Bismillahir Rahmaanir Raheem!
In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Merciful!

Payaam-e-Maghrib, Voice of the West
by Syed Husain Pasha

“Auron ka hai Payaam aur, mera Payaam aur hai,
Ishq key dardmand ka tarz-e-kalaam aur hai!”

(Iqbal)

“How different is my message from the message of all the others!
How different indeed is the cry of a heart stricken by love!”

You Must Read This Book!

Copyright © 2007 Syed Husain Pasha

Contents:

Regardless of Who You Are, or What You Do, You Must Still Read This Book!

I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what or where you are. And I have no idea what you do or don’t do. But regardless of all that, I would still like you to read this book – the most amazing and incomparable Al-Qur’an!

For, there is no other book quite like it in the world! There never was, and there never will be. Not to put any other book down. But simply to tell you that this is a book you owe it to yourself to read. It is quite unlike any other book you may have read.

I mean, are you a Christian? Are you a Hindu, a Jew, a Muslim or a Buddhist?

Are you an Atheist, an Agnostic, an Animist or a Deist? Or are you, maybe, something entirely different?

Are you male or female? Are you young or old? Are you rich or poor or something in the middle?

Are you white, black, brown, yellow, red or a happy mixture of all of the above?

Are you a student, a university graduate, a holder of what people call a terminal degree, or a high-school dropout? Or are you a physician, engineer, lawyer, government servant, public official, business person or someone looking for a job?

Are you a conservative, liberal or something a bit more exotic? And are you from the East, from the West, from the North, from the South, or from somewhere else?

All the wonderful little bins and boxes human beings have devised to sort and separate themselves from one another! And then to use those same bins and boxes as the basis and rationale for their mutual rivalries, quarrels, fights, depredations, domination and exploitation!

What a way to live! But that is us humans. That is how we live.

All the familiar roles people embrace; all the delectable identities people assume; and all the games people play – as individuals, groups, organizations, nations and societies – for all the various reasons they play them for!

But regardless of who or what you are, and regardless of what you do or don’t do – that is, regardless of your belief or behavior, and regardless of your race or religion, gender or age, nationality or language, education or occupation, habits or lifestyle, culture or ethnicity, views or ideologies, likes or dislikes, phobias or obsessions, anathemas or penchants and proclivities – you must still read this book.

This most amazing Al-Qur’an!

You must absolutely, positively read this book. For, there is no other book like it. There never was and there never will be.

Not to insult or attack any other book that you may hold in esteem, but purely to share with you the fact that this book may be quite unique and different from any and everything else that you may have read. And to tell you that you owe it to yourself to get a first-hand acquaintance with such a book.

A Place to Turn to

Did you ever wander through the vistas of life looking for answers? Answers to all sorts of questions, from the most significant to the most trivial? Looking for ways to make sense of your surroundings, your environment and the entire universe – and your own place in it?

Did you ever wish there were some place you could go to, someone you could turn or talk to, something you could look up or read, where you will find the answers you were seeking?

Where you will find the most authentic, true and reliable information – and advice, and help, and comment – on things that mattered most to you? Even beyond that, where you will see, hear and read God himself talk to you: directly and without an intermediary?

Where you will hear God’s own words directed at you personally, individually and often without equivocation and prevarication?

If you thought all this was too good to be true, then all you need to do is read this book. This most amazing Al-Qur’an. For, this book is that book.

That book — Dhaalikal Kitaab!

That is what the Qur’an says. That is exactly how the Qur’an puts it. I am quoting directly from the Qur’an – from that book.

I don’t mean someone or something purporting to speak for or in behalf of God. I don’t mean someone relating to you what God supposedly said to them, but God Almighty himself, addressing you directly, in his own words and voice, speaking to you in First Person and addressing you in Second Person?

And doing so using the direct-address mode of conversation that you are used to all your life. Calling out to you from beyond space and time, saying: “O, You!”

And yet assuring you all the time that he is close – closer than you think; closer than your own jugular vein; and, always, close enough to hear and answer you when you call him.

