What is Kindness? by Karim

What is Kindness?

by Karim

What is “kindness”? A simple enough question one would think, but one that opens us up to the deepest mysteries of God, if pursued.

“Kindness” according to the “Names” is that divine quality which the authors of the wonderful book, ‘The Physicians of the Heart’ tell us is the essence of Allah/God/The One. In particular they invoke one of the Names – Ya Rahman (Compassion/Mercy) and tell us that it is this Name that is ‘Inscribed on the Heart of God/Allah …an infinite container that is incredibly compassionate, kind, and tender. The sun of loving compassion that is endlessly shining. And it includes all the other divine Names’….

According to Rasina Fawzia al-Rawi (author of ‘Divine Names: The 99 Healing Names of the One Love) … “To be truly pregnant means to carry kindness and mercy in your heart and to let all creatures become your children.” Returning to the Physicians of the Heart, the authors tell us that the root meaning (in Arabic) of ArRahman (endless love), is rahm which means “womb.” ‘Allah’ they say, ‘provided human beings a womb to be born into and through which to have a realisation of the love that is at the very foundation of all that exists…’

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This is all wonderful stuff, but – turning to the word in English – we find it has a different history and one which is worth exploring a little if one has some time to spare! The root of the word for us harks back to the Old English (circa 459-1150) term ‘Kyndnes’ which meant then “Kin” or “Nation” in other words…people of our own ‘kind.’ It was only later, so the etymologists tell us, that the word evolved to something closer to our modern understanding, referring to ‘courtesy or noble deeds’.

Thus may we come to understand that others could have all kinds of ideas and/or emotional responses when asked to say what they think ‘Kindness’ is. However, as we have seen – Sufis, and perhaps Muslims more generally (for after all they pray five times daily asking Allah the most Compassionate, the most Merciful, to lead them, through His Divine Kindness to the straight path and to help them avoid the crooked one) – have very definite explanations for its origins and what it means for them. Are there then two different understandings to be had when one considers such a question as we have at the start of this piece, or do these differing views as expressed here through the ‘roots’ of this word in some ways converge so as to become inconsequential where one is discussing these matters? Or, indeed, do any of us (putting Arabic aside for a moment) still hold to the belief that “Kindness” refers too, or indeed should be restricted to, one’s own kind (Kinfolk)? One’s own Nation? If one’s answer to this is no, all well and good. If however one starts to balk at this gradual expansion of the limits (or otherwise) of this term to include members of another faith, of different social orders, and so on, then how does such balking fit-in with the form given to it by Islam and the concept of the Name ‘written on the heart of Allah’?

As always, caution is required where one is confronted by words with which one is so familiar that we think they hold no surprises, so barely spare them another thought.

If, then, we now return to this word ‘Kind/ness” with this added dimension of a more nuanced understanding of its derivation in both languages, there emerges a potential connection point between the English word “Kin” and the Arabic word for “womb” (rahm) that allows us to see that, regardless of such differences lexically and semantically we are all connected through this ‘being held/written on the Heart of All, which means in effect and practically speaking related each other in the deepest sense.

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A Personal Perspective

Recently I re-read a piece written by Ibn al ’Arabi concerning his own experience of this “Name” that is written on the heart of Allah (Meccan Revelations, vol. 1, p58) appears in a long Chapter on the “Oneness of Being” or Wahdat al-Wujud, in the introduction he explains that “… everything that may be said to exist in whatever mode is denoted by the Name “Allah” … [and] all things in the Universe come under the sway of this all-comprehensive Name’.

Perhaps for the first time I found a connection to my own experiences that I have previously written about in my blog, Tracks in a Pathless Land

https://tracksinapathlessland.home.blog

(see The Dream that changed my Life; & - within it - The Coorong Dream).

In the first ‘dream/experience’ I left my physical form in a ‘body of light’ during which time “I” was given to know and experience the connection of everything in creation (nothing left out), and the ‘Word’ that not only described this connection perfectly but was at the same time this connection! In the second dream/experience “I” was – amongst other things – shown this Word, both in its physical manifestation on oval stone tablets, and then asked to observe whilst a young woman in green silk robes demonstrated for me how it was written on her heart (by causing it to be raised on the breast over her heart)!

Thus, we arrive at the real place of comprehension/action in relation to ‘Kindness’ for it resides nowhere else than within us, within our own hearts, awaiting only to be enacted in this world. Only when we are truly able to comprehend through this opening can the giving (or passing on to another) be not merely a giving preference to kin/folk, but an awakening to need in other than self. We must needs discover who our “Kin” is to be able to let go of all these “Distinctions and differences that divide us” when one really encounters life (as Inayat’s prayer asks us to do) through this ‘raising up’!

A word of caution here. Once done there is no turning back, and the road we encounter as we live this experience into being can be extremely painful particularly when we encounter the pain and suffering of our fellow creatures’.

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As Inayat says:

‘It is not surprising if an ego that has become a flower does not wish to live among thorns, but that is its destiny, and in spite of all suffering it is preferable to be a rose than a thorn.’

[Saluk (Morals), Gatha 3, p174, in The Sufi Message, Vol. XIII]

On the Path of Return there is much to learn, but we are not alone. Whilst it takes time, effort, and consideration on the part of the devotee, this ‘awakening’ spoken of is also facilitated by the conspiration of life itself. Events begin to unfold both within and around us such that one may witness the gradual unfoldment of this sensitivity to recognise this connectedness of all things. Thus, in a somewhat ironic fashion, the action of moving towards other to help alleviate their suffering is actually helping us to ease our own, for, along with this realisation of our entwined interests comes a physical, psychological, and a spiritual “tenderising” such that these words of Inayat take on a very special significance.

This world is full of “thorns” not all of which aspire to become roses. As Inayat warns us… “the more sensitive you become the more you will have to suffer [because] The thorn cannot hurt another thorn, but the slightest thing can hurt a rose.” (Ibid, p174).

This was the first lesson given to us on the Sufi Path after our initiation by Hidayat, as Murshida Aziza slowly and carefully removed the thorns from the stems of the roses we had brought as a gift for them both on that day so many years ago now.

May God/Allah bless all our efforts!

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