk. I know that even the halal can be put in an unhealthy place in my life.

One thing we can all do to protect ourselves from this major issue is recite this du’a the Prophet taught us:

“Allaahumma innee a‛oodhu bika an ushrika bika wa ana a‛lamu, wa astaghfiruka li maa laa a‛lam:

O Allah, I seek refuge with You lest I should commit shirk with You knowingly and I seek Your forgiveness for what I do unknowingly.” (Ahmad)

Allah Forgives All Sins Except One


In the Quran, in many places, Allah says shirk is unforgivable.

{Surely Allah does not forgive that anything should be associated with Him, and forgives what is besides that to whomsoever He pleases; and whoever associates anything with Allah, he devises indeed a great sin.} (Quran 4: 48)

Notice Allah says he “forgives what is besides that”–that means any sin is potentially forgivable. Subhanallah.

So what happens if you’re Muslim, and you commit an act of shirk? Does it destroy all your good deeds? Are you doomed to enter hellfire, may Allah protect us all from that?

“Allah does not forgive [shirk]” means Allah will not forgive the person if he doesn’t repent. Repentance wipes out every sin, without exception. Many companions (may Allah be pleased with all of them) were mushrikun (polytheists) when they accepted Islam.

The point is, if you commit shirk and die without repenting, Allah will not forgive you. If you fornicate, drink alcohol, consume interest, steal, and you repent afterward, Allah will forgive you inshaAllah. If you don’t repent from those sins and you die, Allah may forgive you. With shirk, if you die with it unrepented, Allah will not forgive you.

The Prophet(peace be upon him) saught refuge from shirk and taught us a wonderful du’a to protect ourselves:

Allaahumma innee ‘aoothu bika an ushrika bika shaiann wa anaa a’lamu, wa astaghfiruka limaa laa a’lamu.

Translation: O Allah, I seek refuge in You lest I associate anything with You knowingly, and I seek Your forgiveness for what I know not.

Source: The collection of Ahmad. You can find the du’a in Fortress of a Muslim. You can find more details more in the comments inshaAllah.

May Allah protect us all from the evil of shirk, and allow us to live and die as true Muslims.

References

(1) Shakir, trans. “An-Nisaa (Women).” USC-MSA Compendium of Muslim Texts. USC-MSA. <http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/quran/004.qmt.html>.

(2) Pickthall, Muhammad M., trans. Al-Qur’an Al-Kareem: Parallel Arabic text with English Translation. One Ummah Network. 28 Dec. 2005 <http://www.oneummah.net/quran/quran.html>.

(3) Yasir Qadhi. Lecture. AlMaghrib. Light of Guidance. University of Toronto, Toronto. March 2006.

6 Reasons Why You Must Never Lose Hope


Sometimes we find ourselves engrossed in so many bad deeds that we begin to wonder if ever we would earn the mercy of Allah. Some people may even go to the extent of stopping all good deeds, because they feel like it’s a waste of time, and that they are just too horrible to even bother trying to please Allah.

Let me tell you that is the trick of the Satan. As a Muslim, never lose hope in the mercy of Allah, for indeed the hadith narrated in Al Bukhari reports that the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said:

Allah created mercy in one hundred parts and sent down to earth only one part. Because of this one part, there is mutual love amongst creation, so much so that an animal will lift up its hoof from its young one, fearing that it might harm it. Allah has reserved the remaining ninety-nine parts of this mercy to favor His believing servants on the Day of Judgment.

How beautiful! Here are a few verses of the Quran that may serve as a motivation.

