The Blindness of the Heart

[Fabregas]

The Blindness of the Heart:

 

"...you deal with Allah as if you are playing with small children...as Ayyub as-Sakhtiyani said: "They try to trick Allah as if they are tricking a young boy."

 

I often stop at this verse: {"Verily, proofs have come to you from your Lord, so whosoever sees will do so for his ownself, and whosoever blinds himself will do so to his own harm, and I am not a watcher over you."} [al-An'am; 104] and ask myself: 'How can these hypocrites - I seek refuge with Allah from them - have their hearts so blind from seeing, with the Messenger between them, and the light of the Qur'an between them? How can their eyes be so deluded from seeing while the Prophet - this Prophet who receives Revelation - is not given his proper due from them?' And this is for no reason except that the heart is blind, and I seek refuge with Allah.

 

How can the heart be blind? How is it that the heart can be afflicted with blindness? Because of the abundance of sins. The sins start off small! He emboldens himself in front of Allah with a small sin, which leads him to become even more emboldened, and more emboldened, and Allah lets him be, as the Prophet said: "Verily, Allah leaves the wrongdoer, until He takes him and does not let him go."

 

Regarding the Children of Israel, He Said:

 

{"That was because they used to disbelieve in the signs of Allah, and killed the Prophets wrongfully. That was because they disobeyed and used to transgress the bounds."} [al-Baqarah; 61]

 

It all began with sins and transgression, and ended with the killing of Prophets and disbelief in the signs of Allah.

 

Because of this, the Messenger of Allah said: "Allah has cursed the thief whose hand is cut off for stealing an egg." And does one have his hand cut off for stealing an egg? The scholars are agreed that one is not to have his hand cut off for stealing less than three dirhams’ worth, is this not so? Yes! So, how can one have his hand cut off for stealing an egg? Because when he stole the egg, he then stole the chicken. And when he stole the chicken, he then stole a cow. This is how he ends up getting his hand cut off, and such are the sins.

 

The heart is like glass - do you not see the lamp? The glass lamp, or the windshield of the car…the windshield of the car has wipers and wiper fluid installed for it. So, whenever it becomes dirty, you press the button, and the fluid comes out, and the wipers clean it: "Follow a bad deed with a good deed, and it will wipe it out." However, if you splash into a pit of mud, how can you clean your windshield? If a major sin is drowned out by another major sin, which is itself drowned out by another major sin, the heart will become murky. If the servant commits a sin, it will leave a black spot on his heart, followed by another spot, followed by another spot – until it becomes engulfed in blackness. When the heart becomes black, no light can emanate from it, and none is seen from it, and this is what is meant here:

 

{"Nay! On their hearts is the covering of sins and evil deeds which they used to earn."} [al-Mutaffifin; 14]

 

He ends up not being able to visualize things, and one can see nothing from him. He becomes like the lens of a camera: if it is not wiped clean, one can see no pictures from it. Sometimes, he will see things for other than what they are if the dirt and murkiness pile on. So, if they pile on, he will see the good as being bad, and the bad as being good. He has darkened his heart, and has now become unable to distinguish between anything. He has obscured his heart, making it now necessary for his windshield wipers to work continuously, and these wipers will leave the heart clean. However, if the windshield becomes muddy, these wipers will simply spread the mud around. Such a situation requires long term effort, as you would not be able to use the wipers while you are driving. Such a case would require a true and sincere repentance, and a strong return to Allah, and nothing is impossible for you to do.

 

Many of the people were highway robbers. al-Fudayl bin 'Iyad was a highway robber, and one night, he came up to a house that he wanted to rob, only to find its owner standing up at night in prayer, reciting:

 

{"Has not the time come for the hearts of those who to be affected by Allah's Reminder and that which has been revealed of the truth, lest they become as those who received the Scripture before, and the term was prolonged for them, and their hearts were hardened? And many of them were sinners."} [al-Hadid; 16]

 

He then said: "Yes, the time has come!" And he repented on the wall of the very house he was about to rob, and became al-Fudayl bin 'Iyad, the greatest of worshippers and ascetics, and from the greatest of scholars and Muhaddithin!

