The Warrior's Wedding (Call Me Clingy)

Source: Cupegraf Wallpapers

An interesting news story came up on my Facebook feed the other day, 'Terminally Ill Teen Married His Girlfriend Days Before Passing Away'. It told the story of a 16 year old Muslim boy who fought cancer only for it to return a few months later. On being told he had less than a week to live, he proposed to his girlfriend. They had an Islamic wedding ceremony in hospital and he died just three days later. He told his mother, "If God asks me, I will say this is my wife." This story struck a chord with me. As I reflected, I realised it wasn't just his actions to make things right before God that impressed me but how he conquered the battle he must have been fighting internally before he proposed. .

As human beings we don't like being hypocritical. Ironically, we also don't always do what we believe to be right ether. This puts us in a bind. When our actions go against the attitudes we hold it sends our insides in a twist and we're not too fond of that feeling. So what do we do? Find any way to reduce it. Rather than putting in the effort to change our behaviour, we often take the easy route and change our attitudes instead. Psychologists call it dissonance reduction, "making your view of the world fit with how you feel or what you've done." Sometimes, in a fight to reduce our own discomfort, we'll go to the extent of totally ignoring clear evidence to the contrary of what we want to believe is true.

A classic example is of a smoker who struggles to quit even though they know they're hurting themselves. With the same factual knowledge about the dangers of smoking, they're still more likely to rationalise it using distorted logic than a non or ex-smoker. We've all heard, "My friend's 90 year old grandma smoked all her life and she's fit as anything."

As Muslims, our world view is based on the all-encompassing knowledge of the One who created the world, our laws are based on the rulings of the One who will judge us when we stand before Him, subḥānah (He is far from imperfection). We know the Qur'ān couldn't have been written by anyone other than God and that Muḥammad (SAW) could have been nothing other than a messenger of God. So we committed to practice islām (submission), putting aside our own limited views and adopting those of Allāh.

But we're human beings and we are going to make mistakes (because that's just how we roll). Perhaps we can't understand the wisdom in an instruction or fail in disciplining ourselves to act upon it. This causes a huge uneasiness inside of us. We know this action is one we want to practice but are wishing or acting like it isn't. Over time, that feeling of being a bad dishonest person begins to fester. So what do we do? We subconsciously look for ways out.

The easiest and most drastic way to let go of the anxiety is to leave Islam altogether. 'I'm not acting like a Muslim so I guess I don't believe in Islam.' I don't think I need to point out how illogical it would be to forfeit salvation in what you know to be true based on your own fallible behaviour. May Allāh protect us from judging the validity of His message by our own actions.

For most of us, our religion is an undeniable truth that can't be put to the side. So when we find ourselves continuously acting against or disliking an Islamic ruling, our instinct to reduce our guilt is directed instead upon questioning the ruling itself. Instead of acknowledging we're finding something difficult, we can fall into the trap of justifying our actions with supposedly religious rationalisations. We all know our own vices. It could be lessening the importance of an obligation we find too difficult to carry out, convincing ourselves it's just recommended. We might dismiss a sin, explaining it away as irrelevant to our situation. We 'Fatwa Shop' to find an opinion that's more in line with our own comfort or we just avoid researching it at all in hopes the truth will just disappear. We look for loopholes, claim exceptional circumstances and adopt alternative interpretations that quieten that voice inside that's telling us 'You're a bad person for not doing what God wants you to.'

"When you feel anxiety over your actions, you will seek to lower the anxiety by creating a fantasy world in which your anxiety can’t exist, and then you come to believe the fantasy is reality." - David McRaney

We need to be truly honest with ourselves (and we know we all like to see ourselves as honest). There are issues in Islam in which Allāh, in His wisdom, left room for differences of opinion and these are often minor (e.g. what constitutes ḥalāl meat in a Christian-majority country). When we take a fiqhi opinion that is more lenient than others within Islam, we really need to be sure it's based on evidence and not ease. There are other issues, however, which Allāh made clear as day. Ṣalāh, Zakāh and obedience to parents are obligations that are punishable if not carried out. Backbiting, slander, interest, fornication and homosexuality are explicitly forbidden by Allāh, no matter how common they may be or how much the society around us may see them as acceptable. We do not have the authority to change that. To deny the code of ethics that has been given to us by our Creator is questioning His unfathomable wisdom and our very own claim to be muslims, submitters to Him. Going against explicit ayāt is a very risky game to play.

"It is not for a believing man or a believing woman, when Allāh and His Messenger have decided something that they have any choice about it. And whoever disobeys Allāh and His Messenger is clearly misguided." (Aḥzab, 33:36)

A Mu'min (Believer) doesn't pick and choose from the rulings of Allāh, even when they fail to practice them (and sometimes they do). When a Believer feels anxiety over their actions, they know they can't reduce it by changing divine law. So what do they do? Like the 16 year old groom, they take the hard way out and channel their emotional state into a sincere resolve to change. They take precautions against returning to the sin, however hard it is. A Believer uses that feeling of unease to get closer to the One they disobeyed. They humble themselves, turn back to Allāh and plead desperately for forgiveness.

But breaking habits can seem like an insurmountable task. What if we struggle to muster up that determination to change? We do have another way of dealing with our cognitive dissonance. It may not be as honourable but certainly has it's own virtue. That is to cling on to it for dear life.

Forcing ourselves to be fixed in our views of morality while our behaviour doesn't conform is going to irritate like an itch we just need to scratch. Making ourselves focus when we hear verses and narrations that go against what we personally want is difficult. But that's the internal fight we have to commit to until we're strong enough to move forward, that's the fight we have to take on to call ourselves muslims. To sin and excuse it is challenging our Master. To keep sinning and hate it in our heart is a sign that at least there is some God consciousness remaining. That's worth holding on to.

Source: Cupegraf Wallpapers

All that anxiety and uneasiness we keep feeling until we have made a change has a meaningful place; gushing out in humility as we hold out our hands to Allāh like ragged beggars whispering, 'I'm finding it so hard, Allāh. I want you to be happy with me. Please please please help me.' That vulnerability with Allāh will transform our relationship with Him. That humility and sincerity will open doors to changes we never thought we'd be able to make. Bit by bit, step by teeny weeny step, it will get easier and that battle we didn't give up on will reap the most beautiful spoils.

I often wondered why Allāh loves repentance so much. Perhaps that's in part because He knows of the hidden battle raging within. He knows the strength it takes to crush our ego, admit that we're wrong and change our behaviour instead of our minds. Perhaps it's because Allāh knows that we used our guilt, and the instinctive need to reduce it, for its true purpose.

"O Allah! You are my Master! None has the right to be worshipped but You. You created me and I am Your slave, and I am faithful to my covenant and my promise as much as I can. I seek refuge with You from all the evil I have done. I acknowledge before You all the blessings You have bestowed upon me, and I confess to You all my sins. So I entreat You to forgive my sins, for nobody can forgive sins except You."

[Virtues, Arabic and transliteration of this du'ā in Bukhāri]