Chapter Twenty-Two: The Advancement of a Culture of Harmony

The fulfillment of cultural, philosophical, and mystical needs of both individuals and societies is of paramount importance, for culture serves as both an identity-forming and character-defining force, embodying the essence and foundation of an individual or community. It is also the bedrock of any form of development, particularly in an era where the priority of states, in their quest for dominance, is the destruction of others’ cultures through superiority in cultural warfare. Consequently, preserving individual culture and national identity is as critical as safeguarding borders and sovereignty. The pivotal role of culture in shaping identity and fostering social development has been substantiated in cultural and sociological studies.

The richness of a culture, along with its progress or decline, is vividly manifested in the language and literature of a society, particularly in books and artistic tools of cultural transmission. These serve as the forefront of institutionalized culture and a showcase of scientific content, intellectual capacity, national pride, divine ethos, spiritual vitality, racial characteristics, genetic heritage, human virtues, and the nobility and chastity of a society.

The well-being of individuals’ lives is contingent upon the prevailing culture within a society. Thus, self-care is unattainable without a healthy culture and methodical management grounded in tolerance, leniency, humility, convergence, peaceful coexistence, universal benevolence, collective compassion, and interactions rooted in divine or civic principles, fortified to withstand challenges. Culture represents an institutional presence and the magnetic pull of a society’s cohesive identity, centered on deep and enduring roots, resulting from accepted knowledge, the influence of the scholarly class, the exposition of intellectuals, social behaviors, traditions, and practical customs. These systematically connect individuals to their meaningful and ideological roots in a free and voluntary environment. Hence, it is imperative that culture remains free, capable of evolving in alignment with the intellectual roots of a nation and the diverse beliefs of its people.

Cultural development is a priority for both individual and societal progress. Economic development, which brings prosperity, affordability, and the alleviation of poverty, serves as a foundation for cultural advancement. Cultural development hinges on the scientific endeavors of geniuses, modern communication infrastructures, and cohesive divine or civic integration—or a combination thereof—geared toward civilization-building based on universal tolerance, the highest level of respect for diverse tastes, varied talents, and inherent capabilities. It requires a sound mind, correct thinking, superior intelligence, pure sciences free from distortions, and movement along the path of rational proof and universal guardianship grounded in love and obedience to the infallible Household of Purity.

This is particularly relevant in a society thirsting for knowledge, love, and sincere devotion. Guardianship is an inherent and divinely bestowed quality, neither optional nor subject to violation, and it is neither prescriptive nor governmental. Universal guardianship can be transformed into a civic culture through the infusion of knowledge and the elucidation of its beauties, though guardianship itself is an existential proximity and spiritual attainment to the possessor of guardianship, walking the path of being beloved. In the era of occultation, universal guardianship entails moving along the path of knowledge, transforming the struggle of truth against falsehood into a general culture within the framework of scientifically expounding the lofty ideas of the School of Infallibility and Purity, embracing the divine religion while tolerating diverse faiths and creeds.

A beloved system, alongside culture, is tied to a society’s history and heritage, keeping it vibrant and relevant while also striving for future-oriented civilizational engineering. The criterion for a culture’s health lies in measurable and testable sciences, assured knowledge at the level of thought, and universal guardianship in a faith-accepting society centered on God, divine revelations, or at least conscientious fairness based on accurate sciences and knowledge at the level of practice and civic engagement. Valid sciences and correct knowledge, through the institutionalization of universal guardianship or conscientious fairness, eliminate grounds for discord and fragmentation, preventing the infiltration of despotism and fostering unity and cohesion. The details of this process are elaborated in the book Divine Management and Politics.

A healthy culture, suitable for all individuals, enables societies to achieve peaceful, convergent, and mutually tolerant coexistence enriched with intellectual depth and conscientious fairness, without suppressing or exploiting their tastes and behaviors. Even animals, through scientific training, have been rendered capable of peaceful, tolerant, tame, and affectionate coexistence. A healthy culture is one endowed with profound sciences and knowledge in the realm of thought and practical fairness in a free environment, unhindered by rigid, superficial religious dogmatism or disconnection from innate spirituality.

