The Differences Between Riya, Sum’ah, and Ujub: Identify the 3 Destroyers of Good Deeds

A paradox often entraps the spiritual life of a believer: a person might appear exceptionally disciplined in their worship—performing prayers at the earliest time, regularly giving charity, and never missing religious gatherings—yet ironically, the record of their deeds risks turning into worthless dust on the scales of the Hereafter. The ruin of these deeds occurs not because the individual violated the conditions or pillars of a valid act of worship, but rather due to complications of diseases neatly hidden at the base of their inner self. The three primary diseases proven to be the most lethal threats are riya, sum’ah, and ujub. These three are destroyers of deeds that move in silence; they cannot be scanned by the naked eye, and no one can accurately diagnose them except the self-awareness of the servant themselves and, certainly, the surveillance of Allah ﷻ.

Imam Ibn ʿAllān, in his commentary work Dalīl al-Fāliḥīn, concludes his exegetical explanation regarding the verses of ikhlas (sincerity) with a deeply penetrating warning:

وَفِي الآيَاتِ تَنْبِيهٌ لِلْمُوَفَّقِ عَلَى الْإِخْلَاصِ وَتَحْذِيرٌ لَهُ مِنَ الرِّيَاءِ، وَلَا يَغْتَرَّ بِخَفَائِهِ ظَاهِرًا فَإِنَّ اللهَ تَعَالَى عَالِمٌ بِخَفِيَّاتِ الْأُمُورِ، لَا تَخْفَى عَلَيْهِ وَسَاوِسُ الصُّدُورِ

“In these verses, there is a warning for the one who receives tawfiq to be sincere and a caution for him against riya. Let him not be deceived by its outward concealment, for indeed Allah Ta’ala is Knowing of the most hidden affairs, and the whispers of the chests are not hidden from Him.”¹

This article is specifically structured to unravel the tangled threads regarding the differences between riya, sum’ah, and ujub definitively and comprehensively. By anchoring the arguments on the evidence from the Qur’an and authentic hadiths, this comparative study aims to equip readers to recognize the characteristics of each disease of the heart. Consequently, by the mercy of Allah ﷻ, we can take anticipatory steps to avoid them. Deepening this material is an inseparable pillar of mastering the concept of Intention and Ikhlas in Islam: A Complete Guide from Hadith to Fiqh of Worship. To equip yourself with the antidote, it is highly recommended that you study What is Ikhlas? Its Meaning, Levels, and How to Achieve It.

At a Glance: Why Are These Three Diseases Often Confused?

It is not uncommon for the lay public to use the term “riya” as a single label to represent all forms of flawed intentions or the act of showing off worship. In reality, when dissected using the analytical tools of Islamic epistemology and spiritual psychology, the diseases of riya, sum’ah, and ujub possess entirely different triggering roots, target audiences, and mechanisms for destroying rewards. It is certain that all three originate from the same source of illness, namely the loss of purity of the heart and the distortion of the meaning of intention when a person steps forward to perform a deed.

Nevertheless, their operational methods have their own distinctiveness. Riya maneuvers through human visual perception. Sum’ah builds its reputation through the transmission of the auditory senses and public discourse. Meanwhile, ujub is a purely internal pathology that erodes logic through self-evaluation, which ironically requires no external validation whatsoever.

To facilitate conceptual mapping, the following initial orientation table presents a basic comparison before we dissect them one by one:

Riya — Performing Deeds to be Seen by People

What is Riya?

In his effort to correct various deviating intentions of worship, Ibn ʿAllān formulated a very dense and straightforward definition of riya:

يُقَاتِلُ رِيَاءً أَيْ لِيُرَى النَّاسُ قِتَالَهُ

“Fighting out of riya, meaning so that people see his fighting.”²

This sharp definition is articulated in Ibn ʿAllān’s commentary (syarah) on a hadith narrated through the companion Abu Musa al-Ash’ari radhiyallahu ‘anhu. Although the original context of the hadith touches upon correcting a person’s intention amidst the roar of battle, the theological principle of this saying binds universally to all manifestations of worship. The fundamental core of riya is an inner fabrication where a person positions the gaze (ruʾyah) of creations as the ultimate goal, or at the very least, as an accompanying part of the motivation for their worship.

