A is for Allah The Most Loving the Most Merciful God by Sheikh Ibrahim Zedan

1.   There are some people might say that Allah is not a God of Love, a vengeful God, etc, how do we answer this.

It is such a sad thing and the reason it is said is that the we as the human being have great deficiency and we are always in need of the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth and hence, we should not claim such a thing to oneself. How well is the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, the One All Perfect with Names and Attributes. The problem is that the people don’t know the Creator with His Names and His Attributes and they don’t witness His Mercy that covers the whole life and whole creation of Allah, and because of that ignorance, then they tend to misunderstand many things in their lives and one of which is the Attributes of Allah.

Allah is the Most Merciful and we read in the Quran in the first chapter of the Quran for more than one time. Every time we start reciting the Surah, we say  بسم ٳلله ٳلرحمن ٳلرحيم   which means “In the Name of Allah the Most Gracious the Most Merciful”. And we say,
 ٳلحمد لله رب ٳلعلمين ٳلرحمن ٳلرحيم  which is again, “All praises be to Allah, the Lord of the World, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful”. And when Muslims recite this, he witnesses the mercy of Allah and that’s why he seek for the mercy of Allah.

Allah says, “That My Mercy is spacious and it encompasses everything.“ (7:156) Everything means everything other than the Creator of the Heaven and the Earth. Everything shows the mercy of the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth.

In Saheeh Muslim, it is narrated that the Prophet SAW said, “Allah created 100 parts of mercy.  (This mercy is different than the attribute of Allah that He is the Most Merciful.)  And out of this 100 parts of mercy, He revealed only one part of it to this Earth. This one part of mercy presents in the nature of human being that he has the mercy to the other human beings, animals etc. and the Prophet SAW said, “Even when the camel lifts its foot so that it doesn’t hurt its offspring, this is one part of the mercy that is revealed on this earth. And Allah kept 99 parts of Mercy for the believers in the Hereafter.”  

From Sahih al-Bukhari (Book No 73, No 28), It was narrated that ‘Umar ibn al-Khattaab said: “Some prisoners were brought to the Messenger of Allaah SAW, and there was a woman among the prisoners who was searching (for her child). When she found her child she embraced him and put him to her breast. The Messenger of Allaah SAW said to us, ‘Do you think that this woman would throw her child in the fire?’ We said, ‘No, by Allaah, not if she is able not to.’ The Messenger of Allaah SAW said, ‘Allaah is more merciful to His slaves than this woman is to her child.’” Because He is the Most Merciful.

2.   But people mostly misunderstand that if this is the case, why would Allah would punish the disbelievers or the sinners in the Day of Judgment?  

This is because that the mercy of Allah is for those who subject themselves to the mercy of Allah, and He is the Most Just, and justice has to be served. Ibn Qayyim gave an example where he said  that one of the early generations of Islam, he was walking in a street and he saw a door open and  a mother  was yelling at her child and she kept him out of the house and she slammed the door behind him. And this child looks left and right and walks a bit and he doesn’t have any place to go. So he comes back to the door and knocks a bit, but his mother was angry like any other mother who gets angry to the child, but there is still a bit of mercy in her heart. And then when she did not open the door, he put his cheek on the ground and he slept. After a while, the love in the heart of the mother comes in place again, she opens the door to look for her child and she saw the child in such a place. So she carried him, and she went down to him, and she kept asking him why do you keep making me punish you? Why do you make me do this and do that when I love you and I care for you? This man from the early generation of Islam, when he saw this, he remembered the Hadith of the Prophet SAW, “it is the human being themselves, and they are the one who commits injustice to themselves.” As Allah says in the Quran, "They wronged Us not, but they did wrong themselves." (2:57)

Allah SWT is the Most Merciful. He calls them to His Mercy and He calls them to worship Him alone and He made everything easy for them to see that everything speaks for itself, that it is a sign of the Mercy of Allah, that it is all creations and all that show the power of Allah SWT are for them to turn to Him alone. But instead they chose to disobey Him and to worship to other than Him.

3.   What if someone thinks that he has done so much sin that he feels like he is out of mercy of Allah?

It would show the perfectness from the last revelation of Allah SWT and the perfectness of the Sunnah of Rasulullah SAW because it's the most perfect way of life. In Islam, no matter how much the person did evil, if he/she turns sincerely to the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, repenting and asking for forgiveness, the matter is over, they are forgiven, and not just that, the love of Allah SWT for them that was present before, they will get it all back, because He is al-Wadud, He is the Loving One. And this is the mercy of Allah SWT.

Compare this to the human being, if you are in a country or other place, and you commit any evil act, for example, you killed somebody, and then the authority came after you. You go to the court and you tell to the judge, please forgive me and I won’t do that again. The judge would say, justice has to be served, and if the judge forgives him, people would get onto the judge and he will be fired. And the normal human being would hate that so much because that will spread corruption. But the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, no matter how much a person falls into mistakes, if he turns to Him sincerely, the sins are forgiven.

