Analysis and Deeper Benefits of al Aṣma'ī's 'Song of the Nightingale' - Library Chat #26

[Music] ald first and foremost as for me today is the 1 of shaal of the Year 1445 ah and yes today is the actual day of have had a very long day and I'm in alhamdulillah good spirit and mood and I thought that uh it is high time that I did another Library chat I do realize by the time you are seeing this uh for the first time and obviously those are going to be seeing it uh when they see it on the YouTube channel of course it might not be e for you but for me today is and so uh from my side to all of you may Allah accept all of our uh Good Deeds uh a little bit about why I've been there's been a delay in the library chats and then what our library chat today will be about uh so as you're aware that um I have left uh interaction on social media and I must say that it has been such a breath of fresh air may I uh seriously ask those of you that are involved in online uh wasting time to really consider taking a break from social media I found it to be extremely refreshing uh dealing with real people you find uh real comes out whereas the online as you're aware uh it uh it really is debilitating and I think a lot of time is wasted me personally I found too much time being wasted and not much being done uh and I I really um have enjoyed this um Hiatus and I think it will be continuing for a while Allah when I'll be coming back onto social media uh but uh that has not been the main reason why I haven't done any Library chats uh primarily I've been very busy uh finishing up a book uh which you going to be hearing about very soon 500 pages alhamdulillah or even longer and I'm very very uh Happy I've been engrossed with this I've been spending my time productively that was the goal for me to get off of social media and to really just do uh books and and longer and more fruitful projects and alhamdulillah uh you'll hear about uh the new book very soon uh but I've already spoken about it previously and it involves an academic study of a a trend of Islam uh and inall it will be published by a an academic press so this will be the first monograph I have uh inshah will be coming out soon this year and so that book has pretty much been finished the draft has been done so that has been the primary reason why I haven't been doing any Library chats uh also to be honest the political situation in the world uh really I found it a bit um difficult to to to do uh specific academic talks uh but uh that wasn't the main reason because life must go on and regardless of what is happening in the world politically regardless of what is happening we must continue our IAT we must continue our uh uh studying of knowledge and yes that includes uh deep Dives in academic study that does not change uh permanently yes obviously if M or Calamity happens it's understood you're going to take a little bit of time to withdraw and to recuperate but we never stop preaching and teaching we never stop uh uh uh uh you know uh benefiting the people regardless of what is happening uh in the world and uh we might uh reflect the circumstances might be reflected in what we say and our speech speeches and teaching should be changed with regards to the political climate but still de advanc teaching and deep dive still go on and so because of this uh I did take a bit of a Hiatus but we must return back and so today it will be a bit of a um uh interesting one I've never done something quite like this and uh it's going to be about one of the most famous poems that every single student who has uh been born and raised in any Arab land will be familiar with at some level this poem that we're going to be uh doing very quickly uh we're going to be doing this at multiple levels so I'm telling you from the outset we're going to be doing this at three levels the first level you don't need any background and it'll just be a quick uh rehash in English of one of the most famous stories in Arabic every Arab from Algeria all the way to uh Iraq and Beyond every single Arab student that has gone through an Arab High School is aware of this poem and the majority of them have been forced to study and memorize portions of it in their High School I.E this is required reading across the curriculums and I really mean uh Tunisia Algeria uh uh Libya uh Egypt um Saudi Arabia Qatar the Emirates Oman Bagdad Iraq the entire gamut of arabic speaking countries this poem is pretty much required reading in almost all of the high schools and even in I've seen some curriculums as well where it is taught at a advanced level at The Graduate level or at the undergraduate level as a part of you know the uh repertoire as a part of the or the Heritage that one should be aware of of One's Own civilization and culture and also as an example of Arabic eloquence and also uh as one of the famous historical anecdotes or vignettes if you like that is found in uh the books of history and so uh I so I'm going to be uh doing this poem in three levels level one I'm going to be doing it basically at the high school level and that is how an Arab student who has gone through high school would have been exposed to it and I'll just do it the English version of it so that you know you're aware and even if we get to level you don't get to level two and three you should be aware this is what the average you know Arab reader an Arab student is exposed to level one level two I'll be doing it at the uh let's say undergraduate level very quickly very quick that's not going to be a very deep dive and I'm going to talk about how uh variations might occur and we might understand things differently at the level two my my point really is as usual in library chats is to go deep almost all of my library chats they have a a deeper if you like message uh that I want to give to the advanced students so uh if you are not an advanced student don't worry