To lose the ability to see with the eye of tawhid means to fall into seeing with the eye of shirk, or associating other gods with God. If the Qur’an … - William Chittick

The key to the Islamic intellectual tradition is precisely the intellect, which is nothing but the soul that has come to know and realize its full potential. Inasmuch as the soul possesses this potential, it is often called fitra or innate disposition. If we employ the language of the Qur’an, the fitra is the very self of Adam to whom God “taught all the names” (2:31). It is the primordial Adam present in every human being. At root, it is good and wise, because it inclines naturally toward tawhid, which stands at the heart of all wisdom and forms the basis for the acquisition of true knowledge of God, the universe, and the self.

Few concerns are as central to Islam as the search for knowledge (‘ilm). In the Koran God commands the Prophet, by universal Muslim consent the most knowledgeable of all human beings, to pray, “My Lord, increase me in knowledge!” (20:114). Muslims must imitate him in this quest. “Are they equal,” asks the Koran, “those who know and those who know not?” (39:9). The answer is self-evident. Hence, as the Prophet said, “The search for knowledge is incumbent upon every Muslim.”'

To be human is to be born with the fitra, which is an innate recognition of tawhid that is represented mythically by the Covenant of Alast and the Trust. There is nothing extraneous or superadded about this fitra—it is precisely what makes people human. But the fitra tends to become obscured by upbringing and circumstances, and then people become less than human. They are "deaf, dumb, blind—like the cattle; no, even further astray." Dhikr is the all-important remedy that makes possible the actualization of the fitra. Dhikr is both God's merciful response to heedlessness, and the human response to God's mercy.