On Freedom (hurriyya)

From the blog Red-Sulphur

God Almighty and Glorious says, "And they prefer others over themselves even when they are in destitute" (59:9).

They only prefer others to themselves in order to strip themselves of what they have abandoned anyway and preferred to leave to others. Ali ibn Ahmad al-Ahwazi reported... from Ibn Abbas, that the Messenger of God said, "That which minimally satisfies the needs of your flesh is sufficient for any one of you. Finally it comes down to four cubits and a span (the size of a grave). The whole business returns to its end."

Freedom means that a servant is not a slave to created beings and that things and events do not exercise control over them. The sign that it is sign and whole is that preferring one thing to another drops from a person's heart so that it makes no difference whatever may chance to occur...