The Alchemy of Happiness

     Al-Ghazali's Kimiya-yi Sa'aadat, or The Alchemy of Happiness, Book by Al-Gazali as it is known in the English translation, is one of these books that can accompany you during your life and give you a moment of peace and reflection when you need it most. One can easily read it cover to cover, but it can also simply be used as a reminder of various ideas and thoughts that offer a deeper insight into human nature, and ways of improvement when dealing with one’s self and others. To me it has always been an inspiration and a source of reflection about life, its obstacles, and possibilities, its difficulties and goodness.

     Al-Ghazali, who is better known in the Western world under the name Algazel, was a mystic for most of his life, besides working as a jurist, Islamic scholar, and philosopher, but towards the end of his life he felt the need to emphasize his position and share the deep insights he had gained during his life in The Alchemy of Happiness, a book that was written almost one thousand years ago, but still surprises and amazes with its simplicity and depth. He took a position that was trying to reconsolidate between a pure mystical and solely spiritual pursuit of happiness, and the more practical life oriented approach that requires active and scheduled worship. This is something I personally advocate, as I firmly believe that one cannot stand without the other. It can easily be observed that, if one only relies on the spiritual calling of one’s faith, then sooner or later, the person will become forgetful and sketchy in implementing the principles of his faith into his dealing with people, because life is complex and often distracting. In an attempt to clarify this complexity of life, Al-Ghazali introduces the reader to the main elements necessary for the metamorphosis that can turn an average person from a pure instinctual animal-like state into a being of purity and angelic inner beauty. He is illustrating how to become a better human being by following four principal enquiries:  (1) the search of knowledge of the self; (2) the realization and knowledge of God; (3) the analysis and understanding of this world; and (4) the awareness and understanding of the hereafter.
It is of obvious importance to most philosophers that we need to learn about ourselves in order to achieve-ultimate- happiness. If we do not know who we are, and what controls and drives us as human beings, than we are unable to understand the world around us. Al-Ghazali not only offers us the means to analyze ourselves and others by defining categories of desires that threaten our goodness, but he also proposes concrete means and ways to betterment. He explains that the key to self knowledge is the heart, by which he does not mean the physical heart, but the heart that was given to us by our Creator and that will ultimately return to Him comparable to what Christians would call a soul. Losing ourselves in this world and its worldly affairs will not only cause us suffering and eventually damage this precious heart, but most importantly, it will result in denying our cosmic origin. This is especially dangerous to our selves because it is this divine heart, which we are all carrying, that is our source of the absolute awareness about who we are as the creation of God. In practical this awareness is important in many ways. It serves as our connection to ourselves and God, but also determines our dealing with others, as it teaches us to respect and consider all humans as equally carrying a divine nature. Al-Ghazali also teaches us that when our passions take over our lives, it is as if we had handed over 'an angel to the power of a dog'. But if we restrain ourselves and learn to discipline our mind in goodness, compassion and knowledge, we will be able to eliminate the mental and spiritual rust of our mind and shine it up to truly reflect the divine light we carry in our hearts. As a practical result, people who practice the lifestyle, he is recommending, will become more intuitive, and knowledge that otherwise would not have reached them will enter their minds because of the achieved awareness and the deeper connection to their divine origins. On a personal level, I can attest to these experiences of ideas, knowledge and informaiton that one is able to obtain in different stages of mind, and I encountered issues in my life that were resolved with unexpected ease as long as I kept a reasonable lifestyle and I practiced control over the desires that were trying to invade my mind during many stages of my life.  Al- Ghazali reminds us that we are spiritual beings in a human body. If we forget about our connection to God and neglect our active worship, we are committing injustice towards our own selves. Our Creator appreciates our worship, and more importantly, he knows that it is good for us, but He does not waste away if we stop our practices, however, we might, as we need the connection to our origins in order to be a complete human being.

     Al-Ghazali also reminds us that oftentimes a suffering, disease or disaster might reach us for other reasons then we might spontaneously assume. For example, while we will be looking for a reason and a cure when we have a medical problem, we might forget that this ailment might have been sent to us to draw us closer to our Creator and to give us a chance to start over with our life. How often did we change the direction of our life after a drastic crisis? In modern business philosophy and countless self-help books, people have commented on this issue many times, and the word crisis has almost become a synonym with opportunity. I believe this is what Al-Ghazali is referring to here, turning our crisis into an opportunity to better ourselves by strengthening the spiritual connection with our Origin, with our God.  The author also reminds us that, if we are remembering God, we are remembering our own mortality as humans and our accountability for the deeds we commit in this life; he emphasizes that this knowledge serves us in a twofold way: it keeps our egos at bay and strengthens us in our struggle to become better and more compassionate human beings.
One of my favorite aspects in this part of the book is the notion that as humans, we find satisfaction in using our senses and faculties, just like anger rejoices in taking vengeance, the eyes delight in seeing beauty, and the ear in hearing music; our highest faculty as humans is to locate truth and as a result, we find enormous enjoyment and greatest amazement in finding the ultimate knowledge of ourselves and of God. Knowing just as much as I know today, granted me enormous peacefulness and strength in my life and I am constantly looking forward in gaining more insight and experience in this particular apprehension. I experienced that this is a struggle for life and that there is no sudden enlightenment, but a continuous work that needs to be done. Parts of it may become easier over time because we become accustomed to certain things once they enter our long term memory, and become our second nature. But even then, we have to be permanently attentive to ourselves and adjust when necessary, because it is also human nature to forget and neglect, when the outer world overwhelms us and takes possession of our attention and focus.

