When the Self can only surmise but not comprehend something divine, it intently becomes ready to make space to a suspected desire. The extra spiritual care is not a conceptually manageable intellectual fact in daily social intercourse – this seems to be the limit for the sense of reasons to realize it. Beyond that, the discerning part is the climax, where the job is accomplished by emotion. The passion strives to transcend the usual recalcitrant Self to reach out for divine guidance with the prayers and remembrance of the Supreme Being.

Being unable to explain the ineffable, the Self tries to build up a habit of humility, non-violence, honesty – however, these are more or less struggling with the sense of what is right and wrong. Without the heart, which can sense the Ultimate – the Infinite, only grasping the need to transcend greed, selfishness and become compassionate may not be enough for a charity to find its purpose. The Self would then look for showing off to other Selves and satisfy its desire. God would not be the sole audience in the heart to be enough as a desire to seek. Only considering the obvious physical without valuing the spiritual measures sparks the thought – there may be a need for these two to co-exist.

Qur’an suggests every Self is at a loss (103:2), and obviously, this hints corruption is in its nature. However, the following verse points out it is not hopeless at all – “there can be those who believe, do good deeds, advise each other to the truth and patience.” Then the Self can start using its sense of reason and logic and try not to constrict its powers of judgment. While everything around is changing and multiplying frequently, managing those stirs the Self to analyze everything into quantitative, specific, systematic – at the expense of all that is not explicit, not proved, not obvious. While everything spiritual is numinous and intangible, it is a daunting reality that managing everything, which is evolving continually, cannot be governed by something, which is valid for now only. The truth cannot change in line with what is helpful to the Self for now – the Self is required to know its beginning and fathom its end and find the truth to make its present meaningful.

Being hopeful and getting busy with one of the two possessions – the sense of reason at the expense of emotional perception – lets the Self permit doubt to settle in its mind. Its doubt hovers how all the creations can be re-created for a Day of Judgment and how its hidden acts and words get recorded. Even if it travels away towards the farthest frontier, the divine reality would be inseparable as it is divulged to be nearer than its jugular veins (Qur’an 50:16). It is the comprehension of spirituality with its emotional experience, which was kept unused, enabling it to channel the desire to stay on the path of God willingly. It does not seem to be extinguishing the desires created by its creative senses – it is more about not forgetting to use both the insight and passion together, which fosters the essence for these two to co-exist. Interestingly, arrogance, egotism, and other emotional attitudes are morally destructive, but the sense of right and wrong then relay with emotion to look over time. If all the events were visible all at once, it would be possible to understand the wisdom behind every perception of chaos. But in reality, every Self is given the capacity according to its burdens to be carried (2:286). Therefore, the logic from the sense of reason pacifies the emotional Self to willfully choose to obey God even after knowing it is free to choose otherwise.

Qur’an (36:21) portrays a scenario where a man came running to the people to ask to follow two messengers, who had already been preaching God’s message to them. The logic presented here was the selfless ones – not interested in payment from the people – clearly had sincere intention. However, on top of that quality, one has to be rightly guided too. Together with the emotion of sincerity and the sense of logic, guidance would fulfill the features for someone who could become a quality guide. Moreover, (110:1-3) hints at the divine advice: when the sense of reason let a significant number of Selves come to the religion after seeing God’s help – they should glorify the praises of God and ask for His forgiveness. Here the emotional exertion is commanded to match the act of joining the religion with rationalization. The Self’s endeavor into balancing both heart and mind needs to place itself in a continuum that is polarized toward neither too many emotional experiences nor too much sense of right and wrong. How does God make it easy for the Self?

Prayers – Physical and Mental Application

Understanding human weakness amid all the complexities in life generates the yearning for a conscientious effort to establish communication with God. The heart full of emotion generates the urge to experience the association, the intimacy, which eventually finds fulfillment in an attitude of a mind full of logic – this is recognized as ‘Salaat’ – the prayer. This perspective shapes up the concept of prayer as a human relishing to surrender entirely to God because it is for the heart to find strength even in hardships in life.

 
Emotion greater than logic – One point of view would portray prayer as an escape route a human needs at a time – when the mind tends to refuse human weakness in all the complexities of life and starts convincing the heart with the arrogance of closed-minded certainty that ‘I am in control’. Human insight develops over time as they experience the cause and effect of how things happen throughout life. This insight sometimes lets the mind appreciate human freedom and then gradually builds up heartless conviction that I am so ‘very right!’ This arrogance necessitates prayer as it restrains outrageous and unacceptable behaviors (Qur’an 29:45) that counter reason.

