The 365 · Tazkiyah · Day 60 · Envy
Tashfī · Taking Pleasure in Revenge
The disease
التَّشَفِّي
Tashfī
The story
The conquest of Makkah is the operational example for tashfī's cure. The Prophet ﷺ entered Makkah at the head of an army, with the power to execute every Quraysh leader who had wronged him. He chose ʿafw. He said: 'What do you think I am about to do with you?' They said: 'A noble brother and the son of a noble brother.' He said: 'Today, no reproach is on you. Go; you are free.' (Aṣ-Ṣīrah, Ibn Hishām; cross-ref Ibn Kathir's Bidāyah.) The cure for tashfī is to imitate the Prophetic posture: when you have the power to retaliate, choose ʿafw.
Why it's named first
Tashfī is the heart's pleasure in revenge: the warm satisfaction of seeing the person who wronged you suffer in return. The Arabic name carries the meaning of 'healing' (from sh-f-y, the same root as shifāʾ). The disease is named precisely: the diseased heart treats revenge as its medicine. The Quran and Sunnah commend the inverse: pardon (ʿafw), patience (ṣabr), letting Allah handle the accounting. The Prophet ﷺ never took personal revenge for personal wrongs; he only retaliated when Allah's limits were violated.
In the Qur'an
Q 42:40: وَجَزَاءُ سَيِّئَةٍ سَيِّئَةٌ مِّثْلُهَا ۖ فَمَنْ عَفَا وَأَصْلَحَ فَأَجْرُهُ عَلَى اللَّهِ ۚ إِنَّهُ لَا يُحِبُّ الظَّالِمِينَ. Abdel Haleem: 'Let harm be requited by an equal harm, though anyone who forgives and puts things right will have his reward from God Himself, He does not like those who do wrong.' The verse permits proportionate retaliation but explicitly prefers ʿafw (pardon) and iṣlāh (reconciliation). The reward of pardon is named as 'from Allah Himself.'
In the Sunnah
ʿĀʼishah ra. said: 'The Messenger of Allah ﷺ never took revenge for himself; he only retaliated when the limits of Allah were violated.' (Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 3560, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2327.) The hadith establishes the Prophetic standard: personal grievances were not pursued; only divine boundary violations were prosecuted. The conquest of Makkah is the worked example: the very Quraysh who had tortured, expelled, and waged war against the Muslims for twenty years were forgiven en masse. The Prophet ﷺ said: 'Go, you are free.'
The cure
1. When you have the power to retaliate, deliberately choose pardon. Repeat ʿAlī's saying when offered the chance to retaliate: 'I have forgiven for the sake of Allah.' 2. Refuse to take personal grievances to formal courts unless serious harm has occurred. The Prophet's ﷺ standard was personal forgiveness, structural prosecution only when Allah's rights were violated. 3. Refuse to entertain revenge fantasies. They are the disease's incubator. 4. Make duʿāʾ for the wrongdoer.
What is at stake
Q 42:40 names the retaliator as not earning the special reward 'from Allah.' Tashfī is therefore a forfeit: the satisfaction is short, the reward foregone. The Prophet's ﷺ practice of refusing personal revenge is the standard the believer is asked to imitate.
A du'a for this day
اللَّهُمَّ اغْفِرْ لِقَوْمِي فَإِنَّهُمْ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ (O Allah, forgive my people, for they do not know), the Prophet's ﷺ duʿāʾ for the people of Ṭāʾif who had stoned him. (Cross-ref Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 3477.) The duʿāʾ is the structural inverse of tashfī.
The door of mercy
The cure is verbal and operational. Each act of pardon retrains the heart away from the disease. The Prophet ﷺ practiced this lifelong; the Companions did the same. The accumulated pardons free the heart from the bitterness that retaliation actually produces (despite its momentary satisfaction). The cure is daily and accessible.
A reflection to carry
Tashfī is taking pleasure in revenge: the heart's enjoyment of harm-to-the-wrongdoer. The Prophet ﷺ never took revenge for himself, only for Allah's rights. The believer's structural strength is in restraint, not retaliation.
Read the longer reflection
The Prophet's ﷺ life is the worked example: when Quraysh wronged him for years in Mecca, then in Madinah, then opened the city to him at the conquest, his words were: 'Today is the day of mercy.' He freed those who had wronged him. The classical scholars: tashfī is the heart-state of one who has not yet absorbed the Prophetic discipline. Modern grievance-culture amplifies tashfī. The cure: structurally choose forgiveness; even when justified retaliation is permitted, the higher path is forgiveness. Q 42:40-43: 'whoever forgives and reconciles, his reward is with Allah... but whoever is patient and forgives, that is from the matters of resolve.'
Sources: Quran, Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim. The Qur'an and its translation are verified; the scholarship is retold faithfully in our own words and credited to its sources, never reproduced verbatim.
A verse, a healing, and a Sunnah, every morning.
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