Allah has bestowed human being with determined/fixed psychological make-up. The composition of emotions/traits once granted to human being is not changed; however man is empowered to choose the situations and magnitude of emotions/feelings to manifest in those situations.
We know that human brain is associated with all kind of emotions/traits-pleasures and sorrows, liking and disliking, excitements and shocks, sadness and happiness, love and hate, affection and aversion, hope and frustration, confidence and disbelief, self-respect and lack of self-respect, courage and cowardliness, patience and impatience, resilience and lack of resilience. In short, human brain is transmitter and source of all human emotions/traits. Similarly human brain is the origin of human decision-making, and intellectual exertions. Apart from this, human brain is the center of all instructions under which human body acts and reacts.
In Quran all attributes and functions associated with human brain are described with word ‘qalb’. (for details plz go through my article ‘concept of ‘qalb’ and ‘fuwad’ in Quran).
Allah says:
“Allah has not made for an individual two ‘qalbs’ in his interior” (al-ahzab-4).
As word ‘qalb’ is used in Quran to describe all human brain’s functions including traits/emotions, this verse means that composition of emotions/ traits once granted to a human being is never changed;
however he is empowered to choose the situations and magnitude of emotions/traits to manifest in those situations. It means humans can tame their emotions/traits. Emotions/traits provide one basis to human personality, the other basis are knowledge, skills, environment etc. In other words, determined human psyche does not mean human personality cannot grow and develop; human personality can grow and develop positively depending upon how much natural traits/emotions are tamed positively, and how much knowledge, skills and conducive environment has been provided.
The fact that set of emotions/traits once granted to a person cannot be changed is also endorsed by a saying of our Nabi (saw) who states that ‘ human nature does not change’.
The above quoted verse also implies that human being is potentially homogeneous in what he wants or does not want for himself, what he thinks is right or wrong, what he wants to be or not to be, what he wants others to be or not to be. The fixed/determined psychological make-up of human being helps him in achieving such psychological homogeneity, by taming his emotions and acquiring knowledge, and by creating conducive environment for this purpose.
Another implication is that though we cannot change nature of human beings, but we can educate and train them in applying/manifesting their emotions/traits in such situations and in such manner which may be the best suited to public welfare and interest. The most effective apparatus to educate and train human beings is religion which, on the one hand, lends required psychological homogeneity by offering singularity of rationale to human deeds by making Allah the sole cause of human deeds, and, on the other hand, makes human beings most suited to public interests and welfare. Our educational institutions and social development center/institutions should be designed on basis of religious values.
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