In proportion to all of that, however, the sufferer has neither died nor perished. He still possesses a measure of strength that enables him, in general, to perceive and undertake voluntary movement, and from that there arises a pain that afflicts the body—either because of a quantitative imbalance or a qualitative one.
- As for the quantitative imbalance, it is brought about either by a shortage of bodily matter, which calls for nourishment, or by an excess of it, which calls for purging.
- The qualitative imbalance appears when heat or cold exceeds the proper mean; this, therefore, requires treatment.
Exactly so, the heart’s disease is a kind of corruption that spoils both its perception and its volition.
• Its perception is corrupted by the doubts that assail it until it can no longer see the truth, or sees it in a distorted form.
• Its will is corrupted so that it comes to hate beneficial truth and to love harmful falsehood.
Hence the “sickness” mentioned in Revelation is sometimes explained as doubt and uncertainty, as Mujāhid and Qatādah said of Allah’s statement, “In their hearts is a sickness” (al-Baqarah 2:10), meaning “doubt.” At other times it is explained as the lust for fornication, as in His words, “so that he in whose heart is a sickness may yearn” (al-Ahzāb 33:32). It was for this reason that al-Kharāʾiṭī composed his work Iʿtilāl al-Qulūb (“The Ailment of Hearts”), intending by it the heart’s ailment caused by desire.
A sick person is harmed by things that do not harm a healthy person: a slight rise or drop in temperature, a modest amount of exertion, and other such matters that he cannot bear because illness has weakened him. Illness, in general, weakens the patient by reducing his strength so that he can no longer manage what the strong can endure. Health is preserved by what resembles it and lost by its opposite, whereas disease is intensified by the very factor that produced it and removed by its opposite. Accordingly, if the patient is exposed to something akin to the cause of his illness, his sickness worsens and his strength diminishes, perhaps even to the point of destruction; but if he is given what reinforces his strength and removes the disease, the opposite takes place.
The heart’s sickness is likewise a pain lodged within it—such as the anger one feels toward an enemy who has overpowered him, for that anger hurts the heart. Allah the Exalted says: “…and He will heal the breasts of a believing people and remove the rage from their hearts” (al-Tawbah 9:14). Their healing, therefore, lies in the disappearance of the pain that had settled in their hearts. People say, “So-and-so has quenched his anger,” and the heirs of a murdered person seek istishfāʾ (redress) through lawful retribution—acts that amount to healing grief, rage, and sorrow, all of which are pains that afflict the soul.
Doubt and ignorance bring pain to the heart as well. The Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—said, “Why did they not ask when they did not know? For the cure of ignorance is to ask questions.” A person who doubts a matter suffers in his heart until he attains knowledge and certainty, and people say of a scholar whose answer clarifies the truth, “He has healed me with his reply.”
Illness, however, is short of death. The heart dies through total ignorance, and it becomes sick through a degree of ignorance; thus it experiences death, illness, life, and healing. Indeed, its life, death, illness, and cure are far more significant than those of the body. For that reason, the heart falls ill whenever a specious doubt or a base desire assails it