CHAPTER THREE
The Unique Heart
HUMAN BEINGS ARE comprised of two
components: body and soul (ruh). The Qur'an mentions that our body is made
from the soil of this earth:
And among His signs is this,
that He created you from dust. (Surah Ar-Rum: 20)
Then, in this material being, Allah sends an
angel to blow the spirit.
So when I have fashioned him and
breathed into him (his) soul created by Me. (Surah Saad: 72)
The reference to the dual nature of human
beings is made in the Qur' an when Allah describes the creation of Adam:
I have created with Both My Hands. (Surah Saad: 75)
The body and the soul undergo varying
degrees of connection with each other and Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziya mentions the five stages of the body-soul relationship that span both our earthly and
Eternal life:
1 Shortly after conception, Allah instils a ruh in the unborn child;
2 This connection continues when the child
is born until the time of death;
3 During sleep there is partial
disengagement of the soul from the body;
4 After death, in barzakh, although the soul has left the body, a
connection still remains between the two;
5 On the Day of Judgment, souls and bodies
will be re- united. The body-soul connection will be at its strongest then
because in the Eternal Life there will be no sleep or death or any other
physiological changes.42
Thus, the human body is made from earthly
ingredients but the soul has heavenly origins. Therefore, there is a conflict
between our material and spiritual being. The human body possesses desires
similar to those of animals whereas the human soul strives for heavenly
desires. This struggle ends with death, when the spirit leaves the body.
The instinct to worship is the desire of the
human soul whereas instincts of hunger, thirst and sex are the desires of the
body. Islam promotes a balance between the soul and the body, which is why it
prohibits both monasticism as well as hedonism. All the ingredients of food for
our physical body come from the soil of this earth because our physical being
originated from this earth. However, since our soul was instilled by a heavenly
being, its hunger is satisfied by the Divine. In fact, the food for our soul is the heavenly
revelation of Allah - The Qur' an. The Qur' an is the spring of life for our
soul.
In discussing
the body-soul duality in the nature of human beings, Dr. Israr Ahmed, a
contemporary Islamic scholar, medical doctor and commentator of the Qur' an,
said the following:
"The source of human volition and also
the centre of the human soul is the heart. Human beings have a spiritual being
as well as a physical being. The human soul is from Allah and it will return
back to Allah as mentioned in the Qur'anic ayah:
'Truly! To Allah we belong and truly, to Him we
shall return.' (Surah Al- Baqarah: 150).
On the other hand, our physical body came
from this world and it will return back to this world: 'Thereof (the earth) We created you, and
into it We shall return you, and from it We shall bring you out once again.' (Surah Ta-Ha: 55)
The human heart is like a mirror between the
two. The example of the heart is like a glass (zujajah), which contains a lamp (misbah) which is present inside a niche (mishkat) as described in Surah an-Nur (ayah 35). Our chest or ribcage looks similar to a
niche; our heart is like a glass (zl~iajah) inside which the lamp of the soul is
glowing." 43
If the heart is not kept clean then the lamp
of the soul is dimmed, much like a light-bulb that is covered with dust.
However, if the heart is kept polished then the soul will light up the whole human
being. This light or nur was most apparent in Prophet Muhammad (SAW).
The Prophet (SAW) gave the following advice for polishing the heart:
There is a polish for everything that takes
away rust; and the polish for the heart is the remembrance of Allah. (Bukhari)
There are three types of self or states of
spiritual development that have been mentioned in the Qur'an. The lowest of
these is called nafs
ammarah (12:53),
the self that is prone to evil. Nafs
lawwamah (75 :2)
is the self that feels conscious of doing evil, resists, repents and tries to
amend. The highest stage of all is nafs
mutma'innah (89:27) which is when the self achieves full peace and happiness.
Our objective is to control nafs
ammarah that
urges us to fulfil our baser instincts with no thought for the consequences and
ultimately achieve the inner peace that comes with nafs mutma'innah.
This can only come about when we obey Divine
commands and live our lives according to Islamic teachings. There is more
wisdom in these commandments than we can ever fully comprehend but our limited
knowledge is slowly allowing us to understand and appreciate some of these as
the following passages show.
