Interpretation contaminated by mental deviations is not pure. Man’s understanding is like a mirror through which others want to see objects. The more contaminated it is, the more it decreases the viewers’ accuracy. understanding a text requires empathy with its author and cooperation in his intentions, feelings, and beliefs. This is a logical and correct point because empathy with the author facilitates understanding of social good objectives and the real meanings of the text and according to their well-known saying, the interpreter and the author share the same horizon. As to understanding the divine Word, empathy with God should be defined. We have to create a method as to how it becomes possible to extend man’s short and limited horizon to horizons to intellect can never reach. this empathy takes the form of a pure man’s focused spiritual and intellectual harmony with the cosmos. In gnostic terms, this harmony is known to be the correspondence of man (known as microcosm) with the whole universe (macrocosm). Because man is a small particle in the macrocosm and is related to it. Thus, he can harmonize naturally with it and can hear its voice, and understand its purpose with his inner sense.
Understanding the content of the Holy Qur’an depends more on the interpreter’s luminosity and his power of intuition, rather than on man’s historical evolution and the correspondence between the horizons of an interpreter’s modern traditions and the horizon of the relevant text. It is similar to the intrinsic power of a diver in discovering and finding pearls in the sea. This does not depend on his time and history; rather, it depends on his aptitude and practice. It is even possible that interpretations by previous interpreters are more profound than today. Among its major conditions are inward purification and limpidness, i.e. the purification of the mind of wrong presuppositions and backgrounds so that the interpreter is able to understand firstly the text and then interpret it.
All there is in the material world is, in fact, an exemplification or manifestation of the non-material world which is the locus of the higher realities; and such realities which are in the non-material world, have manifestations in the world of matter. For example, the term “pen”, mentioned in the verse “He taught by the pen” exists in the material world in one form, and also in the world beyond matter (i.e. the other world) in another form, while in both worlds, the pen is one and the same reality. Secondly, the levels of man: in addition to the five senses, man has other levels of being and worlds, too, which must be divided into three groups.
- The level of sense, i.e. sensing with the instrument of the five senses.
- The imaginative or ideal level, in which the same senses do exist, but without material instruments, and in which man can see without eyes and hear without ears.
- The intellectual or universal level (in its platonic sense) in which the realities of objects continue to exist, but are free of physical matter, time, and imaginal matter. This is the highest level of the human soul, which is next to the world of heavenly intellects.
Those who, nowadays, consider the interpretation of texts as equivalent to recognizing psychological, sociological, and historical phenomena, too, considered the Holy Qur’an’s interpretation equivalent to the interpretation of the world and man, and hidden and apparent truths. The knowledge of the inner meanings of the Holy Qur’an acquired by a commentator is, in fact, perceived by him through his inner senses. In other words, the commentator establishes a kind of union and communion with the world of existence. The ancient gnostics call the world of existence “cosmos”, and the divine speech as “Logos”. the commentary must be such that the meaning should not be allowed to go beyond the word’s sense, its realm, and the generally-accepted meaning of that word. In other words, the commentator of the Holy Qur’an (and probably of any other religious text) is its trustee and must observe the terms of the trust.
Sparrows by morning, live in peaceful nests! Design shouldn’t dominate things, shouldn’t dominate people. It should help people. Don’t spend your time solving your favorite problems, solve problems that need to be solved, generically. A home is a place where you live, and society is a place where your story begins. Honesty shares honesty, as it is honesty’s nature. Stay always in Ablution and get back to the trust you have been, with.
