Turning Away from Worshipping God

🌼🔆🌼Escape from Servitude🌼🔆🌼

🌹🔅☘️ بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمنِ الرَّحيمِ ☘️🔅🌹

🔅🌹 “The One Way to the One God”  “The Human Relationship with Freedom”  “Mining the Riches of Servitude” “Commentary on Supplication 20 of al-Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya”  “Session 228” and … Summary with Supplement       1403.07.05    Ali Saei (Abdullah Meshkat) 110.141(903)  🌹🔅

🔅🌼An overview and map of the discussion: “Turning Away from Servitude to God” 🌼🔅

🌼 Imam al-Sajjād, peace be upon him, has unveiled a profound secret in this passage from al-Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya: “ وَ مَتِّعْنِي بِهُدًى صَالِحٍ لَا أَسْتَبْدِلُ بِهِ، وَ طَرِيقَةِ حَقٍّ لَا أَزِيغُ عَنْهَا، وَ نِيَّةِ رُشْدٍ لَا أَشُكُّ فِيه” How can a human being take in the whole realm of existence at once? How can one become not merely a superhuman, but one of God’s supreme creatures?

🌼 How can I see from the first glimmer of my existence to the farthest reaches of eternity, and taste the fullness of love and delight? How can I embrace the awareness of the entire universe? What must I do to reach the beginning and end of servitude to God and travel this path? I must equip myself with (righteous guidance).

🌼 When I am fully equipped with it, keep myself on the path of truth, and foster within myself the intention to grow, then I will have become one of God’s noble creatures.

🌼 How can I attain the fairest encounter with God and fully experience the joy of being with Him? This is possible by connecting to this triangle; through it, my beginning will become my return. “ وَ مَتِّعْنِي بِهُدًى صَالِحٍ لَا أَسْتَبْدِلُ بِهِ، وَ طَرِيقَةِ حَقٍّ لَا أَزِيغُ عَنْهَا، وَ نِيَّةِ رُشْدٍ لَا أَشُكُّ فِيه”

🌼 This means passing beyond every veil and reaching the time when I am gathered in, like a ripe fruit. Once I attain this station, I will be sent along another path, one that is no longer a path in the usual sense. I must equip myself with righteous guidance; if I turn it into something else, I will be destroyed.

🌼 God has set out one path for us. He has shown me His religion and introduced me to the rightful guide; I must hold fast to the Two Weighty Things to reach my destination. This means that I have been guided by righteous guidance and have set out on the path of truth.

🌼 If I abandon this way, countless other ways lie before me, and I will lose my way and never find it again. Can anyone walk outside God’s religion? No. What could I replace my heart and soul with? Is there any substitute? Religion is above all these things, and nothing can take its place.

🌼 A human being who errs will never find the right path, not even in eternity. The very Architect of the universe has opened a way and commanded us to enter that way alone.

🌼 The right path, then, is only the straight path. Moving among the many ways and their winding, tangled turns will bring us nothing but greater misguidance. There is no straightness in crookedness.

🌼 How can someone who does not know themselves prescribe a course for themselves? A person ignorant of their own nature denied whatever parts and functions of their being they could not understand, imagining them to be unnecessary. They disrupt their own bodily defenses, yet the body resists their wishes. People betray themselves and seek to destroy their greater world, just as they have betrayed the life of their lesser world.

🌼 Humanity has become like the Khārijites in its servitude to God. In this end-time age, opposition to religion and flight from it are flourishing. The so-called religion of humanity is leading people into error. Humanity has even turned against the religion it fashioned for itself.

🌼 The believer is beset by peoples like the Thamūd and others.

🌼 It is as though the supreme Resurrection were already upon us: amid this hell, a person must create a paradise for themselves. The believer who stands firm and does not let go will hear God say, “کونی برداً و سلاما”

🌼 Yet each day of our servitude to God must reveal something new within us and renew us, like a fragrant plant that receives a fresh fragrance and purity each day through God’s religion. Our sense of nearness and love must grow and strengthen.

🌼 The end-time age is an age for mining the riches of religion. Whoever flees God’s religion and fashions a new one seems to have resigned from servitude to God.

🌼 If a person can escape God’s dominion, let them do so; if they wish to live on something other than water and bread, let them. But the believer must take in all the water, bread, and light, and enter the abode of the Hereafter.

