Nouman Ali Khan – Human Consciousness- Quranic Wisdom vs. Modern Philosophy – Surah Al-Qiyamah
AI: Summary ©
The "hasn't been given" concept is discussed in various aspects of life, including moral reasons, religious reasons, political reasons, and political reasons. The "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for personal reasons and political reasons, as well as for everything happening in the world. The "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world and the importance of animals and human beings in preserving life and the natural process of life. The "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world and the "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world and the "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world.], [The segment discusses the theory of consciousness and how humans are designed to face the world based on consciousness. The "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world and the "hasn't been given" concept is discussed for everything happening in the world.
AI: Transcript ©
Everything else has a purpose.
Then this ru'a that's been given must
also have a higher purpose.
Why give me a sense of right and
wrong?
Why give me a sense of justice?
Why give me a desire to be generous?
Why give me a sense of compassion and
mercy and goodness and truthfulness?
Why give me those things?
As-salamu alaykum.
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Thank you.
Before I share with you the subject matter
of Surah Al-Qiyamah, I need to have
some preliminary discussions with you.
So this is not part of the surah
discussion, but I believe it's necessary for you
to appreciate the power of the surah.
And the reason, I'll tell you the reason
from the beginning why I believe this discussion
is necessary.
The reason it is necessary is that there
are two things Allah put together in the
beginning of the surah.
The beginnings are very important.
Like any course, any course that you take,
any book that you read, the opening is
key to the rest of the subject matter.
Like the Fatiha is the key to the
Quran.
But in a sense, every surah has its
own Fatiha, has its own opening.
And the opening of this surah is two
statements from Allah, two oaths.
لَا أُقْسِمُ بِيَوْمِ الْقِيَامَةِ وَلَا أُقْسِمُ بِالنَّفْسِ اللَّوَّامَةِ
No, I swear by the day of resurrection.
No, I swear by the guilty self, the
guilty conscience.
Okay.
So the day of resurrection.
Thank you so much.
I will open up my own store.
Okay.
Very good.
I swear by the day of resurrection and
the guilty conscience.
Now the day of resurrection, you guys know,
this is the day when the skies and
the earth will collapse, the stars will start
falling apart, animals will be herded, oceans are
going to boil over.
This is the most chaotic event in the
entire lifespan of the universe.
That's the day of judgment.
So it's a huge event, the day of
resurrection.
And followed by that huge image, Allah mentioned,
and I also swear by the guilty conscience.
Now the guilty conscience is something you feel
inside you.
And if you're sitting here feeling guilty right
now, the person next to you doesn't know.
And if somebody put you under a CT
scan machine, they wouldn't be able to find
any traces of your guilt.
They wouldn't be able to measure it in
any kind of scale.
It is the most unnoticed, invisible, personal, minuscule
feeling.
It's a feeling, isn't it?
The guilty conscience is a feeling.
So the grandest of events is compared or
put right next to the most microscopic feeling.
Two polar opposite ends of reality.
And think of it another way.
Resurrection day is actually something where physical changes
are going to happen, isn't it?
Physical changes.
The sun and the moon, as will be
described in the surah, the sun and the
moon will crash into each other.
The sky is going to tear open.
The earth is going to tear open.
These are physical events, aren't they?
But the guilty conscience, is that a physical
phenomenon or is that a spiritual phenomenon?
That's a spiritual phenomenon.
That's an emotional phenomenon.
That's a psychological phenomenon.
It's in the world of the abstract.
It's not in the physical world.
So Allah put something, the greatest physical event,
and He put it right next to this
tiny little spiritual or emotional event that happens
inside your conscience and my conscience all the
time.
Allah is making a connection between these two
things.
Allah Himself has drawn the connection between these
two things.
And this is not small.
And just to wrap my head around this,
I have to do a lot of homework.
I have to do quite a bit of
homework.
So I'm going to try to lay all
of that out on you.
And I'm not going to give you a
break until I'm done.
Sorry.
Okay?
Because I really need you to have this
coherently in your heads.
So I'm going to give you a choice
right now.
Should I give you a five-minute break
and then start this?
Or should I start this right away?
Should I?
Okay.
That one child said, five-minute break.
And nobody cares.
I'm going to start right away.
Okay.
Sorry, child.
Enjoy your sleep.
Okay.
Now, human beings have ideals.
But where do they come from?
Let's begin here.
Human beings have what?
Ideals.
Well, somebody's ideal is they want to make
a lot of money.
That's my goal.
