Desires make slaves out of kings and patience makes kings out of slaves.
Al-GhazaliRead
People count with self-satisfaction the number of times they have recited the name of God on their prayer beads, but they keep no beads for reckoning the number of idle words they speak.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the contrast between spiritual practices and the often overlooked impact of meaningless speech.
Al-Ghazali's quote emphasizes the human tendency to focus on superficial religious rituals, such as counting prayers, while neglecting the importance of our everyday speech and its consequences. It invites us to reflect on the value of our words and the depth of our spiritual practices, suggesting that mindfulness towards both our prayers and our speech is essential for genuine spiritual growth.
Themes
SpiritualityWordsPrayerMindfulnessSelf-Reflection
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about mindfulness, one might say, 'As Al-Ghazali reminds us, we should be mindful of our words in addition to our spiritual practices.'
More from Al-Ghazali
All quotes →The happiness of the drop is to die in the river.
Al-GhazaliRead
To completely trust in Allah is to be like a child who knows deeply that even if he does not call for the mother, the mother is totally aware of his condition and is looking after him.
Al-GhazaliRead
Do not fix hopes on your health, and do not laugh away life. Remember how they walked and now all their joints lie separately, and the tongue with which they talked lightly is eaten away by the worms
Al-GhazaliRead
A man of bad character punishes his own soul.
Al-GhazaliRead
The mere physical man is like the ant crawling on the paper, who observes black lettering and attributes its production to the pen and nothing more.
Al-GhazaliRead
Similar quotes
Perhaps there is no other knowing than the mere competence of the act. If at the heart of one's being, there is no self to which one ought to be true, then sincerity is simply nerve; it lies in the unabashed vigor of the pretense. But pretense is only pretense when it is assumed that the act is not true to the agent. Find the agent.
Alan WattsRead
The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.
John Stuart MillRead
Life stands before me like an eternal spring with new and brilliant clothes.
Carl Friedrich GaussRead
The liberty of the individual is no gift of civilization. It was greatest before there was any civilization.
Sigmund FreudRead
In my view, all that is necessary for faith is the belief that by doing our best we shall come nearer to success and that success in our aims (the improvement of the lot of mankind, present and future) is worth attaining...I maintain that faith in this world is perfectly possible without faith in another world.
Rosalind FranklinRead
What's the difference between the Lone Ranger and God? There really is a Lone Ranger.
Edward AbbeyRead