Quran Study - 22 Oct 1982 - By Dr Rashad Khalifa
Transcript
0:00 But you get the idea. Just because they are called Muslims, you have to go overboard? Just because they say they are Muslims, does that make them Muslims?
0:13 But he said, with the invasion, the third period of history of the Mongols, all of the universities died out except for the ones that just taught the hadith, the sunnah, and the legal juristic students.
0:29 And that the great expansion of knowledge, the development of algebra, the flowering
0:35 of Greek thought, all of these things that happened in the first three centuries of Islam were
0:38 eliminated from the university system, and free thought and all the other things that
0:42 are necessary for growth in a society were replaced by repeating things that were old.
0:47 They became just trustees, and they never developed any farther than that.
0:51 Then he's arguing against "You don't argue."
0:54 Yeah, I mean it's very... it turns around on itself at one point and he never... he never realized it.
0:59 What would be different if you say it's conditional or conjectural?
1:02 Both are equal. They are the same.
1:04 Yeah. I looked up conditional. Conjectural is the same as conditional.
1:07 Same. Yeah.
1:10 But I thought this would attract more attention.
1:13 Did you see the passage there? I was referring to the authority of the... and then he gives a number of...
1:17 He just can't break away from the Sunnah. It's very difficult for them.
1:22 What do you think of this passage here, this passage?
1:28 And he says here, look, it required 200 years after the death of the prophet,
1:33 the compilers rejected as untrustworthy 90%. Nobody doubts that.
1:38 Why did they save the 10%?
1:42 And even those who kept the 10%, doubted the 10%, but they didn't want to come out with it.
1:58 The same thing has happened in Christianity, with the word of the Pope as being equivalent
2:08 to the word of the Bible.
2:09 Therefore, doesn't it work there?
2:12 You know, Church Doctrine.
2:14 Church Doctrine is more important than the teachings of Christ.
2:21 But one thing is good, at least now, because we have no organized priesthood.
2:26 You know, you can only keep on debating the traditions now.
2:46 Well, I don't really have time right now either, but I'd like to get it later maybe after this,
2:51 later in the semester, the end of the year.
2:57 Sure.
3:00 Maybe I'll never be able to get approved by the department, but I would like to, I have
3:07 In the next four years, I think about writing a master's thesis for engineering.
3:13 Well, I haven't come up with a topic. I'm only starting in the program.
3:16 But it would be nice to include a numerical analysis for ensuring that the probabilities
3:29 that a book could be produced like this is beyond human capacity.
3:33 There is some basis for making your decision.
3:39 All of the decision-making process in engineering is based on that probability.
3:48 Nothing has an absolute certainty.
3:51 If you're going to make a decision, the first thing you study is statistics and probability.
3:55 That's the first thing you study.
3:56 But all predictions are based on assumptions. It is a matter of how much proof you need to have.
4:05 Only proven facts are one hundred percent certain. But that's because they are not assumptions, right?
4:14 But all predictions are based on observation.
4:20 We're talking about it as a decision-making process or an attitude towards a decision-making process.
4:26 I thought you were talking about decisions.
4:28 Yeah, okay, well, this is beyond that, okay?
4:33 Most of these people do not seem to have in their own, you know, any direction to their own...
4:39 I mean, you have to make... I mean, if you talk about engineering, you have to talk about what is your basis for doing some kind of a system.
4:47 Is it going to be what is normally considered to be in the society, just because it is?
4:51 Does it make sense?
4:54 What's the normal way?
4:57 Regardless of what it does for the people.
5:00 For cultural development, I mean, I really don't understand.
5:03 Or the decision-making process, whether to go with it or not, would be in accordance with the will of the people.
5:10 And maybe there are, as yet, undiscovered.
5:12 When you boil this down, it doesn't suggest anything. When you do something good for society,
5:21 from the humanistic point of view, that is an end in itself. But from the Quranic point of view, you do good for society.
5:30 Because Allah has said so in the Quran. Therefore,
5:38 Therefore, in Islam, it's a duty to help, to bring about a humane society and a progressive society.
