Spiritual Health Learning Community Center Exploring Life's Horizons   »   Streams Menu Have you seen him who has taken his caprice to be his god, and Allah sendeth him astray purposely, and sealeth up his hearing and his heart, and setteth on his sight a covering? - [The Qur'an 45:23] Backbiting There seems to be something irresistible in the desire to talk about other people behind their backs. Gossip, rumors, innuendo, criticism and character assassination roll off our tongues with such effortless nonchalance. If pressed, we might have difficulty deciding whether we derive more pleasure through speaking ill of others or hearing ill of others. Like pony express riders, we dash from one station to the next dropping off, and picking up, the hot news of the day. Like a communicable disease, our titillation spreads from mouth to ear and from ear to mouth. How many lives - including our own, have we made miserable through this time honored tradition? To what extent have we compromised our own integrity and honor by participating in such rituals, even if only passively? To what degree have we weakened, if not destroyed, our families and neighborhoods and communities due to our addiction to this activity? What manner of mutated enmity, jealousy, envy and arrogance have we spawned through this aspect of social intercourse? Backbiting seeps up from the darkness, ignorance and malice within us. It gives expression to our perverse capacity to take delight in thinking and feeling the worst about other people. Like Everest, we are drawn to it because it is there, beckoning to us to come and explore its contours, ridges and secrets. However, once lured, people soon discover backbiting constitutes a challenge which is far, far more difficult to conquer than is Everest. Through backbiting, we introduce doubts, suspicions and alienation into our gatherings. After all, if we are witnesses to the existence of the reality of backbiting concerning other people, can we not reasonably suppose we may well be the object of this exercise in our absence? Are we so blind to our own foibles that we fail to appreciate what a treasure-trove our lives are for supplying an indefinite variety of gems for the cutting and grinding tools contained in the tongues of our "friends" and acquaintances? Some people argue that although there are potential dangers associated with backbiting, nonetheless, it serves a useful social function because it is a medium for exchanging information, attitudes, and mores concerning events in society. As such, it is just one of the venues through which the process of socialization goes on, and by means of which, individuals arrive at decisions concerning how they will hook-up with various groups. The driving force behind backbiting is not an expression of some sort of heuristic device for the socialization process. Nor is backbiting but a species of the courageous search for truth since backbiting is indifferent to the truth or falsity of what passes through its lips. Whatever constructive benefit may be drawn from backbiting, is purely incidental to the raison d'etre of its being. In fact, the only value, euphemistically speaking, which backbiting has is entirely as a negative exemplar of what one ought not become involved in. Once one encounters backbiting, as one, unfortunately, inevitably, must, one should understand it for what it is. One should understand what "needs" it serves in us and others and stay as far away from it as one can. Backbiting poisons the atmosphere of society. Moreover, backbiting pollutes the spiritual ecology of the individual. For both of the foregoing reasons, the Sufi masters have tried to impress upon the practitioners of the way that backbiting is not a trivial vice. The insidious and treacherous nature of backbiting, along with its prevalence in society, as well as its resistance to being constrained, make backbiting a formidable social and individual evil. To refrain from speaking ill of others in their absence is a commendable practice. To refuse to listen to such talk is also exemplary. However, Sufi masters indicate that this sort of discipline does not end the responsibilities of a person in these matters. Removing oneself from opportunities to speak disparagingly of others or to hear negative things said against others is not enough. One must seek to not even think badly about others, whether in their presence or in their absence. The working principle of the Sufi masters is: love toward all and malice toward none. Only by, God willing, inculcating this principle into every atom of one's being, can one resist the siren call of backbiting. To be aware of someone's shortcomings is not necessarily to be engaged in a mental form of backbiting. Nonetheless, one must exercise extreme caution in such matters. There must be a separation of sorts between the individual and his or her behavior. One must try to see an act of transgression or indiscretion for what it actually is, but one should offer: compassion for; forbearance toward; forgiveness of; and, encouragement to improve, for the person from whom the problematic act arose. Furthermore, one should not dwell on such matters or try to disengage the issue from its proper context. In short, one needs to keep things in proper perspective, neither becoming too preoccupied with them or too indifferent to them. Backbiting is injurious to the spiritual condition of human beings. Backbiting is a heavy veil which obscures spiritual understanding and is antagonistic to spiritual development. To be a Sufi, one must remove all traces of this poison from one's external actions as well as from one's interior states. | Return to Streams Menu | Copyright © 2004 Interrogative Imperative Institute. All Rights Reserved.