ALLAMA IQBAL In his 'Khutbat' the practical concept of 'ijtihad' (interpretation of Islamic Law) given by Allama Iqbal, is different

from the manner the Islamic Movement assign to Qur'an and Sunnah at present? How would you explain? No. It is not so. In principle, the door of interpretation (ijtihad) cannot be closed. Because a door that has been kept open by the Qur'an and Sunnah, can be shut by them alone and no one else. If ijtihad was allowed during the first four centuries, then no new revelation was sent in the 5th century (Hijra) to stop it. So, theoretically speaking, there is no difference of opinion at all in this respect. The door of ijtihad was open, it is open and will remain open. The earlier scholars used to term ijtihad for three occasions. One is ijtihad in a given problem (ijtihad fil-mas'alah) which means, the injunction you want to apply, and in this application, make (extreme) effort to get guidance for the situation that you know, and one which you do not know. This specific process has never been abandoned. The guiding principles which Imam Abu Hanifa, Imam Ma'alik, Imam Ibn Taimiyya, Imam Shafai and others, have derived in this regard, need no change by way of improvement. We find this particular meaning in the traditional thinking. In principle, however, the door of ijtihad is open in our view, provided the qualification and capability required for the purpose are there and also that the situation demands new interpretation (ijtihad). One thing should remain clear that ijtihad is not done without real need. Ijtihad does not mean mowing and clearing a forest; it simply means that to understand the will of Shariah, if the orders are clear and injunctions established, then these will be accepted. But if in a given matter, the orders are not clear or injunctions are absent, then intellect and wisdom will be applied. While doing so, however, certain rules and methods will be followed. Thus by way of 'necessity', we are not differing with Iqbal. We believe and admit that whenever necessity so demands, there should be ijtihad. The second thing is that there are certain regulations for ijtihad and a certain level of scholastic capability. Ijtihad does not mean that those who know not even the preliminaries of religion, or on the other hand have no understanding of the contemporary problems, be given the right to formulate some wishful view in a given matter. If, for pleading a case in a court of law, you impose the condition, that the person should be a qualified lawyer, who has properly registered himself after studying law, if you set a level of education necessary for a doctor and hakim and consider quacks fistular unlcers for the health and society and similarly, if a degree of knowledge and experience is essential for an engineer; then why it is only religion in which anyone, without knowledge and practical experience, should jump in and exercise ijtihad? Even in the present time, personal righteousness , comprehensive understanding of the Qur'an and Sunnah, fair taste of the Arabic language and literature, thorough study of the vast jurisprudential material, and detailed study of the modern economic and politicalphilosophies, are necessary for ijtihad. A lawyer of the high calibre like Allama Iqbal could not hold an unjust view that overlooks such fundamental pre-requisites. In his same lecture (khutba) Allama Iqbal says, that where ijtihad is necessary, then equally essential is to exercise full care, accord full regard to tradition and that those doing ijtihad must possess knowledge, capability, self-righteousness and fear of God. According to his interpretation, Allama Muhammad Iqbal did favour the right of the National Assembly to do ijtihad, as in the current age that institution could discharge this responsibility. Allama particularly said so in the light of experience of Turkey of Mustafa Kamal Pasha. In this respect, it should be kept in view that Iqbal's view pertains to the period when from 1924 to 1928, Kamalism had veiled its secularist face. But when the real secular intention of Mustafa Kamal Pasha were clear and he
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talked of anti-religious secularism, Iqbal felt deeply hurt. He then clearly distanced himself and said: "It is neither apparent in the deeds of Mustafa, nor in Raza Shah. The oriental soul is still in search of a body. Then Allama Iqbal said, directly addressing Mustafa Kemal Pasha: "What is this Secular and Latin stratagem, that entangled you? The remedy for the weak is one: None is Supreme, but Him (the Almighty)" Seeing the intellectual degeneration and practical deviation of the leadership of Muslim 'millat', Allama Iqbal lamented: "They could and were to lead their age; but those worn out minds (blindly) follow their age" The background in which Allama Iqbal suggested that Assembly could be assigned the authority of jihad, and in his same very address when he emphasized the character of the legislative assemblies, he also very clearly stressed that, "the legislative assemblies should incorporate the religious scholars (ulema) as an effective element. But the scholars on their part should also allow open discussion and free expression of views in every matter of law and only then provide guidance. Yet to eliminate the chances of wrong interpretation of Islamic shariah, the only way is that the current (outdated) system of the education of jurisprudence in the Muslim countries is reformed. The fiqh syllabus needs further expansion. It is, therefore, necessary that simultaneously the modern jurisprudence is also studied, taking of course, due care". Forwarding this view, Allama Iqbal said again in 1932, "I would recommend that an assembly of the religious scholars (ulema) be constituted, in which those Muslim lawyers be included who have studied the modern principle of law, so that in the light of the current situation, the Islamic Law (shariah) is protected and further expanded. This assembly should be properly accepted, so that any Bill concerning Muslim Personal Law may not get enacted before being thoroughly screened by it. Allama Iqbal never said that the elected assemblies be given unchecked freedom to do and decide whatever they like. He rather said that the assemblies can be authorized (to undertake ijtihad) provided such capable people were there who fully understood shariah. And that is what we also say, that in the present day circumstances, the assembly, the courts and the scholars (ulema) should all join the process of ijtihad. But it is conditional that permission is subject to adequate knowledge. In this respect, we together with Allama Iqbal, hold the same view.Allama Iqbal does not permit (self-styled) scholars with poor vision, to exercise this right. If these half-cooked poor-thinking scholars, wish to avail the right of ijtihad making reference to Iqbal, then neither Islam and Iqbal, the defender of Islam, give them this right, nor we can permit them to do so. If this just approach is nick-named theocracy by some elements, then we happily accept the allegation. In reality, however, it is not theocracy, because the opportunities are equally available to every God-fearing scholarly person. There is no monopoly of anybody. May they come from the modern or the old fashioned educational institutions, be they garbed in gown and turban or in western suit, should they possess a degree from west or east; as long as they are educated and possess righteousness (taqwa), they have every right to express their views. You will then (be surprised to) see how the collective conscience and wisdom of the Ummah accepts what is suggested by these intellectuals and prudent authorities. Briefly, we present the same view what Iqbal said. We have written on the subject with sufficient details, and to this effect, we have thoroughly gone through his whole poetry and prose sources, to indicate how Iqbal's concept of ijtihad gets constructed. Allama Iqbal did not permit all out freedom in this respect, nor to blindly follow the West. He would rather satisfy the present day demands, but taking all cares which slam determines. We also strive for and desire the same. Professor Muhammad Munawar Mirza, referring to the statements of Iqbal in respect of ijtihad, rightly points out that, "Iqbal's concept of ijtihad was evolutionary like the (process of) ijtihad itself. We may, in the light of "Reconstruction" (i.e. khutbat), therefore, keep in view the