🌼 The believer is in God’s arena of competition. The way people of faith see things is not merely personal. If we hold fast to God’s religion sincerely, God Himself will be our protector.

🌼 Do not let the ambiguous aspects of religion distract you or lead others astray.

🌼 Whoever strives sincerely will reach their goal, like the honeybee that sets out on its way, and to which God reveals the paths to the flowers and inspires how to turn their nectar into honey. Whoever seeks God’s religion, God Himself will help them and show them the way.

🌼 The so-called “religion of humanity” is inhuman. Why? How can a person find the way to the highest destination through knowledge alone? A person governed by desire makes their own laws the standard. Whenever desire gains the upper hand, human understanding declines. A person’s intelligence falls to the level of the dull and foolish. In this state of foolishness, people today write laws for themselves; worse still is the one who submits to the religion of fools. But when desire is governed by reason, it not only ceases to impede growth, it becomes a wing for flight.

🌼  The believer uses the pleasures of this world as steps, wings, and feathers, and soars toward the highest source of pleasure and beauty.

🌼 A person must take care not to be buried in the earth.

🌼 The human path went astray when people came to believe they were masters of their own free will. We are not masters of our free will; we can choose, but when we forget that God is its true possessor, we fall into error. Ignorantly, people misuse it, taking their own lives and killing others.

🌼 At the very first lesson in free will, humanity has lost its way.

🌼 Things reach the point where, seeing themselves as masters of their own free will, people claim divinity—whether deliberately or out of ignorance.

There is a measure of Pharaonic pride in every human soul. The boast “I am your lord, most high” is voiced by the profoundly unjust and ignorant. Whoever keeps saying “I, I” carries a measure of Pharaoh within.

🌼 The contest to proclaim “I am your lord, most high” is under way among human beings. Saqifah is one example. There were quasi-Saqifahs before it, and there will be others after it. Throughout history, Saqifahs have arisen in various forms: people reject God’s choice and insist on choosing for themselves. Take the realm of knowledge, for example: the matter is plain. They reject God’s choice and invent a religion for themselves, then erase God from their minds and deny His role.

🌼 They search for how creation began, devise various theories, and reach no conclusion. At last they claim that everything began from no quantum at all, striving in all this to deny God’s existence.

But however hard they try, they lose their way; there is no scientific evidence for polytheism.

🌼 In the language of their innate nature, they themselves admit that this universe must have come into being all at once. They do not say it came from nothing; rather, they say it derives from something.

🌼 The beginning of things did not come from another thing. They know that time was not created within time; they themselves admit that space was not created within space. They admit that existence did not arise within existence, and finally acknowledge that existence must have come about all at once.

🌼 So the right way is the one our merciful God has shown us. We must enter by that very path and attain the presence of the Beloved. We must not be taken in by beautiful words.

🌼 Humanity strives to free itself from servitude to God, but does not realize that it is impossible to separate from the will of the Real. Even when people dare to rebel, they do so by God’s will.

🌼 There is no point in complaining unfairly in the contest. If the terms of the contest change, nothing of the contest remains.

🌼 A test has meaning only when a person turns away from what attracts them and enters the difficult arena, thereby proving that they are God’s servant.

🌼 We should not flee from hardships that seem unpleasant in the path of servitude; it is in this very arena that the champion of servitude to God will be revealed.

🌼 Imam Husayn says: “O followers of the House of Abu Sufyan”—his address is to all the people of the world—“if you have no religion and do not fear the Hereafter, at least be free.”

Does this mean that a person can go on living without religion?

The Imam’s words carry a particular significance. When he calls them to freedom, he is urging them to return to their own innate nature and discover what lies within it. Imam Husayn, peace be upon him, seeks to expose the unbelievers and polytheists: whoever becomes free will be led by that freedom towards the truth. Freedom is a path to the truth; had they heeded the Imam’s words about liberty, they would have found the truth.

🌼 Imam Husayn, peace be upon him, continues: “At least return to your own tribal codes”—that is, abide by the laws of your tribes. In fact, the Imam was trying to make them recognise who they were, and to show that they were not even faithful to their own laws.

🌼 Those who flee from God’s religion rise up against God, in a sense, seeking to cast Him out of His own dominion. This is manifest misguidance; we must continually cling to God Himself, so that He never leaves us to our own devices, even for a moment.

