Between Prayers
Between Prayers  /  The Minor Sins That Aren't Minor

"O ʿĀ'ishah, beware of the deeds deemed insignificant, for they have a pursuer from Allah."

يَا عَائِشَةُ إِيَّاكِ وَمُحَقَّرَاتِ الأَعْمَالِ فَإِنَّ لَهَا مِنَ اللَّهِ طَالِبًا

Narrated from ʿĀ'ishah. Sunan Ibn Mājah 4243 (Kitāb az-Zuhd); graded ṣaḥīḥ by al-Albānī.

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In The Minor Sins That Aren't Minor

He warned ʿĀ'ishah about exactly this, and the warning is not the one we expect:

Muḥaqqarāt — the things made small. Not the things that are small, but the things we have shrunk. The word puts the diminishing on our side of the transaction.

And notice what he does not say. He does not say these deeds are secretly enormous. The lightness is granted. What is denied is the disappearance — fa'inna lahā min Allāhi ṭāliban, there is something that pursues them. They are followed. They are kept. Nothing about them is dropped for being too light to bother with.

"O ʿĀ'ishah, beware of the deeds deemed insignificant, for they have a pursuer from Allah."
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Qur'anic Arabic is reproduced in the Uthmani script. Hadith Arabic is reproduced from the published collections named above. The English is a rendering informed by widely used translations, offered as an aid to meaning and not a substitute for the Arabic. Verify what is cited, and consult people of knowledge on anything affecting practice.