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subsequent letters, statements, addresses and explanations. Iqbal's thinking did not stop at 1929". This was a just clarification about Iqbal and his thinking. Allama Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938) in spite, or rather because, of his declared commitment to monotheism is a pluralist insofar as his view of the constitution of the universe is concerned. In the second chapter of his The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, he has undertaken a comprehensive philosophical criticism of all the facts of experience on its efficient as well as appreciative side and has been led to the irresistible conclusion that the Ultimate Reality is a rationally directed creative life,[1] whom he conceives as an Ego, a Person, a-Great I Am. To interpret this life as an Ego, he, of course, hurriedly points out, is not to fashion God after the image of man. It is only to accept the simple fact of experience that life is not a formless fluid but an organizing principle of unity, a synthetic activity which holds together and focalizes the dispersing dispositions of the living organism for a constructive purpose.[2] Now nature and laws of nature being habits of God a sort of self-revelation of His person the entire furniture of the universe, from its lowest state of existence to the highest one, does, of necessity, comprise egos and egos alone. Creative activity of God functions as ego-entities because from the Ultimate Ego only egos proceed[3] Iqbal attempts to further define the salient features of his ego philosophy against the context of a critical appreciation of the Ash write doctrine of Jawahir. The Asharites, in opposition to the Mutazilite emphasis on human freedom, laid maximum stress, in the sovereignty of God, His supreme authority and omnipotence. This amounted for them to a denial of the natural powers of secondary agents: the particular material objects as well as animals and human beings have no efficacy and no qualities inherent in them. They have, in fact, no nature whatsoever. Now, substances exist only with qualities. When qualities are explained away, the substances go as well and so fail to have any durable existence. Tangibility of substances having thus been rejected, the Asharites were led straight to a doctrine of atomism which, Iqbal observes, was the first important indication of an intellectual revolt against the Aristotelian idea of a fixed universe[4]. According to the Greek Atomists view, in general, the atoms were determinate in number whereas for the Ash arties they are infinite because the creative activity of God is ceaseless. Fresh atoms are coming into existence every moment and the universe is becoming newer and newer every moment.. The Asharite atom, unlike its Greek counterpart, can be destroyed as well. Its essence is independent of its existence insofar as existence is a quality imposed on the atom by God: if He withdraws this quality, the atom loses its spatio-temporal character. In fact no atom has the characteristic of continuing for two consecutive moments. If a thing does appear to endure for some time what really happens in that God creates, annihilates, creates, and so on, the accidents of existence and duration in a quick, perpetual sequence. If God wished to destroy a body, it was sufficient that He should stop to create in it the accident of existence as well, as the other accidents appropriate to it. The very important fact emphasised by the Ash`arites that the atom appears as materialized and specialized when God grants it the quality of existence necessarily implies, according to Iqbal, that before receiving that quality and, thus, basically and essentially it is nothing but a phase of divine energy. Its spatio-temporal existence is only divine activity rendered visible. Iqbal, in this connection, quotes[5] with approval the remark of Ibn Hazm that the language of the Quran makes no distinction between the act of creation and the thing created. And so a material object is nothing but an aggregation of atomic acts perpetrated by God. It is only minds search for permanence that has created the world of physics. Thus conceived, the material atom

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is essentially spiritual. It is for these spiritual atoms comprising the whole cosmos that Iqbal uses the term egos. The whole world in all its details from the mechanical movement of what we call the atom of matter to the free movement of thought in the human ego is the self-revelation of the Great I Am. Every atom of- divine energy, however low in the scale of existence, is an egos.[6] He further pointed out that corresponding to the different levels of phenomenal existence, viz, material, spiritual and conscious, there are degrees of reality which are nothing but degrees in the expression of egohood. Throughout the entire gamut of being runs the gradually rising note of egohood until it reaches its perfection in man[7] The Ego, that God is, is the most supreme, the most independent, elemental and absolute. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716), the German philosopher, with whose cosmology Iqbal has greater affinity than is recognizable by a casual observer, was also a spiritual pluralist. He also conceived the universe as an hierarchy, an ascending order of spirit- or force-atoms which are variously named by him; metaphysical points substantial forms or monads. At the apex of this hierarchical structure, according to him, stands God, the monad of all monads. The number of monads is infinite and no two of them are exactly alike. As God is pure activity, the clearest consciousness, the Soul par excellence, so all monads exhibit conscious activity more or less. Each monad is a microcosm the universe in miniature - as it reflects, mirrors or perceives the universe from its own point of view. There arc obscure, confused and obfuscated perceptions - the small perceptions - at the lowest level. These become clearer and clearer as we go up the scale. In man they become appreciations comprising a reflexive knowledge of the inner state or, what we call, self-consciousness. They are the clearest in God, the original monad. Permitting no leaps in nature there is a continuous line of infinitesimal differences from the inorganic matter to God. One consequence of faith in the unitary principle and ground of the universe to which both Leibniz and Iqbal, in their respective ways, subscribe is that mind and body are to be considered essentially the same. If that is really so, how would the difference between organic and inorganic bodies be understood. Both, of course, are composed of monads, according to Leibniz, but the organism, he says, has the distinction of having a central monad, a queen monad or soul. Inorganic bodies are not centralized in this way. They are a mere jumble, a heap of monads. The higher a body is in the scale of being, the more organized and centralized it is. Answering further the question as to how is the central monad i.e. the mind or soul related to the inferior monads comprising the body of an organism, Leibniz summarily rejects inter-actionism, the popularly recognized theory about mind-body relationship. Monads, in general, cannot influence one another, he says because they have no windows[8] Everyone of them is self-contained and has in itself the ground of its various states and movements It is in fact perpetually in a process of evolution and goes on realizing its nature by an internal necessity. I do not believe, he writes, that any system is possible in which the monads inter-act, for there seems no possible way of explaining such action. Moreover such action would be superfluous for why should one monad give another what the other already has, for this is the very nature of substance that the preset is big with the future.[9] Anyway some account must be given of the fact that changes in one thing seem to be connected by definite laws with the changes in others. Apparent mind-body relationship, particularly, can be explained, according to Leibniz by the theory of a pre-established harmony between monads. The states of each and every monad are internally engineered in such a way

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that they synchronize with the states of all other monads. The law of natural harmony has been woven into their very respective natures. Souls act according to the laws of final causes, by means of desires, ends and means. Bodies act according to the laws of efficient causes or notions. And the two realms are in harmony with one another.[10] The possibility of such a phenomenon can be explained by an analogy. Suppose there are two perfect clocks whose machines have been so set that when one of them strikes an hour, say, exactly one second later, the other strikes that hour too. To a layman it may appear that one clock exercises a sort of influence over the other and makes it behave in a particular way. However, the fact, as we know, is that the harmony between them has been pre-established by the mechanic who made them, in the first instance. Similarly, the visible harmony between any two monads, and particularly between the monads comprising the mind and the body respectively in an organism, has been pre-established by God, their creator. When, I will to raise my hand and my hand is actually raised, between these two events, there is no causal relationship whatsoever. They happen independently but, of course, in such a way that they would be in a relationship of mutual fittingness. Leibniz agrees with the Occasionalists in their rejection of interactionism. However they sharply differ between themselves also insofar as, according to the latter, God is the only direct and immediate agent of every event in the world, whereas, according to the former, every individual substance evolves in accordance with its own nature which was determined once for all when God created the world. Thus although Leibniz did not subscribe to transiant causality between ordinary monads, he upholds that this causality does operate between God and the universe. This operation took place not only initially as He eternally established harmony between monads and also it continues to happen now and for all times. The clock or the machine that the universe is needs to be conserved by God and it depends on Him for its continued existence. The Supreme Monad would not be windowless to that extent. The source as well as ground of the mechanics of the universe lies in metaphysics. Iqbal, in general, rejects the dualist theory. He specially refutes the doctrine of pre-established harmony because it practically[11] reduces the soul to a merely passive spectator of the happenings of the body[12] Nor are mind and body entirely separate substances having their mutually exclusive sets of attributes and entering into a relationship of mutual interaction as was, for instance, emphasized by Descartes. They rather belong to the same system, says Iqbal. Both are egoes. Matter is spirit in space-time reference.[13] It is a colony of egoes of a low order out of which emerges the ego of a higher order.[14] The physical organism reacting to environments gradually builds up a systematic unity of experience which we call the human ego. Mind and body become one in action. The Quran says: Now of fine clay we created man. There we placed him, a moist germ in a safe abode; then made we the moist germ a clot of blood; then made the clotted blood into a piece of flesh; then made the piece of flesh into bones; and we clothed the bones with flesh: then brought forth man of yet another make.[15] This, however, does not obliterate the distinction between mind and body so that the former appears to essentially stand reduced to the level of the latter. Iqbal says: It is not the origin of a thing that matters, it is the capacity, the significance and the final reach of the emergent that matters. Even if we regard the basis of soul-life as purely physical, it by no means follows that the emergent can be resolved into what has conditioned its birth and growth. The emergent... is an unforeseeable and novel fact on its own plane of being.[16] Here expressly is a reference to the doctrine of cosmic evolution to which Iqbal subscribes. All higher forms of existence, he holds, evolve out of the lower forms and thus there is a
