The status of knowledge in the message of the Seal of the Prophets, Muhammad ﷺ, began with the first and greatest title of knowledge and learning ever inscribed by divine decree upon the most prominent tablets of history. It was the day the heavens said to Muhammad ﷺ, the supreme paradigm of divine messages: {Read!} Thus it came, absolute—in the form of an unconditional imperative command, untethered to any specific text from human sciences, knowledge, arts, or ideas. Nor was it restricted to reading from a written book in the ways people knew of writing, nor tied to methods of recording science and human knowledge. It was not bound by a specific time for the reading to take place, nor confined to a particular place within whose walls the reading would unfold! It was simply a demand to read…

Absolute truths cannot be realized in the reality of life and sensory existence except in the form of their particulars. Yet, there is no single predetermined text through which the demand to read is fulfilled in any of its particular instances! This absolute command in such a form—{Read!}—surrounded by the sudden, awe-inspiring atmosphere of the revelation’s dawn, explicitly inscribed the foundational title of Muhammad’s ﷺ message upon the tablet of life with the most distinctive traits of eternal preservation. It possessed absolute comprehensiveness, missing no generation of people, no era of time, and no place on earth. It excluded no science known to humans in the steps of human evolution, nor any whose pathways the human mind had never before encountered across bygone years and epochs. Nor did it leave out any knowledge that existed in the past of life or that will exist in its future! Its meaning was: (Be a reader!)

Thus, the text to be read in the message of Muhammad ﷺ under its primary title—{Read!}—is not a text that people read in the ordinary sense, but rather one about which they read. It is a knowledge they do not acquire through conventional learning, but rather knowledge about which they learn. It is an insight absent from the familiar knowledge of mankind, yet toward which they aspire. It is the science of the truths of existence written in the book of the (Cosmos) and the volume of life; it is the knowledge of the elements of creation inscribed upon the pages of nature.

This absolute command was repeated three times in the exact same form during that first waking encounter with the faithful spirit of revelation, Gabriel, peace be upon him—as we mentioned earlier—the very encounter with which the message began! When the fourth instance came: {Read in the name of your Lord who created * Created man from a clinging clot * Read, and your Lord is the Most Generous * Who taught by the pen * Taught man that which he knew not} (Al-Alaq: 1–5), it was coupled with what is to be read, yet the command to read did not come as an unconditional absolute here; rather, it came to reinforce that absolute command and realize the act of reading in itself in the manner we have described.

In his response to this extraordinary demand—so alien to his life and his specific human nature—the Prophet ﷺ distanced himself from knowing how to read, neither by nature and innate disposition nor by acquisition and learning. He was unlettered, having never read before, nor learned to read, nor inscribed a book with his right hand. Then, it became clear to him through his interlocutor, the trustworthy spirit of revelation, (what to read) and (how to read)!

There was nothing left for him in the face of this command to read—set as the first and most prominent title within the framework of Muhammad’s ﷺ message—except to seek help in achieving what he did not know and could not attain through the name of his Lord. The noble name was highlighted in direct connection to the absolute imperative verb of reading, appended with a special honorific and dignifying addition specific to the address of the one commanded to read what no human right hand had penned. Thus it was said to him: {Read in the name of your Lord}.

In this honorific addition lies a profound manifestation of overflowing grace, instilling tranquility and the certainty of faith in the heart of the great reader who had been marked by prior divine providence. He was embraced by the care of Lordship and nurtured by its special upbringing, unaware that he was the intended recipient of this divine instruction and heavenly discipline—having never sat before any human teacher. It prepared him for what was desired of him and what was intended by him, even while he did not yet know that he was the Messenger, the Seal of the Prophets, with no prophet after him:

{And thus We have revealed to you an inspiration of Our command. You did not know what is the Book or [what is] faith, but We have made it a light by which We guide whom We will of Our servants. And indeed, you guide to a straight path * The path of Allah, to whom belongs whatever is in the heavens and whatever is on the earth. Unquestionably, to Allah do [all] matters evolve} (Ash-Shura: 52–53).

The generality of the divine will in this noble verse is specifically personalized for him ﷺ, yet it came—as in the verse—to represent the absoluteness of divinity in the perfection of its will: {Allah is most knowing of where He places His message} (Al-An’am: 124).

The core meaning is: Be a reader through miracle, even if you are not one through learned instruction…

Read, seeking help in the name of your Lord who prepared you through His upbringing to be a teacher to the world. Do not look toward worldly causes, and remember with your heart, soul, and mind the One who created them and ordained them. You are taught with knowledge from Us, possessing insight into knowledge not written in a book the way taught scholars write. You are the reader of Our Book, which We wrote with the pen of Our creative, generative word, upon Our pages inscribed by the pen of Our decree in the pre-eternal tablet, so that this reading might remain your eternal hallmark: {Read in the name of your Lord who created} (Al-Alaq: 1). Creation from Allah Almighty is the bringing into existence of what existence has not yet witnessed, and the generation of what had no prior witness before that.

This generality in the object of creation—where the verb of creation is absolute and unconstrained by mentioning its direct object—yearns for its complement to fulfill its meaning. It is suited for every created thing. No single species, type, or individual person has a greater inherent claim—by virtue of the literal phrasing—to be the object of the absolute verb of creation than any other creature, whether among genera, species, or individuals. They are all as though explicitly mentioned in their relation to the act of creation.

This absoluteness differs from the absoluteness found in the imperative verb of reading with which the eternal message began. For the act of reading there neither requires restriction nor accepts it, whereas the act of creation here summons it—general, comprehensive, and implicitly understood as though stated!

The object affected by creation and generation in an all-encompassing, universal sense is the entire (Cosmos), in its absolute totality regarding the elements of its formation and origination. For the act of creation, it is the object through which it is fulfilled; and for the act of reading, it is the text to be read—whose realization does not depend on the reader, yet the atmosphere of events mandates it!

This is a specific indication bearing witness—by virtue of the absoluteness of the act of reading from any specific object—that what is commanded to be read, sought with the help of the name of {your Lord} in your unique designation for the final prophetic upbringing, and in your assignment with the honorific addition alongside the general reality of nurturing every existent being, is none other than the book of creation and origination. And that is nothing less than the truths of existence inscribed within the wondrous book of the (Cosmos)!