The Heart and Salah (Prayer)
During our everyday life, the brain is in a
physically higher position than our heart and that sometimes results in the
arrogance of the brain. However, when we prostrate to Allah as in salah, our heart attains a higher position in our
body than our brain and that is the state of a human being in which he/she is
closest to Allah. This is emphasised both in the Qur' an and in the hadith:
Fall in prostration and draw
near to Allah! (Surah
Al-Alaq: 19)
The closest a slave ever is to his Lord is
when he is in prostration, so make much supplication. (Muslim)
Islam places even greater emphasis on
congregational worship and the reasons for this become apparent in the light of
scientific evidence.
Heart cells are similar to other cells in
the rest of the human body in terms of chemical composition. However, there is
one thing that heart cells do differently from other body cells that makes them
unique - they are the only cells in the body to pulsate or beat rhythmically.
In the laboratory, if a single heart cell is
placed on a slide and observed under a microscope, it continues to beat for a
short while, then loses its rhythm and dies. Similarly, if two heart cells are
placed on a slide at a distance, they also die after a short time of beating
without rhythm. However, if two heart cells are placed close together on a
slide (they do not need to touch each other), they start beating in synchrony
(with the same rhythm) and they do not die. The same phenomenon occurs on a
larger scale in the case of a complete heart. All the heart cells beat in
synchrony (with the same rhythm in unity), which makes the heart such a
powerful organ.
What is the reason behind the synchronous
beating of the two heart cells (even though they are not connected to each
other), which prevents them from dying? Each tiny heart cell produces waves of
electromagnetic energy as it pulsates. According to Joseph Chilton Pearce,
author of 'The Biology of Transcendence' , when the electromagnetic waves
produced by two heart cells on a slide match (synchronise), the two heart cells
strengthen each other and start to beat in unity;44 This phenomenon can be observed on a macroscopic (larger) level
as well. When people are in close proximity in a room, their hearts start to
beat with the same rhythm. Even their breathing pattern synchronises in such
instances.
This phenomenon, called 'entrainment', was
first observed in the seventeenth century by a European scientist called
Christian Huygens with pendulums. When there are many pendulums swinging close
to each other, they will end up swinging in synchrony with the largest pendulum
no matter how different their rate of swinging to start with.
As mentioned previously, the heart produces
waves of electromagnetic energy. In fact
these can be measured using magnetometers from as far as three feet away from
the body. When people are in close proximity, their electromagnetic waves
interact with each and this interaction can also be measured using sensitive
instruments. This means that all the hearts in a given space start to be
affected by the waves generated by the strongest heart (which could be the
heart of the leader) and start to beat with the same rhythm (pulled into
entrainment) as that of the strongest heart. 45
When the companions of Prophet Muhammad (SAW)
were sitting in his presence, they used to remember Allah much more than when
they were alone. Since the heart of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) was always engaged
in the remembrance of Allah (his heart was awake even when his eyes were
asleep), his heart would pull the hearts of his companions in entrainment.46
Straighten your rows three times. Otherwise,
Allah will make your hearts turn against each other. (Abu Dawud}
The Heart and Dhikr (Remembrance
of Allah)
Allah has made the heart and all the other parts
of the human body for His remembrance. The heart is pacified by the remembrance
of Allah (dhikr) and good deeds:
Verily, in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest. (Surah Ar-Ra'd: 28)
Commenting on the Islamic dhikr, Louisa Young, a British journalist and
author, writes in The Book of the Heart:
"The simple pulse, the beating of the
drum of the heart, is the repetitive rhythm which leads and propels meditation
- the voyage into the heart - in all religions ....
One Muslim ritual is the recitation of the
Qur' an; the flowing, hypnotic rhythm of the Arabic words has often been
compared to the heartbeat. Grief caused by the separation from God is assuaged
by remembering God: 'Verily in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest.'
This remembrance is dhikr - remembrance, the mental and verbal
repetition of a verse of the Qur'an or one of the names of God." 47
In fact, it has been scientifically shown
that the human heart is responsive to dhikr. One such study, conducted at the Akbar
Clinics in the US, examined the response of the body when listening to the
recitation of the Qur'an, The heart rate, blood pressure and muscle tension
were monitored among three groups of volunteers - Muslims who understood
Arabic, Muslims who did not understand Arabic and non-Muslims who did not
understand Arabic.
The results of the study show very clearly
that listening to the recitation of Qur'an results in the relaxation of smooth
muscles, reduction of the heart rate and all the physiological changes that are
indicative of release from stress and anxiety. These effects were produced both
among Muslims and non-Muslims, regardless of whether they understood the Arabic
language or not.