That's my ideal.
I just want to make money.
I want to get rich like that guy.
I want to have that car.
That's their ideal.
Somebody's ideal becomes their sports team.
Man, we're going to win the championship.
I'm going to paint my face and my
team's colors.
The finals day is يوم القيامة for them.
This is حشة.
This is حساب.
Right?
Like they're closer to Allah as the seconds
count down in the penalty box.
They're making more dua to Allah that time
than any other time in their life.
Somebody else, their ideal in their life is
if I just marry him, my life will
be so happy.
Ya Allah, I just want him.
Just give me him.
Okay.
Somebody else's ideal is they just want their
child to become a certain way.
This is what's on their mind, their ideal.
Somebody else's ideal is power.
Somebody else's ideal is proving themselves.
Somebody else's ideal is, I don't know, animal
rights.
Somebody else's ideal is the LGBTQ movement.
Somebody else's ideal is just I want to
look like that influencer.
I want to get more followers.
I want to have more influence than that
influencer.
I want to influence that influencer.
It's true, human beings have ideals, don't they?
Some ideals are pretty low, they're kind of
petty, kind of pathetic even.
And some ideals are very high.
Somebody's ideal is they want to join the
Olympics.
Higher.
Somebody else's ideal is they want to save
the whales.
Gets higher.
Somebody else wants to save the ozone layer.
That's an ideal.
They have a cause, they have an ideal.
Somebody wants social justice.
Somebody wants to battle racism.
Somebody wants to battle police brutality.
Somebody else wants to battle corruption in government.
Somebody else wants to...
They're ideals.
And from the lowest level to the highest.
But one thing is for sure, every human
being has what?
Ideals.
Whether they're pathetic or they're remarkable, they have
them.
This much we agree.
You guys agree?
Okay, now let's go forward.
Freud.
I know there are children here, but you
can grow up.
Okay?
Freud answers the question, where do these ideals
come from?
Where did the ideal for justice or beauty
or power, anything, where did it come from?
His idea is, well, we have unmet sexual
desires and when human beings aren't able to
meet their filthy desires, they come up with
ideals to compensate as a substitute for those
unmet sexual desires.
And that's where religion, politics, morality, art, and
science comes from.
This is a khulasa of Freud.
Okay, this is a summary of Freud.
He's saying that's where ideals come from.
Okay, what does...
And by the way, Freud also goes on
to say, the objective of ideals is to
provide human beings a substitute for thwarted urges
in religion, politics, morality, and science.
Adler, another key figure.
These figures, why am I mentioning these figures?
You're like, Astaghfirullah, why is there a kafir's
name on the screen in the masjid?
Let me tell you, these people are pillars
of the modern world.
Education in universities, entire policies in government, political
relations, geopolitics, economics, there is not an aspect
of life that hasn't been impacted by some
of these thinkers.
So if you want to understand the modern
world as it is, you need to understand
some of its intellectual pioneers.
The ones who made an imprint on the
world as it is today more than anyone
else in recent times.
These are some of those people.
Adler says, instinct of self-assertion.
Meaning, he's saying, where do ideals come from?
When an individual is unable to satisfy a
particular desire for power, they create the desire
for a suitable ideal and strive after it
to compensate for their sense of inferiority.
Let me put that to you in simple
terms because that's my job.
Somebody really wanted to become powerful.
They wanted to rule the world.
They wanted to be the governor.
They wanted to be a...
What are you gonna be?
I'm gonna be an astronaut.
And they didn't get to do that.
When they didn't get to do that, they
shifted their ideal to their favorite sports team.
And that sports team became their religion.
And now everything they do, their hat is
from their team, their jersey is from their
team, their sneakers are from their team.
They got all the tickets for the season.
They're watching all the games.
They're always talking about it with their barber,
whatever.
This is their religion.
This is their politics.
This is their world.
They're listening to the talk show on the
radio about that.
Why?
Because there's something they wanted to accomplish.
They couldn't accomplish it.
So they substituted it to some other ideal.
Right?
And now that became their ultimate, ultimate, ultimate
objective.
You with me?
Okay.
That's what Adler is saying.
Karl Marx.
We're going further back.
Karl Marx is probably one of the people
that shaped not only the world with his
thought, but also many of the wars that
have been fought.
Humanity almost came to an end because of
Karl Marx.
The Cold War, at the end of which
the entire planet would have been a nuclear
wasteland, the battle between capitalism and communism that
some of you don't know about as much,
which was going on in the 50s and
60s, the world almost came to an end,
came from ideas as powerful as Karl Marx.
