Discovering God

of having power; he may surrender himself before God without any compulsion. He is blessed in having been given the ability to convert the entire world of nature into spiritual provision for himself, for he has to develop himself intellectually by awakening his consciousness. When he does so, he finds truth at the level of personal discovery; the realization of God comes to him as he bows in self-prostration. Then he has to develop his personality to such a degree of moral refinement that he may be held deserving of finding a place in the vicinity of Almighty God, that is, Paradise. Those who fail to develop such a personality are worthless in the eyes of God. Three Levels of Development A tradition is recorded in different books of Hadith. In the words of Sahih Muslim, Abu Hurayra narrated that the Prophet of Islam said: “Man is like metal—like silver and gold. One who was better in the days of ignorance (that is, prior to Islam) is also better in Islam, if he can develop a deeper understanding in Islam.” (Sahih Muslim, Hadith No. 2638 b) In this tradition, the stages of a person’s intellectual development are explained. The first intellectual level is the one on which human beings are born. The second intellectual level is that which one attains by one’s own