Mokhtar Maghraoui – Spiritual Purification #04 What is the NafsSelf
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A brief way, inshallah, ta'ala, to say a
few things about that is
that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala created us
and of the lata'is
that he created in us,
of these
subtle
divine creations that he
laid in us
to identify
us also as human beings, one of those
is the nafs.
The nafs is not a thing you can
touch.
The locus of the nafs is not something
you can pinpoint exactly.
It is this
Laplace
that has to do
with the overall
human
identity.
There is a ruah, there is a nafs,
there is a qalb, there is a haqal
and there are other things.
But these are the main
elements that
we can, we could deal with in this
in this, discourse
to help us understand our nature
and how our nature
needs tizqiya.
When we say tizkiyah
to nafs, the tizkiyah of my nafs, what
is this nafs
that needs tizkiyah?
And we need to answer those questions,
from the Quran
and from the sunnah of Rasulullah
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam essentially, and from that
which Allah subhanahu ta'ala graced some of his
servants of Ulana and Awliya
of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala of this Ummah
of Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
and their experiential,
experiences,
we learn many things about
these,
these essential realities of which is the nafs.
Now the nafs
inside of us, those traits and those tribes
inside of us
are many.
Those drives actually inside of us help us
identify
the, if you will, the different shades or
the different dimensions
or the different,
realities
of
nafs.
The human being
as an essential reality
is not what the physical body is.
Our physical body in essential reality, as we
look deeper and deeper at the human being
the essential reality of the human being physically
speaking
are protons, neutrons, and electrons,
Atoms and molecules
which every other living creature
shares with us. Even stones,
non living creatures
share that property of being made of protons,
neutrons,
and electrons.
And the way we look and the way
a tree looks and the way an insect
looks and the way
a cow looks
or a hyena looks,
The differences
between those physically
is based simply upon the
arrangements
of those
molecules made of those atoms made of the
same protons, neutrons, and electrons. So we look
the way we look because of that
different arrangement. And essentially,
physically,
we're the same.
Now what characterizes me as a human being
is what I am inside.
What I feel inside. What I know inside.
What I harbor inside. The traits inside
of me,
that's what characterizes
me.
And those are where our study of the
nafs comes.
So we have drives inside of us that
are, for example, in essential reality,
no different than those of a
livestock
animal,
cattle,
cow, forgive me, please forgive me, or a
pig
or an insect.
Some of us,
if
in our lives,
our essential
focus
and our essential drives
and the quality
average time that we spend in the pursuit
thereof,
if we are like that, then our essential
reality is no different than the essential reality
of that other creature.
For example, forgive me, a cow or or
a or a llama or a camel or
a pig,
whose
main pursuits
and that what makes that creature
satisfied and pleased and therefore we say happy,
is the attainment
and the acquisition of those
means.
Eating, drinking,
sleeping, playing, copulating.
And if we are like that, then a
quality time is spent in that way, then
we have nafs. We call this the essential
reality inside of me is a behemi nafs,
is a cattle like nafs.
Because,
as as I think I mentioned before,
Allah tells us in the Quran
and when he speaks to us about happiness
and about tazkiyah,
he relate them together. Tazkiyah
is related to happiness.
Now what is this happiness that I want
defines the process
or the elements of the process of my
tazkiyah
If I want to be as happy in
my essential reality
of happiness
as, for example, a cow
or a pig in the sense of my
emphasis in life is to work and strive
and do things to ultimately
eat and drink and play and copulate and
sleep,
then my pursuit of happiness
is
not distinct in essential reality from that of
of a cattle. And then we have
another level of another nafs.
A nafs that is
those tribes inside of us and if we
seek to satisfy them and we live a
style of life that is
congruent to these,
following
traits, meaning in this case the following traits
that are predatory.
A predator finds
satisfaction
when killing,
when usurping,
when
killing the competition,
when stealing,
when
overwhelming others.
And
a hyena, when it does that, or a
wild dog, when they do that in nature,
they do that and you look at them
after that and they look so cute
and so peaceful.
And that's the way their nature is. In
addition to eating, sleeping and so on, this
is a predatory nature. So if I as
a human being
follow a course of happiness
To be satisfied
by certain means
that are
such as let's kill the competition,
such as usurping others,
such as
being enraged against against others, Part of the
traits of a of a predator, of a
wild beast and animal is rage and anger
and violence.
When those are expressed by me and I
find satisfaction in that, and, and we are
happy and we celebrate that and we party
because we have killed the competition, for example,
then in that elation, in that happiness of
mine, in essential reality, I'm not different than
a predator.
So that's a qualitative
and quantitative sometimes way for me
to gauge what I am inside.
I could be one whose pursuits of happiness
lie also in addition to the previous ones,
could lie also
in the traits and the characteristics of a
shayatan,
of an Iblis, of a devil.
And what are some of the characteristics of
a shayatan?
Arrogance,
delusion,
ostentation,
love to be the head of others,
deceit,
lying,
backbiting,
sowing seeds of animosity,
shirk
of all sorts.
And then I find pleasure in that.
That's a Shaytani pursuit.
Lying,
cheating.
Every time I express such a thing, such
a huluk, such a character, such a trait,
I am actually, in a sense, wearing
the heart of a shaitan,
the personality of a shaitan. My nafs at
that moment,
my inner reality at that moment is shaitani.
That's a shaitani nafs.
And some of us human beings
feel elated
and are happy
on account of having fulfilled
such
drives
inside of us, instead of
the tazkiyah process to help us
liberate
our hearts
from these characteristics that are nafsani.
Because otherwise
the heart
will become
a nafs
when these traits
that I mentioned
of the nafs are predominant
inside of me, in this in this projection
into
2 dimensions as we sometimes do on the
board,
this projection of the beyond 2, 3 dimensions
and 3 dimensions
projection into 2 dimensions,
then this heart is taken over by the
nafs,
and I become a nafs. So I say
I love you, I hate you,
I dislike you, I agree with you, I
disagree with you, this is right, this is
wrong, I feel,
Which is I that does all of that?
This I could be simply
a combination
of one of those three
selves or nafs.
Luckily,
there is another nafs, another state, the angelic
self.
The angelic nafs.
1, since it is angelic,
an angel's nature
is to find satisfaction
and pleasure and happiness in that which is
lofty,
spiritual,
moral,
ethical,
knowing
to know
is angelic.
To know the divine
is the ultimate
goal of knowledge.
And then to be in response
to that grace of knowledge,
to be in zikr, in dua, in kindness,
in subqa, in truthfulness,
in humility, in humbleness,
to be always that way and to pursue
that path.
That's an angelic nature. That nafs is,
malaiki nafs.
And it is either this one or a
combination of the other ones
that will take over the identity of what
we call
our heart.