Shia Islamic Belief System 2/46

'A'udhu billahi min al-Shaytan al-rajim, Bismillah, al-Rahman, al-Rahim. Al-Hamdulillah Rabb il-'Aalameen, wa assalatu wa assalam 'ala Sayyidina wa nabiyyina Abil Qasim al-Mustafa Muhammad, wa 'ala Ahle Baythi at-tayyibeen, at-tahireen.

I would like to welcome all the brothers once again to another session of Mizan courses , excuse me, Mizan live sessions, I confuse them up sometimes. So, last week we had our first session al-Hamdulillah. We put that behind us, it was introductory. I discussed a few things regarding some of the things we need to know before we actually get started with with the actual Shi'a doctrine that we want to cover, and one second, please. All right. And so I just want to go over everything that I went over last week very, very quickly in a couple of minutes, wa 'alaikum assalam Brother Bilal, and wa 'alaikum assalam sister Safeenas. I make it a point to say salam back to whoever said salam.

So anyway, I covered about six point and before I go on to the actual meat of the subject, I just want to go over these very quickly. The six things that we covered last week, wa 'alaikum assalam Sister Fatima and welcome. Number one, I explained what Imamiyyah means. We're taught we're currently covering Shi'a Imamiyyah doctrine in these sessions. And I explained that the bet difference between Shi'a and Sunni, we all know already.

But what is meant by Imamiyyah? Yeah, I covered that as well. Imamiyyah refers to that denomination of this of Shi'a Islam that has to do with adherence to the to the 12 Imams. We're also the Imamiyyah is also referred to as Ithna 'Ashariya. So there was one thing I came across in a book and I thought I might introduce later. Well, let me just introduce it now to this book right here. And this is the translation of the book that I introduced last week. So last week I talked about this book and this is the book that recovering by Ayatullah Subhani.

This is the translation of it. I was lucky enough to find it in the center that we're in. So for those who want to find this online, I don't know if they can or not. Ayatullah Subhani, Doctrines of Shi'a, Doctrines of Shi'a Islam. Yeah, and that's him, by the way, Ayatullah Subhani. Of course he was he's a little younger here than he is now.

Anyway, in this book, the translation, the introduction, I noticed that Imamiyyah, are introduced as the ones who believe in the Imamah of Amir al-Mu'minin after the Holy Prophet. But they are different denominations, he was saying. And so he was saying that Imamiyyah encompasses Ismailis, encompasses Zaidis. And I found it to be a little odd, so I contacted some colleagues and I did a little bit more looking and reading and research.

And sure enough, I found that, yes, Imamiyyahonly refers to the Twelver Shi'a and the rest, like the Zaidis and Ismailis, are not referred to as Imamiyyah. But I was kind of surprised that in the introduction to the translation, in the translators forward, he had mentioned this. Now he probably has his own reasoning for that, which I wasn't able to find. As I said, I double checked with with colleagues who teach philosophy and theology as well. And are in Qum, and also I did some more reading myself, and that's what I found.

So anyway, um, that's one thing that we covered. Another thing that I covered was the different ways a person can approach 'aka'id and learning beliefs and the belief system, Islamic beliefs, and that the two approaches are what number one, you can either go in depth and learn all the arguments, or you can just go through all of the tenets of the faith.

Yeah, and not really go into the details and the nitty gritty of the arguments and so on, just because you already believe the faith in its entirety, you just want to know what the faith says. And you trust the scholars of that faith and the ones who have researched enough faith to tell you what that what the mainstream holds when it comes to that faith. So that was another thing we covered. The pros and cons of each of these approaches was covered.

And then we talked about the book that we were going to be covering, which is this Doctrines of Shi'a Islam book, a compendium of Imami beliefs and practices. And I explain what the book is doing. It's going very concise, just covering all the basics. As you will see, though, it's not all basics, but it's keeping it very concise and all the beliefs that the Shi'a school has. So I introduced the book after that and how, you know, he doesn't get into too much reasoning and arguments, although he will have a hint of that here and there as well.

Next thing that I discussed was Ayatollah Subhani himself is, I spoke about his credentials. And I mean, I just scratched the surface. I mean, he's he's huge, as I said before, he's a very great scholar in this contemporary age. Usually, our maraja', they are maraja' of of Islamic law. And when it comes to, like, actually knowing or having been engaged with all the different Islamic sciences out there, you won't find that in all the maraja'. But Ayatullah Subhani, in addition to being one of the maraja' of today, in Qom, he is also known for his theological credentials. In every field you want to talk about, even in, like, uh, books, he has written a book. I don't know how many volumes of his milal and nihal, for example.

What is a marja' have to do with writing a book on milal and nihal, all the different denominations and different sects of Islam and different, maybe even faiths. I don't know, I haven't looked into that book, but he has even a book on that, usul fiqh, everything, everything, history is known for his history books and so on and so forth, lots and lots of books. He is one of the best I say today when it comes to works and actual written works.

So we spoke about him a little bit and then we moved on to whether or not he can represent mainstream Shi'a Islam. I said that he is in one of the mainstream schools and he hears from affiliated with one of those, which is the Howza Ilmiya and the seminary of Qum. If someone is going to represent mainstream Shi'a Islam, usually they're from one of these two seminaries, the one in or the Qum or the one in Najaf right now. But at the same time doesn't mean they're infallible. And we can discuss and debate, you know, and you will see like even tonight, maybe we might get to some places of his book where we might have a different opinion.

Not that I'm somebody, but we want to discuss, you know, and I'll refer to other books by other greats to show that there are sometimes differences of opinion. So that's that's one of the other things that we cover. Does he represent mainstream Islam or not? And finally, or mainstream Shi'a, Islam or not.

