8 responses so far ↓

• kaki bangku // Oct 9, 2007 at 5:49 pm

  Someone’s entered a phase of Ghazalian skepticism, it seems…

  And by the way, al-Ghazali’s answer to it is maghfirah through dhawq (direct experience), atttainable through proper tasawwuf.

• adibahabdullah // Oct 9, 2007 at 9:34 pm

  i couldn’t resist the temptation to translate the whole thing to Malay, taufik! mohon izin, ya?

  Benar dan palsu,
  kunci erti dalam jagat,
  aturan moral dan pinginan mau berkorban,
  suara kesedaran mendenyut dalam jiwa,
  belas ihsan yang mencahayakan hati,
  tapi kita masih tercegat keliru, di sini.

  Kita sememangnya muda, dan liat,
  kadang-kadang seringkali seolah bodoh,
  walau mengakuinya jarang kita mahu,
  kerana kata mereka kearifan itu datang bersama usia,
  tapi yang beruban juga tersungkur cair di lantai,
  tewas oleh keseronokan yang fana,
  ketagih kepada lonjakan-lonjakan hati,
  tunduk kepada ghairah yang sekilas,
  inikah ia?
  jadi, ini bukanlah ia, langsung ya?

  Apakah itu kematangan?
  Siapa dapat jelaskan?

  Masa mengalir tanpa menoleh,
  tiada ruang walaupun untuk sepatah ‘Kalau’,
  hiduplah seperti pengembara,
  mungkin malam ini kau masih bernyawa,
  pagi esok usah kaudamba tibanya,
  demikianlah juga hidupmu besok, besok, dan besok.

  (kalau tak puas hati - silap makna, atau anggap ini pencabulan hak cipta, beritahu ya, saya potong komen ini segera)

  =)
  meow~

• Taufik // Oct 10, 2007 at 1:38 am

  Sure. I can’t even think of half of the vocabs that you’ve used here in BM spontaneously, apatah lagi nak tak puas hati dengan terjemahan ni. Hak cipta, abende tu? Ada sikit kemusykilan. With my limited and humble knowledge of BM, shouldn’t verse 2 be kunci erti alam jagat, instead of kunci erti dalam jagat? no? Btw, tak pernah terfikir pulak dalam BM bunyi sajak ni macam ni. Menarik juga.

  Bangku oh bangku… What assumption! Anyways, not that far off I guess. Thanks for the suggestion. Hmm, you just never know, I’ll keep that in mind.

  p/s: I’m curious, just how far can you push this thing called altruism. People say, it has its limit. Where exactly? Kalau lah ada defination for limit (delta epsilon ke) in calculus untuk calculate the limit of altruism kan senang. hehe.. It certainly defies evolutionary science though. 

   

• adibahabdullah // Oct 10, 2007 at 9:45 am

  salam,

  fuh lega tuan tulis tak marah =)

  ‘jagat’ maknanya ‘world’,'creation’, ‘universe’, ‘the cosmic manifestation’ boleh juga dimaknakan sebagai ‘dunia’, jadi tak perlulah guna ‘alam’ lagi di depannya, sebab ‘alam’ dan ‘dunia’ bermaksud sama dan akan jadi lewah kalau ditindihkan.. macam ‘naik ke atas’ dan ‘masuk ke dalam’. sastera ni elok concise. hehe jadi macam lecture GKLN lak. it’s sanskrit in origin, this is one of the links that you can visit to verify the claim. http://vedabase.net/j/jagat

  Err, as I learnt, altruism is central to evolutionary science. Cos theoretically a lof of organisms - esp the higher-level ones with better-developed nervous systems - behave instinctively according to the ’selfish gene’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene

  I have a strong suspicion that you already knew all these. =\

  Basically, organisms will act in such a way to ensure the continuity of their genetic existence. In other words, they want their genes to be passed on. So if there’s another member of a particular species that stood a greater chance of passing the genes to the next generation - had they be given some help - the help will be given by other members of the species, hence this help-giving at the cost of the helpers is termed altruism.

  Really reminded me of IB Biology HL. Haih.

  meow~

• Taufik // Oct 10, 2007 at 2:01 pm

  Owh begitu ke. Maaf yek atas kejahilan… Ye sastera memang eloklah concise, apa2 pon elok la concise.

