a beautiful person. You say you have
pretty eyes but you don’t say ‘you
are beautiful’. So when the eyes,
nose and lips are in proportion and
they are individually beautiful then
you call that person, a beautiful
person.
In exactly the same way, Imam
Ghazzali v says that there is a
possibility that you have some
traits of goodness of character.
You may have generosity which is
a good thing. But then you have
anger, which is an ugly thing. So,
you will not be called a person of
good character.
First of all, you should have all the
good traits naturally, and then you
also need to have a proportion and
balance. It does not mean that you
are so gentle, that if somebody sins
in front of you, you only smile at
him. This person is a foolish person.
He is not of a good character.
Imam Ghazzali v says that
there are four areas which we all
have to work on. One is called
quwwatul ilm (power of
knowledge), meaning
to know what is right
and what is wrong. To
know that lying is bad
and truth is good. To
know that cheating
is bad, being honest
is good. To know
that treachery is bad,
sincerity is good. To
know being indifferent
is bad and helping is
good. So this is the
quwwat of ilm that you know these
things, and they are done through
ilm(knowledge) of the Sharia (the
sacred law) and ilm of the Quran
and ilm of the Hadith (narration).
As Allah said,
ََف َأهل َم َها �ورها َو َت ْق َواه
َ َ ُ فُ ج
َ
ا
“And inspired it- its wickedness and
its righteousness.” (91:8)
Naturally you know that certain
things are good and bad. When
you work on this quwwat which is
the ilm and you qualify yourself in
it, then that gives you an offshoot
of wisdom. This is called hikmah
(wisdom) and some people have
been given this gift of hikmah
because of their quwwat of ilm.
A lot of people do not have hikmah,
they do not know where to use
their anger, where not to use the
anger. They do not know where to
smile, where not to smile. They do
not know where to speak, where
not to speak.
41 NISBAH