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gradually rising note of egohood in the universe.[17] Incidentally, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, in one of his articles[18] recently published in Pakistan has emphasized that evolutionism specially, the concept of biological evolution that was popular in the West of Iqbals times is anti-Islamic in its metaphysical implications and is in contradiction with the teachings of the Quran.** Iqbals and other Muslim thinkers of the Subcontinent specially, he in general complains, do not recognize this fact because of the apologetic attitude that they have almost been forced to adopt under the impact of over-all strong influences of Western culture. Here the accusation of being apologetic is, however, I believe, difficult to substantiate adequately at least in case of Iqbal who seems to be fully conscious of the limitations of his contemporary Western science and culture and the inadequacy of the materialistic, reductionist, type of attitude towards life and values that it generated. Anyway, Iqbal is firmly of the opinion that the doctrine of evolution has nothing un-Islamic about it. The verse from the Quran quoted above clearly indicates, according to him, that man did evolve out of the lower forms of existence. The orthodox, by applying a literalist approach to some of the verses of the Quran, have always held that man is a special creation and is not the result of a long evolutionary process. The human race, according to them, started from Adam, the first human being who was directly and specially created by God. Iqbal, like Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan (1817-1898), resorts to a symbolic interpretation of the descriptions of the Quran in this regard. He says: The Quranic legend of the fall does not describe the episode of the first appearance of man on the earth. Its purpose is rather to indicate mans rise from a primitive state of instinctive appetite to the conscious possession of a free self capable of doubt and disobedience. The fall is mans transition from simple consciousness to the first flash of self-consciousness, a kind of waking from the dream of nature with a throb of personal causality in ones own being.[19] God is not a mere contriver working on alien matter as one might get the impression form the Quranic verse referred to above. He, in fact, caused man to grow from earth, meaning thereby in the normal evolutionary course of nature operating in the spatio-temporal world. There is no purely physical level in the sense of possessing a materiality elementally incapable of evolving the creative synthesis we call life or mind and needing a transcendental deity to impregnate it with the sentient and the mental.[20] In fact, God who makes the emergent emerge is in a way immanent in nature: `He is the First and the Last; and the Manifest and the Hidden.[21] Not only in the Quran, Iqbal also traces his views on evolution in various Muslim thinkers. It was Jahiz (776-869), he points out, who first observed changes in animal life caused in general by migrations and environments. The Brethren of Purity further elaborated these observations. Miskawaih (942-1030) was, according to him, the first Muslim philosopher who presented the theory in a regular and systematic form. He gave concrete examples of the evolutionary process from the world of minerals, plants and animals. On the basis of his views on evolution, he seeks ultimately to justify the emergence of prophets and to build up a system of his ethical views. Jalal al-Din Rumi (1208-1274), the spiritual guide of Iqbal, too gave an evolutionary interpretation of the emergence of man However, for him, this evolution does not end with man. It may go beyond him to a level which it is not possible for us to imagine now. The formulation of the theory of evolution in the world of Islam, says Iqbal, brought into being Rumis tremendous enthusiasm for the biological future of man.[22] The views of all these Muslim thinkers have remarkable affinities with the concept of evolution as advocated, and made popular in modern times, by Charles Darwin (1809-1882). However, there is one essential respect in which they differ from him. Darwin, we know, is a naturalist. He holds that all changes in the process of evolution occur due to forces in nature
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itself viz, struggle for existence, chance variations and natural selection. These changes have no exterior causes. Miskawaih and Rumi, on the other hand, are spiritualists. The source and ground of evolution for them is not dead matter but God, Who is the ultimate creator of -everything. Matter for them is only one of the emanations from God which starting from the First Intelligence become more and more materialized as we go down the scale till we reach the primordial elements. So even matter is not dead and inert. It is constituted of dimly conscious monads. It is the expression of Divine Reality and the objectification of soul. The universe is nothing but the outward and opaque form of the ideal. When God wanted to manifest Himself, He created a mirror whose face is the soul and whose back is the universe[23] Iqbal too is a spiritualist: it is not from dead matter but from God Himself that everything originates. And it is to Him that all returns.[24] He is the Goal, the Ideal par excellence. Leibniz, we have seen, also believed in evolution although the kind of evolution that he conceives is entirely private and internal to monads. Development of each monad into newer and newer states is, in the last analysis, a sort of self-revelation, pure and simple, not determined from without, because monads have no windows through which any influence may come in or go out. This, in general, is the doctrine of preformation or incasement according to which all future states of a particular object are prefigured or contained in it already. Every monad, it is said, is charged with the past and big with the future, Iqbal, in contradistinction to this, is of the opinion that egoes have genuine mutual contacts. Those of a higher order evolve out of those of a comparatively lower order when the association and interaction of the latter reaches a certain degree of co-ordination. Talking of the human person specifically, he says: The life of an ego is a kind of tension caused by the ego invading the environment and the environment invading the ego; the ego does not stand outside the arena of this mutual invasion. It is present in it as a directive energy.[25] Personality is a state of tension which is to be maintained as a valued treasure with the help of a perpetual encounter with partly sympathetic and party alien environments. I must be vigilant and active all the time so as not to allow myself to a state of relaxation and so undo my personality. Thus human ego is dynamic in its essential nature. Iqbal, in this - connection, rejects the views of Ghazali (1058-1111) (and of the entire school of Muslim theology which he represents) according to whom ego is something static and unchangeable: It is a simple indivisible and immutable soul substance entirely different from the group of our mental states and unaffected by the passage of time. These theologians wanted to vouchsafe two objectives, a psychological one and a metaphysical one. Psychologically, they wanted to establish that the individual must continue to be the same throughout the diversity of his mental states which are related to the soul-substance as the physical qualities are related to the material substance. Metaphysically, they thought, their doctrine established personal immortality of man. However, Iqbal believes, they have been able to achieve neither of the objectives set before them, Neither are the various conscious experiences, related to the ego as physical properties are related to a material object, nor does the simplicity of the ego guarantee its unending existence. Just as Ghazali and others laid stress on the unity of the human ego at the expense of its dynamic character, so does William James (1842-1910), in his conception of self, stress its dynamic character at the expense of its unity. According to him consciousness is a stream of thought and the ego is nothing but the appropriation of the passing impulse by the present impulse of thought and that of the present by its successor, Iqbal ridicules this idea of appropriation of one bit of experience by the other, holding it to be an impossible state of affairs. For him, human ego is neither over and above our experiences nor is it simply various experiences themselves reporting to one another. Its life, as said above, is rather a state of tension
