Imam al-Nawawī said, “Restricting the hadith in that manner is open to question, yet the scholars unanimously agree that major sins are not erased except through repentance or the application of the prescribed legal punishment.”

Benefit:
We may summarize the distinctive qualities of these blessed ten nights in the following points—without detailing their evidences, which are well known and close at hand, praise be to Allah.

1. During them the Messenger of Allah (blessings and peace be upon him) exerted himself in worship more than at any other time. Such exertion is not limited to one specific act; it spans every form of devotion—prayer, Quran recitation, remembrance, charity, and so forth.

2. He would awaken his family for prayer and remembrance so they could seize these noble seasons, for they are a prize that no rational believer should miss or neglect, letting them pass by to no effect.

3. He performed iʿtikāf in these ten nights to savor solitary communion with Allah, rejoice in the sweetness of intimate discourse, and withdraw from anything that might distract him or cut him off from that seclusion with his Lord.

4. Laylat al-Qadr is most likely to occur within these blessed ten, making their nights the finest of the entire year. One should therefore search for it during these nights in the hope that the believer will be granted it and thus obtain abundant good, for it is “a blessed night” and “better than a thousand months.”

In short, these blessed nights—the fragrant close of the month’s fast—are nights of immense worth, whose benefits and returns are vast. Only one deprived of good, someone who wrongs his own soul, will squander them—and worse still is to spend them in forbidden gatherings and sinful assemblies. We ask Allah Most High for safety.