Between practicality and wisdom
admin on 05 23, 2009
I was having a conversation with a friend on what roles should a Muslim student movement play, and I proposed that the very first thing that student movements should promote is the sincere love for knowledge and the love for reading beyond our fields of study.
He disagreed, citing ‘practicality’ as a reason. This is because his personal observations (which I also share) show that most students today are disinterested in ‘intellectual’ discourses, let alone ‘intellectual’ conversations. Most students today prefer to take the ‘practical’ position of studying for their grades and wind down afterwards in leisurely activities. As such, ‘extra’ or ‘additional’ materials would just add up to the burden of the student. And as such, the Muslim student movement shld promote, as much as possible, ‘leisurely’ activities that most students would be ready to engage themselves in, and these activities would serve as the platform to promote ‘the message of Islam’.
Along the conversation, I observe that he is more willing to look at the issue from a populist standpoint, citing ’sustainability’ as the main impetus for his vision of a student movement.
I reflected over those words, and this is my response:
What we need to do firstly, is to define what ‘practical’ really means? Does practical mean the ‘easy way’, the ease of application, the ease of understanding, or in essence, ease? Does ‘practicality’ constitute the necessity to have a sort of a ‘mass marketing’ approach, where success will now be defined in terms of quantity and numbers? Is there a dualism in the realm of the ideal and the dimension of the practical? Is there a dichotomy between theory and practice, between abstract and application?
Because scholarship, in the age of ignorance and distraction, will attract only the enlightened and sincere few, will it fall under the category of ‘impractical’?
What does Islam say about the ‘practical’?
In a nutshell, in Islam, there is no dichotomy between theory and action, between ilm and amal. As such, the Islamic definition of ‘practical’ is a synergistic combination of the abstract and the application. The abstract must guide the application.
From an adab standpoint, in order for an object to be in the correct position, firstly one must know what or where exactly should the object be placed in. The act of knowing, requires knowledge! As such, knowledge IS the basis of all ‘practical’ applications as so to speak!
In Islam, the abstract ALWAYS guides the application. Our aqidah tauhid is made up of completely abstract ideas such that if the term ‘practical’ understood prior to the conversation is to be used, then aqidah is not ‘practical’ at all!
Many scholars argue that the reason why Islam is in decline is because there is a dearth of intellectual activity. The person who thinks of Islam in terms of ‘practicality’ will only focus on the rituals and the practices; without deeper understanding, without reflecting on the underlying processes that guide the rituals and practices.
In the first place, the message of Islam is indeed firmly rooted on knowledge, intellectual vigor and pursuit of knowledge. Syed Hossein Nasr, in his book “Man and Nature”, speaks of the kalimah syahadah, La ilaha Illallah, as one that has very deep intellectual underpinnings, in contrast to Christianity that cannot be proven to be philosophically and epistemologically coherent with the rational mind and as such had to resort to covering up their intellectual flaws with ‘the message of love’ and of blind faith!
This is not inclusive of the many verses in the Qur’an and the Sunnah that cites the importance of knowledge!
If such is the case, then how can the culture of knowledge, and promoting the pursuit of it through intellectual dialogues with the learned and reading ‘heavy’ intellectual works still be considered ‘impractical?’
Let us now analyze it from a macro perspective. A civilization, without knowledge and intellectual activity, can it be considered to be ‘civilized’? What would happen to society if everyone decides to take a ‘practical’ outlook to life?
What would happen to society if the learned at higher learning institutes decide to take a ‘practical’ outlook to life? Who will guide the society forward? Fools without knowledge?
If let’s say we do have a trade-off between pursuing knowledge and membership woes in astudent movement, I’d prefer to take the former than the latter.
Why?
If I’m not reading and thinking now, then would I expect the layman to do it for the community?
Then we would be facing a serious loss of adab in the society!
Knowledge and wisdom is practical.
Anything without it, is utter rubbish my friend.
If we don’t vigorously seek knowledge, then in the end, we will learn Islam from the Non-Muslims.
And when I say ’seek knowledge’, I also meant the scientific endeavour that precedes it, that is, the constant hunger in asking the why in everything. Not forgetting, the spiritual purification of intentions, in pursuit of ma’rifah and mahabbah of Allah s.w.t..
