Masala fima idha kana fi al-abd mahabbah lima huwa khayr wa haqq wa mahmud fi nafsihi
- Author died
- 728 AH
- Editions
- Dr. Muḥammad Rashād Sālim
Masala fima idha kana fi al-abd mahabbah lima huwa khayr wa haqq wa mahmud fi nafsihi ("Treatise on When a Servant Has Love for What Is Good, True, and Praiseworthy in Itself") is a theological and ethical treatise by the Hanbali scholar Ibn Taymiyya (661–728 AH / 1263–1328 CE) addressing the nature of human innate disposition (fitra), voluntary acts motivated by intrinsic love for virtue, and the relationship between natural inclination and divine law .
Subject and Core Argument
The treatise examines whether an individual is blameworthy for performing righteous deeds—such as aiding the needy, pardoning wrongdoers, pursuing knowledge, speaking truthfully, upholding trusts, and maintaining ties of kinship—purely out of an innate love for those acts themselves rather than out of explicit devotion to God or a desire for human praise . Ibn Taymiyya argues that this inclination is common to humanity in both pre-Islamic times and Islam, operating in both the theoretical and practical faculties of the soul . To illustrate this, he cites an exchange where Abu Dawud asked Ahmad ibn Hanbal whether he sought knowledge for God's sake, to which Ahmad replied: "For God is rare, but something was made beloved to me, so I did it" .
Ibn Taymiyya explains that God created human souls with an innate pleasure in perceiving truth, practicing justice, and showing benevolence, comparable to the sensory pleasure derived from agreeable sounds, beautiful sights, or pleasant scents . Acts performed solely from this innate inclination are neither sinful nor equivalent to ostentation (riya') or idolatry (shirk), though they do not earn the specific reward of intentional worship until performed for God . Such acts may nevertheless bring worldly reward or lead an individual toward divine guidance and sincerity, reflecting the early scholarly saying: "We sought knowledge for other than God, but it refused to be for anything other than God" . He also cites Khadija reassuring the Prophet Muhammad before his mission based on his inherent virtues: إنك لتصل الرحم وتصدق الحديث وتقري الضيف وتحمل الكل وتكسب المعدوم وتعين على نوائب الحق ("You maintain ties of kinship, speak the truth, host guests, support the destitute, provide for the needy, and assist in calamities of right") .
Critique of Theological Positions
Ibn Taymiyya engages with theological debates on rational good and bad (al-husn wa-l-qubh), critiquing both the Mu'tazilite and Ash'arite frameworks :
- The Rationalist Position: Those who affirmed intrinsic goodness and badness in acts were correct that these qualities inhere in the deeds and can be perceived by reason as well as revelation, but they erred in denying that these qualities relate to securing benefit and repelling harm for the agent, and in judging divine actions strictly against human rational standards while rejecting divine decree (qadar) .
- The Voluntarist Position: Those who claimed that goodness and badness arise solely from divine command and prohibition erred in denying intrinsic properties in actions, though they correctly recognized compatibility (mula'ama) and aversion (munafara) with human nature .
He attributes the shortcomings of both groups to an underlying denial of God's actual attributes of love, pleasure, and hatred for deeds, emphasizing that divine law (shari'a) does not suppress or alter natural disposition (fitra), but rather completes and refines it .
Epistemological Framework
Ibn Taymiyya classifies the avenues of knowledge into three interconnected faculties :
- Perception (al-basar): Comprehends immediate compatibility, aversion, worldly benefit, and harm in observable and internal phenomena .
- Revelation (al-sam'): Informs humanity of the unseen matters, benefits, and harms in the afterlife that direct perception cannot grasp .
- Intellect / Heart (al-aql / al-qalb): Comprehends and synthesizes what is witnessed and heard, establishing generalized and enduring knowledge across both sensory experience and revelation .
Publication History
The treatise was published within the commemorative volume Dirasat Arabiyya wa-Islamiyya Muhdah ila Mahmud Muhammad Shakir (pp. 445–452) . It was subsequently edited by Muhammad Uzayr Shams and included in the fifth volume of Jami al-Masa'il (pp. 191–199) .
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