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THE
FRUITS OF THE QURAN’S WISDOM AND
MODERN
SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT AND PHILOSOPHY
In
the Name of God, the Merciful, the
Compassionate.
We
send down [stage by stage], of the
Quran, that which is a healing
and a mercy to the believers .
(17:82)
We
have not taught him poetry; it is
not seemly for him.
(36:69)
If
you want to compare the fruits of the
Quran’s wisdom and modern
scientific thought and philosophy, and
their instructions and teaching and the
degrees of knowledge they provide, then
heed the following:
With
its penetrating explanations, the Quran
of Miraculous Expression removes the
veil of familiarity and the habitual
cast over all creatures in the universe,
which are known as ordinary but are each
an extraordinary miracle of Divine
Power, and revealing these astonishing
wonders [of Divine creation] to
conscious beings and attracting their
gaze to them, opens up an inexhaustible
treasury of knowledge.
As
for philosophy, it conceals within veils
of the commonplace all miracles of
Power, which are extraordinary, and
overlooks them in ignorance and
indifference. It only urges attention to
freaks, which are outside the order of
creation and deviated from their perfect
true natures, and for that reason no
longer extraordinary; it offers them to
conscious beings as objects of wise
instruction. For example: Whereas it
views the creation of man as
commonplace, who is a most comprehensive
miracle of Divine Power, and looks at
him indifferently, it exhibits with
cries of astonishment, a three-legged or
two-headed person who has come out of
the perfection of creation, as an object
of instruction. Similarly: Whereas it
sees as ordinary the regular sustenance
of all infants and young from the
treasury of the Unseen, which is a most
subtle and universal miracle of Mercy,
and draws a veil of ingratitude over it,
it tries, on seeing an insect left alone
under the sea exceptionally isolated
from its fellows, feeding on a green
leaf, to make the fishermen weep for it
because of the favor and grace
manifested in it.
So,
reflect on the wealth and riches of the
Holy Quran with respect to wisdom and
knowledge of God, and the poverty and
bankruptcy of philosophy in regard to
learning, instruction and knowledge of
the Maker and take heed!
It
is because of this, because the Wise Quran
encompasses infinite brilliant exalted
truths, that it is free of the fancies
of poetry. Another reason why the Quran
of Miraculous Expression is not in
strict verse, despite its perfect order
and arrangement and its expounding in
its well-ordered styles the artistic
beauty and order in the book of the
universe, is that by not entering into
the constraints of meter, each verse can
form a line of connection with other
verses in an encompassing context which
binds in relationship the meaning of its
different verses. It is as if each
separate verse has an eye which looks to
most other verses, and a face turned
towards them. There are, in this way,
thousands of Qurans within the Quran,
each being adopted by a different path
or school in Islam. In sura al-Ikhlas,
for example, there is a treasury of
knowledge of Divine Unity provided by
thirty-six suras al-Ikhlas
formed of a combination of six
sentences, each having many aspects.
This
is comparable to the way each star in
the sky, unrestricted among the others
in an apparent randomness, extends, as
if from a center, a line of connection
to every other in the area surrounding
it, indicating the hidden relation
between all creatures. It is as if, like
the stars of Quranic verses, each
single star has an eye which looks to
all stars, and a face turned towards
them. Reflect, then, on the perfect
order in apparent disorder and take a
lesson! Understand one meaning of the
verse, We
have not taught him poetry; it is not
seemly for him.
Understand
also from the meaning of it is not
seemly for him that poetry tends to
adorn insignificant and dull facts with
grand and shining images and fancies,
and make them attractive. Whereas the
truths of the Quran are so great,
elevated, brilliant and splendid that,
when compared with them, the greatest
and most brilliant imaginings are dull
and insignificant. For example,
innumerable truths like those in the
following verses
On
the day when We shall roll up
heaven as a scroll rolled for
books.
(21:104)
He
covers the day with night, each
pursuing the other urgently.
(7:54)
It
is only one cry; then behold, they
are all arraigned before us.
(36:53)
testify
to this.
If
you want to see and appreciate how, like
piercing, bright stars, each of the Quran’s
verses removes the darkness of unbelief
by spreading the light of miraculousness
and guidance, imagine yourself in the
pre-Islamic Age of Ignorance, the desert
of savagery where everything was
enveloped in veils of lifeless matter
and nature amid the darkness of
ignorance and heedlessness. Then
suddenly hear from the sublime tongue of
the Quran, a verse like
All
that is in the heavens and earth
glorifies God, the Sovereign, the
All-Holy, the All-Mighty, the
All-Wise.
