Do they not see that they are tried, [to the end of] the verse: trial is a steersman from God, exalted be He, that steers people to Him. It is mentioned in the ḥadīth: 'Trial is one of God's scourges, exalted be He, by which He drives His servants towards Him'. Every illness, impoverishment, or evil state that befalls a person breaks the vehemence of his soul and its faculties, curbs its attributes and its vain desires so that the heart becomes tender and emerges from its veiling and is roused from its reliance on this world and its pleasures, becoming constricted and recoiling in disgust from it, orienting itself instead towards God. The least of the degrees of this [trial] is that if he should discover that there is no escape from Him except to Him and should find no flight from or way out of the trial besides [through] Him, he submits humbly and yields before Him, as He says: And if waves cover them like awnings, they call on God, sincere before Him in their faith [Q. 31:32]; and [also where He says]: If misfortune should befall a man, he calls upon Us on his side, or sitting or standing [Q. 10:12]. In sum, it [trial] necessarily brings about a thinning of the veil or its [complete] removal, so let him make the most of his moment, seek refuge [with God] and adopt a [virtuous] character trait that will always define him so that awareness and remembrance might be established and presence and repentance might be facilitated [for that person] so that he no longer habituates himself to forgetfulness upon deliverance [from trial] and that the soul is not fortified when security reigns, lest it prevail and [lest] the veil is drawn down [even a] denser [veil] than the one before, as He has said: but when He delivers them to land, behold! they ascribe partners to Him [Q. 29:65], [and] but when We have relieved him of his misfortune, he passes on as if he had never called upon Us because of a misfortune that befell him [Q. 10:12].
