Principle Thirty-Four: The Qur’an makes clear in a number of verses that whoever neglects what would benefit him while it is within his reach will be tried with something that harms him, and he will be deprived of the original good.
Thus, several passages show that when the polytheists spurned the worship of the Most Merciful they were afflicted with the worship of idols; when they deemed themselves too proud to follow the messengers—saying that the messengers were only human—they were left to submit to every unruly notion that defies reason and religion; and when faith was first offered to them, they recognized it but then rejected it, so Allah overturned their hearts, sealed them, and stamped them, and they will not believe until they behold the painful punishment.
When the straight path was set out for them and they knowingly veered from it, preferring the road of error to the way of guidance and sound judgment, they were punished when Allah caused their hearts to deviate and left them wandering in confusion.
When they showed contempt for Allah’s signs and His messengers, Allah disgraced them with a humiliating torment. When they grew arrogant and refused to submit to the truth, He abased them in this world and the Hereafter. When they barred people from the mosques of Allah so that His name would not be mentioned therein and worked to ruin them, they were no longer permitted to enter them except in fear.
Allah says:
“Among them are those who pledged to Allah: ‘If He grants us out of His bounty, we will surely give in charity, and we will surely be among the righteous.’ Yet when He gave them out of His bounty, they became stingy, turned away, and were averse. So He caused hypocrisy to settle in their hearts until the Day they meet Him, because they broke their promise to Allah which they had made and because they used to lie.” (al-Tawbah 9:75-77)
There are many verses to this effect: they inform us that a servant had been on the verge of following the straight path, yet after recognizing it he abandoned it,