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ssss1. Mutanabbí, ed. by Dieterici, p. 662, l. 4 from foot.

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God hath said, describing the savants (`ulamá): “Of those who serve God only the savants fear Him” (Kor. xxxv, 25). The Prophet said: “To seek knowledge is obligatory on every Moslem man and woman;” and he said also: “Seek knowledge even in China.” Knowledge is immense and life is short: therefore it is not obligatory to learn all the sciences, such as Astronomy and Medicine, and Arithmetic, etc., but only so much of each as bears upon the religious law: enough astronomy to know the times (of prayer) in the night, enough medicine to abstain from what is injurious, enough arithmetic to understand the division of inheritances and to calculate the duration of the `idda,^[21] etc. Knowledge is obligatory only in so far as is requisite for acting rightly. God condemns those who learn useless knowledge (Kor. ii, 96), and the Prophet said: “I take refuge with Thee from knowledge that profiteth naught.” Much may be done by means of a little knowledge, and knowledge should not be separated from action. The Prophet said: “The devotee without divinity is like a donkey turning a mill,” because the donkey goes round and round over its own tracks and never makes any advance.