Nouman Ali Khan – Can We Use Surah Al-Isra to Understand What’s Happening in Palestine – World Quran Convention
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AI: Transcript ©
Almost every day I come across 1 of
these, reflections where someone is saying,
in order for us to
give victory
to Palestine and to justice nowadays, we have
to become Ibad like those Ibad.
We have to become Ibad,
servants of Allah, righteous worshipers of Allah, like
those ibad before.
But when I open the books of tafsir,
I find that these ibad,
who I talked about in the ayat of
Sur al Isra,
are not righteous worshipers of Allah.
We shouldn't aspire to be like them because
they were unbelievers.
Even though the name Ibad is used for
them, that's the point that we're obviously going
to need to discuss.
The Quran
which we consider as divine speech of our
creator,
lord of the worlds was revealed over 1400
years ago
in 7th century Arabia
to the last prophet and messenger
Muhammad peace and blessings of Allah
be upon him
over a period spanning 20 3 years.
The first audience of the Quran
was the prophet himself,
and by extension
the people of his time,
his space, and his society.
Those who listened to this divine speech
met him,
believed in him,
and believed in the speech
became his companions.
The revelation
transformed
not only their world view,
but also their very being.
It impacted their emotions,
their psychology, their understanding of the universe,
of history,
of destiny,
and their place in it.
In the era of prophetic revelation,
the companions had the prophet
to turn to,
and even those of their own generation who
were well versed in the Quran,
the likes of Ibn Abbas, or Ibn Mas'ud,
or Bayibin Kab, Zayd
ibn Harith of and
others.
They discussed,
they questioned,
they deliberated over the Quranic content and message.
In their pursuit to understand and study the
Qur'an,
they also sought clarification
from the Prophet
himself.
And the Quran itself alludes to this when
it records their questioning,
with and they ask you.
They deepened their knowledge,
they
depended on their knowledge of the Arabic language
and in particular,
pre Islamic poetry.
And it can be argued, as we shall
see today, that some even relied on the
knowledge of previous
scriptures to make sense of revelation.
The 2 generations after the companions, the and
the
continued and built on this legacy
and the likes of Mujahid,
and many others became reference points
to understanding
and studying the Quran
And what followed then
over a number of centuries
was a scholarly endeavor
to lay down principles
of understanding the Quran and
the penning of many works
of tafsir or commentary of the Quran.
And these commentaries of the Quran,
what we are accustomed to today when speaking
about our classical tradition
or our our intellectual heritage.
Thus, the names and the works of Tabarib
and Kathir, Al Baydawi,
among many countless others
unknown to us all today.
Since Muslims believe
that the Quranic Revelation is for all time
and all spaces and not just the audience
of the 7th Century Arabia,
it is still being interpreted
and understood and studied to this day.
Many of our distinguished panelists
are actually part of this contemporary endeavor
of understanding and articulating
the Quranic message today.
Our panel session today
will explore
how the Quran was understood in the past
and the challenges and opportunities
of understanding the Quran today
and what are the future prospects
of understanding the Quran?
Do we simply regurgitate
classical tradition?
Are we bound by that tradition in our
understanding of the Quran?
Can we be critical? Are there limits?
Can we have fresh and new interpretations
of the Quran?
If so, what tools do we have at
our disposal today?
You would have noticed that Sheikh Rami
recited from the beginning
of Surah Al Isra.
We thought it would be pertinent and relevant
to relate this discussion
about studying the Quran
yesterday, today, and tomorrow to what is happening
in the world today.
Surah Al Isai makes mention of this prophetic
journey from Mecca to the blessed land, Masjid
Al Aqsa, Banu Israel,
the 2 corruptions
having power twice,
dominance and tyranny.
Is this a prediction of what we see
unfolding
today in front of our own eyes?
I'd now like to ask Ustad Noorman
to lay down the case
for choosing these verses,
the first 10 verses of Surat Al Isra
as a case study and begin this session
with a problem statement.
What I'm going to do first, so that
everybody follows along with this conversation,
is I'm going to read and
briefly explain some of the issues
that we're going to discuss in this first
ayat of Surah Al Isra. Those of you
that have a Quran app on your phone
or if you have a copy of the
Quran with you, open it up. It'll help
with this discussion because I'd like all of
the members of our audience to get the
most out of this conversation,
and that's not going to be easy if
you're not following along.
So we begin.
How perfect is the 1 who took a
slave in the middle of the night
from Al Mashid Al Haram to Al Mashid
Al Aqsa, which would be Jerusalem,
whose surroundings we bless, so we can show
him some of our signs.
Certainly he is all hearing all seeing.
Musa Al Kitab, and we gave Musa Alaihi
Salam the book
referring it seems obviously to the
and we made it a guidance for the
children of Israel
that you do not take other than myself
as someone who takes care of your affairs.
I want you to make special note of
ayah number 3. We're gonna come back to
ayah number 3 at the end of our
towards the end of our panel, but I'll
roughly translate it.
The children, the offspring of those who we
boarded on with Nuh. I'm referring to the
the the ark, the ship that he built
and the children that were boarded on.
Certainly he was a grateful slave. Now this
ayah is going to be significant at the
end, like I said, because it seems Allah
was talking about Bani Israel and all of
a sudden he's talking about Nuh alaihis salaam
and the children worded on with Nuh. Why
is he referring to them in this way?
What's the connection? We'll see towards the end.
We decreed to Bani Israel in the book
that you will absolutely cause corruption in the
earth twice.
So Allah has decreed for them that they
will be the cause of corruption in the
land twice.
And you will have you will act with
great arrogance or you will have great power.
There can be 2 meanings here. We will
be discussing them in some detail.
When someone acts
arrogantly,
you can apply
and
when someone has a lot of power,
like even about Firaoun had a lot of
power and he was arrogant and Allah says
the same word was used for him. Right?
So they will have great power twice. Okay.
When the first of our promises was fulfilled,
meaning Allah promised that this will happen twice,
now Allah is talking about the first time
that they will have that great power or
that they are going to cause great corruption.
As a result of that, Allah says,
We appointed over you servants
at our service. Ibadan Lana.
Who are these Ibadan Lana? I will right
now offer you a more recent interpretation.
So there is going to be a lot
of discussion about this throughout the hour, but
right now I will offer you a very
recent interpretation of what this could refer to.
