Title: Our Relationship with our Creator... Question: Ever since I have grown up every time something happens that is good, it immediately follows with something that undoes all the happiness. I almost feel scared to feel happy, as it will be taken away from me. I used to have faith... so much faith... I would counter what everyone would say to me... that God is just separate. That religion is all right to a certain point but that it isn't what your whole life is about. However I always felt that God loves His creation... that He would never leave them hopeless and helpless. But somehow I have lost all that faith. Everything I ever dreamed of has been taken away from me and I feel no desire to pray or believe in anything. I feel numb... faithless. Why does God do this? I believed that He loves us. Why are we hurt like this then? I did not lack in faith... for I never ever lost hope. But I feel abandoned. I almost feel stupid for being such a blind believer. Where do I go from here? Was my faith not important to Allah? I don't know why I should believe in anything anymore. Can you answer any of my questions or explain anything to me? I understand I am immature and people go through much worse. But I need to understand why I pray? Why are we required to pray? Why indeed am I here on this planet? Thank you for your patience... I do hope I hear from you. Answer: There is a general tendency among us - humans - to expect worldly benefits accruing from our faith in God and from submitting to His directives. That is not necessarily the case. It is not because God listens to our prayers and grants us what we desire that we should adore and worship Him or submit to His directives, but, merely, because He alone deserves all our adorations and reverence and all our worships and submissions. It should be kept in mind, my dear brother/sister, that adherence to faith and religion is not an elixir or a panacea for our problems and worldly sufferings. On the contrary, it is an unconditional submission to the truth. A voluntary submission, not for gaining any advantages in the life of this world, but for the sole reason that truth deserves to be accepted and submitted to. The life of this world is a comprehensive test for us. We are being tested in a number of spheres during this life [1] . This test is a temporary phase in our lives. It starts with our mental maturity and ends at our death or mental incapacity. The basic target to be achieved during this testing phase is to cleanse and purify our hearts [2] , minds [3] , bodies and souls [4] from all such things that can defile and corrupt them. The fortunate among us, who shall succeed in their efforts of cleansing and purification, shall be the ones ultimately successful; while those who defile and corrupt their hearts, minds, bodies and souls, shall face the consequences of their defilement and corruption. Immediately after this test is over, we shall be faced with the results of this test. These results shall not be temporary. They shall be eternal. The consequences of failing in this test shall be in the shape of eternal and everlasting punishment; while that of success shall be in the shape of everlasting bliss in the life of paradise. What we generally term as 'faith' or 'belief', relates initially to the cleansing and purification of our mental and intellectual abilities, as, primarily, they relate to the acceptance of and the submission to the truth. However, subsequent adherence to this faith or belief, especially under adverse circumstances, leads to the purification of the heart, the body and the soul as well. Take, for instance, the faith in God. Belief in God relates primarily to the acceptance of the fact that there is only one God and that He possesses all the attributes, which can not only be inferred from the observation and study of His creations, but, which He has Himself declared to be His permanent attributes [5] . Some of the more basic among these attributes are: Mercy, Providence [6] , Omnipotence [7] , Omniscience [8] , Wisdom [9] and Justice [10] . Now, if I truly hold the existence of a god, with the stated attributes to be a truth, acceptance of this truth becomes an issue of intellectual honesty for me. It would, thus, become a moral obligation for me to accept this truth. Refusal to accept this truth, even after being fully convinced of it being the truth, is, therefore, termed as rejection ( kufr ) and injustice upon oneself ( zulm ) by the Qur'an and is declared to be among a few of those crimes, which, on their own, are followed by eternal punishment. However, if, on the other hand, after being convinced of this truth, I accept and declare it to be a reality, I become a believer in God, as introduced by the Qur'an. One can easily see that till this stage, the whole process of ascribing to a particular (Islamic) belief or faith relates primarily to my intellect and understanding. The stages that are subsequent to the declaration of my faith and belief, relate primarily to the truthfulness of this declaration and my practical adherence to this faith under varying circumstances. In other words, after my initial submission to the truth, I am subsequently tested in my commitment with this truth. In these stages, I come in practical contact with the