Al-Islâm: Spiritual Freedom as the Foundation of Human Engagement

The Foundational Error: Making the Human Being a Slave

I do not exaggerate when I say that the greatest error religious people have ever committed is to have made us understand that the human being is the slave of God, and that the best of human beings would be the perfect slave — the one who obeys orders all the time, who never dares to disobey, who never dares to ask why.

This representation of the relationship between the human being and the Divine leads to what I call the suicide of reason, the intellecticide: the rejection of reason, the renunciation of thought.

The most dangerous thing is that this understanding contradicts the very reason for the human being’s existence, both according to the Divine narrative and the reality of things.
For it would be absurd to create an intelligent being and then tell them to abstain from thinking.
It would be absurd to endow a being with the capacity to choose, to say “yes” or “no”, and then to tell them that the only choice they can make is not to choose — or to hand over this faculty to their creator and become a mere follower.

The Real Problem: A Misunderstanding of Freedom

The problem, at its root, comes from a lack of understanding of what freedom truly is, from an ignorance of its very nature.
For many, freedom is synonymous with anarchy.

How many times have we heard preachers cite verse 23:115 saying:

“Do you think that We created you to be free like wild animals, without responsibility, without accountability?”

They compared freedom to that of wild beasts.
But worse still, they made responsibility the antonym of freedom, and a synonym of slavery.
Whereas it is exactly the opposite.

Responsibility and Freedom: One and the Same Essence

True responsibility is born of a free and conscious choice.
A genuine sense of responsibility can only blossom in a being who is free, capable of saying yes or no, and who chooses to commit by conscience.

The slave has no responsibilities: he only has duties.
His actions do not come from him, but from the orders he receives.
The free being, on the other hand, bears responsibilities that arise from an inner contract, from a free and informed consent.
It is this choice that gives value to his commitment.

Wajh Allâh: Absolute Freedom

Freedom, in the Qur’anic lexicon, is called Wajh Allâh — what common translation calls the Face of God.

But Wajh Allâh is not a face turned toward us: it is a state of consciousness.
It is the state of seeking nothing but Allâh — that is, seeking nothing at all, and at the same time seeking the All, with a capital A.

What I do, what I give, I do out of pure value, without expectation or calculation.
I seek nothing in return.
I seek nothing from you.

For as soon as I expect something in return — a reward, a favor, recognition, a place in paradise or fear of hell —
my act becomes conditioned, therefore conditional.

And what is conditional no longer comes from the absolute source within me.
It no longer comes from that unconditioned place, from that free consciousness that the Qur’an names Wajh Allâh:
a universal consciousness, free from all attachment, encompassing all things and acting through them without being chained to them.

It is this freedom from all attachment, from all cause and all expectation, that opens access to the space of intentionality called Wajh Allâh:
that space from which the conscious soul acts, chooses, commits, relates, thinks, speaks, or remains silent —
not out of fear or interest, but from the absolute freedom of the spirit.

The Path of Consciousness: The Essence of al-ʿibâda

This inner freedom opens access to a space of pure action: that of al-ʿibâda.
The ʿAbd is not the slave: the ʿAbd is the one who freely chooses to walk the path of consciousness.
Not a box, not a fixed identity — but a living path, in perpetual evolution.

This path of consciousness is called, in the Qur’anic lexicon, Sharîʿa — or Sharaʿ.
Now, Sharaʿa does not mean to close and forbid, but to open and begin.
It is an evolutionary, progressive, living path — a constant opening toward the horizon of the possible, a continuous march, a work in progress.

Ad-Dîn: Free and Conscious Commitment

The word ad-dîn refers to the same reality of freedom: it means commitment and responsibility.
And as we have seen, it is impossible to imagine true commitment without freedom of choice.

Thus:

ʿIbâda → freely choosing to walk.
Sharîʿa → to open, to begin, to evolve.
Ad-dîn → to engage consciously and freely.

These three notions describe the very movement of human consciousness toward the light of its own freedom.

A Re-reading of the Verse: Inna ad-dîna ʿinda Allâh al-islâm

Inna ad-dîna ʿinda Allâh al-islâm — (Âl ʿImrân, 3:19)
Common translation: “The only religion accepted by Allâh is Islam.”

But the verse can be read differently:

Inna → the reality, the very essence of…
Ad-dîn → commitment, responsibility.
ʿinda Allâh → that is, in its universal and global dimension, aligned with the fitra — the pure, uncorrupted nature of the human being, his original essence, his intrinsic qualities, his moral and spiritual self-evidences.

And what is this essential, natural, universal commitment?

To cause no harm to others.

According to the prophetic definition:

“The Muslim is the one who harms no one — neither by his tongue nor by his hand.”

To cause no harm — this is the universal and timeless condition of coexistence,
the minimal yet essential foundation of every human civilization.

Inna ad-dîna ʿinda Allâh al-islâm —
For the human being, not to harm is the only path to flourish.

Resistances to this Universal Truth

This truth, though simple and evident, has always encountered forms of resistance.
Some come from fear, others from pride, still others from laziness or rigidity.
But all share a single root: the refusal to evolve toward a free and universal consciousness.

Al-Kâfiroun (الكافرون)

They are those who deny the truth after recognizing it.
They glimpsed clarity, tasted its light, but chose to turn away from it.
They live in denial, adopting an inverted narrative of reality to reassure themselves in their illusion of having made the right decision.

