Five Unforgivable Sins That Affect Society
This is according to Hojat-ol-Islam Mohammadreza Yousefi, an Iranian academic, who made the remarks in a session on Sermon 153 of Nahj al-Balagha.
Imam Ali (AS) says in the sermon that there are there ways that misguide people from the right path. These include oppression in the name of religion, distortion of remarks, and fear of saying the truth.
One of the central parts of this sermon reads:
“One of the firm decisions of Allah in the Wise Reminder (Qur'an) upon which He bestows reward or gives punishment, and through which He likes or dislikes is that it will not benefit a man, even though he exerts himself and acts sincerely if he leaves this world to meet Allah with one of these acts without repenting, namely that he believed in a partner with Allah during his obligatory worship, or appeased his own anger by killing an individual, or spoke about acts committed by others, or sought fulfillment of his needs from people by introducing an innovation in his religion, or met people with a double face, or moved among them with a double tongue. Understand this because an illustration is a guide for its like.”
He notes that whoever implements what has been mentioned in the Quran will be rewarded and whoever denies them will be punished. He warns people against five sins.
The first one is to associate others with God. When we say prayers and fast, we should do it only for God. We unfortunately may sometimes associate others with God and that happens when there are benefits for us.
The second trait is to kill another person out of wrath. According to Imam Ali, this sin will not be forgiven by God Almighty. We have no right to kill others or create problems in their lives simply because they oppose us.
The third sin is leveling accusations against others. This is especially evident in the realm of politics as some individuals try to eliminate their rivals through accusations.
The fourth one is to introduce innovations in the religion for the sale of attracting people.
And the last one is related to hypocrisy; i.e. saying two completely different things to different people. This is also more evident when individuals try to attract people and gain power.
Why doesn’t God forgive these sins?
God Almighty does not forgive these sins because they have changed the path of people’s lives. These sins misguide the whole society.
Accordingly, any other sin that leads to deviation in society will also not be forgiven by Allah.