The argument contemporary
is that this refers to the Sahaba
and the Prophet
that in Medina,
we know that we engaged in warfare with
the Jewish tribes who were powerful
And Allah says when the first of my
promises was fulfilled,
that we appointed meaning the Sahaba and the
Rasool
over you who are capable of great warfare,
then they broke into homes or they probed
into every home, and that was a promise
that was meant to be fulfilled. So this
may be referring to Banu Quraybah or if
you're for your own reference, if you look
at the opening of Surat Al Hashab, surah
number 59,
you will see
They were destroying their homes with their own
hands and the hands of the believers that
this might be referring to what happened in
Madinah with the Jewish tribes and the Prophet
Okay.
Then, now this is the again, I'm not
commenting on whether this is correct or not
correct. I'm saying this view exists right now.
That's all we're discussing right now.
Then we gave you Now who's the you?
That would still be Bani Israel.
So Allah is referring to Bani Israel as
the you here right now. Allah is talking
to them and He's saying, We gave you
a return,
another turn against them. So now the them
would be the Muslims.
So now Allah is saying if in that
interpretation
that Allah gave the Israelites
power again over the Muslims.
Okay.
Children is their own assets,
but then Allah
says, and we put for you other people
also or we made you multitudes. And this
might be interpreted as not only was the
state of Israel formed, because there's no other
time in history where they had power again,
so not only was the Zionist state of
Israel formed, but now there are other superpowers
that add to their manpower.
So that would be the implication here. And
now Allah says,
If you do good, you're only doing good
for yourselves, and if you do bad, then
that is how it's going to be. Fa
idhajaawadul
akhira.
When the second promise will be fulfilled. Remember
the first promise was, when they're corrupt,
then the Sahaba and the Prophet
destroyed and overtook. So now Allah is saying
you're going to be you're going to have
power again, but when the second promise will
be fulfilled,
and I'm using
for this purpose of this interpretation,
will be fulfilled.
We'll see later there's gonna be another interpretation
when it was fulfilled.
So not for the future, for the past.
But right now we're interpreting for the future.
Okay. When the second promise will be fulfilled,
then they, meaning the Muslims,
will humiliate you and they will enter the
masjid. Which masjid?
Aqsa,
the way they entered the first time. So
Muslims, of course, entered Al Aqsa in history,
and now they will enter Al Aqsa again
the second time,
and they will cause terrible destruction, or they
will do a great destruction.
Now this last part, when they will take
over and destroy,
the interpretation here is they're not going to
destroy Masjid Al Aqsa. They're going to cause
other destruction. So the Muslims will take over
and they will decimate the Israelites.
It may well be that your master will
show you rahma, and if you go back
to that behavior, we will go back to
the same procedure, meaning we will deal with
you in the same way.
And we have made jahannam a prison for
those who disbelieve. This was a rough translation
and you can see how because of what's
happening with Israel right now and the entire
world is in conversation about
how to or Muslims how to understand this,
because the Quran
mentioned that they're going to have power twice
and if they already had power twice in
history,
then how can we understand that Israel has
power now? So there was a new thinking
about maybe these ayat are referring to what's
happening
right now. But
if this is the second time,
then we have to figure out what was
the first time because it refers to the
first time and the second time. So the
first time must have been the Sira of
the Prophet
So it's actually working backwards. We're seeing they
have great power now and then according to
this interpretation
they are going to be given a lot
of power against us.
And they and there are some other implications
that will come from them.
It. They will have a great power against
us and eventually we will, you know, destroy
them. That's the kind of interpretation
that's being offered. And a lot of, you
know, in recent times on social media, on
TikTok,
du'aat and content producers that are kind of
looking at the Quran and saying this is
definitely referring to what's happening right now has
become a very common conversation.
To remind everyone, our discussion right now is
studying the Quran yesterday, today, and tomorrow. So
this was very much what's happening today.
Right? This is how it's being looked at
today by many people. So now we're gonna
kind of I'm gonna hand it over to
Sheikh Hassan to take the next step in
our conversation.
Thank you for that. So what we're understanding
from this, is that the contemporary
perspective or outlook of these verses are that
these 2
events, 1 took place at the time of
the prophet.
The other is what many interpret as to
what is taking place today in terms of
power
* and then the loss of that. What
I'd like to do now is turn to
doctor Suhaib Saeed, who's well versed in our
classical tradition
and our classical clothing as well, as you
can see. May Allah bless him.
He's a graduate of the 1 of the
most esteemed seats of Islamic
learning, Al Azhar University. I'd like to turn
to you, Doctor. Suhaib, and
if you can kindly share with us what
were the classical perspectives
of these few areas about
ifsad and corruption on earth twice, losing power
twice, the understanding of Ibad, here the contemporary
understanding is that this refers to believers and
at the time of the prophet to the
companions,
does classical interpretation
agree, disagree with this or not?
Bismillah, rahman.
Bismillah.
Jazakalakheeran,
it's almost everyday I come across 1 of
these reflections where someone is saying,
in order for us to give victory
to Palestine and to justice nowadays, we have
to become Ibad like those Ibad.
We have to become Ibad,
servants of Allah, righteous worshippers of Allah, like
those Ibad before.
And every time I hear this, I scratch
my turban
because
I'm someone who works with old books and
the books of tafsir and the classical tradition.
I'm interested in the old and I'm interested
in the new as well.
But when I open the books of tafsir,
I find that these Ibad,
who I talked about in the ayat of
Sur al Isra,
are not righteous worshipers of Allah.
We shouldn't aspire to be like them because
they were unbelievers.
Even though the name Ibad is used for
them, that's the point that we're obviously going
to need to discuss.
So when we look at the books,
we will find that there's a certain amount
which is agreed amongst the entirety of the
tafsir tradition, at least up until
the last century.
And the agreed part of this is,
these are 2 events which took place before
the revelation of the Quran. So when the
ayatul Surah Al Surah were revealed,
they're talking about something that has already happened.
And we can say that this is a
kind of assumption about the ayat.
Right? So it wasn't necessarily a point of
debate or a question
that they were all having to think about.
Is this something in the past or is
this something in the future? It was just
quite evident that the way these ayats are
flowing and the point that's being made
is about some things that happened in the
history of Bani Israel that they have to
pay attention to, the ones nowadays who are
hearing these ayat being revealed.
They have to pay attention to something in
their own history.
