Owning Our Mistakes

Owning Our Mistakes

Dear brothers and sisters, when we talk about the concept of tawbah, when we talk about the concept of repentance, there's a very famous hadith from the Prophet ﷺ where he said:

(Sunan Ibn Mājah, Hadith 4252; also reported by Ahmad)

That regret is repentance. And that doesn't mean that regret is the only ingredient of repentance — it means that regret is the fundamental ingredient of repentance. Because obviously it is not sufficient for a person to simply express regret and not to take any action after that regret. But you cannot take any meaningful step back towards Allah in your repentance unless you start off with النَّدَم — this idea of sincere regret.

Allah says in the Qur'an:

Those who, when they commit an act of shamelessness or they have wronged themselves, they remember Allah — فَاسْتَغْفَرُوا لِذُنُوبِهِمْ — and then they seek forgiveness from Allah, until the end of the ayah. So it starts off with that sense of acknowledgement, that sense of regret.

When Other People Are Involved

Now, obviously with the emphasis on tawbah, in the wake of our frequent debts to Allah, the emphasis on returning back to Him — regretting our mistakes and repenting — becomes a whole lot harder when other people are involved. Why? Because that requires us to swallow our pride as well, and that's harder for us to do as human beings.

It's easier for us to repent from a personal sin between us and Allah, knowing that we're not going to be shamed by Allah, we're not going to find the brokenness of our pride with Allah. But when it comes to owning up — the greater difficulty and tension is that a person will insist on their wrongdoing even if they know it's wrong, because they can't get over that barrier of pride.

This is why in relationships, when you talk about the argument impasse — I feel like acknowledging my wrongdoings will give you the upper hand or disrupt the proportionality. So I can't acknowledge my wrongdoings in a relationship, because if I do that then you're going to take advantage of that and you're going to claim the upper hand, the upper edge. So what do I do instead? I feel like we both did wrong, but you did more wrong, and until you acknowledge your wrong, I'm not going to acknowledge my wrong, and that will keep us a little bit even. So I'm going to continue to insist on my position. I'll use more "you" statements instead of "I" statements, and I'll continue to deflect with blame on you — and that's how marriages end, because the two parties cannot show that level of humility.

SubhanAllah, even the Prophet ﷺ — who is a prophet of Allah — if you want to talk about claiming authority, he could have in his relationships put his foot down and said, "I am the Messenger of Allah. We should stop this argument right now." This is how you kill any argument — "I am Rasulullah." But what did the Prophet ﷺ do? He demonstrated ihsan, excellence. So it has to be that way — that a person is willing to acknowledge some wrongdoing, some mistakes, and listen to the other perspective. And that takes a great deal of humility.

Two Sides of the Same Coin: Giving and Receiving Nasiha

Now there are different levels of acknowledging our mistakes or our wrongdoings in the midst of our interpersonal dealings. One of them is when someone gives us nasiha — when someone gives us advice — and we don't like that advice, or we don't like the person giving the advice, or we don't like the way the person is giving the advice. But nasiha is meant to help me own my own wrongdoings, to acknowledge and own my mistakes.

When it comes to that type of exchange, there are two sides of the same coin. The Prophet ﷺ mentioned kibr — he mentioned pride — as condemning people, looking down upon people, and then rejecting the truth.

The First Side: Playing God

The first side is the one offering the advice in a way that is a condemnation — with a judgmental attitude, with condescending behavior toward the other person. The Prophet ﷺ told us about two men from Bani Israel — two brothers. One of them was a sinner, the other one was an abid, a worshiper. One day they get into an argument, and the one that sins a lot says to the worshiper: "Did Allah send you as a watcher over me?" And what does the worshiper say to him? "Allah will not forgive you."

And what does the Prophet ﷺ say happened? Allah raised the two brothers up and said to the one who said that: "Who told you who I forgive and who I don't forgive? How dare you." That is a person playing God. You don't get to play Allah in your condemnations — or in your condemnation that is disguised as sincere advice. You don't play God. You leave that to Allah — that belongs to the divine — and you can give advice, but you don't offer that judgment.

The Second Side: Playing the Devil

The second side of that coin is not playing God — but it's playing the devil. Why? Because the Prophet ﷺ said, and this is an authentic hadith, that the most beloved of words to Allah are:

"Glory and praises be to You, O Allah. How blessed is Your name and exalted Your majesty, and there is no god but You."

And then he ﷺ said:

(Reported by al-Tabarānī; see also related narrations in Sunan Abī Dāwūd)

The worst words to Allah, the most angering words to Allah, is that someone says to another person, "Be mindful of Allah, fear Allah, think about what you're doing" — and the person responds: عَلَيْكَ بِنَفْسِكَ — "Mind your own business."

That's the other side of the coin — rejecting the truth because I don't like the person giving me the advice, or I don't like the way they're giving the advice, or I just don't like being advised. And the Prophet ﷺ said that's the worst type of person — that people don't even give the person advice anymore, اتِّقَاءً فُحْشِهِ — we don't want to deal with his mouth, let him run his mouth, let him ruin himself — but khalas, we don't want to talk to that person anymore, because they don't take advice.

And this is the behavior that Allah describes in the Qur'an:

When you say to a person, "Fear Allah, be mindful of Allah, think about what you're doing — I'm trying to help you fix your ways" — أَخَذَتْهُ الْعِزَّةُ بِالْإِثْمِ — that person is held captive by their sense of izzah. Izzah, by the way, is usually a good thing — it's dignity, it's honor. But there's a false sense of izzah which is just arrogance. It's not dignity and honor, it's pride. And so what do they do? They sin more. They reject the advice, and to make a point, they get worse — they go further and further and further in their oppression. And what's the other side? فَحَسْبُهُ جَهَنَّمُ — so that person, the only thing that's going to suffice them is Jahannam in the hereafter.

