God is Hazrat Ali (RA)

By Prof Dr. Sohail Ansari

Conceived and worded by Prof DR Sohail Ansari (originality of concepts and originality of words).

He believes that there can never be a zero scope for improvement and appreciates criticism if it is not for the sake of criticism.

(My posting ‘Hazart Ali (RA) as I do not know’ (Sunday, 3 July 2016) was in response to a speech of one Allama. Knowledge that Allama claimed Hazart Ali had appeared to have no apparent source. I posed therefore a question:  Is God Ali? As God only is independent of source. I kept waiting for any answer till I came across a video.

 

Speech credits Hazart Ali with not only divine attribute but also explicitly and implicitly says God is Ali.

So assertive is speaker in all his assertions (only two I quoted, rest readers can listen) and so responsive audience are to them that it appears that for speaker and for his audience the other name of God is Ali. Do sizeable majority of Shia/ ‎‎ Shīʿah community endorse this speech? I have no idea, but I certainly do not as I cannot share attributes of God with any human.

I choose title ‘God is Ali’ not ‘Ali is God’. As Hazart Ali was born and died. Hazart Ali did not exist before birth nor after death. Therefore if Hazart Ali was God so God did not exist before birth of Hazart Ali and came into existence when Hazart Ali was born and died when Hazart Ali died.. Title ‘God is Ali’ dovetails well with sum and substance of speech.)

Claim 1:  Hazart Ali (RA) saves Noah by Noah's Ark. 

To Prophet Noah, God commanded:

“Construct the Ark within Our sight and under Our guidance. Then when comes Our command, and the fountains of the earth gush forth, take on board pairs of every species, male and female, and your people except those of them against whom the Word has already been issued: and address Me not in respect of those who are unjust; for verily they shall be drowned (in the flood).” — Holy Qur’an, 23:27

Finally, when all the unbelievers were drowned in the flood, God commanded:

“O Earth! swallow up your water, and O Sky! withhold your rain! and the water abated and the matter was ended. The Ark rested on Mount Judi.” [6] — Holy Qur’an, 11:44

Holy Quran states explicitly that saving of Hazart Noah lies with God. Even in Christianity that is God Who saves Noah:

 ‘Noah's Ark is the vessel in the Genesis flood narrative (Genesis chapters 6–9) by which God saves Noah his family, and a remnant of all the world's animals from the flood’.

Claim 2: Hazart Ali (RA) Gives/sends rain. 

In the eleventh verse of Surah Az-Zukhruf, rain is defined as water sent down in due measure. The verse is as follows:

"And He who sends down (from time to time) water from the sky in due measure, and We raise to life therewith a land that is dead. Even so will you be raised (from the dead)."Al-Qur'an 43:11

"We send down pure water from the sky. That with it We may give life to a dead land, and slake the thirst of things We have created, cattle and men in great numbers."Al-Qur'an 25:48- 49.

(People may say that artificial rain is produced by people so Hazrat Ali can send rain. This is wrong as  Artificial rain is produced by spraying clouds with substances like Silver Iodide or ones like solid carbon dioxide (dry ice), God alone has created clouds; scientist do not create anything simply capitalize on things created by All Mighty).

This panegyric on the Godlike attributes of Hazrat Ali is a paean that proves claims only by emotion (not by logic) to people need no proof to believe in them. This encomium will work equally well (just replace name of Hazrat Ali with Jesus) with believers of Incarnational Theology  (In Christian Theology the area of  study dealing with the coming of God to be with us in Christ Jesus is known as Incarnational Theology. The doctrine of the Incarnation holds that Jesus, taking on a human body and human nature, "was made flesh, and conceived in the womb of Mary The doctrine of the Incarnation, then, entails that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully human, his two natures joined in hypostatic union.) Or with followers of Anthropotheism (Anthropotheism is ascribing human form and nature to gods, or the belief that gods are deified human beings)

Audience will be different but not response as blindness is same

‘He who know not and knows not that he knows not is a fool, shun him. He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep, so awaken him, he who knows not and knows that he know not is a child so teach him, He who knows and knows that he knows is wise so follow him’.

I had better steer clear of fools because I aspire to grow, and do not want to experience a pang of the guilt of dereliction. Willing blindly to assume that private ‘revelation’ is gospel switches off one’s mind; and  thus one blindly concede control to unlettered and unscholarly benighted people. I do not insist on my right to be ignorant so that I can give harder time to liars.

·        ‘When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons. We cease to grow.’ Anais Nin
‘Liars would have a much harder time of it if so many people didn't insist on their right to remain ignorant and blindly agreeable’. Bill Maher
‘Religious fanatics want people to switch off their own minds, ignore the evidence, and blindly follow a holy book based upon private 'revelation'. Richard Dawkins

Biology gives everyone  a brain, but blind followers never  turn it into a mind.