Why Do Innocent People Suffer
By Omar Suleiman | 2026-01-06T20:06:11.81194+00:00 | Topic: Iman
Why Do Innocent People Suffer?
Dr. Omar Suleiman
Opening
We begin by praising Allah and bearing witness that none has the right to be worshipped or unconditionally obeyed except for Allah. And we bear witness that Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم is his final messenger. And we ask Allah to send his peace and blessings upon him, his family, his companions, those that preceded him from the messengers and those that follow in his example. And we ask Allah to elevate us to be united with him in the hereafter and to follow his sunnah and his guidance in this life. Allahumma ameen.
The Most Difficult Question of Faith
Dear brothers and sisters, arguably the most difficult question of faith is Theodicy - the question of why? Now if you go through the pillars and the arkan of iman, then you see that the last of the articles of faith is the belief in the qada and qadr of Allah. The belief in the divine decree and the predestination of Allah.
But that is the pillar as Abdullah bin Abbas رضي الله عنه says that if a person establishes it then they establish their tawheed and if a person destroys it then they destroy their tawheed. It is the most difficult thing to wrap our heads around. The most difficult things for our hearts to accept. The most difficult thing for us to stomach when we see tragedies unfolding before our eyes the way we see Aleppo (Halab) unfolding before our eyes and quite frankly without the belief in Allah and without the belief in the akhira - the belief in the hereafter - nothing makes sense. Nothing makes sense.
The Foundation: Belief in Allah and the Hereafter
Interestingly enough when you go through the Quran, Allah stresses belief in Allah and belief in the hereafter. You don't see stress as much as you do on those things in belief in al-qada and al-qadr - belief in divine decree - even though that is the pillar in the article that most people will struggle with.
And there is a very important reason for that because just as without a strong belief in Allah and the hereafter nothing makes sense, with a strong belief in Allah in the hereafter everything makes sense. Everything is digestible. Everything is acceptable. Everything is tranquil even in the greatest times of chaos and havoc. Everything can be resolved with the belief in Allah and with the belief in the hereafter and that's why Allah stresses it.
When Allah says:
Whoever believes in Allah and the last day
Whoever believes in Allah and the last day
Everything comes in between those two. So he sends his angels to his messengers with messages to preach the belief in Allah and the belief in the hereafter and that resolves the problem of that question.
The Divine Promise of Justice
So when we talk about the believers and those that go through difficulty in this life and are unfairly tormented for their belief in Allah or never see the fruits of their faith in this world, then we remember that as Allah tells us in the Quran:
Allah does not let the good deeds of the believers go to waste
Two implications in there: number one, a God who rewards; number two, a time after this time in which that reward would be fully realized.
When a person suffers whether that's suffering is something that's due to a disease or an illness or it's due to oppression or transgression, Allah will not let their patience go unrewarded. Allah will reward their patience in ways that cannot be quantified.
But then what about on the other side - those that transgress and the oppressors? Well:
Do not think that Allah is unaware of what the oppressors do. Allah delays them to a day when the eyes will stare in horror
As the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم says:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 4686, Sahih Muslim 2583)
Allah delays the oppressor until he snatches him and he never lets him go
All of these ayat and all of these ahadith are the two very important implications that strengthen that belief in divine decree and that strengthen our belief and allow us to proceed through this life in a way that yes, we are saddened by events that unfold before us, but in a way that we are also proactive about dealing with what we can deal with.
Human Responsibility and Divine Decree
Humanity starts wars and humanity ignores wars. Humanity allows for the death and destruction of over a quarter million people in the last five years in Syria. 11 million displaced people, refugees living all over the place and being dealt with with cruelty. Humanity caused that and humanity ignored that.
There is an oppressor and there are the silent observers. Those that have power and those that don't have power. Governments that could have intervened but did not intervene. And people that watched in
silence and allowed that to unfold and quite frankly some people who are completely unfazed by it, some people who chose to ignore it altogether.
And when humanity messes up and humanity murders people, kill people, watch others being killed, people oppress people, watch others being oppressed, then what do we do after that? We ask God why he let it happen. How did you allow this? After we messed it all up, we turn towards Allah with our complaints.
