A few days ago it was brought to my notice that attempts had...

A few days ago it was brought to my notice that attempts had been made upon some Muslim students in a Christian institution to mislead them against their religion and some of these young men even came over to me to clear up some doubts, and I gave them the same minutes of my discourse with my friends at Trichy.

After going through the matter the young men copied down some of the arguments and the very next day they came to report to me that they had successfully convinced the critics against Islam and desired the matter in the minutes to be published for the benefit of our own young men who very often had to meet unreasonable criticism against Islam and the Holy Prophet. I had to agree to their reasonable proposal.

One thing I would like to be made clear is that the sole object of this publication is to arm young Muslim minds with the truth, and nothing else. If anyone does not want to read or hear anything against his own personal views, he need not pursue this matter or hear it pursued by anyone. I wish it to be known that what is said in this small booklet is exclusively for those who are sincerely interested in knowing the truth irrespective of the source or the quarter from which it comes.

By this I mean only those sincere seekers after truths who are tempera- mentally and purposefully earnest in seeking to know the various points of view about one and the same problem. It is a universally acknowledged fact that, except for those who have been divinely inspired to guide humanity towards the truth, no mortal can ever be sensibly deemed to be perfect in his knowledge. It is according to this native want in man that Islam ordains man to seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave.

It needs also to be known that Islam never accepts any belief which is professed in the blind following of someone else's views or any hereditary concepts, no matter from whose parents they are inherited. Islam invites each sincere adherent to reflect, to think, to ponder, and then to judge independently for himself. Nothing which is not one's own is ever acceptable in Islam, even one's own faith in God.

Every Muslim is ordained by the Holy Qur'an to profess his faith by his own personal and individual scrutiny of his own belief. To know or to acknowledge the truth or the reasonableness in arguments advanced by the opposite side is a task which never appeals to the ordinary slavish mentality of the blind followers of a crowd.