And finally, I spoke about the different types of people that are out there. Wa 'alaikum assalam Sister Tayeeba and welcome. The different types of people that are out there when it comes to learning about Islam. Um, some, you know, have already got the basics down and now they're looking for something more. Right. So they'll watch this a few minutes of this session. They'll be like, oh, that's all, you know, basic stuff. We want extra, those people Mizan courses, sometimes we'll go deeper into things. That's what Mizan courses are all about. But these Mizan live sessions, I want to give them as basic as possible, although we're going to cover a lot of stuff, inshaAllah, but I still want this to be addressing a wider audience, these sessions inshaAllah.

And as time goes, you'll see that it's not all of it isn't basic stuff. Yeah. So that's one type of person. And then you have those who don't even know the basics properly, maybe. I just want to make sure that we ironed out all of these wrinkles and make sure that we don't leave anything unaddressed when it comes to Islamic beliefs. Cover as much as we can inshaAllah. Wa 'alaikum assalam Brother Akbar and welcome.

OK, having said all of that, as I said before, this is the English version of the book, I was lucky enough to find it in our center just a few days ago. I was in our center and I was like, you know what? Let me just take a look real quick. Maybe, maybe, one in a million chances, I'll find, you know, they might have this book, and sure enough, I was like, yes, there it is. So I brought it home. Yeah, it has it has the stamp of our center on it so that people would remember to bring it back.

Anyway, anyway, there's an introduction to this. The translator, as I said, has a forward in this book. It's a nice intro, I think. There are a couple of things that I would kind of maybe have reservations on and disagree with, but I'll know it was nice, I liked the way he's introduced the book and then let us move Bismillah Al-Rahman Al-Rahim into the act, the book itself and the first article out of the 150 articles of Shi'a Islam of the Shi'a faith that are covered in this book.

As I said before, he, until the Subhani starts with a little bit of, you know, I don't know if I should call it this or not, but he starts with the epistemology. And I found that other books of theology also do this, like Bidayat Al-Ma'arif al-Ilaheeya of as-Sayyid al-Kharrazi, his name is, who is was also one of the greats in Qum. He also starts about the different turuq for ma'rifa. Turuq means ways, means, ma'rifa means cognition, knowledge. So he also addresses it like that first. Interesting.

So here Ayatullah Subahanee begins with the same concept. Sister Rohee Rizvi, the title of the book you're asking, its Doctrines of Shiite Islam, A Compendium of Imami Beliefs and Practices. As I said before, I found this on Amazon. This title, I don't know if they're still selling it there or just or if the title was just there, I don't know. But I do know that one of the members of our community has ordered it.

I don't know if she received it or not yet, but she said she ordered it and let's see if she receives it. So, I mean, that's if those who were interested in the book, they can order it from there. I say let's let's go through a few sessions and then see if you're even interested in the book. Then you can order it. But whatever it's that's you guys discretion. Brother Shuja says salam, wa 'alaikum assalam. Um. Brother Ali Hakeem, wa 'alaikum assalam, I don't know what you mean exactly by your question. Uh, what's time to you on that channel? I don't know what that means. All right. If you can explain. I appreciate it.

OK, the first article says that in Islam, we have three ways to gain knowledge of anything, ok? Other than these three ways, there is no way to gain knowledge. Now you're thinking, what are they? Are you sure? Let's talk about it. Number one, he says, the senses, the five senses. And he also adds, by the way, he says that each of these three that we're going to cover, they have their own sphere, right, and jurisdiction. It's not like each of these three different means of knowledge, of gaining knowledge, they all cover the same area and territory. No, that's not the case. First, it starts with the senses, of course, the five senses.

Number two, he talks about intellect and 'aql, it's called in Arabic, and number three, he talks about Wahy and revelation and he starts discussing this. He says the first two, which is the five senses and also the 'aql, the intellect says this is something that is, of course, universal, everyone has them. Now, some people will be an exception, and for whatever reason in this natural world will be will lack, maybe, some of the senses or maybe even lack the intellect, and there might not be sane even. But all in all these for those who do enjoy these faculties, these are ways of gaining knowledge of around us, of of anything really.

And we'll talk about what the scope of these are as we go on. But then he talks about the third one, the Wahy and revelation. He says, as you all know, brothers and sisters who were watching, he says this is something that doesn't belong to everybody. Wahy belongs to a select number of people, a select few, even if we believe in 124,000 prophets and we believe all of them received revelation, even if we believe that 124,000 versus the billions and billions of people that have come on the planet and have died, that's still a very insignificant number.

So it's a select number of people who will enjoy this Wahy and revelation. He goes on to say that, there is one more thing out there that we will talk about, he says later, and that is that in our hadiths, in Islamic hadiths, both Shi'a and Sunni, I think, there is mention of people, certain individuals being muhaddath. Muhaddath comes from hadith. Hadith means to, you know, speak, muhaddath is when you are spoken to, a person who is spoken to is referred to as muhaddath.

There are some people who don't receive revelation, he says, but they are muhaddath, according to our are our Islamic traditions and narrations, who will be spoken to. How is that? What is the explanation of that? Is that the same thing as inspiration or not? He says, I'll discuss that later, but for now, let's just keep it to these three, he says. So that's a footnote that he adds that, hey, there is something out there which might be seen as a fourth means of gaining knowledge. OK, going back, in our hadith, for example, we have that Fatimat az-Zahra or even even Salman al-Farsi in Rijal al-Kashi, he talks about how he was muhaddath. OK, so that's something for later.

He talks about the five senses, he says when we talk about senses and these the five material senses that we have that are used to sense different aspects of matter and the material world, he says these can only be used for what, gaining knowledge regarding the mahsusat, those things, which are sensible. Right. So, for example, if my eye doesn't see something, can I necessarily say that it's not there? No, because my eye is made for sensing, sensing things that are visible. Now, whether with the naked eye or with, with help from, you know, any any devices that we have today.

