True Worship Is Obedience
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"O my son," writes al-Ghazali, "the essence of knowledge is to know what obedience and worship truly are."
Worship, he explains, is to follow what Allah has commanded and to stay away from what He has forbidden, in your words, your actions, and what you choose to leave.
He gives surprising examples. If a person fasts on the day of Eid, thinking it is extra devotion, he is actually disobeying, because Allah has forbidden fasting on that day. If a person prays in clothes that were taken unlawfully, the outward form may look like worship, but he is still in sin.
So worship is not simply doing religious things. It is doing what He wants, the way He wants it.
Then al-Ghazali warns his student about another trap. Do not be dazzled, he says, by the dramatic sayings and ecstatic outbursts that some people repeat. The path is not walked with clever words. It is walked with effort, by cutting off the ego’s cravings with the sword of discipline.
A loose tongue, and a heart covered in rust, heedless and greedy, these are signs of misfortune.
The student had also asked about deep spiritual states. And al-Ghazali answers gently, some things cannot be explained in a letter.
Can you describe the sweetness of honey to someone who has never tasted it? Can words alone give him that taste? No. It must be tasted.
So he says: walk the path, and you will taste. Do not ask for the description of a fruit you have never tried to pick. Act on what you already know, and Allah will open to you what you do not yet know.
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