And what's he saying about ideals?
He says something crazy.
He says something crazy.
It's very relatable.
It's making sense.
He's saying, ideals are rooted in the economic
urge and are no more than distorted reflections
of one's economic condition.
What does he mean?
He means, if you are rich, you have
a different set of morals.
If you're poor, you have a different set
of morals.
If you're living in Pakistan and everybody's taking
bribes, then you come up with your own
morality and say, you can't survive.
What are you supposed to do?
So you come up with a different set
of ideals.
If you're living in a rich nation, you
come up with a different set of ideals.
So your ideals change depending on your economic
situation.
They're a product of your economic situation.
That's what Karl Marx is arguing.
By the way, as an extension of Karl
Marx, eventually, what is communism suggesting?
Communism is suggesting everybody gets paid the same,
everybody lives the same, everybody dresses the same,
everybody's equal in every way.
You know what that means?
There is no economic up and down, so
the ideals will remain the same.
Because ideals change because economics change.
So why not just make the economy stable
so the ideals will become stable?
That's kind of the logic.
Where do they all agree?
I mentioned Freud, Adler.
I mentioned Karl Marx.
There are others.
I could have mentioned others.
But where do they all agree?
Listen to this.
This is really important.
It's coming back to Zutul Kiyama, I promise
you.
Ideals are not independent of human nature.
Ideals are derived from one or more instincts.
In other words, social reality, economic reality gave
you ideals.
Your own innate sexual desires gave you ideals.
Your unmet psychology, compensation, gave you ideals.
In other words, they are from within human
nature.
Now, why is this important?
Let me explain why this is important.
Because this leads us to materialistic atheism.
And let me explain in simple language why.
I really want you to understand why.
Materialistic atheism means there is no reality outside
of this universe.
Yes?
The only reality is this physical universe.
Okay.
If this is the only reality and we
are in this universe, then I am also
only made up of this physical universe.
Which means my ideals were also developed just
like I evolved, just like my cells developed.
My ideals also developed in this physical universe.
They are a product of this world.
We created them.
Or they are a product of the biological
process or the psychological process.
They don't come from outside.
They come from inside.
This is really important.
Now, ideals cannot be anything but a random
accident as all of existence is a random
accident.
This is the atheistic view.
In reality, conscience itself is a figment of
our minds.
By the way, this surah is going to
talk about the guilty conscience, right?
You cannot talk about the guilty conscience until
you talk about the conscience itself.
So let's talk about the conscience for a
moment.
Here's where the atheist is stuck.
The atheist says all of the world is
physics.
Particles.
That's all we are.
It's all particles.
Okay, that means my entire body is also
made up only of what?
Particles.
And my brain is also made up of
particles.
And the particles are governed by physics.
So everything happening in my brain is also
governed by physics.
Which means I have nothing to do with
it.
It's the laws of physics.
So when I decide to do something, I
think it's me who decided, but actually it
was the laws of physics that decided.
Because just like I don't control the electrons,
and I don't control the neutrons, and I
don't control the protons, or the quarks, and
I don't control the molecules, if I don't
control the subatomic particles, how can I control
the collection of them?
I have no control.
Physics is in control.
Which actually means there is no such thing
as free will.
It's just a figment of our imagination.
Free will is imaginary.
It's not real.
That's where the atheist is right now.
And as a result of that, by the
way, if free will is imaginary, that means
I am not responsible for my actions.
Who's responsible?
Physics is.
Seriously.
It's all physics.
And if it's all physics, then there is
no right and wrong.
It's only physics.
Because if there is no conscience, then there
is no morality.
It's only science.
So just do what the particles do.
Just go with the particular flow.
Okay.
This is the atheistic world view.
Now, the Qur'an's view.
Let's contrast.
Human beings possess the urge to pursue the
ideals of beauty and perfection.
I will add even more.
Beauty, perfection, justice, gratitude, patience, virtue, generosity.
Those are higher ideals, right?
Human beings possess these ideals independent of nature.
These ideals did not come from the physical
universe.
They came from something higher that is beyond
the physical universe.
We call it the ruh.
We call it The ruh was blown into
this body.
The body is from the physical universe, isn't
it?
It's made of clay.
But the ruh, is it from the physical
universe?
No.
And our morals, our ideals did not come
from the physical universe.
They came from beyond the physical universe.
Okay.
Now, this urge isn't a product of the
physical universe.
