Perplexing: Friends with different attitudes towards prayer

Dear Nabilah,   I have a friend who never treats his daily prayers with laxity, he’s always committed to offering prayers at their appropriate time, but for sure, I know he’s an adulterer. Asides this, I don’t think he sins in any major way. I have another friend that  is not committed to praying on […]

Dear Nabilah,

 

I have a friend who never treats his daily prayers with laxity, he’s always committed to offering prayers at their appropriate time, but for sure, I know he’s an adulterer. Asides this, I don’t think he sins in any major way. I have another friend that  is not committed to praying on time; but never engaged in fornication and or other major sins. How can one reconcile these two scenarios with Verse 45 Chapter 29 of The Glorious Quran that says:

And perform As-Salat (Iqamat-as-Salat). Verily, As-Salat (the prayer) prevents from Al-Fahsha (i.e. great sins of every kind, unlawful sexual intercourse, etc.) and Al-Munkar (i.e. disbelief, polytheism, and every kind of evil wicked deed, etc).

-Perplexed Friend

 

Dear Friend,

First, you should know that only Allah knows everything, you might know the outward attitudes of your friends toward prayer, but only Allah knows the whole story, only Allah knows what’s in their hearts and souls. Only Allah knows their real intention and sincerity in regards to performing Salah.

Salah indeed protects one from major sins and immorality, but it also has some obligations and conditions to be fulfilled before it can be called a good quality Salah. Below are some of the reasons why Salah might not be able to protect someone from major sins such as polytheism and adultery, etc.

1. Most important obligation of any Salah is the pure intention of doing it only for the sake of Allah, The Most High and not for anything else. If you are doing it because it’s traditional, because everyone is doing it, because it’s expected of you, because you want to be identified as someone who does it, because you want to show off, and any other similar reason, Salah with that type of intention won’t benefit its doer, won’t protect him from immorality and indecency, because performing Salah with any other intention besides its original intention is another major sin on and of itself, so how can a major sins protect from major sin?
2. And if a person becomes careless with any part of its obligations such as cleanliness, performing ablution correctly, performing the Salah correctly, reciting the verses with proper pronunciations, etc, if any of these things are lacking in some way, then your Salah lacks quality and therefore might not protect you from immoral actions.
3. Another reason is that if a person’s source of livelihood is contaminated with unlawful earnings, that will impact his Salah and might make it void and unacceptable because the limbs that he used to perform the Salah, the blood that fuel his system, the energy he used were all nourished by unlawful earning, as such it’s rejected and will never be rewarded, such types of Salah will not guarantee protection from sins.
4. And there are people that establish prayers or other types of worship only in obedience to their voodoo doctors or soothsayers, etc. Such type of Salah is another major sin in itself, so it cannot be a shield against other major sins.
5. You can also see it this way: The devil has already won over the friend that is not praying that’s why he isn’t wasting his time to incite him to sin in a major way because abandoning salah is way bigger than adultery and other major sins. While the friend that is maintaining Salah, the devil is constantly inciting him with major sins because maintaining prayer is of utmost importance.
6. It’s also possible that adultery is a trial for that praying friend, something that he’s constantly struggling with spiritually and maintaining his prayers is one of his ways of trying to fight that major sin. While the non praying friend is fooled by his not performing major sins and thus becomes complacent and lax towards performing and maintaining his prayers.
7. My advice to you is, do not waste your precious time and energy on finding reasons for every perplexing happenings . Instead, channel your energy to something more fruitful, that which benefits you in this world and the hereafter.

Why was my prayer not answered?

 

Dear Nabilah,

It was reported in an authentic narration that The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, mentioned the day of Friday and he said, “In it is an hour in which no Muslim stands to pray and ask Allah for something but that he will be given it,” and he indicated with his hand that the time is very short. And ibn Qayyim said to seek this special hour after Asr before Maghreb prayer. My question is this: an individual supplicates repeatedly for a particular need from Asr until Maghreb, meaning they must’ve covered that special hour. Six years later, they couldn’t see the fruition of their du’a, what they asked for is already gone. Would you shed more light on this please?

-Special supplication

 

Dear Special,

Allah answering your dua doesn’t necessarily means you will always get what you asks for because of the following reasons:

1. Allah knows better, maybe that thing you ask will not really be good for you, might lead to harm in this world or the next etc.
2. Allah might choose to answer your dua, but keep it for you until in the Akhirah when you might need it the more.
3. Allah will avert some calamity or misfortune that is coming your way in place of that dua.