The relationship between deeds and faith Any arbitrary act...

The relationship between deeds and faith Any arbitrary act is either deserving and in line with one’s faith or undeserving and contradictory to it; the former strengthens the faith and makes one’s heart brighter while the latter weakens the faith and darkens the heart. Therefore, any good deed committed by a believer will not only originate from his faith but will also strengthen and stabilise it, paving the way for other good deeds.

The effect of good deeds on the perfection of one’s faith can be understood from the following verse: “To Him ascends the good word, and He elevates righteous conduct” (Fātir:10) Provided that the subject pronoun refers to (al-‘amal al-sālih) (righteous conduct) and the object pronoun refers to al-kalām al-tayyib (good word).

In the same way, in a number of verses, the Holy Qur’an maintains that the promotion of belief, enlightenment, and guidance in good-doers is the consequence of their good deeds (Refer to: Āl-‘Imrān:172, al-Anfāl:2, al-Tawbah:124, al-Kahf:13, Maryam:76, al-Ahzāb:22, Muhammad:17).

However, if opposing motives appear against the requisites of faith and if they lead to undeserving acts and one’s level of faith is not high enough to prevent them, faith will begin to weaken and this in turn will pave the way for the repetition of sin. The continuation of this process will lead to greater sins and their repetition, and this will eventually threaten the essence of faith and (May I ask for God’s shelter) convert into disbelief or hypocrisy.

The Holy Qur’an in relation to those who ended up as hypocrites’ claims: “So He caused hypocrisy to ensue in their hearts until the day they will encounter Him, because of their going back on what they had promised Allah and because of the lies they used to tell” (al-Tawbah:77) The Holy Qur’an states elsewhere: “Then the fate of those who committed misdeeds was that they denied the signs of Allah and they used to deride them” (al-Rūm:10) Similarly, in many verses, the Holy Qur’an discusses the increase of disbelief, darkness, and hard-heartedness in the sinners (See: al- Baqarah:10, Āl-‘Imrān:90, al-Nisā:137, al-Maidah:68, al-Tawbah:37, al-Isrā’: 60,82, al-Saff: 5,9,24).