State of Islam

Question:-

We see Muslims who are militant and commit atrocities while others claim that Islam is about peace. There are those who seem wholly exclusive and intolerant and others who are tolerant and accept all religions. There are the puritanical and austere ones while others indulge in music, song and dance. Though these very different people condemn each other, yet they all claim to be Muslim. You, in your articles, appear to change from one position to another. This, surely, could not have been the original state of Islam. It is all very confusing. Can you please shed some light on how you see the nature and present state of Islam?

Comment:-

Islam is based on Transcendental Unity and is a Unity. It is a Balanced and a Straight Way. It is based on an all-comprehensive and self-consistent view of existence. It is an all-comprehensive and self-consistent Way of Life based on Surrender to Allah, the Self-existing Origin and Creator of all things.

It is the compartmentalisation caused by adherence to words with limited meaning that causes confusion. If a whole system "X" is seen from an angle that gives a partial view "a", then several other partial views "b", "c", "d"…."n", also become possible. These may overlap each other to different degrees, be sub-sections of others, contain others, be mutually exclusive, or even contradict each other.

Have you heard the parable about the elephant and the blind men who wished to know what an elephant was? They decided to get their knowledge by touch and without consulting each other. Some felt the tail, others felt the legs, others felt the ears and still others felt the trunk. They came away with different ideas about what an elephant was and this resulted in much futile dispute.

It could be argued, and some of them did, that all these views were partially true and perhaps also partially false. But note that none of their ideas could possibly be true - the data they had did not describe the elephant at all.

Islam as originally taught, as "surrender to Allah" was a Unity. But Islam as a religion has degenerated as other religions that also started with genuine Messengers also degenerated. So, though we admit that there are many dispensations of genuine religion, all of them are Islam in the real meaning of the term (Surrender to the Creator), and their followers are Muslim also in the real meaning of the term (those who are or try to Surrender to the Creator), they have all departed from the original and are no longer genuine. But as it applies also to the dispensation of Muhammad, (Islam in the restricted sense of the word), Muslims (in the restricted meaning of the term) are not exempt from the same criticism. We are all in the same boat.

Islam degenerated in three ways:-

(1) The people who profess it, Muslims have abandoned it to various degrees. They have ceased to study, understand and practice it.

(2) It has become adulterated with much that is alien to it and even contradicts it. These impurities come from:-

(a) The traditions, culture and practices of the local people from pre-Islamic days.

(b) From foreign peoples with whom they have come in contact.

(c) Misinterpretations, new inventions, modifications and elaborations based on self-interest, prejudices and fantasies, particularly of those who acquired power, wealth and prestige.

However, it is not the case that what is not expressly allowed is forbidden in Islam. On the contrary, Islam allows all that is not expressly forbidden or incompatible or contradictory to what is forbidden. (i) This means that a great number of things not mentioned in the Quran and Sunna are not excluded from Islam. (ii) Islam requires that Muslims should acquire knowledge from wherever it can be found. This is a duty. It is part of Islam and does not refer to ideas, motives and practices that are not knowledge or not useful but contradict the Quran or are incompatible with it, or have become an instrument of diverting attention, misleading and misinterpretation. The entry of Greek Philosophy and intellectualism has had such effects. Not that some of their features have no useful functions, but that they have been inappropriately used in fields where they cannot be relevant. Islam forbids innovation based on ignorance and speculation, especially in matters of religion, but not when and where it is useful and promotes virtue. (iii) There are also cultural features with respect to which Islam is neutral. Differences based on these features have often become causes for unjustifiable dispute and conflict, but should be tolerated.

(3) There has been disintegration along the lines of the different human faculties to various degrees and in various proportions:-

(a) There are those who concentrate their minds on actions and on the outer forms, the means or vehicles - on ritual, dogma and legalisms. Their actions tend to be mechanical and unintelligent, based on habit and tradition and not on consciousness and understanding.

(b) Those who focus attention on the intellectual, the abstract and rational and concern themselves with concepts, ideas, thought and discussions more or less exclusively. They are interested in Theology and Philosophy rather than in spiritual development and tend to look down arrogantly on those in the previous category. Their Islam can be regarded as superficial and appears to be more like self-indulgence in intellectual games.

(c) A third section is more concerned with sentimentality, emotions and feelings, though sometimes they claim greater spirituality, which is often confused with emotionalism. Much that goes under the guise of popular Sufism is connected with music, song and dance and appears to have the same function as Popular Music in the West, a means to satisfy the desire to escape from boredom, drudgery and the mundane. The purpose, they say is to achieve "ecstasy" which, they say is an experience of union with God, but they tend to be carried away into trance like states. A study of the Quran, however, shows that the purpose of Islam is spiritual development and service to God as vicegerents, not self-indulgence in passing states and escapism.