At the end of the day, if my eye is able to see it, that is, then it's there. If my eye is not able to see it, it doesn't necessarily mean that it's not there. So he says the scope of the knowledge that can be gained through sight and through the eyes is those things which are visible in the material world, sometimes some things might not be visible. Right here you can tell that this is where we will separate from what atheists, for example, will say.

Some atheists are not all of them say the same thing or not, because now, even atheism has like 50 different branches, Mashallah. But some atheists will say that I can't see it, I can't if I can't dissect it, if I can't put it under a microscope, it's not there, it doesn't exist, I'm sorry, right.

So that's one. He says in the Qur'an, we have, in the Qur'an we have this, the census is something that have been addressed in the Qur'an. Yes. It reads the verse sort Surat Nahl verse 78. In other words, he wants to say, don't think that this is something that we are injecting into the faith. Like yeah the faith acknowledges the senses, no. The Qur'an also speaks of the senses. "Wa Allah akhrajakum min butuni ummahatikum la ta'lamuna shay'an wa ja'la lakum as-sama'a wa al-asbara wa af'eedata la 'allakum tashkurun" (16:78). Says that Allah's the one who brought you out from the bellies of your mothers, the wombs of your mother's while la ta'lamuna sha'ya, you don't know anything, while you didn't know anything, you were totally ignorant. Wa ja'la lakum as-sama'a wa al-absara wa af'eedata, you were ignorant. He gave you what? Sam, you know, hearing, absar, sight and eyes and visibility, and af'eeda, I'll talk about it in a little bit. OK, so it says you were ignorant. And then what comes opposite to ignorance? eye, hearing and af'eeda. Af'eeda literally means heart, but here it's going to mean something else according to Ayatullah Subhani.

We give you eyes, heart, and hearing or ears, let's say. So these are the opposite of ignorant and ignorance, you were born ignorant, not knowing anything, we gave you these faculties. In other words, these faculties are going to get you out of ignorance. You see how the Qur'an is used here to show that that Allah acknowledges these senses. So if someone wants to go against the senses, there's a problem there. Allah in the Qur'an is saying that this is what's going to bring you out of ignorance. In other words, this is a means of gaining knowledge.

OK, but right here, we have to see, what is the reason for heart, meaning something other than the actual physical heart? Question brothers and sisters, when the heart is pumping, are we gaining knowledge? No, we're not gaining knowledge. The heart is a heart, it's a physical, this is an organ. Yeah. And, but is it like the eye and the ear? Will it give us more knowledge? No, as the heart pumps, even when we're sleeping, the heart is pumping, it doesn't mean that the pumping of the heart is going to give us more knowledge. So here it is meant, they say, is either the heart, heart, you know, that which, you know, we can we feel within us or what the Ayatullaha Subhani says is, no, no, not even that.

Not what we feel within us, you know, the love is in the heart and things like that. No heart here af'eedah means the 'aqud and the intellect. It's been brought next to these other faculties that help us gain knowledge. This is also going to be a means of gaining knowledge. The heart is referring to here as the 'aql. It's interesting that we don't have this word in the Qur'an, 'uqul, but we have a verb form of it. Ya'qeelun, ta'qelun, we have it, so this is also something that's there. OK, so that is the verse he brings for the faculties and the senses.

Sister Sarah explains what Ali Hakeem meant. She says, I think he means what time in your place of residence do you go live? Yeah, so if I if I share that information, then people can guess where I am. But, yeah, we start at 6:00 p.m. where I am. And next week maybe or next sessions that we have, we might change that, so you guys have to make sure stay updated with the flyers that come out as we go on.

What about Wahy now? What about revelation? He says I have a verse for that as well. Of course, I don't think anyone does this, but "wa ma arsanna min qablika illa rijalan nuhi ilaihim fa as'alu ahla al-dhikri in kuntum la ta'lamun" (16:43). Surah Nahl verse 43 talks about how we have sent men before you, nuhi ilaihim, people oh Prophet of Allah, we sent people before you, men before you that we would reveal to them, we would send revelation down on them, fa as'alu ahla al-dhikri in kuntum la ta'lamun. So ask, ask the ones who are the people of remembrance, if you don't know something. In other words, ask these prophets. OK, although ahl al-dhikr is more general than prophets, but that's just how I translated it right now. I want to read off of this part of the translation now and explain as we go on.

Then he goes on, in the end, he says this is a conclusion they want to draw, this is the first article ending, article number one is ending now. Says: the religious person, individual, the religious individual, in acquiring knowledge of the world and of religion, of the world and even of religion, benefits from the senses, but sensible perceptions, you know, the things that we understand, the knowledge we gain through our senses, the sensible perceptions only constitute the empirical foundations of intellectual judgment. In other words, when someone uses their intellect, they will use their intellect to do to to register things and to process things.

But those judgments are based on observations they see outside. So, for example, someone sees the sun is out, their intellect will now process that, that data, that empirical data, and will come to the conclusion that, ok, if the sun is out right now, yeah, if the sun is out right now, then it must be a day. Or if the sun is out right now, it must not be cold outside. You see that the mind is doing something here, the intellect is doing something here, but all this, this whole process and procedure started with empirical data that came through the senses. So that's what he's saying. He says, sensible perceptions only constitute the empirical foundations of intellectual judgment. He benefits from his intellect by acquiring knowledge of God, His attributes and His acts.

