To a lot of people today miracles are just extraordinary actions performed by someone like healing a man from a fatal illness or predicting the future very accurately. Many people use these kind of events as a reason to believe in a religion or a set of beliefs. But is this correct? For one thing we know many people who believe in different beliefs perform the same ''miracles''. For example religions as different as Hinduism and Christianity are full of ''miracle'' healers and ''future predictors.'' So how can these actions be from the Creator when they are performed by people who all say contradicting things?
In actual fact in nearly all cases you will see that even people who do not promote any religion at all can also do the same ''miracles''!!!!!
So something must be wrong with our understanding of the word miracle.
So what is a miracle?
Miracles in actual fact are events which are from God, the Creator. They are signs that He sends with Prophets and Messengers to show that the message they come with is from God and cannot possibly be from anything or anybody else. Therefore they are events that man is incapable of imitating, because man is subject to the laws of the universe which are subject to the laws of the Creator, unlike the Creator.
As we said before this means the wonders of faith healers, predictors, magicians etc cannot be called miracles because they can be imitated by other people.
However like all other Prophets before him, Prophet Muhammad (saws) brought a real miracle - a sign that proved the message he brought was from the Creator and not something made up by him or anybody else.
The Qur'an is a miracle
The miracle Prophet Muhammad (saws) brought was the Qur'an. Allaah (swt) Himself challenged those who didn't believe in Muhammad to produce one chapter like the Qur'an:
''If you are in doubt as to what We (Allaah) have revealed from time to time to our servant (Prophet Muhammad) then produce a chapter like thereunto and call your witnesses or helpers besides God if your doubts are true but if cannot - then fear the fire, whose fuel is men and stones- which is prepared for those who reject faith.'' (2:23-24)
But what was special about each chapter that made it impossible to imitate? Was it its great poetry? It's great stories?
In fact what was noticed by the people as soon as it revealed that was outstanding about every chapter of the Qur'an was it's eloquence.
What is eloquence?
A lot of people think that eloquence is beautiful words. In other words they think it is subjective (it has no rules and depends on peoples taste) like how someone might like baked beans and another person might hate it or how someone might think Picasso paintings are beautiful and another person might think they're ugly.
But eloquence it is not subjective because it has rules. When we write or speak we convey ideas to an audience. Eloquence is defined as the perfect way of conveying these ideas.
Explaining eloquence
Eloquence is made of 3 things which convey ideas differently:
Style - this is the arrangement of words in a sentence.
For example in Arabic if you say, ''Zayd came to me'' this means you are more interested in Zayd than in his coming because you mention Zayd first. But if you say ''There came to me Zayd'' it means you are more interested in his coming than Zayd because you mention coming first.
Meaning - this is the choice of words in a sentence.
For example in the Qur'an 'rayb' is used in the verse (2:1) however the nearest word in meaning to 'rayb' is 'shakk' which means literally doubt. However 'rayb' is more descriptive here since it means doubt with a connotation of unrest and agitation which is not found in the word 'shakk'.
Another example is in one verse Allah (swt) uses the word 'mawr' to describe the movement of the universe at the end of the universe. The word with the nearest meaning to this is 'harakah' which literally means movement. However 'mawr' not ONLY means movement but means light, swift movement which is the most descriptive word for this context.
Grammar - These are endings of words. These indicate whether the word is a predicate, object, subject, feminine, masculine etc...
So all these 3 things affect how well you convey the ideas and so decide whether a sentence is eloquent or not .
Why the Qur'an is unmatchable ?
The Qur'an is eloquent because in every situation described it has perfect:
Style � arrangement of words
Meaning � choice of words
Grammar - ending of words
No human has been capable to meet the challenge and produce a chapter with such a high standard of all these 3 qualities. This is why the Qur'an is inimitable.
What about other great works of literature?
Some people say if the Qur'an is inimitable what about the works of great writers such as Shakespeare or Homer? The answer is simple:
These authors and the experts in the area of literature never claimed them to be inimitable but only great works of literature. In other words they never claimed they to go out of human capacity but just reach the heights of human capacity.
It is definite that their works are not inimitable because they always have parts which we are unsure if they actually written by them or just attributed to them by other people. For example Homer's ''Illiad'' which is supposed to be his greatest work has a whole section (Book 10) which the scholars are unsure whether he actually wrote it or not.
Another example is Shakespeare's ''All is True (Henry VIII)'' which has whole sections which scholars are unsure whether Shakespeare wrote it or not. If these writers are supposed to be unmatchable how come we can't even tell whether some of their works are forgeries of other people?
