Nawawi Hadith 16: Do Not Become Angry

Part One: The Repeated Command Against Anger

Brothers,

Today’s khutbah is based on the 16th hadith in Imam Nawawi’s 40 Hadith:

On the authority of Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him): A man said to the Prophet ﷺ, 'Advise me.' The Prophet said, 'Do not become angry.' The man repeated his request several times, and each time the Prophet said, 'Do not become angry.' (Bukhari)

Abu Hurayrah narrated more hadith than any other companion, and this one is recorded in Sahih Bukhari with a chain that scholars accept without dispute. Picture the scene. A man comes to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and asks for one piece of advice to carry with him for the rest of his life. He is not asking for a summary of the entire deen. He wants one word he can hold onto.

The Prophet ﷺ could have given him a long list: pray, fast, give charity, be truthful, honor your parents. Instead he gave him three words in Arabic: la taghdab, do not become angry. And when the man, perhaps thinking he had misheard or wanted something more, asked again, the Prophet ﷺ gave the same answer. Again and again. This repetition is itself a lesson.

Part 1: Why the Same Answer Every Time

When a scholar repeats an answer instead of expanding it, he is telling you that this single instruction already contains everything you need. The Prophet ﷺ was not being short with the man. He was telling him: if you master this one trait, you will have mastered the deen.

Anger is the gateway sin. Behind almost every act of oppression, every severed family tie, every act of violence, every word of backbiting, every divorce spoken in haste, stands an angry heart that was not restrained. Control anger, and you cut off the root of countless other sins before they can grow.

˹They are˺ those who donate in prosperity and adversity, control their anger, and pardon others. And Allah loves the good-doers. (Aal-i-Imraan, 3:134)

Notice how Allah places control of anger between two other qualities: giving in ease and hardship, and pardoning people. This is not a coincidence. The one who restrains his anger is naturally positioned to be generous and forgiving, because the anger that would have blocked generosity and forgiveness has already been dealt with.

Part 2: What Anger Actually Is

Anger is a fire that begins in the heart and moves outward, into the face, the tongue, and the hands. It is not merely an emotion. It is a state that overtakes reason itself. This is why the Prophet ﷺ traced it back to its origin.

Anger comes from Shaytan, and Shaytan was created from fire, and fire is put out with water. So when one of you becomes angry, let him make wudu. (Abu Dawud)

This is a remarkable teaching. The Prophet ﷺ is telling us that anger is not simply a mood we cannot help. It has a spiritual origin, and it has a physical remedy. Cold water on the face and limbs interrupts the fire before it spreads further.

He gave us other practical steps as well:

If one of you becomes angry while standing, let him sit down. If the anger leaves him, well and good. Otherwise, let him lie down. (Abu Dawud)

Each of these actions, sitting, lying down, making wudu, has the same purpose: to create distance between the impulse and the reaction. Anger wants immediate action. Islam teaches us to insert a pause.

Whoever reflects honestly will find that nearly every severed tie, every rash divorce, and every word of regret traces back to a moment of anger that was not restrained. (Ibn Rajab al-Hanbali)

There is a reason the Prophet ﷺ singled out judgment specifically:

Let no judge decide between two parties while he is angry. (Bukhari & Muslim)

If even the most careful, most disciplined among us, a judge charged with weighing evidence, is forbidden from ruling while angry, what does that tell the rest of us about the decisions we make in the heat of the moment? Every one of us becomes, in a sense, a judge the instant we react to a provocation. Angry, we judge harshly and unfairly. Calm, we judge with clarity. The pause the Prophet ﷺ prescribes is what separates a fair verdict from a rash one, whether that verdict concerns another person or ourselves.

Part 3: The Cost of Unrestrained Anger

Think about what anger has cost people you know. Marriages ended over words said in a single furious minute. Friendships destroyed over an argument that meant nothing a week later. Fights that led to injuries, charges, years added to sentences, over an insult that could have been ignored.

Good and evil cannot be equal. Repel ˹evil˺ with what is best, then the one you had enmity with will be like a close friend. But this cannot be attained except by those who are patient, and it cannot be attained except by those blessed with great fortune. (Fussilat, 41:34-35)

Allah tells us plainly that responding to provocation with patience rather than anger is not weakness. It is a fortune given only to those of exceptional character. The angry man thinks he is showing strength when he lashes out. In truth he has shown that he could not control himself. Real strength is demonstrated in restraint.

