In sciences such as sociology and psychology, there are different categorizations for humans as each of them focuses on a special factor. For instance, Swiss psychologist Carl Gustav Jung puts people into two categories of introverts and extroverts. Or Marxists categorize people with a social view into three groups the bourgeoisie, landowners, and the proletariat.
The Holy Quran also categorizes humans in different forms. For instance, Surah Al-Fatiha puts humans into three categories; those who have been granted blessings, those who are subject to God’s anger, and those who have gone astray. “(Lord), guide us to the right path, the path of those to whom You have granted blessings, those who are neither subject to Your anger nor have gone astray.” (Surah Al-Fatiha, verses 6-7).
Surah Al-Baqarah categorizes humans into three groups of believers, disbelievers, and hypocrites. In the opening verses of the Surah, characteristics of believers have been mentioned: “Who believe in the unseen and establish the (daily) prayer; who spend out of what We have provided them.” (Verse 3)
The second group is disbelievers, i.e. those who do not believe in the Oneness of God, are enemies of the religion, and openly oppose religious beliefs. “Those who disbelieve, whether you forewarn them or not, they will not believe.” (Verse 6) This verse point to the feature of obstinacy in these people as they cannot understand the truth, accept the right words, and abandon their wrong beliefs because they have committed sins.
The third group is the hypocrites. The Holy Quran describes this group more than the two first ones. The word “nifaq” in Arabic refers to hypocrisy and it means inconsistency between inner beliefs and what one actually displays. Quranic verses and hadiths describe hypocrites as worse than disbelievers as they appear like friends at the first sight but are actually enemies. Therefore, their danger to human society is more than the danger of disbelievers.
“Al-Munafiqun” is the name of Surah in the Quran and dozens of verses discuss traits of hypocrites and the danger of hypocrisy. For instance, the two first verses of Surah Al-Munafiqun reads: “When the hypocrites come to you they say: ‘We bear witness that you are the Messenger of Allah. ‘ Allah knows that you (Prophet Muhammad) are indeed His Messenger, and Allah bears witness that the hypocrites are truly liars! They have taken their oaths as a cover and barred others from the Path of Allah. Evil is what they have done.”
source: iqna