Forgiveness in Islam: Forgiving Others

Forgiveness in Islam runs in two directions. The first is vertical: we turn to Allah, admit our sins, and ask Him to forgive us — that is the door of repentance (tawbah) in Islam, and it stands open until the end of life. The second direction is horizontal, and for many hearts it is the harder one: forgiving the people who have wronged us. This blog is about that second direction — forgiving others.

Every one of us carries a small ledger of injuries. A relative spoke a word that still stings. A friend broke a trust. A business partner took what was not his. We remember the exact sentence, the exact day, sometimes the exact tone of voice. And alongside the memory sits a quiet question: why should I let this go? If I forgive, does the wrong simply win?

The Quran and the Sunnah answer that question directly, and their answer is not what wounded pride expects. Forgiving others is presented as the very road to being forgiven ourselves. It is commanded to the Prophet ﷺ as a habit to live by. It is praised as one of the courageous conducts, not a weakness. It carries a promise of increased honour from Allah, not humiliation. And on the hardest day of his life, when the Prophet ﷺ was offered the destruction of the people who had wronged him, he chose pardon and hope instead.

What follows gathers what the Quran and the authentic Sunnah actually say about forgiving people: the verse that ties our pardon of others to Allah’s pardon of us, the command to make forgiveness a habit, the pairing of patience with forgiveness, the promise of honour, and the unforgettable scene at Taif where mercy defeated revenge. These texts do not ask us to pretend injuries do not hurt. They show us something stronger to do with the hurt.

1. Forgiving Others Is the Way to Be Forgiven

The clearest link between our forgiveness and Allah’s forgiveness comes in Surah An-Nur. This verse was revealed about Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him), who had been financially supporting his poor relative Mistah and swore to cut off that support after Mistah wronged him; the verse directed him not to stop, but to forgive and overlook:

“The men of grace and wealth among you should not swear against giving (their charitable gifts) to the kinsmen and the poor and to those who have migrated in the way of Allah, and they should forgive and forego. Do you not like that Allah forgives you? Allah is Most-Forgiving, Very-Merciful.” (Quran 24:22)

Notice what the verse asks for. It does not merely ask Abu Bakr to calm his feelings. It asks him to keep giving — to continue the charitable support with his own wealth — and then adds the two commands: forgive, and forego. Forgiving here is not an inner mood; it is conduct. The hand that was about to close in anger is told to stay open.

Then comes the question that dissolves resentment: “Do you not like that Allah forgives you?” Every believer hopes to stand before Allah and be forgiven for a lifetime of shortcomings. This verse places that hope side by side with our treatment of the person who wronged us, as if to say: the pardon you long to receive is connected to the pardon you are being asked to give. We cannot clutch our grudges tightly and stretch out empty hands for mercy at the same time.

And the verse closes by reminding us of who is asking: “Allah is Most-Forgiving, Very-Merciful.” The One who commands us to forgive is Himself the most forgiving. When we pardon a person who does not deserve it from us, we are imitating, in our small human measure, the mercy we beg from Him every day.

2. Take Forgiveness as Your Habit

A single heroic act of pardon is beautiful, but Allah’s instruction to His Prophet ﷺ goes further: forgiveness is to be a standing habit of life, the default setting of the heart:

“(O Prophet,) take forgiveness (as your habit), enjoin virtue, and ignore the ignorant.” (Quran 7:199)

The verse gives three linked instructions. Take forgiveness as your habit. Enjoin virtue — keep calling to what is good. And ignore the ignorant — do not be dragged into every provocation, insult, and foolish argument that crosses your path.

Read together, these three paint the character of a believer who is very hard to embitter. Most of the injuries that poison our lives are not grand betrayals; they are the daily grit of careless words, slights, rudeness, and people who simply do not know better. A person who waits to forgive only the big wrongs will spend his life choking on the small ones. The verse teaches a rhythm instead: pardon quickly, keep doing and enjoining good, and let ignorant behaviour pass without renting it a room in your heart.