It is from beyond the physical.
And it even, listen to this, it even
has the power to dominate and subserve instincts.
In other words, my body is just a
more advanced version of a cow or a
dog or any other animal.
And all those animals have instincts.
They have sexual instincts.
They have appetite instincts.
They have preservation instincts, don't they?
They have herd instincts.
Do I have those instincts too?
Do you have those instincts too?
Yeah, we do.
Now, what the Quran is actually showing us
is that this spiritual thing that was put
inside us is more powerful than the instincts
that I have.
So even if I have animal instincts, this
ruh can control them.
It can dominate them.
Now, this is the Quran's view.
Now, why does this matter?
I'm gonna give, I'm actually, I've decided to
give you a break.
But I'm gonna give you a break after
these 10 questions.
I don't have the answers to these 10
questions in this series.
But I want you to know the questions.
Okay?
Here are the questions.
If ideals determine all of our behavior, what
determines the ideals?
Isn't that an important question?
Because when a person sets the ideals, that
decides all of their behavior.
That's the question Karl Marx is trying to
answer.
That's the question Freud is trying to answer.
That's what Adler is trying to answer.
That's what your therapist is trying to answer.
Why do you feel that way?
Who did this to you?
I'm sure it was your mother.
Let's talk about your mom a little bit.
You know what that is?
It's Freudian psychology.
In Freudian psychology, all human beings are broken
and you're gonna have to spend the rest
of your life unbreaking.
That's it.
You're imperfect and you're broken to begin with.
We're gonna talk about that when we get
to Ayah 2 one day.
When we get there.
But we gotta finish this.
If natural instincts have the purpose of preserving
life and the species, right?
Instincts are there to preserve life and the
species.
Then what is the purpose of ideals?
If God put ideals...
If he put an instinct in the lion
to perch before it attacks.
He put an instinct in the bacteria to
move the way it does.
He put an instinct in the amoeba to
procreate the way that it does and to
get nutrition the way that it does.
He put an instinct in the flower to
go for photosynthesis.
He put instincts in them for their survival.
But if he put in me a higher
instinct which is ideals, they must have a
purpose too.
What's their purpose?
How do these ideals impact the world?
How can the urge for ideals be properly
satisfied?
This is an important question.
You know why?
Because somebody came along and said the ultimate
ideal for humanity is Christianity and the Christian
doctrine.
And the world...
Huge parts of the world consumed it.
But they couldn't digest it.
It created too much chaos.
So they rebelled against it.
And they said, no, we need liberalism.
We need liberation from Christianity.
And so the Europeans rebelled.
And then came, you know, secular humanism.
And now secular humanism came.
And when it came, it came with its
own set of problems.
And then they started seeing a class society
emerge.
And then communism said, there's too much class
society.
We need something that sets everybody equal.
And so communism came.
A new ideal.
And when it came, it was spreading in
the world like wildfire, man.
Young people were fired up against the bourgeois
because it was the new ideal.
But then it started collapsing because it was
denying some parts of human instincts.
Human nature was being denied.
And then new ideals emerged.
A merger between capitalism and socialism and democracy.
And now we're like, we finally got it.
This is perfect.
We should export this to Iraq.
We should export this to Afghanistan.
This is great.
If people have this, it's gonna be awesome.
Right?
Because it works so well for us.
Right?
And now human beings are starting to realize
this isn't working either.
And then feminism came.
Because women are oppressed.
So feminism came.
This is the new ideal.
And then radical feminism came.
No, no, no.
You're not feminist enough.
We need a radical change.
And then somebody else came and said, what
do you mean feminine?
I'm offended by the word.
You're judging my fluidity.
I'm another.
You know?
And so a new ideology came.
And then a new idea.
And you know what happens every time a
new ideology comes?
Every ideology is a reaction to something that
wasn't being satisfied in the previous one.
You see that?
But every ideology is imperfect.
And it has the germs that will destroy
it inside it.
And so it starts collapsing on itself.
When people ask me, Ustad, what do you
say about the LGBT?
I say, wait.
That's all I say.
Wait, why?
Why?
Because it's against fitrah, right?
And guess what happens with anything that's against
fitrah?
It dies.
It cannibalizes.
Just relax.
Just chill.
Just watch the show.
Watch it rise, and then watch it what?
Fall.
Because when communism was rising, guess what Muslims
were saying?
What are we going to do about communism?
What do we say about...
And guess what happened to communism?
Rise, and it fell.
Ideals do not satisfy the human soul.
