ভূমিকা

The reason why the Qur’an has mentioned these three despised traits in this order is that the first trait (distrusting others) leads to one developing the second negative quality – prying into their private lives. Once a person has bad thoughts of another person, he would naturally begin to spy and scrutinize that person in regards to his actions.

Obviously, when one starts to spy and pry into others’ personal lives, he would not be able to prevent himself from speaking to others about what he has seen – in fact, he would openly and frankly discuss with others what he knows and thus, he would have no choice but to speak bad and back-bite them. It is because of this reason that the Qur’an mentions these three negative traits in the order that it has, so that the natural relationship between them is made clear.

In the previous discussions, more or less, the damage that being pessimistic in relation to others was discussed and at this point, we will discuss inquisitiveness or as the Qur’an calls it, spying on others.

Being inquisitive about the affairs of other people is a negative trait that brings about both ethical and societal harm which can be summarized in the following points: It was mentioned in our previous discussion that Islam has provided four types of security for the community of believers: a. Security of one’s life. b. Security of one’s property. c. Security of one’s honour and dignity. d. Security of one’s character and personality within the thoughts and minds of other people.

In addition, in one of his most comprehensive lectures on these four types of security, we see that the Noble Prophet of Islam (blessings of Allah be upon him and his progeny) had discussed these in detail.[^1] Societal Dangers Brought About by Prying into Others’ Lives 1.