الْإِيمَانُ يَزِيدُ وَيَنْقُصُ

After Ramadan, a retreat or a great class, you may feel full of faith. And a few weeks later, prayer gets harder and you feel far away. That is normal: faith is alive, it goes up and it goes down.

What the sources say • "The true believers are those whose hearts tremble when Allah is mentioned, and whose faith increases when His verses are recited to them" (meaning of verse 8:2). Listen to this passage in the recitation block. • "It is He who sent down tranquillity into the hearts of the believers, so that they may add faith to their faith" (meaning of verse 48:4). • "Faith has seventy-some branches: the highest is saying laa ilaaha illa Allaah, the lowest is removing something harmful from the road, and modesty (al-ḥayaa') is a branch of faith" (Muslim 35, Bukhari 9). So most scholars of the Sunna say that faith increases through obedience and decreases through sins. [À VÉRIFIER : l'école hanafite formule les choses autrement (la foi du cœur elle-même ne varie pas, ses fruits et sa force varient) ; présentation à choisir par l'imam]

What nourishes faith • Prayer, on time, with presence of heart. • The Qur'an: reading it, listening to it, understanding it. • Remembrance of Allah (dhikr), morning and evening. • Learning: every lesson in this course is part of it. • Reflecting on creation: the sky, nature, your own body (meaning of verses 3:190-191). • Good deeds, even small ones, and good company: "A person follows the religion of his close friend, so let each of you look at whom he befriends" (Abu Dawud 4833, Tirmidhi 2378).

What weakens it • Sins, especially when we get used to them. • Heedlessness: hours spent scrolling with no purpose. • Bad company, in real life or online. • Staying away from the places and people who remind us of Allah.

The sweetness of faith "Three things: whoever has them tastes the sweetness of faith: that Allah and His Messenger are dearer to him than anything else; that he loves a person only for Allah's sake; and that he hates to return to disbelief as he would hate to be thrown into the fire" (Bukhari 16, Muslim 43).

A supplication to keep يَا مُقَلِّبَ الْقُلُوبِ ثَبِّتْ قَلْبِي عَلَى دِينِكَ yaa muqalliba l-quluub, thabbit qalbii 'alaa diinik "O Turner of hearts, keep my heart firm on Your religion": the Prophet ﷺ often said it (Tirmidhi 2140).

Challenge: do your weekly "faith check": two things that nourished it, one that weakened it, and one small change for next week.

Understanding the lesson

Explanation Faith is like a plant: it has roots (the certainty of the heart), and it needs water and sun (deeds, remembrance, good company). If you stop watering it, it does not vanish at once, but it weakens. If you take care of it, it grows and bears fruit: good character, inner peace, strength in trials. Dips in faith are not shameful: even the companions felt them. What matters is not to settle into them, and to come back. Repentance is always possible. Having questions is not the same as losing faith. Some companions came to tell the Prophet ﷺ that they found thoughts in themselves so serious that they dared not say them; he answered: "That is clear faith" (Muslim 132), because they hated them. And when a doubtful thought keeps coming back, he advised seeking refuge with Allah and stopping there (Bukhari 3276, Muslim 134). For a real question, we look for the answer from people of knowledge we trust, not in the comments under a video. [À VÉRIFIER : comment l'imam veut accompagner les doutes des ados (rendez-vous, cercle de questions)] Common misunderstandings: thinking you are "a bad Muslim forever" after a hard period; thinking faith depends only on emotions; keeping your questions to yourself out of fear or shame.

Lessons to draw from it • Notice what makes your faith rise and plan it into your week. • Choose your friends and the accounts you follow: they shape you. • In a dip, keep at least the minimum (the prayers) and gently come back to the rest. • Ask your questions to a teacher you trust: seeking to understand is part of faith.

Key points to remember • Faith increases (8:2, 48:4); it has more than seventy branches (Muslim 35). • It grows through prayer, the Qur'an, dhikr, knowledge, good company; it weakens through sins and heedlessness. • The sweetness of faith: three things (Bukhari 16). • يَا مُقَلِّبَ الْقُلُوبِ ثَبِّتْ قَلْبِي عَلَى دِينِكَ (Tirmidhi 2140).

The main message Faith is alive: we nourish it every day, protect it from what damages it, and when it weakens, we come back to Allah, who turns hearts and makes them firm.