“Neither their meat nor their blood reaches Allah, but it is your piety that reaches Him.”

Likewise, denying the Messenger in one’s heart, hating him, envying him, and arrogantly refusing to follow him are graver sins than outward deeds unaccompanied by these inward states, such as murder, unlawful sexual intercourse, drinking alcohol, and theft. Outward deeds that constitute disbelief—such as prostrating to idols, reviling the Messenger, and the like—do so only because they necessarily entail inward disbelief. Otherwise, if, hypothetically, someone prostrated before an idol without intending in his heart to prostrate to it, but instead intended to prostrate to Allah, that would not constitute disbelief. This may be permissible when someone is among polytheists and fears for his life, so he conforms to their outward actions while intending in his heart to prostrate to Allah. It is related that some Muslim scholars and scholars among the People of the Book did something similar with a group of polytheists, eventually calling them to Islam, whereupon they embraced it through their efforts. They had not openly opposed them at the outset.

Here there are “fundamental questions” over which people have disagreed. One is whether affirmation or denial can exist in the heart without anything of it ever appearing in speech or bodily actions, while only its opposite appears, despite the absence of fear.

The position of the early generations, the leading scholars, and the majority of people is that what this inward state entails must manifest itself in bodily actions. Thus, anyone who says that he believes the Messenger, loves him, and reveres him in his heart, yet has never professed Islam or performed any of its obligations, despite having no fear, is not inwardly a believer; rather, he is a disbeliever.