Sometimes I have very bad thoughts in my mind and I cannot stop them. Is it a sin?

Dear Brother / Sister,

Responsibility is in question only for voluntary acts. That is to say, when a person does something voluntarily based on his own will, he also bears the responsibility for it. However, the will of the person is not involved in the bad things that come to mind. That is, you have not voluntarily decided to have bad thoughts and you have not acted upon them. Therefore, you do not bear any responsibility for it. It is best not to dwell on them too much, regarding them as the delusions of Satan.

Satan can say bad things to the heart from a place called "lumma ash-shaytaniyya (satanic spot)", which is located next to the heart. The evidence showing that those words and thoughts do not belong to the heart is that the heart is alarmed by them. For example, if a person watches the beauty of the sky through a dirty pair of binoculars, the dirt of the binoculars does not infect the viewer or the viewed things. Such words and thoughts are the acts of the devil; therefore, they do us no harm. The real harm is to deal with them unnecessarily and try to get rid of them, or to think that they is harmful and to fear them.

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