Engaging the Quran as Revelation
What I understand
Ayyam Allah (the days of God)
وَلَقَدْ أَرْسَلْنَا مُوسَىٰ بِـَٔايَـٰتِنَآ أَنْ أَخْرِجْ قَوْمَكَ مِنَ ٱلظُّلُمَـٰتِ إِلَى ٱلنُّورِ وَذَكِّرْهُم بِأَيَّىٰمِ ٱللَّهِ ۚ إِنَّ فِى ذَٰلِكَ لَـَٔايَـٰتٍۢ لِّكُلِّ صَبَّارٍۢ شَكُورٍۢ Indeed, We sent Moses with Our signs: Lead your people out of darkness and into light, and remind them of the days of God. Surely in this are signs for whoever is steadfast,…
tied/slave to God
There is some water/life in a cup/body I find in my hand and I never cease being thirsty/life-desiring. Many faucets/means-to-life, with an ever-so-gradually decreasing flow of water, around me where I can refill the cup but there are no storage tanks – just cups and flowing water. I can either be tied/slave to those faucets…
interestingly
no concept in the Quran for islamic history; none for tradition, let alone islamic tradition, in a postive sense; none for religion; none for non-muslims; none for conversion to islam; none for taking shahada; no shahada as a formula to recite for any purposel no five pillars; none for schools of law or law; none…
beyond pairs
In yearning for joy without pain or boredom, rise without decline, togetherness without separation, happiness without sadness, a reality without ‘pairs’, don’t despair about the impossibility of physically experiencing such a reality here and now. You can instead rejoice in the news this despair bears about the existence of non-duality and the soul’s knowledge, pre-experience…
the value of life
it is a widely shared misconception that a person who thinks there is life after death would be, or should be, more okay with letting himself or others die and would/should not grieve death as much as the person who thinks this life is the only life and there isn’t any life after this. This…
threat of eternal hell
The Quran has no qualms about presenting a God threatning, nay promising, eternal hell to those who committ ‘zulm’ (oppression, harm, injustice, covering up truth, ingratitude, lying, giving indepdent reality to things and self and not as, entirely, signs glorifying the sustainer and creator and so on). His threat is made credible, and to those…
43:30-35
No entitlement to truth comes from higher (or lower) status in the world – both “great cities”, the one where strength and wealth becomes a criteria for trust/success/piety and the other where destitution/asceticism is the criteria for piety/truth) are not distinctive in the real purpose (which would unite those who have that purpose into ‘one…
the problem with reading laws into revelation
As far as I can tell, the Quran does not make it known or clear who or what, if anyone at all, is going to have the authority to enforce anything that one may call a law or command or rule. It does not, for instance, make it possible to turn to some group of…
reasons and disappointment
I can get disappointed by others, in others. Others can get dissappointed by me, in me. Neither is pleasing and so one’s soul has an inclination to avoid both as much as possible. I am terrorized by the actual (and possible) disappointment (and associated dislike) of others in/of me. I do much in life to…
the utility of pretention
I have found that there is a very large gap between the demands of what I’ll call “personal and basic convictions/committments” (they take a very long to find and invite accountability and revision and refinement and evidence and re-evaluation – all of this because the overall direction and quality of one’s life hangs on these…
reason and live as a human being
One is free to hold any conception of anything. What I hold about being human: I am/was a human for whom there was a way to reason/live as a human being and this way was an alternative to how religious people (all who identified as being this or that religion and conceptualized religion as giving…
chapter 110
I have found myself, and multitudes around me, trapped. In my eyes, we are all trapped. Others may or may not feel trapped but I see them trapped just as I see myself trapped. Trapped in what sense? At least in two senses. I know many people read chapter 110 of the quran as some…
life without death? yes and no
I recently read somewhere that even if life after death were possible or real, life without death in this world is not, and therefore life without loss (and associated pain) is not. I find it half true. The truth in it is that in this world and in my life, there is death and there…
some thoughts about Ghalib’s verse
If you dont already know who Ghalib was and what he said, it suffices to note that he lived and wrote poetry in the Persian and Urdu languages in India in the 19th century. he is widely read and admired by people familiar with Persian and Urdu poetry. In my family, and I think this…
praise be to god for what?
