45. Challenging Modern Orthodoxy (3)

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Challenge #5:   Reality is meaningful.

Because we normally only associate meaning with language, we assume that things obtain their meaning by the signs we use to name, describe, and discuss them. This, however, is an anthropocentric view of language, of meaning, and hence of reality. The Qur’an tells us, contrarily, that all phenomena are in GOD’s language, and so everything is meaningful, regardless of whether it has ever come to our attention. Adam (peace be upon him) did not invent the names of things on a whim or out of thin air; GOD taught him names that had existed, generated by GOD, before Adam himself was made.

For something to be significant, i.e., meaningful, it must function as a sign, referring to something other than itself. No thing, therefore, is meaningful in isolation, which is why even the universe would be meaningless without its Creator, Who is Absolute, Independent Meaning (and not a thing nor a sign of anything). Because each one of us is also a sign of AL-LAH, the basic meaning of our existence, individual or communal, refers to GOD and His intention for us, whether we intend it so or not. (In the same way, your ideas are yours, whether they agree to be so or not.) There is an immortality inherent in this status of being GOD’s intended, for GOD forgets nothing and abandons no one. (There are verses in the Qur’an that seem to say otherwise, but only hyperbolically, for emotional effect, as it is contrary to the nature of Absolute Knowledge and Omnipresence to be voided or undone.) Not only are we retained conceptually, as His ideas, but our whole being – physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual – is returned to Him in a total and final affirmation of a reference that, once made in all seriousness, is never lost.

Challenge #6: Reality engages in acts that are affecting and effective.

One could say that Reality is dynamic, but I need wording that suggests more than the concepts of physical science. What I intend by “acts”, “affecting” and “effective” might best be expressed by the verse that says: Verily AL-LAH performs what He desires. (Q22:14) Every fact (from the Latin facere – to make, to do) is the what, the effect (also from facere) of One Who performs, Who acts with affect (also from facere), i.e., as He desires. We see His effects or facts all around us (though it requires special insight to see that they are His), but only faith can detect the Divine Feeling, the affect or value inherent in any particular performance as it affects us. The bond between facts and values, one that overcomes their polarity in every phenomenon, was discussed before, in Chapter 34. They constitute an example of that constant duality in things symbolized by the heavens and the earth.

If we emphasize only the facts, the createdness of things, then GOD is Independent and Transcendent; nothing causes Him, acts upon Him, or affects Him. But if we turn to the uncreated, timeless value of things, then He is ‘with’ them, and increasingly Immanent ‘in’ them in proportion to their value for Him: Have no worry; verily AL-LAH is with us (Q9:40); Fear not; truly I am with you both – I hear; I see. (Q20:46); and He is AL-LAH in both the heavens and the earth. He knows your innermost and outermost and knows what you are earning. (Q6:3)

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Viewing Reality as a Living Subject, the pronoun for which is Who rather than What, we can say that Reality is personal, elusive, reciprocal, effusive, meaningful, and dynamic. This is not how people normally think about reality, which is yet another reason why the Qur’an is so difficult for the modern Western psyche to absorb.

If, however, we set aside the subjective spirit of this perspective momentarily, we should still be cognizant of how the Qur’anic weltanschauung differs from contemporary versions of reality as an object of thought or experience, as a body. What is different about it?

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Challenge #7:   Reality is transmitted in many ways, including the mathematical, verbal, and pictorial.

At the threshold of the scientific era, it was Galileo who coined the motto of modern comprehension, “Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so.” Within the confines of the scientific method, this is impeccable technique. But such an approach does not reflect all of authentic, immeasurable Reality; it merely reduces part of what we see to a form amenable to our mental capabilities – an inert, colourless sketch, our product, rather than a living being independent of us. When we meet someone and, without a word, begin to measure him, we treat him like a corpse.

Words are greater than numbers. For every number we can substitute a unique and accurately meaningful word, but the reverse is not true. Virtually all our non-numerical words have wispy borders, like clouds; they change their shape and meaning over time, reach out in tendrils to other clouds, break apart and recombine. They are not clearly divisible, calculable, or logical.

While the laws of nature may be mathematical, our impressions of nature and reaction to it are almost always lawless and essentially esthetic. ‘Mathematical’ does not even begin to describe what is essentially ineffable, i.e., reality – an indescribable something that is, nonetheless, constantly enticing us to describe it. That interplay between the possible and the impossible, between the inexpressible and the articulate, between ecstatic, vociferous praise and awed silence, is what should stop us from ever saying, ‘That’s all there is.’

There are many more ways of representing reality than the mathematical, verbal, and pictorial. But these three have a special place in our intellect; they correspond to jinn, humans, and birds in the army of Sulaiman (peace be upon him), a symbol of the active intellect (for which, see Chapter 37). And while jinn may be better at technically diving into things, and birds at surveying things by sight, humans are capable of not only those two but are also uniquely gifted with the power of speech.

Challenge #8:   Reality is primarily conceptual, and subsequently factual.

The belief in primacy of substance over idea is the legacy of Aristotelian ontology, and has bedevilled Islamic theology ever since Muslims came into contact with Greek thought. I discussed the reality of words in Chapter 41, so there is no need to repeat those thoughts here. Concepts are not the same as Plato’s Ideal Forms, which seem to be fixed, lifeless categories; rather, as GOD’s Words, they are nebulous, organic entities that conjugate, expand, multiply, and interact in non-physical, non-mathematical ways that all of us can ‘identify’ with. We are uncannily ‘familiar’ with their workings, but cannot always articulate how, as they are often pre-verbal.

Concepts are vehicles for the expression of values, which we could consider pre-conceptual, as they represent aspects of Who GOD is. GOD’s values are the Absolutes I introduced in Chapter 1, and concepts convey them to us in the form of His Words. The value Truth, for example, is one of GOD’s Names, a metonym for GOD Himself. Truth is also a concept expressing that value, and subsequently takes on substantial reality in facts.

The physical world, therefore, is a set of templates for witnessing truth in discrete, measurable form. The spiritual world is the Kingdom of GOD, in which what is tested and witnessed is no longer measurable phenomena, but what one means – one’s values. All values should ‘mean’ GOD, i.e., should lead to Him as their ultimate end and summation. He is the Whole Who makes values wholesome, concepts true, and facts real.

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