The Lost Treasure of Our Time: Peace

Nearly every day we come across new technological inventions or innovations that bring greater efficiency, comfort, and ease to our daily lives.

However, the losses we experience as a result of these developments outweigh the gains—it’s impossible to compensate for these losses with the means provided by technology.

Peace is one such non-fungible commodity. The age we live in is an age of unrest when it comes to this rare, intangible resource.

Technology makes life easier, but it also blunts our ability to cope with challenges. It can make people weak, frail, and fragile with its long-term addictive effects. The inventions we believe afford greater ease often make us live faster and more intensely—they can burden our lives with tightly-packed schedules, seemingly endless to-do lists, and a relentless preoccupation with the world. The extreme speed of development subjects societies to instantaneous change. It destroys cultural behavioral patterns because of the lack of sufficient time for a process of adaptation and evaluation. The masses then become objects of the changes they are exposed to and struggle to manage in line with their genuine needs. Due to the continuity of the changes, this constant shift in paradigms and norms prevents people from taking the time to think, evaluate, and question. Many who use technology excessively find themselves in the clutches of addiction without realizing they’re being used, directed, and even commodified by it.

Even those who admire the eye-catching innovations ponder where they will lead. An innate fear and anxiety pervade human thought with the knowledge that this course knows no divine, human, or natural moderation. Catastrophic disasters are always predicted in fictional movies and novels based on future scenarios. Technological developments that capture and direct our attention to an endless cycle of clicks, likes, and view counts contribute to hopelessness, anxiety, and pessimism, and thus, the overall feeling of angst about the future.

Trying to quench thirst with seawater

Our introduction to this subject should not be perceived as an absolute opposition to technology. Technological developments are a natural consequence of the advances in science (even if advances were not made as fast in past historical periods), which led to many inventions that have benefited humanity. No one can deny the utility of such inventions that address a legitimate need and result in the transformations of societies within a legitimate framework. However, regardless of necessity and a valid perspective, what is concerning is the irreversible inclination to attribute near-holiness to things that are new because of an unhealthy and exaggerated demand for novelty.

In this addictive state, the obsession with technology is not rooted in providing a solution for a problem, addressing a necessity, or securing a convenience. Instead, it is a sign of falling into a vicious consumption cycle that capitalism has imprinted on impressionable minds with the methodically engineered urge for status validation and instant gratification. It is, in a way, a vain attempt to quench one’s thirst with seawater. In fact, the “consumption frenzy” is the frenzy of turning to seawater again, with greater thirst and desperation. The metaphorical seawater is not just about technology; unfortunately, it’s only one part of a much bigger package. In order to investigate the causes of unrest, we must first examine the foundation on which scientific developments are based.

Against the backdrop, the concept of modernized civilization, which is an excuse to create a strict exclusion zone in the collective mind of human society that shuts out any notion of religion, is based solely on the material world, rational thought, and physical efficiency. It reduces man to his primal nature and promises the impossible to satisfy the desires of the nafs. Such satisfaction is impossible because, as stated in the hadith, “If a son of Adam were to own a valley full of gold, he would desire to have two.” In the final analysis, a human being with this nature cannot be satisfied since their desires are endless.

Pursuing these endless desires causes people to forget the purpose of their creation and who they are. Instant, effortless gratification, an artificial sense of reward and satisfaction, and a pathological compulsion to accelerate the natural processes in our daily routines have become the basic qualities of life. They prevent us from taking the time to think, reason, and ask the right questions to discover the truth. As a result, the modern man, who is a slave to his nafs and ambition, is overwhelmed with a deprivation of inner peace caused by insecurity, competition, meaninglessness, and dissatisfaction. When he fails to find the drive or the energy to get back on the hamster wheel now spinning impossibly fast, he turns to short-lived, self-destructive escapes with diminishing returns like drinking, drugs, entertainment, and other forms of excess or pseudo-therapeutic practices that are more exotic distractions than actual restorative processes like yoga and various “meditation techniques.”

