Renunciation (zuhd)

Asceticism (zuhd) in its linguistic sense is turning away from a thing because one finds it insignificant and one's aspiration rises above it. Ibn Rajab presents it in his commentary on the hadith "Be ascetic in this world and God will love you." ¹

Ibn Rajab notes that asceticism in this world is not forbidding what is lawful, nor squandering wealth. It is that the servant be more reliant on what is in God's hand than on what is in his own. When he suffers a calamity, he is more hopeful of its reward than of its removal. He says that this is the saying of Abu Muslim al-Khawlani in Ahmad's Musnad, and that it is the sound view in his opinion. ¹

• Al-Zuhri: the ascetic is one whose patience is not overcome by the unlawful, and whose gratitude is not occupied by the lawful.
• Sufyan ibn Uyayna: one who gives thanks when blessed, and is patient when tried.
• Sufyan al-Thawri and Ahmad: asceticism is the shortening of hope, not eating coarse food or wearing a cloak.
• Ibrahim ibn Adham: three kinds, an obligation regarding the unlawful, a virtue regarding the lawful, and safety regarding doubtful matters.
• Abu Sulayman al-Darani: leaving what occupies you from God, which Ibn Rajab regards as comprehensive of its meanings.

¹

He notes that people disagreed, in two views, over whether the name of ascetic belongs to one who abstains only from the unlawful. ¹

Muslim opens the book of asceticism and tender hearts with the saying of the Prophet ﷺ: "The world is a prison for the believer and a paradise for the unbeliever." ²

See scrupulousness.

The Sheikh says that when hearts renounce the tables of this world, they sit at the tables of the Hereafter ³.

He says that a person should live in this world as a stranger or a traveller to God, with his heart in the Hereafter ⁴.