If you punish ˹an offender˺, let your punishment be proportionate to the wrong done. But if you patiently endure, it is certainly better for the patient. (An-Nahl, 16:126)

Even where retaliation is permitted, Allah reminds us that patience remains the better path. How much more, then, should we hold back when no wrong has even been done to us, only a word we did not like or a look we misread.

Part 4: The Reward Waiting for the Patient

The Prophet ﷺ did not leave restraint of anger without a reward attached. He described one of the greatest prizes in Paradise for the one who masters this trait:

Whoever restrains his anger when he has the means to act on it, Allah will call him before all of creation on the Day of Resurrection and let him choose from the maidens of Paradise whichever he wishes. (Abu Dawud & Tirmidhi)

Read that again. Not restraining anger when you have no power to act, that is easy. The reward is for the one who has the ability, the strength, the opportunity to strike back, and instead holds himself back for the sake of Allah. That moment of self-mastery, invisible to everyone around you, is seen and rewarded by your Lord before the entire creation.

The strong man is not the one who defeats others in wrestling. The strong man is the one who controls himself when he is angry. (Bukhari & Muslim)

Part Two: Restraint as a Daily Practice

Brothers,

Part 5: A Practical Path When Anger Rises

When you feel the heat rising in your chest, the Prophet ﷺ gave us a sequence to follow, not a vague hope that we will somehow calm down.

When one of you becomes angry, let him keep silent. (Ahmad)

Silence first. Do not speak while the fire is burning, because the tongue in that state says things the heart does not truly mean and cannot take back. Then change your position: if standing, sit; if sitting, lie down. Then, if you are able, make wudu, letting the water do what your willpower alone could not.

Seek refuge in Allah from Shaytan, who is the one fanning this flame in the first place. Remember that the person in front of you, whoever they are, is not your true enemy in this moment. Your own nafs and the whisperer behind it are the real target.

Part 6: Anger in a Place of Confinement

Brothers, you live in an environment built on friction. Close quarters, little privacy, rules you did not choose, people you would never have chosen to live beside. Words are exchanged that would never be tolerated outside these walls. Disrespect comes from every direction, sometimes from other men, sometimes from staff, sometimes from the situation itself.

This is exactly the environment where la taghdab, do not become angry, becomes the difference between a peaceful day and a write-up, between staying on track and losing months or years of progress toward release. One angry reaction here carries consequences that follow you far longer than an angry reaction would on the outside.

Restraint here is not weakness. It is the clearest proof of your character available to anyone watching, staff and inmates alike. When you are provoked and you remain calm, when you are insulted and you walk away, you are living out this hadith in the hardest possible conditions. That is worth more in the sight of Allah than restraint practiced in comfort ever could be.

Use this place as your training ground. Every provocation you absorb without exploding is practice for the rest of your life. The habits you build here in restraining anger under real pressure will serve you the day you walk out of these gates and face the ordinary frustrations of family, work, and daily life.

Think concretely about how the sequence the Prophet ﷺ taught applies here. You cannot always walk to a sink to make wudu in the middle of a tense exchange, but you can still go silent. You can still sit down if you were standing, still step back physically if the setting allows it, still turn your face away from the person provoking you until the heat passes. None of this is surrender. It is the exact method the Messenger of Allah ﷺ gave us, adapted to the space you are in.

Part 7: One Word to Carry With You

The man in the hadith asked for one piece of advice to hold onto. Ask yourself the same question today. If you could only remember one instruction from this khutbah, let it be this: do not become angry.

Not because anger is never justified, but because acting on it rarely serves you, and controlling it is one of the surest paths to Allah’s pleasure and to a calmer, more dignified life in every place you find yourself, including this one.

O Allah, purify our hearts from the fire of anger and fill them with patience.

O Allah, grant us the strength to restrain ourselves when we have the power to strike back.

O Allah, make us among those who repel evil with what is better.

O Allah, protect our tongues from words we would later regret.

O Allah, calm our hearts in moments of provocation and let us see the wisdom in silence.

O Allah, reward us as You promised the one who controls his anger for Your sake.

O Allah, soften our hearts toward those who wrong us, and let us respond with dignity.

O Allah, make our time in this place a means of purifying our character, not hardening it.