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Does not the saying that one who abandons prayer will not benefit from his fasting, Hajj, or Zakat contradict the Hadith: "Indeed, Allah does not wrong a believer concerning a good deed; he is given for it in this world and rewarded for it in the Hereafter. As for the disbeliever, he is fed for the good deeds he did for Allah in this world until, when he reaches the Hereafter, he will have no good deed for which to be rewarded"; given that his righteous deeds for Allah benefit him in this world even if he is a disbeliever?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

What you mentioned is incorrect, because the statement made by those who assert that the one who abandons prayer does not benefit from his good deeds—from among those who consider his disbelief to be a disbelief that expels one from the faith—can be interpreted as referring to benefit in the Hereafter. And the benefit of a disbeliever from his good deeds in this world is conditioned by the will of Allah Almighty, due to His saying: "Whoever desires the immediate, We hasten for him therein whatever We will to whom We intend." So, it is not inevitable that every disbeliever will be rewarded for his good deeds in this world; rather, some of them are not rewarded. And the statement "As for the disbeliever, he is fed for his good deeds" or "he is given according to his account" is correct. And naming what issues from the disbeliever as a "good deed" was based on the disbeliever's own assumption, otherwise it is not a valid act of closeness to Allah due to the absence of its condition, which is faith. Or it was called a good deed because it superficially resembles the good deed of a believer. And whether a disbeliever is necessarily given for his good deeds in this world, or if that is conditioned by the will of Allah, this is the correct view.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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