Have you – has your soul, deep down inside you – ever felt a need, a hankering, a craving, an urge, an aching for something just like that?

If you have, then you must read this book. This most incomparable Al-Qur’an. For, this book is that book.

Dhaalikal Kitaab!

There Is No Other Book Quite Like It!

That is right. There really is no other book in the world quite like that book. All you need to do is read that book and find out for yourself. Compare it to all the other books you know and come to your own conclusions.

You owe that much to yourself, do you not?

You will find that it is a book that elevates and exalts you beyond anything you ever thought was possible.

That answers the questions that were burning holes in your heart for you can’t even remember how long.

That provides you that ultimate solace and comfort you felt you needed when all human efforts to reach you and sooth the turmoil inside you failed to do their job.

You will find that it is a book that provides you clarity when all attempts on your part and on the part of others to remove the chaos and confusion prevailing in and around you never quite accomplished their goal.

That opens up pathways before you that you never thought existed. And lights up a million candles along those pathways for you to pursue the destination of your choice.

That provides for you a wonderful new direction in which to point your life and channel your efforts and energies. And altogether gives your life a new meaning; and gives your existence and struggle on earth a whole new purpose and perspective; and gives your energies a new lift.

You will find that it is a book whose reading puts a new spring in your step; a new tilt in your chin; a new smile on your lips; a new contentment on your countenance; a new sparkle in your eyes; a new confidence in your demeanor; and a new hope in your heart.

A book the reading of which makes your relationship with the rest of the universe around you one of calm communion, peace, tranquility and joy. And, at the same time, sets your heart ablaze with the twin emotions of love for and fear of your creator.

And wrings from your eyes, believe it or not, steaming, cascading streams of intense and sublime joy, sorrow, contrition, remorse, shame, love, bliss, felicity and devotion, as God’s word begins to clear the cobwebs in your soul and burn away the darkness in your heart, and as you begin to feel the awesome and indescribable power, majesty, glory and presence of God before you.

If you want, you can call it a book of miracles. For, everything about that book is a miracle. In fact, that book is so full of miracles, cover to cover, that it refers to every one of its own passages as a miracle or a marker.

How else could it be if it is a book in which God Almighty talks to us directly?

That is why I say there is no other book quite like that book.

Higher Than Angels

For starters, this book will show you that your status in God’s eyes was even higher than that of the angels. So much so that God made the angels prostrate before you as a human being, when he created your progenitor, Adam – may Almighty God bless him.

This book will show you how God Almighty created everything in heaven and earth just for you. And how he made you, man as well as woman, his own personal representatives on earth.

It will show you how your existence on earth is part of God’s grand plan for you – and for his world. It will tell you how, as a baby, God brought you into this world pure and free, and completely unladen by guilt and untouched by sin, to be able to perform that exalted duty: to be God’s representative on earth.

This book would lay down for you, right at the outset, the parameters of right and wrong, and good and bad, and would also provide for you in many cases the rationale for doing so?

This book would make distinct for you the boundaries and demarcations that God has set up to separate the lawful and the permissible from the forbidden and the unlawful, and would outline for you the consequences of breaching those boundaries that God established for your own good.

In many ways you may find in it echoes of some of the other books you may have read before, whether it is the Bible or the Gita. But only in purer and more complete form. As if someone had sat down and gone through those other books carefully and revised and updated them to meet your present-day needs.

It is a book that to a significant degree would place your fate and destiny in your own hand – based on your own choices and decisions; based on your own action and inaction; and based on all your omissions and commissions.

That book would then tell you to go ahead and be your own judge and inform you that God too would hold you accountable for what you do or don’t do.

It is a book that would clearly give you the right of choice, as a rational human being, to make up your own mind with regard to issues, and then make the choices you make the grounds for what happens to you in life and after death.

It is a book that would give you the guarantee that not an iota of good you do in this world would ever be lost or discounted. It is also a book that would, at the same time, warn you that even the smallest of bad you do may haunt you and catch up with you.

And all the time, this book would hold open before you the prospect of God’s unbounded love and eternal Grace and invite you to turn to him and repent.