Regrettably, cultural, intellectual, and scientific deficiencies in individuals far surpass physical and psychological shortcomings. Physical and psychological deficiencies stem from genetics, parental inheritance, unhealthy nutrition, poor sleep hygiene, or living in harsh conditions such as poverty, fear induced by imprisonment, or the oppression and stifling atmosphere of tyrannical regimes, or a disposition toward submissiveness. Cultural deficiencies, however, erode the foundation and identity of individuals, allowing primitivism and autocracy to dominate, preventing others from attaining noble character and divine grandeur or becoming distinguished in their lives and the execution of their divine mandates.

Isolation, individualism, uncontrollable selfishness, widespread ignorance, compounded ignorance, dogmatism, and despotism are factors contributing to cultural decline, preventing individuals from living according to their divine mandates in the present or preparing for the future in their current endeavors. They also hinder foresight regarding future events, particularly in satisfying the thirst for a progressive, modern, advanced, and responsive culture.

If a culture is unhealthy, devoid of certain knowledge and fairness, its revitalization requires transforming the societal fabric and reconstructing it with a clear, specific goal free from any concealment in public stances. This goal influences the leadership and proactive movement of society, gradually and consistently transitioning from an unhealthy to a healthy culture, fostering universal human growth, aligning societal and individual thoughts with it, and removing obstacles to their growth and well-being. The universal and comprehensive nature of this process, avoiding partial or one-dimensional changes, is a hallmark of cultural transformation.

If cultural health is not achieved through the revitalization of thought and practice, religion cannot impart a healthy life to culture. Individuals endowed with a religious, healthy, and cultural disposition can benefit from religion through their fairness, adopting an approach of tolerance and forbearance toward faiths attributed to God. The greatest obstacle to institutionalizing a culture of universal guardianship is jurisprudential dogmatism, superficiality, and appearance-driven behavior. This manifests either in a jurist insisting on personal opinions without regard for evidence, lacking the capacity to listen, accept advice, or engage in dialogue with people, or in a group of jurists pursuing hypocritical behavior in a closed, authoritarian, and exclusivist atmosphere. Alternatively, rigid and limited jurisprudence prohibits any cultural or intellectual interaction with other societies and states, fostering systemic oppression and autocratic governance. Such governance both emerges from and perpetuates societal dogmatism, enforcing it through monopolized propaganda, silencing dissent, and suppressing all correct cultural values that oppose its preferences and survival. Dogmatic jurisprudence and autocratic, superficial governance cling to religious titles and symbols with shallow thinking, devoid of deep understanding or precise jurisprudence.

Dogmatism neither aligns with God in its essence nor possesses a scientific language. It rejects the presence of scientific geniuses and scholars, oppresses them, restricts and confines culture, destroys talents, and stifles social vitality and cooperation through authoritarianism. It also misuses national wealth, leading a society dominated by dogmatism and superficiality toward decline and destruction across all values, including economy and religion. In such a society, religious propagation becomes hypocritical and subversive, and healthy economic activity leads to capital erosion. The dominant face of this authoritarian culture is abject, passive acceptance, hypocrisy, and the prevalence of deceit, flattery, sycophancy, and fanaticism among weak, cowardly, and opportunistic individuals within a distorted, hypocritical religious structure and an embellished, regal jurisprudence.

In the war of cultures, false cultures infiltrate true ones aligned with people’s ethos by promoting cultural humiliation and inferiority. They achieve this by elevating unscientific, anti-cultural but eloquent and polished individuals through excessive spending on purely conceptual games, manipulative rhetoric, flattery, distortion, and embellishment of cultural content, while marginalizing free-spirited geniuses and weakening dedicated scholars. A society’s culture loses in this cultural war if its language is not expansive, its environment is not free, and it succumbs to a mute, monolithic, narrow-minded, lethargic, and talent-destroying dogmatism. Under the bombardment of invasive cultures, it lacks the defensive line of free-spirited geniuses and independent scholars. Dogmatism offers nothing but clamor, hypocrisy, crocodile tears, and brute force through violence, shouting, domination, and control.

A culture is powerful when it honors scholars, geniuses, saints, beloved guardians, language, and literature, and maintains long-term strategic relations with scientifically and professionally robust cultures in its foreign policy. A state gains authority by fostering constructive interactions with the greatest number of powerful countries without conflict or strife, rather than seeking cultural dominance through force, war, or confrontation.

