Tradition

إيّاكَ وَ ما تَعْتَذِرُ مِنْهُ فَانَّ الْمُؤْمِنَ لا يُسِيىءُ وَ لايَعْتَذِرُ وَ الْمُنافِقُ كُلَّ يَوْم يُسِيىءُ وَ يَعْتَذِرُ

Imam al-Husayn (‘a) is narrated to have said: “Do not perform bad actions, for then, apologizing will be an inevitable consequence. This is because a believing person performs neither bad actions, nor does he apologize (as a consequence of his bad action). Yet, the hypocrite performs bad actions and seeks pardon every day.”1

Brief Commentary

It is possible for every individual to make mistakes but the people of faith and the hypocrites have a critical difference in this regard. This difference is that the believers strive to make less mistakes so that they will not have to keep making amends because they realize that apologizing is only a second best after having committed a mistake. One of the marks of the believers is someone who quickly learns and does not keep making mistakes; this is also in line with the issue of faith where one’s inner reality is the same as their outer reality. Therefore, if they are pure internally, then this will reflect clearly on their behavior as well.

• 1. Taken from the book: Tuhaf al-’Uqul, p. 177.