Language and Speech Production

The other day I was thinking about writing a small research proposal around the idea of studying neurological basis for accent and language production. There were a few interrelated reasons for which this came to my mind. First is based on the observation that some people have a natural talent for adapting themselves to various accents. I have personally met some people who can change from a very crude Punjabi accent to a very polite Urdu accent in a fraction of a second. It was also very cool to observe a few people whose native language was Mewaati and they used to change between swinging Mewaati and plain Urdu in a fraction of a second. Same can be said about multilingual people who can speak languages other than Urdu, such as Siraaiki, Potowaari, Punjabi and possibly also English.  Indeed, I have seen people who can copy accents very fast and can have a wide variety. There are people who can mimic a plethora of lingual accents and dialects. Many comedians and actors fall under this category.

The other reason was based on the observation that some people are more prone to speaking in a harsh and impolite manner. Indeed, swearing is very common in Pakistan. I am not sure but I think that the tendency to swear is related to the idea that a person appears to be more masculine and virile if he does so. I am not sure if swearing is considered a crucial positive aspect in grooming and upbringing of an adolescent boy. Moreover, most of this profanity loving psychology is inherited from Bollywood movies too.  Swearing and the use of obscene expression can be very common in Pakistan. When you have a problem, you swear. When you are happy, swearing can sometimes be the best way to express that joy.

On the other hand, I have also had a chance to come across many very soft-spoken people both in Pakistan and abroad. There are languages and dialects that may be considered very euphonious and sweet sounding. Indeed, the way you speak or the way you are addressed can have a great impact on your personality. However, this may not be claimed that people who are more likely to use rough and obscene language are indecent, less effective or less loved in any way. On the contrary, a sweet sounding person can sometimes be considered weak and worthless as opposed to a person who uses whatever words that come to his mouth and somehow manages to achieves his objectives, such as developing a domineering aura around himself.

But I think that it is worthwhile to study the neurological basis for accent and language production. To this end, it can be a good idea to study how people learn to speak from an early age and how they develop one way of speaking or the other. It would also be a nice idea to see the social and psychological factors that affect the speech related affairs of human personality. Along with that it would also be interesting to study the neurological basis for language. It would be interesting to see what parts of the brain play an important role in language production. Similarly, to see how the human ability to speak evolve over the course of his/her life, and whether it is a adaptable trait. It would also be very interesting to study the benefits multilingual people can have over people who speak only one or two languages. And most importantly, I wonder that what are the benefits and pitfalls of speaking in one way or the other.

Allah

Every now and then these days we are asked and hinted by skeptics to contemplate on the idea on as to whether God even exists or not. I have seen many comments of skeptics who have asked this question. As a matter of fact I have seen a question lurching on the websites of many skeptics that pokes the Muslims in to thinking whether Allah is real or not. In a recent article renowned atheist Sam Harris quoted that the God Muslims believe in is almost surely fictional. We live in times in which it is very important for any person to ponder over their beliefs. Indeed, it is very important for people to know why do they believe in what they believe. More specifically, it is very important for Muslims to know that why do they believe in Allah as the sole deity, and consequently Muhammad (may Allah's peace be upon him) as the last messenger. It is equally important for non-Muslims to know as to why Muslims believe in Allah as their God. This is important not even from the point of view of faith literacy, but also to satiate one's own thirst of intellectual curiosity and skepticism.

This article is an attempt to contemplate on the word Allah, as a name or a concept. After all people have believed in various gods since millenniums and no one has ever seen a sight of a convincingly real god. To this end, no one has ever seen Allah as well. It is also important to investigate whether Allah really exists or whether it is a mere invention of the Muslims.

A casual literature survey reveals that the word Allah means 'the God' in Arabic. And even though it is widely believed that Muslims believe in Allah as their God, people from many faiths in the pre-Islamic Arabia believed in Allah as the supreme deity. Pre-Islamic Arabia had polytheism, Christianity, and Judaism as the major religions. The polytheists worshiped other sub-deities along with Allah. These included, Laat, Uzza and Manaat. Christians worshipped Allah along with Jesus Christ (may peace be upon him) as the son of Allah. And jews also worshipped Allah. And more importantly all of these three major religions had the word "Allah" solely reserved for referring to God. Polytheism gradually vanished by the advent of Islam. Christianity and Judaism remain to date as the major world religions along with Islam. And the word Allah is still used to refer to the God by the followers of these two major religions. For instance Arab Christians today still use the word Allah Al-ab (God, the father) to refer to the God and also to distinguish their usage of the word from the Muslim usage. Similarly, Jews use the words such as Allah and Elohim to refer to God, and agree that words Allah and Elohim are derivations of the same origin in a linguistic sense. The word Allah, or its close derivatives, also occur in many other languages as a reference to God.

To this end, it turns out that Muslims have not invented the name or concept of Allah. The only major thing Islam tries to do is to dissociate subordinate deities from Allah. This means, that on one hand Islam dissociates sub-deities such as Laat, Manaat and Uzza from Allah. On the other hand Islam suggests that Jesus Christ (may Allah's peace be upon him) was not a son of Allah, rather he was a prophet of Allah just like Muhammad (may Allah's peace be upon him). This notion of Islam is summarized in the following chapter of Quran-e-Hakeem titled sincerity:

AL-IKHLAS (SINCERITY)

Total Verses: 4
Revealed At: MAKKA

112.001 
YUSUFALI: Say: He is Allah, the One and Only;
PICKTHAL: Say: He is Allah, the One!
SHAKIR: Say: He, Allah, is One.

112.002 
YUSUFALI: Allah, the Eternal, Absolute;
PICKTHAL: Allah, the eternally Besought of all!
SHAKIR: Allah is He on Whom all depend.

112.003 
YUSUFALI: He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;
PICKTHAL: He begetteth not nor was begotten.
SHAKIR: He begets not, nor is He begotten.

112.004 
YUSUFALI: And there is none like unto Him.
PICKTHAL: And there is none comparable unto Him.
SHAKIR: And none is like Him.

P.S. In writing this article I took help from a Wikipedia article. And also the idea that Christians of Arabia refer to God as Allah was brought to my attention for the first time by a close friend who is a devout Roman Catholic Christian. 

Wisdom of the Alchemist

I read Paulo Coelho's, "The Alchemist" back in year 2000. It was given to me by a friend, Salman Ateeque, who lives somewhere in Africa now. The book has many wise anecdotes told by the Alchemist to Santiago. I am writing one here from memory and it is followed by what I thought about it then. The story is not stated here verbatim as I tend to forget bits of it but the central theme and details are hopefully true.

Somewhere in the middle of the book the Alchemist tells Santiago a story of a person who used to live in the Roman Empire. The person had a dream in which, possibly an angel, told him that one of his two sons would grow up to be very famous. When the man woke up he thought that it would be the poet son who would become famous for his poetry and it could not be the other son as he was in the army. It turned out the the son who was in the army progressed to become a centurion. And on a military campaign when one of his soldiers got badly injured he was advised by his fellow men to travel to middle east to a man who cured lepers. The centurion did so and eventually met Jesus Christ (probably but I am not sure, it could some other religious figure). He begged Jesus for his soldier's health and the words he used latter became a prayer. That was the reason for his fame.

At that time two things surprised me. The first was that as the father saw the dream he suspected the poet to be famous. It was strange for me to imagine that the father would think like that. For me it was natural to think that the one in army would become famous. After all army officials get to positions of prestige eventually and Roman Empire, for the large part, was a military oriented regime. It was strange to think that father would consider the poet to be lucky. But that probably owes to the fact that I am from Pakistan, where the profession of armed forces is considered much prestigious.

The other thing I inferred was that it is not necessary that whatever one thinks would come out to be true. The father thought about one son, whereas the other one became famous. This can be observed normally in rural areas of Pakistan when parents normally decide as to what the son is destined to do when he grows up even while the son is in the cradle. And depending upon the looks of the child he/she is either sent to a better school or a not so good one. And normally the instrument used for this judgement is the wise gaze of an elderly paternal figure.

Doom of the Jinn

Much earlier in my life, like when I was 6 or 7 years old, I saw a play on television titled "jinn ka zawwaal", which literally means "Doom of the Jinn". The play was symbolic and had the following plot.

A funny looking lean guy is sitting in his room with a lamp in his hand. He rubs the lamp and all of a sudden a giant, scary looking, really big, black man with horns in his head and a painted face appears in front of the lean guy and asks in his rather loud voice. "What can I do for you my master". Clearly, he is a jinn. The owner of the lamp, at first, gets frightened at his sudden appearance and shivers. The jinn tries to calm him down and somehow convinces him that he is his subservient as he owns the lamp and would do anything he demanded of him. After a while, after regaining composure, the gaunt guy, due to lack of a better idea, asked him to iron the clothes. The jinn got confused a little but then fulfilled the wish and disappeared.

