The following excerpts come from the introduction chapter to Syed Naquib al-Attas’ Prolegomena to the Metaphysics of Islam. He defines the term adab and explains how it manifests in the life of the Muslim who observes it in their internal and external engagements.
Unlike most major religions of the world, Islam is not named after a particular person. The term Islam is a verbal noun that implies an active state of being for the one adhering to it. The trilateral root for it in the Arabic language gives rise to meanings of peace, submission, and freedom from blemishes or faults. A Muslim is not merely one who engages in a number of prescribed rituals interspersed throughout the day, month, and year. When performed with conscious presence, Islamic practice connects one to nature and orients their life to the ultimate purpose they were created for – to know Allah ﷻ.
One of the most under-appreciated concepts in Islam is adab. It’s often translated in English as proper conduct or etiquette. Many think of it in terms of how one behaves in an orderly manner around others, especially those who are older or in positions of authority, so as to not cause offence. However, adab is much deeper than what may be considered as hypocritical platitudes. It’s an internalized state of being that governs how one perceives their own subjective self first and the external world second. Understood properly, adab is not a concept to be weaponized for social gain. It’s the integration of knowledge and wisdom to govern how one treads upon the earth and observes their particular role as a vicegerent who will be questioned by their Lord after they vacate their post in this world and return to Him.
al-Attas’ Prolegomena is part of Al-Andalus Book Club’s 2022 booklist where it’s being studied throughout this year. One reason this book was included in this year’s booklist is to ensure that student’s have the opportunity to study some of the fundamentals of Islamic metaphysics. Adab is an essential component that needs to be properly understood in order for us to fulfil our purpose in this life without transgressing the balance.
The process of acquisition of knowledge is not called ‘education’ unless the knowledge that is acquired includes moral purpose that activates in the one who acquires it what I call adab. Adab is right action that springs from self-discipline founded upon knowledge whose source is wisdom. For the sake of convenience I shall translate adab simply as ‘right action’.
There is an intrinsic connection between meaning and knowledge. I define ‘meaning’ as the recognition of the place of anything in a system, which occurs when the relation a thing has with others in the system becomes clarified and understood. ‘Place’ refers to right or proper place in the system; and ‘system’ here refers to the Quranic conceptual system as formulated into a worldview by tradition and articulated by religion. Knowledge as we have already defined is the arrival of meaning in the soul, and the soul’s arrival at meaning, and this is the recognition of the proper places of things in the order of creation, such that it leads to the recognition of the proper place of God in the order of being and existence.
But knowledge as such does not become an education unless the recognition of proper places is actualized by acknowledgement – that is, by confirmation and affirmation in the self – of the reality and truth of what is recognised. Acknowledgement necessitates action that is proper to recognition. Adab, or right action, consists of such acknowledgement. Education, then, is the absorption of adab in the self. The actualization of adab in individual selves composing society as a collective entity reflects the condition of justice; and justice itself is a reflection of wisdom, which is the light that is lit from the lamp of prophecy that enables the recipient to discover the right and proper place for a thing or a being to be.The condition of being in the proper place is what I have called justice; and adab is that cognitive action by which we actualize the condition of being in the proper place. So adab in the sense I am defining here, is also a reflection of wisdom; and with respect to society adab is the just order within it. Adab, concisely defined, is the spectacle of justice (‘adl) as it is reflected by wisdom (ḥikma).
In order to explain what I mean by adab and to appreciate my definition of it, let us consider, for example, one’s self. The human self or soul has two aspects: the one predisposed to praiseworthy acts, intelligent by nature, loyal to its covenant with God; the other inclined to evil deeds, bestial by nature, heedless of its convent with God. The former we call the rational soul (al-nafs al-nāṭiqah), the latter the carnal or animal soul (al-nafs al-ḥayawāniyyah). When the rational soul subdues the animal soul and renders it under control, then one has put the animal soul in its proper place and the rational soul also in its proper place. In this way, and in relation to one’s self, one is putting one’s self in one’s proper place. This is adab toward one’s self.
Then in relation to one’s family and its various members; when one’s attitude and behaviour toward one’s parents and elders display sincere acts of humility, love, respect, care, charity; this shows one knows one’s proper place in relation to them by putting them in their proper places. This is adab toward family. And similarly, such attitude and behaviour, when extended to teachers, friends, community, leaders, manifest knowledge of one’s proper place in relation to them; and this knowledge entails requisite acts in order to actualize adab toward them all.
Again, when one puts words in their proper places so that their true meanings become intelligible, and sentences and verses in like manner such that prose and poetry become literature, then that is adab toward language.
Further, when one puts trees and stones, mountains, rivers, valleys and lakes, animals and their habitat in their proper places, then that is adab toward nature and the environment.
The same applies to one’s home when one arranges furniture and puts things in their proper places therein until harmony is achieved – all such activity is adab towards home and furniture. And we cite also putting colours, shapes, and sounds in their proper places producing pleasing effects – that is adab toward art and music.
Knowledge too, and its many branches and disciplines, some of which have more important bearing upon our life and destiny than others; if one grades them according to various levels and priorities and classifies the various sciences in relation to their priorities putting each one of them in its proper place, then that is adab toward knowledge.
It should already become clear that my interpretation of the the meaning of adab reveals that adab implies knowledge; it is knowledge derived from wisdom (ḥikmah); it manifests the purpose of seeking knowledge; it is also internal and external activity of the soul that springs form ethical and moral values and virtues; its fount of origin is not philosophy nor science, but revealed truth that flows from religion.
From the above definitions of some of the major key concepts in Islām, which all converge upon the concept of knowledge, it becomes clear that their meanings are closely interrelated, in particular their meanings which all focus upon the notion of ‘proper place’ which points to a certain ‘order’ in the system and one’s relation to that order. The order is in the form of hierarchy which pervades the created order of being and existence, both external existence and mental existence. The hierarchy I mean, when applied to the human order, is not to be misunderstood as the kind of hierarchy crated by man and articulated into a social structure such as a system of caste, or a graded priestly organization, or any kind of social stratification according to class. It is not something to be organised into a social structure; its is rather something to be organised in the mind and actualized in the attitude and the behaviour. The organization in the mind is not formulated by the human criteria of power, wealth, and lineage, but by the Quranic criteria of knowledge, intelligence, and virtue.
When the mind recognises the reality that knowledge and being are ordered according to their various levels and degrees, and when the attitude and the behaviour acknowledges by action what the mind recognises, then this conformity of the acknowledgement with the recognition, by which the self assumes its proper place in coincidence with the act of acknowledgement, is none other than adab. But when the mind displaces the levels and degrees of knowledge and being, disrupting the order in the legitimate hierarchy, then this is due to the corruption of knowledge. Such corruption is reflected in the confusion of justice, so that the notion of ‘proper places’ no longer applies in the mind or externally, and the disintegration of adab takes place.
The disintegration of adab, which is the effect of the corruption of knowledge, creates the situation whereby false leaders in all spheres of life emerge; for it not only implies the corruption of knowledge, but it also means the loss of the capacity and ability to recognize and acknowledge true leaders. Because of the intellectual anarchy that characterizes this situation, the common people become determiners of intellectual decisions and are raised to the level of authority on matters of knowledge. Authentic definitions become undone, and in their stead we are left with platitudes and vague slogans disguised as profound concepts. The inability to define; to identify and isolate problems, and hence to provide for right solutions; the creation of pseudo-problems; the reduction of problems to mere political, socio-economic and legal factors become evident. It is not surprising if such a situation provides a fertile breeding ground for the emergence of deviationists and extremists of many kinds who make ignorance their capital.
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