—his good deeds and the measure of his misdeeds are set against one another; if his misdeeds are found to outweigh, he deserves punishment on account of those prevailing sins. He will therefore be punished in the Fire in proportion to what he merits, then he will be brought out by virtue of his outweighed good deeds—even if they amount to no more than the weight of a speck. By that very speck he will be released from Hell and will not remain there forever. He is not like the one who has absolutely no good deeds—the people whose works have been rendered void so that no weight will be set for them on the Day of Resurrection.

This provides the answer to the question of how someone whose misdeeds outweigh can still leave the Fire. The matter puzzled a group who imagined that once misdeeds predominate no trace of good deeds remains, their existence becoming as nothing. They reasoned that, were such a person to enter the Fire, he would have no portion of faith by which to emerge.

For this reason some of them said, “Faith is not something that is weighed against misdeeds.” Yet we have already demonstrated that such weighing is indeed admissible, and Allah knows best.

Praise be to Allah, Lord of all the worlds. May Allah bestow His blessings and peace upon our master Muhammad, his family, and all his Companions, and grant them an abundance of peace.