Al-Ghazali: The Alchemist of Happiness

[Karachi]

Exploring the life and impact of the greatest spiritual and legal philosopher in Islamic history, this film examines Ghazali's existential crisis of faith that arose from his rejection of religious dogmatism, and reveals profound parallels with our own times. Ghazali became known as the Proof of Islam and his path of love and spiritual excellence overcame the pitfalls of the organised religion of his day. His path was largely abandoned by early 20th century Muslim reformers for the more strident and less tolerant school of Ibn Taymiyya. Combining drama with documentary, this film argues that Ghazali's Islam is the antidote for today's terror.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0439430/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl

Al Ghazali The Alchemist of Happiness 2004 YouTube - YouTube

Highly recommend watching this after I re watched it yesterday. Al Ghazali is perhaps one of the greatest scholars in history , not just Islamic history. From Wikipedia

Al-Ghazali had an important influence on both Muslim philosophers and Christian medieval philosophers. Margaret Smith writes in her book Al-Ghazali: The Mystic (London 1944): "There can be no doubt that al-Ghazali’s works would be among the first to attract the attention of these European scholars" (page 220). Then she emphasizes, "The greatest of these Christian writers who was influenced by al-Ghazali was St. Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), who made a study of the Arabic writers and admitted his indebtedness to them. He studied at the University of Naples where the influence of Arab literature and culture was predominant at the time." In addition, Aquinas' interest in Islamic studies could be attributed to the infiltration of ‘Latin Averroism’ in the 13th century, especially at the University of Paris

[Karachi]

http://islamoblog.blogspot.co.uk/200...ration-of.html

A good post for anybody wanting for information on Imam Ghazali.

[Karachi]

His last words

Say to my friends, when they look upon me, dead
Weeping for me and mourning me in sorrow
Do not believe that this corpse you see is myself
In the name of God, I tell you, it is not I,
I am a spirit, and this is naught but flesh
It was my abode and my garment for a time.
I am a treasure, by a talisman kept hid,
Fashioned of dust, which served me as a shrine,
I am a pearl, which has left it's shell deserted,
I am a bird, and this body was my cage
Whence I have now floron forth and it is left as a token
Praise to God, who hath now set me free
And prepared for me my place in the highest of the heaven,
Until today I was dead, though alive in your midst.
Now I live in truth, with the grave - clothes discarded.
Today I hold converse with the saints above,
With no veil between, I see God face to face.
I look upon "Loh-i-Mahfuz" and there in I read
Whatever was and is and all that is to be.
Let my house fall in ruins, lay my cage in the ground,
Cast away the talisman, it is a token, no more
Lay aside my cloak, it was but my outer garment.
Place them all in the grave, let them be forgotten,
I have passed on my way and you are left behind
Your place of abode was no deweling place for me.
Think not that death is death, nay, it is life,
A life that surpasses all we could dream of here,
While in this world, here we are granted sleep,
Death is but sleep, sleep that shall be prolonged
Be not frightened when death draweth night,
It is but the departure for this blessed home
Think of the mercy and love of your Lord,
Give thanks for His Grace and come without fear.
What I am now, even so shall you be
For I know that you are even as I am
The souls of all men come forth from God
The bodies of all are compounded alike
Good and evil, alike it was ours
I give you now a message of good cheer
May God's peace and joy for evermore be yours.

Last words before death from a famous Islamic sufi -Al Ghazali - YouTube

[Karachi]

Imam Al Ghazali The Sweeper



Imam Al Ghazali The Sweeper | #Humilty | Shaykh Hamza Yusuf - YouTube

[Badlun]

I have read Imam Ghazali's book, Kemya e Saadat, which is a big volume summary of his compendium Ahyay ul uloom.

Ghazali has a big role in the spiritualism, mysticism and sufism of Islam but his negative side is that he murdered philosophy in Muslim world. He was in favor of heart not reason as he used to say that heart has a reason which reason cannot understand.

Because of him rational thinking dwindled in Muslim world and Muslims instead of rationality and science took refuge in poetry and mysticism. He is responsible for the death of progressive thinking and scientific approach. He made Muslims retrogressive, obscurantist and purely religious.

[Badlun]

Imam Ghazali was a typical Mullah and after him the whole Muslim world was hijacked by Mullahs till today. We need to create awareness amongst Muslims that Ghazali was a highly dangerous man and one should not take for granted his teachings.

His apposition to science and Philosophy can be proved by the following excerpt , I have taken from the source Karachi has given above.

He rejects philosophy after divulging himself in its study for years. Studying both science and philosophy, he concludes that to prove the error in philosophy, one must study all of science and philosophy, and know more than his opponents in order to prove them wrong. His reasoning is if one does not know everything about science, one cannot be certain he is right about everything. However, this study of philosophy and science also leads al-Ghazali to conclude that philosophers have a penchant for atheism and blasphemy. He argues that naturalist and materialist philosophers are blasphemous atheists based on their views on Judgment Day and afterlife. He cites ibn Sina and al-Farabi as two examples of theist philosophers who have strayed into blasphemous works, by continuing the work of naturalists and materialists. Unable to reconcile the blasphemy, he rejects philosophy, but leaves the capability of delving into the study of the sciences. He also states that the scientific aspect of philosophy is reconcilable with religion, and have roots in mysticism.

Also rejecting esotericism, al-Ghazali, eventually accepted mysticism as his path to certainty, citing


“…what was most distinctive about them and what was specific to them was what could not be attained through teaching but rather through ‘tasting’, the ‘state’, and a ‘transformation of attributes.’”

http://islamoblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/al-ghazali-rejection-and-restoration-of.html

[Toramana]

A-Ghazali was the major degenerative impact on Muslims.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

Good post Karachi!

[BarakzaiAbdali]

I would posit that dangerous militant secularists like Najibullah killed far more people and damaged more of the istaan states in his short life (thankfully short) than Ghazali did in centuries. Rather we should erase that militant secularist and others like him from the pages of time.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

A-Ghazali was the major degenerative impact on Muslims.

Says a degenerate militant secularist mullah.

[Tamim]

Why is it that many people are not fond of al-Ghazali? How has he influenced people?

[Khostai]

Why is it that many people are not fond of al-Ghazali? How has he influenced people?

I don't knwo his work, I heard few times his name and that his work have influenced the Christian teologists like Aqiuna...But what he exactly achived or did never really interested me, probably another theologists like the countless we have in the muslims world.

[Toramana]

Says a degenerate militant secularist mullah.

Fanatics always live in the past and love retrogression and the symbols of it.

[abassinafghan]

I would posit that dangerous militant secularists like Najibullah

be careful you dont end like this , just like you he also studied medicine , maybe you have a bad feeling that you will end like him ?

[Tamim]

I don't knwo his work, I heard few times his name and that his work have influenced the Christian teologists like Aqiuna...But what he exactly achived or did never really interested me, probably another theologists like the countless we have in the muslims world.

Islam has produced a lot of great minds.

Unfortunately, these minds were not perfect. Every thinking is flawed to some degree. Some more and some less.

To take a thinker as inimitable is dangerous, not only for the individual but also for the larger society.

To think someone does not have flawed thinking and take their work as absolute truths hampers thinking. Also, their work will be used to control a society.

The inimitable work par excellence is the Quran, and it encourages thinking.

I am not familiar with Ghazali's work, but I would never consider something written in the past as having the answer for today.

The Quran does not have answers for today, however, it presents logical axioms that help us solve today's problem.

So, I would say to look at Ghazali's work, because he seems to be renowned, but don't take his work as absolute. I'm sure people who do not agree with him have found flaws in his works.