It may be some high ethical and moral ideal...

It may be some high ethical and moral ideal, like honour, dignity, nobility, or liberty, or it may belong to the spiritual sphere, like the remembrance of God, the love of God, and the desire to acquire nearness to Him. Accordingly, the Zahid (i.e. one who practises zuhd) is someone whose interest transcends the sphere of material existence, and whose object of aspiration lies beyond the kind of things we have mentioned above.

The indifference of a zahid originates in the sphere of his ideas, ideals, and hopes, not in his physiological makeup. There are two places where we come across the definition of ‘zuhd’ in the Nahj al-balaghah. Both of them confirm the above interpretation of zuhd. Imam Ali (a), in khutba 81, says: O people! zuhd means curtailing hopes, thanking God for His blessings and bounties, and abstaining from that which He has forbidden. Also, he says: All zuhd is summarized in…