As for the poets, only those who are lost in error follow them. Are you not aware that they roam confusedly through all valleys, and that they say what they do not do? Excepted are those who believe, and do righteous deeds, and remember God often, and strive to be triumphant after they have been wronged. Those who are bent on wrong doing will in time know what an evil turn their destiny will surely take. (The Poets: Al-Shu’ara: 26: 224-227)
The Arab unbelievers in Makkah sometimes described the Qur’an as poetry, claiming that the Prophet (peace be upon him) was a poet. This was due to their utter helplessness as to how they should face up to the Qur’an, with its powerful discourse which they realized was incomparable to anything they knew. They realized that it touches people’s hearts, strongly affecting their feelings, overcoming their resistance, while they cannot stop it in any way.
In this surah, the Qur’an itself explains to them that the way of life Muhammad advocated and the Qur’an outlined was totally and fundamentally different from that of poets and poetry. This Qur’an sets a clear method and aims toward a definite objective. The Prophet does not say something today that he will be contradicting tomorrow. Nor does he pursue fleeting desires and momentary feelings. He pursues the establishment of his faith, following a straight system that admits no crookedness. Poets are totally unlike that. They are often hostage to their reactions and momentary feelings, which press for expression as they occur. They describe something as black today, white tomorrow. When they are happy, they say one thing, which they contradict when they are angry. Their moods are never consistent. Besides, they create their own imaginary world. They conjure up actions and results, and then imagine these to be hard facts that influence their behavior. Hence, their concern for realities is diminished because they create a different world in which they live, imagining it to be the reality.
A person with a well-defined message who wants to see it implemented in people’s life has a totally different perspective. He has an objective, method of action and a line to follow. He goes along his line, pursuing his method to achieve his objective keeping his heart and mind open and alert. He will not accept myth, or be satisfied with visions and dreams. He will only be satisfied when his message becomes a practiced reality in human life.
Thus the methods of God’s Messenger and poets are poles apart. The two can never be confused: “As for the poets, only those who are lost in error follow them. Are you not aware that they roam confusedly through all valleys, and that they say what they do not do?” Poets follow their own moods, whims and desires, which means that they are followed only by people who roam confusedly with whims and passion, having no defined objective or clear line. Moreover, poets pursue every feeling, idea or statement according to the feeling that takes hold of them at any particular moment or due to any particular factor.
Furthermore, poets say what they do not do, because they live in a world made by their own imagination and feelings. They prefer such imaginary world to real life that does not particularly impress them. Hence, they exaggerate and claim things that they do not fulfill. Thus, what they say has no reality in practical human life.
Since Islam is a complete life system, devised for implementation in real life, and since it has a strong bearing on people’s consciences and on all aspects of life, it is by nature incompatible with the nature of the overwhelming majority of poets. A poet creates a dream in his own world and feels content with it. Islam, on the other hand, wants the dream to become a reality and works for its implementation. It transforms all feelings so as to work together to produce in the real world a perfect model of humanity.
Islam wants people to face up to the facts of life, and not to escape to an imaginary dream. If the facts of life are unsatisfactory or not consistent with its way of life which Islam wants people to implement, it urges them to change these facts so that they will be able to pursue its way of life. Thus, human energy is used up for the fulfillment of noble objectives according to its magnificent way of life, leaving little scope for fanciful dreams.
Nevertheless, Islam does not suppress poetry and art altogether, as some people may take the statement to mean. It simply disapproves of the line followed by poetry and art, giving full rein to uncontrolled whims and reactions, as well as fanciful dreams that absorb the energy of the dreamers so that they cannot fulfill them. When the human soul adopts the Islamic system, and interacts with Islamic values, it produces poetry and art while working at the same time to see its noble feelings realized in practice. It will not be satisfied with living in a visionary world of its own making, abandoning the reality that it abhors.
It is perfectly possible for the human soul to adopt a clear system that aims to achieve an Islamic objective, looking at life from an Islamic viewpoint, and to express all this in poetry and art. In such a condition, Islam approves of poetry and art, and it encourages poets and artists.
