Caption
Islam: The AND Logic of Surah Al-Asr of the Holy Qur’an,
Chapter 103*
Caption
Full text of Surah Al-Asr, Chapter 103 of the Holy Qur'an
Reproduced
above is the full recipe of the pithy Surah Al-Asr of the Holy Qur'an
for a noble life which is “not in a state of loss”.
Notice
what's stated and what's omitted in this self-sufficient tiny Surah
which evidently requires reflection in inverse proportion to its
length.
There
is no reference to Muslims, or to Islam, or to any particular people
or religion.
The
Surah is directly addressed to man, “insaan” (
الۡاِنۡسَانَ
),
to every people of all religions, and to people of no religion (the
overarching pluralistic context for peoples of different faiths has
previously been established in the article: Islam
and Knowledge vs. Socialization).
The
logic of the verses 2-3 is the AND conjunctive clause.
Meaning, a concatenation of conditions joined by the AND clause
(Arabic وَ
).
Every one of the listed conditions in such a statement has to be
individually true in order for the overall statement to be true.
Otherwise the statement is false.
Being
a techie engineer, I have depicted this AND conjunction in electrical
engineering parlance in the top figure using a simple electronic
device called the AND Gate. One can purchase it for a few cents at
Radio Shack. The logic device is made out of a few transistors and
implements this AND conjunctive clause function.
The
4-input AND Gate in the diagram captures the logic of Surah Al-Asr
verses 2:3 with exact precision. Those more inclined to be
“Left-brained” (logic, math, and problem-solving
dominated) than “Right-brained” (art, creativity, and
language dominated) can perhaps appreciate the import of Surah Al-Asr
better in this representation.
Imagine
that an LED is attached to the pin labeled
Output (metaphor for a man's life).
- It glows green (to indicate a life which is not at a loss) only if all four inputs of the AND Gate labeled I1, I2, I3, and I4 are TRUE (represented by a “one” in the truth table). Observe that there is only a single statement in the truth table when the LED is ever green.
- It glows red (to indicate a life which is at a loss) if one or more input is FALSE (represented by the corresponding “zero” in the truth table). Observe that there are fifteen statements in the truth table representing all the remaining permutations for which the LED is red!! The obvious first statement of all zero inputs clearly captures the vile hectoring hegemons of the planet and is of no surprise to anyone. But the remaining fourteen can indeed be very surprising.
Meaning:
- it doesn't matter how many prayers one offered and how many Hajj one performed to “believe” ( اٰمَنُوۡا );
- or how many hungry mouths one fed, how many hospitals and schools one built, and how honestly one earned one's income and paid one's zakat to do “good works” ( عَمِلُوا الصّٰلِحٰتِ ) ;
- if one didn't strive to oppose falsehoods and uphold “haq” ( حَقّ ), the life, even if otherwise piously and well-lived, is still one of “loss” ( خُسۡرٍۙ ).
I
am not making this up. That's what the Holy Qur'an itself states,
unequivocally – reflect on it yourself while further recalling
the admonishment of the Author of the Book of Reflection:
'That
this is indeed a Qur'an Most Honourable, In a Book well-guarded,
Which none shall touch but those who are clean: A Revelation from
the Lord of the Worlds. Is it such a
Message that ye would hold in light esteem?' Holy Qur'an,
Surah Al-Waqia, 56:77-81
Witness
that the hardest thing to do in modern life is to stand up to
oppression and tyranny ( وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالۡحَقِّ
).
And also to persevere in adversity when one is experiencing the
jackboots of the new Nazis upon one's neck ( ۙ
وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالصَّبۡرِ
).
Whereas
the easiest thing to do is to sit in a mosque, and/or to feed the
hungry in atonement of a guilty conscience.
We
already see what the pious Muslims worldwide tend to excel in. We pay
our zakat, khums, fitra
(religiously mandated donations) on time, pray our namaz
on time, and keep our fasts on time. Aspire to go for Hajj
at least once, while the privileged take
great pride in performing it repeatedly. Many among the
oppressed are also incredibly patient in affliction. Indeed, we are
so patient that we oft proclaim “Allah chala raha hai”
(God is running the world), “Allah malik hai” (God
is our provider), and often cry ourselves to sleep with utmost sabr
(patience in the sense of resignation to fate), repeating to
ourselves with quivering lips and glistening
eyes: “hasbun allahu wa naimal wakeel” (Allah
is sufficient for us and most excellent is the Protector, Arabic:
حَسْبُنَا
اللَّهُ وَنِعْمَ
الْوَكِيلُ
Holy
Qur'an, Surah Al-e-Imran 3:173).
According
to the testimony of Surah Al-Asr, take it any which you want, the
fact remains that most of us are still in
خُسۡرٍۙ
unless
we stand up to oppression and unequivocally
affirm حَقّ
with
some measure of constancy to the best of our individual capacity.
While it is true that only Allah can be the fair judge of that
capacity and to what measure each individual is at a loss and not at
a loss, silence and acquiescence to tyranny
are the obvious antithesis of (
وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالۡحَقِّ
).
And that, lamentably, seems to be the modus vivendi of the
majority of Muslims today.