Viewed from its linguistic etymology, the terminology of riya is rooted in the lemma al-ruʾyah (الرؤية), which means the process of seeing visually. A servant infected with riya treats their worship like a theatrical stage that constantly demands the presence of eyewitnesses. This concept necessitates a strict distinction from a natural scenario where someone worships sincerely for Allah, and unintentionally a neighbor passes by and sees them. Riya is only judged to occur when the desire to be seen is deliberately produced within the inner space, either moments before starting the worship or while the worship is ongoing.

Qur’anic Evidence on the Danger of Riya

High-level vigilance against the latent danger of riya rests directly on the decree of the Qur’an. Allah ﷻ says in Surah Ali Imran, verse 29, with a daunting tone:

قُلْ إِنْ تُخْفُوا مَا فِي صُدُورِكُمْ أَوْ تُبْدُوهُ يَعْلَمْهُ اللَّهُ

“Say: ‘Whether you conceal what is in your breasts or reveal it, Allah knows it’.”

Ibn ʿAllān explains that this holy verse holds a dual function: as a warning alarm (tanbīh) for the negligent heart, and as a severe threat to the perpetrators of hypocrisy. The disease of riya, no matter how excellently it is designed and hidden behind the cloak of piety away from human eyes, has absolutely no chance of hiding from the surveillance radar of Allah ﷻ. In his commentary, Ibn ʿAllān uses the straightforward phrase lā yaghtarr bi-khafāʾihi ẓāhiran, which demands that a servant should never feel safe and be deceived by their own ability to hide the disease of riya in its outward appearance.³

The fact that someone performs a ritual of worship in absolute silence, locked tightly in a room, does not guarantee one hundred percent immunity from the snare of riya. This disease remains actively working if, in that silence, the recesses of their heart are still constructing fantasies and imagining how one day people will realize, recount, or respond with full admiration to the sacrifice of their secret worship.

Hadith: Allah Does Not Look at Outward Appearances

The standard used in the divine assessment system is affirmed more clearly through the holy tongue of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ:

إِنَّ اللهَ لَا يَنْظُرُ إِلَى أَجْسَامِكُمْ وَلَا إِلَى صُوَرِكُمْ وَلَكِنْ يَنْظُرُ إِلَى قُلُوبِكُمْ

“Indeed, Allah does not look at your bodies, nor your appearances, but He looks at your hearts.”

Ibn ʿAllān’s commentary on this prophetic text is highly enlightening. He explains that the term naẓar (sight/looking) attributed to Allah ﷻ in this context is a metaphor for the process of assessing accountability and calculating rewards (mujāzāh), and not sight in the optical or sensory connotation of creatures. This is because the attribute of Bashir (All-Seeing) belonging to Allah ﷻ essentially scans the entire existence of creation, both physical forms and atomic matter, without exception.

The direct application of this theological concept against the threat of riya is a severe blow. The act of presenting an outward choreographic perfection in worship—such as engineering the duration of prostration, displaying piles of charitable donations, or polishing the recitation of the Qur’an with artificial, melodious tones—theologically will never add the slightest weight to the record of deeds with Allah if the perpetrator’s heart is actually beating in search of recognition from other than Him. Ibn ʿAllān formulates the rule: mā al-ithābah wa al-taqrīb illā biʾiʿtibār mā fī al-qalb (there is no outpouring of reward and achievement of closeness to God except that it is solely calculated from the honesty residing in the heart).⁴

Riya in the Context of Great Deeds — Lessons from the Hadith of Jihad

The destructive power of merciless riya can be extracted from a comprehensive hadith regarding the ruling of jihad. A companion came to the Prophet ﷺ to question the ruling on three types of motivations underlying departure to the battlefield:

سُئِلَ رَسُولُ اللهِ ﷺ عَنِ الرَّجُلِ يُقَاتِلُ شَجَاعَةً، وَيُقَاتِلُ حَمِيَّةً، وَيُقَاتِلُ رِيَاءً — أَيُّ ذَلِكَ فِي سَبِيلِ اللهِ؟

“The Messenger of Allah ﷺ was asked about a man who fights out of bravery, one who fights out of tribal fanaticism (protecting honor), and one who fights out of riya—which of these is in the path of Allah?”