about it you can just skip to uh or skip over level three don't worry about it and you can just benefit from level one and then level two will be a few minutes and you can skip over and just stop the video before I say now we're going to level three but level three is where I really this is for the actual students so believe it or not levels one and two what I'm going to be doing is basically it's not the primary purpose of the of the video even though it's going to be the bulk of the video so with that um six minute introduction let me now get to the level one this is now we're beginning level one now what is level one level one is a high school introduction level two is an undergraduate level three is where I'm going to go into the deep diab and Analysis where I want you to I'm going to have a deeper message so level one what is level one level one deals with a very beautiful story an anecdote that is taught as I said in almost every single high school across the Arab speaking world and it deals with an encounter between Abu the founder of the ab Dynasty and one of the most famous poets of early Islam is aasan poet who interacted with uh great Scholars like a sha perhaps even and others and he met with uh all of the icons of that era dies around 216 hij uh uh Sor 216 Hijra uh and that's like around 800 or a little bit before 800 740 I think CE so 216 hij uh is at the the Pinnacle of the beginning of Islamic Sciences the flourishing of Islamic sciences and is known to be a polymath he has written books on Arabic poetry on Arabic philology on Arabic grammar he has written books about civilization and a little bit of History he is also believe it or not a zoologist and a botanist he actually writes about plants and animals and he's just an observer of many different Natural Sciences so is somebody who has a very high reputation as an intellectual and a polymath and the story goes as follows that Abu ja the famous Khalifa the founder one of the primary icons of the abas dynasty Abu J it is said that his memory was so powerful that he was able to memorize a poem as soon as it was recited to him and so he could recite it directly from his as soon as he heard it he had a photographic memory if he heard a poem he would recite it immediately and there was in his uh Entourage in the palace there was a young lad a slave who was able to memorize after the second time and there was also a a slave girl who was known for poetry and she was able to memorize if she had heard something you know three times so if she had heard it three times then she would be able to memorize it and so uh Abu one day he decided he's going to going to become stingy and he would not reward The Poets what they deserve uh in the uh Islamic uh time frames poets would have uh open sessions with the and there would be competitions and if the Poetry was approved by the khif so the goal was that the Khalifa would give some money and the poet would go away happy so Abu ja one day became stingy and said I'm not going to give any poet any money so they said how are you going to get out of it he said don't worry I have a plan next time the poet came and recited a poem Abu said what are you talking about this is plagiarism this is a well-known poem and the poet would be become uh indent what do you mean I I'm the one who who who wrote this poem how can you possibly have say that this poem has been written by somebody else Abu J said look I know this already and because he had already wanted to memorize the poem when he heard it the first time and so he would recited back and then he would say and in fact you know what even the slave of mine knows it and so that slave because he memorize everything if you heard it twice so he heard it once from sorry once from the poet sorry not yet once from the poet once from the K and then he would say it and then he goes look even this girl here and then he would bring the slave girl and the slave girl would recite the same couplet or the same poem so the uh the poet would go away mystified how is this I'm the one who wrote this poem how could and this random you know uh um and the slave girl how could they all know this poem so this happened a few times and the new spread amongst the poets that what's going on here that doesn't make any sense and so it is said this polymath said this is a matter that has been pre-planned this is a trick that the Khalifa is doing and I am going to break this trick and what the khif had announced what was usually done in the past was that uh the poem the poem would be written on parchment whatever and so uh the Khalifa would say whatever is the weight of the parchment give the gold you know in return so whatever how however much the poem weighs if it's a short poem If it's a long poem depending on that the gold or the silver would be given so decided to trick Theif and went he said I'm going to prepare a poem that nobody can possibly memorize and this poem is considered to be this is how it is taught in high school so remember this is level one it is said to be uh the most eloquent or the most difficult poem ever written uh and it is mentioned uh uh as a part of the Legacy of and so said I'm going to trick Theif so what did do went in Disguise he put on a turban and he wrapped it all around himself because the Khalifa would recognize him so he went as if he's a bedin he dressed up in a very different Manner and he kind of you know partially covered his face which was common at the time if you were from a particular area you you know you would be covering the face even as a man and so he did this he dressed up in that Garb and he was granted the audience and he said I have a poem but remember the condition that if it is a new poem and you like it you must pay me its weight how heavy it is and the khif said yes indeed I will do that and so he composed this famous poem which is called the