Let Us Get Back To Basic.........al Fatihah Revisited

[  http://tafseerkoran.blogspot.my/2012/09/surah-al-fatiha-1-1-7.html  ]


friends , dato, and tansri,

before we move on from surah ya seen to surah as saffat, let us get back to basic.
let us revisit surah al fatihah.
for some of us who have taken this journey together with me since sept 9th , 2012, we have covered roughly about two third of the qur'an to-date.
that is a long journey indeed.

i started this tafseerblog just shortly before that, inspired by muhammad asad aka leopold weiss. at the turn of the 20th century, leopold weiss, of jewish origin from krakow, poland, as a young man in his early 20's, was 'implanted' in the middle east by a german newspaper to report back the goings on in the muslim heartland.

but mashaallah!
man plan but Allah directs! 
leopold weiss went on to become the most significant and substantive european muslim of his time. in the process he translated and explained an english version of the qur'an, '' the message of the qur'an ''.

my own personal qur'anic journey started in my early thirties. bow-tied, with a slight english twang  occasionally juxtaposed with an unmistakable 'budu' accent, i was just back from london when, i was given the responsibility to be in charge of a large medical contingent looking after the health of 30,000 malaysian muslim pilgrims at haj of 1985.

even at that age , a recalcitrant ' young dr nik already decided in his mind that he was not going to be 'blinkered' by the limited world view of one or two ustaz', so despite my scant knowledge of the 'ugama', i foraged through hamka's voluminous 'tafsir al azhar', all 7,000 pages of it's 10 volumes, in a period of 6 months!

that was the beginning of what i would term as the 'permanent head damage'.
hamka, in this nusantara, i must concede , was very much under-rated.
hardly anyone reads him now.
his tafseer is brilliant.
i know.

over the years , i have gone through tafsir al azhar three time.
its contemporariness and relevance to the modern age, it's depth and breath, dealing with an ayat, beat the rather dry , rather military nuance of ibnu katsir or the 'tafseer by committee' one get from going through say  'tafseer ar rahman'.

then in the 90's came internet and the proliferation of daie like nouman ali khan, hamza yusuf, ahmad israr, suhaib webb, abu talha, ustaz latifi al patani etc and etc.
....and now we have 'whats app'.

marry all of these shaykhs and ustad together to the internet, and spiced them with 'whats app' we get a 'high octane ' combustible mix' free for international da'awah at my fingertip......... my love affair with tafseer has gone  'global under one roof'!

i have people reading this tafseer now right from alaska to vladivostok , form tokyo to dunedin , nz!.......at no cost , just my time.
alhamdullillah.

..............................

in surah al fatihah, unlike the longer surah, we are really spoilt for choice.
we have more than 3 dozen choices actually.
all good contemporary commentaries.

here, i limit it to only four.
if you are the type who keep up with contemporary politics and also a fan of sayyid qutb, i would recommend shaykh abu talha for you.

if you understand 'french' and like politics, and can put yourself in the position of a simple man from kota bharu, tuan guru nik aziz bring back happy memories of what we are missing most in our national political landscape at present.

if you are young, ustad nouman ali khan is definitely for you.

i love contemporary politics  or rather i keep up with contemporary politics. 
and i love sayyid qutb perspective of the qur'an .
i like his honesty and bravery in the face of grave danger and inequities of his time.
therefore after listening to all the four available here , i am biased towards listening to shaykh abu talha.......he seemed to have the right 'controlled anger', and the right dose of acceptance/ridha.

that is what i feel we muslims have to be in the present world climate.

'controlled anger' and the right dose of ridha  .
that climax and perception one gest when one reaches his exposition  on 'waladdho lin...', if you guys have the stamina to reach there.
i doubt that many will do.
the question time is also excellent.
listen
and when you guys finish listening to shaykh abu talha or to tok guru nik aziz or nouman ali khan, venture into my personal journey on the aspect of 'death' in 'just visiting part 2 '



dr nik isahak

[   http://drnikisahak.blogspot.my/2017/01/just-visiting-part-2.html   ]