The Reasonings – (continuation page 137-138)
“O brothers and sisters! The religious life, and the Shari‘a that regulates it, both of which are necessarily in conformity with the essentials of the sciences and rational truths—necessarily so, because sciences are the tongues of God’s universal book of creation, while the Shari‘a is the assembly of His laws for religious life—encompass almost all the different fields of knowledge. To cite a few examples, moral training, purification of the soul, care of the body, management of the house, civil law, social order, general law, and so on. The Shari‘a established detailed rules concerning some matters included in these and other fields of knowledge, while in others it promulgated general principles and left to human reason the deduction of necessary laws that were based on them. Specialists in all sciences and branches of knowledge, if unbiased and fair-minded, will certainly admit that the religious rules and regulations of Islam and the commandments of its Shari‘a, which were given thirteen (now fourteen) centuries ago cannot be the product of a human being. Thomas Carlyle, one of the famous thinkers of the modern world, quotes from a wise German politician that after his research about Islam, he asked himself whether modern civilization could adapt itself to Islam and survive. That politician gave an affirmative answer to his question. Carlyle himself also acknowledges that when the truths of Islam appeared, like a brightly burning fire, they assimilated other systems of thought and religions, which resembled pieces of wood. He is correct in his judgment because any fallacy cannot survive in the face of truth. Despite a myriad of attacks from all fronts and endeavors to distort it, Islam preserves its truths. It can even be said that all those attacks and endeavors make the layer of dirt that has been placed over Islam thinner and thinner (as a love for the truth and a zeal for research develop in humanity). The present state of the world bears witness to this. The premises in the first part of this book should be taken into consideration.
Essential of things is what that thing refers to. Your body needs to be purified. Essential of water is giving the news about the qualities of its Creator, not what kind of atoms are there. Materialist study the molecular structure of the water to benefit from it in and of itself only, rather than getting the meaning”.
- Answer about where water comes from is in the water itself.
- Universe carries lots of meaning about its Creator.
I should not distort my human qualities.
- Be consistent within yourself and not distort your human qualities (taqwah).
- Try to understand yourself and use it in an appropriate way.
The guidance that is brought to you helps you purify your soul and guidance is given by the Source of your Existence.
Prophets are warners, threatening you not to fall into a mistaken conclusion which turns your life in Hell. You will never enjoy your being in this world in a humanly manner, unless you reduce your life to the level of an “accidentally happened to be here as a living being with no meaning and purpose in your existence.”
Religious life: Trying to see the parallel between what the creation introduces to you and what your human side understands from it.
- Rituals come after following this decision. If rituals take priority, then you ignore the understanding of the meaning of existence of the universe. Then rituals turn into material forms only.
Creation gives the message of Eternal Life but does not satisfy this expectation within this type of creation. But it refers to the necessity of the existence of such a creation where the eternal life is possible. This creation also demonstrates that its Maker is Absolute in Its qualities, so It is able to create another type of creation. Human ardent desire for eternal happiness is another reason to expect from this Absolute Creator to satisfy this essential human desire which is engrained within human beings by their Maker.
How can I regulate my life according to an appropriate guidance to my human nature?
If you feel the need to express your admiration in the act of creation that you are seeing, then go for it. Only then, the Prophetic examples come, and the rituals make sense. If you do not experience within your own being the need for satisfaction of your existence and just prefer to live in this world without questioning the reason behind the existence of your human feelings, then, as a result, you see no point in taking notice of the news about the rituals presented to you by the Prophetic examples.
- Laws are to be deduced from the constitution (sharia) for those people who are convinced about the validity of the reasoning in this constitution, rather than imposing it on people who have been convinced about the constitution first. That is why the Sharia laws are universal, open to every human being who questions the content of the constitution and become convinced about the truthfulness of it. After being convinced, the details is left for the individual to decide upon.
This universe is an exhibition hall and when you get mesmerized by creation, then you feel the need to express and talk about it either in verbal or written form. This feeling is the main motive behind acting out the practical side of the Sharia.
If people reject religion or attack it, then it is mostly based on what has been presented to them which is based on irrational reasoning as a result of bias acceptance of religion mostly from cultural tradition. It is also a result of dissatisfaction with religion, hence the need to devalue it. It is in human nature to reject the wrong and confirm the right.
- Such a person is not rejecting religion, rather superficially interpreting religion from what is presented by ignorant people or institutionalized religion. Here, a person is not seriously trying to understand what religion itself is and consequently denies religion. These kinds of people are known with the name of Atheism.
- They maybe good reasoning people but they are looking in the wrong side because they are misled by wrong representation of religion.
Materialist scientists simply deny the Source of Existence of anything and escape that side by putting it on religion to define the Why questions (i.e. why is the seed made to develop the way it does, what is the purpose behind all these acts of creation?) Science is for the how questions they say. But if you think about it, religion poses the how question to the mind of the people and then scripture (i.e. Speech of God) defines it.
What religion teaches is confirmed by the witnessing of the universe. While you are investigating the content of the attack, you become more aware of the truth in religion if you really study it. However, if you defend religion on a shallow base, religion is defeated. When no one challenges your idea, hiding behind your bias acceptance of a religious tradition, you think that you are right. We have to understand the fundamentals of this historical controversy among people.