5:49 So you see, that's the morality there. But the modern man...
6:02 The mentality now is, if you make profit, then that is, by, axiomatically, it's good.
6:08 That's what in philosophy we call utilitarian ethics, pragmatic ethics.
6:15 In the highly industrialized society, what makes money is equivalent to what is good.
6:21 I don't know if it's the good for the most, the greatest number or not, or something like that.
6:26 He's making a statement, you know. He makes a lot of...
6:28 He says Islamic democracy, being idealistic, is an absolute, value-oriented,
6:34 the inner-directedness of the political and technical elite
6:37 generates the fifth type of archetype in the world.
6:40 I mean, he's so wordy, isn't he?
6:42 Yeah, he writes a lot about it.
6:45 The elites are required to look upon power and authority as a trust.
6:49 They are motivated to an inner devotion to anticipate and ratify as far as possible
6:55 the legitimate needs of the people before these become...
7:03 No, that's not it.
7:07 It's a very good example.
7:10 As if, I mean, God has nothing against the prophets.
7:13 He's telling us to go from here to heaven.
7:20 That's what I was telling Isaiah.
7:22 I was just, I was just telling him about...
7:25 I mean, today my wife told me about the Quran class at the MSA.
7:30 When someone was saying about the Hadith.
7:32 Now, apparently this guy has actually modified his position.
7:35 The Hadith are not divine revelation like the Quran.
7:38 He has backed off.
7:39 They are only divine revelation
7:41 in the sense that
7:42 well they were,
7:43 you know,
7:43 the prophet's life
7:44 is grounded in the Quran,
7:45 and so therefore,
7:46 you know,
7:47 but the
7:48 some of the things
7:49 when I don't understand
7:50 the Quran,
7:51 then I go to the Hadith
7:52 for interpretation.
7:53 Yeah.
7:54 and my wife said
7:55 my wife said
7:56 why do you go to the Hadith
7:58 why don't you go to God
7:59 God is the only one
8:00 who is going to guide you.
8:00 That's it.
8:01 Yeah.
8:02 You won't get caught
8:03 in exactly the problem.
8:04 but that was a good thing
8:05 for her to say.
8:06 There is no,
8:07 you know,
8:08 you look at one book and you don't understand it, so you look at another book.
8:12 More opinions against that, but now more different.
8:16 These books were written by people like Al-Bukhari.
8:22 And they had complex minds, too.
8:25 People who were like that.
8:29 But we're reducing it all down to the English language,
8:32 so in one sense that's not a problem. But the question of...
8:35 Yeah, but how did they bring it in? It's from the Sunni's original text.
8:39 Oh, nice. Very illicit. Very, uh...
8:42 Oh, nice. This is, uh, the deceit.
8:44 Yeah.
8:45 The deceit.
8:46 The deceit.
8:48 Yeah, I knew that.
8:56 He's quoting a lot of, uh, these are all supposed proofs from the Quran.
9:01 No, he doesn't quote a lot of them.
9:02 You know, this is where he's making a statement about...
9:05 This woman would take a watermelon and...
9:08 It's probably worth reading.
9:09 I think some of the points he makes are quite valid.
9:13 I mean, because if you can recognize where he contradicts himself...
9:16 I think some of the points he makes are quite valid,
9:18 and I think what he's trying to do is...
9:24 I'm not saying the question is totally wrong.
9:27 I think, you know, if you have an Islamic basis,
9:30 anybody who has an Islamic basis in their life,
9:32 Whatever they do is going to prevail. They're free to do whatever makes the difference.
9:38 I don't accept blindness, but some people do.
9:44 The Messenger is making him know that he's got his own basis for himself.
9:49 He's going to make decisions on that basis.
9:52 He doesn't have to look to the system to judge the problem directly.
10:01 You know what I'm saying?
10:04 Now, but the Fiqh is the...
10:05 The Fiqh is the approach in general.
10:07 Because the approach is more and more integrated unity.
10:12 the thinking process.
10:14 That's to say, you know, what I'm trying to say is,
10:16 the chair is part of the room, the room is part of the house,
10:19 the house is part of the community, the community is part of the Ummah.
