Allah blessed me with the opportunity to listen to Shaykh Yasir Qadhi, who specializes in Aqeeda, speak about shirk. Here’s what he said.
Question: What happens if you’re Muslim and you’ve committed shirk?
Answerer: Shaykh Yasir Qadhi
In the Qur’an, in many places, Allah says shirk is unforgivable.
Translation: Surely Allah does not forgive that anything should be associated with Him, and forgives what is besides that to whomsoever He pleases; and whoever associates anything with Allah, he devises indeed a great sin. (Surah Nisaa, verse 48)1, 2
Notice Allah says he “forgives what is besides that”–that means any sin is potentially forgivable. Subhanallah.
So what happens if you’re Muslim, and you commit an act of shirk? Does it destroy all your good deeds? Are you doomed to enter Jahannam, may Allah protect us all from that?
“Allah does not forgive [shirk]” means Allah will not forgive the person if he doesn’t repent. Repentance wipes out every sin, without exception. Many sahaba (may Allah be pleased with all of them) were mushrikoon when they accepted Islam.
The point is, if you commit shirk and die without repenting, Allah will not forgive you. If you fornicate, drink alcohol, consume interest, steal, and you repent afterward, Allah will forgive you inshaAllah. If you don’t repent from those sins and you die, Allah may forgive you. With shirk, if you die with it unrepented, Allah will not forgive you.
The Prophet (صلي الله عليه وسلم) saught refuge from shirk and taught us a wonderful du’a to protect ourselves:
Allaahumma innee ‘aoothu bika an ushrika bika shaiann wa anaa a’lamu, wa astaghfiruka limaa laa a’lamu.
Translation: O Allah, I seek refuge in You lest I associate anything with You knowingly, and I seek Your forgiveness for what I know not.
Source: The collection of Ahmad. You can find the du’a in Fortress of a Muslim. You can find more details more in the comments inshaAllah.
May Allah protect us all from the evil of shirk, and allow us to live and die as true Muslims.
(1) Shakir, trans. “An-Nisaa (Women).” USC-MSA Compendium of Muslim Texts. USC-MSA. 16 Mar. 2006 <http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/quran/004.qmt.html>.
(2) Pickthall, Muhammad M., trans. Al-Qur’an Al-Kareem: Parallel Arabic text with English Translation. One Ummah Network. 28 Dec. 2005 <http://www.oneummah.net/quran/quran.html>.
(3) Yasir Qadhi. Lecture. AlMaghrib. Light of Guidance. University of Toronto, Toronto. March 2006.
The dua against Shirk/ Riyaa is in Fortress of the Muslim p. 152.
The transliteration they have (and it makes a small difference) is as follows:
Allaahumma “innee “a’oothu bika “an “ushrika bika wa “anaa “a’lamu, wa “astaghfiruka limaa laa “a’lamu
” = Hamza/ Alif sound
‘ = 3ayn sound
Translation
O Allah, I seek refuge in You lest I associate anything with You knowingly, and I seek Your forgiveness for what I know not.
Reported in Ahmad, 4/403. See also Al-Albani, Sahihul-Jami’ As-Saghir 3/233 and Sahihut-Targhib wat-Tarhib 1/19
“With shirk, if you die with it unrepented, Allah will not forgive you.”
I would add a condition to this -
“If you die knowingly committing shirk and unrepented, Allah will not forgive you” – http://63.175.194.25/index.php?QR=1244&dgn=3&ln=eng (What is the ruling of those who did not hear about Islam)
Allahu Alem
I love the way you have described the Shirk and forgiveness argument. Many people including myself used to believe shirk was unforgivebale. I think people understand it to be that even after repentence its not forgivable. But ofcourse that is onyl if you die on shirl without repenting. May Allah save us from such major sins and make us good muslims and sucessful in this life and the hereafter. Ameen
may allah help us to follow the right path.shirk is unforgivable.it should be.otherwise allah wouldnt have created jahannam.In jahannam there will be 7 layers.the deepest layer pharaoh and the hypocrites.2nd layer deepest layer those who commit shirk.lowest layer the muslim sinners.
@ruksar, that is not correct. Shirk IS forgivable. Although Allah says that he does not forgive shirk, this means shirk that a person dies on without repenting. If you repent, Allah will forgive ANY sin, even shirk. Among the proofs are:
1) The hadith of the Prophet (S) that “Didn’t you know Islam wipes out [the sins] what came before it?” when a sahabi said he would only accept Islam if Allah forgave his sins.
2) That the sahaba, radiallahu ‘anhum ajma’een, entered Paradise. They were mushrikeen in the days of old. How would they entire Paradise after 10, 20, 40, 60 years of shirk if Allah didn’t forgive shirk?
3) There are companions who only took shadah and died, and entered Paradise; how, if shirk is unforgivable?
I suggest you study this topic more deeply; you can check islam-QA, or take Light of Guidance by AlMaghrib, or listen to Kitab At-Tawheed on AudioIslam.com.
Regarding Jahannam, the bottom-most layer is for the munafiqeen, the layer above that is for the mushrikeen, and above that, Allah knows best. This is proven in the Qur’an and authentic sunnah and the proofs are many.
Also, it’s authentically proven that even Muslims who sin (which include commiting shirk, provided they are actually still Muslims) will eventually be removed from Hellfire.
Wallahu ‘alam.
May AllAH SWT Bless and guide us all.Ameeeen.
Jazakallah. The above article has really helped me alot :D.
Esselamu alaykumu,
Thank you very much for this information brother/sister.