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If one were to say that the investigation into the rules of perceptions and propensities is useful
for
sharpening the mind which is the instrument of Religion just as the sword is the instrument of Holy
war
(jihad), hence there is no harm in sharpening it, it will be like saying that playing chess,
because it
sharpens the mind, is a part of Religion. This, however, is insane because the mind may be sharpened
through the other sciences of the Religion in which there is no fear of harm or injury.

By this you see how much of scholastic theology is blameworthy and how much is praiseworthy, the
conditions wherein it is condemned and these wherein it is praised, as well as the persons who are
benefited by it and the persons who are harmed. If you should then say that, since you
acknowledge the
need for it in refuting the arguments of the innovators, and since innovations have now risen and
calamities spread, the need for it has become urgent, it is inevitable that undertaking this
science should
become an Islamic public mandate just as undertaking to safeguard property and other rights and
fulfilling the duties of justice and government and the rest. And unless the learned men engage