Deceptive piety..

Ramadhan dawns upon us and I think about these words of my Shaykh,

“We begin to practice a few good deeds and then begin to think to ourselves that we are pious. The reality however is that we continue to be involved in many major sins. Shaytaan encourages us to remain in this deception of piety and does not allow us to even think about our sins and weaknesses.”

The main thing I must make myself realise is that I can accumulate lots of good deeds during this blessed month but a simple act such as backbiting someone will make it ALL go down the drain in a matter of seconds.

So as I address myself, I share with you also, the fact that we need to be careful not to sin at all in this month, and other months, because it will mean all these forms of worship we build up will simply evaporate.

One of the biggest forms of worship I intend to carry out is to do whatever my mother says and straight away. Obviously we should do this all the time but in Ramadhan we get preoccupied with our other ‘ibadah and we do get easily annoyed, what with the hunger and all. But remember that helping anyone is in itself a great reward.

By the way, this isn’t just for anyone reading this, it is for myself first and foremost. I am so easily deceived by this supposed ‘piety’ which leads to arrogance and forgetting the reality of my failings.