song of the Nightingale the song of the Nightingale and I will quickly recite it not in a I don't have a melodious voice uh but uh I will just quickly recite it uh in whatever voice I can and the translation hopefully will be coming on your screen and we'll go over it and all of this is is level one as I said then after we're done we're going to quickly go over level two and then the point really of the whole uh Library chat is really the level three so uh what how does this point begin this is the song of the N Nightingale by said for for for [Music] now obviously you can find this in much better voices online literally just Google uh on YouTube the Nightingale song and you will find people in much more melodious voices than uh mind uh and of course the point is that um he is now writing a poem that apparently the Khalifa cannot memorize so the Khalifa is completely you know uh jaw struck he's like completely Bamboozled what is this I've never heard this obviously you even without knowing any Arabic you see how complex these you know bizarre words are used the sounds and whatnot and he wasn't able to memorize it so he said to theam were you able to memorize he goes I couldn't do anything and he said to the jadia to the slave girl were you he goes I could I couldn't do anything so he said okay well I have to give you your gift then and so he says uh theas apparently said that ohif uh I only had a large Marble Slab that I inherited from my father and I wrote the poem on the slab and so he brought the slab out and the slab obviously is going to weigh like a ton of gold or whatever and so Abu said this is a trick you must be and so unveiled himself and he goes indeed I am Al andif you have to honor Me by giving me the gold and Theif said I cannot do this so because obviously it's a ton of gold so said that in that case I have one request and that is you start giving the poets their share and stop tricking The Poets and so Abu ja agreed to this uh condition and things came back to normal now uh very quickly as usual all Arabic poem and this might be a shock to those of you that never never study Arabic poem Arabic poem poems are always are almost always romantic there's always a romance there's always aaz and by the way this is even pre-islamic early Islamic this is the reality of poetry uh again people just is this is how it is and you just have to uh realize that it is what it is that even even uh a lot of times uh the Poetry that we find of the early umad and the ab that is written by mainstream Muslim Scholars and whatnot there's always aaz and that is how it is and so he begins uh um with this poem he goes uh the singing of the Nightingale is the Nightingale it caused my drunken heart to stir so he gives the impression again this is how many poets were that there's a lot of wine and intoxication and women in their poetry as is always the case so he said that I was lying in a drunken stuper and I heard the Nightingale sing now he is uh saying that when the Nightingale is singing I'm imagining the girl that I love her face is as beautiful as water and Roses combined together with her eyes dark pupils tinged with rosy red so this is again a common Trope to describe the beauty of your beloved and typically you describe it in a manner that is not vulgar uh that you describe it with her face or her hair or her eyes you know this is the reality of uh even pre-islamic and Islamic that you don't really get to stuff that might be considered vulgar and so you describe you know stuff that is generic and especially the eyes her beauty of the eyes and so and the the the rosy cheeks are being described over here so he says that the sound of the Nightingale it reminded me of the beauty of my beloved the girl that I like and and you oh my master my esteemed leader my benefactor how great is my desire how can I explain to you how strong long I desire to be with my my gazelle the English word gazelle and the Arabic word or it's from the same thing is a little gemstone a ruby so he's describing his his his beloved his his you know fiance not even a fiance just the girl that he loves the little gazelle my gemstone so he said oh my master if I could only explain to you how much I desire my uh beloved it is as if I plucked a rose from the redness of pecking her shy cheek so again he's giving this metaphor that when I kissed her on the cheek you know she turned red and the redness was so beautiful it is as if I could pluck a rose from that redness when I kissed her you know she exclaimed no no no oh no no no you know don't do this and she turned away and she fled even though as she is fleeing her her her new B figure she's a young girl so her new B figure almost danced from what the man had done in other words she's ecstatic and her shyness is there but also she's excited that her beloved has kissed her so she so is describing both the excitement and the shyness at the same time and she cried out woe to me woe to me and she said my guardian my guardian oh wo to me like she's getting help from the guardian or it depends on how you want to describe you know this translation you could say that uh is saying that I feared her guardian that what if her comes and oh woe to me what if her guardian were to come you know her father whatever to come and you know I've done this kiss to her so he's now you know uh describing his own fear so both of them can be uh translated in a different way in this regard yet I persisted and I said to her no need for all of this wailing no need for all of this woing and in instead show me your beautiful pearls your smile I want to see your smile she said if that be the case then show some seriousness and bring the requisite Goods bring the I.E what do you have to offer and come and propose for my hand I want to see what you have to offer and come and propose for my hand then just like with classical poetry even