It is possible to assert that since everything I have is from god, I should not mourn when god takes back that which he had given to me. That something was given to me by god, is sometimes presented as a reason for not being sad about losing it – whoever gave it had real…
language fail
so many problems (or reason) arise from the way I use language. That is to say, when I press a concept or usage, I realize that it does not convey a meaning that makes sense to me. Here is one such usage: “I learned X from Y” Does it happen that I come to know…
two philosophies…and a third way
This reflection is not directly tied to any particular verse/sign in revelation. It is prompted by a set of observations about two ways (there may be more!) I think people deal with life, both of which I find inadequate. And I see revelation proposing or offering a third possibility, one that is least understood and…
the first and the last
The question of the first consiousness – how did it come to be? – occurs to me only occassionally but when it does, it stuns me. It stuns me because it seems to be at once a most important and natural question to ask and also an utterly unanswerable one. How did it come to…
profundity too shall pass
People often despair about forgetting or losing what they experience/understand to be deep and profound. They despair about not ‘walking the walk’ in relation to talking the ‘deep’ talk. They hear something that hits them as profound or something profound occurs to them and in that moment, they feel raised to a higher level of…
satisfaction with the meaning of loss
People experience loss – separation from loved ones, the passing of the years, losing health, youth, wealth and on and on. And they feel insecure in the face of this loss. And when one speaks to them about this insecurity that is common to us all and how we could overcome it, one of the…
the ‘akhira’ is good and lasting
there is a paradox in thinking there is something called ‘akhira’ that is good/better? than what is already here and it is this: if the akhira is good in relation to a present reality that is is therefore not good (bad is too strong a word i guess) and that one should be ready/willing to…
my old man (and the old man in me)
My father had a meeting with a psychologist, his first ever. My father is 78 years old. The doctor asked candid questions and my father answered candidly. I find it meaningful to record the questions and answers because the 78 year old in me has the same questions. i paraphrase of course and I dont…
fear God…wa attaqullah
If not fearing the One who sustains my life and who has all death and all life and all compassion and all power and all wisdom and all justice in his hands, lessened my fear as a human being, if it made me less fearful, I would surely never fear god and never consider it…
5:48
A word about two interpretive options before I choose the one I prefer and use it to understand my life in light of verse 5:48 in the Quran. One can read a revelatory claim with reference to one’s experience, allow the verse to make a claim about what is (or rather what meanings are) disclosed…
myself against myself
Culture as “its what we do, its how we do it, its how we have always done it” is an attractive refuge for a person who does not know and does not care about the truth of what she does and omits. Despair about truth (or just plain denial of one’s need for it) often…
refuge from…
some call it an idea. you can call it something else. human experience shows that one can name something, something that is not some individual human being or even a group of them, and it gains a non-material conceptual reality of sorts. Like unicorn. what can be imagined by the mind can be let into…
mercy that kills and blesses
the mercy in my soul with which i worry about my well-being, health and life and with which i grieve others’ loss of health and happiness and life – this mercy kills me and tortures me to no end or it blesses me with joy and gives me news about my origin and destination. the…
dying
soon shall the young and healthy find themselves weakened and old, forgetful and not of use to others as they may have been when young…we shall feel useless, a burden, needy, lonely, with ailments that never leave but progressively feel worse until we die. but much of the life we now know would already have…
experience, taqwa, messenger
If only the experiential presence of good (pleasure) is good, I have not found a good that suffices If only the experiential absence of good (disappointment/sadness) is good, I have not found a good that suffices If only I can become aware of a good that remains present in my awareness when it is experienced…
unhappiness and gratitude
To interpret someone’s choices in the best way – it is one way that one “prays” for them i.e. asks God to give them what is best for them. How shall i interpret someone’s choice to be unhappy, bored and disappointed with this world, especially as the result of old age, illness, profound loss of…
sacred geographies and identities
For the eye that looks at the tree and sees a tree with wood and possibly foliage and roots and fruits. For this eye, the sacred place of prostration, the house of God are in Mecca and the farthest mosque is in Jerusalem. For the eye that looks at the tree and is willing to…
Announcement
I am taking the liberty to post a half-baked announcement of a “spiritual retreat” (a gathering really) I am hoping to host in Istanbul this summer (roughly between June 22 and June 30, 2024). If its not something that interests you, ignore what follows. If you think you know others who may be interested and…
establishing salah/prayer?
