A Theologian's Mid-Life Crisis

(parts of this remind me of RLP's Dramatic Version of Mark 10:17-27 - The Richest Man in Town)

From my reading for Intro to Islam:

Selections from "A Theologian's Mid-Life Crisis" by Al-Ghazali
from That Which Delivers from Error, Al-Munqidh min al-Dalal

From the Introduction

The author was known in the Islamic world as a theologian, defender of Muslim orthodoxy, and champion of the Sufi or mystical search for God. He was a renowned teacher in Baghdad.

"At the height of his career, al-Ghazali gave it up and left Baghdad for years of introspection and travel in Syria, Egypt and the Hijaz. This sudden change in his life has been ascribed variously to a nervous breakdown, a loss of favor with the ruling elite, or the threat of murder by the Assassins, an esoteric sect that threatened the orthodox Muslim rule of the saljuq sultans and that had already succeeded in murdering the vizier Nizam al-Mulk. During the last five years of his life, al-Ghazali lived quietly in Nishapur and in his home town of Tus where he died in 505/1111."

"The search for truth, beginning with the cleansing of one's own soul, is not the property of any single civilization"

"In this selection from al-Muniqh min al-Dalal, al-Ghazali recounts his long years of study, the confusion arising from them, and his attempt to find certain knowledge. In a striking passage, he describes his scepticism in terms later developed by the seventeenth-century French philosopher Descartes. Unlike Descartes, however, al-Ghazali found release from doubt in a light which God most high cast into my breast and from this he achieved an intuitive understanding of things Divine. It was his understanding of this act of grace that led al-Ghazali to reject the dry formulas of theologians, the authoritarian pronouncements of the Batini or esoteric imams, and the convoluted reasoning... of the philosophers. Instead, he gravitated toward the Sufi or mystical path, in which the seekers turned themselves wholly toward God, examined their consciences, and rejected the earthly rewards of the pursuit of knowledge. ... His final position was one of confidence in the mystical search for truth and an affirmation of faith."

Deliverance from Error
and attachment to the Lord of might and majesy

"You must know - and my God most high perfect you in the right way and soften your hearts to receive the truth - that the different religious observances and religious communities of the human race and likewise the different theological systems of the religious leaders, with all the multiplicity of sects and variety of practices, constitute ocean depths in which the majority drown and only a minority reach safety. Each separate group thinks that it alone is saved, and 'each party is rejoicing in what they have' (Q. 23,55,30,31)"

"To thirst after a comprehension of things as they really are was my habit and custom from a very early age. It was instinctive with me, a party of my God-given nature, a matter of temperament and not of my choice or contriving."

"I saw that Christian youths always grew up to be Christians, Jewish youths to be Jews, and Muslim youths to be Muslims. I heard, too, the Tradition related of the Prophet of God according to which he said: 'Everyone who is born is born with a sound nature, it is his parents who make him a Jew or a Christian or a Magian'. My inmost being was moved to discover what this original nature really was and what the beliefs derived from the authority of parents and teachers really were."

"I therefor said within myself: To begin with, what I am looking for is knowledge of what things really are, so I must undoubtedly try to find what knowledge really is. It was plain to me that sure and certain knowledge is that knowledge in which the object is disclosed in such a fashion that no doubt remains along with it, that no possibility of error or illusion accompanies it, and that the mind cannot even entertain such a supposition."

...He considers that he only really knows what he senses and 'first principles' - ideas like how something cannot be affirmed and denied at the same time... but by further questioning, no longer trusts either his senses or the security of first principles since maybe if we zoom out far enough, it's really all a dream. This rather confounded him for a while, since he was not allowed to use first principles to build his explanation...

"At length God cured me of the malady; my being was restored to health and an even balance; the necessary truths of the intellect became once more accepted, as I regained confidence in their certain and trustworthy character. This did not come about by systematic demonstration or marshalled argument, but by a light which God most high cast into my breast. That light is the key to the greater part of knowledge. Whoever thinks that the understanding of the Divine rests upon strict proofs has in his thought narrowed down the wideness of God's mercy."

