Your marriage keeps failing. Your business suddenly collapses. Opportunities appear and disappear at the last moment. You make duʿā’, you pray, you try again — yet the same doors remain closed.
Eventually, a frightening question enters your mind:
As Muslims, we should neither dismiss spiritual affliction nor blame every difficulty on sihr, jinn or the evil eye. Islam teaches us to recognise the unseen without becoming prisoners of fear.
Not every closed door is sihr
Sometimes hardship is simply a test from Allah.
Loss itself is not proof that Allah has abandoned you. A struggling business, delayed marriage, unemployment or repeated disappointment may be a trial through which Allah is developing something within you.
Sometimes what you call a blocked road is actually divine protection.
But spiritual harm is also real
Islam does not teach us to deny the unseen. Allah teaches us to seek refuge:
The Qur’an also acknowledges sihr and its harmful effects, but immediately establishes an essential spiritual principle:
The believer does not deny sihr — but neither does he give sihr more power in his heart than he gives Allah.
Before you say, “Someone has done something to me”
Ask yourself honestly: Have I investigated the natural causes? Have I made mistakes that need correcting? Have I sought appropriate professional or medical help where necessary? Have I maintained my ṣalāh, morning and evening adhkār, Qur’an and relationship with Allah?
If every failed opportunity becomes sihr, suspicion begins to consume the heart. You start looking for enemies instead of looking towards Allah.
The Sufi perspective: perhaps the door was closed for you
You desperately wanted the door to open. But Allah knew what was behind it.
Sometimes Allah removes a person, business, relationship or opportunity because your heart has become attached to what He knows may harm you. The people of spiritual purification therefore ask not only, “Why is this happening to me?” but also, “What is Allah teaching me through this?”
That question transforms hardship into spiritual awakening.
What should you do?
Strengthen your ṣalāh. Maintain your morning and evening adhkār. Recite al-Fātiḥah, Āyat al-Kursī, al-Ikhlāṣ, al-Falaq and al-Nās regularly. Make sincere tawbah. Examine the practical causes of your difficulties and correct what you can.
Whether the difficulty is a test, an ordinary worldly problem, evil eye or genuine spiritual affliction, your first refuge remains the same: Allah.
Sometimes you do not need someone to remove a blockage. You need Allah to show you whether the road you are fighting to reopen was ever meant for you.
“Remember: your faith is not enough until you attain certainty in your actions.”
Thabat Hub