Interestingly, different ayat of the Qur'an produced different effects
among all the subjects of the study. For example, the recitation of those
verses promising reward (verses of targheeb) had a greater stress-reducing effect on the
listeners whereas listening to the recitation of the verses promising punishment
(verses of tarheeb) had less of a stress-reducing effect on the
listeners. 48
A similar scientific study, conducted at the
University of Khartoum in Sudan, looked at the effect of Qur'anic recitation on
patients with hypertension (high blood pressure). The results of this study
also showed that listening to the recitation of the Quran contributed
significantly to a lowering of blood pressure among the patients.49
In the light of this research, it is
therefore not surprising that the companions of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) used
Qur'anic dhiker to heal
medical conditions. Listening to the Qur'an recited beautifully can have a
healing effect which is why the Prophet (SAW) emphasised:
Beautify the Qur'an with your voices. (An-Nasa'i and Abu Dawud}
The Heart and Tawaf (Circumambulation
of the Ka'bah)
Performing the tawaf is one of the most spiritually uplifting times
in the life of a Muslim. It is done in an anti-clockwise manner with the left
side of the body facing the Ka'bah. The same anti-clockwise motion can also be
observed in nature from the largest scale to the smallest scale. For example,
all the planets in our solar system revolve around the sun in an anti-clockwise
manner, while electrons also rotate around the nucleus of an atom in the same
way.
Some Islamic scholars have said that tawaf is performed In an anti-clockwise manner
because in this position the heart (which is towards the left side of the body)
is inclining towards the Ka'bah.50 The
human soul, because of its heavenly origins, yearns to meet Allah and so the
heart, as the seat of the human soul, inclines towards the Ka'bah symbolising
that desire. The Ka'bah also symbolises the Islamic concept of Monotheism.
During tawaf , Muslims
testify that Allah is the centre of existence and He is the focus of our
hearts.
The Heart and the Acceptance of
Islam
The heart plays a central role in the
acceptance of Islam, whether it is a non-Muslim who embraces Islam or a
born-Muslim who endeavours to better understand his faith. Blaise Pascal, the
seventeenth century French scientist and religious philosopher, once said about
the human heart:
"The heart has its reasons the mind
will never know. Those on whom God has imparted religion by intuition are very
fortunate and justly convinced." 51
In this oft-quoted statement, Pascal was
referring to intuition of our heart. According to Pascal, religious truth is
often known through intuition. We have seen evidence, in the previous chapter,
to show that females are more heart-inclined and that intuition in females
relies more on the response from the heart. It may be for this reason that
eighty percent of those who accept Islam are women. It should be clarified that
the decision to accept Islam is not based on mere emotion because almost all of
these women stay steadfast on their decision to accept Islam until their death.
One of these many women converts is Jeanette
Hablullah, a doctor of neuropathy from America, who chose Islam after many
years as a Catholic. In her book about the heart, 'The Magnificent Organ', she
describes the human heart not only as a vital organ and a physical entity but
also as the source of judgement and wisdom.52 She also
explains that a pious and God-fearing heart heals our bodies and souls.
Allah took a pledge from all souls before
their birth regarding His Existence and Authority as the Qur'an states:
And (remember) when your Lord
brought forth from the Children of Adam, from their loins, their seed (or from Adam's loin his
offspring) and made
them testify as to themselves (saying): ((Am I not your Lord?" They
said:""Yes! We testify," lest you should say on the Day of
Resurrection: "Verily, we have been unaware of this." (Surah Al-A'raf 172)
Almost immediately afterwards is the
following ayah:
And surely, We have created many of the jinns and mankind for Hell. They have hearts wherewith they understand not, they have eyes
wherewith they see not, and they have ears wherewith they hear not (the truth).
