Four Hearts in a Further Hadith

In a further hadith, the Prophet (peace be upon him) is reported to describe four kinds of heart in his own right: one closed, one open, one inverted, and one oscillating.

The closed heart admits no light, nūr. Nothing said to it makes any difference — the whole of the Qur'an could be recited to it, or every saying of the Prophet (peace be upon him) besides, and it would remain unmoved: deaf and dumb, ṣummun bukmun, as Allah (swt) says of such people in the Qur'an, and they do not understand — receiving nothing because it is closed. This is the heart of a disbeliever, carrying the same hardness, qaswa, already described.

The open heart is the one that receives: it takes in the light, anwār, of Allah (swt), sees the truth, al-ḥaqq, for what it is, and acknowledges it. This is the heart of a believer, a muʾmin.

The inverted heart, turned entirely upside down, is the heart of a hypocrite: he professes belief with his tongue while believing nothing within, a man who thinks himself smarter than everybody else, clever enough to make his way among people and take whatever benefit comes from being counted a Muslim while believing none of it in his heart — more dangerous, in the end, than an open disbeliever.

The oscillating heart moves constantly between the two, up and then down. This is the heart of a sinning believer, a fāsiq Muslim: one day given over to sin, then overtaken the next by such guilt, lawwāmah, that he weeps and repents, and is right again for a while — only to fall back on his face within two or three weeks, up and down, up and down, until the angel of death, malak al-mawt, finds him in whatever state he happens to be in when his soul, his rūḥ, is returned to Allah (swt). May Allah (swt) strengthen every heart.