بِسْمِ اللّهِ الرَّحْمـَنِ الرَّحِيمِ
... وَيَقُولُونَ هُوَ مِنۡ عِندِ ٱللَّهِ وَمَا هُوَ مِنۡ عِندِ ٱللَّهِۖ وَيَقُولُونَ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ ٱلۡكَذِبَ وَهُمۡ يَعۡلَمُونَ
wa yaqooloona huwa min ‘indillaahi wa maa huwa min ‘indillaahi wa yaqooloona ‘alal laahil kaziba wa hum ya’lamoon
Last part of Al-Imran (Family of Imran) 3:78 ....and who say, "This is from God," while it is not from God: and thus do they tell a lie about God, being well aware [that it is a lie].
Muhammad Asad, citing Muhammad ʿAbduh (Manar III, 345), explains that the above-mentioned distortion of scriptures does not necessarily presuppose a corruption of the text as such: it can also be brought about "by attributing to an expression a meaning other than the one which was originally intended." (The Message of the Qur’an, note 60 to 3:78).
In this context, Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) reportedly said:
“What earth would give me place to live and what sky would shade me if I should speak about the Quran with my opinion (conjecture) or by something I do not know.”
In the name of God
This so-called century of information has brought with it an excess of polarization of beliefs across the spectrum, whether religious or non-religious, and at the same time an unfortunate surfeit of those who claim to speak on behalf of God, or in the name of God. The ayah above shows that this has happened throughout history and remains a danger. The teaching tales below relate to it, albeit on a lighter note; their dialogue is retold rather than presented as a verbatim record.
Lesson 1: The Rescue
One day, a man climbed up a rather tall tree to pluck some fruit. But as soon as he had his fill, he realized that the trip down was not going to be as easy as the trip up. He started panicking and shouting for help. Soon a small crowd gathered, trying to figure out a way to help him (without putting themselves at risk, of course).
As luck would have it, a "scholar" passed by and he immediately took charge. He seemed to be in the know. A scholar of the scripture. He asked for a length of rope to be brought to him and had it thrown up to the stranded man. "Tie this around your waist, and I will immediately rescue you."
When the man had the rope tied around his waist, he and the others were wondering what to do next. The scholar reassured them: "Do not worry, I have read of a similar rescue attempt in the scriptures, and it was successful."
Saying that, he yanked hard at the rope, whereupon the man fell from the tree and was hurt badly, lucky to have survived.
The horrified bystanders shouted, "What kind of a rescue attempt was that?"
"Well," the scholar said with an enlightened expression on his face, "Now I realize the difference. The person mentioned in the scriptures was stranded in a well, not on a tree."
Saying this, he left them to go about their business. And probably to take the unfortunate man to the hospital, I guess.
Lesson 2: Divine Inspiration
One night, the village scholar woke up with much excitement. He eagerly told his wife, "Please get up! Hurry! I have just been divinely inspired! Get me something to write it down immediately!"
The wife rushed to find the necessary materials, lit a lamp and was waiting to hear this piece of divine wisdom.
He wrote furiously, and then rewrote several times, and then put out the lamp and tried to go back to sleep.
His wife was curious. "Wait. Tell me what the divine inspiration is."
He gave it to her and said: "Read and be enlightened."
She impatiently went to the other room and lit a candle and eagerly looked at the writing, which said:
"Wherever you go, there you are."
And this became another one of the "divinely inspired" hackneyed ideas in his repertoire that he kept teaching the people of the village, may God have mercy on them.
Lesson 3: Dilettante
Once someone elliptically told a scholar's son: "Your father is not a scholar but a dilettante." The boy took a fancy to this word and started muttering it like a charm: "Di-lit-tan-te... Di-lit-tan-te... Di-lit-tan-te... Di-lit-tan-te," while playing the kind of games that kids of his age usually play.
Soon after, his father was returning from his discourses with a friend and the friend, overhearing this muttering, was curious as to the meaning of the word.
He said: "Boy, come here. What is the meaning of the word 'dilettante'?"
The boy, without batting an eyelid, said: "It is a seasoning used to make fried chicken."
The father looked at the boy with pride and smiled: "See how smart my son is. He made that answer up all by himself. I am sure in the classic treatises, such a meaning can be found as well if we research carefully. "
Lesson 4: A remedy for wild lions
A religious scholar was frenetically going on and on about a supplication and a cure to keep dangerous lions away from the neighborhood. He supported his arguments by drawing upon his international experience learning from a teacher who had learnt and used it against the wildest lions of Africa.
So saying, he gave all of them a white powder (it looked like salt to me, though I dared not taste it) and a mantra to go with it. Starting on the night of the full moon, they were to recite it while standing on one leg and continue for forty days. He claimed that he had tried it since returning from his travels and that it was a safe remedy worth trying.
As he was exhorting the audience to start on this endeavor, a child innocently remarked: "But dear teacher, there are no wild and dangerous lions in this region."
To which the teacher gleefully replied, "Effective, isn't it?"
Lesson 5: Buttering bread the right way
Once a scholar gave a lengthy discourse about how whenever you butter a slice of bread and drop it, it will land every time on the buttered side, rendering it unsuitable for eating. He gave proofs and explanations from the length and breadth of his knowledge. Everyone was impressed, but there was one student of the Sufi path who believed in trying before believing.
So he went and bought bread and butter. He applied butter generously to a slice of bread, and threw it up, and lo and behold, it landed the right side up. That is, the unbuttered side was on the ground, and the buttered side was facing up.
Demonstrating this as a failure of what the scholar was saying, the Sufi questioned the scholar about it.
To which the scholar explained, "It is not my fault that you put butter on the wrong side of the bread."
Conclusion
So, if this is the state of scholarship around us, what should we do? I propose that rather than spending time and energy on these "scholars", we should instead focus on improving ourselves by looking at how the teachings of God have been implemented by the pious people, and seek to implement them ourselves. And this has been the purpose of the stories in my blog from its inception.
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