in English that this happens another act begins so when you're reading early Islamic poetry or pre-islamic poetry you have to realize it's composed in scenes and if you don't understand this when a new scene occurs you're like what is going on here this is now a completely new scene here and the scene now he is now imagining himself in a previous uh memory so he is so ecstatic that the girl has said that you know bring me your Mah and I'll accept your proposal the girl has basically said I'm willing to marry you but I need to see what you have to offer so then he now goes back to another part of his life either this is imaginary I.E he is literally imagining this he's so exciting or he's basically describing another scene that has occurred to him that it was a maybe in the past or it was as if a young group of ladies or a group of young ladies is are feeding me wine now uh uh the classical Arabs actually had a a term for uh wine that is kahwa and then it was then used only for coffee but in early uh times was actually used for uh for wine a little bit of wine now again guys I'm sorry to burst your bubble but poetry is full of references to Wine women uh and music and whatnot that's all even by great Scholars this is just the way it is uh because that is what poetry is not necessarily that they did it many of them did many of them didn't that is the way poetry so so he's now either imagining a scene or he's going back to another time where he had a great time with his life that he's surrounded by beautiful young ladies and they're feeding him wine or they're giving him wine as sweet as honey I smelt its fragrance of the wine with my own nostrils I could smell it it was pure than clothes I could smell it you know that smell that I like it was pure than clothes while this is happening I'm in the midst of a garden beautiful garden it is it is adorned with flowers and all pleasure belongs to me I own happiness so he's so happy he is saying I am surrounded by these beautiful young ladies they're giving me this wine and I'm in this garden and I'm all happy on top of this the guitar is stringing away and it is coming closer so is so again all of this is alliteration that's one of the reasons why this poem is so interesting so means that the guitar was right stringing away coming close to me and the drums that they were beating away all of it for me and then to give you the impression he literally puts the sound of the drums so the the the the music to my soul so the last is like music to my soul like like it's music to my soul and the beginning part that's like the drum beat so he puts the drum beat into a poem and the roof was whistling for me with the wind blowing through it right so the so there's wind blowing and the roof is now just whistling along with the tunes that I'm hearing along with the women along with the shab along with the garden so again this is for him jna on Earth here and the dancing was a remedy for me so the girls were dancing around him right so grilled meat is being given to him some say this is translate like a king I'll get to this in level two what does it translate into could mean over here like from Shah sha type of a king right uh so that that grilled meat is being presented to me plenty on a quin's tree leaf on the leaf of a Quin tree a nice nice tree plate is being given and I felt like a king with all of this and the dove itself is singing so is the dove the the beautiful bird and that the dove itself is is is you know singing in its ululation adding even more Delight to the Delight that I was in now this is scene number two we finishing scene number two now we go to scene number three scene number three is the current state where he is most likely going to the king so he's describing now he's going to the king so now he's going to the king so the girl has accepted his proposal he was so happy he gives this act to uh surrounded by young ladies being fed wine in this in this Garden that has all of the things around it and he then says act number three if you can only see me riding on my Lane L donkey so he doesn't have that wealth his donkey he doesn't have a horse he doesn't have a camel he has a donkey on top of that it is it is lame it's not even a proper donkey it is walking on three legs like that of a doesn't he have four you know proper legs to do and the people are pelting my ride he calls it Jam Even though it's he just said it is a camel because you're allowed to call any mount a a jam in the S with large Pebbles so they're irritated they're frustrated at this guy either because he's dressed in a poor manner or because he has this Mount or because he's irritating them whatever it might be he's not liked by the people and so they're throwing pebbles at him and the people are running away from me from behind me and all around me they don't like me but I still rushed forward fearing an evil demise I didn't stop I rushed through the crowd fearing that I would have an evil demise and where am I going I'm going to meet a great king one who is admired and respected now obviously the purpose of the poets is to flatter the king the purpose of the poet poets is to flatter the sultan and the Amir and the more they flatter the more gold they get so this is his flattery now he's getting to the end here so the people don't like me but I have a girl waiting for me now I'm rushing to the palace and I'm going to meet a a great king who is admired and respected he's going to give me a royal robe he's going to grant me a beautiful garment that is as red as the blood from a fresh wound and red is a royal color so I'm going to have a beautiful robe that's going to be as red as the wound from a fresh blood I shall be walking around for it in this Grand garment and and I can now be boastful that I have this beautiful clothes and I can even let it trail behind me it's going to go behind me like a