Anger

Anger and wrath are human perfections when guided by knowledge and awareness. Chivalry, freedom, and nobility stem from anger, but only when it is controlled by will, perception, and knowledge. An individual lacking the capacity for anger becomes spineless, indifferent, ineffective, lazy, lethargic, weak, and inarticulate. Desire and fervor in an individual transform into anger, which, when disciplined and guided by prudence and foresight, may turn to cunning and deceit. If it can break free from heedlessness, it surrenders to the heart, awareness, and knowledge. This growth is sequential, yet its actualization is collective. The path of knowledge is delineated in the book Awareness and the Divine Human, where awareness comprises the stages of sensation, imagination, fantasy, intellect, heartfelt wisdom, spiritual knowledge, and truth.

If anger and rage are not rooted in knowledge and awareness, rational defense is impossible, and courage, nobility, and chivalry cannot manifest, rendering the individual weak and lethargic. Misplaced anger becomes violence and fanaticism. To manage misplaced anger, one can practice deep breathing and divine remembrance to reduce stress, which can help mitigate stress and improve social relationships. Deep breathing and divine remembrance, by reducing sympathetic nervous system activity, can control misplaced anger.

Violence and Aggression

Violence is a prevalent psychological affliction, the source of many injustices and familial conflicts, and a significant barrier to attaining spiritual perfections. A violent individual is entangled in inner deficiencies and festering wounds of suppressed anger. No amount of worship, austerity, or remembrance can lead to mystical revelation or spiritual insight for such a person. Only by cleansing the inner self of the fractures caused by violence, aggression, outbursts, and hidden, suppressed anger, and then engaging in divine worship and heartfelt prayer, can the seed of knowledge potentially sprout in one’s heart.

A violent individual causes harm, fear, repulsion, aversion, and alienation in others. Where there is fear, love cannot exist. A violent person is plagued by fragmentation, resulting in terror and dread, and is deprived of true joy and fulfillment. Their essential needs may remain unmet and suppressed, with feelings of anger and rage buried within, manifesting elsewhere through compensatory behaviors. Where violence and force prevail, love, compassion, and courage are absent, replaced by fear and coldness. An individual enveloped in force, domination, stubbornness, wrath, harshness, and suppression is impervious even to love.

Injecting violence into any truth discredits it, making it repellent and replaceable. Deceptive politics maintains its dominance through violence, bullying, and coercion, coupled with unrestrained and reckless sexuality that hollows out individuals, leaving them without resistance, respect for boundaries, or regard for gentleness and consideration. Those afflicted with violence through colonial schemes do not represent enlightened or modern figures pursuing the public good, the path of rationality, reasoning, and evidence, or supporting universal knowledge and dialogue.

The antidote to the poison of violence is awareness. Correct and healthy awareness fosters universal love and compassion, which in turn enhance knowledge and awareness. Everyone despises injustice, yet many who commit violence and oppression adorn, justify, and beautify their actions, presenting them as necessary, and thus feel no remorse. Societal leaders who consider God and the reckoning of the Day of Judgment, aiming solely to benefit society and ward off harm, can avoid injustice. Otherwise, every shortcoming is an injustice against the people. Injustice prevents an individual from reaching the heart, where certainty and assurance in God reside. The entire universe is a manifestation of the Exalted Truth.

The family’s educational system is not immune to the psychological scourge of violence, aggression, disrespect, and disregard for dignity. Instead of affection and love, individuals experience various forms of psychological harshness from infancy. Instilling various fears in children is a common form of violence. Due to such misguided upbringing, most people fear both God and His hell, as well as heights. Superficial and appearance-driven individuals portray religion and God as harsh and severe, attributing to them an image of bullying, coercion, wrath, and excruciating torments of hell.

The majority of the world’s people are intellectually vulnerable regarding God, and thus bear no responsibility, as rational capacity is a general condition of obligation. With someone lacking in rationality, one must engage with acceptance, compassion, and skillful communication, avoiding unreasonable expectations. Overwork, overeating, excessive comfort, abundant luxurious amenities, or poverty and deprivation are factors contributing to fanaticism and aggression. Weakness and fear are primary causes of violence. A person who raises their voice, shouting and roaring, is violent and wounded, revealing their intimidated cowardice.

