Mirza Yawar Baig – In my opinion
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In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most
Merciful, All praise is due to Allah, Lord
of the worlds.
Peace and blessings be upon the most honoured
of Prophets and Messengers, Muhammad, the Messenger of
Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and
upon his family and companions.
My brothers and sisters, one of the big
traps that we Muslims, and especially the intellectual
ones, especially the so-called educated ones, fall
into, is the trap of imagining that we
have knowledge, the illusion of knowledge.
As they say, the opposite of knowledge is
not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge.
The opposite of knowledge is not ignorance, but
the illusion of knowledge, imagining that you are
knowledgeable, when actually you are not.
Now, this is a trap of the so
-called educated.
It's a very funny thing, funny in a
non-humorous way, that for every single thing
in the world, every single body of knowledge,
somebody who is an expert in one body
of knowledge, does not automatically consider himself to
be an expert in another body of knowledge
that he never studied, never learned.
But if he is interested in it, then
he takes the time and trouble to go
study it.
As I'm walking here, I'm seeing this fisherman.
I've seen him fishing before, so I know
he's an expert.
And he's using spinners, spoon bait.
Now, I've done fishing, quite a lot of
it.
And I've done both, used spoons as well
as flies.
And I know very well that somebody who
does only spoon fishing or rather spinners, will
never consider himself to be an expert in
fly fishing.
And vice versa.
Spoon fishing is one game, fly fishing is
another game.
The two are not the same.
And somebody does one, they don't automatically consider
themselves to be the expert in the other
one.
Right?
But very strangely, and may Allah have mercy
on us, Islam is the only thing in
which Muslims who have studied something, maybe they
are doctors or engineers or philosophers or whatever,
just because they have studied those things, they
automatically consider themselves to be experts in Islam.
And you have them making all kinds of
statements about Islam.
And expressing opinions.
You know, one is to have knowledge, and
the other one is to be able to
give an opinion.
They are two different things.
Even in general knowledge, I mean you might
have a lot of general knowledge, many people
do because they read, but they will hesitate,
and quite rightly so, to give opinions.
Because to be able to give an opinion,
it means that you have knowledge of a
certain level.
It's not simply enough to have general knowledge
about something, but you need to have knowledge
of a certain level.
And if you don't have that, then to
attempt to give an opinion is really very
foolish.
Right?
But with Islam, we find, Alhamdulillah, people are
so eager to be foolish.
Now one of the things that has been
happening as a consequence of that, is, this
is a great trap of Shaitan, there is
no doubt about this, but one of the
things that has been happening, and this is
nothing new, so don't get concerned or worried
about it, and say, oh my God, this
is a new thing.
It's not new, it's from day one, because
Shaitan is very intelligent, unlike us, and he
knows what to attack, and what to undermine.
I don't know, I mean, I lived in
a time when we used to have termites,
and we also had wooden buildings, so we
had buildings which had pillars and a framework
of wood, and you had termites.
Now this is a bad combination.
If you have wooden buildings and you have
termites, then if the termites get into the
wood, then one day the building collapses.
But the interesting thing is, that until the
building literally falls on top of your head,
you don't know and you don't recognize that
anything is wrong.
Because the termites eat the wood from inside.
They don't make holes in the outside of
the wood, you won't find the wood scored
and scarred on the outside.
But from the inside, the wood would have
been completely eaten up.
And one day it can no longer hold
the weight that is above it, and your
building, your house falls down on its head.
Not very nice, if you ask me, but
that's the thing about termites.
So, like termites, shaitan, iblis attacks the deen
and attacks our iman from the inside.
So from the outside you still have the
beard, you still have the hijab, you still
have the niqab.
Morning, you still have all the appearance of
piety and appearance of goodness, but from the
inside it's all gone because it's completely eaten
up by the termites of shaitan.
Now, one of the most powerful of those
and most prevalent is this sense of arrogance
with regard to so-called knowledge.
People are so incredibly arrogant about what they
think they know.
And as a consequence they express opinions about
things that first of all they have no
right to express that opinion and secondly that
expressing such an opinion is the route to
getting very badly misguided as well as misguiding
others.
Now, the reason I'm saying this so strongly
about opinions is because if somebody doesn't know
and they acknowledge that I don't know, then
if they are interested, they will try to
find the truth.
But when somebody already has an opinion about
something, it means that they consider themselves to
be knowledgeable.
They're knowledgeable enough to have an opinion.
So where is the question of searching for
the truth or searching for another opinion?
Nothing.
I have an opinion.
This is my opinion.
That's it.
And may Allah forgive us.
For many people, not only is my opinion
my opinion, but it is the opinion.
It is the only possible opinion.
Nobody can disagree with that opinion.
This is the standard.
This is the kind of attitude that a
lot of people have with regard to their
own opinions.
And therefore, the door of knowledge gets shut.
