“Every day has been so short, every hour so fleeting, every minute so filled with the life I love that time for me has fled on too swift a wing.”

Struggle is the meaning of life; defeat or victory is in the hands of God. But struggle itself is man’s duty and should be his joy.

There is a fundamental difference between the Jewish idea of creation and that of Islam.

Outside His will, outside His thought, all is nothing, even the things which seem to us absolutely self-evident such as space and time.

The creation according to Islam is not a unique act in a given time but a perpetual and constant event; and God supports and sustains all existence at every moment by His will and His thought.

Happiness is never a negative affair; it is to be won by men who are fully alive, full of the joy of living.

Allah alone wishes: the Universe exists; and all manifestations are as a witness of the Divine will.

My father insisted that I learnt the Koran and encouraged me to understand the basic traditions and beliefs of Islam but without imposing any particular views. He was an overwhelming personality but open-minded and liberal.

Life is a great and noble calling, not a mean and grovelling thing to be shuffled through as best as we can but a lofty and exalted destiny.