The
crafting of that antithesis, evidently, has also come about courtesy
of the imperial scholars subverting the meaning of the religion of
Islam in the service of tyrants and kings throughout the ages,
modernity being no exception. Language being the first target of
corruption.
Thus,
وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالۡحَقِّ
has
been reduced to some nonsensical gibberish by the pious turbaned man
on the pulpit to mean: just talk about justice حَقّ
with
utmost earnestness while occupying oneself in the mosque believing
اٰمَنُوۡا
and
in doing good deeds عَمِلُوا
الصّٰلِحٰت
!
The exposition of وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالۡحَقِّ
from
the pulpit and among the masses never includes standing up to kings,
rulers, governments, and to their usurpation, oppression, injustices,
and “imperial mobilizations” writ large in the blood of
the masses.
The
ullema (plural for the Muslim man on the pulpit) today, as
yesterday, selectively focus people's attention with verses from the
Holy Qur'an that exhort people to good works
and belief promising
a pleasing Hereafter (e.g. Surah Al
Baqara 2:25), to mask their crafty omissions in the service of
empire.
Keeping
the masses occupied in rituals and salvation, and “rendering
unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s,” is not
merely a Biblical saying (Matthew 22:21).
That semantics has existed from time immemorial. Its biggest
harbingers have always been the man on the pulpit.
Witness
the 600-page
one-sided Fatwa on Terrorism by the vaunted “scholar
of Islam”, the posterboy of “moderate Islam” who
issued a jurist's proclamation (Fatwa) against the terrorism
of the pirates (see http://tinyurl.com/Fabricating-Pirates
) but not the emperor's. For services rendered to empire, the house
nigger (see Faq:
What is a house nigger)
soon found a place-setting at the massa's table. As
previously examined in Islam
vs. Secular Humanism and World Government, the
religion of Islam was hijacked from its very early days to service
“empire” - Muslims' own. Nothing has principally changed
today except for the color of the imperial flag.
Liberating
the meaning of the religion of Islam, the Deen-ul-Haq
(religion of حَقّ
)
from the clutches of the so called scholars and jurists among
Muslims is only as difficult as the uncongeniality
of pondering the message of the Holy Qur'an directly, with one's own
head and commonsense, rather than merely mouthing its melodic and
soothing verses which no doubt are magic to the soul.
To
strive for “haq” ( وَتَوَاصَوۡا
بِالۡحَقِّ
)
against anyone's tyranny requires no man's sanction – when
Allah Itself has sanctioned it for every man and woman ( اِنۡسَانَ
)
in creation.
That
is the momentous import of Surah Al-Asr – that tiniest Surah of
the Holy Qur'an comprising a mere 27 words (as counted for the
English translation used here). Its utility
as a rallying call for denying to Caesar what is not Caesar’s,
for affirming to God what is God's, and to man what is man's, remains
unsurpassed.
But,
at the end of the day, only Allah is also the final Judge of the
extent to which we each did our own due diligence to Allah's guidance
given our individual trials and tribulations, and our individual
bounties and blessings, on all four
criterion for a life which only Allah shall Deem as
“not in a state of loss”!
Q.E.D.
The
holy month of Ramadan, a joyous month of fasting and reflection,
commences tomorrow (or the day after) worldwide for 1.6 billion
Muslims. Perhaps while rushing to “finish” the recitation
of the Holy Qur'an in this month for nourishing the starved soul, the
hunger in the stomach from not eating all day will be matched with a
hunger in the intellect from not thinking at all.
Ramadan
Mubarik.
Zahir
Ebrahim
Sunday,
July 31, 2011
Footnotes
*
For those “Left-brained” readers with a precision
oriented engineering bent of mind, there is an implicit A/D convertor
at each of the four inputs in the figure above to characterize the
threshold of conversion from a zero to a one for every individual.
**
Perseverance, constancy, steadfastness – and
not passivity or resignation.
Source
URL:
http://faith-humanbeingsfirst.blogspot.com/2011/07/islam-surah-al-asr-of-holy-quran.html
Alternate
URL:
http://humanbeingsfirst.blogspot.com/p/islam.html
Source
PDF:
http://humanbeingsfirst.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/islam-surah-al-asr-of-holy-quran-by-zahir-ebrahim.pdf
The
author, an ordinary researcher and writer on contemporary
geopolitics, a minor justice activist, grew up in Pakistan, studied
EECS at MIT, engineered for a while in high-tech Silicon Valley (
http://tinyurl.com/zahir-patents
), and retired early to pursue other responsible interests. His
maiden 2003 book was rejected by numerous publishers and can be read
on the web at http://PrisonersoftheCave.org.
He may be reached at http://Humanbeingsfirst.org.
Verbatim reproduction license at
http://humanbeingsfirst.org#Copyright.
First
Published Sunday, July 31, 2011,
Ramadan eve in the United States, Muslim year 1432
Last
updated with inclusion of audio links and footnotes: December 6, 2012
1793
Islam:
Surah Al-Asr of the Holy Qur'an By Zahir Ebrahim | Project
Humanbeingsfirst.org