As the play progressed the gaunt guy found an interest in the utility of the jinn and kept on rubbing the lamp again and again. And every time the jinn appeared before him and asked for his command, the gaunt guy told him to do trivial things, such as washing the clothes, polishing the shoes and doing the dishes. After a few episode breaks and after a few appearances the jinn started shrinking in size. By the end of the play he stood in the corner of the room having a size of a midget, pale and melancholic, ironing the clothes. The play subsequently ended. At that time it was more funny than horrific.

The play was probably symbolic in nature, as I latter thought about it as I grew older, like in the mid twenties. To me the jinn was probably synonymous for other things, such as mental faculties. As opposed to doing things such as polishing the shoes, the jinn expected to be building castles with in the blink of an eye, or to aid in long distance traveling in a really short period of time. As the gaunt guy was using him for trivial things such as polishing the shoes, the jinn not only got depressed, he also started shrinking. Such is probably the case with human expansive abilities.

At that time scripts for plays and drama serials were written with much creative vigor by people who used to obtain formal training in poetic and prosaic literature. The play was cast on Pakistan Television.

Random Thoughts About Occasionalism and Science

I recently read the article titled Why The Arabic World Turned Away From Science written by Hillel Ofek. I found it very interesting and a stampede of thoughts and ideas rushed through my mind. Following are some random thoughts about it. I hope to organize them in a better way in future.

But there is another vantage point to it. The Greek science was not rubbish at all. Actually, if nothing else, modern days' scientific method has its roots in Greek Science. Consider the necessity of theorem proving, for instance. While contemporary world was also a lot more advanced, such as the engineering acumen of Egyptians, who raised monumental pyramids, only Greeks made the science flourish by necessitating the adoption of some scientific method. Greeks were genuine thinkers.

This is not to say that Muslims were not. Imam Al-Ghazali was a skeptic of sorts for a considerable period of his life. He eventually proposed occasionalism. The latter means that every single thing and action happens in the universe by the direct and immediate will of God (i.e. Allah, in an Islamic context). This means, for instance, that incidents like hurricane Sandy happen by the direct will of God. Western science states that laws of Physics dictate such events. Occasionalism suggests that laws of physics may be suggested as causes effecting such events. But at the core of them direct will of Allah is responsible for them and the laws of Physics are only used as covers to conceal the divine hand. West frowns upon such ideas. Indeed, even in the midst of such events one can hear Western intellect shouting that the idea that a divine will is responsible for all such events is ridiculous. I know Western skeptics say this even while they are dying. Muslims (and also Christians and possibly also Jews), on the other hand, suggest that the reason behind such events is moral decadency, such as homosexuality and lesbianism.

A belief in occasionalism also has a consequence for the Islamic belief system. This becomes evident when natural disasters like floods and earth quakes strike Muslims countries. In wake of such events, the Western intellect ridiculously asks the Muslims that why is this happening to Muslims and claims that there is no God. Surprisingly, the theology of Islam has an answer for this too; moral decadency of the society. And this is where the debate starts lurching into other extreme dimensions.

The question is whether Muslims should read philosophy or not. Our times suggest that we should do it. Imam Ghazali suggests that we should not do it. The main reason is that it can lead the Muslims away from piety. Indeed, the propensities of philosophers and the nature of the subject is such that it leads the pupil away from firm belief and lead to heresy. For, if a Muslim was not to pose and address the most arch-question of philosophy, "Does God exist?", he could be lured in to addressing the following question, "Does devil exist?". Or there could be other dodgy questions, investigation of which would at least sway the Muslim away from performing diurnal rituals.

West has a problem with the way religious people think. While the Muslims, for instance, use all the ifs and buts of logic to show the superiority of their theology, the Western intellect uses them to address the most primordial questions about existence of God. This causes a friction of ideologies. While a Muslim (or a Christian for that matter) would be highly inclined to circumscribe and direct his theses and arguments in a way that eventually find that God exists, philosophers and free thinkers have a genuine problem with that predisposed way of thinking which clearly inhibits free inquiry. This is absolutely understandable. 

Coincidentally there is now much evidence that human consciousness survives bodily death. A lot of evidence about this can be found in Western literature about spiritualism and near death experiments. This is obviously no proof for the existence of God. Stated in other words, the fact that human beings have ever lasting souls is by no means a proof of existence of a God. Human beings could possibly just have souls just like they have bodies. I would not be surprised to hear one day of emergence of a theory concerning evolution of human souls. But if the evidence that suggests that human beings have souls is true does point to the possible truth of religion, which after all is all about afterlife and souls. This again does not point us to the truth of a single religion. All religions have mentions of souls and afterlives within them. And a keen adherence to the spirit of science demands that we stick the necessities of evidence and proofs. Evidence and proof are indeed two strong pillars of science.

Meet an average European guy, who is possibly also a student of sociology. Ask him about his views on religion and he would say that religion is wrong. This is suggested because of sociological reasons. For one of the things religion is considered important that historically it has been a vital tool in organizing the society. West wants to get rid of this crutch. Western intellect claims that society could be organized by adopting means from other ecological systems. Study apes, for instance, and we can learn to make peaceful and prosperous communities. But organizing the society is and has possibly been one trivial utility of the society. The main speciality of religion is afterlife. It is to meet this end successfully that religion has other arenas pertaining to the worldly social life. And if there is indeed an afterlife, religion becomes all the more significant. Organized religion may as well be wrong, specially if there is no afterlife. But I have a propensity that if any organized religion stands a chance for being right, it has to be Islam as it is the most organized of them all. I make this claim based on empiricism in some sense. Islam has already addressed every thing. This includes Christianity, Judaism, Idolatry, polytheism, atheism and all the philosophical intellect. This has been done in Quran. And Allah invites every human being to convert to Islam. This is done by frightening, by encouraging, by showing great rewards, by showing that He is merciful and extremely punitive at the same time and by showing them signs. Muslims are advised to invite others to Islam and to amend their own ways in the meantime. In the meantime they have been consciously advised not to use force of any sorts. For there is no compulsion in the religion. The greater emphasis is on the Muslims to live according to the tenets of Islam in this ephemeral worldly life. In the mean time they have also been advised to resist any force that tries to sway them away from achieving their otherworldly goals. This is called Jehad. The smaller and the bigger jehad. Which, of course, Muslims have not been doing very well.

On a separate note, Ubqari is a non profit organization that invites people to the religion of Islam. There are many prayers and Islamic medicines that can be found here. By and large Pakistanis browse the website the most. The second largest number of people who browse the website are from the United States of America, the third largest from from Saudi Arabia and the Fourth Largest from the U.K. There are many healing methods that are taught, such as Islamic sufi meditation. The message of the organization is not that of terrorism at all, but a genuine effort to attract the humanity to the religion of Islam. I would like to assert here that organization does not teach Muslims to hate non-Muslims. I am privy to this as I have heard many lectures of Hazrat Daamat Barkaatam Allama Hakeem Tariq Mehmood Chughtai. I have to force this point because I have read many Western accounts, specially those of Sam Harris, which claim that Islam spreads hatred. This is not true. I have heard Hazrat crying in combined prayers for infidels too. Islam is not a hate based religion. Besides, mostly average Muslims genuinely love the Western people. Indeed, this is because of the general attitude of the Western people which makes them so adorable. Even if you don't like it, Islam is worth reading and understanding.

On The Brink of Death

These days quite often we hear of death from various sources around us. Every now and then we hear someone died whose death may or may not have concerned us. There are people who are dying due to natural causes, accidents, bloody conflicts, terrorism, natural disasters and ship wrecks. Many people present various explanations for death and for the factors that may have caused it. This, in large part, depends on the cultural upbringing of people and specially on the religious conditioning he/she may or may not have undergone. Death is, somehow, a very frequent event of our life. I remember having googled statistics about death a few month ago to learn that every second one person dies and two are born on our planet. Death is nonetheless going to stay with us for so long as we are alive. 

May be this inevitability and frequency of death has led us to extend our thoughts about what may or may not happen once we are dead. We have religious doctrines, on one hand, that try to give us an explanation about a possible afterlife. Almost each one of them is embellished with a notion of a heaven and a hell and an everlasting human soul that will reside in one of those places, possibly for ever. On the other hand we have scientific explanations for what may or may not happen after we die. Of these there are two that are most popular and are based somehow on empirical research and on thought experiments. One view is that as we die we live in an eternal oblivion and in an eternal nothingness forever. This is backed by a hypothesis, stretched out after careful research, that human beings do not have an immaterial soul and that the idea of a soul is a mental one, coined at some stage in the remote human history by human beings with a propensity towards believing in the unseen and the unseeable, specially to explain the cause of unprecedented events, and also to survive beyond burial and bodily death. According to the proponents of this idea, the mind ceases to exist as soon as the brain death occurs and all the mental ideas along with beliefs about whatever esoteric things had been held also vanish and cease to exist. Proponents of this idea have conducted research and they often leverage from the results and loop holes in others research. We have learnt to call such people with various names such as atheists, agnostics or skeptics, although the name atheist suits them the most, specially if they are that rigid about believing in what they want to believe.