A fearful individual contracts, curling up like one afflicted by cold. A miserly or introverted person exhibits such constriction and closure. Health and development lie in expansion, freedom, and voluntary actions and decisions. Both the poor and deprived, and the excessively wealthy who lack the capacity for their wealth, experience intense fear, becoming violent and aggressive. Consuming cold water, hot water, sour foods, or encountering dark faces, darkness, or abundant insects induces fear. Similarly, keeping long nails, whether in men or women, fosters fear and nervous weakness, as nails, like hair, are connected to a highly sensitive neural network linked to the brain.

Violence first destroys an individual’s worldly resources, including their body, through greed, agitation, excessive demands, and unreasonable expectations. One must maintain harmony with individuals and governments. In a collective system, violence has a domino effect, interconnected and sequential, breeding further violence. Those wounded by violence perpetrate it against the weak and subordinates. However, the impact of injustice, harm, and violence against another first affects the oppressor and violent individual, who, before harming others, harms themselves, succumbing to fragmentation, failure, and premature aging.

Individuals afflicted with arrogance, haughtiness, or superficial, imitative personas lacking substance, who craft a highly polished exterior, as well as ignorant yet pretentious individuals, quickly become angry and aggressive, intolerant of the slightest opposition. A person who is constantly irritable, sharp, and aggressive gradually loses memory, knowledge, and awareness, succumbing to memory impairment, forgetfulness, and Alzheimer’s disease. In their final years, they confuse everything, losing the ability to distinguish objects.

Music, dance, and exercise, bathing, or showering in lukewarm water are therapeutic methods for managing fanaticism. Healthy and appropriate dance and music, if incorporated into daily life, can prevent or treat many physical ailments, fanaticism, and aggression, enabling individuals to become gentle, adaptable, and cohesive. To avoid violent behaviors, one should focus on compassion to achieve mental health and strengthen empathy. Studies have confirmed the benefits of compassion and empathy for mental health. Compassion, by enhancing empathy, reduces violent behaviors.

Severe Symptoms of Rabidity and Illicit Consumption

Consuming illicit wealth exerts intense pressure on the body and soul, manifesting symptoms akin to terminal rabies, such as mental delusions, fanaticism, confusion, anxiety, seizures, restlessness, anger, violent behaviors, and hypersensitivity to everything. A rabid and predatory individual stings others with their venomous tongue. Consuming illicit wealth is akin to ingesting refuse and filth, creating a fertile ground for attracting malevolent forces and serving as their stronghold. Illicit consumption renders its resultant offspring corrupt and deceitful.

An individual who consumes illicit wealth first experiences disturbances in sleep and dreams, often finding themselves in settings like restrooms. Illicit consumption is like administering deadly poison to the soul. A soul tainted by illicit consumption, like a scorpion, stings others with treachery and rabidity, causing harm, aggression, and injustice. If illicit wealth is mixed with lawful and benevolent sustenance, it contaminates it. Consuming wealth tainted with illicit elements shortens life, erodes inner purity, and fosters discord, ingratitude, burdens, insecurity, and disease among individuals. It may even become a killer of some who serve or operate within the sphere of such wealth, or cause significant damage to their property.

Some who commit murder are weak individuals driven to such extreme rabidity and violence by illicit consumption, not because they possess strength or resolve, but because illicit wealth has placed this crime in their lap. While the intoxication of alcohol is widely recognized, the rabidity caused by illicit consumption remains understudied and lacks public awareness. A rabid individual becomes aggressive and unpredictable, compensating for psychological disorders caused by illicit wealth through violence and rabid symptoms. Psychological rabidity is the root of violence, aggression, and numerous other corruptions and psychological disorders, such as sadism, and is also a cause of sleep disturbances.

Illicit consumption is a primary cause of cruelty, heartlessness, and various forms of madness. A heart tainted by illicit consumption never softens or weeps. Illicit consumption uglifies the appearance of an individual and their offspring, making beauty of skin and attractiveness unattainable. An individual who consumes illicit wealth loses mental focus and is deprived of acquiring knowledge and understanding. Such a person lacks the ability to concentrate, muster strength, or maintain focus, even during prayer, succumbing to mental turmoil, preoccupation, distraction, or rumination.

