The Fourth Way
This is the question of the Shari‘a in particular, from the page of the future. You must not hold back from considering four points carefully.
The First: One person cannot be an expert and proficient in four or five sciences, unless he is a marvel.
The Second: Two people speak of a single matter. One of them expresses it suitably to the context and what precedes and succeeds it and its relationship with them and situates it suitably; that is, he sets it in fertile ground, thus indicating his skill and proficiency in the science and his knowledge of it. The other one, however, because he neglects these points, displays his superficial and plagiaristic knowledge. Whereas what they speak of is the same. If you cannot not discern this with your mind, your spirit discerns it.
The Third: As described in the Second Premise, if a discovery which two centuries ago was considered wondrous had remained undiscovered until the present, even a child could discover it now due to the progress of science. Keep this in mind and go back thirteen centuries. Divest yourself of the developments of the intervening time and seat yourself in the wild Arabian Peninsula. Observe it carefully and you will see
an unlettered, inexperienced man, unassisted by time and place. He is alone, yet he has established in accordance with the laws of science – which have been discovered not only through human intelligence but also through very many experiments – such a system and such justice that if the human stature and potentialities were to increase through absorbing the products of man’s thought, that system and Shari‘a also would expand and head for eternity. It thus proclaims that it proceeds from Allah the Most High’s pre‑eternal speech and ensures the happiness of this world and the next. If you are fair, you will see that this is beyond the power of the people of that time, and even of all humankind, unless evil doubts have rotted your inborn nature’s eye so that it looks only to the here and now.
The Fourth: As is described in the Tenth Premise and will be mentioned in the answer to the second objection, the Shari‘a offers guidance in accordance with the mental capacity of the mass of the people.
Since people generally have little education and cannot comprehend abstract truths without their being presented in familiar form, the Shari‘a depicts them with figures of speech and allegories and metaphors. Also, since the people perceive things through their external senses, and consider necessary what is contrary to reality and in the physical sciences have not the followed the necessary steps in their development, the Shari‘a is vague and unspecific in such matters lest the people fall into the abyss of error. But it is still not devoid of hints to the truth.
Misapprehension and Note Truthfulness shines forth in all the conduct and actions of the Most Noble Messenger (UWBP), but all his acts and all his conduct did not have to be wondrous. For the purpose of his displaying marvels was to affirm his claim to prophethood. When there was no need or it was inappropriate, he complied with the laws of divine practice and followed the general course of things. And it was requisite that he did so.
Brother! This note is of the same type as the premise (mukaddeme) of the First Way. It lost its way and place due to forgetfulness and ended up here. Keep these points firmly in mind, for now we are embarking on the conclusion.
Consider this, my brother! The Islamic Shari‘a and religion, which are founded on rational proofs, comprise the sum and substance of the sciences and branches of knowledge. These include the science of refining the spirit, and of training the heart, and of educating the conscience, and the science of physical training, and domestic science, and the science of local government, and that of international relations, and the legal sciences, and so on. The Shari‘a explains and elucidates where necessary or needed, and is concise where it is not necessary or people’s minds are not ready or the times do not allow, and it lays down principles that can be elaborated, deduced, and expanded through consultation and the exercise of reason. At the present time, all these sciences or even a third of them after thousand three hundred years – having grown through the meeting of minds and expansion of their results – could not be found in a single person even in a civilised place and among clever people. In all fairness, your conscience could not prevent your affirming this.
Virtue is such that enemies even cannot deny it. The New World’s most famous philosopher, Carlyle, quoted a German thinker and politician, who after conducting some close studies, asked himself:
“If Islam is thus, wouldn’t present‑day civilisation flourish within the bounds of its truths?” He replied to himself in the affirmative. The punctilious scholars of the present are living within its sphere.
The above‑mentioned philosopher said that when the truths of Islam burst forth, they swallowed up like flames the religions and ideas of that time as though they were dead wood. And it was right they they did, for nothing but falsehood proceeded from those religions. And so so.
Yes, Islam has preserved its truths for thirteen centuries despite all the clashes and confrontations. Indeed, the clashes have lessened and lightened the dust of concealment settled on the shoulders of the truths of Islam. Yes, existence and the state of the world testify to this. One needs to ponder over the Premises in the First Article above.
Misapprehension and Note If you say: It’s possible for one person to know all the sciences in summary.
The Answer: Yes and no, because the summaries are such that as with the points mentioned above, being employed appositely in suitable positions and fertile ground, they show like glass full knowledge of and proficiency in [the sciences] beyond them. Yes, if two people speak of the same matter, what they say will hint at the ignorance of one and the knowledge of the other.
Indication and Guidance and Note Brother of conscience who has travelled with me in the imagination through the previous stopping places of this book! Take a broad look and weigh them up. Convene a high council in your imagination to judge them. Then summon your choice from the Twelve Premises to secure their presence. Then consult with the following rules.
