What is Islam?: The Quranic Perspective (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781974206940)

Ghulam Ahmad Parwez was born in Batala, Punjab, in British India on 9th July 1903 into a profoundly religious family. His grandfather, was a renowned religious scholar. His education was carried out under the direction of his grandfather. While he studied the traditional religious teachings, he also had the desire to question its content using his intellect and reasoning. This led to his inner conflict with the external religious environment and he continued to question the prevalent religious beliefs/rituals. He noticed that whatever was being taught as part of the religion was being referred to some religious scholar for authority. This did not satisfy his desire to seek reason and logic in every claim made within the religious literature. However, he could not express these doubts and reservations due to the constraints of the religious environment. Later, due to his employment with the Indian Civil Service in 1927, he moved to Lahore, and found a degree of freedom to question some of these religious beliefs. This led to his discovering that most of these have been acquired from others. He tried to study the Quran using the traditional religious approach but was unable to find the answers to all his doubts. Through his contact with the famous philosopher Allama Iqbal, who had a deep interest in the Quran, Parwez concluded the following: (1)The Quran calls itself Light and a light does not need any external source/aid to make itself visible. It makes itself evident and also exposes the reality of those things which are within its domain. (2)The Quran is revealed in the Arabic language and to understand it correctly one needs to understand the Arabic context which was prevalent at the time of its revelation. (3)The Quran has guided us by saying that through Tasreef-ul-Ayat (through cross reference of verses of the Quran) it makes its guidance clear e.g. see (6:106). Regarding the precise meaning of the Arabic words in the Quran, he researched and compiled a Lughat-ul-Quran (also in English), which is a dictionary of all the words and terms used in the Quran and which includes the meanings which were prevalent among the Arabs at the time of the Quranic Revelation. He dedicated most of his life to researching the Quran and its significance in presenting an alternative solution to human problems. After the creation of Pakistan he migrated to Karachi. Later he moved to Lahore from Karachi and settled there. He died in 1985.