"When the Messenger of God (peace be upon him) was asked about 'enlarging' (sharh) and its meaning in the verse:

'Whenever God wills to guide a man, He enlarges his breast for islam (i.e. surrender to God)'(Q. 6, 125),

he said, 'It is a light which God most high casts into the heart'. When asked, 'What is the sign of it?', he said, 'Withdrawal from the mansion of deceptioni and return to the mansion of eternity."

In the days of your age your Lord has gusts of favour; then place yourselves in the way of them.

"...if what is present is sought for, it becomes hidden and lost."

(He describes his opinions regarding the path taken by theologians who seem to only defend orthodoxy and find problems with other arguments, the results of which he did not consider 'sufficient to dispel universally the darkness of confusion due to the different views of men')

"My purpose here, however, is to describe my own case, not to disparage those who sought a remedy thereby, for the healing drugs very with the disease. How often one sick man's medicine proves to be another's poison!"

He goes on from theology to study philosophy to get a grasp on the sciences in question for him, and since as far as he knew, none of the doctors of Islam had devoted thought or attention to philosophy.

"I realized that to refute a system before understanding it and becoming acquainted with its depths is to act blindly."

So he reads about philosophy for 2 years...

"I continued to reflect assiduously for nearly a year on what I had assimilated, going over it in my mind again and again and probing its tangled depths, until I comprehended surely and certainly how far it was deceitful and confusing and how far true and a representation of reality."

[here, 20 pages are removed from the reading. Perhaps details about various philosophers and 'sciences']

"There are indeed certain of them who lay claim to have some special knowledge. But this knowledge, as they describe it, amounts to some trifling details of the philosophy of Pythagoras. The latter was one of the earliest of all the ancients and his philosophical system is the weakest of all; Aristotle not only criticized him but showed the weakness and corruption of his thought. Yet he is the person followed in the Book of the Brethren of Purity, which is really but the dregs of philosophy"

"It is truly amazing that men should toil all their life long searching for knowledge and in the end be content with such feeble and emaciated knoweldge, while imagining that they have attained the utmost aims of the sciences!"


He moves on to Mysticism

"I knew that the complete mystic 'way' includes both intellectual belief and practical activity; the latter consists in getting rid of the obstacles in the self and in stripping off its base characteristics and vicious morals, so that the heart may attain to freedom from what is not God and to constant recollection of Him."

"The intellectual belief was easier to me than the practical activity"

"It became clear to me, however, that what is most distinctive of mysticism is something which cannot be apprehended by study, but only by immediate experience (dhawq - literally 'tasting'), by esctasy and by a moral change. What a difference there is between knowing the definition of health and satiety, together with their causes and presuppositions, and being healthy and satisfied!"


"I apprehended clearly that the mystics were men who had real experiences, not men of words, and that I had already progressed as far as was possible by way of intellectual apprehension. What remained for me was not to be attained by oral instruction and study but only by immediate experience and by walking in the mystic way."

From the paths he had traveled in his studies, "...there had come to me a sure faith in God most high, in prophethood (or revelation), and in the Last Day. These three credal principles were firmly rooted in my being, not through any carefully argued proofs, but by reason of various causes, coincidences, and experiences which are not capable of being stated in detail."

"It had already become clear to me that I had no hope of the blisso fthe world to come save through a God-fearing life and the withdrawal of myself from vain desire. It was clear to me too that the key to all this was to sever the attachment of the heart to worldly things by leaving the mansion of deception and returning to that of eternity, and to advance toward God most high with all earnestness. It was also clear that this was only to be achieved by turning away from wealth and position and fleeing from all time-consuming entanglements..."

