His Advice to Protect Books:
Imam (as) advised people to protect the books from destroying and loss as he said:
“Keep your books protected as you will later need them.”
There was a crisis affecting the books of Shiah during the Abbasidd government, which targeted the destruction of the Shiah heritages and the abolishment of all the works of the guiding Imams (as) such as intellectual and scientific wealth. Therefore, Imam (as) ordered in protecting them.
Urging on Documenting the Science:
Imam (as) was urging on documenting the science, as it is the key to authoring, the cause of thought progress and advancement of students in scientific fields. He told his companions the following: “Write as you will not memorize without writing.”
He also advised his jurisprudent student, Ubayd ibn Zurarah to document the science as he told him: “The Prophet, Allah’s blessing and peace be to him, said: ‘Record the science.’ He interpreted recording the science as documenting it.”
Imam al-Sadiq (as) motivated his students on documenting his lessons and lectures, which talked about all kinds of sciences and skills. This was to ensure its availability and correctness. He was emphasizing on his repeated call in different situations more than once. Abu Basir narrated the following: “I entered to see Abu Abdullah (as) and he said: ‘What prevents you from writing?! You’ll not memorize until writing. A group of people from Basrah left here. They were asking about something and documented it.’”
The Imam (as) asked his student, Jabir ibn Hayyan to create a fireproof book, which would not be destroyed by fire, because he had an important book. Jabir invented a fireproof book. Therefore, he wrote a book with his own handwriting and threw it in the oven while it was burning, but the book was not affected at all.
His students agreed with this luminous call, which carried in its deep, the illumination of human thoughts, science’s distribution among the people. Therefore, his students were writing and documenting his knowledge.
THE LIFE OF IMAM JAF’AR AL-SADIQ (AS) – BAQIR SHARIF AL-QURASHI