So now he's explaining. I don't like the way this is translated, by the way, but he says that, this person will gain knowledge with that, so that was with the with the, uh, excuse me, with the senses, the senses plus the 'aql. And sometimes just the 'aql is going to do work and it's going to gain knowledge of God or the characteristics of God or the actions of God through intellectual endeavor.

Yeah, that's that's what he saying. So he's give an examples of how these are used. The proper utilization, this part's important, the proper utilization of each of these three means within their respective fields, proves their efficacy and the disclosure of the truth. So these three can all respectively be used to uncover some of the truth that's out there around us and to understand some of the truths of the universe, of religion, of God and so on and so forth.

But he says each scope is limited to its and is confined to its restrictions and no more than that. So, for example, for example, I cannot use the senses to figure out what's happening in the grave right now with somebody who has just been buried. Yeah, we can't sometimes we read in our hadiths or in the Qur'an of what a person is going through in those final moments while death is happening and the people are watching and they don't see anything happening to the body, they cannot conclude that, OK, nothing is got nothing is going on here. No, nothing is going on in the material physical world, but you can't rule out other things that might be happening that you can't see.

So here each of them has their own jurisdiction, really. Salam 'alaikum Brother Inayat, welcome. And Brother Akbar, you're asking, is there a difference in the meaning of 'af'eeda and qulub? We'll have to see, that's a tafsiri, uh, discussion, I have to first bring all of the different examples of these terms and see how they've been used. So it's not something I can just answer right away. Yes. So all of these, he says, can be used.

He goes on, he also adds something in the footnote as well, and this is important. He says, tazkiyah and tasfiyah, it's called. These two, in other words, refinement of the soul, from sin and impurities, can also be the cause for certain inspirations to come down on the heart of an individual, he says that. And this itself sometimes can be a means of understanding the truths around us and gaining some form of knowledge. Well, will that be binding? Will that be binding on others, though? No.

Every person who has a religious experience like this, uh, every person has a religious experience like this, it's for themselves. They can't necessarily use it for others and to convince others, maybe some people will believe them, some people won't believe them. It's not always even whether or not that that person went through that experience or had that inspiration or not. It's not always it's not always the problem, the problem is how they interpret it also, which also plays a role in our understanding of of the real world around us, how we use that inspiration to understand what reality is around us.

Anyway, that's a long story itself. All we know, brothers and sisters, is that there are pure individuals out there who are given special spiritual gifts, let's call it from Allah, and after they receive that, they have a better understanding of things than others, their Tawhid is stronger. They see Allah's involvement in the earth, in the world, in the universe, more than others might feel it or see it. Yeah, that is peculiar to them, it's not binding on others.

OK. Oh, look at that, Brother Mohammed Khanee, says that Sheikh Mutahhari Rahmatullah alayh, mentions the verse in his book, the same verse, al-'af'eeda, that I said, as a proof for the heart being a tool to gain a sort of knowledge, through tasfiyahtu al-nafs, so just explain that, yeah. Yes, so what is Sheikh Ja'far Subhani reasoning for this, he has now explained it in the book. He has not explained it in his book, he just says that here af'eeda means 'aql. He doesn't really explain what his reasoning is. As I said, this is a very concise book.

But if you paid attention in the beginning when I was explaining, I said af'eeda it can mean either the heart that we feel through, you know, or it can be the heart, meaning the 'aql, it can be one of these two, I didn't really touch on the first one because that heart is the first meaning of the heart that I didn't explain much is what is meant here when it says the one that the container in which inspiration goes to and ilham goes to.

Yes. Brother Shuja asks, how do we gain these gifts of Allah? Well, it just said it right now, tasfiyah al-nafs, tasfiyah al-nafs, refining the soul. How do we refine the soul? How do we refine the soul? It's through obeying Allah Subhana wa Ta'ala through everything he wants us to obey him through. So when Allah says this is wajib on you, you do the wajib acts of Allah. When he says this is haram on you, you stay away from it. You become an 'abd and servant of Allah. Prove to Allah that everything that matters to Him is His satisfaction through the wajibat and the harams, all of them, all of them, not just salat and fasting and so on.

No, no, no. That's part of it, it's not all of it. How you deal with your spouse at home, how you deal with your parents and siblings at home, how you are at work, in school, the backbiting, the haram interactions, the gender interaction, all these things, all of these things, interest and haram, interest, maybe sometimes, you know, lots and lots of things when it comes to our money issues. Haram and wajib of Allah encompass all of our lives, brothers and sisters. And I know I'm going on a tangent here a little bit, but if a person wants to receive the gifts of Allah, they have to continue being an 'abd of Allah through the wajib and haram, at least, and continue that and not even wait for the gifts of Allah.

You see, that itself is a problem. Some people, they are obedient servants of Allah because they want the gifts. No, no, no, no. Those special gifts in this life, if Allah wants to give it to you, He gives it to you. If it doesn't, He's going to give it to you in the Akhirah.

So we're going to work for our Akhirah through the wajib and haram and observance of the wajib and haram of Allah. If he gives us more bonuses in this life, al-Hamdulillah if He doesn't, He's going to make sure to give it all to us on the other side. Right. So for now, we have to learn all of our wajib and harams, not just fasting and prayer, all of the wajib and harams that I gave examples of, number one. And then number two, once we learn them, we have to apply them and act upon them, no matter how hard it's going to be. OK, so I guess that covers everything so far of questions.

All right, so that's the first article it goes through. Wow, what time is it? Took us about 20 minutes to go through this one. Let's go to the second article, now, I want to try to go as fast as I can, but at the same time, I don't want to compromise the explanations either. I want to make sure that we explain everything and go through all the questions as well. And I like how you guys are asking questions. Thank you so much, gives me energy as well. All right. oh Mohammad Khanee, angushstaran adushtraha rasish, let's see. I don't know if you noticed or not.