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ set a strict parameter that collapsed everything else:

مَنْ قَاتَلَ لِتَكُونَ كَلِمَةُ اللهِ هِيَ الْعُلْيَا فَهُوَ فِي سَبِيلِ اللهِ

“He who fights so that the word of Allah becomes the highest, then he is (the one considered) in the path of Allah.”

Ibn ʿAllān dissects the layers of meaning of the three intention indicators presented by the questioner. The first intention is shajāʿah (fighting as a proof of manhood and masculine supremacy), the second is ḥamiyyah (fighting purely out of bloodline fanaticism or to save the group’s dignity), and the third is the disease of riyāʾ (fighting with the design to be recorded by public memory as a praised hero). The fate of these three intentions is truly tragic; they are strictly sentenced out of the jurisdiction of fī sabīlillāh—even though the individual is risking their life and covered in blood in the most extreme structural worship within the foundation of the meaning of Islam linguistically and legally including its pillars.

The essential core we must absorb is: the performance of a good deed, no matter how small, if pulled purely by the breath of sincerity for Allah, its position will undoubtedly far exceed and defeat a deed as great as armed jihad into which the virus of riya has crept. Ibn ʿAllān states, “The final product of the saying indicates that fighting in the path of Allah requires fighting activated from the foundation of spiritual intellectual strength (a clear conscience and purpose), and is not driven by explosions of anger, let alone the turbulence of lust”.⁵

Riya within the Levels of Intention — Its Position Among the Diseases of the Heart

When classifying the stages of intention according to the mapping of the maestros of ma’rifah (arbāb al-ishārāt), riya is placed in a very sorrowful zone:

نِيَّةُ أَهْلِ النِّفَاقِ التَّزَيُّنُ عِنْدَ اللهِ وَعِنْدَ النَّاسِ

“The intention of the hypocrites is to adorn themselves before Allah and before people (simultaneously).”⁶

This phenomenon represents the manifestation of the most severe stage of riya. The perpetrator of this pathology is not merely exploiting a moment to appear pious in the eyes of their peers, but manipulatively and irrationally, they also attempt to garner a holy image before Allah ﷻ, even though the walls of their inner self are hollowed out by the termites of hypocrisy. The use of the diction al-tazayyun (التزيّن) means the process of beautifying one’s appearance or artificially applying makeup. The essence of worship, originally descended as a medium of communication and surrender to the Creator, is hijacked into a social cosmetic device to dress up the ego. In the construction of the six-level hierarchy of sincerity of intention, this moral bankruptcy is deposited on the third floor—a precarious position that almost drowns the perpetrator, even if the outer shell still wraps fragments of worship.

Sum’ah — Performing Deeds to be Heard and Talked About by People

What is Sum’ah?

Discussing sum’ah demands mental clarity to prevent overlapping concepts. Ibn ʿAllān weaves the definitional boundaries of sum’ah with a dense composition, even placing it right next to the phrase riya:

وَمِثْلُهُ الْقِتَالُ سُمْعَةً أَيْ لِيَسْمَعَ النَّاسُ

“Equivalent to it (riya) is fighting out of sum’ah, which is so that people hear of it.”⁷

The positioning of the sum’ah formulation adjacent to the riya definition within the framework of the same sentence supplies an academic proof; Ibn ʿAllān acknowledges that both hold a parallel or equivalent position in terms of the magnitude of their destructive power against the reward of deeds. Despite this, their instruments of transmission operate through opposing paths. The absolute dividing line separating riya and sum’ah is: riya targets and exploits the optical channel (ruʾyah), while sum’ah uses the functions of audio, hearing, and narrative echo (samāʿ) as its battlefield.

A person exposed to sum’ah is not controlled by the desire to present their worship like a live theatrical performance before human eyes. The perpetrator of sum’ah might practice their night prayers in a quiet corner. But their brain waves work hard engineering a scenario and maintaining the ambition that tomorrow morning—or in the days to come—the news regarding their secret worship can leak to the public, spread widely through the tongues of their friends, and become a commodity of conversation within their community.