And when they try to identify which
particular moments in history, there is a little
bit of variation here.
If we go back through the entire tafsir
tradition, there's so many works.
We can go back to the earliest
ones, very important early tafsirs like the tafsir
of al Tabari, which has been mentioned.
And part of the value of the tafsir
of Tabari is he gives you a window
onto
the narrations
from the salaf. That is to say, sometimes
from the prophet salaw al salaw al salawam
himself,
sometimes from the Sahaba and the Tabi'in and
the generation
after.
So it's interesting to see how did they
understand this.
And in fact,
and sadly, we don't have something directly from
the prophet
Certainly not anything that is authentic
with regards to these ayaats and who,
these Ibad are, and what were the specific
events, and what were the specific crimes that
led to those events.
So we have to see what was said
by others.
So amongst the Sahaba, amongst the Tabi'in,
there are things that they have talked about
which then get recorded in our books,
and we can now examine all these centuries
later. So this is the value and the
beauty of our tradition.
We can see that those who were closest
to the time of revelation
had things
to say. And then people later in our
tradition, in our entire history also had things
to say. And sometimes the people later would
look at those earlier statements and revise them
and critique them and improve upon them and
build upon them.
But what's interesting is that the salaf,
the early generations,
they didn't have something
absolutely firm to go on here. They didn't
have a direct teaching of the prophet
But it can be sometimes that when the
Sahaba tell us something, we can figure out
that they must have got that from the
prophet
But at other times, we can see,
well, it's quite evident and quite natural that
they could have got it from somewhere else.
When they see a'at that are talking about
Bani Israel,
it's natural that they would go and ask
the converts from the people of the book,
those who have become Muslims, Abdullah bin Salam
and others.
Or indeed others that they might speak
to, who would tell them, well, this is
what we know of. This is what we
talk about.
We have very famous events in which
Jerusalem was besieged and sacked, and we were
driven out, and we were put into captivity.
And these things weigh heavily in our history
and upon our identity
as Jews.
So
generally,
the opinion has,
converged around saying that there were 2 events.
The first of them
was in the 6th century
before Isa alaihis salam.
So around
597
BCE,
there is the Babylonian,
siege and captivity
and this is led by someone called Nebuchadnezzar
or in Arabic, Buqd An Nasr.
So mostly this is identified with his time.
And then the second event is generally understood
to be
after the time of
around
70 CE or AD 70, the year 70
after
the birth of Isa approximately,
there was the siege now done by the
Romans. So the first 1, the Babylonian,
and the second,
the Roman siege and captivity.
So generally, this is what's understood and later
Mufassilin
would tend to agree with this.
So we have to understand this is not
based
on
a clear teaching of the prophet
but it's based on an understanding of history
according to the information that they had. And
they would build upon this, and they would
be open to revising that.
So I hope that they would also be
open to us asking this question later on.
A couple of very crucial things I just
want to draw attention to about what we
find in the tradition around this. Number 1,
we don't seem to have anything from the
sahaba,
that I've seen anyway,
where they've said, Hey, you know what? These
ayaat are about us. You see this
that's us. That's us. We did that.
Or that it was a prediction that was
about what they were about to do.
So
the absence of evidence
is not evidence of absence,
if you know this expression. Right?
So the fact that they
haven't said
it or the fact that we don't find
that statement doesn't mean that it's not about
them. But I think here we would probably
expect them to have said something. Yeah. Yeah.
And second and secondly, just to say that
they also pointed out that
where they did come in is just after
this. After these 2 events, then Allah says,
Perhaps
your Lord will have mercy on you. But
if you return to what you are doing,
then we will return to what we did
to you.
If you go back, we will go back.
If you repeat, we will repeat. So here
they say, that's us.
Because then what happened is, they went back
to their mischief by opposing the messenger Muhammad
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. So Allah dealt with
them at the hands of the believers.
1 thing I wanted to add
for clarification and thank you for this.
And inshallah as you'll see this will turn
more and more into a conversation.
Some of you might be confused. How can
Allah talk about disbelievers
as Ibad servants
of ours?
You know Allah says,
Nobody knows the armies of Allah except Him.
The way you can interpret that and it's
very in line with the principles of Allah's
book
is that Allah in His plans
And they don't even know that they're serving
Allah's plan.
Right? So even consciously they think they're rebelling
against Allah, but they haven't escaped
the grand plan of Allah. And so the
people like when when the 2 interpretations
of almost 600 years before Isa and almost
70 years after Isa, the 2 destructions of
Jerusalem,
the people that destroyed were disbelievers, were the
Babylonians and the Romans.
But they were doing something in accordance with
Allah's plan
and they don't even know that they are
servants of Allah. And that's why
is different from just technically Ibadana.
Ibadana would be our servants, but Ibadan lana
would be something like some servants
at our disposal.
Servants that did what we wanted them to
do, kind of.
And that's how it's if I'm saying this
correctly, doctor Saib, this is how it's been
looked at classically
on the Ibad comment. Yeah, absolutely. So Ibad
in general just means any of Allah's creation.
And then here it would be those who
are at the disposal
of Allah's plan.
And I don't like to step on any
biblical territory of others,
but what's very interesting is that
1 of the predictions, 1 of the areas
that is often identified
as an example of the kind of prediction
that could be matching what is referred to
here, because the Quran is saying
we
we predicted for them and we decreed for
them in the book.
So in the book of Jeremiah, it is
mentioned
who is mentioned? Nebuchadnezzar,
and he is called my servant, Nebuchadnezzar.
And when you look at the commentaries as
well, they explain it just like what we
just explained,
that God has some servants
who don't believe in him,
but do His will.
Thank you.
Turning to Doctor. Saqib
here, what would you how would you
engage with this discussion around the contemporary and
the classical interpretation
vis a vis your own research around
alternative sources of interpretation
from external
to the Muslim space. So I know you
have extensive research in
biblical studies, you're involved with the
Centre For Muslim Christian Studies at Oxford.
Do we have anything that sheds light
on a possible interpretation
from external sources
in resolving this tension?
Assalamu alaikum. Thank you so much.
So
looking if you come to this surah
or this passage from the perspective of modern
Western scholarship,
The sort of questions
that modern Western scholars would ask, I think
these are these are this is a good
way to approach the Surah whether, you know,
whether you're looking at it from an academic
perspective
or from a devotional
perspective, is
firstly
when the surah is being proclaimed, what is
in the mind of the audience?