🔅🌼Finding the way is the only path to guidance🌼🔅

🌹The Most Merciful of the merciful has placed just one path to guidance before us, so that we may not mistake it. Every path other than that one leads astray: one guidance, one path, one intention.

🌹The path to guidance has been laid by the very Architect of existence; we must take that path alone.

🌹If we were to replace our heart and mind, what could take their place—something better, or even their equal? And if we abandon our religion, what can we gain but misguidance? The so-called “religion of humanity” and its like are no more than artificial eyes set against true sight.

🔅🌼Do people’s mistakes in choosing their representatives help them grow?🌼🔅

☘️🔆If people make the wrong choice, and its consequences affect only the person who made it, then it is between that person and God. But if those consequences ensnare others, one is not entitled to make such a mistaken choice!

☘️🔆Voting is a form of consultation. When it comes to important matters, whom do we consult? So let us recognise the importance of our vote.

☘️🔆It is an individual duty to identify and recommend the most qualified person by whatever means possible, and anyone taking part in a public election must be earnestly reminded of this. For the fire of people’s misguided choices will set society ablaze and drag it into filth, corruption and ruin!

☘️🔆In society, a succession of mistaken choices is paid for not by the individual voter alone: its grave, irreparable cost is imposed on the whole community, all of history, and the entire world.

☘️🔆Not every experience is right, whatever its form. An experience whose price others must pay is a kind of imposed penalty.

☘️🔆Mistakes do not necessarily lead people to reform. Indeed, making mistakes may become socially accepted and even enshrined in law; error may even be mistaken for what is right and reformative.

☘️🔆No wrongdoer attains excellence through a series of mistakes. Only with sound plans, deliberate action and just laws can a person hope to reach a worthy goal and outcome.

☘️🔆Is our time on earth endless, that we should make mistakes in certain circumstances before recognising what is right? Perhaps we will have only one chance to choose, so we must take care not to err.

☘️🔆We must not legitimise mistakes or make them seem appealing, for doing so is a kind of execution of what is right and true.

☘️🔆Social growth comes from nurturing society properly. Nor does growth come about simply through mistakes: a person may fall once and reach the end of life, without the chance to learn from it or grow.

☘️🔆If the spread of a disease is not checked, a person will die as it worsens—not only failing to grow, but dying in that same wretched state and dragging others to their deaths as well.

☘️🔆The human brain does not hold a vote among the body’s organs—let alone among the germs, viruses and bacteria within it. If there is to be a vote, it should be held among the body’s vital tissues and brain cells.

☘️🔆Humankind killed 124,000 prophets and failed to recognize its mistake. It killed the successors of its final Messenger and still failed to recognize its mistake. It drove God’s final Proof into exile and again failed to recognize its mistake. Little by little, humankind has increased both the speed and the frequency of its errors, yet it has never acknowledged them. It has crossed the limits of animality and savagery, but still has not awoken or come to its senses. It stands on the brink of annihilation and extinction, yet still fails to recognize its mistake. It will not stop making these errors until a forceful hand intervenes!

☘️🔆Shedding light on the errors of deceased scholars eases the burden of their responsibility in the Hereafter—and is the greatest service one can render them.

🔅🌼 A crooked road leads to a crooked destination 🌼🔅

🌹A person who goes astray will go on making mistakes forever. Every road but the straight path is crooked. How can someone walk a crooked road and expect to arrive straight?

🌻🔆Al-An‘ām: 153   وَ أَنَّ هذا صِراطي‏ مُسْتَقيماً فَاتَّبِعُوهُ وَ لا تَتَّبِعُوا السُّبُلَ فَتَفَرَّقَ بِكُمْ عَنْ سَبيلِهِ ذلِكُمْ وَصَّاكُمْ بِهِ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَتَّقُونَ

🔆“This is My straight path, so follow it. Do not follow other paths, lest they lead you away from His path. This is what God commands you, so that you may become mindful of Him.”

🔅🌼 The laws people make for themselves are to their own detriment 🌼🔅

🌹People do not know themselves; they remain a mystery even to themselves. This ignorance extends to every aspect of their being. They lack even an adequate understanding of how the body functions and behaves, or how it interacts and responds to other phenomena in creation. So, despite all their advances, they remain unable to understand and treat many illnesses; in most cases, the body heals itself without any intervention from human thought.