Another Articulation of Sum’ah — Acting “To be Mentioned”

Indications of the spread of sum’ah are also recorded and confirmed in the alternative literature of the hadith investigating the motivation of deeds:

وَقَدْ جَاءَ فِي رِوَايَةٍ: «سُئِلَ عَنِ الرَّجُلِ يُقَاتِلُ لِلذِّكْرِ»

“And indeed it has come in another narration: ‘(The Prophet ﷺ) was asked about a man who fights for the sake of being mentioned’.”⁸

Ibn ʿAllān’s brilliance stands out as he dismantles the anatomical meaning of this li-al-dhikr motive:

أَيْ لِأَنْ يُذْكَرَ بِالشَّجَاعَةِ، أَيْ مُلَاحَظَةً لِنَظَرِ الْخَلْقِ لِيَمْدَحُوهُ وَيُقْبِلُوا عَلَيْهِ

“That is, with the intention of him being mentioned (talked about by the public) as a brave hero, namely by continuously considering the response of the gaze of fellow creatures so that later they will all shower praise upon him and flock to approach or sympathize with him.”

The presence of the term al-dhikr (الذكر) in diseases of the heart refers to the uncontrolled ambition for one’s existence to be constantly declared, remembered, and made a topic of positive discourse in public spaces. If we dissect Ibn ʿAllān’s commentary above, we encounter three mental pathologies that construct the edifice of sum’ah:

1. Yudkhar bi-l-shajāʿah: The obsession for one’s profile, portfolio of goodness, or bravery to be recognized, validated, and campaigned to the wider society.
2. Mulāḥaẓah li-naẓar al-khalq: A flawed mental calculation process, where a servant performs deeds by constantly weighing the profit and loss of the social perception they will acquire.
3. Li-yamḍaḥūhu wa yuqbilū ʿalayh: The peak of spiritual illusion, where the ultimate target of the deed is a monopoly on praise, and the hope that society will approach and fully sympathize in order to secure social advantages.

This structured exposition tears away the camouflage of sum’ah, which often covers its face with false humility. This hidden disease of the heart is not merely a thirst for momentary praise; it launches a long-term strategy so that the perpetrator’s name enters the list of legendary figures continuously echoed by human collective memory.

Riya vs. Sum’ah — Often Confused Differences

Many assume that riya and sum’ah are identical synonyms, as both originate from the same well: a chronic thirst for human appreciation. In reality, the mechanism of poison distribution and pattern of invasion of the two move in different directions.

The understanding of the demarcation line between the two can be easily identified through the comparison in the following table:

These two malignant diseases can very freely collaborate within a matter of days. As an illustration: At Maghrib time, a congregant donates money into the mosque’s charity box with slightly dramatized movements upon realizing he is monitored by others—at this second, riya has worked. Then, the next afternoon, while gathering at the workplace, he provokes a discussion about the mosque’s operational difficulties so he has an opening to tell the story of his large donation last night—at this second, sum’ah takes over.

Ujub — Being Amazed by One’s Own Deeds

The Position of Ujub Among the Three Destroyers of Deeds

Important Scholarly Note: Unlike the discussions of riya and sum’ah whose interpretative evidence is explicitly detailed by Al-Hafiz Ibn ʿAllān when dissecting the chapter of Ikhlas in the manuscript of Dalīl al-Fāliḥīn, the philosophical study and terminology of “ujub” (العجب) requires additional references. To maintain the integrity of academic tradition, the details of the ujub definition in this fragment rely on the primary literature of Ahlus Sunnah wal Jama’ah tasawwuf, which shares a similar methodological foundation, namely the magnum opus of Imam al-Ghazali, Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn.

The most fundamental distinction between ujub compared to the previous two destroyers of deeds lies in the direction of orientation. Riya and sum’ah are diseases oriented outward (externally); the perpetrator wavers if not injected by the validation of humans around them. Conversely, ujub is a disease with an orientation circling inward (internally). A person can very possibly be diagnosed with acute ujub, even if since birth not a single person has ever known of their achievements in worship.

Ujub does not rely on the glare of spotlights, needs no oratorical stage, and does not crave the noise of appreciation. Ujub is nothing else but a flawed monologue communication between a servant and the mirror of their own ego; a blind spot where they transform themselves from the position of a servant into an idol worshipper of their own deeds. Knowledge of the anatomy of this disease is the lifeblood of understanding the essence of tasawwuf to prevent spiritual malpractice.

