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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Taqwa (Piety) Advice of Piety And Knowledge (Science) ================================= One of the other issues about which a human should exercise piety, that is to say, he must be careful not to be deviated and misguided is the acquisition of knowledge, for the word ‘knowledge’ can be as deceitful (how much knowledge one has) as the word ‘scholar’ (how much knowledge that scholar has) is.

Apparently those who go after what is called knowledge or science are usually known as scholars or scientists whether in mathematics, physics, chemistry, astronomy, geography, natural sciences, medicine, and industry or in the science of distinguished men, ancestry and lineage, history, Hadith, insight, morphology and syntax, rhetoric, beliefs, theology, philosophy, wisdom, prosody, literature, mysticism, ethics and behaviors, whether they have taken a right or wrong path.

Sheikh Tusi, Khajeh Nasseeruddeen, Majlesi, Allahmah Helli and Boroojerdi are called scholars while Abu Hanifah, Malik, ash-Shafi’ee, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, al-Ghazali, al-Fakhr ar-Razi, Seyed Qutb, Shaltut, Ibn Abil Hadeed and Ibn Hajar are called scholars too. However, we must exercise piety in this area too by making sound knowledge distinct from the wrong knowledge, by making justice distinct from injustice. What is of significance to Islam is clear for all.

Imam Musa ibn Ja’far (AS) has been reported as saying: “One day, the Messenger of Allah (SAW) entered the mosque. He saw a group of people gathering around a man. He asked who the man was, and it was said that he was a scholar.

The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said: ‘What is he expert in?’ They said: ‘He is the most knowledgeable in the lineages of the Arabs, the events of the pre-Islamic era, poetry as well as Arabism.’ The Holy Prophet (SAW) said: ‘His knowledge does not harm one who does not know it nor does not benefit the one who knows it.’ The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said: ‘Knowledge or science is of three types; a clear sign that is the principles of faith, a just obligation that is ethics which is the middle course between the two extremes, and a well known norm (Sunnah) that is religious orders as well as issues related to lawful and unlawful things.” [^1] It is said that the principles of faith are related to human mind, ethics to his soul and heart, and lawful and unlawful things to his body.