That is why you must read this book, for there is no other book like that book.

Dhaalikal Kitaab!

Reprieve and Redemption

This book would at all times show you the way out of your predicament by throwing open for you the doors of repentance, reprieve, redemption and restitution.

Not by way of absolution of your sins through another human being like you, but through a genuine change of heart and repentance on your own part.

You must read this book, for in this book you will hear God Almighty call out to the sinners of the world:

“O my slaves who have wronged themselves!
Despair not of the grace and mercy of God!
For, God forgives all sins!”

When did you ever hear that call that loudly, that clearly and quite in those terms? Not in a voice modulated and mediated through others, but in God’s own voice that speaks to you directly and without intermediaries?

It is a book that would proclaim to you the unity and equality of the human race in terms you never quite saw or heard before.

It is a book that would solve the mystery of the male-female dynamic – parity, equality, balance, harmony, reciprocity and complexity – in terms clearer and more powerful than you ever thought was possible.

It is a book that would show you how to use your reason, judgment and common sense, not only to solve your practical problems in this life, but also as guides to find God and reach out to his love, Grace and mercy.

It is a book that would teach you how to use your powers of logic as well as intuition, and all your skills of research and analysis, not only to make your life on earth better and more fulfilling, but also to work your way to God Almighty.

That is why you must read this book – regardless of who you are or what you do and regardless of whether you are Muslim, Jewish, Christian, Hindu, atheist or something else. For, you need that book in your life as much as anyone ever needed anything in this world.

For, that book is God’s own personal gift to you that he sent to you through a very special personal messenger.

Wait No More!

If you had wished and wanted and waited for any or all of this, and a host of other things besides, then wish no more!

And wait no more!

For, your wish has come true. God has granted you your wish. And that book is here! And that book is the incomparable, the most amazing, Al-Qur’an. A book directly from God Almighty that you absolutely, positively must read.

For, it is a book that may be quite unlike anything that you may have ever read or heard of before.

Reach out and grab hold a copy of that book today – either in the original Arabic or a translation of it in any language that you are most comfortable in. For, Almighty God has made that book available, ready and waiting for you.

And he did it from before you were even born, knowing, as only he could, that once born in this world you would need that book. You would need that book to navigate the murky and turbulent waters of life on earth as much as you would need your mother’s milk.

Or as much as you would need air to breathe, food to eat or water to drink.

God Almighty prepared all those things for you – did he not? – and kept them all waiting for you before you ever set foot on earth. So also did he prepare and keep this most amazing book ready and waiting for you from before your birth.

So reach out and pick up a copy of that book today – and read!

It Is a Book that Calls Itself “The Reading”!

That is right.

That is what that book calls itself. It calls itself “The Reading”!

Or “Something to Read!”

And it calls itself “The Writing”!

And it calls itself “The Book”!

What a book indeed!

How can there be a book that calls itself “The Reading“? And which then turns around and calls itself “The Writing“? And then finally labels itself “The Book”?

And all this 1400 years ago, when reading and writing were the prerogative of the rich and the privileged few. When reading and writing were allowed only for the royals, the clergy and the nobles. And when most of the rest of the people of the world were forbidden by law from reading and writing, at times on pain of death.

Can you imagine that? Did you know that there was a time when human beings were kept from reading, writing and teaching by law and by use of brute force?

Till this book came and liberated humanity and conferred upon all human beings, regardless of their birth or rank, the right to read and write. And in fact commanded them all to read.

That is why you must read that book, because that is what that book calls itself: “The Reading!“

It calls itself Al-Qur’an, which in the Arabic language means “Reading” or “Something to Read.”

And It Did So 1400 Years Ago

And that book did all this, not yesterday or today, but all of 1400 years ago.

There is no other book in the world that ever called itself that – 1400 years ago.

And that book calls itself “The Writing!” – Al-Kitab. And there is no other book in the world that called itself that – 1400 years ago.

And that book also calls itself “The Book,” which is another meaning of the Arabic expression “Al-Kitab.” And indeed The Book it is – a book quite unlike any other book that you may ever have read or will ever read! And there is no other book in the world that called itself that – 1400 years ago.

