Wednesday, October 05, 2005

The Complete Human ( Insan il Kamil)1

It seems to me as if I know nothing about the Perfect Human yet that is what I aspire to. How does one aspire to what one does not know? It cannot be, one has to know to aspire to something.


What does it mean to be human? To have a body that functions like other animals, needing food, having a nervous system that has an autonomic part that functions without our conscious effort.
And then having a conscious part that seems to have a will. Or does it?
When the consciousness is a tribal one the individual will is subject to the tribal will.
There is a verse in the Quran that saya: When the angles asks an individual who is doing himself harm, why did you do this? And the individual replies, because my forefathers did it.
Not good enough an answer...If this answer is good enough then tribal consciousness is not good enough either. Doing something you found your parents doing is not good enough.
This reminds me of the story of the baked aubergines. Mum was baking aubergines and she cut the tops off. Daughter asked mum why do you cut so much off the top and mum says this is the way grandma did it. Daughter asks did you ask grandma why? So they phone grandma to ask and Grandma replied, because my baking tray was too small and the whole aubergine did not fit so I cut the tops off.....Mum's tray was big enough though.....
So that is what comes out of doing something just because your mum did it, you lose some aubergine!

No, I will not be able to get to the definition even in this post.
I think I may need the whole of Ramadan to ponder and write on this.
But my thought today is that the complete human is one who has a natural tone, is comfortable in his/her skin...and is at peace within and is in touch with reality , within and without.


Each human personality is like a piece of music,
having an individual tone and a rhythm of its own.
Hazrat Inayat Khan

4 comments:

Unknown said...

We lose more than aubergines when we don't question.
Selamat berpuasa

ahnali said...

hehe children tend to observe what their parents do n follow them =D plus those who r taught tht parents r always rite..muahaha..

dith said...

What does it mean to be in touch with reality, within and without?

sume said...

Children are big on wondering and asking those why's. It's something we shouldn't lose just because we've grown up.