“All opinions are that of the author and not necessarily those of the website that it is published under.”
This post was born from my scrambled thoughts when I came across a question that said,
Do we do good for getting rewards or because it’s good?
Do we refrain from evil because it’s evil or because we fear retribution!?
Let me crack it up in to two.
Firstly, as a preamble to expressing the idea I believe in, I thought it would be very accurate to introduce the technical term fitrah. According to Islamic way of understanding, the one I believe in, the “my own morality” is termed as fitrah. It is this urge to stick to truth in the very inside of us, ultimately uncontrollable, the one that defines the morality in us.
Secondly, to do good or(and) to stay away from evil, there are multiple levels of understanding, I should argue. In my humble thoughts, I came across 3 ways of understanding morality, mainly. There should be more for sure. They are,
• To do good and to stay away from evil in response to one’s own morality as mentioned above. And also knowing that this morality is trained every moment in accordance to our perception of the society’s response towards everything. But the blueprint is the fitrah and the will to be moral and just is the driving force. This can explain why someone with fitrah, built-in, would err. She/He either lacks the will or the will is a biased one. And this lack of will is the counter-will to remodel her/his morality in accordance with the new perception of justice. This is the atheistic way of it, I think.
• To do good, expecting rewards from a Superior God, and to stay away from evil, in fear of retribution and punishment and ultimately model the inner conscience and thus morality from a set of rules that we believe, are from the Lord. This kind of morality doesn’t change much, and kills the confusion and doubts that arises in one’s rational intellect. This is the average religious common man’s way. This is not wrong. But we have to understand that there is a superior way as well.
• To do good and to stay away from evil just because we, or more precisely, the humble self of humans, understand and realize the existence of the Superior Lord, from knowing that our perception of this world is just through 1,2,3,4 and 5 senses, and feel humbled and belittled in front of Him and then helplessly Love Him and believe that it is for His Pleasure that I do anything and I keep away from anything. And when we truly understand that perspective of actions, we will surely be unbiased in morality and we don’t need to remodel it based on our perceptions and our whims. This one to me is the best way of doing good and refraining from evil. I would like to quote Rabia Al Adawiyya Al Basari here. She wrote,
“O Allah! If I worship You for fear of Hell, burn me in Hell,
and if I worship You in hope of Paradise, exclude me from Paradise.
But if I worship You for Your Own sake,
grudge me not Your everlasting Beauty.”
How beautiful is doing good then?!!!
“All opinions are that of the author and not necessarily those of the website that it is published under.”
