IDEA 53
How to Read the Qur’an (in my opinion) 1
Truly this Qur’an guides to what is straightest and provides glad tidings to believers who do good deeds that they will have a great reward. / And that for unbelievers in the Everafter We have prearranged a painful punishment. (Q17:8-9)
The term aqwam is actually much broader in scope than “straightest.” It encompasses the ideas of correctness, appropriateness, moral rectitude, permanence, and a host of other meanings.
One could start out by saying that one has to be straight and honest to appreciate the straightness of the Qur’an. A newcomer to Islam (as I was nearly 50 years ago) will immediately be struck — yes, struck — by how direct, emphatic, and peremptory the message of the Qur’an is on first reading. That impression, if one is reading it straightly, i.e., correctly, should persist. Some of the passages are sharp or biting to the point of feeling brutal. If you want your sensitivities protected and insist on safe (mental) spaces in your life, as so many supposedly tolerant moderns do, then you may soon find the Qur’an to be unwelcoming and intransigent. GOD does not mind too much if you find HIs Word distasteful or offensive. After all, He created you and set you down in an environment where you chose to cultivate those precious proclivities of yours. He has been dealing with proud, spoiled people like you ever since he moulded the first man out of clay.
So get ready for a rough ride in this rodeo of the soul. The most serviceable saddle you could obtain for the spiritual adventure awaiting you is the habit of suspending judgement. The mental and emotional equipment you are bringing to the Qur’an is going to collide with a text that was designed to rearrange your internal furniture. What you have at present is somewhat off, or crooked, which implies that you are looking askance at what could be seen the right way if you would just change your position. Changing people’s minds is easy for GOD to do if He wanted to do it … but He wants you to do it. The only way you can acquire the skills of self-examination, self-motivation, and self-improvement in this setting is to get down on your knees, put your head on the floor, and confess that you are not yet fit to judge that of which you have but a little knowledge (Q17:85). You may never be fit … but you have a resource that many knowledgeable people lack.
That resource is faith. The glad tidings, i.e., the reassuring and pleasant parts of the Qur’an, are intended solely for readers who intend to straighten up, endure some remorse, humiliation, and mental suffering, and trust that the One prescribing this course of action knows, and so has decreed, that all knowledge should have preconditions. If you do not understand everything, that simply means you are not ready for everything. Based on what makes sense, appeals to your highest principles, and reorders your priorities in a way that is simple, moderate, and sustainable — and that is 99% of the Qur’an — you can trust in the ultimate truth of the 1% that is too abstract or unfathomable for your modern mind.
If everything in the Qur’an made sense right away, and in the way that you are accustomed to think and feel, then that would not just be a suit perfectly tailored for you; it would be a straitjacket. Your mind and soul need room to gain new perspectives, to try out new thoughts, and to outgrow childish preferences and prejudices. But please realize that this book is not just for you and your needs; it has to serve the urgent demands of all humanity. So in reading the Qur’an, remember that this is not a scholarly work (though scholars can have a field day in it.) It was meant for ordinary people — the kind of people GOD made in the millions and billions — to read as their daily spiritual sustenance. The Qur’an brings you down to the level of humanity, in case you thought that you were better (and you are not), and simultaneously raises you to a level where you can look out and see what angels have been testifying to from the beginning of Creation.
On the other hand, you will not really start to feel the power and warmth of the Qur’an, once you have committed yourself to it, disciplined yourself with its help, taken it all on trust, and lowered yourself to the point where you are bowing with those who bow (Q2:43) until you have made yourself at home inside it and discovered how it speaks unerringly and especially to you. Some people say that they get that from the Bible or the Bhagavad Gita or the Tao Te Ching. I doubt it. Those books were composed by humans and bear the marks of having been edited repeatedly over centuries to satisfy a particular class or group with certain vested interests. None of those books can come close to what is, in my opinion, the dominant feature of the Qur’an — one that I felt almost immediately, namely the Voice of Divinity. This is the Word of GOD. It says so, repeatedly, and you recognize that instinctively.
AL-LAH spoke to one man, the Prophet Muhammad (may GOD bless him and give him peace) over the course of twenty-three years, but His Message was so grand and yet so meticulous in its style and substance that it speaks to me directly. It asks me to look past what other people are saying about it and receive it directly — straightly, the way it was intended. Yes, I might need help with interpretive tools from time to time — this hadith or that tafsir or translation — but ultimately this Book was meant for me. Once you get that feeling, then you are on the straight path to truly believing in the Everafter, a moment when you will ‘see’ AL-LAH. Suddenly, but quietly, things become clearer than they ever were before.
Still, you must go on. You will not want to stop. GOD does not stop, and neither should you.
Download the PDF version for free at Ideas Inspired by the Qur’ān – Mont Redmond complete version, or purchase a hard copy at Ideas Inspired by the Qur’an: Redmond, Mont: 9781738842506: Books – Amazo