Illicit consumption causes severe symptoms such as fanaticism and nervous weakness, entangling the individual in numerous mental delusions, false perceptions, and chaotic fantasies, driven by the assault of malevolent forces on one who consumes illicitly. Illicit consumption strips away human will, rendering the individual unable to sleep or wake by choice. A significant factor in destroying chivalry is contamination with illicit wealth, particularly the unlawful appropriation of the rights of the poor and weak, which renders such filthy wealth incompatible with the body, shortens life, eradicates purity, vitality, and manliness, and destroys the spirit of chivalry. Men who consume wealth tainted with illicit elements not only lose their chivalry but also experience diminished sexual potency and masculinity, increasing dissatisfaction from their sexual partners.

Granting the rights of the poor does not place them under obligation but rather invigorates the health of life, perfect virtues, and the root of energizing satisfaction in the individual and their family. If a nation’s leaders become tainted with large-scale illicit consumption and injustice, collective calamities such as earthquakes and droughts afflict the people of that land. Beyond avoiding illicit consumption, one must also refrain from miserly or hardship-laden income or wealth acquired through toil and struggle.

Consuming miserly or laboriously earned wealth, even if lawful, hollows out the human spirit and personality, crafting a miserly and weak character that flees from any challenge at the slightest hint of danger, displaying extreme caution. Begging-derived income or anything acquired through stinginess fills the human soul with weakness, fear, and delusion, sometimes robbing one of joy or blessing, bringing sorrow and distress, or causing humiliation, diminution, brokenness, premature aging, or ugliness of appearance. Begging consumption drives individuals toward idleness, impatience, lethargy, and sloth.

Examples include offerings distributed in small packets on streets or for the repose of the deceased in cemeteries, as well as food provided for mourners at burial ceremonies, prepared with great difficulty. Even government subsidies, if meager and stingy, dry up the spirit of spirituality and nobility in society. Consuming wealth acquired through toil and struggle, such as gifts prepared with hardship, stress, greed, or anxiety, can cause ailments like diarrhea or other adverse effects in the consumer. If one associates with the poor who earn through toil and consumes their wealth to honor them, they must provide manifold kindness exceeding their consumption.

The children and spouse of such a person, nourished by such income, feel humiliated, small, broken, and hopeless, unable to hold their heads high with pride anywhere, losing trust and faith in God entirely, consumed by feelings of inferiority and emptiness. Meager, petty, and begging-derived income strips away human dignity, rendering one small, shortsighted, and stagnant, sapping the inclination and capacity for healthy work.

If stingy or begging-derived income is consumed, the individual loses the drive for work, research, teaching, study, effort, perseverance, and patience. Just as laboring for money kills love and devotion, worship performed with an eye on reward is greed-driven and fruitless, yielding no knowledge, vision, truth, unseen realms, revelation, or insight, neither piercing nor sparking movement. It is crucial that even in worship and supplications, one avoids a begging mentality.

After awareness, the first step toward physical, mental, and psychological health is vigilance in lawful consumption and sustenance, avoiding begging-derived consumption. Such consumption is addictive, leading to greed and avarice, uprooting all perfections, while illicit consumption breeds rabidity, violence, and chaos. With begging or illicit consumption, even remembrances and prayer, which should be the believer’s ascension, only add to the individual’s impurity and aberrant behaviors. Just as sorcerers, magicians, and those engaged in demonic subjugations and bodily desires amplify their imaginative power through illicit consumption and feeding on insects like worms, this is the antithesis of spiritual proximity, which is arduous and requires divine etiquette and training under the Exalted Truth. Though sorcerers may influence believers, they cannot affect God’s saints.

