5:51 O you who have faith, take not the Jews and Christians as friends. They are friends of each other. Whoso of you takes them as a friend is one of them. Surely God does not guide the wrongdoers.
The majestic compeller, the great Lord, the knower to perfection, the exalted Possessor of Majesty, calls to His servants with a call of generosity. By way of gentleness, He caresses them and in the attribute of clemency and mercy, He turns the faces of their hearts away from others toward Himself. He is saying, “Do not take the stranger as a friend, and do not approve of the enemy for your companionship. When you take a friend and take a companion, approve of him for the sake of God. Take the friend in God’s work and approve of the companion in God’s religion. When you seek the realities of faith, seek them from friendship with God’s friends and enmity with the enemies of the religion.”
Muṣṭafā said, “The firmest handle of faith is love in God and hate in God.”
The enemies of the religion whose enmity is obligatory are first Satan, and second the commanding soul. The soul is harder than Satan, for Satan does not go after the faith of the faithful, but rather their disobedience. The soul, however, pulls him to unbelief and wants his unbelief. Satan flees from [the formula] “There is no power and no strength but in God,” but the soul does not flee. Joseph the sincerely truthful suffered many trials—he was thrown into the well, sold into slavery, and remained in prison for years—but he never lamented the way he did at the commanding soul: “Surely the soul commands to ugliness” [12:53]. Muṣṭafā said, “Your worst enemy is the soul between your two sides.”
