(al-Fath 48:19).

When Allah granted the Muslims victory, their wealth multiplied and kept on increasing. Affluence set in, and some of them slipped into a life of ease. Indeed, there were people who, when lunch or dinner was placed before them, would burst into tears, remembering the meagre fare and slender means on which the earliest generations had lived.

They once visited Khabbāb ibn al-Aratt—may Allah be pleased with him—while he was ill, and he had already been cauterized seven times.

Cauterization is one of the effective treatments, by Allah’s permission. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) identified three remedies in which there is healing, with Allah’s leave: “cauterization, cupping, and honey.” By Allah’s permission, these three rank among the most beneficial cures. There are ailments for which nothing avails except cautery. One example is pleurisy: a disease that strikes the lungs, causing them to clot and adhere to the chest, and from which a person dies unless Allah grants healing through some means.

With such illnesses nothing helps but cauterization. How many patients suffering from pleurisy go to physicians, receive injections and medications of every kind, yet gain no relief—then, when they are cauterized, they recover by Allah’s leave.

Similarly, there are disorders that attack the intestines which Arab physicians call al-ṭayr (“the bird”) because the pain roams throughout the body. Here again, nothing benefits except cauterization; no matter how many medicines the patient is given, only cautery proves effective.