This also frees forgiveness from depending on the other person’s apology. A habit does not wait for perfect conditions. The one who has taken forgiveness as his habit forgives because of who he is becoming, not because the offender has finally performed remorse well enough. His heart stays light, and his tongue stays free for enjoining virtue rather than rehearsing grievances.

3. Patience and Forgiveness: One of the Courageous Conducts

Some people hesitate to forgive because they fear it makes them look weak — as if pardon were what you do when you have no other option. The Quran reverses that idea completely. Forgiveness, it says, belongs to the strong:

“And if one observes patience and forgives, it is, of course, one of the courageous conducts.” (Quran 42:43)

The pairing matters. Patience comes first, because forgiveness without patience is nearly impossible: the wound is real, the memory is fresh, and the urge to answer in kind is strong. Holding back that urge — observing patience — is itself an act of strength, as the detailed guidance on patience (sabr) in Islam shows. Then, on top of patience, forgiving: not merely enduring the wrong silently, but releasing the offender from your claim against him. Allah calls this combination one of the courageous conducts — a matter of true resolve, in the words of the verse’s fuller meaning: the deeds done by people of firm determination.

Think about what revenge actually requires: nothing but impulse. Anyone can strike back; it is the easiest motion of the soul. Forgiving, by contrast, requires a person to master his own anger, silence his own ego, and choose a higher road while the lower one is wide open. That is why the verse does not describe forgiveness as softness. It describes it as courage.

This should change how we see ourselves in the moment of pardoning. You are not surrendering. You are doing one of the bravest things a human being can do — and Allah Himself is the one who called it that.

4. Forgiveness Increases Your Honour, Not Your Shame

Underneath the fear of looking weak sits another fear: that forgiving will cost us our honour — that people will think less of us, and the offender will think he can do it again. The Prophet ﷺ addressed the economy of the heart with three reversals, the middle of which speaks directly to this fear. Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ) as saying:

“Charity does not decrease wealth, no one forgives another except that Allah increases his honor, and no one humbles himself for the sake of Allah except that Allah raises his status.” (Sahih Muslim 2588 — Sahih)

Just as charity looks like a loss of wealth but is not, forgiving looks like a loss of honour but is not. “No one forgives another except that Allah increases his honor.” The increase is guaranteed by the One who never breaks a promise, and it comes from the only source whose honour truly lasts. The respect people give out of fear evaporates; the honour Allah gives to the forgiving heart stays.

This promise also settles the question of motive. We do not forgive so that onlookers applaud our nobility, and we do not forgive because the offender deserves it. We forgive because Allah has attached His own increase to the act. The transaction is between us and Him. Even if no one on earth notices the pardon — even if the offender never knows — the honour is recorded and raised by the Lord who sees the heart that let go when it could have held on.

So the believer’s calculation is different from the world’s calculation. The world says: hold the grudge, guard your pride. The Prophet ﷺ says: forgive, and watch Allah raise you.

5. The Hardest Day: The Prophet’s Pardon at Taif

All of this teaching becomes flesh in one scene. Aisha (may Allah be pleased with her) narrated that she asked the Prophet ﷺ whether he had ever faced a day harder than the day of Uhud — a day on which he had been wounded and his beloved uncle killed. His answer pointed not to the battlefield, but to Taif, where he had gone to invite its people to Islam and had been refused and wronged by them:

“Your tribes have troubled me a lot, and the worse trouble was the trouble on the day of ‘Aqaba when I presented myself to Ibn `Abd-Yalail bin `Abd-Kulal and he did not respond to my demand.” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih)

“So I departed, overwhelmed with excessive sorrow, and proceeded on, and could not relax till I found myself at Qarnath-Tha-alib where I lifted my head towards the sky to see a cloud shading me unexpectedly.” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih)

In that cloud was Gabriel, who told him that Allah had heard what his people had said to him and had sent the Angel of the Mountains, to do whatever the Prophet ﷺ ordered against them. The angel greeted him and made the offer plainly:

“Allah has heard your people’s saying to you, and what they have replied back to you, Allah has sent the Angel of the Mountains to you so that you may order him to do whatever you wish to these people.” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih)