What are they thinking? What kind of ideas
are coming to their mind?
And so as soon as you begin the
surah,
Allah begins the surah with this journey that
the prophet goes on from
al Masjid
al Haram to al Masjid al Aqsa, al
ladhee barak na hollahu. This is a distant
mosque or distant place of worship
which is in a land that is blessed.
Immediately, what comes to mind in the audience,
this is the holy land. This is a
land that has
significance in terms
of God how God interacted with humanity in
the past.
And so
then when
the Surah then goes on to talk about
the 2
destructions of the Bani Israel
after it's mentioned the holy land already,
it's very difficult to imagine that
any other thing comes to mind than the
2 destructions of this temple. The temple has
already been introduced at the start of the
Surah.
The Holy Temple, the the Masjid Al Aqsa
that
the prophet
has been taken on this night journey to,
and that this the history of that temple
is well known. It's well known to Bani
Israel and as soon as you talk about
the 2 destructions,
that's what comes to mind immediately. Doc, for
the ease of the audience,
so the the biblical reference to the temple
is the same as our reference to the
Masjid. So when you're hearing the word temple,
don't think of a Buddhist temple. Okay.
Yeah.
Yes. So so that's I think the first
thing to say that,
1 has to look at what are what
are the well known stories, the well known
history,
that the audience is familiar with when the
Quran is being proclaimed.
And then the second thing to think about
is, there's a far greater insistence
both in which is nice as a convergence
between how
modern academics are looking at this at the
Quran and how Muslims have been looking at
the Quran as well for the past century,
century and a half, which is sort of
an insistence on the coherence of the text,
the flow of the text,
rather than looking
at ayat in isolation.
So, if the Surah begins with a reference
to the
Jerusalem Temple, the Heikal Suleiman, the Temple of
Solomon, the Masjid that's built by Suleiman
the center
of Jewish
worship,
and then it starts talking about the 2
destructions, and everyone knows that the temple is
destroyed twice,
and then it finishes with,
What seems to be,
what the ayah seems to be saying is,
you know, that they, in the second destruction,
will enter this masjid, this temple, this place
of worship, just as they entered it the
first time. Well, that first time surely must
be referring to first destruction that was mentioned
earlier.
So the flow of the Surah seems
both the flow of the Surah and the
well known history of Bani Israel both point
in the same direction that this is talking
about
the past events that
Bani Israel are familiar with.
So you would add credence to the to
the argument that these are 2 events that
took place pre Nabuwa or the pre the
Prophet's,
error,
and thereby
perhaps
not necessarily undermining but opposing the contemporary,
interpretation
of this.
Do you have any thoughts on this, Sadat
Noaman?
Yeah. I have a few thoughts on this.
From a from a language perspective,
somebody might simplistically look at the word,
so for example, and is used as
a word which translates in English as when.
But the thing in English is when you
use the word when, you can use it
for the future and you can use it
for the past.
So when I finish this, I'm going to
have some orange juice is the future,
and when you came I became upset
is the past.
Right. So when is the same. But in
Arabic, generally,
is used when associating when with the past,
and idha is used when associating when with
the future.
Now because idha is being used in these
ayats, somebody might be able to argue well
because idha is being used and that's generally
associated with
the future,
this must be talking about the future.
The problem with that is, as Doctor. Saib
and I were discussing previously also,
Allah started by saying we told Bani Israel
in the book. So is that now or
way back?
We told them that you will do this
and then you will do this and then
this will happen.
So the will is perfectly fine. The future
is perfectly fine but it's still referring to
the past as far as we're concerned
because they were told 1000 of years ago
this will happen then this will happen and
it already happened.
So that's 1 issue. The second issue is
the way
if we take the contemporary
interpretation
and we say we really want this to
work, the problem with that will become we
have to describe the Prophet
and the Sahaba
with words that don't really seem to fit
their character
because it says the phrasing are
So it's kind of servants at our service
as opposed to the prophet and the sahaba
being qualified with more dignity ibaadana.
That's the first problem.
And why would they be made nakiala, like
some servants that we have. Why say some
servants? You could argue great servants if you
really wanna be creative, but it seems odd
for the Muslims to be talked of in
this way. The second issue becomes,
when Allah describes them that they're capable of
great war
and they broke into homes.
That doesn't sound like the kind of ethics
of war that Muslims follow,
that they break into homes.
Right?
And that does sound a lot like the
biblical descriptions of what happened when the temple
was decimated,
like civilians and, you know, combatants, there's no
there's no distinction between them. But of course
in our religion we make that distinction,
Right? And we attribute that kind of distinction
to the messenger of Allah
So it become then then people have to
interpret this ayah to kind of be softer.
So make it sound a little No. They
weren't breaking down into homes. They were investigating
all the homes or they were probing the
homes. Now we have to come up with
an interpretation that sounds like maybe this can
fit the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam but
I feel like that's too much gymnastics to
make it work. And I believe some of
you might have other thoughts on some of
the reasons why
the the contemporary
analysis
doesn't seem to add up. Even though it
sounds very attractive to us because we're in
the middle of this situation,
it doesn't seem to add up. So I
wanna hear some pros and cons from the
rest of us also inshallah.
Sure. I mean, we just just to build
on what you just said about language, Ida
and also Summa, some of the
contemporary,
exponents of this, and also the fact that
you mentioned about Diyar and this is not
the ethics of warfare, they make a distinction
between Diyar and Bayut. For Diyar, they speak
about the open space, the market space, the
open dwellings.
Again, I'm just exposing the contemporary
argument on this, whereas had to do with
the houses and this is, you know, sort
of not befitting Islamic ethics of warfare. But
anyway, I'll turn to
Doctor. Dawood Bakar to share any reflections you
may
have on this contemporary interpretations or reflections on
the classical interpretation of this and then move
on to doctor Suhayban,
doctor Saqib.
Okay.
Alhamdulillah
wabehine Stein.
Her Royal Highness, the Cooper Matsuri Leonard
Panelist and distinguished audience, brothers and sisters.
Alhamdulillah,
we are gathering
on this panel to
unlock
perhaps
the very voice of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
in term
of what is actually intended by Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala.
