Brothers and sisters! InshaAllah, in today’s khutba, I intend to share some thoughts with you on the human heart from the Islamic perspective. In the Arabic language, the human heart is called Qalb, which means heart, mind, and conscience all at once.
أَلَا بِذِكْرِ اللَّهِ تَطْمَئِنُّ الْقُلُوبُ
“Truly, it is in the remembrance of Allah that hearts find peace (ar-Ra’d, 13:28). The Qur’an also refers to the heart as sadr, meaning chest.
فَمَن يُرِدِ اللَّهُ أَن يَهْدِيَهُ يَشْرَحْ صَدْرَهُ لِلْإِسْلَامِ
“Whoever Allah wills to guide, He opens their heart to Islam” (al-An’am, 6:125). Sometimes the heart is referred to as fuad meaning intellect.
إِنَّ السَّمْعَ وَالْبَصَرَ وَالْفُؤَادَ كُلُّ أُولَٰئِكَ كَانَ عَنْهُ مَسْئُولًا
“Indeed the ear, the eye, the heart, each will be questioned” (al-Isra’, 17:36). All this illustrates the centrality of the heart in Islam.
There are also many sayings of the Prophet (SAW) mentioning the heart. For example,
إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يَنْظُرُ إِلَى صُوَرِكُمْ وَأَمْوَالِكُمْ وَلَكِنْ يَنْظُرُ إِلَى قُلُوبِكُمْ وَأَعْمَالِكُمْ
“Truly, Allah does not look at your outward forms and wealth, but rather at your heart and actions.” This means that believers should focus on the reformation of their hearts as well as on accumulating good deeds. Pointing to his heart, the Prophet (SAW) said, التَّقْوَى هَاهُنَا (“Consciousness and fear of Allah is here!”). The Prophet (SAW) used to pray with the wordings:
يا مُقلِّبَ القُلُوْبِ ثَبِّت قَلْبِي عَلَى دِيْنِكَ
“Oh Turner of hearts! Keep my heart firm upon your religion.”
اللَّهُمَّ مُصَرِّفَ الْقُلُوبِ صَرِّفْ قُلُوبَنَا عَلَى طَاعَتِكَ
“O Allah, the Turner of hearts! Turn our hearts to your obedience.”
Although there are multiple verses in the Qur’an and Prophetic traditions about the spiritual heart, there are also references made by the Prophet (SAW) about the physical heart such as:
أَلاَ وَإِنَّ فِي الْجَسَدِ مُضْغَةً إِذَا صَلَحَتْ صَلَحَ الْجَسَدُ كُلُّهُ، وَإِذَا فَسَدَتْ فَسَدَ الْجَسَدُ كُلُّهُ. أَلاَ وَهِيَ الْقَلْبُ
“Truly, there is a piece of flesh in your body, which if sound, the whole body is healthy and if it is diseased, the whole body is diseased… Truly it is the heart!” Another reference about the physical heart is that when the Prophet (SAW) was as a child playing with other children, Angel Jibril came to him, opened his chest, removed his heart and washed it with Zamzam water and then restored it back in its proper place.
In nearly every culture in the world, people use idioms and phrases that directly or indirectly allude to the heart. For example, we call certain types of people “warm-hearted” because they are kind and merciful. And there are those who are “cold-hearted” because they are unsympathetic, sometimes even cruel. People with “large hearts” are generous. To have a lot of heart means to be particularly empathic, compassionate or loving. The downhearted people are so called because they are depressed and dejected. When someone’s words or actions penetrate our souls and affect us profoundly, we say that this person “touched my heart.”
Given the importance of heart in Islam, many scholars wrote about it from the spiritual context. Imam Al-Nawawi discussed al-aql fi al-qalb referring to heart as the seat of the mind and Ibn Kathir’s tafsir of Qur’an interprets the heart as an organ of understanding. Both scholars suggest that the heart overpowers the mind and is more fundamental in shaping our behavior, especially as regards to fulfilling our faith.
One of the earliest writings on the importance of heart was by Imam Muhammad Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, who said that to have knowledge of one’s heart is obligatory on every Muslim. In his well-known work—Ihya Uloom Al-Din, Kitab Sharh ‘Ajaib Al-Qalb, he writes that the word heart has two meanings: (1) It is a physical organ in the left side of the breast and has within it a hollow cavity. In that cavity, there is black blood, which is the source and origin of the spirit (ruh), and (2) It is a spiritual organ, which is subtle and divine and is the essence of man. It perceives, knows, is aware, is spoken to, and is responsible for its actions. It has connection with the physical heart and the minds of most men have been baffled in trying to grasp the mode of this connection.