On the other side of that:

Right after that, what does Allah tell us? There are some people who have sold themselves in the pursuit of Allah's pleasure. And Allah is full of kindness to His servants. That person does not consider their nafs — their self — in the pursuit of mardaatillah, in the pursuit of Allah's pleasure. And so when they see anything that comes their way — pleasant or bitter — that can potentially bring them closer to Allah, they say: "You know what, I'll own it. JazakAllahu khayran. Thank you for helping me see."

As the saying goes: مَنْ أَهْدَى إِلَيَّ عُيُوبِي رَحِمَهُ اللَّهُ — may Allah have mercy on the one who shows me my faults. "Thank you for helping me see that. JazakAllahu khayran for pointing that out. Let me acknowledge my wrongdoing. That person's wrongdoing will be between them and Allah on the Day of Judgment — I don't want to be destroyed by my own wrongdoing on the Day of Judgment."

مَن يَشْرِي نَفْسَهُ — that person has no nafs. They sold themselves in the pursuit of Allah's pleasure. The other person is captive to their nafs, captive to their pride — and so they don't hold themselves accountable.

How This Plays Out: Oppression and Personal Sin

The Oppressor Who Cannot Hear

There are a few ways in which this transpires. The first is with oppression — with zulm, with tyranny. And this is, by the way, the context of these verses in Surah Al-Baqarah — in regard to zulm: these people who are spreading fasad, corruption on earth, hurting people, consuming people's wealth. And they're taking pride in it — they're seeing the pain that they're causing, and they're high-fiving each other, being grown in their kibr, in their pride.

With tyranny, with an oppressor, with a zalim — and I'm talking about in our own interpersonal relationships — people start to backbite and gossip about one another, and then people start laughing at it, and they egg one another on. When you have your foot on someone else's throat, or you are taking away their honor and their wealth and oppressing them — and someone tells you to fear Allah — you smell blood. And like a shark, SubhanAllah — the human being truly, as Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, rahimahullah, said — a human being has the capacity to be a devil or an angel. We become grown in tughyan, in oppression. We smell blood. So you go further and further and further. You have cheerleaders. And because you have cheerleaders, you can't hear your own conscience anymore. You can't hear your sincere critics anymore, because you're winning.

And what did the Prophet ﷺ say — a scary hadith, by the way:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 4686; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2583)

Allah lets the oppressor grow and grow and grow — until when Allah grabs that person, He never releases him. The person feels like they're winning — they have the upper hand, they've got the support, they've got the power to do this and that. Their arrogance grows, their pride grows. Then Allah snatches that person, and never releases them again.

The Personal Sinner Who Won't Be Told

When it comes to personal sin — when someone gives you sincere advice, loving advice — a person insists upon that sin. Why? Because I don't want to be told I'm doing something wrong. Every type of advice toward me is an attack on me. And that's how we start to interpret things. Everything that comes my way is an attack. Everyone that says anything mildly critical is trying to destroy me. And so my immediate tendency is to defend, deflect.

And SubhanAllah, that's why the Prophet ﷺ warned us about the belittling of sins. You insist upon these sins. Why? Because I don't want people to think that I gave this up just because this person said I should give it up.

I've had people on Hajj with me that had a turn of heart, a change in their lives, and they're about to go home — and they're thinking: "But if I change this, or if I give this up, or if I start talking differently, dressing differently, walking differently, doing things differently — they're going to say, 'Oh, that person went to Hajj and did this. We've been telling them to do this all along. Alhamdulillah, they finally listened.' I don't want to give the satisfaction to those people."

That's not how it works. Why? Because you're seeking mardaatillah — the pleasure of Allah. So your personal accountability is not driven by success in this life. It's not driven by winning something in this life. It's driven by meeting Allah with a clear conscience, and with a sincere effort to meet Him clean.

The Hadith of True Honor

I'll end with this hadith, dear brothers and sisters. The Prophet ﷺ said in the hadith from Abu Hurairah, radiyAllahu ta'ala anhu:

(Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2588)

Wealth is not decreased by a person spending it in charity. And Allah does not increase a servant in pardon and forgiveness except for — look at the word — izzah, glory. Even if it's temporary humiliation, Allah increases them in izzah, in true izzah — al-izzah al-mahmoodah — the praiseworthy form of dignity, not the false one that the hypocrite continues to insist upon.

And the Prophet ﷺ used it in the same capacity as your charity: you might see the numbers on your bank account decrease, and you might feel like you're giving up — but you're not. You're actually increasing the barakah of your wealth. The same thing with your honor. When you humble yourself, when you increase in forgiveness, Allah grows you.

And the Prophet ﷺ finished: وَمَا تَوَاضَعَ أَحَدٌ لِلَّهِ إِلَّا رَفَعَهُ اللَّهُ — and no one lowers themselves for Allah except that Allah elevates them.

May Allah allow us to be a people that seek His pleasure in all things, that own their mistakes, that seek forgiveness from Allah, that reconcile with the people, and that seek glory from Allah. May Allah do away with pride so that it does not destroy us in this dunya or in the akhirah.

Indeed, Allah commands justice, excellence, and giving to relatives, and He forbids immorality, wrongdoing, and oppression. He admonishes you that perhaps you will be reminded. So remember Allah — He will remember you. Be grateful to Him for His blessings — He will increase you. And the remembrance of Allah is the greatest thing. And Allah knows what you do. And establish the prayer.