Anyway, article number two. Article number two is, that the prophets of God, they came, they came for two things. Number one, belief, number two, action, very simple. When it comes to beliefs, he starts explaining. How these beliefs were supposed to gain them and then he talks about actions in the wajib and haram, as I said, and those laws of God, how we're supposed to figure those out. So there are two major things we need to talk about here. He says the prophets came with this.

We have to figure them out, figure out our proper beliefs and the proper actions that Allah wants from us. Number one, the beliefs. Let's talk about that a little bit. There are five points here that I want to mention about what he says. Ayatullah Subhani says here, I like the wording he uses. But in the end, he kind of says something that, you know, I might have a little bit of a want to discuss with you guys, see what you guys think.

He says, when it comes to the beliefs, when it comes to the beliefs, that which has to take place, is that a person has certainty regarding these beliefs, OK. Yaqeen and conviction when it comes to these beliefs. So, for example, if I'm not sure if God is one or not, then we have a problem, right? If I'm not sure that God like the Holy Prophet is the prophet of God, we have a problem. I have to be sure about these things, to be deemed a Muslim, to be deemed a believer. Now the question is, how can one gain yaqeen and conviction? Is any form of gaining conviction and yaqeen, enough or not?

Ayatullah Subhani, here, he says that, let me just read off of what he says of the translation, the second paragraph here. The aim of right belief is knowledge and certainty, yaqeen, conviction, he says. Naturally, it is only decisive, self-evidence, hujjah, that can lead the way to this certainty. Thus, it is incumbent, (I'll explain all of this, by the way, then just go through it) incumbent on every Muslim to attain certainty in his beliefs on his own account. So far, so good. He cannot simply resort to imitation, taqleed or blindly following, of others when it comes to this issue. That's what he says.

Two words and two key words and terms that we have here. One, yaqeen, two, taqleed. He says if you want to have these beliefs that the prophets came with, you have to have yaqeen and them, but a yaqeen that doesn't come and is not a result of doesn't come out of and is not a result of taqleed and just following others. In other words, in other words, based on the wording he uses here, if a person believes in God, but not because they've come to the conclusion themselves, but they're just blindly following others, then that is a problem. OK.

This is different then when it comes to the actions, the wajib and haram, the laws of deen, the laws of faith, it's a little different then that. When it comes to those taqleed, it is a widely accepted concept. Yeah, I can't do 67 years of studying in the howza to come up with what Islam wants of me when it comes to all of the laws of Islam. No. I let other experts do the work and I just, you know, follow whatever their verdicts are. That's OK, they say, that it doesn't have to do with beliefs, that's the actions part. The belief part, they say you can't do that. You can't let others do the work for you and then just follow what they say. OK. I need to talk about this a little bit. I will agree and disagree at the same time, OK?

Yes, I personally will agree, and I'll also read off of some books of other great scholars who because if I give you another opinion, I'll tell you if it's only my opinion or if it's other scholars opinion as well. I personally will agree with the notion that if a person lets others do the do the research for them and just follows whatever they come up with, even if it doesn't help them gain certainty, that would be a problem. So, for example, I tell my friend here, I tell my friend, hey, let's think of a random name, Zaid, hey Zaid, can you go do some research for me and see if God is one or not? He goes and does research. He's like, yeah, God is One and I'm like, oh, OK, I mean, since you said so.

That's not enough because I, I don't that's not a belief actually that I have. It's just me following someone else. Right? It's not a real belief, it's just me following someone else. If you open up my heart, will you find me believing in that, necessarily. Not necessarily. Right? Because, because that person did the research, I didn't do the research. And when he told me, it still didn't make me 100 percent sure, but, you know, just because he said so I'm following that will probably be a problem.

And I hope these examples don't confuse you. So if you have any questions, please, please ask. And I will repeat and I will explain again and again. These are very important issues, these are not just rulings of Islam, these are the beliefs and the belief system of Islam, so we need to talk about them. So just blindly following in that sense is a problem. But, but, what if I trust someone more than myself?

And when that person comes to me and says that they are a prophet of God and I believe them 100 percent and I believe their message 100 percent. Yes, is that going to be a problem now that I believe in what they say? Is it or is it not? Brothers and sisters, in the past, during the Prophet's time, even, there were people that embraced Islam and embraced the message of the Holy Prophet because of the high, lofty character of the Prophet, that was it really.

True the Prophet will also recite verses of the Qur'an as well. But you have to add to the equation the Prophet's character. As a matter of fact, one of our teachers, once he narrated this hadith, I haven't found it yet myself, but he was telling us about it, that the Prophet would complain to Allah Subhana wa Ta'ala. And he would say and he would say that, oh Allah, he would complain to Allah that my people are not believing in me while they see me. He didn't say while they recite the verses of the Qu'ran, while I recite the verses of the Qur'an to them, no, he didn't say that. He says, while I am amongst them and they're seeing me, the Prophet's character was so high that if he was going to say some of the people were supposed to take it, as a matter of fact.

And he actually uses that argument in the beginning when he comes and calls the people to Islam for the first time. Yeah, we've all heard the story, how he came and he asked the people, hey, people, if I tell you that there is an enemy behind this mountain coming to attack you, will you believe me or not? And they said, yes, we will believe you. So he says things like this first to remind them of who he is and then he delivers the message of Islam for the first time openly to them. Yeah. Sometimes following Islam, excuse me, following somebody works, sometimes it counts. What matters, though, is this, that when I reach 110 percent conviction and yaqeen from what they say. Right? Or else we're going to be in big trouble, because a girl nowadays who turns baligh when she is nine, for example, based on the fatawa or the verdicts of contemporary maraja'.

