“Knowledge is not what is memorized. Knowledge is what benefits.”

Al-Shafi'i is considered one of the four great imams of Islamic jurisprudence. He was also a poet of remarkable beauty and a man of deep personal piety. This saying cuts through one of the most common forms of religious self-deception: the accumulation of religious information as a substitute for religious transformation. Knowing is not the same as practicing. Quoting is not the same as embodying. He drew the line clearly.

What knowledge do you carry that you have not yet allowed to change you? What is the gap between what you know and how you live?

Pick one piece of Islamic knowledge you already have — something you know and believe — and find one way to act on it today that you have been avoiding.

“Knowledge is not what is memorized. Knowledge is what benefits.”

— Taqwa Daily