Our search for knowledge

"The one who seeks knowledge is like a warrior in the cause of religion for the way of Allah." (Imam Ali a.s.)

Do you have enough knowledge to call yourself a warrior for the way of Allah? No, nor do I. No doubt at one point or another we find ourselves motivated to learn, to seek knowledge by way of lectures and reading - more often then not this commonly occurs during the first 10 days of Muharrum but soon enough we find ourselves increasingly distracted and subsequently find it hard to fit in the time to make an effort to seriously learn, revise and spread our knowledge of Islam.

Our basic Islamic understanding tends to come from the education provided by our parents or perhaps the few years spent at the Saturday/Sunday madressa, but how much of that knowledge do we retain today, and how much more have we sought ourselves? The information we have learnt from a lecture or a book is only one step in increasing our knowledge. Studies have shown that knowledge can only stay fresh in the human mind for a short period of 24hrs after which it needs to be revised in order for it to be retained. After listening to lectures, ask me what I learnt the next day and the information is limited.

Either out of laziness or naivety, we don't tend to enhance what we have learnt from lectures with further revision. I often think that when the time comes, I'll be able to seek the knowledge from various books or knowledgeable friends, but rarely make the effort to search for knowledge out of choice. It is important to know about the basic Islamic beliefs. I'm sure like me you find yourself in debates with Sunni's or non-Muslims and often come unstuck when your are unable to identify a viewpoint they have as incorrect. You know it's wrong, but can't back it up. The historical fact or quranic verse or narration of that particular event is missing from your mind and you end up looking foolish. 

For us Shias it's even more important. There are several topics that are controversial for Sunnis and it's important to be able to talk about them with the correct information. I've previously touched upon temporary marriage and dissimulation and there are other topics which seem to be unique to the Shias although backed up by the Quran and Ahl-Bayt, and often cause great difficulty for us simply because we don't have the knowledge to back ourselves.

Islamic law and jurisprudence is arguably the most difficult simply because of the level of detail that is needed to have a proper understanding. However, even if we stick to the basics, how much knowledge do we have? Do we know what invalidates our prayers, what breaks our ablution, what needs to be performed after certain events? It is not good enough to simply argue that our intentions are pure and therefore God will accept our mistakes or lapses. When we have the ability to learn and clarify our practices, then there can be no excuse for being lazy - shaitan thrives on this laziness and lures us into a false sense of security.

I remember a hadith as a child (I don't have the authentic source unfortunately) where a man dreams about the shaitan. He sees him in a room lining up some equipment - a rope, a pipe, some string, a tree trunk etc. He asks him what is he doing. The shaitan replies that he's preparing his tools for distracting people during their prayers. Some people's faith and concentration is so strong that only a push with the tree trunk can distract them, for others a rope is sufficient to distract them and others, a piece of string. The man asks what he needs in order to distract the Prophet, the shaitan says that no power on Earth can distract the Prophet during his namaaz. The man confident about his namaaz having learnt it from the Prophet, asked the shaitan what he used to distract him. The shaitan put all his equipment away and said for you I don't need any of this, just a pull on my little finger is enough to distract you.

Ever since I've heard this hadith, I've always thought is shaitan using only his little finger to distract me? Sometimes it is so easy to get distracted. To strengthen our concentration we need more knowledge of what namaaz means and how important it is. We can't just say that our intention was pure, we need to constantly strive to improve our concentration levels at all times. Maybe then the shaitan will need to use something stronger to distract us - we can safely say that he won't give up - but our struggle to defy him can get stronger with more knowledge.

Having identified what we need to do, what is the best way to achieve it? Starting from scratch would be the best bet. Identifying the basics of Islam - the wajab and haram acts and then checking how much of it do we actually know. There are plentiful sources online such as Al-Islam.org and Madressa.net, both have excellent resources of knowledge, easily navigated and easy to read.

After exploring the basics, reading books which go into more depth will make more sense. Al-Islam.org has a vast amount of lectures and literature composed by a variety of scholars, our Imams and the Holy Prophet. There are also quite a few resources for watching lectures online such as ShiaTV.net and AIMIslam.org which again are a useful source of knowledge and information.

Armed with this ever increasing knowledge will not only increase our faith and beliefs and thus bring us closer to God, but also allow us to engage in debate and discussion with confidence and a certain level of authoritativeness. Obviously people will always try to catch us out, but having more and more information can only help. If you get a chance and inshallah have the motivation, check out the above sites and see what you make of it all. I particularly recommend the fact sheets of Shi'ism as a starting point, indeed many of you might recognise them from my blogs which have been based on them in the past and no doubt I'll be referring to them again in the future at some stage.

Before wrapping up, I want to congratulate Liverpool for the sumptuous thrashing of Manchester United last week and then commiserate as once again they face Chelsea in the quarter-final of the Champions League - it's going to be tense once again and I always hate the tension that surrounds these games, being a supporter is not that much fun.

Lastly, the new series of The Apprentice starts next Wednesday. It's always been entertaining for one thing - how dumb the candidates are. No matter what their background, some of the things they try in their tasks are just so inane, you wonder how Sir Alan could hire any of them. Should be entertaining.

Take care all,

Thoughts just flow, when do they have to make sense?