But, let it not be misunderstood, it is not being proposed that there are no genuine Muslims, who study, understand and practice Islam in a more comprehensive and balanced manner, persons who have surrendered to Allah or try to do so. Nor is it being asserted that all persons in the categories of Muslims described above are uniformly alike or that there is nothing of value in them at all.

There is most certainly a degree of piety and righteousness involved even in the behaviour of those who follow the letter of the Islamic law without much understanding. They also obey Allah rather than merely following their own prejudices and whims and they do make some efforts that transform them. But this change is not always for the better because the criterion of judging this has not been understood.

The intellectual intelligencia, on the other hand have a better grasp of the teachings and this allows them to practice Islam more intelligently. But intellectual strength tends to be obtained at the expense of weakness in motivation and action. Feelings, sympathy and empathy tend to atrophy and the person tends to be a sophisticated shell without centre. The same intelligence and rational faculty that allows them to understand better also allows them to make better excuses and justifications for departure from the Law, and to distort and reject through rationalisation. Yet better understanding bestows greater responsibilities without the equivalent ability to meet them.

It can be argued, and it has been argued that only those who follow the Spiritual path are true Muslims, because it is they who are actualising the human potentialities that lie dormant because of the Fall, and it is they who are exercising their vicegerency as persons in surrender to Allah. But this cannot be true if they misunderstand spirituality and the real goal, or withdraw from the world, or are diverted into futile behaviour patterns that make the means into the goals, persons, instruments and institutions into idols, and techniques into entertainment. But there have been, and there are, Muslim Saints, and many have written inspiring and enlightening books, and there are shrines and organisations devoted to some that continue to do some good. These do much charity work not only in physical and financially terms, but also in offering comfort, help, companionship and advice. They also act as "Beacons of Spiritual Light" within the community, providing a reminder of spiritual values and truths, and a stimulus for those who can hear and see and have hearts. Without them the Community would surely be spiritually dead.

But we must look at realities and not at words and names that cover a variety. There are people of many kinds and levels who differ in the set of qualities they have, the amount of each and the degree of integration. They differ also in the physical and cultural environments and the experiences that formed them and in the effort they have made in acquiring knowledge, virtue and ability. People cannot be held responsible for what they have been given by inheritance or environments. It is the deliberate efforts that transform them and it is that by which they will be judged.

The Quran tells us:-

"He indeed is successful who causes it (his soul) to grow (or purifies it)! And he indeed is a failure who corrupts it!" 91:9-10

"O you who believe! You have charge of (or guardianship of) your own souls; he who errs can do you no hurt if you are rightly guided. Unto Allah will you all return, and He will declare to you the truth of that which you did." 5:105

"And every man's augury (fate) have We fastened on his own neck; and We will bring forth for him on the Day of Judgment a book offered to him wide open. (It will be said to him): Read your book. Your soul suffices as reckoner against you this day. He who accepts guidance (or does right), accepts it only for his own soul: and he who errs, errs only against it; nor shall one burdened soul bear the burden of another. Nor would We punish until we had sent a Messenger (with warnings). " 17:13-15

"But whoever desires the Hereafter, and strives for it with the necessary effort, for such, their striving shall find favour." 17:19

"And those whose scales are heavy (with good deeds), they are the successful. But those whose scales are light, these are they who lose their souls, in hell will they abide." 23:102-103

In the end:-

"And you shall be sorted into three classes:- First the companions of the right hand - what will be the companions of the right hand? And then the companions of the left hand - what will be the companions of the left hand? And those foremost (in faith) will be the foremost (in the Hereafter). These are they who are drawn nigh (to Allah), in the Gardens of Bliss, a multitude of those of old, and a few of those of later times." 56:7-14

Muslims can also been divided into categories as follows:-

(1) There is a group that has the tendency for speculation and expressing thoughts and opinions about Islam without checking if they are compatible with Islam or not. Some of these opinions are based on partial or superficial knowledge, accident of circumstance, habit, conditioning, fantasy, whim, prejudice or self-interest. Some are advanced by persons who have a purpose or agenda of their own unconnected with Islam. They tend to be self-opinionated and will not exchange ideas or discuss anything with others. This allows much to enter into Islam that has little to do with it and adds to confusion and bewilderment. It is the great increase in knowledge and technologies and the interchange of ideas owing to development of communication and transport that has caused great diversity, mixing and complexity in ideas. This has led to confusion and the increasing need for systematisation and clarification. It is this that fuels the tendency for speculation and the proliferation of a diversity of explanations often of a hasty and superficial kind.

