What is the solution in these days when we see prevailing stinginess, pursued whims, an influential worldly life, and every opinionated person admiring their own opinion? Is it silence and seclusion to avoid argumentation, or is enjoining good and forbidding evil obligatory despite the harm that may befall the one who enjoins and forbids?

Enjoining good and forbidding evil is among the most important matters of religion. You must be patient with any harm that may befall you due to fulfilling this obligation, in accordance with Luqman's saying to his son: "O my son, establish prayer, enjoin what is right, forbid what is wrong, and be patient over what befalls you. Indeed, that is of the matters [requiring] determination."

As for the interpretation of the verse "O you who have believed, upon you is [responsibility for] yourselves. Those who have erred will not harm you when you have been guided," it has not yet come to pass. Some Companions and Successors said that its interpretation will come when hearts differ, and desires and stinginess prevail. That time has not yet arrived, and people are still in a state of goodness, and the impact of da'wah (invitation to Islam) is evident. Abu Bakr warned against using this verse out of its proper time, for enjoining good and forbidding evil remains an obligation as long as the time has not reached a state where neither enjoining nor forbidding is beneficial.

The harm that invalidates the obligation of enjoining and forbidding is considerable harm that ordinarily afflicts people. However, minor harm, such as mere disputation, does not nullify the obligation, because religious duties are not devoid of ordinary difficulty.