The Nature of the Virtuous Soul in al-Ghazali and Hamka

Abstract

This paper elaborates view of al-Ghazali and Hamka on the healthy soul in ‎ tasawwuf. Both have an interest correlation in understanding healthy soul with different ‎ ways of explanation. Hamka affirmed that healthy soul should be maintained by four ‎ qualities; syaja>’ah, ‘iffah, h}ikmah , and ‘ada>lah . In fact, these four qualities are known as ‎ ummaha>t al-fad}a>il or the mother of virtuous in the book of al-Ghazali. Al-Ghazali’s way in ‎ explaining the meaning of ummaha>t al-fad}a>il , however, is different with Hamka, making this ‎ issue is important to be discussed. This research is done using descriptive analysis method ‎ to elaborate both al-Ghazali and Hamka’s idea on healthy soul, before finally compared ‎ in order to gain multiple results based on their different perspectives on this issue. ‎ Researcher finds afterwards that Hamka was much influenced by al-Ghazali’s thought, but ‎ attractively, Hamka succeeded to contextualize thea meaning of healthy soul in accordance ‎ with al-Ghazali’s thought into Indonesian context in a more simple way to be understood ‎ by all people, especially in the land of archipelago. ‎