Al Ghazali Quotes

The happiness of the drop is to die in the river.

Knowledge exists potentially in the human soul like the seed in the soil; by learning the potential becomes actual.

Never have I dealt with anything more difficult than my own soul, which sometimes helps me and sometimes opposes me.

…a man should say to his soul every morning, "God has given thee twenty-four treasures; take heed lest thou lose anyone of them, for thou wilt not be able to endure the regret that will follow such loss.

Desire makes slaves out of kings, while patience makes kings out of slaves.

Know, O beloved, that man was not created in jest or at random, but marvellously made and for some great end. Although he is not form everlasting, yet he lives for ever; and though his body is mean and earthly, yet his spirit is lofty and divine

Teringat saya amaran daripada Imam al-Ghazali, bahawa jika solat dipersembahkan kepada Allah tanpa ada sebarang rasa, sama keadaannya dengan mempersembahkan bangkai yang tidak bernyawa.

Live as long as you want, but you must die; love whatever you want, but you will become separated from it; and do what you want, but you will be repaid for it!

Men have such a good opinion of themselves, of their mental superiority and intellectual depth; they believe themselves so skilled in discerning the true from the false, the path of safety from those of error, that they should be forbidden as much as possible the perusal of philosophic writings.

رسول الله صلي الله عليه و سلم قال لبعض أصحابه : اعمل لدنياك بقدر مقامك فيها ، واعمل لآخرتك بقدر بقائك فيها ، واعمل لله بقدر حاجتك إليه واعمل للنار بقدر صبرك عليها ، و إذا أردت أن تعصي مولاك ، فاطلب مكاناً لا يراك .

Ukhuwah itu bukan pada indahnya pertemuan, tapi pada ingatan seseorang terhadap saudaranya di dalam doanya.

In God, there is no sorrow or suffering or affliction. If you want to be free of all affliction and suffering, hold fast to God, and turn wholly to Him, and to no one else. Indeed, all your suffering comes from this: that you do not turn towards God.

Verily, the weight of half of disbelief in the world is carried by religious people who made God detestable to His servants.

Praise be to God; whose compassion is all-embracing and Whose mercy is universal; Who rewards His servants for their remembrance [dhikr] [of Him] with His remembrance [of them] - verily God (Exalted is He!) has said, 'Remember Me, and I will remember you' - Opening lines from Kitab al-Adhkar wa'l Da'awat of the Ihya ulum ad-Din

و اعلم أن الرياء يتولد من تعظيم الخلق ، و علاجه أن تراهم مسخرين للقدرة ، و تحسبهم كالجامدات في عدم قدرة إيصال الراحة و المشقة ، لتخلص من مراياتهم ، و متي تحسبهم ذوي قدرة و إرادةٍ لن يبعد عنك الرياء

Mempelajari pengetahuan itu adalah sama dengan memuji Allah SWT. Menuntut pengetahuan adalah sama dengan melakukan perang di jalan Allah SWT. Mengajarkan pengetahuan adalah sama dengan bersedekah, dan dengan mengajarkan pengetahuan kita akan mendapat pahala.

قال رسول الله صلي الله عليه و سلم ،، من عمل بما علم ورثه الله علم ما لم يعلم

Knowledge without work is insanity, and work without knowledge is vanity. Know that any science which does not remove you today far from apostasy, and does not carry you to obedience, will not remove you tomorrow from the fire of hell.

The Prophet Muhammad (s) said: “Be kind, for whenever kindness becomes part of something, it beautifies it. Whenever it is taken from something, it leaves it tarnished.

Does money upset the hearts of learned men ? He answered, "men whose hearts are changed by money are not learned'' --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Faith is confession with the tongue and belief with the heart and work with the members of the body. So long as you do not work, you do not find reward.

The one whose concern is with that which enters the belly will discover that his value is found in that which goes out of it.

