Real Mantiq
Real Mantiq
Real Mantiq
What is mantiq?
It is the tool by which our Aql brain is protected from making mistakes whilst contemplating,
meaning we don't draw away from rationale and logic. So simply it is something which helps
us not to be illogical
Is mantiq good?
Yes, it is very useful and helpful, however, as with many things, it is also dangerous if used
improperly or understood incorrectly.
~Ibn Taymiyyah has a book called ar radd alal manatiqah the refutation on the logicians
and he highlights the flaws that some of the logicians fell into when using mantiq to define
God. Examples of these people are like the first early logicians like Ibn Sina, Al Farabi and
others.
What is the difference between us and those who used mantiq wrongly, how do we
know we won't fall under the same trap?
Those who used mantiq wrongly used it to find the deen, to discover the deen, however we
will use mantiq to defend the deen.
What is falsafah?
Arriving at metaphysical basically abstract stuff, meaning like things which exist as a thought
or an idea but not physically.
conclusions without the aid of quran and sunnah
Example: Like ibn sina believing the universe existed eternally with god
What is kalaam?
Instead of giving a long definition, just for this scenario and stuff we'll say this is the opposite
of falsafah.
As you can see falsafah is what Ibn Sina did, however kalaam is
Arriving at metaphysical conclusions with one of the two following things, Like Al Ghazali
did.
What are the two broad categories of mantiq, and explain them in depth.
But they're both Jumlah inshaaiyyah, however if I said fire, you would think of fire, you would
get an image in your head you'd perceive it quite easily.
This is in contrast to if I said tuberculosis, which you'd probably need a few steps to
understand and picture it in your head, it would take longer and a few more steps.
This shows there's TWO types of Jumlah Inshaaiyyah:
Simple, tasawwur badihi
and speculative, tasawwur nadhari where you need multiple steps and stuff for it to be
perceived.
What are the 7 ways Jumlah inshaaiyyah appear in and provide examples for them
each.
Istifhaam (interrogation / question)
Nidaa’ (calling)
Tamann (Hoping for something improbable)
Tarajj (hoping for something probable)
Amr (imperative)
Nahy (prohibition)
Half (oath)
Example of Istifhaan:
> “Why are you bullying me?”
Example of Nidaa’:
> “come here boy!”
Example of Tamann:
> “i hope i will fly one day”
Example of Tarajj:
> “i hope i will become a scholar one day and meet ataraxia”
Example of amr:
> “Obey Allah and his messenger”
Example of Nahy:
> “make sure you do not follow the footsteps of the loser shaytaan”
Example of Half:
> “wallahi ataraxia is the goat”
● Tasdeeqaat - affirmation/verification
Is also Jumlah khabriyyah, a sentence which contains a piece of information we can verify or
falsify.
Example: Hasan is gay
Can be verified/falsified
Also we have two types for this too, the fire is hot, this is true, and we know it is, however if I
say the sum of 27433+4-3575-2+4+4-3+5-3-3-5-3+35-4-5–4-4-55-3-5-5-3-3-5-5 X4 =2
This can be verified but it'll take steps and be long too, so this shows there's also two types
for tasdeeqaat too, the same as tasawwuraat (simple and speculative)
Now all of this stuff is what our intellect dhihn allows us to do, perceive things, verify them.
But what's the point of having intellect if we have no knowledge to accompany it with?
Knowledge in other sciences is 100% certainty in a fact, for example, the fact that 2+2 = 4 is
mathematical knowledge, but the idea that 2+2 = 5 is not mathematical knowledge
But in mantiq 2+2=5 Is knowledge.
Yaqeen (100%)
Dhann (51-99%)
Shakk (50%)
Wahm (1-49%)
Jahl Baseet (0%)
The guys jahil ( ignorant ) but he accepts it
Jahl Murakkab (less than 0%)
When the jahil doesn't even know he's a jail
Ayn al yaqeen is us directly verifying that thing with our own eyes or empirically
Example: As Muslims we believe in Jannah and know that it exists, we 100% believe it and
we have Ilm al Yaqeen knowledge that it is certain
~Then we will go on the day of judgement and we will see paradise before us, this is known
as Ayn Al Yaqeen, belief through the fact that we have seen and verified this with our eyes.
