Since Imam Ali (a) was a zahid...

Since Imam Ali (a) was a zahid, indifferent to the world and unselfish, with a heart that overflowed with the exuberance of the love of God, he looked at the world, from the minutest particle to the greatest star, as a unit entrusted with responsibility and duty. That is why he was so sensitive towards the matters of social rights. Had he been a hedonist devoted to his own interests, he would never have been the responsible and committed person that he was.

The Islamic traditions are eloquent in regard to this philosophy of zuhd and the Nahj al-balaghah lays particular emphasis upon it.

In a hadith, it is related from al-Imam Ja’far al-Sadiq (‘a) that he said: All hearts that harbour doubt or entertain shirk shall be inauthentic; that is why they adopted zuhd so that hearts may be emptied and made ready for the Hereafter.(3) As can be seen from this tradition, every kind of hedonism and attachment to pleasures is considered shirk and contrary to the worship of the One God.

Mawlana (Rumi) describes the zuhd of the ‘arif in these words: Zuhd means taking pains while sowing; Mystic knowledge (ma’rifah) is (care during) its cultivation; The ‘arif is the soul of the Law and the spirit of taqwa; For mystic knowledge is the fruit of the labours of zuhd. Abu ‘Ali Ibn Sina, in the ninth namat of his al-‘Isharat, which he devotes to the description of various stations of the mystics (maqamat al-‘arifin), differentiates between the zuhd of the ‘arif and that of the non-‘arif.

He writes: The zahids who have no knowledge of the philosophy of zuhd, make a certain deal in their imagination: they barter the goods of the world for the goods of the Hereafter. They forego the enjoyments of the world in order that they may enjoy the pleasures of the Hereafter. In other words, they abstain here in order to indulge there. But an aware zahid, acquainted with the philosophy of zuhd, practises it because of his unwillingness to engage his inner self with anything other than God.

Such a man, out of his self-respect, regards anything other than God to be unworthy of attention and servitude. In another section of the same book where he discusses spiritual discipline, Ibn Sina says: This training has three ends in view. First, removal of impediments from the path towards God; second, subjugation of the earnal self (al-nafs al-‘ammarah) to the contented self (al-nafs al-mutma’innah), third, refinement of the inward (batin).