Are we part of God and can we find the truth by looking inward?

No, God has no parts, and human beings are not a piece of Him. But God has placed His attributes in human beings as a potential, and that is why an honest look inward is worthwhile.

Only physical things have parts. A car has wheels, an engine and doors. A spirit has no such parts. You cannot say that this is the arm of the spirit and that is its neck. A spirit has attributes, but no limbs. This is all the more true of God. He is one and indivisible, and a human being is not a piece broken off from Him.

And yet there is something right in the idea. God created human beings in such a way that His attributes, as far as a human can grasp them, lie within them as a potential. Because God is kind, the capacity for kindness has been planted in people. Because God protects the innocent and does not let wrongdoing go unpunished, people too long for justice. That is why whoever looks honestly within finds traces of their Creator, as the second verse above says.

The body is not a mere shell to be cast off either. It is made up of countless cells, and each one follows instructions that God has placed in it. The body is more like an instrument from which the soul emerges and which the soul then governs.

The soul itself has no parts. It belongs equally to the whole body, and yet you cannot point to one spot and say, here it is. The Holy Qur’an says that the soul comes into being by God’s command and that we have been given only a little knowledge of it. Still, its existence is certain. The very moment we reflect on ourselves, it becomes clear that we are more than matter.

So looking inward does lead to the truth, but not because we are part of God. It leads there because God has placed His signs within us.