Al-Risala (English), January-February 2000

respective fields, in which they were knowledgeable. In this way, the Caliph learnt many things about fields other than his own. In modern times, this is called the spirit of enquiry. From the scientific viewpoint, this is of the utmost importance. In fact, it is only those who possess this inquisitive spirit who can scale the heights of scholarship in any field. This is extremely important both for the common man as well as for the scholar. Usually people are interested only in talking, instead of listening. This is a permanent obstacle to academic progress. Great scientific progress can never be achieved by such persons. When you are talking, your level of existence remains just where it was before. But when you are listening, you are in fact adding to your knowledge. Anyone of a proper scientific temper will listen more than talk, and when he meets a person he will ask questions of him in order to obtain more knowledge and information from him. There is a wealth of knowledge all around you. But it comes into one’s possession only if one knows the art of acquiring it. □ Moral Concept of Islam Ethics is the subject matter common to both religion and philosophy, yet it is approached by them in basically different ways. Religion presents moral principles as divine dictates while philosophy simultaneously looks into both ‘what’ and ‘why.’ The latter preoccupies itself with questions like why it is that what is morally true is after all true.