Dengan segala kehebatannya dalam dunia keilmuan, tengoklah bagaimana sikap 'tahu diri' seorang al-Ghazali. Beliau tetap menempatkan dirinya di bawah mazhab Shafii dalam soal metodologi ushul fiqh. Beliau tidak merasa lebih hebat dari Shafii. Banyak ilmuan besar Islam tetap memelihara sikap adil dan beradab dalam mengkaji dan menyebarkan ilmu kepada masyarakat.

Filsafat yang mampu mengubah sesearang

A wise man said: When knowledge increases, loquacity decreases.

How many nights have you remained awake repeating science and poring over books, and have denied yourself sleep. I do not know what the purpose of it was. If it was attaining worldly ends and securing its vanities, and acquiring its dignities, and surpassing your contemporaries, and such like, woe to you and again woe; but if your purpose in it was the vitalizing of the Law of the Prophet, and the training of your character, and breaking the soul commanding to evil, then blessed are you and again blessed.

Just as you have taken returning to sins as a habit, then also take returning to tawba as a habit, because through tawba you expiate your past sins, and it is very possible that you may have the fortune to die while in a state of tawba.

Marilah kita bersatu untuk menghadapi musuh bersama kerana pada suatu titik waktu kritikal, kita harus melupakan pertelingkahan peribadi kita.

Shame upon you, O soul, for your overweening love of the world! If you do not believe in heaven or hell, at any rate you believe in death, which will snatch from you all worldly delights and cause you to feel the pangs of separation from them, which will be intenser just in proportion as you have attached yourself to them.

What is meant for you, will reach you even if it is beneath two mountains. And what is not meant for you will not reach you even if it’s between your two lips.” IMAM AL-GHAZALI, 11TH-CENTURY MYSTIC

The learned man who does not act up to his knowledge is like a patient who describes the qualities of a medicine without using it or like a hungry man who describes the taste of a food without eating it.

Kedudukan apakah di dunia Allah ini yang lebih rendah daripada kedudukan orang yang menganggap terhormat meninggalkan kebenaran yang diterima secara autoriti tetapi lalu segera menerima pembohongan secara taklid tanpa didukung penelitian yang saksama?

Mujahadah adalah kunci petunjuk, tidak ada kunci petunjuk selain mujahadah

A fourth group of people climbs from ignorance and pretends to possess the rational faculty. They suppose that the highest felicity is the expansion of honor and fame, the spread of reputation, a multiplicity of followers, and the influence of the command that is obeyed. Hence, you see that their only concern is eye service and cultivation of the things upon which observers cast their glance. One of them may go hungry in his house and suffer harm so that he can spend his wealth on clothes with which to adorn himself so that no one will look at him with the eye of contempt when he goes out. The types of these people are beyond count. All of them are veiled from Allah by the sheer darkness that is their own dark souls.

The Prophet said: Don't sit with every learned man. Sit with the learned man who calls towards five matters towards faith from doubt, sincerity from show, modesty from pride, love from enmity, and ascetism from worldliness.

Aku telah menerobos setiap celah yang gelap, aku telah menyerang setiap persoalan, aku telah menyelam ke dalam setiap lautan, aku telah meneliti akidah semua sekte, aku telah menelanjangi semua doktrin rahasia setiap komunitas. Semua ini kulakukan agar aku dapat membedakan antara kebenaran dan kesesatan, antara tradisi yang sahih dan pembaruan yang bid'ah

The highest function of the soul of man is the perception of truth; in this accordingly it finds its special delight.

Hendaklah tukang-tukang cerita waspada terhadap hal-hal bohong dan hikayat-hikayat yang menyajikan perbuatan salah, atau yang tujuan baiknya tidak dapat difahamkan oleh umum. Atau, cerita itu merupakan satu pertarungan antara yang baik dengan buruk, lalu yang buruk mendapat pembelaan yang berlebihan sebelum dikalahkan oleh yang baik. Tanpa disedari, hal ini memberanikan orang berbuat dosa (Ihya' Ulumuddin).

Den Wert von vieren kennen aber nur vier: Den Wert des Lebens kennen nur die Toten; den Wert des Gesunden nur die Kranken; den Wert der Jugendkraft kennen nur die Altersschwachen; und den Wert des Reichtums kennen nur die Armen.