They loved, then they fled,
preferring darkness to light,
for it was unbearable for them to admit they were wrong.

It is a psychological resistance,
a strategy of self-justification born from the need to preserve one’s self-image.
→ Sûrat as-Saff (61:8)

Al-Moushrikoun (المشركون)

They are those who lock themselves in fixed identities.
They define themselves by ideological and conceptual boxes,
which they confuse with the truth itself.

Attached to their inherited schemas, to their mental habits,
they become slaves to their forms and prisoners of their traditions.
They refuse anyone the right to walk toward freedom,
for any opening threatens their sense of inner security.

It is an ideological resistance, rooted in the fear of change,
in the fear that openness may shake their certainties.
→ Sûrat at-Tawba (9:33)

Al-Moujrimoun (المجرمون)

They are those who break the bonds of friendship, kinship, or social trust,
driven by selfishness and individual interest.
They sever what God has united — human relationships, solidarity, mutual trust —
to serve their own desires or ambitions.

It is a moral and ethical resistance,
one that destroys fraternity and dries the heart.
→ Sûrat Yūnus (10:82)

Al-Moubtiloun (المبطلون)

They are those who sabotage prophetic work and slow humanity’s march toward a higher consciousness.
Their resistance often comes from lack of inner effort:
they do not seek to understand the depth of prophetic teachings.
They reduce the message to forms, symbols, and protocols,
deprived of spirit and fertility.

It is a spiritual resistance,
the refusal to let the message continue to reveal the new.
→ Sûrat Ghafir (40:78)

Rituals and Service: The Right Understanding

Commitment toward the Divine cannot be separated from commitment toward others.
One cannot serve the Divine apart from serving creation.
To serve Allâh is to serve the Living — within and around oneself.

Rituals are not services rendered to God:
the Divine needs nothing.
They are exercises of consciousness,
spaces of centering and inner opening.

For the more conscious ones, ritual becomes an energetic service:
a sharing of light, an act of harmonization,
a cultivation of peace and love among beings.
This is what Salât truly is — a movement of the soul toward unity.

Commitment to Allâh Arises from Freedom

Ad-dîn — commitment and responsibility —
if they are ʿinda Allâh, must arise from an inner space of freedom,
from a place the Qur’an calls al-islâm.

Lâ ikrâha fî d-dîn —
“There is no compulsion in matters of commitment.”
(al-Baqara, 2:256)

An action born of compulsion gives no life.

Faman yabtaghi ghayra al-islâmi dînan falan yuqbala minhu —
“Whoever seeks a form of commitment other than freedom, nothing will be accepted from him.”
(Âl ʿImrân, 3:85)

The word qabûl, from the root qabila — that of the midwife —
means here: to give birth.
An action accomplished without freedom is sterile:
a body without breath, a statue without soul.

The first responsibility of the human being is therefore to reclaim their spiritual freedom,
to free themselves from imprisoning beliefs,
from certainties that kill thought,
and to detach from conditioning and expectations.

Faith as Absolute Trust and Justice as the Foundation of Freedom

To Ground One’s Faith in the Absolute
To be muʾmin billâh is to ground one’s faith in the All, in the Absolute,
and not in a particular hope or fear.
It is to live in unconditioned trust,
free from all expectation and calculation.

True faith does not rest on reward,
but on the certainty of meaning:
the certainty of the unity of the Real,
the certainty of the Living that encompasses all things.

The Certainty of Absolute Justice
The second foundation of spiritual freedom
is the certainty of absolute justice — al-yawm al-âkhir.
Not a future day, but the Eternal Present,
the time when everything is seen, everything accounted for,
nothing forgotten.

“Where nothing is forgotten and everything is taken into account.”
(Sûrat Maryam, 19:64)

It is Divine memory, the time of the Real.
To believe in it is to live under the gaze of the Just,
not out of fear, but out of lucidity.

Freedom as Conscious Responsibility

To become aware of this justice
is to become fully responsible again:

I refrain from harming,
even when no one can judge me.
I free myself from opinions,
for I live in the presence of this absolute justice.

Thus I no longer act to please,
nor out of fear, nor out of hope.
I act only in search of Wajh Allâh:
seeking nothing in particular,
but seeking the All.

Al-Islâm: Spiritual Freedom, Not Submission

Al-Islâm, which I translate here as spiritual freedom,
has often been defined as “the universal path of submission to God.”
This interpretation has freed the word from the box of identity,
but in translating it as submission, it has betrayed its essence and its breath.

Linguistically, islâm comes from salima —
to be free, sound, intact, detached, without bond or flaw:

moussalamatun lâ shiyata fîhâ —
A pure cow, detached, without spot or blemish.
(Sûrat al-Baqara, 2:71)

There is no sense of submission in any of this.
Even the word taslîm, often interpreted as surrendering one’s will,
in reality means:

To free oneself from specific expectations
and not to insist on a particular result.

It is liberation, not capitulation.

The Danger of the Word “Submission”

To translate islâm as submission
is not only a linguistic mistake,
but a spiritual and political deviation.

For if islâm means peace,
and one translates it as submission,
then peace becomes a peace under domination —
like the Pax Romana, imposed by power.

Such an understanding is dangerous and outdated.

Humanity today is called to live
a universal peace,
founded not on submission to an authority,
but on faith in justice
and on the awareness of the intrinsic value of Peace.