Forty Gems of Beauty — Page 127
127 door of repentance closed to man, have instead opened the door promoting, on the one hand, distrust of God, and on the other, pessimism and moral degeneration. As for instance, the Christian Church, following its rejection of the repentance, sought refuge in the totally artificial and unnatural theory of vicarious atonement. And the Hindu religion has bogged down its followers in the quagmire of reincarnation. While the truth of the matter is that the postulate of repentance is clearly a natural remedy, in disregard of which man can neither attain to spiritual perfection nor to moral excellence. It is a strange irony that the religious systems that bolt the door on repentance are not prepared to concede to God, Creator and Lord of this Universe, even the moral attributes which are considered praiseworthy endowments of a good man. A gentleman overlooks the faults of his children, of his friends, of his subordinates, and of his servants, day in and day out. It is considered praiseworthy on his part. But it is a pity that such generous treatment on the part of God has been considered improper. In fact, it has been considered imperative on His part to crush the sinner even though he was contrite and repented for his sin sincerely. Islam spurns this impure doctrine outright with contempt and opens wide the gate of God’s forgiveness and mercy to every truthfully contrite sinner. And it is in this manner that it causes a two-way stream to flow between man and his Creator: of compassion and mercy on the part of God, and of dependence and gratitude on the part of man, as much worthy of the glory of God as it is becoming of the worshipfulness of man. Clearly, man is weak and prone to stumble often under the pressure of momentary influences. It would be highly unjust to condemn him still to the gallows when he was truly repentant and sincerely contrite. It is totally fallacious and unreasonable to argue that acceptance of repentance encourages sin.