One person cannot be an expert and proficient in numerous sciences.
Also, when two people speak of the same matter, what they say differs.
Also, the sciences are the product of the meeting of minds in the course of time.
Also, something that is self‑evident in the future, may have been hypothetical in the past.
Also, what is known by the civilised may be unknown to the uncivilised.
Also, it is a false analogy and misleading to compare the past to the future.
Also, the simplicity of hunters and desert dwellers is quite dissimilar to the trickery and cunning of peasants and the civilised; trickery is disguised behind the veil of civilisation.
Also, many sciences may be given rise to and provoked by customs, circumstances, and events.
Also, the light of human vision cannot penetrate the future and cannot see what is particular to it.
Also, human laws have a natural lifespan; at some point they cease like human respiration.
Also, time and place have a powerful effect on the affairs of people.
Also, things that formerly were considered marvels, may now be looked on as commonplace, for ways and means have been perfected.
Also, no matter how wondrous human intelligence may be, it is inadequate to perfect a science all at once, so how could it perfect numerous sciences?
Brother! Consult with these matters, then withdraw and assume the position of inspector. Divest yourself completely of the imaginings and assumptions of time and place; then from the shore of this age enter the boundless ocean of time and emerge on the island of the Era of Bliss. What will strike your eye before all else is
a single person who bereft of helper and power is challenging the whole world. He has taken on his shoulders a truth greater than the globe – a Shari‘a and code of laws which guarentees the happiness of all humankind; which as the sum and substance of all the divine sciences and branches of true knowledge, expands in conjunction with the unfolding of the human potentialities, and establishes such justice that it organises humankind’s circumstances – yielding fruits in this world and the next – as though men were members of a single council and the people of the same era.
If you were to ask the Shari‘a’s laws whence they had come
and where they were going, they would tell you that they had come from pre‑eternity, and that, accompanying humankind for its well-being on the road to eternity, they were headed for post-eternity. Even if their outward links with us are severed after departure from this transient world, in spirit they will always be the guide and spiritual sustenance of humankind.
Conclusion
There are three sources of doubts. It is like this: you feign ignorance of what the Lawgiver intends and the guidance that is commensurate with the capacity of people’s minds, and you object, uttering the following erroneous statement, which is the breeding ground of all evil suspicions: “The Qur’an, which is the chief component of the Shari‘a, comprises three doubtful points.”
The First: The Qur’an contains allegorical verses and obscurities, which are opposed to eloquence, and eloquence is the cause of its distinction and is based on clarity of expression.
The Second: The Qur’an is vague and general concerning the physical sciences and this is contrary to guidance and instruction, the true purposes of the Shari‘a.
The Third: Some of the Qur’an’s literal meanings tend to be contrary to rational proof and so may be opposed to reality, and this is incompatible with verification and guidance, which constitute its method and way.
Brother! Success is from Allah (May His glory be exalted!). I say that these three points which you claim are defects, are not as you imagine. The three of them are rather veracious witnesses to the Qur’an’s miraculous inimitability.
Answer to the First Point: You have anyway twice received the implicit answer to this. It is as follows:
ordinary people form the majority, and in the Lawgiver’s view, the minority follows the majority. For the elite understand and profit from a discourse addressed to the common people, while the opposite is not true. The common people cannot free themselves from what they are familiar with and how they imagine them, and they can comprehend abstract ideas and sheer truths only through the telescope of the imagination. But to see the depictions (lit. forms–suver; sing. suret) of imaginary things and restrict attention to them necessarily gives rise to such impossibilities as their embodiment and having physical dimensions. And then they are seen as actual things rather than mere depictions. For instance, the mass of people can see divine rule over the beings in the cosmos in the form of the sultan’s rule on the throne of his dominion, as in The Most Gracious on the throne of His almightiness.
Since they perceive things in this way, guidance and eloquence require that their feelings are taken into account and respected and that allowance is made for their understanding. Such respect and allowance for human understanding is called ‘divine condescension.’ The purpose of this condescension is to familiarise and get the people to understand. You may refer to the Tenth Premise.
By reason of the above, the depictions in the allegorical verses have been put as telescopes to flatter the feelings of the mass of people with their fanciful views so that they may look on the abstract truths. This answer is corroborated by the fact that numerous metaphors are utilised in speech generally in order to conceptualise or depict profound or various meanings in a simple and straightforward way. That is to say, the allegorical verses are the most abstruse of metaphors. For they are the parabolic forms of hidden truths. This means that the abstruseness is due not to the incomprehensibility of the words, but to the subtlety of the meanings.