What is Ujub?

Implicitly, the theological foundation as an antipathy therapy against the snare of ujub has been touched upon by Ibn ʿAllān. He formulated it while unraveling the peak degree of intention of the Sufis:

نِيَّةُ أَهْلِ التَّصَوُّفِ تَرْكُ الِاعْتِمَادِ عَلَى مَا يَظْهَرُ مِنْهُمْ مِنَ الطَّاعَاتِ

“As for the intention of the Sufis, it is abandoning reliance on the various forms of outward obedience that appear from their physical movements.”⁹

Ibn ʿAllān’s theological claim placing the concept of tark al-iʿtimād (releasing the ego from the habit of relying on deeds) as a high spiritual qualification, affirms that the condition of al-iʿtimād ʿalā al-ʿamal (the mentality of pride and feeling secure due to relying firmly on the greatness of the quantity of one’s own good deeds) is a form of disease that must be discarded. Ujub is nothing but the factual manifestation of that al-iʿtimād claim. Humans attacked by the disease of ujub position their charity and series of prostrations as “personal assets” achieved thanks to their sweat, rather than as guidance (tawfiq) facilitated by Allah ﷻ.

As a guideline to define the terminological boundaries of ujub precisely, we refer to the formulation of Hujjatul Islam, Imam al-Ghazali:

فَإِذَنْ الْعُجْبُ هُوَ اسْتِعْظَامُ النِّعْمَةِ وَالرُّكُونُ إِلَيْهَا مَعَ نِسْيَانِ إِضَافَتِهَا إِلَى الْمُنْعِمِ

“Thus, what is essentially called ujub is the attitude of magnifying (feeling great because of) a blessing of worship and relying upon it, which is constantly accompanied by the perpetrator’s negligence in attributing the ownership of that blessing to the Essence of the Bestower of Blessings (Allah Ta’ala).”¹⁰

Guided by Imam al-Ghazali’s formulation above, ujub peaks when someone feels endlessly amazed looking at how much their donation funds are, or when someone is amazed by how melodious their recitation rhythm is. The ego within them whispers that this giant achievement of deeds is purely the product of their discipline alone, while at the same exact second they lose the memory that their eyelids wouldn’t even be able to open to worship without power from Him.

The Difference Between Ujub and Gratitude for Deeds

A natural question arises: “Is the feeling of relief, joy, and peace after completing a worship automatically sentenced by the Shari’a as a symptom of the ujub disease?”

The resolution lies entirely in which direction our inner attribution is aimed:

• Syukur / Gratitude (Tawhidic Appreciation): Dragging the acknowledgment of all the smoothness of worship rhythm into the lap of grace and pure tawfiq from Allah. The heart speaks, “Alhamdulillah O Allah, all glory belongs only to You who has been willing to make it easy for this servant to stand and prostrate.” This reaction is the pinnacle of servitude because it educates the ego to accept its position as a creature needing help.
• Ujub (Ego Appreciation): Hijacking the ownership rights over the success of the worship to claim it as the fruit of physical endurance and personal competence. The mind boasts, “I knew it, I am consistently waking up for night prayers because I have high-level discipline, unlike others who are fast asleep.”

The theological logic in distinguishing the two is recorded if we compare the intention qualifications of level five and the peak level (six) based on the compilation of arbāb al-ishārāt immortalized by Ibn ʿAllān. The fifth level imposes the curriculum of tark al-iʿtimād (breaking free from the habit of hanging one’s salvation on piles of deeds), on the other hand, the perfect position at the sixth level is narrated with the rule of rubūbiyyah tuwallidul ʿubūdiyyah (absolute recognition of Allah’s omnipotence will automatically lead the ego to drown in unconditional servitude). This formulation affirms the fact: the more a human understands the reality of rububiyyah, the more closed the possibility for the disease of ujub to inhabit their mind.¹¹

Why is Ujub More Dangerous Than Riya?

In the literature of authentic tasawwuf studies, scholars provide warnings that the danger of ujub is exceedingly complicated. Riya and sum’ah to certain limits have clear isolation protocols; the perpetrator is advised to practice multiplying secret deeds (al-aʿmāl al-sirriyyah), routinely giving charity secretly, and refraining from publishing worship.