They are like cattle, nay even more astray; those! They are the heedless ones. (Surah AI-A'raf 179)
It is not mere coincidence that the Qur'an
speaks of the heart as an organ of intellect after mentioning the covenant
taken by all human souls. This implies that our hearts carry the primordial memory
of our covenant with Allah taken from our souls. In other words, every child is born with a
natural belief in Allah and an inclination to worship Him alone, which is
called fitrah. However, the environment in which a person
is brought up then affects that natural state as the Qur'an asks of the
non-believers:
Do they not then think deeply in
the Qur' an, or are their hearts locked up (from understanding it)? (Surah Muhammad: 24)
Dr. Mohammad Iqbal, famous Islamic
philosopher and poet, raised the very pertinent point that regardless of the
strength of logical evidence provided, in the matter of accepting Islam, it is
the heart that must be touched. He said to one of his students:
"According to my understanding, the
human heart and brain process information in different ways. The brain may
sometimes reject many strong proofs and does not care about them. But the heart
on the other hand may be impressed by a small incident and, all of a sudden,
the whole life pattern may change. The matter of acceptance of Islam is related
to the heart much more than the brain. The actual thing, which an Islamic
preacher (da'ee) should know, is what are the things that
touch the heart of non-believers. We have many mental proofs to testify the
truth of Islam but we have very few 'hearty proofs' .... In the acceptance of
Islam, the heart is the actual thing. When the heart agrees on a change and it
is convinced about a matter, then the whole body has no choice except to obey
the heart. "53
So the matter of accepting or rejecting
Divine Guidance depends upon the heart more than the brain. When the heart
opens to the truth, the whole body follows it. As Allah says in the Qur'an:
And whomsoever Allah wills to
guide, He opens his breast to Islam,
and whomsoever He wills to send astray, He makes his breast closed and
constricted, as if he is climbing up to the sky. (Surah Al-An'am: 125)
This point is well illustrated by an
incident (one of many) that took place at the time of the Prophet Muhammad (SAW)
it as narrated by Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyah in his book Zad al-Ma'd:
"After the conquest of Makkah, the
Prophet was circumambulating the house when Fudala ibn 'Umayr decided to kill
him. He drew near to him. The Prophet said, "Fudala?" He replied,
"Yes! Fudala, O Messenger of Allah!" He said, "What were you
saying to yourself?" "Nothing!" He said, "I was invoking
Allah!" The Prophet laughed then said, "Ask Allah for
forgiveness!" Then he placed his hand on his chest and there was peace in
his heart. Fudala used to say later on, "By Allah! By the time he took his
hand off my chest, none of Allah's creation was dearer to me than him! As I was
returning to my family I passed by a woman I used to converse with, she said,
"Come over!" I said, "No, Allah will not allow it, nor will
Islam!"" 54
Not only does the individual heart play a
vital role in embracing Islam, but Muslims as a whole need strong hearts to be
united as an ummah, as a hadith states:
12,000 Muslims united (as one heart) cannot
be defeated. (Abu Dawud)
Commenting on the underlying wisdom of this
hadith, Jeanette Hablullah, writes:
"We have gatherings greater than this
in some cities here in the United States at least twice a year but where is our
effect? Our hearts have not yet reached the necessary level. The heart must
first purify and right the individual in which it resides, then it will join
with other purified and righteous hearts. When this happens, there is nothing
in this universe that can have a sufficient opposing force."55
Maulana Mahmood-ul-Hasan, who was imprisoned
on the Island of Malta by the British government in India, said that during his
years in prison, he contemplated over the cause of the decline of the Muslim
nation and he reached the following conclusion:
"There appear to be two reasons for the
decline of the Muslim ummah today:
i)
Muslims have forsaken the
Qur'an; and
ii)
Muslims are disunited." 56,
Today the defence system (immune system) of
the Muslim ummah has become very weak. One of the features of
a healthy body with a good defence system is that the antibodies (defence army
of the body) learn from the past. When they encounter a virus or any other harmful
intruder in the body, they remember it and so if it enters the body again,
these antibodies unite to defend the body from the onslaught. If a virus is
present in four persons and only one person falls ill, it is not the virus that
is to blame but the immune system of the ill person. Similarly, the Muslim ummah should work to build up its own strength
before placing the blame for our illness elsewhere.
Imam Shafi has rightly said in one of his
poetic verses:
"We blame time and the fault is in us,
There is no fault in time except us."
(Diwan ash-Shafi)
The companions of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) had
very strong immunity and a good defence system and their hearts were united
because they had vaccinated themselves with the Qur' an. The remedy for the
current situation that the Muslim ummah finds
itself in is quite simply a daily dose of the Qur' an and Sunnah.
And holdfast, all of you together, to the Rope of
Allah (i.e. this Qur'an) and be not divided among yourselves. (Surah
Al-Imran: 103)
If you differ in anything;
amongst yourselves, refer it to Allah and His Messenger (i.e. Qur'an and Sunnah} (Surah An-Nisa: 59)
I am leaving with you two things. If you
hold them tight, you will never go astray. They are the Book of Allah (Qur'an)
and my Sunnah (Hadith). (Muslim)
When we stop competing with each other with
wealth and material possessions; when we sacrifice our egos and learn to
tolerate differences of opinions within the boundaries of the Qur'an and
Sunnah, then our hearts will unite, and with that unity will come an
unparalleled strength. As the old saying goes - 'United we stand and divided we
fall'.
