Integration; Man's mind, body and spirit

 Wholeness is not achieved by cutting off a portion of one’s being, but by integration of the contraries.

      - Carl Jung 

Man is a three-dimensional being, created by the fusion of body, mind, and spirit. These three are in the 'Integrated man' existing in a state of harmony with each reinforcing the other and never in conflict.

Conflict does arise and with dire consequences, as only in a state of harmony between the three can man attain his pinnacle as 'Khalifa-fil-ard' (i.e viceroy of God on earth).

With man's fall, from both the literal and metaphysical perspectives succumbing to his base self, Allah SWT promised 'to send him guidance periodically' to reverse this fall into a glorious ascent responding to tendencies embedded in his primordial.

Thus, man's struggles on earth is a series of ascents and descents in his journey towards integration and all his toils can be traced back to a lack of alignment of the body, mind, and spirit, it is he who aligns and integrates them that is a worthy viceroy of God.

The process is only possible if all the manifestations of his trilateral nature are attended to and nurtured by the individual as each has its peculiarities as entrusted to man by Allah SWT.

The body (i.e flesh, blood, and bones) must be attended with sufficient rest, feeding in the right proportion to fuel it, and physical activity, excess plunges man into his base beastly tendencies, whilst ignoring cause withering and decay.

The mind is a garden that must be guarded jealously and cultivated tenderly, for all actions stem from the mind, demonstrating primacy over the body. Education and discipline shape the mind into a veritable tool of upliftment making her a better moderator of bodily affairs.

The third and perhaps most crucial yet contentious aspect of man is his spirit, seemingly ambiguous and incomprehensible to man's tools of cognition is the essence of man and in touch with his divine nature, transcendent, with the heart being alluded to as the seat of the spirit and the Qur'an alluding to its 'sealing and blindness' in;

'Allah has set a seal upon their hearts and upon their hearing, and over their vision is a veil.1 And for them is a great punishment.

Q2V7 

and furthermore;

'Have they not traveled throughout the land so their hearts may reason, and their ears may listen? Indeed, it is not the eyes that are blind, but it is the hearts in the chests that grow blind.'

Q22V46.

The spirit should be nurtured with fasting, salah, and zikr, with salah being an 'ascension' of the believer, a journey towards his higher self. Fasting purges of distractions, caging his base instincts allowing one to connect with his spirit after dispersing distractions and zikr cleanses the heart.

In the Islamic tradition, a distinction is made between two holy wars, the “greater holy war” and the “lesser holy war”.

This distinction originated from a saying (hadith) of the Prophet SAW who on the way back from a military expedition said: “You have returned from a lesser holy war to the greatest holy war.” The greater holy war is of an inner and spiritual nature; the other is the material war waged externally against an enemy.

The relationship between the “greater” and the “lesser holy war,” however, mirrors the relationship between the soul and the body; to under heroic asceticism or “path of action,” it is necessary to recognize the situation in which the two paths merge, “the lesser holy war” becoming the means through which “a greater holy war” is carried out, and vice versa: the “little holy war,” or the external one, becomes almost a ritual action that expresses and gives witness to the reality of the first. 

Originally, orthodox Islam conceived a unitary form of asceticism: that which is connected to the jihad or “holy war.” The greater jihad is man’s struggle against the enemies he carries within.

More exactly, it is the struggle of man’s higher principle against everything that is merely human in him, against his inferior nature and chaotic and all lower attachments. Be a warrior and kill desire, the powerful enemy of the soul.

The “enemy” within ourselves must be subdued and put in chains. This enemy is the animalistic yearnings and tendencies, impulses, the limitations imposed on us by out ego, this subduing of the enemy is the only way to achieve inner liberation or the rebirth in a state of a deeper inner unity and harmony becoming fully integrated.