Unfortunately, ujub proves immune to such self-isolation medical procedures. A servant whose heart is encrusted with ujub actually faces the potential of thickening pride when they distance themselves to act without friends. The ego within their inner self freely produces dialogue: “Look at how pure my intention is, I am willing to seclude myself to be sincere, very different from my colleagues.” The absence of outside human intervention actually injects their ego of pride to proclaim an absolute victory.

We can glean a guideline for curing ujub through the majestic story recounting the fate of three young men from the past who were trapped by a large boulder blocking the cave door. Entering a critical phase between life and death, each of them agreed to utilize the concept of tawassul by intermediating their track record of righteous deeds performed most secretly. The three agreed to begin their supplications with an identical intention blueprint:

اللَّهُمَّ إِنْ كُنْتُ فَعَلْتُ ذَلِكَ ابْتِغَاءَ وَجْهِكَ فَفَرِّجْ عَنَّا مَا نَحْنُ فِيهِ

“O my Lord, if I performed that deed purely seeking the pleasure of Your Face alone, then be willing to shift the crushing rock that traps us.”

Analyze carefully the use of the diction: “if I performed it” (in kunta faʿaltu). Experts note that the use of the conditional word “if” in this prayer is not a doubt about the certainty of the fact that they truly did that goodness in the past. Chronologically, the first man genuinely offered milk selflessly to his parents, the second man successfully restrained his lust at a critical second, and the third man proved his integrity by distributing wealth to its rightful owner. The particle “if” demonstrates nobility of character, where they declare full awareness that the authority to judge whether their worship was pure, sterile, and worthy of acceptance, lies absolutely in the hands of the Essence of Allah, not dictated based on the delusions of their own self-pride.¹²

Comprehensive Comparison of the Three — A Complete Matrix

To summarize the structure of the comparative study above, here is a comparison matrix of this trilogy of reward-killing diseases:

Do These Three Automatically Invalidate Deeds?

A question that naturally arises in the minds of society: Suppose an Islamic practitioner is detected to be exposed to the pathogen of riya, sum’ah, or drugged by ujub while reciting worship, are their fundamental acts of worship like prayer or fasting automatically categorized as invalid according to the law of the shari’a court?

To construct a precise argument that satisfies the rules of the meaning of fiqh alongside Sufi ethics, we must elaborate on two realms: the review of the legality of valid conditions (ṣiḥḥah fiqhiyyah), and the trial of the deed’s worthiness in the sight of Allah (qabūl ukhrāwī).

Review of the Legality of External Fiqh Law Status:

Whether riya, sum’ah, or ujub afflicts a person, all of them fundamentally do not automatically invalidate the foundation of juridical validity of a shari’a rule from the lens of the science of fiqh of worship (if the disease of the heart appears without destroying the basic obligatory intention). If someone performs prayer where all pillars and valid conditions are orderly fulfilled—from perfecting the obligatory acts of wudu, completing how many pillars of prayer exist, up to the fiqh of salam—then according to the administration of shari’a law in the world, the execution of this person’s obligatory prayer is justified as valid, their obligation is dropped, and they are not obligated to make up (qadha’) their prayer.

Review of Accountability for Reward Acquisition:

It is in the spiritual arena that true destruction occurs. Although holding the legalization of “valid according to fiqh”, an offering of worship wrapped in the intention of riya loses its soul and will not be valued in the court of Allah ﷻ. Relying on the hadith of Abu Musa al-Ash’ari quoted by Ibn ʿAllān’s pen; that an individual who crashes the battle lines solely intending to be praised for their bravery (riya), is strictly excluded from the virtue of fī sabīlillāh. Resulting in their deposit of good rewards being burnt without a trace.

This conclusion echoes absolute harmony with the hadith narrated by Abu Hurairah. That the vortex of Allah’s evaluation (naẓar) is directed penetrating the substance of the heart, not feeling the aesthetics of the outer shell. A worship whose heart is besieged by riya is detected to be empty of valuation weight. Moving from this complexity, theological academics and scholars of Ahlus Sunnah wal Jama’ah agree to formulate the nomenclature of riya as a variant of shirk aṣghar (minor shirk).¹³ The servant’s mentality has divided obedience by placing the hope of creatures’ appreciation as a rival to the essential goal of worship.

