Bismillah Al Rahman Al Raheem. May Allah SWT send his peace and blessings upon the best of creations and the beloved of our hearts Muhammed SAW and on his pure family and may Allah hasten the reappearance of our awaited saviour Imam Sahib al Asr wal Zamaan AJTFS.
Salamualaykum everyone I really hope we can all benefit from this small blog on controlling our nafs. I dedicate this post to imam Musa al Kadhim AS, The Suppressor of Anger.
In theory, it seems easy to control ones self, being a good muslim as well as maintaining our faith and spiritual connection with Allah SWT, is also being a good person. These things go hand in hand together. The Prophet Muhammed SAW said, “my religion is based on cleanliness,” now we know that in a literal sense, as momineen we must maintain a healthy level of hygiene, but in this hadith the prophet is referring to a different type of cleanliness. The purity of the soul. As momineen we strive for perfection, no, as humans we strive for perfection. I once was listening to a lecture where the sheikh was saying, the universe strives for ultimate perfection, anything that may go against that will be eliminated. When one struggles and stands up to the desires of this world, they begin the journey of gaining ultimate closeness to Allah SWT and therefore Allah will help him on this path. The Holy Quran says, “And [as for] those who struggle in Our cause, surely We guide them in Our ways.” (29:69)
Sheikh Al Naraqi in his beautiful book Jami Al Sadaat explains the different powers of the soul very well. He explains it as four types, The Power of Intelligence, The Power of Desire, The Power of Anger and the Power of Imagination. We need all of these powers to create a harmony or balance within our soul. Naraqi goes on to explain, “The function and value of every one of these powers or forces of the soul is commonly well understood. If man did not have the power of reason, it would have been impossible for him to distinguish between good and evil, right and wrong, true and false.” I want to finish this part of the blog by reminding you all of this absolutely beautiful hadith from Imam Ali Ibn Abi Talib, Amir Al Momineen AS, “Surely God has characterized the angels by intellect without sexual desire and anger, and the animals with anger and desire without reason. He exalted man by bestowing upon him all of these qualities. Accordingly, if man’s reason dominates his desire and ferocity, he rises to a station above that of the angels; because this station is attained by man in spite of the existence of hurdles which do not vex the angels.” Just think of the rank that we would rise to if we could successfully control our nafs. This is the greatest jihad as the prophet SAW says, the jihad against our own soul. I would like to take a moment to ask all the readers to recite salawat as when we think of perfection and successful jihad of the nafs, our minds naturally go to The Prophet SAW and his purified progeny.
Now, how can we battle these desires and these emotions we face. Anger, sadness, lust, desire, all of these feelings if not controlled can cause a human to become overwhelmed by this world and deviate from the straight path. Before discussing the answer, I feel it vital to understand what true happiness is. What is happiness to you? For some, it may be money, for others it may be love and relationships. But for the Momin, true happiness and felicity is to be the embodiment and manifestation of Divine attributes and characteristics. The soul of a man who is truly happy is developed with knowledge and love of God. When one reaches this level, nothing but light and beauty will emanate from him because, as we know, nothing but beauty can come from the beautiful. We must remember, we cannot attain this closeness and happiness unless we battle all the negative aspects of our soul, once this is done we can reach perfection. This point reminds me that everything we learn, we must apply to our daily lives and that is how we open the door to more knowledge. Sure, we can learn and have knowledge on all these things, but only once we begin to apply these teachings and principles into our lives do we begin to lift the veil that is between us and ultimate truth.
There are hundreds of vices that I could speak about when it comes to the soul. However, I will be speaking about how to battle two vices I feel we all struggle with on a day to day basis. If you want to seek more knowledge on this subject I strongly recommend jami al sadaat by sheikh al naraqi.
1. Backbiting (gheeba) – This vice is one of the worst and most condemned sin, we all know this and yet why do we still find ourselves falling into the trap of committing it? Sayed Mohammed Ridha Al Shirazi RH (Al Fatiha on his soul) spoke about this eloquently. He said in one of his lectures, “if you hear someone committing gheeba, you get up and leave, you tell them to stop. If you are worried you may hurt their feelings when you do so, well, why are you worried?” You would rather risk you committing this great sin than lose a friendship? The root of gheeba is Hatred. Why bring Hatred into a religion based on Love? Hatred, jealousy, wanting to be liked by others, wasting time in frivolities, self admiration, low self esteem, cowardice, pity for others or surprise and anger at their actions (conveyed wrongly), all these are examples of the roots of gheeba, all dangerous and all negative. The treatment for this? Just think about the consequences, think about what you are truly doing. When backbiting and spreading things about someone that they might not like, even if they are true, you are creating fitnah. As fallible humans we should wonder about our own faults and be completely occupied with them, not others. “See your own faults and judge yourselves before you are judged (by Allah SWT).” Why be so caught up with others when we have so many faults?
2. Love of the World – This may be one of the scariest realities. Having such deep love for this world is condemned many times. This hadith from the Prophet SAW has stuck with me for many years now and continues to inspire me, “One who wakes up with his whole attention directed towards the world is cut off from God, and God shall make four qualities to accompany him: endless sorrow, never ending occupation, a neediness which is never relieved, and a hope which is never achieved.” I find this hadith to tie perfectly into the idea of Yaqeen, a beautiful word meaning Certainty. What does it mean to have certainty in islam? It is the belief that whatever is planned by Allah SWT will be the best for us and having complete trust in Allah. This is the sign of a true believer. Certainty is the light in the darkness, it is the tranquility amidst chaos and it is the peace when the earth shakes beneath the feet of the people. Certainly is believing in this verse, “They have plans and Allah has Plans, and Allah is the best of Planners.” What a blessing, what a gift to us that Allah plans what is best for us. When we find ourselves becoming sad when we lose a worldly item or relationship, remember that the one thing we should say is “Allhamdulillah,” as every single thing is a blessing from Allah SWT. Amidst all of what happened in karbala, she watched her entire family, her brothers, her protector Abu Fadhl Al Abbas be killed, Sayeda Zaynab AS found the beauty in what happened and found solace and peace surrounded by patience. Imam Al Sajjad healed our hearts with sahif al Sajadiyyah, all of these examples are of people who had ultimate tawakuul and belief in Allah SWT.
As I wrap up this blog, I want to thank you all for taking time to read and I hope that we can all benefit from learning from each other, we are the shia of Ali ibn Abu Talib ASWS and we should do well to remember our imam and all the ayimmah AS in each aspect of our lives. Thank you to the AfterMaghrib team for making it possible to share my thoughts on this topic. Wa alaykum asalam wa Rahmatullah wa Barakatoh.
Allahuma Sale Ala Mohammed wa Ale Mohammed, Wa ajal liwaliyakal faraj.
