Death

 “Every soul is certain to taste death.” (Quran 21:35)


“Death will overtake you no matter where you may be” (Quran 4:78)

Death is something we as living beings do not enjoy thinking about.  It creates the realisation within us that all of the attachments we have built in this world are no longer going to be.  Significantly, it awakens us to the brutal fact that we will no longer exist on the planet.  There have been many philosophies on death, for example thinkers discussed that death is an interruption to life, like sleep or a disease, only permanent.  Others explained that death is to be considered as part of life, something which every person has to come to terms with in order to live well; part of what is involved in accepting our finitude.  Some thinkers claimed death is to be considered as a transition from this life to an afterlife, the eternal life of bliss or pain.

Whatever our views on death are, one thing we can all agree on is that it is something that we do not think about enough.  This may sound morbid but there is a profound value of reflecting on death, it brings about the actualisation that we are all human beings with a short life.  Our egos will no longer seem that important, our attachments and desires to the material world are put into perspective, and our lives are questioned; all of which is a source of great benefit, as the 11th century Theologian and Philosopher al-Ghazali said, “…in the recollection of death there is reward and merit.” Contemplating about death provokes thought and give us that window in our lives to really reflect on the ephemeral nature of our existence.

In light of death, how should we view life? What does it tell us about the importance we attach to things, and how does it deliver meaning to our existence? If we view life through the lenses of death we seem to be in an emotional and intellectual space where we can really assess our situation on this planet.  How did I come to be? What should I be doing here? Where am I going? Death is the driving force behind these critical questions, because the moment we recognise that this life is short and that we will breathe our last one day, it puts everything into perspective.

So let us reflect on death; imagine you are here one minute and the next you are no more.  You have probably experienced loved ones that have passed away; how did you feel? Was there not a sense of loneliness, emptiness and lack of attachment to the things we used to take so seriously? Now if you were to taste death right now, as every human being will, what would that mean to you? What would you want to have done differently if you were given the chance to go back? What thoughts and ideas would you take more seriously? And what would your outlook be if you could re-live your life once experiencing the tragic reality of death?

The sad thing about death is that we can’t go back to change our perspectives, or to think about life, or to challenge our outlook and detach ourselves from the empty nature of worldly life.  The good thing though, something that we can begin to do is to take the brave step to deeply reflect on death, and best of all we could make all of these changes now, right this minute.

Thinking

 “…for those who reflect.” (Quran 10:24)


“…and he taught Adam the names of everything…” (Quran 2:31)


“Do they not use their minds?” (Quran 6:32)


“Do they not reflect within themselves?” (Quran 30:8)

How should we think? How can we understand the world around us? What methods should we use to gain a true understanding of the world? These questions have puzzled the minds of many great thinkers throughout history.  Our human tradition is full of debates and discussions trying to find answers.  The likes of Locke, Hume and Kant, and many others have tried to provide answers to shed light on the perennial debate concerning our understanding of the world.  Some of these thinkers, such as Locke, claimed that our knowledge of the world is limited to our perceptions only, in other words knowledge is dependent on our sense experience, also known as a posteriori in epistemology, which forms the empiricist tradition in philosophy.

Locke argued that our minds were a blank sheet, a tabula rasa, waiting to be written on by experience.  Other thinkers like Leibniz argued, in his ‘Nouveax Essais sur l’entendement humain’, that as human beings we have innate concepts and ideas that are necessary to understand the world around us, known as a priori in epistemology, which means that knowledge can be gained independent of sense experience, and forms the rationalist tradition in philosophy.  Leibniz’s view seems to be a stronger position as it is makes more sense, however some philosophers and scientists deny this and claim that you can’t think of examples of things we can know independent of our sense experience.  This is not true; take the following examples into consideration:

·       Circles have no corners.

·       4+4 = 8.

·       Time is irreversible.

·       Everything that begins to exist has a cause.

·       The whole is greater than its half (just eat half an apple!)

·       Causality

Let’s take causality as an example to illustrate that we can’t just rely on sense experience.  Causality can be known without experience because we bring it to all our experience, rather than our experience bringing it to us.  It is like wearing yellow-tinted glasses, everything looks yellow not because of anything out there in the world, but because of the glasses through which we are looking at everything.  The contention that this is just an assumption is not true because without causality we would not be able to have the concept of the real world, and we would not understand our sense experience.  Take the following example into consideration; imagine you are looking at the White House in Washington DC.  Your eyes may wander to the door, across the pillars, then to the roof and finally over to the front lawn.  Now contrast this to another experience, you are on the river Thames in London and you see a boat floating past.  What dictates the order in which you had these experiences? When you looked at the White House you had a choice to see the door first and then the pillars and so on.  However with the boat you had no choice as the front of the boat was the first to appear.

The point to take here is that you would not have been able to make the distinction that some experiences are ordered by yourself and others are ordered independently, unless we had the innate idea of causality.  In absence of causality our experience would be very different from the way it is.  It would be a single sequence of experiences only: one thing after another.

