The Pillars of Kufr (Disbelief)
Ibn'ul Qayyim al-Jawziyyah Rahimahullâh1
The pillars of Kufr are four: Pride, envy, anger, and desire.
Submission prevents pride. Accepting advice and exhorting all efforts to accept it prevents envy. Justice prevents anger. Devoting oneself to worship prevents desire.
When the pillar of pride demolishes, submission becomes easy for him. When the pillar of envy demolishes, accepting advice and exhorting all efforts to accept it becomes easy for him. When the pillar of anger demolishes, justice and humility becomes easy for him. When the pillar of desire demolishes, patience, chastity, and worship becomes easy for him.
Removing mountains from their places would be easier than removing these four aspects from whoever was afflicted with them, especially if they have become solid attitudes, talents, and firm characteristics. This is because none of a person's deeds is upright with these and a person's soul will not be pure with the existence of these. Whenever a person endeavours in a deed, these four aspects will spoil it. All evil results from them. When they become deep-rooted in the heart, they show this person falsehood in the form of truth and truth in the form of falsehood, evil in the form of good and good in the form of evil. They bring this worldly life close to him and move the Hereafter far away from him.
When you pounder upon the Kufr (disbelief) of the nations, you will see that it originated from these four aspects, and the punishment occurred upon these aspects. The lightness and severity of the punishment will be according to their lightness and severity. Therefore, whoever opens these doors for himself; he opens all doors of sooner and later evils. And whoever closes them for himself; all doors of evil are closed for him. For verily, these aspects prevent submission to Allâh, devotion, repentance, penitence, accepting the truth and advice of the Muslims, and having humility to Allâh and His creation.
The origin of these four aspects is the person's ignorance pertaining to Allâh and himself. For verily, if he recognized his Lord with the perfect attributes and majestic qualities, and if he recognized himself with deficiencies and evils, he would not be pride, angry for himself, and he would not envy anyone for what Allâh granted them. This is because envy in reality is a way of showing enmity towards Allâh. Since this person dislikes the blessing of Allâh which He bestowed upon His servant while Allâh loves it, and such person loves for it to vanish while Allâh dislikes that. Thereby, the envious person is against Allâh in His judgments, destiny, love, and hate. That is why iblîs is the enemy of Allâh in reality, since his sin resulted from pride and envy.
Extirpating these two aspects is achieved through knowing Allâh, unifying Him, being pleased with Him and for Him, and turning to Him in penitence.
Extirpating anger is achieved through knowing oneself and knowing that it is not worthy of being angered and revenged for. This is because anger is preferring oneself by being pleased with it and being angry with its creator and originator. The most important thing to repel this evil is to accustom oneself to be angry for Allâh and to be pleased for Him. Whenever something from getting angry for Allâh and being pleased for Him enters the soul, its opposite which is getting angry for oneself and being pleased for oneself exits the soul, and likewise is the opposite.
As for desire, its cure is true knowledge and recognizing that giving the soul its desires is the greatest cause behind being deprived and obstructed from it, and that protecting it is the greatest cause to unite with them. Therefore, whenever you open the door of desires for your soul, you strive for them being deprived for your soul. Whenever you close the door of desires for your soul, you strive in the most perfect way for your soul to unite with them.
Anger is like a predatory animal; if its owner sets it free, it will eat him first. Desire is like fire; if its owner kindles it, it will burn him first. Pride is like a king quarrelling with his slave, if he does not destroy you, he will expel you. Envy is like showing enmity to the one who is more powerful than you.
The devil separates from the shade of whoever overcomes his desire and anger. And he separates his imagination from whoever has been overcome by his desire and anger.
1- Ibn'ul Qayyim, al-Fawâ'id, Atâ'ât'ul Ilm, 1/231-232.
