Beginning a New Text with Imam al-Ghazali

Alhamdulillah, this session marks the beginning of a new text in our weekly Ratib & Reminders gathering. For those based in Perth, you’re warmly invited to join us live at Qaswa House every Thursday from 7:00–9:00 p.m. The gathering is open to everyone — men and women, young and old.

After returning to Perth, it was a joy to be back at Ratib and to see the continuity of the program while I was away. We recently completed Arba‘ina Shamil fi Insanil Kamil, the 40 hadith on the perfection of Rasulullah ﷺ, and many were able to join the khatam we did live from Madinah. With that chapter completed, we now move into a new phase of study.

The most common request I receive is to study the works of Imam al-Ghazali. While his magnum opus Ihya’ ‘Ulum al-Din is one of the greatest works in Islamic scholarship, it is also vast — effectively forty books in one. For this reason, rather than beginning something we may struggle to complete, we’ve chosen a shorter, more focused text that reflects Ghazali’s core project.

Over the next two sessions we’ll introduce this new book and begin exploring its themes. After that, we’ll pause for Ramadan, as Ratib will be replaced by nightly taraweeh at Moresby Street Hall, Kensington, where we’ll be reading and briefly reflecting on Surah al-A‘raf. After Ramadan, inshaAllah, we’ll return to the text and continue the journey.

Imam al-Ghazali had a unique way of teaching. He often wrote large, comprehensive works, then summarised them into medium-length texts, and finally into concise versions meant to be memorised. His belief was that knowledge only truly becomes yours when it is internalised — when you live with it, not merely read it. This approach shapes the book we’ll be studying together.

The text we’ve chosen is Al-Arba‘in fi Usul al-Din (The 40 Principles of the Religion). Interestingly, it did not begin as a standalone book. It was originally written as an appendix to Jawahir al-Qur’an (The Jewels of the Qur’an). After guiding readers on how to approach and understand the Qur’an, Imam al-Ghazali addressed the next essential question: How do we live the Qur’an? These forty principles were his answer. Recognising their importance, he permitted the work to be published independently.

For many, especially those who went through traditional Islamic schooling in places like Malaysia, the content of this book will feel familiar. Much of classical Islamic education has been shaped, directly or indirectly, by Imam al-Ghazali’s framework.

To understand his project, we stepped back and looked at the foundation of Islamic scholarship itself — Hadith Jibril, often called Umm al-Sunnah. This hadith presents the religion through three inseparable dimensions: Islam, Iman, and Ihsan.

Islam refers to the outward actions of the religion — prayer, fasting, zakat, and hajj — which later became formalised as the science of fiqh. Iman addresses belief, engaging the intellect before settling in the heart, and developed into the science of ‘aqidah. Ihsan focuses on spiritual refinement: worshipping Allah as though you see Him, and knowing that He sees you even when you do not.

Over time, each of these dimensions developed its own sciences and terminology. These terms did not exist in the Prophet’s time, but they were created to preserve clarity and make learning accessible. Tasawwuf, when understood correctly, belongs firmly within this tradition — addressing the heart and soul, not as a replacement for fiqh or ‘aqidah, but as their completion.

Imam al-Ghazali lived during a period of deep fragmentation in the Muslim world — politically, intellectually, and spiritually. His life’s work was to bring these dimensions back together, showing that a sound religious life cannot survive on law alone, belief alone, or spirituality alone. Each needs the others.

It was during a profound personal crisis, after reaching the peak of his academic career, that Ghazali withdrew from public life for years of spiritual seclusion. From this period emerged Ihya’ ‘Ulum al-Din, the first work to systematically unite belief, practice, and spiritual purification into a single guide for living Islam.

Al-Arba‘in fi Usul al-Din is the distilled essence of that project. It is organised into forty principles: foundations of belief, guidance on practice, dangers on the path, and the means of salvation. This is the text we’ll be walking through together, slowly and practically, inshaAllah.

This session served as an introduction to both Imam al-Ghazali and the book we’ll be studying. We’ll continue next week, before pausing for Ramadan, and then resume the journey together.

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