3. PEOPLE OF KALAM (DEDUCTIVE REASONING) GAIN ONLY SORROW AND WASTE TIME
The Salaf forbade from indulging in rhetoric (kalam) for reasons that are great. First, a person often wishes to see that which his sight is unable to capture. This lends to confusion because if we contemplate the essence of the Creator, we will become confused and our senses become distorted. We cannot comprehend something with no beginning, for we only comprehend objects and attributes and nothing else.
If we contemplate His Actions, we will notice how He erects a building then ruins it, without being able to understand His wisdom.
So a wise person must stop looking at something he cannot comprehend. It is enough for the mind to establish the existence of the Creator through His creation, and by the sending of Prophets and contemplating their miracles.
If after listening to Allah’s saying:
“Until he listens to Allah’s Words.” [al-Tawbah (9):6]
He concludes that the Qur’an is Allah’s Speech.
As for those who want to act intelligent by saying, ‘The recitation is that which is being recited or not, and the reading is the same as that being read or not …’ will be wasting his time for nothing. The objective is for him to act upon his knowledge.
It is said that a king once sent a letter ordering a group of his appointees to do such and such task. So they all did as he ordered except for one of them. He spent his time thinking about the king’s letter; what type of ink it was written with? Did the king write it while sitting or standing? He continued to do so until the king arrived, so he ordered this appointee to be executed and rewarded everyone else.
(Source: al-Hafiz Abu’l-Faraj ibn al-jawzl [d. 597AH] “CAPTURED THOUGHTS being” a translation of his masterpiece ‘Sayd al-K hatir)
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