In the presence of Imam al-Mahdi (1)
Prohibition from asking useless questions
It is narrated from Imam al-Mahdi to have said,
فَأَغْلِقُوا أَبْوَابَ السُّؤَالِ عَمَّا لَا يَعْنِيكُمْ وَ لَا تَتَكَلَّفُوا عِلْمَ مَا قَدْ كُفِيتُم
“Thus, close the doors to needless questions and do not bother yourself to know about non-required matters.” (Al-Ihtijāj, by Tabarsī, vol. 2, p. 471.)
Asking questions has two sides: either it is for knowing and learning which is admirable in Islam, or it is for unnecessary and improper discussions which is regarded as being detestable. The Imam prohibits his followers from getting involved with the second form of questions.
Undoubtedly, asking question is the key to understand the realities. In Islamic versus and hadiths, Moslems are strictly ordered to ask about things they do not know. However; since each rule has some exceptions, there is an exception in this basic principle of education.
The fact is that, there are some cases should remain concealed and this is for preserving social system and supporting people’s interests. In such cases, not only asking questions for being aware of the reality is not considered as a virtue; but it is also disliked and undesirable.
This is why God says in the Quran,
يا أَيُّهَا الَّذينَ آمَنُوا لا تَسْئَلُوا عَنْ أَشْياءَ إِنْ تُبْدَ لَکُمْ تَسُؤْکُمْ
“O, you who believe! Do not ask Questions about things which if made Plain to you, may cause you trouble.” (The Quran, 5: 101)
This verses prohibits the believers from asking about something which they will become sad if it becomes revealed to them.
In following we refer to some instances of this case,
It is a custom among the physicians that often prefer not to let their patients be aware of their severe and horrible diseases and sometimes they only inform the relatives of their patients about the disease, because according to the experiences, if one knows about the severity of his illness, he would get into a panic and his recovery would take a longer time.
Or, for instance, people need to trust each other when working together. Consequently, in order to achieve such a great result, it is better for people not to know about the details of each other’s secret lives. Everybody has some weak points and disclosing them to others ends in putting trouble in their cooperation, for example, a person with good and positive personality who is born in an ungenerous and low class family; if his family background becomes known, his personal status may be jeopardized. Nobody is permitted to search about such cases.
Moreover, Many social or military plans should also be hidden up till they are executed. Exposing them to others who are not involved may affect their success and endanger the productivity of the plans.
In addition, God, based on wisdom, has revealed the reality about some cases for people but decided some other cases remain concealed from them. Showing curiosity about knowing the hidden affairs may result in system disorder, for example the reason for not knowing the time of death is to always feel that death is close to us. Consequently it would prevent us from committing sins. It also would deter us from not repenting and thinking that we still have time. This is why we should not try to know the time of our death by referring to palm-readers, fortune tellers, or the ones who claim to be connected to Jens.
Another example of bad consequences resulted from asking unnecessary questions is mentioned in the the Holy Quran in Surah al-Baghareh verse 67 to 69 within the story of the Children of Israel and a cow when people were ordered to slaughter a simple and ordinary cow but they asked many absurd questions about the specifications of the cow and it made the case deeply difficult for them. The result was nothing but that they become troubled to find the cow and when they found it, they paid too much to buy it.
It was expressed under the same versus that the prophet once offered a sermon about the importance of Haj. A person asked, “Is it obligatory to go to Haj every year?” The prophet didn’t answer him. He repeated his question. The prophet became sad and said, “Why did you insist? If I say yes; then it would be difficult for you to obey. When you notice I prefer to remain silent do not insist on asking unimportant questions.” Then, the prophet said that one of the reasons that the previous nations faced destruction was due to their inappropriate questionings. (Tafsir Nemūneh, Vol. 5, P. 96)
This is why we read in a hadith quoted from Imam Ali to have said,
إِنَّ اللَّهَ ... سَکَتَ لَکُمْ عَنْ أَشْیَاءَ وَ لَمْ یَدَعْهَا نِسْیَاناً فَلَا تَتَکَلَّفُوهَا
“Indeed Allah remained silent about some cases.... He did not do it out of forgetfulness. Therefore, do not bother yourself to know about them.” (Nahjulbalaghe, Wisdom 105)
As Imam Ali says there are some matters which have not been referred to by God and it was a mercy from God on people. Therefore, when we see that the exact knowledge about the life of the next world is not made clear for us likewise many other forms of knowledge, it was not because of God’s negligence, since God is free from forgetfulness and oblivion; but they are kept concealed since they are not important for people’s physical and spiritual life or that getting involved with such matters would prevent people from learning useful knowledge.
This is why sometime ordinary people used to ask the Prophet about the reality of the soul or the reason behind different shapes of the moon, but the Prophet instead of explaining the cases for them preferred to direct their attention to something else which were more beneficial to them. (The Quran, 2:189; 17:85; 18:83 and 79:42)
Likewise, scrutiny in many complex theological and philosophical cases for ordinary people has no desirable ending, and it may also distort their beliefs.
Let’s end this article with an interesting story. It is narrated that once Imam Ali bin Abī Tālib said: “People, ask me anything you want before you lose me”. A man namely Sa’d bin Abi Vaghās stood up and said: “If you know everything, say how many strings of hair I have in my head and beard?” Imam Ali responded: “This is not a question one would ask. I instead inform you that you have a child at your home who will kill my son.”
Here Sa’d asked an absurd question and the Imam did not answer him and instead, mentioned an important reality about something else that could be rendered as a warning alert for him.
Source: The Final Hope, No. 6, June 2015
