An example on how our intellect (aql) can lead us astray.

Our intellect (aql) will tell us that the companions of the Prophet, salalahoalayhewsalam, (Sahabah) were much better than us as they were more closer our beloved Prophet, salalahoalayhewsalam. And if we know for a fact that the Qur’an was revealed over 20+ years to the Prophet, salalahoalayhewsalam, and the rulings were gradually enacted in the society and with the sahabah; similarly we, as Muslims in the 21st century, should get at least 20+ years to follow Islam?

Why is that from the second we are a mature adult, the entire Quran is mandatory upon us and we are a muqalif  (fore-bearer) of all the rulings. Whereas for the sahabah, they had 20+ years.

For example, the alcohol was forbidden to the sahabah in 3 stages and for us when we enter this deen of Islam, we have to refrain from it instantaneously! This argument has pure logical reasoning and our intellect, if we were to answer this question purely on the basis of our intellect, i.e. through rational reasoning, then itwould surely be in favour of this argument.

However, we must first reflect on the question and it will show you that that person who lets his aql or intellect go free, i.e. allow yourself to sit and think all types of things about Islam, you will surely go astray.

In fact that is what you have in many people who are professors in Islamic Studies department in America and the West. They know more about the Qur’an than you and I do! They sit day and night reflecting about it, reading and studying it, analysing it only to criticise it, doubt it, wonder about it!

Therefore their intellect puts a veil over their belief and iman does not enter their hearts. It shows that this is the baraqah of keeping with your aqeedah. Prophet, salalahoalayhewsalam, said in a hadith which one should implant on our hearts, “Al barakatu ma’a akabirukum,” roughly translated as “blessings is with your elders.”

That the blessings lies in keeping with the company of your elders; it lies in following the path of your elders, in taking the understanding of our deen (religion) from those that are senior to you.

And Allah knows best.

Quran: A source of guidance or a means to go astray

Allah, suhanahuwatala, openly mentions the purpose of revealing the Quran.

“Le tuq rijannaas minazulumati illan-noor”

Allah, subhanhuwatala, by way of this book could take people out of darkness and bring them into light. At the same time, at another place in the Quran, Allah mentions that there will be some people who would be guided by this book, and there will be some people for whom this book would be a means to go astray!

And you find this example at the time of the Prophet, salalahoalheywasalm, some ayat/verse would be revealed and instead of letting it impact upon their hearts, there were some kuffars amongst the Quraish that would respond and say “le sahrummubeen”, “this is magic, this is just fraud, this is deception”.

They would say these things in response to the wahi that was being revealed in front of them or hear about it second hand.

So from that time until now, it is just only logical to understand to say that if people could be led astray in the presence of the Prophet Muhammad, salalhoalayewasalam, while witnessing wahi (revelations) being revealed onto Him, while listening to the revelations being recited from His tongue and still they could be led astray, its only easy to understand that there will always be people from that time until the Day of Judgement, that because their hearts have hardened, because they are blinded by the their intellect, or because they actually following their own rules and desires, they may be lead astray by this very Quran.

Three means to acquire knowledge

When we approach any kind of the sacred knowledge, the knowledge of Quran, Sunnah, Fiqh and Tazkiyah. We should know that there are three means/tools (zaraeh) that a person has for husul-e-ilm to acquire this knowledge.

The first is what they call asbah-al-khamsa, his or her five senses, i.e. sight, smell, hearing, touch and taste. This is the first means through which a person acquires knowledge of this world – your sensory perception, your five senses. But also know that these five senses can also deceive you, and can sometimes be wrong, incorrect or misleading. They are deficient and are not perfect means to knowledge.

For example if you were standing at a far distance from a mountain. To your eye, that mountain appears small. That is a separate thing that using your brain you know that it is not really small, it is bigger than it looks. The moon is much bigger than it looks, but in reality if you were to confine yourself just on your five senses or just to your sense of sight then you would imagine that the mountain or the moon is just as small as it looks.

So the five senses that you have can deceive you. Many times a person can be deceived by his sight, smell, hearing, touch or taste.