🌹No one can make laws for themselves without first knowing themselves.

🔅🌼 Interpreting the clear and ambiguous aspects of religion and its laws 🌼🔅

🌹A sincere religious outlook is not a personal one. Every sincere effort in the path of the Two Weighty Things is always praiseworthy, and God supports everyone who strives sincerely.

🌹Personal experience and analysis of religion, the Qur’an and the Prophet’s Household are unacceptable. Any religious analysis must be grounded in knowledge and sound, innate reason.

🌹Innate nature is the compass that guides a person to the truth.

🌻🔆Al-‘Ankabūt: 69   وَ الَّذينَ جاهَدُوا فينا لَنَهْدِيَنَّهُمْ سُبُلَنا وَ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَمَعَ الْمُحْسِنينَ

🔆“As for those who strive in Our cause, We will surely guide them to Our ways. God is indeed with those who do good.”

🌹A religious outlook and the effort to strengthen it are incompatible with one-sidedness, for this is not a personal outlook but an interpretive one. Religious interpretation must be grounded in knowledge and remain in harmony with an open, receptive innate nature.

🌹An ambiguous interpretation of religion is always unacceptable. Religious interpretation must rest on clear and decisive principles; such interpretation is always praiseworthy and possesses enduring strength.

🌹The honeybee reaches honey only by feeding on the nectar of flowers; otherwise, what it produces is counterfeit, useless honey, sometimes even deadly. Those who strive in religion must fly through the field of innate nature and the garden of sound knowledge.

🔅🌼The Khawarij of servitude 🌼🔅

🌹Replacing religion leads to its removal from every sphere of social life, and ultimately to the removal of God’s role from nature and the universe.

🌹The End Times mark the height of flight from religion and hostility toward it; the market in manufactured religions is thriving. The fabrication of religion has moved from the so-called religion of humanity to a religion of animality—and even descended below that.

🌹 People of faith are the finest of their age. Amid the likes of the peoples of ʿĀd and Thamūd, and Pharaoh and Lot, they endure hardship and torment, yet seem to keep their faith safe and unharmed among the seven Hells.

🌻🔆Maryam: 71   وَ إِنْ مِنْكُمْ إِلاَّ وارِدُها كانَ عَلى‏ رَبِّكَ حَتْماً مَقْضِيًّا

🔆You will all enter Hell. This is a decree, final and certain, from your Lord!

🌹 The God of Abraham will preserve the believers in safety and honour amid fire, filth, corruption and impurity.

🔅🌼 Let us keep our faith in God alive and fresh 🌼🔅

🌹 To keep our faith in God alive and fresh means that, with every passing moment, its colours and beauty should shine more brightly within us than the day before. Our religious feeling and faith should be continually renewed, like a plant still growing.

🌹 Is not God’s religion a way and a path to God? Is it not a means of drawing near to Him? And if it leads us towards nearness and encounter with Him, then the warmth of that nearness should become more palpable, and its pull more powerful.

🌹 Are we not moving forward? Then the longing to reach our destination should fill us with excitement.

🌹 Our sincere religious outlook must grow stronger. A person of faith should let God’s religion make them brighter and warmer, become more deeply in love with every passing moment, and flourish ever more in their journey along the path of faith.

🔅🌼 The Treasures of God’s Religion 🌼🔅

🌹 In the end times, we should draw the fullest benefit from God’s religion; it must not be abandoned. Its treasures must be mined to the very last vein.

🌹 Outside religion, happiness and salvation are impossible. Choosing one’s own law on the path of a life devoted to God is, in a sense, a turning away from servitude to Him.

🌷🔆 وَ لَا يُمْكِنُ الْفِرَارُ مِنْ‏ حُكُومَتِك‏[1]

🔆O God, escape from Your rule is impossible.

🌹 Whoever seeks a religion other than God’s is, in a sense, fleeing God’s sovereignty and staging a coup against His religion; in effect, they are seeking their own annihilation.

🌹 Belief in religion is not enough: practising it and drawing upon it are essential to faith.

🌹 It is not enough to acknowledge water, bread and light; what matters is taking nourishment from them. Drawing nourishment from religious knowledge is essential to a life of devotion—otherwise, that life will die.

🔅🌼 Do not let go of God’s religion, or you will lose your way 🌼🔅

🌹 In this world, if human beings let go of their faith, they lose their way.