~Then we will enter paradise and be inside it, now we are experiencing it, we are in Jannah
itself, this is Haqq Al Yaqeen, the highest form.
What is a universal?
A universal is basically a set of multiple entities (existing beings) which share common
properties between them.
What is a genus/species?
A genus is a set of entities that all fall under its overarching (comprehensive) essence but
different in their particular realities
Example;
Genus: wood - all these species have this overarching essence in common.
Species: chair
Other species: table
Abdullah Ibn Zubayr ibn isa ibn Ubaydullah Al Humaydi's Usool as Sunnah
Passed away in 219
1} The sunnah for us (starts with): For the person to believe in Qadr it’s good and its bad,
it’s sweetness and it’s sourness, and for him to know that whatever afflicts him is to not
wrong him and whatever is to wrong him is to not afflict him, and all of that is the decree of
Allah.
~Deep how he's starting it all of, he's describing imaan firstly through explaining Qadr first
and foremost, it is at the forefront of everything.
And Al Humaydi clearly says, whoever insults them or diminishes them or even a single one
of them then he is NOT him the sunnah, and he is not on the truth.
So to love the sunnah = necessary to love the sahabah (companions)
The kalam of Allah, I heard Sufyan ibn Uyaynah say: Al Quran is the Kalam of Allah, and
whoever says it is created then he is a Mubtadi’, (innovator) and we have not heard anyone
say this.
Of course the zeitgeist (spirit "vibe" of the time) has changed and eventually from
mubtadi’een, we call those who say the speech of Allah is created that he is a disbeliever.
We of the sunnah affirm that we will see our lord after death, on qiyamah.
~We do affirmation of the sifaat without ta’teel distorting the meaning.
And whatever has been transmitted in regards to the Qur'an and hadith we accept, we do
not increase it, nor try to malform it, nor do baatil Tafseer (false interpretation) of it, we stop
where the Qur'an and Sunnah stops.
Example: And we say, Allah has rose over his throne, and whoever claims besides this is a
disabler of Allah's words and a jahmi.
Because Allah is He who knows the best about himself.
And Allah is he who is most truthful in his saying.
And Allah is he who is the most appropriate in speech.
As sabooni also mentions that we stop where the salaf stopped.
We do not say just as the khawarij said, "whoever does a major sin then he has committed
disbelief," we disagree with this.
~There is no takfeer in any sin, and kufr is only from the abandoning (there is a lot more
detail regarding what abandoning means here) of the five pillars that Islam is built on.
Because there is no delay in these things from their allocated time, and making up these
things is necessary, and whoever leaves that purposefully there is no doubt in there.
~As for hajj then whoever is able to must do it, and he is not sinful for delaying it; but he is
sinful for delaying zakah, and he would be held in prison for that.
● And if the person was able to do hajj and they didn’t do it, then it is incumbent on his
family to do hajj on his Behalf, and we hope that it is accepted for him after he
passed away. One Hajj for each person.
1) Forgetfully: Example is when you say that okay I'll pray Zuhr after this nap but you
sleep and the time for Zuhr becomes complete and so you miss the Salah, this is
forgetfully.
2) Accidentally: Example for this is when someone believes Salah ends at 10pm and
they pray at 9pm however the Salah time actually ended at 8pm.
3) Purposefully: Someone who purposefully misses Salah as he believes Salah isn't
even an obligation.
4) Rebelliously: Examples is when you don't pray because you want to prove a point,
or you say that I'm not going to pray unless you give me X.
5) Laziness: When you know to pray and accept is an obligation upon you but you
choose not to out of laziness, according to Imam Ahmad you are a disbeliever, the
other imams do not say you become a disbeliever however.
Side note: Imam Abu Hanifa's opinion on what to do when someone doesn't pray
Salah due to negligence/laziness:
Modal Logic
What is a modal?
A modal is the object that qualifies the truth of a statement.
It is related to Jumlah khabriyyah
Notice, we are trying to qualify the degree of his happiness here, not the whole statement.
Think of the modal being placed before “happy” kind of giving like a meter of 1-10 to the
happiness.
