Before a Prayer, Let me Remember You

Early this morning, I received the news that Hafiz Osman passed away. I had heard that he was not well, and had also heard ten days ago that he was getting better. It was a moment to reflect on a friend of a long time ago.

Hafiz Osman, as he had come to be known, was my companion in madressa. He earned the title for he had truly memorized the Qur’an with accuracy and precision.  He led the Tarawih preachers year after year in our hometown. I had lost touch with him, but I heard him recite the Qu’ran a few times in recent times. I was impressed how well he knew the Qur’an. We had all aspired to know the Qur’an well, and he seemed to have reached this esteemed goal.

I knew him better a long time ago when we were the students of Molsaab (Molvie Saheb) Adamjee. We started memorizing the Qur’an together. We spent hours together in the local school, in the mosque and at our teacher’s home. I do not think we counted the hours and days, but it was a lot of time of friendship, mischief and commitment rolled into one indescribable whole.

At some point, we were expected to be at the madrasah well before Fajr prayer. I would wake him up in the early hours of the morning. Walking in darkness across our “yard,” my knocking on the door would wake up the whole family. I cannot remember who woke me up. I would wait in the kitchen while he got ready. We did this regularly, but for how long I do not remember. 

During this time, I also remember going to school together in Laudium. Then, we would be memorizing the Qur’an in the Kombie at great speed. I always thought this was the cause of my poor eyesight. But Hafiz Osman had 20/20 vision - and it seems that he kept in that way.

ًWhile I went to University, he journeyed to Karachi. He stayed for a while and then returned. He spent some more time on the Qur’an, spending a few years making dor (revision). Over time, he developed the proficiency for which he is rightly remembered. He was never given the title of Mawlana, but he had studied the Qur’an in a less formal way. On the few occasions that I asked him about a verse here or there, he always impressed me with the depth and breadth of tafsir 

He remained a quiet pillar in the community of hifz. He led Salah regularly, and Ramadan in Brits without Hafiz Osman was not imaginable. I hardly think that the community of Brits would be the same after his passing. 

I obviously have not done full justice to him. But I want to share these few words before I join in prayer for him, his family and his friends. 

Ethics and Knowledge in a Time of Uncertainty (continued)

Last week I raised a question about how conspiracies are not only linked to fake and untested knowledge. They may also be seen as desperate attempts to fill the gaps in a world that promises to be predictable. I closed with a quick nod to a religious worldview in which ethics is not always linked to full knowledge and predictability. I want to follow this up more closely. 

A world determined by God is both certain and unpredictable. In contrast with God, humans might never know in great detail what is to happen in the future. But they trust in God to know, and then accept whatever happens. For humans, the future remains fundamentally unpredictable. 

But let us consider how this ethic is offered in the Qur’an. Rather than a philosophical or theological postulate, it is presented in a concrete form. Consider the following Qur’anic verse (ayah, literally sign): 

Indeed, God has knowledge of the Hour and sends down the rain and knows what is in the wombs. And no soul perceives what it will earn tomorrow, and no soul perceives in what land it will die. Indeed, Allah is Knowing and Aware (Qurán 31:34)

The verse captures the sense that God knows the hidden and the future while humans do not. The verse specifically spells out aspects of the future.

I have often wondered how to translate this verse in a world in which modern sciences seek to know the world and its future. Clearly, there are aspects that are still beyond knowledge. We might count here the 'knowledge of the Hour', what one will 'earn tomorrow', where one might die. But some aspects mentioned in the verse are not as opaque. With a greater understanding of the world, for example, we have a better understanding of rain and what is in the wombs. 

I would go one step further and argue that, in general, we live in world in which what we earn tomorrow and where we might die is also probed. Economists and statisticians work tirelessly on models that predict how we might earn, and where we would die. Such models are built on extensive data fed into machines for processing. Big data in recent times is built on this conception of models and their predictability.  

Of course, we do not know what a particular person may earn or where she may die. But the models have been fairly accurate in predicting what people may do, or shaping may do. The former is embraced by scientists who think that human behavior is predictable, while the latter argue that these models fed into human relations and communication are self-fulfilling prophecies. 

My point in this is to show how one verse in the Qurán on knowledge of the future stands against a model of the world founded on knowledge and predictability. In the verse (sign) of the Qurán, humans are reminded how little they know, and thus act accordingly. In contrast, sciences founded on incremental knowledge geared towards the predictability of the future, creates an ethics based on knowing. 

Until the 1960s, social scientists predicted that this model of science would eventually replace religious worldviews determined by divine knowledge and fiat. Based on their understanding of the world, Weber, Marx and lesser mortals predicted and assumed the future course of the world. 

We now emphasize how wrong they were, sometimes with some glee. Others counter that this prediction is not dead, but needs adjustment. Again, prediction can never be accurate, but faith in it is not given up. 

For me, the question that remains is how people balance these contrasting maps of the world? What do they do when they think that everything is knowable, and what do they do when they face the uncertainty of the future?

In my previous post, I was suggesting that COVID-19 throws up this conundrum for our consideration. The development of the vaccine is predicated on eventually knowing its nature, and understanding what the future will hold. The actual production of the vaccine, its distribution and sale present a world full of unpredictables and uncertainties. 

The time of COVID-19 might be the place for thinking of the right thing to do in the face of uncertainties. It might offer ways of how religious values and ethics may work in the gaps of knowledge.