Human - above the material

There are moments in life when questions about the human mind stop being theoretical and start becoming deeply personal. When someone close experiences mental suffering, it naturally pushes the heart to think beyond diagnosis and treatment. One begins to reflect on what it really means to be human — the need for understanding, emotional presence, and steady companionship during inner struggle. In such moments, it becomes difficult to separate medicine from meaning, or biology from the lived experience of the heart. This reflection is an attempt to think through these questions with honesty and balance.

Over the past few weeks, I have been listening to long discussions and reading material about spirituality, mental illness, modern society, and the unseen dimensions of human life. Some of these voices come from writers and thinkers like Sean Stone, Father Stephen De Young, historians, and researchers who believe that modern society has become increasingly materialistic and spiritually disconnected.

The central idea they present is that human beings are not only physical bodies driven by hormones and chemistry. Human consciousness, emotions, morality, and mental states are also seen as having a deeper, spiritual dimension. According to this view, when societies become overly materialistic, fearful, addicted, or disconnected from God, human beings gradually become more psychologically and spiritually vulnerable.

One of the strongest claims in these discussions is that modern thinking explains almost all human suffering through biology alone — hormones, brain chemistry, genetics, or neurological imbalance — while ignoring the inner, spiritual condition of a person. The concern is that reducing a human being to only a biological machine leaves out meaning, purpose, morality, and the soul from our understanding of life.

This subject became personally important to me because of our daughter’s illness. Watching psychosis and then seeing antipsychotic medication reduce emotional expression and personality brings difficult questions that are not easy to ignore. Medical treatment is necessary and often essential for safety and stability, but at the same time, it feels incomplete to understand a human being only through medicine. Emotional, relational, and spiritual dimensions also seem to be part of healing.

Some of the material I came across links mental suffering with what religions describe as spiritual darkness — states such as fear, hatred, addiction, jealousy, trauma, arrogance, hopelessness, and moral confusion. These conditions, it is suggested, slowly weaken the human inner self. When a person lives for long in fear, isolation, comparison, or emotional neglect, they can become more vulnerable to destructive thoughts and inner disturbance.

Islam, in its own balanced way, acknowledges many of these realities.

The Qur’an and Hadith speak about the inner life of the human being in terms of:

• Waswas (whisperings that disturb the mind),

• diseases of the heart,

• envy and arrogance,

• hatred and despair,

• excessive attachment to worldly life,

• the influence of Shaytan,

• and the weakening of the soul through neglect of God.

At the same time, Islam is careful about balance. It does not encourage paranoia or the habit of attributing every illness to unseen forces. The Prophet ﷺ encouraged seeking medical treatment while also guiding believers toward spiritual care, prayer, and inner purification.

A balanced Islamic understanding, then, would be:

• Mental illness can have biological causes.

• Trauma and emotional pain can deeply affect the mind.

• Spiritual and moral conditions can also impact a person’s inner well-being.

• Human beings often need care on all these levels together.

Healing, from this perspective, is not only medical and not only spiritual. It is a combination of:

• medical treatment,

• emotional support,

• family compassion,

• prayer and remembrance of Allah,

• recitation of the Qur’an,

• good and stable company,

• reducing fear and negativity,

• avoiding harmful addictions and environments,

• cleansing the heart from envy, hatred, and hopelessness,

• and strengthening one’s connection with Allah.

Another idea that appears often in these discussions is that modern society has become overly materialistic. Success is measured in terms of money, power, appearance, status, and control. This often leads to emptiness, anxiety, comparison, and emotional exhaustion. Islam had already warned about this imbalance through the concept of excessive attachment to dunya.

There are also broader claims about how powerful individuals and systems throughout history can become morally corrupt when they lose accountability before God. While some of these discussions become speculative, the underlying message is still important: when human beings place ego, desire, and worldly power above moral responsibility, societies begin to lose their spiritual health.

At the same time, it feels important not to fall into fear-based thinking or constant suspicion. Islam emphasizes clarity, justice, evidence, patience, and trust in Allah — not paranoia or obsession with hidden explanations. Fear itself can also harm the mind and heart.

What becomes clearer through all of this is a simple but profound realization:

Human beings are far more complex than modern material explanations alone can capture. The mind, heart, soul, emotions, relationships, and lived experiences are all deeply connected. Real healing likely requires attention to all of these dimensions together.

Perhaps the answer is not in rejecting medicine, nor in rejecting spirituality, but in understanding the human being more completely — as body, mind, heart, and soul.

In the end, whatever explanations we lean toward — medical, psychological, or spiritual — a human being remains more complex than any single framework can fully describe. Islam reminds us that every soul is known to Allah, and that trials are never without meaning, even when they feel overwhelming or unclear. Alongside treatment and practical care, there is also a deep need for mercy, patience, companionship, and steady emotional presence. The human heart does not heal in isolation. It heals through connection — with family, with support, and ultimately with Allah. Holding all of this together allows a person to move forward without losing hope, even in uncertainty.