it is outright disbelief and misguidance; Allah has laid bare its falsity and warned against it. Many people, however, become confused on these matters and imagine that once some benefit is shown to come from a given means, that means must automatically be lawful and sanctioned. Thus a person may call upon a saint or seek help from someone who has died; his request is granted and his wish fulfilled. He then asserts that this proves the dead and the saints can rescue people and that invoking them and seeking their aid is permissible—his only “evidence” being that he obtained what he asked for. Regrettably, we have come across numerous statements of this kind in certain religious books. Their authors, or those they quote, will say, for example: “I was in distress, so I called upon such-and-such a saint—naming him specifically—whereupon he appeared at once, or came to me in a dream, delivered me, and granted my wish.”

What this poor soul and those like him do not realize is that—if the event genuinely occurred—it is nothing but a form of gradual enticement from Allah for the polytheists and innovators, a trial and a stratagem by which He repays them, measure for measure, for turning away from the Book and the Sunnah and following their whims and their devils.

The one who makes such claims therefore deems it lawful to seek relief from other than Allah—an act that is the very essence of major shirk—on the basis of some incident that happened to him or to someone else. That incident may have been fabricated from start to finish, or distorted and exaggerated to mislead the children of Adam. It may also be genuine and the narrator truthful in what he reports, yet he errs in identifying the rescuer and helper: he assumes it is a righteous saint, whereas in reality it was nothing but an accursed devil who acted with malicious intent, confounding people and ensnaring them in the traps of disbelief and misguidance, whether they perceive it or not.