Sincere Love and Worship

One of the main driving forces for a Muslim believer should be 'Sincere Love.'

Love of Allah is what I truly believe to be the greatest weapon that a believer can have. We live in a world where we are constantly competing for other people’s love, admiration and acceptance – whether it be through what we do, the things we say and what we possess. It cannot be disagreed that it is a wonderful feeling to be loved and to feel accepted by the people around us, but imagine if you were one of Allah’s most beloved creations. Can you honestly compare the love of Allah to human love? It is inevitable that the creation will hurt you and they cannot always be relied upon. The same cannot be said about Allah. We as the creation are not perfect but Allah is. He is All Loving and All Merciful to the ultimate degree and thus deserves our utmost degree of love and veneration. (Kidwai, 2016, pp. 4-6)

When you love someone or something, it becomes an integral part of your daily life, including part of your main thoughts throughout the day. When the believer sincerely loves Allah, he wants to please Him and ensure that he doesn't anger Him because of this immense love. Ibn Qayyim, as quoted in the book Patience and Gratitude (1997, p. 34), stated that those who refrain from sins due to their love of Allah are those who have the highest status with Allah. The Sahaba also reinforced the idea of love by actually referring to a verse in the Quran as the verse of love - Say, [O Muhammad], "If you should love Allah, then follow me, [so] Allah will love you and forgive you your sins. And Allah is Forgiving and Merciful." (Surah Al Imran 3:31). This verse sets the condition for gaining Allah's love, being that one should follow the messenger (ﷺ). Therefore, love encourages us to implement the Sunnah of the messenger (ﷺ).

Love is also an umbrella for many virtues such as appreciation, concern, strength, forbearance and obedience. For example, out of the love of Allah, the believer would want to show more concern and also be more careful in regards to how he treats the creation of Allah. Therefore, sincere love is powerful for the believer as it really helps him to implement the other traits that a believer ought to have.

An important note to also mention is that, the opposite of love is hate. When you truly love Allah, you will naturally hate anything that opposes Him and His religion. Thus you will begin to encompass an important aspect of Islam known as Al Wala wal Bara (loyalty and disavowal). You will begin to hate that which Allah hates and as a result obedience to Allah comes with more ease. Therefore, not only does love help you envelop the other traits of a believer but also the important concept of Al Wala wal Bara (Ali, 2012, pp. 66-67).

To love also means to strive and focus. When the reason is love, you are more ardent to never give up and you aim to seek as much closeness as possible to what you love. Thus, I believe that love really helps to elevate the believer by encouraging them to gain more nearness to Allah through various forms of worship. Love is also what made me want to know more about Islam and thus love served as a factor which motivated me to study more about my religion. The love of Allah really helps me to keep my focus on how Allah wants me to be and not how society wants me to be.

To gracefully end, I would like to mention a beautiful statement made by Ibn Qayyim (1426H, p. 6) - "The heart on its journey to Allah is like a bird. Love is its head and the two wings are fear and hope." Love for this great scholar was so important that he viewed it to be the main component of the journey towards Allah. Likewise, seeking knowledge can be seen as a journey or a path and one that I also believe should have love as the main head and driving force on our return back to our Lord.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The Quran. Various Surahs. (Translated by Sahih International), from https://quran.com

Hadith 1388, Reported by Abud-Darda, collected by Abu Dawud (2682) and At- Tirmidhi (3541), Riyad as-Salihin Book 13 The Book of Knowledge, classed as hasan by al-Albaani in Saheeh at-Targheeb, 1/17

WhyIslam. (2017, August 25). Retrieved May 29, 2019, from WhyIslam.org: https://www.whyislam.org/brochures/worship-in-islam

Ali, M. (2012). Exeter. Retrieved May 29, 2019, from Exeter.ac.uk: https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10871/9181/AliM.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Ibn Qayyim. (1997). Patience and Gratitude. Nasriuddin Al-Khattab.

Qayyim, I. (1993). The Purification of the Soul. London: Ta-Ha Publishers.

Qayyim, I. (n.d.). Madaarij as-Saalikeen. from https://kalamullah.com/Books/Madarij-us-Salikeen.pdf