ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books The Islamic Concept and Its Characteristics Chapter V : Comprehensiveness "And all things We have kept in a clear register" (Ya Sin 36:12) The third characteristic of the Islamic concept is its comprehensive­ness. This characteristic also proceeds from its first characteristic, its Divine origin. It comes from the Creator Himself and not from any man, and comprehensiveness is a characteristic of what Allah has made.

When we look at a human being, we see that his existence is circumscribed by time and space. He comes into being from non­existence at some instant in time and then he perishes at a later instant. He occupies a limited amount of space. These limitations of time and space apply equally to a single human being, to a generation, and to the entire human species. Man is also limited in his knowledge, experience, and comprehension.

As an individual he starts to learn from scratch after his birth, and the sum total of his knowledge and experience is limited by his life span and by the places he occupies. Man as a whole is limited in his knowledge and experiences by his sensory and mental apparatus, which are given to him for performing a certain task, that of being the vicegerent of Allah on this planet. In addition to this, he is subject to his inclinations, desires, and emotions.

When a human being tries to construct a metaphysical concept or a system of life through his own efforts, this concept or system cannot be comprehensive. It can only be partially valid, good for one time and place but not for other times and other places, and appropriate for one set of circumstances but not for another.

Furthermore, even in tackling a single problem, he is incapable of looking at it from all possible sides and of taking into consideration all the consequences of this proposed solution, since every problem extends in space and time and is connected with precedents and antecedents beyond the scope of observation and comprehension of human beings.

We therefore conclude that no philosophy and no system of life produced by human thought can have the characteristic of "com­prehensiveness." At most, it can cover a segment of human life and can be valid for a temporary period. Because of its limited scope, it is always deficient in many respects, and because of its temporariness it is bound to cause problems that require modifications and changes in the original philosophy or system of life.