Rida Billah
Definition
Rida billah — contentment with God — is the culminating station of this book and one of the highest stations in the entire spiritual hierarchy of the Ihya. It is the state in which the heart has so fully surrendered to God's will that it prefers whatever God decrees over whatever it might have chosen for itself. This is not resignation or passivity but a profound, joy-filled trust: the heart knows that God's will is wiser, more merciful, and more loving than anything it could desire on its own, and so it rests in whatever comes. The Quran promises: 'God is pleased with them, and they are pleased with Him' — and al-Ghazali takes this mutual pleasure as the definition of the highest spiritual arrival.
As understood in the classical tradition of Imam al-Ghazali and the scholars of his school.
Appears in
1 book in the library
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