And this discourse is going to be going
on until we die. In fact, my great
teachers were saying to me that
even when we are, you know, when we
are
in the day in the hereafter,
you know, being
risen back, We're still debating about the meaning
of the Quran when we are in this
world because this the meaning of the Quran
is never
endless.
It's unstoppable
to get some insights
about the meaning of each and every ire
that our great scholars in the past,
the contemporary and the future will be engaging
in.
I think
if I were to
interject and
make some contribution to the discussion of today's
session,
I would like
to pick up some of the issues
away from the historical, away from the classical
and contemporary debates
on the 2 occasions which were mentioned by
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
I tried to pick up some of the,
but sometime in the history is not, the
history is not important, but the lesson from
the history is more important.
And this is something that we have learned
a lot in the entire Quran
in the case of, Balqis
and Prophet Soleiman when
Balqis was trying to understand the psyche of
the great emperors.
How do they think about conquering
a country
or a village for that matter? And as
you
know
in
the
Quran,
The very nature of the king and the
emperor when they
enter into the into the villages or the
cities, they will humiliate,
the people and so and so forth. And
Allah has endorsed
that kind of psyche of the kings and
emperors. So we have to learn the psyche,
the lesson from the Quran.
I think in the interest of time, I'll
pick up some if not all the
thought I have you know been gathering from
the great scholars, my fellow panelists. I think
the word I
mean it's not a it's not a simple
victory.
We have to
underpin
when and how this Oulu 1 Kabi, Oulu
1 Kabi, right,
in the Quran. So there are many wars
in the past.
I was fascinated,
you know, when I put my hand on
the book
called Kitab ul Iqthivar.
I think a very great scholar,
Usama bin Moqis Al Kinani
as Shazari.
He was living in the in the fraternity
of Al Quds. In the old time when
Muslim were fighting the Asolibiyan,
what we call in English?
Crusade. The crusades. They're coming from,
from England, from Scotland, from whatever will, coming
to to this part of the world fighting
the Muslim.
And during that time, there were ceasefire from
time to time. When we when they had
the ceasefire,
the non Muslim, the crusade were able to
see and observe the Muslim
and this is a very living documentary
book that was to be translated into all
languages.
He died in
118880.
In that book, he mentioned about ceasefire, the
war and how the the crusade were learning
from the Muslim about everything, medical,
health, you know, hygiene and how to take
shower
and how they cut their hand when they
got injured
and some are saying they are very stupid
people because they know how to treat their
soldiers well. Interesting book. I want to to
say that there were wars in the past
but there should be 1 important war or
2 important occasion
when the Bani Israel will
be described by Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala, or
has been described by Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
as the great dominant and the great hegemony
and the great
event of all wars and this is something
scholars,
historians are still debating
when and how this great war will be
coming in the future. The second element,
the description of Aibah Adelana, Uli Baq Sin.
I think we have heard about the scholars
contemporary and classical.
Who are these people? Are they in the
past? Are they to relate to the prophet
Muhammad
or are they
still not coming yet just to fight? And
I will agree as a country scholar with
the know the moderator that the word Doctor
and Hilal Doctor, we need to reinterpret
giving the the meaning
of the day. Nowadays the war is not
the the normal war.
Man fighting man is a drone war.
Now they have to speak and the drone
will be able to
see every single thing in the house,
every single thing
even a small nail in the house. In
fact, nowadays
whatever is happening now in Gaza is all
about
drone, is about
you know the new technology and what have
you.
What is
exciting to me is the word Oli Baqsim.
I think we need to look into this
meaning,
this idea to understand
are we preparing only vaccine in our society?
Are we preparing the technology that required
to really fight the war when the war
take place? And this is a very important
lesson.
I mean I'm also an educationist and also
an academician.
We have not in some Muslim country, we
have not
put the right dosage of education
on preparing for the high technology or weaponry.
And this is something that the Quran wanted
to challenge us. Look,
everyone that we have to prepare
whoever they are, Ibadan Lelana or Ibaduna,
who has
who has the power
to really
create the fear and to create the the
the the respect
of your enemies and of course the enemies
of the world
is,
the the the Israel and the Zunis. And
the third point I wanted to, you
know, mention,
I think at the end of the day,
I have
to have the personal interpretation,
the war is not about the war of
geography,
it's not about
you know, in Gaza, in Palestine or what
have you. And this is,
you know, a very important statement because some
of the superpower did control by proxy. I'm
sure you are you are family with this
statement. When we talk about the Zionist Israel,
this is about the whole world
war and this is,
has been made very clear in the Quran
that,
the alfasad
is not limited to certain
geography of the world. Al Fazad is very
much
borderless,
limitless and this is
the war
of al Fazad,
the war of,
corruption and and
so and so forth. So we have to
look around and perhaps to free our mindset
from the geographical
interpretation of the Quran and try to bring,
a meaningful interpretation,
an abstract interpretation to give the real meaning
because the Quran was not meant to serve
the people, the nation, the geography,
but to serve
the bigger and higher
objective and meanings at the end of the
day. I think I would like to stop
at that point of view.
I'm not
with the classical, I'm not with the contemporary
point of view but perhaps we have to
make these verses
meaningful,
purposeful, impactful in term of preparing for the
future. And this is the whole meaning of
the Quran as Hudan Dinas and Hidayah. Thank
you very much, sir Themis.
But although you said you're not with the
classical or the contemporary, it seemed like to
me you are actually advancing the contemporary,
extrapolating
meanings into this, and this leads me to
my next question to Doctor. Suhaib.
Here,
coming back to our question of studying the
Quran yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
Here we have an issue about a Quranic
passage where we are stating there is no
categorical
interpretation
as to what the 2 corruptions entail, what
the loss of power, dominance entails. Is it
believers? Is it disbelievers? There seems not to
be a categorical
definitive interpretation here, which gives scope for contemporary
scholars to build on these meanings and interpret
them in the way that we are seeing
it happen today. My question is this, that
to what extent
will the classical tradition
and the classical understanding of text accommodate
interpretations
such as what we just heard now from,
let's say, Doctor. Daud Bakar?
Yes. I I think that, what Tan Sri
has kindly highlighted for us is the importance
of
looking anew at the Quran all the time
in terms of the world that we are
living in, the relevance of the lesson that
we are taking from it. Yep. And, importantly,
that's always what the scholars have done.
But when it comes to the example that
we are dealing with,
generally, once they had established that this was
referring to historical event, they just considered that
to be a closed case. There was no
reason to re examine that case.
