Your secret identity: sincerity

Respond to your Lord before a Day comes from Allah which cannot be turned back. On that Day you will have no hiding-place and no means of denial. (Surah ash-Shura, 47)

Sincerity is to reveal and display what one really thinks inside, to reflect what one feels in his heart to others, to be honest, open and clear as much as he can. It is to reveal his actual thoughts and genuine identity without hiding, without having any feelings that he only keeps to himself. One important feature of sincerity is that it can never be imitated unless it is felt deep in one’s heart. A sincere person’s all attitudes are as natural as how they are felt inside and such natural attitude has very profound and positive influence upon people. The looks, speech, style and mimics of sincere people prove to be natural and very impressive.

Power of Sincerity

Many people are unaware of the power and impact of sincerity. For this reason, they look for the attributes which can only be acquired by sincerity in other attitudes. Some people resort to affected manners to impress people. Although they are far away from being their sincere thoughts and manners, they try to look like just as how they think other people would like them to in order to please them. Because every person has different traits of character, they try to assume a different character, display different attitudes, pretend to advocate different views when they are with different people. However this insincere approach urge them to act in a hypocritical way. On the other hand these affected manners do not generate the impact they anticipate since they do not reflect the person’s genuine character.

On the very contrary, such manners render a person repulsive, aloof and distant. Knowing that this person conceals his genuine personality and that his manners are affected conduces to feelings of uneasiness and insecurity on other people.  

Affected manners come into being when one lives by the principles that are distant to the morality of the Qur’an. This, in turn, drags a person not towards Allah’s approval but to people’s consent and thus to a life of loss. Our All Mighty Allah relates that He will not forgive those who ascribe partners to Him:

Allah does not forgive anything being associated with Him but He forgives whoever He wills for anything other than that. Anyone who associates something with Allah has committed a terrible crime. (Surat an-Nisa, 48)

In the Qur’an Allah explains the state of people who devote themselves to earning Allah’s good pleasure and approval with the following example:

Allah has made a metaphor for them of a man owned by several partners in dispute with one another and another man wholly owned by a single man. Are they the same? Praise be to Allah! The fact is that most of them do not know. (Surat az-Zumar, 29)

A person attains sincerity by the fear of Allah

People of ignorance who cling to values distant to the facts related in the Qur’an see no harm in assuming affected manners since they do not think properly about the harms insincerity brings in the Sight of Allah and in the eyes of people. Putting on false manners is frequently observed in the characters of people who do not live by the morality of the Qur’an. Such people may show false love to people for whom they do not have real love and respect only because they have some common interests. Without any hesitation they may tell lies to one another and deceive. They may conceal their real negative convictions about a person and see no harm in telling otherwise out in the open.

However a person who lives by the morality of the Qur’an meticulously avoids such manners because he has fear of Allah in his heart. He never tries to please others in return for his trivial interests. Aware that such are manners degrading a person both in Allah’s Sight and in the eyes of people, he never condescends them. His purpose in life is to engage in deeds in every moment of his life that will make him earn Allah’s good pleasure. He knows that the morality that pleases Allah can only be attained by sincerity. As is stated in the verse, “Allah knows what the heart contains”, he is aware that Allah knows what people conceal in their hearts. In another verse Allah relates this fact in Surah Ta Ha: “Though you speak out loud, He knows your secrets and what is even more concealed." (Surah Ta Ha, 7)” For this reason concealing what is in one’s heart from other people is of no significance. Allah is already aware of what is in his heart. Despite this fact, trying to deceive people would be a great insincerity and imprudence on one’s part.

Besides this a person living by the morality of the Qur’an is also aware that pleasing people and earning their favor bring no benefits either in this world or the Hereafter. Therefore people of faith meticulously avoid any attitudes tending to ascribe partners to Allah and earning people’s good pleasure. This also ensures unwavering resoluteness in sincerity for a lifetime because a genuine Oneness of Allah entirely divorced from ascribing partners to Allah stipulates sincerity.