Thursday, March 29, 2007

Man is a creature who is thinking, feeling, and having wills. His wills are guided by what he thinks and what he feels. Human soul systematically functions and is supported by following five subsystems. Nafs (Soul) is an inner side of man, it likes a very large room in which there are parts as its subsystems, which are `aql (mind), qalb (heart), bashirah (conscience), syahwat (motive), and hawa (passion). People have souls with different “sizes” depending on hereditary factors and psychological interactions during their lives.

1. ‘Aql (mind) has a capacity to solve problems; its function is to think. Mind can’t determine the truth, but it can find the truth. Intellectual truth is relative.

2. Qalb (heart) is a means for understanding reality. An irrational thing may still be understood by this qalb. In a nafsany system, qalb is a center that controls the system, leading the functioning of human soul. In qalb there are various “powers” (good things) and “illnesses” (bad things) such as faith, love, envy, courage, angriness, arrogance, peace, and infidelity. Qalb has the authority of deciding on an action, so that anything realized by qalb has implications in forms of good deed or sin, reward or punishment. Things had been forgotten by qalb enter memory of nafs (subconscious mind), and those things sometimes appear in dream. In accordance with its name, qalb is often inconsistent.

3. Bashirah, is an innate sight as the opposite of sight of eyes. Different to the inconsistent qalb, bashirah is always consistent to truth and honesty. It can’t be compromised to deviate from the truth. Bashirah is also called nurany from word “nur” (light). Bashirah is divine light in one’s heart. nurun yaqdzifuhullah fi al qalb. Introspection, crying of awareness, religiosity, God spot come from this source.

4. Syahwat is a motive to carry out behaviour. Almost all men and women have sexual motive to the other sex, are proud of their children, love valuable things, good vehicles, gardens, and livestocks.

5. Hawa (passion) is an urge toward a low and blamable object. Crime, angriness, frustration, arrogance, irresponsible behavior, corruption, and arbitrariness come from this passion. The character of passion is wishing to immediately obtain things desired by ignoring moral values.

Therefore, we may conclude that:
• A person whose subsystems are normally functioning has proportional behavior

. A person more often following his mind than the other subsystems of the nafsany system has behavior highly rational but his life tends to be “dry”.

• A person more often following his heart tends to have a calm life although he is sometimes irrational.

• A person more often following his bashirah is guaranteed that his choice is correct and his behavior will be correct vertically and horizontally.

• A person more often following his motive tends to be consumptive and hedonistic in his life

• A person more often following his hawa ( passion) tends to destructive to himself and to others.