Idolizing the nafs and the cruelty of it

For a human being to ignore their soul, the essence breathed into their being through a divine act of creation, and reduce themselves to a shallow, purely biological lifeform is to forgo their true identity. To live in denial of one’s soul is to live devoid of meaning. Such a bleak outlook is a catalyst for the change that sends individuals and societies shifting towards a meaningless existence in modern times. Living a life of bodily satisfaction has the effect of degrading a person to a level comparable to beasts. This translates into the tragic loss of one’s place as the most honorable among all of creation and is another reason for finding an implacable void that gapes like a wound where inner peace is supposed to reside.

The idolizing of the nafs leads to an oppressive form of self now commonly called “individualization.” It's more akin to a visceral identity that does not recognize the distinction between right and wrong, driven by solitude, indifference, and selfishness. The result is isolation from society for individuals who strive to possess everything without the intention to share. Everyone other than themselves becomes the “other,” and, for these people, this becomes a constant thorn in their sides. For such individuals, these “others” are competition and even potential threats to be eliminated due to their warped understanding of what is “rightfully” theirs for the taking and how the mere existence of “others” could mean that their share of the pie is getting smaller or even being snatched away from between their fingers.

The cruelty aspect of this oppressive self results from  unbridled enmity and the lawlessness of removing perceived enemies from the equation at all costs. Sometimes it comes out as ruthlessness that tries to demonize Syrian refugees for a slice of bread imagined to be missing from the table. And at other times, it manifests as an atrocity that turns the Middle East into a bloodbath for oil.

A distinctive feature of the individuals who cannot find peace nor grant peace to others is their high level of welfare, meaning they often have above-average financial means and comfort. Contrary to popular belief, having the advantage of material privilege on one’s side does not bring peace; consider the ever-increasing drug addiction, suicides, and divorces, and the use of antidepressants in economically and technologically developed societies. Despite this, the overbalanced formula of “more worldly gain and more comfort” is still the most popular prescription for happiness among these people.

Are happiness and peace the same?

While having mentioned that material wealth doesn’t necessarily mean peace, we are also aware of an annual report claiming to measure people’s happiness on a numeric scale and with rankings for different countries, known as the “World Happiness Report.” The interesting point about this index is the metrics it chooses to evaluate happiness by: social welfare level, gross domestic product per capita, and healthy life expectancy of the population. All of these indicators the report relies on are based on economic welfare. While these criteria can definitely affect a person’s quality of life, is what they represent really interchangeable with happiness?

Happiness, according to the contemporary interpretation, means “the pleasure or joy of obtaining, owning, and enjoying a desired object, service, or commodity.” A state of peace can sometimes give an intangible pleasure, a feeling of satisfaction that makes a person feel blissful. Maybe that's why we often use those words interchangeably, but as concepts, happiness and peace aren’t as close as they are made out to be. Spiritual pleasure or satisfaction derived from a state of peace is not correlated to attaining worldly possessions.

On the other hand, happiness is a temporary feeling of contentment based on the fulfillment of a human desire. It's only temporary—the nafs demands novelty, an improvement, or greater excess each time its needs and wants are met. As a result, the threshold for happiness rises constantly. What led to a state of happiness yesterday might lead to dreary stagnation or even stark disconsolation today. For this reason, it is not possible for the people of kufr, who take striving for material gain as the sole purpose of their lives to experience tranquility and peace of heart even if they experience swift, serial, but ultimately temporary gratification.

The slogan is right but…

At the same time, our envy of developed societies indicates our disconsolation as Muslims. It reveals that reliance on their false prescriptions for peace results in us forgetting what peace is. That is why we seek peace in places and things where it would never naturally occur and cannot be found. However, peace is in Islam, and it is a state exclusive to a believer.

For those who pay attention, “Islam is peace” and “Find peace in Islam” are highly common maxims that are known and used widely in Muslim communities around the world. These statements have been allowed to face attrition over the years because they remained as slogans that weren't lived up to or acted upon by the greater Islamic society. Maybe it is because we have recklessly thrown these mottos around as concepts without actualizing them and have gone too long without backing up our words with actions that we find it awkward to be vocal about and broadcast this message to every corner of the world our voice can reach. Perhaps we really have forgotten that peace is in Islam.

