I have always been intrigued by the saying of Ali (ra): “He who knows himself, knows God.” What is meant by this statement? Can we really get closer to God through self-analysis?The more I have reflected upon this the more I realize that it works on multiple levels.
Where are you from?
The first meaning is a very basic one: if someone were to ask you “tell me about yourself”, you would start with where you came from. For example, I would say something along the lines of, “I was born and raised in Canada, my parents immigrated to the Greater Toronto Area from Pakistan about forty years ago and I lived there until about two years ago.” So the first thing we would consider is a person’s ORIGIN.
On a deeper level, my origin (as well as yours) is Allah. We are the created and He is the Creator. As believers, we are very blessed to be cognizant of this. Many people are not. I have been in several conversations with people, mostly well-intentioned, who tried to prove to me the non-existence of God. If you asked these very people about the origin of their cell-phones they will no doubt tell you that they came about through a lengthy and complex manufacturing process. But somehow, when you ask them where mankind came from, they attribute it to some kind of random accidental event. My usual response to this involves some version of pointing out the unfathomable complexities and subtleties that define the human race. Even if you’re not interested in the workings of the human body or human mind from a medical or psychological standpoint, you must marvel at the brilliance and intricacies of the final product. For me, it’s a profound “sign” for “those who reflect.” This most basic acknowledgement of our origin, therefore is the first step to knowing ourselves and it’s a step that unfortunately eludes many otherwise intelligent people.
The Prophet (sas) taught us that every human being inclines towards the fitrah (a deeply-ingrained, natural goodness.) This is where Islam differs from most other religions and worldviews. Despite our innate decency, however, life takes us in different directions. Our choices end up defining us. Islam also teaches that before our bodies existed and long before the earth was created, our souls were created. Allah (swt) asked us at that time, WHO IS YOUR LORD? And we all affirmed the Oneness and distinct sovereignty of God. So somewhere, deep within every one of us is this acute recognition of God and our true origin. It is almost like a deep buried treasure within us just waiting to be uncovered.
Where are you going?
So the first way to know yourself is to know where you came from. The second is to know where you’re going. What’s your purpose and what is the point of all this? Just as we must try to strengthen our awareness of our true origin, we should simultaneously strive to remember that it is to Him that we will ultimately return. Our days on this earth are numbered. Life pretends like it is always going to be with you but in reality it is constantly slipping away from you. The Prophet (sas) warned us repeatedly not to get too attached to the life of this world and to approach life with the attitude of “being a traveller.”
To put it into perspective the Prophet (sas) asked his companions to picture an ocean and a drop of water from that ocean. That is the time we have here compared to the ultimate reality awaiting us in the hereafter.
We also know all of this will seem like a vague dream on the day of judgement and we will wonder how many days we spent here and it will seem like a small, inconsequential amount.
One of my favourite films of all time is a popular movie by the name of “Inception” starring Leonardo Dicaprio. One of the persistent themes in this brilliant film is the question of “What is reality?” When you’re dreaming, when you’re actually in the dream you feel like that is your reality. You are deeply in tune with everything happening around you, your senses are alert and working. If you drink something, you can actually taste it; if you touch something you can discern its texture. You feel every range of emotions humanly possible. Even the physiology of your body–your heart rate, your circulation, everything responds as if this thing is actually happening to you, even though it is really all in your head. That is how real dreams can be. And then you wake up and within seconds the dream starts fading, memories start slipping, and what was your reality only moments ago is now just a hazy shell of a feeling. That is how we need to start imagining the life of this world. We need to know, really deeply know where we are ultimately going.
What is your essence?
The third way to know yourself is to recognize your essence. Now we know that Allah (swt) created us and we know that we’re returning to Him and the life of this world is just a series of tests. If you were born Muslim, then you have probably had these concepts drilled into you at a very young age.
But what is our essence?
At the most fundamental level, each of us has certain neutral attributes due to which we are just as much a part of the animal kingdom as say lions or elephants.These include our need for food, sleep and sex as well as a natural instinct that leans towards fighting and violence. These are the basest parts of our personalities. The impulses controlling hunger and lust are in the lowest, least sophisticated portion of the brain. And for a lot of people, life is really limited to just fulfilling these impulses and whims. They never make it to the next levels. They live and die basically like animals.
The next facet of our essence struggling for control is our positive attributes. These are given to us by Allah (swt) and are the only reason anything great has ever come about on earth. Any good book or work of poetry, any terrific work of art, exceptional parenting, splendid cooking, amazing works of architecture–whatever excellence has ever occurred is because people rose above their basest inclinations and struggled for something more.
This is what I believe is meant by the hadith of the Prophet: “Indeed Allah created Adam in His image.” (Muslim). Each of us possesses certain attributes like mercy, kindness, love, patience, gratitude, forgiveness, intelligence and empathy and that these are just a glimmer of those possessed by Allah (swt). For example, if Allah is THE MERCIFUL, or the source of all mercy, it is through Him that I’ve been given a little bit of mercy in my heart. And the Prophet (sas) confirmed this line of thinking when he said:
“God divided mercy into 100 parts, out of which he retained 99 parts with Him, and sent down one part to earth. From this one part emanates all the compassion that all of creation exercises toward one another…” (Bukhari).
These are what scholars call the angelic attributes of man. Every person has some, and if we can train ourselves to strengthen these positive attributes for the sake of Allah, that is really what Islam is all about.
The intention is also critically important, however, because there are a lot of good people in the world doing excellent things, but as we know, the people who are good for any reason other than their relationship with God will receive their reward in this life and then their deeds will become like dust. The everlasting good deeds are those done for the pleasure of Allah (swt).
Even if we do not accomplish something extraordinary, one of the best things we can do as Muslims is have good manners with people. As the Prophet (sas) himself said “I have been sent for no other reason but to perfect good manners.” I think the priority of this Ummah more than anything is to struggle to bring morality and manners back to centre of Islamic practice.
The third category is the bad qualities each of us possesses. Sometimes it is your own soul or nafs, sometimes it is the negative people around you, and sometimes it’s Satan and his agents: the world has plenty of sources of evil and corruption and the wise Muslim really strives to minimize their influence on his essence.
Part of knowing yourself is recognizing your weaknesses. If you’re at work one day and your boss turns to you and your colleague and says, “I need one of you to give a presentation and one of you to crunch these numbers…” your automatic thought will be to avoid the task that corresponds with your weakness. Alternatively, suppose you’re trying to lose weight and you have no problem exercising but you like to eat everything. There’s no point perpetually focusing on the exercise. You are already excelling at that aspect of the problem. To make an actual, sustainable change, at some point you will need to recognize that you eat too much and do something about it. You cannot simply keep consolidating your strengths while ignoring your weaknesses.
We need to think like this in terms of our deen as well. Maybe I’m not quick to anger or jealousy but I’m a very impatient person. I want immediate results. I like people to fall within my expectations. Maybe I’m a rude wife or maybe I like luxury and spend too much money. Whatever it is, recognizing and acknowledging your personal weaknesses are the necessary first step to confronting them. It is just like those Alcoholics Anonymousmeetings where they teach you that the first step isacceptance. Unfortunately, many of us spend years and years repeating the same mistakes and essentially go on into denial.
If you have a specific problem, study the cure for it. If uncontrollable lust is your challenge and you cannot get married, the Prophet (sas) advised fasting and lowering the gaze. If you have a bad temper, RasulAllah counselled leaving the room, making wudu or lying down.Our religion contains prescriptions for nearly everything.
Your soul then is like a battleground between your animal instincts, your positive attributes and your negative tendencies. And we all know which part of our essence needs to win for us to make it to Jannah.
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