Now, what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala did
in His great mercy is that He sent
us a way of life.
And this way of life He sent in
the form of His speech, His kalam, which
we know as the Kitabullah, the Book of
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, Al-Qur'an
Al-Karim.
And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala then sent
us a teacher whose job was to teach
that book to the people.
Now, you might say, well, the book, what
language was it?
Did it come in?
And it would be a legitimate question to
ask because if you see the Bible today,
if you're reading an English Bible, you have
a right to say what language did it
come in because it didn't come in English.
The original revelation was in the language of
Isa, which was Aramaic, but not so the
Qur'an.
The Qur'an Al-Karim came in the
Arabic language, which was the original revelation and
which was the language of Rasulullah, peace be
upon him, and his people.
And they spoke that language on a daily
basis.
They were the experts in that language and
they were experts to the extent that they
were incredibly, probably rightfully, but rightfully in the
sense of their confidence, but not rightfully in
their behavior, but rightfully arrogant about their command
of the knowledge of Arabic to the extent
that they considered non-Arabic speaking people to
be dumb.
Dumb not as in stupid, but dumb as
in mute, meaning that they were in effect
saying that the only language which is worthy
of being called a language is Arabic.
Everything else is like the speech of animals.
They talk to each other, who cares?
But Arabic is a language which is actually
a language.
This was their attitude.
And Allah, peace be upon him, sent his
Kalam in that language and the Kalam of
Allah the speech of Allah, in its elegance,
in its eloquence, in its amazing depth and
breadth, convinced these people that this is not
the speech of any human.
Now this is the thing to understand that
Allah sent his Kalam and he sent a
teacher to teach that.
The reason I am saying all this in
such detail is because I want to set
the ground to demonstrate the kind of trap
that Shaitaan sets.
So here is a book which comes to
a people in their language and these are
not any people, these are people who have
a command of their language to the ultimate
degree of excellence and who are not just
proud of it, they are arrogant about it.
Yet Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala sends them
a teacher for that book.
Now why is a teacher required?
Why is a teacher required?
Because today we have a situation in the
world and world over it's not restricted to
any country or restricted to any group or
restricted to any individual, this is all over
the world where we have people who don't
even know the language, forget about knowing the
language at this level and that level, they
don't know the language of the Quran, they
do not know Arabic, they have never studied
Arabic and they make no effort to study
Arabic either.
They pick a translation, maybe a good translation
but a translation is a translation.
So they pick a translation and they start
to pontificate, they start to elaborate and they
start to give their opinions about the meanings
of the ayats.
And they say that this ayat, Allah says
this but in my opinion this is what
it means.
And if you say stop for a minute,
excuse me, I mean your opinion, where does
your opinion come into this thing?
Allah is saying something and this is Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala speaking and you say
my opinion, so who are you?
Who are you?
Are you, have you been authorized by Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala to express your opinion
in the context of his speech?
Do you have this authorization?
Where is it?
Are you a Rasul of Allah?
Are you receiving Wahi?
Did Jibreel a.s. come to you and
say here is what Allah said but you
are free to interpret that according to your
understanding, according to your whims and fancies and
where is the justification?
And as I said this is a huge
trap because you know, what must I say
interestingly or what not, the point is that
if someone did this with anything else in
the world, with any other body of knowledge,
we would not accept it.
You would ask the question, excuse me, you
are making this statement on what basis?
You say this is what it means, this
is what that means.
How do you know?
How do you know?
How do you say?
What gives you the authority?
You, what gives you the authority to say
this?
You know, where did you learn this from?
What are your qualifications?
Which degrees?
I mean we would ask 50 questions but
in the case of Islam we not only
do not ask questions, we go and sit
and listen to them, these people and we
imagine we are learning from them.
Now what are you learning?
You are learning, believe me, make no mistake.
What you are learning however is not what
you should be learning because number one, what
you are learning is that the Quran Al
-Karim is open to the interpretation of every
Tom, Dick and Bihari who decides to interpret
it.
You are learning that the Quran Al-Karim
is the word of Allah but the opinion
of this one and that one also has
validity.
