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from you any reward that your deeds deserve. Verily God is
Forgiving, Merciful. (Al-Hujurat, 49:14)
From the words ‘not yet (lamma)’30 it is clear that faith eventually
comes through the persistent practice of Islam; indeed, God
says at the end of the verse: Yet if you obey God and His Messenger,
He will not withhold from you any reward that your deeds deserve. In
other words, practicing the five pillars of Islam eventually leads to
faith taking root deep in the heart of a Muslim. This is in a sense
to be expected since, as will later be seen, the five pillars of Islam
engage so much of what human beings as such are. From this it also
follows that practicing the five pillars of Islam more will lead to faith
quicker. Thus one may do the following: (1) invoke the Shahadah
more, and indeed, frequently throughout the day and night; (2)
one may pray more (and indeed, as already mentioned, one should
pray the minimum of 13 or 15 extra rak‘ahs of sunnah daily prayers
throughout the day and night); (2b) one may also strive to constantly
renew one’s state of ablution; (3) one may give away in alms and
charity more than the 2.5% annually required by zakat; (4) one may
fast the sunnah (i.e. Mondays and Thursdays, at least, in addition of
course to the fast of the month of Ramadan), and (5) one may—if
circumstances permit—perform the minor pilgrimage (‘umrah).
In addition, since, as we have seen, faith is inextricably bound to
the performance of good deeds in general, one may perform more
good deeds as such. All these things gradually lead to faith growing
and taking deep root in the heart, until faith becomes complete and
total certainty of God.31 This is because—as seen earlier—faith is
30 Abul-Qasim Al-Zamakhshari (d. 538 ah, 1143 ce) explains:
‘Know that that which is an affirmation by the tongue without the profound agreement
of the heart is Islam, and that which is a profound agreement of the heart
with the tongue is Iman …. As regards ‘lamma’ (‘not yet’), it implies an expectation
that those [people] would [truly] believe thereafter ….’ (Jar Allah Abul-Qasim
Al-Zamakhshari, Al-Kashaf, Vol.4, p.1536, Commentary on: 49:14, Dar Sadir,
Beirut, Lebanon, 1st ed., 2010.)
31 There are three degrees of certainty (yaqin) in God mentioned in the Qur’an. These are
(in ascending order): certain knowledge (‘ilm al-yaqin) or certainty of the mind and soul;
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