10:22 That kind of a mentality.
10:24 And if you really look at Islam, it's a very God-oriented point of view.
10:28 Yeah, but I mean, you could have...
10:30 You're trying to unify everything because God is One.
10:33 It's based on a principle...
10:35 But, you know, systems can be made of objects that are there, but are they required?
10:42 That's another level of...
10:43 You know, it is a sign. I mean, to me, basically, the whole scientific thing is,
10:47 if you don't follow the rules, you know, which are set down in law, you decide to abide by the laws rather than defy them; you have to work with them, not defy them.
11:03 Yeah, but it's not so evident in the realm of ethical values, because most engineering decisions are made on a utilitarian level.
11:12 It is useful, it is cost effective. Whereas here, it is actually made on political choices.
11:18 Well, I mean, let's just try to put it in a more Islamic way. I'm talking about the reality of life in 1982 in America.
11:24 If it makes money for a big company, then it's good, regardless of whatever else it may be.
11:31 But if in the long run it goes against the good of society, then it's against the good
11:37 of the big companies.
11:37 Of course, these people are very short-sighted.
11:43 If they weren't so short-sighted, they would have had much more respect for the environment.
11:48 There would be a much more cautious attitude on development of nuclear energy, which we don't
11:54 fully understand.
11:55 And there would be much less of an attempt to...
11:58 Here, what I object to in the...
12:00 What I object to in the...
12:00 In the American culture, what I find the most prominent is the exalting in some of the media of the consumer mentality,
12:07 in which a person from the day he is born to the day he dies, he's encouraged to buy something,
12:13 whether he needs it or not, whether it has any value in life or not.
12:17 Consume and produce, consume and produce, consume and produce.
12:19 This mentality, which is hyper, super hyper materialism, which we've never known in the world before,
12:26 The great mass of people are now able to consume at a level that was never possible in the past.
12:35 I find it very vulgar myself. The only alternative seems to be escaping to the Third World.
12:40 To some place where it isn't.
12:43 I unfortunately have to work.
12:46 I know.
12:46 We will miss you for another two months.
12:49 Until your schedule is over.
12:50 Do you remember Wolfe? The historical Wolfe?
12:53 No, I don't think so.
12:55 Um...
13:02 Well, if you want to, Bob, it doesn't matter.
13:08 All right. I have to see what my, you know, I've got a whole...
13:12 I don't have to go to the University of Arizona...
13:14 Well, I... I'm taking three units, but...
13:19 Well, I mean, I could take it back and get another one and see if it'd be the same, but I don't have the time.
13:28 Well, I think you should. I'd like to read it, but I don't think I have the time right now.
13:32 Thank you.
14:08 But before we get there, we really have to thank God for inviting us to be in this
14:20 tour. It was actually a tremendous journey we discovered doing the first two surahs, Al-Fatiha and Al-Baqarah.
14:34 Tour number one and tour number two.
14:40 When we come to the end of Al-Fatiha, we say,
15:01 Then we come to Surah number 2, and we find in it the key.
15:06 First, it says this,
15:08 alladhīna an'amta 'alayhim, which are the righteous ones.
15:13 And then the second group,
15:16 ghayril-maghḍūbi 'alayhim,
15:20 the ones who incurred the deserved wrath.
15:25 What I'm trying to say is that this group
15:27 can be defined. So now when we think about it, I've been thinking about it the whole week,
15:32 and some of the people came to me and said,
15:35 Now they have a whole new perspective when they are reading Al-Fatiha. Fatima was one of them.
15:41 Because when you're reading "alladhīna an'amta 'alayhim," you think of the righteous, and all the revelations.
15:47 Then in Surah number 2, when you say,
15:50 ...
15:51 ...
15:52 ...
15:53 ...
15:53 those who deserve wrath.
15:56 What I found
15:57 in the last words of this verse,
15:59 is that when you read it, when you think of
16:01 Allah's description as
16:03 detailed in Surah number 2,
16:05 you'll get it.
16:07 Now what does it say?