There are other signs that indicate our obliviousness about the true nature of peace. Here, too, the number of people who seek peace in worldly gain, success, career, and comfort has increased. Some of us may have sought peace by isolating ourselves from those who need us, for example, by admitting an elderly family member to a care home, making these institutions the final residence of elders who still have living, capable relatives rather than a shelter for those with nowhere to go to and no one to share a home with. This heartbreaking reality may very well be one of the reasons behind a great deal of the suffering in this world. The pains we endure, the hardships, disasters, droughts, floods, and food shortages we contend with might be the price we pay for breaking the hearts of our elders with cold indifference. This hypothesis is further substantiated by the fact that we act contrary to the truth stated in the hadith, “Respecting an aged Muslim is out of reverence to Allah …”

Now we must remember once again that peace is in Islam. Even as a word, Islam describes peace with all its subtexts and connotations. Islam is to surrender to Allah. In this surrender, one attains true freedom by removing false gods and curtailing the insatiable desires of one’s own nafs. This submission brings with it the safety and sanctuary of taking refuge in the protection of Allah the Most Merciful. Islam is to be “at peace” with Allah the Almighty, oneself, and all of creation. Islam is the only religion that has remained pure to perfectly match the pristine initial state of human nature per its design in creation. As Imam Ghazali (rahmatullahi alayh) stated in his Kimya-i Saadat, “Peace resides in preserving the fitrah (the original, pristine nature) and living according to it.”

Contentment, tranquility, and peace

You may have heard that most reverts who become Muslims through their own research say, “I found peace in Islam.” If we, as people who claim to be Muslims, are deprived of peace today, it means we need to return to Islam with a renewed iman in order to remember, find, and attain peace.

According to dictionaries,  peace denotes “harmonious relations, freedom from disputes, freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions, and harmony in personal relations.” There are verses and hadiths that describe peace as a state of the heart by using words like “itminan” and “sakinah.” Itminan is the heart's clear conviction and reassurance that comes into being when it is calmed and satisfied with certainty and an acceptance free from delusion, doubt, waswasa, and hesitation. Just like a picture becomes clearer with the right resolution and focus, itminan is the heart’s focus on its beliefs that clarifies when it achieves certainty.

Sakinah, on the other hand, is interpreted as a state of placation by and through tranquility. Our scholars attribute it with the definition, “a nur, a divine light effected in the heart as a result of divine blessing.” This is a nur that protects believers from the encumbrance of fear, anxiety, panic, and meekness, especially against non-believers. It allows believers to preserve their dignity, gravity, strength of character, and principles and act with a sound mind.

You may have noticed that these definitions of peace, itminan, and sakinah convey not the reality of the relevant emotions but how they affect people. Although, it is usually nigh impossible to define emotions in any other way. This necessity, however, shouldn’t pose an impediment to turning our attention towards the reality behind these emotions and how they are established and generated. There can be no peace without embracing the means that lead to the manifestation of the peace of the heart—means that present themselves after adhering to the truth and the will of Allah with a keen awareness. It is stated in the Qur’an that  “Listen, the hearts find peace only in the remembrance of Allah” (Ar-Ra’d, 28). Sakinah is a feeling awarded to believers as a reward for answering the call of Rasulullah (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam) and showing loyalty to him (Al-Fath, 18).

Peace is the name of this itminan and sakinah peculiar to the mu’min in tasawwuf. More specifically, it describes the delight and blissful feeling that the heart enjoys when blessed by a flow of divine inspirations and manifestations. Generally, it implies all aspects of the state of peacefulness.

The true source of peace

In the Jibril hadith, when Jibril (alayhissalam) asked the Prophet (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam), “Tell me about ihsan,” The Prophet (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam) replied, “Ihsan, is to worship as if you can see Allah. For although you cannot see Him, He sees you.” This hadith categorically states that people are in Allah the Most High’s presence at every moment and in every place. To worship Allah as if you see Him is only possible with the understanding that we are in His presence. The sign of this realization is dhikrullah. The sign of dhikrullah is to live in accordance with Allah’s will.

