Why “Qur’anic Life”?
The beginning, the middle and the end of all our all acts are done in His name and on His behalf.
Praise and glory is due to Allah. He is Allah, compassionate in His essence, compassionate in His works. He is the source of endless grace. He blessed man with revelation and filled our hearts with it via our minds.
Our support and prayers be upon the Messenger of Allah, who conveyed the revelation as it was and, beyond just conveying it, lived a life that became a model for mankind. Being the alms for mankind, he is the one who left a path of light that has eternal happiness at the end of it. He is the one who symbolizes how a lifetime can be dedicated to revelation, and his life is a living Qur’an.
The greatest manifestation of all things written is revelation. Existence began to exist when it started to talk. History began when it started to talk. The human spirit was blown upon to make man understand the language of it. The will, reason and speech were placed inside the spirit in order to make a recipient for the divine revelation. And man has come into existence to understand it.
The One who started creation with words also started the journey of man with words. He taught man, to whom He assigned rights and duties, how to use them through revelation. He placed words on the axis of history. He guided man with revelation. To enable man to build life, He made him the “vice-gerent” (khalifah) of the world. To make this assistant do a good job, He edified man through revelation.
Islam is the name of the system through which Allah rules the universe. And revelation was a divine project of “building.” Life is the path. And man is the traveler. He is the One who created both the path and the traveler. It was the right of the Creator of the path and the traveler to determine the road map. All divine revelation was sent to enable this noble fruit of the universal tree to actualize its own purpose for being called into existence. And in the last stage of mankind eternal guidance was revealed in the form of the Qur’an.
The last revelation has summed up all of this in four sentences:
Er-Rahmân…
Alleme’l-Kur’an
halaka’l-insan,
‘allemehu’l-beyân…
He, the source of limitless grace…
He is the One who taught the Qur’an,
He is the One who created man,
He has granted him the ability to express himself.
Revelation of the Qur’an was an unbiased life that comes from the Alive (Al-Hayy) to the very heart of life for “building” it. The goal was to take man from the depths of darkness to light, from selfishness to cognition of the self, from slavery to instincts to the freedom of the spirit, from the hell of the subconscious to the peak of consciousness, from slavery of the self (an-nafs) to the freedom of spirit.
This was given to the noble seed of the tree of existence to prevent man from destroying himself and everything that he touches. Furthermore, it was to make him pure by surpassing himself, to make him evolve, to elevate him and make him advance towards his horizons of potential.
The Owner of revelation and man has tied the actualization of this goal to laws. If man acts in accordance with these laws, revelation will actualize its aim of “building.” If not, man will be deprived of it. And the first condition of this is approaching revelation as a subject. For revelation is actually a subject.
Revelation proved through the first generation, which it addressed that it has the capability of thoroughly “building.” It constructed life and the world with the hands of the generation that it had “built.” It achieved a leap of faith, which mankind has rarely seen, by the hands of the generation that it built.
And the revelation proved one more thing: If a generation submits itself so as to be “built” by the Qur’an, then Allah will submit history to be “built” in the hands of this generation.
In other words, the one who becomes the object of the Qur’an, becomes the subject of history.
The one who becomes the apprentice of revelation, becomes the master of life.
The one who submits himself to revelation, receives life in turn.
The one who lets revelation determine his way of life, receives the privilege to determine the way of time.
After that, it was the turn of those who had been entrusted with revelation. However, the believers were not always able to show the same success in terms of “being built” by revelation. They attempted to build the revelation itself, instead of being built by it. They dared to take revelation as an object, instead of being the object of it. The consequence of this was very grave. They themselves became the object of history. This was nothing more than the penalty for viewing revelation as an object.
The process of regarding revelation as an object occurred by passing through the following stages:
The Sustainer of the words put meanings into the heart of the words, so that the ones who have “reasoning hearts” would understand those meanings and then elaborate on them by including them to their lives. The ones that were “built” by revelation continued to elaborate on the meanings. The compilation of the Qur’an language; the compilation of Islamic sciences; the magnificent conquests for the sake of Islam which are rationally unexplainable; the development of systems of sciences on proof, speech and insight; the establishment of an original civilization; the introduction of a tremendous heritage of wisdom, together with all the other developments concerning every aspect of life were all the bountiful consequences of this elaborated meaning.
