By; Murtadha Mutahhari
Ayatullah Murtaza Mutahhari was born on February 2nd, 1920, in Farīmān, close to Mashhad in Eastern Iran. He began his formal religious studies at the teaching institution in Mashhad where he discovered his great love for philosophy, theology, and mysticism that came to shape his entire outlook on religion. He later went to Qum where he was able to benefit from the instruction of a wide range of scholars. He studied Fiqh and Usul with Ayatullah Hujjat Kuhkamari, Ayatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Damad, Ayatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Ridha Gulpayagani, and Hajj Sayyid Sadr al-Din al-Sadr as well as Ayatullah Burujerdi. His prime mentor in Qum was Ayatullah Ruhullah Khumayni. Source: http://ijtihad.ir/ScholarDetailsen.aspx?itemid=326
Our young generation of today has both good qualities and some deficiencies in them. This generation has a series of understandings and emotions that the previous generations did not possess and therefore, we must always give them the benefit of the doubt.
The Need to Respect Inherent Good Qualities
At the same time, they also have some corrupt thoughts and negative ethical traits which must be removed from their character. It is not possible to remove these traits from them without keeping in mind and respecting the good qualities that the youth possess – meaning their understandings, emotions and their other noble traits and qualities – thus, we must show respect to them in these regards.
A Generation of Open Minds
There is no dead end in life. In the previous generations, the thoughts and minds of the people were not as open as the generation of today. These emotions and good qualities were not present in the people of the past, and thus we must show respect to the youth for their noble qualities – and it is Islam itself which has shown respect to these traits.
The Impossibility of Guidance Without Respect
If we do not wish to pay attention to these issues, then it is impossible to think that we will be able to take charge and remove the intellectual perversions and the negative ethical traits from the future generations.
The Flawed Method of Criticism and Slander
The method that we have presently taken in the face of this generation is that of making faces at them, criticizing them, and slandering them. We are continuously crying out to them that the movie cinemas are like this, the theatres are such, the guest houses that exist between Shamiran and Tehran (two cities in Iran) are such and such; the dance halls are like this, the swimming pools are such and thus we continuously cry out (about the corruption in all of these places) and we must know that this is not the correct method to follow.
Returning to the Root Cause
We must return back to the original reason for the corruption found in these places (and why this new generation should not go to these places).
If we do not wish to pay attention to these issues, then it is impossible to think that we will be able to take charge and remove the intellectual perversions and the negative ethical traits from the future generations.
The method that we have presently taken in the face of this generation is that of making faces at them, criticizing them, and slandering them. We are continuously crying out to them that the movie cinemas are like this, the theatres are such, the guest houses that exist between Shamiran and Tehran (two cities in Iran) are such and such; the dance halls are like this, the swimming pools are such and thus we continuously cry out (about the corruption in all of these places) and we must know that this is not the correct method to follow. We must return back to the original reason for the corruption found in these places (and why this new generation should not go to these places).