(62:1)
and
see how those creatures of the world
seen before as lifeless and unfeeling
spring to life in the minds of those
listening at the sound of ‘glorifies’,
how they awake and spring up and begin
to extol God by praising His Names!
Also, at the sound of
The
seven heavens and the earth
glorify Him.
(17:44)
the
stars in that black sky, each a solid
piece of fire, and the miserable
creatures on the earth, represent to the
mind of those listening the sky as a
mouth and the stars as each a
wisdom-displaying word, a
truth-radiating light, and the earth as
a head with the land and sea each a
tongue, and all animals and plants,
words of glorification. If you look at
each verse in the present context from a
modern view-point, that is, after each
has spread its light since its
revelation, with its content having
become (with the passage of time) among
already known things after the darkness
of ignorance had long been changed into
daytime by the ‘sun’ of the Quran
and the light of Islam, if you look at
it through the superficial and
stultifying veil of familiarity, you
will not truly see what sort of darkness
each verse removes by its sweet melody
of miraculousness, and you will not
appreciate this aspect of its
miraculousness among its other aspects.
A
parable to understand the highest
degrees of miraculousness of the Quran
Let
us imagine an extremely strange and
vast, spreading tree hidden under a
veil. As everybody knows, as with the
members of a man, there is a
relationship, harmony and balance
between all parts of a tree, that is,
between its branches, flowers and
fruits. Each of its parts has a form and
shape according to the nature of the
tree. If someone appears and draws a
picture on a veil corresponding exactly
to that hidden tree, giving each part,
from the branches to the fruits, from
the fruits to the leaves, its exact
shape and form in the same relationship
with and proportion to one another as
the original, no one will doubt that
that artist sees the hidden tree with an
eye penetrating the unseen, and so
depicts it correctly.
In
just the same way, the distinguishing
explanations of the Quran of
Miraculous Expression concerning the
reality of things, that is, the reality
of the tree of creation stretching from
the earth to the Divine Throne1
and from particles to the sun, maintain
the proportion between the parts to such
a degree and give each part and fruit a
form so suitable that all exacting and
truth-seeking scholars have concluded
about the description of the Quran:
‘What wonders God has willed! May God
bless it! It is only you, O Wise Quran,
that solves the mystery of creation!’
For
God the highest comparison must be put
forth-let us represent the Names and
Attributes of God, and the acts and
qualities of His Lordship, as a tree of
light so vast and great that it
stretches in time and space to eternity,
and includes Divine acts in an
infinitely vast sphere stretching from
He
comes between man and his heart,
(8:24) and
The
Splitting of the seed-grain and
the date-stone,
(6:95)
and
It is He Who fashions you in the
wombs as He wills,
(3:6)
to
And
the heavens rolled up in His right
hand,
(39:67) and
He
created the heavens and the earth
in six days,
(7:54) and
He
has subjugated the sun and the
moon.
(13:7)
The
wise Quran describes that radiant
reality, the truths of those Names and
Attributes, and acts and qualities, in
all their ramifications and results, in
a way so harmonious, so fitting and
appropriate to one another, without
impeding one another and invalidating
the decree of one another, that all
those who have penetrated the reality of
things and discovered the hidden truths,
and all the sages journeying in the
realm of the inner dimension of
existence have declared in the face of
that description: ‘Glory be to God!
How right, how conformable with reality,
how beautiful, how fitting!’