royal king I am the poet can also mean Pearl Stone uh as if he's trying to say I'm from but in reality he's so he invents the name from the land and District of this is where his ancestors were from I wrote a poem so intricate and beautiful that the greatest of poets are incapable of producing something similar to what I have written I stay I say in its first stanza the song of the Nightingale the singing of the Nightingale so he begins the poem as he ended it and he ends the poem as he begins it is the first stza is the last stanza now this is level one and if you want to stop here realize this is what your average high school student has to memorize in the Arab land he has to literally memorize I remember when I was at the University of Medina one of my teachers also told us this story and he recited this whole poem from memory uh and he said that oh I spent so many hours memorizing this poem and I have to admit I was very impressed and that was my introduction to this poem because it really sounds so beautiful when it is done by somebody with a better voice than than yours truly uh and so please do listen to it uh online uh in a in a more beautiful voice you can listen to now that's level one level two would be to uh go into a detailed analysis of every single word and sometimes even differences because here's another point every poem without exception has variations there're different warnings different different now for this presentation I ignored it and I just chose one version in reality there are plenty of versions out there and uh even the famous there are not preserved word for word no poem I repeat no poem is preserved word for word letter for letter uh the poems are preserved by their gist and every single poem uh has variations uh that are recorded because that's human nature you cannot memorize you know uh poems literally every and even sometimes the writer himself has written his poem but still the might differ the might differ and that is reality every single famous Arabic poem this is no different and this poem at level two we're not going to do it uh because it's I don't see the point in English a level two analysis would be to look at the variations of the poem and to look at the alternative meanings and the Obscure words and the grammatical usages to deconstruct the eloquence of the poem uh and also a lot of times uh poetry it is allowed to use phrases that would not be allowed outside of poetry this is called of The Poets and it what the poets are allowed to do the average Arabic speaker is not allowed to do so for example like that's not really or right uh so uh uh this is not something that is typically allowed to do so he said you don't say you would say it's not really something you do also four times repetition right uh and uh so many other uh words so for example uh uh it's nobody knows what it means I already said the word nobody it's not a pure Arabic word it seems to be taken from another language and arabized right uh you have different meanings of uh if you are serious then bring me a be serious and bring me a what is it could mean food it could mean a it could mean Furniture uh again all of this is level two that what exactly is the meaning of the word what is the grammatical analysis and I'm not going to go there because frankly it's not an interest to English speaker and you have to understand Arabic uh to to Really benefit this now let us get now to the real point of uh the lecture for me I hope inshallah this is understandable so far because again these are obscure topics my purpose again for the library chats really is always a deeper dive and a bit of critical analysis now level three level three is to point out that in fact this despite the fact that this poem is studied by pretty much every single literate Arab on the face of this Earth who has gone through schools in arabic speaking lands despite the fact that if you do a simple Google the most famous poem of Al you will find this come up numerous times despite the fact that this is a a well-known uh anecdote that is pretty much like mut if you like in terms of uh its narrations in in in in the popular sphere the fact of the matter is that the story is simply too good to be true and it is of course a complete a complete myth and fabric it is a complete fairy tale there is no authenticity to this whatsoever and in fact we can be certain 100% that this story never occurred now uh what I'm saying is not shocking to Arabic academics to Arabic linguists every single professor of the Arabic language who cares about academics knows exactly what I'm saying there are many professors who don't care and so they will my own teacher I remember also thought it was real and he just said it to me as well and this leads me to my point number three which is really the point of uh the the the library chat and that is the reality of the very difficult uh topic that when you start taking a look into Concepts and ideas that might be very popular it doesn't matter how popular an idea is uh sometimes it just comes out to be a simple fairy tale or myth now I chose a topic and I chose an example that would actually be zero level controversy and I did this on purpose because the goal here is to demonstrate for you something that uh has been accepted by large segments of even Scholars the fact of the matter is many you will find this their anecdotes many famous preachers many famous you know people who have graduated from seminaries are going to be quoting poem and of course it doesn't matter theologically there's no that's based on this there's no there's no I'm making a point here and the point is that sometimes something becomes very very popular and it becomes a type of normative understanding of something and yet when you do a deeper dive you actually find out that um they might not be true or there might be alternative understandings now in