So many verses in the quran claim some version of the idea that the wellbeing of human beings, in this lower realm/world and in life in the eternal, higher realm, is tied to what is often translated (terribly obscurely in my view) as their “establishing prayer” (yuqiimun al-salat, aqimu al-salat etc). i want to say…
2:260
“And, lo, Abraham said: ‘O my Sustainer! Show me how Thou givest life unto the dead!’ Said He: ‘Hast thou, then, no faith?’ (Abraham) answered: ‘Yea, but so that my heart may be set fully at rest.’ Said He: ‘Take, then, four birds and teach them to obey thee; then place them separately on every hill;…
27:81
Mostly I write to myself and for myself. Sometimes I write because I feel someday Isa, my son, will find himself confused and dissatisfied with what people say about God and revelation and truth and maybe he will find something said in these blogs useful and helpful. For as long as I remember, the notion…
2:67-73
What do human beings do when it is clear to them what they must do but they are reluctant, for the sake of protecting some material benefit (shorn of meaning)? They pretend things are not clear and they demand more clarification! Take the matter of Israeli occupation of Palestine. People who wish to avoid following…
ghafur-eraser
If I didn’t experience/feel/understand ‘wrong’ as that with which I hurt and oppress myself (whoever else I may also harm), I could do no wrong. If I could never do all that I understand/experience/know as hurtful and oppressive towards myself, I could do no wrong. But I found that I knew things to be wrong…
94:7-8
The otherness of what comes to pass through me is known to me – life, acts, thoughts, feelings, state of the heart/mind – none of it is from me. None of it can be from anything that does not have power to create these, the will to send them to me so that I find…
sacred place of prostration
إِنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا۟ وَيَصُدُّونَ عَن سَبِيلِ ٱللَّهِ وَٱلْمَسْجِدِ ٱلْحَرَامِ ٱلَّذِى جَعَلْنَـٰهُ لِلنَّاسِ سَوَآءً ٱلْعَـٰكِفُ فِيهِ وَٱلْبَادِ وَمَن يُرِدْ فِيهِ بِإِلْحَادٍۭ بِظُلْمٍ نُّذِقْهُ مِنْ عَذَابٍ أَلِيمٍ This verse helped me understand existence and things happening around me and inside me, in a new way…in a way that took away the burden of everday living so long as i looked the world with the lens of this verse. its not always some catastrophy that upsets and pains me. it is everyday…
with the help of the One..
