(143) Abbas related to us from the Apostle of God that “When the hair of a bondsman stand on end owing to the fear of the Lord, his sins fall away like leaves from an old and sapless tree.”
-Bazar
Commentary.-Fear and anxiety are felt in the heart but the human nervous system is such that our emotions make themselves manifest through the body as well. Thus, when we are happy our face reacts to it, and, often, we laugh or smile, and when we are afflicted with sorrow our face also reflects it, and, sometimes, we weep. In the same way, the sensation of fear in the heart makes our hair stand on end. Like the preceding Tradition in which the glad tidings of protection from the Fire of Hell were given to the Believers who wept out of the fear of the Lord, the above saying, as related by Hazrat Abbas, tells that when the hair of a Believer stand on end owing to the fear of God his sins fall away like the leaves of a withered tree in the autumn.

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