“Be More & Achieve More!”

Hi Dear Reader,

One of the most important aspects to self-purification, self-leadership and righteous conduct is to understand that True Guidance is from the One Divine Deity who Creates and Commands all. His Signs are everywhere: His Power, Wisdom and Goodness are shown through all Creation and in Revelation. Any who rejects such signs does so to wrong his own soul. Many were given similar signs and bounties afore-time, but they fell into disputes, formed sects and followed their own lusts.  Such wrong-doers are steeped in sin and live an altogether shallow life: as materialist, hedonistic pleasures are their goal. The future is sure and in the hands of God, to Whom all will bend their knee, when the Truth will shine in all its glory. We learn this from the chapter “The Kneeling” (45):-

1. Ha-Mim.
2. The revelation of the Book is from Allah the Exalted in Power, Full of Wisdom.
3. Verily in the heavens and the earth, are Signs for those who believe.
4. And in the creation of yourselves and the fact that animals are scattered (through the earth), are Signs for those of assured Faith.
5. And in the alternation of Night and Day, and the fact that Allah sends down Sustenance from the sky, and revives therewith the earth after its death, and in the change of the winds - are Signs for those that are wise.
6. Such are the Signs of Allah, which We rehearse to thee in Truth; then in what exposition will they believe after (rejecting) Allah and His Signs?
7. Woe to each sinful dealer in Falsehoods:
8. He hears the Signs of Allah rehearsed to him, yet is obstinate and lofty, as if he had not heard them: then announce to him a Penalty Grievous!
9. And when he learns something of Our Signs, he takes them in jest: for such there will be a humiliating Penalty.
10. In front of them is Hell: and of no profit to them is anything they may have earned, nor any protectors they may have taken to themselves besides Allah. For them is a tremendous Penalty.
11. This is (true) Guidance and for those who reject the Signs of their Lord, is a grievous Penalty of abomination.
12. It is Allah Who has subjected the sea to you, that ships may sail through it by His command, that ye may seek of his Bounty, and that ye may be grateful.
13. And He has subjected to you, as from Him, all that is in the heavens and on earth: Behold, in that are Signs indeed for those who reflect.
14. Tell those who believe, to forgive those who do not look forward to the Days of Allah. It is for Him to recompense (for good or ill) each People according to what they have earned.
15. If any one does a righteous deed, it ensures to the benefit of his own soul; if he does evil, it works against (his own soul). In the end will ye (all) be brought back to your Lord.
16. We did afore-time grant to the Children of Israel the Book the Power of Command, and Prophethood; We gave them, for Sustenance, things good and pure; and We favoured them above the nations.
17. And We granted them Clear Signs in affairs (of Religion): it was only after knowledge had been granted to them that they fell into schisms, through insolent envy among themselves. Verily thy Lord will judge between them on the Day of Judgment as to those matters in which they set up differences.
18. Then We put thee on the (right) Way of Religion: so follow you that (Way), and follow not the desires of those who know not.
19. They will be of no use to thee in the sight of Allah. it is only Wrong-doers (that stand as) protectors, one to another: but Allah is the Protector of the Righteous.
20. These are clear evidences to men and a Guidance and Mercy to those of assured Faith.

Hear it read in English here

At the turn of the last year in the first decade of the second millennium, isn’t it time to take heed? Isn’t it time to turn heavenly and submit to His commands whole-heartedly? How much longer does one need to remain in jest and folly, following nothing but fanciful notions, baseless conjecture and lustful desires?

Turn to Him directly and commit to Him, for He hears, sees, answers and provides all. And to Him will be our final return.

For Success & Contentment,

Asad Khan

Hello,

Sometime ago, I read (parts of) the book “Islam Between East & West” by the late former Bosnian President, Alija Izetbegovic (1984, American Trust Publications, ISBN: 0-89259-057-2). I must admit it wasn’t the easiest of reads as it appears to be a real in-depth journey into his mind and the reconciliation between his identity, philosophies, nationality and faith. So, I’m glad he summarised the work in his autobiographical notes: “Inescapable Questions” (2003, The Islamic Foundation, ISBN: 0-86037-362-2) so that I may represent the summary here for your convenience (pp 26-29):

“My aim with that book was to consider the place of Islam in the present-day world of ideas and facts. It appeared to me that it lay somewhere between Eastern and Western thinking, just as the geographical position of the Muslim world occupies the space on the globe between East and West. I tried to show that some general ideas and some values are common to all humanity. To summarise briefly, these are the contents of the book: there are only three world views and more there cannot be - the religious, the materialist and the Islamic.

Everything is created in pairs (Qur’an). Man is a dual being: body and soul. The body is merely the ‘carrier’ of the soul. That carrier has evolved, which means it has a history, but the soul has not; it was inspired by the touch of God.

The first aspect of mankind is the subject of science, the second of religion, art and ethics. This is why there are two accounts and two truths about mankind.

