Why are we here? Now that we are, what is our best course of action? What would supreme success for man look like? Why is there so much suffering? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why wickedness and unconscientiousness appear to prosper? If God is the Creator of everything, is He the creator of evil deeds too? Or (if He creates good only), where does evil come from? Men, at any rate thoughtful individuals among them, cannot help seeking answers to questions such as these.
Humans are strange creatures though. Way too many of them are happy to simply get answers to such questions as and when needed; very few having the desire or the appetite for developing the competence to be able to figure out the answers for themselves, or at least to be able to assess the quality of the answers they receive. The analogy that comes to mind is that of men not interested in learning how to fish, merely being content perpetually receiving fish as charity instead.
A man may be informed that a given problem is described by a particular differential equation, as well as told the solution to that differential equation. That does not mean however that he knows differential equations. For whenever he encounters a different problem, he will fail to derive the relevant equation for it, much less solve it. Similarly, memorizing the correct answers to all questions in a past examination paper does not mean that one knows that subject, for the subject is much more than a few right answers. To know a subject, one requires the tools and the ability to tackle problems one has never seen before. This is what education is all about. What is true of differential equations /////(or any other area of knowledge) is true of fundamental philosophy as well.
Unfortunately, way too many people prefer ‘solutions’ simply given to them over learning the much more useful art of how to think, which would enable them to figure out how to address issues themselves. This intellectual lethargy is especially hard to explain on the part of Muslims, considering the emphasis the Quran places on its readers educating themselves instead of merely parroting ‘correct’ answers that they have memorized.
It is curious how it never occurs to an overwhelming majority of Muslims to open the Quran to see what it has to say. Although they claim that it is the unadulterated, verbatim speech of God, for responses to any and all questions (or objections from critics) they rely on other sources (anything but the Quran) instead. A strange state of affairs, to say the least.
Some of these questions are: Can non-Muslims enter Paradise? Is Islam fourteen centuries old? Was it in the Hijaz in the seventh century A.D. that the daily prayers were first made mandatory? Is praying alone acceptable, or one must always pray in congregation? Will people of the Fire dwell therein till eternity? Under what circumstances is repentance acceptable? Are men superior to women in Islam? Can prophets make mistakes? Are the descendants of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) superior to ordinary folks by virtue of their lineage alone?
The self-proclaimed religious leaders are not too keen on ordinary folks knowing their Quran. Which is understandable because they cannot hope to exercise their authority over such individuals. This is what the Quran immediately does for those who study it. It refers to itself as al-Furqan (The Criterion between right and wrong) and Muhaimin (quality control agent). It is simply a matter of examining anything brought to one’s attention in the light of the contents of the Quran, and thereby separating the wheat from the chaff, the worthy from the unworthy, and the religion of God from fantasies of mere men.
This may surprise many Muslims, but all of these questions (and more) are addressed in the Quran. Most Muslims are content to read the Arabic text (without knowing any Arabic) for blessings, despite the Quran explicitly stating that it has been revealed to guide mankind. The man who does not read the Quran with a view to understanding it, does not know why the Quran was revealed. And since he does not know the answer to this question, he feels no motivation to read it in order to understand it. A vicious circle, if ever there was one!
Knowing correct answers is a relatively minor part of education. To be educated is to be able to address new questions relevant to unfamiliar situations. This is precisely how the Quran educates. Not only does it tell how things are but it goes on to say why that must be so. It thereby teaches how to think. A Muslim is supposed to be able to give an account of what he believes. It is impossible to coherently do so unless one settles for nothing less than the Quran as the last word on any issue.
In addition to covering the fundamental questions in abstract, the Quran deals with application of the principles to specific instances as well. In the sphere of jurisprudence, it contains many illustrative instances of precepts as they are applied to specifics in response to questions from the original audience. Some critics point to such places and ask why God had to clarify something upon somebody asking for clarity instead of pre-empting the questions in the first place. They fail to appreciate the immense pedagogical value of the whole exercise of applying principles to applications – yet another way the Quran teaches its readers to think.
Loud-speakers, TV, tattoos, dress-codes, segregation, purdah, music, art, sports, organ transplants, co-education, mixed gatherings, in-vitro fertilisation, surrogacy… the list of questions regarding prohibition (or otherwise) keeps expanding as technology brings new challenges. Equally long is the list of questions pertaining to prohibitions in food. A great amount of ink and untold terabytes on the internet have been devoted to answer all such questions in a case-by-case, arbitrary manner, where one answer invariably contradicts another. This bottom-up approach cannot possibly result in a seamless philosophy. Instead of treating each of these questions separately, the Quran treats all of them as branches of the same tree-trunk. It provides a coherent framework, which the reader can use to answer each question as an application of one of the fundamentals. The reader of these lines is invited to verify this for himself.
There are those who have this convenient excuse for blindly following some authority figure instead of applying their minds to figure out what the Quran teaches. Namely, one could misconstrue God’s intent. Indeed, that is always a possibility when somebody employs reason to understand the Quran instead of relying on hearsay. But how does one identify one’s error and rectify it except by utilizing the faculty of reason? In contrast, blind following is completely barren since one can never know whether one is on solid ground on any given issue, let alone being able to do anything about it. It is therefore a certain recipe for going astray or getting fooled by charlatans.
The self-proclaimed religious leaders are not too keen on ordinary folks knowing their Quran. Which is understandable because they cannot hope to exercise their authority over such individuals. This is what the Quran immediately does for those who study it. It refers to itself as al-Furqan (The Criterion between right and wrong) and Muhaimin (quality control agent). It is simply a matter of examining anything brought to one’s attention in the light of the contents of the Quran, and thereby separating the wheat from the chaff, the worthy from the unworthy, and the religion of God from fantasies of mere men.