If we qualify Hasanul’s happiness itself, then we are saying that Hasanul must obtain
happiness, but to what extent?
The lower the meter is, he’s still happy, and the higher the meter is, he’s still happy.
But the modal being out at the end gives a meter of 1-10 of Hasanul’s own personality of
being happy.
If we qualify Hasanul’s state of being happy, then we can say that he could not have been
happy he could have been angry or sad or crying or Nsane
The higher the meter is, the more certain it is that he is happy.
The lower the meter is, the less likely he’s happy but rather he’s in a different emotion.
If you had the sentence, a man is a guardian of the woman, would this sentence necessarily
be true?
No, because some feminsits would disagree. And some men would agree.
P = P is actualised
□ = Necessarily
◇ = Possibly
⊃ = Implies
P, Q, R = usually proportional letters
These stand for unanalysed propositions
Some texts use L & M for □ & ◇
K = is often used to in place of □ if knowledge is concerned
You can use Kₐ or Kₑ or anything if there are more than one persons involved.
So we say:
So in our real world when we say Hasanul is happy, currently we are referring to Hasanul as
Hasanul Haque from E3 2HF studying at Blackburn darul uloom, and happy means happy as
we think of it.
For some more examples, let's label the real world as world x, alongside this we have other
worlds, world y, z.
This means that P=world x
So ◇P may mean that P is true in world Z, this doesn't imply that it is true in world X (P).
Does P ⊃ □P hold?
No, because P being true in the actual world, does not imply or then mean that it is true in
every world.
Does □P ⊃ P hold?
This is true, because if P is true in every world, then it implies that it is true in the actual
world.
And once more to quickly clarify all of this one last time:
If we say, "Safa is necessarily possibly fat" then this means that it's 100% that she's possibly
fat, she must be fat in at least one world.
If I say "Safa is necessarily, necessarily fat," then she is 100% fat in every world, she
definitely is.
Safa is necessarily fat =
Safa is fat in every world.
Safa is necessarily necessarily fat =
Safa is necessarily fat in every world.
HADITH SCIENCES
The Sahīh narration is a “supported” Hadith (Hadith al Musnad), the Isnad chain of which
coheres continuously through the transmission of one upright "'Adl" and accurate "Dhaabit"
person from another up to its point of termination. The Sahīh narration can neither be
“anomalous” (shādh) nor “defective” (mu’allal).
Ibn Katheer in Ikhtisaar Uloom al Ahadeeth succinctly quotes Ibn Salah from the latter’s
book ‘Uloom al Hadith:
Also note that the chain must be uninterrupted, it cannot be a mursal hadith, and if it is then
its objection to (the report’s) authenticity / using it as evidence is of a difference of
opinion.
Musnad Al Hadith:
Mursal:
Isnad:
Matn:
Shadh:
Mu'allal:
Munaqti':
Mu'dal:
'illah:
Jarh:
'Adl:
Dhabt:
Tadlees:
Sahih li Ghayrih:
Sahih li dhātih:
بسم هللا والحمد هلل والصالة والسالم على رسول هللا
Abu Muhammad Abdullah Ibn Abi Zayd Al Qayrawani may Allah be pleased with him says in
his Muqaddimah:
Praise be to Allah who originated man by virtue of His Ni’mah, and he formed them in the
wombs with His wisdom, and bestowed and eased for them with provision, and taught him
that which he did not know, and had virtue upon them a great virtue.
And he guided whoever He wished through his virtue.
And he left in mid guidance those who neglected him in virtue of His justice.
And he continues to ease for the believer through ease.
And covered their hearts with remembrance of Him.
And they believed in Allah through their tongue expressing willingly.
And by their hearts a pure faith.
And acting upon that which came to them in His books or through His messengers.
And those messengers taught what He had taught them.
And they stopped where it was restricted for them.
And they delved into that which was permitted for them as opposed to that which was
prohibited for them.
(Allah did everything out of his own Virtue and Kindness to us)
He testifies with his tongue, he believes purely with his heart without any doubt, and he acts
upon that which was brought to him in the Books and through the Messengers
And he endorsed that the children of the Muslims must be taught the Quran so that their
hearts may proceed to understanding the deen of Allah, and its legislations.
