The Bane of the Tongue: Book 24 of Ihya’ ’Ulum Al-Din, the Revival of the Religious Sciences Volume 24

The Bane of Tongue (Kitab afat al-lisan) is Book 24 of the Imam al-Ghazali’s magnum opus, I?ya? ?ulum al-din, The Revival of the Religious Sciences. Within the architecture of this monumental work, Afat al-lisan is the fourth book of the third quarter, The Ways to Perdition (Rub? al-muhlikat), in which al-Ghazali sums up in ten books (or chapters) all the human shortcomings and vices traditionally believed to lead a person into a state of loss in this world and the Next, and which in certain respects overlap with the Judeo-Christian notion of the seven deadly sins. In Book 24, al-Ghazali divides the banes (afat) or defects of the tongue, from the least to the most offensive, into twenty short chapters, each of which comprises a psychological/spiritual analysis of how and why the particular defect might exist in a person’s soul, examples of how it manifests itself in behavior, and practical suggestions for eliminating it from one’s personality. The misuse of the gift of speech and language is certainly not something new, as this work, composed nearly 950 years ago, amply shows, but in this age of internet-based communication, it has taken on a new and more destructive dimension.

Fouad Aresmouk grew up in a traditional Marrakesh family, the son of an Arabic teacher in the public school system and grandson of one of the most renowned Qur’ an teachers in Marrakesh and muqaddam for the Tijani Sufi order. Fouad completed his degree in Islamic Studies and Arabic at Qadi Ayyad University, Marrakesh, also pursuing a personal study of Sufism in Morocco that continues today. He is the author of al-Rashad fi zabdati alawrad, a commentary (shar?) on the litany of the ?abibiyya Sufi order of Morocco, and co-translator of several works, including in the Fons Vitae Ghazali series. Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (d. 1111) was a leading scholar, jurist, and theologian of the golden age of Islam, and he remains its truest advocate in modern times. As a teacher of both inward and outward faith, he recorded these practical teachings in his forty-book compendium of Islamic knowledge. Originally from California, Abdurrahman Fitzgerald and his wife migrated to Morocco in the late 1970s. He has since been involved in education and the study of Arabic, Islam, and Sufism. He is co-translator of Ibn al-Qayyim on the Invocation of God (Islamic Texts Society, 2000) and, with Fouad Aresmouk, has translated two portions of Ibn ?Ajiba’s Quranic commentary, al-Ba?r al-Madid, Ibn ?Ajiba’s spiritual glossary, The Book of Ascension, five books in Fons Vitae’s al-Ghazali’s series, Letters on the Spiritual Path by Mulay al?Arabi al-Darqawi, and the Diwan of Sidi Mu?ammad ibn al-?abib.