     Following the chapters about the knowledge of ourselves and our Creator,  Al-Ghazali moves on to the chapter about right dealings with other human beings. He introduces us to the subject by saying: "This earthly world is a caravansary on its journey to God, and all mankind is gathered as travel companions. As they all wander towards the same goal, and are all bound together in a caravan, they have to hold up peace and harmony, help each other, and respect each other’s rights." (Al-Ghazali) This simple comparison teaches us about how to treat and respect our fellow human beings. However, Al-Ghazali does not only advice us in how to deal with neighbors, relatives and fellow men in general, but soon directs our attention to the true and pure nature of friendship. He warns us to spend our time with friends that join us for worldly reasons or because they are hoping to benefit in one way or the other from our friendship and relation to them. While they have still certain rights on us as human beings, they should not be considered true friends. The true friend is the one that loves you for the sake of this friendship and for the sake of God, which means he has no ulterior motive for his affection, but the fact that God planted this love in his heart. It is the person, who would give up his or her own advantage for the sake of the friend, and it is the person who would risk his or her life to prevent the friend from harm or even committing an act of injustice. It is this true friend, we all hope for in life to have on our side, the one that thinks in our interest, and who has compassion and care to offer for us. It is the kind of person that permanently pushes us to be our best and whose greatest hope is that we are worthy in the eyes of our Creator. It is a selfless love that Al-Ghazali praises as an ideal, and he also explains our duties as a real true friend. He explains to the friends when they have to be silent, and when to talk, how far they have to go in sacrificing their wealth and possessions, and eventually even their lives, if the friend is in danger. He also speaks of the importance of forgiveness and intercession for the friend, as well as loyalty and truthfulness. These ideals are obviously hard to find in a person, and someone, with whom we can build a relationship like this, can be counted as a rare gem. But this is how real friendship should look like, and how we should try to live up to these ideals, when we decide to make someone our friend and call him by this name. It is true that many of our relations will not reach a mutual level of these values and ideas, but as a person of integrity, we should go by these principles and offer our truthfulness and loyalty to others, and approach them without having agendas or selecting them for friendship according to our needs and wants. If we treat people this way, we will find relations that will develop in real friendships that orientate themselves towards the noble values mentioned above. Overall, the pursuit of following these ideals tends to improve the relationships we have with all kinds of people, family, friends, employees, business partners and customers.
The Alchemy of Happiness easily offers further inspiration, as Al-Ghazali moves on to the chapter about human and divine love, where he beautifully explains the different level of love a human being is able to reach in his or her lifetime. He explains the nature of love and discloses that our ultimate happiness can be found in our love to God our Creator, a love that can become so strong of a bond that it will still provide happiness even in our darkest and most difficult moments. This love will fill our hearts so entirely that it can take us through hardships and crisis without being greatly affected by them. He compares the situation to a person who agrees to undergo a surgery, and despite the hurt, rejoices in the certainty, that this operation -even if painful- will bring him the benefit of a cure, just like calamity will purify us and grant us merit in the judgment of God, if we patiently deal with the test and take the right actions. As a matter of fact, I experienced many times, that the worst thing to do in a crisis is not to be patient. What are ultimately our options to deal with it? Giving up, or letting oneself drown in self-pity is not going to resolve any issue, but on the opposite, usually drives us deeper into the disaster. Trust and patience and a great deal of gratefulness however, can help us to keep up our optimism and our ability to take action, when action is required. Patience also keeps our minds clear and our senses sharp, so we are able to deal with new situations and make the best out of it.
     The Alchemy of Happiness is a book that is written using many deep and beautiful allegories that are simple enough so almost everybody can understand their meanings. Al-Ghazali, even though he was a lifetime mystic, employs reason alone to prove the existence of God and the truth of religion. And even though he has been called 'The Proof of Islam', his writings could make a case for any religion. His greatest message is that, no matter what religion we might call your own, our greatest happiness derives from the knowledge that we are all creations of God and that therefore we have been made for a purpose. We obtain peace from the certitude that we are merely travelers in this foreign world, who will eventually return to an eternal paradise. These messages are so essential, because they put into perspective our efforts, our pursuit of righteousness, our goals and means and most importantly our hope.