The Eternal Legacy of the Quran
Your gift has outweighed the cosmos in value, O Beloved of the Lord of the worlds!
O you upon whom no eye has ever looked at one more excellent! How astonishing is the affair of time: it swallows kingdoms as the sea swallows the footprints upon the shore; it folds up states as the wind folds the pages of autumn; it erases from the memory of the earth names that once filled the horizons with awe and clamour, so that nothing of them remains save a faint echo, like the rumble of thunder after the storm has passed. Peoples have passed across this world who presumed that the mountains had been created as pillars for their throne and that the stars only adorned the sky in celebration of their sovereignty; yet they soon became report after presence, trace after glory, memory after majesty.
We are the children of an age weighed down by losses, wearied by defeats, pursued by calamities, until it has become like a traveller exhausted by the length of the road. We look behind us and behold what has slipped from our grasp: strength that once filled hearts with confidence, grandeur that once filled horizons with majesty, unity that once gathered the scattered as a string gathers its pearls. Then we look ahead and behold surging waves of tribulation, division and incapacity, so that despair almost steals into souls as winter’s cold steals into the limbs of a stranger.
Yet no sooner do we raise our gaze to the heritage you bequeathed to us than all worldly losses shrink before it, and what has been misplaced seems but leaves that have fallen from a mighty branch, so long as the root of the tree remains firm in the earth, reaching up into the sky.
O you the like of whom no woman has borne! You departed this world leaving neither coffers of gold, nor palaces for heirs to quarrel over, nor crowns for dynasties to inherit, nor armies that fill land and sea. You left it having bequeathed something that, were all the treasures of the earth set in one scale-pan and it in the other, its pan would outweigh them until gold appears as dust, pearls as pebbles and kings as mere passers-by.
You left us the Word of God. Is there in all existence a word more exalted than this? You left us the speech of Him who hung the stars upon the curtain of night like lamps, who spread the blue seas as mirrors for the horizon, who made the rivers flow in the bowels of the earth as blood flows in the veins of the body, and who raised the heavens without pillars visible to the eye. You left us the speech of Him who, when He wills a thing, says to it, “Be!” and it is; who, when He wills to bestow life, breathes into it of His command; and who, when He wills to fold up the worlds, folds them as a page is folded. What gift can equal this gift? What inheritance can rival this inheritance?
O son of Khalīl Allāh, mankind may speak of conquerors, yet the greatest conquest is not the conquest of cities but the conquest of hearts. They may speak of kings, yet the greatest dominion is not what the hand possesses but what the spirit holds in certainty. They may speak of riches, yet the greatest wealth is not that counted in dīnār but that measured by nearness to God.
With this Qurʾān you opened realms that no map can show; with this revelation you established a polity that armies cannot tear down; with this light you built a kingdom whose frontiers do not end at any sea or mountain.
You entered the hearts of human beings and kindled within them a light from God that caused a shepherd to vie with kings upon the heights of greatness and caused a poor man to carry in his breast a wealth not possessed by the treasuries of Kisrá or Qayṣar.
O Beloved of the Lord of the worlds, the Qurʾān you brought is not a text to be recited only; it is a sun placed by God in humanity’s long night. Whenever the clouds of misguidance thicken, it sends forth its rays; whenever the chill of heedlessness intensifies, it diffuses its warmth; whenever souls are about to wander in the deserts of this world, it raises for them the beacons of guidance.
It is not merely lines of script between two covers, but a river of light flowing through the centuries: the first and the last drink from it and its water is never diminished; scholars and devotees draw from it and its source is never exhausted.
How like is the world to a vast caravan crossing an endless desert, and how like is the Qurʾān within it to the pole-star by which caravans are guided when landmarks disappear and all directions blur. Feet may stumble, travellers may go astray, storms may rage until sight is blinded, yet the star remains fixed, awaiting the one who lifts his head towards it.
So too the Qurʾān: ages churn around it, civilisations change, languages are altered, empires fall like dry leaves, yet it stands firm in its station, sending forth its ever-ancient, ever-fresh summons to humankind: “Respond to the call of your Lord and come to a word common between us.”
O choicest of creation, we have indeed forfeited much of the world—this is a truth none but the obstinate can deny. We have forfeited strength, we have forfeited unity, we have forfeited leadership, we have forfeited the capacity to bear the message as our earliest forefathers bore it.
Yet another truth, greater and more enduring, remains: we have not lost the greatest treasure we possess. So long as the Qurʾān is in our hands, the sea lies open before us, the light burns in our lamps, and the sky remains open above our heads.
A man may lose his garment yet his body remains, he may lose his wealth yet his soul remains, he may lose his house yet his heart remains; but if he loses his heart, he has lost everything.
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