He stresses the importance of understanding the deen.
And Allah has mandated upon the hearts actions from the beliefs and the external body
parts actions from the obedience.
بسم هللا والحمد هلل والصالة والسالم على رسول هللا
But over time the commands changed a bit too, so this is one possible source of ehh some
narrations appear to be conflicting with other narrations. This leads on to being one of the
reasons why there are scholarly differences of opinions today on prayer and other aspects of
worship.
But the imams are here and they were the ones who sifted through all these apparent
contradictions, they made everything clear and easy for us to understand the Sunnah in a
systematic way, why do we wanna change it or do something different?
Due to this it's very possible that if I'm finding the arguments and evidences presented in one
imams jurisprudence, I could feel the same way when reading literature from the other
schools.
Ettiquette
بسم هللا والحمد هلل والصالة والسالم على رسول هللا
Taqdeem Wat Ta'kheer Fil Quran
Difference between:
( In terms of expression of thought )
Mantiq - Mantiq helps you think rationally and without being prone to illogical errors.
Nahw/ Sarf - Nahw and Sarf allows you to formulate your thoughts into linguistic expression.
Balaaghah - Balaghah allows you to formulate your thoughts appropriately to the correct
audience in the correct place at the correct time, eloquently and effectively
Urūd - Urud is poetic meters which makes your speech more eloquent in writing
What is an uslūb?
An Uslūb is like a form of a stylistic, something concerning literary style, Examples: Pathetic
fallacy, similes, metaphors, foreshadowing, onomatopoeia
Cut off the hands of the male thief and the female thief
Versus
Cut off the hands of the female thief and the male thief?
They both have the same meaning right? Nothing's really changed between these two
sentences.
That's what you'd think, but that's for normal language. When it comes to the Qur'an it's so
much deeper, as we have seen before when we mentioned how every single word is written
on purpose and is in its most appropriate place. And we will explain this next with several
examples.
So what are the actual reasons as to why some words are placed before others?
1} Tabarruk
To start something off in a blessed way, defined as:
The Tabarruk type is preceding important matters with Allah’s name to evoke that it is
important and attention worthy, as you can see in the above example.
~Notice how Allah is always first.
2} Ta'dheem
This is when a list is being made and it is usually put in order of importance (highest to
lowest importance)
This verse shows how their is ranks between the believers, secondly if we look into other
verses we'll see that the muhaajireen are always mentioned before the mujaahideen,
ALWAYS.
The ones who sacrificed so much in Makkah and bore do much pain and trouble, and they
migrated and left their home lands to go Madinah, the Muhaajireen, are not equal to the
Mujaahideen.
This is what Ta'dheem is about, greatness, the order of the list talks of the "greatest" things,
the most important, and then goes down in order.
Examples: Take care at looking at the order of the mentioned things in the list. This is slightly
similar to the first example too, Allah is always first ( unless of course there is a list of ranks
of people or something and Allah isn't in the list )
3} Sabaq with respect to time
Notice how it all follows in chronological order.
Those closest to Abraham are his people, then Muhammad ﷺ, then his people (us)
etcetera. That’s why we are on the millah of Ibrāhīm.
This verse has a list, and the list goes in order of who accepted Islam first. It could also be
because of ranking maybe, which leads onto something important.
Verses do not have to be specific to any one category, it can belong to several
categories. A verse may have a list in which 3 things come in order of importance, it
may also be in order of coming into existence. They can belong to several categories.
Another point to mention for the aforementioned verse is that, we can look at the hukm, the
order, given in the verse. The prophet has a larger duty to get his wives to do the command
(cover up), then his daughters and then the women of the believers.
We can show an abundance of verses for this but this is quite simple to comprehend,
nevertheless here are a few more examples:
Night before day, darkness before light, always Adam before nuh, always ibraheem before
musa,
Its never injeel wat tawrah,
Always Tawraat before injeel
And like we said, this is the importance of it, the beauty of it, showing how every single word
is in its perfect position. Switching the order of tawraat and injeel doesn't change the
meaning, but we can see the tawraat is first as it was revealed first.
