Knowledge as Light

Abstract

The question of knowledge presents itself as one of the most important
issues for human thought and society because it is through knowledge that
we establish a bond with God, ourselves, other human beings, the world, its
meaning and purpose. We establish sociopolitical systems and civilizations
on the basis of it. Defined as such, no society can dispense with knowledge.
Knowledge, however, transcends the limits of social function and reveals
something of the deepest nature of the human being. Our state of being-inthe-
world and being-created-by-God is revealed to us in our knowledge of
ourselves. More importantly, we do not simply exist but also know that we
exist. It is this knowledge that enables us to make sense of the world, conceive
it as an intelligible state of being, and realize our place and role in it.
Knowledge, however, is always the knowledge of something. Every
meaningful statement is the affiition or negation of something. In knowing
a physical entity, a concept, or a feeling, we affirm or negate the existence
of that “thing” which has become the subject of our knowledge. This
“thing” and the “of” of our judgments ultimately hark back to the allencompassing
reality of being, because what can be affirmed or negated
cannot be other than being. In this regard, there is no knowledge that precedes
being. Every cognitive act directed toward ourselves or other things
that can be the subject of human knowledge is grounded in the all-inclusive
and penetrating reality of being. This aspect of being has been called in
Islamic philosophy the in&@ al-wujud, “expansion of being,” and sometimes
al-sarayun al-wujiid, “penetration of being.” In sharp contrast to the
epistemologies of subjectivism, one is before one knows. Our existence
always precedes our knowledge of it, even though the latter may effect and
mode the former in a myriad of ways. Said differently, the reality of being
is not exhausted in the deliverances of conceptual thought.’ ...