The Paradox of Free Will
So on one hand we want the free will to be able to reject God, to reject his orders, to reject his revelation, to reject his legislation, to live free without any restrictions. We reject when he calls us to zakat and generosity and benevolence and mercy and to take care of the poor and the vulnerable amongst us.
But then at the same time while we're rejecting God and we want to be free, we also want God to not let us be too free. We want him to referee us. And we want him to stop us when our free will gets us out of hand. Isn't that hypocrisy? Isn't that a double standard?
"Oh Allah don't force us to do good, but when we mess up too bad, force us to stop being evil." To turn it back towards him after we try to demand our freedom of choice.
So if God stopped evil, and if God did not give us the ability to do wrong - we know that Allah doesn't force us to do wrong, that's a false creed, as false as the creed that says Allah doesn't know what's going to happen tomorrow. We know Allah doesn't force us to do wrong.
But if God stopped evil, then we wouldn't have free will. Then we wouldn't have choices. Then that would defeat the purpose of the entire human enterprise. Then we might as well be angels or robots.
Either God forces us to worship him and we have no desires, we have no inclinations, or we're robots just like a doll or something - you push the button of love. It's not real love even though the doll keeps saying "I love you" to the child. It's a doll. It's robotic. It's not real.
So on one hand, do we want God to stop us or on the other hand do we want God to let us completely go free to where we will ruin ourselves and where we completely mess up?
If we don't have free will and God stops all this evil when we blame it all on him when humanity messes it up, then what's the point of this world? Is there such thing as freedom without choice?
Or do we really just not want other people to have free will and other people to have choice? Because we've somehow convinced ourselves that we're not that bad and if we were in the position of government and authority and dictatorship then we would be better than those that we criticize. If we were in that position of power we would be so different.
So yeah, Allah, let us continue to try to climb the ladder of our own professions in our own careers in our own pursuits of power, but don't let them get it. How does that make sense? Aren't we creating more problems than solutions in that case?
The Proof of Divine Design
And subhanAllah when we think about even the idea of how we recognize good and evil. Because to resolve this and say well, maybe there is no God. Maybe we just all got here. Maybe this entire complex design, all of our DNA that's been written, all of our functions, all of that is all by accident. Maybe we're just here and the proof of that is how bad we've screwed it up. That's the proof that there is no God.
But the fact that you can recognize good and evil and you can recognize oppression versus goodness and generosity is a proof of Allah. The fact that that makes you uncomfortable if you're a decent human being - seeing dying children makes you uncomfortable and you can recognize what is good and what is bad - that's a proof of Allah in and of itself. That he gave you the ability to recognize, but people, humanity, human beings decide to stop being human and neglect those things.
SubhanAllah, can you imagine what goes through the mind of a person when they kill somebody? You imagine these people walking through the streets of Halab mercilessly brutalizing these women and children - what's going through your mind? Where is your heart? We can't even reason with them.
Do you think they were born like that? Do you think Allah created them to kill women and children? Do you think that they didn't know growing up that it's wrong to kill women and children and a part of them somewhere in there is probably telling them while they're deliberately ignoring the good qualities that Allah put inside of them? Somewhere in there there's a voice that's telling them this is wrong. You don't think that's there? It is there.
But the fact of the matter is that when we become so powerful, when we find ourselves in positions of authority, often we are not what Allah created us to be. We lose our own sense of purpose and all of those questions about evil and hardship and pain and why does this happen and why does that happen the vast majority of it can directly be traced back to what humanity does wrong.
The Reality of Human Evil
Moral evil, our own selfishness, our own intoxication with power, our own deliberate ignoring of the world's problems around us, our own gluttony and luxury and enjoying the things that we've been given by Allah. Let's face it:
Poverty doesn't bother you that much until you're in poverty, until you start to feel the pinch. Hunger doesn't bother you that much until you feel some hunger. Oppression doesn't bother you that much as long as it's in another land, you know subhanAllah.
We think about the privilege that we've had as American Muslims this entire time. We thought everything would be smooth. We thought that the Islamophobia wouldn't get too bad. We thought we were just going to integrate with society seamlessly and no hate crimes would take place. That we can continue to remain in our shells - the privilege of being an American Muslim.
