The Disease of Desires and Passionate Love (2/2)

When the soul loves something, it will do all that it can to attain it, so the one who does this out of having a blameworthy love or hatred then this action of his would be sinful. For example his hating a person due to envying him and thereby harming whosoever is linked to that person either by preventing his rights or by showing them enmity, or his doing something that is commanded by Allah but he does it due to his desires and not for the sake of Allah .

These types of sicknesses are commonly found in the heart. The person can hate something and due to this hate, love a great many things due to mere whims and fancies. As one poet affected by this said ,

“For the sake of a Sudanese girl he loved Sudan to the point that he loved the black dogs due to his love of her ”

So he loved a black girl, and therefore loved all types of black even the blackness of dogs! All of this is a sickness in the heart with regards to its imagination, fantasies and desires. We ask Allah that He eliminate all of the illnesses from our hearts, and we seek refuge with Allah from evil manners, desires and sicknesses .

The Natural Inclination of the Heart is to Love of Allah

The heart has only been created for the worship of Allah, and this is the natural disposition (fitrah) upon which Allah created His servants as the Prophet (Peace be upon him) said,

 “Every new-born child is born upon the natural disposition and it is his parents that make him a Jew, Christian or a Magian, as an animal produces a perfect young animal, do you see any part of its body amputated?” Then Aboo Hurayrah, radiyAllahu ‘anhu, said, recite if you wish the saying of Allah ,  

 “The Fitrah of Allah with which He has created mankind. No change is there in the creation of Allah.” [Soorah Ar-Room (30):30][1]

So Allah has made the natural disposition of His servants to love Him and worship Him Alone, so if the natural disposition was to be left as it is without corrupting it, then it would be cognizant of Allah, loving Him Alone; but the natural disposition does become corrupted due to the sickness of the heart such as the parents making it a Jew or a Christian even though this be by the Will and Pre-decree of Allah, just like the body is altered by amputation. But even after this it is possible for the heart to return to the natural disposition if Allah makes this easy for the one who does his utmost to return it to the natural disposition .

The Messengers were sent to affirm and re-establish the natural disposition and to perfect it, not to alter it. So when the heart loves Allah Alone, making the religion sincerely for Him, it will not be tried with this passionate love (directed to him) his love of Allah Alone, making the religion sincerely for him, did not allow him to be overcome by this, rather Allah said ,

“Thus it was, that We might turn away from him evil and illegal sexual intercourse. Surely he was one of Our chosen, guided slaves.” [Soorah Yusuf (12):24]

As for the wife of al-‘Azeez, it was because she was and her nation were polytheists that she was afflicted with passionate love. No one, and no one is afflicted with passionate love except that this diminishes his singling out Allah Alone for worship and his faith. The heart that repents to Allah, fearing Him, has two routes by which it can remove this passionate love :

Preventative Measures from Passionate Love

( 1 ) Repenting to Allah and loving Him, for indeed this is more satisfying and purer than anything else, and nothing will be left to love alongside Allah .

( 2 ) Fearing Allah, for indeed fear is the opposite of passionate love and removes it .

So everyone who loves something, with passion or otherwise, then this love can be removed by loving that which is more beloved to compete with it.[2]

This love can also be removed by fearing the occurrence of a harm that is more hateful to one than leaving this love. So when Allah is more beloved to the servant than anything else, and more feared by him than anything else, then he will not fall into passionate love or find any love that would compete with his love of Allah, except in the case of negligence or at a time when this love and fear has become weak by his leaving some of the obligatory duties and by performing some of the prohibited actions. For indeed faith increases with obedience and decreases with disobedience, so each time a servant obeys Allah out of love and fear, and leaves a prohibited action out of love and fear, his love and fear becomes stronger, and any love or fear of anything else besides Allah will disappear from his heart .

Some Cures for the Heart

The same is true for the sickness of the body: for the health of the body is preserved by the same, and the sickness is repressed by the opposite. The correctness of the faith in the heart is preserved by its like, meaning that which would breed faith in the heart from the beneficial knowledge and righteous action for these are its nourishment as occurs in the hadeeth of Ibn Mas’ood, reported as his saying and as a hadeeth of the Messenger (Peace be upon him), “Indeed every host loves that people come to his table spread, and indeed the table spread of Allah is the Qur’an .”

So the Qur’an is the table spread of Allah .

From those things that nourish the heart are supplication at the end of the night, the times of Adhaan and Iqaamah, in his prostration, at the ends of the prayers[3] add to this repentance. For indeed the one who repents to Allah and then in turn Allah forgives him, He will then give him enjoyment for an appointed time. That he takes to reciting the reported adhkaar for the day and at the time he sleeps. That he bears with patience what he is enticed with that would divert him from all of this, than Allah will immediately aid him with a spirit from Him and write faith in his heart. That he be eager to complete the obligatory duties such as the five prayers inwardly and outwardly for they are the pillars of the religion. That his words of recourse be “laa hawla wa laa quwwata illaa billaahi”[4] for by them the heavy burdens can be born, horrors can be overcome, and the servant be gifted up the supplication and seeking help from Allah, for the servant will be answered as long as he is not hasty, saying:

 “I have supplicated and supplicated but I have not been answered.”[5]

That he should know that help comes with patience, that relief comes after anxiety and distress that after every period of difficulty there follows a period a period of ease.[6]

That he knows that no prophet or one less than him was rewarded with a good end except as a result of his being patient .

And all praise and thanks are due to Allah, the Lord of Creation. To Him belongs praise and grace for guiding us to Islam and the Sunnah, a praise that would suffice His favours to us outwardly and inwardly, as in required for the nobility of His Face and might of His Magnificence. Abundant Peace and Blessings be upon our master, Muhammad (Peace be upon him), and upon his family, Companions, his wives, the mothers of the believers, and all those that follow them in good until the Day of Judgement .