Dead hearts and empty supplications

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It is reported that Ibraaheem ibn Adham, رحمه الله, once passed through the market of Basrah. People gathered around him and asked:

O Abaa Ishaaq, Allaah, the Exalted, says in His Book. ‘Call on Me, I will answer your prayers’, but we have been calling on Him for a long time and He does not answer our prayers.

Ibraaheem replied,

“O people of Basrah, your hearts have died in respect to ten things:

First, you know Allaah but you do not give Him His rights;

Second, you have read Allaah's Book but you do not act by it;

Third, you claim to love Allaah's Messenger ﷺ – yet you abandon his Sunnah;

Fourth, you claim to be enemies to Shaytaan but you conform to [his ways];

Fifth, you say you love Paradise yet you do not work for it;

Sixth, you say you fear the Fire yet you put yourselves closer to it [by sinning];

Seventh, you say death is true but you do not prepare for it;

Eighth, you busy yourselves with the faults of others and disregard your own;

Ninth, you consume the favors of your Lord but are not grateful for them;

And tenth, you bury your dead but take no lesson from them.”

[Abuu Nu’aym, Hilyah Al-Awliyaa, 8:15,16]