Revenge

OmegaZero said...
I dont know if this is the place to ask this but i need to know...if a person wants revenge for the things done to him, it is still wrong to carry it out?

AsSalamu'alaykum wa Rahmatullah wa Barakatuhu OmegaZero,

Insha'Allah, I pray you are well. I'm simply a blogger and wayfarer, but I can share something of what I have read:

Sayyidina Ali (may Allah honor his face) was fighting a kafir in one of the battles. During the battle Sayyidna Ali knocked him down and raised his sword to kill him. As soon as the kafir knew that he was going to be killed he spat in Sayyidna Ali's face, so immediately Sayyidna Ali left him and went on his way. He was later asked, "Why did you leave him when Allah clearly gave you power over him?!" Sayyidna Ali replied, "I was fighting him for the sake of Allah, and when he spat in my face I feared that if I killed him it would have been out of personal revenge and spite." Therefore, the understanding of jihad is to establish the means for the guidance and salvation of the kuffar, not merely to just fight them. Fighting them happens in a few cases, and the goal behind it is to save others from the oppression of the ones who are preventing the guidance from spreading. We do not fight out of revenge and spite. The Muslim doesn't fight because the kafir is my (personal) enemy, because the kafir is conspiring against me, because the kafir has killed and slaughtered other Muslims. The Muslim fights the kafir because he has prevented and has become a barrier for the guidance to reach others. Again, the Muslim doesn"t fight out of revenge and only because the enemy has killed other Muslims. Think about what is being said deeply!
-Habib Ali on Jihad in the Way of Allah (applies to revenge in general)

The example from Sayyiduna 'Ali (May Allah ennoble his countenance) is often cited to illustrate to us the seriousness with which the early Muslims and gnostics treated the impulse for revenge -- and how they took great care to avoid ever acting on that impulse. In this is a great lesson for us to avoid acting out revenge or taking the law into our own hands. Revenge can really harden the heart and this is the opposite of our purpose in life.

A good book to read is: Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart, translation and commentary by Shaykh Hamza Yusuf. The accompanying tape set is also excellent.

Shaykh Hamza`s Content of Character is also excellent, as is Sufism and Good Character, translated by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani

Ultimately, the best way to rid oneself of such states of the heart is to take a spiritual path in which one`s Shaykh systematically helps ones purify the heart.

Also see this video by Shaykh Hamza on ethics.

And Allah Alone gives success.

Wassalam,
Salikah