🌷🔆عَنْ أَبِي عَبْدِ اللَّهِ ع قَالَ‏ كَانَ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ ص فِي بَيْتِ أُمِّ سَلَمَةَ فِي لَيْلَتِهَا فَفَقَدَتْهُ مِنَ الْفِرَاشِ فَدَخَلَهَا مِنْ ذَلِكَ مَا يَدْخُلُ النِّسَاءَ فَقَامَتْ تَطْلُبُهُ فِي جَوَانِبِ الْبَيْتِ حَتَّى انْتَهَتْ إِلَيْهِ وَ هُوَ فِي جَانِبٍ مِنَ الْبَيْتِ قَائِمٌ رَافِعٌ يَدَيْهِ يَبْكِي وَ هُوَ يَقُولُ «اللَّهُمَّ لَا تَنْزِعْ مِنِّي صَالِحَ مَا أَعْطَيْتَنِي أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ وَ لَا تَكِلْنِي‏ إِلَى‏ نَفْسِي‏ طَرْفَةَ عَيْنٍ أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ لَا تُشْمِتْ بِي عَدُوّاً وَ لَا حَاسِداً أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ لَا تَرُدَّنِي فِي سُوءٍ اسْتَنْقَذْتَنِي مِنْهُ أَبَداً» قَالَ فَانْصَرَفَتْ أُمُّ سَلَمَةَ تَبْكِي حَتَّى انْصَرَفَ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ ص لِبُكَائِهَا فَقَالَ لَهَا مَا يُبْكِيكِ يَا أُمَّ سَلَمَةَ فَقَالَتْ بِأَبِي أَنْتَ وَ أُمِّي يَا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ وَ لِمَ لَا أَبْكِي وَ أَنْتَ بِالْمَكَانِ الَّذِي أَنْتَ بِهِ مِنَ اللَّهِ قَدْ غَفَرَ اللَّهُ لَكَ مَا تَقَدَّمَ مِنْ ذَنْبِكَ وَ مَا تَأَخَّرَ- تَسْأَلُهُ أَنْ لَا يُشْمِتَ بِكَ عَدُوّاً أَبَداً وَ لَا حَاسِداً وَ أَنْ لَا يَرُدَّكَ فِي سُوءٍ اسْتَنْقَذَكَ مِنْهُ أَبَداً، وَ أَنْ لَا يَنْزِعَ عَنْكَ صَالِحَ مَا أَعْطَاكَ أَبَداً وَ أَنْ لَا يَكِلَكَ إِلَى نَفْسِكَ طَرْفَةَ عَيْنٍ أَبَداً فَقَالَ يَا أُمَّ سَلَمَةَ وَ مَا يُؤْمِنُنِي وَ إِنَّمَا وَكَلَ اللَّهُ يُونُسَ بْنَ مَتَّى إِلَى نَفْسِهِ طَرْفَةَ عَيْنٍ- فَكَانَ مِنْهُ مَا كَانَ.[2]⟦23]

🌷🔆It is related in a hadith from Imam Ja‘far al-Sadiq (PBUH) that he said: One night, the Messenger of God (PBUH) was at the home of his wife Umm Salama. During the night, Umm Salama noticed that the Prophet was not in bed. She got up and searched for him around the house. Suddenly, she saw him standing in a corner of the room, his hands raised toward heaven, weeping as he supplicated to God: « اللَّهُمَّ لَا تَنْزِعْ مِنِّي‏ صَالِحَ مَا أَعْطَيْتَنِي أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ لَا تُشْمِتْ بِي عَدُوّاً وَ لَا حَاسِداً أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ وَ لَا تَرُدَّنِي فِي سُوءٍ اسْتَنْقَذْتَنِي مِنْهُ أَبَداً اللَّهُمَّ وَ لَا تَكِلْنِي إِلَى نَفْسِي طَرْفَةَ عَيْنٍ أَبَدا»

“O God, never take away from me the blessings You have bestowed upon me. O God, never let me fall prey to an enemy or an envious person. O God, never return me to the evil from which You rescued me. O God, never leave me to myself, not even for the blink of an eye.”

Umm Salama went back and began to weep, until the sound of her crying made the Messenger of God (PBUH) turn around and ask her, “O Umm Salama, why are you crying?”