~This all proves how the Qur'an truly is Allah's words and cannot be the words of a man,
look how detailed and intricate the Qur'an is.
5} Bidh dhaat
This is when numbers are listed in ascending order.
We have several examples here, once Is عليمA'leem (all knowing) before حكيمHakeem (All
Wise) Why are Allah's names mentioned in a certain order?
Because hukm (ruling) is predicated on knowledge in the first place, the one who has all the
knowledge can give the best ahkaam, one cannot give hukms without having knowledge first
Before we get into this book, we shall look at some context of the zeitgeist (vibe of the time)
that Ibn Taymiyyah رحمه هللاlived in. It is unfortunately believed by some that the sheikh was
out to to attack others and shame them, however it was indeed the complete opposite.
Political fragmentation and breakage was almost palpable (physically touchable) in his time.
People were becoming so lax with doctrine but so fanatic (excessive zeal) about politics, it
was literally leaving creed for laziness and adopting fanaticisms in legality.
What did Imam Shafi'ee say about sufis and who were they?
The sufis that ibn Taymiyyah criticised at that time they weren’t the sufis that imam Shafi’i
was talking about when he said فقيها وصوفيا فكن غير واحد.
These sufis abandoned the quran and sunnah and were doing hujjah (used (the following)
as evidence) of fabricated reports.
Anyway Sufis back then would do Ihtijaaj (take as evidence) of fabricated, or lies, or weak
reports and say this is from Islam and then they would do some mad stuff. Yet at the same
time the politics of the time was crazy. Which leads to the purpose of this book…
~Ibn Taymittag at some point in this book explains and defends why some mujtahids may
depart from acting directly on a hadith and instead follow his own Usul with regards to its
ruling.
~Ibn Taymiyyah in this book defends the mujtahids, especially the four imams, and explains
why Ikhtilaaf exists. He defends them all by saying none of them were trying to go against
the Quran and sunnah.
~He also dismantles madhhabi fanatics and supremacists who say oh no my madhhab is
better than yours etc. He says that whoever follows Imam Shafi’i shouldn’t disapprove of
those who follow imam Ahmad and vice versa.
Moreover, he explains that even if there are “incorrect opinions” in the madhaahib, this is
absolutely no excuse to attack the founder of the madhhab. Those scholars were mujtahids.
And despite this, laymen still heavily attack them, may Allah forgive us and protect us all.
Was Ibn Taymiyyah رحمه هللاhimself ever wrong then? Did he accept his mistakes?
Ibn Taymiyyah himself was a man who was ready and at the forefront to acknowledge his
own mistakes, and forgiving anyone who attacked him. You can see in other books he is
so ready to acknowledge his own mistakes.
He has a very beautiful allegory for who the scholars and mujtahideen are with regards to
the laymen:
”… especially to the scholars who are the inheritors of the prophets, whom Allah made like
stars that serve as guides through the darkness of the lands and oceans.“
That the scholar did not believe that the Prophet actually uttered that Hadith
That the scholar did not think that the issue in question was addressed by that particular
hadith
That the scholar believed the ruling in the hadith was abrogated.
Perhaps the hadith did not reach the scholar, or he was unaware of it. If he gave a ruling
pertaining to a particular Mas’alah on the basis of the apparent meaning of a verse or
another hadith then used Qiyaas or Istis’haab then his opinion may agree with the hadith in
one way but oppose it in another given the additional hadith he was unaware of.
Other reasons hadith may not have reached scholars is because hadith compilations came
after them.
They memorised what they memorised and several times it was in their heart but the
quantity would not still encompass every hadith.
Also for example: if someone memorised every hadith in a certain book this doesn't mean
he knows every hadith in another book. In fact those who came before the emergence of
Hadith collections were far far more knowledgable in the sunnah than those who came after
them.
A large part of the sunnah that reached them may have not reached us or maybe through
munqati’ isnaads (cut off chains of narrations) or with unknown narrators in there.
The hadith that had reached the Mujtahid may not have been deemed to be Authentic
by them
And this can be for a few reasons:
بسم هللا والحمد هلل والصالة والسالم على رسول هللا
Aqeedah