Then comes the 20th century,
the events of 1948,
the other events of 1967.
And all of a sudden,
scholars were now questioning
their assumption of the trajectory that the Quran
is talking about for the Jews,
that they will remain in such a state
until the end of time, and then all
of a sudden they have a state, right,
of a different kind. Now, things are happening
which are which now challenge some ways that
we had been reading the Quran, so they
had to look afresh.
And so, the scholars who have advanced that
view, even if I don't agree with their
conclusion,
I highly value
what they brought to the table. And the
fact that by presenting some evidences and saying,
let's think about this again. People like Sheikh
Mohammed Mutwali Shahrawi,
1 of the great great scholars of tafsir
in the 20th century,
1 of the luminaries of Al Azhar.
Various other scholars who are known in these
regions as well like Salah al Khaledi and
Fadullah Hasan Abbas,
Various others who have written on this. And
then there are scholars who wrote in the
other direction, like Allama Yusuf Al Qaradawi
defended the standard view, the classical view against
this modern idea. But it's important that we
are able to have that discussion
because when it comes
to established opinions in tafsir,
they are not always of the kind of
weight of something that we call ijma', like
we call consensus.
In matters of fiqh, in matters of law
and practical questions
of how we perform our deen and we
fulfill our ibadah.
We sometimes have a matter where all the
scholars agreed on something, and therefore we know
that the truth must be here because otherwise
the ummah would have gathered upon something false
and this just cannot happen.
But in questions of tafsir, it's a lot
more
flexible than that, a lot more open than
that. Sometimes
the scholars are all agreeing on something just
because they are repeating each other. They're just
passing on. That's the way tafsir often works.
The later mafasir is just reading what the
early mafasir said and passing it on
with the openness that perhaps if there's reason
to re examine,
we would re examine it.
I would like to say, very briefly that
we do need to look for the lessons
in this passage,
whether we are thinking in terms of
the traditional view that it is 2 past
events or if it is something
like Sheikh Jarawi and others suggested that it's
a modern event.
Because, for example, if we assume that these
these
that I referred to here are actually not
the believing ummah.
They are not,
believers or righteous servants of Allah.
Then isn't there a lesson for us then
as
the inheritors of Bani Israel those who have
now received
the covenant and the chosenness
and the responsibility
to represent
the deen of Allah upon earth as the
Muslim ummah, having received this responsibility and burden.
Is there not a lesson here that maybe
even Allah would send some other people against
us if we fail in our duty.
What are we going to say that really
happened in the 20th century? What really happened
when
colonialism
has ravaged our lands? Are we going to
always point the finger
at those worldly forces? Or are we going
to look within and understand that maybe our
corruption has led to Allah
appointing some Ibad of his,
not from the Muslim Ummah, but from others
who would show us and put us in
our place, and make us look
again
at Perhaps your lord will have mercy on
you. But if you continue and you return
to that wrong action, then we will return
to disgrace you as we had done to
Bani Israel before. Perhaps this is a lesson
for us. Allah knows best.
Doctor. Saqib, I just wanted to ask here.
I it's my understanding that you,
that you adopt the classical position.
However,
you arrive at that conclusion
differently to what the classical scholars
have adopted to arrive to that conclusion. Is
that first of all, is that correct?
Or
I stand
yeah. I guess.
So I I do think this is
talking about past events, that that's
the most convincing reading of the
passage to me.
I hold that position,
I guess,
on the basis of the
what's in the IART itself, it seems to
suggest that it's a past event,
and on the basis, as I say, of
how this
passage seems to address
well known
events in Israelite history. What would have come
to mind
for contemporary
Jewish
and Christian audiences
as soon as they heard about
the temple of Sulaiman, the Masjid of Sulaiman,
Al Masjid Al Aqsa. And just to pick
up on something
Sheikh Suhay was saying, that just because it's
a past event doesn't mean it doesn't have
contemporary relevance.
And
the passage begins with linuriyahuminayadina.
The whole thing is happening, the Prophet
is being shown this vision,
is being taken on this journey, is being
told this
history,
so that he can see these ayaats because
these ayaats are going to have relevance
in the life of the
Prophet
and there's going to be lessons that the
Prophet
draws in terms of when he's setting up
this new community
just as an old community once existed, a
previous community once existed, and they had a
history
and they had to go through certain events
as a result of their actions, The prophet
is being told that
that you are now about to inaugurate a
new community, a new
Umrah,
and remember what happened to the previous 1
when they performed certain actions. So, there's absolutely
relevance for those past events at the time
of the Prophet and in our time now,
and I think that we
can draw out those lessons without
thinking of these 2 destructions as referring to
any sort of future events. On that note,
if I may. Go ahead.
The
the Quran
never really talks about history without it being
relevant to the believer.
So the Quran's never discussing history for the
sake
of history itself. It's the lessons from history
that are at the core.
And another piece to this discussion is that
the history of Bani Israel is of particular
importance in the Quran
because
Allah has
taken them
by the coming of the Quran, he has
taken them from the role of being the
role models to humanity
and now has chosen this ummah for that
role.
And in this journey of the Prophet
in Israel and Mi'raj, it's kind of interesting
that before he goes up into the heavens,
he's taken to
Jerusalem
and as Doctor. Saqib is suggesting, he's being
shown, look, the people before you,
this place is really important because it was
destroyed twice
because of the corruption of the ummah.
And why would the Prophet
be taught that And why would we remember
that? And why would that be a significant
thing for the ummah that if the ummah
starts to behave
in ways like when Israel behaved,
then other nations
can come time and again
and cause destruction to this Ummah,
and that history will repeat itself and even
the words like that that are being echoed,
like even the sahaba said this is about
us,
like it may be that Allah will show
you rahma, but if you go back to
your old corrupt ways, then we will go
back to to the consequences
that we give for your corrupt ways.
Right? And then the Ibadan Nala that was
suggested,
well, they
had non believers that did Allah's plan and
caused great destruction and destroyed Allah's house even.
Right? Caused a great destruction to the the
ummah
of that time. They are the ummah of
Islam of that time.
And so if you do this, then Allah
will may well bring
colonizers and other superpowers and other nations that
are going to bring this destruction on you.
And the only way back will actually have
to be what Allah told them.