(2) There are those who explain Islam in a one sided and simplistic and unsophisticated manner and as apologists. Islam, for instance is presented as Peaceful ignoring the battles mentioned in the Quran. They try to make Islam acceptable to Western thought and to fit into the existing dominant western system (political, social and economic). They want to ingratiate themselves with and integrate into the dominating societies and cultures.

(3) Those who present it in Militant and Political terms. They see things in simple dichotomies, good (themselves) and evil (those whom they oppose)and in a confrontational manner, as a defence against attack, which requires aggressive and violent retaliation. Some are fanatics and negate the very system they profess, Islam itself, and carry out atrocities, attributing them to Islam.

(4) Those who present it as an other-worldly system with a purely spiritual goal, having an ascetic life style. They propose remedies, sometimes obscure or unrealistic remedies for often vague spiritual diseases and afflictions. They do not or seldom try to solve the problems of life, of poverty, disease and ignorance, and of knowledge, organisation, or technology.

(5) The Reformers who believe that there is something wrong with Islam in ideas or practice, rather than with Muslims, and wish to change Islam to suite their own whims and conjectures, and without understanding what the real underlying problems are. They ignore the fact that the system they wish to imitate has many psychological, social and environmental problems, that Islam came to free man from injustice, vice, superstition, idolatry and diverse social and psychological malfunctions, and as an escape and alternative to the limitations and fetters that trap man.

(6) The leadership, intelligencia or authorities, the Ulema, who have become an illegitimate, self-appointed priesthood concerned to various degrees with their own power and prestige and tend to make pronouncements and give Fatwa's on various isolated subjects rather than being interested in reform and regeneration.

(7) Those who wish to abandon parts of Islam, such as the Sunna of the Prophet, claiming to follow the purity of the Quran whose teaching they flout. They ignore or are ashamed of Islamic history, traditions and scholarship, of those who explained Islam and protected it from adulteration, additions and deletions, and those through whom Islam spread in the world and made it into the source of modern civilisation. They are also the ones that please and flatter, and are flattered and encouraged, by the enemies and critics of Islam. They adopt and follow alien values, showing contempt for centuries of Islamic thinking and history.

(8) Those who wish to return to Islam as it was practiced in the by-gone age when Islam was dominant and established the dominant civilisation and Empire. They ignore the fact that the condition of the world has changed and the Islamic civilisation degenerated because it did not adapt. Most certainly circumstances have changed and Muslims are facing various internal and external problems and need to rethink Islam.

(9) There are those who despair, give up, and spread despair and negativism, and only criticise destructively everything and everyone, usually without insight into what the problems really are, or their causes or solutions, and have nothing constructive to contribute and do nothing whatever to solve the problems.

(10) The main body of Muslim who know or understand or practise little of Islam and have become apathetic or so complexity involved in personal problems, materialism and the influences of the foreign culture, or owing to poverty and a harsh and difficult life, to be passive and ineffective, or sitting on the fence. These are the ones who have abandon Islam to various degrees, become indifferent, agnostic or atheists or idolaters and become prone to conversion to other faiths.

However, the positive and negative are known with respect to each other. Knowing the defects also tells us what should be avoided. Conversely knowing the good allows such to see what is bad in contrast. Knowing, however is not enough. It must inform the motives and these should lead to action. But action is only possible and effective if it is appropriate and the environmental conditions are suitable.

Whereas there are certainly un-Islamic opinions being expressed by some Muslims, many quote the Quran or Hadith and Islamic scholars in support. An exchange of ideas is a good thing and much can be learnt from the various elucidations.

It is also necessary to mention that all or most of the affairs in all Muslim countries are influenced or run directly or indirectly by Western, non-Islamic powers, by persons who are educated in the West or in the Western style and have values, motives, and ways of thinking and behaving that are alien and often contradictory to Islam. These people generally have little knowledge of Islam. They have little in common with Muslims, and their interests are largely connected with the West and those who have the wealth, power and prestige there. As this Western education is appropriate to the Western way of life, and Islamic education is not, then Islamic education of Muslims has been neglected and remains primitive. Muslims, therefore remain at a disadvantage. However, Islam is spreading in the West and is taking an increasingly more sophisticated form. It is likely to spread back to Muslim countries, increase its influence and eventually to transform the Global Way of Life once again.

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