We seem to...
All this time, we seem to have not
found the ultimate ideal that can finally satisfy
humanity.
It's not a team.
It's not the therapist.
It's not...
We can't find it.
But it seems in Allah's grand plan, there
was a time that is coming where...
سَنُرِيهِمْ أَيَاتِنَا فِي الْأَفَاقِ وَفِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَتَّى يَتَبَيِّنَ
ذَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الحق All ideologies will collapse, and
only the ideology that fits human nature perfectly,
that balances between the animal and the spiritual,
as we will see later, perfectly.
Only that ideology will survive in the end.
To me, I'm actually fully convinced, the world
on its own, as it goes from one
crazy ideology to another to another, is actually
naturally taking a course towards Islam.
It's like sometimes you have a teenage kid
who's going really crazy, and the imam just
says, just wait.
And the kid gets really stupid, and then
he feels really bad, and he comes back
and says, I was really messed up.
Now I'm memorizing Quran, and I'm taking care
of my mother, and I massage her feet
every day, and I can't believe I was
that stupid.
Does that happen?
Yep, it happens.
The world is a stupid teenager.
It's going through its phases, and then it's
gonna...
حَتَّى يَتَبَيِّنَ ذَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَق Do ideals change
over time in a person's life, in society,
across history?
If they keep changing, what is their ultimate
destination?
Why, well why, are there so many opposing
ideals and ideologies, while our instincts, the animal
instincts, are all the same?
Is the relationship between ideals and animal instincts,
we do seem to carry both?
We have animal instincts, and we have ideals,
and they seem to go against each other.
How come?
How do ideals impact politics, ethics, law, art,
education, science, philosophy, and religion?
By the way, do people's ideals impact these
things?
Yeah?
Yeah, look at the war over school textbooks
right now.
Isn't that a war over opposing ideals?
Right?
Do ideals tell us anything about the purpose
of all creation, of evolution, of a greater
reality beyond creation?
Can understanding ideals and their origin impact our
understanding of physics, biology, psychology, personal and social,
the unconscious mind, reason, intuition, prophethood, history, culture,
civilization, war, revolutions?
My God!
Our understanding of reality itself is based on
ideals.
It's based on ideals.
I know this is very philosophical.
I know.
But it's important.
I could just give you an inspirational, like,
Mufti Menk-style talk.
I love him.
I'm going to send him a WhatsApp that
I trolled you today.
I'll send him a voice note.
But anyway, so...
But I need...
Something is happening.
The world is getting stupider and smarter at
the same time.
I figured this out when I went to
Pakistan.
The dumbest questions I've ever heard in my
life came from Pakistan.
And the smartest people and the smartest questions
I've ever heard in my life came from
Pakistan.
And I realized, this is TikTok.
TikTok will either make you dumber than you've
ever been, or it will make you smarter
than you've ever been.
I met 12-year-olds that are smarter
than me that when I was 12, I
was an amoeba compared to them.
Like, they're really smart.
And then I've met 40-year-olds that
are like, did you stop growing at the
age of three?
What happened to you?
Who did this to you?
Right?
But anyway, I'm going to keep moving.
The pursuit of new ideals, actually, we already
talked about this.
It will break and make way for a
new ideal.
It's okay.
So thus far, if you're not asleep already,
let's do this.
Psychology and scientific atheism is arguing that consciousness
comes from within physical nature.
It is not from anywhere beyond the measure
of physical reality.
But, after the theory of relativity, something happened.
And Muslims didn't pay enough attention except very
few people.
Let me...
I know this is crazy.
You guys need to hear this though.
Every Muslim should hear this.
And I'll give you a book at the
end of this that everybody should read.
Especially every college student needs to read this
book.
I'm going to give you a homework assignment.
Not today you read it, but make sure
you read it this month sometime.
Actually, it's on my mind now, so I'll
tell you now.
It's called The Ideology of the Future by
Professor Muhammad Rafiuddin.
The Ideology of the Future by Professor Muhammad
Rafiuddin.
Rarely have I ever read something that profound.
Much of what I'm sharing with you is
a summary from his first few chapters.
Muhammad Rafiuddin.
Okay.
Listen to some of the...
So, what is the theory of relativity?
The future.
The ideology of the future.
Okay.
What is the theory of relativity?
Basically, Newtonian physics said matter can neither be
created...
Finish the sentence.
Matter can neither be created nor destroyed.
Which means matter is eternal.