They have to hold on to the book
of Allah. They had to hold on to
the book of Allah and it's interesting at
the very end of this passage,
the 10th ayah or is it the 11th,
That the Quran this Quran now guides to
that which is more upright
and gives good news to believers. In other
words, if you follow this, there's only good
news.
And if you don't follow this, then there's
my implication, there's bad news,
you know. Yeah.
I think,
if I may,
I think 1 of the important verses
in the 10 verses,
which has been recited
is verse number 6.
This is a fact
from Allah
This is a divine fact
which is non negotiable,
where Allah
has promised
to give them, to award them. Them refers
to
the Jews.
That Allah will give them
not only sufficient, more than sufficient in terms
of wealth.
Wealth cannot be defined as money.
Wealth should be defined as more than the
money.
It could be,
stock.
Now the stock is much more powerful than
money. The most richest person in the world
is not the money he has, but how
many stock he has in public state companies,
gold and
properties
and asset here and this. And wabanin,
the offspring, the children.
And also
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
will make
them more than us. And that's why I
was saying that it's not about the geography
of Palestine or Israel vis a vis
Palestine.
We have to look this ayah is about
the whole
formulation
of Judaism,
hegemony
of the world from the financial sector,
from the publishers
sector because
perhaps that give the signal,
I don't know, I mean the scholars can
correct me on this, that the Israelite state
will be larger and larger to accommodate
more nafero, more population
of the Jewish, either they're staying in that
part of the world or beyond. So this
is something,
a fact that everyone must agree. This is
a promise to from Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
and Allah promise is always
right and accurate. So this is something we
have to
not only
take note but fight against
the wealth of, you know, struggle and the
population struggle
and the geographical struggle as well. So this
is something I think we need to take
that lesson
because it's about population, it's about wealth, it's
about
territory expansion moving forward. Then this is the
fact mentioned by Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
Look, indirectly it's up to the mind,
the intelligence
Muslim to really take note. And I have
to put seriously that this is the challenge
of our ummah.
The financial challenges,
the population challenge and the quality of the
population that we have, education and health and
also
the territorial.
We are losing many
Muslim territorial as we speak.
Sudan and this and that and this. So
we need to take note and try
to bring back,
all the important issues to the Ming state.
I was wondering if I may ask a
question to
Doctor.
I have we have around just under 10
minutes and I have 2 last questions to
wrap up the session. So You go ahead.
Actually You can you can ask the question
or respond to it as part as the,
concluding remarks.
No, no.
I'll take your questions first. You take the
questions? Okay. So what I'd like to do
now, we have 10 minutes left and I
just want to sort of bring it, wrap
this,
bring this discussion
to some sort of set conclusions
on ideas
and on
reflection. So what we've seen here is
a contemporary interpretation
of
verses from Surat al Isra
who are engaging in
a discussion with our classical tradition.
Here, what we've noticed is that
although there are I see many of you
are giving room for that interpretation,
at least in terms of relevancy,
The
belief seems to be that, look, these are
essentially 2 historical events, but there are lessons
to learn from this even if we
reinterpret them. I'd like to get a bit
more contentious right now with 2 questions. Firstly
is that, and this is open to all
the panelists, so feel free to answer or
avoid answering,
is that is there any classical
interpretation
of any verse, any Sura, any passage, any
story
that you strongly disagree with and you feel
that in these circumstances
there has to be a reinterpretation,
that it's not just, you know, it's not
just good to just point to relevancy of
a classical
interpretation, but a classical interpretation perhaps is not
aligning with the intent of God's you know,
speech here? Can you give us any case
studies, any verses? So
I want a bit of controversy, basically. Okay.
I'll I'll start off. I can start.
Go ahead. I'll start off.
Yeah. Let's just jump right in. But do
remember, look, we have around Yeah. 8 minutes.
So a couple of minutes each and then
I'll continue with the final question. 1 of
the classical
opinions,
commentaries on the story of Dawud alaihis salam,
many of you might be familiar
that people came into his quarters and
they terrified him and then they said, this
is my brother. He has 99 sheep, and
I only have 1 sheep, and he's
intimidating me. And the interpretation was actually borrowed
from a story in biblical tradition that Saqib
can pinpoint
with laser precision. I can't, but Muslim interpreters
are classical tafasir, started mentioning it and accepting
it as a normal interpretation
that Dawud
had 99 wives and he saw this other
woman and he became interested in her and
turns out that she was married
and then he still has a relationship with
her. So there's an accusation of Zina against
him. And then on top of that,
he's now he wants to be with her.
So he sends her husband, because he was
the ruler, he sends her husband into some
battle
kind of setting up that he can get
killed,
so he's done and he can have his
100 sheep.
Right? So that's the interpretation,
and I absolutely reject that interpretation with no,
with all due respect to the tradition, I
have no respect for that view in the
tradition at all. III think it's disrespectful to
prophets. I think it's actually again going against
the text of the Quran. I think there's
plenty of literary
and very clear linguistic markers in the Ayah
that is saying that this is not referring
to that case at all.
And in fact,
the the Ayah, you know, some people have
looked at, you know,
you know,
at the end, you know, that he fell
on the floor in Sajdah and he,
you know, made his tighfar and he to
repented to Allah, or he must have repented
for this.
This is
this is the kind of thing that people
before us did
to undermine the integrity of prophets.
And a quick similar thing happens with Soleiman
that he the interpretation is he was taking
care of the horses and he was taking
care of them so much that he missed
Maghrib
because the sun set. And because he got
so upset that it's the horse's fault, he
cut off their legs and their necks, which
means he mutilated the animal. He tortured the
animal by cutting the legs first and then
he cut their necks.
I
absolutely would strongly disagree
with that interpretation of the ayah because first
of all, if if I miss Maghrib and
I was taking care of my child
and I miss Maghrib, then I wouldn't get
angry at my child. So I don't understand
why a man, a prophet of Allah with
such wisdom
could possibly get angry at the horses.
And and on top of not just we
we slaughter animals with mercy and he would
what? Cut their legs off first and then
cut their that doesn't make any sense.
So there there is an alternative
explanation that makes far more sense. Imam Razi,
I believe, talks about this.
But that but the opposite view is very
popular and it's a classical opinion.
So for me, 1 of the takeaways today
is
sometimes the classical opinion has far more stronger
evidence than
some contemporary new interpretation. We're not talking about
drawing the universal lesson. We're talking about interpretation
itself.
