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The Author said: Since we have already treated a person's self-accounting before God (great and exalted), and since abstinence from the world (zuhd) is among the aspects of that accounting — for it is among the causes that assist the servant in fulfilling the conditions of self-accounting — I thought it fitting to explain the varieties of abstinence and what is sound and what is unsound in it.
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Abstinence in the usage of the law and those who apply it to religious and worldly matters is of two kinds: general abstinence and special abstinence. The general kind is obligatory upon all rational believers; the special kind belongs to the spiritual elite among the believers.
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The Author said: Know that the term "abstinence" in common usage means the suppression of the soul's desire when capable of satisfying it and having the means to do so — the cause for this suppression being some consideration that makes it obligatory. It is said: "The abstinent one is he who can but refrains."
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The cause that makes the suppression of desire obligatory is of two kinds: one arising from the law, the other from rational deliberation. The cause arising from the law is God's prohibition of certain things, such as the forbidden foods, the forbidden sexual relations, forbidden financial dealings, and the like. Rational deliberation leads one to refrain from things that are permitted but whose excess is harmful to the body or to the religion or to both.
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Know, my brother, that there are two desires whose satisfaction the soul is compelled to seek by the necessity of preserving the life of the body: the desire for food and drink, and the desire for sexual union. The Creator (great and exalted) attached to these two desires their own pleasure, in order to impel the soul toward them for the maintenance of the body's existence and the preservation of the species — as He said: "He has also set the world in their heart" (Ecclesiastes 3:11). If these two had not been pleasurable the human being would not seek them, and if he did not seek them the body would perish and the species would be cut off.
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Alongside these two, God (great and exalted) assigned to the soul passion (hawā) — which is its inclination toward the two desires of the body and toward all the pleasures and comforts by which the body subsists. This passion was assigned to the soul as the soul was assigned to the body: just as the soul governs the body and directs it as it pleases, so passion governs the soul and inclines it according to its nature. Passion is like an overseer appointed to urge the soul toward food, drink, sexual union, and all the pleasures and comforts by which the body subsists.
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All of this was created as ordered and calibrated by God — its full harmony and completion being the proper order of the world, as the sage said: "He has made everything beautiful in its time" (Ecclesiastes 3:11), and: "For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven" (Ecclesiastes 3:1). The general meaning of abstinence and the world's need for it has thus become clear, along with the necessity of the two kinds of desire for the body.
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The Author said: Know that the two domains are religion and world. The abstinent who refrains for the sake of religion, and who are the people of true and sincere abstinence, are of three groups.
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The first is a people who pursued the highest degree of abstinence in order to resemble the spiritual beings and the celestial angels — so they refrained from all the world's pleasures and devoted themselves entirely to the worship of their Creator (great and exalted), turning away from the two desires of the body to whatever extent life allowed. But this path overreached what religion obligates, for it is an imitation of beings who are not human; and the sages criticized whoever pursued this path.
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The second group consists of people who pursued a middle path between the highest level and the lowest — inhabiting their homes and having solitude in their dwellings. They attained both domains and obtained both portions. They are closer to the proper limit of the law than those previously mentioned.
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The third group consists of people who pursued the lowest level of the law's limit regarding abstinence — those who combined participation in the world with devotion to God, fulfilling the world's obligations and the religion's obligations together, giving each its due portion without excess in either. This group is the one that the law validates and the prophets and our early teachers praised.
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There is also a fourth group — those who pretend to abstinence while secretly attached to the world. Scripture says of them: "Their tongue is a sharpened arrow; he speaks deceit with his mouth; each speaks peace with his neighbor while plotting ambush in his heart" (Jeremiah 9:7). These are the furthest of people from the truth, the worst of them in conduct — their claim to abstinence is false, and the sincere observer will recognize the reality of their conscience from the lie in their abstinence.
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The Author said: As for the explanation of the conditions of the special and true abstinence. One of the wise described the true abstinent person as follows: he is one who has renounced the world — not with the renunciation of those who are compelled by weakness and poverty to renounce it, but by choice; who has occupied himself with God (great and exalted) — not seeking a reward from Him in the world, but seeking His favor; whose character is good toward the creatures; who is a lantern in the land; a helper to the weak; a refuge for the beset; who does not tear away veils nor expose secrets; who has much tribulation and little complaint; who, when he sees a good deed, publicizes it, and when he sees a bad deed, conceals it; who is generous with what he possesses, and sparing in hope, in desire, and in fantasy.
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The qualities of the true abstinent include that he be the most vigilant of people regarding forbidden matters and the most scrupulous in keeping away from what the law prohibits. He should give his soul its due portion of the permitted and the lawful in proportion to what keeps his body alive and preserves his strength for the service of God (great and exalted). His goal in giving his soul the permitted pleasures should be to gain strength and sustain himself for the worship of God, not for pleasure itself — for when he eats and drinks and takes a wife, his intention should be for the worship of God, so that these acts become worship.
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He should feel mercy and compassion for all God's creatures, being free of their burdens, speaking well of them, taking the better interpretation of their acts, cutting off hope of benefiting from them, and despairing of what is in their hands. He should feel love for all of them, and incline toward the entirety of them.