Worship in Islam is not only observance of the prescribed worship rites – Prayer, Almsgiving, Fasting, Pilgrimage – but living one’s entire life in obedience to God, doing His will and seeking His pleasure, exactly in the way He has laid down.

(علامة إعراض الله تعالى عن العبد اشتغاله بما لا يعنيه، و إنّ امرأ ذهبت ساعة من عمره في غير ما خلق له من العبادة، لجدير ان تطول عليه حسرته، و من جاوز الأربعين و لم يغلب خيره على شرّه فيتجهّز إلى النّار).

For such people, the ruling gods are progress, science, and development. They imagine that we know so much more about the world than those people of olden times, because "we" have science. Of course, they themselves do not have science, they have simply heard and believed that scientific knowledge is real knowledge. They know little about the goals and methods of science, and nothing about the Islamic Intellectual tradition. They are blind imitators in intellectual issues, that is, on the level where they should be striving for their own understanding. What is worse, this is a selective imitation, since they only accept the authority of the "scientists" and the "experts", not that of the great Muslim thinkers of the past. If Einstein said it, it must be true, but if Al-Ghazali or Mulla Sadra said it, then it can't be true, because it isn't scientific.

Hatem said: You are not safe in this world unless you possess four characteristics - (1) overlook the ignorance of man (2) conceal your ignorance from them, (3) seek their good (4) don't seek anything from them.

(إعمل لدنياك بقدر مقامك فيها، و اعمل لآخرتك بقدر بقائك فيها، و اعمل لله بقدر حاجتك إليه، و اعمل للنّار بقدر صبرك عليها)

The question of divine knowledge is so deep that it is really known only to those who have it.

Aklın bütün meseleleri kavramada müstakil ve bütün müşkillleri halledecek durumda olmadığını anladım.

سهر العيون لغير وجهك ضائع * و بكاؤهن لغير فقدك باطل.

A third group of people see the highest felicity in the abundance of property and the extension of ease. After all, property is an instrument to achieve the object of appetite. Through it, the human being attains the ability to achieve wishes. Hence, these people aspire to gather property; to increase estates, land, valuable horses, cattle, and farmland, and to hoard dinars in the earth. Hence, you will see one of them striving throughout life --- embarking on great dangers in the deserts, on journeys, and in the oceans to gather possessions with which he is niggardly toward himself, to say nothing of others. These are the ones meant by the words of The Prophet: "The slave of the dirham is miserable: the slave of the dinar is miserable." What darkness is greater than that which deceives the human being? Gold and silver are two stones that are not desired in themselves. When wishes are not achieved through them and they are not spent, then they are just like pebbles, and pebbles are just like them.

O youth.......be assured that knowledge alone does not strengthen the hand......Though a man read a hundred thousand scientific questions and understood them or learned them, but did not work with them---They do not benefit him except by working.....Knowledge is the tree, and working is its fruit; and though you studied a hundred years and assembled a thousand books, you would not be prepared for the mercy of Allah the Exalted except by working.

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 naught 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, I am a bird, and this body was my cage, Whence I have now flown forth and it is left as a token, Praise to God, who hath now set me free, And prepared for me my place in the highest of the Heavens, 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, With no veil between, I see God face to face. I look upon “Loh-i-Mahfuz” and there in 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, here we are granted sleep, Death is but sleep, sleep that shall be prolonged Be not frightened when death draweth nigh, 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 men 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 forever more be yours.

O youth.......be assured that knowledge alone does not strengthen the hand......Though a man read a hundred thousand scientific questions and understood them or learned them, but did not work with them---They do not benefit him except by working.....Knowledge is the tree, and working is its fruit; and though you studied a hundred years and assembled a thousand books, you would not be prepared for the mercy of Allah the Exalted except by working.

A rational foe is better than an ignorant friend.

