According to our analysis, there are two fields for introspection. On the one hand are some evils that most people know to be bad. On the other hand are hidden or secret evils. All evils or unwanted actions belong to either one of these categories. One should engage in regular introspection to check if one is engaging in either category of evil.
In Islam, consuming wine, dealing in usury, committing murder, engaging in adultery and eating pork, for instance, are clearly forbidden. All Muslims know, or should know, these to be wrong. That is why people generally refrain from these actions. These evils can be called ‘unjustified evils’, because, being clearly forbidden by Islam, believers cannot justify them in any way.
But there are other evils, evils that can be called ‘justified evils’. People who engage in these evils offer what they regard as justifications for them. Most people are engaged in some ‘justified evil’ or the other. Consciously or otherwise, they do not believe these actions to be wrong. They engage in these evils without even knowing them to be sinful. Most people know about the ‘unjustified evils’, which are very well known. Their being wrong is clear and widely recognised. But ‘justified evils’ are hidden evils. Many people do not know that they are evil, because they are wrongly sought to be justified as ‘good’.
This point is referred to in a Hadith report. According to this report, Rasulullah SAW said that in the future, a group among his Ummah would consume wine. When some of his companions asked him why they would do so when Allah SWT had clearly declared it to be unlawful, Rasulullah SAW said that these people would give a new name to wine and in this way declare it to be lawful. (Al-Darimi) That is to say, people will invent some supposed justification for drinking wine.
Drinking wine is not the only evil that people will seek to legitimise in this way. ‘Wine’ here is a symbol of a larger phenomenon. What it means is that, as in the case of wine, people will seek to justify other evils by giving them names that will not make the evil appear bad.
As this Hadith indicates, in addition to ‘unjustified evils’ are what can be called ‘justified evils’. These evils are very deceptive and dangerous. Those who indulge in these sins do not even know that they are sinful, in contrast to ‘unjustified evils’. This makes these evils additionally dangerous. It is like drinking poison while believing it to be water or a soft drink. If you drink a bottle of poison while thinking it to be water or a soft drink, you cannot save yourself from its bad effects. The poison will kill you, notwithstanding the fact that you do not think it is harmful. Nothing you may call it, no seemingly innocuous or sweet-sounding name you may give it, can save you.
