In the Name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful

From the moment human beings first encountered one another, they needed a means of exchanging ideas and sharing emotions. With the discovery of agriculture came the need to settle and produce food rather than continually search for sustenance across plains and forests. It was here, in Mesopotamia, that some of the earliest villages in history emerged.

As villages grew and populations increased, the need for language as a tool for understanding and expression became greater. With the expansion of these settlements and the evolution of life, the first cities appeared. Language accompanied this transformation, becoming an indispensable means for conducting daily life and facilitating interaction among people.

As states—or what historians refer to as city-states—emerged, so did the need to communicate across long distances and preserve the spoken word. Humanity therefore required a form of language more enduring than sounds that disappear as soon as they are uttered. The people of Mesopotamia met this need with a remarkable innovation: writing, which enabled them to preserve speech and record human thought for future generations.

The invention of writing and the representation of different sounds through visual symbols inscribed by scribes using reed styluses on clay tablets before drying them constituted a revolutionary achievement of immense significance. Indeed, it may well be the single most important event in the history of humanity.

Human civilization inherited this extraordinary innovation and continued to develop it throughout history, enhancing its capabilities with each passing age.

Today, as we witness unprecedented advancements in instant communication among people separated by thousands of miles, vast oceans, forests, mountains, and deserts, the need for language becomes even more critical, especially when communication takes place between speakers of different languages. The means of communication may be available, but what benefit can they provide if no common language exists between the parties involved?

For this reason, learning languages acquires paramount importance and becomes an unavoidable necessity in a world that contains thousands of languages. Even if we limit our discussion to languages with writing systems, they still number in the hundreds. Economic activities, commercial contracts, political engagements, and even the affairs of daily life all require knowledge of the language of others. How else can a Chinese merchant negotiate with an American counterpart? How can news from Germany or Russia be conveyed to Arabs or French speakers?

Young people, endowed with intellectual vitality, physical energy, and a strong capacity for learning and comprehension, are particularly suited to language acquisition. Learning languages not only enables them to communicate with others but also opens the door to a promising future, laying the foundations for a dignified life and granting access to the intellectual and cultural treasures of other peoples.

To acquire a language in addition to one’s mother tongue is, quite simply, to become two people in one. It expands one’s ability to contribute both personally and socially. The great poet Safi al-Din al-Hilli expressed this profound truth eloquently in his famous verses:

The more tongues one masters, the greater one’s worth,

For in times of adversity, they stand as steadfast allies.

Strive earnestly, then, to preserve and master languages,

For every tongue is, in truth, another human soul.