5.4. THINGS THAT ERASE SINS
One’s good deeds should be of the same sort with his bad ones as this is more effective in erasing sins. The consequences of sins can be erased by a number of things, among them what follows:
1. Repentance (tawbah)
2. Seeking forgiveness (istighfar) without repentance, for Allah may still forgive him in response to his invocation. The most complete way, however, is to combine both repentance and seeking forgiveness.
3. Righteous deeds (amal al-salih) that compensate for one’s sins. This includes pre-measured compensations (kaffarat al-muqadira) like those prescribed for having sexual intercourse in Ramadan, pronouncing the zihar-divorce, and violating the pilgrimage (hajj) by committing the unlawful, leaving the obligatory, or hunting. There are four types of premeasured compensations: slaughtering, freeing slaves, charity, and fasting.
Unrestricted compensations (kaffarat al-mutalaqa) are those found in Hudhayfah’s {radijAllahu ‘anhu) words to ‘Umar (radijAllahu ‘anhu) “A man’s problems with his family, wealth, and children are com- pensated for by prayer, fasting, charity, and enjoining the good and rebuking the evil.”
The Qur’an and the sahih hadiths confirm this as they inform us that one’s sins are compensated for by the five daily prayers, the Friday prayer, fasting, the pilgrimage, and other good deeds that are referred to in the following manner: “If someone says such and such a thing and then does another thing, he is forgiven” or: “his past sins are forgiven.” One will find many such actions in the hadith collections, especially in the works about virtuous deeds.
By Shaykhu’l-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah
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