Time Value of Knowledge (Part II)

The right to all praise is Allah's. By His Mercy, what follows is an abridged translation of an excerpt from ibn Taymiyah's collection of fataawa, the Book on Uloohiyya (as promised in the last blog). I provide the headings to capture the main point of the section and some commentary intermittently where I feel it may be useful.

The concern of these set of passages is the importance of learning that which the Messenger of Allah (may Allah pray for him and grant peace) was sent with. So after praising the Lord of the Worlds and asking for prayers and peace for the His Messenger, the author continues on to say:

[Beginning of Excerpt]

The only source of pleasure and salvation

...As to what follows: Then, indeed, there is no pleasure for the slaves [of Allah] nor any salvation on returning [to Allah], except by following His Messenger. And whosoever obeys Allah and His Messenger, he will be admitted by Him to gardens [in Paradise] beneath which rivers flow, abiding eternally therein; and that is the great victory. And whosoever disobeys Allah and His Messenger and transgresses the limits set by Him, he will be admitted to a fire – abiding eternally therein – and for him is a disgraceful punishment [an-Nisaa`(4):13]. Therefore, obedience to Allah and His Messenger is the axis upon which all pleasure revolves, and is where all salvation permanently resides and does not leave.

[Ibn Taymiyah considers all our actions to be driven by two basic human motivations- whether done with religion in mind or not: to seek pleasure for oneself and to guard oneself from harm. Hence, he couches the objective of following Allah and His Messenger as a purely rational decision made to maximize pleasure and minimize harm. It is something he expounds on elsewhere - but since we are only going to have the excerpt then this is worth noting up front for the rest of the discussion.]

What counts as worship

For Allah created the creation for his worship, as He the Exalted states: And I have not created the Jinn and mankind except that they should worship me [adh-Dhaariyaat(51):56]. He has required them to worship purely through obedience to Him and obedience to His Messenger. Thus, there is no form of worship except that it is an obligatory or desirable act within the religion of Allah. Whatever is other than that, then it is a straying from His path.

Therefore, he (Allah's prayers be upon him and peace) stated: Whoever performs any act which is not in accordance with what we have sanctioned then it is rejected. This was recorded in the two Sahih works [Bukhari & Muslim - the wording is of the second]...

Worship and the role of the Messenger

Indeed, Allah has mentioned [the issue of] obedience to the Messenger and following his example in about forty different places in the Qur’an. Such as His, the Exalted’s, following statements:

• Whosoever obeyed the Messenger, then indeed, he has obeyed Allah. [an-Nisaa’(4):80];

• And We did not send any messenger except to be obeyed by the permission of Allah. And had they come to you when they had wronged themselves, and then asked Allah for forgiveness and the Messenger as well had asked forgiveness on their behalf, then would indeed have found Allah Accepting of repentance and Especially Merciful. But no, by your Lord, they will not believe until they make you judge over all disputes between themselves and then do not find within themselves any sort of discomfort regarding your decision and submit with absolute submission [an-Nisaa’(4):64-65]; and

• Say: ‘Obey Allah and the Messenger. Then if you turn away then, verily, Allah does not love the disbelievers.’ [Aal-e-‘Imraan (3):32]. And He, the Exalted, says: Say: ‘If you love Allah then follow me, Allah will love you and forgive your sins’… [Aal-e-‘Imraan (3):31].

Thus, He made the love of the slave for his Lord necessitate the following of the Messenger. And He made close following of the Messenger cause for Allah’s love for His slave.

Even the Messenger needs Allah to tell him what is worship

And verily He, the Exalted, states, "And thus we have revealed to you an inspiration (or ‘the essence’) of our Command. You did not know what is the Book nor what is Faith. But we made it a light with which we guide whoever we wish from amongst our slaves" [ash-Shuraa(42):52]. So it is through what Allah has revealed to him that Allah guides whoever he wishes from amongst his slaves. As he, Allah's prayers be upon him and peace, himself is guided [only] through that by Allah the Exalted. As He, the Exalted, states, “Say: ‘If I err, then I would only err against myself. But if I am guided, then it is due to what my Lord has revealed to me.’” [as-Saba(34):50]...

Fruits of this knowledge

Thus, it is through Muhammad (may Allah pray for him and grant him peace) that disbelief is distinguished from faith, profit from loss, guidance from straying, salvation from disaster, the wrong path from the right, deviation from steadfastness, the people of Paradise from the people of Hellfire, the God-fearing from the rebellious and the preference for the way of those upon whom Allah has bestowed His favour of the prophets, the steadfast affirmers of the truth, the martyrs and the righteous from the way of those upon whom is the Anger and of those who are astray.

Putting a value on this knowledge

Therefore, the souls are much more in need of knowing all that which he came with and of following him than of eating and drinking. For if these are neglected then one only acquires death in this world. But if that is neglected then one acquires the punishment of the Hereafter.

Hence, it is the duty of every single person to expend all their efforts and abilities to learn what he came with and to obey him as this is the path to salvation from the painful torment and to happiness in the house of blessings. And the path to that are the oral narrations and written transmissions. That is because the intellect, purely on its own, will not be enough for learning that. No. Like the light of the eye cannot see except when there is also a light that appears before it. Similarly, the light of the intellect will not find guidance except when there dawns upon it the Sun that is the Message. It is due to this that preaching the religion has always been from the most greatest duties in Islam and learning what Allah has commanded His Messenger has been obligatory upon all thinking creatures.

[End of Excerpt]

In conclusion, I hope this was something that inspires us all to reconsider not only the value of the knowledge that has been revealed to our Messenger (may Allah pray for him and grant him peace), but also the value (or even lack of value) of our own intellectual pursuits, unless they are guided by this light. May Allah adorn our hearts with faith and make us guided guiders.