Leave What Makes You Doubt for What Does Not: The Law Wants to Put Your Soul at Ease

Occasion: Transcription of a Fajr khatira delivered on July 13, 2026 Source: A transcription of a video khatira by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — Watch the original video on YouTube

Our Lord, set right for us our religion, our world and our Hereafter, prepare for us right guidance in our affair, and bless us, O Allah, in what You have provided us, protect us from the punishment of the Fire, and turn away from us the causes of punishment in this world and the Hereafter, through mercy, pleasure and generosity from You, O Lord of the worlds.

The Ḥadīth That Caught Up with Us

The plan was to take up another ḥadīth yesterday, and this guest caught up with us: the saying of the Prophet ﷺ: «دَعْ مَا يَرِيبُكَ إِلَى مَا لَا يَرِيبُكَ» (Leave what makes you doubt for what does not make you doubt). And in another narration he ﷺ says: «فَإِنَّ الْكَذِبَ رِيبَةٌ وَإِنَّ الصِّدْقَ طُمَأْنِينَةٌ» (For lying is doubt and truthfulness is tranquility), and in a narration: «فَإِنَّ الْخَيْرَ طُمَأْنِينَةٌ وَإِنَّ الشَّرَّ رِيبَةٌ» (For good is tranquility and evil is doubt), or as he ﷺ said.^[1]

A Ḥadīth Usually Approached from the Side of What Is in Hand

People mostly approach this ḥadīth from the side of the facts in hand: you have a doubt about this money, so leave it and turn to something else, and you have an issue in dealing with some matter, so there is no harm. One of the brothers asked me two days ago: I have a "plaza" that I rent to someone, then I was surprised that he sells alcohol after we had agreed on a restaurant, so what is the solution? And you find many such questions, and the mixing of truth with falsehood and good with evil is widespread. So the question is about what is in a person's hands and what he does with it, and the answer likewise. I put my money in the bank, do I take its profits or not? These are matters in which a fatwa is issued.

Another Aspect: The Prophet's ﷺ Concern for the Psyche of the One Dealing with Life

But from another aspect the Prophet's ﷺ concern for the psyche of the one dealing with the course of life appears, as though he ﷺ feels compassion for you psychologically, lest you fall into a stage of psychological hesitation and become distressed. You become distressed in your sleep: is my food lawful or unlawful? And you become distressed while eating the morsel: is this growing in me something that enters Paradise, or growing what belongs to the Fire and its causes? And we seek refuge in Allah, blessed and exalted, from that. And when one of us deals with the income that comes into his house, in its lawfulness and unlawfulness, there are many consequences, and it is narrated from him ﷺ: «كُلُّ جَسَدٍ نَبَتَ مِنْ حَرَامٍ فَالنَّارُ أَوْلَى بِهِ» (Every body that grew from the unlawful, the Fire is more fitting for it).^[3]

Imagine a person, in the example we gave, who receives a monthly return, we do not say a salary, from renting out this place, for example. And at every moment while he eats he pictures that part of this food is from that return, as though he is growing himself on the unlawful. What psychological pain a person remains in! So the summary: it is as though the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, when he calls us to some scrupulousness, wants to remove from within you all causes of psychological exhaustion. Never put yourself under pressure.

All of Legislation Wants to Give You Rest

If you looked, you would see that legislation, from its beginning to its end, wants to give your soul rest and set your mind at ease. This prayer of yours at the start of the day is a kind of purification of the self, emptying it and steadying it before you set out into the world of life. Imagine those who go to the beach, very careful about their faces and skin, so they apply protective lotion to their bodies before jumping into the water. It is as though the Fajr prayer does something like this for me: this emptying and inner self-restoration, then you set out into your life, then you return to the Ẓuhr prayer and rest a second time. You say: Praise be to Allah, I have no problems. ﴿مَالِكِ يَوْمِ الدِّينِ﴾ (Master of the Day of Recompense) ﴿إِيَّاكَ نَعْبُدُ﴾ (It is You we worship),^[4] I have no aim other than this. You may come from your work or your shop having lost in your trade, or you have a problem at work, or one of the children broke a dish, or some problem occurred, but you have returned to the Ẓuhr prayer: Allahu akbar. And between this and that you see Islam restoring the person inwardly in every detail of his life.

