Theory Lecture vs Practical Lecture

Bismillah

I will categorize Islaamic lectures into two types. Lectures which are knowledge packed, motivational but doesn’t have action items for the audience to release their energy. I call this as "Theory Lecture." On the other side, there will be a lecture which will have lot of action points: "Do this!", "Do that!" and so on. I call this as "Practical Lecture."

Problem with the first type is that people who attends the lecture will find their Eemaan bit raised but after some time they will wonder what I have done after hearing that lecture. They wonder because it doesn’t channel the audience into action. Subhanallah, majority of Islaamic lectures are of this sort.

With second type which contributes to minority, they lack foundational principles and goes on adding dos and donts. Problem here is listener will loose motivation after sometime and the study shows when you give more than 3 action points, audience will automatically forgot.

What’s the solution then?

When I thought about this, an analogy came to my mind. "Need of Fiqh and Usool al Fiqh." Fiqh (Jurisprudence) is full of practical items. Usool al Fiqh (Principles of Jurisprudence) is more abstract and devise rules/principles on how to derive Fiqhi rulings. When person studies Usool al Fiqh without Fiqh, its only a theory and he will lack application. When person studies Fiqh without Usool al Fiqh, he may derive incorrect rulings according to his whims and desires and which in turn will oppose some fundamental Islaamic principles. Hence the person needs both Fiqh and Usool al Fiqh.

Similarly there should be some trade off between Theory lectures and Practical lectures. With that tradeoff, I will call it as real balanced Islaamic lecture.

Fond Regards,

Umar Shariff