major shirk (associating partners with Allah). Allah, Exalted is He, says:
“Among the people are those who take others besides Allah as equals, loving them as they love Allah. But those who believe are stronger in their love for Allah.”
Those who gave precedence over love for Allah and His Messenger to love for the wealth they hoarded and the created beings they followed were guilty of wrongdoing and shirk in proportion to that. He therefore consigns them to what they loved, as in the hadith in which Allah, Exalted is He, says:
“Is it not just of Me to consign each of you to whatever he used to follow in this world?”
It is also established in the Sahīh that He says:
“Let every people go to what they used to worship: those who worshipped the sun to the sun, those who worshipped the moon to the moon, and those who worshipped false gods to the false gods. A likeness of the Messiah will be presented to the Christians, and of Ezra to the Jews. Each people will follow what they used to worship, while this nation will remain, with its hypocrites among them.”
This hadith will be cited later, if Allah wills. These are “those guilty of major shirk.” As for the “slaves of wealth” who hoarded it, and the slaves of men whom they obeyed in disobedience to Allah, they will suffer a punishment less severe than that of those who associated partners with Allah, either on the plains of the Resurrection or in Hell. Whoever loves something other than Allah will be tormented through it.
Allah, Exalted is He, says:
“O you who believe, spend from what We have provided for you before a Day comes when there will be no bargaining, no friendship, and no intercession. And it is the disbelievers who are the wrongdoers.”
Thus, “absolute disbelief” is absolute wrongdoing. Those guilty of it will therefore have no intercessor on the Day of Resurrection, as He denies intercession in this verse and in His saying:
“And warn them of the Approaching Day, when hearts will rise to the throats, choked with anguish. The wrongdoers will have neither a close friend nor an intercessor whose plea is heeded. He knows the treachery of the eyes and what the hearts conceal.”
And He says:
“So they will be hurled into it, they and those who went astray, and the soldiers of