ليس العيب أن تكون مدججًا بالسلاح، وإنما العيب أن تسطو بسلاحك على الوادعين، أو تروع به الآمنين" *محمد الغزالي

Woe unto you, O soul, you turn away from the Hereafter but it draws closer to you; you approach the world while it turns away from you." —Al-Ghazāli

A learned man said: The learned men are the lights of the ages. Each is a light in his own time giving light to the people of his time.

Wealth and property are the servants of body which is the vehicle of soul of which the essence is knowledge and for which there is honor of soul.

Hazrat Abu Darda'a said: He who thinks that to go at dawn in search of knowledge is not jihad is deficient in intellect.

قال عيسى عليه السلام: (إنّي ما عجزت عن إحياء الموتى و قد عجزت عن معالجة الأحمق).

Whenever the time of Prayer approached, ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib, may God be pleased with him and ennoble his countenance, used to quake and change colour. They asked him: ‘What is the

لا يرى الحاكم الراشد حرجًا في أن تنطلق الألسنة من عقالها تصف ما ترى، وتبحث عما غاب، فلن ترى في الشهادة والغيب إلا ما يزهو صاحبه به ويهش له، من عفاف وعدالة واستقامة أما الحاكم المجرم فيريد جوًّا يسوده الصمت الرهيب، لأنه يدري أن الأفواه لو نطقت فستفضح خبأه وتكشف سرّه، وهنا الطامة الكبرى

Oh mein Sohn, es wird auch berichtet, dass Luqman (der Weise) seinem Sohn riet: "Oh Sohn, du möchtest doch nicht, dass der Hahn gescheiter ist als du. Er kräht zur Morgendämmerung und du schläfst weiter.

Every creature who is moved to attain and perceive Him will be cast back by the splendour of His majesty, nor is there anyone who cranes his neck to see Him whose glance is not turned aside in amazement.

placing the Ka’ba between my brows, the Bridgeover-Hell beneath my feet, Paradise to my right and Hell to my left, and the Angel of Death behind me, thinking all the while that this is my final Prayer. Then I stand between hope and fear.

Having being asked about what humility is, Fudayl [ibn Iyad] said, 'It is that you submit to the truth and follow it — even if you hear it from a little boy, you accept it; even if you hear it from the most ignorant of men, you accept it.

The third duty of a teacher is that he should not withhold from his students any advice. After he finishes the outward sciences, he should teach them the inward sciences. He should tell them that the object of education is to gain nearness of God, not power or richness and that God created ambition as a means of perpetuating knowledge which is essential for these sciences.

Another sign of the learned man of the hereafter is that he keeps himself distant from the ruling authorities and avoids their company, because this world is sweet, ever-new and its bridle is in their hands. He who comes near them is not free from their pleasures and harms. They are mostly unjust and do not obey the advices of the learned men. The learned man who frequents them will look to their grandeurs and then think God's gift upon him as insignificant. To keep company with the rulers is the key to evils.

According to Ibn ‘Abbās, may God be pleased with him and his father, the Prophet David, God bless him and give him peace, used to say in his intimate Prayers: ‘My God, who inhabits Your House? And from whom do you accept the Prayer?’ Then God told him by inspiration: ‘David, he who inhabits My House, and he whose Prayer I accept, is none but he who is humble before My Majesty, spends his days in remembrance of Me and keeps his passions in check for My sake, giving food to the hungry and shelter to the stranger and treating the afflicted with compassion. His light shines in the sky like the sun. If he invokes Me, I am at his service. If he asks of Me, I grant his request. In the midst of ignorance, I give him discernment; in heedlessness, remembrance, in darkness, light. He stands out among ordinary people as Paradise towers over earthly gardens, its rivers inexhaustible and its fruits not subject to decay.

