Two Men Who Feared

But there was still some good among them, so two men came forward.

Two men of those who feared Allah, on whom Allah had bestowed His grace, said: assault them through the gate, for when you are in, victory will be yours. They said: attack them, open up the gate, and that will be enough to defeat the enemy. Does this mean that it is a miracle — that they just have to break in the gate and the enemy will leave? Or does it mean that if you break in the gate, the enemy will immediately lose? Allah knows best. But these two men told them: enter the gate, and if you enter the gate, you will win. That is all you need to do: just open up that gate and walk in. So these two men were willing to fight. They were willing to go in and fight, and they were encouraging their people to fight.

With what quality did Allah (swt) describe these two men? What quality did these two men have? Fear: yakhāfūn — they fear. This is a very important thing to notice: you cannot fight the enemy unless you fear Allah (swt) more than you fear the enemy. You have to have khashyah of Allah. Otherwise you cannot face the enemy, because as a human being you have natural fear — you have natural fear of death. But if you have the fear of Allah, and you are more afraid of Allah (swt) than you are of the creation, then nothing can stand in front of you.

And that is why, for the mujāhidīn in the path of Allah (swt), nothing can stand in front of them. Nothing. Because nothing can put fear in their hearts; they have no fear of the creation. The creation can present a bigger army; it can present stronger weapons; but it can never put into their hearts a fear greater than the fear of Allah. Allah (swt) says: a-takhshawnahum fa-Allāhu aḥaqqu an takhshawh — do you fear them? You need to fear Allah; Allah is the One who should be feared. We should not fear the creation. And that is why nothing can shake the hearts of the men of Allah (swt) who have khashyah.