this particular case it's actually very very easy to demonstrate that this poem is a complete fabrication uh of them of course is the fact that there's now every now every single science or every genre it has its tools to do a deep dive and to look into it soith has its own way has its own way has its own way poetry has its own way now because Library chat is about poetry so in poetry how can you do this a number of ways first and foremost obviously you look at the the the diwan of the poet himself the the the the one is his collection of poems and sometimes the poet himself has written it sometimes the students write it and generally speaking obviously if a poet uh poet poet has written uh a poem generally speaking you will find it in his earliest diwans or da in this case there is no reference whatsoever to's poem for for over 800 years we don't find this at all in fact the first uh book that has ever mentioned this it is a book written um I think uh 1,000 Hijra if I'm not mistaken 1,100 Hijra and is called and it is by an obscure unknown author we have the manuscript the manuscript uh the author lived around 1,000 Hijra and he's mentioning this incident that allegedly occurred quite literally 900 years before he wrote this book uh this manuscript there is a gap of 900 years and not just this it's not just about the earliest uh uh uh time it occurs we also look at other other indications we look internally and with regards to poetry we look at Concepts and ideas and words that would it be acceptable to use this in the earliest uh period of the abases and again that's a little bit deeper for our analysis but no could not and would not have used some of the words that are found in this poem and even the the fact that the poem has non-arabic words right these are non-existent words there is no Arabic word was a uh how to put this a proud Arab in his own way he was very proud of his culture and a manner inshallah uh very very much involved in his uh pre-islamic poetry and and classical poetry there is no way that he would have written a poem that has actually number of grammatical mistakes and unknown and words that are quite clearly invented Allah would never do such a thing so even internally so externally there's evidence internally there's evidence also another thing you can do is to look at uh the concepts that are mentioned and the uh reality so for example Abu the founder of the Abbasid Dynasty Abu ja mans as far as we know never interacted with doesn't make any sense would have been in his early 30s when Abu was in power and he wasn't famous at all for him to already have come to this level this is a complete ahistorical myth that nobody who understands history could have actually done properly because was not known to be associated with actually was known to be a close friend and a close associate of harid har Rashid is the grand son of Rashid is coming 30 years later when when is in his 60s now he has a relationship with uh harun Rashid so to claim that when he was in his 20s and 30s he had a relationship this is again uh nonsensical so you look at the content of the poem and you look at you know the whether the internal structure and the internal Concepts and the internal wording would it match what is being ascribed to and uh to give you a little bit little bit more more uh you know controversial example but again this is a a factual example there is a famous poem allegedly attributed to in which uh it is said it is alleged that he said that when he voice verified he said that uh you [Music] have that you have been created without any flaw as if you have been created the way you desire to be created right now uh I'm sorry to again burst your bubble but again this is simply factually speaking this is not an authentic poem of it cannot be an authentic poem simply because uh the content of this notion of perfect creation and you are creating yourself as you desire to create yourself it is impossible that these sophisticated theological Notions uh would have been prevalent you know uh in that time time frame in that Society these are Concepts and constructs that are coming 4 5 600 years later the notion of purity of creation and the notion of you have been created in this form and whatnot you don't find this in this time frame it is simply impossible now that's not the only evidence there's other evidence as well that this poem uh cannot be from H but again it's clearly not and uh the the motif of being created as you yourself wish in perfect form this Motif it is is clearly stemming and emanating from a time and place far after the first generation of Islam in Medina and mecah and this is just one example internal inconsistency now but again go back to our example of and of uh this story is a simple and clearcut indubitable example of why just because something is popular just because something is normative just because something is accepted it doesn't mean it has to be a fact and this poem If you were to tell your average you know uh person who has has again studied it since childhood that this is a fabrication your average even uh well- read uh Arab in fact your average sh again just this is the way they are if you would tell them that this is um this is a factually incorrect poem they would scoff at you what do you mean everybody says it's his you know this is reality like I said for the record every ser ious academic whether they're Arab or non-arab every serious scholar who is more interested in the Integrity of the discipline will tell you this is a fabrication there's no two opinions about this it's Common Sense actually again even the story if it's too good to be true usually it is it is not true right even the story itself it reeks of fabrication but it is actually disconcerting to find how popular it is and in fact again how mut it is now this lead lead me to the deeper point and I'm not going