“O Muhammad! Order what you wish. If you like, I will let Al-Akh-Shabain (i.e. two mountains) fall on them.” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih)

Pause here and feel the weight of the moment. This is not forgiveness from weakness; there was no weakness in that valley. Complete destruction of the city that had humiliated him was one word away, and the offer came from heaven itself. Every human instinct screams to say yes. The Prophet ﷺ, bleeding and sorrowful from the worst day of his life, said:

“No but I hope that Allah will let them beget children who will worship Allah Alone, and will worship None besides Him.” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih)

He refused revenge and asked instead for their unborn descendants — that from the very people who rejected him would come generations who worship Allah alone. History records that Taif did embrace Islam, and its children did become worshippers of Allah. The pardon that looked like loss became one of the great gains of the Seerah.

When forgiving feels too costly, this is the scene to sit with. If he ﷺ could pardon at Taif — with the power of annihilation in his hand and the pain still fresh — then our pardons, over far smaller wounds, are within reach.

6. Forgiving in Daily Life: Simple Reflections

The texts above give the principles; what follows is simply reflection on carrying them into ordinary days, in the spirit of the same verses and narrations.

Begin with the people closest to you. The verse of Surah An-Nur was about a kinsman, and our sharpest grudges are usually inside the family — against a parent, a sibling, a spouse, a child. Walking the path of kindness to parents in Islam and to family generally means deciding, again and again, to forgive and forego rather than to keep accounts. A home where small wrongs are quickly pardoned is a home at peace.

Clear the account before sleep. The day’s slights are small in the evening; left overnight, they harden. A short, sincere resolve before sleeping — “O Allah, I forgive whoever wronged me today; forgive me as I have forgiven” — joins this blog’s theme to the other direction of forgiveness, and the dua for forgiveness helps us ask Allah for our own pardon with the same hope we extend to others.

Expect anger, and plan for it. Forgiveness usually dies in the first hot minute of rage, so meet that minute with the habits taught for controlling anger in Islam: silence, stillness, and delay. The pardon decided in calm is rarely regretted; the revenge spoken in heat almost always is.

Finally, remember that forgiving does not require pretending. The verse of Surah Ash-Shura joins forgiveness to patience precisely because a real wound exists to be patient with. You may remember what happened; memory is not a grudge. A grudge is the refusal to release. You can release the debt of the heart, wish the person well, and let Allah — the Most-Forgiving, the Very-Merciful — take care of every account, including your own.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1. Why should I forgive someone who has wronged me? Because Allah ties your pardon of others to His pardon of you: “they should forgive and forego. Do you not like that Allah forgives you? Allah is Most-Forgiving, Very-Merciful” (Quran 24:22). Forgiving is the way of the one who hopes to be forgiven.

Q2. Does forgiving others lower my status or make me look weak? No. The Prophet ﷺ said: “no one forgives another except that Allah increases his honor” (Sahih Muslim 2588 — Sahih). Forgiveness raises honour with Allah, and the Quran counts patience joined with forgiveness among “the courageous conducts” (Quran 42:43), not among weaknesses.

Q3. What did the Prophet ﷺ do when he was wronged on his hardest day? At Taif, after being refused and wronged, he was offered by the Angel of the Mountains: “If you like, I will let Al-Akh-Shabain (i.e. two mountains) fall on them.” He refused, saying: “No but I hope that Allah will let them beget children who will worship Allah Alone, and will worship None besides Him” (Sahih al-Bukhari 3231 — Sahih).

Q4. How can forgiveness become part of my everyday character? Take it as a habit, as Allah instructed His Prophet ﷺ: “take forgiveness (as your habit), enjoin virtue, and ignore the ignorant” (Quran 7:199). Pardon small slights quickly, keep calling to good, and do not let provocation occupy your heart.

Q5. Must I keep helping a relative who wronged me, as Abu Bakr did? The verse of Surah An-Nur addressed men of grace and wealth who had sworn to stop their charitable gifts to kinsmen, the poor, and the emigrants, and directed them: “they should forgive and forego” (Quran 24:22). It teaches that a wrong done to us is not a reason to close the hand of charity that Allah had opened.