Sustenance for the body must be lawful, pure, and delightful—sweet, pleasant, expansive, and consumed with enjoyment—while being content and satisfied with such delightful sustenance to bring legitimate joy, fulfillment, strength, and longevity to the body. Lawful but unpleasant or constrictive sustenance, acquired through force or endurance, such as fruit or food purchased by a poor individual who deprives their spouse and children to preserve another’s dignity or maintain their own honor under hardship, transfers the effects of sorrow, weakness, or degradation. Lawful and delightful sustenance comprises foods offered by a wealthy individual with abundant, effortless sustenance, imbued with expansion, conveying joy, vitality, and purity. Certain heavenly blessings, spiritual gifts, and celestial knowledge exemplify delightful and beautiful sustenance.

The sole factor restraining one from excess, which leads to unkindness, is voluntary and conscious contentment and the control of expectations. For instance, using handmade carpets crafted with immense toil is not delightful, whereas machine-made carpets exemplify pure and delightful use. Using the wealth of a miserly, stingy, or narrow-minded person can diminish one’s inner vitality for years or shorten life. Even utilizing the knowledge or skills of a miserly individual is detrimental to the soul, let alone their money or bread. A miser harbors weakness, frailty, and emptiness within.

Evading religious dues and lawful taxes in a democratic society with legitimate governance taints lawful effort with illicit elements. The prevalence of illicit wealth in society erodes its health and security. Signs of rabidity are evident in individuals entrenched in politics and commerce who deceitfully undermine their rivals through propaganda, violence, and barking at one another.

Sadism

Sadism is uncontrolled anger and excessive cunning in service of satisfying lust, deriving excessive pleasure from humiliation, delighting in harming others, and engaging in criminal behavior to achieve sensual tranquility and sexual fulfillment, projecting strength over others through perverse displays and dark personality traits. Sadism, as a personality disorder, has been examined in clinical psychology and psychoanalysis. A sadistic individual harbors intense insecurity, fear, feelings of humiliation or despair, or a strong inclination to instill shocking terror and a sense of sudden danger.

Such an individual imposes restrictions on others, constantly monitoring or isolating them, making them distrustful or withdrawn, lying without reason, taking pleasure in disappointing others, intimidating them from completing their tasks, and deriving joy from others’ torment, suffering, distress, and helplessness. The victim of a sadistic individual is often someone resembling the person they wish to punish or penalize. A person with sadistic traits enjoys teasing others, controlling them dictatorially, or distressing them through humiliation and mockery, finding others’ cruelty thrilling and contemplating harming those who have harmed them.

Narcissistic personalities, with excessive and unbalanced self-focus, lack empathy and are inclined toward domination at any cost, proving as harmful as sadistic personalities. Among animals, vengeful wolves exhibit sadistic cruelty, tearing apart entire herds with utmost brutality. Untrained or feral cats and dogs may also display sadistic tendencies toward mice or others. However, the sadism and predation of some animals are innate abilities, a harmonious law of nature to rejuvenate material phenomena, a requirement of their existential manifestation, and rooted in the necessity of wisdom, justice, and balance. For humans, however, sadism is a disorder, an imbalance, and a disharmony.

One test for detecting sadism in children involves providing them with a few kilograms of fruit, such as apples, pomegranates, or carrots. If the child bites the fruit halfway and wastes or spoils it, they are at high risk and require psychological care from a specialist. Such children should not be admitted to religious studies centers, as they may pose a danger to religion. Individuals with latent violence, classified as high-risk, dislike soft, cooked meat, preferring to chew tough, undercooked meat. They easily oppress others. Similarly, those who harm animals or plants, such as immediately plucking flowers upon seeing a plant, may be afflicted with cruelty of heart.

Heedlessness

The era of occultation is an era of profound heedlessness, with such intensity and volume that it drags everything into deception and falsehood. The Western lifestyle, advertisements, and trends designed daily for profiteering and draining people’s accounts create a spectacle of trickery, beguilement, and the injection of heedlessness into humanity. In a collective system where people consume abundant deception and lies, nature itself deceives humanity. When rain falls, God’s blessings do not increase; instead, rain becomes a calamity and affliction. The sun scorches so intensely that it sets records for national and global retribution. A girl wishes to revel in the joy of her wedding, but either the groom is killed, or one of their mothers suffers a stroke from excessive joy, burning hearts and forcing all to weep.

