Dear Hadi,
Dear Reader,
Thank you for your question. We believe your situation offers both lessons and opportunities for you. Of course, we don’t know if God will answer your prayers by mending your relationship with this person. Only Allah SWT knows that. But what we can advise you on is the following.
Your situation has provided you with a painful lesson in what can happen when we lie, especially to those we care about. It undermines trust and can, as you now know, have lasting consequences. However, from this difficult experience, you now have the opportunity to learn from this and commit yourself to not repeating this or similar actions in the future.
Moving beyond this, let’s take a look at your boyfriend’s refusal to forgive you. We, of course, don’t know the seriousness of the lie that you told him, but we do know that forgiveness (both by God and by people) is of significant value in Islam.
Forgiveness by Allah SWT is not just something God does, but is a fundamental part of His identity. The Quran (39:53) tells us, “O my servants who have transgressed against themselves, do not despair of Allah’s mercy. Indeed, Allah forgives all sins.”
With regard to forgiveness by people, the Quran (24:22) tell us, “Let them pardon and overlook. Would you not love that Allah should forgive you?”
And the Prophet (pbuh) also emphasized mercy, saying “The strong person is not the one who overpowers others, but the one who controls himself when angry.” (Sahih al-Bukhari)
You should remind your boyfriend of this verse and this hadith, and let him know that you are willing to commit yourself to Islamic ethics and not lie to him again, and ask him if he is willing to commit to Islamic ethics and forgive you.
If this young man is unable to forgive you, either because the lie you told is so significant to him that he can’t move past it, or because he is not a forgiving person by nature, then it may be that this relationship is not what is best for you, and it may be best to move on.
By the way, although you’re using the word boyfriend, we assume, and you haven’t told us anything to make us think otherwise, that your relationship did not go beyond the bounds set by Islam, so we have not addressed any potential issues related to that.
In peace.