A great thinker does not necessarily have to discover a master idea but has to rediscover and to affirm a true but forgotten, ignored or misunderstood master idea and interpret it in all the diverse aspects of thought not previously done, in a powerful and consistent way, despite surrounding ignorance and opposition. This criterion we think would include all prophets and their true followers among the Muslim scholars. He is both a great and original thinker who brings new meanings and interpretations to old ideas, thereby providing both continuity and originality to the important intellectual and cultural problems of his time and through it, of mankind. Thus the brilliant interpretations of scholars and sages like al-Ghazali and Mulla Sadra then, and Iqbal and al-Attas now, deserve to be recognized and acknowledged as manifesting certain qualities of greatness and originality.

He who acquires knowledge and acts up to it and teaches it to the people is noble to the angels of heaven and earth. He is like the sun which illumines itself and gives light to other things. Such a man is like a pot of musk which is full of fragrance and gives fragrance to others. He who teaches knowledge to others but does not himself act up to it is like a notebook which does not benefit itself but benefits others or like an instrument which gives edge to iron but itself has got no edge, or like a needle which remains naked but sews clothing for others, or like a lamp which gives light to other things but itself burns.

ولا تظن أنّا نعني بالعالم العلوي السموات فإنها علو وفوق في حق عالم الشهادة والحس، ويشارك في إدراكه البهائم. وأما العبد فلا يفتح له باب الملكوت ولا يصير ملكوتيا إلا ويبدل في حقه الأرض غير الأرض والسموات، فيصير كل داخل تحت الحس والخيال أرضه ومن جملتها السموات، وكل ما ارتفع عن الحس فسماؤه وهذا هو المعراج الأول لكل سالك ابتدأ سفره إلى قرب الحضرة الربوبية

أيّها الولد، العلم بلا عمل جنون، و العمل بغير علم لا يكون

La cuestión del conocimiento divino es tan profunda que realmente la conocen solamente aquellos que lo poseen.

What’s meant for you will reach you even if it’s beneath two mountains, and what’s not meant for you won’t reach you even if it’s between your two lips.

إن الثقافة الغزيرة تعين الرجل و المرأة كليهما على ضبط الحقائق و إحسان الحكم على الامور والاشراف على تربية الاجيال الناشئة تربية مثمرة مجدية.

Yet whoever believes in something to which he has not attained believes in what he cannot see [al-ghayb], and that is the key to happiness.

Three Habits Destroy a Man Or Woman: Greed, Envy and Pride.

And how can someone be described as flawless [or protector] who is not freed from his lower self

Bersungguhlah kamu dalam menuntut ilmu, jauhilah kemalasan dan kebosanan kerana jika demikian engkau akan berada dalam bahaya kesesatan.

For surely it is not the eyes that are blind, but blinded are the hearts which are in the breasts

و الايمان قول باللّسان و تصديق بالجنان و عمل بالاركان،

The reason of the human spirit seeking to return to that upper world is that its origin is from thence, and that it is of angelic nature.

أيّها الولد، اجعل الهمّة في الرّوح، و الهزيمة في النفس، و الموت في البدن،

it seems clear that Ibn Khaldun preferred al-Ghazali to Averroes. “He who wants to arm himself against the philosophers in the field of dogmatic beliefs should turn to the works of al-Ghazali.

و سألتني عن التّوكّل و هو أن تستحكم اعتقادك بالله تعالى فيما وعد، يعني تعتقد أنّ ما قدّر لك سيصل إليك لا محالة، و إن اجتهد كلّ من في العالم على صرفه عنك، و مالم يكتب لن يصل إليك و إن ساعدك جميع العالم.

By the end of the eleventh century,” Edmond said, “the greatest intellectual exploration and discovery on earth was taking place in and around Baghdad. Then, almost overnight, that changed. A brilliant scholar named Hamid al-Ghazali—now considered one of the most influential Muslims in history—wrote a series of persuasive texts questioning the logic of Plato and Aristotle and declaring mathematics to be ‘the philosophy of the devil.

sejauh usia mudaku hingga menjelang llima puluh tahun, aku dengan nekat menerjang ke kedalaman samudra. aku selalu bertolak menuju laut lepas. mengesampingkan seluruh rasa cemas, aku menghunjam setiap ceruk gelap. aku telah menggempur setiap masalah. aku telah menelaah keyakinan dari setiap aliran. aku telah berupaya menelanjangi doktrin terdalam dari setiap umat. semua ini kulakukan agar dapat membedakan mana yang benar dan yang salah".