There is another classification of people who also leverage from science and their scientific training to show that a human soul, indeed, survives a bodily death and once we leave our bodies we keep on living forever in a so-called afterlife. The research that has been conducted and the body of knowledge that exists to support this line of argument has many dimensions to it. First, we have the spiritualists and psychics, who started addressing afterlife in the middle of the nineteenth century in North America and England. This group of people includes notable and renowned people of that time. Thus, one of the pioneers, Sir Alfred Russel Wallace, was a contemporary of Charles Darwin and the co-founder of his theory of natural selection. A careful review of the history and literature review of spiritualism suggests that it became an independent and a disparate body of knowledge even during its early years. Many spirit communication experiments were conducted and some notable members spent plenty of months in isolation to assess the feasibility of the enterprise and to contribute to the literature in the form of  books. The main reason why spiritualism flourished so much in the early years of its inception was also death. Another one of the early pioneers of the enterprise of spiritualism, Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle, states in his book titled, The History of Spiritualism, that frequent deaths due to war was the main reason to vest so much interest in this enterprise. Certainly, people die and their relatives want to know if they are doing well to where ever they have departed. Spiritualism, it turns out that, is widely seen as a religion in the West ever since its early days and its success in the area of spirit communication. A religion that tries to amalgamate and overshadow all the known religions that have a component of life after death appended to their respective doctrines. 

Another group of people who belong in this class are the ones who leverage from the findings of the so-called near death experiences (NDEs) and out of body experiences (OBEs). In a laboratory experiment involving an NDE or an OBE the subject is rendered clinical death or comatose to an extent that he/she is almost dead, in a meaningful clinical sense. After being brought back to life the subject is investigated about his/her experience of that period of time. Indeed, this is thought not only to be a difficult process for the subject to undergo but also for the experimenters as well. Besides, the validity of the tests is questionable from various scientific and philosophical perspectives. There is a variety of subjects' experiences, as have been reported in the literature. While most of the subjects have reported utopian experiences, it must be accepted that some subjects have reported nothingness too. The tests and their results, clearly, have to be conducted and reported, respectively, with a great deal of perfectionism as it can be supposed, fairly, that they have grave consequences on the well being of society as a whole. 

The conclusion, nonetheless, is that this latter class of scientifically motivated people have come to believe, as suggested by empirical research, that there is something after death. And that even though human beings may undergo bodily death, human consciousness tends to live on forever. We  can still, however, safely believe that the topic of afterlife is an open question, subject to further scientific scrutiny. 

This, all of a sudden, heightened interest in the nature of afterlife, in the western circles has many aspects to it. Some of them are intuitive and others can be thought that may have philosophical repercussions. Indeed an interest in the science of afterlife prevails in the oriental mindset as well. I have personally heard many common people talk about the western scientific endeavors about the nature of afterlife and about some of the simplistic methods that may have been adopted; such as fixing video cameras in the graves to know if actually anything supernatural, like any angels coming to the dead and asking various questions, happened. It may be argued that when common religious people, who do not have direct access to scientific method and apparatus and, above that, who do not have any scientific training, read and discuss such accounts of the western researchers' endeavors about knowing the plight of the dead and not being able to get a clue, whatsoever, about the internal happenings of the grave, have a propensity to alluding it as limit of the power of science and the excellence of religion in being esoteric. I believe that this propensity is wrong. West needs to be complimented a great deal in the way it has progressed scientific research over the past few centuries.  

In our era to vest an interest in knowing about a possible afterlife has many motives to it. First and foremost of these reasons is what was pointed out by Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle. That is, death. We live in a highly connected world where deaths are taking place around us all the time. We are encouraged to deal it with in different ways in so many ways to soothe our agonies. Thus, it is very common to hear in a western country the common slogan that life is short and that it should be enjoyed to the fullest, something in which there is no harm. Similarly, religion offers many antidotes to death. Islam, for instance, encourages everyone to live every day as the last one. 

A very major concern in knowing about the nature of afterlife is that the nature of the latter, if one exists, or if it does not exist, can be vital in shaping and modeling the present ephemeral life. Indeed, any concrete knowledge about the nature of afterlife can be extremely useful in influencing human behavior. For, if we were to find out great evidence supporting the idea that we are destined to live in eternal oblivion once we are dead does not only mean a huge victory  for the atheists, it also means a great loss of equal proportions to the religiously inclined, spiritualists, and NDE and OBE sympathizers. The more indoctrinated you are, the more the magnitude of the feelings. Even though I think and believe that there is no harm in knowing the truth. For instance, there is no harm in believing the theory of nothingness if it were found, with compelling evidence, that this is what a human being is destined to be. The viable question then would be to wonder about how to effectively live this current, short and otherwise pointless life, specially in an otherworldly sense. A bad option may be to completely mess it up. A better option would be to shape it nicely, specially by leveraging from some nice examples, such as, as I presume, may have been laid out in The Moral Landscape. 

Finding out that an afterlife exists does not rule out the reality that science is a useful enterprise. The idea that science has come to the brink of death just by there being a possibility of an afterlife is probably a foolish one. Obviously, in a philosophical sense, science may be considered to be less valuable if the present life is minute as compared to the next one. Some people may naturally get inclined to improving their afterlives as opposed to their present plight. Some people may still hate their current state of affairs for reasons known to them despite all the worldly endowments they may have at their hands. But people may still hate to live even if they knew that they were destined to nothingness. After all, people living in the western countries have had a greater propensity towards committing suicide in the absence of reasonable stimuli. But the possibility that there is an afterlife does not render science useless or bring it to a brink of death; it only possibly makes it a little less useful.

Similarly, any finding that contradicts popular and deeply held notions should not be ruled out just for the sake of its being idiosyncratic. As a personal opinion this applies to people of all schools of thoughts. Open-mindedness is virtue. Scientific theories evolve and devolve to refine, accept or to reject previous developments.

A conspicuous contradiction to this is the religion itself which remains inflexible to any criticism that is thrown towards it. It must be accepted that the religious, if not the religion itself, have a bad tendency about endorsing every scientific finding that agrees with their religious doctrine and rejecting vigorously whatever is in conflict with science. This must be discouraged. I remember having read an account in the Big Bang by Simon Singh, once upon a time, that when some Pope (possibly Pope John Paul) endorsed the big bang theory, Bishop Lamaitre, one of the pioneers of the theory, discouraged it. The very rational and understandable reason given for that was that science is an enterprise that is in constant flux all the time. And that as much as it may be a source of great happiness for the believers for a scientific theory of great significance to agree with their beliefs about the creation of the universe, it may be a cause of an agony of equal proportions if a latter scientific theory were to refute the former one with a lot more clarity. This is something that happens in Muslim circles too. Thus, every once in a while one gets to hear sermons in which glorious achievements of science are told with much pride which seem to endorse the Islamic ideas. This does sound absurd since normally the deliverer of the sermon has little or no formal education in science.

I am not sure about Islam's stand on theological skepticism. Of course, it makes a lot of sense to believe that Islam would discourage such an idea. According to Islam a believer is expected to strive to increase his faith in Allah as the sole God and Muhammad (may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him) as his last and final prophet. I, however, read of a famous Islamic scholar and philosopher, Imam Ghazali (RA), also known as Algazel to the West. He formally introduced philosophical skepticism in Islamic philosophy.  According to his own account he practiced skepticism for a considerable while in his life. And after a while he became a firm believer when the God, most high, himself cast His divine light in to his heart. One may argue about the nature of that light or about the qualitative aspects of his conversion, or the ulterior motives there of. One may also argue, after establishing it as a fact, that his spiritual experience was of the sort of the myriad of fake NDEs. But it may as well be the case that he literally was enlightened by God himself. He may have adopted a strategy for that in parallel to his skeptic pursuits. May be he leveraged from a path synonymous with this. Nonetheless, Algazel is one of most revered sufi saints of medieval times. His work also inspired and influenced numerous well known western scholars of latter times. These include, and, possibly, are not limited to, Rene Descartes, David Hume, and Thomas Aquinas.

If the claims of the afterlife enthusiasts are actually true and if there "is actually" an afterlife, it cannot be known, at the present moment, as to which religious doctrine, if at all, is true, This, however, does seem to mean a demise for atheism as to their claim concerning a "nothingness" after death has been rendered false. Obviously, only a formal, universally acceptable, proof of the existence of a supreme supernatural deity (aka God) can hammer the last nail in the coffin of this doctrine.

Psyops: The Reality of European Spiritualists and Their Mi...

Psyops: The Reality of European Spiritualists and Their Mi...: This article tends to present translations of important excerpts from the chapter titled " The Reality of European Spiritualists and Their ...

