Signs of a Sick Heart – Rejecting the Truth and Embracing Falsehood – Shaykh Rabee ibn Hadi (rahimahullah)

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Ponder, O my brother — is your heart sound or sick?! Is it alive or dead?!

Revive it with the truth. Seek the truth from the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger. Make the truth your goal. Accept the truth from whoever brings it. Do not be like the Jews, of whom Allah — تبارك وتعالى — said:

وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ آمِنُوا بِمَا أَنزَلَ اللَّهُ قَالُوا نُؤْمِنُ بِمَا أُنزِلَ عَلَيْنَا وَيَكْفُرُونَ بِمَا وَرَاءَهُ وَهُوَ الْحَقُّ مُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا مَعَهُمْ

“And when it is said to them: ‘Believe in what Allah has sent down,’ they say: ‘We believe in what was sent down to us.’ And they disbelieve in that which came after it, while it is the truth confirming what is with them.” [Al-Baqarah: 91]

Meaning: they knew the truth yet would not accept it except from their own books. They are consummate liars; even in this claim they are not truthful.

Today, some people do not accept anything except what comes from so-and-so. If it comes from someone else, they reject it and pass sweeping judgement that it is falsehood.

Allah — تبارك وتعالى — calls for verification:

يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِن جَاءَكُمْ فَاسِقٌ بِنَبَإٍ فَتَبَيَّنُوا أَن تُصِيبُوا قَوْمًا بِجَهَالَةٍ فَتُصْبِحُوا عَلَىٰ مَا فَعَلْتُمْ نَادِمِينَ

“O you who believe! If a rebellious evil person comes to you with a news, verify it, lest you harm people in ignorance, and afterwards you become regretful for what you have done.” [Al-Ḥujurāt: 6]

That is: clarify and verify. The speech you take and spread without verifying its reality — you are spreading lies! False rumours stand as barriers between many young people and the truth. They push them towards falsehood, towards allying with the people of falsehood, and towards supporting the people of major innovation — not the people of minor innovation.

False rumours, slanders and slurs against the people of truth have tarnished the beauty of truth. They stand as barriers between people and the truth, and divert them away from the path of Allah. The people become those who will not accept the truth unless it comes from so-and-so — and even if the statement of so-and-so is false, they regard it as truth.

This is a deadly disease, O brothers — a sickness of the hearts. This sickness demands that all strength be harnessed to cure it… The one whose heart dies whilst the truth is before him — within his reach — yet he flees from it and races towards falsehood, he is not from those of whom Allah said:

إِلَّا مَنْ أَتَى اللَّهَ بِقَلْبٍ سَلِيمٍ

“Except him who brings to Allah a clean heart [clean from Shirk (polytheism) and Nifāq (hypocrisy)].” [Ash-Shuʿarāʾ: 89]

Ponder — is your heart sound?!

The sound heart is that which combats polytheism, rejects falsehood, accepts the truth, and repels falsehood with all its strength. This is the sound heart.

If you find that you accept the truth — even from a Jew, a Christian, or a Muslim — that your guiding principle is the truth and your goal is the truth, then by Allah your heart is sound and your intellect is sound.

However, if you find that you reject the truth when it comes from a certain direction, yet you accept falsehood when it comes from a specific direction, then know with certainty that your heart is sick. The sound heart is in opposition to the sick heart. The sick heart is that which accepts falsehood, wallows in it, the devils do as they like, whilst the angels distance themselves from it and the devils whisper into it and it is lead astray by this devilish whispering. This sick heart must be treated. In this Qurʾān there is a cure for people — a cure for the ailments of the hearts and the diseases of the bodies.

Let us treat ourselves with this Qurʾān. Let us cultivate ourselves upon its beliefs, upon manliness, upon love of truthfulness, the truth, and loyalty to it, and upon disavowal of falsehood and its people — even if they were our fathers, our sons, our brothers, or our kinsmen. This is the sound heart; the repentant heart, they are one and the same, however with different wordings. Allah — تبارك وتعالى — said:

 وَأُزْلِفَتِ الْجَنَّةُ لِلْمُتَّقِينَ غَيْرَ بَعِيدٍ ﴿٣١﴾ هَٰذَا مَا تُوعَدُونَ لِكُلِّ أَوَّابٍ حَفِيظٍ ﴿٣٢﴾ مَّنْ خَشِيَ الرَّحْمَٰنَ بِالْغَيْبِ وَجَاءَ بِقَلْبٍ مُّنِيبٍ ﴿٣٣

“And Paradise will be brought near to the Muttaqūn (pious) not far off. (It will be said): ‘This is what you were promised — (it is) for those oft-returning (to Allah) in sincere repentance, and those who preserve their covenant with Allah. Who feared the Most Beneficent (Allah) in the Ghaib (unseen) and brought a heart turned in repentance (to Him).’ “ [Qāf: 31–33]

The repentant heart is that which turns back to Allah  تبارك وتعالى.

Shaykh Rabee (rahimahullah) Website