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caused by the mutual invasion of the ego and the environments and held in unicity by a sense of direction. I-amness is not a thing; it is an act. You cannot perceive me like a thing-in-space, or a set of experiences, in temporal order; you must interpret, understand and appreciate me in my judgements, in my will-attitudes, aims and aspirations.[26] The question arises what is the principle involved in the emergence of the human ego? Henry Bergson (1859-1941), the French philosopher and biologist, had believed that it was the principle of elan vital, the vital dash which is entirely arbitrary, undirected, chaotic and unpredictable in its behaviour. It is a free creative impulse. The portals of the future, he remarked must remain wide open to Reality[27] Theology like mechanical causation would make free creativeness a mere delusion and would make time unreal and unless. Iqbal, on the other hand, resorts to the theistic hypothesis. God is not only transcendent, He is, in a sense, the immanent force also, Who is constantly causing within the spatio-temporal order newer and newer emergent like the human ego. Soul is the directive principle from God,[28] says the Quran. Iqbal agrees with Bergson that: If teleology means the working out of a plan in view of a pre-determined end or goal, it does make time unreal. Ali would already be given somewhere in eternity; the temporal order of events is (then) nothing more than a mere repetition of the. eternal mould.[29] According to this view there would be no really free creation and growth in the universe. Anyway, despite this criticism, Iqbal is firmly of the opinion that our activities are goal-directed, purposiveness being essential to the human self. The ends and purposes, whether they exist as conscious or sub-conscious, form the warp and woof of our conscious experience[30] This is because, he points out, there is a sense of teleology available other than the one conceived and rightly rejected by Bergson. As I act I do not do so because there is a grand plan of action already determined for me. I, in fact, go on creating my own purposes in life. Though there is no far off distant goal towards which we are moving, there is a progressive formation of fresh ends, purposes and ideal scale of values as the process of life grows and expands. We become by ceasing to be what we are; life is a passage through a series of deaths.[31] God, the Ideal, inseminates the entire universe and, specially, the life of man with goal-directed behaviour at every step during its tenure of existence. The essence of this insemination is, according to Iqbal, love or ishq. He says: Beneath this visible evolution of forms is the force of love which actualizes all strivings, movement and progress. Things are so constituted that they hate non-existence and love the joy of individuality in various forms. The indeterminate matter, deed in itself, assumes, or more properly, is made to assume by the inner force of love, various forms and rises higher and higher in the scale of beauty.[32] The ego is individual. There are, of course, degrees of individuality, as pointed out by Bergson also. Most perfect individuality, says Iqbal, belongs to God, the Ultimate Ego Who begets not, nor is He begotten and there is none like Him [33] But man too is an individual, more or less, insofar as the Quran has a clear picture of him as one who is responsible for his own deeds alone and who has his unique future that awaits him: No bearer of burdens bears the burden of another[34] Further, the Quran visualizes that in the life hereafter every resident of heaven or hell will have a clear remembrance of his past life for which he will be rewarded or punished. Psychologically speaking too, the I-amness of man is absolutely private. My experiences, my to ughts and feelings are all unique with me and unsharable with others. Even- my experience of a table or a chair which are, to all appearance, public facts, is strictly my own and cannot be confused with anyone elses experience of the same object. The ego or self in man has two aspects which may be termed as the noumenal aspect and the phenomenal aspect. Bergson calls them the fundamental self and the social self respectively. Iqbal makes a more or less corresponding distinction between the appreciative self and the
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efficient self of man. The former lives in pure duration while the latter deals with serial time. In our day to day life we are so much absorbed with the world i.e. with the seriality of time and the spread outness of space that we entirely lose sight of, he fundamental or the appreciative I within. It is almost incumbent upon us to recognise this not only because that world qualify us for an encounter with the Great-I-am and prepare us for authentic social relations with other human beings, but also because it would make me a human person in the full sense of the term. Iqbal says: To exist in pure duration is to be a self and to he a self is to be able to say I am . Only that truly exists which can say I am. It is the degree of intuitation of I-amness that determines the place of a thing in the scale of being.[35] Mystics of all times have laid a special emphasis on true self-awareness of man. How do I know myself? Iqbals answer is that, being most simple, fundamental and profound, I-amness is neither an object of perception nor an idea pure and simple to be logically inferred and rationally conceived. It can in the final analysis only be known through a flash of intuitive insight. David Hume, for instance, is the philosopher wellknown for his attempt to reach the self through purely sensory, empirical channels. He said: When I enter most intimately into what I call myself I always stumble on some particular perception i.e. some particular mental content or other, of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never catch myself at any time without a perception And were all my perceptions removed by death I should be entirely annihilated.[36] He thus concluded that there is no-such thing as I or self and that a person is nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions. Humes supposition here is that all knowledge is to be furnished by sense experience alone and sense experience being a temporal affair leaves no scope for a permanent, mon-successional being. Descartes (1598-1650), on the other hand, represents those who followed the course of reason. Being himself a brilliant mathematician and a discoverer of Analytical Geometry, he was firmly of the opinion that for philosophy a method could be discovered on the analogy of the one used in mathematical sciences where we start with certain simple and self-evident principles, rising by degrees to the complex ones thus building up an entire system of thought. So he set out in search of the indubitable and the self-evident. This he did by a grand process of elimination. He doubted away everything he could possibly doubt: the testimony of his senses, his memory, the existence of the physical world, his own body and even the truths of mathematics. One thing, however, he found, he could not possibly doubt and that was the fact of his own existence, his own self, his I-amness. It is he after all who had been performing the activity of doubting all the time. Doubting is a form of thinking. I think, he concluded, therefore I am, meaning to say, I exist. This argument, the critics have pointed out, is fallacious on grounds more than one. For one thing, the conclusion to which the entire reasoning leads could only be that there is a state of doubt and thats all. At the most a logical I, which in fact is the subject of all propositions that are made, can be asserted. From this to skip over to the factual existence of an I, as Descartes really does, is a leap which cannot at all be justified. Iqbal is thus right when he holds that both sense-experience as well as reason, forms of perception as well as categories of understanding, are meant to equip us for our dealings with the spatiotemporal world: they are not made to reach the core of my being. In fact in our constant pursuit after external things we weave a kind of veil round the appreciative self which thus becomes alien to us. It is only in the moments of profound meditation, he goes on to say, when the efficient self is in abeyance, that we sink into our deeper self and reach the inner centre of experience.[37] So neither the mutakallimun (theologians) nor the philosophers but the devotional Sufis alone have truly been able to understand the nature of the human soul. The meditation, referred to here, is either pure meditation through which I imaginatively remove