But one day meaning was no longer produced. When meaning is no longer produced, it is consumed. The latter was the natural result of the former. In order to close the gap that arose from the scarcity of meaning, form was glorified. At the end of this cycle, the meaning of revelation was covered by its letters, and the aim of the revelation by its meaning. The relationship with revelation was reduced to an action of “reading the lines” instead of “reading from the heart.” The owner of the revelation has ordered us to read the revelation with our minds attuned to its meaning. This order of reading attuned to the meaning (tartil) was reduced first to pronouncing the words in the proper way (tajwid) and then to literally a reading contest.
Revelation, of course, should be read in the proper way (tajwid). It should be enriched with the most beautiful sounds. It should be written with the most beautiful characters. It should be published with the most beautiful pages and covered with the best binders. But even all these things are insufficient forrevelation. Revelation did not come for any of these. It came essentially to be understood, to be lived and to be invigorated.
The point where we arrive at the end of this cycle is the exact point that was shown by Mehmet Akif, the Qur’an poet:
“Either we open it and stare at the Glorious Verses
Or we whisper it to a dead man and pass on.”
This point of desperation was described by revelation itself, in its own words, as “to leave forsaken.” The implied meaning of this is: holding it in one’s hands, but not carrying it in one’s consciousness; putting it in the highest places, but not applying it to life; saying it in words, but not with the heart; keeping it in full view, but not taking it into consideration; listening to its sounds, but not listening to what it is saying. In summary, taking revelation as if it were a “dead text”…
Revelation was excluded from being the source of meaning by passing through these stages. It is no more an issue of understanding. When not being even an issue of understanding, how can it determine life? Can an incomprehensible truth be implemented in life?
The explanation of what has already happened is this: to leave revelation without life.
The one who suffered from this was not revelation. Life was the prime subject of this harm. And Doomsday began when life was left without revelation. How can mankind be saved from this turbulence of trivialization and voidance of meaning?
The core question of questions and the core matter of matters is this.
Ideologies are dissolving one by one. For the fact that ideologies cannot be a cure for the wounds of mankind is understood clearly now.
As prices supersede value, man perishes more and more. Security measures that are void of spirit and stereotype education policies are insufficient to stop the bleeding of man’s humanity. It is sorely grasped that the modern education system, which is upon the eve of becoming an intellectual massacre, can hardly be a cure-all. In addition there is no reason for an education -which lacks its share of grace from the Most Gracious- not to become a jungle – a jungle that raises savages with diplomas.
The attitude of global centers of power glorify the powerful so much that even the victims themselves worship power. Brutal secularization, which ignores the link between livelihood and the Ever-Providing (Ar-Razzaq) of the universe, prepares to worsen the situation by adding a “food crisis” now to its chain of crises.
The earth, which was prepared and furnished by Allah as a guest house for the noble fruit of the tree of creation, has never been used so despicably and roughly at any other period of history. Modern life, which consumes both underground and aboveground resources in unreserved greediness, is not able-and apparently will not be able to- solve any problem apart from announcing the catastrophe that it has prepared.
Despite all the “self-styled” claims of development and evolution, mankind is not happier today than he was yesterday. The average level of happiness of mankind is not higher today than it was yesterday. Current starvation levels are not lower than yesterday’s. The output of mankind’s kindness and compassion is not more than yesterday’s. On the contrary, the veins of mankind’s kindness and compassion are dying and being killed day by day. The deficit of justice grows like a snowball.
There is no other way to stop the bad course of events, together with these factors stated above and the other elements unmentioned here, except by “turning back to revelation.” If mankind will regain its humanity, this will not be actualized without turning our faces from prices to values. There is no way to return to values without Allah. Because Allah is meaning. And life without Allah is a meaningless life.
So the revelation is the link of meaning that is between Allah and life. And the answer to the question of “Why Qur’anic Life?” that we stated in the title, is this.
If mankind will turn back to the reasoning heart, it has to turn its face once again to the holy books.
If mankind will turn to holy books, it has to turn to the Qur’an. For there is no rival to the Qur’an in this field.
A return to the Qur’an is inevitable. A return to the Qur’an is not merely a return in the sense of an intellectual activity. It is a return to the heart of life. The Qur’an has been revealed to invigorate life.
The “rope of Allah” is the Qur’an. The one who clings to the Qur’an will be clinging to the rope of Allah.
O our Sustainer! We ask for Your forgiveness because of our attitude towards the Book! And we are turning to revelation again! And we know that an approach to revelation is an approach to You! Accept our approach and approach us with Your grace!
Blessings be upon the “Qur’anic Life” for your reasoning hearts!
Islamoglu Mustafa. (2008-01).
Nicin Kur’ani Hayat?
Kur’ani Hayat, 1/4-6.
Translators: Ayse Asli SANCAR & Zekiye T. BAYKUL