Prescription 9: Your Dynamic Selflessness
طبيب دوار بطبه
Amir al-Mu’minin (ʿa) is reported to have introduced the Holy Prophet (S) as follows:
طَبِيب دَوار بطبهِ، قَدْ أحْكَم مَرَاهِمَهُ، وأحمى مواسمه ، يَضَعُ ذَلِكَ حَيْثُ الْحَاجَةُ إِلَيْهِ مِنْ قُلُوبِ عُمِّي وَآذَانِ صُم والسنة بكم، متتبع بدوائِهِ مَوَاضِعَ الْغَفْلَةِ وَمَوَاطِنَ الحيرة
[The Prophet (S)] was a traveling physician who has set ready his ointments and heated his instruments. He uses them wherever the need arises for curing blind hearts, deaf ears, and dumb tongues. He went with his medicines to the places of negligence and places of perplexity.1
Although the word tabib in the above directions of Imam ʿAli (ʿa) has apparently been employed in the spiritual usage of the word, it is also extremely suitable for the medical doctor who mainly deals with the body of the human being. The fundamental message in the above passage is that a doctor must be concerned for the well-being of others, and hence go after the ailing one and not always anticipate the ailing one to come to him. This is the true spirit of a doctor.
Fortunately, we do have programmes where doctors travel to poor villages and serve to treat the indigent free of charge. However, this is not enough. The doctor should not wait for such programmes to be held at community level. He must be a nation (ummah) in himself yearning for the emancipation and serenity of others. He must therefore allocate some of his precious time to go to homes and places where he would be able to serve and practically follow the above prophetic tradition. And this is one of the most important secrets of progress and development in a doctor.
Amin al-Islam Shaykh al-Tabrasi (d. 548 AH) in his Majmaʿ al-bayan fi tafsir al-Qur’an mentions a narration from Wahab, who said:
ربما اجتمع على عيسى من المرضى في اليوم خمسون ألفا من أطاق منهم أن يبلغه بلغه ومن لم يطق أناه عيسى يمشي إليه
Sometimes in one day around ʿIsa (ʿa) would gather fifty thousand sick people. Those among them who could reach him would reach him, but those who could not, ʿIsa (ʿa) would walk to them [to cure them]2
Those who would like to know the kernel of the meaning of thanking Allah which would reap increase and development must understand that this is one of the most powerful ways of expressing gratitude. Interestingly, the word shukr signifies the disclosure of a blessing. When someone discloses a divine blessing, he is known to have expressed practical gratitude.
When one employs his knowledge and skill for their fundamental purpose, Allah will make him more powerful and able. The secret therefore is to use the blessing for the purpose of its creation.
This makes me recall an incident worthy of mention: Some years ago, one of the Muslim organizations arranged a summer camp at a place in East Africa. The normal trend is that in such retreats there are always doctors brought to attend to the youth if they were to suffer from any kind of sickness or malady. That year we had one doctor who was given a room where he was to meet the ailing patients.
It so happened that some of the students turned so ill that they were not able to walk to the clinic. So the doctor was approached and informed about the situation, and he arrogantly said that it is not his duty to go to the patients, but rather it is their duty to come to him.
Fortunately, among those who had come as instructors and teachers was one who was a well- established physician but would not occupy himself in his practice due to his great interest in studying the depths of religion. This noble instructor exemplified the true character of a tabib (a doctor who instils serenity in the heart of the patient).
Despite not being his responsibility to diagnose and treat the ailing ones, he went from room to room and talked to the suffering ones with utter patience, so that he may treat them. When I saw this scenario, my thought was transported to the word angel, and I thought to myself that indeed we do have angelic human beings on this earth.
The ancient history of doctors reveals that we had very spiritually powerful doctors who were not only well-versed in their field but had elevated their spirit and epitomized the term tabib in the true sense of the word. One such figure is Asclepius (isqilbyus). Galen is reported to have said that God Almighty revealed the following unto Asclepius:
لأن أسميكَ مَلَكاً أَقْرَبُ مِنْ أَنْ أُسَمِّيَكَ إِنْسَانَا
Naming you an angel is more suitable than naming you a human being.3 Obviously this does not imply that an angel is higher in status than a human being but alludes to the fact that Asclepius would enormously employ his intellect, which in our traditions is aptly called the inner apostle (al-rasul al-batin) and would never be overcome by the faculty of appetite (al-quwwah al-shahawiyyah).
It seems that one would feel that he does not have such a faculty in him. Otherwise, according to a tradition, if the human being overcomes his faculty of appetite, he transcends the level of the angels.
Imam al-Sadiq (ʿa) is reported to have said:
قال أمير المؤمنين علي بن أبي طالب عَلَيْهِ السَّلام: إِنَّ اللهَ عَزَّ وَجَلَّ رَكَّبَ فِي الْمَلائِكَةِ عَقْلاً بِلَا شَهْوَةٍ ، وَرَكَّبَ في البهائم شهوة بلا عقل، وركب في بني آدم كلتيهما، فَمَنْ غَلَبَ عَقْلُهُ شَهْوَتَهُ فَهُوَ خَيْرٌ مِنْ الْمَلَائِكَةِ ومن غلب شهوته عقله فهو شر من البهائم
Amir al-Mu’minin ʿAli ibn Abi Talib (ʿa) said: Indeed Allah, the Invincible and Majestic, mounted in the angels’ intellect without appetite, and He mounted in the animal’s appetite without intellect, and mounted both in the children of Adam. Therefore, whosoever’s intellect overcomes his appetite is better than the angels, and whosoever’s appetite overcomes his intellect is worse than animals.4
We pray to the Almighty to inspire the doctors to go after the patients and not limit themselves to the hospitals that they work in or the personal dispensaries they own, nor depend on their noble communities to start thinking and arranging for such divine ventures.