The Infinitely Good is He who loves men, first by creating them; second, by guiding them to faith and to the means of salvation; third, by making them happy in the next world; and fourth, by granting them the contemplation of his noble face.

Counsel: Man should yearn to reach a point where the locks to the divine mysteries are opened by his speech, and where he might facilitate by his knowledge what creatures find difficult in religious and worldly affairs, for him to gain a share in the name of opener.

Were it conceivable that a person see only the sun and its light spreading over the horizon, it would be right for him to say: I see only the sun, for the light radiating from it is part of the whole and not extrinsic to it. So everything in existence is a light from the lights of the eternal power, and a trace from its traces. And as the sun is the source of light radiating to every illuminated thing, so in a similar fashion the meaning which words fall short of expressing-though it was necessarily expressed as 'the eternal power'-is the source of existence radiating to every existing thing.

INTELLECT AND ITS NOBLE NATURE. The noble nature of knowledge has been revealed through intellect. Intellect is the source and fountainhead of knowledge and its foundation. Knowledge is like the fruit of a tree and it flows from intellect, or like the light of the sun or like the vision of the eye. Why should it not be honored when it is the cause of fortune in this world and the next? What is there to distinguish between beasts and men except intellect? Even a ferocious beast which has got more strength than man fears a man at seeing him as it knows that he may put him into snare on account of his intellect.

An important part of our knowledge of God arises from the study and contemplation of our own bodies, which reveal to us the power, wisdom, and love of the Creator. His power, in that from a mere drop He has built up the wonderful frame of man; His wisdom is revealed in its intricacies and the mutual adaptability of its parts; and His love is shown by His not only supplying such organs as are absolutely necessary for existence, as the liver, the heart, and the brain, but those which are not absolutely necessary, as the hand, the foot, the tongue, and the eye. To these He has added, as ornaments, the blackness of the hair, the redness of lips, and the curve of the eyebrows.

إعلم أن من لم يكن حظه من معاني أسماء الله تعالى إلا بأن يسمع لفظه، ويفهم في اللغة تفسيره ووصفه ويعتقد بالقلب وجود معناه في الله تعالى /فهو مبخوس الحظ/ نازل الدرجة، ليس يحسن به أن يتبجح بما ناله. فإن سماع اللفظ لا يستدعي إلا سلامة حاسة السمع التي بها يدرك الأصوات وهذه رتبة يشارك البهيمة فيها. وأما فهم وضعه في اللغة، فلا يستدعي إلا معرفته العربية وهذه رتبة يشارك فيها الأديب اللغوي، بل الغبي البدوي. وأما اعتقاد ثبوت معناه لله تعالى من غير كشف، فلا يستدعي إلا فهم معاني هذه الألفاظ والتصديق بها. وهذه رتبة يشارك فيها العامي، بل الصبي...فإنه بعد فهم الكلام إذا ألقى إليه هذه المعاني تلقاها، ولقنها، واعتقدها بقلبه، وصمم عليها[...] ولكنه نقص ظاهر إلى ذروة الكمال؛ فإن حسنات الأبرار سيئات المقربين.

According to Imam al-Ghazali, there are four worldly and four spiritual tips to help a person perform tahajjud. The worldly tips are: •Avoid overeating, and over-drinking, which would lead to heavy sleep. •Avoid tiring the body during the day in what is not beneficial. •Take to the afternoon nap, which helps you pray at night. •Never commit sins during the day, which may prevent you from praying tahajjud. The spiritual tips are: •To purify your heart of any resentment against another Muslim. •To constantly have fear in your heart of your Lord and realise that your life is short. •To understand the benefit of tahajjud. •To love Allah, and have strong faith when you stand in prayer in the night, calling upon Allah.