 
Logic greater than emotion – Faith involves struggle as it is difficult to tolerate human imperfection; that is why prayer is a genuine need for humans as it lets them find contentment (Qur’an 20:130) and manage the mind demanding perfection. In other words, when the mind tries to deal with engineering a mechanism based on the impulses it encounters to bypass spiritual sense and embrace so-called freedom – that is where coming back to God and re-build relationship every day becomes meaningful.

 
How is it for the Self – The prayer itself is not for the Creator’s benefit – instead, His slaves are the beneficiaries. It is a gripping reality that humans tend to get around the part of being the slave and try to forcefully establish ‘rightness’ and keep praying, which gives rise to a feeling that help would come as they sent a favor because they prayed! Prayer (Salaat) is more than worship – in Arabic, it is more appropriately known as ‘Ibadah’, which brings in worship and obedience in its meaning. ‘Worship’ comes up with Google search as revering, glorifying, exalting, honoring – this points out only one side of the prayer. Humans doing the prostration delineates the fact that they have a Master to submit to.

Physical submission with touching the forehead to the ground is the embodiment of the mental state of being overpowered by the remembrance of God in prayers. This is termed as “Khushoo” in Arabic and is mentioned as one of the attributes of a true believer in the Qur’an (23:2). The spiritual sense united with the physical acts portrays the tangible submission that the Self will have to take and walk on earth as a human, made in the best of stature (95:4) – strong enough to fulfill its purpose but co-exist with humble submission to God (2:45).
These prayers remind the Self again and again that until the time of the next Salaat – the rest of the times in the day, even if it is not worshiping God, it still requires to obey God (i.e., not telling lies, not harming others, eating halal foods, avoiding forbidden acts, etc.) Accepting itself as a slave needs to materialize in the heart, facilitating the mind to regroup its reasons. That will manifest prayers being the part-time job – a favor to refresh before re-engaging with the fight with myriads of impulses waiting to make it feel arrogant again. Being a slave to God is thus a full-time job, which makes the nexus of the verity that prayer does not benefit God – it is a favor to the Self.

 
The attitude towards Prayers is to make it stand erect robustly through single-minded devotion to establish complete submission and humility in remembering God (Qur’an 20:14). It requires following the way precisely as commanded by God to the Prophet (peace be upon him) (Qur’an 2:239). Hastening to the Friday prayer (Arabic: Jumu’ah) when the call for prayer is made (62:9) is adjoined too. Establishing Salaat was recorded in the Qur’an as early as in Ibrahim’s (A:) supplication to God when God directed him to leave wife Hajar and infant son Ismael (A:) near the Kaaba: “Our Lord, I have settled some of my offsprings in an uncultivated valley near Your Sacred House, our Lord, so that they may establish the prayers.” (Qur’an 14:37). Later, Ismael (A:) enjoined on his people prayer as mentioned in the Qur’an (19:55). As time progressed, people started disbelieving and distorting the prayer, and it became “nothing but whistling and clapping” (Qur’an 8:35). However, the rituals continued despite distortion, and the Qur’an (107: 4-7) depicts a vital fact that without the genuine intention to please God and preferring showing off to the humans in salaat creates miserliness in the heart. Their ostentatious display in salaat results in heartless meanness even in helping neighbors with household necessities.

Remembering God – Besides establishing prayers in times of peace, Salaat is observed through guarding its continuity – protecting the practice from falling apart, especially in times of fear and insecurity. Even in a war situation, a true believer is not oblivious to prayers. The essence of it is to remember God. In the remembrance of God, believing hearts find assurance (Qur’an: 13:28). This association with the Supreme Being fortifies the character to shun humility that does not care about morality and detaches from altering truth while meeting own needs. Prayers would not face the Self up with a choice to become an ascetic recluse or a pleasure-seeking materialist. The confidence that all hope is not lost despite the mistakes committed – is crucial via removing evil deeds with good deeds, and this is well connected with remembrance practiced in prayers according to the Qur’an (11:114). This makes the Self aware that to renunciate natural desire in the name of equanimity is not the way endorsed for a God submitting Self. It waits for guidance from God while striving for justice because the reliance on that guidance is as worthy as its sincere submission.

Based on both reason and a sincere heart, faith is supposed to generate a willingness to submit to God wholeheartedly. That submission heralds God’s intervention to bestow certainty in the course of life of the Self. Unfortunately, a sincere heart willing to submit to God alone is rare. Each Self has to make a conscious choice either to permit the ego to reject any authority other than itself or to follow its spiritual essence. Prayers offer solid support to the Self to submit to the Will of God and then live life without submitting to anyone else. Because of its innate nature of forgetfulness and tendency to succumb to egotism or hypocrisy, repeat connection with God through prayers keep the heart and mind concur with its choices in life.