Hud 101: We did not oppress them, rather they committed oppression against themselves. When the order of your Lord came, the things they worshipped by leaving Allah have not given them anything and have not helped them other than to increase their loss.

In verse 101 of Surah Hud: We did not wrong them, it says.

Now they have interpreted the verses of the Quran: We increased their unbelief. We increased their rebellion. We sealed their hearts. Yes, He sealed them, and He had them sealed too. Had them sealed. Again, Allah had it sealed; Allah's sealing is different. A person sealing something himself is different. A person having that person seal it is different. For example, someone comes and seals your shop (?). He sealed it.

He is the authority here. Can you say anything? You cannot. He sealed it. But you broke the law, so he came and sealed your shop. Now, did he seal it, or did you seal it?

Here there is a matter of ascribing attributes to Allah. Look what it says: We did not wrong them, but they wronged themselves, it says. The verse: When your Lord's command of punishment came, the gods they worshipped besides Allah did not avail them at all. They did nothing but increase their loss. So Allah Almighty, by His attribute of justice, leaves people free in their own will; within their own will, when people made a covenant with Allah Almighty, He gave them their wishes as their destiny, and when He sent them into the world realm, without interfering in what any person does, people, by the actual deeds they themselves do, earn reward and sin. And if a person is going to increase his unbelief, if he is going to torment his nafs, Allah does not increase his unbelief, does not torment his nafs. That person himself increases the torment of his own nafs and so brings wrong upon himself.

Now, I live under the laws of this state. According to the state's laws, if I went and stole the property of Ahmet Efendi, stole it, and they proved the theft with cameras, and Ahmet Efendi filed a lawsuit against me, would I be punished or not? Would the judge punish me or not? Did the judge give me this punishment, or did I make the judge give it? Did I make him give it myself? So you cannot blame Allah. Through a deed of people, through the actual deeds they do with partial will, through the reward and sin they earn, people wrong their own selves (?) (?). But Allah is such an Allah, so great an Allah, that since He did not create people (?), when people commit sins through their mistakes, ask for pardon and forgiveness, and on condition of not doing them again repent to Allah Almighty, then that Allah, since we have no other door to go to, forgives us and pardons us.

In the divine presence, tomorrow on the Day of Judgment — the way the state catches us and imprisons us at once, Allah does not imprison us at once in this world. In a period of ignorance, within a set lifetime, after we have proved what kind of person we are, at the end of our life He calls us to account. If you were caught at once for the mistakes you made, you would not find a single living being walking on the earth, He says. In that case, since Allah Almighty created us deficient in reason, deficient, He gives us within our lifetime the opportunity to know Him. In that case, if a person still inclines to the world, disregards Allah's commands, puts Allah's creatures in his heart and turns his back on Allah, and if, in return for the covenant he gave, he has completed his life, and has proved what kind of person he is, then when, in the presence of Allah Almighty, on the Day of Judgment, in that great court, he is called to account and is left subject to punishment, Allah did not wrong him. He wronged his own self.

So: We did not wrong them. But they wronged themselves. When your Lord's command of punishment came, the gods they worshipped besides Allah did not avail them at all. They did nothing but increase their loss.

If our people had spoken of such verses to people, and not with superstitions — for people always pin many verses on Allah: Allah increased their unbelief, Allah increased their loss — God forbid. Because they explain it this way, ascribing attributes to Allah, people neither came closer to religion nor turned to living it. Most Muslims live with a dry tawhid in their hearts. They have said the Kalima-i Shahadah. Apart from that Kalima-i Shahadah: no prayer, no supplication, no fasting, no zakat, no hajj.

First, in a state of modernity, in the whim of being among the enlightened, modernity and the enlightened class — as if it meant to them: uncover, undress and display yourself — wrapping themselves in such an air, wanting to make their living within that air: people who have fallen into an inferiority complex. What is modern? As far as I understand, the meaning of modern is the technology in which all the states of the world have advanced — catching up with that technology and competing with them at the same level. That is modern. Modern does not mean uncovering and undressing, displaying one's own chastity and honour to all the world.

These people take modern to mean this. And enlightenment, enlightenment — moving away from Allah, from religion, from faith, and living in this uncovered, undressed state, they think that is enlightenment. So such people, because they are far from Allah and His Messenger, from (?), according to the verse that says their hearts are restless and scattered, in order to dispel that restlessness and scatteredness, uncover and undress, display themselves to people so that people make use of them; deceived by the sweet words said to them, they let themselves be used like a rag in everyone's hands and pushed aside; for a moment's whim they trample their own honour and dignity, their self-respect — poor people living far from human dignity.

Know well the meaning of modern and of enlightenment.

Allah Almighty does not wrong His creatures.

In the verse: We do not will wrong for the worlds. But they wrong their own selves. Again, in a verse: what you have earned is your own recompense. So Allah loves people very much, and because He loves them He has given their will into their own hands. And after making Himself known, He will call each person to account for the deeds he did. Rewards for those who do good deeds,

and those who commit bad deeds will of course also receive punishment. So those who are subjected to these punishments and dragged into pain and torment — the suffering they will endure is the recompense of what their own two hands earned. These people run after the nafs and Satan, outside what Allah says, and follow the taghut. Of course they too will suffer their punishment. They are the ones who give this punishment to themselves. In this respect, they are the ones who wrong their own selves. The gods they worshipped besides Allah, when Allah's command of punishment came, could not benefit them at all.

Although here it seems addressed to those idolaters, since the verses continue until the Day of Judgment, there are still those who worship Satan, those who worship the mascots in their homes saying ‘it's my luck’, and again those who worship their nafs. Their nafs. When He says ‘Have you not seen the one who takes his nafs as his god’, sir, must one necessarily worship an idol? People who, outside what Allah says, make their own nafs a god through Satan's temptation and go the way of their nafs — as if worshipping an idol, they make themselves an idol and worship it. Yes. The gods they worshipped besides Allah, when Allah's command of punishment came, could not benefit them at all.

Because they too were Allah's creatures. They worshipped idols made by their own hands, which could neither benefit them nor do them any harm. They rebelled against Allah. Because they turned their faces from Allah and the Hereafter, these people bought Hell, the place of punishment.

Moreover, the idols they worshipped increased their loss.

Because if you leave Allah and worship what Allah created, you go into unbelief. You increase your loss. This increase of loss, as the recompense for what they did, is a humiliating punishment in this world. They perished by punishment. Moreover, in the Hereafter, because they left Allah and worshipped idols, they prepared their places of torment in Hell. So this is the fate of those who do not believe in Allah and the Hereafter, He says. What an evil (?).