The second means of knowledge is our aql, our rational intellect, i.e. our brain. Allah, subhanuwatala, endowed human beings, perhaps more so that all other creations with a rational ability, the ability to reflect, ponder and think and process thoughts. But also this intellect, our aql can also lead you astray. In fact, all the terrible things that go on in this world today are all because of the aql. This is because human beings’ intellect have let them astray. Whether it lead them to create the atom bomb, whether it lead them to make the decision to drop it on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, whether it lead them to invent the false ideologies of communism and socialism, whether it lead them to invent any type of false ways of human life, any -ism. All these things are acts anything other than the product of human intellect, so much of the sufferings, much of the savagery, much of the butchery that goes on today, is a product of human beings who had ideas and ideologies and some of them viciously trying to propagate their views on earth. So it shows that a human beings’ intellect can also lead him astray. Not just in violent matters, but also in cultural matters, in ways of life. In American you have these debates these days of same-sex marriages. This whole concept of same-sex marriage being something that should be permissible, something that should be acceptable – this whole concept is a product of human beings’ minds. It’s a way of thinking, it’s a way of reflecting, an outlook on life. If a human being lets his intellect go unrestricted, he doesn’t rein it in, then with the kind of examples just highlighted, the kind of consequences (nataij), the type of results his or her intellect may lead him – truly his aql has no bounds.

The third and utmost highest of ways is through divine revelation, i.e. through wahi. Allah, subhanhuwatala, actually sent wahi to us to save us from our aql. To curb our intellect, to manage our intellect, to lay down the borders (hudud) through which we can live our life – be it our individual lives, our family lives, our communal lives, our societal lives, our political lives, our political lives, our lives as a global citizen, the wahi defines each and every in which you have to live. So the purpose of wahi that Allah, subhanuwatala, said in the Quran:

“Kul hudalhe huwal huda”

The guidance of Allah, subhanuwatala, alone is true guidance. If you want to live a rightly guided, informed life, and an enlightened life, it is through the guidance of Allah. The way to be enlighten in this world, where this is no other form of intellectual fulfilment, no other form of enlightenment, no other form of spiritual upliftment, other than the hidaya that is contained in this wahi, in the devine revelation of Quran al Kareem. Say that verily the hidaya of Allah, subahanuwatala, sends, that alone is true hidaya and that alone is true guidance.

Quran-al-kareem

The next series of post will be outlining the four sources of our deen (religion), and the aspects of knowledge. The scholarship in each of these four sources will be highlighted henceforth starting from the primary source, Quran-al-kareem.

The first and primary source of our deen, the Quran al-kareem, the sacred text of revelation, the very words of Allah that He has sent to us. Believe it or not, but we live in a time, in an age, in which this very Quran is under attack, both from within and from without. We live in an age of progressive Islam. A time of liberal Islam. A time of reformers who wish to reform this deen, who wish to reinterpret this book, change this deen to fit themselves. There was a time when people would wish to change themselves, to adapt themselves to the deen. However today we live in a time when people wish to adapt the book, interpret the book and adapt the deen and change in a way that fits them. So it means that for a young man or for the middle-aged man, it is necessary for him to understand how he can approach the Quran and how he can gain knowledge of this Quran, and what is true scholarship from the Quran so that he can remain guided and he can safeguard himself from going astray.

The whole purpose of the Quran is the purpose of our hidaya and guidance. Allah says in the Quran:

Raban allaze aata khulna shayin khalkahu summa hada

That our lord is that being, that entity, that zaat, that gave each and everything its creations, i.e. He created everything. But He simply didn’t just create everything and leave it as it is, summa hada, but then He created its hidaya, i.e. He gave the means for that creation to understand how to function.

And you look at this and find that this is not only in human realm, but also in the animal realm. Animals are given an instinct, Allah, subhanhuwatala, created them, but he also created the hidaya for them. That is when the new born chick when she hatches from her egg, she already knows how to walk around, how to breath, and how to eat. Similarly that’s how the human baby when she is born from the womb. In the womb she never used to cry, Allah, ta’ala, gave her the hidaya, this instinct, this fitra, this human nature, this basic programming, that the baby knows that whenever he or she needs something, i.e. when she needs to be changed, when she needs to be shifted, when she needs to be fed, all she has to do is cry. So Allah, subhanhuwatala, not only did He create everything, but he also created the hidaya and guidance for everything.

