REFUSAL OF REVELATION
Included among our modern educated class of people are those who understand that the Quran is a collection of the thoughts and conceptions of the Messenger, the exalted, himself. But since he (S) happened to be a genius, so like a genius he (S) used to understand (God forbid) that
These ideas, weaving a chain of thoughts, come from what’s hid.
Suffice is to say to them that the idea of this inkling is a flat refusal of the Revelation and the Quran; it makes no person a Muslim there-by. The Quran is a revelation from God, having no interference of the personal thoughts and conceptions of the Messenger of Allah (S).
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN WORDS AND IDEAS
The second group (as has been mentioned previously) is the class of people who think that the ideas of the Quran used to come by intuitively from God, but the Messenger (S) had described these ideas in his own words. This is the very class of people to whom we address at present and to whom it is essential to make them cognizant as to what the relation between ideas and words is.
Allama Iqbal, in his Zarb-e-Kaleem, under the title of “Psyche and Physique – Body and Mind” has written:
Word and concept are inter-related,
Like the relation of Psyche with Physique,
So is exactly the cinder, the fire, clandestine in the ashes
In this couplet he has amalgamated the philosophical discourse in a concentrated and concise mode by which efforts were put forth to answer this question: what is the mutual relation of word with idea? He has, by the way, also touched upon this question in his lectures (first lecture). In this connection he writes:
“Inarticulate feeling seeks to fulfils its destiny in idea which in its turn, tends to develop out of itself its own visible garment. It is no mere ****phor to say that idea and word both simultaneously emerge out of the womb of feeling, though logical understanding cannot but take them in a temporal order and thus create its own difficult by regarding them as mutually isolated.” P.18
Dr. R. M. Bucke, regarding the mutual relation between concept and word, writes in his famous book “Cosmic Consciousness”:
"For every word, there is a concept and the vice versa. Word and concept in isolation can not exist. No new word without depicting a concept can ever be coined, and likewise no now concept can be ingrained till there is simultaneously a new word created for its expression". P. 27 (Translation is mine)
Prof. W. M. Urban, in his book - Humanity and Deity – has described this topic in detail: what is the mutual relation of intuition with words? Referring Croch, he writes:
The incarnation of intuition without words is impossible. It is well nigh impossible that a person may first develop a concept of a thing and then he may seek words for the expression of that concept. That concept regulates itself with words. P. 53
Hence intuition can never be segregated from words. P. 53 (Translation is mine)
In this connection, he furthers:
Whatever the language of religion states, can never be embarked upon in other words or style. (P. 65)
With this, he has concluded that divine books cannot be translated. In this connection he has presented poetry as an example. It means you, by translating a highly symbolized couplet, can not epitomize the impression its original words enchant.
The research of the contemporary thinkers corroborates the assertion of the Qur’an that the Qur’an is the Qur’an along with it very words. It is the book of Arabic language, revealed from Allah. It means its words are revealed from Allah – its words surpass any equivalents. Each of its word on its own is fortified, undefeasable and unswerving like the Himalayas.