Heedlessness has even taken on the guise of hypocritical religion, rendering religion itself a deception. Reciting the Holy Quran, attending mosques, or praying does not evoke God or His presence in hearts; rather, prayer, mosques, fasting, and other rituals and symbols have become sources of heedlessness. The dust of the world is intertwined with forgetfulness. In their heedlessness, humans forget all heedlessness, reconciling with daily routines and striving to shield their essence from sorrow and grief. Through jesting, recklessness, and heedlessness, humans flee from the trivial, tainted sorrows of life, even falsifying their joys through self-deception, sustaining the dominion of the world’s superficiality with lies and trickery, lending vibrancy to darkness, and growing ever more estranged from God, sinking deeper into heedlessness.

Spiritual practices and recitation of the Holy Quran can foster mindfulness, counteracting heedlessness, enhancing spiritual health, and reducing anxiety. Studies confirm the benefits of meditation for awareness and avoidance of heedlessness.

Obsession

An individual afflicted with obsession must qualitatively increase recreation, enjoyment, and vitality, exercising to the point of perspiration. Hot showers are harmful to them, and they should use cool water, or lukewarm water if unable. Among obligatory acts, an obsessive person should suffice with a very brief prayer, as supplications and pilgrimages are unsuitable for them. While there are remembrances to prevent obsession, they are generally ineffective for those already afflicted. Obsession, as a psychological disorder, and the impact of isolation on it have been studied in clinical psychology.

Mindfulness exercises and avoiding repetitive thoughts can reduce anxiety, improve mental performance, and mitigate obsession. Mindfulness, by reducing prefrontal cortex activity, alleviates obsession. A key cause of obsession is mental disturbance, leading to doubt, hesitation, and delusion. Such individuals awaken startled from sleep or experience nightmares. Their living environment is unhealthy, driving them into isolation. A significant factor in mental disturbance, delusion, and mental disarray is a tendency toward isolation and withdrawal. An isolated and solitary individual struggles to converse with others, gradually developing practical or mental obsession.

For a healthy brain with proper function, all dimensions of life must be healthy and correct. Poverty, financial scarcity, habitual isolation, and lack of outings, joy, and vitality each dry and burn parts of the brain’s cells. Isolated individuals are more prone to delusions than others. Even if only for a minor or recreational purchase, one must allocate time to leave the home to avoid delusions or obsession. Spending time on walks is not a waste but rather a means of revitalizing and caring for the brain. An individual lacking recreation, joy, and outings has a brain that dries up, becoming entangled in obsessive thoughts, delusions, and compulsive behaviors.

To prevent or treat obsession and manage delusions, recreation, swimming, play, gatherings, and joy are essential, keeping the brain alive, active, and engaged.

Fear of the Weak

In the miracle of Prophet Saleh, to complete his proof against his rebellious people, he brought forth a she-camel from the heart of a mountain, not a roaring lion. The distinction of this camel from other animals was that God was its protector, standing with utmost zeal in its defense. One must fear the weak, poor, helpless, oppressed, stranger, or solitary individual, for if God stands in their defense and becomes their refuge, this seemingly alone person is accompanied by a legion of divine might and glory. The weak cannot be fathomed for their backing, as it is unknown how much God has invested in them.

If someone attacks the courageous, they can focus and muster strength, becoming more powerful through such assaults, especially if they possess faith in God and derive security from the Exalted Truth. In contrast, fearful, cowardly, and weak individuals become hollow and empty under others’ attacks. Fearful individuals cannot undertake meaningful progress and are constantly anxious about shortages in income and sustenance. Fear stems from a lack of awareness and deprivation of the blessing of guidance.

Fearful individuals are unsuitable for spiritual wayfaring and love, as both require courage. Spiritual masters do not select cowardly or fearful individuals for the journey of wayfaring or love unless they can dispel their fear, as such individuals reject whatever God or His saints offer out of fear, rendering efforts futile. A weak individual can enhance self-confidence through exercise and divine remembrance, reducing anxiety and improving mental health. Exercise and divine remembrance, by fostering self-belief, diminish fear of perceived personal weakness.

Misuse of Opium, Cannabis, and Psychoactive Substances

Persistent misuse of opium and addiction to opiates erode physical strength and capability. An opium addict, particularly if elderly or weakened by illness, lacks even the ability to die or surrender their soul, facing excruciating and prolonged agony during the throes of death. If the body is ensnared by opium, its narcotic nature binds the soul to this world, preventing an easy departure until the angel of death forcibly seizes it, a process that may last over a month, leaving the individual in a coma and agony until the opium’s effect is neutralized.