The Reality of European Spiritualists and Their Misunderstanding

Hazrat Faqir Noor Muhammad Sarwari
Qadri Kalachwi (RA)

This article contains translations of important excerpts from the chapter titled "The Reality of European Spiritualists and Their Misunderstanding", from the book "Irfan (part 2)" by Hazrat Faqir Noor Muhammad Sarwari Qadri Kalachwi (RA). This book was first published in 1942. It has two parts. Both parts also  have translations in English. The urdu version of the first volume can be read here and English version can be read here. I have to acknowledge that this translation is not very good and has various reasons to it:

1. I have tried to translate everything verbatim from Urdu to English with less regard for grammatical corection but to stay more in harmony with the text.
2. There are many jargon words specific to Islamic spiritualism which I do not know the meaning of and I do not possess an Urdu to English dictionary.
3. Translation is a cumbersome process.
4. I did the translation.

It is advisable that this article be read in connection with, and preferably after reading, An Account of Invocation of Jinns, Angels and Souls.

It is also advisable that this article be read in connection with, and preferably after reading, On Afterlife and Islamic Spirituality.

The motivation behind doing this translation very immediately was this interview of Richard Martini, 

New Pathway To Healing: An Interview With Richard Martini.

Now we want to make this thing clear that what beings are the safli (evil) souls that  European Spiritualists invoke and communicate with. And when they are asked that who are you, why do they reply that we are your forefather's and we are the souls of those people who have passed away from this world. And before this we have been living our lives on earth like you, and now we are living and are busy in spiritual progress in the seven communities (or planes or levels or realms) of the aalam-e-arwaah (the world of the souls).

If this is true then the beliefs of all religions, specially Islam, which are, judgement, the judgement day, hashar nashar (I think this translates to judgement too), azaab-e-qabar (punishment of the grave), munkar nakeer (some angels that ask questions in the grave), qayaam-e-qayaamat (again the setting of the judgement day), and the reality of heaven and hell etc., then belief vanishes in them. Because when these spirits are asked about these things they deny their existence. And say that there is no such thing like this. Neither there is hell nor heaven, nor is there any existence of a Godhead. Although because of spiritualism Europe's science-ridden materialists' previous naturalist and atheistic ideology has now changed and they have all become convinced of life after death and they have gotten redemption from the Christian Religion's old papal and priestly machinations.which had indulged them into the wrong consolations of tasliyyat (I don't know the translation, but I think that it means confession) and kaffaara (this is an urdu word which means to pay or worship, or do something similar to attain redemption from one's sins). Now everyone considers himself responsible for his deeds. But these spirits meaning safli souls' (I don't know the meaning of safli but I think that it means evil) and jinn devils' false descriptions have pushed them into a quagmire of a new type of atheism and irreligiousity and the ghost of Darwin's evolution has again overcome their hearts and minds. Meaning that this life is a natural thing and just like in the worldly life the human body is attaining the levels of material progress and evolution, similarly death is also synonymous with a natural change and after death human being keeps on accomplishing higher levels of spiritual progress and evolution. Before this, although to a certain extent, everyone had the fear of death, due to which those people used to refrain and shy away from doing bad deeds, but now the fear of death has vanished away from their hearts and the thought of reward and punishment has also vanished. Only the name and the process of progress and evolution has remained which is happening autonomously. Similarly the devil has pushed them in to a new kind of irreligiosity and atheism. Thus, the example of falling from the sky and getting stuck in the date palm suits truly with them. And similarly he has imprisoned them in the false idea that the miracles of the previous prophets were also of this kind and type of safli (evil?) and mad (mental, the word junooni) karishmas and when their mediums heal and cure the diseases created by mad ghosts then they think that previous prophets, specially Hazrat Isa (Alaihe Salaat-o-wassalam, meaning peace be upon Him) (i.e. Jesus Christ PBUH) who used to cure, handicapped or the blind by birth, he also had inside him this type of spiritual and healing power, the practice of which these people do in their churches with the help of passes etc. Even though, there is a diference equivalent of sky and the earth between every two of these safli (evil?) acrobatics and alvi (good in some sense?) miracles.

Now we consider it important to tell the souls or the spirits that are invoked by the spiritualists of Europe in their seances and those that say we are your forefathers who have passed away from your world or we are those dead humans' souls who inhibited the earth. We have passed away from this world and tell their relatives and kin their complete signs and whereabouts. Who they actually are? And what is their reality? 

It should be clear that the mediums of Europe are often women or weak, illiterate, or simple minded (or possibly innocent) men. Most of the mediums are affected by certain mental illnesses for a while. And the guide spirits that are appointed on them that mostly tells of itself as a foreign person. The most strange thing is that such infants who die after less than even a week or so, such infant children' souls' when invoked start talking, communicating and answering every question like grown up adults without training. Moreover, when some people die, they appear in spiritual seances and start talking without inhibition, even when they are not buried. Even though the person, after having undergone prolonged illness, the difficult process of death, enters the unseen and unheard barzakh (another jargon word, but it is one of the planes of the afterlife) and has to deal with different kinds of revolutions and storms therein. He, for no reason, has the pain and agony of leaving his beloved land, house, relatives and kin and solitude, how can he instantaneously get rid of all of these irritations and problems and start talking with the members of the seance? Thus, these are things which the refined wisdom cannot agree to accept.  Thus, what are these things that tell of themselves as the dead peoples' souls? If they are not souls, then how and why they are aware of all the information and circumstances of the souls.  

So the real thing is that according to Islamic beliefs when a human being is born, a devil is appointed and fixed for (and with) him. Therefore, when it was asked to Hazrat Muhammad Sallalaho Alaihe Wassalam (PBUH), You (PBUH) replied, "Yes, a devil has been fixed with me. But Allah Almighty has endowed me with dominance over him and my devil has become a Muslim". Such physical jinns and devils are born naturally with every human being and to him is also an hidden structure, to which some people refer to as duplicate. This structure is human soul's image, shadow, and complete model and all human feelings and knowledge. Besides this there are other subtle structures in human self. Our spiritual teacher Hazrat Sultan Baahu (Rehmat Allah Alaih) (May Allah's beneficience be upon Him) says in his book Noor-ul-Huda Kalaan:

There are bodies within the body of the human beings and there are various types of these bodies. And every type has a name given to it. Because Humans' body is like a magical treasure. The puzzle of this magic of body is solved by a person of spell by virtue of the name of Allah and attains inner and hidden wealth and blessing. Those hiddedn structures are described as follows:

(I am missing the translation because of the fact that there is use of Persian language here and some jargon).

On another occasion he says:

Nine types of subtle bodies come out of Arif Billah's body. Thus, four bodies are nafs-e-ammaara, nafs-e-lawwaama, nafs-e-mulhima and nafs-e-mutmainna. Three bodies are of the heart; qalb-e-saleem, qalb-e-muneeb, qalb-e-shaheed, and two bodies of the soul; rooh-e-jamaadi, rooh-e-nabaati.

On a third occasion he says that:

From every body, thousand rather so many bodies come out and then they assemble in to one body.

So this type of numerous bodies/structures exist in the human body and after death this type of human's symbolic bodies stay behind like offspring. Other than this there is Allah Almighty's uncountable invisible creation the quantity of which is not known to any other but Allah Almighty.

Translation 74:31: And none can know the hosts of your Lord but He.

One structure, namely humzaad which is called as duplicate in English is appointed with a human from the time of his/her birth. If the spiritualists of Europe invoke such an invisible subtle structure and he/she tells of him/her-self as the body and mind of or the soul of the same soul, then because of this an aspersion cannot be made about different divine religions' specially Islam's, beliefs and ideologies and various notions regarding human soul about punishment, judgment, etc stay untainted as they are. The existence of jinns is although true and shown in Europeans' old religious beliefs and they exist with the names of genie, fairy, devil etc. But the type of invisible subtle creation spiritualists encounter in or out of their seances, they describe themselves as dead peoples' souls. And whatever right or wrong those souls tell them they believe in that. Although one hundred years ago there was not a single person in Europe who was convinced about the existence of soul after death. Now only due to the invocation of souls in the spiritual seances and frequent visual exhibitions experiments has convinced Europe of life after death and a slight glimpse about the one  true thing among many beliefs and ideologies about the religion of Islam, which is life after death, has been known. And in spite of so many observations and experiments devil has indulged them in to a new type of atheism and naturalism. As Allah Almighty has said in surah Al-Anaam (chapter 6) of the Holly Quran:

111. And even if We had sent down unto them angels, and the dead had spoken unto them, and We had gathered together all things before their very eyes, they would not have believed, unless Allah willed, but most of them behave ignorantly.