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from my self all that is not essentially me i.e. all that I possess due to my particular historical and geographical situation, in the broadest sense of these terms. Or it may be the meditation charged with activity in which case I practically eradicate from my nature exclusive love for, and involvement with, the world which is the cause of my alienation from the source and ground of my existence. The second meaning is accepted particularly by the mystics of Islam. The sufistic path, in fact, starts with the inculcation of the virtue of tawbah (repentance or turning about) which signifies purification of soul and the deliverance of it from all extraneous material so that the divine within it stands realized, It can thus positively prepare itself for an encounter with God because such an encounter can take place only in case a person realizes the divine in himself and like Him dispenses with all determiners. The adherents of mystical religions, says G.S. Spinks, feel compelled to empty their psychical life... in order to achieve by personality-denying techniques an emptiness that will prepare the way for the incoming of the Divine.[38] Anyway, realization of the true self through meditation is not at all an end in itself. It is a means for the improvement of our behaviour and for the cementation and confirmation of our personalities. The ultimate aim of the ego is not to see something but to be something. The end of the egos quest is not emancipation from the limitations of individuality; it is, on the other hand, a more precise definition of it.[39] Now as the essential nature of the human ego is his quest for purposes and ideals, he cannot afford to be mechanical and stereotyped in his behaviour. He must be free. Positive scientists psychologists, physiologists and others have sometimes tried to understand human behaviour on the pattern of the behaviour of the physical world which, they think, is characterized by causal necessity. But the determinism of the physical world, Iqbal rightly observes, is not definitive, objective and final. It is, he says, an artificial construction of the ego for its own purposes. Indeed, he goes on to observe: in interpreting nature in this way the ego understands and masters its environment and thereby acquires and amplifies its freedom Tracing the historical development of the problem, Iqbal makes a distinction between ordinary fatalism and higher fatalism. The latter which is the result of a living and all-absorbing experience of God is, however, commendable, though very rare: strong personalities alone are capable of rising to this experience The experience is so total that its recipient has a strong feeling of resignation. As the Infinite is absorbed into the loving embrace of the finite, the will of the individual is though temporarily held in abeyance. Hopes, desires and aspirations of man, freely exercised by him, become identical with the will of God because of his being thoroughly saturated in Divine colour. As to the mutual relationship of God, the Ultimate Ego, and the universe, too and specially as to how did God produce the world there appears to be a close affinity between the respective standpoints of Iqbal and Leibniz. Iqbal counts creativeness as one of the important elements in the Quranic conception of God. But as we .follow his argument into details it transpires that he does not hold on to the strictly orthodox position in this regard. The act of creation, he says, was not a specific past event; nor is the universe a manufactured article having no organic concern with the life of its Maker and confronting Him as his other. The universe, according to him, is rather to be conceived as a free creative energy that proceeds form God. It is one continuous act which thought breaks up into a plurality of mutually exclusive things and interprets as space, time and matter. Here the word proceeds is very important. It spontaneously brings to ones mind the doctrine of emanation that was so popular with the earliest Muslim thinkers who philosophised under the aegis of neoPlatonism. Proceeds does have other meanings; for instance, corollaries following from a geometrical definition or rays radiating from the sun or smell from a flower or melodies from a musical instrument or as habits and modes of behaviour are exhibited by the personality of an
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individual. Now God being a Person Himself, the last meaning appears to be the one closest to the mind of Iqbal. That is why he declares the world to be a self-revelation of the Great I am. Incidentally the Qurans insistent statement that there are pointers to the being of God spread out in the various phenomena of nature sufficiently brings out the revelatory character of God, on the one hand, and correspondingly, the representative character of the universe, on the other. Earlier, Leibniz too had vacillated between creativeness and expressionism. He, like Iqbal, avoided the phrase creation out of nothing for describing the origination of the universe. Also, he instead used a term which is as ambiguous as if not more than the term proceeds. He describes monads as substances co-eternal with God and calls them fulgurations or manifestations of Him. As it has been shown above, monads compressing the universe are, according to Leibniz, in general self-contained and independent. The entire life of everyone of them consists purely in the development of its own internal nature. There is, however, at least one property of each monad of which the ground lies not in itself but in God viz. its actual existence. From the point of view of Leibniz, it may be ingrained as an additional predicate added by the creative act of God to those already contained in the concept of the world as possible. This view comes close to the metaphysical position of the Ash ante theologians which was very much appreciated by Iqbal himself. The last-mentioned closeness between Leibniz and Iqbal pointed to a deeper metaphysical ambivalence that is mutually shared by them. Creativeness, in general, we know goes with a theistic view of God whereas emanationism implies pantheism. Controversies have raged regarding each one of the thinkers whether he belongs to one of these metaphysical camps or the other. And, further, in either case majority of the writers have agreed that- specially as we go by their overtly declared positions they must be taken to be more in sympathy with theism than pantheism. A detailed discussion on this subject will not, however, be undertaken here as it will take us a little beyond the scope of the present article. It needs a treatment independent by itself. REFLECTIONS ON QURANIC EPISTEMOLOGY In these days of specializing it is perhaps something of a risk for one whose competence and training is mainly in Western Philosophy and thought to write on Quran and, in particular, Quranic epistemology. But surely none of us who professes to be a convinced and committed Muslim is spared from the task of making a rational enquiry into the foundational beliefs of his faith, and particularly from the obligation of epistemological reflection. This is because; living in a scientific ethos, every dialogue or debate between the secular-oriented scholars and protagonists of religion leads ultimately to a discussion of epistemological issues. In this article my concern is with an exploration in the epistemological zone of the Quran and with some basic questions in the relation of epistemology to a broad philosophical world-view. My interest in the subject grew and was stimulated while working on my M. Phil dissertation at Reading University (England) in the year 1967-69. It consisted of a comparative study of the philosophies of Kant and Kierkegaard.[1] More recently, I have been hearing during the past several years extremely perceptive and deep exegetical sermons and lectures of a renowned religious scholar of Lahore on Quranic epistemology and allied themes. These also motivated me to write the present article: a humble contribution towards the great goal of analyzing the Quranic epistemological schema. And in this venture I have tried my level best to adhere to the most essential rule recently phrased very aptly by Dr. Fazlur Rahman thus: "What is required is a willingness to get into the Quran itself rather than to go around it indulging in what must be distortions of the Quran at worst and trivialities at best."[2]

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At the outset, let me say a few things which must be appreciated positively by any scholar studying Islam and its doctrines. About the character of the Quran one thing is abundantly clear. It neither is nor purports to be a book of philosophy or metaphysics. It calls itself "guidance for mankind' (hudan-lil-nas) and demands that people live by its commands. Islam has, as its central task, the construction of a social order on a viable ethical basis. It is a practical remedy for the multiple ailments of humanity and a recipe for how man may transcend his banalities and create a positive human brotherhood. In order, therefore, to derive epistemology from it, a determination of its teaching into a cohesive enough unity is required. Islam is a divinely revealed monotheistic religion: it is a complete way of lifeideology or Deen. As such, its epistemology is deeply enmeshed in its over-all metaphysical view of reality and being. In the present paper 1 shall mainly concentrate on the concept and nature of knowledge in the Quranic scheme of things and the sources of veridical knowledge. Knowledge and Social Reality: In the present climate of academic 'learning' one usually drives a wedge between epistemology and moral philosophy. It has become a standard practice that philosophy teaching departments allot separate courses to epistemology and to moral philosophy. This seems to enshrine a fact/value distinction into the very structure of education. (In one course we discuss knowledge, in another values). One of the central questions of 'epistemology' concerns the conditions under which it is possible to acquire knowledge. But the knowledge about which this question is asked is usually knowledge of facts about the 'material world'. If the question is understood to include knowledge about oneself, about the Ultimate Reality, about one's society and one's relationship with others, then the Islamic contention that secularism (Scientism included) is intrinsically a mystifying social formation in which people are systematically prevented from seeing the truth about their lives, ideals and their society immediately become relevant. The question about knowledge has to be dealt with in the context of the question: what kind of society and social relations would enable a non-mystified view of reality, would replace illusion with knowledge? This transfers the focus of the epistemological question from trivial extraneous considerations to the individual mind and the type of society which makes knowledge possible and accessible. It also raises the question of how this knowledge enters the mind, and the relationship between the person and his knowledge; thus it would involve issues