Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Imam al-Ghazali's Faysal al-Tafriqa - I love it!

As for yourself, if your aim is to extract this rancour from your heart and from the hearts of those like you who are not seduced by the provocations of the envious and not afflicted by that blindness that condemns people to being led around by others (taqlid), but who instead thirst for insight into some of the agonizings that result from the obscurities engendered by systematic thinking and stirred up by speculative inquiry, then address yourself and your companion and ask him for a definition of 'Unbelief'. If he claims that the definition of 'Unbelief' is that which contradicts the Ash'arite school, or the Mu'tazilite school, or the Hanbalite school, or any other school, then know that he is a gullible, dim-witted fellow who is stifled by his enslavement to blind following. In fact, he is blinder than the blind. So do not waste your time trying to reform him. For it would be enough to silence him that you compare his claim with those of his opponents, since he will not find any difference between him and the rest of those who blindly follow some other school in opposition to him.
-On the Boundaries of Theological Tolerance in Islam: Abu Hamid al Ghazali's Faysal al Tafriqa (Studies in Islamic Philosophy, V. 1), translated by Dr. Sherman Abdal-Hakim Jackson, pg. 88-89.

2 comments:

  1. awesome quotes... that book had so many memorable quotes... and every time I read it, it refreshes itself.

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  2. it is so awesome! I just recently finished the actual text and ma sha Allah what a book - you get Dr. J for an amazing, insightful two part introduction and then you get his translation of al-Ghazali!

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