Using opium or morphine for terminally ill patients, such as those with cancer whom physicians determine have only months to live, is the most effective painkiller. Misuse of cannabis (derived from the resin of the hemp plant) leads to dulled senses, impaired vision, hearing, and touch, sedation, and immediate detachment, not without negative effects like thirst, the need to moisten lips, and reduced sexual desire if misuse escalates to addiction or dependency. The detachment from cannabis misuse and addiction induces emotional coldness or an emotional stroke, rendering the individual indifferent and apathetic to relationships, devoid of worry, stress, interest, excitement, motivation, hope, joy, or enthusiasm. Such an individual neither engages with nor completes tasks or duties.

In general, misuse of psychoactive substances, if leading to physical or psychological dependency, alters brain function, afflicting the individual with an absence of pleasure. Those lacking healthy thinking, philosophy, wisdom, mysticism, a sound mind, and a correct heart—namely, a proper worldview and the blessings of the heart—resort to psychoactive substances to escape psychological issues. An individual addicted to substances can replace drug use with healthy activities like exercise to restore physical and mental health and reduce dependency. The effects of substituting healthy activities have been studied. Exercise, by stimulating the brain’s reward system, can reduce substance dependency.

Sin and Transgression

Avoiding sin is the surest safeguard in a perilous material world. Sin varies in intensity, degree, and compatibility with the individual. Just as humans are drawn to goodness, they are also inclined toward evil in proportion to their nature and essence. As the Holy Quran states: “Indeed, the soul is inclined to evil” (Yusuf: 53). Persistent sinning or engaging in contagious sins that promote sharing and encourage others to sin, beyond deserving otherworldly punishment, incurs worldly consequences and deprivations that harm the body and psyche, stripping life of joy and fulfillment.

Psychological addiction to sin can be managed. Meditation and counseling are strategies for controlling obsessive thoughts, reducing anxiety, and improving mental health. Meditation and counseling, by enhancing mindfulness, reduce psychological addiction. Among the consequences of psychological addiction to sin is periodic madness, sometimes manifesting as mockery of spirituality, ridiculing religion and divine truths, or negative encounters with God’s saints. In such an environment, one must seek refuge in the impregnable fortress of “There is no god but Allah” and other remembrances, seeking protection in the Exalted Truth and the guardianship of God’s saints to remain safe from the evils and perils of the era of occultation.

The effects of sin can be mitigated or purified through filters such as purity, love, universal compassion, causing no harm to others, reciting the Holy Quran, attending mosques, prolonged and frequent prostrations, or visiting sacred shrines. In visiting sacred shrines, the essence lies in familiarity with guardianship, knowledge, truths, Quranic recitation, and connection with the realm of meaning and spirituality without doubt or condition, rather than being swayed by the material world and markets surrounding the shrines.

For pilgrimage, it is best to perform ablution, seek forgiveness and repent near the shrine, stand respectfully in a corner, and offer salutations. The entire shrine holds the sanctity of the inner sanctum, and kissing or touching any part fulfills the etiquette of pilgrimage. Moreover, the entire material world bears the sanctity of God’s saints’ body, serving as their pilgrimage site, where one can kiss it, offer saintly salutations, and be mindful of their voice and tone to ensure it remains respectful, measured, and neither loud nor harsh. Physical proximity to the shrines of God’s saints, with proper etiquette and reverence, can yield spiritual proximity. In sacred shrines, God’s house, or the pilgrimage sites of the infallible ones and encounters with God’s saints, one should maintain inner silence and quietude, respect boundaries, keep distance, and avoid advancing too closely, as this is where goodness lies. Inner silence is itself a subtle remembrance, bringing inner vision and attainment.

Conclusion

Discerning what is good for each individual rests with God. The Holy Quran declares: “Say: O Allah, Sovereign of all dominion, You grant dominion to whom You will and seize dominion from whom You will; You exalt whom You will and humble whom You will. In Your hand is all good. Indeed, You are capable of all things” (Al-Imran: 26).