Guess what? That privilege is waning away now, and it's not fun. It's not any fun. Other people have been living under that for a very long time, that times 100 and times 1,000.
So when we think about the evil around the world, how much of it can directly be traced back to us as people? There is enough food in the world for every single member of the human race to have a 3,000 calorie diet. But we don't care about that until we ourselves feel the pinch of that hunger.
When Good People Suffer
And then you talk about the other evil, but what about this and what about that and there are good people that just suffer inexplicably. They suffer, it doesn't make any sense.
And subhanAllah I'm going to go to the example of Abu Bakr رضي الله عنه when he saw the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم suffering. It didn't make sense to him. Why? Why him? I mean he knows the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم. No one loves Allah like he loves Allah. His darajah, his greatness is already established. Why does he have to lose a third, fourth, fifth, sixth child? Live in poverty? Why? It didn't make sense to Abu Bakr رضي الله تعالى عنه.
All of that walked in and saw the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم in this situation where he's rising from his bed, and he's got marks on his back. Abu Bakr has a better bed and Abu Bakr رضي الله عنه starts to cry. He says, "Ya Rasul Allah, I've seen the palaces of Caesar and Kisra and all these people. You deserve so much more than that."
And Rasul Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم tells Umar:
أَمَا تَرْضَى يَا عُمَرٌ أَنْ تَكُونَ لَهُمُ الدُّنْيَا وَلَنَا الْآخِرَةُ (Similar narration in Sahih al-Bukhari 4913) Aren't you pleased, O Umar, that for them belongs this dunya and to us belongs the hereafter?
The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم is telling Umar, I'm okay with this. I'm okay with this. Don't worry about me. I'm content because I know my purpose in life.
So yes, it hurts me when I go through pain because I'm a human being. The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم cried when he lost his children. The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم felt the pain of hunger. The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم felt sickness and illness, he felt poverty, but he never once questioned why because he knew that that was a futile pursuit on his part. You're not gonna get anywhere. Allah has assured you of something.
أَمَا تَرْضَى يَا عُمَرٌ Aren't you pleased, O Umar?
That they have the dunya and for us belongs the hereafter.
The Example of Syrian Refugees
Well, the most shocking thing about meeting those Syrian refugees, about going through the camps of the Syrian refugees - these are people who have lost everything. Everything. It's unbelievable how much they've lost. Family, wealth, possessions, everything. Their career, everything.
And subhanAllah, they are more content than we are. They complain less about life than we do. They're telling us, "Allah will give us more in the hereafter." No wonder why the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 5198)
The majority of the people of Jannah are the fuqara and the masakin, the poor and the downtrodden
They get it. It hurts, but they get it. And they're telling us entitled, privileged, rich, spoiled Americans that it's okay. Allah knows. Allah will give us. Allah is great. We know that what awaits us in the hereafter is better than that which we have lost in this world.
The Foundation: Purpose of Life
And so you cannot, dear brothers and sisters, start to grapple with the question of evil or the purpose of evil until you grapple with the purpose of life itself. Why are you here in the first place? Before you start asking about why things are not going the way you think they should be going, why are you here in the first place?
If you don't work that out, then you're not gonna work this out. And we see that through the Sunnah of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم where he constantly assures the believers that through hardship, we often find Allah.
How many people do you know in your own life found Allah in their hardship? Found Allah in their pain when things got shaken up a bit because otherwise they were complacent. How many people do you know that are like that? The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم constantly assures us of that over and over and over again that complacency is dangerous and sometimes in ease we are complacent.
The Limits of Human Understanding
But dear brothers and sisters, here's the problem. You look around and you see the suffering and you say, "Fine, you know, I can understand this. I can't understand that one. I get this one. I can reason through this one. I can't reason through that one. Like I can get why maybe he went through that hardship. I don't understand why he went through that hardship. Or I can get why he went through that hardship, but why the extents of that hardship? Could have figured it out. Why do they have to keep on going through this? What's the point of these children suffering?"
You go back to the fundamental principle. When the angels asked Allah:
Ya Allah, are you going to place therein one who will cause corruption and shed blood?
