Followed today by more than one billion people, the Qur'an is a unique book that, with its eternal and unchanging divine principles, guides everyone to the shortest and most illuminated road to happiness.

The Qur'an has been a source of light for the most magnificent and enlightened communities that have ruled the world, those that have produced thousands of scholars, philosophers and thinkers. In this sense, no other rule is equal to its rule.

Since the day it was revealed, the Qur'an has encountered many objections and criticisms. However, the Qur'an has always emerged unscathed and so continues to reflect its victory.

The Qur'an crystallizes in the heart, illumines the spirit, and exhibits truths from beginning to end. Only believers who can sense all the beauty of the universe in a single flower and see rainstorms in a drop of water can know and understand its real countenance.

The Qur'an possesses such a style that Arab and foreign linguists and literary men and women who heard its verses bowed before it. Those who recognized its truth and understood its contents bowed before this masterpiece of eloquence.

Muslims can reach unity only by affirming and believing the Qur'an. Those who cannot do so cannot be Muslim, nor can they establish any lasting unity among themselves.

Saying that "faith is a matter of conscience" means "I affirm God, His Prophet, and the Qur'an" with my tongue and my conscience. Every act of worship connected to this understanding manifests this affirmation.

When humanity was floundering in the brutality of ignorance and unbelief, the Qur'an burst forth in a flood of enlightenment that drowned the world in its light. The Qur'an engendered a revolution without parallel or equal. History is a sufficient witness!

The Qur'an teaches in a most balanced way the meaning and nature of humanity, and the truth and wisdom, as well as the Essence, Attributes, and Names of God. No other book can equal it in this field. Look at the wisdom of scholarly saints and the philosophy of true philosophers, and you will understand.

The Qur'an is the unique book commanding true justice, real freedom, balanced equality, goodness, honor, virtue, and compassion for all creation. It is also the matchless book forbidding oppression, polytheism, injustice, ignorance, bribery, interest, lying, and bearing false witness.

The Qur'an is the only book that, protecting the orphan, the poor and the innocent, puts the king and the slave, the commander and the private, the plaintiff and the defendant in the same chair and then judges them.

Claiming that the Qur'an is a source of superstition is nothing more than repeating the words uttered by ignorant Arabs fourteen centuries ago. Such a view ridicules wisdom and true philosophy.

If only those who criticize the Qur'an and the things it brought could produce something to guarantee the order, harmony, peace and safety of human life even in a short, temporary period... Actually, it's very difficult to understand this perversity and obstinacy when faced with the miserable and unbalanced civilizations based on principles foreign to the Qur'an, and the troubled, depressed, and moaning hearts of those deprived of its light.

The most orderly life for humanity is that breathed by the Qur'an. In fact, some of the beautiful things that are today universally commended and applauded are the exact things encouraged by the Qur'an centuries ago. So, whose fault it is if Muslims are in an miserable situation today?

Those who criticize the Qur'an as if it were their profession generally have only a vague and superficial knowledge of its contents. It is ironic that such people feel free to vent their opinions without researching the Qur'an or even reading it. Actually, there is no difference between their attitude and the obstinacy some ignorant people show in the face of (positive) sciences. It seems that we must continue to wait for people to awaken to truth.

Those who have faith in Prophet Muhammad, upon him be peace and blessings, and the Qur'an have faith in God. Those who do not believe in the Qur'an do not believe in Prophet Muhammad, and those who do not believe in Prophet Muhammad do not believe in God. These are the real dimensions of being a Muslim.

The Qur'an enables people to rise to the highest level, namely the station of being addressed by God. Those who are conscious of being in this position hear their Lord speak to them through the Qur'an. If they take an oath that they speak with their Lord, they will not be among those who swear falsely.

Even though we are still in this world, when we enter the Qur'an's enlightened climate we feel that we are passing through the grave and the intermediate world (between this and the next), experiencing the Day of Judgment and the Sirat (bridge), shuddering at the horror of Hell, and walking on Heaven's tranquil slopes.

Those who have prevented Muslims from understanding the Qur'an and perceiving it in depth have thus removed them from Islam's spirit and essence.

In the near future, and under humanity's gazes of commendation and amazement, the streams of knowledge, technique, and art flowing toward the Qur'anic ocean will fall into their essential source and unite with it. At that time, scholars, researchers, and artists will find themselves in that same ocean.

It should not be too hard to see the future as the Age of the Qur'an, for it is the word of One Who sees the past, present, and future at the same moment.