And the two verses we heard in the Fajr prayer are an antidote from Paradise: you hear the Noble Qur'an and sense the greatness of the Lord of the worlds, glorified and exalted be He, between the destinies of the people of faith and ﴿وَيَوْمَ يُعْرَضُ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا عَلَى النَّارِ أَلَيْسَ هَٰذَا بِالْحَقِّ﴾ (And on the Day those who disbelieved are exposed to the Fire: Is this not the truth?).^[2] This truth that you are in now, and others are not in it, the truth whose sweetness you enjoy while others are scorched by its fire, the truth whose fruit you see in your hands in this world as a righteous fruit of good children, and whose fruit in the Hereafter is a Paradise whose width is that of the heavens and the earth. Glory be to Him who legislated this for us.

From Numbers to Persons

The Prophet ﷺ says: «دَعْ مَا يَرِيبُكَ إِلَى مَا لَا يَرِيبُكَ». I will take this rule from its dealing with numbers and tangible things to its dealing with persons. The person who exhausts you psychologically, do not deal with him. Leave what makes you doubt for what does not make you doubt. I am not obliged to thrust myself into relationships that exhaust me inwardly.

And I once heard a sentence, when I started a job in which I had to study something of the science of management and how the world proceeds and the hiring of people, one of its famous sentences: the employee who makes you think about him for more than five minutes before you sleep, reject him. And I say: what makes him come to your mind before you sleep? Before sleep you are thinking of one of two things: either you are tired, or your wife is beside you and you two want to talk or do whatever, and you are free with one another, and this is lawful between you. So now what are you thinking about? The person in your life who makes you think of him before you sleep, remove him from your life entirely. It is as though the Messenger of Allah ﷺ is teaching me how to spare myself any kind of sleeplessness.

What Is the Meaning of "Rība" (Doubt)?

Then comes the narration: «فَإِنَّ الصِّدْقَ طُمَأْنِينَةٌ وَالْكَذِبَ رِيبَةٌ». What is the meaning of rība? Something that creeps within the self, you cannot see its features well, but you see its effect: something moving, you cannot seize it but you feel it. Do you know what we say in Egypt? "I feel a mouse is playing in my bosom." And among our brothers in Syria it is the same sentence. You cannot bring it out nor catch it, but you are apprehensive about some matter.

The Summary: Restore Yourself So You Enter Paradise Whole

The summary in this noble, blessed morning, full of good things through seeing these righteous, good faces: leave what makes you doubt for what does not make you doubt. The thing you feel will trouble you, set it aside from your life and do not occupy yourself with it. This world ends after a while, and its ending requires a righteous soul for entering Paradise. So restore yourself until it is ready to enter Paradise. Do not meet Allah, glorified and exalted be He, while your soul is worn out and tattered. Be strong enough that you can say to people: yes, stay in my life, I open my heart and my chest to you; and able to say: please, stop at this limit, with a kind word and a righteous sentence, and peace be upon you.

And our Messenger ﷺ teaches us not to exhaust ourselves inwardly, so pay attention to what is inside as you pay attention to what is outside. The greatest problem people fall into is that they care about the outward: I want a good brand, and a clean car, and a respectable house, and a plush bed, and everything you wear on your head or on your feet. But the real care is for the inside of the human being, that craft for which Allah, mighty and majestic, prepared a method for us. Whoever looks after his worship of Allah has safeguarded himself inwardly, and whoever cares about this world has safeguarded himself outwardly. Which wears out and which remains? The outward wears out and the inward remains. The body from the outside is eaten by the soil and what is in it, and the human being from the inside is safeguarded with every kind of honor.

I ask Allah, the Most High, the Almighty, for us and for you, the purification of souls, and the protection of minds and hearts.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: The ḥadīth "Leave what makes you doubt for what does not make you doubt" was narrated by al-Tirmidhī and al-Nasāʾī, and it is the eleventh ḥadīth of al-Arbaʿīn al-Nawawiyyah; what appears in the other narration is reported here according to what the speaker said. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: The verse is from Sūrat al-Aḥqāf (46:34), and the speaker limited himself to pointing to part of it, so it has not been completed in the body text. ^[3]: Editor's documentation: The speaker gave the wording without attribution; it is narrated with similar wordings and there is discussion about its chains among the ḥadīth scholars, so its documentation should be reviewed before publication. ^[4]: Editor's documentation: al-Fātiḥah: 4–5.