to sexual immorality. She persistently tried to seduce him, even seeking the help of others who might assist her, but he clung fast to God, choosing prison over the immoral act and preferring the torment of this world to the anger of God. Thus he was wronged by someone who loved him only for her own lust and corrupt purpose. Such love—driven by the lover’s whim—finds both its cure and its ruin in whether the beloved yields to it.

Those who hated him, on the other hand, despised him with a hatred so intense that it led to his being thrown into the pit and then taken captive and sold as a slave against his will. They dragged him from the freedom of a free man into the false bondage of slavery without his choice, whereas this woman forced him to choose voluntary confinement. Consequently, the latter trial was greater, and his patience in it was voluntary and joined with godliness, unlike his earlier endurance of their oppression, which belonged to the sort of calamity that, if the noble do not bear it with dignity, they simply forget it like animals. The second form of patience is the better of the two, and for that reason Joseph said: “Indeed, whoever is mindful of God and patient—surely God does not allow the reward of those who do good to be lost.”

The same holds true when a believer is harmed because of his faith and is ordered to embrace unbelief, sin, or disobedience; if he refuses, he is harmed and punished. He therefore chooses harm and punishment rather than parting with his religion—be that imprisonment or exile, as happened to the Emigrants when they preferred leaving their homelands to abandoning their faith. They were tortured and abused, and the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—was himself subjected to many kinds of harm, which he bore with willing patience, for he was harmed only to make him give up what he was doing of his own free choice.

This was an even greater patience than Joseph’s, for Joseph was merely asked to commit an immoral act and, upon refusal, was punished with prison, whereas the Prophet—peace be upon him—and his Companions were asked to renounce their faith; if they refused, the punishment sought was death or something less, and the lightest of these was imprisonment. The idolaters confined him and the Banu Hāshim in the mountain pass for a time; after Abū Ṭālib died, they intensified their persecution. When the Helpers pledged their allegiance to him and the Quraysh learned of it, they tried to prevent him from leaving, detaining him and his Companions. No one migrated openly except ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb and the like; all others left in secret. Thus they were driven to abandon their homes, yet whoever among them the Meccans could restrain they imprisoned.

The harm and afflictions that befell the believers therefore came about by their own choice, in obedience to God and His Messenger; they were not heavenly calamities that descend without human volition, like Joseph’s imprisonment or his separation from his father. This category is the more excellent of the two, and its people enjoy the higher rank—although one who suffers involuntary calamities is still rewarded for his patience and acceptance, and his sins are expiated by them. In the present case the believer is afflicted and harmed by his own choice, out of obedience to God; he is rewarded for the very calamities themselves, and they are recorded for him as righteous deeds. God Most High says in Sūrat al-Tawbah: “That is because they suffer neither thirst, nor fatigue, nor hunger in the cause of Allah, nor do they tread any ground that enrages…”