IBRAHIM BELLO KANO: THE MAN I HEARD ABOUT

[Abu-Safwan]

THE MAN I HEARD ABOUT (I.B.K)
Ever since, I have been hearing about you: your erudition, wisdom as well as your vastness in literature and philosophy. What a man I have never met! I, like many other students, really astounded by your talent to the extent that I regretted for not belonging to English department during my course of study in BUK, just to drink from your vast sea of knowledge. Now, my heart bleeds for missing you as tutor; while my colleagues presently in the university (English department) are very lucky for having you as a unique tutor. They are benefiting from your fountain of vast knowledge; they are drinking from your sea, enriched with wisdom and philosophy. In fact they must be the luckiest students as far as they are concerned. Having you as tutor is worthier than having a 'River Nile' of Dollars; because you speak with logic, think with wisdom and act on evidence, however, rarely.

As painful as it might be to admit, that I have now held my 1st Degree without undergoing your course of programme namely; Literary Theory and others. So how I wish to come to English department for my M.A just to meet you and imbibe, with avidity and curiosity, from your 'Sea of Knowledge'. Nevertheless, the initial loss must have been irreplaceable.

This is ridiculous to me. How can one appreciate and praise a man that he has neither met nor come into contact with? This is the parable of what I did a little far. This is just to show the super-quality of the one being blindly praised and appreciated. 

Short and Sharp
As usual, all men are fallible for their intellect, reasoning, mental and physical capability are drastically limited. Even the power of knowledge which they are vehemently proud of, only a least is given to them – "....you have been granted no knowledge but a least" (17:85). Therefore, knowledge, whatever kind it is, is not meant to lead one astray; and no matter how knowledgeable one is, he should not be overestimated or overemphasized; likewise nor shall he be underestimated or downplayed. Knowledge is man because it gives him personality. Man devoid of personality makes no difference from the simple animal. Value of knowledge is innumerable and unquantifiable. But one ethic we always have to believe and bear in our mind is that no matter how fully knowledgeable one is, he remains ignorant yet, because even the how much he knows is not more than the how much he doesn't.
In whatever one is doing, pursuing or engaging his self, he has to be guided by ultimate divine principle. Just like mathematics has been the language in which God wrote (i.e. designed) the world as Galileo asserts, philosophy is the language by which man attains the truth, but many are being misguided. In his treatise titled 'On First Philosophy' the renowned Arab philosopher Al-kindi, accorded most priority to philosophy more than any other branch of knowledge. He maintains that the human art which is highest in degree and most noble in rank is the art of 'Philosophy', the definition of which is knowledge of the true nature of things, in so far as is possible for man.  He further asserts that the aim of the philosopher is, as regards his knowledge, to attain the truth, and as regards his action, to act truthfully; not that the activity is endless, for we abstain and the activity ceases once we have reached the truth.

Throughout the human history, philosophy has been a struggle to attain the truth by man. Although philosophers emerge to search for reality many of them have been misguided, instead of reaching this truth. Wherever one is, he should let his knowledge reflects the truth one has been seeking for. Philosophy is not meant, at all, to discredit peoples' religion, their norms, values and or beliefs. Those who, due to their erudition in literature/philosophy, appear to be cynics to their or others' religion are not the authorized genuine philosophers.

And finally, I would like to play Ludwig Von Mises, when he says that "the criterion of truth is that it works even if nobody is prepared to acknowledge it". This is the most conspicuous disparity between Good Philosophy and Bad Philosophy.             

[Muhsin]

Salam,

Matter of fact, buddy, your write-up lacks cohesion and organization; or to put it more bluntly, it has neither purpose nor focus. I have been wondering what is there to comment on, which I had wanted to.

Beside, I kinda fathom something hidden in the piece, i.e. you want to admonish the man, yet you seemingly are afraid to do so. Remember this is a forum, not a real world. Go ahead, open and say more so that we can understand what specifically you have in mind.

Any way, I like the exaltation. Hope he--IBK, will come across it. I wonder how he would feel.

[Abu-Safwan]

Got me right chairman! 'Shigo-shigo ba zurfi' na ke mai in case he might come across it. I never fear to expose my inner view.

[Muhsin]

Got me right chairman! 'Shigo-shigo ba zurfi' na ke mai in case he might come across it. I never fear to expose my inner view.

I doubt.