[MedicineForUs]

I came across a thought provoking comment that said something along the lines of "an atheist/intelligent person does not need the promise of heave to see the merit of good deeds". It's been niggling at me for a few hours now. I don't quite know how to explain how it's making me feel, other than, is that true? Are we only "good" or strive to do good because of the promise of a reward? What does that make us quote religious folk compared to the irreligious who still do good? Somewhere I read, mafoom, that doing ibada' for the sake of a reward is considered to be the lowest form of worship (I'll double check on this).

Jzk.

[Kolovorotkes]

If you read about the lives of the sahaba, the early generations of Muslim, and in fact even some in our time, the aim is neither for reward nor is it for the fear Hell, rather it is for the pleasure of Allah Ta'aala.

There is a famous incident of Rabi'ah Basri Rahmatullahi 'Alayha, where she had water in one hand and fire in the other. When someone asked her why, her reply was something to the effect that she wished to set fire to the Jannah and extinguish the fires of Hell, so that worship was neither for reward nor fear, rather solely for Allah.

[virtuah]

Salam alaykum,

This is actually a secondary consideration when arguing with the Atheists, since we should only discuss with them in a way that they will accept the Islamic concept of God to be correct and that everything else is wrong.

If we want to discuss this, however, it should be under the umbrella of challenging them to prove to us that creating a "Heaven" and a "Hell" is impossible for Allah. This is something they can never do, since there is nothing which logically inhibits its creation.

If they say that this shows us as (for example) "dogs" who do all sorts of things for small materialistic gains, we say that (as far as the atheist is concerned) this is total inconsistency from their side. The reason is obvious, in that the atheist believes that there is nothing other than matter and therefore every reward is materialistic (even the good feeling of helping someone is according to them, solely caused by the interactions of nerves and portions of the brain with each other, so it is basically materialistic for them). So they cannot come back and accuse of being overly materialistic while we believe in both material and spiritual pleasures in the Hereafter, while they believe only in matter and matter-based pleasures in this world only.

Secondly, we say that every person does things for certain goals to be achieved, and no one does things just for the sake of doing them. (This is one of the reasons we oppose ideologies which say that absolutely all desire has to be removed if one wishes to reach "liberation" or "enlightenment" since this wish to reach enlightenment is itself a type of desire that has to be kept in mind while performing actions, thus showing their contradictory ideology).

In the case of Islam, Allah has created us and has created the rewards and punishments for us, knowing what our mental composition is. As a result, the presence of Heaven and Hell are one of the incentives for people to perform good deeds and avoid the bad ones. It is true that the ultimate motive for action should be simply because Allah has ordered us to do so and we should hurry to do what is commanded because we are thankful to Allah, but for those who cannot comprehend matters in this way yet (and this is almost all of us), the manner in which Allah's commandments will affect us after our death is also presented before us.

[bestformaldress23]

everyone does some good. both muslims and non-muslims. both do it naturally as it is in our nature. it is in our fitrah to do good. as we grow up in this world our fitrah of doing good gets corrupted by this world so we tend to do some bad as well as good. so to counter that, religion and islam encourages its followers to do MORE good by giving a reward.....and discourages the follower from doing more bad. so the rewards are not just rewards but incentives to try and constantly do more and more good, and do less and less bad. and the rewards are also rewards because Allah is pleased by His servants doing good so He chooses to reward us out of His grace. Allah does not need to reward us for any good that we do. He rewards us out of His mercy he has for us.

[Colorostikse]

Yes, the highest form is obeying Allah to please Him alone, then obeying Him in hope of Jannah, then lowest is obeying Him for fear of Jahannam, from what I have read.

Humans are ultimately motive-driven beings. Everything in creation is driven by some kind of need, we eat because we need food, we sleep because we need to rest for our bodies to function properly, we love others because we need interaction and companionship... etc. This is how Allah swt has made us. It is only Allah that creates, sustains and loves without need.

We also have a need to do good due to our fitra, as was mentioned earlier in the thread. For believers, the need is to obey and to want to please Allah, as at the end of the day we are slaves to Him and we should submit completely to Him. Atheists who argue that they do things simply because of the good in it, one has to ask, how do they know there is good in it? Because of their fitra. They have a need to feel good about themselves, to be able to sleep comfortably at night thinking they have done something good. That is the reward in itself, peace of mind. All these 'philanthropists' who give money and do all sorts 'just for the sake of it', aren't doing it 'just for the sake of it' at all, it's to make themselves feel better and to comply with societal expectations of what makes a good person, and given that the rise of Atheism is a very recent phenomenon, these expectations are ultimately based on religious morality... the west is just trying to forget the fact that the very substance of their society and values is based on Christianity.