You are learning that the Quran Al-Karim
is the word of Allah but if this
person or that person especially if it is
somebody who is eloquent and who can speak
persuasively and persuasively meaning able to persuade those
who wish to disobey Allah because remember the
same person completely fails to persuade the Mutakhun
persuade those people who have Taqwa so he
is not really persuasive he is persuasive to
you maybe because you wish to be persuaded
and that is the definition of a con
man so here you have got somebody who
is conning you and you wish to be
conned so good luck to you so you
are learning the lesson that as long as
you can have the gift of the gab
as long as you have a loose tongue
in your head and you can talk and
talk and talk all of this is valid
and all of this is fantastic and you
can do it now and other things but
I think this suffices let me ask you
do you think these are lessons that you
should learn do you think these lessons are
going to help you what are you and
whoever is sitting in these gatherings which are
addressed by people who are interpreting the Quran
who don't know the language of Arabic and
just knowing Arabic for example I know Arabic
but the level at which I know Arabic
is completely inadequate to interpret the Quran so
I never do it now the point is
that I never do it not to prove
my piety to anybody because I am afraid
of Allah I am afraid of the day
and I want to remind you of that
day because you will see that day and
I will see that day I am afraid
of the day when I will stand before
Allah and if I have taken an ayat
of the Quran and I have interpreted it
and I said this is what it means
then Allah will ask me may Allah save
us from this Allah will ask me on
what basis did you say this is what
it means now remember you might say well
you know I might be saying the right
thing this is what it means in my
opinion this is what it means my brothers
and sisters the door to Jahannam the gate
of Jahannam you know we know the names
of the gates of Jahannam right we have
Raya and so on the door to Jahannam
big one big gate you know what it
is called in my opinion that is the
name of the door to Jahannam in my
opinion so if Allah says well you stood
there and you said in my opinion on
what was that based who gave you that
authority then what is my answer what is
my answer we are not saying whether you
are right or wrong we are saying who
gave you the authority to speak so I
remind myself in you let us fear Allah
let us fear Allah let us fear the
meeting with Allah let us fear the time
that will come to every single one of
us whether we like it or not let
us fear the day when no one will
be able to benefit anyone else a day
when لا ينفعه مال ولا بنون a day
when neither the wealth nor children nor influence
nor authority will benefit anybody a day that
will come to every single one of us
let us fear that day and ensure that
we don't take we don't allow our tongues
to take us into Jahannam we don't go
through the door the name of which is
in my opinion because the reality is that
even if you are right if you are
acting outside your authority you are wrong the
whole point of authority is that the example
I give is because it happens quite a
lot in my country we have what is
called encounter killings there was a movie called
close encounters of the third kind so it's
like this where a policeman sees a man
decides that he is a criminal and he
may be right because he would have recognized
his face from whatever information he had he
might know this guy personally or what not
decides he is a criminal and he shoots
him because he believes that this criminal deserves
capital punishment and he tells himself that even
if the criminal had, even if I had
not shot him if I had caught him
and followed due process in law this criminal
would have been sentenced to capital punishment anyway
so actually by doing this I am saving
the state a lot of money and time
and trouble our courts, our law courts are
overburdened with cases untried, unsolved so I am
taking away some of the burden from the
judges now this is his reasoning and he
kills this person and remember the example I
am giving you in such detail because I
want to show to you that this opinion
of this policeman is correct in terms of
facts the person he shot and killed was
actually a criminal he had committed murder, maybe
more than one so therefore had he been
brought before a court of justice after due
process in law he would have been sentenced
to death so you might say well you
know the man actually did a favor but
what will happen to that policeman the fact
of the matter is that that policeman then
becomes the culprit, he becomes the criminal and
the policeman will then you know the extreme
form of that is he will be tried
for murder and if he is found guilty
he will be hanged for killing a person
who probably deserved to die now why would
you do that outside the purview of his
authority he is a policeman he is not
a policeman * public prosecutor * judge he
is not, he is only a policeman so
his job is to arrest the thief arrest
the murderer arrest the criminal bring him before
the public prosecutor collect the evidence prove the
case and then it is for the judge
to pass a sentence it's not for the
policeman you might have a case where a
person comes before a judge in a lower
court and is sentenced to this or that
maybe 20 years rigorous imprisonment and the person
then appeals to the higher court appeals to
the supreme court and this judgment is then
overturned and the person is freed because either
there wasn't enough evidence or the judge of
the lower court passed a wrong judgment because
of his or her understanding of the law
do you think that judge of the lower
court will be punished no, they will not
be punished because they were acting within the
purview of their authority the key is not
whether your and my interpretation of the Quran
and your and my statement about this is
right and that is wrong and this is
halal and that is haram and you can
do that in this country and that in
that country and all of this stuff which
we talk very glibly and blatantly the question
is not whether those statements are correct or
incorrect the question is did we have the
authority to make those statements or not and
if we did not have the authority to
make those statements even if the statement was
right it is wrong and if we had
the authority then Allah will reward us because
the Prophet said for the one who has
the authority for the Mujtahid for the Faqih
who has the authority if he is wrong
Allah will still reward him once and if
he is correct He will reward him twice
and they asked him why and he said
Allah will reward the one who is correct
twice one for making the effort and the
second one for being correct and he will
still reward the one who was wrong once
for making the effort but that refers to
a person who was qualified to do that
not to everybody we ask Allah to help
us and be pleased with us and to
enable us to do that which is pleasing
to Him wa sallallahu ala nabil kareem wa
ala alihi wa sahbihi wa nabim bi rahmati
kahi