SubhanAllah, the angels didn't even see Adam yet. They knew it. They knew that fallible creatures will wreak destruction and havoc when they have power. They knew it. They didn't wait for the quote that "absolute power absolutely corrupts." They knew it.
"Ya Allah, are you really gonna do this? Are you gonna create them? Are you gonna give them this power?"
And what was Allah's answer?
I know what you don't know
Allah could walk them through perhaps one or two people and show them how each and every single thing that happened to them that there was a wisdom for it. But at the end of the day, sometimes things are not going to make sense even to the malaika, even to the angels.
When you establish that foundation:
I know what you don't know
Who judges to what extent someone should suffer? Who knows the present and future implications of suffering in an individual or community or country's lives? Who knows? Who can actually dissect all of that? Who can trace all of that and experiment on each person and derive the positives and the implications and how it's affected this and how it's affected that that person in that situation and what it will do in the future? Who knows all of that? Nobody.
So if you can come to the terms that I can't understand when something small happens to me - relatively small that I interpret as a hardship happens to me - I can't understand that but I trust Allah's wisdom, then why can't I trust Allah's wisdom when something major happens that I don't understand?
What are the variables? What are the parameters that you're going to accept? Was it not an issue in Palestine? It wasn't an issue in the Central African Republic, the Rwandan genocide, Bosnia? None of that was an issue? The Holocaust, that was? But this one's an issue?
You have to establish a foundation and that foundation is Allah knows what I don't know. And I'm comfortable with that. I'm comfortable with that. I'm assured with that. But I do know one thing: Allah is perfect. I'm not. Allah is perfect.
Our Role as Agents of Change
I'm not and the world is not perfect, but Allah has given me as an imperfect being the power to change a lot of the imperfection around. Allah has also put me as an agent of change to where I can do something about some of the stuff that's around me.
So maybe I can't save every single child. And maybe I can't reason why each and every single person is going through what they're going through, but I do know that there are things that Allah has given me that I could change that I didn't change. And that I can change - Allah has given me the ability to actually do away with someone else's hardship whether it's financial or whether it's physical, whatever it may be.
Allah has put you and I in a position to be able to change some things around us and subhanAllah by and large evil exists in the world when it's allowed to exist. Corruption exists in the world when people who claim to not be corrupt don't do anything about it. So that's where we put ourselves.
A Powerful Reflection
And subhanAllah there's a powerful quote where a man once said that I wanted to ask God why he allows oppression and evil and suffering and poverty in the world, but I was afraid he might ask me the same question.
Allah will ask you. You're not gonna ask Allah. You will not ask Allah about his plan. You will not ask Allah about his judgment, nor will you project your failures as humanity on Allah, or your failures as an ummah on Allah, or my failures as a Muslim or human being on Allah. That's not my place.
I can do what I can do and I can be assured that the rest is within his ultimate plan and that nothing - no transgression, dear brothers and sisters, no transgression in this world, no oppression will go unchecked. Wallahi, each and every single one of these dictators, each and every single one of these oppressors will pay the price for their oppression. No doubt about it.
The UN is not God. The U.S. is certainly not God. They're not gonna call anybody into account, but Allah will. And if you don't have that trust, then that's going to shake your faith.
The Ultimate Justice
And I have full trust in Allah that each and every single one of those people that suffer whether it's me or whether it's them, that Allah will not only reward them for their struggles, that Allah will not only do away with their pain, but Allah will do away with their pain in a way that they will not even know that they ever experienced pain.
The oppressor will not forget his pain. The oppressed will forget what they've been through. And trust me, on the day of judgment as the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم says:
(Similar concept in various hadith) When the people who were tested severely by Allah are being given their rewards by Allah, dipped into Jannah where the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said they would forget any hardship they ever faced in life
Those of us ahl al-afia would see ahl al-bala - the people who were generally pardoned who lived easy lives would see those people and they would wish that they could cut their skins so that Allah could reward them the way that he's rewarding the others. Think about that.
Our Response to Suffering
Ask yourself what you can do and do what you can do in your capacity and stop ranting about what everybody else is not doing.
Dear brothers and sisters, when one person that's close to us suffers, it's a tragedy. SubhanAllah, we look at it and we're so moved by it. But when hundreds of thousands of people suffer that we deliberately turn a blind eye to, the same thing we accuse God of doing by the way, we deliberately ignore the suffering of millions and millions of people around the world. It's just a statistic. It's just a hashtag.
