The quest for truth is one of the loftiest traits a human mind can possess. It is a yearning that may first disturb a person; however, if he continues with this journey undauntedly, it becomes one of the most fascinating experiences of life. More than that, it is an obligation imposed on human beings by their creator.
It gives me great pleasure to introduce and recommend a work produced by one such seeker of truth: Hamza Ali Abbasi. He is known to many as a media celebrity who has won phenomenal acclaim. It seems that the traditional interpretation of religion did not satisfy him, and it became the perfect foil for him to tread into the uncharted territory of atheism. As a true seeker of truth might have it, fate brought Hamza face to face with his future mentor, Javed Ahmed Ghamidi,
about 10 years ago. He realized that he had stumbled on the famous Shakespearean tide:
There is a tide in the affairs of men Which,
taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
It was a God-sent chance he capitalized on with great relish and fervor. He set about to unlearn and then learn religion afresh. The basic questions that haunted him began to get answered. The pieces of the jigsaw puzzle of life seemed to fall into place. The mysteries of life and the afterlife began to unravel before him. Like a person possessed with the burning desire for truth, he confronted his atheistic beliefs with his newfound understanding of religion that was based on reason andrevelation. He discovered God afresh, and this was perhaps the most cherished moment of his life.
Like any sincere seeker of truth, the process of self-discovery logically led this voyager to the next stage of his enthralling expedition: he decided to share the truth he had discovered with those he could reach. He first used the spoken word to share his incredible odyssey. This led him to meet both young adults and seasoned minds and apprise them of what he had learned. Time then became ripe to dip his pen in the ink of his thoughts and write this book that is now in front of our readers. As a humble student of Javed Ahmed Ghamidi, I can vouch that the author has worked very hard in understanding the views of his mentor and has tried to succinctly and eloquently draft them in the modern idiom. Like any human work, no effort can be fault-free, and neither can any author claim this. The key to understanding religion is critical thinking, which is a lifelong process. I hope that Hamza will not stop at what he has understood and will continue to revisit and improve his findings. After all, real affiliation should be with the truth itself and not with personalities.
My prayers are that the passion for the quest for truth remains ignited in him forever and makes him earn immense reward from his creator both in this world and in the next. May this effort show others the way too and add fuel to the torch of truth personified by these words of Voltaire:
Stand upright, speak thy thoughts declare
The truth thou hast that all may share
Be bold, proclaim it everywhere
They only live who dare
Shehzad Saleem (PhD, University of Wales, UK)
Research Fellow, GCIL