So how can anyone think they are inimitable at all?
How we know for sure the Qur'an is inimitable ?
The following is a conversation between a Muslim and a skeptic who is not convinced that the Qur'an is inimitable.
Skeptic: How do I know, though, that the Qur'an is really unmatchable? I don't understand Arabic let alone eloquent Arabic!!!!!
Muslim: Knowledge (Certainty) we have in our everyday life can be direct or indirect
Skeptic: What is direct knowledge?
Muslim: Knowledge that you sense yourself: for example that fire burns, glass cracks when dropped or water quenches thirst.
Skeptic: What is indirect knowledge?
Muslim: Knowledge which we hear from other people; for example that World War II occurred or that humans have kidneys.
Skeptic: Direct knowledge is certain since we experience it ourselves but how is indirect knowledge certain since we have to trust other people who have told us it and they may have lied to us or just made a mistake?
Muslim: Although we don't or haven't directly seen or heard these things you can still be certain about them since loads of other people have sensed them and they tell you. It is impossible for the information to be a lie or mistake since they are so large in number. For example is absolutely impossible that all the sources which tell you about World War II (TV reports, relatives' stories, monuments, biographies, photographs, museums etc) actually grouped together to make it up since there is too many of them to all know each other and all these sources could not all of made the same mistake about the event.
Skeptic: But this is only true about a large amount of people since if only 1 or a few people were to tell you something there is a possibility that they could have made a mistake or lied.
Muslim: This is very true, reports that you hear in your every day life, like a story your relative tells you, are not believed by you straight away because of this reason: the possibility of error. However undisputed well known facts can be and are believed due to the fact that such a large number of people tell you the information it is impossible that they all lie together because they don't know each other or that all of them make a mistake.
Skeptic: But the only way I know about the Qur'an being inimitable is from you only! I've never heard it from anyone else before. Even if I ask other Muslims they will obviously say it is because it is part of their religion!
Muslim: This is not completely true. If I asked you if you knew for certain that humans have kidneys what would you say?
Skeptic: Yes, of course!
Muslim: Why is that?
Skeptic: Well it's like you said before even though I have never seen a human kidney the information has been transmitted to me in such a way that removes any doubt. Since hundreds of doctors have seen it and sensed them and then transmitted the information which I receive and due to their large number it is impossible for them to conspire on a lie or for all to commit a mistake.
Muslim: Likewise the Arabic rhetoricians, linguists, philologists and others who specialise in eloquence and the rules of language sense the matchlessness of the Qur'an's eloquence and transmit it to the common people. Because of their large numbers (which makes it impossible for all of them to lie together or make a mistake) the fact is certain and so becomes a well-known fact. Because of this the fact of the Qur'an being inimitable is known to the common Arab people Muslim, Christian, Jew etc. This is exactly how any well-known fact is known like how Shakespeare was a great playwright is to known to the English people or how we know that Malaria is a disease or how we know Pele was a great footballer.
Skeptic: So how would I be certain myself about it - I am not an Arab.
Muslim: Well like a villager from a remote part of the world who comes to live and study in Britain and learns that Shakespeare was a great playwright from many different sources and so he becomes certain of it the same is true here. Certainty that the Qur'an is inimitable can come through different sources through many ways. For example you could ask loads of Arabs until you are satisfied, you can ask those who have skill in Arabic rhetoric and eloquence and study it etc.
Comment
Therefore, we ought to think, believe the same way the Sahaba used to. That is to think about the Qur'an and reach from this thinking that this book is indeed Allah's word, then believe based on this that Muhammad who brought this miracle is the messenger of Allah. Once we establish this foundation, we should not refer to another source to prove the validity of an idea/event/concept mentioned in the Qur'an. For example, we have to believe in Isrra the way it is mentioned in Al-Qur'an. Any attempt to compare this miracle with space travel or to claim that Muhammad's spirit was so strong that it controlled his body and disabled the natural law that made his body in no need for food, air or being affected by time travel is absurd. The fact that this event has been mentioned in the Qur'an, which is the miracle of Allah, is sufficient for us to believe in all the verses without any justification from our minds. Even if our intention is to simplify the concept of ISRRA to those who cannot comprehend it. Also, the revelation cannot be explained as ELECTROMAGNETIC wave transference. Such approach means that we do not believe in the miracle.
Source: http://www.adduonline.com/articles/mujiza6.htm
No comments:
Post a Comment