A Discussion With Al-Mutanabi

Nowadays, when I look at the library shelves, especially in the literary sections, I wonder: Is there any hope for the new generation to break into these wide-open castles? To look at its treasure of human heritage, then meditate on the reason of why there were abandoned? The possible answers might be their uselessness, the difficulty to understand them, their abundance and diversity, their big size, the shortage of time, the weak cultural establishment of new generations in the educational institutions, the improvised raising of new generations in their families, the shallow media space which is run by businesses that seek their personal interests only, and the scarcity and weakness of reform initiatives. This book is an attempt to attract new generations to these treasures in an innovative way; it may open the door to other creative ideas aimed at changing the status quo, which is worsening quickly. The prevailing belief that public culture is not a priority must be corrected. It is a negative understanding that has led to the decline of its social role in building the national character. This is what we witness in every situation and social scene every day.

The author is a professional economist and holds a degree in development economics from the United States. He worked as an economist throughout his career until he retired. He is an active person and has numerous hobbies. He reads for at least six hours a day from various genres because he sees a close link between all specializations that cannot be separated. If they are separated, then that would result in an imbalance, affecting the personality and thought of the individual. Nevertheless, he believes in the importance of the major specialization as well as the minor one. A lover of literature from childhood, he organizes poetry and writes stories; he has many reflections, but in the last ten years, the subject of education has taken over all his thoughts, effort, and time. After a long contemplation, he derived the result that education and its outputs (often) do not add an integrated and distinctive figure to life. This figure, no matter how accomplished it is at the scientific level, remains educationally deficient. This deficiency is difficult to remedy at an advanced age because the precise and preferred time to establish a character is during the pre-school years, especially the first three years of human life. This is what led him to write a two-part book on the subject: Learn and Do Not Work and The Residential Neighborhood. He is also interested in the subject of comparative religions and the purposes of Shari’a. He wrote a book titled Strike Them, which studies Verse 34 from the fourth surah in the Qur’an, Surat An-Nisa’a. He is currently studying the social role of religion.