Combating the Temptations of the Caprice

The Noble Qur'an describes some of the false symbols that make man submit to them, as ‘gods’. It describes caprice saying, {Have you seen him who has taken his caprice to be his god?}, and the rabbis, {They have taken their rabbis and their monks as lords apart from God} and Satan, {That you should not serve Satan}. The common idea is that everything that makes man submit to other than Allah is a served god and idol.
Man must explore his inside map to locate the place of caprice on it. The baby is born with the divine ‘original’; his insight and the acquired rationality grow with him. Alongside that, the desire grows and becomes complete at the time of attaining puberty when the struggle between the forces of rationality and the forces of instinct occur.
The first stage of the struggle between caprice and rationality is the attempt to isolate rationality from sharia so that the capricious man begins to look for the philosophy behind every rule, and if his limited mind were not convinced by it, he would relinquish that rule on the pretext of rationality and liberal thinking. In the second stage, the forces of caprice try to restrict rationality preventing it from controlling the will-and consequently the conduct-this is the stage when one of the forces overwhelm the other. In the third stage, the forces of caprice occupy the kingdom of rationality so that reason rules no more. This is when man loses distinction between what is evil and what is good. Here, man reaches the point of ‘sealing’ of the heart so that, {they have hearts, but understand not with them; they have ears but they hear not with them; they have eyes but perceive not with them}.
Among the problems of our time is the philosophization of promiscuity. Some people hold the view that ‘every human is free as long as he does not transgress the boundaries of others’ freedom, a saying equal to stripping man of his humanity and joining him to the class of unbound beasts. What logic justifies that we permit man to do what he wishes whereas his commanding caprice does not acknowledge any kind of shameful act whether traditional or legal?
Among the factors that lead to the victory of caprice is losing control over the self after sinning for the first time following attaining puberty. Repeatedly doing the forbidden deed will deprive it of its shamefulness until man reaches a stage when he loses control over himself despite his belief in the shamefulness of what he is doing. This is the reason why parents must observe their adolescent children during this period of life.
Another factor is man’s ignorance of the consequence of yielding to caprice. No sane man would prefer a temporary pleasure that is followed by a permanent distress with respect to the guilty feeling, the social disgrace and the punishment in the life to come.
Man’s nature seeks pleasure and if we want to prevent him from taking pleasure in the forbidden, we must make available the good alternative, which is the lawful sensual pleasure. However, there are two other kinds of pleasure that can fill a significant gap in the soul. There is the undeniable joy of scientific discovery and the spiritual delight of talking to the originator of happiness and pleasure-the spiritual and the sensual-and that is the Lord.
Pleasure is an internal relief resulting from achieving a goal. The man, who does his best to transform his sensual goal into a spiritual one, will also experience pleasure achieving his spiritual goal. This is why the amount of the pleasure that the religious and wise people experience is not less than that of the capricious people; it could even be much more because sensual pleasures are short-lived and costly while the spiritual ones are persistent and free.
Desires come as a gush, and if man resists them, remembering the sweet taste of victory over them, they will fade especially with the repetition of the experience. Most of the time it takes only a few minutes of control over the will for the fire to die by the guidance of Allah who controls man’s heart in such moments according to the verse, {So was it that we might turn away from him evil}.
Among the blessings of Allah upon his servant is that He makes him see the kingdom of the forbidden. With that exposed, it will be easy for him to avoid doing the forbidden deeds, which he will perceive as utterly disgusting, as it is easy to turn away from delicious food when one discovers in it killing germs using a microscope. So too when man sees by the scope of the clear heart the hidden germs in every forbidden thing, will turn away from it without having to struggle hard.
One of the ways to get immunity in this respect is not to be exposed to the excitants of caprice, which have spread in a way not witnessed before in the history of humanity. Instead of putting out a fire, a wise man would rather not ignite one.
Keeping company of the capricious people is a way of stepping into the abyss. What is the motive behind spending one’s time and money on a spectrum of social relationships in which there are people who are of no benefit in this world or the world to come? It was related that two things would be very scarce towards the end of time, legitimate money and a trustworthy fellow man.