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Doing Shirk Unknowingly
Islam is very strict against shirk. To worship someone other than God is a big crime and the person is doomed to eternal hell for this.
My question is non muslims who idolaters or mushriks doesn’t know the gravity of this Sin. I mean it is totally rational that there can be only 1 god but still they do it without knowing where it is Going to lead him ie eternal hell. Murder and Oppression are also going to lead to eternal hell but humans know the gravity of this sin. We don’t need revelation for this because God has inspired us two ways but when it comes to shirk we don’t have this natural inspiration regarding its evilness. So my question is shirk still unforgivable if someone doesn’t know the consequences or understand it’s gravity or doing it knowingly.
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10 Replies
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Doing Shirk Unknowingly
updated 1 year, 5 months ago
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Shirk or polytheism is violation to human nature. Without having guidance from God, human can think that their might be one or more creator, but they can never be in a position to assert that they are more than one creator or administrator of this world. In fact, this assertion is the blame on the polytheist. They can’t justify it, why they believe in more than one god, who told them so. That is why they are blameworthy.
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The forgiveness is not based on having / not having knowledge of the gravity of a particular sin, instead, it is based on person’s knowledge, resources and use of that knowledge and resources in a particular situation. Quran says:
وَأَنزَلْنَا إِلَيْكَ الْكِتَابَ بِالْحَقِّ مُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ مِنَ الْكِتَابِ وَمُهَيْمِنًا عَلَيْهِ فَاحْكُم بَيْنَهُم بِمَا أَنزَلَ اللّهُ وَلاَ تَتَّبِعْ أَهْوَاءهُمْ عَمَّا جَاءكَ مِنَ الْحَقِّ لِكُلٍّ جَعَلْنَا مِنكُمْ شِرْعَةً وَمِنْهَاجًا وَلَوْ شَاء اللّهُ لَجَعَلَكُمْ أُمَّةً وَاحِدَةً وَلَـكِن لِّيَبْلُوَكُمْ فِي مَآ آتَاكُم فَاسْتَبِقُوا الخَيْرَاتِ إِلَى الله مَرْجِعُكُمْ جَمِيعًا فَيُنَبِّئُكُم بِمَا كُنتُمْ فِيهِ تَخْتَلِفُونَ
Then [O Prophet!] We have revealed to you this Book with truth in corroboration of the Book before it, and standing as a guardian over it. Therefore, give judgement among them according to the guidance revealed by God, and do not yield to their whims by swerving from the truth revealed to you. For each of you, We have ordained a shariah that is a line of action. Had God pleased, He could have made of you one community: [but he did not do this] because He wanted to try you by what He has blessed you with. So, try to outdo one another in good deeds. To God shall you all [one day] return. Then He shall disclose upon you all your differences. (Quran 5:48)
Shirk which is unforgivable is the one which a person commits consciously as Shirk. Therefore, if someone is knowingly committing Shirk after consciously reaching to this decision that Shirk is the only true religion, then that is the kind of shirk which is unforgivable, becasue there is no basis available to reach this conclusion and it would tantamount to establishing a lie/blame unto God.
Secondly, this is not true that gravity of Shirk is not known to Humans as opposed to gravity of evil deeds. Quran makes it very clear that just like good and evil, monotheism had also been ingrained in human nature through ehd-e-Alast.
Please refer to the video in the following link which includes a very insightful discussion on polytheism:
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Please also refer to the video below from 1:45 to 28:35
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@UmerQureshi brother but i remember that i asked a similar question that knowledge of gravity of sin affects someone’s punishment accordingly or not and @Irfan76 replied that it is an aspect of Allah’s justice that, a person’s situation, condition is kept in mind in their punishment and even in the Hadd punishment it is also considered, like in the punishment for slaves for Zina. So Allah would also keep aspects of justice for it surely and judge us accordingly. As they said in this thread
Discussion 73520 • Reply 73611
So my question is that if a person knows that something is sin, but is totally unaware of the HUGE gravity of the sin, and thinks it to be a small sin, then acts accordingly, then how would he be punished with that same HUGE punishment, That is same for the one who understood it to be something to earn ETERNAL HELL. And by saying that he is unaware, i do not mean that some knowledge of it came to him and he realized it but did not pay heed to it. By being unaware i mean that not knowing the HUGE gravity by his straight abilities.
Like for example a Man borns into an isolated, cut off tribe of Papua new guinea’s Islands, and is unaware of Islam, Christianity, and other religions and not connected to outer world. And according to his Fitrah, he understands that telling a lie is not right, or slapping someone without reason is not right, and by noticing signs of day and night and other natural phenomena with it’s precision, he understands that there is a creator and He is one. And to associate something with Him is not right, but he thinks places that thing in the same category of gravity as lie is not right, slapping is not right. And then he does all 3 of them thinking them to be of this much gravity. Then why would those 2 acts (slapping and lying won’t earn him eternal hell, even though he understands with his Fitrah for them to be wrong, but he earns eternal hell for the other thing (shirk) which he knew it to be wrong but understood it to be of the same gravity but here he earns ETERNAL HELL.
We know very well! And it is very strongly evident that deterrence and knowing the consequences and gravity of a thing, effects deeply how a person becomes sensitive to something and also how he acts on that thing. If someone knows that something is of very small margin error then naturally he would be less sensitive to it, as compared to something he knows will earn him such great pain of eternal hell, then a person would be even scared to do that thing in his dreams.
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Every individual will be given the opportunity to put forward his or her excuses. If the excuses are valid, God will give them concession, otherwise not.
We read in the Quran in Surah Maida, that the misguided Christians who lost true guidance and believe in the Trinity can be excused, rather will be given favous, if they were truthful in their beliefs. See verses 5: 116 onwards.
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@irfan76 sir so if this can be said that if a person was in a truthful way, but due to some human error went into misguidance then his misguidance won’t be counted, so similarly if a person gets to know of a sin, but with a genuine error could not understand the gravity of that sin, and genuinely thought it to be a small sin, so that sin would only be counted to the margin of how much he understood the gravity of the sin. Like for example a person, who genuinely couldn’t understand the severity of shirk, and to him it was of similar gravity thing like slapping a man or saying a lie to someone, then he would be only judged according to how much he dared to cross the limit, and according to it, he may be forgiven with some punishment (little punishment for understanding it is wrong, and forgiveness because he genuinely couldn’t understand the gravity of it, and to him it was same like slapping someone)
But sir we also see that Allah in Quran says that he does not forgive Shirk. So can it be said that this Shirk that is mentioned here is when someone was well aware of it being sin and well aware of how much gravity is of this crime, but still chose it. So for him there’s no forgiveness at all. Can you explain both aspects?
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Again, the validity of such excuses is to be judged by God. God is just. When he says, He will not forgive Shirk, it obviously means Shirk knowingly. Not only shirk but murder and other transgressions of God’s Hudood incur the same displeasure to announce the same punishment. See for example the verses:
4: 93
4: 13-14
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@irfan76 okay sir so by meaning knowingly, it means that not only knowing that it’s wrong but fully knowing the gravity of this wrong and the consequences of it. And how huge of a crime it is
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yes. and willful negligence is no excuse.
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@irfan76 Okay sir thank you now it’s clear, because i also think that just knowing the gravity and consequence of something, is in itself a huge aspect in being far from it and as a deterrent
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