So, for physicists, since the time of Newton,
the only thing that is forever لم يلد
ولم يولد was the physical universe.
And so, God was replaced with the universe.
Then came Einsteinian physics and eventually paved the
way for quantum physics where matter can actually
be converted into what?
Energy.
And energy itself can disappear.
Which means, matter can eventually become nothing.
Matter can become nothing.
And when that happened, this was an existential
crisis for scientists and physicists around the world.
Especially in Europe.
This theory actually caused a great deal of
depression.
Listen to some of the things these people
said.
This is in the 30s, 40s, and 50s.
Okay?
After the theory of relativity, Professor Rogier in
the book Philosophy and New Physics writes, nothing
is created and nothing is lost.
That's Newtonian, right?
One must now substitute the contrary principle, nothing
is created, everything is lost.
He was so depressed.
The world marches towards final bankruptcy.
والله العظيم إِنَّكَ كَادِحٌ إِلَىٰ رَبِّكَ كَدْحًا فَمُلَاقِهِ
كَتَبْ ذَلِكْ وَلَمْ يَعْرِفْ He wrote humanity's heading
towards bankruptcy.
He didn't even know إِنَّ الْإِنسَانَ لَفِي خُسْرٍ
And he wrote that.
Like he was writing ayat of Quran without
knowing.
He's writing about ayat of Quran.
Dr. Harry Schmitt, his book, Reality and the
Universe.
Space and time sank into shadows.
Motion itself became meaningless.
The shape of bodies, a matter of viewpoint.
The world there was banished forever.
Then he wrote a poem.
Whoa!
Whoa!
Thou has destroyed the beautiful world with violent
blow.
Now we sweep the wrecks into nothingness.
Fondly we weep the beauty that has gone.
وَمَا الْحَيَاةُ الدُّنْيَا إِلَّا لَعِبٌ وَلَعِبٌ This world
is nothing, just a clay.
It's flimsy, it's gone.
Allah says this in the Quran.
And now they're like, Oh my God, this
dunya is nothing.
This dunya is nothing.
They're having this spiritual crisis without knowing.
Professor Plank, the preponder of the quantum theory
remarked in an interview with J.W.N.
Sullivan which appeared in the Observer on January
26, 1931.
Listen to this.
This is my favorite one.
I regard consciousness as fundamental.
This is a physicist saying what?
What is fundamental?
Consciousness is fundamental.
I regard matter as a derivative of consciousness.
إِنَّمَا أَمْرُهُ إِذَا أَرَادَ شَيْهًا أَن يَقُولَ لَهُ
كُنْ Allah consciously says, كُنْ إِرَادَ is consciousness.
Allah's إِرَادَ, Allah's conscious decision to create became
creation.
This physicist who developed quantum theory says, I
regard consciousness as fundamental.
I regard matter as a derivative from consciousness.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Check this out.
We can get behind physics.
We can get behind matter.
Behind matter is energy.
Behind energy is nothing.
But behind that nothing is consciousness.
And we cannot get behind that.
This is, you know, لَيْسَكَ مِثْنِهِ شَيْء لَيْسَكَ
مِثْنِهِ شَيْء And this is like, you know,
اللَّهُ وَرَىٰ فَمَّ وَرَاهُ الْوَرَىٰ Allah is beyond
the beyond.
You can't get behind Allah.
Right?
So, now check this out.
He goes on.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Everything that we talk about, everything that we
postulate as existing requires consciousness.
Everything requires إِرَادَةُ اللَّهُ كُنْ فَيَكُنْ It requires
it.
This is all going to come back to
Surah Al-Qiyamah, I promise, before the Day
of Judgment.
It's coming.
Sir Oliver Lodge, the universe is ruled by
mind.
They can't say Allah, right?
So they're going to say what?
Mind.
And whether it be the mind of a
mathematician, or of an artist, or of a
poet, or of all of them, and more,
it is like, whether he has the أَسْمَاء
You know, وَلَهُ الْأَسْمَاءُ الْحُسْنَةُ So he says,
one of his أَسْمَاء must be his mathematician.
He's الحسيب.
Right?
And he's الجميل.
And he's a مصور, an artist.
Right?
Are these Allah's names?
Right?
And then he says, and of all of
them and more, it is the one reality,
الحق which gives meaning to existence.
خَلَقَ السَّمَوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضَ بِالْحَقِّ Allah Himself is الحق,
and He created سماوات والأرض بالحق.
