The Benefits of Dhikr: The Opening Treatise

One of the most celebrated sections of Al-Wabil as-Sayyib is Ibn al-Qayyim's extended enumeration of the benefits of dhikr. He lists over seventy distinct benefits — some scholars count as many as ninety-nine — drawing on Quranic verses, hadith, the sayings of the Companions and Successors, and his own reflections. This listing is not a mechanical catalogue. Each benefit is developed with explanation and evidence, and together they build a picture of dhikr as one of the most comprehensive forms of worship a Muslim can engage in.

Among the benefits Ibn al-Qayyim mentions is that dhikr repels Shaytan and weakens him. The devil's access to the heart is through heedlessness — ghaflah — and dhikr is the antidote to heedlessness. A heart occupied with the remembrance of Allah is a heart that leaves little space for whispers and delusions to take root. This is not a metaphor in Ibn al-Qayyim's treatment — it is a description of a spiritual mechanism that operates with the reliability of cause and effect.

Dhikr, he writes, illuminates the face and the heart. This illumination is mentioned both in the Quran and in the hadith literature. He cites the narration that the heart has a polish, and its polish is dhikr. A polished heart reflects divine light; a tarnished one does not. The imagery runs through classical Islamic spiritual literature in various forms, and Ibn al-Qayyim roots it firmly in its textual foundations rather than leaving it as poetic impression.

Another benefit he develops at length is that dhikr draws rizq — sustenance and provision. He cites the verse of Tawakkul and connects the inner state of remembrance to an outward opening of means. This is not a guarantee of worldly wealth in every case, but an argument that the servant who remembers Allah does not find themselves abandoned in their material needs. The Quran's promise is that whoever relies on Allah — and reliance begins with remembrance — Allah will provide for them.

Dhikr brings tranquility of heart. This is perhaps the benefit most directly expressed in the Quran itself: 'Verily, in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest.' Ibn al-Qayyim treats this verse as one of the foundational statements in Islamic psychology. The restlessness and anxiety that afflict the human heart are not fundamentally problems of circumstance — they are problems of disconnection. The heart was created for a relationship with Allah, and when that relationship is active and alive through dhikr, the restlessness settles.

He also discusses how dhikr softens the heart against hardness, helps the servant at the moment of death, and continues to benefit a person even after their faculties of deliberate choice have passed. Narrations describe dhikr as protection at the time of death, and Ibn al-Qayyim explores why: a tongue and heart habituated to Allah's name in life will not easily be absent from it at its final moments.

The accumulation of these benefits across Ibn al-Qayyim's pages is deliberate. He wants the reader to arrive at a single conclusion: that dhikr is not a supplementary practice for those with time and inclination, but a necessity for any heart that wishes to live rather than merely survive. To be without dhikr, in his framework, is to be spiritually in a condition comparable to a body without water or air — technically present but in a process of deterioration.