112. And so We have appointed for every Prophet enemies - Shayatin (devils) among mankind and jinns, inspiring one another with adorned speech as a delusion (or by way of deception). If your Lord had so willed, they would not have done it, so leave them alone with their fabrications. (Tafseer Qurtubi, Vol.7, Page 67)

In the verses above, how has Allah

CONTINUED

Certainty in Belief is Dependent Upon Seeing

Hazrat Faqir Noor Muhammad Sarwari
Qadri Kalachwi (RA)

This article contains translations of important excerpts from the chapter titled "Certainty in Belief is Dependent Upon Seeing", from the book "Irfan (part 2)" by Hazrat Faqir Noor Muhammad Sarwari Qadri Kalachwi (RA). This book was first published in 1942. It has two parts. Both parts also  have translations in English. The urdu version of the first volume can be read here and English version can be read here.

It is also advisable that this article be read in connection with, and preferably after reading, On Afterlife and Islamic Spirituality.

Now we come to our real topic and describe the reality of nafs (the soul, or the self). It should be made clear that Allah shows to the seekers of path verses and signs of the aafaaq (skies) and anfas (souls, selves) so much so that they clearly find the truth.

سَنُرِيهِمْ آيَاتِنَا فِي الْآفَاقِ وَفِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَتَّى يَتَبَيَّنَ لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَقُّ أَوَلَمْ يَكْفِ بِرَبِّكَ أَنَّهُ عَلَى كُلِّ 

شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌ (حم 53:41)

We shall show them Our portents on the horizons and within themselves until it will be manifest unto them that it is the Truth. Dothnot thy Lord suffice, since He is Witness over all things?

In the verse quoted, a mention has been made about the world of aafaaq (the skies) and world of anfas (the souls), the whole universe is composed of these two worlds.

The world of Aafaaq (the skies) is also called as the world of creation, the apparent world, the witnessed world, the material world, the subtle world, the shape world, and the unreal world. And this is this world that the human being knows about and feels through his five senses.

The second world of anfas (the souls) is also called as the upper world, the inner world, the invisible world, the subtle world, the world of meaning and the real world. And this world is hidden from the apparent senses. The anfas world is real and the aafaaq world is its image. Both worlds have similar earth, sky, sun, moon, stars and all of the other things and two types of material and subtle subtle creation. In Quran-e-Pak Allah Almighty often discusses the reality of the invisible world with the subtle world and its creation. As Allah Almighty says.

الم  o ذَلِكَ الْكِتَابُ لاَ رَيْبَ فِيهِ هُدًى لِّلْمُتَّقِينَ  o  الَّذِينَ يُؤْمِنُونَ بِالْغَيْبِ()

This is the Scripture whereof there is no doubt, a guidance unto those who ward off (evil). Who believe in the Unseen.

Normally with, يُؤْمِنُونَ بِالْغَيْبِ, it has been considered to bear faith without seeing. This can never be correct because faith and belief become firm with seeing. As there are three levels of belief: First is ilm-ul-yaqeen (knowledge of belief), ain-ul-yaqeen (vision of belief) and haq-ul-yaqeen, which mean identification, visual perception and discovery. Just like in the case of any issue or incident a man's testimony is true only if he has actually witnessed and seen the particular issue or the incident. Otherwise, without seeing the witness can be proven to be wrong. Similarly, in the case bearing testimony of oneness of Allah Almighty and on Prophethood of Hazrat Muhammad (May Allah's Peace and Blessings be upon) only those virtuous and people of enlightened conscience can be true who have seen the invisible accounts and the inner/hidden issues of Allah Almighty with the eyes of their inner self. Meaning that their kalimah (word of testimony):

اَشْهَدُ اَنْ لَّآ اِلٰهَ اِلَّا اللہُ وَحْدَهٗ لَا شَرِيْكَ لَهٗ وَ اَشْهَدُ اَنَّ مُحَمَّدً اعَبْدُهٗ وَرَسُوْلُهٗؕ

Translation: I bear witness that (there is) no god except Allah; One is He, no partner hath He, and I bear witness that Muhammad (Sall-Allahu Alayhi wa Sallam) is His Servant and Messenger.

is correct. Just like Allah Almighty showed the angels of the earth and the skies to Hazrat Ibrahim (AS) to strengthen his faith and belief. As it has been said: 

Translation: 6:75. Thus did we show Ibrahim (Abraham) the kingdom of the heavens and the earth that he be one of those who have Faith with certainty.

Rather Hazrat Ibrahim kept on begging and requesting Allah Almighty for peace of heart and solidarity of certainty in faith. As it is discussed in these verses:

Translation 2:260. And (remember) when Ibrahim (Abraham) said, "My Lord! Show me how You give life to the dead." He (Allah) said: "Do you not believe?" He [Ibrahim (Abraham)] said: "Yes (I believe), but to be stronger in Faith." He said: "Take four birds, then cause them to incline towards you (then slaughter them, cut them into pieces), and then put a portion of them on every hill, and call them, they will come to you in haste. And know that Allah is All-Mighty, All-Wise."

Then Allah showed the process of resurrecting the dead to Hazrat Ibrahim (AS). And if having certainty of faith without seeing had any value then why would Allah Almighty have increased Hazrat Ibrahim's faith by showing him the angels of the earth and the skies? And why would Hazrat Ibrahim have requested to see the resurrection of the dead?  So belief and faith and the certainty therein is dependent on seeing and reciting the kalimah of testimony without seeing is not correct at all. And such is the testimony of hypocrites. As we have described in the previous verses:

Translation 63:1. When the hypocrites come to you (O Muhammad ), they say: "We bear witness that you are indeed the Messenger of Allah." Allah knows that you are indeed His Messenger and Allah bears witness that the hypocrites are liars indeed.

So the issue of faith is all about the invisible. As it has been described in the conditions of faith (The detailed declaration of faith): 

I have faith in Allah and His Angels, His Books and His Messengers, and the Day of Judgment and that all good and evil and fate is from Allah and it is sure that there will be resurrection after death. 

And all of these are invisible things. And till the time a believer cannot see these hidden secret things his having faith in the invisible world is word of testimony is not at all correct and right. The starry eyed hypocrites who are blind since ever from this invisible real world, their formality driven and conceited faith is not equal to a piece of straw in value near God. Rather like hypocrites their verbal word is not becomes a cause and reason for their curse and doomed faith. The saying of Allah in this regard is:

Translation 17:72. And whoever is blind in this world (i.e., does not see Allah's Signs and believes not in Him), will be blind in the Hereafter, and more astray from the Path. 

The description about Hazrat Ibrahim (AS) that has been given of another occasion in Quran-e-Hakeem  that he after seeing the stars, moon and the sun after one another that this is my God. The real detail and description and explanation of these verses is extremely important. Allah says:

Translation 6:76: When the night covered him over with darkness he saw a star. He said: "This is my lord." But when it set, he said: "I like not those that set."

And when he saw the moon while it was shining, he said this is my lord. But when that set he got fed up of that too. And when he saw sun he considered it as his lord and god. But when that also set he showed annoyance with that too. Ultimately after seeing the actual noor (light) of God he said:

Translation 6:79. Verily, I have turned my face towards Him Who has created the heavens and the earth Hanifa (Islamic Monotheism, i.e. worshipping none but Allah Alone) and I am not of Al-Mushrikun (see V.2:105)".

So all the universe is composed of Aalam-e-Aafaaq (the visible world) and the aalam-e-anfas (the invisible world. Just like the visible world has material stars, moon and the sun, the invisible world also has subtle stars, moon(s) and sun(s). When the disciple achieves levels of discipleship in his inner self he has to pass through many inner places, levels and circumstances. And different enlightenments are bestowed upon him. Thus the enlightenment of nafs (the self) on the level (place) of naasoot appears in the form of star due to lights of the deeds. On some disciples when this type of light appears then he considers it as the light of Allah.But after some while when the disciple progresses and moves ahead from this level then this light disappears and dims. At this stage the disciple understands that this passing and dimming light is temporary and Allah's light (noor, actually the urdu word tajjalli is used here) is ahead which is eternal and perpetual. After this the tajjali-e-qalb (light of heart?) appears on the disciple on the level of malakoot (angels?) due to lights (anwaar) of names (asmaa) in the form of moon. Because this light is slightly brighter than than the previous light, due to this the disciple starts considering it as the the light of Allah Almighty. But after a while this light also disappears and the disciple understands that this could also not be the light of Allah Almighty. When the disciple progresses further then the light appears in the level of jabaroot due to anwaar-e-sifaat (lights of characteristics, traits, qualities) in the form of sun and the disciple (the actual word in Urdu saalik is used here and I do not know the real translation of the word in English) thinks that this electrifying and clear light is that of Allah Almighty. But when in the accomplished levels this light disappears, he abandons it by saying "I like not those that set." (verse 76:6). After this in the level of Laahoot the actual light of Allah Almighty appears on the disciple which does not dim or disappear in any way. At this stage the disciple knows that this is the actual, real and personal light of Allah Almighty. At this stage, like Hazrat Ibrahim (AS), by becoming appointed on the level of real unity of and by attaining close proximity of Allah Almighty he proclaims: 

Translation 6:79. Verily, I have turned my face towards Him Who has created the heavens and the earth Hanifa (Islamic Monotheism, i.e. worshipping none but Allah Alone) and I am not of Al-Mushrikun (see V.2:105)".

