"Had It Been an Easy Gain"

Allah says about the munāfiqūn: had it been an easy gain and a moderate trip — meaning, if there were a lot of ghanīmah, and if the distance were not far — the hypocrites would have followed you; but distant to them was the journey. And they will swear by Allah: if we were able, we would have gone forth with you — destroying themselves through false oaths; and Allah knows that indeed they are liars.

Allah is telling Muḥammad (peace be upon him) that he should not have excused them. Allah says: may Allah pardon you, O Muḥammad; why did you give them permission to remain behind? You should not have, until it was evident to you who were truthful, and you knew who were the liars. So it was a test from Allah, and Allah (ʿazza wa jall) is telling Muḥammad (peace be upon him) that he should not have excused them.

And then Allah tells us who are the true believers and who are not. Allah says: those who believe in Allah and the Last Day would not ask your permission to be excused from striving with their wealth and their lives; and Allah is Knowing of those who fear Him. So the ones who have taqwā, and the ones who believe in Allah, are not going to try to find excuses; you will find them eager to support the religion of Allah and to fight for it. But as for the ones who are looking for excuses, Allah says about them: only those would ask your permission who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day, and whose hearts have doubted, and they, in their doubt, are hesitating. And this is a fact: those who do not believe misinterpret the concept of fighting; and those who have weak īmān, and try to get out of it, are always in a state of hesitation. They are always in a state of unclarity; they are in a state of contradiction, because on the one hand they say, we want to support the religion of Allah, but then they refuse to do it and try to find excuses to get out of it. So it is a contradictory state, and a very changeable heart. And Allah says about them that they do not have true belief in Allah and the Last Day. Somebody who has yaqīn in the Ākhirah, and somebody who has true īmān in Allah (ʿazza wa jall) — first of all, because of his īmān in Allah, he will fear Allah more than he fears anybody or anything else; and because of his īmān in the Last Day, he will not put any value on this dunyā.

And then Allah says — and this is a criterion for those who are really excused and those who are not — and if they had intended to go forth, they would have prepared for it. Anything important needs preparation. If you want to be a physician, you need to prepare for it: you need to go to school. If you want to be an engineer, you have to go through years of education. And the same is true in Islam: just as in the dunyā any job or any profession needs preparation — otherwise you are lying. If somebody says, I want to be a doctor, but then does not go to college; and somebody says, I want to find employment, but never goes to search for it — he is being dishonest with himself. The same is true in Islam: if you say, for example, that you want to make hijrah, and you do not prepare for it, you are being dishonest with yourself.

And then Allah (ʿazza wa jall) tells Muḥammad (peace be upon him) that it was better that these people did not come out. Why? Because this is what they would have done: had they gone forth with you, they would not have increased you except in confusion. They would not have increased you in anything good; they would have added to your confusion, because their minds are full of doubts. They do not have firm yaqīn and īmān in what they are doing; they are confused; they have so many doubts in their hearts — doubts from the news, doubts from the munāfiqūn, doubts from the kuffār. Their minds are full of doubts, and if they come out with you, they will just add confusion.

And then Allah says: and they would have been active among you. Active with what? Seeking to cause you fitnah. They are going to come out for the sake of fitnah; they are going to come out with namīmah, backbiting; they are going to try to cause disunity among you; they will spread their doubts among your ranks. And Allah (ʿazza wa jall) says: and among you are avid listeners to them; and Allah is Knowing of the wrongdoers. To whom is Allah speaking? He is speaking to the generation of the Companions. Allah is telling them: and among you are avid listeners to them. Subḥān Allāh — how could a Companion be an avid listener to a munāfiq? Well, that is the whole point behind the importance of warning against the munāfiqūn: because they are so elusive, it is very difficult to tell who a munāfiq is. They can be very sweet-tongued; they can be very knowledgeable; they can be very prominent; they can be very charismatic; they can have such a captivating personality that you look up to them and listen to their words, and their words make sense to you, and that is why you become an avid listener to them — and in reality they are deceiving you. And Allah (ʿazza wa jall) is giving this warning to the Companions.

So what does one think about us today? How much confusion are these munāfiqūn causing us today, when we are very far from the understanding of the Companions, when our fiṭrah is corrupted? Because the Companions had a clean fiṭrah: because of their clean fiṭrah, they had a better ability to distinguish right from wrong. However, with us, living in such a corrupt material world, where the values and norms we are brought up with are so messed up, the confusion is even worse. And that is why one finds that a wide section of the ummah is really confused: they do not know what they are supposed to do; they do not know what their duties are; they are in a state of loss.

It is very important to study the āyāt of Sūrat al-Tawbah, and to study the āyāt about the munāfiqūn in al-Tawbah, so that we can be cautious of two things: number one, that we are not munāfiqūn ourselves; and number two, that we do not fall for, and are not fooled by, those who are munāfiqūn. Nifāq is such a delicate and elusive thing that even ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (may Allah be pleased with him) used to fear that he might be a munāfiq — subḥān Allāh, ʿUmar! And he would go to Ḥudhayfah, the keeper of the secret of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), who knew the names of the munāfiqūn. He went to him and said: I ask you by Allah, did the Messenger of Allah mention me among the munāfiqūn? Ḥudhayfah told him: no; and I am not going to answer this question for anyone other than you — because it was a secret, and Ḥudhayfah did not want to give it up. And so Allah (ʿazza wa jall) is telling the Muslims that it was better that they did not come out, because if they came out — they are not really into fighting; they do not understand fighting — and therefore they would come out and just cause confusion among you.

They had already desired dissension before, and had upset matters for you, until the truth came and the ordinance of Allah appeared, while they were averse. ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy — such a despised individual; we all hate him, because we know that he was a munāfiq. But put things in the right context. ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy was the leader of his people: he was sayyid al-Khazraj, the lord of al-Khazraj, their chief. And ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy used to stand up before the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) gave the Jumuʿah khuṭbah, and tell the people: Muḥammad is the Messenger of Allah, so listen to his words. He was standing in front of the people before the khuṭbah, introducing the khuṭbah of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), telling the people to listen to him. And when ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb told the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) that we should kill him, the Messenger of Allah mentioned, in one narration, that there were many men who might fight for him — subḥān Allāh: ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy had a great following, and some of the people deceived by him might not take it well — and that is why the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) refused to execute him. So these were prominent members of the society, and they had caused such dissension among the Muslims, and problems in the past, as Allah (ʿazza wa jall) says in the ayah just recited.