The harms of isolation:

As for the harms of isolation, they are seven; in isolation there is deprivation from them and distance from them, and they are:

1 - Teaching and learning, which are among the greatest acts of worship, and isolation before learning obligatory knowledge is disobedience.

2 - Benefiting others and benefiting oneself, because both occur through social intercourse.

3 - Disciplining others and becoming disciplined, by suppressing desires, which is better than isolation for someone whose character has not yet been refined.

4 - Seeking sociability and providing sociability; this may be prohibited (haram), such as gatherings of backbiting and amusement, and it may be permissible (mubah) in religion, such as sitting with the sheikhs and people of knowledge.

5 - Attaining reward and enabling others to attain it, through attending the five ritual prayers in congregation (jama'a), the two Festival (Eid) prayers, visiting the sick, attending funerals, and other things, and this only comes through social intercourse.

6 - Experiences in everything, and this only comes through social intercourse.

7 - Humility, which one cannot achieve through solitude, and it may also be the greatest reason for choosing isolation.

For more, see al-Iḥyāʾ (2/236–134).

I say: The sum of the matter on this issue (mas'ala) is what ʿAlī Mullā al-Qārī said in Mirqāt al-Mafātīḥ (4/743): "The chosen view is: taking the middle course between isolation from most people and the common folk among them, and socializing with the righteous, and gathering with their general public in things like their Friday prayers and congregations." End quote.

This book of ours will clarify this topic clearly, and Allah is the Grantor of success to what contains goodness.

Written by Musʿad ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd Muḥammad al-Saʿdanī May Allah pardon him and his parents.