Sadia Dehlvi

Every culture has metaphors alluding to the heart — cold hearted, warm hearted — and we use phrases like “breaking” or “touching” the heart. In Islamic traditions the physical heart is residence to the ruh, the spirit. Muslims are obliged under their laws to look after one’s spiritual and physical being.
Prophet Mohammad spoke of the heart as a repository of knowledge and a vessel sensitive to the needs of the body. He explained that it perceives wrongful action and is agitated by it. One of the Messenger’s most cited statements is: “Actions are based upon intentions”. All intentions emanate from the heart, which means that every action is rooted in the heart.
The heartbeat is not initiated by the central nervous system but by itself, by God. Modern science informs that the heart beats before the brain is fully formed, and that it could continue to beat despite its connections to the brain being severed. Prophet Mohammad said, “The difference between one who remembers God and one who does not is like the difference between the living and the dead”. Spiritually dead hearts are the cause of all injustice and oppression in the world. When people are completely immersed in the material world they forget or refuse to believe that they will be accountable for their actions — this brings about diseased hearts that are in turmoil.
People often use alcohol, power, wealth and other such worldly pursuits to suppress spiritual agitation. Islamic philosophy asserts that if there is a sickness in the heart, it increases, and if there is love for God, the love increases. Nothing in the biological, physiological or spiritual world is static; everything either blossoms or decays. Similarly, the heart by its very nature is constantly turning, either moving towards purity or impurity; either towards God or away from Him. Interestingly, the Arabic word for heart is qalb, meaning something that turns and inqilaab is from the same root, meaning to turn something upside down. Two of the 99 names of Allah are Al Qabid and Al Basit, “The Constrictor” and “The Expander”, for it is Allah who makes our hearts expand and contract, both physically and spiritually.
God has programmed the heart as an organ designed to be in a state of calm, something that is achieved by remembrance of God. The Quran says, “Surely in the remembrance of Allah does the heart find calm” (13:28). The heart naturally gravitates towards God and the best nutrient for a healthy heart is polishing it with remembrance of the Creator.
Islamic scholars say the foremost requirement for remembrance of God is making amends for wrongful action with nidamah, remorse. This is not the same as guilt, for in Islam there is no original sin, which is the concept of sin being natural to human nature. Islam believes that a child is born in a state of fitrah, natural goodness, which if not cultivated leads man to falls into states of ghaflah, forgetfulness. State of heedlessness can lead to temporary slips into wrong action, from where one can move into the state of remorse and seeking forgiveness (taubah), and ascend towards high ranks with God.
Seeking taubah is a continual act, turning to Allah all the time, just as the earth constantly moves around the sun. Delaying repentance requires another taubah for the delay for the wrongful deeds get compounded with the lapse of time. Taubah includes rectifying the wrong to the self by way of unlawful actions, and rectifying the wrong to fellow human beings by way of seeking forgiveness from them or returning their trusts which were betrayed. Only after forgiveness is sought and accepted can one grow in spirituality. Zikr, remembrance of God, is the sole polish for the heart — it empties out ugly deceptions and makes space for what is true, allowing for God’s nur, light, to penetrate our souls.

— Sadia Dehlvi is a Delhi-based writer and author of Sufism: The Heart of Islam. She can be contacted at sadiafeedback@gmail.com