16:10 Alladhīna an'amta
16:11 'alayhim
16:12 are the righteous.
16:16 ...
16:18 Ghayril-maghḍūbi
16:19 'alayhim.
16:20 Those who deserve wrath are the disbelievers.
16:27 They are defined in a few verses that follow.
16:30 Surah number 2, verse 6.
16:32 wa la-ḍ-ḍāllīn.
16:33 What does wa la-ḍ-ḍāllīn mean?
16:35 It means somebody who started on the path
16:39 and then got lost.
16:42 Lost his way. He strayed off.
16:44 These are the hypocrites.
16:46 Because the hypocrites, they come to the Quran.
16:50 And they come to a class, and then somehow they deviate.
16:55 So we will now draw a conclusion.
16:59 And this is an incredible observation that Abdullah made last week,
17:04 in that he used the same words; that these, the hypocrites, are the ones who chose
17:10 straying over guidance, using the same words that we see.
17:23 So now when you read Al-Fatiha, you have a whole new perspective, and you can see the
17:28 connection, even though between Al-Fatiha and Al-Baqarah was 13 years, and many miles.
17:39 The journey from Mecca to Medina is about 300 miles.
17:45 Between the first surah and the second surah are 13 years and 300 miles.
17:52 But you see the connection that is absolutely very watertight.
17:58 That is the only truth from God. The whole Book was considered as one.
18:02 Exactly.
18:03 That is what I think.
18:06 The text of the Quran was actually written down before the creation of the heavens and the earth.
18:13 But it was released case by case.
18:17 When the Prophet turned away and frowned from the blind person,
18:25 the verses were revealed immediately after he did that.
18:28 It was revealed right after that.
18:31 The description of the event was present.
18:34 It was written before the earth was created, but it was revealed immediately after the
18:39 event.
18:41 So,
18:43 the revelation of the Quran over a period of 23 years was scattered, and the verses of the surahs
18:50 were separated in time and place.
18:53 But the whole Quran, as we know it now, was written down before the creation of the earth.
19:03 I don't want to take much time, but can I comment on what you're saying?
19:09 I have to say this now, as I cannot depend anymore on my memory.
19:13 It's getting old.
19:15 What I'm going to say is just something to think about.
19:21 I'm not positing it, because I'm not ready to debate it myself.
19:24 What I think is very bizarre. I would like to point to verse 6 of Surah
19:40 1. And in Arabic it says,
19:49 Just as you have been speaking about the meaning, I am speaking about this one word.
19:55 This word, mustaqim, in all the translations I have seen, is either 'straight' or 'right'.
20:08 They mean the same thing, and that's something that's very good in English.
20:11 When you say he's on the right path, he's on the correct path, he's on the straight path.
20:19 Now, I think, for the ordinary Arab, they don't analyze it beyond 'the right path'.
20:23 What we have before us is: the right path, the straight path, the correct path,
20:28 or the path that you ought to go, or the true path.
20:31 So, now I was studying the root... the root... yes, well, you may have to help us... the root of al-Muttaqin.
20:48 And I found out that there are three letters: Qaf, Ta, and Ya.
20:55 Ah! So what entered my mind immediately was this question:
21:02 These same letters you also find in Taqwa, which is right here.
21:09 So I said, let's go to the dictionary.
21:14 So I went to the derivations of Taqwa.
21:20 Taqwa has many translations: righteousness,
21:25 and this is the most common translation, and so on and so on.
21:28 But I never found the word
21:31 mustaqim under the heading of
21:34 Taqwa.
21:34 So I said this is an ordinary dictionary,
21:37 I'll go to a Quranic dictionary
21:38 to try to explain it. It's easy.
21:41 Under Taqwa and its derivatives,
21:43 you can find the word
21:45 mustaqim, under this
21:47 verb.
21:49 So I went to
21:52 It's very interesting that the word Qiyamah, you know, also the Day of Qiyamah is the Day of Standing.
22:04 of resurrection, because that's the day when you will stand up.
22:08 Also when you do the prayer, it's qiyam, and also, and so on, Qiyamah really also means
22:16 al-qayyimah.