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The Author said: True abstinence encompasses several aspects: abstinence in outer conduct, abstinence in inner life and beliefs, and abstinence in the heart's thoughts and inclinations.
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**Abstinence regarding forbidden desires:** The highest goal regarding forbidden desires is that the forbidden becomes naturally objectionable to you — that unlawful sexual union and taking money through prohibited means and taking pride in another's shame become naturally as repugnant to you as eating excrement or drinking urine or wearing filthy clothing. This highest level is not within everyone's reach; but the closest thing to it is that the forbidden become objectionable through reason and religion, even if it retains its natural appeal. This is an attainable goal for whoever strives toward it. Know, my brother, the greatness of God (great and exalted) and His majesty — and in proportion to your understanding, look after your soul and be abstinent regarding whatever occupies you away from God's obligations with your heart and intention.
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**Abstinence regarding the tongue:** The tongue has power over life and death — "Death and life are in the power of the tongue" (Proverbs 18:21). I mention it before the other senses and limbs because restraining it is harder than restraining the others, as the pious one did in saying: "Who is the man who desires life... Guard your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit" (Psalms 34:13–14). Among the greatest sins are those of the tongue: false oath, slander, lying, flattery, idle speech, and backbiting. Whoever guards his tongue from these guards himself from great evils.
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**Abstinence regarding the eye:** Do not use your sight and glance for what harms you. God is more worthy of being feared and revered — He who warned: "Do not follow your heart and your eyes" (Numbers 15:39). And our early teachers said: "The heart and the eyes are the intermediaries of sin." Rather use your sight for looking at God's creation and reflecting on His signs, as God said: "Lift your eyes on high and see: Who created these?" (Isaiah 40:26).
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**Abstinence regarding food:** When you eat, make your morning meal lighter than your evening meal if you eat twice daily — to lighten the movement of your limbs during the day and to make the matters of your religion and your world easier for you. If you are fasting, break your fast with what is of the lightest and least heavy food, such as pomegranate and grape and the like. This advice is founded on what is healthiest for the body and most conducive to clarity of intellect.
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**Abstinence and livelihood:** The abstinent person should not be a burden on his brothers. Some of the scholars said: "May God have mercy on a servant who was abstinent from the world but did not make his abstinence a burden on his brothers, and who lifted his burden from them." He should engage his limbs in some form of craft or work — as Scripture says: "When you eat the labor of your hands, happy are you and it is well with you" (Psalms 128:2), and the early teachers praised the man who occupies himself with a trade.
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**Abstinence in what concerns our hearts, beliefs, and the praiseworthy and blameworthy thoughts in our chests:** The first form of this is abstinence from the world's acquisitions — not in word but at the level of the heart's thought, so that if wealth came to you, you would not covet it, and if it were taken from you, you would not grieve over it.
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The beginning of this inner abstinence is that your heart be free of attachment to things and not cling to them, and that you consider your possessions God's trust in your hand — to be spent according to His command and in what He pleases.
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Among the strengthening supports for this inner abstinence are the stories of the prophets. Elijah walked on the power of a single meal for forty days and forty nights — as Scripture says: "He went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights" (1 Kings 19:8). And the case of the Nazirite, whom God honored and called holy — "All the days of his Naziriteship he is holy to the Lord" (Numbers 6:8) — for refraining from something of the world's pleasures with a sincere intention for God. And among the prophets' marks of dress: they wore garments of hair, as Scripture says: "And they shall not wear a hairy cloak in order to deceive" (Zechariah 13:4) — which indicates that this was the dress of the distinguished ones in ancient times, until people of that age adopted it as a form of ostentation.
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Among what the tradition has transmitted to us in the Talmud regarding this is more than my book can encompass. The best of it is found in tractate Avot and in their saying: "This is the way of Torah: eat bread with salt, drink water by measure, sleep on the ground, live a life of difficulty, and toil in Torah" (Avot 6:4).
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The Author said: Those who sought sustenance but went beyond it to the superfluities of food, drink, sexual union, and building — the more the land grew in civilization, the more the intellects grew in ruin, as Scripture says: "Lest you eat and be satisfied... and your cattle and your sheep multiply" (Deuteronomy 8:12–13). They were drawn by hope and pulled by desires and dragged by fantasies — stumbling in their blind wandering, going astray in their deception. They heard but did not absorb; they spoke but did not act. They sought comfort and fell into hardship; they sought joy and were covered with sorrow. Time deceived them and negligence caught them.
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But those who were not distracted by hope and whose appointed time was not wasted — they were ever on guard against death's approach and took precaution against its consequences. They are God's guests and those who seek Him and hope in Him and worship Him. They spoke the truth and cleaved to righteousness without deviation or deception. They were given to awe, fear, trembling, and reverence of God's greatness and majesty. They did not cease to be so until the Creator (great and exalted) befriended them and calmed their awe and fear — and at that point, love of God (great and exalted) blossomed in them, and they were singled out for closeness to Him.
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See their faces: light has come upon them. When you look into their hearts, you find hearts broken for God, alive with the conversation of God, empty of worldly occupations. The love of God fills their hearts; His fear dwells in their faces; His glorification is upon their tongues. They feel no loneliness with God, and no closeness to those other than God, and no pleasure in anything other than the pleasure of God. May God make us among them, through His mercy and grace.