Can Someone Follow Our Point of View Blindly ?

Question:
Is it necessary to follow any particular school of thought, because I think if you are not following any school you are somewhat lost. I like Javed Ghamidi Sb and scholars like you, and want to follow you. I would like to be guided by you, because i think a common muslim must follow a scholar otherwise there is great chance that he may lose his way.

Response:
When you say that one should follow a school of thought, it could mean two things: You should blindly follow a certain way of understanding religion and accept what its scholars are saying without questioning it. The other possibility is that you appreciate a certain school of thought because of its arguments and continue to follow it so long as its arguments make sense to you; in case scholars belonging to some other schools of thought make more sense in some matters, you unhesitatingly follow them in those matters.

If you are intending to follow our understanding in the latter sense, you are most welcome to do so. However, in blindly following us you will do exactly the opposite of what we stand for.

I agree with you that without following a school of thought you are kind of lost. You need to have a clear understanding of what approach to adopt, because religious understanding emerges only on applying a particular approach. And different approaches can give different results, at least in some cases. For example, we follow the approach of considering Qur'an as the most significant source of understanding Islam. Hadith must never go against Qur'an or else it will be rejected. If there is a possibility of reconciling the two, hadith will have to bend itself, in our approach, to adapt to the Qur'an. However, there are many Muslims who would unhesitatingly require the Qur'an to adjust itself to the message of hadith.

One should however also continue to reconsider one's approach to see if it was correct or not. In no case should taqlid --blind acquiessence to a religious scholar or view -- be adopted as a religious approach.

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