Meaning that I have turned my attention completely towards the personal light of Allah Almighty and I have become a complete knower by ridding myself off from all polytheism except the lights (anwaar) deeds, names and traits.

NOTE: Another relevant topic to this is that of the psychospiritual organs.

An Account of the Invocation of Jinns, Angels and Souls

Captain Black Beard's Ghost!

This article presents translations of important excerpts from the chapter titled "An Account of the Invocation of Jinns, Angels and Souls", from the book "Irfan" by Hazrat Faqir Noor Muhammad Sarwari Qadri Kalachwi (RA). This book was first published in 1942. It has two parts. Both parts also  have translations in English. The urdu version of the first volume can be read here and English version can be read here.

This is in response to the materialist views of the atheists who claim that once we die, we live in an eternal oblivion. The purpose of presenting this translation has many aspects but it is indeed not intended as a possible rebuttal. This is meant to give some food for thought to the present-day, and future, scientists, and intellectuals and to help them form concrete notions of any possible human afterlife. It is also advisable that this article be read in connection with, and preferably after reading, On Afterlife and Islamic Spirituality.

For the past one hundred years science of invocation of souls , which is called spiritualism, is published and practiced among the Europeans, it is much celebrated there. And this science has acquired a form of a worldwide religion over there. In the USA tens of millions of people believe and follow this religion and this religion has spread all across Europe. And there is not a single country in Europe where this religion's numerous spiritual gatherings, huge organizations, large scale societies, thousands of lecturers and hundreds of practitioners known as mediums are not present. Credible doctors, chemists, scientists, philosophers and even members of parliament are special members of these organizations and societies. There are plenty of daily newspapers and weekly magazines in Europe that publish the achievements of these spiritual organizations for the general public. Thus, in London "psychic news" is a famous newspaper which has a huge audience. And there are plenty of news papers that are publishing about this science. There are colleges for its education. Proper education of the science is given in London and "The British College for Psychic Science, London" is a big college for this science…. (continued)

The circles and gatherings that are established for the invocation of souls in Europe are called spiritual seances, spiritual circles, spiritual sittings. In these spiritual gatherings a medium's presence is extremely necessary and the success of the whole circle or gathering depends upon him/her. Medium is such a person upon whom some soul gets appointed naturally. Although now is colleges this spiritual excellence (mediumship) is somehow acquired but normally mediums become to be so naturally by birth, 

The Fox house in Hydesville

In these circles three persons sit around a table. One among them is the medium and the other two are his/her helpers. Rest of the people are spectators. Sometimes these gatherings are conducted successfully with hundreds of people. Thus, souls come and go in these gatherings. They talk, show faces, they transport physical objects in and out of closed locked rooms. They play drums, they take the medium out of the closed room. They touch the bodies of the attendees to make their presence felt. They make signs and write excerpts on walls. Rather this science has progressed so much there that with sophisticated photographic equipment and plates pictures of spirits can be taken which are photographed. Souls come and deliver lectures in these circles and gatherings and their voices are recorded on tapes. Thus, so many strange things are done that leave human wisdom dumbfounded and material wisdom and science is unable to explain it.

Casa Da Familia Fox

Here, for the purpose of keenness of the reader, I (the author) would like to describe  a brief history of this science. Initially when, where and how this science started and how did this gain tradition in the agnostic, atheistic countries of Europe.    The first strange incident of this science happened in 1846 in a village named, Hadesville, in the USA the detail of which is that in the town of Hadesville a man named Weekmaan used to live. In the house, rappings were heard for a few successive nights. The people of the house became so frightened of these invisible and unnatural voices that after a few months they left the house. After they left another man named John Fox settled in this house with his wife and two children. They also started hearing the same rappings in this house. When they informed the villagers of these voices the villagers rushed for the discovery of these voices. They learnt that an invisible hand and an unnatural object produced those rappings. A person named madam Fox told the people that some soul was responsible for this and that this was a soul of a traveller who was murdered, whose name was Sharl Ryan (I might be wrong in interpreting the name of the person correctly, but this was my guest guess). The story is that a few years ago this man appeared in this village while he was traveling and roaming around and stayed in that house for a night. Some other person who was staying in that house already, killed him out of his greed for former's possessions and money. When the news of those rappings spread most people started ridiculing this incident of spiritualism. Some even said that it was a white lie. This could never happen. After this poor John Fox, along with his family, moved out to another town named Rolter. News spread in this town and he became a subject of that town's atheists and materialists ridicule. People of Europe have a distinguishing feature that when ever they see and experience a new phenomenon, all of them start researching about that and do not abandon the subject unless they gain some knowledge about it. When the discussion of this incident gained momentum in Rolter, the people of that town sent a committee of scholars for inquiry over there for three times. But the committee could not reach at a decision and the townspeople made John Fox and the scholars a subject of their criticism and ridicule. For the newspapers all of the accounts became a source of entertainment and they ridiculed them a lot. But in the mean while strange spiritual incidents of this type started happening and rigorous research ensued and when the health of this science was proved then only in four years the knowledge of this problem spread in all of the USA very quickly and with much intensity and it became well known everywhere. Thus, people started using those rappings as ticks and clicks of the telegraph system and everywhere spiritual gatherings and circles established. People used to sit around a big table along with the medium. One person used to read out the alphabetical letters. When upon reaching the desired letter a rapping would be heard, they would make note of that letter. Like this they would collect all the letters, such as in the case of telegraph, and form words and phrases from them to see a complete utterance of what the soul had desired to say or a complete answer to a specific question. Like this initially the process of conversation with the souls began. 1854 had not yet finished when Washington's parliament took responsibility of research of these unnatural events. Meaning that after eight years of the mentioned incident Washington's members of the parliament themselves focused their attention to the research of it. The reason was that a rather long application with fifteen thousand signatures was presented to the members of the parliament. The application is as follows:

We, the signatories of the following, residents of the united states of America, beg to state that some unnatural and unusual incidents are occurring for a few days in this country and in various parts of Europe. These incidents appear mostly in northern, southern and central america. Nothing becomes known about these incidents. Common public is completely perplexed, bewildered and anxious. Because the purpose of this application is to gain attention of you people, that's why we state a few accounts of these incidents in this application:

1) These thousands of wise people have witnessed a hidden force that gives motion to huge and heavy bodies and completely topples them around. That is apparently against the laws of physics and is out of the common human knowledge and power. Up until now no man has been able to explain these incidents. 

2) In a dark room a light of different shape and color appears. Even though that room does not have any such substance in it before that is chemically reactive or is ignitable like phosphorous.

3) The strangest thing about these incidents which needs attention is that different types of sounds appear in the house. Sometimes such rappings are heard that point towards the presence of an invisible wise being. Sometimes machine or factory-like sounds are heard. Sometimes sound of a severe blizzard is heard. Sometimes such a voice is heard as if when a tide hits a wall due to wind. Sometimes a loud knock and cannon-like sound is heard of the intensity that nearby houses echo and vibrate. Sometimes this voice is like a human voice. Sometimes the voice of a horn-blow is heard from that house even though there is no such instrument in that house. It feels as if a harmonium, or a gramophone, or a sitar or a Saarangi (a string instrument) or horns gather by themselves in the house and start blowing. Nobody plays them. Sometimes these sounds are heard without the presence of horns. And all of these voices are produced according to the laws of physics the description of which is according to acoustic undulations. And they properly reach our ears. Researchers have tried hard to know the producers of these sounds but they have not been successful in their pursuit so far. We find it pertinent to describe the two principles here which are considered mandatory to solve this difficulty. First is that all of these incidents have been related to souls of men. (I am missing a sentence here because I don't think that I can translate it near to perfection). The explanation of this was done by its hidden force itself when it was asked about the question. Second renowned personalities of our country accept this. But other renowned personalities reject it saying that its research should be done under the power of the sciences of visibility so that the actual reason for the occurrence for these incidents could be known. We do not hold agreement with this last suggestion because after our research we have reached a conclusion that there is something that is against what can be called the reason for these incidents. We earnestly request you people that these events that are happening are completely true and certain. And their research and inquiry for the benefit of humanity is (….) required. Therefore your attention is extremely needed. Can every wise person not understand that perhaps the research of these incidents may produce an important result that may be beneficial for the literary, material and intellectual condition of the inhabitants of America? Something that may change out principle of economy al together? And may correct our faith and our philosophy? And that it could change the nature of our educational system?

