The Gates of Jihad in This Age and Its Types

Question:
The chapter on obeying the scholars and rulers in prohibiting what Allah has made lawful. Ha. Your brother, Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, what are the gates of jihad that you see in this age, and what do you indicate for us to work in them to attain the great reward?

Answer:
Jihad has many types. Whoever wants to look into them should refer to *Zad al-Ma'ad* by Ibn al-Qayyim. First, jihad is against Shaytan, by disobeying his command and doing what he forbids. One fights Shaytan by doing what he forbids you from and leaving what he commands you to do. This is the jihad against Shaytan.
Second is the jihad against the self and the jihad against people. People need jihad because they do not want to work and do not want idleness; they want laziness, they want sleep, they are stingy with water, they are cowardly in obeying in the path of Allah. If you yield to them, they dominate you, they dominate you, and you become a slave to them, a slave to desire. And whoever follows his desire is not from Allah. So it is necessary to discipline the self by compelling it to obey Allah and preventing it from disobeying Allah. Otherwise, it will drag you, drag you, toward evil and distance you from good, unless you train it and accustom it to the obedience of Allah the Exalted and Majestic.
The poet said: "The soul desires if you let it desire, and if you turn it back to little, it is content." If you let it desire and give it what it wants, it will never find a desire for the solution; it is always desiring. But if you turn it back to little and accustom it to that, it will be content and save. So you accept the self, and this is a jihad that never ceases; it is a continuous jihad. Your jihad with Shaytan, and your jihad with your self. The third is the jihad against the sinners among the Muslims, and that is by enjoining good and forbidding evil. The sinners are targeted by this, namely by enjoining good and forbidding evil.
The fourth is the jihad against the hypocrites. The jihad against the hypocrites who sow doubts and speak ugly words. They need jihad to refute their falsehood, to respond to them, and to break their arguments. Do not forget that they are sharp and learned, and they have the ability to speak. If you see them, you are pleased with their appearance, and if they speak, listen to their words. They have eloquence and rhetoric. They have doubts in what they write, in what they say, in what they preach, and in what they author. They need jihad. How wretched and evil are the hypocrites. The hypocrites are not fought with weapons because they claim Islam; they pray, they fast, and they associate with people. They are not fought with weapons; they are fought with argument and the tongue, by refuting their falsehood and exposing their doubts. How many of them there are today! How many of them are in the radio stations! How many of them are in the newspapers and magazines! How many of them are in the books! They attack the Muslims and Islam. They bring doubts, they bring words that appear to be arguments but are false in their essence. So they need jihad, the jihad against the hypocrites.
The fifth is the jihad against the disbelievers, and that is with weapons. That is with weapons to exalt the word of Allah the Exalted and Majestic, which is the least of the types of jihad.
And each of these types has a share and a portion for everyone. Whoever fights with them fights Shaytan, fights his self, fights the sinners among the Muslims, and the closest of them are his family. He fights them. He fights his family, he fights the sinners around him. He fights the hypocrites, and how many hypocrites there are today? He fights the disbelievers if jihad is established. He fights the disbelievers if the knowledge of jihad is established with the rulers. If the knowledge of jihad is established with the rulers of the Muslims, you fight with them, if you are able. Yes.