al-Raghib al-Isfahani #06 – The Two Tools For Self Reform

In the next segment arrival as for HANA, he talks about the two or two other tools, we could say that human beings have been granted kind of the nature of human beings and how they are to begin this process of reforming the self and attaining to the station of a Khalifa of a steward or representative of Allah subhanaw taala. And his take on it is that human beings have a dual nature. So one of the part of that nature is material, right the body. And then the other part of that nature is not material, you can call it the intellect, you can call it the spirit, the soul, whatever you want.

And he justifies us by the sorts of data to fill out the Ayatollah Moteino fee and physical, right, and there are signs in your own selves. And his point is that, you know, all of these things are again capacities, their potentialities, they're not yet realized they are tools for you to use. And he's going to get to the importance of that in a second how Allah created us different from everyone else, because we come into the earth not as a finished product, we come in as a potential or as a capacity, he gives us the tools. And he, our job in this life is to use those tools to bring it to fruition or to develop the proper end product. But in a general sense, so we have this one tool,

which is the body, that's that's a tool, right? We everybody knows, everything that you do can be an act of worship, if you actually put your intention through that, right. So if you're sleeping, that can be an act of worship, if you're eating, you know, if you're being intimate with your spouse, if you're doing any of these things that can all be acts of worship for you. If you have the right intention, that's your body. Right? Now, when it comes to recognizing Allah signs, there's part of that which is also your body, Allah gave you eyes, right, he gave us the ability to see color, he gives us the ability to smell, fragrance and sense he gave us the ability to hear the birds singing,

he gave us the ability to feel the different textures, and attend the plants and the animals that he created. And all these sorts of things, right? All of these physical characteristics and qualities and capacities that we have, are all tools that were given to us to use for accepting Allah science. Right. So they're not just random. They're not just an evolutionary stratagem, just to secure resources and reproduce, you know, find the best mate or whatever, and reproduce as much as possible. That's very, very basic level stuff. That's the level of email. Right? That's not the level of TNF. And things might have more than one purpose, right? If you have that stuff for level

of any matter, okay, great. But you also have them to recognize the signs of your Creator. So that's the body. And then the second aspect is the intangible, and the inspiration, the insight, right? If our eyes are foresight, then our intellect and our soul is for insight, right to be able to observe these things, and put them all together to recognize the patterns to be able to detect in the creation, mercy, and love, and genius, and beauty. Right? This is something that it's not, it might be tangentially related to physical forms, but it's not it's not purely physical. Right? This is something that is sublime, we would say it goes beyond the physical Corporal reality. And so these

are these are the tools that were given, which is why, which is why and we're getting into now a little bit of the macadam Sharia, which is why some of the guidelines in the Sharia are geared towards protecting these two things. Okay, if you've been given a body to detect and recognize a lot of signs, then it stands to reason that there's going to be guidelines for how to protect that body. If you've been given an intellect that is designed to recognize a lot of signs and submit to a lot of signs, then it stands to reason that you're going to have to protect that that there should be guidelines that you cannot cross red lines, consequences, to keep that intellect intact, because as

long as that intellect is intact, you might still recognize a lot of science. Maybe not until you're 50 years old, maybe not until you're 60 years old, seven, maybe not until you're on your deathbed, but as long as it's intact, you stand a chance. Okay, what if I'm an alcoholic? What if I'm a druggie? What if I do things that just destroy the tool?

Am I ever going to be able to recognize the signs if I destroy the tools that Allah gave me?

It's not possible unless Allah wills otherwise it's not possible. And so many of the guidelines in the Sharia, whether it comes to intoxicants in intoxicants, or whether it comes to substances or whether it comes to relations with other people, anything, a lot of it has to do with the preservation of these tools. Because the most important thing in our lives is the ability to recognize Allah signs and any activity that we engage in, that might damage these tools that Allah has given us to recognize

As the signs it's not worth it. We would rather go without these fun things that we think are going to bring us happiness. We'd rather go without them for our whole lives than damage the tools that Allah gave us to recognize the signs