Gems Under the Sand
I find it funny when many Muslims argue poetry to be a source of misguidance, when the most well renowned scholar in the history of the religion (and cousin to the beloved Prophet pbuh), Ibn Abbas, specifically asks us to seek meanings of the Qur’an in many cases, from poetry itself.
Over the last few months I’ve refocused myself on diving deeper into Arabic grammar and linguistics, in order to be able to soon compose Arabic poetry as opposed to simply consuming it. It’s an arduous process but one I’ve been enjoying. The reason for the focus on Arabic poetry is that it’s become well apparent over the last two years that one cannot have a true grasp of the Qur’an and its wonders, without a deep understanding or familiarity with poetry in the Arabic language. This is especially the case when one takes a deeper look at Hafez’s own claim of inspiration from the Qur’an as a treasure of wealth from which he was able to generate immense levels of creativity.Thank you to Mummy for for putting me in poetry classes back when I was a nugget, without a clue regarding rhyme or metre.
In every ‘Qaum’, or nation where a Messenger has been sent, they battled with the wonders of their time as a reference point from where success would be attributed to God as opposed to human advancement of the time. During the time of Moses(pbuh) in Egypt, sorcery had reached its heights, so the Prophet had to face the magicians of his time and prove the miracles of God over that of Satan. During the time of Christ(pbuh), medicine in Jerusalem was the height of the world, so many of the miracles of Jusus(pbuh) were that of a healer. In pre-islamic Arabia, the tip of the spear when it came to culture, was an art form which the arabs had mastered - poetry. It is within this context that the Qur’an was revealed to a man who could not read, as the greatest source of inspiration for art that the world would see in the last 1500 years.
“Here is a challenge. Take ten words in any language, formulated into three lines or verses, and add any preposition or linguistic particle you see fit. Produce at least twenty-seven rhetorical devices and literary features. At the same time, ensure it has a unique structure, is timelessly meaningful, and relates to themes within a book that it is part of — the size of the which is over seventy-thousand words. Make sure four of its words are unique and never used again in the book. Ensure each line or verse ends with a rhyme, created by words with the most optimal meaning. Make sure that these words are used only once in the three lines, and not used anywhere else in the book. Ensure that the three lines concisely and eloquently semantically mirror the chapter before it, and they must formulate a profound response to an unplanned set of circumstances. You must use ten letters in each line and ten letters only once in the entire three lines. Throughout the whole piece, make sure you produce a semantically oriented rhythm, without sacrificing any meaning. Do all of the above publicly in one attempt, without revision or amendment, in absence of any formal training in eloquence and rhetoric.
Impossible as the above may seem, this is exactly what the Qur’ān achieved in its shortest chapter, Al-Kawthar (The Abundance); and it was expressed through Prophet Muhammad ﷺ who was not known to have composed any poetry nor cultivated any special rhetorical skills. “
- @DigitalWaqf
It’s from الله