decisions, judgments and directives of God. In these stages, I am required to maintain the prescribed relationship with God - entailing His continual remembrance in my heart, expressing my sincere gratitude for His countless blessings, remaining steadfast, under all circumstances, in His prescribed ways and submitting whole-heartedly to His directives and decisions, irrespective of whether these directives and decisions are according to my desires and wishes or against them. In these stages, man is tested with good times as well as bad, with successes as well as failures and with elations as well as disappointments. Truthful in their initial declaration of faith are those who accept and submit to all the decisions and directives of God, even if these decisions and directives translate into their apparent failure or in the undoing of their most valuable possessions in life. While deceitful in their declaration are those who are willing to accept only those decisions of God, which are according to their own wishes and desires. Such people by objecting to God's decisions and directives, in effect, refute their initial claim of holding God to be merciful, wise, omnipotent, omniscient and just. It is due to this reason that the Qur'an has contemptuously referred to those whose faith is conditional upon God's granting them their desires: The Qur'an says: There are those who worship God from a threshold [of faith]. Thus they are content only if they are blessed with good, while if an ordeal befalls them they turn away [from faith]. They are the ones who are losers in this world as well as the hereafter. ( Al-Hajj 22: 11) If you look closely at the foregoing explanation you should be able to find the answers to most of your questions. However, you ask: "why are we required to pray?". Our prayers are actually an expression of our love, adoration and worship toward God. This expression, for a true Muslim, is not conditional upon the fulfillment of his worldly desires. It is independent of all our unfulfilled wishes and desires and is solely dependent upon our initial intellectual decision of believing in one God, Who possesses the stated attributes. Prayer is an expression of our servitude and submission to our Master. It is an expression of our gratitude and thankfulness for all the blessings that we enjoy in life. It is an acceptance of the fact that if our eyes see, our ears hear and our touch feels, it is because our Creator has allowed us these privileges. It is a vow to remain steadfast in His ways, till the day we die. It is a pledge of unshakable confidence on His absolute mercy and wisdom and of complete submission to His decisions relating to us, which are always based on these attributes, even if they apparently go against our desires. It is an oath of giving up all that we have, for His cause, whenever the situation so requires. It is a supplication for all that we desire; yet it is also the expression of absolute submission for whatever He decides for us. And it is an invocation for steadfastness on faith, till He, in His absolute wisdom and mercy, decides to conclude our test. Worship, indeed, is our remembrance of our Creator. I hope this helps. August 16, 2000 [1] However, as a general rule, we may say that this test relates basically to the moral aspects of our lives - i.e. the goodness or otherwise of our personal and interpersonal behavior. [2] 'Cleansing of the heart' refers to the cleansing of one's emotions and feelings and making them subservient to the universally accepted moral values and the directives and decisions of God. [3] 'Cleansing of the mind' refers to the cleansing of one's intellectual and mental abilities and making them submissive to God's Truth. [4] 'Cleansing of the soul' refers to one's spiritual and moral elevation. [5] For details regarding the attributes of God, please refer to one of my articles on the web, titled: " The Basic Articles of Islamic Faith - Tawheed ". [6] That He is the provider and the sustainer of all that enjoys existence and the ultimate source of all blessings. [7] That He has the power and the ability to do all that His wisdom, mercy and justice require of Him. [8] That He knows all. [9] That none of His action is devoid of wisdom. [10] Keeping in view the absence, to a great extent, of the principle of justice in our lives, man has sometimes been prone to believing that even if there is a creator and a controller of our lives, he is indifferent toward our moral behavior. Abiding by moral principles generally entails costs and losses, while ignoring these moral values may sometimes result in tremendous physical/material benefits. Honesty is hardly, if ever, rewarded, dishonesty rarely punished. This absence of justice in the moral sphere of our lives, has generally led to the refutation of the attribute of justice in God. Nevertheless, the Qur'an tells us that for the purpose of carrying out the test of man, during the life of this world, God has generally kept this attribute dormant. If individuals were to be immediately punished for doing wrong or immediately rewarded for doing good, this effectively would have refuted all moral authority for the individual, which subsequently would have made the test during the life of this world absolutely redundant.