1. After a Difficulty, Allah will Soon Grant Relief


So, verily, with every difficulty, there is relief: Verily with every difficulty there is relief. Therefore, when you are free (from your immediate task), still labor hard. And to your Lord turn (all) your attention. (Quran 94:5-7)

2. Allah is the Most Merciful


The Quran Says:

Say: My servants, you who have transgressed against yourselves, do not despair of the mercy of Allah. Truly Allah forgives all wrong actions. He is the Ever-Forgiving, the Most Merciful. (Quran 39:53)

3. Good Things Await Those Who Fear Allah


…And whosoever fears Allah…He will make a way for him to get out (from every difficulty). And He will provide him from (sources) he never could imagine. (Quran 65:2-3)

4. Trials and Tribulations are the Gateway to Paradise


Do you think that you will enter paradise without such trials as came to those who passed away before you? They experienced suffering and adversity and were so shaken in spirit that even the Prophet and the faithful who were with him cried, “When will Allah’s help come?” Ah, verily the help of Allah is near. (Quran 2:214)

5. Only Those Who Disbelieve Despair of Allah’s Mercy


My sons (said Prophet Jacob)! Go you and enquire about Yusuf (Joseph) and his brother, and never give up hope of Allah’s Mercy. Certainly, no one despairs of Allah’s Mercy, except the people who disbelieve. (Quran 12:87)

Surely there is in the person of Allah’s messenger an excellent example for you—for every person who has hope in Allah and the hereafter and who remembers Allah, reciting His name many times. (Quran 33:21)

…So be not of the despairing. (Quran 15:55)

6. Of the Things of this World, Only Good Deeds Matter in the Sight of Allah


Wealth and sons are allurements of the life of this world: but the things that endure, Good Deeds, are best in the sight of thy Lord, as rewards, and best as (the foundation for) hopes. (Quran 18:46)

Do not lose heart nor fall into despair! You shall triumph if you are believers. (Quran 3:139)

Call upon your Lord humbly and in secret. Lo! He loveth not transgressors. Work not confusion in the Earth after the fair ordering thereof, and call on Him in fear and hope. Lo! The mercy of Allah is nigh unto the good. (Quran 7:55-56)

I hope this is useful. On a final note, remember this verse:

So whoever would hope for the meeting with his Lord – let him do righteous work and not associate in the worship of his Lord anyone. (Quran 18:110)

Allah’s Names come from intensity in meaning; they indicate that He embodies the most intense form of the meaning of the word.

So with the name Al-Ghafoor, it means that He’s intensely forgiving, the Most forgiving, in fact He’s constantly forgiving.

There are other forms of this word found in the Quran one of that indicates that Allah is immediately forgiving, He forgives immediately, not like us, get upset or insulted and we need time to cool down and to finally come around and say “ok I forgive you”.

Allah Almighty Al-Ghafoor, He forgives immediately. He forgives abundantly; there is absolutely no limit to His forgiveness.

In the Hadith, we find that if one of us were to come seeking forgiveness would come to Allah with sins that fill the entire earth or from the earth to the limits of the heaven, Allah would match that amount of sins with His forgiveness; He would forgive all of it, His forgiveness is limitless.

There is chapter 48:3 in the Quran that is entitled Ghafir (the Forgiver), Allah said in the third verse describing Himself {The forgiver of sin, the Acceptor of repentance}

Then he goes on to say that He is severe in punishment, and that He mentions that He is the owner of abundance. There is no deity except to Him and to Him is the final destination.

So He affirms that He is the Forgiver here, but He reminded us in this verse that this is not our final destination. We’re all travelling back to Allah and this worldly life has a purpose, therefore there are consequences.

The concept of sin, I think is not fully grasped in some aspect of the society, especially the secular side that lack religious knowledge. They say: “why would God care about what I wear or what I say, or how I live my life?”

But in Islam we understand that we have not created aimlessly, we are not here for no reason; we do have a purpose and it must be fulfilled in order to be successful.

Sins are not haphazard, Allah Al-Ghafoor, describes sin as being against ourselves. When we sin, we are the only ones to get harmed.

Allah Almighty is free of need, we can’t harm Him, we can’t hurt Him, we can’t do anything to Him, or take anything away from Him and He doesn’t gain anything by us doing good deeds or by us staying away from sin.

In chapter Az-Zumar verse 3, Allah says: {Say, O my servants who have transgressed against themselves by sinning, do not despair by the mercy of Allah. Indeed Allah forgives all sins. Indeed it He who is the forgiving the merciful.}

Here, He’s commending us. First of all, He’s pointing out that when we do wrong then that we are transgressing against our own souls. But He’s commending us that do not despair of the mercy of Allah. Do not give into those sins. Do not give into losing hope.”