You who objects! Consider this fairly: is it not in conformity with eloquence, which is to speak suitably to any situation and clearly in any context, to bring close to the people’s understanding in this way those truths which are furthest from them, or is it as you imagine it to be? You judge for yourself!
Answer to the Second Point: This was discussed in detail in the Second Premise. The sciences are successive and sequential, for they are the fruits of man’s inclination to progress – a branch of the desire in the world to be perfected – and are like the steps of the ladder of progress formed through numerous experiments and the products of the meeting of minds. The formation of the succeeding one is dependent on the forming of the previous one. That is, the science which is previous becomes established as axiomatic, then it may be preliminary to one that succeeds it.
It is because of this that supposing a man had tried ten centuries ago to teach a science which had come into being through the refinement of experiments, he would have done nothing but cause confusion and error.
For instance, if he had said: “Behold the stationary sun and rotating earth and the swarming millions of living organisms in a droplet of water, then conceive of the Maker’s grandeur!”,
the mass of people would have either denied it due to their superficial view and their supposing it to be contrary to what their external senses perceived, or they would have deceived themselves, or competed with it. But to confuse people, especially over a period of a thousand years, is a grievous error when offering guidance.
In short, the earth being flat and the rotation of the sun were considered by them to be self‑evident truths since that is how they saw them.
Note Matters like this cannot be compared with future theoretical matters. For matters that belong to the future are possible in two respects since they are not connected with the external senses. They may be believed in, for they are possible. One may feel confident about them. Clearly their right is to be clarified. But errors arising from the senses raised this matter of ours [that is, matters dealt with by the physical sciences] from the level of possibility to that of plain self‑evidence, that is, to that of compounded ignorance. Whereas their undeniable right in the view of eloquence is to be vague and indefinite lest the people’s minds become confused. Nevertheless, allusions, hints, and indications should be made to the truth. Doors should be opened to minds and they should be invited to enter. That is anyway what the Illustrious Shari‘a has done.
Brother! Is it fair, is it investigating the truth, to imagine to be contrary to guidance the thing that is the very essence of guidance and pure eloquence? And to suppose to be defective something which according to eloquence is perfection itself?
Is it eloquence according to your defective understanding to cast the people’s minds into error and confusion and to propose things reason cannot support because time and place have not adequately equipped their understanding? Allah forbid! The rule Speak to people in accordance with their understanding is wise and meaningful. Refer to the Premises if you wish, especially the First Premise; ponder over it.
Now the Answer to the Third Point, which is that some of the literal meanings of verses are contrary to rational evidences.
Study the First Premise then listen to this: the Lawgiver’s main aims in guiding the mass of people are proof of the Single Maker, prophethood, the resurrection of the dead, and justice. In which case, mention of the universe is secondary and digressive; it is in order to deduce from the wondrous order in the art which is clearly apparent to people [the existence] of the All‑Glorious Maker, Who is the True Orderer. The works of art and their order are apparent in everything; the manner of their formation is unrelated to their main purpose.
Note It is an established fact that the evidence has to be known before what is being asserted. Therefore, the literal meanings of some verses incline towards the people’s beliefs, which are acquired through their external senses, in order to clarify the evidence and familiarise the ideas. They are not for purposes of deduction. For the Qur’an has placed hints and associations in the web of its verses which for investigators of the truth point to and indicate the pearls in those shells and the truths in the literal meanings.
Yes, some verses of the Perspicuous Qur’an, which is the Word of Allah the Most High, expound other verses. That is, some verses disclose what is hidden in their sisters’ hearts. In which case, some may indicate others; their literal meanings are not intended.
Misapprehension and Note If it is said by way of inference or deduction (istidlâl): consider the wonders of electricity, the marvels of [the laws of] general attraction, the daily and annual rotations of the earth, the chemical combinations of the more than seventy elements, and the motionlessness of the sun together with its apparent motion! Know that the Maker exists! In this case, the art, which is the evidence, would be more obscure than the conclusion, which is knowledge of the Maker, and since it would be more obscure and contrary to the rules of inference, people would incline towards understanding some of the verses literally. But such verses contain associative expressions and allusions, and these are neither true nor false. For instance, the alif in the word qāla is alif; even if it is actually wāw, or kāf even, it does not affect it.
Brother! Be fair! Aren’t these three objections the very clearest evidence of the miraculous inimitability of the Qur’an, which was revealed to guide all the people of all times. Indeed,
I swear by the One Who taught the miraculous Qur’an that the view of the Bringer of Good News and Warner and his critical insight were too fine, brilliant, and penetrating to confuse truth and illusion, and his way of truth was too elevated, pure, and exalted to deceive people or mislead them.
Indeed, how could imagination show itself to be the truth in his light‑scattering view. His way is pure truth and his method, purely right. Truth and right are free of deception and do not lead astray.