It reaches our daily task, encourages our hope,
energizes us with faith, wherever knowledge fails, and
illuminates the whole universe with immortal love.
This is a physicist talking.
A physicist.
Nowadays when you think of scientist, you immediately
think atheist.
There has been a suppression of the community
of scientists that developed incredible spiritual insights because
of quantum physics.
And let me tell you why that happened.
Because quantum physics for the first time says,
there's more to reality than matter.
Right?
Which means, for the first time, we had
to acknowledge the غَيْب.
The غَيْب, the unseen, became part of the
scientific discourse.
This is unprecedented in human history.
Right?
There's more, there's more.
I know you're not bored because I believe
in myself.
Sir James Jeans, the mysterious universe.
He writes, 30 years ago, we thought or
assumed that we were heading towards an ultimate
reality of a mechanical nature.
Today, there is wide measurement of agreement, measure
of agreement, which on the physical side of
science approaches almost to unanimity, meaning there's اجماع
of the علماء of science, that the stream
of knowledge is healing towards a non-mechanical
reality, meaning the world is not running itself.
It's not just mechanics.
The universe begins to look like a great
thought rather than a great machine.
Oh, wow.
Wow.
Mind no longer appears as an accidental intruder
into the realm of matter.
In other words, this was the problem for
the scientists.
How can we have a mind?
How can we have a free thinking mind?
This must be an accident of nature because
nature itself doesn't have a mind.
It's just physics.
So for them, the fact that we have
a conscious will, we have a mind, was
an accident.
Now look at what he says with that
background.
Mind no longer appears as an accidental intruder
into the realm of matter.
We are beginning to suspect that we ought
rather to hail it as the creator or
the governor of the realm of matter.
الخالق, المالك, المصور, القهار is what they're writing
about.
Yeah, sometimes you read this stuff and you
read, Allah says in the Quran, He says,
سَنُرِيهِمْ أَيَاتِنَا فِي الْأَفَاقِ وَفِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَتَّى يَتَبَيِّنَ
لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَقُّ We will show them our
signs in the horizons and inside of themselves
until it becomes abundantly clear to them that
it is the ultimate reality.
And then you see, read these scientists like,
Wow, what Allah said is true.
They're living examples of that ayah.
The new knowledge compels us to revise our
hasty first impression that we had stumbled into
a universe which either did not concern itself
with life or was actively hostile to life,
meaning life is an accident.
The old dualism between mind and matter which
was mainly responsible for the supposed hostility seems
likely to disappear.
We discover that the universe shows evidence of
a designing and controlling power that has something
in common with our own individual minds.
إِنَّ اللَّهَ جَمِيلٌ يُحِبُّ الْجَمَالِ قَتَبَ عَلَى نَفْسِهِ
الرَّحْمَةِ Allah says He wants rahmah.
He wrote rahmah on Himself.
And what does He say about us?
وَتَوَاصَوْ بِالصَّبْرِ وَتَوَاصَوْ بِالْمَرْحَمَةِ Right?
Allah has certain qualities.
He's al-Sabur, right?
He's al-Hakeem, and He wants us to
have hikmah.
He's al-Aleem, He wants us to have
ilm.
Right?
SubhanAllah.
Okay, almost done here.
Okay, cool.
Now let's look at what the Quran says.
Why did I bring all of this up
to you?
Let me tell you.
Now, you're almost ready for your break.
Scientists believe that the universe has no conscience.
Yes?
Then, at the advent of quantum mechanics, many
scientists began to realize there's a conscious designer
behind all of the physical universe.
Which means, all of the universe is acting
consciously.
Because it's being driven by a conscious mind.
We call Him Allah.
They don't say Allah, they say the mind,
consciousness, but it's driven by consciousness.
Now, as a result, actually, many scientists even
purported the idea that the universe, every atom,
has some level of consciousness.
Electrons are consciously moving the way they're moving.
Atoms are functioning the way they're functioning, because
they have a programming, they have a conscious
mind.
Okay, what does Allah say?
From the very beginning of creation.
ثُمَّ اسْتَوَٓا إِلَى السَّمَعِ فَقَالَ لَهَا وَلِلْأَرْضِ إِذْ
كِيَا طَوْعًا أَوْ كَرْهًا قَالَتَ أَتَيْنَا طَائِعِينَ Allah
told the earth and the skies, surrender willingly
or unwillingly.
And they said, we surrender willingly.
Does that not demonstrate a consciousness attributed to
the skies and the earth?
