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CONFLUENCE OF OPPOSITES
175 mythological garb. It mostly follows the teaching of the portion known as the Old Testament of the Holy Bible, and has a body of tradition of its own besides. There is a tablet of destiny on which Allah wrote at the commencement of the world with the Pen of Fate of which the Jews and the Christians were both kept ignorant.
The story of Dhul Qarnein, the history of the bro. thers Yajuj and Majuj, and the disobedience of Satan are some of the other items of interest in Al Qur'an. That these are pure mythologies, like the fall of Adam, is hardly open to doubt in our day. As a matter of fact there was a sect of Muslims themselves who maintained that the allegorical method was the only true method of interpretation of the Quranic text. As shown in ERE. (vol. ix. p. 881): “One of the main problems of Maslim philosophy was naturally
the definition of its relation to religiou, as presented in the Qur'an and the Tradition. Many theologiaus, more or less couscions of this problem, were already working towards its solution by spiritualising the letter of the law, having taken ovor from Hellenigma the allegorical method of interpreting sacred writings. Those who applied this. method in thorough going fashiou were called Batinites (adherents of the inner sense, [batin, interior ', inside]). Extreme mysties, rationalists, and free-thinkers all came in this way to the same results. Another theory common to them all was that the inner genge of the word the trath- as revealed to only a few, whether by diving enlighteumeut (mystics) or by one's own reflection - (rationalists and free-thinkers)."
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