about nonoppressive forms of education, an education which liberates people's capacities to discover and to do things for themselves and with others which enables them to understand their society. It is a feature of the modern secular system that it cannot allow this to happen, that its nature and operation is obscure to those who work and live under it. Thus the structure of education and knowledge reproduces the fragmentation of understanding which seems to be an essential feature of secular society. How, while remaining within the academy can we avoid being agents of this and other forms of oppression? How can we ourselves avoid being screwed up by the false positions and compromises we are forced into? Can we as Muslims get our own heads (and lives) straight while we are subject to its domination, to the disruption it imposes on our thinking should we not get out, trying to contribute to the building up of a truly and radically religious culture, living in a more integrated, humane manner? The present-day academic philosophy is created and transmitted in an atmosphere of so-called `scholarly detachment.' It appears to be entirely remote from the struggles and needs of the world. Academic philosophers, both in their thought and in their lives have almost entirely withdrawn from any relation-ship with the concrete social reality around them. In short they seem to have abdicated from any socially valuable role, and their work consequently becomes entirely trivial and irrelevant. Though
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replete with technical jargon, hair-splitting distinctions and logic-chapping, modern philosophy is empty, formal and sterile. We Muslims, however, should stand for less academics and more self-understanding and concrete social change. We should liberate humanity from inhuman and enslaving philosophical presuppositions and reconstruct knowledge in the light of broad religiohumanistic framework of Islam. Let me here briefly explore how the above mentioned fragmentation and summarization of knowledge took place in the West. Knowledge and Value: The historical roots of man's present intellectual crisis can be traced back to the Enlightenment and its successors "logical positivism", "logical empiricism" and "utilitarianism". Our physical and spiritual crisis is a logical outcome of the worship of Reason and Scientific Fact and the divorce of values from knowledge. A new theory of knowledge, multi-dimensional and multicultural in character, which reintegrates values and knowledge calls for an alternative epistemologythe epistemology of Islam--which synthesizes metaphysics with physics This theory of knowledge will be appropriated by any one who has a new awareness concerning our needs for enlightened cosmology and ontology. Let me here give a brief historical survey of the contemporary scene. The epistemological and intellectual tradition which is responsible for the present status of modern knowledge and science has its roots in the Enlightenment which by many is considered to be the beginning of modern times. The Enlightenment was the work of the Philosophers - the intellectuals who conceived and perfected it. The philosophers looked at science and exploration not just for new knowledge but also for new attitude towards knowledge. From science they acquired the skeptical attitude of systematic doubt (Descartes), and from exploration-a new relativistic attitude towards belief and used them as ammunition against traditional norms and values. Curiously, the effect of such skepticism and relativism was to glorify and magnify man in general and European man in particular. When the Enlightenment wanted to characterize its power in one word it called it "Reason". "Reason" became the verifying force of the Eighteenth century, expressing all that it strives for and all that it achieves. The epistemological concerns of the Enlightenment derived from the seventeenth century. The intellectual spokesmen of that century--Bacon, Descartes, Hobbes, Locke, Newtonall appealed for a rational criterion of truth. The philosophy of the Enlightenment takes up this call, particularly the methodological pattern of Newtonian mechanics and begins to generalize it This then became the basic epistemological framework of the Enlightenment. However much individual thinkers and scholars agree or disagree with the end results, they are all unified in their framework of knowledge. The new tools of "reason" and "analysis", however, were not only for mathematical and physical knowledge but they were also used by the philosophers to dissect all branches of human Endeavour. Such fundamental disciplines as metaphysics, religion, politics, and ethics were also analyzed on the basis of reason and logic with a view to ending their perplexities once and for all. The principles which both the rational and empiricist philosophers attempted to apply were the new scientific cannons of the seventeenth century; there was to be no a priori deduction from "natural" principles without concrete experimental evidence. Isaiah Berlin writes; `This use of observation and experiment entailed the application of exact methods of measurement, and resulted in the linking together of many diverse phenomena under laws of great precision, generally formulated in mathematical terms. Consequently only the measurable aspects of reality were to be treated as real - those susceptible to equations connecting the variations in one aspect of a phenomenon with measurable variations in other phenomena. The whole notion of nature as compounded of irreducibly different qualities and unbridgeable `natural' kinds, was to be finally discarded. The
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Aristotelian category of final cause - the explanation of phenomena in terms of the 'natural' tendency of every object to fulfill its own inner end or purposewhich was also to be the answer to the question of why it existed, and what function it was attempting to fulfillnotions for which no experimental or observational evidence can in principle be discoveredwas abandoned as unscientific, and, indeed, in the case of inanimate entities without wills or purposes, as literally unintelligible. Laws formulating regular concomitances of phenomenathe observed order and conjunctions of things and eventswere sufficient, without introducing impalpable entities and forces, to describe all that is describable, and predict all that is predictable, in the universe, Space, time, mass force, momentum, restthe terms of mechanicsare to take the place of final causes, substantial forms, divine purpose, and other metaphysical notions".[3] This convictionthat reason and analysis can bring man knowledge of all realitygained footholds in the most varied fields of eighteenth century culture. The celebrated saying of Leasing, that the real power of reason is to be found not in the possession but in the acquisition of truth, has its parallel everywhere in the intellectual history of the eighteenth century. This fundamental idea of the Enlightenment was the adhesive which united the Christian and romantic poets. The Enlightenment separated knowledge from values with-out giving an adverse judgment on the either. The philosophers were in favour of reason; but they did not throw intrinsic values overboard. Kant, for example, clearly saw in Newtonian mechanics knowledge of the law of the physical universe, but he did not submit the autonomy and sovereignty of man to deterministic mechanics. He separated the domains of physical knowledge and intrinsic values by proclaiming "the starry heavens above you and moral law within". The Philosophies that followed the Enlightenment took the divorce of knowledge and values further. The nineteenth century heralds the true triumphs of reason in the unparalleled spread of materialism. Logical positivism and materialism (of which Marxism is a part) and their twentieth century counterpart logical empiricism threw, values overboard altogether. In their epistemological framework values are not considered proper knowledge. Utilitarianism declared that the goal, the ideal, of all moral endeavour is the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people. What came to be practiced, in fact, was the greatest, number of material goods for the largest possible number of people. Industrialization, which also became the main agent of the environmental devastation, had produced this reality. Contemporary Anglo-American linguistic and analytic philosophy, I strongly feel is at a dead end. Its academic parishioners have all but abandoned the attempt to understand the world, let alone change it. - They have turned philosophy into a narrow and specialized academic subject of little relevance or interest to anyone outside the small circle of professional philosophers. The result has been that serious philosophical work beyond the conventional sphere has been minimal. The great mass of human beings undoubtedly have real need for an enlightened philosophythat is, for a consistent world view and a body of guiding principles and clearly defined aims. This mass is effectively deprived by contemporary philosophers of any ideological material which might prove relevant to their existences. Bazarovism: Henryk Skolimowski[4] has aptly coined the phrase "Bazarovism" to describe the currently widespread intellectual and academic climate. The spirit of the age is characterized by Sergei Bazarv (from rarageney's novel Fathers and Children who is a robust, exuberant believer in science, in materialism, and in the world in which fact and positive knowledge are supreme values. He has no use for art, for poetry, for other `romantic rubbish'. The modern man is engulfed so completely by the worship of reason and scientific fact and bogus empiricism that it is often difficult to see through them and assess their impact on society. According to