  Owh the selfish gene and Dawkins! Of course there is a war of the two worlds when it comes to almost any theory - back to theory of knowledge… There are strong theories presented by evolutionists themselves against the one presented by Dawkins and co. I can argue with you right now, but it doesn’t make much sense because if I am to convey the idea in the best way possible, I will only reproduce what Francis S. Collins said in his book: The Language of God. Pray read that book, it’s interesting. He is an evolutionist - ‘theistic’ evolutionist to be precise - himself, but I’d say one of the more enlightened ones, unlike Dawkins (hehe..). Macam bangku kata la, we must even be aware of our own ego, aptah lagi benda-benda lain, jadi read with a critical mind - I know some don’t need this advice. By the way, Dr. Collins is the head of the Human Genome Project and he was at University of Toronto last week, giving a lecture.

  I’ve tried to write something in this comment on the difference between the “ant altruism” (the one explained by selfish gene) and the selfless, altruistic love (C.S. Lewis terms it as ”agape” in his book Four Love and it’s different from friendship, affection, and romanticism) that is prevalent in human nature, and how the latter is a bit ‘problematic’ in evolutionary science so far, but I realize that I am only doing an injustice to that topic. Hope those interested on this topic will have the time to read that book, but I must say that altruism is covered in only 3/4 pages out of the 299 pages of that book. Anyone can ask me too…

  A good article: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/altruism-biological/

  Read especially the last part of the article, ”But is it ‘Real’ Altruism?”

  A good example : There is an inner voice that causes you to feel compelled to jump into a river to try to save a drowning stranger, even if you’re not a good swimmer and you may yourself die in the effort. Shockingly, you will even save the drowning man even if he is an enemy. Of course not all people will do this; in fact, most doesn’t, but the history of mankind has witnessed countless of such selfless act being commited - I need not mention them here, do I? What about melepaskan anjing yang tersepit (pretty suicidal)?  Back to topic, what selfish genes are at work here? What reciprocal advantages? What advantegous kin selection? We must have also heard of sufi stories about great act of altruism of this sort, and we usually felt elated by such stories, as the motivation to practice this kind of love exists within us (the voice of conscience), although we often ignore it. Furthermore, when we talk about human as a population then usually it comes under sociobiology, and I personally think this field is just so vague. To refute each arguments scientifically is beyond what this short comment is intended for.

  Kalau jumpe my verses in this poem resembling mana-mana verses yg pernah dibaca, I’d say it’s allusion, not plagiarism This is a rough list of the allusions in the peom:-

  Verse 1: “Right and Wrong as a clue to the meaning of the universe” (Book One, C.S. Lewis) 
  Verse 7: “So young, and so untender?” (King Lear, Shakespeare) 
  Verse 8: “Almost, at times, the Fool.” (The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock, T.S.Eliot) 
  Verses 21-23: “‘Be in this world as if you were a stranger or a traveler…” (Hadith Number 425, Sahih Bukhari)
  Verse 24: “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow” (Macbeth, Shakespeare)

• kaki bangku // Oct 10, 2007 at 8:25 pm

  I’m a nurturist more than a naturist, so I take down the Skinnerian path of operant conditioning (with a pinch of sufism, obviously). And thus, as says Skinner,

  ”I don’t deny the importance of genetics. However, the fact that I might be altruistic isn’t because I have a gene for altruism; the fact that I do something for my children at some cost to myself comes from a history that has operated on me.”

  The genes that have evolved throughout history are the basic mechanisms for dealing with all types of relationships and the day-to-day world. Beyond that, it is a person’s upbringing and the outside environment that determine whether an individual will be helpful to another. The culture may or may not teach you to be altruistic. Wilson wants altruism to be due to a gene -but that is not necessary.

  This is from a 26 year-old article, but still a relevant perspective. The full article is here.

• Radenjowo // Oct 12, 2007 at 4:28 pm

  Saya Radenjowo…dari ntbn.wordpress.com. Saya telah copy artikel tulisan saudara bertajuk “Shaykh Amadu Bamba dan Jemaah Muridiyya”. Minta maaf sebab mungkin saya terburu-buru dan terlupa. Saya menyanjungi tulisan saudara lantas saya ingin berkongsi dengan pembaca blog saya. Namun kalau saudara melarang sekali lagi saya memohon maaf dan artikel tersebut telah pun saya DELETE. Artikel saya pun pernah di salin dan cetak tanpa kebenaran tetapi tujuan saya adalah untuk dibaca dan dikongsi bersama. Maka tiadalah masalah bagi saya. Mungkin tujuan kita berbeza.

• kaki bangku // Oct 12, 2007 at 8:19 pm

  Saudara, saya cuma kata kalau nak copy-paste tu nyatakanlah dari mana sumbernya. Saya tidak minta lebih dari itu. Tak usah merajuk sampai terus delete post tu…

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