The Prophet SAW gave us example where a man killed 99 human beings and he wanted to repent to Allah SWT. He went to a worshipper but he doesn’t have knowledge. And he asked him, would God forgive me? He said no you will not be forgiven. And this is the previous alteration to the books of Allah that people have this sense that once a person makes mistake, he's doomed, he's done. In Islam there is no such a thing. So the man, the serial killer, killed him too, as he thought he would not be forgiven, so he makes his killing 100. But then he still wants to repent and so he met a scholar who is knowledgeable, the scholar said, “Who would deprive you from repentance. God is the Most Merciful,  but go to so and so town because the people there, they are good people, live with them for your repentance to be accepted.” So he started to travel and on the way he died. The Angel of Death came to him and they had dispute whether the Angel of Mercy will take his soul or the Angel of Punishment would take his soul. Allah SWT who sent this angel is the most knowledgeable, so He asks the Angel to measure the distance between the two towns. If he is closer to the good town then the Angel of Mercy takes his soul; if the opposite then the Angel of Punishment will take his soul. And Allah made the earth in such a way that he made it close to the good town and as a result the Angel of Mercy took his soul (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 56 No. 676). So the point is and as mentioned in the Quran, the worst sins that ever committed which are associating partners with Allah, those who kill, those who commit zina, if they repent to Allah SWT sincerely, "Allah SWT will even replace their sins with good deeds." (25:70)

Allah calls the people of the Book (Christians and Jews) as disbelievers and called them back to repent. Allah mentioned in Surah al-Hadid, to the People of the Book,” O you who believe [in Musa (Moses) (i.e. Jews) and 'Iesa (Jesus) (i.e. Christians)]! Fear Allah, and believe too in His Messenger (Muhammad SAW), He will give you a double portion of His Mercy, and He will give you a light by which you shall walk (straight), and He will forgive you. And Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.”. (57:28)  Why? Because they believed in Moses (PBUH), they believed in Jesus (PBUH) and then they believe in the Prophet Muhammad SAW and if they corrected their believe, they will get double of the rewards because of the great mercy of Allah SWT.

4.    Is it true that the God is Merciful that He sends His son to die for the sins of the mankind?

i. What is the evidence of that? Allah says in the Quran, “Say Muhammad SAW, if Allah the Most Merciful had a son, I would be the first to worship him" (43:81). But this is not true and there is no evidence that says this is true.

ii. Why would the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, the one who is capable of all things, have to do that to forgive the human beings. It is as simple as they turn to Him alone, He forgives Him, and He is capable of all things. Why it has to be in a form of a show for people to have their sins forgiven? God is the Most Merciful and each person is responsible for their own actions. What happens to the people before Jesus PBUH, Ibrahim AS, what was his religion? Who did he worship? Was he born in a state of sin?  when he was the one that Allah chose to be one of the best messengers. So this notion and these stories have never been in the messengers before. Adam AS didn’t mention anything about that and even Jesus PBUH himself. So the matter is as clear to all the messengers, to all mankind that you should worship the Creator alone, turn to Him alone.

If you commit a sin, don’t go and confess to a human being as human being has deficiency.  Turn to the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth alone and He is the Most Merciful and He hears you and He sees you and He knows what is in your heart. Allah says in the Quran, “If My slaves ask you about Me, tell them I am close to them” (2:186). Eventhough there is so much saying in the Quran that means "say o Muhammad SAW",  that particular verse when they talk about the Oneness of Allah SWT, the word Qul is not there, so not even the Prophet SAW is an intermediary between us and Allah SWT.

5.   What if those who say that God has a son and then He send His son to die, then you say Allah is the Most Merciful and He can forgive, but they will say He's like a judge who just forgive but where's the justice, i.e. the justice when a person commits a sin.

God is the Most Merciful and He gives people time for them to return to Him, that's why we have a certain amount of time that we spend on the face of earth.

i.   If a person dies young before the age of puberty, then there's no sin on him even if he commits some evil deeds. This is because that he's not fully responsible for his actions.

ii.  If a person become insane, he's not responsible for his actions.

iii. So once a person is responsible for his actions, then it's the mercy of Allah that people would be given time for them to see for their own selves, the power of Allah for them to turn to Him alone. The message has been presented clearly to them and if they refuse it and then, they die in that state, they should not blame anyone but their own selves. They disbelieve in the One that is the Most Merciful. They did not subject themselves to the vastness of the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth. They chose to be the opposite. They chose to be disobedience and they chose to be sinners and die in that state.

iv.  So, as a result of that, if in the Day of Judgment, they are punished in the Hellfire and they won’t be punished out of injustice. Out of justice, if they are dealt with it, they will be punished in the Hellfire which is because that they did not worship the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth. They chose that. That's why Allah says in the Quran, "And certainly We sent before you messengers to their people, so they came to them with clear arguments, then We gave the punishment to those who were guilty; and helping the believers is ever incumbent on Us" (30:47). Without the messengers, if the message did not reach the people then they won’t be punished unless the matter is made clear to them".