So it seems that the correct way of forming conclusions is by using our innate ideas and the experiences of the world around us, in other words using rational thought or what some people call reason.  Just relying on our experience of the material world would not be sufficient as a method of thinking as it would not be able to confirm political truths, moral truths, mathematical truths, logical truths, and let’s not forget to mention a fundamental truth like causality.

Though we can understand the world around us using rational thought, how can we formulate an argument or verify our conclusions? Well, this lies in the study of logic which essentially means the principles of reasoning, with particular emphasis on the structure of our arguments.

Let’s illustrate the use of logic in the following example: if our friend Mary says “John is coming to dinner tonight”, and David says “Mary is not coming to dinner tonight”.  Is what they say consistent? Well, logic would tell us that if they are referring to the same person and the same day then no, their statements would not be consistent.  However if they are referring to a different person or a different day then yes their statements would be consistent.

So let’s combine the two processes.  John says “Whatever begins to exist has a cause and the universe began to exist, therefore the universe has a cause”.  Now from a logical perspective it is a valid argument as the last statement “therefore the universe has a cause” logically follows from the first two statements.  But this doesn’t mean it is rational or reasonable.  In order to find out that it is reasonable we would have to investigate using our innate ideas and our sense experience to see if the first two statements are true.  If they are, then the conclusion will not only be a valid argument but it would also be a sound argument.

Just relying on empiricism would not give us an answer as it would lead us to suspend judgment on whether the universe has a cause or not because it cannot be sensed.  However this would be equivalent of denying the existence of your great great great great great great great grandmother, because there is no empirical evidence for her existence.  You may argue “but I wouldn’t be here today!”, that is true, but that would be using rational thought to form that conclusion, as you would have deduced that you must have had a great great great great great great great grandmother as all human beings must have had a grandmother in order to exist.

This is how all of us should start to think about life and the universe, so we could form the right conclusions using valid arguments.

World-view

 “But perhaps you hate a thing and it is good for you; and perhaps you love a thing and Quran it is bad for you.  And God Knows, while you know not.” (Quran 2:216)

Live and let live, don’t harm others and you’ll be fine.  This makes sense, right? Even to the point that it shouldn’t be questioned.  But why is this? Why do we automatically accept some ideas and reject others? Why do certain viewpoints seem agreeable to us yet we disagree with others, all without really thinking about them?

The answer lies in the concept of a world-view.  A world-view is a philosophy of living that enables us to make sense of life and our daily experiences.  The world-view we adopt affects the way we process ideas, and allows us to understand society and our place in it.  A world-view is important in particular association with our society today – this is because the contemporary world has had a huge effect on human psychology.  We seem unable to deal with the unpredictable changes and increased complexity of life – subsequently stress, uncertainty and frustration become common and our minds are overloaded with information.  A world-view is the framework that ties all of this together, and allows us to understand life’s complexity and unpredictability, it helps us make the critical decisions that will shape our future and our own selves, and it aids us in providing a picture of the whole.

World-views vary and can range from being shallow to comprehensive.  A shallow world-view is one that just gives us the framework to react to day-to-day experiences, such as work and friendships.  This type of world-view is usually formed via our previous experiences in life and it develops by creating templates of understanding the world by contemplating on our history with it.  This type of world-view is problematic as it obstructs us from progression by maintaining an inflexible fixation on the past, with no possibility of viewing the world in a positive or different way that will enable our transformation.  It is limited in its scope as it becomes only as comprehensive as your experiences, and individually our experiences are very limited.

A comprehensive world-view, as discussed by the philosopher Leo Apostel, encompasses everything in life and it includes various components, for instance it provides a model for the world by answering the basic question “who are we?” In addition it provides an explanation usually answering “why is the world the way it is?” and “where did we come from?” Another important part of a comprehensive world-view includes extrapolating from the past into the future to answer the question “where are we going?” It should endeavour to answer “what is good and what is evil?”, in other words to include morality and ethics, while giving us a sense of purpose, direction and goals for our actions.  Additionally, the answer to the question “what for?” may help us to understand the real meaning of life and a comprehensive world-view must answer “how should we act?” thereby helping us to solve practical problems.  Lastly a comprehensive world-view should answer the question “what is true and what is false?”, this is equivalent to what in philosophy is called “epistemology” or “the theory of knowledge”, therefore it would allow us to distinguish between what is correct and what is incorrect.

For any situation there are various possible outcomes all of which are dictated by the world-view that someone adopts.  Instead of discussing the actions, or fruits, of a world-view the foundations of the world-view should be challenged and validated.  So the world-view that is more correct or has stronger intellectual foundations should be the one to adopt.

This is why when looking into Islam the primary focus should not be an assessment of women’s rights, clothing and on instances sensationalized by the media, because the assessment of these will be biased and skewed in line with your existing world-view.  But rather, the intellectual foundations of any world-view should be assessed for its truth, and the one with greater reasons to believe in its truth should be the world-view to adopt, because it will be in line with the principle of: whatever comes from truth is true.

So let the journey begin!