In the Western world, they are symbolised by Darwin and Michelangelo. Darwin has nothing to about Michelangelo’s man, and vice versa. Their truths are different, but not mutually exclusive. Over time they manifest themselves as the opposition of civilisation and culture. Science and technology belong within the domain of civilisation, religion and art to culture. The first is the expression of human needs (how do I live), the second of human aspirations (why do I live). This is the contradiction between utopia and drama.

Utopia does not recognise the individual, drama, morality. Study and meditation are two different spiritual activities, with opposing foci: the first is outwardly oriented - towards nature, the second inwardly - towards the spirit and the Self.

Every scientific method leads towards a negation of God and man, whilst all art announces religion. If there is no God, there is no Mankind either. And without mankind humanism, human dignity and human rights are empty phrases.

Civilisation knows nothing of the notion of duty, and every culture is an affirmation of the victim. Civilisations aim is an ‘earthly empire’ with utopian equality, and religion’s is the ‘kingdom of heaven’. This is Campanella’s ‘Civitas Solis‘ as against the ‘Civitas Dei‘ of St. Augustine. Their is no moral order without God. Morality is merely ‘another physical condition’ of religion. While civilisation is evolution; history, religion and art have no true development.

Every religion was pure in its origins (ur-monotheism). It becomes corrupted in the course of its history, as is the case with art and morality; hence the opposition between Jesus and the Church. Every true law is dual, and medicine is never purely science.

Caveman’s drawings or the aboriginal masks from Polynesia are in essence works of art no less stirring than modern creations. The whole of life is marked by this primary dualism, and its ’signs’ may be found in every phenomenon linked with the name of man. Here too is the difference in spirit between Old and New Testament, between Moses and Jesus. One was leader of the people, the other a preacher of morality. And there, too, lie their two different justices and aims: the Promised Land and the Kingdom of Heaven.

These opposites are reconciled in mankind and in Islam. Islam is a synthesis, the ‘third way’ between these two poles that denote all that is human.

I must admit that I was afraid of experts and their reading of the book ‘line by line’. I felt confident that a reader who followed the vision outlined in rough, or even hinted at, in the book would find something more in it than the pedantic, analytical mind. I was aware that my attempt at stating my vision remained understated, merely conjectural, and in places incoherent. I gave a number of familiar concepts a metaphorical rather than conventional meaning: Judaism, Christianity, Islam and so on are metaphors, with general rather than specific meaning. For example, Islam is a major metaphor for the ‘third way’, for every form of life, with a formula that fulfils the human person. In fact, the book was no more than testimony to a vision of the world.

I enjoyed identifying new parallels, theses and antithesis, coincidence and symmetries, but this was not the subject that interested me most deeply. There was one issue that always preoccupied me more than any other: the issue of famous losers. I regarded it then, and regard it to this day, as the deepest religious problem. It can be posited in a number of different ways: whence the tragic and pathos in the Darwinian-Euclidian world? What are the great losers like, and why do we admire them so if this life is the only one we have? Were Antigone, Socrates and Jesus really losers? And if so, why are they so great in our eyes?

What is the origin of our admiration for the fallen heroes that has accompanied us ever since the pre-historical Iliad and The Epic of Gilgamesh? Do not even films such as cheap Westerns exploit our innate sympathy for the victim (that is, for losers) and resistance to the calculated, to self-interest? Sympathy for the victim is not something we can find in the intellect, but only in the soul, by which I mean, essentially, that is not ‘of this world’. And I say sympathy, not understanding, for this is not, and cannot be, understanding.

No amount of reasoning, cogitation and sagacity can explain or justify a single case of a life sacrificed for justice and truth. Something that is very close and comprehensible to every human soul eludes examination by all our science and philosophy. Between the act approved and the approbation there is no mediation of reflection, no apportionment of reasons pro et con. It may even be said that there is no time lapse. It is the instant reaction of the soul to good and justice, to something that is identical to the soul itself. In the world that atheists regard as the one and only, the tragic and tragedy are impossible. In such a world there are only incidents and misfortunes.

In this mindset, tragedy manifests itself to us as a religious parable. In tragedy, villains fall on their feet and great and sincere souls suffer. And because there is no ‘intellectual’ operation to proclaim these eternal losers as mad and demented, the entire story, and in particular its tragic end, appears to us as merely the first act of a greater drama - one that only God could think up. For suffering and death - which are the end of everything to the intellect - are here merely an interval between two acts in a continuing drama. Our admiration and sympathy for the fallen hero are completely meaningless from the intellectual point of view, but for that reason - whether we are aware of it or not - it is deeply religious. For only in such experiences do death and failure or loss have an entirely different meaning.

I dedicated many pages of Islam Between East and West to this question, seeking to resolve it in a variety of ways, but I was never wholly satisfied with the answer. It continues to preoccupy me to this day.”