But
other times there are classical views that just
if you look at them again with fresh
eyes, you say there's no way I can
accept that. That's not
that's that that doesn't fit with prophets. It
doesn't fit with what Allah says. It doesn't
fit with the spirit of the Quran. It
just doesn't work.
So yeah. That would be at least 2
easy cases.
Sorry I took it off. So
I'm gonna use this microphone to advertise an
academic paper of mine.
Called
Fights and Flights.
Fights and Flights. It's got 2 halves. The
first is about fights
and the second half, I'm gonna talk about
very briefly, is about flights.
It is about It sounds like an action
movie that happens in a plane. You have
to get people to open the paper. So
it's make it easy to Google. So hebsaid
fights and flights. You can read it inshallah.
Right? But the second half is about Ibrahim
al Islam and the birds. Ayat 260 of
Sur Al Baqarah,
and
there is a view that came. It's not
a modern view,
but many, many modern people have accepted it.
But it's an old view that goes back
to someone called Abu Muslim
al Isfahani,
who is from the Mu'tazilah,
Abu Billah. So as soon as you recognize
it comes from someone from a strange group,
then this becomes a subject of suspicion.
And I've documented in this paper how the
Mafas Mafasridin have discussed that position,
Imam al Razi being 1 of them who
directs and,
you know, objects to this alternative position. The
alternative is basically,
the standard view is Ibrahim
was being told that he has to kill
and chop some birds, and then put them
on hills. And then he's gonna call them,
and a miraculous event will happen that they
will come back to life.
What is the alternative view that I happen
to think is the right view in this
ayah, is that it's not talking about an
actual killing of the birds. It is talking
about training the birds.
And this is an example that is being
struck, so that he can understand,
How
do you give life to the dead? So
once he understands
that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has created us
all with this imprint to recognize Him, So
when He calls us back on the day
of judgement, we would all come flying back
to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. That's it. And
very very brief.
But I argue in the paper that it's
sad sometimes how the Mufasirim
dismissed this opinion for reasons that were not
very good, but I think there's a lot
of good reason to accept Abu Muslim's alternative.
So, that's just to say I'm not always
on the old opinions, I'm sometimes
on the new.
Edel Sakib.
So,
sticking with the theme of biblical prophets,
we're discussing Adam al Islam, Adam in the
Quran
a
little while ago and in Surat Al Baqarah
you have this really interesting Ayah,
When the angels object
or when the angels question Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala, why are you going to create someone
who will
shed so much blood?
Allah swanwala's response is to teach Adam the
names
and this 1 of
the popular interpretations of this and early interpretation
is this is referring to the names of
the creatures of the land and the sky,
which raises the question and that's based on
the biblical story, which raises the question how
did this respond to Allah subhanahu wa'ala to
the angels objection.
Their objection is or their question is why
would you create someone who will shed blood
And Allah's response is to teach Adam the
names of the birds of the sky and
the creatures of the earth. How
is the angels objection met? So, but this
is a popular understanding amongst the Mufasirun
mainly based on the biblical
story, it just doesn't work in the Quran.
So it's actually happening.
It's something that you'll have to understand in
Surat Zimbal. Story night.
Thank you, thank you, Doctor. Safkab here. I
I think our time is,
up. I don't want to be,
I don't want to be receiving warnings from
those rules. For 1 minute. I really want
everybody to know,
doctor Saqib's view on remember I told you
aya number 3 with Nuh alaihis salaam?
And why that's kind of situated and he
had an insight into that based on the
perspective of the Israelites themselves. If you could
just
articulate that, that I think would be a
really nice conclusion to this discussion. Okay, so
the the surah begins with the prophet
being taken to Al Masjid Al Aqsa, which
is that which is Jerusalem,
the center of their religious
kind of worship,
and then it says Wa Ateen al Musa
Al Kitab, we gave Musa al Islam scripture,
and then it says what Bani Israel were
told to do in the scripture, the first
thing is
you will have no other you will rely
on no 1 except me. So this is
tawhid,
this is the first thing that they're commanded
to in this in scripture.
And then you have this
apparently strange shift
the children of those we carried with Noah.
So why is this sudden shift to Nuhr
al Islam is difficult to understand unless you
understand how
Bani Israel
themselves understood their responsibility.
They understood their responsibility as being 2 things.
Firstly,
a responsibility to Allah, Tawhid
and secondly, a responsibility to the other nations
of the world whom they called
Bani Nuach, the children of Noah or the
Noahides. So they have a responsibility to worship
only Allah and they have a responsibility
to take the message of Tawhid
and to take the to be a moral
example or light to the nations as the
Bible calls it to the other nations of
the world. So the Quran here I think
is saying remember your responsibility
to the other zuriya
of
Nuh
So these are the 2 things you were
commanded to do and then the facade,
can be understood in this context. What is
the facade that they caused? They didn't fulfill
their responsibility to Allah to have no other
wakeel except him
and they didn't fulfill their responsibility to their
fellow human beings to take this message of
Tawhid and this message of moral monotheism
out to the other nations. And that's I
think the the core message of this
whole passage is that where you have this
chosen nation who is going to receive profits,
if they don't live up to their responsibility,
they won't be destroyed like Ad and Samud
and Fir'aun, but instead they'll be humiliated and
the prophet is being told that this is
now going to be the situation that you're
going to be in. You are now a
nation which has this dual responsibility to Allah
and responsibility to other nations to take this
message to them and if you don't fulfill
it,
Allah will destroy you like you destroyed Fir'aun
and destroyed the people of Lut, but you
will face humiliation
through whichever Junu'ud
decides to choose.
Thank you, Doctor. Saqib. I mean, this is
a very strong note to finish this panel
discussion,
summarizing
the lesson that classical interpretation or tradition
is important, but it is something that is
open for critical inquiry
or addition. We should not be imprisoned by
our classical tradition nor do we seek liberation
from it. What we seek is negotiating with
that
tradition between the modern and the tradition. And
as we've just seen from this,
new, insight by doctor Saakib that,
that there is possibility
for meaningful,
conversation, meaningful addition
to that, to that tradition, and as doctor
Dawood also mentioned that more importantly, there is
also a wider context about lessons and extrapolating
universal
maxims,
divine norms from these lessons.
I hope you guys enjoyed that video clip.
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