al-Raghib al-Isfahani #63 – How Could a Genius Get This Wrong

remember way back in the beginning it was for Hani, he's defending the intellect and the intellect as he sees it is the primary tool that Allah subhanaw taala has given us to see his signs. And if we not just preserve our intellect in the sense of, you know, keeping it free from substances and practices that dulled it or destroy it, but if we actually enhance our intellect, what he's calling the intellect, then it's going to enhance our submission to Allah Subhan Allah to Allah because we're going to see his signs everywhere. Remember, Allah Spano Tata. He's not his handiwork is not hidden. Okay? Allah Spano. Tata is obvious, obvious in the sense that his handiwork is obvious. His

signs are obvious, they're not hiding in some sort of obscure formula or theoretical point somewhere in some book that only some super genius can sort of access or think about. No, it's actually self evident. It's imminent in creation, his his signs are everywhere. But it takes the development of the intellect according to Ragosa, honey to be able to register those signs, recognize them for what they are, and then act on them, let it bring you to submission and let it bring you to expressing your gratitude, which is another way to say worship. And so you know, in talking about knowledge, right, which is related to the intellect are all about us, for Hani wants us to not get it twisted.

And the reminder that he gives us I think, is extremely pertinent to the day and age that we live in, you've got Muslims that like to quote, you know, seek knowledge and they add on, you know, even to China. And we use that as a justification for becoming a doctor becoming an engineer becoming a lawyer, these sort of very lucrative positions, especially in North America. But what is knowledge at the same time, at the same time, unfortunately, many of those same people who value that knowledge so much, if somebody were to come to them and say, Mom, Dad, I really want to go study a stat, I really want to go enroll in a religious college or a seminary or something like that. What

would be their response? They would be disapproving. They would be even maybe upset, say you're ruining your future. What do we really view as knowledge? What is knowledge? I was for one, he's not talking about the knowledge we're talking about. He's saying that knowledge is knowledge, information that is going to lead you to salvation in the afterlife, knowledge of Allah subhanaw taala, who he is who he's not what he does, what he doesn't do, knowledge of His signs, knowledge of his city, which is His will His wish for us what he wants from us. This is real knowledge. It's going to that's the knowledge is going to bring you to salvation. And so we need a real

redefinition. You know, in the Muslim community in North America, we need to set our priorities straight. Everybody knows we have young, talented minds, where do we send them? We send them to become a doctor, become a lawyer, become an engineer. And then who do we send to study the religion? Oh, whoever's left to tragedy, what's the real knowledge? The real knowledge is the knowledge of the afterlife, the knowledge of the deen, that's what's going to save us of how some of us are, you know, he made a remark at his time that's pertinent to us today. He said, You know, if you saw the Companions, you would think they were crazy. He would think they were insane, because of the

knowledge that they had, the knowledge they had. And we're not just talking about the accumulation of information, but also the translation of that knowledge into work into action and to worship who didn't, you know, we know they used to dig their own graves and lay down in them to keep that edge. So they would stand up, you know, at night and prayer and worship, Allah is bound to honor the giveaway all of what they own sometimes, or half of what they own, they had no problem with that, you would think that they were insane. You saw somebody worshipping Allah like that today. But he also said, and this is, you know, very scary if, if they had seen us on Hasan Basri said that they

would think that we were devils, because we're so attached to the dunya were so negligent, lazy, apathetic about the salvific knowledge, the knowledge that's going to lead to our salvation in the afterlife. And we'll hear people say, write about this Christian or that atheist or whatever. Oh, that the person is so smart. That person's a genius. Oh, well, so honey, he says, This is insanity. How are you going to call someone intelligent, who got the most basic and essential thing for their salvation so wrong? How are you going to say that somebody has intelligence or somebody is brilliant or someone is a genius, and hasn't figured out that their Lord exists, hasn't seen those signs and

hasn't felt moved by their recognition of those signs to the worship of Allah subhanaw taala alone. What kind of intelligence is there? You know, they're on the mat. They have the saying that there's no sin after Cofer, or we could say that there's there's no knowledge there's no intelligence after the recognition of our Creator and His Divine unity.