Use your time wisely!
You should not neglect your time
or use it haphazardly; on the contrary you should bring yourself to account,
structure your litanies and other practices during each day and night, and
assign to each period a fixed and specific function. This is how to bring out
the spiritual blessing (baraka) in each period. But if you leave yourself adrift,
aimlessly wandering as cattle do, not knowing how to occupy yourself at every
moment, your time will be lost. It is nothing other than your life, and your
life is the capital that you make use of to reach perpetual felicity in the
proximity of God the Exalted.
Each of your breaths is a priceless jewel, since each of them is
irreplaceable and, one gone, can never be retrieved. Do not be like the
deceived fools who are joyous because each day their wealth increases while
their life shortens. What good is an increase in wealth when life grows ever
shorter? Therefore be joyous only for an increase in knowledge or in good
works, for they are your two companions who will accompany you in your grave
when your family, wealth, children, and friends stay behind.
- Imam Ghazali rahimullah –
Education
The soul should take care of the body, just as the pilgrim on his
way to Makkah takes care of his camel; but if the pilgrim spends his whole time
in feeding and adorning his camel, the caravan will leave him behind, and he
will perish in the desert.
— Imām al-Ghazzālī [رحمه الله] -
Imam al-Ghazzali
Imam al-Ghazzali (rahmatullah alayhi) spent much of his life
making this point, in some very sophisticated ways. Let me read to you
his very passionate defense of this Qur’anic principle:
“If you are educating yourself, take up only those branches of
knowledge which have been required of you according to your present needs, as
well as those which pertain to the outward actions such as learning the
elements of prayer, purification and fasting. More important however, is the
science which have all neglected, namely, the science of the attributes of the
heart, those which are praiseworthy and those which are blameworthy, because
people persist in the latter, such as miserliness, hypocrisy, pride and
conceit, all of which are destructive and from which it is obligatory to
desist. Performing these outward deeds is like the external application of an
ointment to the body when it is stricken with scabies and boils while
neglecting to remove the pus by means of a scalpel or a purge. False ulema
recommended outward deeds just as fake physicians prescribe external ointments
[for virulent internal diseases]. The ulema who seek the aakhirah, however,
recommend nothing but the purification of the nafs and the removal of the
elements of evil by destroying their nursery-beds and uprooting them from the
heart.”
A key component of the Ghazalian agenda is the restoration of
balance between outward and inward. And the Imam himself realized that the
balance comes about primarily through cultivating the inward. For a balance,
which is the true meaning of al-sirat al-mustaqim, is
a subtle thing, and requires wisdom, and wisdom exists only when the sould is
illuminated.
After a long study of 2 years when Imam Ghazzali (rahimahu Llah) was returning,
he was blocked by a bandits, who tried to snatch his and companions belonging.
Among them was his books and notes, the Chief among the robbers snatched it
from him, and imam says,
It contains all that i have
learned, and it is not of use to you.
The reply that the chief gave
changed his life, Cheif said,
So, all that i have to do to strip
away your knowledge is to take these notes.
Which made him realize
Your real possession is that which you will not lose in a ship
wreck (sinking ship) – i.e. your imaan and good deeds with sincerity and what
you memorized.
If you see Allah, Might and Magnificent, holding back this world
from you, frequently trying you with adversity and tribulation, know that you
hold a great status with Him. Know that He is dealing with you as He does with
His Awliya and chosen elite, and is watching over you.
- Imam al-Ghazzali (rahimullah) -
“Hikmah is knowledge of the most excellent of things through the
most excellent Knowledge. Allah is therefore the true possessor of hikmah
(Hakim), since He knows the most excellent things through the most excellent
knowledge…”
- Imam al-Ghazzali (rahimullah) -
Each faculty of our delights in
that for which it was created;
lust delights in accomplishing
desire, anger in taking vengeance,
the eye in seeing beautiful
objects, and the ear in hearing harmonious sounds.
The highest function of the soul
is the perception of truth.
- Imam al-Ghazzali rahimahu
Llah -
I reflected on my intention in public teachings, and I saw that
it was not directed purely to God, but rather was instigated and motivated by
the quest for fame and widespread prestige. So I became certain that I was
on the brink of a crumbling bank… Mundane desires began tugging me with their
chains to remain as I was, while the herald of faith was crying out:
“Away! Up
and away! Only a little is left of your life, and a long journey lies before
you! All the theory and practice in which you are engrossed is eyeservice and
fakery! If you do not prepare now for the afterlife, when will you do so? And
if you do not sever there attachments now, then when will you sever them?”
- Imam
Ghazzali –
It is personally
obligatory to….
Imam Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti (rahimullah) said: “As for having
knowledge of the heart and its diseases such as: envy, conceitedness,
ostentation, and its likes, al-Ghazzali said that it is personally obligatory
upon each individual.”
Source: Al-Ashbah wal-Naza’ir
Imam Ghazzali
while dying…
There is a story to the
effect that when Imam Al-Ghazzali fell ill and felt that his death was
approaching, he sent away those who were with him. No one entered his presence
until the next morning when they went in as he had bidden them. They found him
facing Qiblah, clad in his shroud, dead, and at his head they found a sheet of
paper bearing these verses:
“Say to my friends when they look upon me dead
Weeping for me and
mourning me in sorrow
Do not believe that this
corpse you see is myself.
In the name of God I tell
you it is not I
I am a spirit and this is
nothing but flesh
It was my abode and my
garment for a time.
I am a treasure, by a
talisman kept hid,
Fashioned of dust which
served me as a shrine.
I am a pearl which has
left it’s shell deserted
It was my prison where I
spent my time in grief.
I am a bird and this body
was my cage
Whence I have now flown
forth and it is left as a token,
Praise be to God Who has
now set me free
And prepared for me my
place in the highest of the heaven.
Until today I was dead
though alive in your midst.
Now I live in truth with
the grave-clothes discarded.
Today I hold converse
with the saints above.
Now with no veil between
I see God face to face
I look upon the tablet
(Lawh Al-Mahfuz) and therein I read
Whatever was and is and
all that is to be.
Let my house fall in
ruins. Lay my cage in the ground.
Cast away the talisman.
It is a token, no more.
Lay aside my cloak. It
was but my outer garment.
Place them all in the
grave. Let them be forgotten.
I have passed on my way
and you are left behind
Your place of abode was
no dwelling-place for me.
Think not that death is
death. Nay, it is life,
A life that surpasses all
we could dream of here.
While in this world we
are granted sleep.
Death is but sleep, a
sleep that shall be prolonged.
Be not afraid when death
draws near.
It is but the departure for
this blessed home
Think of the mercy and
love of your Lord,
Give thanks for His Grace
and come without fear.
What I am now even so
shall you be
For I know that you are
even as I am.
The souls of all people
come forth from God.
The bodies of all are
compounded alike.
Good and evil alike it
was ours.
I give you now a message
of good cheer.
May God’s peace and joy
for evermore be yours.”
Taken
from “Al-Ghazzali His Psychology Of The Greater Struggle” by Laleh
Bakhtair (Page 111)