Yeah. She turns nine. Do you think that she can philosophically now prove God's existence and then prove the necessity of prophethood and then imams and then resurrection? Hurry up, tell me. She's like nine years old now, 15, 20 years old. Some people that are in their 40s right now, they can't even argue and bring arguments for their beliefs. Lots of times we're born into the faith. Who are we kidding? Who are we kidding now? Now, I want to talk about each of these separately. So, number one. OK, so this was all just an introduction.

Number one, how much time do I have I got time. Oh, thank you, al-hamdillah Ameer Haidarm you say you're not confused. OK, that's good. Number one, I want to talk about is I want to go to the other book that I mentioned a couple of times in this session, Bidayat al-Ma'arif al-Ilahiya of Ayatullah al-Kharrazi, Sayyid Mohsen al-Kharrazi. Let me see what let's see what it says here. He's also alive today. He's also very spiritual individual and his salat al-jama'a in Qum is very famous as well and people go there. Every now and then, you know, when you feel down, spiritually, that's one of the salat al-jama'a that you go to in Qum. Those were the days really. We don't have those masjid's here too much in this part of the world. Anyway, where you have a great figure that's known spiritually.

Anyway, in this book of his, he says, I don't want anyone in any center to say, oh, but in our center, we're very spiritual. I said some, I said will have too many. Maybe there are some out there I don't know about.

OK, so he says that he brings about this whole argument or this whole discussion of, hey, wait, wait a minute, hold your horses. Who says taqleed is always a problem when it comes to our beliefs? Not that it's encouraged, but if someone reaches conviction and yaqeen, 100 percent, can we call them out on that and say, hey, your faith is problematic, because you don't know the arguments to prove God's existence?

No, no, no, no, no. Some people just read some Qur'an and they're like, you know what, this is the faith. Some people convert to Islam because of a few verses of the Qur'an. You know, you have people turning away from Islam as well. I don't want to rule that out and turn a blind eye to it like some people like to. But the number of people that are embracing the faith is multifold versus, you know, the ones who might leave the religion.

Yeah. Why? Do all of them hear all the philosophical arguments and go through all the theological debates and stuff? No, no, no, no, no. As a matter of fact, if you talk to ten people who embrace the faith, you'll find that it's not the theological arguments and the pristine, flawless, invincible proof, philosophical proof that brings them to the faith, for God's sake.

There's this beautiful masjid in Germany, Hamburg, Germany, the Shi'a mosque imam, the Imam Ali Mosque. I've been there and it's beautiful, really. And it was built by the order of Ayatullah al-Burujeri in his time. There are people, the people that are there, they tell me, the ones who run the mosques. Some of the sheikhs that I know, they tell me that every day there are a few people who come there and because of the mosque, they convert to Islam. That's pretty interesting to me. Now, whether that's true or not, that's on them. But that's what I've been told. Right. This this faith has no value now, just because it was because there's no argumentation involved.

Let's see what they say here. Ayatollah Kharrazi in his book, he says, I'll read this in Arabic and I'll translate for those of you, because I know there are some of you understand Arabic watching right now. Thumma innahu hal yatahaqqaq al-wajib al-madhkur bil tahseel al-'ilm wa law min al-taqleed am la yakfi ila ma yakun mustanadan ila al-daleel. Yeah. Do we have to? Is is faith and and yaqeen that we have, does it only have to be based on intellectual endeavor or not? Even if it comes from taqleed? Because there are 10 people that I look up to in life and they've done research and they've all come to the conclusion that Islam is the way. So I'm going to also embrace Islam and learn about Islam. This is no good. Now, why? Because you didn't do a study yourself.

I trust these individuals. Yeah. And I'm going to. And if they're going to come to this conclusion, then I'm going to also come to this conclusion. He says, no, that's not the case. He starts mentioning a few names here and he ends with the name of al-Sheikh al-Ansari, this is on page 13 of Bidayat al-Ma'arif of volume number one. He says Sheikh al-Ansari, which is the last of the greats that he mentions here, he says, ankara Sheikh al-'adham, luzum kauneehim min al-daleel.

He says, no, no, no, no, no. Who said you have to necessarily go through all the arguments of God first before you can embrace a faith and that faith is accepted by God. Who said that? No, he says all that matters is that you reach 'ilm and yaqreen, even if it comes through following what others have done. So if I tell my friend, hey, I really believe in you, should you go look into this new faith for me?

And he does that and he comes to the conclusion that that is the right fit and then I embrace it as well, because I have 100 percent trust in this friend of mine. That counts. That counts. Yes. If I don't become 100 percent sure just because he did it, I'm going to do it. That's that's that's that's going to be problematic. But if I really gain faith and conviction as a result, that doesn't count in worship. Sheikh al-Ansari here is saying it's OK. And then Ayatullah Kharrazi concludes, he says, fal akwa kama dhahaba ilahee al-sheikh as sheikh says, Sheikh al-Ansaree says, I also believe that you, if you gain conviction and yaqeen and 'ilm through others, that is also fine and it counts.

Fala daleel 'ala luzoom az-za'id 'alay, this is awesome. He says there is no reason, to push people for more than that, there's no reason. Show me proof, show me a daleel that says, if you have conviction and yaqeen in Allah, in Islam and the Holy Prophet, that it has to come out of argumentation necessarily. It has to have an intellectual backing necessarily. Not necessarily, he says, if really you have conviction and yaqeen, that counts and you're good. Back then, the Bedouins of back then, do you think that they would make sure that they go to some philosophical class? There was no philosophy back there back then in the Arabian Peninsula. And they're going to go like, do, you know that kind of stuff before they actually believe in God? Or the guy, the guy's a shepherd who while he goes out, he looks around and sees this guys is like, man, you know what? The guys are so big, look at everything is working fine. I believe in God. That's about it. Like, nothing very special about that.