"I put one foot forward and drew the other back. If in the morning I had a genuine longing to seek eternal life, by the evening the attack of a whole host of desires had reduced it to impotence. Worldly desires were striving to keep me by their chains just where I was, while the voice of faith was calling, To the road! To the road! What is left of life is but a little and the journey before you is long. All that keeps you busy, both intellectually and practically, is but hypocrisy and delusion. If you do not prepare now for eternal life, when will you prepare? If you do not now sever these attachments, when will you sever them? On hearing that, the impulse would be stirred and the resolution made to take to flight."

He winds up with some sort of anxiety that dries out his mouth and prevents him from lecturing (or even eating properly). Feeling that he had lost his power of choice, he turned to God who 'made it easy for my heart to turn away from position and wealth, from children and friends'. He makes secret plans to travel to Syria, leaves Baghdad, and distributes his wealth so there is just enough for him and to provide for his children. He feels a prompting to fufil the Pilgrimage, makes the journey tot he Hijaz, and is later drawn by various concerns and the entreaties of his children back home. He stays home for 10 years between solitude and obstacles.

"I learnt with certainty that it is above all the mystics who walk on the road of God; their life is the best life, their method the soundest method, and their character the purest character; indeed, were the intellect of the intellectuals and the learning of the learned and the scholarship of the scholars, who are versed in the profundities of revealed truth, brought together in the attempt to improve the life and character of the mystics, they would find now way of doing so; for to the mystics all movement and all rest, whether external or internal, brings illumination from the light of the lamp of prophetic revelation; and behind the light of prophetic revelation there is no other light on the face of the earth from which illumination may be received"

He goes on in trying to descripbe the mystic 'way' (tariqah), speaking of purification of the heart completely from what is other than God most high,... the 'sinking of the heart completely in the recollection of God; and the end of it is complete absorption in God.'

"Certainty reached by demonstration is knowledge ('ilm); actual acquaintance with that 'state' is immediate experience (dhawq); the acceptance of it as probable from hearsay and trial (or observation) is faith (iman). These are three degrees. 'God will raise those of you who have faith and those who have been given knowledge in degrees (sc. of honour)' (Q. 58, 12)."


He eventually goes back to teaching. In explaining why, he describes an elaborate comparison between prescribed medication and formal worship. He describes different kinds of men who respond differently to issues of truth and worship. Ultimately, at God's prodding, he realizes that the initial grounds for his retirement are no longer in effect, even though he does not have much hope in his ability to explain to others what he has come to think.

"As the Tradition has it, The heart of the believer is between two of the fingers of the Merciful. In myself I know that, even if I went back to the work of disseminating knowledge, yet I did not go back. To go back is to return to the previous state of things. Previously, however, I had been disseminating the knowledge by which worldly success is attained; by word and deed I had called men to it; and that had been my aim and intention. But now I am calling men to the knowledge whereby worldly success is given up and its low position in ithe scale of real worth is recognized. This is now my intention, my aim, my desire; God knows that this is so. It is my earnest longing that I may make myself and others better. I do not know whether I shall reach my goal or whether I shall be taken away while short of my object. I believe, however, both by certain faith and by intuition that there is no power and no might save with God, the high, the mighty, and that I do not move of myself but am moved by Him, I do not work of myself but am used by Him. I ask Him first of all to reform me and then to reform through me, to guide me and then to guide through me, to show me the truth of what is true and to grant of His bounty that I may follow it, and to show me the falsity of what is false and to grant of His bounty that I may turn away from it."

"Genuine knowledge is that which informs us that sin is a deadly poison and that the world to come is better than this; and the man who knows that does not give up the good for what is lower than it.

This knowledge is not attained by means of the various special branches of the knowledge to which most people devote their attention. As a result, most people's knowledge only makes them bolder in disobeying God most high. Genuine knowledge, however, increases a man's reverence and fear and hope; and these come between him and sins (in the strict sense) as distinct from the unintentional faults which are inseparable from man in his times of weakness. This proneness to lesser sins does not argue any weakness of faith, however. The believer, when he goes astray, repents. He is far from sinning intentionally and deliberately."