And, mind you, these are not the titles conferred upon it by its readers, admirers and devotees. These are all words which that book itself uses to describe itself – all of it going back 1400 years ago.

So, pick up a copy of that book today and read it. For, this book is that book.

Read that book. For it is “The Book” and it is “The Reading“!

And it is “The Writing.”

All of it divine, all of it from God.

Asking Questions: The Stuff of Human Life

Much of human life is about asking questions and looking for answers, is it not? Answers to all sorts of questions that we can think of?

Thinking, reasoning, reflecting, asking questions, looking for answers, seeking clarity and understanding, trying to make sense of what surrounds us – are these not the threads out of which the fabric of human life is woven?

Well, those are all the things that this book is about. This book will tell you, as it has been telling everyone for the past 1400 years, that these are all some of the noblest and most important activities human beings can – and must – undertake.

That is why you must read this book. For, this book encourages thought, fosters inquiry, welcomes questions and provides answers.

Answers to all sorts of questions – questions that you were too embarrassed, confused or afraid to ask; questions that you did not even know had any answers.

Below are some questions that people ask from time to time. The challenge is to find the answers – or at least knowing where to look for them. Answers that bring a measure of satisfaction to humans across the spectrum of their many divisions and variations.

The fact is that in life, often, we all need to find our own answers. In a sense, that is what really gives meaning to life – having questions in the first place and then being able to find answers for them. And if those answers turn out to be the right answers, then we are the most fortunate people on earth.

The good news is that the answers are all out there. Often, it is just a matter of looking for them – and of course finding them. And, having found them, being able to tell the right answers from the wrong ones.

And, then, having made that determination, being able to embrace those answers that we consider to be the right ones – and building our life around them. That is what human life is all about.

Questions, therefore, are the stuff of human life. They are God’s little flashlights in our bosom turned on and off as he gently moves us along the path to truth and discovery – and ultimately to himself.

Because in the ultimate analysis God is truth. He is, as that book says, Al-Haqqul Mubeen – clear truth. That means where truth is that is where God will be. And where truth is kept away from human beings that place then becomes the Devil’s domain.

Therefore, the key to all this is the search on the part of the individual – unremitting, tireless search, a search without fear or favor – and a burning, uncompromising passion for truth. Thereafter, what often determines the course and outcome of human life – whether in individuals and groups or in nations, societies and civilizations – is not the mere act of asking questions, but the honesty and integrity of those questions and the humility and the courage with which we embrace the answers that turn out to be true.

God Is Truth

You must read this book, because this book will tell you that search for truth is the very purpose and essence of human life. And it is, therefore, the highest, noblest and loftiest form of human activity on earth.

This book will tell you that truth comes from God. Therefore, you must pursue truth relentlessly, regardless of who or what you are, and regardless of where it takes you.

Al-Haqqu Mir-Rabbika, says this book – truth is from your master! So, why fear truth, when it is from him?

Not only that, this book will further tell you that truth is God Almighty himself. He is Al-Haqq – the truth!

Annallaha Huwal Haqqul Mubeen, says this most amazing book – surely, Allah is the clear and open truth!

And questions are important, because questions give impetus and direction to our search for truth. They are like knocking at doors. Questions help open doors.

Answers come when we have gone through the search process; when we have paid the price in pain, uncertainty, integrity and humility; and when we are in the right place at the right time to receive them.

And that means when Almighty god knows we are indeed ready for them. For, as that most amazing and wonderful book, the Qur’an, tells us that God does everything according to a most meticulous plan.

Never late, never early, but always – always – just when the time is right. That is when and how God Almighty does things.

So, here are some questions that come to my mind when I think about the Qur’an, and when I pick up a copy of the Qur’an and read it. I want to send those questions your way. I want you to see if those questions mean anything to you, and if you can find the answers to those questions – your own personal answers.

Because after all the only answers that matter are the ones that we find for ourselves.

And then you can see where those answers take you and what you want to do with those answers.

So, here it goes!

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