But if it's a celebrity or someone that you know or someone that you've allowed yourself to constantly get to know over the years, then it's a tragedy. They break their leg, it's a tragedy. People's skulls are crushed that you don't see and it's not a tragedy, it's a statistic. The same thing we accuse Allah of doing.
Allah did not ignore them. We did. We did.
Now the point of this khutbah is not that we just feel horrible about ourselves. The point of this khutbah is what do you do about it now? How much are you giving? Just an excuse before the Lord that I've tried to do my part. Whether it's lobbying for them, whether it's raising their voices for them, whether it's giving charity to them, whether it's making dua for them. What have I done for them?
And that's a question we have to ask ourselves each and every single time we see tragedy unfold before our eyes and we see innocent people being killed. What can I do? What am I doing? The rest is to Allah. I am assured in Allah's plan, but I'm not assured in my own efforts. What can I do different?
And so when these things unfold, Allah's kingdom does not decrease at all, but our humanity does. Our humanity does.
Closing Du'a
May Allah enable us to be in the service of people. May Allah allow our hearts to be such that we don't ignore the suffering of those around us or those that are far from us, but that we engage with it, that we feel empathy for it and that we do what is in our capacity to do for it. Nothing more except for the sake of Allah and out of gratitude for what he's given to us.
We ask Allah to be with our brothers and sisters all over the world that are suffering. We ask Allah to alleviate their pain. We ask Allah to allow us to be instruments by which he alleviates their pain. We ask Allah to stop the oppressors from their oppression. We ask Allah to stop the oppressors from their oppression. We ask Allah to guide us to where we are not oppressors and we are stopping other oppressors. Allahumma ameen.
Final Reflection
Dear brothers and sisters, there is no fundraiser. I'm not gonna ask you for your money for this cause. There is no particular call to action for you except for all of us to reflect. The purpose of this Juma is to remind and for us to remember who we are as people and what Allah has created us to do and for us not to turn a blind eye and to each question ourselves what we can be doing.
And I just want to leave you with one thought. Abdullah bin al-Harith رضي الله تعالى عنه mentioned about the Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم in some poetic verses, but the Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم could have shut his doors after the conquest of Mecca.
Think about that. The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم grieved, he suffered and he made it. He made it صلی الله عليه وسلم. And we all know what "made it" means. The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم was the authority. He ruled all of the land around him صلى الله عليه وسلم. He had the adoration of his followers replace the rejection of the people around him.
He could have صلى الله عليه وسلم gotten into a comfortable palace and waited for two years:
When the victory of Allah has come and the conquest
Right? اللَّهُمَّ إِنِّي بَلَّغْتُ - "I did my part. I did what I had to do."
He could have ignored the suffering that continued to exist around him, but he didn't صلى الله عليه وسلم . Our ease is not an excuse for us to ignore the hardship around us.
So may Allah guide our hearts, guide our hands and guide us in every way, our tongues, to support those who are being oppressed.
Extensive Du'a
اللَّهُمَّ انْصُرْ إِخْوَانَنَا الْمُسْتَضْعَفِينَ فِي مَشَارِقِ الْأَرْضِ وَمَغَارِبِهَا
اللَّهُمَّ أَعِزَّ الْإِسْلَامَ وَالْمُسْلِمِينَ وَأَذِلَّ الشِّرْكَ وَالْمُشْرِكِينَ وَدَمِّرْ أَعْدَاءَ الدِّينِ
اللَّهُمَّ أَهْلِكِ الظَّالِمِينَ بِالظَّالِمِينَ وَأَخْرِجْنَا وَإِخْوَانَنَا مِنْ بَيْنِهِمْ سَالِمِينَ
Closing Quranic Verses
"Indeed, Allah orders justice and good conduct and giving to relatives and forbids immorality and bad conduct and oppression. He admonishes you that perhaps you will be reminded."
"So remember Allah; He will remember you. And be grateful to Him for His favors; He will increase you [in them]. And the remembrance of Allah is greater. And Allah knows that which you do."
"And establish salah (prayer)."