Relevance
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Peace all,
I just wanted to share a reflection I had. Perhaps obvious to some, but still worth thinking about.
There are many stories and accounts of events in the Quran. For many of these there are many different understandings and interpretations. Some may never be known fully.
BUT, if there is a story in the Quran, e.g. about malaika being ordered to submit to adam, and iblees refusing, then it must obviously mean that this story can have benefit for the reader. Otherwise it is useless. Why would there be a story just for entertainment or for information sake of what once happened?
My idea was that every story should be interpreted in a way that it provides some useful knowledge to us.
It could give us an insight about us as human beings and our nature, making it easier for us to handle and control our rebellious selves.Or the other thing I can think of is that the purpose of a story may be to help explain or define something else mentioned in the Quran.
Like I said, this may be obvious to many in this forum, but I'm sure many in the world just take their quranic stories as nothing more than historical accounts to pass on to the offspring... all for the sake of cultural homogeneity and "coziness".
I do believe it is important to ponder the relevance of what one reads, and the purpose it is relayed to us. Why would I bother for example that 'iblees' was created from 'smokeless fire' unless my understanding of 'iblees' and 'smokeless fire' somehow helps me in understanding myself and my situation in this world and how to go about improving it?
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....but how to address the wives of the prophet, now how is that relevant to us and what are we to learn from that? something i have often wondered....
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when i was growing up, i didn't quite understand why when we had male visitors, my female relatives would go to another room and talk to the male visitors with the walls separating them. when we rode in cars, their was a screen separating the front where the driver/guys sat and the back. that's just how things were. it was a form of 'respect' and 'protection' for women.
the principles of the story have been more oppressive. personally, i don't see how the story about the wives of the prophet are relevant to me in my life.