مَن كَانَ يَظُنُّ أَن لَّن يَنصُرَهُ ٱللَّهُ فِى ٱلدُّنْيَا وَٱلْـَٔاخِرَةِ فَلْيَمْدُدْ بِسَبَبٍ إِلَى ٱلسَّمَآءِ ثُمَّ لْيَقْطَعْ فَلْيَنظُرْ هَلْ يُذْهِبَنَّ كَيْدُهُۥ مَا يَغِيظُ Existence is anguish…the dread of living and dying…the transience of joys and the senselessness of pain…the burdern of living and worrying and wanting and desiring and losing hope and hoping again…. i seek remedies in knowledge, in community, in work, in effort….some means to rise above it all so that i may see the…
3:7 “we find safety with it”
What is important here is to decide what i am going to mean by “aamanna bihi” generally rendered “we believe in it”. what does it mean to say that? is the Quran asking me to believe in something that I do not understand? is it asking me to not try to interpret and understand? i…
2:49-50
what is the truth about the people of pharoh? and their killing the sons while leaving the women alive? what is the terrible suffering here that the people of pharoh inflict upon me and how is it also a trial from God? what is the parting of the sea and how does God save me…
true or not
I get shocked everyday. People are not bothered to find out if any given claim in some supposed revelation is true or not. They don’t celebrate the realization of truth like it was a light that took them out of some darkness. Instead, they want religion! They are interested in religious debates and doctrines and…
my attempts at peace and my real friends – 66:1
chapter 66 is puzzling at first sight, especially if the sight is tainted with baseless assumptions that whatever it said is a report of some historical event that must have happened, an assumption that whether or not i find here any truth that guides me, i am still going to just accept it as Gods…
22:9-10
This is what verse 10 of chapter 22 claims: “This is an outcome of what your hands have sent – for, God does not do wrong (zulm) to His creatures” The verses claim that human beings suffer in hellfire because of what they do, not because God is punishing them unjustly. but even a child…
labor
it is both simple and complicated. how much should i work? should i enjoy it? what if i dont? work a lot? just enough? not at all? is there a passion so strong that if i were to find and follow it, i would (like the cliche says), not have to work a single day…
face of God
No matter how much you tell a child, “Dont worry, when your parents die, they will go to God/heaven and you will see them again and live with them forever!”, it doesn’t quite cut it. It doesn’t lessen his dread of ‘losing’ his loved ones because in the mind of the child (and adult children…
humans, rocks & destroyed bodies
It is curious that verses in the Quran mentions human and rocks/stones as fuel for hell (2:24). Rocks, solid bodies of matter: they do not understand, feel or think as far as I can tell. Things of the same kind, for the same reason, it seems, should merit hell. I therefore think about how human…
of earthquakes and revelation
It is feb 9th 2023 today. An earthquake hit southeast Turkey and northern Syria and other places on Feb 6th. Thousands died and many more are injured and even more are affected by widespread death and destruction and suffering. I am affected. Sadenned. I wish it didn’t happen. I hope it doesn’t happen to me…
the truth about “dont judge me”
I realized something today..again…and i thought i’ll write it down..again..there are probably other blog entries where i have said this in different ways perhaps..and i have come to realize what i am about to say by what the Quran teaches..but let me just say it here without going to verses… ideas and claims are true…
9:36
إِنَّ عِدَّةَ ٱلشُّهُورِ عِندَ ٱللَّهِ ٱثْنَا عَشَرَ شَهْرًا فِى كِتَـٰبِ ٱللَّهِ يَوْمَ خَلَقَ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضَ مِنْهَآ أَرْبَعَةٌ حُرُمٌ ذَٰلِكَ ٱلدِّينُ ٱلْقَيِّمُ فَلَا تَظْلِمُوا۟ فِيهِنَّ أَنفُسَكُمْ وَقَـٰتِلُوا۟ ٱلْمُشْرِكِينَ كَآفَّةً كَمَا يُقَـٰتِلُونَكُمْ كَآفَّةً وَٱعْلَمُوٓا۟ أَنَّ ٱللَّهَ مَعَ ٱلْمُتَّقِينَ I may be wrong but I think If you read the existing english translations of this verse (and this is true of so so many other verses…perhaps even all the verses) and if you come to this verse with assumptions about who you are and aren’t, and why you are reading the verse, and…
109-1
ibada or what is called worship..what is it? kufr or what is called denial or unbelief (and the disbelievers)…what is it? who are they? i should look at my life to understand what my maker means when he tells me to say ‘o deniers..i do not worship what you worship..’ in this, i assume, is…
