Religion and Theology: Summary on Al-Kindi’s On the Device for Dispelling Sorrows
Like any other work written by Al-Kindī, this Epictetus is an original composition yet takes a very inspirational point from the Greek Exemplars. The Epictetus gives an extended version of a metaphor that compares our life to the sojourn on the land that interprets sorrows and happiness. Just like the voyagers are prepared to race back to their boat if called and get the best seats, Al-Kindī article posits that the most favourable conditions await those prepare for sorrows and anguish. This paper analysis Al-Kindī advice by first summarizing the piece into the most straightforward language and offer an extensive analysis of the advice on how we can equip ourselves best to avoid sorrow infliction in case of loss of our valued things
While it seems less technical philosophically than most of the other al-Kindi’s
Available treatises, Ghada Jayyusi-Lehn claims that the epistle remains fundamental for acknowledging the spirit underlining his thinking. First, he prays to the almighty God to preserve his laudable brother, guard him against every shortcoming, and grant him success on the path that leads to his satisfaction and abundant rewards. al-Kindi claims that he understands his brother’s request on clarifying his statements on overcoming sorrows, the warnings against their debilitating effects and offering protection against the pain of their dominion. Therefore, he vividly describes what he thinks will be sufficient for him and will help his protection from God.
According to the article, al-Kind claims that there is no viable remedy for any pain that its cause is unknown. Therefore, he clarifies what constitutes sorrow and its causes for its pills’ existence to be rapidly apparent and easy to use. He further claims, “sorrow is psychological pain, occurring due to the loss of an object of love or the missing of things desired” (P. 2). If the leading cause of the sorrow is what is stated here, then it is an occurrence due to the loss of something missed or something loved or desired, and we must investigate to know if anyone can be free of these causes.
Al-Kind claims that to dispel sorrow, we must take care of, ensure that we are happy, and protect ourselves from being miserable by putting our desires and the things we love to be what is accessible to us. He further claims that to banish sorrow, we should not regret what we have missed, and we should only seek the sensory things that are accessible to us. We must treat what is available to us in the noblest way possible. We must neither long for them before touching, observing, or after they depart from us as they will burden us with regrets or preoccupation of mind.
Additionally, the article claims that we should endure in remedying our souls through the repugnancy of treatment, their hardships, and bearing their manifold burdens, which we hold in remedying our bodies, even though healing our souls is less objectionable and less burdensome that what is involved in remedying the body. al-Kind gives the reason behind this assertion as remedying ourselves lies in the “strength of the steadfastness of undertaking what rectifies us but in forcing the soul commendable habits in the smallest affairs, the adherence to which is easy, it is elevated to the larger ones” P. 5. If our souls become accustomed to this, they will become elevated to this in their appearance, which is more significant in adhering to the small ones from the little to broader issues.
Al-Kindī suggests that we must acknowledge that everything we have missed or lost has been missed or lost by many other people, and all of them accepted their miss or loss and thus banished away sorrow. He further claims that he whose child has died or has no child will find many people in a similar state to him. The same notion happens with money, and virtually all otherworldly sensory possessions are humans’ universal desires. Therefore, according to him, sorrow is by convention and not by nature as if we come across anyone that has been deprived of possession, they will be sorrowful. Therefore, he recommends not to create bad things as sorrow and sadness come from bad things. Besides, who makes for himself suffering or something terrible is devoid of mind, and we should not devoid our minds as this will ultimately lead to lawlessness.
Moreover, the author claims that the most straightforward remedy for banishing the sorrow we endure from the things we missed is to think of the grief and divided it into different portions. Therefore, the author posits that suffering comes must be either other actions or even our actions. In cases of our cations, then we should not do what sudden us and start acting and retraining our prerogatives. However, if what brings sorrows to us is others’ actions, then banishing may depend on both others and ourselves. For our side, we should not be sad before their occurrence as for anyone whose prerogative is to dispel will dispel it before it occurs, and thus thou who causes the sorrow will probably not sudden us. Therefore, we will no acquire suffering that no one has given us.
According to the author, before sorrow buries us in the sad of regrets, we should bear in mind that if it is incumbent on us to be sorrowful on things that we missed or lost, then we must acknowledge the fact we will always be sorrowful and thus not sorrowful at all. The reason behind it is that if the cause of the sorrow is missing or losing things that are out of our control, it is hateful that sorrow will always inflict us and its cause being what has been mentioned through this summary. Therefore, if we do not have any possession and do not seek it, no sorrow or any other anguish will inflict us, as neither is loss nor is being missed will happen to us.
While Al-Kindī does not extensively dwell on the point that if you want to have few sorrows, you should have fewer possessions around you. His solutions’ implication is excellent and compelling as suffering can be banished by wading off and avoiding attachment on anything vulnerable to the vicissitudes of fortunes. These attachments include family and friends, mentioned in the Epictetus, who also gave the advice when kissing a child. We should remind ourselves that the child could quickly die tomorrow or some days later. Concisely, this unsentimentally implies that we should avoid loving anyone or anything or at least value them lightly.
While Al-Kindī is no Buddhist, his advice that we can banish sorrow by avoiding attachment to things and people around us reminds us of Buddhism. However, he did not disregard the self’s reality, and he did not advise us to avoid all attachments. Unlike the former, Al-Kindī encourages us to place a high value on the things that cannot be retracted from us. Nevertheless, he takes a more metaphysical view as he thinks that the whole realm of objects that provide us with great pleasure and are invaluable to lose them. These things reside in the realm of intellects, and thus his point is that the person who is immune to sorrow is the person whose aim is not to own material possession and grasp intelligent truth.
Al-Kindī advice is also cogent as not of it is to say that we have to avoid bodily possessions and pleasures at all costs. That was the philosophy suggested by other renowned ancient philosophers such as Diogenes the Cynic, who only lived with a wine jar for shelter and who, on discovering a sweet in his breakfast, cast it away like a tyrant. Al-Kindī advice is more cogent and moderate as it claims we should neither avoid nor pursue wealth or pleasures that can be taken away from us. Instead, we should treat them as the noble king greets his guests. The king never advances towards the guests nor sees them off when they depart but takes pleasure of whatever encounters he makes them calmly even though he shows he does not need for its
However, Al-Kindī’s advice should be taken keenly, and the lesson that should be drawn is not that we should avoid forming attachment entirely but the lesson that we should do this sparingly and only for a good reason. The advice is excellent and cogent for material possession but less compelling and appealing when it comes to our children and friends. Arguably, the person who can endure the horrible death of their loved one without inflicting sadness is not a moral hero but an evil monster. I tent to aggress with this statement even though Al-Kindī’s advice has most that we can learn from the family and friends’ perspective. The perspective of his advice is that the grief and sorrow we face are directly proportional to the attachment we form on the things that we lose or miss.
Therefore, the lesson that we should take here is not that we should avoid forming attachment entirely but rather that we should form theses attachments sparingly and only for the right reasons. To put it in a better perspective, we should love our children, family, and friends and not material things such as television. Moreover, Al-Kindī’s advice can significantly help us cope with the things that we do not value much. This is candid through the story he gives featuring a king because we all get attached to people and things, and we will always lose what we love and value. Therefore, for those that we are not Buddhist or Socrates, this makes sorrow inevitable. However, if we take Al-Kindī advice carefully and prepare ourselves significantly by acknowledging that loss and suffering are unavoidable, then the sadness will be easier to handle.