Criticism, particularly in religious matters

 

QUESTION: How do you view criticism, particularly in religious matters?

ANSWER: What leads to criticism is either an attempt to calm anger and hatred in one’s mind or to indulge compassion. Finding fault with a friend or enemy is an example of this.

A tendency toward acceptance or preference in a thing which is equally possible to be sound or corrupt comes from compassion, while an inclination toward rejection – if suspicion has no part– results from hatred.

 

An eye of love and consent is blind to all faults,

While an eye of anger and hatred sees only evil.

 

What motivates criticism should be love of truth and a desire to show the truth as being free from falsehood. The criticism made by our pious predecessors was of this kind.

(From Tulu‘at [“Flashes of Thoughts Rising in the Heart”])

 

Bediuzzaman Said Nursi