The second usage refers to the object of devotion itself—that is, it serves as a comprehensive term for every act by which one worships Allah: purification, prayer, charity, fasting, pilgrimage, honoring one’s parents, maintaining family ties, and every other form of worship.
Worship rests on two conditions:
- Sincerity to Allah alone, seeking nothing but His face and the attainment of His abode of honor. This fulfills the testimony that there is no god but Allah.
- Conformity to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, so that one does not worship Allah with anything He did not prescribe. This fulfills the testimony that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.
A polytheist’s worship is neither accepted nor valid, because the first condition is absent; and an innovator’s worship is neither accepted nor valid, because the second condition is absent.
Both conditions are established by the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger ﷺ.
• Proofs for the requirement of sincerity from the Book of Allah include His words: “So worship Allah, devoting the religion purely to Him. Surely, to Allah belongs the pure religion” (39:2-3); “They were commanded only to worship Allah, devoting the religion purely to Him, inclining wholly to the truth” (98:5); and, “If they had associated others with Him, all they had done would have come to nothing” (6:153), along with many other verses of varied import.
• Proofs from the Sunnah include the report recorded by al-Bukhari and Muslim from ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab, who said: I heard the Prophet ﷺ declare, “People! Deeds are judged only by intentions, and each person will have only what he intended. Whoever migrates for Allah and His Messenger, his migration is for Allah and His Messenger; but whoever migrates for some worldly gain or to marry a woman, his migration is for whatever motive he migrated for.” This is one of al-Bukhari’s wordings.