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Skolimowski, Bazarov is at once an embodiment of the prevailing nihilism, materialism, scientism and positivism, which, in their respective ways, regarded intrinsic values as second, insignificant, or even non-existent in the world of cold facts, clinical objectivity and scientific reason. By raising reason and fact to the level of `gods' the modern man has brought himself into the era of supersonic age. The achievements and successes of modern science and technology no doubt have brought some benefits to humanity, but they have also brought us alienation, urbanization, moral degeneration and ecological crisis. The worship of economic growth has brought us fragmented and meaningless work, cracked and superficial relations. The assembly lines symbolize the way things should be done: rapidly, efficiently and, of course, massively. The whole society operates as a machineincluding people. The vast amount of published work on philosophy and epistemology in the west is of utter worthlessness, and I have here in mind the works published strictly within the academic nexus. Indeed, the very system of contemporary 'learning' is in its structure and method geared to anaesthetize any incoming organism that might threaten its supremacy. According to the present social culture and academic milieu, reality begins with the group, with publicly available deta. The private project and inner life is denied any reality. 'Knowledge' in the Islamic Perspective: Historically speaking, philosophical thinking epistemological doctrines included, is closely related with religious beliefs and gnostic traditions. It has often culminated in the attempt to do intellectually what religion has done practically and emotion-ally : to establish human life in some satisfying and meaningful relation to the universe in which man finds himself, and to get some wisdom in the conduct of human affairs. Knowledge, according to the Quranic doctrine, is both a gift of Divine revelation as well as a creative element or aspect of the human spirit. Most of recent philosophy threatens our spiritual existence and freedom by driving the contemporary mind into irrational and compulsive negation of religious truth. Islam, however, is a faith that is reasonable and rational, a faith that we can adopt with intellectual integrity and ethical conviction. Philosophy, with all its variegated disciplines, in the frame-work of Islam cannot be squared with an antiactivist or `spectator' view of it which aims merely at an enlargement of the understanding. Indeed it here becomes an essentially practical subject: it seeks to get people to do things. It cannot remain uncommitted to social action. The attack on spectator-ism which we find in Existentialism and in the pragmatists is very relevant to current philosophical scene. Moreover, Anglo-American academic philosophy is presently built around the assumption that its true centre is epistemology. This assumption is apparent particularly in the structure and content of university courses. The approach to the various areas of philosophy via the problem of knowledge is one possible way of organizing one's conception of philosophy. But the outcome has been the abstraction of `man as Knower' from the rest of human life, and in particular from human practice. This has been a distinguishing feature of the empiricist traditionand epistemology is still dominated by that tradition: the so-called `problems of knowledge' are the problems of the isolated individual knower confined to the world of his own sense perceptions.[5] Conversely it is essential to see the activity of `knowing' as arising out of, and part of, man's general attempt to organize and cope with his world, in order to vindicate the status of human knowledge as a meaningful totality rather than a series of discrete sense impressions. It is Ludwig Wittgenstein, the venerated philosopher of the later half of this century, who has said: "Even if every possible scientific question were answered, the problems of our living would still not have been touched at all".

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What are the real problems of our living to which Wittgenstein is referring? I am sure that he and his acolytes know it very well that these pertain to the meaning and value of human existence and his ultimate destiny.[6] All human beings worth the name feel that life must have a meaning--but what is it? Do they find it in the contradictions, double talk, and cynical resignation they encounter at every turn? They long for happiness, for truth, for justice, for love, for an object of devotion. Are the modern academics able to satisfy their longing? According to Islamic doctrine, no one is born with knowledge; however, everyone is born with a greater capacity to acquire knowledge. We read in the Quran: 'It is He who brought you forth from the wombs of your mothers. You did not know a thing; and He gave you hearing, sight and winds in order that you may give thanks, (al-Nahl 16:77). This Quranic verse amply shows that in Islam great emphasis is laid on empirical investigation and observation and it is in this sense that Allama Mohammad Iqbal rightly asserts that Islamic civilization represents the advent of inductive intellect 1. The knowledge of physical world is attained throng `hearing' sight and minds'. However, the aim of such knowledge is to produce appreciation of Allah's attributes of creativity, power and wisdom, and to discharge man's duty as His vice-regent on earth with humanity: Indeed, in the creation of the heavens and the earth and the alternation of night and day, there are signs for men of understanding. Those who remember Allah standing, sitting, and reclining on their sides and contemplate (the wonders) in the creation of the heavens and the earth" (al-Imran 3:191) `Only the learned among His people truly fear Allah' (Fatir 35:28) Scientific knowledge directed toward the glorification of man leads man to his own destruction in this world as well as in the Hereafter. The Quran relates the story of Quran explaining this point: "He (Quran) said, 'This has been given to me because of a certain knowledge which I have.' Did he not "know that Allah had destroyed before him generations which were superior to him in strength and greater in number?" (Al-Qasas 28:78). The only authentic source of knowledge concerning the Unseen realities is the Quran, the final and most perfect form of Divine guidance. Speculation, philosophical theories, and man-made theologies or 'isms' do not constitute true knowledge. Islam is not against rational speculation. But it does not grant authority to such speculation. The ultimate source of knowledge is the Quran and the Holy Prophets sunnah. Allah gives1. Dr. Muhammad Iqbal: Reconstruction of Religions Thought in Islam, Lahore (Pakistan) p. 127, passim. examples of such human speculations and surmises in order to reject them. For example, He say: "And they say, "What is there except our earthly life? We shall die and we live, and nothing destroys us except time.' But of that they have no knowledge; they merely speculate'. (al-Jathivah 45 24) "But most of them follow nothing but conjecture; indeed, conjecture is of no consequence against the truth; Verily, Allah is well aware of what they do. This Quran cannot be produced by other than Allah ; but is a confirmation of (revelations) that went before it and a fuller explanation of the Book wherein there is no doubtfrom the Lord of the world" (Yunus 10 : 37). A person's faith must be based on knowledge. As Jung has acutely remarked, 'The modern man abhors dogmatic postulates taken on faith and the religious philosophies based upon them. He holds them valid only in so far as their knowledge-content seems to accord with his own experience of the deeps of psychic life. He wants to knowto experience for himself". To be sure, Islamic faith is not a blind faith, whereby one is asked to believe in something which is either a contradiction, such as `One-inthree and three-in-one' or if not a contradiction, so remote from reason that one has to twist his logic to bring him to say, `I believe'. An example of this is the theory of reincarnation, in which a man's actions are judged by none (as there is no God) so that this none decides in what form to send him back to earth after his death. The faith in Islam, on the contrary, has to be sustained by