The
Quran describes all the essentials of
belief and Islam in
miraculously balanced and harmonious way
Take,
for example, the six pillars of belief,
which are like a single branch of two
mighty trees-the sphere of contingency
(the realm of material existence) and
the sphere of necessity (the realm of
Divine Existence). The Quran
describes the pillars of belief together
with all their elements and furthest
fruits and flowers, observing the
harmony among them to such degree,
illustrates them in a way so balanced
and well-measured, that the human mind
is astonished at and scarcely able to
grasp the beauty of it. Also, the Quran
has established among the pillars of
Islam, which are like one twig of the
branch of belief, down to their finest
details, the smallest of good manners,
furthest aims, most profound wisdom, and
most significant fruits, a proportion so
beautiful, a relationship so perfect,
and a balance so complete, that the
perfect order and balance, and due
proportion and soundness observed in the
supreme Shari‘a of Islam, which has
originated from the incontrovertible
commandments of the all-comprehensive
Quran, and the secondary meanings,
indications and allusions of its
statements, are an irrefutable and
decisive proof and a just, undeniable
witness for it. This means that the
explanations of the Quran cannot have
issued from the partial knowledge of any
man, particularly from the knowledge of
an unlettered one. They rest, rather, on
an all-comprehensive knowledge, and are
the Word of One Who is able to see all
things together like a single thing and
observe at the one, same instant all
truths between two eternities. The
verse,
Praise
be to God Who has sent down unto
His servant the Book, and has
allowed no crookedness therein,
(18:1)
is
about this reality.
O
God! O One Who has sent down the Quran!
For the sake of the Quran and the
one unto whom You sent it down,
illumine our hearts with the light
of belief and the Quran. Amen. O
One from Whom help is sought!
The
Quran and modern civilization with
respect to literary merits
In
the same way as modern civilization is
defeated before the scientific and
practical miraculousness of the Quran,
when compared to the Quran’s
literary merits-which may be likened to
the uplifting songs of an elevated lover
arising from a temporary separation or
heroic epics encouraging to victory and
lofty sacrifices-the literature and
rhetoric of modern civilization are like
either the desperate, grief-stricken
wailing of an orphan or the clamor of a
drunkard.
In
regard to effect, styles of literature
and rhetoric give either sorrow or joy.
Sorrow is of two kinds. It arises from
either loneliness and being without
protection and support or from
separation from the beloved. The first
is despairing and of the kind which
modern misguided, naturalist and
heedless civilization produces. The
second is lofty and exhilarating and of
the kind which arouses in man a hope and
eagerness for reunion, and which is
given by the guiding, light-diffusing
Quran.
As
for joy, it is also of two kinds. The
first is of the kind which incites the
soul to animal desires. This is what the
literature and all forms of the arts of
modern civilization do-the ‘fine’
arts, drama and cinema, etc. The second
kind of joy restrains the carnal self
and urges in a mannerly, innocent way
the heart, spirit, intellect, and all
other inner senses and faculties of man
to lofty things and reunion with his
original, eternal abode and his friends
who have already gone to this abode.
This joy is given by the Qur’an of
miraculous explanation, which encourages
man to Paradise, to eternal happiness
and vision of God, for which it arouses
in him eagerness.
Thus,
the profound meaning and great truth
contained in the verse, Say: ‘If
man and jinn banded together to produce
the like of this Quran, they would
never produce its like, not though they
backed one another’ (al-Isra’,
17.88), is not, as some careless people
of little understanding assert, an
exaggerated claim. It is a hundred
percent truth and reality, which the
long history of Islam has proved.
The
challenge the verse contains has two
principal aspects. One is that in
styles, eloquence, rhetoric, wording,
comprehensiveness, conciseness and
profundity, no beautiful words of men
and jinn which do not originate from the
Quran can resemble or equal the Quran.
Nor all the most beautiful, most
eloquent words of men and jinn composed
together in a well-arranged volume by
the most capable among them can in any
way be equal to the Quran. The second
aspect is that, however glittering and
apparently profound and beautiful, all
of the civilizations, philosophies,
literatures and laws, which are the
product of the minds of men and jinn,
and the result of their studies, are dim
and helpless in the face of the Quranic
commandments, wisdom and eloquence.
1.
Divine Throne (‘Arsh) and
Chair (Kursiyy) are unknown
to us. However, since God speaks
according to our level of
understanding, He usually speaks in
parables and metaphors. Elsewhere,
Bediuzzaman says that earth is the
Throne of Life (‘Arsh al-Hayat),
and water, the Throne of Mercy (‘Arsh
al-Rahma). This means that in
the world God creates most things
from earth and water, rain, is, in
one respect, the embodiment of His
Mercy. So, one of the meanings of ‘Arsh
may be all the things combined which
God uses in conveying and executing
His commands, or it may be an
immaterial entity enveloping all
creation from which God controls and
administers the universe. While ‘Arsh
may be related to the Divine ‘Empyrean’
World, Kursiyy may be rather
concerned with other unseen worlds
of immaterial forms. God knows the
best.
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