She replied, “May my father and mother be sacrificed for you, O Messenger of God. How could I not weep when I see you like this, despite the exalted station you hold before God?”

🔅🌼 Humanity betrays the trust of free will 🌼🔅

🌹Human beings lack the capacity to bear responsibility and quickly lose their way. When injustice and ignorance come together, they fall into grave injustice.

🌻🔆Al-Ahzab: 72   إِنَّا عَرَضْنَا الْأَمانَةَ عَلَى السَّماواتِ وَ الْأَرْضِ وَ الْجِبالِ فَأَبَيْنَ أَنْ يَحْمِلْنَها وَ أَشْفَقْنَ مِنْها وَ حَمَلَهَا الْإِنْسانُ إِنَّهُ كانَ ظَلُوماً جَهُولاً

🔆We offered the Trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains, but they refused to bear it and were afraid of it; yet the human being took it on. Indeed, he is most unjust and most ignorant.

🌹The greatest injustice and betrayal is committed against the Trust itself, quite apart from the injustice one inflicts on others.

🌹The ignorant and unjust use of human knowledge, power, and wealth has driven humanity into decline.

🌹Human beings became wretched when they came to think of themselves as masters of their own affairs, forgetting that what they hold is only on loan, entrusted to them.

🌹Most people, in one way or another, claim divinity; each carries within them some measure of Pharaoh’s arrogance and proclaims, «انا ابکم الاعلی».

🌻🔆An-Nazi‘at: 24   فَقالَ أَنَا رَبُّكُمُ الْأَعْلى‏

🔆Then he said, “I am your supreme lord.”

🌹When people say “I, I,” their greatest claims of self-importance arise in the realms of social, ethical, and administrative rules. A clear example is the story of Saqifah. Saqifah is reproduced in various forms and guises because they turned away from God’s choice and rejected the divine religion.

🔅🌼 Shirk in the realm of knowledge is the result of replacing the divine religion 🌼🔅

🌹A scientific example of the consequences of replacing the divine religion—from removing God’s religion to removing the divine role in the order of creation—is the search for a cause other than God to explain the universe and how it came to be.

🌹The ostensibly civilised but irreligious human being has arrived at the idea that the universe was created from nothingness at the quantum level. The theory of evolution belongs to the same school of thought. The ignorant and unjust sit on the platforms of knowledge and technology.

🌹Shirk is not knowledge; it is ignorance.

🌹Human beings cannot but acknowledge that one thing cannot be created from another thing, nor can time be created within time or space within space. Their creation must instead have occurred all at once. The spread of rebellious shirk denies that creation came into being through God’s will. The beginning of creation transcends time and space, as does the composition of its parts. In other words, both its beginning and its continuation and cohesion depend on the absolute divine command, «کن فیکون».

🌹Outside their innate nature and rationality, human beings resist the divine will.

🌻🔆Ya-Sin: 82   إِنَّما أَمْرُهُ إِذا أَرادَ شَيْئاً أَنْ يَقُولَ لَهُ كُنْ فَيَكُونُ

🔆He is the One who gives life and brings death. When He wills something, He need only say to it, “Be!” and it comes into being at once.

🔅🌼 Why a Human Religion Is Not Humane 🌼🔅

🌹There can be no doubt that if human conduct is left unmanaged, people are led away from their humanity and toward animality. This is especially evident in the case of lust and anger. What would happen if a robot tried to make laws for itself?!

🌹When people make laws, they use God’s gift against God’s religion.

🌹A human being is truly human only when living under human laws, and no one but the Creator of humanity can establish such laws. Any disregard for God’s laws concerning humanity is plainly a departure from the bounds and laws of human nature.

🌹Words dressed up in fine language are not always used in their true sense; sometimes they serve merely to deceive. Take “human rights”: devils use the concept as a means of imposing inhumane laws. The devils have stolen beautiful words.

🔅🌼 The Relationship Between Religious Devotion and Freedom 🌼🔅

🌹Imam al-Husayn’s words, “If you have no religion, then be free,” gently point us back to our innate nature—to the very human laws inscribed within us. The Imam points to a profound truth: no one can escape their innate nature,

🌹even if they claim to have been unable to recognize God’s proof. No one, however, can plead ignorance of the message carried by their innate nature. We see that at Karbala the hypocrites turned away from even the most basic dictates of that nature. Without doubt, our innate nature guides us to God’s proof.