There is in fact no good reason al-Ghazali and his ilk should have the last word in defining Islam. Muslims around the world cannot go on claiming that “true” Islam has somehow been “hijacked” by a group of extremists. Instead they must acknowledge that inducements to violence lie at the root of their own most sacred texts, and take responsibility for actively redefining their faith.

Fire causes burning, lightning causes thunder, winds cause waves, and gravity causes bodies to fall. Such connections between an effect and its cause form the cornerstone of scientific thinking, both modern and classical. But this notion of causality is one which is specifically rejected by Asharite doctrine, and the most articulate and effective opponent of physical causality was AI-Ghazzali

If you were to show a piece of intelligible writing to a reasonable person and say to him: 'do you know its writer?' and he said 'no', he would be speaking truly. But if he said 'yes: its writer is a man living and powerful, hearing and seeing, sound of hand and knowledgeable in the practise of writing, and if I know all this from [the sample] how can I not know him?-he too would be speaking truly. Yet the saying of the one who said 'I do not know him' is more correct and true, for in reality he has not known him. Rather he only knows that intelligible writing requires a living writer, knowing, powerful, hearing, and seeing; yet he does not know the writer himself. Similarly, every creature knows only that this ordered and precisely disposed world requires an arranging, living, knowing, and powerful maker.

The mystic Al-Ghazali said that the inhabitants of heaven remain forever thirty-three. It reminds me of Iran, stuck in 1976 in the imagination of every exile. Iranians often say that when they visit Tehran or Shiraz or Isfahan, they find even the smallest changes confusing and painful - a beloved corner shop gone to dust, the smell of bread that once filled a street, a rose garden neglected. In their memories, they always change it back. Iran is like an aging parent, they say.

Similarly, whoever worships God-great and glorious-for the sake of paradise has made God-may He be praised and exalted-a means to seeking it rather than making Him the goal of his quest. The sign that something is a means is that no one seeks it if its benefit can be attained without it, so that if one's intentions could be achieved without gold, gold would neither be loved nor sought, for what is really loved is the benefit sought and not the gold. So if paradise were attainable to one worshipping God for its sake, without worshipping God-great and glorious, he would not worship God. Therefore, what he is seeking and what he loves is paradise, and nothing else. Whoever has no love but God-great and glorious-and seeks nothing except Him, and whose gain lies in delight at meeting God most high, being near to Him, and in accompanying the heavenly host who are close to His presence; he is the one who can be said to worship God-great and glorious-for the sake of God; not in the sense that he is not seeking gain, but in the sense that God-great and glorious-is Himself his gain, and there is no gain beyond Him.

Man in this world resembles the guest who was invited to partake of the hospitality of a rich man. In token of respect, the servants set before him silver washing-basins, vessels of costly stones, perfumes of musk and amber with chafing dishes. The poor guest is overjoyed at the sight of these things, thinking that they have been made his own property, and belays hold of them with the intention of retaining them. The next day, when he is upon the point of departure, they are all taken from him by force, and the measure of his disappointment and regret is clear to every person of discrimination. Seeing that this world is itself a mansion built for travellers, by the road over which they are to pass, that they may make a halt, and lay in provisions preparatory to leaving it again, he is a wise guest who does not lay bis hand upon other things than his necessary provisions, lest on the morrow when about to move on, they take them out of his hands, and he expose himself to regret and sorrow.

Man in this world resembles the guest who was invited to partake of the hospitality of a rich man. In token of respect, the servants set before him silver washing-basins, vessels of costly stones, perfumes of musk and amber with chafing dishes. The poor guest is overjoyed at the sight of these things, thinking that they have been made his own property, and belays hold of them with the intention of retaining them. The next day, when he is upon the point of departure, they are all taken from him by force, and the measure of his disappointment and regret is clear to every person of discrimination. Seeing that this world is itself a mansion built for travellers, by the road over which they are to pass, that they may make a halt, and lay in provisions preparatory to leaving it again, he is a wise guest who does not lay bis hand upon other things than his necessary provisions, lest on the morrow when about to move on, they take them out of his hands, and he expose himself to regret and sorrow. The people of this world are