 

…It is within the person’s capabilities to repent. However, he must make his repentance true and sincere! As for one disobeying Allah one day, followed by Allah making him taste the pain of his sin, followed by his repentance at the end of the day, and by morning, he returns to the way he was before repenting? No, no, no…it must be a true, sincere repentance, and the true and sincere repentance means that you a) completely detach yourself from the sin, and b) you make the most intense effort to never return to it again, and c) you truly regret what was done, and d) that you sooner or later patch up the rights of others that you violated. Only then will Allah take your repentance into consideration…"

 

['Fi Dhilal Surat at-Tawbah'; p. 322-324- Abdullah Azzam]

[Fabregas]

Test Your Heart:

 

"...How heavy is the Qur'an upon the immoral fasiq, and how heavy is worship and prayer upon the immoral fasiq hypocrite! The prayer is so heavy upon these hypocrites! You see him sitting and writing in a diary for one, two, or three hours, or standing and talking for one, two, or three hours, and if he stands behind the imam for five minutes, it is as if a mountain has been placed on his chest and heart. The diseases of the hearts, we seek refuge with Allah from them...

 

Because of this, if you want to test your heart, inspect it and test it out when the Qur'an is being recited - is it heavy upon your heart or not? Test your heart out during worship. Test your heart out when you see the salihin. Test your heart out when you are making your adhkar during the morning hours. Test your heart out when you stand up to pray - do you love to pray? Or is it heavy upon you? If it is heavy upon you, and if worship is heavy upon you, then ask Allah to remove the hardness from your heart and replace it with softness, because this is proof that the jahiliyyah is still entrenched in your heart and soul.

 

The hardness of the heart...we seek refuge with Allah from the hardness of the hearts. The hardness of the hearts is increased by satisfying the desires - sexual desires, even if by permissible means, and the desire for food, even if by permissible means.

 

This is why they say that the softness of the heart is achieved in six occasions:

• Praying at night

• Reciting the Qur'an

• Keeping the stomach empty from food

• Befriending the salihin

• Dhikr

• Istighfar during the morning hours

This is why if they felt that their hearts were becoming hard, they would say: "Lead us to those who will lead us to Allah," and the best people are those who, when you see them, remind you of Allah...he whose condition and mannerisms remind you of Allah and whose words cause you to increase in your obedience to Allah, and when you see him you remember Allah.

 

I used to sometimes lead the people in prayer. So, some youth were behind me, as well as an old man who was over 90 and from the Caucasus, a Chechen. After the prayer was over - I love to recite the Qur'an, firstly because I am in prayer, and by Allah, it is too hard on me to only recite two or three verses - and I know that the people behind me of course do not like too much recitation of the Qur'an. Anyway, after I would finish, the youth would sometimes complain to each other, and I would overhear their complaints. However, this man who was over 90 years old would say: "Increase as much as you can from the Qur'an," and he was over 90!

 

So, the issue is one of the soul. Once, one of al-Banna's students prayed behind me in Ramadan. So, I used to recite one juz' every night. After the prayer, he would ask: "How much did you recite?" I would reply: "A juz'." He said: "Ya Salam! It went by as if it were a minute," and in the prayer, you are not allowed to sit down. Regardless, this man was deriving enjoyment from the Qur'an! If he had spent the entire night like this, he would not become bored or exhausted. On the other hand you have a man who - subhan Allah - his heart is hard, so the Qur'an affects his heart by making him more exhausted, and it therefore is not softened by the Qur'an, and no matter how much Qur'an you recite to such a person, he will find it very heavy and hard upon him.

 

Because of this, from the blessings of Allah upon a person is that He makes faith beloved to him and beautifies it in his heart:

 

{"And know that, among you there is the Messenger of Allah. If he were to obey you in much of the matter, you would surely be in trouble. But, Allah has endeared faith to you and has beautified it in your hearts, and has made disbelief, wickedness and disobedience hateful to you. These! They are the rightly guided ones."} [al-Hujurat; 7]

 

This is a blessing from Allah...with this, the person derives pleasure from this hardship and this roughness. Why? For Allah. He tastes its sweetness...the torture is sweetness when it is for Allah...exhaustion is beloved to his heart if it is for the Knower of the Unseen...

 

Someone once told me - a journalist, Jabir Rizq, he wrote a book - there is a book he gave to Muhammad Yusuf Hawwash, who was executed with Sayyid Qutb. This man had an amazing understand of Islam. He stayed in prison for ten years before they executed him. He was imprisoned from 1954 to 1964, and he was executed in 1966. They had released him for health reasons, and then they brought him back.

 

Jabir Rizq told me that whenever the torture became too much for him, this man would look to the sky and say: "All of this is nothing when it comes to Your love...all of this is nothing when it comes to Your love," meaning that all of this torture is nothing when it is for the love of Allah."

 

['Fi Dhilal Surat at-Tawbah'; p. 485-487]