Imam Al-Ghazali explains further that the spiritual heart represents the entire human personality. “It enables man to attain knowledge of Allah (SWT), draw near Him, work for Him and labor towards Him. It is the heart, which rejoices in closeness to Him and prospers when it is purified, and miserable when corrupted.” He also wrote that each heart has a sound natural disposition (fitrah salihah) to know the truth (li ma’rifat al-haqa’iq) because it is from a noble and divine command and therefore different from any other worldly creation.
Also, Ibn Taymiyyah, in his well-known book, “Diseases of the Heart” (Amradh al Qalb) wrote that the heart has special importance in Islam because it is considered the leader of the body and it is only through the purification of the leader that the organs become pure. With its corruption, they also become corrupted.
These concepts of the human heart in Islam are centuries old. Early Muslim scholars studied all phenomena from an integrated perspective, combining the physical and spiritual aspects of human existence. This integrated learning amongst Muslims stopped for centuries due to various reasons, one of them being that as a nation, Muslims abandoned the habit of thinking and probing into the mysteries of the universe and uncovering the treasure of powers hidden in the nature. As a result of this, lethargy and inaction took over them.
Research and scholarship in the West continued, mostly in the physical realm, due to separation of science and religion. There is serious interest, however, in the scientific community about the functions of the heart as an organ other than pumping blood. Dr. Andrew Armor from Canada writes that until the 1960s, the heart was only considered a pump, because we did not have the facilities to see the heart in any other form. From his own studies, he discovered a knot in the heart, medically known as cardiac ganglia, which is now described in science as the “heart-brain.” The heart-brain is considered the intrinsic cardiac nervous system, with an intricate network of complex ganglia, neurotransmitters, protein and support cells that are the same as those found in the human brain.
We know already that in the embryonic development process, the heart is created long before the brain is, and each cell of the heart is believed to have a memory by which it transports information to the brain with the blood it pumps throughout the body. After intensive research for more than 25 years, the Heart-Math Institute Research Center has concluded, “The heart is an access point to wisdom and intelligence that we can call upon to live our lives with more balance, greater creativity and enhanced intuitive capacities.” The Qur’an said this more than 1400 years ago!
The Qur’anic references about how the heart has cognitive abilities are further reinforced by the multiple case studies of heart transplant recipients who received memories, feelings, fears, food preferences and even musical favorites of their donors. Other case studies showed that patients experiencing transplants experienced changes in their personality, suggesting that the heart retains the memories of the donor’s personality that are also transplanted through its memory to the receiver.
Upon a closer look on the importance given to the heart in Islam and recent scientific findings, it is an irony that what Qur’an urges Muslims to do, i.e. reflect upon the signs of God, is something that others are doing without knowing the Qur’an.
أَقُولُ قَوْلِي هَذَا وَأَسْتَغْفِرُ اللَّهَ لِي وَلَكُمْ وَلِسَائِرِ المُسْلِمينَ وَالمُسْلِمَاتْ فَاسْتَغْفِرُوهْ إِنَّهُ هُوَ الْغَفُورُ الرَّحِيمُ
الحمد لله رب العالمين والصلاة والسلام على سيد المرسلين وعلى آله وأصحابه أجمعين
Brothers and sisters! The desire to exploit, the urge to dominate, the excessive love of wealth, power and status, hypocrisy, jealousy, needless interfering in other people’s lives, indulging in gossip, rumor mongering, backbiting, and all such maladies are manifestations of diseases found nowhere but in the heart. Every criminal, every miser, every abuser, every boastful, arrogant and hateful person does what he does because of a diseased heart. In the Qur’an, one of the descriptions of the Day of Judgment is:
يَوْمَ لَا يَنْفَعُ مَالٌ وَلَا بَنُونَ () إِلَّا مَنْ أَتَى اللَّهَ بِقَلْبٍ سَلِيمٍ
“The day when neither wealth nor children will benefit anyone; except for someone who comes to Allah with a sound heart” (ash-Suh’ara, 26:88-89).
