Auron ka hai Payaam aur, mera Payaam aur hai, / Ishq key dardmand ka tarz-e-kalaam aur hai!
(Iqbal)
Much of human life is about asking questions and looking for answers, is it not? Answers to all sorts of questions that we can think of?
Thinking, reasoning, reflecting, asking questions, looking for answers, seeking clarity and understanding, trying to make sense of what surrounds us – are these not the threads out of which the fabric of human life is woven?
Well, those are all the things that this book is about. This book will tell you, as it has been telling everyone for the past 1400 years, that these are all some of the noblest and most important activities human beings can – and must – undertake.
That is why you must read this book. For, this book encourages thought, fosters inquiry, welcomes questions and provides answers.
Answers to all sorts of questions – questions that you were too embarrassed, confused or afraid to ask; questions that you did not even know had any answers.
Below are some questions that people ask from time to time. The challenge is to find the answers – or at least knowing where to look for them. Answers that bring a measure of satisfaction to humans across the spectrum of their many divisions and variations.
The fact is that in life, often, we all need to find our own answers. In a sense, that is what really gives meaning to life – having questions in the first place and then being able to find answers for them. And if those answers turn out to be the right answers, then we are the most fortunate people on earth.
The good news is that the answers are all out there. Often, it is just a matter of looking for them – and of course finding them. And, having found them, being able to tell the right answers from the wrong ones.
And, then, having made that determination, being able to embrace those answers that we consider to be the right ones – and building our life around them. That is what human life is all about.
Questions, therefore, are the stuff of human life. They are God’s little flashlights in our bosom turned on and off as he gently moves us along the path to truth and discovery – and ultimately to himself.
Because in the ultimate analysis God is truth. He is, as that book says, Al-Haqqul Mubeen – clear truth. That means where truth is that is where God will be. And where truth is kept away from human beings that place then becomes the Devil’s domain.
Therefore, the key to all this is the search on the part of the individual – unremitting, tireless search, a search without fear or favor – and a burning, uncompromising passion for truth. Thereafter, what often determines the course and outcome of human life – whether in individuals and groups or in nations, societies and civilizations – is not the mere act of asking questions, but the honesty and integrity of those questions and the humility and the courage with which we embrace the answers that turn out to be true.
GOD IS TRUTH
You must read this book, because this book will tell you that search for truth is the very purpose and essence of human life. And it is, therefore, the highest, noblest and loftiest form of human activity on earth.
This book will tell you that truth comes from God. Therefore, you must pursue truth relentlessly, regardless of who or what you are, and regardless of where it takes you.
Al-Haqqu Mir-Rabbika
, says this book – truth is from your master! So, why fear truth, when it is from him?
Not only that, this book will further tell you that truth is God Almighty himself. He is Al-Haqq – the truth!
Annallaha Huwal Haqqul Mubeen
, says this most amazing book – surely, Allah is the clear and open truth!
And questions are important, because questions give impetus and direction to our search for truth. They are like knocking at doors. Questions help open doors.
Answers come when we have gone through the search process; when we have paid the price in pain, uncertainty, integrity and humility; and when we are in the right place at the right time to receive hem.
And that means when Almighty god knows we are indeed ready for them. For, as that most amazing and wonderful book, the Qur’an, tells us that God does everything according to a most meticulous plan.
Never late, never early, but always – always – just when the time is right. That is when and how God Almighty does things.
So, here are some questions that come to my mind when I think about the Qur’an, and when I pick up a copy of the Qur’an and read it. I want to send those questions your way. I want you to see if those questions mean anything to you, and if you can find the answers to those questions – your own personal answers.
Because after all the only answers that matter are the ones that we find for ourselves.
And then you can see where those answers take you and what you want to do with those answers.
So, here it goes!
QUESTIONS PERTAINING TO THE QUR’AN
No matter how you look at it, you are most likely to find that this book, this most amazing Al-Qur’an, is a book unlike any that you may have ever read or seen in your entire life. And here are some reasons why.
What other book in the world do you know that begins with the words that mean “In the name of God, the most loving and merciful, the most loving and merciful?”
Those words not put there by the readers, admirers, advocate or devotees of that book, but by that book itself? That means there simply is no other book like that anywhere in the world.
This is not to knock or attack all the other books, especially those books that people treat with special reverence, but merely to recognize a simple fact about that book, the Qur’an. And make discovery of that fact the starting point and the signpost for our future research and investigation.
What other book in the world do you know whose every chapter but one begins with the words that mean “In the name of God, the most loving and merciful, the most loving and merciful”?
And that means all of its 114 chapters – with the exception of the 9th chapter.
Have you ever come across a book that makes cleanliness of body an absolute requirement of not only human life in general but also for touching and handling that book itself? A book that requires you to take a bath and be formally clean every time you touch, open and read from it?
I am not saying there aren’t other books like that. All I am saying is if any of those books themselves says that, as distinct from the admirers and followers of the book saying those things.
A book that requires you to first go through the careful washing of your hands and face before you touch, open and read from it. And this going back 1400 years before the American Society of Microbiology (ASM) discovered the benefits of hand-washing in the 1990’s?
A book that teaches you to seek God’s protection from the Devil, every time you begin to read it?
A book, as I said earlier, that begins in the name of God, the most loving and merciful, the most loving and merciful?
A book in which the third word from the beginning is: “The Most Merciful and Loving One”?
A book in which the fourth word from the beginning also is : “The Most Merciful and Loving One”?
A book whose very first introduction of God is the “Most Merciful and Loving one”?
And whose second introduction of God also is the “Most Merciful and Loving one”?
A book 113 of whose 114 chapters begin with the words “In the name of God, the most merciful and loving, the most merciful and loving”?
And the remaining one of whose 114 chapters also has in it the words “In the name of God, the most merciful, the most merciful” (27:30)?
A book whose very first words mean “All praise is due to God”?
A book whose very first characterization of God is “Master of the Worlds”?
A book that is from 1400 years ago, and whose frame of reference is not a village, a town, a tribe, a region or race, but what it calls the “Worlds,” all the worlds – in plural?
A LOVING, MERCIFUL AND FORGIVING GOD
A book in which God Almighty himself calls himself “The Most Merciful and Loving” close to 200 times?
A book in which God refers to himself as “The Most Forgiving, The Most Merciful and Loving” over 50 times?
In which God’s second most frequently used name is “The Most Merciful and Loving One”? A name that God uses almost like his nickname.
In which God himself uses his second name “The Most Merciful and Loving One” no less than 50 times?
In which God’s own direct references to his unbounded love and quality of mercy are nearly 10 percent of the total words of the entire book?