Always have hope in the mercy of Allah Almighty so as we long to Him. He goes on in the chapter to talk about returning to Him in repentance submitting to Him and following the guidance that He revealed.

So it’s a very simple recipe basically. We just stay in contact with our Lord and constantly come back to Him seeking His forgiveness, being aware of our actions and then we submit to His Will and we follow the guidance that we are so graciously, generously, and mercifully revealed.

If we deny this generous gift that He’s giving us in this guidance and this opportunity and the countless of opportunities that He gives us to turn back to Him and instead we decide that we want to turn away, then we’re ultimately destroying ourselves, and that’s the ultimate loss.

When I think about turning to Allah and when I think about the idea of fleeing to Him, it reminds me of my daughter. She’s just 4 years old, she’s really cute, and when she does something wrong and she realizes she’s in trouble, she runs to me, crying, usually tears streaming down her face, her face is getting red and she hugs my legs and she would say “I love you mummy” or she told me that she’s sorry… so adorable, so sincere and genuine and it’s so enduring and honestly it’s quite affective.

So comparing that a child runs to his or her parent in remorse out of love wishing and hope that their love would not be removed.

The child is fearing that the love of their parent, their affection will somehow be taken away from them, that it would be changed. They’re crying from that fear, that the beautiful relationship they have will be altered…

Comparing that to us, as believers, we need to run to Allah Almighty Al-Ghafoor in a similar way to this.

In fact we should be running to Him with more love than a child would to their parents and with more fear.

He’s the one who’s given us life. He’s the one who provides us with every single bit of sustenance and happiness and family that we have and it is to Him that we’ll return and if we fail, we have lot more to lose than a child would by losing in their parent.

Why we turn to Him while He promised us of His forgiveness?

The fact that Allah has promised us His forgiveness no matter how many times we come back asking for it. It reminds me of a psychologist of parenting, they tell parents even “don’t tell your child that you are ungrateful, you are stupid, for example…” you never tell the child that they are the embodiment of a bad action. Instead, you correct them by pointing out the action that they did, like when you say that, you are ungrateful to say that or it was not wise decision when you did this.

Instead of saying: “you’re not wise, you’re stupid, you’re ungrateful…” you don’t characterized the child by their actions, instead you pick the action out and you explain why it is incorrect.

So what I learn from the fact that Allah Almighty is Al-Ghafoor, that He’s constantly forgiving, it means that we don’t embody our sins, we’re not characterized by our sins. Our sins are actions that we may do, but we can break free from them, we can rid ourselves from them, we can be netter than that.

So if I did something wrong, it doesn’t mean that I’m that way, that means we’re separate from our actions, that we can change, we can go forward in life and we can be better.

It means that the door to self improvement are always open as we are alive and well. Isn’t that beautiful?

I want to make one last point, in chapter An-Nour, Allah Al-Ghafoor says: {Part and overlook, would you not like that Allah should forgive you. Allah is the Most Forgiving Most Merciful}

He’s pointing out, reminding us that our state that we desire to be forgiven. When one we love doesn’t like to forgive us, it causes us pain and turmoil. The thought of running to Allah seeking His forgiveness and then not being forgiven! Just imagine if that were the case… it would be death stating.

But that’s not the case, instead He wipes away our misdeeds and covers them up. So this needs to translate into our own actions and the way that we deal with our follow human beings.

This verse basically points out that we should be treating others as we hope to be treated. We desire forgiveness from Allah, therefore we should strive to also be pardoning and lenient with people, and avoid wishing any less on anyone than we would hope for ourselves.

By striving to be more forgiving and merciful ourselves, we can completely alter what kind of energy we have in the world. Imagine how it would change your life if you were to let things go more easily, if you were to turn to people you love most especially with mercy instead of anger and resent.

I pray to Allah that we might be of those people who constantly remember and turn back to Allah Al-Ghafoor, knowing with certainty that He is the Most Forgiving, the most abundantly, constantly forgiving.

I pray that each one of us, you and I, can ponder over this Name as we read it throughout the Quran, in our prayers, in duas, supplications… that it transforms us into more forgiving, loving and merciful people. Ameen.