A New Means Employed by the Hypocrites for Administering Their Schemes: Social Media

The life of a hypocrite is built on obtaining minor interests. He acts on his interests when he is together with Muslims, and he also relies on such a way of thinking when he approaches irreligious people. As the hypocrite subconsciously assumes that irreligious people are powerful, he attempts to please them while at the same time he tries to obtain some sort of personal benefit. He strives to use every available opportunity in order to sidle up to irreligious people, or anyone or anything that he assumes is powerful. He secretly and stealthily plots in contemplation, “How could I sidle up to them and get a foothold among them? How could I benefit from their opportunities?”

In the time of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), hypocrites used to meet the leading idolators in fairs and caravans and to praise them. In our time, the most important tool employed by hypocrites is social media: A hypocrite determines the most popular accounts on social media such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

He begins to individually follow every leading institution with the most profound connections, the widest circle and the most powerful financial resources in media, politics and the economy as well as their executives. Then, in order to attract the attention of these people, he tags them in his social media posts and responds to their posts in an interesting way. He also “likes” their posts and tries to express his admiration for them. He “retweets” or “shares” their posts on his own social media, hoping to show his appreciation and admiration for them. All of these acts serve as a message to these people, whom he overrates, essentially saying, “Notice that I am on your side and I could ally with you on everything against Muslims.”

If the hypocrite has managed to be noticed as planned, he quickly reaches them through personal messages and embarks on making friends with them. The purpose of all of these efforts is that he believes he could benefit a great deal from these people. He hopes that he could take the opportunity to settle in a foreign country or find a job there by means of these people or could acclimate himself to a new environment and establish a reputation. In fact, most of the time, it would be just enough for a hypocrite to hear a “well-done” from these people. People who are ignorant about the morality of the Qur’an call such characteristics of the hypocrite as “fawning or flattery.”

In the Qur’an, Verse 139 of Surat an-Nisa’ reveals this immorality of the hypocrites:

“Do those who take the irreligious as protectors, rather than the believers, hope to find power and strength with them? Power and strength belong entirely to God.” (Surat an-Nisa’, 139)

The way to put the hypocrite off his act of hypocrisy is to reveal his insidious schemes to derive personal benefits from people and to prove the weakness of those whom he attempts to get in contact with. God has granted His sincere servants “...a superior discrimination…”, which is what the hypocrite lacks. For that reason, believers spot the schemes hatched by the hypocrite a mile off and act in a certain manner to spoil such schemes. They quickly uncover the superficiality of the hypocrite down to the last detail and render him incapable of doing that again through the scientific precautions they have taken. Muslims swiftly come to realize any and all systems based on irreligion, which the hypocrite relies on and obtains benefit from, and discloses these systems and denounces them intellectually worldwide.

When those circles, from which the hypocrite looks forward to benefiting greatly, are denounced, he becomes disenchanted. People, who he considers popular and important, have now become ordinary. He acknowledges that these discredited people could no longer provide any benefit for him. When he realizes that his scheme has been ruined, he stops his efforts at pleasing these circles. Moreover, recognizing the capability of Muslims, his henchmen kick him aside soon enough. At that, the hypocrite has become isolated. In the Qur'an, God states that He will spoil any and all schemes hatched by the hypocrites as follows:

“God will make their actions come to nothing. That is easy for God.” (Surat al-Ahzab, 19)