How Dr. Allama Iqbal recited Holy Quran? Find out here…

The atmosphere in which Iqbal was brought up during his childhood was permeated with Islamic values. Iqbal’s father was a paragon of Islamic virtues. His mother was an embodiment of ideal Muslim womanhood. His teacher Syed Mir Hasan was a great scholar of Islamic learning. These happy influences inculcated in Iqbal a deep love for Islam. He said his prayers regularly. In the month of fasting, he fasted for all the days. In the morning he recited the Holy Quran as a matter of course.

allama-iqbal-portrait

Maulana Sulaiman Nadvi has stated that when in 1933, Sir Ross Masud, Iqbal and he went to Afghanistan at the invitation of the Government of Afghanistan, Iqbal related to him the following anecdote of the days of his childhood highlighting the way the Quran should be read. Iqbal recalled:

“I used to read the Holy Quran every morning. My father saw me reading and often heard my recitations, it gave him immense pleasure. He came to me once and said how he would like to tell me two things when the occasion arose.

I had waited long for the fulfilment of my father’s promise when one day, after I had passed my B.A., he came to me. I was then reciting the Holy Quran as usual after my morning prayers. He reminded me of his promise, but wished to be assured that I would carry out his instructions to the best of my ability.

On my promising to do so, he told me “Reciting the Holy Quran that the Almighty God was talking to me, and to try and carry his message to the humanity”

The implication of the instructions was that the Quran should not be read in the mechanical way; it should be regarded as a dialogue between God and man. And secondly it was imperative that the message of the Quran should not be confined to one’s self; it should be brought home to the people in a suitable way.

Iqbal faithfully observed the advice of his father throughout his life. He absorbed in himself the teachings of the Holy Quran, and cultivated in himself such Quranic qualities that led to his immortality. About the equation between the Momin and the Quran, Iqbal later said in one of his verses:

“None knows the secret that the Momin
Though he looks to be the reader, is really the Quran”