I started studying Islam formally in my early 20s. I use the word “formally” because as someone who was born Muslim my knowledge about Islam was first handed down to me “informally” from my parents, older sisters, and the general Muslim community. We sat in lectures that served as religious reminders, we read the Quran as a family, my father quoted Hadith often, and I received various other forms of Islamic knowledge without sitting in a classroom or learning directly from a traditional text. In my 20s, sometime before ever taking a formal course on any Islamic subject I came across a video of Imam Zaid discussing Shafi Fiqh. Having grown up between what I’d call a “salafi-esque” community and a Warith Deen Muhammad community (the latter was less influential but still a part of my upbringing) I didn’t know much about madhabs, yet by the time I finished listening to Imam Zaid’s lecture on Youtube I felt I had to study this school of law.
I stumbled my way into finding an Islamic center in New York teaching Shafi Fiqh. I eagerly signed up to take the class with Imam Amin Muhammad only to be disappointed that the class would no longer be available that semester but he would instead be teaching Aqidah. I was hesitant to take Aqidah, the subject of the Islamic belief system, because growing up Muslim I was sure I certainly knew what Muslims believe. But I didn’t have much of a choice, it was either Aqidah or waiting another few months until the Fiqh class began, so I decided to just get started.
Needless to say, my assumption that I didn’t need or wouldn’t benefit from taking an Aqidah class was wrong. Even if I could feel somewhat confident in not making mistakes of larger kufr (disbelief) I wasn’t free from making smaller errors. Learning Aqidah formalized and refined my understanding of my faith.
That was the beginning of my journey. For the sake of this keeping this post short I’m going to skip ahead to now, over 10 years later. Had I stuck to my formal studies consistently I’d probably be reading Quran fluently with understanding, rattling off beginner Fiqh and Aqidah points without effort, and speaking Arabic fluently, but that’s not the case. My blog is named after Surah Teen where God says He made man from the best mold and then lowers them to the lowest form (except those who do good deeds, etc.). I mention that because it somewhat reminds me of my journey as a student of knowledge, I’ve had high points and –at times, really low points. Long periods without studying and periods of consistency. 10 years later —as I was 10 years before, I’m studying Fiqh, Arabic, Hadith, Quran memorization, and Tafsir. At best I can say I’m “beginner-intermediate”, sometimes when I come across people —whom I occasionally have the honor of teaching, I’m reminded of what a beginner truly looks like. Other times when I come across those who also started studying around the same time I did I feel a sense of shame for how much further along I could be.
Consistent study has not been easy for me but these past two or so years have been one of my better efforts. The frustrating but also alluring thing about studying Islam is that it’s never-ending, you advance but there’s no actual endpoint. The more you learn the more you realize you need to learn. The more you know the more you realize you don’t know. This journey is tedious and never-ending but every once in a while I realize I know more than I knew before or a topic is easier to grasp now than it was with previous efforts. I once listened to a scholar mention that another great scholar of the past would pray 1000 sunnah rakat day. It almost seems odd that someone could dedicate so much time to prayer, it would make one think they “must not have had anything better to do.” Not in the sense of a slight –as it is often said, but in its most literal meaning. If we knew the ajr (reward) we’d attain from worshipping Allah and studying His deen perhaps we would realize that there is truly nothing better to do. Hopefully with time that reality will become more clear and reflect itself in my dedication to Islamic knowledge.
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Related:
- Islamic Studies, https://bythefigandtheolive.com/islamicstudies/
- We need our Shuyukh https://bythefigandtheolive.com/we-need-our-shuyukh/
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