Independent Self-Evaluation (Muhasabah) — How to Recognize the Three Within Oneself

All forms of theoretical exposition do not provide a guarantee of safety if a servant is reluctant to translate it into a personal muhasabah session. This session presents an instrument of soul evaluation retraced from the reference texts elaborated above.

The First Mirror — Extraction of Riya Symptoms:

Polished from the foundation of Ibn ʿAllān’s warning regarding the slippery mode of hidden riya, ask yourself:

“When I weigh the quality of my worship (including the duration of bowing, solemnity, down to the beauty of reciting the Qur’an)—does this rhythm change drastically for the better with the arrival of colleagues or people I respect, compared to when I worship alone?”¹⁴

If the quality of your worship shifts sharply to become slow and full of adab when a certain figure stops by to visit, be careful, at that point the seed of the riya virus is asking to be given an intake of attention.

The Second Mirror — Investigating the Seeds of Sum’ah:

Taken from Ibn ʿAllān’s explanation regarding li-yudhkara bi-l-shajāʿah (the intention for the public tongue to echo their story), test your tongue control:

“Have I ever consecutively felt uneasy or devised conversation tactics, just to get momentum to insert a story about a charity package or secret deed that I have done?” [8]

The manifestation of a hidden drive to serve tales of piety to certain figures so they praise us, is a red emergency alarm signal of a sum’ah crisis.

The Third Mirror — Auditing Ujub Cancer Cells:

Resting its footing on the doctrinal paradigm of tark al-iʿtimād (releasing the anchor from absolute reliance on deeds), observe your deepest reactions:

“When fate restrains me from performing a special routine of worship (for example, falling fast asleep and missing the tahajud prayer), which dominates my feelings more: Am I sad purely because of losing the time to commune with Allah? Or am I depressed feeling ashamed that the record of my ‘spiritual discipline statistics’ that I have been proud of all this time is finally tarnished?”¹⁵

If what tears your chest the most is the feeling of anger due to the drop in the reputation of the personal record you built, this demonstrates transparently that the wheels of the ujub machine are operating to print arrogance in your body.

FAQ Regarding Riya, Sum’ah, and Ujub

Conclusion

Dissecting case studies regarding the series of inflammatory heart diseases in the Islamic spiritual arena leads us to pick an essential guarantee that problems of the class of riya, sum’ah intrigues, up to the silent arrogance of ujub are not as low as archaic words on the tombstones of Sufi history. The entities of these vices occupy real positions as active threats greedily hunting for weak gaps, which anytime can infiltrate and manipulate right at the central hub of even the holiest rites of worship.

The eternal warning testament sharply inscribed by the pen of Ibn ʿAllān constantly voices the echo of theological early warnings guarding the sanity of the heart:

وَلَا يَنْغَتِرَّ بِخَفَائِهِ ظَاهِرًا فَإِنَّ اللهَ تَعَالَى عَالِمٌ بِخَفِيَّاتِ الْأُمُورِ لَا تَخْفَى عَلَيْهِ وَسَاوِسُ الصُّدُورِ

“Let him not be trapped in a deceiving sense of security when finding the disease of the heart (riya) hidden in mere outward visuality—remembering the Essence of Allah Ta’ala in reality is All-Knowing of the track record of polemics in the highest secret space, and nothing is obscure to Him of the roaring whispers in the deepest recesses of the chest.”²⁰

The intellectual brilliance of dismantling the demarcation line veil and reconstructing the theoretical differences between riya, sum’ah, and ujub is merely the beginning footing. Determining to concoct a potion to muffle their spread is a marathon war test until death docks, which undoubtedly is only conquered if this spiritual soldier bears total, liberated honesty. A format of honesty that folds human ego before its mortal insignificance, while bowing totally laying down all matters purely pursuing the pleasure of Allah ﷻ, the Judging Essence of the Highest Court of Eternity.

As a route to develop literacy in the next stage, you can delve into its basic material in the complete review on the Pillar Page core article: Intention and Ikhlas in Islam: A Complete Guide from Hadith to Fiqh of Worship. Ensure your understanding is proficient by absorbing the elaboration related to What is Ikhlas? Its Meaning, Levels, and How to Achieve It.

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