For most of us, education means going to a place called school where teachers enrich us with their wisdom. Well, let’s consider what the real world has to do with all of that. Do we really need to memorize stories of ancient cities and dead political leaders? Do these things really enrich us? Or is it the lessons we learn independently that compromise the greatest growing experience? I find it interesting to see a famous person, who spent all his professional life holding top level positions at major corporations, summarize the greatest of his life’s experiences in a book detailing what he had learned at summer camps. Does this not suggest that the realizations we come to while exploring our world together with other people are the most meaningful?
I do not mean to diminish the value of formal education, but to suggest that the potential for broader and deeper meaning is found when we follow our desire to learn.
Listening to Jim Weiss, a fantastic professional story-teller, recount the events of the death of Teddy Roosevelt and the resulting Presidency of Harry Truman. He described the stature of President Roosevelt, who came from a wealthy family, and who had been educated at an Ivy League University. His credentials and charisma seemed to invite success. But, when Mr. Truman was told by Eleanor Roosevelt, “Oh Harry, I’m so sorry”, she wasn’t kidding. The public did not perceive Truman to be in any capable of succeeding Roosevelt. The most noticeable difference between them over and over. He especially liked to read the histories of ancient civilizations and their rulers. During one interview, he attributed his diplomatic success to repeating the approaches that had been successful historically. He loved to go back and reference these accounts, and relate his current problem to the personality and resolution of the past. This proved to be quite successful.
But how many of us are captivated by history? Do we reflect daily on the lessons of old? Do we use this easily accessible knowledge of days gone by to rethink current circumstances?
Apparently not.
Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhe wa sallam, said, “Surely, you will follow the ways of those before you, just as the flight of one arrow resembles another, so much so, that even id they entered the hole of a lizard, you would enter it.” They said, “Do you mean) the Jews and Christians?” He, sallallahu alayhe wa sallam, replied, “(If not them,) then whom?” (Bukhari and Muslim)
It seems we are a stubborn people who forget easily. The Qur’an is jampacked with account of human civilizations, their mistakes and triumphs.
Allah uses the accounts to give very clear and direct advice about how to get the most value added experience here on earth, and in the hereafter. I find it no coincidence that the vast majority of hadeeth deals with issues of human interaction. Are these lessons so hard to learn? Or do we have our minds focused in a different direction.
Let’s step back and reflect on what it is we are doing here. What are we accomplishing as parents, citizens, neighbors, husbands, wives, employers, friends, or passers-by?
Will the world be left unchanged when we are gone? Or will we spend our lives striving, demonstrating, and encouraging others to live each day as if it were our last. Let us not forget that it will be our status in our last moments that will determine our success or failure in this life. Let us work to educate ourselves and those around us about the true purpose of our existence best described by the Qur’anic verse: “And I did not create the jinn and mankind except to worship Me/”
[51:56]