Page:A Moslem seeker after God - showing Islam at its best in the life and teaching of al-Ghazali, mystic and theologian of the eleventh century (IA moslemseekeraft00zwem).pdf/113



way to it, for it will soon pass. If you obey it, if you give up this fine position, this honourable post exempt from trouble and rivalry, this seat of au thority safe from attack you will regret it later on without being able to recover it.

" Thus I remained, torn asunder by the oppo site forces of earthly passions and religious aspira tions, for about six months from the month Rajab of the year A. D. 1096. At the close of them my will yielded and I gave myself up to destiny. God caused an impediment to chain my tongue and pre vented me from lecturing. Vainly I desired, in the interest of my pupils, to go on with my teaching, but my mouth became dumb.

" The enfeeblement of my physical powers was such that the doctors despairing of saving me, said: The mischief is in the heart, and has communi cated itself to the whole organism; there is no hope unless the cause of his grievous sadness be ar rested/

" Finally, conscious of my weakness and the prostration of my soul, I took refuge in God as a man at the end of himself and without resources. He who hears the wretched when they cry (Koran, xxviii. 63) deigned to hear me; He made easy to me the sacrifice of honours, wealth, and family" ("The Confessions," pp. 42-45).

That his conversion did not mean ethically all that the word means in the Christian sense is evi dent from what immediately follow