to give any other examples because the goal is to cause you to to think about this right and that is that the deeper point and this is my level three and we're going to conclude on this point is that generally speaking in these types of books of history and hearsay and and just popular culture a lot of what you find generally speaking there is little to know actual evidence and in fact in all likelihood a lot of hearsay and a lot of popular tropes and a lot of popular statements that one finds that we are raised up on in reality if you go you know deeper into this you know we find them to be simply without any basis whatsoever and of course uh when it comes to Arabic poetry the reality is who cares and I agree who cares the problem comes the problem comes that when you go to other genres of knowledge when you go to things that are more important and lots and lots and lots of people are taught something and they say it and somebody comes along and figures out or researches and like hold on a sec um even if all of these people are saying it the reality is that when you really go back there's just no basis for this statement and this is where again it gets extremely difficult to uh for the serious researcher the question arises should you start bursting popular myths or should you let the people believe that which maybe you know they're just he hearsay and there's not much harm to it but again the problem comes what if there is harm to it and so this is where I'm going to leave over here and that is the goal here is to be brave enough to do your own research and to choose you know which subjects you want to go do a deep dive in and which areas where do you think it is wise to uh be a bit more blunt or is it wise to let people believe what they want to believe uh this is where again it gets very difficult here and we have to look at our own internal biases just because a lot of people say something and just because they are good people it doesn't mean what they're saying is correct 100% now of course I'm not talking about that's something that is understood I'm talking about historical vignettes and anecdotes and I'm talking about maybe some other facts that are more than just history but obviously you know as for the alhamdulillah the of our de alhamdulillah Allah is Al he has revealed he has sent a messenger that teaches us the H of course we're not talking about that but I am talking about tropes I'm talking about vignettes and anecdotes I'm talking about uh Concepts even that are not from the core of the de because the core of the de obviously alhamdulillah Allah has promised to protect it I am talking about especially uh aspects that of our popular culture that we just assume is Islamic or a core of the de and even if it might not be un Islamic just because a lot of people are doing it doesn't actually make it Islamic and that's something that again a case by k spases i purposely chose a topic and a example that is super easy and it is non-controversial who cares if the singing Nightingales poem is actually complete fabrication it doesn't change anything however there are other uh anecdotes and other issues that sometimes it does cause some disconcertion and perhaps even more than this and the point here was to illustrate something as clear-cut as a well-known fabrication amongst academics it is the curriculum of so many places of learning across the Muslim world it is in the standard curriculum and the irony again is that even within uh those institutions I guarantee you you will find academics who care about the truth who will point out this poem is fabrication yet still popular teachers and preachers and popular you know uh people and these are again these are arudi these are people that are learned but not every learned person really does a critical investigation of every fact they're taught and that's really one of the points of this Library chat that you can have a degree even in Arabic uh literature and still many people are going to assume that this is from why because when something is so nice to listen to and it's so beautiful and it it just makes you feel good you don't even feel like correcting it and you just would rather it be true well I made an example or I gave you an example that is non-controversial and I want you to understand there are examples uh that for various aspects that might actually be a little bit more difficult and bring about more disconcerting thoughts and this is the problem that again many people have when they do research is that is it worth it to uh go into a deeper dive or not and to explain this or just let the people believe and that is really a difficult question to answer but the goal of this Library chat is very simple and that is to understand that sometimes what is popular even amongst people who have studied is not necessarily what is academically correct and the two are not exactly the same so we constantly ask Allah subhana waala for and we should be brave enough to understand and accept the truth even if large groups of people um are saying otherwise and with that inshallah will stop this Library chat and inshallah I hope to start resuming on a more semi-regular basis I hope this was of some [Music] benefit [Music] [Music] for for [Music]

Channel: Yasir Qadhi

Views: 23,523

Keywords: yasir, qadhi, official, islamic, scholar, Islam, Quran, Sunnah, Hadith, Bukhari, Muslim, Tirmidhi, Yasir Qadhi, Shaykh Dr. Yasir Qadhi, Library Chats With Shaykh Dr Yasir Qadhi, The Obligations of A Muslim, Politics in Islam Yasir Qadhi, Priorities of A Muslim Yasir Qadhi, Politics Yasir Qadhi, Surah Al Araf Yasir Qadhi, Library Chat #26: Analysis and Deeper Benefits of al Aṣma'ī's 'Song of the Nightingale', Yasir Qadhi Poems in Islam, Analyzing poems, Romantic Poems in Islam

Id: VozG9qDtho0

Length: 48min 34sec (2914 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 13 2024