2021 Essays

Ihsan: Aesthetic Ethics

Rashid, Hussein

In a hadith qudsi, God says to the Prophet (peace be upon him and his family) that God is beautiful and loves beauty. The words that God uses for “beauty” come from the Arabic root j-m-l, meaning an outward or physical beauty. Yet we know that God has no physical appearance, so what does it mean when we are told that “God is beautiful”? I propose that we have to understand beauty as tied to iman (faith). Beauty is an aspect of ethical and spiritual development, not a fleeting aspect of the physical. Drawing on Muslim histories and traditions, I want us to think about the contribution we make to beauty in the world as tied to ethical transformation, which can and should be aesthetically pleasing.