We people, for the research of problems that may produce an important result for collective existence, consider it important to consult the gathering of you people for the betterment of our collective system. We, the compatriots, have come here to request you with extreme humility to guide us about these strange incidents. It would be good if you form a research committee for this no matter how much money is spent on that. We have a firm belief that whatever the committee will do, its results will provide the best benefits to our collective existence. We people have a hope that your respectable gathering will definitely accept our humble but important application.

After this the parliament of Washington made a research committee for this, which after research and inquiry announced the feasibility of this. After this, this knowledge spread all over united states of America. So much so that by 1898 the followers of this religion reached the count of twenty million. In 1870 common spiritual gatherings were 20, important gatherings were 150 and there were 207 lecturers and 22 mediums. One of the famous scholars of this was Professor "Admone" (This is how the pronunciation in Urdu translates to English. I suppose that the author intended to mention John W. Edmonds, but this is only a guess) who had been selected in the parliament many times. Professor Robert Hare of the United States of America wrote a book about this. Similarly professor Robert Dale Owen wrote a book titled "Boundaries of the Invisible World" in America. By the end of the last century there were almost 22 such newspapers that used to publish the achievements of such committees and organizations for the common people.

All of these scholars used to do research about this so that they could save the people from going astray. Because Allah Almighty had bestowed them with the knowledge of Physics, mathematics, science and philosophy. Scholars in England also indulged in the research of this when the news about the researches regarding this event reached the ears of the British.

Therefore the educational society of England, which was established in 1867, suggested in one of its congregations, that was held on 6th December 1869, that a committee be formed for the research of this type of spiritual incidents that will inform the people about the correct circumstances. Therefore, this committee remained busy in research and inquiry for 18 successive months. When after its research it announced the feasibility of the spiritual incident, the British nation was astonished. Professor Wallace wrote a book named "spiritual wonders". Among these scholars were a few who were staunch opponents of this science and that included Dr. George Sexton. He left opposition of this and read about this for 15 years. He says that after reading and experimentation I developed firm belief on the religion of spirituality and during my moments of research I had conversations with my demised relatives, elders and friends. Dr. Sawmarace (or possibly Chalmers), Dr. Haggen, and professor Myers etc. also researched about this. They established a "Society for psychical research" which used to publish a magazine ".... of the souls". It used to publish the research work concerning these types of unnatural incidents and events.

Like America and England, an interest in scholars of France also developed about this and like this science of spiritualism spread in Germany, Russia, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Holland, Sweden etc. and in all of Europe there are numerous societies and organizations about this science and numerous books on this have been written and newspapers and magazines are busy about publication of this science. The point is that in all of the Europe this science is clearly established. If we describe the comprehensive practices , the reality, and detailed accounts of this modern European science of spirituality, then it will constitute a separate huge book. Anyhow the important and mandatory details are listed here for addressing the curiosity of the keen reader. Although this dervish (the author) has never had a chance to sit in any of these types of spiritual circles and neither in our country Pakistan there is any such spiritual organization or society. But I have done a keen study of spiritualism and I have performed a comprehensive research on as to what sort of souls are these which these people invoke and considerable literature and many books concerning this science have crossed my eyes. It is important to discuss this science here because our youngsters, who are fans of new enlightenment, are so much mad about following the Europeans that they consider each and every word and action  and every ideology and belief of Europeans to be above and better than divine revelation. Bare this in mind that life after death and existence of soul and the issue of its reward and punishment etc. has become a firm belief and a certain ideology of your materialist priests of Europe and the British sages. But you are still riding on the devilish donkey of atheism and you are racing it towards the hell. If you have any doubt on our knowledge of invocation of souls, we don't mind that. You will after all agree with the beliefs and ideologies of your materialist priests. In which are included your renowned philosophers, doctors, scientists and wise politicians. If you find it hard to believe what we say then you can read these writing for yourself. And if you are not satisfied even then, you get a chance to go abroad for higher education in fields such as law, science, physics, engineering, etc. You can go and see for yourselves by taking part in those spiritual circles to testify what we say. But you people have the same plight over there that if you get a chance to spare time from your studies, you spend it on reading novels, viewing theaters and dance clubs and when you come back to your country you bring a paper permit to fill and empty your stomachs with food while sitting on the same donkey of atheism. And if by mistake someone talks to you about God and his prophet (may Allah's peace be upon him) and religion you show your irritation by saying that don't talk to us about these obsolete issues in this time of education and enlightenment. It is a pity that how heartlessly you commit murder of the wisdom and even upon doing this you are called wise and enlightened. Now we shall present forth you a few practices and the reality of this spiritual science. In our country also there is not a single city where this type of invisible and unnatural voices are not produced and this type of unusual events and incidents do not happen. We people abandon such houses for ever by considering them houses of ghosts and jinns and nobody dares to live in them. Moreover, in our country there are numerous mediums, upon whom some soul is attached naturally or from birth. We overlook these mediums considering some shadow of a jinn or a ghost or a disease. The difference is only that the Europeans, who are extremely brisk, have researched and inquired about this thing and created a series of communications with it, have derived beneficial results from it. And they have progressed it to the degree of a proper science and skill.  But we, like the inhabitants of the America's Hadesville village, are still running away from this, and still we have not moved one step further from its initial milestone. Our people of virtue and sages of the religion have, in their times, have shown such astonishing and unbelievable exhibitions of that. Today's European spiritual practitioners have no reality in front of them. And they hold, in front of the former, value less than infants. But we have pride as if son of a sultan is also sultan. And we are putting scars on the names of our dear sages with our impure and filthy selves. We are drowned from our head to feet and still we have pride and illusion about being close to God. We beg in streets and door to door but still we claim to be the contractors of the heaven. We cannot take care of our torn clothes and lice but the euphoria of being called the best Ummah is riding on our heads. We have become a statue of abjection and pity but the ecstasy of sacredness and piety rides so high in the head that it never gets off. The result is that our undeserving ummah is drenched in such a nervous disease from which there is little hope of resurrection. May Allah Almighty have mercy on this dead ummah. According to the Europeans there are three main principles of acquiring this knowledge: The first is meditation. The second is to focus the imagination and thoughts on a single point that is called concentration. Third, there are many ways of communicating with their senses. But the special and major methods are listed below:

The Ghosts Can Do It!

1) First, a huge table is made for this purpose below which there are wheels and that starts moving and rotating with a little force applied by the soul. Or there develops a tension in it around which sits a medium along with his/her two helpers and audience sit nearby. In every circle and meeting the presence of a medium is important and the soul gets imposed naturally on this medium. Initially the soul is invited to come in the circle. This is called as a guide spirit and through this other souls are invoked. In order to invoke the soul the medium has to go into unconsciousness, which is called a "trance" in English. The medium either imposes trance on him/her-self by self concentration, or he/she goes in a trance with the help of a helper who, with the magnetism of hypnotism makes the medium unconscious. In such a situation the soul or ghost to be imposed comes and gets imposed on its head. After this the process of dialogue and conversation begins with the soul. Dialogue and conversation initially commences like the  ticks and clicks of the telegraph. Meaning that a single rap can imply affirmation and a two raps imply a negation. One person asks the desired question on the table and the souls one time click is considered a "YES" and a double click is considered a "NO". 

2) A more developed form than this is that when the soul is imposed on the medium and the table starts revolving and moving and rappings start to be heard then one man reads alphabetical letters on the table and on which letter they hear a knock, that letter is written down on a paper by a person and like this whatever letters are collected are used to form words and phrases to get the answer to their questions and to get what the soul has to say. This is done when the imposed soul is educated. 

3) On the table a heart-shaped piece of wood is made that has a long end like a pointer. It has three wheels underneath it so that they can start moving with a little force of the soul. Medium places its both hands on this heart-shaped cow-tail wood and the helpers also occasionally place their fingers on the medium's hands so that a connection can be established with the soul. Alphabets are written in front of the table and the soul enters the body of the medium and turn by turn, from the 30 letters of the alphabet, points one by one with the end of the cow-tail stick and one person on the table copies these alphabets. Similarly the alphabets that are collected are used to form words and phrases like in the case of the telegram. 

4) The medium keeps a pencil in his/her hand and the soul gets imposed on him/her and gives it an unintentional (on behalf of the medium) movement to write what it, the soul, intends on paper or slate. This is the job of a more elevated medium and an educated soul. 

5) A pencil and papers are placed in an empty box and the medium places his/her hand on this and those papers automatically get written by the soul's intended writeup.

6) The sixth method is that the soul speaks from the mouth of the medium and answers the questions. Addresses the attendees and delivers lectures. Sometimes the soul adopts a physical and bodily shape and appears, touches the attendees, topples the things, rings bells, plays horns and drums. Sometimes it takes the medium away too. Brings things out of the locked rooms and takes the things that are out inside. The crux is that it does strange and weird things which are out of the scope of the material wisdom and knowledge and science and philosophy have not been able to explain them and human wisdom is unable to apprehend this knowledge.

