The matters of feeding, resting

Activities of man

Just consider, O Mufadhdhal, the matters of feeding, resting and sex, which are ordained for man and the expediencies underlying them. Each one of them is propelled by an urge, which gives rise to a desire and a consequent excitation. Hunger demands food which supplies life and energy to the body and its substance. Sleep demands rest for the recuperation of the body to remove the fatigue. If man were to take food just for the needs of his body without an urge from within forcing him to feed, it is pos sible that he might have given way to indolence because of lassitude or pressure, his body would have been emaciated leading to death, just as a man puts off taking medicine which he only needs to improve his tone. And this may cause death.

Similarly he may put off sleep, which his body and organs need, by being busy with other things and thereby emaciate his body.

If procreation were the sole aim of sexual union, (with no natural impulsive insistence), it would not have been improbable on man’s part to slacken with resulting decrease in population and final extinction, for there are people who have no desire for progeny nor any heed therefore. Behold, then, that every act concerning man's health and improvement has been reinforced by an insistent urge embedded in his nature prompting him thereto.

And know that there are four faculties in man:

1. The affinitive faculty that accepts the food and pushes it into the stomach.

2. The retentive faculty that retains it for the natural processes to act thereon.

3. The assimilative faculty that processes it to take out its extract for distribution to the body.

4. The eliminative faculty that eliminates the waste products after the assimilative faculty has completed its function.

Just consider the adjustment made in the body among these four facilities. They have been organised to meet the bodily needs as part of the Omniscient design. (Any deficiency in any one of these faculties would disturb the body economy with ultimate death). Without the affinitive faculty, how would man exert after food which is necessary for the upkeep and maintenance of his body? Without the retentive faculty, how could the food be retained in the stomach to be digested? Without the assimilative faculty, how could the food be processed to get the extract to supply the body without disturbance? And without the eliminative faculty how could the waste products, given off by the stomach, beeliminated regularly?

Don't you see how the Almighty Allah has ordained and appointed the faculties for the functions conditioning the health of the body by His Consummate Skill and Supreme Will?

Let us illustrate it by an example. Imagine the body to be a royal palace, with servants and attendants residing therein. There are employees engaged in its management. One of them is entrusted with the task of sup plying provisions to the attendants. The second is charged with the task of treasuring it until it (the food) is treated and prepared. A third has to process it and dis tribute it. The fourth sweeps the waste

products left over.

The monarch of the palace is the Omniscient Creator Almighty, the Lord of the entire universe. The palace is the body and the dependents are the organs of the body, while the employees are the four faculties.

O Mufadhdhal, you may, perhaps, consi der the explanation given by me concerning the four faculties and their functions as redundant and unnecessary. Yet my explanation does not follow the pattern of the books given by the phy sicians, nor does the tenor of my talk follow theirs. Those people have made mention of the four faculties on the ground that it is needed in the medical art for healing. We men tion it from the viewpoint of its need for in vigorating the Faith and reformation of the recusant minds, hence my comprehensive explanation and exemplification illustrating the Omniscient design.