Umar bin al-Khattab (RA) , the second
rightly guided caliph, said:
There is no Islam without a congregation and
there is no congregation without a leadership.57
Allah reminds us in the Qur' an that we can
only be brothers in faith when our hearts are united:
And remember Allah's favour upon you, for you were enemies and He
joined your hearts together, so that by His Grace, you became brethren (in
Islamic faith). (Surah
Al-Imran: 103)
The Heart and the Mother-Child
Bond
By the time an unborn child is four and half
weeks old in the womb of the mother, its sense of hearing (auditory system) is
complete and it can hear sounds produced in the body of the mother. Of all the
sounds that the child hears in the womb, the most predominant one is the
continuous rhythmic sound of its mother's heartbeat. As long as the mother's
heartbeat is normal and regular, the unborn child feels safe. However, if the
mother is in a prolonged heightened state of anxiety then this will have
adverse effects on the unborn child. In the 1940's, Lester Sontag, M.D. first
discovered that the mother's heartbeat affects the heartbeat of her unborn
child.58 This is
why it is so important for the mother and those around her to take care of her
emotional well-being as well as her physical health.
The unconscious memory of the mother's
heartbeat in the womb remains with the child after birth and throughout his/
her life. Thomas Verny, M.D., in his book 'The Secret Life of the Unborn
Child', has mentioned that it is because of the unconscious memory of the
mother's heartbeat that a baby can be comforted by being held close to
someone's chest in much the same way that many adults can fall asleep to the steady
sound of the ticking of a clock.59
It is known that when our heart waves and
our brain waves match (synchronise), our body functions at "optimum
capacity". 60
Similarly, when the wave-frequencies of the hearts of mother and baby are
synchronised, as Joseph Chilton Pearce puts it, "the mother's developed
heart furnishes the model frequencies that the infant's heart must have for its
own development in the critical first months after birth." 61 One of the times that this synchronisation of the mother-child
heart waves occurs is when the mother is breast-feeding her child.
During breast-feeding, the child is close to
the mother's heart and listens to her heartbeat. As Joseph Chilton Pearce
writes, "On holding her infant in the left-breast position with its
corresponding heart contact, a major block of dormant intelligences is
activated in the mother, causing precise shifts of brain function and permanent
behaviour changes."62 Perhaps
this could be why most mothers instinctively place their babies to their left
breast, keeping those hearts in proximity. The importance of close body
contact, or better yet, close heart-to-heart contact of the mother and her
newborn is stressed by James W. Prescott, Ph.D. of the Institute of Humanistic
Science:
"Only in the human mammal do we find
the newborn separated from its mother at birth and the mother not breast feeding
her newborn and infant. We have discovered that such aberrant behaviours which
violate millions of years of evolutionary biology and psychobiology have
exacted a terrible price upon the physical, emotional and social health of the
newborn and infant and as a child, adolescent and adult - depression, impulse
dyscontrol, violence and substance abuse." 63
Mother's milk contains just the right amount
of fatty acids, lactose, water and amino acids for digestion, brain development
and growth. It also contains many types of immunities a baby needs in early
life while his/her own immune system is maturing. In addition, human milk
contains the lowest concentration of fats and proteins compared to the milk of
other mammals. This makes feeding of the newborn necessary after about every
twenty minutes. In contrast, rabbit milk has such a high concentration of fat
and protein that the mother need only feed the baby rabbit once a day. Such low
frequency feeds are found in all other mammals. The fact that human milk is
poor in nutrients and is digested quickly makes it necessary for the mother to
breast-feed her baby several times day and thus make frequent contacts which
are beneficial for both mother and baby.
It is precisely for these reasons that in
the Qur'an, Allah has emphasised the importance of breast-feeding and has set
the time period for breast-feeding at two years:
And We have enjoined on man (to be dutiful and good)
to his parents. His mother bore him in weakness and hardship upon weakness and
hardship (during pregnancy), and his weaning (stopping of breast- feeding) is in two years - Give
thanks to Me and to your parents - unto Me is the final
destination. (Surah
Luqman: 14)
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(Urdu Lecture). Lahore, Anjuman Khuddamul Qur'an.
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(1999). The HeartMath
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47. Young, Louisa (2003). The Book of the Heart. New York, Doubleday.
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Qur'an in Athar, Shahid, M.D., Ed. (1993). lslamic
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