Or like a lady in that famous story or hadith where the Prophet asks her, hey, how do you know God exists? She says, look at how I'm spinning this wheel and making yarn as I spin this wheel, things are moving, I have to be moving with my hands. So this whole universe is spinning and moving around, everything is getting done, there is no God, there's no one like really on top of it, on top of things. For some people, this will be a very flawed argument. For some people looking at the sky and coming to the conclusion that there is a God, that's not a good argument because there's 50 problems with it, philosophically, they'll say. This is the argument from design, there's a million problems with it for some people that works though. So now their yaqeen, their conviction has no value? No brothers or sisters, it seems like that wouldn't be the case.

So we have to be very careful with our wording here and not to turn people away from the religion. Why? Because of these things. The person, here's one verse of the Qur'an and they didn't even know Arabic there, they just hold the translation and they're like, you know what, I really believe in this, I believe in this faith. That's not enough. OK? I think I give enough examples and I showed how much this means to me as well. So this yaqeen, that's coming from means like this, it holds value, brothers and sisters.

Another point that I want to make is that blindly following, is a problem, though, I just need to give an explanation. Brother Akbar says, So if we follow someone we 100 percent trust and believe in, isn't that itself a logical argument? So it's not blind following. Exactly. Very good. We have to talk about this. Mashallah. That's very good.

When, during the Prophet's time, the Prophet would call out the mushriqeen for taqleed. OK. He would call them out for taqleed. I want to I want to I want someone might come up to us and say, hey, you're saying that following others when it comes to the faith is enough, right? Following. If I'm born into the faith and my parents, I trust them and I follow them because they're Muslim, I Muslim, so that's that's enough. If that's the case, then why is it that during the Prophet's time and with the Qur'an, it calls out the mushrikeen who use the argument of, I do I am an idolater because my parents and our forefathers did the same thing. Yeah. What's the verse? It says, when they're asked why, "wa jadna 'alaehee aba'ana" (2:170), this is what our forefathers would do, so we're going to follow them. When they're asked, why do you pray to these idols that you've built with your own hands? The answer is that this is what our forefathers would do.

Those who say, this is a person that I'm playing devil's advocate right now, those who say that it's OK to follow others when it comes to the faith, their reasoning and argument is the same argument that the mushrikeen used when they wanted to do what they did of worship, of idols. There's no difference. So why are you using that same argument? Answer. There's a big difference. The big difference is that that's blindly following. This is not blindly following.

Well, what constitutes blindly following? How what is a sign of blindly following? A sign of blindly following, is that when an argument or a counter-argument to your faith and to your belief or the way you have been all your life is presented, you don't leave it unaddressed. These mushrikeen, what they would do was they would worship the idols, someone comes up to them who is a prophet, whether it's Prophet Ibrahim, whether it's our Holy Prophet or any other prophet and says, hello, did you did it, wasn't this like a big block of wood two days ago? Yes, it was. And then did you use your own hands to chip away at it to make this idol? Yes, I did. So how is it that a piece of wood that needed your help to come into existence is now being worshiped by by you? Their answer was, well, our fathers did it. The counter-argument to that or the answer to that was, well, what if your fathers were wrong?

Think about it a little bit. Instead of thinking about it and figuring it out logically, they're like, no, no, no, I'm going to refute you with the argument that my father did it. That's not enough now. So, for example, for example, if a person, who's who who trusts ten people and there are ten people who tell him that, look, we're turning Muslim, for example, or we're embracing the faith and we believe in God now, and he also believes in God because they believe in God.

If someone comes up to them, this person now who has believed in God because of his ten friends and asked him a question of, hey, you believe in God? Yes, I do. Then why is it that there's so much suffering in the world and God doesn't do anything about it? This person better have an answer for it. They can't just say, well, it's because my friends said so. See, there's a big difference here. Yes, sometimes you'll see my friends, they've also done the research regarding that as well. And they have said to me that there is an answer for that and I believe them, that also would work. But if this person just says, you know what, I'm not I don't care what you're saying, my answer to you is that my friend said so then yes, we will have a problem.

So there's a difference between these. A person who believes because of other reasons other than argumentation, and then a day when a challenge is posed to them, they'll address it, they'll have to think about it. This is blindly following in that sense, like the mushrikeen had. It has a lot more to talk about here, but that's all in a nutshell. I said last week, we don't want to spend too much time on each article, but we're spending a lot of time, although these are the foundations of our beliefs. So I think it's worth it.

Now, having said that, this this idea I've seen this in some of our lectures today, that who travel here and there and lecture in different communities, I've noticed this as well. They will call out people who don't study and do research into their religion, into these foundational beliefs of their religion. And they'll they'll sound like, you know, this person who hasn't done research in their religion, what good is their religion? They have to go, or some people say your faith is not worth anything until you study all the faiths in the world, disprove all of them, and then believe in Islam. Ok. This, I will have I personally will have a problem with because that is not how it has been in history. If you say that, then lots of the people out there, trust me, their religions are going to be problematic and their faith is going to be problematic. No, it doesn't seem like that Islam would push for such a thing.

You find in the Qur'an, of course, ta'keelun, ya'qeelun 'afala ya'qeelun, do they not think. But we're talking about these things, they're talking about what the people would do that would go against the intellect. Yeah. So if it's something that goes against the intellect, your reasoning better being more than just, hey, my my forefathers said so, it better be more than that. But when it comes to believing in God and in something that, you know, all of this, all the fine tuning is falling back on, then that's not something that intellectually doesn't make sense.

