Interpreting Language in Islamic Legal Theory

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Event Name: Interpreting Language in Islamic Legal Theory
Transcription Date:Transcription Modified Date: 4/6/2019
Transcript Version: 1


Transcript Text

nd and they

mean very different ways on you know

face has many meanings it's used for

many different meanings

it can mean aspect it can mean you know

equality lots of things and then they

have a lot of idioms that take a long

time to learn like mad watch you know

the water of the face which is you know

it doesn't make any sense on the face of

it no pun intended

but you know mad you know of Habana I

would watch hehehe you know the Arabs

say he he dissipated the water of his

face which is something that happens to

people when they live bad lives they

lose a type of clarity in their faces

the the reflection that water enables to

happen something bad happens to their

faces and so that's an idiom of Arabic

that they use you know that America

shadow and up here you know and you'll

see these come up in in books so that

takes a long time but I would say you

know the Arabs the Arabs the more

Italians they say aha moment for a homo

ha Eden tomorrow one too so often were

added to be a shorter one the most

important in in knowledge is that peda

that's the most important and I Peter

has a lot of metaphysical foundations

like if you study in the Quran you will

find a lot of metaphysics

and when you get into sophisticated

theology there's a great deal of

metaphysics and all of our great

theologians were masters of metaphysics

all of them tough touzani though see I

mean truly great metaphysicians and when

you get into their books we have many

people at the level of Aquinas in in the

West we have several with the kidney

moon that are at the level of Aquinas

and my father who knows Aquinas very

well when when when I did a film on

Ghazali and he watched the film he got

intrigued and he wanted to read some

books he said is he translate I said yes

he said could you get me some of his

book so I got him several of Gasol's

books and he read through them and then

he said to me the West never produced a

Ghazali and and I know his knowledge of

the Western canon is very very strong so

that statement to me holds a lot of

weight but that's what he said he said

that the West never produced a ghazali

and and it's sad that now people

disparage imam al-ghazali's name it's

just tragic

it's the ignorance of the time and the

prophets said the end of time won't come

until the later part of this community

curses the first part of it so that's

one of the signs at the end of time is

that people will curse the earlier

people so so you have to learn a Kyi's

and then you have to learn for 1/5

before o Sole also it is not it's a 45

but for what is for dying and then you

have to learn tasawwuf means Allah I

mean there's two types of two souls

there's a metaphysical to solve which is

very complicated and and it's it's like

it's like quantum mechanics you're

entering into a realm that just it to be

able to read those books and understand

them takes a long long time but the the

tussle that we need is that the soul of

a holic and our ethics is generally in

the books of the self

I mean that's where the ethical

tradition ended up in us

so you learn to have even apps how to

rectify the fault of the self I think

she thought her mother always been

talking about these things from the icon

and and and these think this is really

that a lot of of Islam is in the books

of tussle wolf and and and nobody

disagreed about that even Tamiya even a

bit of a hob all the people that they

use to bash to solve all of them except

that that aspect of to solve what they

were against was metaphysical Sufism so

Inman Tamiya was against metaphysical

Sufism even Umberto Wahab was against

met if that's true but they were not

against ethical to solve that that's

absolute fact so that's the soul of

Allah and the soul of an earth walk

those are the two types of tussle

you know the experiential tasawwuf which

is about States and stations of the

heart and the other one is about

refining your character so nobody

disagrees about that and even a layman

josiya wrote a famous book on to sew

wolf which is his commentary of Abdullah

on Saudi khawaja abdullah onslaught his

famous book amenaza de set 18 right

madad is just a tea keen so the this is

well known even akadama did a motifs are

of imam al-ghazali's yeah yeah is mostly

he says you have no Kashyap and Mohammed

ah those are the two types of azov mocha

Java Inman mocha Java and aluminum arm

but he said I'm not this book is not

about element of mocha Java

it's about Edmond Muhammad ah so what he

was saying is the idea is not about

spiritual states it's about a clock and

refining the soul the he's got the the

key tab and I bet that right sheet a bit

more I'm a dad and then he's got the

monocot and the moons yet it's four

sections forty books right and at the

heart of it is what book twenty the lap

of the prophets a lot isn't that's the

heart of the area so the architecture is

very impressive

he begins it with the book of knowledge

not the book about Peter the book of

knowledge defining what knowledge is and

defining who the knowledgeable who the

true anima are differentiating them from

recall the motorists amoun the formalist

and then showing you what false ottoman

do one of the things that false Illuma

do is they they attack other Annamma and

belittle them in order to gain followers

that's a sign of false aroma because

true allama work at the level of ideas

and they don't attack people like that

they look at ideas and and they write

and and do that but they don't get up

and slander Muslims and things like that

so so that and then he says add a toombi

hot shoe or a tool that you need to

start with and that's the Arabic

language so that's this tool that you

need to start and that doesn't mean that

you cannot you can learn Islam and

become a very educated Muslim in English

you can learn Islam then come a very

educated Muslim in order do you can

learn Islam become a very educated

Muslim in Turkish or any of these

languages that's absolutely true and

there are many many very learned Muslims

that don't know Arabic but to to to

enter into really the the realm of

defending Islam and moving into that

realm it's to have access to those

primary texts important but the Hanafy

position is you don't need Arabic to

understand Islam and and as an ad you

mean you know Alba Hani who was a Janee

I think to me that's that's the truth

that but the vehicle of Arabic is

extremely important that's the position

of the other three Imams because the

meanings that are embedded in Arabic the

semantic fields that are created by

Arabic the deep dimensions of the

language are extremely important and

there's a reason why Allah chose Arabic

to be the language that he spoke to his

creation through and so that's very

important so but a solid fifth is really

important in order to understand this

religion and I think it's good to have

what we did was just a very basic

introduction to all soon and flip which

is useful to have some idea

of how sophisticated our scholarship is

in that I think there was one other and

with that you know I also want to say to

everybody somebody asked me what course

do I teach I teach ethics that's a tuna

I've taught logic

I've taught astronomy I've taught the

Freshman Seminar and I've taught

prophetic biography but right now I'm

teaching ethics so we have to break but

I want to say I was I'm really very

happy with a dev of this group and it's

really been impressive and I you know we

have to get to a point where we can just

benefit from our people and not you know

and so I was I was just really pleased

with how everybody because I know people

there's people that could you know with

dr. Nelson could have brought up things

that you know just for me would there

there's no point in bringing them up and

and I was really happy that nobody did

that you know because he's somebody that

I feel has just been such an

intellectual powerhouse for our

community and he comes from a different

tradition than I do but he's he's not

and he's not on Rothfeld Lee by any

stretch of the word you know he's not

somebody that speaks ill of Sahaba or

anything like that so it's you know it's

important that that we respect and I not

and in our early period imam niye tabu

Hadi has people from the Shia community

in his Senate there are Shia in soluble

Hadi and this was the early period it

was much more fluid than a lot of what's

happened now with the divisive miss the

Muslim world right now between the

Sunnis and the Shia's and undeniably

there have been atrocities on both sides

so in Iraq there have been Shia death

squads that have gone we've gone out and

and and killed but we're not those this

is not what we're about we're about

intelligence and honoring people and

honoring differences and respecting

different positions so he's somebody

that respects the own amount

irrespective of where they came from or

who they are and that's something that

we really need to inculcate in our youth

just a respect for intelligence and for

intellect and and for achievement in any

field or endeavor and for goodness

people that have a floppin character so

I just want to thank everybody for being

so respectful and and just really

wonderful group of people young people

that it's you know you give me

personally give me hope to see so many

good faces and in our youth and I'll a

bless all of you it's nothing enough