Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
Articles

Ghadab and the Single Piece of Advice

Citation Formats

General Reference

APA Style

BibTeX

Learn More
Ghadab and the Single Piece of Advice

Sahih al Bukhari records a man asking the Prophet for advice and, receiving the answer do not become angry, repeating the request several times hoping for a fuller counsel, only to be given the same single instruction each time, a report akhlaq scholars cite as evidence that ghadab was judged sufficiently central to right conduct that restraining it could stand in, on its own, for an entire programme of ethical instruction.

Ghazali's treatment in the Ihya locates the danger in anger's specific effect on judgement, describing it as a fire that, once kindled, can overwhelm the intellect's capacity to restrain the tongue and the limbs, producing speech and action a person would not have chosen in a calmer state and often regrets once the state has passed, which is why his prescribed remedies focus less on suppressing an angry feeling once it has already arisen, judged too late to be reliably effective, than on removing its habitual causes beforehand, correcting the pride, kibr, and excessive attachment to one's own status that akhlaq literature treats as anger's usual root. The tradition distinguishes this excessive ghadab sharply from a measured anger at genuine wrongdoing, which several scholars including Ghazali treat as a natural and even necessary faculty when it remains proportionate and directed by reason rather than seizing control of it.

Cross-Tradition Connections

Article On

Sources
Comments (0)
No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.
Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.

View At A Past Year

The atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.