Allah says, even with that, you can think about it more as well, no problem at all. Brother Ali Rizvi, if a believer is asked the theological question over their faith and they're unable to answer it, would it be necessary for them to find out the answer one way or another? Or would it be enough for them to say, I trust the intellect of the religion and I know it has an answer, even if I don't know. This is a very good question and it's a continuation of what we're discussing as well.

Brothers and sisters, there's this thing out there nowadays, it's so big that, hey, we should be able to answer all the atheists out there. And not only that, we should be able to bring everyone into the faith as well. That's how solid arguments are, arguments are. Brothers and sisters, no, I'm sorry. Intellectual arguments, first of all, let me say, people are different, intellects are different, intellectual capacities are different, philosophies are different.

At the end of the day, the filter through which the reality and truth goes through is the mind of men. So as there are all these filters that knowledge goes through, that reality goes through, our perception of a reality is different than others. Lots of our judgments and beliefs aren't even based on ration, they're based on what we're influenced by our feelings. Someone has been hurt as a youth, as a child. And so now you know, they're going to hate religion no matter what.

And they will find ten arguments against it, while the reason for it wasn't even arguments, the reason for it was that they've been through a hard time in their lives, you know, as the youth. A person is struggling financially, they're they're take on God or perspective, God is going to be different. This idea of me being able to answer other people's questions, I'm not saying this is what you're asking, I'm just saying this on the side, I'm just ranting a little bit here. This idea, get it out of our minds. If anyone's watching these sessions, by the way, thinking, OK, after this, I'll be able to prove God to everybody, don't please don't continue. That's not what we're after. We're just trying to learn our own faith and the tenets of our own faith. OK? Having said that, you're saying now, Ali Rizvi, you're saying that if I can't answer the question, then I should, you know, should I go and research and find the answer, at least for myself?

The answer to your question Ali Rizvi, in my opinion, is if the question that's posed to you causes doubt within you, then, yeah, it is necessary for you to go figure it up. But sometimes certain questions are asked and are thrown our way and we don't know the answer to it, but we know that Islam has an answer for it and we've accepted Islam in its entirety, the Qur'an, it's it's in its entirety. Not necessarily, it's not necessarily the case that you're gonna have to go figure it out, now. Someone will ask, well, the Qur'an says that Prophet Musa's dad was a mushrik. How is it that you Shi'as believe anyone who is going to be infallible, whether it's prophet or imam, his father and his lineage should all be people who were not mushrik, it says in the Qur'an.

Le abeehe Azar (6:74), his father, Azar was a mushrik. And you're like, you know what? I never thought of it like that. I don't know what the answer is. Now, you'll be pretty sure that the Ulama have an answer or the Qur'an has an answer, there is an explanation. Do you have to go necessarily figure that out as long as it doesn't hurt your fundamental beliefs? No, you don't have to necessarily go and figure it out. OK.

So let's move on now. Last point that I want to say here is that, having said all of that, that the faith of an individual will have value, even if they haven't gone through all these arguments and so on. Still, we have to understand that a person who has figured things out for themselves, you know, of course, relative to the capacity, the intellectual capacity Allah has gifted them with, this person, the person who actually researches does the work and comes to certain conclusions. Of course they will, that that person's beliefs will have more value.

Yeah, there has value and it's something that has more value than maybe someone who just believed because of, you know, because he has a bunch of friends that he trusts, like his own like his own siblings. And because of that, he's following them, you know, no no, no. That person's faith, at the end of the day is going to be much more immune to the challenges that are thrown his way, that come his way, yeah, because he's done the work, she's done the work, it's different.

So that having said all of that does, I'm not trying to undermine the ones who actually go do research, go do work, go read and try to strengthen their faith. OK, that itself that we have ahadith for it, all over the place that a person who has learned, a person who has taffaquh in the religion, meaning they've gone gone deep into the religion, learned more about it. Of course, these people are going to be much higher in that sense, and what they do has more value Islamically as well. We have some interesting hadiths in that regard.

So, yes, of course, that is something and then, of course, in addition to all of that, there have to be people out there, individuals out there who go and do extra study, even though they don't need it, for their own conviction, but extra study to see what, for example, Western philosophy says, to see what contemporary theology says. What are the challenges of today? What are what is science proving today that might go against, you know, that might undermine the faith of certain people? They have to go and do that research as well so that they can also protect and preserve the faith and the religion. The religion, brothers and sisters, it has answers. They just have to be uncovered and fished out sometimes from the sources and the scripture and the text that we have

Brother Akbar says, we've proven God as classes, that is an inside joke for those of you who know. LOL, for those who don't know, it's OK. It's nothing. It's not too important. All right. So that concludes today. I had gone to article actually four and prepared for article four, but we got through our two articles. But Hamdillah I think, I think it was pretty good. So I just want to say that next week we're not going to have a session.

And please, please do check the page, whether our website, whether it's our website, Mizaninstitute.org or the Facebook page for updates on the January schedule, we have to go on a monthly, bi monthly basis on a monthly basis. Every month is going to be different because of the commitments that me and Sheikh Mehdi have here and there or with our own centers. So we there will be a timetable on a monthly basis of the sessions. So, for example, you will know that for January we're going to have a class for this on this date, this this date, this date.

OK, so just look out for that and or watch out for that or I don't know, keep an eye out for that. And probably I'm going to try my best to do that on my next session on the 2nd of January. So that is only one week off, which is the 26th of December. I'm going to trying my best to do that. But as I said, for the final verdict, you have to, you'll have to just check the Facebook page or the website for for those updates inshaAllah. Keep us on your du'as, inshaAllah you all have a good winter break, a winter break of taqwa and closeness to Allah. And also a good time with your families wherever you are and keep us in your du'as inshaAllah. Al-Hamdulillah Rabb al-Alameen wa assalamu alayuikum wa Rahmatullah.