Straight Path Is Path of Moderation
Here we are ordered to take the path of moderation as (Imam Ali (AS) has put it in Nahj al-Balagha): “The best of affairs is their middlemost.”
Nahj al-Baagha and the words of the Infallible Imams (AS) are the interpretation of the Quran. They have said that that right and left lead to deviation and aberration, and the middle path is the right path.
So when there are no extremes and no easts and wests, the path taken is the straight path and one should not abandon it.
One who knows the straight path well would call for more and more of it.
Sometimes one does not know the straight path and thus goes to extremes both in giving and in abandoning generosity. Here the command is: “The best of affairs is their middlemost.” But when one becomes the straight path himself, here the best of affairs will no longer be the middle most but will be giving, worshipping, reciting Quran, saying prayers, etc.
In such a stage, if someone like Imam Hassan Mujtaba (AS) donates all his wealth twice in life, it is not considered to be acting in extremes because he himself is the straight path.
In order to enter the straight path, one should migrate from ignorance and when he enters the path, he will be told gradually to move faster and then little by little he will be told to overpass.
One who see nothing but God should overpass others in good deeds and the field of competition for him is the earth and heavens. The straight path is so extensive.
“Know that God is between a man and his heart and that before Him you will all be brought together.” (Verse 24 of Surah Al-Anfal)
