saalamAlaikum
Ego (nafs) always desires to find excuses to look down on others and make one look superior. A person of one country looks down on people of other countries. It doesn’t stop there; two persons of the same country look down on each other because of different ethnic backgrounds. Inside family, relatives look down on each other and fight for supremacy. This is an excerpt from famous Ihya Ulumiddin of Ghazali on medicine of pride based on ancestry.
MEDICINE OF PRIDE BASED ON LINEAGE
If one takes pride for ancestry, let him treat this disease of his heart after knowing two things. One of the two things is that he should know that he is getting respect not for his own quality but for that of another. For this reason, a poet says:
If you take pride of ancestry though it be true,
Think of what thing you have been created.
What benefit will a man get owing to the honor of his own ancestor? If his predecessor would have been alive for whom he takes pride, he would have said: Honor is for me, who are you? You are merely a worm of my semen. Honor is not due to man for only this worm but for his soul which comes from God.
The second thing is that he could not recognize his real ancestor. His father was created of an obnoxious matter (semen) and his real ancestor was created of earth. God says “He created him from dust…†(003.059) Thus, man’s origin is earth which is trodden upon. How can he take pride of his ancestry?
(If you have benefited from this article, raise your hands and pray for me and send it to others)
