Rabbaniyat: Islamic Spirituality

Rabbaniyat means one’s inner personality may acquire godly qualities by becoming immersed in thoughts of God and the Hereafter. This level of spirituality is produced after an intellectual revolution rather than by renouncing the material world.

I was once asked to explain the concept of spirituality in Islam and what, from the Islamic viewpoint, the method was of attaining spirituality. I said that the word ‘spirituality’ (or ruhaniyat) began to be used later in the history of Islam. In the Quran the word used for it is rabbaniyat (3:79), meaning the virtue of being God-oriented.

It is generally believed that there is only one way of finding spirituality and that is through renunciation. But that is not true. What we achieve by renouncing the world is not spirituality but mysticism (rehbaniyat) and, according to a tradition mysticism is not desirable in Islam. (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 25893)

Ruhaniyat or rabbaniyat means one’s inner personality may acquire godly qualities by becoming immersed in thoughts of God and the Hereafter. This level of spirituality is produced after an intellectual revolution rather than by renouncing the material world. This is an act of intellectual rather than physical renunciation. According to the Quran, the way to this intellectual renunciation is tawassum, meaning the learning of lessons. Such spirituality can be found through an intellectual awakening which in the Quran is called abundant remembrance of God (zikr-e-kaseer) (62:10).

This abundant remembrance of God is not simply a matter of repeating words. It is, in fact, an intellectual act of seeing God’s signs in material things and learning lessons related to the Hereafter from material experiences. This spiritual or divine aspect is hidden in all worldly things. Spirituality enables one engaged in material or worldly activities to see the divine signs. Spirituality can be attained neither by renouncing the world nor by the repetition of certain words. Spirituality can be attained only by one who has the intellectual ability to convert material provision into spiritual food.