Are you ready to struggle to learn Islam?

They can do the painstaking actions to learn the beneficial stuff. Can we do the similar to learn about ‘Islam’ if we really think that ‘Islam’ is beneficial for us?
Read the following two stories.

The first story is from one of the successful investor and philanthropist in present time and the next story is from the life of a Sahabi (Companion of the Prophet, pbuh).

1. Tony Robbin’s story:

In his childhood, Tony Robbins [1] spent $35 to attend a motivational seminar conducted by an expert (Jim Rohn [2], who took 10 or 20 years of his life and he condensed all the learning into few hours to deliver -according to Tony). Tony was making $40 per week as a janitor while going to high school.

Tony said, “I struggled and struggled to take the decision but ultimately decided to go for it. It turned out to be one of the most important investments of my life. It took a week’s pay and went to a seminar where I met Jim Rohn – the man who became my life’s first mentor and it changed my life!

Learn to work harder on yourself that you do on your job.”

2. Salman Al Farsi (R)’s story:

“Salman Al-Farisi travelled from his hometown in Esafahan, Iran to Syria, Iraq and Madinah. Even though he was cheated, robbed, tortured and even made a slave, he didn’t give up. Eventually he met a Christian priest who told him of the coming of a Prophet who brought the message of Prophet Ibrahim and that he should seek him out.

Salman Al-Farisi finally met Rasulullah(S) in Quba and after ascertaining that Rasulullah(S) was indeed the Prophet that he was searching for, he hugged Rasulullah(S) and cried. His arduous journey was finally over. The truth he was trying to find was Islam; through the teachings of Rasulullah(S).

The accessibility of knowledge that we have today however, is something that we can all appreciate and be thankful for. Unlike Salman Al-Farisi who had to travel great distances and go to great lengths just to find it, for us it’s just a masjid, institution or a few clicks on our computer away. It’s just a matter of whether we want to or not.

Information has become too readily available but not people with the wisdom to interpret it.

Scholars dedicated years of their lives on the study of a particular subject taking into account the context of their environment as well as other factors before finally issuing a ruling on it but here we are simply “googling” it and what’s worse we could be undermining the efforts and being blatantly disrespectful of these scholars.

This is why we should always refer to people who are more knowledgeable. This was what Salman Al-Farisi did in his travels. He didn’t think himself to be smarter than others not did he assume he was right but instead learned from others until he found Rasulullah(S) and learned from him.

In a nutshell, I feel what we can learn from this is that we should continually seek knowledge from credible sources under the guidance of a teacher while being respectful and humble.” [3]

Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said: “Acquire Knowledge. It enables its possessor to distinguish right from wrong. It lights the way to heaven. It is our friend in the desert, our society in solitude, our compassion when friendless. It guides us to happiness. It sustains us in misery. It is an ornament among friends and an armour against enemies.”

[The Secret Shrine, Islamic Mystical Reflections, edited by Catharine Hughes]

Now the question remains: Are you ready to struggle to learn Islam? Struggle by time, efforts and money to learn from the good scholars?

REFERENCES:

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Robbins

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Rohn

[3] http://muzlimbuzz.sg/khutbah-reflections-lessons-from-the-story-of-sayyidina-salman-al-farisi-r-a/