Dhikrullah is not just about uttering the names of Allah (jalla jalaluhu). Essentially, it is an act of the heart, and its manifestations in the tongue and other parts of the body will amount to nothing if they are not acts of the heart. Indeed, our obedience and worship are dhikr. Our righteous deeds are dhikr. To turn to the righteous and avoid what is forbidden is dhikr. In short, it is dhikr to do what Allah commands and to avoid what He forbids. All this encompasses the work of remembering our Rabb with the consciousness that we are at peace as a result of dhikrullah. For this reason, “The hearts find peace only in the remembrance of Allah.”  In its widest scope, we must understand the “dhikr” in the ayah above as “perfect iman, good deeds, and the bond the servant establishes between their heart and their Rabb through these essential elements.”

That being the case, if we are to give a description most appropriate to its truth, it can be said that “Peace is a profound feeling that arises in the heart when we realize that we are in Allah the Exalted’s presence and act according to this realization.” For example, a Muslim can experience this feeling during prayer when they perform it with khushu and ikhlas. A prayer that is performed with khushu and ikhlas and that leads to a state of peace is a prayer that the servant performs with the awareness that he is in peace. The duties of servitude carried out with the awareness of being in such a state of peace increases “marifah,” which is the divine knowledge and insight in the heart. Marifah increases closeness to Allah, devotion, and love. 

In the Noble Qur’an, “It is He who sent down tranquility into the hearts of the believers that they would increase in faith along with their [present] faith” (Al-Fath, 4). It is conducive to the perfection and continuity of the state of peace.

Being at peace is only possible by acting in accordance with the truth that we are always in His presence.

When we forget that we are in His presence

The state we call restlessness is the result of being unaware of the fact that we are always in the presence of Allah (subhanahu wa ta’ala) in all places. For this reason, committing a sin, an injustice, or abandoning or neglecting the duties of servitude weighs heavily on a Muslim’s heart. As Rasulullah (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam) describes, it “rouses suspicion in the heart” of a believer. Turning to sins and disobedience indicates the believer has forgotten dhikrullah, and by extension, Allah the Exalted Himself and the truth that we are in his presence. For this reason, it is stated in hadiths that we should repent immediately after committing a sin. We are required to do a good deed immediately after a bad one. Both repentance and good deeds are signs that we have gotten back on the straight and narrow and show that we have turned to Allah once more, recovering the consciousness that we are in His presence.

Continuous dhikr and constant, perfect peace in the heart is reserved for the Friends of Allah who are at the level of nafs al-mutmainnah and ihsan. Ordinary Muslims, even if they set out to reach this level, aren’t completely free from the conflict within. After all, Muslims are human beings too. Sometimes they follow their nafs, fall for the deceit of the shaytan, or get pulled in by the wicked allure of the world. Sometimes, disturbances outside of their control can lead them to give in to anger, fractiousness, despair, and fear, causing them to grow restless.

In such cases, the disturbance in the heart should be considered a warning that we need to reclaim the “state of peace.” The feeling of trepidation that engulfs the heart should be a means of giving up the sins we are embroiled in. Failing to do so and perpetuating heedlessness and agitation will either lead a person to seek peace in the most unlikely places or silence their heart.

Even if there is temporary happiness in the luxury, success, and comfort of the world, there is no peace. Just like the world itself is a restless place, the hectic pace of our daily lives takes so much from us that it causes us to neglect our servitude and our duties to Allah, resulting in yet another inflammation of distress. Another term  closely associated with peace is “waqfah,” which is translated as “stopping.” If you don’t make a “waqfah,” if you don’t stop to think clearly, then it’s not possible to know the truth. You cannot attain clarity without stopping and settling down to listen for the sound of truth and set it apart from all other noise. To numb the heart and mind with entertainment, temporary pleasures, and substance abuse in order not to feel the disquietude within is a cry of despair due to being stuck between the grinding gears of such an abusive, meaningless rush.

