Explanation of the Book of the Beginning of Revelation, Faith, and Knowledge-05a

The reciter: Muhammad ibn al-Muthanna narrated to us, Yahya narrated to us from Hisham, who said: My father informed me from Aisha: And the most beloved of religion to Him is what is done consistently by its practitioner.

The Shaykh : This is because abandoning persistence may indicate a person's disinterest in the deed. For this reason, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said to Abdullah ibn Amr or Ibn Umar: , and it was his way that when he did a deed, he would persist in it (peace and blessings be upon him and his family).
And his saying in the hadith: , is a noun of command, meaning "hold back." "Sih" is a noun of command meaning "be silent." So "Sih" is for speech, and "Mah" is for actions.
And his saying: , means do not burden yourselves in deeds, whether in prayer, recitation, glorification, fasting, or otherwise. It means stick to what your capacity reaches so that you can continue with it. Because a person may have a desire for good, then he burdens himself and tightens up at first, and then afterwards he gets tired and lazy. But if he accommodates himself from the beginning with ease, he will continue. You see this even in your ordinary actions, even in ordinary actions, when a person first does something, he finds himself with momentum and strength, but in the end? He weakens.
One of the students says: I will memorize a quarter of a part every day. He memorized for four days, five days, ten days, and then afterwards? He weakens. This is a tested thing. But if he measures it against himself from the beginning and takes what he can bear, then there will be persistence in it. For this reason he said: .
This phrase was difficult for some people, and they asked: Does Allah get tired?
The answer to this is easy, that it can be said: Did the Messenger affirm tiredness for Allah? Did he say: If you get tired, Allah gets tired? He did not say this. If he had said this, we would also say there is an answer in it, which is that the tiredness of Allah is not like our tiredness. We get tired, we become annoyed, the matter becomes heavy upon us so we get tired. But the tiredness of Allah is not accompanied by this deficiency. Like anger now, when we get angry, what do we do? Perhaps a person does many things, perhaps he takes his son and hits him on the ground out of anger, perhaps he divorces his wives, frees his slaves, and endows his wealth because of anger. This behavior is reckless behavior. But when Allah (Mighty and Majestic) gets angry, does He do this action, or does Allah do nothing but what wisdom requires?
The second, without a doubt. So the anger of Allah is not like our anger. Also, the tiredness of Allah, if this hadith indicated the affirmation of tiredness, it would be a tiredness that does not resemble our tiredness, but rather it is a tiredness befitting Allah.
And let it be known with certainty that it is impossible for an attribute that contradicts the perfection of Allah to ever emanate from the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him). This is impossible. So if we say:
First: This hadith is not explicit in affirming tiredness for Allah.
Second: If tiredness is affirmed for Allah, it must be understood as a tiredness befitting Him that does not resemble the tiredness of created beings.
Third: Some scholars claimed that the meaning is: , meaning: He gives you of the reward according to what you did, whatever you did. So he diverted it from its apparent meaning, based on the fact that its apparent meaning contradicts the perfection of Allah (Mighty and Majestic). But we do not see that. We see first:
That one should look at whether this necessitates tiredness, whether this necessitates the affirmation of tiredness for Allah or not, because there is a difference between saying: I will not stand until you stand, and saying: If you stand, I will stand.
"I will not say until you stand" indicates the prevention of my standing before your standing, but it does not necessitate that if you stand, I will stand. And this is the arrangement of the hadith: .
But if I said: If you stand, I will stand, then it is necessitated from this that if he stands, I will stand. So if he said: If you get tired, Allah gets tired, we would say this affirms tiredness for Allah without issue. But the arrangement present is not explicit in affirming tiredness. And on the assumption that it is explicit and that a person understands from it that it is explicit, the tiredness affirmed must be?
A tiredness befitting Him, and what is in the tiredness of created beings does not befall it.
And the most beloved of religion to Him is what its practitioner persists in. "To Him": To whom? To Allah or to the Messenger?

The questioner : It returns to the Messenger.

The Shaykh : It returns to the Messenger, yes, because...

The questioner : In a narration in al-Fath... to Allah.

The Shaykh : To Allah, in a narration?
Well, in any case, if it returns to Allah, it is because He is the nearest mentioned: By Allah, Allah does not get tired until you get tired. And if it returns to the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), it is because he is the one being spoken about, so the hadith is about the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), so the pronoun returns to the one the hadith is about.
But if an explicit narration is reported: , the difficulty is resolved.

The questioner : Yes.

The Shaykh : Rather, the possibility is resolved.