The sound heart is understood to be free of diseases of the heart. This heart is actually the spiritual heart and not the physical organ per se, although in Islamic tradition the spiritual heart is centered in the physical. So we understand from this that the center of the intellect, the center of human consciousness and conscience, is actually the heart and not the brain.
Indeed, those who possess sound heart are the best people in this world. It was narrated that Abdullah Ibn Amr Ibn al-Aas (RA) said: “It was once said to the Messenger of Allah (SAW) ‘which of the people is best?’ He said, ‘everyone who is pure of heart and sincere in speech.’ They said, ‘sincere in speech, we know what this is, but what is pure of heart?’ He said, ‘it is (the heart) that is pious and pure, with no sin, injustice, rancor or envy in it.”
Brothers and sisters! It is crucially important to be aware of the spiritual diseases of the heart. This understanding is at the essence of Islamic teachings. The Qur’an defines three types of people: al-Mu’minun (the believers), al-Kafirun (the disbelievers), and al-Munafiqun (the hypocrites). The believers are described as people whose hearts are alive and full of light, while the disbelievers are in darkness.
أَوَمَنْ كَانَ مَيْتًا فَأَحْيَيْنَاهُ وَجَعَلْنَا لَهُ نُورًا يَمْشِي بِهِ فِي النَّاسِ كَمَنْ مَثَلُهُ فِي الظُّلُمَاتِ لَيْسَ بِخَارِجٍ مِنْهَا كَذَلِكَ زُيِّنَ لِلْكَافِرِينَ مَا كَانُوا يَعْمَلُونَ
“Can he who was dead, to whom We gave life, and a light whereby he could walk among people be like him who is in utter darkness from which he can never emerge? Thus the deeds of those who deny the truth have been made fair-seeming to them.” (al-An’am, 6:122)
According to the commentators of the Qur’an, “the one who was dead” refers to having a dead heart, which God revived with the light of guidance. Also the Prophet Muhammad (SAW) said, “The difference between the one who remembers Allah and one who does not is like the difference between the living and the dead.” In essence, the believer is someone whose heart is alive, while the disbeliever is someone whose heart is spiritually dead. The hypocrite, however, is somebody whose heart is diseased.
Our beloved Prophet (SAW) spoke of the heart as a repository of knowledge and a vessel sensitive to the deeds of the body. He said, for example, that wrongdoing irritates the heart. So the heart actually perceives wrong action. According to a hadith, “…Sin is that which causes discomfort within your heart and you do not like people to know it.” A peaceful heart, however, is one that is enlightened with faith (iman) and always sides by truth, justice, righteousness and virtue.
The problems we see in our society come down to covering up or suppressing the symptoms of the restless or troubled heart. The agents used to do this include alcohol, drugs, sexual experimentation, power grabs, wealth, arrogance, pursuit of fame, and the like. These enable people to submerge themselves into a state of heedlessness concerning their essential nature. Heedlessness starves the heart, robs it of its spiritual nourishment. One enters into a state of unawareness—of God and of humanity’s ultimate destination: the infinite world of the hereafter.
When people are completely immersed in the material world, believing that the world is all that matters and all that exists and that they are not accountable for their actions, they affect a spiritual death of their hearts. However, before the heart dies, it shows symptoms of affliction. These afflictions are the spiritual diseases of the hearts. From this perspective, Islam places great emphasis on hearts and calls for cleansing them from sins for it is the heart at which Allah (SWT) will look on the Day of Judgment.
رَبَّنَا لَا تُزِغْ قُلُوبَنَا بَعْدَ إِذْ هَدَيْتَنَا وَهَبْ لَنَا مِنْ لَدُنْكَ رَحْمَةً إِنَّكَ أَنْتَ الْوَهَّابُ
“Our Lord! Do not let our hearts deviate after you have guided us. Grant us Your mercy. You are indeed the Giver of all bounties.” (Aal ‘Imran, 3:8)
رَبَّنَا اغْفِرْ لَنَا وَلِإِخْوَانِنَا الَّذِينَ سَبَقُونَا بِالْإِيمَانِ وَلَا تَجْعَلْ فِي قُلُوبِنَا غِلًّا لِلَّذِينَ آَمَنُوا رَبَّنَا إِنَّكَ رَءُوفٌ رَحِيمٌ
“Our Lord, forgive us and our brothers who preceded us in faith, and leave no malice in our hearts toward those who believe. Our Lord, You are indeed full of kindness, most merciful.” (al-Hashr, 59:10)