6.   Tell us for those who might be calling other than the Allah and putting intermediary in between you and the creator

Allah SWT has mentioned in the Quran that many of the disbelievers, they had this argument that when they worship idols or images, they said that, “We do not worship them except that they would draw us closer to Allah.”(39:3) “We are not worshipping them in the sense that they are not the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth but we make them a step to get them closer to Allah”.

 And this was condemned in the Quran. Why? Because Allah SWT is the most perfect in His names and Attributes and as a result of that you don’t need any intermediaries between you and Him. He created you, He knows what is in your heart, He is the One that has The Mercy on you, hence, you don’t need another creation, you need the Creator, if you need something, you tell to the Creator, as the creation can never benefit you. 

So He orders us in the Quran and all the Messengers before, to call people to the worship of Allah alone. Allah says in the Quran," Surely, they have disbelieved who say: "Allah is the Messiah ['Iesa (Jesus)], son of Maryam (Mary)." But the Messiah ['Iesa (Jesus)] said: "O Children of Israel! Worship Allah, my Lord and your Lord." Verily, whosoever sets up partners in worship with Allah, then Allah has forbidden Paradise for him, and the Fire will be his abode. And for the Zalimun (polytheists and wrong-doers) there are no helpers." (5:72)

Even in Islam, some deviant sects among the Muslims fell in the same trap. They believe in the saints, they had people in the graves with Masjid built over the grave, and this people would go the pious man in the grave and they would tell him, O, so and so, do this for us. This is Shirk, associating partners with Allah. Or they would say O, so and so, make Allah forgives us. Allah clearly says in the Quran ,”if they ask you about Me, tell them that I am close to them” (2:186), so that they should turn to Him alone, asking Him alone, hence there is no such a thing as manipulation in the religion of Allah.

7.    Someone says that Allah is the Most Merciful, the Most Loving and says I love Allah in my heart and Allah loves me. I just don’t have time for the prayer; I don’t have time to do all these things that He asks me to do. What should we answer?

If a person is truthful in saying that he loves Allah and he loves the Most Merciful, then he would have obeyed Him. And this is the sign of the love. Allah says in the Quran, “Say that if you love Allah, (which everybody claims that), then follow me” (3:31), meaning follow the Prophet SAW, then Allah will love you. 

Nobody can plot against Allah SWT by only saying and not showing it through action. He did not order us to kill ourselves, to give up all of our wealth, to suffer; He just ordered us that to turn to Him alone. In all of our needs, that he prescribed a certain time for us to have this for us for our own benefits. He doesn’t benefit anything from our prayer. It is the human being that benefits himself in his worldly life that people would have a better conscious that God would help them in this life. The other reason is that we worship Allah and make the Solat for the Hereafter to fulfill the purpose of our creations and that is to worship the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth. This is the sign of the mercy of Allah that we only have to pray 5 times a day instead of the initial 50 prayers a day. In Sahih of Al-Bukhari, it mentioned "that five in actions will gain 50 in rewards". (Al-Bukhari Book 8, No 345) Hence if you do the five prayers, you will receive the rewards of  50 prayers in a day.

Once you are drifted away, it's time for you to come back as this is the purpose of your life. Everything that you do in between the prayers is only a mean, it’s not the goal. The goal of our existence in the face of earth is to worship Allah. When the people make the act of worship one day a week, and then they just follow their own desires for the whole week, they don’t remember the Allah, when He is the One who provides for them the health and the hearts beating by His power and the food. But they don’t remember him.

But when a person is doing the five daily prayers, and establish them in the most perfect way, and once he starts to drifting away, they know that it’s time to put all of these aside and repent to Allah alone, and make Sujud and prostrate to Him alone, and make doa and supplication and praises to Him alone. When you take this with you to the next prayer it will help you to be able to face the world with such heart that turns and submits to Allah SWT.

8.       How a person can be a part of the mercy and away from the sin.

You must know for sure that there is enemy which is the Shaitan and he is the one that wants you to stay in the state of sins. Allah calls u to repent to Him alone and there is a verse in the Quran that says,”O my slaves, those who transgress upon themselves (commit sins) do not give up on the mercy of Allah.” (39:53) If you give up on the mercy of Allah, and say I’m a sinner or He will never have mercy on me, this is a sin of itself.

And He said, "... ask for forgiveness for He forgives all sins.” (4:106)
It's so easy to repent. For those who had so much evil in their past, no matter how long that past was, no matter how close the death is, once you repent to Allah sincerely, you regret that you have sinned, you have the strong intention that you won’t do it again, and you quit the sin, all of that past, even if it's his whole life is already fixed.

And for the present and the future as we cannot control the future, our present is to submit to Allah, we fear him, we obey him and that would take us to the future until the moment of death where the person is in that state.

That’s why the main job of the human being is to be always in a state of returning to Allah and that is sincere repentance to Him. We are going to make mistakes, and we should keep going back to Him, follow up with the good deeds. And we should never leave the repentance no matter what the person do.