false living and true worship
some will say “one is distracted by the life of this world…by work, by family..by this or that…and therefore we have prayer to bring us back to god…”.they want false living (not living in God’s name) to be remedied by prayer and true worship..few times a day one will turn to god, they imagine, and…
choosing my context
Yes, there is always context – some conception of the whole or of the broader picture within which i exist at a given moment and in which I feel and think and experience something and encounter the world or some event or person and respond to it…but what this context is, is a matter of…
67:2 He made death and life…
People sometimes say, ‘its good to keep death in mind…’. its depressing..its meant to make people realize that they are transient beings and will die someday..its meant to be a ‘reality check’…but it is half true only…one sees death all around and everyday and one seeks guidance from one’s maker about this…the claim in 67:2…
wastelands
if i wasn’t careful, the people of lower, material life would have me feel that drinking a glass of tap water in my apartment is less potentially sacred than drinking from some sacred water well in some sacred land..that my soul’s thirst will be quenched when i visit such and such a place and that…
my most remotely acceptable things
Sometime I find myself in a place, a condition, which I find acceptable and nice – i am healthy, my loved ones are healthy, life is okay by and large, things are ok. they may even be really great sometimes. laughter and enjoyment. things to look forward to. life can be such that one does…
helplessness of the oppressed
There is nothing in this world, this lower realm, that does not indicate some reality that must already exist in the higher realm since this realm cannot exist, my reason says, without being given existence. The reality of things must exist in the permanent realm, with the source of all things and which must be…
5:114
let me say at the start, I celebrate what you may not and I do not celebrate what you may. قَالَ عِيسَى ٱبْنُ مَرْيَمَ ٱللَّهُمَّ رَبَّنَآ أَنزِلْ عَلَيْنَا مَآئِدَةًۭ مِّنَ ٱلسَّمَآءِ تَكُونُ لَنَا عِيدًۭا لِّأَوَّلِنَا وَءَاخِرِنَا وَءَايَةًۭ مِّنكَ ۖ وَٱرْزُقْنَا وَأَنتَ خَيْرُ ٱلرَّٰزِقِينَ Said Jesus, the son of Mary: ‘O God, our Sustainer! Send down…
the illogic/dishonesty of the ethical
When I begin with the assumption, and it can only be an assumption until I could see its truth and it becomes truth for me, that my maker and the one who gives me my reason, my sense of right and wrong, my feelings, my agreeableness and disagreeableness towards or about something, is speaking to…
Subhan Allah (God’s is perfection)
One travels with purpose when one travels towards an end that one has not yet attained but that one seeks and finds beloved. What I love is perfection, to be in a state that my heart feels everything is perfect as it is, even the imperfections make perfect sense. I want perfection of meaning. If…
written/determined for you (“kutiba alaykum…”) 2:178-179
When my maker says that something is written or determined for me (or for those who are safe and therefore for me insofar as I too want to be among the ones who are referred to as safe), I can either assume this claim to be true without knowing it is true (which is what…
signs, rasul, mockery
25:41 وَإِذَا رَأَوْكَ إِن يَتَّخِذُونَكَ إِلَّا هُزُوًا أَهَـٰذَا ٱلَّذِى بَعَثَ ٱللَّهُ رَسُولًا Hence, whenever they consider you, they but make you a target of mockery “Is this the one whom God sent as rasul? 30:10 ثُمَّ كَانَ عَـٰقِبَةَ ٱلَّذِينَ أَسَـٰٓـُٔوا۟ ٱلسُّوٓأَىٰٓ أَن كَذَّبُوا۟ بِـَٔايَـٰتِ ٱللَّهِ وَكَانُوا۟ بِهَا يَسْتَهْزِءُونَ And then, evil is the end of those who do evil by giving the lie to signs of God and deriding them 36:30 يَـٰحَسْرَةً عَلَى ٱلْعِبَادِ مَا يَأْتِيهِم مِّن رَّسُولٍ إِلَّا كَانُوا۟ بِهِۦ يَسْتَهْزِءُونَ OH, THE REGRETS that slaves…
2:26
Revelation should, and does, gives clues to readers about what they should seek and find in revelation. It gives clues about how I might be guided in my interpretation of its claims. Very plainly, I put it like this to myself: If I cannot ask and answer the question: “Is that true?” about a verse,…
28:77
What do i do with what i have such that it would be excellent or beautiful to do? has something excellent been done to me by my maker so that i too would do it? how is my doing it likened to his doing it? Here is a thought: He has made known to me…
The Quran as Revelation 