Page 52 - Perfected Faith

50
PERFECTED FAITH

believers is truly exemplary and unique. This compassion is accom-
panied by humane qualities such as self-sacrifice, considerateness,
forgivingness, love and respect. People of perfected faith recognize
any material, physical or spiritual needs of others even before they
express them, and lose no time in meeting these needs, due to the
deep compassion they feel for them. As is in every other subject, our
Prophet (saas) set the best example with the moral perfection he dis-
played in terms of compassion and mercy. The mercy and compas-
sion our Prophet (saas) felt for Muslims is described in the verse as
follows:
A Messenger has come to you from among yourselves. Your suf-
fering is distressing to him; he is deeply concerned for you; he
is gentle and merciful to the believers. (Surat at-Tawba, 128)
As is seen in the above verse, the mercy and compassion our
Prophet (saas) felt for believers was so profound that their suffering
greatly distressed him. This is the understanding of compassion for
which people of perfected faith strive.

The Self-sacrifice of The People of Perfected Faith
Only fearing Allah and having faith in the hereafter lead one to make
sacrifices without expecting any reward in return; the God fearing ex-
pect their rewards only from Allah. For this reason, unlike those who
pay no heed to the values of religion, those of perfected faith make no
distinction between people or issues while making a sacrifice.
In an unenlightened society, however, the majority of the people
lack a subtle understanding of sacrifice. The major reason is their self-
ishness, which is a character trait that originates from being distant
from the values of Islam. In a society distant from the values of reli-
gion, everyone is chiefly or is solely concerned with himself and sim-
ply ignores the needs and priorities of others.
The attitude of a man of perfected faith is again entirely different; he
is, above all, someone who has purified his self of such base desires.