Preparation for the inevitable end and peace

Peace also means “being ready.” It requires preparation beforehand – if we are not prepared for an obligation on time, we become agitated. If we don’t take preventative measures against possible dangers, we become nervous. Recently, we have been talking a lot about the visible effects of climate change, such as floods, droughts, and extreme weather conditions. The possibility of contending with even worse natural disasters is making everyone feel deeply concerned, all because we are not ready enough. If the fear of being caught unprepared for what is possible is so unsettling, the fear of being caught unprepared for death, which is certain and from which there is no escape, should be a cause for greater concern. There is no point in putting up with the restlessness of this fear since fear is powerless to stave off the coming of death. So,  to eliminate this gnawing fear in our hearts and find peace, we must prepare ourselves for death and the afterlife, assuming it is one breath away.

The awliya are the most peaceful people of the world because, rather than defeat the fear of death, they ensure the death of their nafs before the death of their bodies and rejoice at the prospect of death as it will be their reunion with their Creator and a cause for celebration. Meanwhile, as can be discerned from the maturity and perfected iman of the awliya, peace is not a state of nonchalance, stolid indifference, inanity, aloofness, or senseless jubilation. It is derived as an outcome of the keen, undistinguishing love for both the blessings and burdens bestowed by Allah, the owner of absolute majesty over all of creation.

With such love, one should aspire to peace by rejecting any fondness for this world, which is but a ball and chain for one making preparations for death and beyond. To refuse to be infatuated with the world does not mean to neglect it altogether, turn our back on the blessings in it, ignore our responsibilities in this life, or live a secluded life away from everyone and everything. Zuhd is to prioritize our gains for the akhirah when our interests in akhirah and legitimate interests in the world are in conflict. It is to have contentment and even make do with barely enough to see to one’s basic necessities when there’s scant little to go around.

A royal spread worthy of a king’s dining hall is an eyesore for a Muslim endowed with zuhd when there are hungry people nearby who can’t eat.

Keeping the peace within the heart

Peace also means “law and order.” Peace and order are ensured by a healthy structure, a correct supervision system, and a reformative approach for correcting the defects and failing elements. Peace being a state of the heart presupposes several things: keeping law and order within the heart, facilitating its structural development, ridding it of ailments, and supervising its condition. These requirements are further consolidated by the fact that dhikrullah, the most indispensable prerequisite for itminan, is an action of a purified heart that has been fashioned into a jewel that holds perfected iman and is therefore worthy of holding qualities similar to baytullah. Just as a sultan will not hold his court in a decrepit, run-down palace, a heart sullied, blackened, and caught in a vice-like grip by the world’s riches and luxuries cannot be a receptacle for divine manifestations. When these manifestations are absent, so is dhikr, and when dhikr is absent, peace will have no grounds to take root in the heart.

Just as peace is the state of a prosperous heart, restlessness is the state of an afflicted one. While the growth and expansion of the heart turn it into a conduit for peace, its contraction into a narrow, lightless vessel that only has room for the world’s vices places it in the clutches of a harrowing distress. If it inclines towards its Rabb, it expands, and if it begins to surrender to the poisonous allure of the world, it contracts. A person cannot find peace unless they rid themselves of diseases such as greed, envy, selfishness, grudge, hatred, arrogance, hypocrisy, hopelessness, and stinginess. 

Purifying the heart from these diseases is undoubtedly a job reserved for competent professionals. For ages, this profession has been practiced by scholars who have inherited the legacy of prophets and kamil murshids, the awliya who are qualified to offer guidance and prescribe a remedy for these maladies. In fact, everything we have discussed from the very beginning are but stages and states gained through the course of tasawwuf. The ultimate purpose of tasawwuf is to enable people to live Islam with the reality of ihsan, admitting them into the group of true servants of Allah who return to their Lord well-pleased with Him and well-pleasing for Him.

Tasawwuf is the path that brings true peace to the believer. Our disturbances today stem from our nonattendance to this path.

The dominant thought of our age lost its peace long ago enough to forget what peace is. It is in search of something it cannot find for lack of an ability to recognize what it has lost. We partake in this futile pursuit by envying prosperity, technology, excess, and comfort. The deceptive, temporary sources of relief we misidentify as happiness and the fads we think of as peace feed into our inner turmoil. In reality, peace is our lost treasure that we have no way to reclaim other than returning to the path of Islam and recommitting to the guidance of tasawwuf. So, let’s look for peace in the right place so that we may find it.

Ali Yurtgezen