22:17 And this dictionary says this, but what it says, you know, in the Quran, in the Quran, it says,
22:27 Mustaqim is based on the root qama, qama, which means to stand up.
22:31 But he says, in this form, it means righteous.
22:38 So I was thinking that in the development of the true root in original Arabic,
22:44 many things. He infused many strange meanings and so on. But as Arabic became more and more
22:51 literary, then it acquired a new meaning. And so, the guidance in it always tries to
22:58 go to the good. Now, if this dictionary is correct, if it puts Mustaqim under a straight
23:06 and so on, verse six can be read as follows. It's just a point in the literature that
23:12 Yes. The last, near the last. Guide us in the path of righteousness.
23:18 I suppose, you know, depending on your level of knowledge, but all of this, yes.
23:22 Guide us on the path of righteousness, the path of those whom You have blessed,
23:30 not of those who earned wrath upon them,
23:36 nor of those who have gone astray.
23:40 which, as we see now, requires going deeper into the understanding of.
23:46 However, there is something that has bothered me, that I think,
23:50 in my own modern reading,
23:52 or that I relate to you.
23:58 Looking at the
24:01 versions of,
24:02 very briefly, of al-Manar,
24:04 al-Tabari and al-Manar,
24:05 Qurtubi,
24:08 even Zamakhshari.
24:11 They all seem to be a little bit hesitant in making a difference between those who deserve
24:22 wrath and those who are astray.
24:24 A lot of the discussions have gone on the difference between these, but none of them
24:28 has hit what we have been able to get.
24:31 None of them, as far as I know.
24:33 None of them.
24:38 Zamakhshari, Baydawi, Ibn Kathir, and Al-Manar, which is from the last century.
24:45 None of them said that the answer is on the next page.
24:49 But they give us a lot of distinction between those who deserve wrath and those who are astray.
24:58 I think the confusion is that we must not look at the hypocrites and the kuffar
25:14 as completely separate.
25:16 If we think that they are two different groups, we will not be able to understand the Quran.
25:23 Now, be patient with me.
25:25 Let us go to chapter 2, verse 8.
25:35 These are the hypocrites.
25:37 But look what Allah says.
25:39 The hypocrites, then there are those who say, "We believe in God and the Last Day," while
25:46 they are not believers.
25:47 These are the hypocrites.
25:49 Therefore, the hypocrites are also disbelievers.
25:58 Yes. Then let us go to verse 19. Verse 19, after talking of the disbelievers and the hypocrites,
26:08 Allah says, after summarizing the characteristics, "He encompasses the disbelievers."
26:15 From this, and I don't want to take so much time, I arrive at the conclusion that
26:23 All hypocrites are disbelievers, but not all disbelievers are necessarily hypocrites.
26:30 because there are some people who say immediately, "I do not believe," and they are dismissed.
26:37 And so, to use the language of mathematics, the hypocrites form a subset of the unbelievers.
26:49 If this interpretation is correct, dear brothers and sisters, then let us go to 7 and 8 of
26:59 Baqarah again.
27:02 Verse 7: Allah seals their hearts, their hearing, and places veils
27:08 upon their eyes. They have deserved terrible retribution.
27:11 Now Verse 8, "Then there are those who say," this must now be interpreted within brackets:
27:18 Then there are those among the believers who say,
27:23 these are the hypocrites.
27:24 Yeah.
27:26 Among these believers, there are those who say,
27:29 these are the hypocrites.
27:31 If you will accept this interpretation,
27:34 the rest of the chapter becomes very clear
27:37 why Allah says that these hypocrites really don't believe,
27:41 and at the same time, it just sifts out these believers.
27:44 So I'll put it this way.
27:46 All hypocrites are disbelievers, but not all disbelievers are necessarily hypocrites.
27:53 And therefore, Allah is angry also at these betrayers.
27:59 And as we mentioned before, you cannot be a betrayer of the pact, unless you were there from the very beginning.
28:07 And that's why they have to be in the lowest part of the Fire.
28:11 But they saw that there is no excuse; they are those who are ungrateful.
28:42 Thank you.