The human beings, i.e. humanity, is the greatest creation of Allah, subhanhuwatala. We are what is called in Arabic as the ashraf-al-makhlooqaat, the honour, the most exalted creation of Allah, subhanhuwatala. So for that best of creation, Allah created the best means of hidaya, known as wahi, which is sacred revelation. And the greatest and final and the most complete form of revelation is the Quran-al-kareem.

Belief In Divine Guidance

“The foremost belief around which all the Islamic concepts revolve is that the whole universe is created and controlled by One, the only One God. He has created man and appointed him as His vicegerent on the earth to fulfill certain objectives through obeying His commands. These commands are not restricted to some modes of worship or so-called religious rituals. They, on the contrary, cover a substantial area of almost every aspect of our life. These commands are neither so exhaustive that straiten the human activities within a narrow circle, leaving no role for human intellect to play, nor are they so little or ambiguous that they leave every sphere of life at the mercy of human perception and desire. Far from these two extremes, Islam has a balances approach to govern the human life. On the one hand, it has left a very wide are area of human activities to man’s own rational judgment where he can take decisions on the basis on his reason, assessment of facts and expedience. On the other hand, Islam subjected human activities to a set of principles which have external applications and cannot be violated on a superficial grounds of expediency based on human assessment.

The fact behind this scheme is that human reason, despite its vast capabilities, cannot claim to have unlimited power to reach the truth. After all, it has some limits beyond which it either cannot properly work or may fall prey to errors. There are numerous domains of human life where ‘reason’ is often confused with ‘desires’ and where unhealthy instincts, under the disguise of rational arguments, misguide humanity to wrong and destructive decisions. All those theories of the past which are held today to be fallacious, claimed, in their respective times, to be ‘rational’ but it was after centuries that their fallacy was discovered and their absurdity was universally proved.

It is thus evident that the sphere of work delegated to human ‘reason’ by its Creator is not unlimited. There are areas in which human reason cannot give proper guidance or, at least, is susceptible to errors. It is these areas in which Allah Almighty, the Creator of the universe, has provided guidance through His revelations sent down to His prophets. On the basis of this approach it is the firm belief of every Muslim that the commands given by the divine revelations through the last messenger (salalaho-alayhe-wasalam) are to be followed in letter and spirit and cannot be violated or ignored on the basis of one’s rational arguments or his inner desires. Therefore, all the human activities must always be subject to these commands and must work within the limits prescribed by them. Unlike other religions, Islam is not confined to some moral teachings, some rituals, or some modes of worship. It rather contains guidance in every sphere of life including socio-economic fields. The obedience from servants of Allah is required not only in worship, but also in their economic activities, even though it is at the price of some apparent benefits, because these apparent benefits may go against the collective interest of the society.”

Extract from “An Introduction of Islamic Finance” by Muhammad Taqi Usmani

As always some great words of Muhammad Taqi Usmani, one of the great scholars of our present day time, who has worked extensively in the field of Islamic Financing. However, even though we know that our rational reasoning may be affected by our desires, how do we control them?

Asalamaualaykum

Asalamaualaykum readers,

This is the first post by thepath2jannah of many to come (god-willing). As the name suggests, ThePath2Jannah, our aim is to guide, foremost ourselves, and then our readers to the path of the divine. May Allah bless us with new ideas in trying to improve this blog and to create it a hub where both non-Muslims and Muslims can try to learn new facts about Islam.

More updates about our aims and objectives will be coming soon, but for now, some food for thought: a quotation from Chapter Hadid (The Iron), Verse 22-24 from the Holy Quran:

“Anything that happens on earth, or to you, has already been recorded, even before the creation. This is easy for GOD to do. Thus, you should not grieve over anything you miss, nor be proud of anything He has bestowed upon you. GOD does not love those who are boastful, proud. They are stingy, and enjoin the people to be stingy. If one turns away, then GOD is the Rich, the Praiseworthy.”

(Chapter 57: Verses 22-24)