Wronging Oneself and the Overpowering of Wretchedness: ‹Do Not Place Me Among the Wrongdoing People›

Occasion: Transcription of a Fajr khatira delivered on 7 September 2026 Source: A transcription of a video khatira by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — Watch the original video on YouTube

The Doctor opened his khatira with blessings upon our master and Prophet Muḥammad ﷺ, and upon his family and Companions, and then supplicated: O Allah, we ask You for well-being in our first things and our last, and we ask You for concealment in all our affairs, and we ask You to preserve for us what You have entrusted to us of good. O Allah, amen, O Lord of the worlds.

Glory be to Allah! You hear in the recitation the Lord of the worlds, Glory be to Him, teaching His Prophet ﷺ to supplicate by saying: ﴿رَبِّ فَلَا تَجْعَلْنِي فِي الْقَوْمِ الظَّالِمِينَ﴾ (“My Lord, do not place me among the wrongdoing people”).^[1] And people look at this sentence and one of them imagines that a person must be joined to an army, or a banner, or a ruler in order to be among the wrongdoing people. But the prohibition is broader than that: there is individual wrongdoing and there is societal wrongdoing; a person's wronging of himself, his wronging of his household, his wronging of his neighbors, and his wronging of those around him. And the picture that comes to mind is that you seize money or something material from people, but the kinds of wrongdoing are many.

And the point of the talk, in the briefest terms: “My Lord, do not place me…” — I am not speaking about wrongdoing in itself, but about the patterns and kinds of wrongdoers: do not place me among the wrongdoing people. So how does a person keep himself from being a wrongdoer?

Linking the Sentence to Another Sentence

Imagine that you link this sentence with another sentence: ﴿قَالُوا رَبَّنَا غَلَبَتْ عَلَيْنَا شِقْوَتُنَا﴾ (“They will say: Our Lord, our wretchedness overcame us”).^[2] Stop at it alone in the flow of recitation, and reflect on the state of a person in the depths of prison, sentenced to life, for example, looking at what he did, and finding that he killed someone or usurped money or did such and such, then he reviews himself: why me? Why did this outcome happen? And he sees nothing but that his desire moved him, or his lowliness moved him, or his greed alone, for example. And they said: “my wretchedness overcame me.” And wretchedness does not express these things alone; it is as though he was wretched when he did not listen to the voice that came to him from above, and as though he was wretched when this self prevailed and overran the movements of the body, the mind, and the feelings, and drove him to a certain line of conduct and behavior, so that he became as he is. ﴿رَبَّنَا غَلَبَتْ عَلَيْنَا شِقْوَتُنَا﴾ (“Our Lord, our wretchedness overcame us”): the wretchedness of every person is in his brain and in his heart.

Where Are We Heading, and What Moves Us?

What moves a person? In states of anger, a person sees himself at his best in decision-making, in speed and accomplishment, but regret follows afterward. And in states of desire, when we hear the saying: “Desire, or lust, is blind, it does not see, deaf, it does not hear,” then if a person gains mastery over a desire, prevails over it and wants to seize it, there is no room for an adviser. So what prevails at this moment? The wretchedness of the human being: ﴿رَبَّنَا غَلَبَتْ عَلَيْنَا شِقْوَتُنَا﴾ (“Our Lord, our wretchedness overcame us”).

So between a person's wronging of himself, the wretchedness that overpowers him, and the Fire in which he ends, there is a line of travel in thought that we want to perceive clearly as we step through our lives. Whoever has grasped the Hereafter and known Paradise and tasted the flavor of its description has drawn for himself a line that reaches it. And whoever has not grasped this goal has become, in life, a random wanderer, stumbling between a self that commands, a devil that whispers, a companionship that seduces, and so on, until he sees himself in wretchedness, then sees himself crowded into the company of these wrongdoing people.

O Allah, take us by our forelocks to what pleases You, guide us to You, guide us to Your straight path, do not entrust us to ourselves, and do not try us with what ends badly in this world.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: The verse is in Sūrat al-Muʾminūn: ﴿قُل رَّبِّ إِمَّا تُرِيَنِّي مَا يُوعَدُونَ ۝ رَبِّ فَلَا تَجْعَلْنِي فِي الْقَوْمِ الظَّالِمِينَ﴾ [al-Muʾminūn: 93–94]. The sūrah is not named in the transcript. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: The verse is from the words of the people of the Fire in Sūrat al-Muʾminūn: ﴿قَالُوا رَبَّنَا غَلَبَتْ عَلَيْنَا شِقْوَتُنَا وَكُنَّا قَوْمًا ضَالِّينَ﴾ [al-Muʾminūn: 106]; the speaker confined himself to saying: “Our Lord, our wretchedness overcame us.”