🌹To be free and to heed the guidance of one’s innate nature are direct paths to recognizing and drawing near to God’s proof and to the truth.

🌹Imam al-Husayn condemns the hypocrites for failing to uphold even the most basic tenets of their own tribal code. 🌹In fact, the first to break the laws of humanity are the very people who make those laws.

🌷🔆وَيْلَكُمْ يَا شِيعَةَ آلِ أَبِي سُفْيَانَ إِنْ لَمْ يَكُنْ لَكُمْ دِينٌ وَ كُنْتُمْ‏ لَا تَخَافُونَ‏ الْمَعَادَ فَكُونُوا أَحْرَاراً فِي دُنْيَاكُمْ هَذِهِ وَ ارْجِعُوا إِلَى أَحْسَابِكُمْ إِنْ كُنْتُمْ عَرَباً كَمَا تَزْعُمُون‏[3]

🔆Woe to you, O followers of the family of Abu Sufyan! If you have no religion and do not fear the Day of Resurrection, then at least be free and noble in this world. Remember your lineage and ancestry, for you are Arabs.

🌹Freedom and nobility lead to the truth and to God’s proof, who is the truth itself.

🌹Imam al-Husayn demonstrated that when people abandon their religion, they even break the rules they have made for themselves. The Arabs at Karbala broke the rules of their own Arab code; they did not even observe the customs of their age of ignorance, and failed to abide by the most basic standards of human conduct.

🔅🌼 Human-Centeredness Goes Hand in Hand with Permissiveness 🌼🔅

🌹In a nonreligious society, human desires and emotions become the basis for its laws,

🌹The realm of desire is where human nature is put to the test. Trials always involve desires and attractions. Surely, something repugnant to human nature would not be set before us as a test. A test has meaning only when we are drawn to what is placed before us. Desires are of this kind, and their governance under divinely ordained laws makes them the ideal test.

🌹In the arena of trial, we are sometimes forbidden what pleases us and commanded to do what we dislike, so that the champion in the field of servitude may be revealed.

🔅🌼 The Erosion of Humanity Through Desire Is an Established Scientific Fact 🌼🔅

🌹As anger and desire intensify, a person’s intelligence can decline to the point of stupidity; and people today have reached a state of raging anger and desire.

🌹Desire is a test, not a product.

🌹Being driven by desire and anger lowers a person’s intelligence to less than one third of its normal level.

🌹 Even if a person brings their passions and anger into balance, without divine religion to guide reason, they will sink into the realm of animality. Divine religion grants the human being a higher intelligence.

🔅🌼 The Experience of the So-Called Human Society 🌼🔅

🌹 Throughout history, rebellious humanity has repeatedly turned its back on divine religion. It has killed 124,000 prophets in an effort to extinguish it, martyred the eleven successors of the Seal of the Prophets, and cast out the Seal of the Successors. Now, in this age of the so-called most humane society, a society without religion bears witness to the utmost savagery.

🌹 Humanity has led its society to ruin; driven morality into isolation; and destroyed truth, dignity, respect and  the family.

🌹 The so-called religion of humanity is the most inhumane civil code humanity has devised.

🌹 A humanity without religion has no humane definition of the human being; its definitions are inhumane. New definitions of the human being have been put forward: once, the human being was called a rational animal; now, human beings are equated with filth.

🌹 Humanity wants to turn back from its so-called religion of humanity, but it cannot.

🔅🌼 God’s Law Has No Rival 🌼🔅

🌹 Divine law has no rival. Divine religion is like water and bread.

🌹 Anyone who speaks of a law other than divine law admits that they do not believe in God. They do not accept God as God.

🌼 Ali Saei (Abdullah Meshkat), 110.141 (903) 🌼

[1] Misbah al-Mutahajjid wa Silah al-Muta‘abbid, vol. 2, p. 845 Tusi, Mu’assasat Fiqh al-Shi‘a, Beirut, first edition, 1411 AH.

[2] Tafsir al-Qummi, vol. 2, p. 75 Qummi, Dar al-Kitab, Qom, third edition, 1404 AH.

[3] Al-Luhuf ‘ala Qatla al-Tufuf, translated by Fahri, text, p. 120 Ibn Tawus, Jahan, Tehran, first edition, 1348 SH.