What is the Sixth Sense?
The sixth sense is the brain. Its function is comprehensive and integrative perception, which unifies the inputs from the other senses, the hand, ear, eye, tongue, and nose, into touch, hearing, sight, taste, and smell, respectively. When this sense becomes strong, its perception of everything becomes remarkably all-encompassing, as if it simultaneously touches, hears, sees, tastes, and smells.
What is the Seventh Sense?
The seventh sense is the heart, and its function is life itself. This sense is the origin, while all other senses serve as its messengers and forerunners, leading to the fountain of complete life.
Life began amidst fear. Allah says: “Indeed, We created man in hardship.” (90:4). Here, hardship (kabad) refers to toil and difficulty. This hardship, which surrounded life from its inception, planted fear deep within living beings. Without fear, life would not have emerged in the first place, nor would it have advanced and evolved later. However, unless life ultimately overcomes fear, it cannot achieve its full perfection.
Life triumphs over fear when the sixth sense strengthens and perceives matters as they truly are, in the manner described above. At that point, [sentient] life realizes that fear was merely a stage accompanying its nascent ignorance and inadequacy, and that fear has no grounding in the true nature of things.
Once the sixth sense reaches this level of clarity, the seventh sense, the heart, relaxes, becomes reassured, and releases itself from the constrictions caused by fear. The heart will begin pumping the blood of life powerfully into every particle of the body and every cell of the skin, rejuvenating what fear had previously hardened into a shell or armor to preserve primitive life. As a result, sensation returns to the entire body, making it fully alive, fully refined, and fully beautiful, an embodiment of utmost beauty. The living body, at this stage, is the one referred to in Allah’s words: “And you see the earth barren, but when We send down upon it rain, it quivers, swells, and grows every delightful variety.” (22:5)
This is the function of the seventh sense, complete life, and complete life has no final perfection. Its perfection is always relative. It evolves in pursuit of absolute life and absolute perfection, which belong to the Absolutely Perfect, Allah. Its evolution is continuous through the progressive refinement of all the senses, each in its domain, and the corresponding advancement of the intellect, strengthening thought and broadening comprehension. The clarity of the intellect and the power of thought determine the purity of the heart, the breadth of life, and its perfection. This progressive development of the senses is what Allah meant by His saying: "and grows every delightful variety." (22:5).
Through our examination of the origin and development of the intellect, we have reached the fourth stage of human development. We have briefly delved into this stage, even though we have not yet completed our discussion of the third stage of human evolution. We will pause this exploration to touch briefly on the fourth stage before returning to continue discussing the third stage, as it is the most significant of the four stages of human development.