Below are written some incidents of these spiritual scholars which happened with their interactions with the souls:

1) The first incident: A German medium namely Dr. Sirpox describes about his state that I tried to write on a paper 19 times through a soul and all of my sittings went in vein. But the 20th time when I sat for invocations, I felt a (……) and an unintentional motion in my hand. After that a cold gust of wind touched my face and hand. After this my hand started flowing on the invisible writeup and I started writing unintentionally the things about the world (or space) of the souls. The logic for this is that while writing down the spiritual things, I used to talk to the people sitting with me and my hand kept on writing the spiritual reasonable things. 

2) The second event: William Crookes writes that I saw a practitioner Aanis Fox that he would write a spiritual excerpt on one place and at the same time he would dictate some other topic to some medium and at the same time with a third man he would very easily argue about some third conflicting topic. 

3) A practitioner's statement is that he saw a boy who used to do mediumship. He was completely ignorant about education and civility. At the time of imposition of the soul he inquired him about problems of philosophy, logic and spirituality, for example, he inquired him about problems of invisible world, intention and ability, and gave comprehensive answers about all of these problems in extremely scholastic excerpts. Even though he did not know anything about these domains. 

4) Fourth Event: Research was done about a girl that upon imposition of the soul she knew eight different languages, for example, French, Spanish, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Latin, Hindi and English. Even though she actually only knew English.

5) Fifth Event: William Crookes states that in a spiritual circle in which Mr. Home was the medium Florence Cook's soul appeared in her exactly physical and apparent form and I conversed with her by shaking hands with her.

6) Baron Glastow writes that on the 13th of the water month (I don't  know which month that is) 1886 I placed a white paper and a pencil in a locked box and kept the key with me and there was no limit to my astonishment that when I opened it I found it written. Then on the same day I tested the same process ten times and I was successful every time and the box would lay open in front of me and statements would themselves be written in front of me. After that I placed a white paper in front of me on the table without a pen and that was found written in front of me.

An incident of this dervish is that once upon a time this dervish was staying with a friend of his in Khushab. Some of his friends brought to me an old man and said that this man has a shadow of some jinn or ghost upon him since a long time. Please cure him so that this shadow should leave him and go away. Our people have this habit that they try to get rid of these ghosts. Thus, some commercial practitioners invite the spellbound and beat and torture him badly. Nonetheless, that old man was sat in front of me. That old man's whole appearance changed and his face became immensely scary and horrible. So much so that in that gathering who ever he would look at he would start shivering. At last that old man started reciting mantras of sanskrit language with such clarity as if he was some sage or pandit. He joined his hands and begged me: "Mahaaraj have mercy on me. I am a Hindu yogi. Peace be with your two sons (I had two sons at that time). I am your cow. Don't say anything to me." He did a lot of pleading like this. At last, in order to make me happy, he made a few foretelling statements that came out to be true verbatim afterwards. After that he asked me if he could leave. Thus, I told him to go and the old man took a long yawn and came back to his original form. When that old man was asked that if during the imposition of  ghost and the soul he remembered anything, he said that at that time he would become oblivious of everything and neither his ability or intention remained. Whatever speaks or does is the jinn or the soul that gets imposed on me. After that he also told that this soul never imposed on him with this much intensity. Because of its imposition my whole body aches. 

Thus human body is like a utensil and safli and alvi (spirituality specific jargon words) souls gets dissolved in it as if in a utensil a liquor, for example water, scent or pigment, acquires the shape of the utensil. 

In Europe in order to invite and invoke souls a few voluntary acts are done that serve as spiritual diet and food for them and they are drawn attention towards so that they come easily in spiritual circles easily and quickly. Included in these things is music also. Due to this, on one hand, the self of the medium gets attracted towards the world of the souls. Secondly, the souls love music. They get attracted to such parties and gatherings easily where music is played. Third, fragrance, for example smoke of bakhore is blowed and flowers are placed. This also helps in the invocation of the souls. Fourth, the houses in which the souls are invoked are kept relatively dark. Or red light is turned on in the houses.

Now we write in relation to these invisible things as to what is it that these people invoke. So this is to be remembered that in invisible worlds and delicate spiritual worlds the lowest and the most inferior world is that of the "aalam-e-naasoot's" (again Islamic spirituality specific jargon) asfalest world which is the home of all the "safli" selves. In these jinn, ghosts, devils and "safli" souls live. The latifa nafs (the psychospiritual organ) in the human self is the most resemblant and close to these "safli" creatures. The person whose self has resemblance with any one of these invisible "naasooti" creatures, then sometimes by gaining opportunity that matching creature, through jinn devils and "safli" souls, enters and dissolves into this person. And by making a permanent home in that persons self resides there forever. And just as a bird comes to its nest, this soul comes inside the human body often. And when one soul makes room and place for itself in it, it becomes a home and place for various other devilish and "safli" souls. And when this type of a soul enters a human self (the word here is wajood, which probably means the mind, body and soul). then it acquires its whole body, heart, brain and senses. And it exits and pushes out the actual self al most at the same time out of it. And that occupying soul talks, walks, thinks, understands, and works. This is the reason that in Europe the mediums for these "safli" souls are normally women and in our country also women are normally ghost-ridden and men are very few. Because women's hearts and brains are normally weak. Therefore, jinn devils and "safli" souls occupy the selves of them relatively easily. This "naasooti" world of the jinns, devils and the "safli" souls is the closest to us relative to the other subtle invisible worlds and our selves are normally in this world while we are dreaming. Jinn, devils and "safli" souls sometimes become a cause of such bodily and nervous illnesses that somehow cannot be treated by any means. This is the reason that people who take up the profession of mediumship in Europe normally do not have good health. But because the europeans have made this conquering of souls a profession, they perform trade with this. Therefore everyone who enters a spiritual circle or a gathering has to pay some fees and they have to buy tickets. That is why in every sitting and meeting a considerable amount is collected for the medium. And those practitioners and mediums that exhibit the most exhilarating miracles have the largest crowds of people around them. In such circles the seats and places are reserved a month before the meeting and it becomes very difficult to obtain a ticket. So it is a pity that such self centered people have converted this delicate and priceless knowledge also into a source of living and a profession. And instead of seeking advice and warning they earn through it for a few days of this life.

The purpose of describing the accounts of european's invocation of souls in this book is to invite people to develop faith in Quran-e-Kareem where miracles and spiritual abilities of prophets are written to a large extent. For example, the account of Prophet Suleman's invocation of queen Bilquees's throne with his spiritual power. If it can be correct for an invisible creature to transport things in and out of a closed locked room, then it is not difficult about the spiritual power of the king of all practitioners, the prophet Suleman (AS). Similarly it should be thought about the miracles of all the prophets and aulia Allah (friends of Allah) that they used to invoke angels and excellent souls to take such astonishing services from them that human wisdom remained dumbfounded in attaining knowledge of them.

In Europe in the circles of captivating the souls, these souls often appear either behind or on the left side of the medium. And this is particular about jinns, devils and "safli" souls that they appear behind and on the left side of the medium. Moreover, before these souls are invoked there, cold wind blows in the rooms. So much so that the temperature of the room falls considerably below the normal. And frequently the curtains of the room or something else also catches fire. And often when the medium is a woman she becomes naked at the time of imposition of the soul. All of these actions depict that they belong to the jinns and the "safli" souls. The accounts of after death experiences that have been obtained from these souls are more or less similar to our Islamic beliefs:

1. Souls see their friends and relatives as flesh and bones and when after the death of someone, people mourn, this is a source of agony for the dead (according to the teachings of Islam it is forbidden to mourn over the dead).
2. In life if someone is blind or lame or has other physical disability then after death that fault is removed due to some good deed while he was alive.
3. After the death people get rewarded according to their good or bad deeds.
4. On the inner side there are seven worlds for the souls. Good and virtuous souls live in the top most world (or realm) and with excellent communities and live serene and affluent lives. And the inferior "safli" souls live in the lower "safli" worlds and get punished for their deeds.
5. For the "alvi" (possibly meaning good) souls there are always available for them gardens, palaces, schools and other  luxurious things.
6. The male and female gender remains established there but in the "barzakh" marriage or nikkah or birth of children does not happen.
7. A statement of souls is that the problem of extension and rebirth (Aavagone or reincarnation) is completely false. And the soul cannot take birth in this world again. Every soul comes to this world once and acquires only a unique body.
8. The time for death is fixed and that cannot be changed, forward or backward, by a second.
9. For the souls there are in the next world spiritual masters that give them spiritual education and there are separate inner schools and colleges that have specific laws and regulations.
10. Souls can get to know a few future events and they come to living people and meet them in their dreams, meditations and even when they are awake.
11. Souls help their relatives and friends in their worldly affairs, as much as they can, and they become happy about their happiness and sad with their sorrows.

So there are such and similar other things which have similarity with Islamic beliefs and ideas.