Chapter I: Acquisition of Knowledge
Story-telling is an innovation. Ibn Omar once came out of the mosque exclaiming: None has sent me out except a story-teller.
Hazrat Ali turned out the story tellers from the congregational mosque of Basra. He did not turn out Hasan Basari as he used to deal with the hereafter, contemplation of death, defects of soul, machinations of the devil. Such is the assembly about which the Prophet said: To be present at the assembly of Zikr is better than one thousand rak'ats of prayers, visiting one thousand sick men and attending one thousand funerals. Hazrat Ata said: One assembly of Zikr expiates the sins of seventy assemblies of ' useless talks. The Prophet once heard three talks from Abdullah- b-Rawahah and said: O Abu Rawahah, keep yourself far from ornamental talks. He asked the Prophet one day about the blood money of a child which died in the womb of its mother saying:
How shall we pay the blood wit of a child who has taken no food, no drink, nor cried, nor breathed. Such murder is excusable. The Prophet said: are you like the desert Arabs who indulge in ornamental words?
POETRY: As to poetry, its general use in sermons is bad. God says: As to poets, those who go astray follow them. Don't you find the wondering in every valley and say what they do not do-26 255? God said: I did not teach him (Prophet) poetry, nor it is becoming of him. Furthermore what is narrated of poetries is sermons comprises mostly of love episodes, descriptions of the beauties of the beloved; the joys of union and pangs of separation. This gives arise to lust and sexual passion more than religious enthusiasm. There are however such poetries which contain wisdom. The prophet also said: There is wisdom in poetry.
HIKMAT: The word Hakim derived from the word Hikmat is now used in the case of physicians, astrologers and those who tell the future of the people by examining hands, but God says about the word Hikmat (wisdom): He gives wisdom whom He wishes Whoever has been given wisdom has been given a great good-2:272Q. The Prophet said: If a man learns a word of wisdom, it is better than the world and what it contains. Now think what was Hikmat and what it has come to. Now think also of the meaning of many words which have come down to us. One
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day a man asked the Prophet: Who is the worst creature in creation? The Prophet said: O God, pardon me. On being repeatedly asked, the Prophet replied: They are wicked learned men.