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metaphysical knowledge and enquiry. The worlds of reason and of religion do not turn in different orbits. The Real is to be known through reflection or `tafaqquh' in Quranic terminology. The intellectual approach to the knowledge of supreme reality is insisted in Islamic thought. We have to think out the metaphysical presuppositions and attain personal experience of the religious verities, from which alone the truly authentic and living faith starts. Let me now dwell upon a few basic Quranic expressions which provide a clue to the understanding of essentially Islamic theory of Knowledge. 'Tazakkur'--Recalling the Fundamental Truths Intuitively: 'Tazakkur' is a very significant Quranic term which means recalling to mind the fundamental truths intuitively recognized by human nature For understanding the significance of this term we have to note that the Quran frequently calls itself 'Zikr', 'Zikra', 'Tazkir'derivatives of the same root from which 'Tazakkur' stems. In essence, 'tazakkur' pertains to the first stage in the comprehension of divine realities and meanings. It also alludes to the truth that the Quranic teaching is not extraneous to the human nature. It actually reflects the Experiences of man's inner self and it is meant to awaken reminiscences of something already apprehended rather than to import anything altogether new. The Holy Quran appeals to all thoughtful persons whom it address as Uiul albab' (men of understanding) and 'Qaum-an-Yagilun' (people who have comprehension and insight) to think and ponder over the outer universe of matter as well as the inner universe of the spirit, as both are replete with the unmistakable signs of the Almighty Creator. Simultaneously, it invites them to deliberate over its own signs, i.e., its divinely inspired verses.' Thus the Quran, in addition to its own verses, regards both 'anfus' (self) and "afaq' (world) as sources of knowledge. Pondering over the three categories of signs, a man will be able to perceive a perfect concord between them; and, with the realization of this concord, he will grasp certain fundamental truths which are borne by the internal testimony of his own nature. So to say, the truths cherished by his inner self will emerge from its depths and shine in all their brilliance on the screen of his consciousness. In other words, full and intense awareness of Absolute Reality will spring up to his consciousness like the memory of a forgotten thing shooting up from the dark depths of the psyche to the surface of mind with the aid of a pertinent suggestion. I. It is noteworthy here that the Quran calls its verses 'ayat' i.e., Signs (of God) These verses are considered as signs of Godas important as any other of His signs in the universe or in the heart of man. It is because the Quranic verses are parts of Ralamullah (God's speech) and also because, like other signs of God they, too, turn man's mind to the Almighty.' The Quran thus declares in unequivocal terms that every man can derive the benefit of 'tazakkur' from it. It does not matter if a person's intelligence is limited, and his knowledge of logic and philosophy is poor ; and if he has no fine sense of language and literature. In spite of these drawbacks, he can develop an inkling and appreciation of ultimate truths if he has a noble heart, a sound mind, and an untainted nature not perverted by any kind of crookedness. The central themes and basic subjects of the Divine Book are nothing new or unfamiliar to the true human nature. While reading it a man often feels as if he were listening to the echoes of his inner self. In this sense, the Quranic theory of knowledge subtly resembles the Platonic theory in which true knowledge is also attained through recollecting forgotten memories of eternal forms. 'Tadabbur'Intellection and Reflection: The Holy Quran urges us again and again to study it intelligently and with deliberation, bringing our thought to bear upon it, and exercising our reasoning faculty in following its arguments and comprehending its meaning. For this purpose it uses the location 'Tadabbur' and its cognates, 'fahm"aql' 'fiqha' and 'fikr'. 'Tadabbur' generally means pondering and reflecting over the meaning and significance of ultimate questions. Specifically in the Quranic context, it connotes
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diving deep into the fathomless ocean of Divine wisdom. We learn from authentic traditions that the companions of the Holy Prophet used to reflect and ponder over the different surahs of the Quran for years on end. This brings us to the question as to what reason, reflection and ratiocination mean in the Islamic perspective. Of course, one must distinguish between the use of reason and rational faculty, and rationalism which makes reason the sole source of gaining knowledge and the only criterion for judging the truth. One does sometime speak of Aristotelian rationalism, although in the philosophy of Aristotle there are metaphysical intuitions which cannot be reduced to simple products of the human reason or logical understanding. Most regrettably, the meanings of many words like thought, reason, reflection and others have shrunken tremendously in contemporary philosophy, with the result that the suggested association of ideas have become quite restrictive. In the human microcosm, intellect is the deep spiritual centre or being, and not merely any specifiable mental faculty. It is necessary to distinguish between rational thought which is discursive and proceeds from the mental faculty alone; and intellective thought which proceeds from intuition and pure Intellect. The Arabic counterpart of reason or intellect'aql'signifies etymologically both that which binds or limits the Absolute in the direction of creation and also that which binds man to the truth, to God Himself. In this sense, the word 'aql' is at once intellect us or nous and ratio or reason. In the Islamic perspective it is precisely `aql' which keeps man on the straight path and prevents him from going astray. The sense of the numinous cannot be excluded from the world of empiricism. Experience is not exclusively what comes through science and scientific method. In other words, a distinction has to be made between terrestrial thought, aroused by the environment and celestial thought aroused by that which is our true being and finding its term beyond ourselves and, in the final analysis, in God.[7] Reason; in the present day limited sense, is something like a profane intelligence essentially the profane point of view springs from there. It is necessary for reason to be determined, transfigured or enriched both by faith and gnosis which is the quintessence of faith. Gnosis, in the Islamic theory of knowledge, keeps its original meaning of wisdom made up of knowledge and spiritual sanctity. It is the higher type of knowledge which comes of intuition by the intellect, the term intellect having the same sense as in Plotinus or Eckhart. If human intellect `aql' is obscured by the passions, by the nafs, then it can become the veil that hides man from the Divine. Were it not be so, there would be no need of revelation at all. `Love'Mystic unitive apprehension There is intellectually nothing more depressing than to read the trivial writings of the linguistic philosophers and the existentially barren texts of the social theorists. The Islamically oriented epistemological theory, on the contrary, represents a deepknowledge process which transforms the seeker. Here the idea of knowledge being an ideational process is not even considered. The foundations of knowledge are only accessible to the one who is prepared to undergo a profound existential transformation. The Islamic approach to knowledge involves an operational zone taking in the whole life-pattern of the student. According to Islamic epistemic theory, the sole element that can unite the soul to God is love, for love alone is desire of possession or of union; while discursive knowledge appears as a static element having no operative or unitive virtue. For securing a complete vision of Reality, therefore, sense perception must be supplemented by the function of what the Quran describes as 'fuad' or 'qalb' i.e., heart. 'Love' is held to include all modes of spiritual union, an eminently concrete participation in the transcendent realities. Intellect, divorced from Love, is a rebel (like Satan) while intellect wedded to Love has divine attributes. But surely 'loving' God presupposes
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being conscious of God. To be conscious of Him is to fix the heart in the Real, in permanent remembering of the Divine. 'Remembering' or 'dhikr' must be understood as referring essentially to an aspiration of the being towards the Universal with the object of obtaining an inner illumination. Heart, in Quranic epistemology, is symbolically the seat of the true self, of which we may be conscious or ignorant, but which is our true existential, intellectual and so universal centre. The heart is as it were immersed in the immutability of Being Contemplatively is here stressed more than the sharpness of intelligence. In contemplation of the heart things appear in their metaphysical transparency. The role of love is also emphasized in Christian philosophy. For example, Paul Tillich writes, 'Full knowledge does not admit a difference between itself and love, or between theory and practice'.[8] Thus knowledge infused with intuition and love gives celestial and divine knowledge. Love acts as the purgative that effects the perfection of soul by purging it of all spurious matter accumulated by intellect. The practical explanation of love is also contained in Allama Iqbal's philosophy of self in a systematized exposition of it in the letter sent by Iqbal to Dr. Nicholson and incorporated in his introduction to the Secrets of the Self, the English translation of Iqbal's Asrar-i-Khudi, he says about love: "The word is used in a very wide sense and means the desire to assimilate, to absorb. Its highest form is the creation of values and ideas, and the endeavour to realize them. Love individualizes the lover as well as the beloved". The reason why in Islamic epistemological framework so much emphasis is laid on love or intuition is that intuition catches the glimpses of the ultimate reality while intellect fails to achieve that goal on account of its inherent imperfection. Love, in short, is able to know the unknowable. To conclude, the various components of Islamic epistemology I have outlined are mutually supporting and interdependent. Islamic theory of knowledge, updated in idiom, sweeps away the contemporary western state of confused affairs in no uncertain manner. It recomposes man's divided self and restores his sanity because it restores the unity of knowledge and wisdom. It infuses in us the realization that the state of our knowledge is an important characteristic of the state of our being. It teaches one to be logical, rational and scientific without losing sight of the spiritual verities known through prophetic revelation, love and intuition. I have not loaded the essay with much technical detail but nevertheless tried to give a fairly intelligible account of the Quranic epistemology in the context of present philosophical scen

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