what is faith (iman)? He (S) replied: It is to believe in Allah, His angels, His Book, meeting Him, His apostles, and the Unseen, and in Destiny as a whole. He said: You said the truth, adding: O Messenger of Allah, what is benevolence? He said: It is to fear Allah as if you are seeing Him, since if you see Him not He is verily seeing youetc. We discussed this hadith in details in our book Shaykh al-mudirah, so it is better to refer to it with reading what Dr. Taha Husayn stated about it.142 Abu Ayyub143 is reported to have said: A man came to the Prophet and said to him: Inform me what act I can do to bring me near the heavens, and distance me from the Fire. He said: You should worship Allah without taking anything a partner to Him, establish the prayers, and pay the zakat, and be kind to your relations. Then the Messenger of Allah said: If he heeds to what he was ordered to do he will verily enter paradise. In another narration by Ibn Abi Shaybah, (he [S] said): "If he heeds to it" Abu Hurayrah is reported to have said: A bedouin came to the Messenger of Allah and said to him: O Messenger of Allah, guide me to an act that when I do I can enter paradise. He (S) said: You should worship Allah without taking anything into partnership to Him, establish the prescribed prayers, pay the zakat, and fast the Month of Ramadan. The man said: By Whom in Whose hand is my soul, I shall neither add anything to this nor omit from it. After he left, the Prophet said: Whoever likes to look at a man from paradise inhabitants, he is asked to look at this man. In his comment on these traditions, al-Imam al-Nawawi said (in the very words):144 "Know that any reference to hajj (pilgrimage) was never made in hadith of Talhah or Gabriel hadith through narration of Abu Hurayrah. Besides, in some other traditions no reference was made to fasting (sawm), nor to zakat in some others. In some of them doing kindness to uterine relations was mentioned, and paying out the khums (one-fifth) in some others, while no any reference to iman (faith) was made in some others. So
142. Mir'at al-Islam, pp.211, 212. 143. His name is Khalid ibn Zayd al-Ansari. Refer to Sharh al-Nawawi 'ala Muslim, vol.I, p.172; Ibn Qutaybah's al-Ma'arif, p.119. 144. Op. cit., vol.I, p.215, margin by al-Qastallani.
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