Allah says, قَالُوا اتَّخَذَ الرَّحْمَٰنُ وَلَدَا لَقَدْ جِئْتُمْ
شَيْئًا هِدًّا تَكَادُوا السَّمَاوَاتُ وَيَتَفَطَّرْنَا مِنْهُ وَتَنْشَقُوا
الْأَرْضُ وَتَخَيْرُوا الْجِبَالُ هَدًّا When people say, Ar
-Rahman took a sun, the sky is about
to tear open, the earth wants to rip
itself open, crack open, and the mountains wish
to collapse.
When the sky wants to rip open, and
the earth wants to tear open, does that
not demonstrate the unwillingness of the skies and
the earth to even listen to a word
of shirk?
Isn't that a conscious mind, that creation itself
has?
Listen to this, وَهِمْ مِنْ شَيْءٍ هِلَّا يُسَبِّعُوا
بِحَمْدِهِ وَلَكِنْ لَا تَفْقَعُونَ تَسْبِيحَهُمْ Allah says, there's
not a single thing that He's created, except
that it does His tasbih, by doing hamd
of Allah.
However, you cannot understand their tasbih.
Allah even mentioned hamd, and hamd is an
act of the heart.
Everything has its own heart, as doing hamd
of Allah, and tasbih of Allah.
My favorite one, أَلَمْ تَرَىٰ أَنَّ اللَّهَ يُسَبِّعُ
لَهُمْ فِي السَّمَاوَاتِ وَلَهُ Didn't you see that
everything in the sky and the earth does
tasbih for the sake of Allah?
The sky, وَالطَيْرُ And the birds, صَافَاتٍ With
their wings spread out, كُلٌ قَدْ عَلِمَ صَلَاةَهُ
وَتَسْبِيحَهُ Every one of them truly knows their
own prayer and their own tasbih.
Every bird knows how to make their own
tasbih.
You know sometimes you go at maghrib, you're
stuck in traffic, you're maghrib at a traffic
light, and you see all these birds perched
up on the cables, Right?
The power lines.
قُلُّنْ قَدْ عَلِمَ صَلَاةَ هُوَ تَسْبِيحَهُ Did the
Qur'an describe that the universe itself has
a conscience?
Yes.
Yes.
Let's take that a step further.
If every particle has conscience, the rock, this
bottle, this cloth has conscience.
It has conscience.
Then when the bacteria came on this planet,
it had a higher level of conscience because
it's working against gravity.
It's working against the other matters of physics.
It's fighting for life.
The amoeba, higher level of consciousness.
The monkey, even higher level of consciousness.
The whale, the elephant, higher and higher levels
of consciousness.
And at the top of all of them
is who?
The human being and he was given the
ruh, the highest level of consciousness.
Evolutionary biologists say, oh you people of faith,
you believe that you're the only one who
has conscience?
No.
Monkeys have self-awareness too.
We're like, no idiot.
We believe even a rock has consciousness.
We've just been given the highest level of
it.
The highest level of it.
But, now understand the point.
This is the point where I'm gonna give
you the break.
I did all this story to get you
to this point.
If Allah gave an animal instincts, part of
its conscience, instincts.
So the lion goes under the tall grass
so it can blend before it attacks, yes?
That's a conscious act, yes or no?
Right?
Okay.
The bird is building a nest.
A conscious act, yes or no?
It's protecting its eggs.
Conscious act, yes or no?
So life engages in these conscious acts, these
instincts, and the purpose clearly seems to be
survival.
The purpose of those instincts seems to be
survival.
And if you take a step back, if
you look at non-living things, like rocks
and trees and birds, then they have physical
qualities, physical properties, or even energy like fire.
It seems to have a physical functional purpose.
Metal has a certain functional purpose.
Wood has its own functional purpose.
Fire as a phenomenon has its own functional
purpose, etc, etc, etc.
So at a lower level, it's functional purposes.
At a higher level, for living beings, it's
the purpose of preservation of life.
Then you come to the human beings.
Human beings have been given something nobody else
has been given.
What's that?
The ruh.
And the ruh is full of much higher
ideals, isn't it?
So if everything else has a purpose...
Hey guys, you just watched a small clip
of me explaining the Qur'an in depth
as part of the deeper look series.
Studying the Qur'an in depth can seem
like a really intimidating thing that's only meant
for scholars.
Our job at Bayyinah is to make deeper
study of the Qur'an accessible and easy
for all of you.
So take us up on that challenge.
Join us for this study, the deeper look
of the Qur'an, for this surah and
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