Means of God-Realization
Realization is to discover the Creator by pondering over His creation. Such contemplation allows man to discover the prior knowledge stored in his unconscious mind.
What are the means of attaining God-realization? The way of realization is to think about one’s existence and natural phenomena. In this way, one discovers the secret of realization by pondering both physical and human nature.
A fifty-fifty combination of external observation and intuition accounts for the arrival at this source of realization.
Much of the knowledge of things is attributable to intuition, and through contemplation, man discovers the coincidence between observation and prior knowledge stored in the unconscious. Moreover, this discovery is made continuously; thus, a believer’s journey of realization continues uninterruptedly.
The attainment of realization is not mysterious in nature. It is to discover the Creator by pondering over His creation. This process started in the seventh century with the advent of Islam, when the Quran influenced people to think about the things of the universe from the viewpoint of realisation. For instance, Abu Zar Ghifari, a Companion of the Prophet, says: “The Prophet of Islam used to remind us of some knowledge (of realisation) even at the flight of a bird in the air. (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 21361)
The Muslims, having received the Prophet’s training in finding the way to God-realization through contemplation of creation, this process was given a significant impetus and continued for several centuries. This is an argument based on the reasoning in Ilm al-Kalam (Theology). But in this science, or knowledge of realisation, the Muslims failed to go beyond a specific limit because, in ancient times, there was only a traditional mental framework within which contemplation could take place. This conventional framework made the observation and experiment possible only within a limited sphere.
Much broader contemplation became possible in modern times when the telescope and the microscope were invented. For the first time in 1609, Galileo used the telescope for astronomical studies. The microscope had been invented about twenty years before this. After these developments, it became possible to delve deeper into the micro and macro worlds. Those aspects of realisation that had so far been hidden from man’s eyes now came under his direct observation.
In later times, this task was performed entirely by the West. The results of the investigations into nature conducted by Western scholars in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries opened up vast doors to the realisation of God. Consequently, for the first time in human history, what earlier only had the status of a creed became a scientific fact. (For details, see the author’s book God Arises)
The task performed by Western scientists in present times has been gigantic regarding the knowledge of realisation. There is a Hadith that God will even let the non-believers support His religion. (Al-Mu’jam Al-Kabir, Al-Tabarani, Hadith No.14640) This Hadith applies to Western scientists.
