- There is no harm in feeling sorrow and in shedding tears; neither conflicts with patiently submitting to Allah’s decree. In fact, they are a mercy that Allah has placed in the hearts of relatives and loved ones. The Prophet – peace and blessings be upon him – grieved, tears flowed from his eyes, and he said, “We say only what pleases the Lord.” Some scholars have even considered weeping a recommended act.
People of learning and spiritual insight have expressed various opinions on this matter, each according to the religious impulses inspired in him.
Two benefits may be drawn here:
First: Faith in Allah Most High and a servant’s confident hope in His kindness and recompense are a cool, protective shade in which all who are seared by life’s scorching winds may find refuge. Within it he finds rest, companionship, and security, sustained by the reward he expects from Allah and the abundant gifts He grants to the patient. Life itself becomes light in his eyes, and hardships grow easy to bear; hence it is said, “Whoever truly knows Allah finds his calamity insignificant.” The Prophet – peace and blessings be upon him – said: “How amazing is the believer! All of his affair is good. If something pleasant befalls him he is grateful, and that is good for him; and if something harmful strikes him he is patient, and that is good for him. This is for no one except the believer.”
After people lost this generous shade – true faith in their Lord, hope for His fine reward, and expectation of His noble recompense – we have begun, Allah’s refuge is sought, to witness in our times a sharp rise in suicides among those whose hearts faith has never entered. They kill themselves, hurrying their souls toward the Fire, because they never inhaled the cooling breeze of that shade which the believer finds with his Lord, confident in His promise. Indeed, for the pettiest of reasons they stifle their own lives, unaware that by their rash and blameworthy haste they move on to a torment worse than the one they are fleeing, like a man who seeks relief from scorching heat only to throw himself into the flames.
They do not possess the contented heart of the believer, for whom calamities fade beside the generous reward that awaits with Allah.
Second: Ahl al-Sunnah wa-l-Jamāʿah hold that a Muslim does not leave the fold of Islam merely by committing sins, even grave ones such as the unlawful taking of life. Yet many authentic texts, taken at face value, appear to indicate that a Muslim does exit Islam by perpetrating certain major sins. Among them are the two hadiths: “He is not one of us who strikes his cheeks and tears his garments …” and “The Prophet – peace and blessings be upon him – is free from the wailing woman and the shaven-headed mourner,” as well as the saying, “None of you truly believes until he loves for his brother …”