Matters of faith.

Lets suppose, there are three 20 years old guys namely Ali, Baber and Fahad who have never prayed regularly before, now decide to do so because they believe its better late than never. Irrespective of their reasons for praying, all three of them are determined and enthusiastic about praying. But each one of them decides a different approach to praying. Ali decides that he will try to pray all the obligatory rakat of the prayers, Baber decides to pray all the rakats of every prayer whilst Fahad decides to go easy on himself and take it slow and so decides to pray as many rakats of whichever namaz he can offer easily. All three of them begin together and do considerably well especially in the start, but as time passes, all of them find it difficult to follow through with their approaches, because it's hard to adapt to a new habit and predominately fight temptations. This is analogous to certain hijabis, some are like Ali who take it in all settings but sometimes keep it loose, some are like Baber who have immense will power and strength of faith so they take it regularly whilst others are like Fahad who take it in settings they are comfortable with, without pushing their limits for the fear of a rebound.

Nonetheless, what we need to realize is that all three approaches to praying and taking a hijab are commendable because of the intention behind it, because these people decided to step up their faith even with the looming fear of failure and most importantly judgmental looks and scornful comments. Every step however small, taken towards God matters! Nothing is insignificant in His eyes for He is the only one who knows of our capacity, our capabilities, our fears, our insecurities, our temptations and our intentions. We need to understand that not everyone can exercise the same level of will power and that just like how it's okay to fail in other aspects of life, it's okay to fail in taking a hijab or praying too. Not everyone is cut out for everything so just because something may be easy for you doesn't mean it is for others too. 

Besides, if cheating on a diet is okay then why cheating on a hijab or prayers isn't? Is it because hijab and prayers are for God whilst cheating on a diet is for oneself? Well if we truly believe that prayers and hijab are solely for God and not for any other being, then why do we fail to realize that only He should be the one to judge and not us? Who are we to tell with surety if a person will go to heaven or hell when we can't even tell whether we will take our next breath or not? Just because we see someone's struggle in faith doesn't give us the right to mock them or rather demotivate them. Furthermore, the sentiment that prayers and hijab aren't something to be taken lightly and so, we have to be stringent in taking it and can't leave it whenever we please, tends to do more harm than good. Because those who utter such sentences, without realizing, become the reason for someone not reaching out to his God, repenting for his sins and finding Him. I understand that matters of religion aren't something to play around with but what many a times people tend to forget before uttering such sentences is that they paralyze people with the fear of failure that it prevents them from even giving it a shot. 

Moreover, we need to be tolerant if not appreciative of everyone's efforts for they are striving in the path of God be it a women who wears a hijab along with an capri/ sleeveless dress, someone who doesn't pray regularly but keeps a beard, or someone who does all the wrongs but doesn't eat pork etc. for it's the little bit that counts. Why do we consider humans infallible when it concerns matters of faith? Abu Huraira reported: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “By Him in whose hand is my soul, if you did not sin, Allah would replace you with people who would sin and they would seek forgiveness from Allah and he would forgive them.” (Sahih Muslim). Never has once it been stated in any hadith or Quran that He wouldn't be Merciful if we repent or that humans will never sin or make mistakes. It's strange that we utter the line "In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Beneficent, before the commencement of every surah and act, yet, never believe it through and through.

Lastly, if He wouldn't forgive then Who will? A long time ago, I started believing that even if we repeat the same mistakes a hundred times but repent afterwards then He will forgive because He is The Most Merciful. Humans however, will never forgive neither for the mistakes involving them nor those that doesn't concern them. So to all those people who struggle in their faith, whichever one it is, the only piece of advice will be to always remember that He loves you more than anything and so He will forgive you for the gravest of the sins, which you can't forgive yourself for, the moment you repent. Because He is the Most Merciful. So let's learn to Love God than Fear Him, make as many botched attempts in the hope of being successful one day and take as many baby steps as we can.